Darker and Darker Down We Go

by FireThatFox

Sakura meets Sasori in a 3-year medical exchange program to Suna. She helps Suna get their hospital up to date, he teaches her about poisons...and reluctantly about antidotes. They become closer than anyone had ever thought, they find they share many of the same interests and passions. Sasori teaches Sakura everything he knows because she has earned his respect. Then, he is gone

1. Chapter 1

Maybe it was the timing, or maybe it was her new positive attitude but she felt like throwing up.

Sand was in her hair, her shoes, her shirt, her pants, her...underwear. She wanted to scream.

"How much longer?" She yelled to her Sand escorts.

"Only three more miles Haruno Sama." The Nin closest to her yelled.

She had left her Konoha escort back on the border between Wind and Fire country and was heading to Suna with her Sand escorts to help establish a modern hospital by personal request of the Kazekage, Gaara Sabaku.

The last time Sakura had seen Gaara it had been shortly after the failed invasion of the Sound and Sand at the Chunin exams that had been held in Konoha. Orochimaru had killed the lord Third and fled when his arms were sealed by the Reaper. The Sand had no choice but to sign the alliance Konoha presented to them after the death of the Kazekage was discovered.

One of the terms of the alliance was to give aide to any Sand or Leaf team engaged in missions that may span across the border. It was on one such mission that Sakura had last seen Gaara before he was the Kazekage.

Sakura sighed in relief and awe as she saw the walled cliffs of Suna come into view. She had never been to Suna before, she had never been to another Hidden village before at all. The party slowed as they came up to the gates flaring their chakra for the gate guards. Sakura leaned over, hands on her knees breathing hard. Suna was a lot warmer than she had anticipated.

A cool bottle of water came into view as she stared at her toes breathing hard.

"Eh?" Sakura stared at the water dumbly.

"Yes, I see what you mean, she is very intelligent and quick-witted." A drawling voice said sarcastically.

Sakura stood up taking the offered bottle of water from Gaara with thanks. "Kazekage Sama." She bowed.

Turning to glare at the voice who had insulted her she was met with cool amber eyes, bright red hair like Gaaras and a smirk.

"My Uncle, Akasuna no Sasori." Gaara waved his hand at Sasori.

Sakura narrowed her eyes at the man but nodded politely all the same.

"Forgive me Sakura, I forgot you are not accustomed to the heat of the desert. Allow me to show you to your quarters, you may rest there until dinner if you like. And please, call me Gaara." Gaara held out his hand to her.

Sakura stared at it for a moment before placing her hand in his not noticing the odd looks they were getting from the surrounding Sand nin...and Sasori. Her shoulders drew up a little self consciously, was she not supposed to take his hand? Tsunade had told her to follow Gaara's lead, that there were certain customs in Suna she would be expected to know and abide by. He had held his hand out to her, so she had taken it.

Gaara led her down the blistering streets past food stands, clothing stalls, and street performers. She paused momentarily and watched a man thrust two flaming swords down his throat then pull them out clean.

"A little different than Konoha I know." Gaara smiled softly at her. "I hope you will enjoy many new experiences while here in Suna."

"I've never seen anyone do that before, how do they do that? Are they a shinobi?" She asked turning to him eyes wide.

So expressive, Sasori hummed to himself watching the green eyes widen and sparkle with interest.

"Street performers Sakura, not shinobi. A long preserved pastime and form of Suna entertainment." Gaara smiled more openly at her expression.

Sakura looked down to the small tin beside the man, there were coins in it. She reached into her pouch pulling out a few coins and dropped them into his tin. The man smiled broadly and spit out several phoenix shaped flames over her head by way of a thanks. She clapped her hands in delight, pulling her hand from Gaara's.

So innocent, Sasori mused. Is she really a S-Ranked shinobi? His interest was piqued, he wanted to know more about this little pink-haired Leaf Nin.

Gaara held his hand out to Sakura once more indicating that they should move on. She gave him her hand again and they made their way down the street. She had to keep herself several times along the way to the mansion from stopping again. Suna was so colorful, so exotic, so different from Konoha.

Sasori watched the pink-haired medic take in her surroundings with wide green eyes. It was clear she and resisted the urge to stop several more times to gawk at something new to her as they made their way to the mansion. Her eyes sparkled, her head tilted to the side in contemplation, her nose scrunched up when she saw something she considered what he could only assume was distasteful. It was clear she had never been to Suna before and that she was having the time of her life. It was also clear that his little Jinchiriki nephew had a little crush on the little pink-haired medic from Konoha. Sasori wondered if it was Gaara or Shukaku that had the bigger crush though. The Tea loving monk had a disreputable reputation before he had been sealed with the Tanuki. A taste for blood and women.

Sakura's mouth dropped open as they approached the Kazekage manse. It looked like something out of a storybook. Tall towers and ledged lined the perimeter of the manse, trees she would have thought were dead if not for the wisps of green exploded from an enclosed garden of some sort and rock sculptures decorated with sandstone could be seen set into the base of the walls. It was beautiful. Sakura's mouth hung open in awe and Gaara chuckled softly next to her.

"Unlike Konoha, Suna's Kage is by order of succession. The strongest of the offspring is chosen for the title. Like I was. My family has lived in this manse for over 500 years. Welcome to Suna Sakura." Gaara pet her hand and led her into the Sabaku manse.

"So beautiful." Sakura turned left and right taking in her surroundings. It looked like some exotic Arabian castle, but she supposed, they were royalty weren't they? Suna was so different from Konoha in so many ways. She was enthralled.

Gaara smiled as he watched her, pleased with how impressed she was with his home, proud to have her here helping his village, his people. "Allow me to show you to your rooms."

"Rooms?" She stuttered.

"Yes, you will have the suite adjacent to my own while you are here. If you need anything, I will be close by." Gaara walked down a long corridor, Sakura's hand tucked under his arm pulling her in close down the not so narrow corridor to their rooms.

"My suite and yours are the only ones down this corridor, the others are in the towers or Eastern side of the manse. This side is reserved only for the reigning Kazekage and his intimates. I hope you know what an honor it is to have you here with me Sakura. Please, get some rest. I will have someone call you down for dinner when it is time." He bowed shortly to her, kissed her hand and walked back down the dim corridors.

Sasori was leaning against the wet bar in the living room when Gaara entered with a light smile on his lips, eyes slightly shining.

"She's a real cutie huh bro? Cuter now that she's older." Kankuro slapped his brother on the back with a grin.

"She is very accomplished," Gaara replied taking a glass from the wet bar beside his uncle and pouring himself some water.

"You mean she isn't boring and has a tight little body now to go with it." Kankuro licked his lips.

"I doubt a woman such as her would even glance at an imbecile such as yourself Kankuro, stop now before you embarrass Suna with your crass behavior." Sasori drawled turning a tumbler with amber liquid the color of his eyes in his nimble hands.

"What did you just say ?" Kankuro stood up straight glaring at his uncle.

"He said to leave her alone." Gaara looked up from the scroll he had started to read.

"Well, she is here to learn about poisons isn't she, I can help her with that." Kankuro smiled smugly.

"Your amateur intellect of a finely tuned art is deplorable, you are not qualified to teach her anything. You would do more harm than good." Sasori scoffed at the young puppeteer.

"Amature, I am not an amateur, I'm in the Bingo book!" Kankuro said angrily.

"A flaw of the publisher no doubt." Sasori plucked a speck of sand from his shirt and patted it down looking up to meet Kankurao's angry glare.

"I will be teaching the pinkette about the poisons of Suna." Sasori smiled.

"And antidotes," Gaara added cocking his head at his uncle who never volunteered to do anything.

"If I must." Sasori pushed off from the wet bar, refilled his tumbler and walked out of the room to his suite down the hall.

"I thought I was going to be the one to teach Sakura during the exchange between villages Gaara?" Kankuro huffed at his brother.

Gaara's eyes were still on his uncles back as he made his way slowly to his rooms. "You were, but it appears a better option has just volunteered. Don't worry, you can be her guide while she is here. I don't have time to take her around the village with my duties as Kazekage, and from our small walk, it is clear, she won't rest until she sees everything Suna has to offer." Gaara smiled remembering the excitement in Sakura's eyes as they walked through the market.

"And that includes the nightlife!' Kankuro rubbed his hands together.

"Wait till she is settled in a bit before you scare her off Kankuro." Gaara smiled at his brother, picked up his glass of water and made his way to his study, down the corridor Sakura and his suites were located.

Kankuro watched his brother open and close the door to his office.

Gaara had changed a lot in the last few years. He had taken a position among the ranks of regular Sand shinobi to be one of the people, had earned his titles along the way, showed his people he was not the monster they had previously known him to be, fought for control over his tailed beast and mostly mastered him. He smiled more, talked more, showed more emotions, lived. His interest in the Konoha medic was obvious. Kankuro had never seen his little brother hold anyone's hand besides Yashamaru...and that was a very very long time ago. Kankuro sighed. He could give him this. He wouldn't pursue the pinkette, but that didn't mean he wouldn't flirt with her for some fun.

Sakura stood in the main room of her suite. It appeared to be a very large, very richly decorated living room. She ran her fingers over the silk coverings of the soft sofa, tried not to step on the thick embroidered rugs at her feet, and marveled at the artistry of the carved sandstone walls.

She made her way into the next room, it was a study. A large marble desk with raccoon heads as feet sat in the middle of the room. Bookcases lined the walls and one side of the room facing the desert was all windowed. It was beautiful.

Sakura continued on to the last room, the bedroom. A round bed dominated the far left corner, windows lined the opposite wall just like the study and an open step down bath took over the far right corner of the room with a smaller door leading to the bathroom toilet and sink. Sakura smiled and spun around, it was a luxury she couldn't even dream of.

A loud knocking came to her from the suite door. Sakura opened the door to find a pretty blonde, taller than her with a slightly hard look on her face that didn't reflect her smile staring at her.

"You are Sakura." The blonde told her.

"Um yes." Sakura smiled slightly, recognizing the dangerous blonde.

"I'm Temari, remember me? Gaara's older sister? I'm High General of the Sand now. Welcome to Suna." The blonde stuck her hand out awkwardly and Sakura shook it.

"I am pleased to see you again, General." Sakura bowed low and Temari smirked.

"Just Temari. I came to show you how to use your room." Temari stepped into the room when Sakura moved aside.

"This is to summon a servant for food, towels or anything else you may need while you are here." Temari pointed to a small silver rope hanging from the wall beside the door.

"This one is only for emergencies or to set the manse on alert for fire, attack, whatever." She looked Sakura over as if determining how often she would use it for something ridiculous.

"I can take care of myself but don't worry, I'll pull it if there is a fire," Sakura smirked.

Temari laughed outright, "I think we'll get along just fine."

"Usually there is a water limit but since you are in the manse with the royal family, you don't have one," Temari smirked again.

"Do visitors usually stay in the manse with the family?" Sakura had wondered about that since she had stepped into the first room. It was far too ornate and richly accommodating than a normal room for a visiting nin.

"No, Gaara insisted you stay here, this room is used mainly for visiting family, he said that the strenuous relationship our villages have shared thus far warranted such...drastic measures." Temari cocked her head to the side looking much like Kankuro, "Now that I see you again though, I can see why he wants you close to him."

"What?" Sakura furrowed her brows.

"You have really filled out since the Chunin exams, but I guess a lot has changed for all of us hum?" Temari watched her.

Sakura narrowed her eyes, did their entire family have a staring problem or was it a Sand nin thing in general? Sakura huffed and pushed her hair back, "Yeah, a lot has changed since then. I'm not a whiny little useless cry baby anymore, you're a General, Gaara is Kazekage and Kankuro is...what has he been doing? He didn't tell me." Sakura and Temari laughed.

"Well, it is kinda hard being a puppet master following Sasori of the Red Sand. He is a living legend. Kankuro is very good at what he does but, well, there is no comparison between the two really. Sasori is a genius." Temari sighed for her brother.

"Anyway, Gaara told me he told you to rest, I'll be back later to get you for dinner." Temari turned to open the door.

"Thanks for showing me the ropes, literally." Sakura grinned and waved goodbye to the blonde.

Sakura looked at the clock on the wall, she had a few hours before dinner she figured so she went back to exploring the rooms. Stopping in front of one of the larger bookshelves she pulled a large volume from the shelf and cracked it open. It was on the history of Suna. She carried it over to the couch in her living room and tucked her feet up under her legs.

After an hour of reading, she decided she should probably get cleaned up for dinner. She set the book on the coffee table intending to read more when she got back to her room that evening after dinner and headed for the bath. If she would have turned to look at the bookcase before leaving the room she would have seen the detached amber eye following her across the room...but she didn't.

Hair clean and combed flowing down her back in a soft light cascade of pastel pink, black shinobi shirt and pants, she was ready for dinner.

A knock at her door let her know Temari was there to get her. She opened the door with a smile that faded as she realized it wasn't Temari but Sasori that had come to get her for dinner.

"Good evening kunoichi." Sasori greeted her without bowing moving past her into her rooms as he spoke.

"Goodevening Sasori Sama," Sakura remembered her manners even if he didn't, and bowed to him.

"I see you enjoy reading." He picked up the volume she had started to read earlier that day and thumbed through it lightly.

"Surely you must know that this isn't accurate." He dropped the book on the table with a loud thud.

"Excuse me?" She said a little annoyed he had barged in and was making so much noise.

"Come now." He gave her a condescending raise of the brow. "History is written by those who lie the best."

"Well, I hadn't really thought about that." Sakura offered, picking the book up and putting it back on the shelf where she had gotten it from.

"What else haven't you...thought of I wonder." Sasori cocked his head and watched her.

A family trait then, Sakura said to herself.

"I'm not sure what you mean Sasori Sama." Sakura glared at him.

"Of course you do, you aren't stupid like Kankuro, you are intelligent, observant and curious, like Gaara, like me. You just lack the confidence." Sasori told her like he was telling her the sky was blue.

"Excuse me?" She blundered, what the hell is with this guy.

"No, I don't think I will be doing that. It must be fixed, and quickly." He pulled a book off of the shelf and handed it to her. "Read this by the morning."

"What for?" She looked down at the book. "Poisons for beginners and not so great shinobi."

"I am your new Poisons Master." He told her and walked out the door as Temari was walking in.

"What was that about?" Temari watched her uncle leave the room and looked at Sakura who was red in the face and glaring at his back.

"Is he always that rude to people or is it just me?"

"He is always like that. I think he hates everyone. The only person he tolerates even a little bit is Gaara. Gaara is intellectual, quick thinking, a strategist, like Sasori, they are a lot alike." Temari smiled.

"The only difference is Gaara has learned to be more diplomatic, talks more, listens more and takes what others think into consideration more. With Sasori, it is his way or nothing because you are wrong and he is right." Temari grinned at Sakura's open-mouthed exasperation.

"He is the one who is teaching me about poisons and antidotes?" She moaned.

"The difference between most Know it Alls and Sasori, is he really does know it all. If he says he is right...he is." Temari shrugged. "Ready?"

"Ugh, yeah, let's go." Sakura pulled the door shut behind them.

Sasori made his way to the dining hall smiling at how Sakura's eyes blazed dark green with anger when he told her she lacked confidence. Her reaction proved she knew of that weakness and hated it. He was going to enjoy this. He didn't think he would find anything entertaining about having a silly Leaf nin join their ranks temporarily but he found Sakura most fascinating and her innocence more than alluring.

Gaara watched Temari and Sakura enter the dining hall through the west door and sit down side by side. He smiled, Temari must be pleased to have another female in the house, she grew up with all males, fights with almost all males, is the High General where no women stand side by side amongst their male counter parts, because there are no other women.

"How beautiful." Sakura murmurs as she looked around the hall.

Jeweled frames hold paintings of generations of Sabakus. They line the main walls of the dining area. Servants set exotic dish after dish on the table, a pitcher of purple liquid is set before Sakura and she leans forward looking at it curiously.

"Passionfruit juice my dear." Sasori waves to the pitcher she is peering at from his seat next to hers.

When the hell did he get here? Sakura hadn't heard or seen him enter the room, much less feel his chakra signature.

Her apprehension must have shown on her face because he smirked at her and said, "I see the Leaf doesn't deem their medical staff worth giving basic sensory lessons to hum? We shall have to remedy that."

"Sasori, don't antagonize Sakura, she is here of her own free will to help bring our hospital staff up to date." Gaara warned his uncle.

"I was under the impression she was also here to learn." Sasori drawled picking up his glass and filling it with passion fruit juice then Sakura's without asking her.

"I am willing to learn anything you can teach me Sasori Sama." Sakura fake smiled sweetly at him.

Sasori's mouth twitched and Gaara smiled.

"Well said Sakura." Gaara smiled at Sasori who merely looked bored.

"Well I'm starving. Have you ever had fried liver, try this." Temari handed a dish of what looked like thinly sliced beef but smelled like dead rotting beef.

"Uh, thank you." Sakura took the dish from the blonde trying not to inhale as she did so.

She placed a piece of thin sliced...liver on her plate and looked at it. A hand poured some yellow...something over it. Sasori's voice could be heard from her right, "Curry makes it taste better."

Sakura picked up her knife and chopsticks cutting off a small piece and slowly put it in her mouth. She chewed and immediately scooped up more yellow sauce.

"See." Sasori smirked. "Personally I find liver disgusting, I wouldn't eat it if I were you." He handed her a dish of what looked like bean sprouts and fried pork over steamed rice.

Sakura smiled gratefully at him and he smirked back at her.

Gaara, Temari and Kankuro laughed.

"So Sakura, we can start off by introducing you to the hospital staff tomorrow morning, you can take a tour of our facilities and go from there. I am relying on you to tell me what we need to do. I'm afraid our head medic is light years behind you and won't be much help." Gaara grimaced at her by way of an apology.

"Not to worry Gaara, I have ran our Konoha hospital for the last two years directly under my Shisou, I will help as much as I can. Sakura took another helping of bean sprouts.

"Yes, and after you are done scolding and chasing the children at that sad excuse of a hospital you can come to my lab and the real work can begin." Sasori picked at his food, removing the onions from his pork and onions.

"Do you not consider the hospital to be real work?" Sakura was a little miffed by his comment. She worked nearly night and day at the hospital in Konoha, there was always so much to do, she never had enough time, she felt like she practically lived there. Real work indeed.

"No." Sasori didn't even bother to look at her when he responded, he continued to pick the onions out of his pork.

"It is work, hard work and it is also rewarding. I know I am making a difference, helping those who need my help, healing them, caring for them, it is important." She glared at the poison master beside her.

Sasori turned to her and said, "So is watching someone wither and cry out covered in blood, that too is rewarding, knowing I killed them, knowing they will die in the most painful way possible, that all my hard work in formulating a new poison will allow me new ways to tortutre and kill enemy shinobi."

"You're an asshole you know that?" Sakura exploded, fire in her eyes.

"There it is." Sasori smiled.

"What?" Sakura growled at him.

"The passion I knew was there, hidden. Why do you hide who you are?" He poured her more juice.

"Sasori." Gaara warned his uncle.

"The sooner we get this out of the way the more productive her time will be here." Sasori crossed his arms over his chest and sat back in his seat.

"Or she'll get so pissed she leaves and goes back to Konoha ruining our alliance and bringing about the next Shinobi war." Kankuro muttered picking at his own plate.

"She isn't a quitter." Sasori turned his eyes back to Sakura, "Are you."

"I am not, but you are an asshole." Sakura picked up her glass and drank.

Temari burst out laughing slapping her hand on the table, "Yeah, we're going to get along just fine."

"Well, now that the fireworks are over and that is settled, goodnight." Sasori rose from his seat and left the dining hall, onions neatly stacked to the side of his plate, pork gone.

"Please tell me he gets better once you get to know him?" Sakura groaned out loud.

Kankuro avoided her eye, Temari kept eating but Gaara smiled at her.

"Would you care for desert Sakura?" He held up a plate of sugared pistachios for her.

"Uggh." She groaned but took the plate and ate one.

"These are really good." She grumbled.

Gaara smiled. "I am pleased you like them."

The rest of dinner was pretty boring. They went over her work schedule for the hospital, her days off, what would be covered by Suna and her allowance. Gaara asked her to get together a list of materials and equipment she thought they would need for the hospital and to have it to him by the end of the week for his review. She would have every afternoon from 2pm to 6pm for her poison and antidote lessons with Sasori and her weekends were her own.

Sasori watched her with his floating eye. She had returned back to her room after dinner pausing only to wash her hands then sat down on the couch with the book he had told her to read. She huffed a bit at first no doubt irked he had told her to do something but soon she appeared to really enjoy the reading and even started a small scroll with notes and possible questions she may have for him. He was pleased to see she was interested and taking this seriously. Kankuro had never made any notes or asked hardly any questions. The boy was a dud, no matter what anyone said.

To his amusement it had only taken her an hour to read the three inch thick book, she had sat there and made several more notes on her scroll then rolled it, tied it and set it by the book. She stood and stretched, walking to the window to look out over the village only...he noticed she wasn't really looking at the village so much as she was looking past it, toward Konoha. Ah, he said to himself, it really was her first time alone in another hidden village, perhaps...he had been a little rude to her. He released his jutsu and opened his eye, rubbed it and closed his drapes.

Morning came at the sound of a knock on her door. Sakura opened it to find a smiling Kankuro there to take her to the hospital as her trusty guide.

"Have you had breakfast?" He asked her as she grabbed her bag from the couch slinging it across her body.

"Yep, the best too! Your cook is amazing!" She grinned up at him.

"I know right! She makes the best desserts too you'll have to try more than just the pistachios next time." He led her out the front door and to the main street.

"It is so hot here, how do you wear that black jumpsuit?" She asked him looking over his less than cooling attire.

"I'm used to it I guess, but we can stop later maybe after lunch and get you some loose cotton clothes. You Leaf nin don't know how to survive in the desert I swear. I did a recon mission with a Leaf jonin last year, he almost died of heat stroke and he burned up like a crispy flake in the sun." Kankuro laughed.

"I'll get used to it, after all I'll be here for a few years I'll have to right?" She smiled at him and shaded her eyes, they were nearing the market.

"Yeah you will, let's stop now and get you some sunglasses though." He pulled her over tot a glasses stand.

They tried on a few pairs laughing at one another and making faces in the mirror until she finally found a pair she liked.

Kankuro introduced her to the current Suna Hospital staff and left, telling her he would be back around noon to take her to lunch.

Sakura turned to her new staff, "Well I am very pleased to meet all of you, Department heads, follow me, I want to take a quick look around, can someone please get me a pen and a notepad so I can make notes as we go?" She smiled at them, no one moved.

"It seems we are at a bit of a stand still, let me reintroduce myself. I am Haruno Sakura, late of Team 7, student of Hatake Kakashi the Copy Nin of Konoha, the apprentice to Lady Tsunade the Fifth Hokage of Konoha. I am here on a voluntary basis to help your village, I both deserve and demand your respect, however, I understand that respect is earned. Someone get me a damned notebook and pen so I can make my rounds and earn that respect or we can take this to the training ground and I can earn it that way hum?"

"Lady Sakura." A small timid voice spoke from her right, arms extended, fingers trembling on a notebook and pen, her head was bowed.

"Thank you, um?" Sakura took the notebook and en with two hands politely from the girl.

"Kokane, Lady Sakura." Kokane bowed lower.

"Kokane, thank you very much, but please do not call me Lady Sakura, I do not need such a lofty title. I am a Doctor, please address me as such."

"Yes Doctor." Kokane smiled at her.

"Not at all," Sakura turned to the rest of the department heads, "Let's move."

A little wooden puppet cocked it's head to the side as it "watched" the pink haired medic turn the corner of the hospital, then jumped out the window and away.

It took her the full three hours to walk, evaluate, interview, review and glare her hospital staff down. Kankuro was sitting in the main lobby when he saw her round the corner with the irate current head doctor on her heels.

"I don't care how you do it in Konoha, that's not how we do it here and we aren't changing for some pink hair little wanna be a doctor just because she is the apprentice to the overstuffed Senju whore!"

Sakura's hand shot out before anyone knew what had happened. The man flew through the air and the wall behind him landing in a crumpled heap. Sakura climbed through the hole in the wall his body had left, and spoke quite calmly.

"Please allow me to show you first hand why it is important for you to change the way you do things, that you will be changing the way you do things and that if you ever insult my mentor, friend and the Fifth Hokage again, terrible painful things will happen to you! I can be very creative!"

That said she pushed chakra into her hands , running them slowly over the man's broken ribs, bruised collarbone and twisted lower back. Within 15 minutes he had been fully healed. She thrust her now chakra free hand out to him with a raised eyebrow, "Well?"

"I...I'm sorry. That was...amazing." He ducked his head, took her hand and stood there shuffling his feet in embarrassment.

"Now for your punishment." She threw her arms out in front of her and cracked her knuckles. He flinched and paled before her.

"Go tell everyone in the hospital what just happened, how you insulted me, the Hokage, and how I punched you through a wall, how I healed you and hold no ill will against you or Suna. I told you...I demand your respect, if I can't earn it because you are too short sided and stubborn, I will beat it into you. Understood?"

"Yes Lady Sakura!" He fled.

She rolled her eyes and turned toward Kankuro who was laughing so hard he almost peed his jumpsuit.

"Stop laughing." She frowned.

"Oh my gosh, that was hilarious, you are so awesome, oh oh wait till Temari hears about this!" He falls back down in his seat laughing and flopping to the side holding his chest.

"Are you quite done, I'm starving and I have a ton of work to get done before I meet with Sasori." She put her hand on her hip.

"Yeah yeah, let's go." He wheezed wiping tears from his eyes.

Sakura stood outside the door leading to Sasori's lab. She sighed, shuffled her feet, then knocked on the door.

"Come in." A drawing bored voice called out to her.

"Good afternoon." She bowed politely.

"Come here and hold this." He ordered her without greeting. She huffed but made her way over to the table and held the beaker he thrust out to her.

"What is this?" She asked.

"Be quiet and I'll tell you." He said annoyed.

She rolled her eyes.

"Don't roll your eyes at me." He scolded her.

"How did you…" She blurted out.

He smiled, "I see everything you do, remember that."

"Yea yea, so what are you doing?"

"This is my latest formula, it isn't quite finished yet but it won't be one of my more dangerous poisons so I don't mind you helping me with it." He pulled a small vial from his lab coat and poured the green liquid into the beaker.

"That was frogspawn of the desert fire toad, very good for causing hallucinations and destabilizing the enemy, mix it with monkshood, or aconite as you Leaf like to call it and it makes the enemy live out the worst moments of their lives over and over , each time the moment gets more and more horrific till they are cured or killed." Sasori smiles, a smile so sweet and almost innocent in its placement that it shouldn't belong on a man who just spoke of such a torturous poison.

"The best part is if they don't get an antidote, they eventualy commit suicide to end the terror." He smiled at her as if he had just given her good news.

"That's terrible." She said.

"I call it effective." He took the beaker from her hand and poured it slowly into the other beaker, he swirled the contents around a bit then set it over the fire to heat.

Pulling a thermometer from his lab coat he placed it in the beaker and watched. As soon as the beaker reach 175 he removed it from the heat.

"It's ready to be imbued with my puppets now." He smiled at her again.

"What about the antidote?" She asked.

"What about it?" He started taking down little metal gauges that formed smaller rings around a larger loop.

"Aren't you going to make an antidote for it?" She asked him exasperated.

"Why would I do that?" He looked at her just as exasperated.

"What if you accidentally cut yourself with it or, I don't know ingest it by accident." She threw her hands up in the air.

"If I did that...I would deserve to die...ridiculous Leaf nin, that's why you're a bunch of tree hugging, bleeding heart, emotional messes, you always want a safety net." He scoffed and said something about real nins don't need such things.

"So where do you find your ingredients for your poisons?" She opted for the diplomatic approach.

"Come." He left the lab and headed out of the main wing and around the corner. She had to run to keep up.

"This is the green house and those are the indoor gardens." Sasori waved her into a wide open lush building.

"It smells like Konoha." She smiled wistfully. She didn't think she would miss her home so much, but she did.

"Yes, the smell of dirt, fascinating." he started walking to the back, "Follow me."

They stopped in front of the strangest plant Sakura had ever seen. The trunk was thick but it wasn't a tree, it had flowers on it but she wouldn't call it a flower like regular flowers, it was beautiful...and it was moving.

"This is a Chugoki Hamaruta plant." Sasori told her. "Don't touch it or you will die.

Sakura backed away from one of the plants moving vines but continued to look closely at it.

"What do you use it for?" She asked him.

"Nothing." He watched her.

"But, what? Nothing?" She frowned and looked at the plant.

"You tell me." He smiled.

"You read the book told you to, figure it out." He left her, he turned on his heel and walked out the door and left her there with the deadly moving plant.

4 ½ hour later...

Gaara knocked on Sakura's door. No answer. He knocked again. No answer. Gaara teleported into her suite and looked around. She wasn't there.

Sasori labeled the last two vials and set them in the rack just as Gaara knocked on his door. Sasori sighed. He didn't want to deal with this right now.

"Yes?" Sasori answered the door to his lab not even trying to hide his annoyance.

"Where is Sakura?" Gaara asked without greeting his uncle.

"Lost the little Leaf nin already? Maybe she really was a quitter and ran back home?" Sasori sneered at the Kazekage.

"She was last seen with you." Gaara insisted.

"I left her in the greenhouse, I would have thought she would be done by now." Sasori yawned.

Gaara teleported to the greenhouse and pushed the door open.

"Sakura?" He called out her name as he walked up and down the aisles.

"Sakura?" Sasori mimicked him.

Gaara smelled the blood before he saw it.

"Sakura!" Gaara fell to his knees by the pink haired medic.

"I'm okay, it is the plant's blood, not mine, I'm almost done." She smiled up at Gaara.

"The plant's blood?" Gaara frowned.

"Interesting...though it did take you a lot longer than I had hoped." Sasori leaned against the seedling racks.

Sakura capped her last vial and set it in the foam rack on the counter with the others she had filled.

"You bastard!" She took one quick step, arm raised and went for Sasori. "It could have killed me!"

He grabbed her arm, twisted it up against the small of her back, turned her and brought her back up against his chest, her arm pinned between them his lips to her neck.

"Careful dear." His lips brushed her neck as he spoke. "I may be a puppet master but that isn't all I can do with my hands. It could have killed you, but it didn't."

He rested his cheek up against her neck, her hair tickling his nose as he looked at Gaara and pointedly inhaled her scent.

"Enough." Gaara's sand rose around them, filtering in between Sakura and Sasori where he held her to him.

"Just a lesson, dear nephew, nothing to get...alarmed about." Sasori released Sakura and she stumbled forward into Gaara's arms.

Gaara held her out and away from him, slowly letting go once he knew she wouldn't fall.

"The blood." Sakura turned to Sasori, "The blood is the antidote to your new poison. She took a vial from the stand and handed it to him.

A real smile spread across his face, "So it is."

"Sakura, perhaps you wish to clean up before dinner?" Gaara's gaze never left that of Sasori's as he spoke.

Sakura nodded and walked to the door of the greenhouse, pausing only slightly, looking back then pushed the door open and left, leaving the two red heads to glare at one another.

"Need I remind you uncle, that I am the Kazekage, you are not. Sakura is here as a diplomat and healer, not a toy for you. If you put her in danger again, I will take action against you, whatever action I deem necessary." Gaara spoke calmly, but the threat was clear.

"You do what you must Kazekage," Sasori smirked. "She really is quite interesting, isn't she?"

"She is not interested in you," Gaara warned.

"Oh? I wouldn't be too sure of that my young nephew." Sasori smiled and walked past Gaara, out the door.

Gaara sighed heavily and teleported to his chambers in a whirl of sand.

6months later…

"Sakura! To your left dear!" Sasori yelled above the sand storm.

Sakura flipped through the air landing unsteadily on the soft sand. "Shit." She pulled the kunai from her shoulder and ran at the enemy nin.

"Why is The Leaf fighting alongside the Sand!" The Iwa nin yelled at her as he threw more kunai her way.

"Alliance!" She screamed as her fist made contact with his leg shattering it into a thousand pieces. He fell to the ground in a small spattering of blood.

"Good girl." Sasori landed beside her looking down at the last Iwa nin.

Sasori took a small senbon from his waist and flicked it at the Iwa nin who was still trying to get up through the pain of his shattered leg. It hit him in his brow, between his eyes. He fell backward dead.

"Come Sakura, let's get back to camp, you need your wounds tended to. Are you capable of walking? He asked looking to her bloodied leg and shoulder.

"Yes." She panted slightly and started walking off in the direction of their camp.

She got ten feet before she collapsed to the ground.

"You've lost too much blood, daft girl. You always push yourself too hard." Sasori bent down and picked her up.

"Put your arms around my neck so I don't jostle your shoulder." He instructed.

She did and laid her head against his chest breathing hard. Sasori smiled, kissed the top of her head and ran back to their camp at top speed.

He laid her down gently by the fire that was still going, the bedroll that was still laid out. They had caught them by surprise. She had been filling their canteens when the Iwa nin had attacked. He had heard the cracking of her chakra filled punch rent the air. She had two deep slashes to her leg by the time he had gotten to the river, one Iwa nin dead at her side, head bashed in, the other had her pinned to a tree, chakra cuffs on her and was choking her slowly with one hand, the other roaming up and down her body.

Sasori had reacted poorly. He didn't call forth his puppets, he pulled two kunai from his belt and cut the Iwa's throat from behind. He was so distracted with breaking her chakra cuffs he hadn't seen the other one in the tree.

He shook his head. He needed to focus. She needed him. Pulling a small vial from his pouch, he slipped his hand behind her head lifting it up and upended the vial into her mouth.

"Swallow dear." He coaxed her.

Sakura swallowed, relief was instantaneous.

She smiled at him. "Sasori.

"It won't last long, I need to work quickly." He shushed her.

He sewed her shoulder wound shut disinfecting it as he went, then the two long slashes on her leg. It would have to do till her chakra returned enough for her to heal them herself.

Sasori popped the top off of a bottle with red pills in it and put one in her mouth. "Chew, blood rejuvenating pill."

Sakura ground the pill between her teeth grimacing at the taste.

"Sasori." She tried to sit up but he placed a hand gently to her chest.

"Rest. I'll get you back to Suna in the morning." He pulled the bedding up and over her the desert was cold at night, particularly at this time of year.

He sat beside her as she drifted off to sleep watching the rise and fall of her breathing. He had been distracted, he had been caught unaware, because of her.

"Ridiculous." He said to the fire.

Yet, it wasn't. Those Iwa nin were nothing, he should have been able to kill them with a mere flick of his wrist. She had screamed and he had run to her without checking for chakra signatures, without thinking, he had just gone...foolish.

A gentle breeze blew over the ground lifting leaves, dust, and pink hair as he continued to watch her sleep. His hand reached out to her before his brain could laugh at him. He brushed the scattered locks from her face. She turned her head in her sleep and smiled at him, eyes opening just a sliver, of green, and closed again. She sighed, pressing her face into his open palm. She trusted him.

Something, deep down, that before now, or from long ago. Fluttered softly, painfully. Heat rushed to his face in embarrassment. What was that...ridiculous. Only, this time, he couldn't bring himself to say it out loud.

They had become close over the year, spending time together in his lab, foraging for poison ingredients. He taught her what plants to look for, how to cut and prepare them. He taught her everything he knew, he never held back from her. She was brilliant, intelligent, a genius in her own right, he had never had a more worthy student.

When they weren't creating they were still talking, discussing and analyzing, be it people, politics and of course poisons. He had taught her how to be a better sensor, how to improve her movement speed, how to dodge even better than Tsunade had taught her. He taught her puppetry, she had been a perfect candidate with her perfect chakra control. She was his greatest work of art. He was so proud of her. He cared about her.

"Sakura!" Temari ran into the hospital room coming to a skidding halt beside her friend's bed.

"What happened?" Temari's wide eyes met Gaara's.

"Sasori brought her back from the foraging trip with two sword slashes to the leg and a stab wound to the shoulder, major blood loss, chakra depletion and hypothermia," Gaara said calmly.

"She will be just fine, he did emergency medic aide on sight, let her rest the night with a blood pill and a pain killer, then ran her here this morning before dawn, he just left." Gaara looked out of the small hospital window as the sun rose above the horizon.

"Oh thank goodness." Temari brushed almost tears from her face quickly.

Sakura and Temari had become good friends over the last 6 months, Sakura had become friends with almost all of Suna in the last 6 months. Gaara couldn't think of anyone in Suna that didn't adore the little pink-haired kunoichi, including himself...including Sasori. Even their crotchety great grandmother liked the little medic.

Kankuro knocked and walked in holding a small potted cactus. He nodded to his siblings then set the plant in the window. "How is she?"

"She will be fine, she suffers from blood loss and chakra depletion, she just needs rest.

"Where is Sasori?" Kankuro asked.

"In his lab or his suite I imagine, he left shortly after dropping her off," Gaara said.

Sakura woke up several hours later, dizzy and tired. Temari was sitting by the window and rose when she called her name.

"Have you been here long?" Sakura asked her friend in a raspy voice.

"Only a few hours, not long, you look terrible!" Temari laughed.

"Thanks." Sakura chuckled softly.

"Where is Sasori?" Sakura asked noticing Temari bite her lip. "What is it?"

"We can't find him," Temari told her.

"Gaara thinks he may have left, for Iwa."

"What?" Sakura gasped.

"Sasori told Gaara that you got ambushed by the river when you went to fill the canteens by Iwa nin and that one of them, touched you." Temari's eyes met Sakura's in a knowing way.

"Well yes, but it wasn't anything new, if you know what I mean, it happens all the time." Sakura grimaced at the other woman.

"Yeah, but how often do you think those lug-heads know about it much less see it?" She sighed, "Besides, even if he tries to hide it, we all know Sasori...cares for you."

"I'm his student, Kakashi sensei was the same way." Sakura smiled but her smile faded. "Do you think he really went to Iwa?"

"With Sasori, there is no telling." Temari sighed.

"Isn't that, I mean, even he can't...isn't that suicide?" Sakura asked.

"You've never seen his one hundred red puppets have you?" Temari asked her.

"No, can he command them all, at the same time?" Sakura gasped.

"Yes." Temari looked out the window.

"So, then, Gaara has a right to be worried." She laid back in her bed and closed her eyes. "Sasori."

Sasori stood at the gates of Iwa. "I am Akasuna no Sasori and I wish to speak to the Tsuchikage."

"Get lost Sand nin, you're kind aren't welcome here!" The Iwa guard yelled down from the gate.

"I will only repeat myself once, I wish to speak to the Tsuchikage...now." Sasori drawled.

"Fuck off Sand nin." The guard threw two kunai at Sasori, who merely stepped back two paces.

"Very well. The destruction of Iwa is on your head." Sasori removed the scroll from his back, " Red secret technique, performance of one hundred puppets!"

Puppets flew from the scrolls by the twenties.

"I warned you," Sasori called out to the Iwa guard, who looked on in horror.

With several small flicks of his wrist, he attached chakra strings to his lot. "Let us begin."

Sakura woke the next day to a soft touch on her face.

"Sasori." The name left her lips before she had fully opened her eyes.

"Sakura. I have returned to Suna. Are you well?" Sasori continued to caress her cheek gently.

"I'm so glad you're back, Gaara said he thought you went to Iwa, he said that you went to avenge me because that Iwa nin touched me and."

The look in his eyes stopped her. "Sasori, you didn't." Her hands went to her mouth.

"I did."

She sat up, she could see it now, blood on his shirt, pants, face, arms, blood, everywhere.

"The Tsuchikage…"

"Is dead." Sasori sighed and sat in the chair by her bed, his hand never leaving her cheek.

"Oh Sasori, you shouldn't have." Tears ran down her cheeks as she looked into his eyes.

"The filth of Iwa has been wiped clean, you are my student." He paused. " I had to."

He laid his head in her lap, "I had to."

Sakura laid her hand on his head. "Sasori."

Gaara watched them from outside of her hospital room door. His fists clenched at his sides. "Sasori, uncle, what have you done." He turned and walked calmly down the hall, out the front door of the hospital, out the front gates of Suna and disappeared in a flurry of sand...Shukaku needed to be let out, he needed to vent.

6 months later…

"They are calling for war Sasori, do you not understand that?" Gaara had both hands on the table in front of him leaning forward toward his uncle who sat calmly on the other side.

"I expected it." Sasori rolled his eyes.

"The Leaf, The Sand, we will both be thrown into a war because of our alliance all because of you and your reckless actions." Gaara narrowed his eyes at his uncle, the man didn't even seem to care.

"I didn't think there were enough of them left to start any sort of war much less make you worry about it Kazekage." Sasori looked up to meet Gaara's heated gaze. "If she had been with you, what would you have done? Would you have been able to control that beast in you?"

"They have an alliance with The Raikage, they are not alone, he can't just sit back and watch them die and he won't, we already received over 25 scrolls of war communication, terms, and recompense!" Gaara sat down in his seat exhausted. He normally didn't get any sleep but lately he had gotten even less.

"What do they want?" Sasori asked, choosing to ignore the fact his nephew had not answered him.

"They want us to surrender you to them, alive," Gaara said.

"Ah, torture then. Well, I see no other way, we'll just have to go to war." Sasori sighed like he was bored.

Temari choked on her drink. "Are you serious?"

"Unless you plan on handing me over to them, what else is there?" Sasori looked at her cocking his head to the side.

"I am not going to hand you over to the Raikage uncle," Gaara said quietly. "We will go to war, send a missive to the Leaf."

Temari nodded and left the room.

"Don't be stupid boy, I was just joking, you can't go to war. I started this, I'll finish it." Before Gaara could say anything before he could move. Sasori was gone.

It was late as Sasori made his way to Sakura's rooms, or early depending on your perception. He undid the protection seals on her door and opened it slowly.

Moonlight cast shadows over the couch and table as he made his way through her living room to the office. Her files and hospital forms fell haphazardly over the desk in the middle of the room, he smiled at her organized chaos. At the door to her bedroom, he stopped and looked to the left, she lay barely covered on the large round bed, legs diagonal, arms thrown wide, he smiled.

Sasori sat on her bed leaned over and whispered in her ear, "Sakura, wake up dear, I have to tell you some things."

She moved slightly, rolled a bit and blinked. "Sasori?"

"Yes dear, it's me, I need to speak with you." He took her hand in his.

Sakura sat up in her bed and blinked the sleep away. "What time is it?"

"Sakura. I have to go, I'm leaving Suna. I won't be coming back." He drew her to him and hugged her for the first time. They had touched casually, in passing, for medical care but this was a real hug.

"I wanted to say goodbye before I left and...give you this." He pulled a delicate gold chain from his pocket with a small gold scorpion dangling from a ring.

"It's...so beautiful." Sakura looked at the necklace in front of her face.

"It is one of my own, the most venomous of all the scorpions in the world, I dipped it in gold, but the poison remains in its body if you should ever need it. Never take it off." He clasped the chain around her neck, running his finger gently along her collar bone where it lay glistening in the scare moonlight.

"I will not bring the war to Suna." He looked up at her.

"But you said." She began.

"I know, I lied."

"You do care." She smiled.

"You were my best student." He rose from the bed and looked out the window.

"They are coming," he said quietly.

"Who?" She asked.

"Stay away from the Akatsuki Sakura, and do not tell anyone I taught you puppetry." He removed a small scroll from his waist and handed it to her.

"Your first puppet. I made it special, just for you." Sasori cupped her face in his hands and looked at her as though he were memorizing her every feature, every eyelash, every hair, and then he was gone, out the window before she could move.

"I do not regret." came to her on the wind...and she started to cry, falling back onto her bed.

Sakura woke with a start, "Sasori!" she gasped.

"He is gone." Gaara sat in a chair by her bed. "But you know this don't you."

Sakura brought her hand to her neck and fingered the gold chain, "Yes."

"I had hoped, it was just a dream." She said.

"I have declared him a missing-nin, he will be hunted by all five of the great nations now," Gaara spoke quietly.

"This is all my fault." She started to cry.

"No. I have learned, when you love someone, you will go to any length to ensure they are safe."

"I was safe, he didn't have to do that, he didn't have to kill all those Iwa nin." She cried.

"Do not insult his gesture by condemning it." Gaara rose from the chair and sat on the bed beside her.

"It is not your fault, he knew what he was doing, and he did it for you." Gaara pet her once then stood. "I will call the maid to bring you breakfast and inform the hospital you will be a little late this morning."

"Thank you." Sakura tried to smile at him.

"Sakura, Sasori is gone, but I'm still here for you." His pale green eyes met hers, she nodded and he left.

Days passed, then weeks and she fell back into her routine she had begun to know during her time in Suna. She filled the hours she would normally spend learning from Sasori developing new poisons and antidotes in his lab, she was the only one Gaara would allow in there now.

The Suna hospital had done well, the medical staff after a few broken noses and broken walls fell into order. Two new doctors under Sakura's instruction joined the ranks of the Suna medic-nin, she couldn't have been more proud.

At night, when she couldn't sleep Gaara would join her on the roof to watch the stars, one night they kissed, her first kiss. He had wanted more but she had pulled away, the gold of her necklace glinting in the moonlight.

A year later found her handing the reins over to her former assistant, Kokane as head medic for the hospital. The girl had worked hard over the last two years and deserved every bit of the title and praise. With her title transferred to a native and her time less in demand, she found herself in Sasori's lab more and more.

By the end of the next year, she had developed 12 new poisons of her own design and their antidotes. The end of her third year was drawing near, soon it would be time for her to return to Konoha.

She was in her room packing when she found the scroll. It had been tucked up under her pillow sealed by a familiar chakra signature.

"Sasori." Sakura pulled the scroll open. It was a storage scroll. She laid it out on the floor of her room and pressed her chakra into it, a cloud of smoke erupted around her. When the smoke had cleared and she looked down she saw a beautiful katana. An ivory sheath, yellowed and polished to an aged grain, smooth and cool to the touch. She pulled the sword from the sheath, the sensual whisper of the blade filling her ears. Two degree, diamond cut, tenfold, full hilt, with a small scorpion like the one she wore around her neck etched into the base.

A note was tucked into the sheath, the small white poking out from the opening. She pulled the paper out and unfolded it.

It read: Sakura, I am well. You are missed. Never forget, puppets are not the only weapon a puppet master can wield. You were my best student. -Sasori

Sakura sheathed her sword, normally she would bloody the blade so it knew it's purpose but this was a gift from Sasori, it would be poisoned. She burned the note so no one else could find it.

Gaara met her in her living room.

"Do you think it would have been different if he had stayed, perhaps you would have found comfort in Suna, family." Gaara watched her put books back on the shelf one by one as he stood in the middle of the room.

"We weren't close like that Gaara, he was my teacher, I was his student." She sighed, they had had this conversation many times since Sasori had left.

"Yet you pull away from me, you never let me close." He moved toward her taking her hand.

"Sakura, he was not the only one who cared for you, does care for you." Gaara pulled her closer to him, she could feel his breath on her cheek.

"I care for you." He said quietly arms around her waist, face in her hair.

"Gaara, I…" She gently pulled away from his embrace." I'm sorry."

Gaara sighed. "I am sorry, but I guess Kankuro is right, who could possibly compare to Akasuna no Sasori." He smiled at her and disappeared.

She said goodbye to them at the gates of Suna with promises to write. Gaara kissed her on the cheek and held her for a little longer than was polite but she let him, it was goodbye after all.

Temari promised to visit her soon, Kankuro said he would send her the design for his latest puppet when he was finished so she could tell him what she thought. Sakura waved to most of her hospital staff that had showed up to see her off.

Turning one last time before joining her Sand escort, she waved goodbye, then turned and ran to catch up.

Her Konoha Anbu escort met them at the border. Sakura hugged a teary goodbye to her Sand escort, all of whom had become friends in the past three years.

"Sorry about that, I'm ready to go home now." She smiled at the Anbu, a tall man with the mask of a weasel.

"Hn." Was her reply.

"Sasuke Kun?" She asked the Anbu.

"No, uh, his brother, Itachi." Itachi bowed to her low and polite.

"It is good to see you again Sakura san, it has been a long time. Are you well?" Itachi smiled behind his mask.

"I am very well, I had a very enlightening time in Suna, it was a good advantage for both villages. I am happy to get home though, I have missed my friends and family greatly. How is Sasuke Kun?" She asked Itachi.

"He is well, and looks forward to your return."

"Let's not disappoint him then, shall we?" She motioned for him to go first.

"After you Sakura-san." Itachi bowed.

Sakura laughed and leaped into the trees.

Itachi watched Sakura fly through the trees, she was fast, very fast. Her feet barely touched the branches, it was like she was really flying, or on strings, like chakra strings. Was it something she had learned while staying in Suna? She was so graceful and beautiful. It looked like she was dancing.

They were making good time and were almost to the village gates when a bomb went off. Tree bark, dirt, and leaves flew around them.

"That's her! The pink hair!" An unidentified nin yelled across the forest. Many things happened at once.

Itachi leaped in front of her "Fire style, Fireball Jutsu!" The largest, most powerful fireball Sakura had ever seen flew from Itachi's mouth taking out and burning two Iwa nin instantly.

Sakura fell to the ground, feet imbued with chakra sending the landscape around her into chaos.

The Earth rippled like waves on the ocean, Iwa nin went flying off balance, senbon laced with her now signature poison flew through the air hitting mark after mark.

Itachi was in front of her, behind her, to her left, to her right, Iwa nin after Iwa nin fell to the ground like flies.

"Incredible." Sakura looked at Itachi in wonder. He was so fast, so accurate. She only knew one other as fast and as accurate, Sasori.

"You were very impressive as well Sakura-san. I would expect nothing less from the apprentice of the 5th Hokage however." Itachi plucked one of her senbon from a nearby Iwa nin and sniffed the end.

"I have not encountered this poison before, is it from Suna?" Itachi asked her.

"Yes and no." She smiled. "It is of my own design that I created in Suna with the help of Akasuna no Sasori."

"Ah yes. I had heard something about that." Itachi admitted.

"Shall we?" Sakura abruptly changed the subject and leaped back to the trees.

"I will send a retrieval squad once we get into Konoha." Itachi looked back at the dead Iwa nin.

"Good idea." She smiled and leaped branch over branch until she saw the familiar gates of Konoha. "Home!" She closed her eyes and breathed in the perfume of the forest. Home.

Itachi watched as she made the hand signs for her water dragon. She had improved, they were almost as fast as his, almost.

The water dragon erupts from thin air flying fast toward her clone which spun and leaped into the air, water bullets flying from her lips.

Itachi leaned a little out of the tree he was in and saw her nimbly evade the surprise move by simply stepping to the side, no wasted energy, nothing flashy, simplicity. That's what he liked most about her fighting style. It was simple, straight forward...and dangerous.

Two more clones popped out of the ground running fast, jumping over the now crashing water dragon, pulling a wire between them taunt.

"Shit." The curse escaped her lips as he smirked. He had always thought it humorous such a small petite little woman, cursing like a 250-pound male.

Dirt and rock exploded around her. Another smirk from Itachi.

There was that danger, that power. When the dust had cleared the clones were nowhere to be seen but the wire lay in a tangled heap at her feet. Her tiny feet.

She took a deep breath, wiping her sweaty brow. Yes, he enjoyed watching her train with her clones.

"SAAAAAKURRAAAAA!" Naruto was screaming as he ran to his teammate with the signature goofy grin spread across his face.

Itachi rose from his branch where he had been suppressing his chakra and disappeared.

"Hey, Naruto, what's up?" Sakura brushed pink locks back from her face turning to greet her teammate.

"Sasuke just got back from his solo mission, want to join us at Ichiraku Ramen?"

"Let me go home and change first, I'll meet you there okay?" She smiled at him. Sasuke had been gone for another long term mission to the land of Tea, it would be good to see him.

"Okay! See you soon!" Naruto bounded off in the direction of the market and she flickered to her apartment.

Fifteen minutes later had her walking slowly toward the other side of the market by the Uchiha compound. She opted for a simple dress after her shower. It was hot and the sun was out, no clouds in the sky, not as hot as Suna but still a nice summer day. She smiled or waved to other nin or villagers as she made her familiar way to the ramen stand. It was nice to live in Konoha, so peaceful.

Sakura had been on solo missions but not assassinations and she had never had to kill anyone on them. In fact, most of the dead she saw were at the hospital when she couldn't save a patient. When there were deaths on her missions, her boys were the ones to make the killing strike mostly. She had only killed 12 people at the old age of 21, 10 of which were while she was in Suna. It was rare, but she was a medic-nin, in a time of peace. It was different from when she had visited Suna for three years, she understood now, how different all the hidden villages must be.

A little part of her also admitted, she had learned more about killing in Suna than she had in her entire time in Konoha. Were some villages more adept at killing than others, it seemed so.

She could make out Sasuke's dark hair and straight back from a mile down the road, not to mention the obnoxiously bright orange and black of Naruto's normal dress. Her boys. She loved them so much, they had always been together and she hoped they always would be.

She sat down next to Sasuke who gave her his signature "Hn. and a small upturn of his mouth as a way of greeting.

Naruto being naruto waved his arms around like windmills before they settled on her waist dragging her into his chest for a bone-crushing hug.

Her boys.

"Yo." Kakashi sat down beside her at the bar.

"Kakashi." She nodded to her old Sensei.

"I saw you out at training ground 7 earlier Sakura, your use of your shadow clones is admirable. Good thing you have such a smart sensei to come up with that training tactic hum?" He patted himself on the back.

"Oh yes, Sensei you're the best." She rolled her eyes.

All teasing aside, it was a brilliant tactic for training and had benefited not only her and Naruto but Sasuke as well.

With shadow clones one could learn new Jutsu in half the time, or less depending how many clones you could muster. She maxed out at fifteen, which wasn't bad. Not everyone could be Naruto and call forth 50 or 70 depending on how much ramen he had eaten that day.

Sasuke could call forth a steady 20.

Sakura thought she could do more but had drawn the line at her modest 15, she didn't like overdoing things if she wasn't in battle and they were in a time of peace. She did call forth more clones when she was in her lab, a decent 30 to run diagnostics and testing on her favorite subject, poisons. It had become a hobby of hers.

She had spent 3 years in Suna on an exchange at the insistence of her Shisou, Tsunade Senju. It had been beneficial to both villages. She taught minimal healing Jutsu and techniques to their regular hospital staff and in turn Sasori their own poisons master taught her about several common, and not so common poisons.

Her 3 years there had been particularly advantageous, Sasori of the Red Sand had returned after a two-year-long infiltration and recon mission, just as she had arrived. He was brilliant and not a little handsome, made even more attractive by his genius and quiet mannerisms. He had reminded her a bit of Sasuke's older brother Itachi. Quiet,not quite as polite as Itachi... and dangerously talented.

"We have a mission, we leave tomorrow Sakura." Kakashi handed her a scroll as their bowls of ramen were set in front of them.

"Oh?" She took the scroll and unfurled it, by the time she was done reading, his bowl was empty and his book was out in his hand.

"We are going to Rain?" She frowned.

"Mm." Kakashi nodded, face in his book.

"Anbu reported suspicious activity and abnormal chakra signatures moving in and around Rain, we are to act as a foraging party and check it out." Kakashi turned a page in his book not looking at her.

"Abnormal chakra signatures, as in powerful signatures?" She rolled the scroll back up and put it in her bag.

"Mmhm," Kakashi confirmed.

"This actually works out, I am in need of several of the rare herbs that grow in Rain." She smiled picking up her chopsticks.

"That's why the Hokage is sending us." He didn't need to add the "Duh." But he did. "Duh."

She grabbed his book out of his hands and smacked him with it. He grinned at her and disappeared, book and all.

"So what are we doing tonight?" Naruto who was on his second bowl of ramen asked them

"We were doing something tonight?" Sakura asked between bites.

"It is your night off isn't it?' Sasuke asked her innocently.

"Yea." She said looking at him strangely. Since when did he know her schedule, and didn't he just get back home?

Her affections for Sasuke had changed over the years. She had once professed to being madly in love with him but realized soon after puberty she really wasn't. He was handsome, he had tendencies but no, he wasn't the one for her. Maybe no one was. She sighed.

"What's wrong?' Sasuke asked her.

"Oh nothing, I was just thinking how stupid I was when I was younger, how I obsessed over your brooding good looks with the rest of the girls at the academy." She laughed.

They had really grown up.

"Speaking of which, how are you and Hinata doing Naruto?" She leaned forward to speak past Sasuke.

"We're great ya know! Thanks for setting us up on the "Date" last month, I never knew she liked me!" Clueless Naruto smiled.

"Since the academy idiot." She grinned nevertheless.

"By the way," Sakura turned her attention back to Sasuke, "Michiko, one of the nurses at the hospital wanted to know if you were seeing anyone Sasuke, I think she likes you. Want me to set you up?"

"Uh, no." Sasuke had a strange look on his face.

"She is really pretty and nice. Tell you what, I'll find a date and go with you, we can double date."

"No." He glared at her.

What was that about?

"Have it your way." She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and ate her last bite of ramen, dropping her money on the bar before she left.

"Oi! Sasuke and I will be at your apartment around 6 pm with take out okay!" Naruto called to her as she made her way down the road to the library.

"Sure thing!" She called back with a wave.

Red eyes watched her from high up, on a utility pole.

Sakura slowly made her way to the genjutsu section in the library. She had gotten the water dragon and the water bullets down, now she wanted to strengthen her genjutsu arsenal. Kakashi had always told her she had an affinity for it when they had been genin.

Slowly she walked up and down the aisles pulling a book out to browse randomly. She stopped at the end of the corner and pulled out an old volume, dusty. "Ohhh." She hummed in interest stepping back to lean on the opposite bookshelf while she scanned it.

"Oomph." A male made a small noise behind her.

Sakura jumped, she hadn't seen anyone else in the aisle, she couldn't even feel a chakra signature. She turned to apologize.

"Itachi!" She facepalmed.

"I'm so sorry, I didn't know you were there." She frowned a little. She still couldn't feel a chakra signature and he was right in front of her. Wow, she knew he was good but this was...incredible. Her sensory skills were quite good, Sasori had taught her how to hone that skill to perfection. She should feel his presence, particularly at such a close proximity.

"Why are you suppressing your chakra?" She asked him.

"I like to come here and read in peace, if people know where I am, I can't be at peace." He said in his normal calming quiet tone.

"Ah." She made a small noise of understanding.

"I'll let you be then, sorry for um, leaning against you." She blushed.

"Anytime." Itachi murmured and pulled a book from the shelf next to her head bringing his body close to hers. He smelled of firewood and something sweet, Dango.

She inhaled deeply and sighed closing her eyes. Her eyes snapped back open once she realized what she had done.

Itachi was looking at her, eyes calm and relaxed, a small quirk of his lips told her he had noticed. Her face flamed a brilliant red and his quirk grew into a smile.

She had never seen him smile before. She stumbled back "Uh, bye." and almost ran from the aisle, book clasped against her chest. She could have sworn she heard him chuckle.

Itachi left the library shortly after his run-in with Sakura releasing the confines of his chakra.

Shisui dropped down from a nearby roof walking in time with Itachi as though they had been strolling through the park all day together.

"Hey cuz, what's with the chakra suppression, we have been looking for you, we leave in ten mins," Shisui asked Itachi.

"I was at the library," Itachi said.

"Right before we have to leave for a mission, what the hell was at the library?" Shisui grinned, he knew who was at the library, he could feel her chakra signature.

"Nothing," Itachi said and picked up his pace. "I'm ready, let's meet the others.

"Uh-huh. Sure." Shisui grinned wider.

"What do you think Sasuke will say when he finds out his older brother has a crush on his teammate who used to be in love with him?" Shisui teased.

"She was never in love with him. It was a silly infatuation" Itachi countered calmly.

"Uh-huh, but was Sasuke ever in love with her?" Shisui asked carelessly.

"I doubt it, he never paid her any attention," Itachi said as they approached the gates.

"He does now." Shisui pointed out.

"She is the Hokage's apprentice." Itachi wanted to know where this was going but he could guess.

"And she is powerful now." They were at the gate.

"She has always been powerful," Itachi said pulling his mask over his face.

"Yeah, well you're not the only one noticing now, there are others noticing how powerful she is now." Shisui pulled his own mask over his face.

"But I was the first." Itachi smiled behind the confines of his mask. Besides, she never looked back at any of the men that looked at her, as if she couldn't be bothered. He knew she hadn't been dating, hadn't been seeing anyone since she had gotten back from Suna. There was no real competition.

6 pm came and went and there was no sign of her boys. Sakura sighed and changed out of her day clothes into a pair of comfy shorts and a tank top. She opened the window and walked to the kitchen to see what she had to make for dinner when a knock sounded at her door.

"Better late than never!" Naruto grinned at her holding up several bags of take out food.

"You could have sent a clone to tell me you were running late, I already changed into my comfy clothes." She grimaced at him her hands on her hips.

"You look great! We're like family! Who cares!" He bounded through her door and headed for the kitchen.

"Hey." Sasuke waved following Naruto into her apartment.

Sakura shut the door behind him and followed them into the kitchen.

"Ramen, dumplings, red bean buns and Dango." Naruto waved his hand over the spread on the table.

"Hey nice, what's the special occasion?" She took a red bean bun and bit into it.

"Hinata said she would be my girlfriend!' Naruto exploded.

"Congratulations!" Sakura hugged him hard.

Naruto deserved this kind of happiness. He had Sakura and Sasuke after Team 7 had been formed but he still had spent 12 years without parents, without being loved at all. She was happy for him.

"Well, why isn't she here with us?" She asked him still smiling.

"She had to attend clan stuff with Neji but she said she would train with us tomorrow morning!" He couldn't stop smiling.

"The Dango is for you." Sasuke handed her the small container of Dango.

Sakura blushed. She might not be infatuated with Sasuke anymore but he was still a handsome man. "For me?"

"The girl at the stand told us someone had ordered it for you but it hadn't been delivered yet. She knew we were coming here so she asked us to bring it."

"Oh, did she say who it is from?"

"No." Sasuke looked away from her and picked up a dumpling shoving it in his mouth while Naruto snickered.

"Well, let's put a movie on." She ignored the byplay.

When the movie was over the food was gone, she sat blinking sleepily at the credits rolling over the screen.

"I'm going to get going, see you tomorrow morning at training ground 5?" Naruto called as he opened her front door.

"I have a mission tomorrow with Kaakshi remember?." She waved to him from her couch.

"Hn." Sasuke waved at Naruto who hadn't heard Sakura at all.

"I'll just take these to the kitchen and throw them out." Sasuke started picking up paper plates and paper containers shoving them in a paper bag.

"Hmm." She closed her eyes and laid her head on the armrest of her couch, feet tucked up under her.

She was asleep by the time Sasuke came back into the living room. He sat down beside her on her couch and looked at her. A few locks of hair had fallen over her face so he reached out and brushed them aside.

Her hair was soft and her body was warm where his arm touched it. He drew his hand away from her face.

"Sakura." He called to her gently.

"Hum?" Her eyes fluttered open.

"You fell asleep. I'll go now, get some rest, I'll see you when you return from your mission in Rain."

"S'ok." She said quietly and closed her eyes again.

Sasuke stood and left her apartment locking the door behind him. Had she always been that beautiful? He asked himself. He shook his head as he walked back to the Uchiha compound.

The next morning…

Kakashi was waiting for her by the gate when she arrives.

"This is new since when do you show up early?" She teases him.

"Only for you Sakura." He eye crinkles at her.

"Let's get moving old man unless you need to take a rest already, it was a long walk from your apartment to the gate." She smiles at him sweetly.

Kakashi holds a hand over his heart as if struck. "Sakura, I would never have expected such a thing from your lips, Sasuke maybe, but not my sweet little Sakura."

"Come on old man. " She tugged at his sleeve smiling.

Missions with Kakashi are always nice. The conversation isn't too deep, and the silences aren't awkward.

"So, what can we expect when we get to rain do you know?" Sakura asks Kakashi a half-hour into their travels.

"Not much really, there weren't any reports of any wrongdoing, just abnormally high chakra signatures."

"So I will gather herbs and you scout the area? We can move around with the foraging excuse and not draw attention to ourselves? Are we going openly as Konoha nin?" She asks.

"Yes, I think it is best, we will be there for a few weeks at least." He says as they run through the trees to Rain.

Sounds easy enough, but she knows if it were that simple, she and Kakashi wouldn't have been chosen to go. There was more to this than he was telling her. The question was, why wasn't he telling her everything.

They stopped and made camp that evening, Kakashi had said there was no rush. She had caught 6 fish, he had gutted and strung them up over the fire.

"So Sakura, do you ever miss Suna? You were there for three years." Kakashi broke into the conversation.

"Sometimes, it was really beautiful there once you got used to the heat." She smiled thinking back to some of the desert sunsets she had seen while she was there.

"Did you make any friends while you were there?"

"Yes, well, as much friends as we could be, I suppose. It hadn't been long after the Chunin exams remember." She pursed her lips.

"But Temari proved to be decent at conversation if a bit cynical and Gaara is very intelligent, we used to map and watch the stars together sometimes." She smiled.

"And Kankuro, how was he?" Kakashi asked casually again.

"Fine." She didn't elaborate. The third Sand Sibling was fine if a bit annoying at times. He never did fully understand that she wasn't interested in him.

"Ah." Kakashi paused. "There is another puppet master in Suna if I remember, what's his name?"

"Sasori." Sakura narrowed her eyes. Kakashi knew damn well who Sasori was. What is he up to…

"Yes, Sasori, what can you tell me about him Sakura?" Kakashi turned their fish lazily.

"Sasori was...quiet, he kinda reminded me of Sasuke at first, then Itachi." She smiled.

Kakashi watched his former student smile. "You're smiling." He fake teased her. His heart dropped when she blushed.

"Oh um, well. I had just realized how I wasn't really in love with Sasuke and started to notice other men and Sasori was, is very handsome. He is very strong and powerful, intelligent, he is a genius." She smiled again.

"Well, they do say that intelligence is attracted to intelligence." Kakashi turned the fish again.

"I was fortunate that he came back from his two-year mission when I got there. He taught me more than anyone I know"

"He actually taught you? You never told me that. Did he consider you his student?" Kakashi was leaning forward now, fish forgotten.

She hadn't really talked alot about her time in Suna. She had been there for three years so people assumed she had a lot to talk about but she never felt right telling them about Gaara, Temari, Sasori especially, or even Kankuro. It almost seemed like another life. There were things she couldn't tell them, they wouldn't understand.

"I don't know, maybe. We would go out for long treks in the desert, he showed me the places where the green and the cactus grew, the ones for the special poisons. It was fascinating and beautiful. I had never seen anything like it before. The sand shifting across the open sea, like waves and then after a small rain, flowers exploded across the dunes." She sighed.

"I've always wanted to go back but none of my missions ever took me there."

"Maybe they will in the future," he said noncommittally.

"I wonder if Sasori is still there." She traced her finger over the thin chain around her neck, a gold plated scorpion dangled from the end.

"He was very knowledgeable about poisons of course but he didn't put a lot of effort into creating antidotes."

"Any lesson from the legendary poison master is impressive Sakura." Kakashi's voice was serious.

"It isn't a big deal Kakashi, I impressed him with my skill and how fast I learned things. He told me how refreshing it was to have such an apt learner at his side, that the world was filled with imbeciles." She laughed.

"Hum." Kakashi hummed and took the fish from their lines over the fire handing her a plate.

"Is that why am I here? Is Sasori one of the strong chakra signatures in Rain?"

"Yes." Kakashi blew on his fish before biting it.

"Hum, you could have just told me instead of interrogating me." She said a bit taken aback by his sneaky approach.

"Do you have anything else to tell me, is there anything else I should know?" He countered.

"Probably not." She admitted. Gaara, Temari, Kankuro Sasori and her had decided not to tell anyone about his near genocide fo Iwa, or why. The Raikage hadn't let word out, neither would they.

"Did you sleep with him?" Kakashi asked her boldly.

"Only on foraging missions, the desert is cold at night." She smiled at him, she knew what he had meant, had they had sex. No, they hadn't but she didn't like his questioning her.

He dropped his fish in the dirt.

"I didn't have sex with him you old pervert!" She laughed at him. "We slept in the same sleeping pallet because the desert really is very cold at night and the winds often blew out our fire. Geeze Kakashi, I was only 17 years old!" She gave him a glinty eye.

"Old enough." He grumbled.

Her jaw dropped open and it was her turn to sputter. "He is like, 10 years older than me! It would be like having sex with you! " She gaped at him. She had tried for the last year to put Sasori out of her mind. She didn't want to have this conversation.

"I'm only 14 years older than you." He grumbled.

"We are not having this conversation." They ate the rest of their fish in silence and went to bed in silence too. Kakashi always took the first watch.

Morning came. She nudged him awake with a foot then handed him a cup of hot coffee.

"Sorry." He said before she could.

"I'm sorry too." She said sitting next to him with her own hot cup.

"Nothing happened between Sasori and I Kakashi. He is a Sand nin and I'm from Konoha. It was only three years after the invasion, and even if he wasn't in Wind country when it happened, I still wouldn't date anyone from Sand." She sipped her coffee, or anyone who tried to comitt genocide upon Iwa. That's what she told herself, what she had been telling herself since she had returned home. Her dreams though, told another story.

"Naruto told me you kissed Gaara."

Her face went red...with anger. Naruto was going to get his face pounded in when she got home.

"It was one night, two kisses, my first. It was nice, innocent and a good memory but that's it. He is the Kazekage Kakashi, no dating potential even if I had considered it, which I didn't. Besides, what would the Kazekage see in me?" She had almost forgotten about that. He had looked so much like Sasori sitting beside her on the rooftops of Suna.

"You might be surprised," Kakashi said out of the corner of his mouth.

"What's that supposed to mean?" She glared at him.

Kakashi let out a deep breath. "You can't be that blind Sakura, or maybe you are just that humble. Itachi follows you around the village when he isn't on missions, Sasuke buys you dango all the time and tells you it is from someone else. Naruto even caught on it is so obvious. Men watch you in the market. You have no idea how stressful it is for your old sensei!" Kakashi acted like he was going to fall over and faint...which he wasn't.

"Itachi follows me around the village?" She thought of the library yesterday.

"But why would he." she was cut off.

"Because he likes you," Kakashi said gently.

"But, but, he's Itachi Uchiha!" She stood up in shock.

"Who is attracted to intellect and strength,you have both. " Kakashi added for her. "He was under me in Anbu, I know what kind of man he is. You two actually would go very well together, if Sasuke wasn't involved."

"Sasuke...but I was infatuated with him for years why now?" She asked looking down at white hair.

"Because his brother, who he adores and admires, likes you Sakura, suddenly you're worth something to him." He shakes his head.

"That makes more sense than something romantic." She laughed.

She poured him more coffee thinking. "It doesn't matter. I don't have time for any of that anyway."

By mid-morning, they were at the border of Fire and Rain. She had been collecting small plants here and there as they went and had a decent basket or two in her storage scrolls.

By nightfall, they had made their way into Rain and decided to make camp instead of staying at an inn for the second night.

Sakura made her way to the nearby lake to fetch water. She filled both buckets then bent over to wash her face and hands. She hummed as the water hit her face and smiled as the coolness trickled down her neck and soaked into the top of her shirt.

She closed her eyes and sat still for a moment listening to the gentle ebbing of water against the stones of the shore. A small rustling noise had her opening her eyes and looking to her left.

There wasn't anything there now but she could have sworn she had seen a glimpse of...red? She picked up her buckets and made her way back to camp.

Sasori watched her carry her water buckets back to the Copy Nin and their fire.

"Sakura." He breathed out. "It's been a long time." He said to lips curved into a smile.

No, Sakura hadn't had sex with Sasori, but she had had a crush on the man, and she thought he may have had one on her as well.

Flashback…

Sakura was waiting for him by the front door of the manse. She and Temari had gone shopping the previous day picking out simple but elegant kimonos for the annual summer festival. Temari had already left with her date, a visiting nin from Rain.

Sasori watched her from the shadows of the corridor. He felt ridiculous dressed in a formal yukata of black and gold. He watched Sakura play with the end of her gold sash. She too work black and gold, Temari, you twit, did you do this on purpose? He cleared his throat and stepped out to greet her.

"Sakura, sorry to have kept you waiting." He bowed over her hand.

"I haven't been waiting long, you look very nice Sasori Sama." Sakura was blushing.

Sasori watched as pink flooded her cheeks, so adorable.

"Just Sasori, you have earned the right by now, shall we?" He motioned to the door holding out his hand.

Something pulled, deep down, around his heart when she placed her tiny hand in his. He met her eyes, green like fresh dessert grass after a rain, rare and just as sweet smelling. He shook his head.

"After you dear." He motioned her out the door.

End Flashback...

Kakashi had caught two rabbits while she had been foraging along the trail that day. They were skinned and roasting over the fire when she got back to camp.

She set the buckets down and stretched, twisting left then right and sighed. It hadn't been a hard day by any means but she hadn't slept well after their conversation. She had dreamed of Itachi who morphed into Sasori who turned into Gaara. She supposed it was a good thing that neither had morphed into Sasuke after.

"Here." She handed a few large mushrooms to Kakashi. "String those over the flames to sizzle, they go well with rabbit."

Kakashi nodded and did as she had suggested.

"You know, it isn't just Sasori, Anbu reported several powerful chakra signatures. Sasori was only one of the reasons you were chosen."

She understood.

"I want to go into the mountains tomorrow. There are a great deal of sunflower patches in the mountains of Rain, that hold special properties. It is the season so I want to get a head start. I'm sure I will have competition." She smiled into the fire.

"The last time I was here to collect herbs Tsunade insisted Naruto come with us, it was before I could make shadow clones of my own. She had him send out ten of his clones in the middle of the night to harvest the flowers. We left shortly after he got back and heard merchants for months after complaining that someone had come like a thief in the night and harvested all of the known patches of flowers...all the flowers!" She laughed out loud.

"Apparently, Naruto didn't know what sunflowers looked like so he cut them all down and brought them back to camp!' Kakashi joined her in laughing.

"Sounds like him." He continued to snort a bit.

"I'll take first watch after we eat Kakashi, it's only fair." She offered.

He nodded.

Sakura sat by the fire pouring coffee into her thermos getting ready for her watch. She added a little dash of cinnamon before capping it and tying it to her waist. She waved to Kakashi, his nose just over the rise of his bedding and walked off into the woods a short distance away and hopped into the tree.

Sakura loved the night. It was dark and quiet, peaceful. It was summer so it was still warm but there were no bugs here in the Rain country, or at least not many. She leaned back against the wide trunk of the tree and stretched her legs out across the branch she sat on.

Tilting her head up and to the left a little she could see up through the branches and the leaves to the stars. They shone bright against the dark. There weren't any villages near by so there wasn't the usual light pollution.

A rustle, like the subtle shifting of silk, had her looking down to the ground. She squinted but didn't see anything. She looked around the trees but saw nothing. Just as she was tilting her head back up to look at the stars again she felt a slight tapping on her knee. She looked down to see...a puppet.

"Sasori." She breathed out quietly.

The little puppet bowed gracefully to her then stood back up it's little hands linked in front of it.

"What, where are you?" She looked around but couldn't see him anywhere. Idiot she thought to herself, of course you wouldn't see him if he didn't want you to see him. He is a puppet master, not only a puppet master but THE puppetmaster.

"Sasori, why are you here?" She leaned forward and asked the little puppet the size of her hand quietly.

The little puppet jumped onto her shoulder and she sat back turning her head to it and it tapped her on the nose.

She smiled, it was so cute.

"You're going to get me into trouble."

The puppet shook its head in denial.

"Kakashi, my partner down there was already asking about you last night, don't underestimate him."

The puppet did not have a face, it was linked with metal rings, small wooden joints carved by hand with care, a natural wood color but no face.

Sakura could swear if it had one, it would have scoffed at her.

"He is no joke Sasori, it's Kakashi Hatake the Copy Ninja of Konoha." She looked back over her shoulder around the trunk of the tree to where Kakashi was sleeping.

The little puppet pulled on her ear lobe gently.

"What?"

It slipped it's little wooden arm under the delicate gold chain she wore around her neck with the scorpion Sasori had given her almost 2 years ago. She blushed.

"You said it was important. I haven't taken it off since you gave it to me." She blushed more deeply.

The puppet stroked the scorpion gently, head down as if it were looking at it, then turned its head up as if to look at her.

"I just wanted to remember you." She said slowly.

The wooden head tilted to the side a bit as if considering her. Then climbing over to her chest it stood looking at her, wooden face to bright green eyes and bent slightly, rubbing it's head against her lips.

Sakura gasped, the puppet flew from the tree, it's chakra strings being pulled back suddenly.

Kakashi appeared before her in a puff of smoke. "What is it Sakura?" he stood on the branch over her and looked around.

"I think I fell asleep, I'm so sorry Kakashi." She lied.

Kakashi stood there looking at her. Her eyes were dilated a bit, her mouth open, in weariness?

"I'll take over from here, get some rest Sakura."

"But Kakashi, I can stay up I have coffee with me, just let me drink some and I can keep watch, I'm so sorry."

"Get some rest." He turned his back on her.

Resigned, she jumped down from the tree and walked slowly back to the camp. She knew Kakashi was watching her, she kept herself from looking left or right and walked straight ahead not pausing till she reached her bed roll and laid down.

Just as she was about to fall asleep she felt a small tickling working it's way up from her feet. She looked down and saw the small wooden head of Sasori's puppet poke it's head up under her covers by her neck. She smiled. It brought it's small puppet hand to its face, as if to say "shhh". She nodded and it snuggled up against her neck and laid down, she closed her eyes and fell asleep. When she woke, it was gone, replaced by a small Sakura flower.

Sakura lay in the field of sunflowers, arms spread wide, face turned up to the blue sky overhead. She closed her eyes and let the sounds of the valley flow over her. She had slept well last night. Her dreams had been of sand, miles, and miles of sand, golden, soft and drifting along in an open endless ocean. He had been walking toward her, he looked just as she remembered him, red hair, amber eyes, long lashes, too long for a man, it was so unfair. She smiled. "Sasori."

Can you miss something that was never really yours? She opened her eyes and watched a lazy cloud float by. Yes, she missed him, but he had been hers, if only her teacher, her friend. Her fingers closed around the small clump of mushrooms in her hand. Grundy caps, when dried were a quick and deadly poison with no cure. The poison simply worked too quickly.

Flashback…..

"What is that one Sasori Sama, that poison over there by the window?" Sakura pointed to the black capped vial of something.

"Nevermind that, seep the wormwood as I told you to." He didn't even look up from cutting the dark brown reeds in front of him.

Sakura ignored him and walked over to the window picking up the black vial from its holder in the stand.

"Put it down." He commanded not turning around.

"I want to know what it is though." She went to uncork the vial, he stood in front of her before she could and took the vial from her hands, death in his eyes.

"If you don't want to listen I will not teach you." He set the vial back in its holder and turned back to his reeds.

"You aren't teaching me if you deny my questioning." She put her hands on her hips.

Sasori groaned...actually groaned. This little twerp was getting under his skin.

"Fine." He turned to face her.

"Pick it up but do not uncork it yet." He told her.

She picked it up and waited.

"If." He paused, "I stress, IF, you can decipher what the main ingredient is, I will tell you what it does and show you how to prepare it."

"Really?" She asked eyes gleaming.

"Yes, but you won't figure it out." He turned then, his back to her. "You may uncork it, do not ingest it or you will die instantly."

It had been 3 months since she had arrived in Suna he mused himself with the thought as he sliced his reeds. She was intelligent, she was clever, she was annoying...but she couldn't figure it out. He was confident.

"Grundy cap fungi." She said not three minutes after he had turned his back to her.

"What?" His hand stilled over the reeds.

"Do not make me repeat myself." She intoned just like him, like he had told her so many times in the past few months since their lessons had begun.

Sasori set down his knife and turned around. "How did you know?" He was not happy. He had underestimated her. He hated being wrong.

"The blue film along the top are the residual spores of the Grundy cap fungi, also, it is the only ingredient, this is a powder, it is dried." She smiled triumphantly at him, eyes radiant.

"Very well, tomorrow we move on to level 2 poisons and their application." Sasori turned back around to finish his reeds. She had just earned his respect and a little admiration but he wasn't going to tell her that.

"Now finish seeping the wormwood." He commanded.

End Flashback...

Sakura smiled at the memory and pocketed the mushrooms. Searching out with her chakra she found Kakashi in a tree at the base of the mountain reading. She smiled, that silly man. Sitting up she stretched her arms above her, she felt like Alice in Wonderland, the sunflowers grew high like little golden capped towers around her.

Just as she was about to rise from her spot the strangest white bird flew overhead. It was pure white, and misshapen like a cartoon of some sort. She watched as it circled overhead round and round above her. That's when she felt it, a strong chakra signature, and it was coming from the...bird? She narrowed her eyes and watched the bird closely. As it turned in its circle, she caught the slightest glimpse of black and red, a cloak with red clouds on it and blonde, blonde hair.

Three more times the bird circled overhead, a flash, or a reflection of sorts and then it flew away over the mountain. Sakura stood bringing her basket of sunflower tops up with her.

"Strange bird hum?" Kakashi was beside her, he had seen it too.

"I have never seen anything like that before, was it a summons?" She asked him.

"Don't know but that was an Akatsuki member on it for sure, red clouds, black cloak. I guess we know who we are doing recon on, I had thought this might be the case." He continued to look up toward the sky, scanning.

"He's gone, his chakra signature has disappeared." She lifted her basket more securely into her arms. "Let's go back to the inn, I want to seal these in the storage scrolls.

"Sure." Kakashi took the basket from her." and they made their way to the Inn they had booked a room at in the village of Kenkoji.

Deidara hung the wet developing pictures from the morning up on lines in the darkroom of the base humming to himself. It had been a fruitful morning. He had not only found the field of sunflowers rumored to be nearby but one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen laying in it watching the clouds. He had had to take her picture, he couldn't resist. Her long pink hair fanned out around her head on the patches of green grass mixed with the vibrant yellow and dark blacks of the sunflowers almost ready to seed was a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Leader Sama had told them, no exposure, hide, keep still, but he couldn't resist. He knew the white haired nin was in the tree, he knew the pink haired beauty was a nin but it was just so perfect, and he needed it, he wanted it...for his art. Deidara smiled as he hung the last picture. He couldn't wait to show Sasori and brag about his good fortune, the man would be so jealous. Deidara paused. If he showed Sasori the man might go back and take the girl, he would want her for his collection. Hum, maybe he wouldn't show him.

Itachi stood before the 5th Hokage listening to the latest Anbu report from Rain. It seemed more and more high-level chakra signatures had been detected in the area around Rain. Movement suggested a base of some sort.

"Hokage Sama, doesn't Hanzo of the Salamander control the Village or Amegakure? Does this mean he is amassing an army of high-level missing-nin perhaps to make a move on one of the other smaller villages in his immediate area?" Itachi asked.

"We honestly don't know, it is, of course, a possibility. There is also the growing concern that it isn't Hanzo at all, that he has been overthrown." Tsunade's face was grim.

"I want you to rendezvous with Hatake and Haruno who are currently in Rain under the pretense of a foraging mission, but are really there doing recon on the high-level chakra signatures in the area. Give them this update and my speculation, send Hatake back to the Leaf and stay with Haruno to finish the recon mission. Uchiha san, you are to stay out of sight, it will appear as though Hatake has left Haruno there alone." Tsunade handed him a scroll.

"Any questions?"

"No, Hokage Sama." Itachi bowed and left the tower.

Itachi walked slowly back to the Uchiha compound. Why would the Hokage want it to appear as though Sakura were alone? What benefit to the mission would that be? The answer was simple, she expected her to be approached...by who?

Rain fell loosely around him as he made his way to the main house. Pulling back the door he was met with dark eyes and spikey hair.

"Itachi, can we spar today?" Sasuke asked, he had never quite lost that hero worship look in his eyes when asking to spar with him.

"I'm sorry Sasuke, not today. I have to get ready for a mission. I leave as soon as I am packed." Itachi poked Sasuke in the forehead, smiled and walked by his little brother to his room.

It would be best to arrive in the night, that way no one would know he had come and Hatake could leave openly in the morning, it would appear as the Hokage wishes, Sakura would appear alone.

Itachi pulled a few shirts from his drawers and folded them neatly into his bag, pants, then undergarments joined their fellows. His hand wavered over adding another shirt, he really only needed three and he liked to pack light. Sasuke had given him the shirt under his hand, he added it to the bag. Yes, Sasuke had given it to him but Sakura had given it to Sasuke for his birthday last year, so really, it was from Sakura. Sasuke had claimed he didn't like the color, it was blue like everything else he owned.

Weapons were fitted into his pouch, pill rations accounted for, blood pills, chakra pills, and soldier pills from his Anbu rations were added to his pouch as an afterthought. He stood back and ran through his usual mental list. He turned his head to his bathroom, yes, he would bring it. He took the cherry blossom soap his mother had given him from his shelf and packed it into his bag. It was new, unopened, maybe Sakura would want it. He was ready.

Itachi attached his bag to his back on its clips. He had his mask but left it in the bag, this was a regular mission, not Anbu. Sliding the door open he left the main house and made his way down the Uchiha main district road to the gates of the compound.

"Mission cuz?" Shisui dropped down beside him.

"Hn."

"How long?" Shisui noticed Itachi wasn't in his Anbu gear.

"3-5 weeks depending on the first 2-4 weeks." Itachi answered.

"Well, come home safe, see ya." Shisui waved and jumped back onto the nearest roof.

Itachi walked out of the Konoha main gates 20 minutes to noon and leapt into the surrounding trees. He would have to hurry if he was going to make it before dawn. The usual two day trip should only take him 10 hours if everything went smoothly.

Kakashi followed Sakura as she made her way through the market of the small Rain village. He sighed as she passed by yet another food stand. Did the woman not understand how hungry he was? Finally, after she had passed the second favorable looking stand he had had enough. "I'm going to eat here Sakura, good luck finding whatever it is you're looking for." He sat down at the bar and crossed his arms pointedly at her.

Sakura laughed, "I'm trying to find a good dango place, have fun, I'll meet you back at the inn later."

She continued to make her way down the street eventually coming to the end of the food stands. She threw her head back and watched a lazy cloud float by, sighed and then made her way back up the street, maybe she had missed a stand. Her steps slowed as she felt a chakra signature drawing closer, not looking up or around she drew a kunai from her pouch and continued down the street.

"No need for that yeah. I just wanted to say hi." A long haired blonde missing nin was walking beside her grinning.

"Uh, hi." She cocked her head at him. "Who are you?"

"Deidara, I'm an artist. I saw you in the sunflower field this morning, you made for some great photos yeah. It's your hair color and your eyes, the way your were looking up at the sky, I could tell you were deep in thought, what were you thinking about huh?" He rattled off quickly.

Sakura blinked.

"You took pictures of me in the sunflower field?" She asked him.

"Yeah, want to see?" He pulled a few loose photos from his red and black cloak like they were old friends.

She flips through them. "Wow, these are really good, creepy, but good. You really are an artist." She smiles at him.

Deidara's whole face lights up. "I was inspired yeah."

"So, why aren't you, I don't know freaking out. Don't you recognize the cloak?" He asked her as they casually walked down the street together. Sakura noticed how the villagers were giving them a wide berth but it was more out of respect than fear, interesting, she thought.

"Yes, but I wanted to find out why you were following me, I didn't feel any killing intent from you and I was prepared for an attack irregardless." She smirked at him.

"You're clever huh, well you're right I wasn't planning on attacking you, but won't your white haired partner mind?" Deidara nodded to Kakashi who was watching them over the top of his book at the ramen stand.

"Yes, he is a little less understanding than I am." She laughed.

"I'll be going then, but I want to see you again yeah. Will you be here long or just passing through?" Deidara grins at her.

Sakura smiles, she already knows he had been watching her, he knows what they have been doing, but does he know the cover or the real mission…

"We will be here for a while, it is a foraging mission, hence the sunflowers."

"I'll be seeing you again soon then." Deidara winks at her , reaching into his pocket he pulls out a small clay bird and throws it into an alley off the main road. One hand sign enlarges the clay figure and he hops on it, two more hand signs and he is off, flying into the sky.

"Later!" He calls down to her as he flies away.

Sakura waves, then makes her way over to Kakashi at the ramen stand.

"You certainly attract interesting people Sakura. First Sasori of the Red Sand, Itachi and now that guy. Be careful Sakura." Kakashi warns her.

"What better way to find out more about the dangerous high level chakra signatures than to speak to them? Besides, he came up to me." She took a menu from the bar and ordered a medium BBQ pork ramen with extra menma.

"That was Deidara, a missing nin from Iwa, explosive jutsu is his preferred method of fighting. He is in the Bingo book, just be careful."

"Stop worrying Kakashi, I can handle myself. I'm not that crying little Genin anymore." She hissed at him. When would he see her as a fully qualified shinobi?

Kakashi studiously refrained from any further comments.

Their food came, they ate and went back to the inn.

Sakura sat by the window in her room for the rest of the afternoon reading an herbal she had borrowed from the Konoha library before they had left. Evening came and she found that she had been staring at the same page for the last 30minutes deep in thought.

A day ago Sasori had been nearby, close enough for his chakra strings to have his little wooden puppet let her know he was close. Why had he done that she wondered. Had he sent the puppet for fear of her reaction after 2 years apart? What would she have done if she had come face to face with the puppet master himself instead of the little wooden puppet. She smiled, yes, he knew her, she might have screamed. Even with all of her training, all of her power, she was still much more emotional than most shinobi, more than many shinobi thought she ought to be.

Her hand rose automatically to stroke the gold chain of her scorpion necklace. She found herself doing it more and more lately while deep in thought. When she had first returned to Konoha she had missed him terribly. Not only him but all the people of Suna that had touched her life while there. Letters back and forth from Temari and Gaara helped. Kankuro wrote sporadically but from Sasori there was nothing directly.

Once, three months after her return she woke to find a small desert flower on her pillow and a bundle of orris root. She had cried. She knew it was from him. How he had managed to get in and out of Konoha without detection was both impressive and threatening. It spoke volumes for their lack of defense. Of course he wasn't just anyone, he was Sasori.

Six months after that she had been in the Land of Tea on a solo mission and had woken in her room at the inn to the delicious smell of bean sprouts and fried pork over steamed rice, her favorite dish while she had been in Suna. She had cried then too.

Sakura closed her book and set it on the little service table by the window. The village lanterns were being lit, she assumed Kakashi would be by soon to see if she wanted to get some dinner. Her joints cracked as she rose and stretched. She had been sitting for so long in the same position. A deep yawn escaped her lips. Other than running into Deidara this was a pretty boring mission, but it was only the first full day in Rain, and Kakashi didn't know about Sasori's puppet visiting her.

Knock Knock Knock

Speaking of which, she smiled to herself. Sakura opened the door to reveal Kakashi, facemask and all, hands in pockets, "Dinner?"

She grinned at his one word question, "Yeah."

Sakura grabbed her bag and threw it across her body locking and sealing her door behind her.

Itachi touched down in Rain less than 9 hours after his departure from Konoha. A small smile graced his lips. He knew he was fast, he never boasted, never bragged but beating his own travel record had made him smile if only a little.

He had been searching for her chakra signature since his arrival in Rain and followed it like a light to guide him. Itachi was pleased to see there was another Inn next to the one they were staying in. He wouldn't be able to stay at the same one for fear of being found out, but he wished to remain close to her in case she needed him.

For now, he perched on the roof outside of her window suppressing his chakra to nothing, waiting for the right moment to enter her room and let them know he had arrived.

Sasori's eyes narrowed as he watched the Uchiha crouch above her window. For he had to be an Uchiha, dark hair, dark eyes the reluctant grace all but stamped Uchiha to him. As a puppet master he watched the body movements of those around him, saw beauty and art in movement, it is what made him such a good fighter, he could almost always predict an enemies next five moves just by simple observation. This one, Sasori decided, was dangerous. The Uchiha had also ruined his plans for the night, he sighed and turned back to the cave in the valley. He had really wanted to see his old student in person, maybe tomorrow night.

She felt him before she saw him. Sakura sprung up from her bed only to be knocked back down flat on her back, a weight on her chest, breath on her neck. She bucked and kicked, her hands glowing green and just before her hand would connect with his head, "Sakura, it's me, Itachi."

She froze. "Itachi?"

Slowly, very slowly, he released her, his breath still hot on her neck, lingered a little longer, then pulled off and up, away from her body.

In the darkness of the room she could feel his chakra signature, faint and miniscule, he was letting her know it was really him. As soon as her body relaxed he suppressed his chakra again, waiting in the dark.

"Itachi, what are you doing here?" She finger combed her hair and adjusted her sleeping tee shirt.

He smiled, she was that familiar with his chakra signature? Focus he told himself.

"Hokage Sama sent me. I need to speak with both you and Hatake San, will you get him please? I think it best if you wake him instead of me." Itachi smiled in the dark because he knew she couldn't see.

"Yes, of course, um, could you please, turn around while I put some pants on?" She blushed, thankful for the dark of the room so he couldn't see.

"Hn." He rose from the bed and turned toward the wall, facing away from her.

Sakura threw her pants on quickly and went to her door, unsealed it, and shot across the hall to Kakashi's door. Two minutes later they were back in her room with Itachi.

"Hokage Sama sent me to complete the mission with Harano San, you are to report back to the Leaf Hatake San. My presence is to be masked, no one is to know I am here, it will appear as if Sakura is here alone to finish the foraging mission." Itachi told them.

"Ah, I see. Sakura has already been approached by a member, Deidara of Iwa, when she was alone in the market. It seems the Hokage has a good plan." Kakashi looked over at his former student. His personal worry hidden from view. He was not entirely sure this was a good idea.

As if Itachi could read his mind, "Do not worry Hatake San, I will keep her safe." Itachi inclined his head. He wasn't so sure it was a good idea either.

"Very well, I will be going then before it gets light, good luck to both of you." He paused in front of Sakura. "People change Sakura, whatever he may have been once, he is not the same person you once knew, he can not be trusted."

Sakura smiled at her old sensei, "Do not doubt me Kakashi, I am my sensei's student."

Yes, he thought, which sensei, he knew she hadn't told him everything, he knew she was holding back about Sasori.

"I trust you Sakura, be safe." He ruffled her hair and poofed away.

Sakura stood there for a moment and watched as the smoke dissipated into nothing, a twinge of guilt twisted in her heart. She couldn't tell Kakashi everything, there were some things, most things about Sasori he just wouldn't understand...most people wouldn't understand and it would mark her as a traitor to Konoha. Sakura was no traitor. She clenched her fists and shook her head. Why didn't they have more confidence in her? She knew Sasori, he didn't.

Itachi stood quietly beside her, watching her ball her tiny hands into fists and grit her teeth. What wasn't she saying? Who was Kakashi referring to? Is it something she wouldn't say or couldn't? Itachi wondered. He had grown accustomed to watching and waiting, learning that people tended to reveal themselves if left alone for any length of time. Sakura was the exception. He never knew what she was thinking, her actions never betrayed her thoughts, only emotions. It is difficult to piece together emotions when lacking the other clues. She was a puzzle to him and it intrigued him to no end.

Itachi watched the emotion flitter across her face, guilt, anger, apprehension, humor. He wondered what she found humorous about this situation, surely she knew how dangerous their situation, their mission was? Resignation settled on her features, ah, he thought, a conclusion. He smiled at this little window into her brain.

"Sakura, I will leave you to your rest. I will need to find my own lodgings tomorrow morning, for now, know I will be closeby if you should need me." Itachi bowed slightly and took a step toward the window.

"Use Kakashi's room, it has already been paid for, for the next three weeks by Konoha." She stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

Itachi stilled, so few people ever went so far as to touch him, he had stopped himself just short of breaking her arm at the gesture. Anbu habits are hard to turn off.

"Hokage Sama wishes to ensure no one knows I am here, it would be unwise. I have funds for another room from the village in case you are unable to get a refund. If you are able to get a refund, Hokage Sama wishes you to use it for the mission." Itachi took her hand from his shoulder rubbing his thumb over the back and stepped out her window into the night.

Itachi sat hunched over on the rooftop outside her window until he heard her move back into bed. After he was sure she was settled for the night once again he stretch his long legs out in front of him and glanced around. It was a small town, anyone new would be noticed. A henge then. He would put on a henge and find lodging at the inn next door come morning. Itachi laid back on the roof, arms behind his head, he looked up at the stars, who did Hokage Sama expect to reach out to Sakura now that she was alone? Was it that Deidara that had already approached her when Kakashi was here? He would become more bold with Kakashi gone most likely. Itachi knew Sakura was skilled, knew she could handle most missions solo, he had seen how her time in Suna had changed her, but the Akatsuki were different.

He had been on two of the three Akatsuki recon missions, this was his third. Some of the known Akatsuki members were formidable. He wondered about the ones still out there unconfirmed. He thought of Sasori of the Red Sand. He was a suspected member, nothing confirmed. Is that why Sakura was here? She was the only outsider to have direct extended contact with the famous puppet master. Her input would be invaluable. Perhaps it was Sakura herself that was the trump card, how close had Sasori and Sakura been he wondered. He would have to find out. It was important to the mission, it had nothing to do with his personal feelings toward the woman he told himself.