Sai waited for the two men to leave the room before Sai dared to move for Naruto's room to find Sakura.
He found her asleep with her head on the bed as she still sat in the seat beside Naruto's bed.

"Sakura?" said Sai softly trying to wake her without having to touch her.

Sakura retorted with a sleepy mumble that sounded a lot like a 'fuck off'

"Sakura" said Sai again, this time placing a hand lightly to her back to wake her properly.
She was quick. In a flash Sakura grabbed a hold of Sai's fingers and squeezed them tight as she straightened herself to look up at him.

"What is it?" she growled

"I need to speak with you," Sai paused to look over to Naruto who still remained asleep and pale "outside" he didn't want to risk Naruto overhearing what he was about to tell Sakura, he couldn't imagine how Naruto would react if he was the slightest bit awake – he pictured a lot of yelling.

Sakura stared at him for a long moment, the only sound being slight tapping in the window from a branch outside. Hesitantly Sakura got to her feet and followed Sai out of the room and softly closed the door behind her.

"If you are going to speak to me, at least let me wake up first' stated Sakura as she led the way into another room down the hall that was the nurse's room which had a kitchen and lounge area.

"Naruto" said a soft voice from outside the room.

The voice had been so soft that he was surprised he had awoken to it.
He glanced around the room, but he was alone in the dark white room.

A tapping came from the window and he knew exactly who it was.
Hinata.

Despite his weariness and fatigued body he managed to get to his feet and make his way slowly to the window.
Through the moonlight of the night he could see the faint silhouette that was Hinata on the other side of the window. He pulled back the white curtain to reveal Hinata on the other side of the window.
She wore the same clothes as when he had last seen her alive.
Her skin was pale and her eyes were entirely black, the only colour in her eyes being from her glowing red irises.
The eyes of the risen.

She smiled to him through the window as though everything was normal.
"N-Naruto" stammered Hinata shyly as she used to always do "please, can I come in?"

Naruto knew what she wanted.
She was hungry.

He knew what would happen if he unlocked the window for her.
What would happen if he let her inside.

"Naruto" came her soft voice.
He lifted his hand to the window lock, resting his fingers on the lock.
He didn't want to open the window, but his body wouldn't listen to reason.
Instead his hand lifted the window lock, allowing Hinata to open the window and enter the room.

She approached Naruto and hugged him tightly as though she hadn't seen him for a long time.
Dyeing had made her different. She wasn't shy anymore. She wasn't the same Hinata anymore.
Her body was cold against him and her chest never moved from breathing.

She lifted her head to his ear and whispered to him.
"I missed you."
Every instinct in his body was yelling at him to move, to run.
The fox was growling at him to get away from her.
But he had already been bitten by her once before. She had control over him now.
He couldn't move, his body frozen as her mouth opened towards his neck.

He felt her new fangs pierce his neck and his body let out a shudder from the sensation of her sucking out his blood.
Almost instantly his knees became too weak to support his weight and he stumbled backwards.
Hinata forced him backwards so he fell onto the bed and not onto the hard floor of the clinic.

He lay across his bed on his back the wrong way, his legs hanging off the bed.
Hinata returned to his neck to gorge her hunger with his hot blood.

After several minutes Hinata withdrew her fangs from his flesh and sat on her knees beside him on the bed.
Naruto looked up to her, barley able to move his body.

"I'm sorry Naruto. I didn't mean –" she broke off her words.
This was the real Hinata he had known.

She let a tear role down her cheek.
"Naruto, I don't know what else to do. I – I can't stop myself. I just get so – so hungry" sobbed Hinata above him.

Naruto managed a smile to her which haltered her sobbing.
"It is alright Hinata" said Naruto, his voice a croaked whisper from his weariness.
"I know your just hungry"

Hinata then began to sob again.
Naruto lost his consciousness while she sobbed beside him.

Sakura was furious.
She didn't know her way around the clinic but she soon found Toshio's house that was directly connected to the clinic. She marched down the hallway that connected the two buildings, Sai following cautiously behind her, not wanting to get in her way when she was so angry.

"What the hell do you think you are doing?" cried Sakura in rage as he marched in to Toshio's living room where he stood beside Seishin who sat on a couch.
Toshio and Seishin looked to her silently, shocked by her sudden appearance and outburst.

"You have no right to use Naruto!" exclaimed Sakura, letting her anger ferment within her.

"It is for research" stated Toshio

"Research? He is our friend and a ninja form the Leaf village. You can't just sacrifice him like that"

"He is the only person we have who can help us right now. If we can't do this research our entire village will die from the Shiki" retorted the doctor calmly.

"Shiki?" questioned Sai from a safe distance behind Sakura.

"The risen are also known as shiki. They prefer to be called shiki than vampires or the risen" explained Seishin

"I don't care what they prefer to be called!" exclaimed Sakura "You can't use our Naruto like this"

"I'm afraid it is already too late for him" stated Toshio "He is a slave to them now until he dies. No matter what, they will kill him"

"We can take him away from here. We can keep them away from him" proposed Sakura desperately

"No. Once bitten they become a slave to their attacker. He will only return to his attacker" stated the doctor calmly.

Sakura hadn't realised before how much she hated the word 'attacker'.
They were calling Hinata – sweet, nice Hinata – an attacker.

It couldn't be true.
Hinata couldn't be dead.
Didn't Naruto help her? Protect her?
And of all the people for Hinata to attack, why Naruto?
She cared too much for him to attack him.

"As it stands, his attacker has probably already come for him." Sakura snapped back to attention at Toshio's comment.
She never should have left the room.

Sakura turned and ran back down the hallway that connected the two buildings and ran down the hallways till she reached Naruto's room.
She swung to door open, pausing to check the room.

There lay Naruto on his bed, laying the wrong way, with his legs hanging off the side.
And the cold.
A cold breeze came in through the open window.

Toshio entered the room and moved past her to Naruto's side.
He confirmed to Sakura that Naruto was only unconscious and presented to her the two red spots that were teeth marks that were present on his neck.

Sai and Seishin entered the room after them.
Toshio stood and faced the window.
"He must have let the shiki in"

"Don't you mean broke in" corrected Sakura close to tears, she desperately hoped she was right and that Naruto hadn't opened the window to his attacker, Hinata.
He would have surly known what would have happened to him if he did.

"No, he would have let her in. They can only enter a building if they are let in. And at any rate, he would have let her in if she had asked him to. Once bitten they are slaves to them" stated Toshio in response.

He shut the window and locked it again before returning to inspect Naruto.

"How long?" asked Seishin, his tone suggesting he didn't want to know.

"He may make it to a third attack another night. But I wouldn't rule out him not lasting till then"

Sakura's knees gave out beneath her and she fell to the hard clinic floor.
She fell her face into her hands and wept at the men's' cold words.
Sai approached her and knelt down beside her, placing a hand to her back and tried to comfort her to the best of his ability – which wasn't the best.

Together Toshio and Seishin shifted Naruto's body so he was lying in the bed correctly and covered him with the horrid pink sheets before they left.

Sakura wanted to help him, but her medical ninjustu couldn't replenish his lost blood.
She felt helpless.
The clinic didn't have any blood to give him, having been taken previously by the shiki which craved blood so much.

All Sakura could do was cry for him.
Sai and Sakura remained with Naruto throughout the night just for the sake of being there for him.

The doctor had guessed correctly.
Naruto hadn't made it through the night.
His body had grown cold and his chest lifted and fell no more, instead he remained in his bed motionless as the sun rose for a new day.