Title: Fragility of the Sakura

By: Frozyemo
Category:Action/Romance
Rated: M, because of graphicness in later chapters (violent and sexual content)


Epilogue:

Thinking of it now I don't know what to make of it.

The seal is gone, deactivated. I have to believe that. Perhaps I should have felt naked without it, but I don't. Perhaps I should have cried for the loss of it, for the loss of what it represented, but I'm not delusional.

Kakashi hasn't mentioned the seal. I like to think he knows me too well to do it, but at the same time I know he is just afraid it will make me snap. He has distanced himself from me, an understandable precaution with the seal and whatnot, but it still weighs me down, hovering like a disease and refusing to dissolve. I haven't sought him out and confronted him about it, because why would I tear open freshly healed wounds? For now Naruto will have to be my go-to person, although with him I can't bury my face in his neck, claw at his shoulders and scream out my frustrations. Sasuke is out of the question. And I miss Kakashi.

Akatsuki has made no further move that we know of.

Itachi has made no further move that I know of.

I don't know why I so very naively had expected that to give me closure. However, he did show up a month ago and pulled me up by my roots, leaving me rootless.

…

…

…

With the sun beating down on her back she crouched low by the small stream, splashing lukewarm water onto her face and neck. All bones in her body crunched and gnashed with exhaustion and her head felt far too heavy for her shoulders. It had her wonder for the twentieth time why she didn't spend her time off duty honing her medical skills instead of jumping around and chopping trees into woodchips. After all, she had just been offered to work fulltime at the hospital and at the request of one very persistent Tsunade, she had accepted the offer.

Needless to say her team hadn't, but then again they wouldn't have had to say no to a pissed off Tsunade either. It was safe to say Sakura hadn't fully been in her right mind when she had agreed.

Speaking of Tsunade, Sakura ought to head back home and get ready for her evening shift at the hospital. Shizune would have her leg and more if she showed up in dirty clothes and matted hair again. She had done that once and-

"Itachi."

There was a pause.

"I don't train with Naruto. You won't find him here."

Somewhere behind her she heard him move, and knew instantly that he had wanted her to hear. Out of pure spite she didn't stand up from her crouch, but watched her blurred reflection in the water. If she had had it in her, she would have been proud of her stoically blank face, but when she at the same time could feel her heart crawling up her throat like a fat juicy bug, there wasn't much to be proud of.

"I am not here to track down the Jinchuuriki."

He sounded as tedious as ever. Sakura dug her fingers into the ground beneath her, curling them and feeling soft dirt creep up underneath her nails.

"Is it Sasuke then?"

"Sasuke will come to me. I do not come to him."

She dug deeper.

"You do not keep your back turned on the enemy," he reprimanded quietly, "Sakura."

There was a soft lift to his voice she hadn't heard before. Well, fuck. She rose to her feet, uncurling her fingers from the ground, and with her heart threatening to roll off her tongue she turned and faced Itachi.

His hair was longer; much sleeker than what she remembered, but what screamed for her attention was the stark white gauze wrapped tightly and neatly around the back and left side of his head. She chose to believe it was the medic in her that forced her to take notice of the injury before all else, but it wasn't the polite and levelheaded medic who spoke seconds later.

"Pity they didn't knock it all the way off."

He blinked in response and she could have sworn his lips twitched.

"You master chakra control well enough to do so. That is not the case for all shinobi."

Sakura knew a subtle compliment when she heard one. She had spent years around Kakashi, and if anyone found great entertainment in beating around the bush it was him.

"I don't….," she trailed off, her eyes roaming his chest and shoulders, "why do you show up now?"

"Why are you here?" she repeated immediately after, as if to emphasize the fact that he shouldn't be there. His dark, dark eyes, no Sharingan surprisingly, didn't waver from hers while she waited for his answer, and she found that the cold indifference didn't bother her like it would have done three months ago. Was it bad that she wasn't quivering like a skittish animal, scouting desperately for an escape route right now?

"My former business with you has become an inconvenience to… an inconvenience," he corrected himself but didn't catch it in time. Feeling bold – because when did Itachi ever falter? – Sakura moved away from the lazy flow of water behind her, and by doing so put herself closer to the man in question. He watched her move with such precision and focus that she was reminded of how a snake hovered nearby its chosen prey, preparing to lash out and sink its teeth into the fresh, warm meat.

She could be food if that was what did it for Itachi. It hadn't escaped her notice that you got the most out of the man if you kept him pleased. Sakura was a proud person, but she was not above playing dirty.

"This is about the seal?"

"For now it lays dormant," he answered her unasked question.

"So it can flare back to life?"

"As its maker I could have it do that, yes," Itachi confirmed. A sensory memory flashed viciously to the front of her mind, and she remembered how it had felt to trace her fingers along his strong, corded arms and dig her nails into his firm, rounded shoulders.

"You're not backing up," she pointed out and as if to mock her furtherer, a strong gust of wind picked that moment to wrap her up in the smell of rich soil, rainwater and syrupy wood. Itachi's smell. She resisted the urge to raise her hand and wave at the air.

"The seal is of no consequence to me. It is you who should back up."

"You should know I don't respond well to threats, Itachi," she said and irritation painted her voice bitter. Itachi made a soft sound that sounded suspiciously like a snort, and like that Sakura's eyes lost all irritation and softened. Like that she could see past the measured looks and the curt answers, because for a second there it had been her Itachi and not Uchiha Itachi who had snorted.

And I have missed him, she admitted in the stillness of her mind.

"So what is your plan now?" she asked humorlessly.

"As I am sure Kakashi-san has already made clear to you, the seal is permanent."

"Yes?" she prodded when he didn't finish, weary of the situation and her indecisive heart.

"You must be killed."

He said it the way Sasuke would turn down an offer for a dinner date.

"You won't kill me, Itachi," Sakura said dully, "if that had been your plan, you wouldn't have dragged it out for so long. You would have snapped my neck already."

He didn't say anything for a long time and Sakura suspected she had been right in her assumption, but then he had his hand around her throat, blunt nails digging into the skin and Sakura's heart launched up her throat so fast she thought she would throw up.

"I was out of options but to come," he said stonily.

She brought her hand up to her neck and tightened it around his wrist.

"Who do you answer to? Who wants you to kill me so I won't trouble your hunt for Naruto and the other Bijuus in the future? Because that's what it is about, is it not?" she continued, wheezing for air to enter her lungs faster, "that's why you are here. I know the former location of your headquarters, because I assume you're smart enough to have moved someplace else by now, and I've got loads of inside information that makes me a threat to your organization whenever I open my mouth."

In retrospect it probably wasn't very smart to provoke a ninja prodigy while he had his hand around her throat, but she felt confident that Itachi wouldn't kill her. Hurt her, maybe, but pain just didn't scare her off anymore. She was a kunoichi; she was trained to kill and to be killed.

Itachi had remained silent and was now staring down at her with a blank look on his face.

"What? You didn't think that I had already figured out you would show up to finish me off?" she said bitterly.

"You don't just let hostages of Akatsuki go," she rationalized, "it's too much of a risk. I knew you eventually would be sent to clean up the mess you made."

And it was true. And Itachi knew that. And he probably also knew that she had known it.

"I answer to no one."

She was about to ask what that meant, but then his grip on her throat loosened and he kissed her.

His mouth latched onto hers, soft and plush lips sucking on her bottom lip and her stomach dropped to the ground. She searched for his lips with her own, and the kiss was hard, wet and yesyesyes. His tongue swept inside her mouth and with every lazy, slow stroke they rediscovered each other. As he pressed the long, slim line of his body up against her softer one they recalled, and when she tugged him forward and his hips rolled into a slow thrust, they remembered.

And Sakura was lonely.

So damn lonely in her apartment with her expired food and the door that was never knocked upon.

But this would do her no good either.

"Wait-- wait," she spoke into the kiss, her voice irritatingly thick and raw. He didn't move back, but tangled a hand in her hair and pulled her out of the kiss.

"Ita-," she broke off when he licked a fat stripe right up her bared neck. She jerked in his grip and he ran the pad of one thumb down the same road his tongue had just taken. With the fascination he had for blood and killing, Sakura wasn't surprised he went for the neck. In every sense of the word.

"You intrigue me," he mumbled, a small frown marring his forehead, one which Sakura would never have seen if she hadn't looked for it in the first place.

Just like you didn't kill Sasuke because he was intriguing, she thought drearily.

"I'm glad I could be of entertainment to you," she muttered and the hand in her hair tightened painfully.

"Less can be said for my partners," he continued his own conversation as if he hadn't heard her.

She wanted to comment 'and what will you tell them when you return with no dead Sakura slung over your shoulder', when a sudden thought struck her.

"You came here to warn me."

His eyes were distant as she searched his face for the answer, and in a moment of selfishness Sakura didn't want them to be that. So she so leant forward, grateful that he relinquished his hold on her hair, and pressed a kiss to his neck. She stayed there, waiting for him to settle on a reaction. Her nose bumped his jaw when he turned his head and caught her eyes with his own. For a long moment they looked at each other, each of them expecting the other to say something.

"Akatsuki wants my head and you came here to warn me," Sakura repeated slowly. "You…" went out of your way to track me down and tell me in case I wasn't aware.

"It would not suit me if you died because you were caught unprepared," Itachi said as nonchalantly as she had ever heard him speak and even though Sakura wanted desperately to push that issue, she knew that emotionally Itachi was a rabbit: you pursued him and he ran.

"Do they know you are here?"

She was released so fast that she nearly lost her balance. He stood with his side to her, his eyes closed, when he spoke next.

"I must return."

He turned on his heel and took the first step that led him away from her. There will be no end to this, Sakura thought dejectedly. This was what you got for fraternizing with the enemy: a life of second thoughts and coincidental meetings with your heart's desire.

"Itachi."

He didn't stop walking but slowed his steps, and Sakura used the opportunity to finish: "Thanks."

She didn't know what she was thanking him for. There were so many things really, but in that moment thanks seemed appropriate.

"Do not thank me."

With a flare of his coat he was gone and Sakura had half the heart to follow.

* * *

"See you later, Naruto!"

When you spent a lot of time with persons, you became as attuned to their name as you were to your own, so when Sakura heard Naruto's name being yelled out in the middle of a random crowded street she happened to be occupying herself, she stopped dead in her tracks and scouted the street for a familiar blond, spiky head.

"Sakura-chan!"

Only it found her first.

"Naruto," she greeted with a small smile, as he came jostling towards her dressed in civilian clothes, which in itself was a rare sight. Most of the time he wore civilian clothes only when he had neglected to do his laundry and had no clean uniforms left – and even then he sometimes chose to see past that – or when Sasuke had been on an impromptu raid in his apartment. What Sasuke used Naruto's uniforms for Sakura really had no intention of ever finding out. Some of the things Sasuke and Naruto did in private were more disturbing than Ino hitting on Jiraiya-sama.

Naruto reached her, spitting out an immediate: "Have you seen Sasuke?"

That left out the laundry option.

"Ah, no-"

"Are you okay?"

For being a raving idiot Naruto did have his moments of being frustratingly perceptive.

"I'm fine, Naruto."

He scowled and crossed his arms, obviously not pleased with her weak answer, "Sakuraaa, don't lie to me."

If they had been younger, now was when Sakura would have smacked him over the head and yelled twit, although she wasn't above doing it nowadays either.

But just when she thought she would have to come up with some lame excuse for her sullen mood, one which Naruto would fall for immediately if she added a slight pout and an upturn of her brows, she caught sight of Sasuke and Kakashi coming towards where she and Naruto stood. Both of them had their hands buried in their pockets and had an indifferent look on their face, but where Kakashi's indifference was aloof in its nature, Sasuke's was more of a disgruntled one.

"Yo," Kakashi greeted with a simple hand wave, "I stumbled upon a stray cat, sitting all by its lonesome next to the Hokage tower and thought its company would be appreciated more by you two than the pebbles on-"

"I'm not a cat," Sasuke finally snapped, "and you should mind your own business, old man."

Kakashi shrugged and looked ahead, completely unbothered by the venom in Sasuke's voice – and the fact that he had just been called old – which only served to have Sasuke trying to set him on fire with his eyes.

"Hey bastard," Naruto addressed Sasuke loudly, "you stole my uniforms again!"

At this, Sasuke's disgruntled look was washed away by a gleeful smirk. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah!"

"And why would I do that?"

"I- I don't know! You were the one who did it!"

"And why would I need your clothes?"

Lovingly blocking out the two blabbering fools Sakura turned to Kakashi, and found him looking right back at her with his customary blank expression. It was amazing how utterly bored the man could look. Then again perhaps that would be her face in ten years. Sakura was sure that once you were promoted to jonin you were offered The Elite Shinobi Rulebook, which would consist of only one rule written on all three-hundred pages: 'A jonin must never fall victim to facial twitches'. And being the lazy, eccentric bum Kakashi was he had of course worked his way around that by covering up his face.

"I haven't seen you around lately," Sakura commented lightly.

"Hm? I've been busy," he answered with a small uptilt of his eye.

Oh yeah, Sakura thought grimly.

"Mission?"

"Just got back."

"Remember to stop by the hospital for a checkup. Tsunade-shisou is big on those these days."

Kakashi scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Yeah, I did hear about that one incident-"

"Just admit you did it!"

"Idiot, I don't wear things that ugly."

"Why not? You are that ugly!"

Listening to the obnoxious bickering of Naruto and Sasuke, Sakura had never felt quite as detached as she did right then. So she decided to flee.

"Well, I'm off for the hospital," she cut through the escalating argument and against all odds Naruto actually heard her.

"Wait, wait, you didn't tell me what was wrong!"

"Something is wrong?" Sasuke immediately asked, pushing everything that was Naruto aside and if it had been any other day Sakura would have appreciated his concern, hell she would have basked in it, but right now it only made her feel worse.

"No," she sighed, "and I'm late."

She turned and pushed through the crowd, but not before noticing how Kakashi had found a sudden passionate interest in watching a grocery stand down the street. She didn't claim to know what went on in that man's head, but right this minute she had a pretty good idea.

Itachi might have shown her new sides of herself, but in his hurry he had also taken the old ones with him.

…

…

…

In Itachi I saw someone who had no expectations of me but despite that still saw potential. In me Itachi saw a person built up around qualities he greatly assessed but lacked himself. I am not the person I thought I was, and I can't be the person they all want me to be, but I will take that for what it is and accept it.

I will meet Itachi again. Naruto is still a part of Akatsuki's ultimate goal, I myself am now a minor goal and Sasuke will never cease to hunger for his, in his mind, rightful revenge. Perhaps that's why this doesn't seem like much of an ending, but we all have our unfinished endings and I will let Itachi be mine.

A/N: And this is complete. With all its loose ends and material for a sequel I say it's complete. You can hunt me down if you want to, but I quite frankly won't give a shit. (sorry if that was a bit bitchy, but in this way I hope people will understand XD)

Now, in my defense I have not written on this story in over two years, so if I have characterized Sakura and whoever else differently in this chapter, it is either because my perception of them has changed or that my writing style has changed and grown over the years. I apologize in advance if any of you were bothered by this during reading.

Now I'll be off starting a new project that I hopefully can find enough inspiration for to eventually post here.

-frozzy (new and improved - hopefully)