Almost two years had passed. During the first few months, rescue missions and search parties were issued constantly, and towards the end of the first year it was only due to Naruto's insistent nature that Tsunade still bothered to send out one or two pairs of shinobi out of the village, even though it was all hopeless.

Naruto walked through the dimly lit streets of Konoha, wandering around for hours, not really wanting to go home. The moon was the only thing providing some light in the more secluded area of the village he was now walking through. The quiet night reminded him of when Sakura came to him with her concerns, perhaps the only time she'd seriously trusted in him, and how he'd failed to listen. And now she was gone. And so was Sasuke. The only family he had known had fallen apart, and he was damned if he would allow things to stay that way, but he also didn't know what to do.

He spent the better part of the year training with the perverted Sannin, Jiraya, travelling around, or training on the outskirts of the village. He was meant to leave tomorrow with him, for a final year of intense training. If he did know anything about his current situation, it was that he needed to become strong enough to bring them back. They were alive. They were well and they would listen. He had to believe that. And even if he didn't, the look on Kakashi sensei's face when he asked him to speak with Tsunade, or the haunted expressions of Sakura's parents trying to go about their daily lives in the village, were enough to keep his determination alive.

The screams were annoyingly loud. Sakura was looking down at a large man, a lot taller than six feet, heavier than a slab of concrete, watching how he convulsed and shook. Kabuto, beside her, wrote down notes regarding the man's reactions. They had injected him with a combination of cells taken from Kimimaro's body and what was supposed to be an antidote to the condition which made the sick man's body so weak. If a man as large and strong in constitution as this one reacted in such a way, Kimimaro would certainly die on the spot. Yet another failure.

"Damnit." Kabuto whispered angrily scribbling down the last of the notes.

His calm was impressive to Sakura, considering how much was hanging onto these experiments. They needed to find a cure within this next year, or Orochimaru would be unable to take his prized talent as a vessel And surely, he'd be happy to have Sasuke instead. Sakura clenched her fists and concentrated a small amount of chakra in her right hand then smashed it through the yelling man's chest, silencing him for good.

"Another failure." she simply stated, wiping her bloody hand on her dress.

They'd been doing these sort of things for so long she could hardly remember how it started. Kabtuo and her in a dark room, always with new people to experiment on, extracting cells or implanting them, taking samples or testing out new drugs. She still wondered, sometimes, how she'd stopped sobbing and vomiting as soon as the deeds were done. But she had. It was these people or Sasuke. It was, for her, an easier choice the closer they got to the deadline.

A moderately sized snake was slithering around Sasuke, waiting to receive his orders. It was an ugly thing, looking hatefully with its yellow eyes. It was the sixth summoning of the day and even with his improved chakra control and reserves, he was starting to feel the exhaustion.

"A year ago you would have summoned a dead snake skin. Stop looking so disappointed." said Orochimaru, chuckling softly, a short distance away from Sasuke's panting form.

He couldn't help but grunt. He could explain an infinite amount of times that none of this was fast enough, yet he still would get scolded for being displeased. He briefly wondered how far along he would have been now had Orochimaru not halted his progress a year ago. It was necessary to remind himself how ruthless the missing nin was.

However, what was undeniable was his growth. Fast enough or not, Sasuke could not ignore that whatever was done to him previous to the little test all that time ago, it changed him in unnatural ways. Every time he moved he felt power surging through his veins, his muscles firm and strong, his chakra spiking all on its own sometimes due to the massive amount. He smiled to himself, imagining the moment when he'd face his brother with his newly acquired powers, some of which he's yet to learn. He could definitely do this.

"Do the third set of exercises again, then you're free. I need to check on Kabuto today."

Sasuke didn't comment on how frequent these check ups had become. The man was getting impatient and it was showing. He simply started concentrating his chakra, practicing his jutsu and wielding his katana, focusing only on his goal.

They reached the door at the same time. Sakura was yawning widely, waving to Sasuke halfway down the hallway, and he nodded to her, holding the door open and waiting for her to walk inside.

A few months ago they'd managed to convince Orochimaru to change their room location, somewhere closer to the surface, so they could have a tiny opening to the outside world and have some natural sunlight. It was now dusk, the sun going down at a steady pace, stealing away the light they'd missed out on.

The room was larger too, and much more different than the last one. The two beds they'd pressed together in the middle. On the right side were Sakura's things. Her desk with so many medical books and notes Sasuke had to wonder how she kept track of all of them. On the left side were Sasuke's own things, his training equipment, some books on chakra control borrowed from Sakura and some scrolls.

It was a strange thing for both of them, but this was home now. And the routine they'd fallen into, living together, was no longer haunted by any unpleasantness.

"Did you make any progress today?" asked Sasuke as he was organizing some of his own belongings.

"Hardly. We have to break down the very molecular structure so we can figure out what to use for each element and find an antidote. The only thing we managed was to bring yet another person to a state where we'd have to kill them." she replied with a long sigh.

Out of the two of them, Sakura had the more daunting, exhausting task. She was tired in a way Sasuke knew no amount of sleep could fix. She'd seen people die daily, she had to kill many of them herself to put them out of their misery. Sasuke didn't know much about doctors in general, but he knew Sakura was still, underneath it all, the classic kind that wanted to heal and cure, not experiment and murder. He knew despite her calm demeanour and her changed personality that it still bothered her.

He also knew why she kept doing it. It dug a hole in his stomach, one which he didn't think he could ever fill.

"You can always stop, Sakura." he said to her, hoping she would but knowing it was foolish to ask.

She smiled at him. They'd had this discussion a hundred times, always going back and forth between each other, trying to convince the other person they could stop and rest or maybe even give up. They'd never do it though. Both of them were too stubborn and determined.

Walking towards him until she was just inches away, she wrapped her arms around him, and his reaction was instantaneous. He was holding her tightly, her long pink locks tickling his skin as his hands were running up and down her back. He could feel her silently laugh beneath his touch and he pushed her away slightly, looking at her with a confused expression.

"When did you get this tall?" she asked, looking up at him.

The difference wasn't all that impressive, yet he realized she was in fact forced to look up talking to him, even when they weren't this close together. For some unexplainable reason, this fact made him smile.

"Just wait. In a few years you'll need a ladder to get to me." he teased, absent mindedly flicking her forehead and moving closer towards the bed to sit down.

Her speed was not quite up there with his, but it was still impressive. He felt her pushing him down on the bed, turning him over mid air so that he would land on his back, facing towards her. He could have stopped her, of course, but he could see no reason in the world why he should.

"Or, I could just do this." she whispered, her face red despite her bold attitude.

Looking up at her bright, green eyes, feeling her breath warm on his face and seeing how much even the smallest touch still affected her, Sasuke couldn't help but still feel the same warmth he always had. He was the source of something good and strong in her life. Somewhere along his complicated path, he'd learned to appreciate that.

He kissed her. He did it because she was close, and warm, and her lips were slightly parted as she was panting from the internal reaction she was having to him. Her hands grabbed his neck, nails digging slightly into his skin as she pas pulling him closer and closer. Their chests were moving together rapidly, breathing erratic all due to this simple, yet complicated, touch of their lips. She tasted so much like home he wondered if one of these days, when they kissed, he'd simply refuse to stop and live off this good feeling for as long as he could.