Hermione had never shown a specific interest in healing before, but she seemed to know a spell for everything. She didn't even wait for Sakura to make room before she started casting. For a moment the two of them worked side by side, pumping out enough energy to light up the entire alley way. But then Sakura faltered. Her chakra dimmed as she pulled back. Naruto stepped closer. In his experience med-nin's only stopped when things were beyond being helped. When there was hope or things were going well, they just kept going. There was always more that a medic could do. Healing was a long and complicated process and it didn't just stop when the person was no longer in danger of dying immediately. It kept going, sometimes for days and weeks afterward as the medics tried to put back together whatever had been damaged. They didn't stop until the job was done. Or until there was no more job that could be done.

Hermione kept working however, with no indication that she even noticed Sakura shifting to turn the task over to her. Naruto stepped closer. Sakura glanced over at him and shook her head. But then she started digging into her pockets and pulling out bandages and other equipment. "Chakra's not doing much," she explained briefly. They had seen that before. Magic and chakra might be almost the same thing, but they didn't always like one another. It hadn't occurred to any of them, Naruto didn't think, that it might interfere with Sakura's ability to put back together a wizard. That was going to make it harder for them if Harry got hurt.

Assuming they got Harry back.

Naruto grimaced but gritted his teeth and pushed through. They couldn't give up yet.

Time to focus on what he could do. He had no doubt that if there were any of the bastards left alive, Sasuke would have them strung up and talking in no time. There'd be plenty of opportunity to go help him later. Right now, some things couldn't wait. Naruto knelt down by his teammate and started handing her items or holding gauze in place when instructed to. Northstein might be a curmudgeonly old bastard, but he was the closest thing to soldier Naruto had seen here even if he was a retired one. And like a retired nin, he hadn't gone down without giving it one hell of a fight. His arm was a mess of torn flesh, some of it twisted out of position. His knee wasn't as visible but Naruto understood enough of human anatomy to know that things weren't suppose'ta be that shape or bend in that direction. If he managed to survive this, assuming they could get everything pieced back together, Naruto seriously doubted the man was going to be able to walk ever again.

The real problem seemed to be something wrong with his chest. Hermione was focusing most of her attention on that, leaving the mere flesh wounds to the nin. So while she kept a steady stream of magic aimed at the old man's rib cage, the nin got their hands bloody. It might not make a difference, but Naruto had to figure every bit of blood they could keep in him was better than not. Thankfully Sakura never went anywhere without enough bandages and medicines for a small army. She wasn't the type to just rely on flashy jutsus, so they were equipped to do things the old fashion way.

It wasn't until Hermione started crying that Naruto knew for sure they weren't going to win this one. She still hadn't given up. She still was incanting slowly and steadily even as she started to lose it. Sakura's hands slowed until they came to a stop and she gently pushed Naruto's away. It wasn't until Sakura took ahold of Hermione's hand over her wand that the other girl stopped.

"He's already dead," she said calmly but flatly. Because now wasn't the time for pretending this was anything other than what it was.

Hermione didn't reply but she slumped back slowly. The three of them sat huddled around the body of their teacher. Some of the other students were checking on who else might be hurt and taking charge of the few Death Eaters that Naruto and Sasuke hadn't killed. No one approached them, though Naruto could see a few stop just out of range and stare silently. There wasn't anything else to be done and everyone seemed to know it.

Finally, Hermione wiped her face and asked "where's Harry? Is Sasuke with him?"

Naruto didn't flinch away from her stare. He managed that at least. "We don't know," he admitted. "Sasuke...couldn't get to him in time."

Hermione frowned liked Naruto had admitted that he didn't know the answer to some piece of homework, not like he had just admitted to having failed to protect someone dear to all of them. It was like she couldn't wrap her head around what he was saying, and Naruto decided that was maybe the only thing worse than seeing the anguish on someone's face when they did understand what it meant when you told them that their loved one was MIA.

"Well, he's clearly not here," Hermione pointed out like it was a reasonable thing to notice that there was no body lying about.

Sakura was staring at him too now, but Naruto suspected she had a much better guess as to what had happened and how dire it all was.

"Did Harry explain anything about Sasuke's, um, well, his complicated - that is to say, the family - the Uchiha family - it's gone. That someone killed them all."

"Harry said Sasuke's brother tried to kill him," Hermione filled in bluntly.

"Um, yes, that. A few times." Naruto wasn't sure which him she was referring to, but frankly it was true for both of them now.

"It is tragic," she said and Naruto was kind of surprised at how matter of fact she was in that assessment. She did not like Sasuke, but she seemed to have no trouble agreeing that Sasuke really had had a rough time of it. "It's also the kind of absurdity I have far too often had to accustom myself to in this world. So. We have a murderous brother. I take it he's decided to target Harry? Why? Some kind of revenge on Sasuke?"

"Itachi wants the entire clan dead," Sakura summarized. "Harry's a threat to that as long as he's capable of anything resembling chakra."

"So you lot thought it was a good idea to put a great deal of effort into trying to teach Harry more chakra? Nevermind," she answered herself. "None of that is important right now."

"But!" Naruto tried to interrupt, because really, the Uchiha drama had kind of determined most of their lives for years now. Sasuke's problems were their problems and boy did Sasuke have problems.

But Hermione cut him off. "The why isn't as important right now as the logistics. Where did they go?"

Naruto huffed. "We don't know."

Sakura jumped in. "A transportation jutsu like that is almost impossible to track. Particularly with this much interference about. And he won't have stopped at one jump. He could be miles away by now, in any direction."

"So it's not a straight jump?" Hermione asked and it was her focus that got Naruto's sluggish brain back into motion.

"No?" he answered. "Not really? I mean, you move to a fixed spot, but like, the point is to keep movin'." Short frequent jumps. Confuse your opponent and move yourself into a better tactical position. Itachi's former ANBU. He's real good at doing it fast, clean, and efficiently.

"How long?" she asked right away.

"How long to what?"

Hermione huffed and pushed herself to her feet. Her knees were soaked in blood but the rest of her was relatively clean. She'd lost her coat somewhere but even though her breath was fogging the air she didn't seem that cold. Naruto would have given her his jacket, but he had all kinds of things squirreled away in his pockets and he might kind of need 'em.

"If he did this jumping thing, what? Five minutes ago? How long would he keep moving and how long would it take him to get where it is he wanted to go?"

"We don't know where he'd go," Sakura pointed out. "Over a short distance, yes, maybe we could track it. But with all this magical interference? It's hard for us to even know where each other is. Trying to track someone good at keeping his trail hidden? It would take ages just to find the first couple of steps, and the longer there is the less of a trail there is."

"Right, so that's not going to work," Hermione agreed briskly but she clearly wasn't done yet. "Where would he go? And how long would it theoretically take him to get there? Would he know to shield against basic searching charms? A Point Me spell isn't going to cover a large amount of distance, but we could at least rule out anything in the village."

….oh, hell yes. Naruto grinned brightly. "No fuckin' clue," he told her cheerfully. "But we can start guessin', right?"

"We don't even have the first idea where Itachi might take him!" Sakura exclaimed but she had her thoughtful face on as the three of them huddled for a quick war conference.

"Then start with what we can rule out," Hermione suggested. She turned around briefly, seeming to look for something around them as if she expected Itachi to be lurking in a corner, but then she waved down a blond boy that Naruto recognized from DA Club. "Harry's missing," she told him. "Get some of the others who can manage and start searching the village. We need to rule out if he's here. And send someone up to the castle to let the teachers know." She turned away suddenly and snapped, "damn it, where's Ron?"

Sakura glanced back the way she had come, a bit of pink around her ears. "I left him with some of the younger students? A couple of them were badly hurt, but nothing life threatening."

Hermione huffed but nodded. "One of us needs to get back up to the castle and check the map. Make sure this Itachi isn't using anything on castle grounds. It wouldn't be the first time someone's tried to hide close to home. Once we rule that out, we'll need to start thinking of what other places this Itachi might know enough about to use."

"Right!" Naruto saluted.

"And where the hell is that bloody cousin of Harry's?" Hermione demanded but then she seemed to change her mind abruptly and frowned. "He's not hurt, is he? He's not here."

Sakura raised an eyebrow at him and Naruto shrugged. "I sent him off to round up the rest of these bastards," Naruto admitted. "The timing was too neat, Itachi showin' up the same time they do. Someone's been talkin' to someone. I figured if Sasuke could rustle up at least a couple of them alive, maybe we could get some answers."

Hermione hesitated but she nodded. "He better move fast," she told him. "Once the teachers get here, the Ministry is going to descend on this like locusts. And they have a track record of being more concerned with making things like this go away than worrying about anyone. Least of all Harry."

Naruto would like to say that he was shocked by that, but he'd seen far too many villages over the years that were more than happy to sacrifice people because it was easy. He nodded and took off to find their teammate. They'd have to work fast if they wanted to find any information. Hermione would take care of the magic side. She and Sakura already had their heads bent together coming up with a list of places to check.

It wasn't perfect. Hell, it was a freakin' long shot. And that was assuming that Itachi hadn't killed Harry once he was clear of the scrum. But Naruto refused to believe yet that Harry was dead. And as long as they believed he was still alive, they had to keep trying.