Sinbad made his way down the stairs and towards the room he shared with Ja'far and Masrur, making sure to keep a good grip on the petite maid. Kicking the door to the master bedroom open with his foot, he made his way over to the bed, setting Ana down on the soft mattress and removing her shoes. He then pulled a silk sheet up over the unconscious woman, watching as she shifted deeper into the softness of the bed. Smiling slightly to himself, he left, making sure to close the door as quietly as he could.

As he walked back up the stairs, he thought back to the young maid now sleeping in his bed. She was so small, so delicate, and yet, despite her fear, despite how much she trembled, she still did what she felt needed to be done to keep everyone around her safe. She was brave and strong, though she didn't look it.

Sinbad wondered briefly why this little girl, over ten years his junior, was intriguing him so much, but he didn't have time right now to dwell on that. Making his way down the hall, he entered the room at the end. Inside sat Aladdin, Morgiana, Alibaba, Masrur, Ja'far, and some of the Fog Troop. Sinbad noticed that Kassim and his main followers weren't present, not that he expected them to be. He cleared his throat to gain their attention, and took charge when they looked to him.

"The first that needs to be done is that we need to meet with the king to try and change his mind about the country's current situation. Alibaba and I should be the ones to approach King Ahbmad, since we are the only ones with any royal or noble standing. Now, we need to…"

Meanwhile

Sakura waited until she could no longer sense the purple hair king, then counted to ten. She then jumped up out if the bed and made her way over to the window. Opening it wide, she closed her eyes, concentrating on the chakra signature of the king and his group. After about a minute of searching, she found them, three floors up and in one of the large lounge rooms. Smiling, she propped herself up on the ledge and stretched, her joints popping loudly.

"I know you're there."

"You're a lot sharper than you were before."

Sakura glared at the figure siting cross legged on the wall about thirty feet above her. "You're my clone; of course I'd know where you are."

"Naruto could never figure it out."

"That's because he's the village's number one knuckleheaded ninja. He thinks with his stomach and his fists, not so much with his head. I may not be able to create as many clones as him but I can at least keep track of the one I have. Honestly, I wish that I created you with no personality."

Yayaba's mouth stretched into a witchy smile. "Aww, you're just mad that I still exist after all of these years and you still can't control me. Or at least my mouth."

Sakura rolled her eyes at the withered clone. "I can still make you disappear, you know. It might be nice to lock you back away in my head."

Her clone sniffed at her. "You were much nicer to me when I helped you beat Ino during the chunnin exam. You wouldn't have broken her mind transfer jutsu if I wasn't there to help. But now you treat me like this, even though I have been extremely helpful to you and-"

"Alright, alright, alright, I get it, geez. And to think I actually missed having you around years ago. Just keep an eye on Alibaba and Sinbad; if they are as smart as I think they could be, they will try negotiating with that fat king tomorrow morning, even though it won't do them any good. Nothing a bastard child could say will change Ahbmad's mind, prince or not. Even Sinbad's presence will do little good since Ahbmad is planning on selling Balbadd to Ko." Sakura sighed and rubbed her temples.

"You alright?"

Sakura nodded. "I'll be okay; I'm just not used to using so much chakra continuously. It's starting to really wear me down. I need to sleep so that my chakra levels will return to normal, so I'm gunna have to dispel you until sometime tomorrow."

Her clone nodded in confirmation, then poofed out of existence in a small puff of smoke. Sakura shut the windows and made the bed before slipping out of the room and making her way back to her personal room in the basement, muttering to herself. "I now wish I had never wished for a Kekkei Genkai; having two souls is exhausting."

She rounded the corner and had to clutch the wall as a sudden wave of dizziness washed over her. She clutched her head with both her hands and sent a small spark of healing chakra to it to sharpen her vision for just a bit longer.

"I'm running dangerously low on chakra. That faint earlier on the roof was no act. If I had blacked out for just a second longer, all of my jutsus would have been unraveled. If it wasn't for my necklace, I would have been exposed and I'd probably be worse off than I was when I was dying of thirst in the desert."

Reaching her room, she bolted the lock and placed an explosive tag on the door that would detonate if someone tried to force their way in. It wouldn't damage the building above but it would definitely blow the door off its hinges and injure an intruder. Giving her trap a once over and humming slightly in satisfaction, Sakura removed the necklace and felt her features slip back to her own. Walking over to the small wardrobe, Sakura began to change into one of the plain white dresses that she wore as a nightgown.

As she removed her uniform, she caught her reflection in the small mirror next to her bed and froze. It had been a long time since she had looked at herself without the henge. She was somewhat surprised at what she saw.

She was thinner than she remembered being and was less noticeably muscular. Her once short hair had grown long and luxurious, now reaching her lower back easily, and her eyelashes looked longer. She felt odd being several inches taller than her cover and felt oddly uncoordinated do to that. Her smooth skin was paler than she remembered and… had her eyes always been so green and sadly serious?

Sakura sighed as she combed through her hair with her fingers through her hair. Her hair had never been this long before, but she just couldn't bring herself to cut it. Not that she needed to, her henge made her hair short anyway, but for some odd reason, she just couldn't cut it short again. It didn't feel right.

Sakura sighed and quickly braided her hair to keep it out of her face before she washed her face in the small basin of water that she kept by her bed. As she dried her face, she looked back to the mirror once more. There. On her left cheek was that strange mark that almost could pass for an eight pointed star. She lightly touched it with her fingers. No matter how much healing she put into it, no matter how many times she made it disappear, the moment her face was wet, the mark returned, almost like it was taunting her.

The mark frustrated Sakura to no end. She still had no clue how she got it or who she got it from and it bothered her even more that it wouldn't go away. However, what made her the angriest was that the mark represented at least three or four days that she couldn't remember, of her failure on a mission, and of the teammates that she had no way of contacting or even knowing if they were okay. This mark was the key to everything but she didn't even know what it stood for, let alone what it had to do with her being brought here.

Sakura shook her head as she climbed into bed, trying to clear it of bad thoughts. Bad thoughts would do her no good tonight. She closed her eyes and slowed her breathing, feeling the satisfying trickle of her chakra being renewed. Sleep washed over her in waves, and the last thing that flickered through her mind before sleep pulled her under was of a tall, dark haired man with captivating, one-of-a-kind eyes.