Fanfiction is being really weird… it won't send me notifications when I got reviews, or when my favorite stories were updated… I hate it! So anyway, I figured I should try and live a little longer, so I'm updating!

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"I'm not sure if you're ready to hear this…"

"Itachi-san, you have to tell me," said Sakura desperately. "I need to know who… who…" she couldn't bring herself to say the word.

"He fought bravely," Itachi started, trying to make up for what he was about to say that could possibly crush this girl's already shattered heart. He shouldn't really care this much, but he'd spent too much time with her not to get a little bit attached. At least to the point where he felt it hard to tell her one of her friend's died in an attempt to rescue her from her current prison. "But he is still foolish," he finished. Sakura looked confused for a moment, and then remembered what that title meant. 'My foolish little brother'. He'd refer to Sasuke like that. Sasuke… was dead? No! She refused to believe it.

"No, no, no, no," she repeated over and over again, shaking her head to add to the affect. "No. He's not… he can't be… NO." She was sobbing now, hardly breathing as the tears rolled down her pale cheeks. She continued to repeat 'no' over again, trying to convince herself more than anything else.

"He was your brother," she finally managed to choke out.

"And he made it his goal to kill me. He wasn't ready though, and he failed."

Sakura flung herself at Itachi, pounding on his chest, hitting him as hard as she could in her weakened state of mind. He let her hit him a few times before grabbing her wrists to prevent her from doing anything else. She struggled in his grasp for awhile, still crying her heart out. She eventually stopped in her attempts to break free and went limp, "I loved him, Itachi. I really did."

The word hopeless came to mind when Itachi looked at the pink haired medic, who was sobbing so hard she couldn't speak anymore. She had built her entire life around him, and he had just taken that away from her. "You said you were going to get over him," he reminded her, in hopes that she would calm down a bit.

"I was going to, but I still planned on him being alive when I did it… he was my friend, even if he was with Hanabi. Naruto, Ino, and him were my only friends, and now he's gone. He's gone forever! You killed him. I hate you." She freed her hands, but didn't move afterwards, she just stood there, not being able to do much else.

"I still don't hate you," Itachi said calmly.

"Why are you still here? Go away! I don't want to be with a murderer right now."

"You've talked to me before, and you knew I murdered a lot of people. You've known for awhile that I killed one of your friends, you just didn't know whom. Why does it make a difference now?"

"I'm tired of your mind games!" she flew at him again, trying with everything she had to hurt him. This time he caught her around her waist, and held her tightly so that she wouldn't escape and attempt to harm him again. She didn't move again, she simply sobbed into his chest. She didn't have enough energy to care about anything at the moment, all she knew was that Sasuke was gone. She needed that hug more than she knew. It didn't matter if it came from the person who had so forcefully ripped him from her, she just needed someone at the moment. She would never admit it, that was a given, as soon as she worked up the strength she'd yell at him to let go of her. But for that moment, she was simply going to cry into his supposed embrace.

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"She seems to be taking it pretty hard," Sakura heard. She was lying in her bed, and was awoken by the sounds of voices not far from her. She didn't move, nor did she open her eyes. She regulated her breathing, and made sure that it looked as though she was still asleep. If they were going to talk about her, then she wanted to know what it was about.

"What did you expect?" she was sure that was Kisame. "That she'd be over the moon that you got rid of the last of your clan?"

"She said she was ready. Turns out she wasn't."

She heard her door open, "Kisame, Leader wants to see you, yeah." Kisame grumbled under his breath and walked out of the room, leaving Itachi there alone.

"You really shouldn't listen in on other people's conversation," said Itachi after a moment of watching her pretend to sleep.

"I don't think talking about me without my knowledge is considered polite either. Didn't I tell you about proper manners already?"

"I can see your back to your sarcastic self, and just in time really."

"Just in time for what?" asked Sakura, racking her brains for any scrap of information that might lead to his answer.

"We've just received word from Konoha. They're ready to make a deal. They've set up a date when they'd like to make the negotiations, of course you'll have to go so they know you're still alive and well."

"I get to go home?"

"Only if you want to," with these parting words he left the room to leave Sakura with her thoughts. Did she want to leave? She had said before that she wanted to go home, and that would be the logical thing to do. She was a hostage that's all. Didn't she long to be able to leave the terror that was the Akatsuki lair? Then again, was it so terrible? She hadn't really had many terrible things happen. Sasuke's death was traumatizing, but he had died the way he would have wanted, in battle with his brother. The exploding clay sculpture was a little frightening, but once she had gotten over the initial shock, it was pretty funny. She had jokes with Itachi, gave Kisame a nickname, had a vacation from missions, and was starting to become happy again. It was true, she was a lot happier than the day before she was kidnapped. She was living a life where she was constantly reminded of how she wasn't up to everyone's standards, even if she had surpassed most of them. When she was home she had Sasuke's interest in Hanabi thrown in her face every day. She had to watch as all of her friends went about their lives, with their own relationships, while she was alone with nothing but work to occupy her time. Ino couldn't hang out with her as often now that she was going on dates with her boyfriend, Naruto and Sasuke were almost always at the Hyuuga mansion, Kakashi spent his time with a certain dolphin, and she didn't have very many other friends.

But she had friends. She had a life. She had a home. Konoha was where she had grown up, and she'd promised to give her life to protect it. Could she really live with herself if she gave that all up? How could she really? Her parents, friends, teachers, and her life were there, was she really going to give that up? What was she giving them up for? A selfish want to get out of missions? An S-class criminal that she joked around with? That hardly seemed like a valid reason to refuse to return to her home. When she thought about it logically, there was no doubt in her mind that she was supposed to return to Konoha.

Her mind was going a mile a minute, and she was giving herself a headache from the inner arguing. Common sense vs. Selfish desire. She was very used to this kind of battle, she had it almost every day that she saw Sasuke. Common sense stated that there was no way in hell that he would ever return her affection, but her selfish desire to be with him kept her from giving up. Now she was having the same battle over staying with his brother. It wasn't a battle she had ever thought she would be a part of. If someone had told her a month ago that she would be kidnapped by Uchiha Itachi and then debating herself on weather or not she wanted to stay with him, she would have laughed in their face and told them they were crazy. So was she crazy now? Why would anyone in their right mind not want to go back to their home? Did she have no loyalty? Or was it something else entirely? She would never admit it, but she was beginning to grow fond of Itachi. Their little talks, the teasing, the inside jokes, the deep crimson eyes that she felt she could get lost in… she was starting to like him.

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I killed Sasuke. I should feel guilty, but I don't. I just wrote a SasuHina oneshot anyway, so I don't feel so bad. FF wouldn't let me upload any documents, so that's why this chapter is later than what I intended. Don't forget to review!