"I'm sorry, ma'am, but any outside personal are forbidden to enter the area beyond this point at the current time." Sakura huffed in annoyance at the ANBU guard in front of her. He or she seemed not to be too perturbed by her foul mood. She had meant to come and check on the Uchiha bastard (purely medical curiosity, she assured Tsunade), but it seemed that the ANBU were freaked out at the prospect of having an Uchiha in their compound, and had the entire west wing shut down.
"You might as well head home, unless you have any other visits to make, ma'am." Sakura sighed again, and turned on her heel to head down the dark hallway. Various murmurs filtered out of the cells as she walked past them. This was one of the few places that a ninja could their guard down, as strange as it was. The cells were reinforced to the maximum, and were specially designed to drain the prisoners of almost all of their chakra. Between each of the cells, there were seals that responded to break outs and summoned a gamut of things: weapons, familiars, and even ninja. Sakura drifted to one side of the hall and let her fingers ghost over the wall where the seal to summon her team and several other teams lay imbedded. She hoped she would never be summoned here. Who knew what she might be in the middle of when the call came. Sighing, she looked up, and was startled into jumping back several feet. A bloody hand holding an apple stuck out the small barred window in the cell door in front of her. Inside of the cell, someone coughed.
"Hey, a little help here, kunoichi? They gave me this apple, but they didn't give me a knife to cut it with. Surely you could cut it with those handy kunai you have there on your hip?" Sakura narrowed her eyes. The voice belonged to none other than Deidara. His strange speech quirk was still there, with a quiet 'hmm' punctuating every few sentences. There was no way in hell that she was going to help him, even if he did bring the Uchiha bastard back. Determined, she walked by the cell, ignoring him. Just as she passed the window, she heard a sigh.
"Look, I wouldn't bother asking, but I really like apples, and they knocked a few of my teeth out yesterday. Their medic did a shitty job putting them back in. So, please…help me out?" Sakura paused. Deidara sounded genuinely desperate…and if the medics did a bad job, someone was going to hear about it. There were certain conduct orders that medics had to follow when treating prisoners in between 'sessions', and one of the conduct orders made sure that prisoners were healed to the extent that they were able to eat. She turned around. The hand was still sticking out of the window. It was now shaking a bit with the effort it took to hold the apple. Someone was going to get it. If he couldn't even hold food for an extended period of time, then someone was not doing their job.
"Give me that. I want to take a look at those teeth." When she snatched the apple away from him, she saw that the mouths on the palms of his hands were sewed shut, and not well. They were weeping unidentifiable liquids, as well as blood. Sakura's mouth curved down. She was not happy.
"Lean forward and open your mouth." Deidara's face came into view. She took out her keys and used the small light that she had on it to examine his mouth. True to his word, the medics had only done a very rudimentary job with putting the teeth back into his mouth. She sighed and flicked off the light. Deidara studied her through the bars as she splashed the bloody apple with water from a small bottle she kept hooked to her side. Looking both ways, she drew a kunai and quickly sliced the apple into several pieces. His hand came back through the bars and she handed him the slices.
"Look, I'll get you some proper medical treatment, even if it's myself giving it." His face appeared up against the bars. She could see blood smeared across his face, and a few pink tracks down his face marked where involuntary tears had fallen during the interrogation.
"Why?"
"Why? It's not you personally, trust me. I hate you for making my life hell, and my friends' lives hell. But frankly, we have rules here about how people are treated. I suppose you don't even know the definition of rules, living how you have." He indignantly huffed, obviously offended. She smirked. It was an easy, cheap victory, but she'd take it. This man infuriated her with every movement he made and every breath he took. The small victory eased off the impending blow up from being in his presence. She turned to walk away, and could feel his eyes following her.
"Thanks, I guess."
"Don't get used to it."
"Tsunade-shishou, something has to be done about this situation! The condition of the prisoners is absolutely horrendous! The compound medics have not been doing their job!"
"Sakura, is this about the Uchiha again?" Tsunade looked at her angry student, obviously doubtful about her intentions. Sakura smashed her hand down on the desk, slightly cracking it.
"Shishou, let's put it this way. I stopped by a cell today, and the man inside had infected wounds and could not eat. This is in clear violation of the contracts that those medics abide under." Tsunade sighed.
"Even if that's true, Sakura, I can't do anything about it. There's a shortage of medics as it is. I can't appoint new medics. It's obvious that the medics there have a bias towards the prisoners, and I can't exactly blame them. The things that some of those prisoners have done have probably affected them in some way or another."
"Shishou, do we have a current warden over those medics?" Tsunade groaned.
"Sakura, I already told you, we don't-."
"Do we have a warden?" Sakura glared at her shishou. She was not letting the older woman getting out of answering this.
"No." Tsunade opted for watching a nest of blue birds outside of her window instead of meeting her student's eyes.
"Well then. I'll start tomorrow." Tsunade swung her chair around and gaped at her student.
"What? Sakura, no! I can't lose you at the hospital! It's absolutely critical that you remain there!"
"They handled just fine without me before. Besides, there are some good nurses that are positioned there that just sit around on their asses and gossip all day. They can pick up the slack." Tsunade sighed. Her student had set her mind on doing this, and there was no way that anyone could change her mind at this point.
"Fine, Sakura. Reform the entire medic system we have set up at the ANBU compound. Do you need anything to help you get started?"
"Well, I'll send you an inventory list tomorrow, and there's one little thing I need to have the power to do."
"What's that?" Sakura smiled like someone had given her a handful of daises on Valentine's Day.
"Oh, just the power to demote people down to genin status if they dare cross me."
Well well. Two whole reviews. I love you guys that reviewed. I'm glad to see that you still enjoy my writing.
But for the rest of you, review! I can see how many people have hit the story now, and I want to know where all my reviews are. =
Anyway, I'm flying by the seat of my pants here. I have no idea where I'm going, but I know something that's going to appear in every chapter. Have you guys found it yet?