Will-O-Wisp
Chapter 9: You Lost Your Mind in the Sound
'Keep that anger, you'll need it.' He wanted to tell her but remained in silence.
It was then that he felt the strong presence of Madara, making his appearance at last. Although strong, the difference to the Madara that attacked the leaf village in his time was enormous, infinitely so.
This Madara could still be defeated.
"I knew it was just a matter of time, Madara." Sasuke spoke in the distance and his own grip on Sakura tightened.
Sakura tensed at the sound of the familiar voice, and with Sasuke's hand still over her mouth she could do nothing but remain motionless. She had missed her sole chance of bringing him back, she wanted to cry but most of all she wanted to claw away at the man behind her. It was all his fault.
"So you have been expecting me." Madara commented and the voice sent chills up her spine.
"What do you want?" His voice was harsh as he asked the question, so much like Sasuke, cutting to the point. From where they were Sakura could not see him, but she could imagine the way his eyes stared right through Madara with his head held high and his eyebrow slightly raised.
"Would you believe me if I told you I just wanted to see how the family was doing?" There was a slight tone of humor.
"No." Sasuke's answer was as flat as his expression probably was.
"I thought so. Well I wanted to make you an offer."
"There's nothing you could offer me." Sasuke almost cut him off and Madara only chuckled in response. Sakura had a bad feeling about the situation.
"What if I could offer you what you want most." Sakura knew there had to be a catch, he wouldn't offer anything without wanting something in return.
"There's no bringing back the dead." Of course, his family, it shouldn't have surprised her. His tone of voice held something that made her heart clench as if he's thought long and hard about the matter.
"I meant something tangible, Sasuke…" Madara sighed before he continued. "You want a revolution, to change the ninja world…so do I."
"I don't need your help for that." Sasuke snapped and Sakura's eyes widened.
"No, but I need yours and of course I will make it worth your while." There was a pause, too long a pause, in where Sasuke didn't deny him, he just listened. "I will give you a single moment with your parents if you give me Konoha to destroy."
Sasuke's body tensed behind her and suddenly she felt she couldn't breathe.
"What happens to the village after it is destroyed?"
"I don't care, you can have it, reshape it from the ground up as the village you want it to be." Madara wanted to destroy the leaf and Sasuke wanted to change it, the perfect compromise between them. "What do you say, a single moment with the parents you haven't seen since you were a child, wouldn't you give everything and anything for a closure?" The question hung in the air and she knew the answer even before she heard it.
He was Sasuke Uchiha, first and foremost Uchiha, and at heart he was a child longing for his long lost family. "Yes."
Yet, it clenched her heart to hear it from his lips. Her vision suddenly blurred and she blinked away the tears.
"Perfect. We will meet again." And just like that Madara poofed away. Sasuke was alone again and Sakura didn't move, didn't even try to break from the strong grip around her. She remained unmoving until he left.
The man behind her took the hand covering her mouth away, but for a long moment neither of them spoke. She wouldn't even turn to look at him.
They sat across from each other and the look on Sakura's face was everything he knew it would be. Disappointment, hopelessness, sadness. Every emotion on her face left him feeling guilty, reminded him of the trash he was, of the monster he desperately tried to leave behind.
"How could you?" She finally spoke and the anger in her voice was as clear as the sorrow. "How could you do this to us?" She asked but didn't wait for a reply. "You did it didn't you, you gave him Konoha."
"I didn't." He answered. "I backed down, but it was too late and I wasn't able to stop him. But I did give him all the means he needed to destroy Konoha."
"And you're here to patch up your mistakes, right? The worst one yet I'd say." He could see her battling her emotions, with every word her voice rose in volume. It wasn't the worst mistake though.
"You told me you found happiness, was that all a lie?!" Tears brimmed in her eyes and she bit her lip, from the way her fist clenched at her sides he was sure she wanted to leap forward and punch him.
He wouldn't have stopped her if she'd tried.
"I didn't lie to you, Sakura, I just left a lot of things out." He just wanted her not to look at him the way she was looking at him then.
"Then you better start talking, now." The order in her voice was unmistakable, it's not the first time he hears her use that tone of voice.
"I go back to the village decided to hand it over to Madara to destroy, with nothing to strive for except that promised moment with my parents. There was nothing I loved more than my family, I craved the closure and I needed it." He sighed, he could see the way her eyes softened and it was like déjà vu. "Naruto's trust was easy to regain, the village's trust with hard work was attainable, your trust was the hardest to recover but once I had it every closed door opened." He set his gaze on the ground, avoiding the look of betrayal that would surely show on her face.
"I made my way up and slowly but surely I got what I needed. But the years passed and I made a mistake." He turned to her then. "I fell in love. At first I thought I could have her and the moment with my parents, I couldn't and the time came when I had to choose."
"You chose her, didn't you?" He could hear both the relief and the pain in her voice.
"I did, I found out then that I was not prepared to once again lose my family to senseless slaughter." He chuckled then, but there was no humor. "It was too late though, I had already given Madara all he needed and he destroyed the village and everyone in it."
It was hard for him to talk about it, but he knew she deserved to know. He owed her of all people an explanation.
"Very little of us survived, with the sharingan, the rinnegan, and Tsunade's help I was able to come back." When he was about to continue she cut him off.
"After what you did, handing Konoha over to Madara, how did Tsunade trust you?" Her eyes were guarded.
"She didn't, she just didn't have a choice. I think, she held on to the fact that I too had lost something I couldn't live without, my wife and daughter." He wanted to say more but couldn't, the words stuck on his lips and he remained silent. He could see Sakura's eyes widen at the revelation of a daughter.
"They died." It was a simple statement and he only nodded in response. He saw the way she bit her lip, the way tears formed in her eyes and he couldn't help but think there was something truly precious about her mourning a faceless woman, a faceless family for his sake. "Did she ever find out about what you did?"
"She did." He grimaced and his chest ached. "She was enraged, but most of all she was distraught." He could remember the look in her eyes and the way he wanted to reach out but couldn't.
"If you knew then who I was would you have still decided to fall in love with me?" His question was out of the blue.
"Back then I knew you were a broken boy and even if I'd known all of this it probably wouldn't have changed a thing. I probably would have still fallen helplessly in love with you." There was a moment of silence after that before she opened her mouth to speak again, her words were soft barely above a whisper. "I'm sure it was the same way for her."
"Love doesn't need a reason…" She added as an afterthought.
He sighed and spoke eyes turning to hers, pleading for her to understand. "Sakura…I need to make things right."
She shook her head. "You want me not to tell Tsunade…"
"I want you not to tell anyone, with every person that knows there's a chance for things to change. If I'm apprehended by the leaf I will not be able to stop him and I'll just end up seeing everything fall around me once again." He's not sure he can bear to see himself lose it all, again.
"What you're asking me…it's treason to my village." Her gaze turned angry, fury dancing in her green eyes because how dare he ask that of her.
"Yes."
"Why would I agree to it?" A challenge in her voice and he couldn't say he had an answer because this was something Tsunade had anticipated.
"Not for me, because I don't deserve it." He wanted to reach out to her, but didn't knowing it would only worsen things. "Do it for everyone else you care about because they all die in the future you're heading towards." Her eyes widened and he could see the fear in them.
"Tell me more." The words were a mere whisper.
"Kakashi dies standing against Madara and in what probably was his worst nightmares come to life, he didn't stand a chance." He could see as she swallowed and the way pain took over every feature. "Naruto died trying to keep Madara from getting his hands on Kurama but not before seeing Hinata get impaled through her stomach, she was expecting a girl." He heard Sakura gasp and when he looked up at her there were eyes were filled with tears.
"Maybe that's enough." He spoke, he didn't know how much more she could handle.
"Tell me more." She repeated again, her voice breathless.
"He attacked the academy, looking for my daughter. She wasn't there, but none of the children survived. Ino lost her mind after losing her son, Tsunade said she died of pure anguish, Sai almost died with her. Your parents died during the attack, Shikamaru forced Tsunade to flee, and the village burned up in fire."
He didn't want to tell her all of it, but he had no choice. She wasn't going to understand the gravity of the situation until she knew, there was too much at stake. He could remember that day with excruciating detail, could almost feel the heat of the fire on his skin, could almost hear the screams filling the air around him, and every time he closed his eyes he could see the blood.
"What about your wife and daughter…?" She asked, slowly, she looked into his eyes for an answer but he gave none.
"There are some things I'm not prepared to talk about yet…" He was glad she left the subject drop.
"About…keeping things between us, I'll think about it." She said, her gaze far away, but he knew her, she was lying through her teeth. There was nothing to think about, he had made her decision for her the moment he told her the truth.
"If you choose Sakura for the mission take care of her and I'm sure I don't need to tell you this but remember that with her decisions will often come from the heart. She will do anything for the people she loves and that includes you." The Hokage had advised him against choosing Sakura in favor of Shikamaru but in case of his current decision she had given him a word of warning and a weapon.
She never really learned rule twenty five, a shinobi must keep emotions on the inside you must possess a heart that never shows tears. But she wouldn't be Sakura if she didn't wear her heart on her sleeve.
