on still water
by: whisperedsilvers
prompt: "for you."
summary: and sometimes, there are days without rain. —sakura/shisui
X
with your brightness
Shisui, Sakura began to think wryly, was something else.
He was very friendly, social, but he was quiet at times, especially around people he didn't know and he used his friends or family as a crutch to socialize with other people. He spoke with a warm tone – like the gentle heat of a fire – perhaps it was an Uchiha thing, to have that type of lithe, but she couldn't really put her finger on it—he was so different.
And it wasn't just because he was an Uchiha – though it might be, she wasn't too sure – it was because he was different than any other man she's ever met. It was dangerous territory she was venturing off to, she knew this because to separate Uchiha Shisui from a shinobi, a friend to the facet of a man—she needed to stop this train of thought. Right now.
"Welcome to my training grounds," Shisui introduced her to a forest, a forest that looked vaguely familiar, a forest that looked like—
"Are we in the Nara Forest?" Sakura asked with disbelief, this wasn't his training grounds and she doesn't think they were even allowed to be in the forest. The area was secluded, preserved for only Nara clansmen and members of said clan, occasionally for events were outsiders ever invited, but that was it.
"Hey," He frowned at her incredulity, "I'll have you know, I own a couple acres of the Nara forest."
She looked at him suspiciously, narrowing her eyes, she inquired, "What do you mean you own?"
"Shikaku-senpai let me purchase some land a while back," Shisui shrugged, he took out his holster and placed it on a nearby rock, "The clan's compound is about a half-hour walk from here anyway, so it's not like I'm secluded or anything."
"But why buy land here?" Sakura frowned, "There are plenty of pieces, cheaper too I'm sure near the northern district."
"True, but I've always liked nature," He answered, he grabbed her hand and dragged her deeper into the brush. The foliage was green, very green and lush. The forest looked healthy, and there were very few deer this far out, but it's kind of peaceful.
Shisui's hand was warm, his fingers calloused from kenjutsu, and it was nice. He felt nice. Shisui took her deeper into the forest where it got so unbearably thick that she thought she was inhaling pine and sunlight, there were trees that were strategically cleared, producing a pathway, then it cleared, like light at the end of the tunnel. He stopped abruptly and said, "Look."
The ocean.
Sakura had no idea how Shisui managed to swindle Shikaku-sama into purchasing land this close to the sea, but she wasn't complaining. Instead of a cliff, like most of the terrain at the borders, the trees faded until it became clear that sand was at her feet and the ocean was blue.
So blue. Like there were tiny pieces of sapphire threading the waves and salt, glittering like pieces of silver and it smelled so clean.
"If you look close enough, you can see Kiri," Shisui pointed out, there was a faint piece of land miles and miles out at sea.
"I don't have eyes like you, Uchiha-san," Sakura rolled her eyes, but still, she couldn't help her smile.
He laughed at that and then paused abruptly. Frowning at her with dark eyes, he reminded her, "Shisui, Sakura."
"Shisui-san."
Shisui sighed, "Stubborn."
"Of course," She agreed with him but did not move otherwise.
"I'm building a house here," Shisui revealed and grabbed her hand to lead her back to the forest, "It's close enough to the ocean, but a few minutes' walk back to the house. It's peaceful."
"I would hope it's peaceful," She raised a brow, "You're near the ocean."
Shisui chuckled, "Well there's that too, I always liked the smell of water."
"You can smell water?" Sakura stared at him funnily, then she paused, looked at him and asked him in shock, "You're building a house? You're not staying the compound?"
"No to the first question, yes to the second, and no to the third," He answered, he tilted his head, "Well to the first question, rain always smells slightly sweeter than ocean-water, I think because it soaks into the trees and flowers, and oceans are just salty, but they are distinct—"
"You're rambling," Sakura pointed out with mild surprise, "Why aren't you living in the compound? After the compound's feast, I thought that…" she trailed off not knowing how to continue.
"The compound is," Shisui sighed, his hand tightened around her's and then it relaxed, "It's suffocating and it's tiring. I don't like it, I've never liked it. I only go to visit my mother and Mikoto-sama, and Sasuke-chan of course. Sometimes, Fugaku-sama, but mostly Itachi."
"The clan just allowed you to leave?" She inquired dubiously.
"Not without some fight," He shook his head, "But how are they going to fight me? After all, I've been dead for fifteen years," his lips quirked, "At least not literally. Are they going to condemn a dead man?"
"That's a morbid question," Sakura replied slowly, her fingers wiggled under his grip, but she made no move to untangle her digits, she kind of liked the weight of his hand. "So you're just going to live out here like a hermit?"
"A hermit," Shisui scoffed, the sunlight made his hair look like red-speckled milkweed, "What if I get married?"
"And drive your spouse crazy this far out?" She tried not to laugh.
"I'm sure our kids we'll fill up space."
"You want kids?"
He looked at her, "Don't you?"
Sakura refused to be flustered at that question, instead, she focused on the markings of the rocks and grass. And more dirt. "Well, yeah. Maybe later, but not now."
"How many you want?"
Green eyes widened, "Isn't that a little personal?"
He rolled his eyes, "Humor me."
"I don't know," She lied, "I never really thought about it."
Shisui stared at her blankly.
"Okay maybe I've thought about it," She rolled her eyes and they came back to their field, "I was thinking two or three, I don't really know."
"I want four or five or six," He offered immediately, "But no more than seven."
Sakura stared at him incredulously, "I bet you even have their names picked out."
"I do."
She couldn't stop her laugh, "Of course you do."
"But," He released her hand to grab his tanto from his holster, "Obviously my wife and I'll have to talk about it. What if she has a brother and his name is on my list? I don't want to name my kid after her brother—" He shuddered, "Too much family drama."
"And I'm sure you've had enough of that to last for a lifetime," Sakura huffed.
Shisui chuckled bitterly, "I'm glad you have me figured out, Sakura."
"I don't," She admitted, green eyes flickered to him and then back to her gloves, "But I will."
And it was the difference between warmth and heat. Warmth, curling and comforting, soaking into her like sunshine, and it purred like a cat, all teasing and soft, but there was heat. Heat hot enough to scorch, hot enough to burn, hot enough to have your hands covering your mouth because you just can't breathe.
Shisui's smile was like that.
—
Sakura was panting because holy shit, Shisui was fast. He was so fast that her brain had troubling perceiving his movements, because he was here and then he was there. He was substituting his presence with dust rather than smoke like most people do, but Sakura's trained with Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei – though not as much as she would like – so she could keep up, but barely.
Because Shisui didn't know what personal space was, she knew what he smelt like, he smelt like fire and rain, he had the briefest hints of sandalwood, funneling chakra through her nasal pathways, she forced her brain to lock onto sandalwood – which was probably not the best idea because they were in a forest, but she doubted that sandalwood grew here – he also smelt like the ocean and that wasn't helpful at all.
Somehow, it worked, because her kunai clanged against his and she pushed him back into the trees. His back slammed into a trunk and she nearly breathed in relief because finally, and then he wasn't there at all.
"Not bad," Shisui's voice was at her ear, a kunai to the neck and his hand in her pocket.
"When did you—" She was exasperated and she gave in the urge to stomp her foot like a petulant child. She groaned, "Substitution?"
"A clone actually," He chirped as the crumble beneath his feet, he removed the kunai, but still remained behind her, hand still in the pocket of her skirt. "That wasn't bad. I almost used full speed too."
"Full—?" Sakura half-shrieked, "You were holding back?"
Shisui suddenly appeared in front of her and smiled kindly, "I don't usually use full-speed when I'm training. Plus I just need to assess how fast you are, going at full speed would be counterintuitive because I don't want to use my chakra unnecessarily. We still have ninjutsu to think about," Then he raised a brow, "Plus, you were holding back too."
Sakura bit out, "If I used my full-strength you'd be swimming in the ocean."
"See?" He poked her cheek, "You're fast enough to be eye to eye with the second level of the sharingan, but you could be faster."
"How?" She asked slowly and rubbed her cheek.
"I'm going to teach you how to use shunshin," He grinned wickedly.
Sakura stared at him as if he were daft, she crossed her arms and retorted, "But I know how to use shunshin."
"Not the way I do," Shisui hummed pleasantly.
"That was shunshin?" She said surprised, she thought it was completely different jutsu, but she shouldn't be too surprised, sometimes even the basics of jutsus can be perfected into something entirely different, "It didn't feel like shunshin, it felt like lightning."
"Ah," He looked startled, "That's more of a signature thing, I use a tiny bit of lightning ninjutsu to stun my opponents, I'm surprised you picked up on it."
"I'm sensitive to chakra."
"I remember," Shisui said softly, "But it is shunshin. I figured it would be easy for you to pick it up, it requires very good chakra control," he nearly laughed at how quickly excitement touched emerald orbs, "But the timing also, you have to cut off chakra at a certain point or you'll be too slow."
"What do I do?" She tilted her head.
"Show me your shunshin," Shisui pointed to the rock in the middle of the field, "Flicker from here," he points to a spot on a tree three hundred feet away, "To there."
It took five seconds and then she appeared. It was standard, but he wanted it down to a blink of an eye, he commented, "It's textbook, you even have smoke."
"Am I not supposed to have smoke?"
"Shunshin is based on the sole purpose of disappearing, so not even a trace is left behind."
"Is it possible to not leave an imprint of chakra," She pondered, "Suppressing your chakra while cutting it off seems to contradict."
"It is," Shisui agreed, "But you have to channel chakra to a secondary pathway rather than the main branch."
Sakura's eyes brightened, it almost made sense, and then she used shunshin. Her chakra was non-existent, but instead of releasing it as she cut the chakra, she managed to shift it to a different pathway and appeared behind him, "Like that?"
He didn't even feel her.
His eyes widened, "How did you—?"
"There are five chakra pathways," Sakura explained, she lifted a finger, "I shifted my chakra from my main pathway to two smaller pathways. I shifted my chakra—kind of like water. I suppressed my chakra into the second pathway, then shifted it to the third one to complete the shunshin and then I shifted it back to my main pathway to keep my suppression."
"But you still have the chakra?" Shisui asked slowly.
"Chakra doesn't disappear," She shook her head, "I just transferred it back, energy is always moving, the concept isn't hard, but I had to use a counter-clockwise movement, that way it doesn't knot up in my system."
"Are you telling me used shunshin without using chakra?" He questioned her in incredulity.
"Well I did use chakra," Sakura scratched the back of her neck, "But it didn't deplete, I just put it back. I tried to mimic your lightning ninjutsu, but instead of physically, I used the same concept to my chakra system, that way—why are you looking at me like that?"
"Again," Shisui demanded.
Sakura used shunshin, fingers forming a tiger seal and then she emerged in front of him. Shisui couldn't feel her chakra, not even when she appeared in front of him – and she was supposed too, because you can only cut chakra so quick – his fingers jabbed her forward and she used shunshin to stand on the rock.
He stated slowly, "You're not cutting your chakra."
Sakura shook her head, "I shifted it instead, that way I don't deplete it."
Shisui really shouldn't be so surprised, after all, her chakra control was in the ninety-ninth percentile, and the last person to have that kind of control over their chakra was the first Hokage. He wanted to scratch his head with a toothpick, she got the theory down to the teeth, but the application was the difficult part.
"Alright," He rubbed his face, "I honestly didn't expect you to pick it up so fast."
Her voice sounded off, "You expected me to do bad?"
"I expected you to shunshin, but I didn't realize how good your chakra suppression was," Shisui admitted, but then he rolled his eyes, and looked at her softly, "I shouldn't be too surprised though, you're pretty amazing."
Sakura's mouth parted at the compliment, eyes blinking slowly she swallowed her flustered state and inhaling deeply she said, "It's not fast enough."
"No, it's not," He agreed and then he grinned, "We're going to get your shunshin down to a blink of an eye."
She blanched not liking the mischief flickering in charcoal orbs, it was times like these, she remembered that he was Sasuke's cousin.
"We're going to play tag."
—
Sakura was bruised, poked and prodded as she wobbled out of the Nara forest with the elder Uchiha whistling behind her. She was exasperated, she managed to fall at least thirty times, he poked her on the side, shoved her on the ground and pressed her against so many trees she was sure that she had splinters on her back, but she felt sort of full.
Shisui was rough.
He was rough, he respected her enough to take her seriously and he wasn't without mercy, because every so often he would ask if she was okay and if she wanted to take a break. She liked that he did that. He was very considerate, but he was rough with her because she was a shinobi and knew that she could handle it.
Sakura liked playing rough.
She liked knowing he wouldn't break under her, that she could push him to his limits – or at least try – and that he wasn't adverse to getting messy. Even if she did manage to land a blow on him, he didn't complain and he didn't bitch about it. He took it in stride and kept going.
She liked that.
"Are you sure you don't need to go to the hospital?"
"Why?" Sakura exhaled, "So they can see how many times you poked me?"
"Itachi's the one with the poking fetish," Shisui huffed and swung an arm around her shoulders, "Not me."
"I wonder where he learned it from," She grumbled under her breath.
"What was that?" He gave her a squeeze, fingers sliding up to her ribs and he took great pleasure in watching her flinch at his fingers. Ever since he realized that she was ticklish from his game of tag – Sakura had groaned when she understood what tag meant – he took great lengths to find an opening to jab at her sides.
"Shisui-sa—N!" Sakura squeaked as his fingers dug into her ribcage, she was torn between laughing and sobbing, because she was sensitive.
"I'm sorry I can't hear you," He hummed, his arm squeezing even tighter, fingers sliding and scraping.
"I'll break your arm, Shisui!" Sakura half-shrieked, half-laughed, she squirmed around his hold and then abruptly, he released her. The sound of her voice traveled throughout the village, civilians watched as the pink-haired medic squealed at the amorous Uchiha suitor – well at least to them – shinobi, on the other hand, were flabbergasted.
"That's right," Shisui laughed, his fingers tangling in pink hair, "It's Shisui."
"You're so annoying," She panted and rubbed her sides gently, "I bet you don't even do this to Sasuke."
"Sasuke-chan's not cute anymore," He reminded her, shoving his hands into his pockets.
Sakura snorted, "So you did tickle him."
"When he was a toddler," Shisui hummed, "He's sensitive in the weirdest places. Like the back of his ears are super sensitive."
"His ears?" Her eyes sparkled at this new-found information.
"Blackmail looks really attractive on you," Shisui winked, he leaned closer to her and wasn't perturbed by her ignorance.
"I wasn't aware," She sniffed.
"Your witlessness is really cute, Sakura."
"I do my best," Sakura blew, then she winced at the sore spots on the back of her neck, "Just how many times did you poke me?" she took her hand and swiped the back of neck with healing chakra, moving it down her arms and under her shirt, she sighed, "Are you sure you're not a Hyuuga?"
"Cross my heart," He swore with mock-seriousness, "I may have jabbed you with chakra fingers, but that's it."
"Chakra fingers, huh?" She warned him darkly, "You better hope my shunshin doesn't become as fast as yours, or you're going to be tasting my chakra fist."
"Sexy, Sakura," Shisui deadpanned, he didn't sound the least bit scared and that would have been a blow to her pride, but instead, it made her even more excited.
There was a strangled sound from behind her, she blinked and turned her head to see her teammates staring at her with a very, very strange look. Then she realized how close she and Shisui were standing, inwardly she sighed, but when she made a move to put some space in between them, Shisui tossed his arm over her shoulders—again.
"Sasuke-chan," Shisui greeted cheerfully, "Sasuke-chan's teammate."
Naruto choked, blinking rapidly, he lifted a finger and pointed at the two of them, "What are you doing with Sakura-chan, you—you Uchiha!"
Sasuke slapped the back of Naruto's head.
Shisui raised a brow, "Sakura and I were going to get dango."
Sakura blinked, "We were?"
"Well I thought it would be a good idea, I pushed you really hard today," He chuckled sheepishly, giving her a squeeze, he continued, "I know you wanted a turn, but I haven't had that much fun in years."
"A…turn?" The blonde sounded broken.
"Why are you holding her like that, Shisui?" Sasuke demanded, his eyes could hardly believe what he was seeing, Shisui and Sakura—it was like Itachi cut his hair or something.
"She smells nice," Shisui said casually.
Sakura gaped, either he was lying or he was telling the truth or he was purposefully antagonizing her idiotic teammates—she paused and cleared her throat, "That's cause you shoved me against the magnolia tree."
"I didn't hear any complaints."
"It's not like I could exactly speak," Sakura rolled her eyes, "You were suffocating me."
Naruto actually whimpered.
Sasuke blanched.
She used a hand to cover her mouth and snickered. Her teammates could be a little too overdramatic if she had to be honest, she inhaled and didn't have to look at Shisui to know that he was amused, "Did you guys need something?"
"Sakura-chan you can't date this Uchiha," Naruto grabbed her arm and yanked her towards him. The pinkette yelped at the sudden force, Shisui's fingers jabbed into the crease of the blonde's elbow and dropped his arm to slide against her waist, he rebuked him, "Naruto, don't pull her like that."
"We were training, you blonde-idiot," Sakura snapped, she winced when she had to use her chakra to heal her dislocated shoulder and she swore quietly at the sting.
"Oh," He frowned, "But why? I thought you trained with Baa-chan."
"I finished my apprenticeship, Naruto," She scowled, "I'm a combat medic, remember?"
"Right," He didn't sound convinced.
"So you roped Shisui into training you?" Sasuke raised a brow, his mouth marring into a frown, "Isn't that a little desperate?"
Desperate.
Sakura inhaled deeply, her temper and frustration getting the better of her. Shisui's grip on her tightened, but she was tired and she was sad, because these were her teammates, and she was just tired. Deciding that they really weren't the trouble, she smoothened her features into a blank expression, then she turned to face Shisui and bowed her thanks, "Thank you for the lesson, Uchiha-san."
And she used shunshin without waiting for a response.
When Shisui turned to face her teammates, his sharingan blazed hell-red.
.
.
.
footnote1: i can't believe the lack of Shisui x Sakura fics — :|
footnote2: next chapter, the ultimate apology ft a very sadistic Shisui ; )
footnote3: also I need more Shisui on my blog.
As always, please review.
