A/N: My deep and endless thanks for your patience and your reviews! To all those who review anonymously, or not logged in, I want to give another public thank-you; yours are often the most constructive responses, and I wish I could answer you one by one. I take what you say into consideration, even so!

Chapter 13 should not be nearly so long in coming. Again, thanks for waiting! This chapter might seem largely like silly politics, but it's pretty important. (Hopefully no one gets too bored.) Thanks for reading!


twelve: logical consequence

Kakashi sent for them the next morning, shortly after Sakura had started her early-morning training session with Sasuke.

Pakkun appeared in the middle of their taijutsu practice with a pop and a bark, startling Sakura so that she faltered in her delivery; Sasuke intercepted her fist and neatly threw her behind him. She skidded to a stop on her knees and cold seeped from the ground through her skin.

She huffed, shooting Sasuke a glare that he deflected with only half a smirk and a raised eyebrow. The past couple of weeks had seen a rather different Sasuke; it was as if joining her, Naruto, and Sai for dinner had given him leave to be a person around her once again. She didn't quite trust the change, but it was getting less hard to look at him when he gave that familiar smirk and less hard to talk to him when all his answers were wordless grunts. It felt like being twelve again, like those blissful months after the Wave Country mission and before he left them—when they had really been a team. She'd recently realized that those golden days hadn't actually lasted very long.

It scared her, sort of—she felt that every step towards friendship with her errant teammate might be a step backwards. Her strength would vanish, what was left of her confidence would dry up, and she'd fall back in love with the tall, dark, handsome, impossible Sasuke, and all the self-worth she'd spent seven years building would collapse into the dirt.

Pakkun cleared his throat. "Sorry to interrupt," the pup said, pawing at his nose and obviously anything but. "Kakashi wants both of you up to the Tower for a mission briefing and a meeting with a bunch of clan heads."

Clan heads? "Now?" Sakura grimaced, dusting snow off of her knee. They were both sweaty in double-layered training clothes, and she knew the cold had her cheeks and nose rubbed raw. It was hardly the time for a powwow with the likes of Hyuuga Hiashi. But Pakkun nodded a doleful affirmative.

If Sasuke was surprised, he kept it hidden with admirable ease. "Both of us."

"I forgot to mention it to you," said Sakura loftily, who had done no such thing but enjoyed the rare chance to catch him off balance. "Hyuuga Neji and I are leading a diplomatic mission to Iron. Apparently the other villages want to fawn over you." 'Fawn' was probably the wrong word—it would be less fawning over than dissecting—but her words had the desired effect. Though Sasuke didn't expend effort on questioning her, she did detect a miniscule thinning of his lips.

A child's vengeful triumph had her inwardly crowing as Pakkun led them through frigid air and over icy tiled rooftops to the new Hokage. The dog entered through the window, so they followed, coming in over Kakashi's shoulder like a pair raucous kids. Their old sensei seemed vaguely displeased by this. "I believe most shinobi follow something called 'protocol' or exercise 'courtesy' when dealing with their Kage."

"I don't think those were ever in your lesson plans, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura said, bending to scratch Pakkun behind the ears. "Stop acting so old." Sasuke snorted; the sound was painfully familiar, and young.

Kakashi ignored this. "I see you two have been sparring. Who won?"

Sasuke shrugged. "I had the upper hand when your message came."

That was unexpectedly humble. Sakura was looking askance at him when someone knocked and Kakashi called them in. An odd assembly of nin entered the room: Neji first, followed by the Inuzuka matriarch Tsume, Akimichi Chouza, Hyuuga Hiashi (who Neji did not look especially pleased to see), Aburame Shibi, and a woman she'd never met before but who could only be Shikamaru's mother: dark brown eyes, straight back, and a fierce—if weary—countenance. Tsunade was the last to enter, throwing Sakura a wink and going to stand behind Kakashi after shutting the door with an unceremonious bang. Sakura stood up from rubbing Pakkun's ears and took her place beside Neji, leaving Sasuke to look all the clan heads up and down. The Rinnegan glimmered weirdly in the morning light. He is one of them, I suppose. Technically. A clan head.

Kakashi stood up from behind his desk. "Now that we're all here. I've mentioned to a few of you in the last council meeting that the Land of Iron is requesting the presence of an ambassadorial delegation from Konoha at a diplomatic conference with the other hidden villages. They requested a delegation of Kage, but most of us are complicit in not attending, largely as a matter of bad timing. I don't think Iron really expected us to go. Instead, we are asked to send representatives of prominent clans, or Council members."

Typically, Hiashi cut in here—he addressed the group as if he was Kakashi's second-in-command. "It is worth mentioning that we do not know which hidden villages requested this conference. It seems as if the Land of Iron is hosting of its own accord, for no reason that we can see. It is undoubtedly a trap."

Kakashi frowned quite obviously, even behind the mask. "I see no reason that the Land of Iron should want to incur the wrath of every hidden village. They say this will be the first of a string of annual conferences between our villages. This one is meant to resolve existing complications left over from the war—reparations and whatnot—which makes me think that one of the poorer villages did request the conference. Kirigakure, maybe, or even Oto."

"Reparations?" Aburame Shibi was as impassive as his son but slightly more eloquent, for which Sakura was thankful; he cut cleanly through Hiashi's arrogant certainties. "What could Konoha have to repay?"

"Oh, this and that. Borrowed weapons, medical supplies purchased on loan," Tsunade spoke up airily. "Every village has monetary debts—those don't much matter. The important debts are the imagined ones."

Akimichi Chouza looked grim. "The other villages still blame Konoha for the war, you mean?"

"The war, Orochimaru, Akatsuki—everything that has ever harmed them." Tsunade shook her head. "This village has always had disproportionately powerful and ambitious nin. We might defeat global criminals, but first, we create them."

Hiashi's eyebrows were so severely drawn Sakura was surprised his eyes didn't cross. "Even so, they are rogues who broke their connection with the village long ago. We hold no responsibility for their actions."

"But you can understand why many would not see it that way," Chouza rumbled, crossing his arms over his girth. "Rogues are one thing, but we have not been good at keeping our own nin close."

An uncomfortable silence descended somewhere over Sasuke's head. To Sakura's great relief, the last Uchiha said nothing.

"Whether we're truly to blame or not, the other villages saw us display our wealth during and after the war," Kakashi reasoned. "They think they have a right to demand aid in money or intelligence and they know we have a surfeit of both. But we have to attend—if the moderators in Iron and all the villages agree that we owe something and we're not there to counter it, they might come with force."

"Let them," Inuzuka Tsume snarled. "They saw our own forces, too, during and after the war."

Hiashi shook his head now. "Even Konoha cannot repel so many. I do not doubt the wisdom of sending a delegation, Hokage-sama, but I am ill at ease with the idea of sending members of prominent clans to bargain for the village. Likely they ask for some kind of clan exchange. Let me assure you that none of Konoha's noble clans will willingly give family secrets away to other villages."

"The non-noble clans, as well," Inuzuka Tsume half-snarled, sending the Hyuuga patriarch an edged look. "Bloodline techniques are for blood."

Sakura felt Neji shift next to her and glanced his way: he looked vaguely awkward, and she could guess why. The only advantage the 'noble' clans of Aburame, Akimichi, Hyuuga, and Uchiha held over the other clans of the village was a position on the Council; it was likely that the Inuzuka and Nara simply didn't care enough about village politics to petition the fact. The Inuzuka were fiercely loyal to the village no matter its leadership (at least, to some extent); the Nara knew they were inherently useful and didn't feel like they had to bother with any politicking to have their interests met. Hiashi, then, was just being pompous by rubbing the 'noble' title in Tsume's face. From the disdainful look on Tsunade-shishou's face, Sakura could tell that her mentor had come to a similar conclusion.

Kakashi waved the fractiousness away with a stern eye and an easy hand. "Noble or not, it doesn't matter here. Of course I'm not suggesting you give up bloodline information. No one else will. But we can't snub a diplomatic engagement by sending any old chuunin, can we? I called you here to discuss who from your clans might have something to offer symbolically or practically. Haruno Sakura and Hyuuga Neji will coordinate security and policy for the delegation we have chosen."

"I do not think we have established a delegation as yet," Aburame Shibi objected quietly.

"Oh, I believe we have," Kakashi said cheerily. "I can't make you all give up your family members for diplomacy, but I can do what I have to for the sake of the village. This is an A-ranked mission to which I have assigned Sakura, Neji, Uchiha Sasuke, and Uzumaki Naruto."

Wait. Naruto? That couldn't be right—Kakashi wouldn't—

Sakura found Tsunade's eyes and had to fight down a smile; Kakashi knew what he was doing.

On cue, Hiashi cleared his throat. "Excuse me, Hokage-sama, but I must interrupt and ask what role your old team has here at all? Sakura-san, though skilled as a medic, is not a member of a prominent clan. I see little reason for her to co-captain this mission with my nephew. And it seems like the peak of foolishness send the last remaining Uchiha and the shinobi world's most famous jinchuuriki to a diplomatic conference of other hidden villages, particularly in such uncertain times. They'd likely kill them or capture them. Either way, the village loses irreplaceable, unique advantages over other villages."

Sakura's mouth, seconds ago curved in a smile, was now open in disbelief. Hiashi had taken the bait, but in such a way… 'skilled as a medic…' 'the village loses irreplaceable, unique advantages over other villages…' While she openly seethed, however, there was almost tactile cold coming from Sasuke in waves. "I would not be killed or captured," Sasuke said darkly, "and nor would any of my teammates."

For the second time that day, she stared at him—Neji, too, turned slightly towards the Uchiha heir. She wasn't sure if Sasuke meant that she and Naruto could take care of themselves or that Sasuke would protect them, but either way it was more inclusive by bounds than any team sentiment he'd ever voiced in public.

The suddenness of it filled her with a weird warmth. It felt almost like he'd plunged his hand into her chest all over again but instead of sending her into twisting darkness, it turned her bones into steel. She smiled as pleasantly as she could at the Hyuuga patriarch. "Hiashi-sama, I think what Hokage-sama is saying is that he has no choice to send us if no other clans are willing to send their members. Team Seven, you know, will always answer our Hokage's call."

Hiashi looked murderous.

"It appears to me, Hiashi-sama, that sending Uchiha-san and Sakura-san is a strategic move that would make Naruto an important actor simply by his absence." Neji's voice, quiet but sure, had them all turning around to where he was standing, arms folded, by the wall and by Sakura. She noticed him truly for the first time that morning. He had evidently also been training; his hair was up in a higher ponytail than usual, and he was wearing simple black warm-up clothing. It suited him. "The original Team Seven and their summons made an important picture during the war. Naruto will be implied by the presence of his teammates, even if he does not attend—as will Hokage-sama."

"Neji-san speaks well," Aburame Shibi said. "It is a symbolic gesture and a practical one. Sakura-san may offer medical knowledge as well as the image of two Hokage. She should go."

"But you can't send the Uchiha's—well, the Uchiha," Inuzuka Tsume sputtered. "He's the only—"

"The Uchiha clan," Sasuke interrupted quietly, "has represented this village for years. It will continue to do so."

Shikamaru's mother spoke up stridently. She looked out of place next to Hiashi's regality and the standard nin wear of the other shinobi—she wore civilian clothing, a purple dress and a long black coat—but her voice was strong. "Hokage-sama, I cannot presume to speak for the Nara clan. My son is now the clan head."

Kakashi smiled at her from behind the mask. "Yoshino-san, I'm especially happy you could come. I know the Nara clan is undergoing a change in leadership. I was thinking that you could offer medical or veterinary information from the libraries on your compound."

The severe-looking Inuzuka Tsume appeared to finally approve. "My daughter Hana may have some information to give in conjunction with something like that," she said. "She is an accomplished veterinarian."

Sakura had been thinking the same thing, having worked with Hana several times. "Kakashi-sensei, Konoha's primary contribution could be medical," she said. "We've made great strides in field practice as well as administration in civilian-shinobi hospitals. And if Suna is in accord, I could take part of the poison and antidote index we've been working on. That way we can avoid getting too deep into bloodline techniques. If someone else comes as a medical representative—Shizune, perhaps, or even—" She sent a beseeching look towards Tsunade, who smiled but shook her head. We couldn't spare them from the hospital. Only she, it seemed, was expendable.

Heads had swiveled her way when she'd begun speaking. Akimichi Chouza seemed to like what she was saying. "The Akimichi have several anatomical scrolls for display that do not reveal anything about specific chakra molding. I would be glad to donate those. But I'm afraid I would not send a clan member. My son Chouji has recently been on a diplomatic mission already, and quite recently."

Hiashi again cut through her ire. "Well, then. This diplomatic mission will include my nephew, Haruno Sakura, Uchiha Sasuke, and offer medical techniques and information to villages who want our livelihoods?" His voice expressed deep doubt. "I am not comfortable with this arrangement. Other villages will bring much larger delegations and have much more accomplished negotiators. Safety lies in numbers and expertise."

"By all means, then," Kakashi said in a clipped tone, sending the obviously-agitated Sakura a warning glare that said, plainly, 'keep silent'—"what other members of your clans would you put forth?"

The heads were silent. Underneath her umbrage, Sakura understood their hesitance. The journey to Iron as a known diplomatic delegation would be dangerous. The event itself lent the opportunity for traps to be sprung and secrets to be stolen. Konoha's clans had long been under threat of abduction, assassination, and massacre. But that doesn't make the rest of us disposable!

Doesn't it?

Creeping tendrils of blackness, ink-blackness, curled at the corners of her eyes.

Her head spiked with pain—she turned around at once, staring at the wall and blinking furiously. It would not do to have the clan heads see her fall to Inner, not when her role in the mission had already been so severely disparaged by Hyuuga Hiashi. It just would not do.

It's all politics, isn't it? the voice whispered, sibilant. Naruto's too valuable to risk. Sasuke is the last Uchiha. But you're not such a hot commodity. You'll do the dirty work.

It was true, she thought—of all three of them, she was the least desirable. Resentment rose to her face in the form of an angry blush as her head throbbed. Sasuke would be a curiosity, a freak show piece, and she would be his handler. Not even noticed, not even considered—a pointless ambassador, ignored by all the people of the world.

Don't be so hard on yourself. If they're interested in freak shows, you're a third of the Konoha tryptic.

She almost chuckled, but turned it into a cough and was saved from prying eyes anyway by Kakashi, who'd resumed speaking once none of the clan heads offered anyone up. "I am not worried about safety. All three nin in the diplomatic team are accomplished and self-sufficient. But I will send the team with a revolving security detail for the duration of the conference. Are you all in accord with this?"

There was acquiescence in nods and affirmatives, but Sakura felt a nasty combination of anxiety and anger coiling in her gut. How would she ever function as an ambassador? How would she keep Sasuke from pulling out the chidori when someone looked at him the wrong way? And to keep Inner tamped down the whole time… and to do it all without Naruto, who everyone in the world loved as a hero…

She felt her spine prickle and turned to find Neji watching her, a small frown on his face, his arms still folded. She realized too late that she was clenching her fists hard at her sides in a rather obvious show of discontent. He quirked an eyebrow at her and, wonder of wonders, gave a small, reassuring smile as Kakashi sat again, so heavily that the chair creaked.

"The team will leave a week from today, with full briefings taking place the morning of departure. All are dismissed. And Uzumaki Naruto isn't going," he added, in a tone that brooked no argument. "He has already been assigned to a scouting mission along our border. Just remember that as important as your clans are, this is a shinobi village first. All of you have duties to the village. This is me performing mine."


"Okay. Are you two ready?"

"Yes."

"Yep!"

"Okay. I'll, um, start. I'll just—"

"Breathe, Sakura-chan. Just breathe. Slow and deep. Give yourself space."

"Right. Right." A breath. "Okay."

"Okay."

It takes longer this time but again, here we are in the desert. The sky is still a whirlpool of dusky gray clouds—ominous, to be sure, but never delivering on their threat of rain. The air skips over the skin, which is bare.

It is, in fact, quite bare. She is naked, and wonders why for a moment before remembering that she must stay here. Staying here probably means not asking silly questions like that. Here, it simply is. So the wind plays its whispery fingers over her collarbones, ribs, elbows, the bones of her hips, the knuckles of her toes. It skates over the hard things and settles on the soft. The coarseness of the sand is not unpleasantly harsh under her feet; the million tiny pricks of pain feel good.

She breathes and waits, but when She appears She is not alone. She stands on the dune parallel, as she did last time, but now there are arms around her from behind. The wind—the wind was those long arms along. She closes her eyes so she does not see Her but only feels the warmth of other human muscle on her back. Energy seems to transfer between them—somewhere just underneath her skin, it thrums. It has been a long time since touch has been so thrilling. It has been a long time since touch.

Suddenly, it eats at her; she is an adult, after all, fully-fledged as far as such things go, and here in the freedom of her own head it is an unanswerable question: Why not?

"Because it's not real."

Ah, so She is close by. Her mouth moves of its own accord. "It feels real. That's maybe enough."

Doubtfully: "Maybe." How would She know? The hands on her move lower and higher, over the softer parts, now: stomach, thighs, cheek. "You left."

"I was startled."

"I know. That moron tried to touch you. But the goal was to get me to leave."

So many sensations. It is as if she is a part of a waterfall that never reaches the ground. "I'm good with second tries." There is the hardness of the sand under her feet and the softness of hands everywhere else; the wind whispering in her ear, or is that a voice?

"Better not listen too closely," She advises.

"Why not?"

"You hear what you want to hear."

This does not seem immediately ominous, but is worth pushing away to get at the primary question. "Why have you come back?"

"I never left."

"You know what I mean."

"You know what I mean."

It is table tennis against a wall. It is throwing yourself against a sealed door. It is poking a mirror. When the wind curls around the top of her ear, she can't hold back a sigh that sounds wanton and eager even to her own ears. She fights to stay on topic. "You say I'm stuck."

"It is generally known here."

"How do I—" Warmth pools in her stomach and below, beyond. The murmurs of the wind grow louder and she gasps. "How do I unstick myself?"

She answers, but is hard to hear—the wind is too loud, spitting a steady stream of consonants in her ear. It cups against her everywhere and she is close to splitting but manages to ask again, "How do I move?"

She can only make out a faded buzz of speech from Her. Frustrated, she opens her eyes, and abruptly the hands grasp her hard, the warmth turns into sharp heat. The wind screams, moans. "sssssstuckstuckstuckstuckstuck." But the most dizzying thing is that she sees nothing but the whirling sky—there is no ground to which she is tethered—and it is condensing, crackling, the storm coming at last—and she doesn't want to be here when it begins, that's a bad idea, and as soon as the thought crosses her mind, the thought, 'leave,' the acid burns at the back of her mouth and she knows she has to stay and see it come—but everything darkens and she spins, fear crippling her sense of self-balance-time-space-is-ing and she closes her eyes again and cannot draw a proper breath and then—

Sakura woke up on her knees in the snow and with her arms pinned behind her back and was immediately sick, with little ceremony or embarrassment, on the pristine whiteness in front of her. Someone pushed her hair behind her ears immediately, one side after the other, for which she was thankful.

Thankful until she spat and turned and realized it had been Hyuuga Neji, who was using one hand to hold her in place. With the frowning Byakugan he looked like someone she didn't want to put her back to, and yet here she was, on her knees in the snow. "I didn't want to interrupt," he said tersely, "but you…"

A distinctly weird feeling settled at the base of her skull—not quite the headache she usually got after episodes like these, but not the vertigo she'd experienced in the dream, either. She heard herself call for Naruto, who was right behind Neji, and thankfully unhurt.

He did, however, look quite serious. "You did really well, Sakura-chan. You stayed in control for a long time."

"Not long enough." She wiggled her fingers behind her back. Now the embarrassment was coming in waves that she felt redden her from tip to toe. "I think you can let go of me now."

Neji released her and his Byakugan in one movement, but the frown remained. "Sorry."

"It's okay." He'd had a firm grip on her wrists; her shoulders ached from his hold. She massaged her right one with the opposite hand, still kneeling on the grass. "So what happened?"

"You were calm," Naruto said with a shrug. "I could feel you tuning inwards and I tried to help it along—just some chanting, like Ero-Sennin taught me."

"That would've been the wind," she murmured.

He blinked. "I didn't want to touch you—not after last time. No, not like that, don't look so bad—I just didn't want to interrupt. So I tried to coax it along from here."

Coax. When would the old Naruto have ever used the word 'coax?' They really were getting older. She looked up. "And then?"

"Your chakra built up steadily," Neji answered quietly. "It did not increase, but it withdrew from all other points in your body to gather at your forehead. I have never seen that before."

Neither had she. What would that mean? That she was reversing its natural flow, yes, but also that she drained herself from being able to concentrate it anywhere else. "That explains why I didn't punch you with all my strength, last time," she said to Naruto. "And it explains the headaches and the dizziness and whatever else follows. But—what about when I woke up? What happened then?"

"It's hard to explain." Unexpectedly, Neji offered her a hand. It was to her shame that she realized she needed it; her legs were shaking. Everything was shaking. "There was quite a lot of buildup, but it wasn't—it didn't look like it needed to be released. It was swirling into a point, as if in anticipation of being stored in your seal." He let go of her hand and when she subsequently stumbled Naruto was there, like an ancient column, to keep her upright. Neji peered at her forehead as if he could still see the chakra moving in its circular, rhythmic pulses. Like the clouds in the desert, she thought. "And then you physically reacted—you tensed, and the chakra was released. It went back to its natural pathways but it washed all over you first. It ran through your brain and made its way elsewhere, and has since returned to its normal patterns."

Irritation rose fast and high in her throat. Sakura spat again. "It was my fault," she seethed. "I was getting so close—I was talking to her—and then I got uncomfortable, and I ruined it." She kneaded her forehead with the heel of her hand. "I'm so stupid. I knew I should have just gone along with it, but I didn't—it was—" Well. What had it been? She definitely didn't want to tell present company that she'd essentially been having an odd, one-sided sex dream; that would take her out of the realm of the bizarre and into the laughable, even for the stodgy Hyuuga whose help she needed. And Naruto would probably just get uncomfortable.

Naruto squeezed her shoulder. "Next time!" he said brightly. "With Neji here to help we'll figure it out by next week. Don't worry, Sakura-chan."

He was warm and solid, and she took her deserved rest against him selfishly. "Sorry about the spewing."

Neji quirked an eyebrow. "The 'spewing?'"

"What would you call it?"

Naruto gave a "heh" and reprised Neji by tucking her hair behind her ear with the hand that wasn't around her already. "You look pretty even when you puke, Sakura-chan."

She swatted him away—"You're such a dope—" because she didn't like the look Neji was sending her way, and she had a feeling it had to do with the way Naruto had touched her. Her cheeks flushed again and she rushed to change the topic. "Do you have any thoughts on our first security team for Iron? I was hoping for your team—TenTen and Lee would be good company on the journey."

Neji seemed surprised that she'd named his friends, but overcame it quickly and nodded. "TenTen, Lee, yes. I would also like Shino to join the squad. I think for the replacement team we should get the Inuzuka siblings. They would be a good addition."

Naruto's arm was still warm around her; she felt it tense at talk of the mission in which he wouldn't take part. "But how would we get the clan heads to agree to Shino and Kiba and Hana?"

Neji offered a quietly confident grin. "It's listed as a security mission, not a voluntary diplomatic assignment. They couldn't deny Hokage-sama so easily for that."

"And the families will be paid from the village coffers, wouldn't they?" Sakura mused. "That's devious. So even if they're not part of our diplomatic squad, clan members are in some way represented at the conference." Hana would be a huge help for deciphering the Inuzuka veterinary scrolls—animal medicine was never Sakura's specialty—and Shino, Lee, and TenTen were respectable nin, all skilled in their own right and good friends besides. They would be able to keep an eye for externalities while she and Neji managed diplomacy and Sasuke. "What about Shikamaru?"

Neji was looking at the sky now, watching a flock of birds press their wings against the gray. "The Nara are not eager to send their newest heir into a potentially dangerous situation."

Naruto was shaking his head. "I don't get it. Why do they think it's so dangerous? The villages haven't gone directly against each other since before the war."

Neji was always parsimonious with his motions—Sakura noticed that he lifted only one shoulder in a shrug. Maybe he'd adopted it from Hiashi, or maybe it was a Hyuuga thing? The poverty in his normal movement made the extravagance of his Divine Punishment into an art. "Perhaps they think it's about time, then. Clan secrets have always been jealously guarded, and all peace is fragile. This call for reparations is probably an excuse to see how—and to what extent—the village has rebuilt."

"The Hyuuga aren't worried about you going?"

"I'm Branch Family. The clan does not mind."

An awkward silence came after that, in which Sakura could tell Naruto was itching to say something that Neji would not be happy to hear. "Let's go inside," she said quickly. "I can clean this up in a moment. Neji—dinner, as promised?"

The grown prodigy struck quite a figure on her lawn: tall, immaculate, capable in his jounin vest and heavy overcoat. She remembered the small smile of yesterday morning, when he'd seen her struggling with herself. He was always a good captain; she wondered if he'd be a good co-captain. He shook his head. "I don't think so," he said unapologetically, and then amended: "Not this time."

"Next time, then," Naruto said again. As if there were infinitely many of them.


Next time, though, would have to be delayed, because the next day at four twenty-three PM Shiranui Genma collapsed at the front gates with a blonde bundle in his arms and blood leaking from his mouth.

Inner had been acting up all day, and Sakura's head was throbbing with the effort of suppressing her during her hospital shift. She suspected it had something to do with the 'success' of yesterday's meditation; delving so deeply into her own head must somehow make her increasingly susceptible to Inner's poking, prodding thoughts. Knowing why she was having such difficulty didn't alleviate it, though, and Sakura had spent the afternoon attempting smiles for her patients that left her breathless and grimacing for any poor soul who might pass her in the corridor.

When a red-faced and breathless Udon burst into the room, Sakura was working on a long-term case—a fifty-something retired shinobi with intractable nerve damage who had to stop by frequently for checkups—and the severity of her frown was intensified, she knew, by the pain in her head that had bloomed with the crash of the door against the wall. "Udon," she scowled, "what have I told you about—"

"It's Yamanaka Ino-san, senpai," he said, pushing his glasses up from where they'd slid in his haste to get to her. "She's just come back and she's in the emergency wing. Shiranui Genma-san, too."

Sakura kept her composure and did not immediately drop her hands from Ichiro-san's knee (although they twitched with the desire for doing so), but she was well aware of her heart leaving its usual spot and taking up residence in her throat. "Ichiro-san, I'm going to have to leave you—my apologies. I'll send in a doctor to finish the check-up, but it all looks normal for now." As quickly as possible, she stripped off her gloves and signed his chart in a dotty series of signs that looked nothing like her name. My hands are shaking.

Ichiro-san nodded. "No problem. Go quickly, Sakura-san."

Of course. Ichiro was retired, but he was still a shinobi; he knew what it meant for a friend to come back from a mission and head straight to the emergency wing. Sakura walked at a fast clip through the door Udon held open for her and the sound of her boots on the cleaned floor made a dull thump that echoed through her bones and up to her skull, where it joined the knocking in her head. "What do you know?"

"Not much—I saw her when the nurses were wheeling her in—" The young genin must have seen her face tighten, because he hurried to make it sound better than it was. "She wasn't bloody," he offered helpfully. "Genma-san was bleeding heavily."

Sakura felt her lips tighten. Not bloody but unable to walk nonetheless—that rarely signified anything good. "Were they awake?"

"I couldn't tell, senpai, their eyes were closed. I saw Ino-san and came to find you. I know she's your friend."

Tenderness for this odd, misplaced boy shot through her like a poison, and she almost stumbled; instead, she put a hand on his head, like Kakashi used to do with Naruto. "Go get one of the doctors in the break room to tend to Ichiro-san. It shouldn't take more than ten minutes or so to finish his examination."

"Okay. S-sorry."

"Don't be sorry," she said, sparing him a glance before barreling through the emergency wing doors. "You've done exactly the right thing."

Hurry up or there won't be much left of her to save, you dolt.

Stop that!

The on-duty nurse looked up at the thud of Sakura's feet and the swish of her coat and immediately stood to attention. "Shiranui and Yamanaka. Which rooms, and what happened?" Sakura's voice sounded strong and consistent to her own ears, which was a good sign, because really it felt like ants were crawling up her spine.

"Shiranui is in three-oh-five, Yamanaka in three-two-six. Shiranui is conscious, with multiple lacerations and a broken sternum; blunt trauma, possible internal hemorrhaging. Yamanaka appears to have suffered a penetrating head injury and has been unconscious since reception. Shiranui carried her as far as the gates before dropping. Shizune-sama is tending to her."

Sakura swallowed hard. "So Genma needs help."

"We just called for you, Sakura-sama."

Had they? She hadn't even noticed it. "I was already on my way. Okay—okay, I'll see Genma first. Come find me immediately if Yamanaka's condition goes south. Immediately."

"Of course."

Sakura burst into room 305 to find three medic-nin with their hands on him already. She joined them, pooling her chakra into his hands to find the abnormalities. Genma didn't look good; he was breathing shallowly and his eyes were misty with tears of pain. Blood covered him like a second skin. But he was awake, and he was looking at her. His trademark senbon-smile came without the senbon. "Sakura. Always… pretty face."

"You idiots always talk," she growled, eyes closed to better sense his injuries, "when you really shouldn't. I'm getting a broken sternum and two ribs and a laceration of the right coronary artery. Bleeding is getting worse. He needs ventilation and some hypertonic saline—right now. Go, go, and get three more medics while you're at it. I'm going to try to find where the bleeding's coming from. And Genma-san, we're going to have to shut you down, okay? Don't worry. You're in good hands."

He only grimaced; she felt adrenaline shoot through her like lightning in her own, mercilessly whole, body. As the medic to her left administered the anesthetic, she couldn't help but shake her head—how had Genma even made it this far? There was some very, very minimal evidence of healing at his sternum, which meant that Ino had likely tried to put him back together until she'd been knocked out herself. The cuts on Genma's arms were fresh. So how had he managed to carry an unconscious Ino with internal bleeding so close to his heart? He'd have collapsed within four kilometers, at most.

Unless they were attacked close to the village.

She hated when Inner was helpful. As the backup she requested ran in, pulling on their gloves, she immediately sent one of them back again. "Someone—tell the Hokage that they might have been attacked close to the village. Probably no further than five to ten kilometers from the gates. We need to fortify the entrance. And get a civilian surgeon in here, too, please."

"Hai!"

She didn't pay attention to who had run off to deliver her message; Genma was still bleeding, and she couldn't find the cut. I wish I had Hyuuga eyes right now. But there—there it was, a weakly-pulsing artery, leaking blood like it was no problem at all from where his broken rib had nicked it. "Fuck," she said quietly. This was going to be more work than she'd thought, and every moment working on Genma was a moment leaving Ino unattended. But that was the wrong way to think about it. She had chosen this patient, not the other, and this patient needed her, and Ino was with Shizune anyway. I might be more of a fighter than Shizune, but she's still a better medic. Ino will be fine. It would be better to go in there and do it yourself. What if Shizune makes a mistake?

Sakura firmly pushed herself out of the way. "Okay. We're going to need to slice him. Can you keep his ribs back for me before healing them? I found the cut and I need both hands to do a ligature."

Surgery was always a messy business. Sakura remembered the feeling of first sinking her hands into another body, although it had been a fish's: a fat carp, fleshy and full of slippery guts, which Tsunade had injured rather crassly by whacking it against the dock. "Go," she'd said simply. "Diagnose and heal." It had been a similar problem of blunt trauma and the resulting internal damage: the fish had to be operated upon, because even her precise chakra control couldn't tie off an artery or heal damaged organs without being in close contact with the injury itself—there was too much meat and bone in the way, even in a fish. Sakura had used her hands as a scalpel and cut cleanly through the flesh (which was nothing, she would come to find, like cutting through human flesh) and then set to work on repairing the internal organs. When she finished, panting and proud at their health, Tsunade had been watching her with a wry smile. "A picture-perfect surgery," she'd said, not unkindly, "with one problem." Sakura looked: the fish was already dead. She'd been restoring useless organs to their former glory without even checking to see if the thing was still alive to enjoy them.

Genma was not a fish, though, and if years of medical work had taught Sakura anything, it was that the human body had an extraordinary will to continue being. Thirty minutes later the artery was temporarily closed and the bleeding staunched. The civilian surgeon, Dr. Okamura, watched over her work as a witness for the surgery; she did the final healing with chakra. Her heart was in her mouth the whole time and her mind counted the minutes she'd spent sealing Genma's artery and repairing his chest. Twenty-three. Twenty-four and thirty. Twenty-five…

She threw off her gloves and blood-smeared coat and ran into 326, where only Shizune stood above the pale blonde-haired woman Sakura had come to save, writing on a clipboard. Sakura whirled around, looking frantically for more faces, for action. She found none. The gentle light coming through the window was a mockery. "What happened? Is she okay?"

Shizune raised dark eyes to her in pity and understanding. "I've healed the damage, but there was some cranial bleeding from a strike to the head and a fractured skull on top of that. She might be out for a while."

"Some cranial—" Sakura didn't bother with gloves this time, but placed her hands on Ino's head and chest, let her chakra swim through her system, took everything in. Shizune was right, of course. There was evidence of a skull-piercing injury and a clean heal. Sakura swallowed again, but nothing in her body seemed to feel like moving. She released her chakra but kept her hands where they were: on Ino's forehead and at the juncture of neck and chest. "So she's in a coma?"

The older woman nodded. "I've called for her family and her team. Besides that, we'll have to wait for Genma to wake up to hear the whole story. Did he say anything to you?"

Genma, Sakura remembered, had been on teams with Shizune back when she was still in the field. Shizune's gaze was steady, but Sakura knew her well enough to recognize worry. "He's stable," she offered meekly, ashamed that she hadn't said as much immediately. "He didn't say anything, but he was—he was too bad for them to have been attacked far from the village and still make it here. I sent word to Kakashi-sensei to fortify the gates."

Shizune nodded. "Good. I'll let you stay with Ino, then. Tsunade-sama will come by soon to do a last check up."

Sakura let out a breath between her teeth. It hissed. Her brain felt pressed too close to the confines of her skull and she thought of the pain that Ino must have felt, and then the fear. "Thank you, Shizune."

Shizune smiled and handed Sakura the clipboard; she took it listlessly and let it hang like an extension of her arm. "You did well, I'm sure," she reminded her gently. "You always do."

Better with humans than with fish.

Sakura let herself smile, but felt it must look a little grim. "You, too." Shizune exited the room and Sakura stared at the door for a moment more before collapsing on the chair by her friend's bed. Shizune had shaved side of Ino's head to better assess the injury, but the rest of that Yamanaka cornsilk hair was swept aside, bangs and all, revealing a rare full look at Ino's face. Her lips moved, just barely, not forming words but seemingly making the effort.

Sakura slowly tore the band from her hair and let it fall over her face like curtains or blinders, directing her gaze at Ino's closed eyes.


That was how Shikamaru found her: sitting slumped in contrast to the straight-backed posture she generally adopted at hospital bedsides, with legs akimbo and hair falling down her face, and her hand on the bed. He took it in quickly and shut the door behind him. The sound roused Sakura to turn.

The blank look on her face had him sighing already. "She's in a coma," she told him without prompting. "A penetrating head wound. Unknown adversary. Genma carried her to the gates before collapsing himself."

Ino looked remarkably clean and well, but Shikamaru knew enough to realize that internal injuries were frequently the most damaging. "You shaved her head. She won't like that."

Sakura smiled wryly. "Thankfully, you can blame Shizune, not me. I operated on Genma. He had a—he'd punctured an artery with a broken rib. It was a more immediate trauma. Do you want to sit down?"

He shook his head. "You look more tired than I feel." You look terrible is what he'd really thought, but such things are unwisely voiced. Sakura did, however, look terrible, in marked distinction with her happiness days ago at Kakashi's inauguration. Her eyes were dark, her cheeks pale. She seemed to sag under the weight of her medic's uniform. "Have any Yamanaka come by?"

"You're the first," she said, dropping the clipboard she'd been holding onto the floor with an echoing clatter. She leaned back in the chair and raked her hands through her hair and he wondered how long she'd kept herself still and silent, waiting for a movement from her friend on the bed. "Where's Chouji?"

"On his way back from a bodyguard stint."

"Alone?"

She'd asked it with some urgency. "Yes—I think so. Why?"

Sakura's mouth tightened. "I think Ino and Genma were attacked close to the gates. Genma was bleeding heavily—with the extent of his injuries, there's no way he would have been able to carry her long. I told Kakashi-sen—Hokage-sama."

Shikamaru walked towards Ino's bed and took a good look at his teammate. She seemed at peace, but a quiet Ino made him nervous. "I'd bet good money that their attackers vacated once Genma got them out of there. Chouji will be fine." No doubt the gates had been reinforced and an ANBU squad and tracking team sent out to find the attackers—Konoha never took chances when violence occurred nearby. Chouji would probably be tested and interrogated upon his return, but it was probably safer to return now than it normally would be. "Will she wake up?"

Sakura nodded. "Most likely. Shizune did a good job, and there wasn't too much cortical damage. But the body doesn't take kindly to brain injuries—she's going to need time to heal."

"So you don't know when she's going to wake up."

Mutely, pink hair swayed a negative. Shikamaru resisted the urge to cradle her head in his palm. It was not the time for gestures like that, no matter how comforting for either of them (or both). Instead, he tapped her shoulder. "Hey, you should go home, Sakura."

"Someone from the hospital should be here to meet the Yamanaka," she protested.

Of course she protested. She was stubborn and self-sacrificing, like her whole damn team. It was not attractive and nor was it smart, but Shikamaru knew he was just about powerless to change her mind. "Then get someone else," he ordered nonetheless, feeling rancorous. "One of your subordinates or some other doctor. You should get out of here and get some rest. How's your head?"

It was a pointed question, and she frowned at him for it. "I feel fine."

He felt obstinate against her resentment, or maybe just angry for Ino's sake. It was hard to tell. "Look, don't be stupid about—"

"I am not," she snarled, with a peculiar curl on the 'not,' and stood up with such fluidity that his hand fell from her shoulder. Shikamaru stared as Sakura's pupils shrank in and grew out again; she blinked and blushed a hard, embarrassed red. "I'm sorry," she mumbled, "I'm so sorry, I didn't…" She looked again at the sleeping Ino and could manage only a mangled-sounding "irresponsible."

There was a risk of tears here, and with realizing it Shikamaru felt his irritation abate. "Go home," he said again, gentler this time. "Or at least go take a break. You probably saved Genma's life, and you—"

Suddenly she was hugging him—he didn't quite know how it had happened, only that her head was against his collarbone and her arms were around him. She was warm, and strong, and it took him a moment of processing to manipulate his arms in a reciprocal position around her shoulders.

They stayed that way for several moments, in which Shikamaru tried to force his heart to beat quieter. It didn't work. Into his vest Sakura said, "I have a mission coming up."

The change in topic startled him, but she didn't let go, so Shikamaru didn't release his hold, either. "The diplomatic thing in Iron? My mom told me about it."

"The clan doesn't want you to go, I hear." She paused. He could feel her breath warm his chest and then she was letting go and stepping back again, clear-eyed. Air rushed to fill the space she'd made between them. "I'm working with Neji and Sasuke."

Everything about that sentence bothered him. "I don't believe I could come up with a worse mission," he said with fake solemnity, trying to get a smile out of her. "I'm fine with not going and leaving you to their mercies."

It sort of worked; she chuckled. "Neji-san's not so bad," she said with a shrug. "But I don't know how long it will be, dealing with Sasuke."

"Diplomatic events are inherently too long," he said, shoving his hands in his pockets. He let his eyes wander over her face, which she'd closed off after stepping away from him. "But don't stay away forever or Ino will go to drag you back. When she wakes up." He winced at the additional statement, but Sakura seemed to have been thinking the same thing, for she only nodded.

Iron might be a dangerous place, given its involvement in the Matsuo debacle—especially for Sakura, if by some chance she had a freak encounter with a samurai who recognized her as Tsukiko. She was probably going a) practically, to rein in the Uchiha, and b) diplomatically, as the former Hokage's apprentice, but it was possible that Kakashi also considered her as c) bait—a way to test the Land of Iron, in case some samurai did recognize her and Iron took action against them. "Stay vigilant in Iron," he said suddenly, like a parent—as if she needed a reminder, this jounin medic with the strength of a hundred who had undoubtedly already realized that she was at risk.

Indeed, when she looked at him with raised eyebrows he could have kicked himself. Haruno Sakura had a habit of pulling words from him like stray threads. Unraveling him.

She said only, "thanks, Shika," and very quietly at that. Then, with another look at Ino, she sighed and seemed to give in to something. "I think I will go home, after all. Could you stay until I get another doctor in here?"

He nodded. "I was going to stay anyway. Until Chouji gets here." There was no telling how Chouji would react to the sight of their beautiful teammate on a hospital bed, pale and silent for who knows how long. Chouji had never handled Ino's injuries well. It made Shikamaru wonder, but then, who was he to ask or judge? He was the one reminding a very capable ANBU medic-nin to be careful on her missions.

"Thanks." Sakura reached down to pick up the clipboard she'd dropped and attached it professionally to the footboard of Ino's bed. "In case I don't see you again before I go—keep a close eye on her, okay?"

"Of course." How could he not? But as he thought it, and as Sakura turned to go, another thought, brief and muscular, of Sakura coming home in similar condition—or not coming home at all—struck him with unwarranted force.

It was not unusual for shinobi to die on the job, although Konoha had always been blessed with extremely capable nin and thus a startlingly high survival rate. It was not unusual to lose a friend early in life, or for never leave his hospital bed alive. Shikamaru thought briefly of his father and of Asuma, of Mirai and of Kurenai and of his mother, and of Ino and Sakura in a booth with him, teasing him about Temari.

Of all things, Shikamaru was not irrational. Watching Sakura move towards the door, and thinking about all of the real and potential loss of his past two years, it felt rational to reach for her wrist and mumble "wait"—although he wasn't sure if that's what he'd actually said—and it seemed prudent to cup her head at the juncture of skull and neck like he'd wanted to earlier, and when he calculated his odds and found it probable that kissing her—kissing her anywhere, though he finally landed on the side of her mouth, the corner that lifted in the event of a smile—was a good idea, and a fair one, and sensible.