Hmm ...yet another piecewise chapter, I'm afraid. :( Not because of Word, at least - but rather because of the Internet. Ahh, rainy days. :) Which I love. Perfect day to curl up with the cat and sip a cup of hot cocoa while the baby kicks. And writing, of course... ;)

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

A WhiteWalled Christmas

-CHAPTER ELEVEN: IN THE MIDST OF MADMEN-

-0-

"Why hellooooo doctor!" Hidan's voice rang out.

Kabuto whirled around. There, lounging less than a table's length away, was Mifune Hidan in all his glory. The inmate was wearing a crazed grin. It would have been sinister, but for the almost-childish joy radiating from it.

In Hidan's left hand was a huge butcher's knife.

Kabuto dropped the scraping tool in alarm. The tool made a dull clattering noise as it bounced off the cadaver in front of him and landed next to it on the metal drawer.

Quick to compose himself, Kabuto asked in a cool voice, "Searching for a way out, Hidan? Did Orochimaru send you?" Inside, his mind was whirring. How did Hidan get in?

Hidan shook his head gleefully. "I don't have one whit to say about that fucking pedophile!" he said cheerfully. "You and I have unfinished business!"

Kabuto scoffed. "You speak of Orochimaru's pedophilia like it's a bad thing. Wouldn't you be able to resonate with him…?" That's it, change the subject... the head doctor urged himself silently.

"Not a fucking chance, doctor!" Hidan practically sang. "And guess what, right now you are going to die! Congratulations, bitch! You're going to be the first on my list of victims to get your balls nailed to the wall." He leered dangerously at Kabuto. "Don't you wish now that you had let me kill people while I was imprisoned here, doctor? Could have gotten on my good side… But no, it was always, 'No, no fucking killing allowed here' and shit like that. You bastard!" His grin turned feral.

If there was one thing Kabuto hated, it was being treated like a mouse in the cat's paws.

"…Oh really?" Though he had a hard time keeping his demeanor quiet and calm, he had no trouble in lacing his voice with contempt, "And wouldn't you say Ten Ten has been a victim enough, hmm," he said, "of you ceaselessly groping her?" …While meanwhile, his hand searched for the scalpel in his pockets. If he could just get to it before Hidan went postal-

Kabuto was known to be very good with a scalpel. Even a doctor's hands are not innocent of blood. In fact, he wondered sometimes if the record in this hospital-prison really should go to him and not Sasori.

Hidan's eyes narrowed. "At least that bitch isn't fucking under-aged!" he growled indignantly. "Quit fucking lecturing me like I'm some kind of fucking pedophile, like your precious doctor's pet, that fucking snake bastard!" His grip tightened on the cleaver.

"Oh really, Hidan?" Kabuto sneered, somehow forgetting what he had been preparing to do to Sakura minutes before, "You think you're above it? I saw you, you know."

There was a moment's pause. "What did you see, Doctor?" Hidan asked forcefully.

"Grabbing her and feeling her up against the bars of your cell..." Kabuto said, keeping Hidan distracted as he kept searching - where was that scalpel? "Really, mooning after a guard, not even a normal civilian girl from back home? Someone you can never have?" The inmate's arm seemed to drop a little, and Kabuto saw it. He hissed: "You're pathetic."

If Head Doctor Yakushi had been trying to somehow regain his superiority over Hidan, or somehow keep him talking to delay him from attacking, he had failed miserably. At that moment, Hidan's patience wore out, and fire roared behind his eyes—

"Don't you fucking dare!" the Jashinist spat. "Just because I'm here, I'm crazy, doesn't mean I'm not a fucking human being! I feel lust just like anyone else on this fucking wretched planet! And you're dead, bitch!"

-And Kabuto found his scalpel.

But it was too late.

With an enraged shout, Hidan leaped forward, swinging the cleaver in a wide arc. The blade cut into Kabuto's right arm and he clutched it, screaming. Blood ran from the wound. His grip on the scalpel slackened, and he raised one hand in self-defense. Suddenly, he was minus two fingers. The inmate cut them off in his rage. By now, Kabuto had tried to lunge forward to wrest the butcher's knife away ...Hidan stepped out of reach and swung again.

Kabuto ducked behind the table to avoid getting a full hit. He lunged again, but the inmate stepped back once so the doctor lost his balance, then grabbed him and pulled him to his knees, striking him mercilessly. Kabuto felt the knife cut into his shoulderblades and he screamed again. Hidan kept attacking him relentlessly, not even caring that he wasn't yet going in for the kill. Just hacking, hacking...

Truthfully he wished he were holding his scythe in his hand – but he was sure that was locked up in some police vault for further evidence of his crimes, should he ever be brought to trial – but the meat cleaver worked just fine. How lucky he was that Tobi managed to unlock the doors to the kitchen just as he was searching for a way in …and how fortunate that he should so happen to find a map to the place, seemingly abandoned in the hallways.

Maybe Kabuto had dropped it.

His loss, the bastard.

The knife swiped at Kabuto's head, knocking the doctor's glasses off. Blurred, he could barely make out Hidan swooping in on him.

Pain, then—

Darkness.

-0-

"…I just can't believe it," Sakura mumbled as she sat on the edge of the bed, putting her clothes on.

Suigetsu stood a respectful distance away, but his eyes peered at her curiously. Sakura look over her shoulder, caught him staring, and blushed.

"Suigetsu! I thought you were supposed to be a decent person, rescuing me from that rapist – and now you're looking at me while I'm changing!"

The waterlike man blinked and lowered his eyes, smiling a bit. "Just because I'm rescuing you, doesn't mean I won't stare at you. You're a beautiful woman, Sakura; any man would stare."

The nurse lost her composure for a second and seemed at a loss for words. Then she perked up with a half-smile on her face – one that was decidedly out of place for the severity of the situation.

"If I were a man of lesser caliber, I wouldn't have untied you. I would have taken you right there on that table," he joked. Sakura flinched, not happy with the reminder of what had almost happened. "But as it is..." Suigetsu grinned cheekily, before Sakura could say anything, "I limit myself to looking! Besides, we have to hurry and help Juugo..."

Sakura forced a smile to her face at her patient's attempt to cheer her up.

"So you admit you're a rescuer but also a Peeping Tom?"

Suigetsu didn't speak; he answered her by hastily turning away further and affording her full privacy. Sakura looked at him, amused, for a second before she let his compliment about her beauty sink in.

"Thanks," she said.

They were silent for a moment as Sakura quickly zipped up her scrubs.

"This whole situation seems unreal…" Suigetsu heard her whisper. He chanced a look; Sakura's back was frozen, rigid. He turned his body and approached her. A frightened look was in her eyes and she seemed paralyzed by her thoughts. "How could this be really happening?"

He grabbed her wrists. "Reality has a way of disintegrating for us patients on a regular basis. Come on, hurry," he said urgently, "We'll walk and talk at the same time."

"Who'd have thought Hidan would be coming to help me against the likes of Kabuto," Sakura mumbled.

Suigetsu stilled. "He's not."

This alarmed her. "What—?"

"He's not here to save you. You're next. The only reason why he targeted Kabuto first is because he saw him walking down the way when we first came in. He didn't even know I was following him…" He tugged her to her feet and together they hurried out of the operating room – but not before Sakura managed to grab a couple of syringes off the table, no doubt sedatives Kabuto had intended to use on her. Or perhaps the ones that had been in her pocket. Her pockets were empty.

Once they were outside of the room, the fear suddenly ratcheted up for Sakura. Strangely the room almost felt like a sanctuary compared to out here in the hall. Her patient must have felt the same way.

"Can you grab Juugo's meds?" Suigetsu asked frantically. They could hear the sounds of a slaughter taking place a couple of rooms down. A meaty smack was heard. No more screams. Sakura realized that the screams she'd heard earlier, while she'd been tied to the table, were real.

"Why?" She indicated the syringe, "Couldn't I just use—"

"No, don't you see? We have to calm him down, not knock him out! He'll be dead weight otherwise—"

"So you're planning on escaping—?"

"Well what do you expect?" Suigetsu asked, frustrated. "The Akatsuki are after us. They want to kill us all, except for the people they need who are useful. They're after Sasuke and Gaara, that's for sure."

Sakura remembered hearing Pein say that, the ruthless gleam in the patient's eyes as he appraised her red-headed charge.

"What's to stop them from killing us?" Suigetsu looked at her with wide eyes. "You have to get us out of here."

"And why should I trust you?" Sakura asked suddenly. Suigetsu hushed her to a whisper as they went through a back hallway, circumventing Kabuto's office and avoiding Hidan catching a glimpse of them. "What's to say you're not going to kill me as soon as I subdue Juugo? Huh? What's to say you're not going to go out and kill someone else?"

"I—" Suigetsu was getting impatient. "Just come with me this way and I will convince you. Anything to get away from Hidan, alright?"

Sakura looked at him stubbornly before nodding reluctantly.

"Good – where are your keys?"

She looked at him incredulously, even as she followed him past the back room and back into the main hospital bay. "I don't have any keys! If I did, wouldn't I have found a way out already? You guys took them from me! And I have no idea how!"

"We didn't take your keys, we took Ten Ten's…" Suigetsu broke off, deep in thought. He seemed to make a grim decision. "No other way… we have to break open these cabinets!" He gestured to the medicine drawers in front of them – all of which were still locked.

"We have to wait until Hidan finishes killing Kabuto," Sakura corrected, "If he hasn't already. Then we have to raid Kabuto's corpse. Ten Ten's keys wouldn't have the medical cabinets on them …but Kabuto's would. He's head doctor after all."

"Ex-head doctor," Suigetsu mumbled.

"Besides, it's not like I have a choice. Right now it's either you or Hidan." She kept that thought about Gaara well in the back of her head.

Suigetsu nodded, with a grim smile on his face.

"Let's hide somewhere…" They made their way cautiously towards one of the back rooms. "When it's time, I'll go get the keys. You be prepared to run," Suigetsu said urgently. "Keep a lookout for Hidan."

"And you're sure you're not going to bring him back to kill me…?" Sakura asked skeptically.

Suigetsu grimaced. "He's part of the Akatsuki. Don't tell me you didn't know? The prison gang? About half the folks here have connections from outside. Don't ask me how I know. But they're willing to kill anyone who gets in their way – especially lowly criminals like us."

Sakura heard the bitterness in his voice. "So he doesn't even know you're here helping me?"

Suigetsu scoffed. "He doesn't even know I followed him. If he does, we're both dead." He took a deep breath. "I'm going to have a look. He tends to bathe in the blood of his victims for a while – that's what I gathered anyway. I'll see if he's done. Hopefully he doesn't take the keys before us…"

He slipped out into the hallway, and Sakura waited behind with growing apprehension.

-0-

Suigetsu knew he could very likely die as he ventured out of the nook he and Sakura had hidden themselves in. He wondered to himself what was worth him risk getting killed over.

Juugo. That's right. He's my friend. Friends don't let each other down.

He gritted his teeth and stepped around the last corner, peering into the room. As he looked, he heard the sound of cussing. Hidan wasn't in there. It seemed the cussing was coming from the direction of the operating room.

He slipped inside the head doctor's office and looked around, spotting him immediately.

Kabuto was lying face-up on the floor, blood splattered everywhere. The scene was so ghastly; Suigetsu was taken aback, even though he had witnessed - been the cause of, in fact - many similar bloody scenes. Gingerly, for he hated touching bodies after he was done with them, he reached into the head doctor's pocket. Keys - yes. He pulled them out, thanking his lucky stars that Hidan hadn't taken them first, and pocketed them. He turned to go, hearing the sound of furniture - likely the table - crashing from the operating room. But he couldn't get the image out of his head of a meat cleaver, stuck through Kabuto's head, and his wide, unseeing eyes...

-0-

"Let's get out of here," Suigetsu whispered to Sakura as soon as he returned. The image had shaken him - again, not because he hadn't seen dead bodies before (obviously he had, though it had been a while), but rather because Hidan had a real probability of making them his next victims.

"And you're not going to kill anyone else once you get out of here? How do I know I'm not helping two murderers escape?" Sakura asked as they crept back towards the medicine cabinets.

"Juugo never wished to be a killer," Suigetsu informed her in a low voice as he handed her the keys, careful not to let them jingle. "I thought you knew that. And me…? I've never had friends before I met Juugo. I guess you could say I'm a little…" he shifted almost sheepishly, "…manic."

Compassion filled her suddenly, and sympathy. "What do you mean, Suigetsu?" She found the key she was looking for and started unlocking the cabinets. She found that talking helped keep her mind from panicking so much at the idea of Hidan in the next room - who was audibly smashing the furniture, as it were. She shuddered - and then Suigetsu's next words took all her distraction away.

He sighed. "I have a friend now: Juugo. I'd much rather keep us safe and alive – and Sasuke too, if he comes with us – than go back to killing people." There was a thoughtful expression on his face. "You know ...it's honestly something I think I might be able to give up. Even the rude ones!" He half-smiled but then quickly looked serious again. "But for Juugo? He doesn't want to kill. He wants help stopping his urges. And I want help to overcome my OCDs and my mania. I'm aware I look like an idiot when I can't stop giggling! I don't want to feel that way!" He sighed. "If I get out of here tonight, I swear Juugo and I are getting help. We're gonna live normal lives again someday."

"…And Zabuza? You don't want to be his protégé in the killing art anymore?"

"Quite frankly, no," he said. "And to be honest, I'm getting the impression he doesn't want to anymore either."

Sakura nodded and finally opened the cabinet. Quickly she retrieved Juugo's pills. "You know, Suigetsu–"

"Found you, bitches!" a wild voice suddenly cackled. Sakura and Suigetsu didn't even have time to scream. They bolted just as Hidan came from the operating room, his torso, hands, and face covered completely in blood.

-0-

Sakura was terrified. Again.

As she and Suigetsu tried to run from the madman, she called out to her partner-in-cahoots. "Suigetsu! Where's Juugo right now?"

"He's- pant- somewhere near the solitary confinement cells! He tried to confine himself before he lost it- pant- entirely on a rampage!"

"You're dead, bitches!" Hidan shouted.

"Hn, listen bitch, you gotta catch us first!" Suigetsu yelled back. "And if we get to Juugo first, he might kill you! You should just focus on leaving this place!"

"Now now," Hidan chuckled. "Where's the fun in that?"

"Sakura, whatever you do, get to where Juugo is," Suigetsu hissed. Sakura panted in response. Her lungs and legs were screaming! Pure adrenaline rushed through her body. Pure fear. She had seen the look on her pursuer's face when he caught them. Bloodlust and malevolence shone in his eyes.

"Hey blondie!" Hidan howled from somewhere behind them. "Did you hear that? These bitches are looking for Juugo! Let's get 'em!"

Sakura heard more footsteps joining Hidan's and a muted curse.

"Don't call me blondie, un! And who are we getting? That Nurse Pinky or something?"

Shit, Deidara.

"Oh chill out you fucking girly-man! We can't help it you're blond. Yeah, her and Suigetsu are making a run for it! And we all know blonds are fucking moron dumbasses!"

"SHUT UP, un! I'll blow you up later!"

Sakura couldn't believe it. Here they were chasing them and holding a happy normal conversation, like they were having a casual chase!

"I'm only helping you cuz I can't find Tobi. Asshole gave me the slip, un!"

"Tobi's a retard."

"So are you! Why haven't you thrown this at them yet?"

"You do it."

"Damnit!"

Sakura heard a thud behind her and chanced a look over her shoulder. They had Suigetsu! She stopped immediately, torn about what to do. There were two syringes in her pocket - should she use them?

"Hah, no more fucking running for you!" Hidan yelled gleefully. Suigetsu winced in pain. Deidara had thrown yet another knife at Suigetsu. It seems Hidan had stocked up when he went to the kitchen. Horrified, Sakura watched as they ganged up on Suigetsu, who was down on the ground staring up at them.

"Fuck!" she swore loudly.

Deidara's eyes moved fast and he stared after her as she slowed down, looking back. "Don't worry," he said lowly. "I'll get someone else to chase her while we deal with him." And he began to walk off casually in the direction of the main cell block. Apparently he knew where to find someone ...for moments later, she heard Pein's voice.

"Fuck!" she swore again and ran. Before she did, she could have sworn she caught a glimpse of raven hair, swooping in on them.

-0-

She made it to the solitary confinement cells, panting and almost crying. Suigetsu! During these last few months, as she had gotten to know her patients, she had found his humor refreshing, and she knew he valued his friendship with Juugo a lot. He was crazy – but then, they all were. Especially, it appeared, certain head doctors, she thought darkly.

Certain head doctors who were no longer around.

What would have happened to her if Suigetsu hadn't come then and saved her?

Suigetsu. She had left him to die. To those madmen.

Shuddering in revulsion, Sakura wondered if her definition of "mad" was changing. From the disgusting display she had seen of Kabuto, she began to wonder if some of the real madmen weren't the ones on the outsides of the cells instead.

Yesterday she would have said that mad people were the ones who had clear unmistakable symptoms, who seemed compelled to do things, almost as if they did not have control most of the time… People who didn't understand their own minds, whose minds could not be easily understood.

But maybe there were diseases that no one had ever heard of before. Or ones that no one understood. What causes someone to hurt others so profoundly yet wear such a normal façade? Like a wolf in sheep's clothing. Sheer sociopathy, that's what.

Yes, she knew there were crazy people out in the real world. Never had she met one whose credentials were so high.

Kabuto is crazier than Suigetsu, she realized. And quickly her mind put into place that uncomfortable feeling she always had when she had been working in Kabuto's lab. The creepiness that crawled over her body when he mentioned the likeness of animal brain abnormalities to humans'…

She suspected suddenly that those theories he'd mentioned…

Oh Kami! He really had been experimenting on patients, hadn't he? she thought, almost crying. Was he going to experiment on me too …after…?

As she shook her head to clear those thoughts, she heard a low growl. She started. An inhuman fear began to boil in the pits of her stomach. Somehow it was worse than her fear of Hidan.

Someone was down there.

Down at the end of rows of solitary confinement cells.

She gulped. Be brave, Sakura...

And walked headlong into danger.

When the lights are out, sound is amplified. No matter where you walk, you feel you are walking into danger. Those open doors, instead of being warm and inviting, feel cold and unforgiving as the grave. That is what it is like when you walk inside ...like stepping into an open coffin. Yours.

Sakura could hear her footsteps echo against the cold cement. What is normally a whisper becomes loud. She knew that whoever was waiting for her on the end of the darkened block of cells, could hear her.

And that scared her.

Her death might be waiting.

Down at the end of the silent, solitary cells.

All the doors were wide open …except for one.

"Juugo?" Sakura called softly as she walked slowly passed the open doors, heading for the last door…

-0-

Author's Note: *sigh* Again, meant to make this one longer. Well, I'm already working on the next chapter. Rain gets my creative juices flowing! Anyway, here's a little preview of the next chapter... just for fun. :)

Chapter Twelve: "The Baker's Dirty Dozen" (excerpt)

"Where is she? Tell me now, Deidara!" Gaara leered down at him. "Tell me before I pull your pretty blonde hair out of your head!"

"Eat my Play Doh!" Deidara snorted contemptuously before he backhanded Gaara.