Being Human
Chapter 20

He's a hunter out for cold and bloody revenge. She's an innocent vampire, trying to stay human. Two worlds clash, black and white meet and sometimes the lines blur and they become grey. This is the story of a monster… and a human.

With a relieved sigh, Sakura closed the door of the abandoned hunters lodge behind her. She was out of breath, her lungs screaming for oxygen while her back slid down the rough wood. The muscles of her legs were burning like fire while her eyes slowly but surely started to work again. Even the dim light of dawn was already too strong for her sensitive retinal. Sasuke grabbed the old dusty curtains and pulled them close over the windows. Just like Sakura, his strong legs were no longer able to carry the weight of his body and he broke down in the middle of the room. With a grown he turned to his side, hugging his stomach tightly. Beneath the sweat and the smell of dust and wet wood, Sakura smelled something else, something that made her fangs pulsate. Blood. The shocking realization hit her, when she understood that he had been shot. His face was pale, a sheen of cold sweat covered his face, his raven hair stuck to his temples. On hands and knees Sakura crawled to him, her legs were still too weak to carry her.

"Sasuke- oh God, please talk to me-" she broke down next to him, the daylight has weakened her so much, her vision was blurred. She pried his arms from his middle and gasped when the scent of the blood, much needed in her weakened state, hit her nose. She inspected the wound, his black shirt was soaked already. Two rounds wounds, one in the upper section of his abdomen, the other one close to his narrow hip.

"It's- not that bad…"

Sakura felt helpless. She knew next to nothing about first aid and this was more than a scratch or a cut, this was a serious injury.

"Sasuke, please tell me- I don't know what to do!" she couldn't hide the rising panic in her voice. Sakura knew the best thing to do in a situation like this, was to stay level headed, but that was nearly impossible. Especially when she heard the tumbling beat of his rapidly slowing heart.

There was no other way to help him – she had to give him blood. Blood her body needed to regain its strength. With a desperate sob, she pulled the tattered sleeve up, exposing the blue veins beneath her milky skin. Her fangs pierced the thin skin and blood gushed into her mouth and rand down her arm.

She held her open wrist to his mouth. "Drink, Sasuke. It's the only way."

Sasuke opened one eye, looking at her from the corner of his eye, before he opened his mouth and closed his lips around the two small wounds in her wrist. Immediately he started to drink. Sakura felt the pull and sucking on her wrist and she let her head fall onto his broad chest, it was his stabilizing heartrate that calmed her down.

"Drink, Sasuke, you'll feel better in no time."

He groaned deep in his chest and the vibration tickled her cheek. Sakura was well on her way to slip into sweet, dark oblivion when he let go of her wrist. With a dull thud his head fell back onto the wooden floorboards. After a while of heavy breathing, Sasuke finally opened his eyes and looked down his body. To feel the sheer power of vampire blood flowing through his veins was a terrific experience. It was the heat suddenly exploding in his lower abdomen, that catapulted Sasuke back into reality. The same desire he felt for her in Berlin swallowed him whole and consumed every logically working cell in his brain. Gritting his teeth, Sasuke sat up, shoving her from his chest with a little too much force. While his body was quickly recovering, he saw that Sakura was way behind. Her skin was as red as a lobster in some places where the daylight hit her. The green eyes were bloodshot and swollen, he had no idea that even these dim rays of daylight could hurt vampires in such extent. Even though both needed rest desperately, they had no time. Neji and his hunters were surely hot on their heels and they had vehicles, Sasuke and Sakura didn't. Adding to their tricky situation, was the fact that they had ten hours of daylight ahead of them, locking Sakura inside the old lodge.

This was the point, where they desperately needed help. Sasuke had one or two contacts the hunters didn't know about or affiliated with but he had no mobile on him. And surely enough, there would already be a meaty bounty on his head. And hunters were mercenaries. Name them the price and honor went out of the window for the most of them.

With a hoarse curse, Sasuke thought about every contact he had here in London but quickly came to the realization, that none of those contacts would help him, given the circumstances he had maneuvered himself into.

"You got a phone?"

Sakura, who was still a little dazed, just like him, nodded and her hand slid into the pocket of her jeans. Standing up on wobbly legs, she handed him the mobile. There was only one person on this planet left, who would help him without selling his ass out to Neji.

Sasuke quickly dialed a number and prayed to the heavens, that the number was still active. His heart hammered against his ribcage, while he waited. After thirty seconds, he cursed and dialed again, this time, peaking through one of the many holes in the curtain. The sun was a good amount up already, and Sakura hissed, when a ray of sunlight hit her arm. She jumped into the corner of the cabin to hide from the sunlight. Cursing, Sasuke stuffed the phone into his pocket and strode across the small space, pushing the old, foul smelling sofa from the wall, creating a small space.

"Get over here." He motioned for her to come to him. "Stay here."

She hurried over to him and crouched in the tight space between the couch and the wall.

"What are you going to do?" Her voice was a little rough, panic laced through every word. She was terrified. "Sasuke, even if you find a car or something – I can't move."

He knew – god damn him, of course he knew she couldn't take a step out of the cabin. But Neji was hot on his heels, he knew the hunter all too well and letting a prey go? Only over his dead body. Sasuke ran out of ideas, hell, he didn't know how to move her out of the cabin. All his training was useless now. But his only other option wasn't picking up his phone.

"Sakura, if anyone comes through this door and it's not me, you kill them. Understood?"

With fear filled eyes, she only looked at him but she soon had to shield her face, when he opened the door and disappeared into the dawn.

Sakuras heart was pounding against her chest, it felt like her heart would jump out of her chest at any time now. The adrenaline was leaving her body already, leaving her exhausted and limp. Her hands were shaking, her eyes were burning and swollen from the sunlight outside, making it all the harder to see her surroundings clearly. Everything was just a blurry shadow, as if there were spider webs across her eyes. Giving Sasuke her blood weakened her immensely, given the fact that she forgot to drink her daily blood bag yesterday evening, Sakura was thirsty beyond any measurements. She just prayed that Kakashi and the others got out of the cabin safely and weren't captured by the hunters. She could never forgive herself if anything happened to her friends because of her. God, this was all her fault. She just wished she had never left Paris, she should have just stayed in her little apartment, in her uneventful life. The hunters were hot on her heels and she knew they only had so much time left, until their enemies reached the cabin. But they had at least eight to nine hours of sunlight between them and safety.

What were he thinking? Just leaving, putting himself out in the open. Her blood would help him heal, but it wasn't a wonder tonic that healed injuries immediately. He would be slow and he would be weak – if a hunter attacked him, there was a great possibility, that Sasuke would not survive that fight. Automatically she reached for her mobile, but as soon as her fingers met the empty pocket of her jeans, she remembered that she gave it to Sasuke. A cold arrow of fear pierced her heart. What if- what if this was all a trap? What if Kakashi was right from the beginning on and Sasuke just played them all? She was trapped and right there where a vampire hunter would want her. No way to escape and weak. Icy cold fingers of fear gripped her heart and squeezed it. And he had her phone, she couldn't call for help.

'Oh no', she thought, her mind already razing and coming up with all possibilities to escape if Sasuke truly had tricked her. 'Oh, Sakura, what have you gotten yourself into again?'

She peeked around the corner of the old smelling sofa, pain exploded behind her eyes and with a desperate scream, she had to scramble back into the furthest corner. With a curse, Sakura covered her burning eyes, hoping to find some relief behind her closed palms. While she waited for the pain to subside, she controlled her breathing or else she would be heading for a collapsed lung. She was trapped. Franticly she thought about a way to leave her friends a message, a sign she was alive, at least for now. No, she pushed those dark thoughts aside, she trusted him. He told her he'd changed and that he was no longer interested in revenge.

"He changed, Kakashi. I think we can trust him."

"People don't change, Sakura. They say they did but deep down, they can never let go of what they were before."

Kakashis words echoed through her head, while Sakura tried to calm her razing thoughts. Was Kakashi right all along? Was his warning concerning Sasukes changes true and Sakura was just too blind to see? Or were those complicated feelings she had developed for him the past few days clouding her rational thinking to a point, where she couldn't tell right from wrong anymore. The first time she felt a sting of wanting in her gut, when she walked into his cell and found him on the floor, his powerful body outstretched and all those muscles on display, working out with his own body weight. Despite his grim demeanor, his deadly beauty was the first thing she had ever truly noticed about him. His almost aristocratic facial features, the sharp cut jawline and high cheekbones and his hypnotizing black eyes. His beauty was a deadly disguise, hiding his skill in the art of war and death. If he killed her, she would at least die by the hands of beauty.

Sakura didn't know how much time had passed since Sasuke left the lodge, but the judging from the light, dimmed by the curtains, it was still morning. Sakura had been fighting sleep for a while now, her eyes were constantly dropping close. Of course, daytime was her time to sleep. She had been on her feet a good amount of time and the missing day ration of blood were slowly but surely getting to her. But when sleep was about to take over again, she heard an engine coming closer to the lodge. She was wide awake immediately. She was waiting for the door to open.

Was it Sasuke? 'Dear God, please, let it be him. I'm not ready to kill again.' The door flew open and was quickly closed. Familiar broad shoulders, tall physique- definitely Sasuke. Thank God.

"Sakura?" he bent down and looked behind the sofa, where she was hidden. "Come on, we have to leave."

"Care to explain?", she asked while he pulled off his leather jacket.

"I filched a car, that was parked at the side of the road. We gotta leave, now. I saw a team of hunters driving towards town, down the main road." He threw the jacket at her. "One turn and they would have found you."

Sakura looked at the large, heavy jacket in her hands and wrapped it around her body, covering her face and upper body completely. Sasuke lead her by the shoulders out of the lodge, towards what she guessed, the high jagged car. She was pulled to a stop and Sakura heard a door open. In the next second she was pushed into the car seat. Just a second later, she heard the other car door open and close, the engine was started and he hurled away from the lodge. The worst thing about her current situation, was that she was unable to see where they were going. He could drive her directly into her enemy's lair, or in other words, straight into her doom.

"Where are we going?"

He didn't answer, so she tried again. "Sasuke, where are you taking me?"

"Somewhere safe." He said curtly.

Well, that was helpful. "Sasuke, please. Tell me where we're going. It's driving me nuts not to know. And you tried to call someone, who was it?"

When he still didn't answer, she wished she could see his face, at least to judge his reaction or read his facial expression. But she couldn't take the jacket off, not even for a second, the sunlight would burn her eyes clean out of the sockets.

"Sasuke, please-," her voice broke. "I'm so scared. Who did you want to call? At least answer this question. Please."

A long moment of silence was followed by her request. She heard him take a deep breath, before he finally answered. And the answer, truly was a shock to her.

"My brother."

Neji could barely restrain himself from killing the hunter next to him. They got away. Again. His surveillance team stumbled across the abandoned hunters lodge in the woods just half an hour ago. He was sure the Uchiha and the vampire used it as a hideout, at least as long as the sun was up. But when he arrived with his own team, ready to smash some skulls and spill some vampire blood, but to his great disappointment, he found the cabin empty. Adding to his fury, the house they had stormed earlier this night, they didn't find anything but clothes and blood bags. Not one single drop of information, where the vampires went to seek safety. Neji found an empty tablet with dishes in the cell, where the Uchiha has been kept in. Neji understood then, that the days where he had sent countless of other hunters after Sasuke, he had been hiding with the vampires. Disgusting.

"Sir, we found tire tracks leading down the road, towards the high way. No way of telling if they drove north or south on the road."

"Send two teams, one north and one south."

Neji walked out of the cabin and took a second to look into the bright morning sky. Bright red mixed into gold and orange. Yes, dawn was his favorite time of the day. It would also be one of the last dawns, Sasuke Uchiha would ever witness.

"What are we gonna do now, eh?" Bronson sad, while he checked the safety clip on his gun. "We gonna kill Uchiha now? The others won't like that, boss."

Neji knew that. Killing one of the captains would only weakens Nejis position as a leader, a blow that Neji couldn't risk, not now at least. The recent attack on the safe haven had strengthened his position even more, an advantage he didn't want to give up by losing the trust of his hunters in him, by killing the Uchiha. He would have to come up with a different plan.

"You got a plan B, boss?"

With a grim glare over his shoulder, he left Bronson standing in the door of the lodge. He did have a plan B. A plan that has been in the making for the last ten years. He pulled the mobile out of his pocket and dialed an encrypted number on a secure line. It was time to get serious. It was time for the vampires to die.

If it wouldn't have been for the bright daylight outside, Sakura would have been tempted to rip the jacket away from her face to make sure, she still sat next to the dark hunter.

"Your brother?"

"Is that so much of a surprise?"

Sakura could have sworn she heard a small smirk underlying his words, when he spoke them but sadly, she couldn't see his face. She would have given anything to look into his dark, endless eyes. Was it truly a surprise? Maybe. She never truly spared a thought about possible family relatives. It just seemed so absurd somehow to think that this man had a family. She knew he had a wife before he became a hunter but not once he spoke of remaining family members. Well, given his profession Sakura wouldn't have thought of him to visit his parents frequently or attending thanksgiving dinners.

Suddenly feeling embarrassed by her rash judgement, she quickly apologized. "I'm sorry, I had no right to-,"

"Don't be." Was all he said about it.

They drove meanwhile Sakuras thoughts were practically screaming in her head. in silence, for hours, or at least it felt like hours to Sakura, none of them spoke during their drive to wherever Sasuke would take her. Meanwhile, Sakuras mind was working full blast, trying to figure out, what would be the best thing to do next. She worried about her friends, Kakashi, Valentine, Tsunade… she just prayed they were okay. Sakura didn't know when her fatigue finally got the upper hand and she dozed off into a dreamless, uneasy sleep. Sakura couldn't tell how long she had been asleep but she was suddenly jostled awake by the sudden stop of the car. With the forward movement of the air, the jacket slid from her face and she choked on her desperate groan, when she expected the pain to hit her. But pain never came. Sakura opened her eyes and saw the nightly sky behind the window screen.

"Sunset was about an hour ago." Sasuke said, while he got out of the car.

Sakura opened her own door to follow him. She felt stiff, her limbs numb and her neck aching. Sakura stretched arms above her head and took in her surroundings. The landscape didn't change, trees and meadows wherever she looked.

"Where are we?"

"About an hour south from Aberdeen."

"We're in Scotland?"

He curtly nodded and walked to the car, grabbing his jacket and pulling it over his broad back. Sasuke had parked the old truck by the edge of a meadow, leading to the clue that he planned to leave the vehicle behind.

"Sasuke, why are we in Scotland?"

He just threw an unreadable look over his shoulder at her. "I have a favor to collect. We need to get off this island as soon as we can."

With that, he walked straight into the dark tree line, almost blending in with the shadows of night. Sakura followed him, unwilling to let him go and leaving her with more question marks than answers.

"Sasuke, wait-,"

She grabbed his forearm and pulled him around, making him stop in his tracks and almost stumble with the force behind her movement.

"At least give me my phone, so I can call Kakashi and the others to know they're and tell them, that we're okay."

He just stared at her, his face and eyes unreadable but after a moment of hesitation he pulled her phone out of his pocket and gave it to her. Their fingertips brushed against each other, when Sakura took her mobile form his hand and it was like a small jolt of electricity went from her fingertips directly into her chest. Her blood in his veins was calling to her and judging the tightly locked jaws, Sasuke felt the same. As if her touch burnt him, he pulled his hand from her.

"Stay here, Sakura. Where I go, it would be unwise for you to follow."

Sakura knew she couldn't stop him, so she let him go. Sakura watched while he disappeared into the shadows, leaving her alone with nothing but all the confusing feelings he elicited within her.

With a heavy sigh, she unlocked her phone and to her dismay, most of the battery was already spent. Her heart hammered in a steady, scared beat against her ribcage, while she quick-dialed Kakashis number and waited for the vampire to pick up her call.

"Please, please Kakashi… just pick up and be okay…"

"I told you we couldn't trust him!"

"Kakashi, just calm down, we need to think for a moment here."

With a growl, the grey-haired vampire drove his hands through his already disheveled hair. "How the hell can you stay calm? Sakura is out there with him! With a goddamn hunter. By all means he could have lied to us the entire time and-"

Tsunades amber eyes fixated Kakashi. "He won't harm her. Just trust me on this."

"So we'll just sit around and wait for something to happen? Tsunade, we need help, no, we need a wonder to get out of this alive."

"We're officially on the most-wanted list, just like Sakura and now we're working with a hunter. Well, if this isn't treason, I don't know what else is. I hate to admit it, but a little help is not the worst thing in our situation."

Valentine sat across from Tsunade in a small chair, his injured leg probed high on the table. A bullet had hit him while they fled from the hunters last night. Even though the wound had closed after Tsunade had extracted the bullet from his thigh, his leg still hurt like hell.

"We have to trust Sakura and Sasuke. Exposing the hunters main lair and plans might save our necks. But they need time and we need to make that happen."

Kakashi was about to answer to that, when his phone started to ring inside of his pocket. Pulling it out, he heaved a sigh of relief when he saw the familiar number on the screen.

"It's Sakura!"

Tsunade and Valentine were immediately on their feet. "Answer it."

Kakashi took the call and put her on speaker. "Sakura, thank goodness! Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm alright. Sasuke got me out before the hunters gained ground on us. What about Tsunade and Valentine?"

"We're here, Sakura." Tsunade said, her face a sheer picture of relief after hearing the younger vampires voice. "Are you two hurt?"

"No, we're okay. Listen, my battery is pretty low, I don't know how long we can talk before my phone dies."

"Sakura, where are you? We'll come and get you-," Kakashi started but Sakura cut in.

"No, I'm safe with Sasuke. I know it sounds crazy, but I do trust him." She stopped for a while and it sounded like she turned around frequently to look behind her. "Where are you right now?"

"No, the better question is, where are you?" Valentine said, while holding Kakashis wrist in his direction, so Sakura could hear him clearly.

"Um, Sasuke said we're about an hour south from Aberdeen."

"Scotland? What the hell are you doing in Scotland?"

"I don't know, Kakashi. But Sasuke obviously knows someone around here who can get us out of England. I'll talk to you as soon as I know where we're headed at. Right now, I'm just glad to know you all are okay."

Kakashi gave a defeated sigh and nodded, even though Sakura couldn't see it. "Alright, kiddo. I hope you know what you're doing."

Sakura chuckled, but it sounded more nervous than amused. "We'll see. Okay, you guys, I'll talk to you soon and stay safe."

"You too, Sakura." Tsunade said.

"Good luck, we're waiting for your call." Valentine added.

With that, Sakura ended the call and Kakashis display told them, that the connection to the other caller was lost.

"At least she's okay." Valentine said, relief clear in his voice, while he hobbled back to the chair, putting his still healing leg back up onto the table. "So, we know the kid is okay. Time to worry about ourselves."

"I think it's best we stay together and hide until we hear news from Sakura and the hunter." Tsunade said.

Kakashi nodded. "I think so too. In the meantime, we can help them form here with information. They will need it."

"Yes, we make sure they're always a step ahead of the council. This could actually work out when we do it right. When we do it clever."

"Alright, then!" Valentine clapped his hands, rubbing them together. "Shall we begin?"

OMG, you guys, I am soooo shook… I didn't realize I didn't update for a year… a freakin' year! I am so, incredibly sorry for your long wait… I don't know how this happened… however, here is your new chapter and I hope you all liked it. As always, leave me a review and tell me what you think. So, the game is on and it gets as serious as it can be now. Also, I welcome future predication and what you think will happen.

I am immensely grateful for all your kind reviews, concerning my story. I love you all so much, just so you know, it's greatly appreciated.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter and I promise, the next update will NOT take a year 3

XoXo Alessandra