-x-
Three days ago
Jonin Exam Day 13
She took it back.
She took it all fucking back.
She would rather have to do twenty Botan escort missions than to spend another minute in the fucking desert.
After she dropped off an ungrateful Botan to his estate in Iwa, he stamped her scroll, tossed it at her and told her to go away. Nakamura, on the other hand, said he was grateful for her protection, commenting how strong she was and that if given the chance, he would request her. She wondered if he saw her begging with her eyes not to.
She barely spent another hour in Iwa, replenishing her stock, and darting off to her next mission. Time was a factor here, and if she could finish this stupid exam with time to spare...but instead, she rushed right into the one thing she hated more than sexist men. Overwhelming heat and sand.
All around her was sand. Hot, dusty, burn your feet sand. The sun was relentless, it was bright, and it made her headaches flare up at all times. The blackness of her Uchiha made outfit only seemed to suck up the sun, cause her skin to burn, and sweat run down her back.
The only good thing is that when she was having headaches, there were no voices to annoy her, no bugs to crawl around in her head. And she had officially gone three days without a black out. If that wasn't a good sign, she wasn't sure what was.
Sakura had managed to spend a few hours in Suna, questioning them about where she could begin to look for someone named Saburo. Temari had no idea, but she was quite happy to see her old friend. Gaara hadn't heard the name, but understood when Sakura declined to join them all for dinner. Kankuro wished her luck, and refilled her bag with more bandages, and weapons. He had even given her a stronger version of a generic antidote pill on the terms that Sakura find time to come back and experiment on new poisons with him.
It was by chance, really, that she was sitting at the bar, nursing a cold glass of water, when she heard the name.
"...Saburo said so."
Her head snapped up, and she just about tackled the poor civilian of his bar seat. "Where did you hear that name?" She gasped, hand squeezing his arm.
"Get off me!" The man growled, ripping out of her hold. "Why should I tell you?"
"I need to speak with Saburo. It's in regards to a mission." She just about panted, a new rush of energy running through her. It was only 13 days into the exam, she still had eight days to complete the mission and get home. She could do it, there was still so much time! She could still pass this exam.
But the civilians eyes narrowed, and he looked more uncomfortable than before, looking her over. A nervous jitter started in his leg and he looked over at his companion who refused to look up from the table. "He's uh-... village head of Crossroads. A-..." he paused, licking his lips, eyes darting back to his companion before looking down at the table. "A civilian village, to the south-west, near the coast."
Sakura wanted to cry. Wind was one of the largest countries there was, and she wouldn't have had time to search any of the scattered villages around it for her target. Judging by the man's reaction to the name, this wasn't going to be an easy mission for her. She couldn't tell if it was fear, or something else in the civilian man's face, but she was grateful all the same.
She slapped a handful of coins on the table, thanked him for his information, and was gone.
-x-
It was modestly sized, and looked just about abandoned. But the carved name in the wood sign at the front of the gates told her that this was Crossroads.
She pulled a kunai from her weapons pouch, tucking it into bandages wrapped around her arms, just within reach as she moved down the main street. Doors were closed, and shutters were locked up tight. Every building nearly looked the same. A bland stucco, cracked and sun-bleached. There were places where window-sil flowers once stood, but there was nothing there now except dried vines, and crumbling leaves.
Looking down, she swiped her foot across the sand, seeing a polished stone road beneath. No doubt this place was once quite beautiful and lively.
There was a faint sound, a crack, and her attention snapped to it. A second-level window was open, and Sakura could see a small brunette head peak out before a woman came by, and pulled the shutters tightly closed.
Something wasn't right here and it made her nervous.
The largest building at the end of the main road had a door open, and Sakura took that as an invitation.
Or it was a trap.
Well, guess we'll see.
The wooden door creaked loudly when she entered, sunlight streamed through the pale glass into the hall. Pews lined the room, to a dias at the front where a group of three old men sat. The place was reminiscent of an aged temple.
Their chattering ceased as soon as her shoes echoed on the ancient wood.
"I am looking for Saburo." She stated, fingertips touching the handle of the kunai on her wrist, eyes darting around the room for anything out of place in the faint sunlit room.
The middle man shot up, his chair clattering backwards to the ground. "You're a shinobi?" A little breathless, laced with desperation. A civilian man, old beyond his years.
"Are you Saburo?" She stopped near the dias, watching all three men glance around at each other.
"I am," the middle one said, picking up his chair and sitting back down. "You... received my request for help?"
Nodding, she slowly began to relax her body. "I did."
Saburo frowned, propping his elbows on his legs. "I sent that request out weeks ago. I put desperately urgent at the top."
Not liking the way his tone was turning, Sakura crossed her arms, pulling herself up to glare him down. "If it was such an urgent matter, I don't understand why you wouldn't contact the Kazekage instead."
It was quick, but there was a flare of irritation, that melted into that desperate look again. "We tried, but he ignores our request! Says it isn't important enough to waste time on."
That doesn't sound like Gaara. Sakura frowned, trying to pick up on anything more from the three old men. Saburo was the only one who spoke, but the other two had practiced looks of fear and desperation on.
"What is the mission?"
"Bandits." Saburo pulled a piece of parchment from his pocket, handing it over to Sakura. "There is a bandit leader and he comes into our village every now and then to drink all our fresh water, eat all our food. He steals girls that he takes a fancy to, keeps him prisoner in his camp." Saburo looked down at the floor, wringing his hands together. "We can't stop him, and since he isn't well known, and doesn't have a large following, the Kazekage said it was wasted time. We don't-... we barely have the money to pay for this." He looked up with tears at the corner of his eyes. "Kenji has tormented this village for so long, and many of us are so poor now that we can't leave. We wouldn't have anywhere else to go."
This was the truth, Sakura figured, remembering how completely dilapidated most of the village was. "Okay," she replied, taking a look at the parchment. It had a small map from Crossroads, to a place at the coast with the name Kenji. "Okay, just tell me all that you know about him and his band."
"Small," one of the other men cut in, with scars on his forehead and down one eye. "Maybe ten, maybe a bit more."
She hummed, tucking the parchment into her bag. "Civilians as well?"
The third man nodded. "Yes, but they are all strong. We tried to fight back once, but they beat us and took nearly all our girls over the age of fifteen."
That rubbed Sakura the wrong way, and she couldn't help but think about Maiya. If they were taking girls that young, it didn't take a genius to figure out what they were doing.
She was disgusted. And it wasn't just the scratching of the bugs returning behind her eyes. She snapped her eyes shut, taking a huge breath and forced a normal voice. "I will need a room at an inn for the night, and I will take care of this tomorrow." She opened her eyes, and it was just as she feared. Another hallucination stood right in front of her, it was Shisui again. Cold eyes, bared teeth, sharingan spinning wildly. He was yelling at her. Calling her all the things she never wanted to hear come out of his beautiful mouth.
She could barely hear the village head over Shisui, before she turned around and stumbled out of the town hall back into the blazing hot sun. Just like magic, the hallucination was gone, and her headache was back.
The antidote that Kankuro had given her didn't seem to be doing much of anything. Her shoulders sagged and she made her way off to the right where she vaguely heard Saburo say the inn was.
-x-
The inn bar was just about empty, save for one or two men that kept looking back to Sakura sitting at the bar top. The woman, much older with face filled with wrinkles and lines, pursed lips, cleaned a glass.
"If ye've got time to stare, why don'tcha go 'ome to yer wives an' stare at 'em?" She snapped loudly, pointing to the front door where the two men guiltily slithered away. Sakura let out a soft laugh, taking another big sip of water.
"Don't see a lot of visitors?" She commented conversationally, the barkeeps dark green eyes pausing on her.
She huffed, setting down the glass. "Not really." She gestured with her chin to Sakura's glass. "Too good fer the hard stuff?"
Sakura shook her head. "No, I love the hard stuff. I just don't drink when I'm on a mission. I'm Sakura, by the way." She smiled.
Naomi, as she was called, didn't return it. "Yer here to take care of that bandit problem we 'ave?"
"That's the plan."
Naomi slapped down a key. "Room's on the second floor, third on the right," before disappearing into the back, leaving Sakura alone in the bar. That unsettling feeling growing inside her again.
Finishing off her drink, she made her way up the stairs, finding her room already open, the sound of shuffling inside. On attack mode, she rushed in, kunai just about released when she came face to face with a young girl with a scarred face, dropping an armful of towels.
"Oh gods!" She cried, stumbling backwards.
Sakura cursed herself for being so on edge. The girl was just a housekeeper, dropping off fresh towels. Insisted it was all okay, and that Sakura had a right to be so suspicious.
Crawling into bed that night, she was pleasantly surprised to find, that she had managed to fall asleep for the first time in thirteen days.
Guess Kankuro's antidote wasn't shit after all.
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A/N: Sometimes I still get so surprised at how many follows, faves and comments this story has. I honestly just started it with a one-shot and now we're here. So, thank you to everyone. I hope you all have a great Christmas if you celebrate that, or have a good Holiday, or just have a very nice Tuesday and Wednesday.
Drinks for the new year are on me!