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The Chase For Her
Love

Chapter 6: Red in The Snow

Sakura entered the room with four of the Rebel leaders, ranging in age from twenty to forty. They weren't particularly handsome, but not ugly. The men reeked of danger, so she knew she had to be careful. Even if Sasuke was in the next room, hopefully, she could still be stabbed in the heart if she was not alert to the attacker.

She bowed as the screen behind her shut. "Hello." Sakura said and sat at the large short table to reach for the tea pot. "Are you all thirsty?"

"Oh yeah." said the youngest man, earning some snickers and nods from his elders. She ignored him and went about to pouring tea into the cups.

"Are you interested in conversation, this evening?" she asked and lowered her head modestly.

"Not so much, but we can pass the time until our partner can get here."

Sakura nearly gulped and wondered what a real geisha, an average woman, could do to protect herself against forced sexual play. True, she hadn't pushed Sasuke away when he had, but a part of her had wanted him at that same moment, so he'd gotten away with his fondling.

But these men…

If they did try anything she was going to blow the poison power in their faces and shove chop sticks in their necks…

Sakura smiled and poured the tea, then poured glasses of sake and noticed the alcohol was gone the instant she served it. She'd found her beverage of choice for the assassination and now all she had to do was find an opportunity to pour the powder into the sake...

They drank several rounds before the fifth man joined them, sitting beside herself. He smelled of sweat and some other strange smell that seemed foul to her. As she looked up at him, he smirked and winked.

"You'll be getting some too my precious." He said and trailed and finger down her arm, freezing her skin through the silk layers of her kimono.

She didn't understand what he was talking about, but she knew the meaning of his words.

"You reek of sex, Kojiro." One of the other Rebel leaders said and held his glass out to Sakura.

"That I do." The man, Kojiro, said and winked again at the pink-haired woman beside him. "Boys, how about we call this meeting over with and we have some fun with our little lady here."

Sakura blood chilled at his words and her eyes widened, earning open leers and smirks. "No quite yet." One of the others said. "We still haven't begun."

"Very well. Fill up my cup, whore." He said.

Sakura quietly, despite her sudden bloodlust, reached over as the men spoke together and took the large bottle of sake softly. She'd used the length of her sleeved to cover the band that held in a vial the small amount of the Butterfly Dust poison and pulled out the small cork with a needle.

As she reached for his cup slowly, she allowed the powder to fall into the bottle, her hand seemingly protecting the sake from falling over onto the table. She set the cup down, poured some sake into his, and before she finished he snatched it and brought the cup to his lips.

When he paused, she struggled not to blanch and pale. He was suspicious!?

Sakura heard his gulp as he downed the sake and demanded more. She readily obeyed and filled his cup, the others holding out their own as well.

Once they had all drank at least three cups each, she knew they were more than poisoned enough to die. But to her, they looked completely unhurt and totally normal.

While she was curiously looking at the men, hoping for signs, she was suddenly yanked upon Kiroji's lap, and his mouth was trying to force it's way on hers.

She pressed her hand over her own mouth and glared at him though nervous eyes. "Bitch," he began, "I could force you on your belly and fuck your ass. Then another will fuck your pussy and another shove his cock in your mouth. That's sounds fun, right boys?" he said and looked around.

Sakura was close to panicking; there were too many of them for her to fight. "Danna!" she screamed the code word loud as she could and tried to struggle out of the bastard's grip.

"We told the woman who brought you to bring you to another room. We heard your danna was a pompous ass who only wants you for to serve drinks to other men. But we've outsmarted him and we'll get our fill...of you."

Sakura had a hard time believing that. Sasuke would have realized he wasn't in the right room...wouldn't he?

She hissed as Kojiro tried to force his mouth upon her again and bit his lip like a wildcat, ripping skin and drawing blood.

"You fucking whore!" he hollered and slapped her so hard her head reeled. She jerked, still dazed, as two of the men grabbed her off the floor and pulled her up.

"Let go!" she shouted and struggled against them.

"Oh, let go!" the men mocked her and she wanted to rip their eyes out. She hurled her feet back and nailed one of them right in the family jewels, but the other had seen it coming. "Bitch has energy, Kojiro. I say we teach her a lesson on how to use it."

Sakura nearly whimpered, restrained by steeled arms, as Kojiro lifted his hand to her neck, gripped. "As soon as I rip that kimono off, we're going to fuck you to till you bleed."

"To death." Added another, and Sakura closed her eyes, built her chakra so she could force it out. It could injure her, but she'd rather be injured than raped and have stolen the only thing precious that was her own from birth. A gift she had saved for Sasuke…

Kojiro's hand lowered to the neck of her kimono and just as she was about to explode her chakra, hoping to kill them, all five of the men's eyes bulged and they leaned over; spitting up blood.

The bastards fell to the ground, writhing in agony, as their eyes bled and their skin felt aflame. As she watched, horrified, Sakura dropped to her knees and wondered what kind of sicko found such a brutal poison. "Sweet dreams." She whispered at the last man convulsed into death.

Sakura was quickly over her shock, slightly disappointed it was already gone, and she leaned her head back and screamed bloody murder.

Very soon after Sasuke, the tea house foreman, and the wife who would have gotten Sakura raped, entered the horrific room and looked upon the mess; shocked.

"T-they tried to r-rape me," she blubbered, acting like a star, then continued as she saw Sasuke's look, "T-then they just collapsed! They all shook suddenly and died!" She wailed like a little girl, earning coos and aw's from the foreman's wife as Sasuke leaned down and gathered her up into his arms like a doting danna would do.

"I bring her into this house and this is how you repay me?" he spoke softly, but his voice was menacing. Sakura suspected he wasn't completely acting…

The foreman muttered and stuttered like an idiot until Sasuke lifted Sakura to her feet and pulled her out of the room, through the halls and out the tea house entrance.

Together they walked out of the village and once they were safe in the trees, he grasped her shoulders, spun her to his furious face. "What the fuck happened there!?"

Sakura glared and pushed at his chest with no avail. "What do you mean 'what the fuck happened'?! The fucking poison was slow acting; they must have tried to immune themselves to it!" She was not it the mood to be yelled at. All she wanted to be comforted even though she could have handled herself.

Sasuke nearly snarled at her and gripped tighter on her arms. "Why the hell weren't you in the room next to mine? I heard the voices of five men, but not yours. I was fucking worried!"

She shook her head. "It was the foreman's wife. The Rebel's paid her off to bring the new geisha to their room for goddamn group fuck!" her voice broke and the tears she hadn't needed peaked out in the corners of her eyes.

She viciously wiped them away and glared back at him. "They said they were going to rape me and they came very fucking close!" Sakura swallowed the lump in her throat and tried to get out of his still grip. "If I were a normal woman, without that poison or my chakra, I would have been raped."

Sasuke didn't realize how close she'd gotten. How close he'd gotten to losing her…

She shook herself out of his grasp and started walking towards Konoha, leaving the Uchiha where he stood. "Wait…"

Sakura stopped and turned, the kimono disheveled and strangly sexy despite the serious situation. The snow fell around them and she looked distant and untouchable in the bold red. The cold cloaked them, and they noticed how different they looked; he in black and she in red, both silent upon the white snow.

Sasuke watched her for a moment longer before gliding forward, lifted his hands and caught them in her hair which was falling out of its complicated bun. And pulled her into his kiss which was desperate, angry, and frightened all one…

Sakura wrapped her arms around his neck and invited him to deepen their kiss. "Sasuke it's alright. I'm fine!" She was suddenly tearing up, and whimpered as he ruthlessly dragged her harder against his own body.

"Fuck…" he muttered and felt her hands tangle in his hair. Sakura forced him to look at her and she was smiling.

"Come on. Let's go back."

Sasuke nodded. "Fine. We need to be in Konoha before night."

They ran together, Sakura doing surprisingly well in her kimono, and they made it there just as it was getting dark.

She heard their stomachs growl in unison, but they needed to report to Tsunade quickly, so they bypassed the food shops and walked to the Hokage's tower. It was quieting down in the mansion as they moved through the halls and Sakura opened the big oak doors to the Sannin's office.

"Tsunade?" she said as she and Sasuke entered.

The woman looked up and grinned. "Wow, you might have found your calling Sakura, I see it went well. Were you hurt? You look handled." Tsunade's eyes were narrowed and she looked to Sasuke for confirmation, but he was looking out the window.

"Yes, but nothing happened other than them ganging up on me, holding me down." She could sense the anger of Sasuke from beside and she nearly gulped. "The foreman's wife was bribed by them to rape the new geisha, me, and that is why Sasuke was absent. The poison took a while to absorb into their systems I suppose, but before I could explode the energy of my chakra they were killed by the poison. No harm done to me."

Tsunade snorted at that. "Not to your person, but to both of your physics. I don't want you getting on her about this Sasuke. Just go and eat some food. You'll both have several days to cooperate from this mission. Go rest, and thank you. I'll be telling you soon about the outcome of this mission."

Sakura and Sasuke walked out of the office silent and awkward. What was she to say to him? Did he still want her now that she'd been semi-violated?

"Sasuke…?"

He said nothing as his hand reached back a lied on her lower back, pulled her against his side as they walked. "Don't worry." Was all he said.

They walked out into the snow, their fine attire and very out of place in Konoha when they noticed their friends walking into Choji's favorite restaurant. Ino turned suddenly with her excited husband's arm around her shoulders and gasped.

"Wow! Sakura look at you!" The others turned and TenTen, Temari, and Hinata all smiled as they saw the crimson kimono.

"Why did you get such a great mission?" Ino asked and pulled on Sakura and Sasuke's arm as she stepped up to them. "Come on, we're celebrating tonight. We'll see if Choji like this BBQ or my special version better."

Sakura smiled as Ino winked and looked up at Sasuke who looked mildly interested in joining the others. "Coming?" she said and he nodded.

"Hn."

They were brought in by the others and Naruto looked at Sasuke's kimono with a scrutinizing gaze. "Hm. Teme you look pretty cool in those. Like an old samurai!"

"Damnit dobe, just point me to the bar." He said and slapped a hand on Uzumaki's back while Sakura was brought along with the girls to find a table with Choji, Lee, Kiba and Akamaru.

Shikamaru joined Sasuke and Naruto, along with Neji and Shino. "So how was it?" the lazy man asked as they waited for their drinks.

"She poisoned the five Rebels but they tried to…you know." Sasuke took his sake and downed a good portion of the bottle.

Naruto blanched. "What the fuck? Are you sure? Did they-?"

"No."

Neji nodded along with Shino and said, "Good that she killed them without remorse. She knew what she was doing."

Shino interjected and said, "Sakura-chan would have been fine even if the poison hadn't been there. She's a jounin, isn't she?"

Sasuke said nothing as he drank his sake. "I was supposed to be there for the soul purpose of protecting her. I didn't listen to my gut when I was there."

Naruto watched his best friend mope, knowing full well the Uchiha was madly inn love with Sakura, but the man wasn't going to admit it without a knife to his throat. And Uzumaki Naruto was the man to help it along!

"So…have you told her?"

"Told her what?" Sasuke snapped, not in the mood for games.

"Told her how much you love her!"

Neji looked at Sasuke knowingly, not in the least surprised or mocking. "It is no weakness. I believe that it can make one stronger."

"And leave you open to even bigger weaknesses." Sasuke added and drank again.

Naruto pushed.

"So have you?"

"Goddamnit dobe, shut the fuck up!" the Uchiha snarled and glared over at his friend.

The blonde man nodded, satisfied that he'd put the tidbit in Sasuke's head about love, but was he one to stop there? No.

He would go over and above expectations…

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