Sakura woke up at some moment in the morning hearing the roar of a powerful thunder, leaving her wide awake. The hideout, as always, was silent and the so-ever pouring rain was the only source of sound. She had to admit the rain was somewhat soothing, and she took advantage of the calmness to rest a little bit more in her comfortable blankets before taking a hot shower.
She ended up not thinking a lot about Itachi's condition yesterday, because every time she did so she inevitably went back to the darkest questions; how was a man so cursed, who killed hundreds with no effort and no mercy, living untroubled after so many years? She always thought of Itachi as a soulless monster and expected the worst of him, and he did seem soulless, but not because he was pure evil… he seemed empty. Devoid of anything inside of him. Well, she guessed it would be like so if he killed his entire family. You have to throw out every human part inside of you to continue living after such a thing.
Just after finishing her business in the bathroom, Sakura dressed one of her new clothes and left the room. She intended to eat something and drown in her studies afterwards, anxious to find anything about the Rinnegan. She knew she needed to work on Itachi, but she already knew she wouldn't be able to focus on anything about the Leaf missing-nin.
Finally arriving in the kitchen, Sakura almost turned back and ran. With the fridge open, there was a long-haired blond guy; one she remembered to be reported missing two arms and probably dead from blood loss. But there he was, with two arms in place and very much alive. Deidara, the bomber madman. She had to admit that looking closely, he was much younger and youthful than she imagined; he was probably somewhere around her age.
He sensed someone behind him and turned back to see, his blond hair stunningly shining against the lights of the room. Watching her from head to toe, his lips turned into a smug, crooked grin.
"The new girl, huh?" he asked rhetorically. Before Sakura could even answer, another new voice, coming from the side of the kitchen Sakura still hadn't the opportunity to look, spoke.
"Yup, the new just a little girl, it seems. Kinda lame she isn't hot," said the grey-haired man. He carried a strange scythe stained with blood and gazed at her with sardonic eyes, daring her to answer him so he could have more fun. From his eyes, he seemed to be from the dangerous kind of missing-nin, the ones crazy-driven.
Deidara never replied, and he seemed annoyed with the other man's comments. Sakura preferred to pretend she was deaf and made her way to the fridge just as the blond closed it and sat down. She was never bold to assume everyone would be easy to deal with as Konan and Kisame, but she hoped at least the others would ignore her like she wanted to ignore them.
"Hey," the rude one —the ruder one— called. "What is your name again?"
"Sakura," she answered. She didn't want to know his name, never asking for it. Sitting at the table, the patterns in the wood seemed more interesting than anything at that moment.
"If you decide you can't get your job done and get crazy, Sakura," he spat the name with mockery, "you just tell me. Jashin-sama's favorite offerings are those made of little virgin sluts. Says they taste better."
Sakura's skin crawled. Well, if she was expecting monsters inside Akatsuki, she found her first one. She tried to not show intimidation, but she knew she failed. Fearing the seal and the man, she stood silent and submissive. And oh gods how she hated it. If she at least tried to look back at him with some disdain, imagining her fist breaking his skull with no difficulty at all…
The jade eyes raised from the table and she knew she had anger in them, but it soon faltered when she finally stared back at him. If Itachi was devoid of emotion, this one was devoid of any good emotions. She finally saw pure evil in someone there. His eyes were just like Orochimaru's: sadistic, waiting for the next person he could watch suffer in his hands for his own benefits. Just as her gaze faltered, Deidara spoke.
"Hidan, you stink. Go take a bath, for god's sake, I don't want to puke on my breakfast."
"Shut up, little fucker. I am just getting acquainted with the girl. But you know that if you get tired of this shit you say it's art, you can just come to me and—"
"Hidan," Kisame suddenly appeared in the kitchen's entrance. His always-there smile had something different about it this time. "Don't bother Sakura-san, did you forget what Leader said? This would make her work her harder, ya?"
Just as casually Kisame appeared, he walked to the back door and left for the training camp. Sakura mentally thanked him, because the man named Hidan cursed some more and left soon after. Being left only with Deidara, she was again awkwardly uncomfortable. She had killed his partner, wished his death when she saw what he did to Gaara and Suna, and when he tried to kill Naruto too. Remembering all those things, she couldn't avoid glaring at him, and he answered her by glaring back before getting up and leaving to his room, not saying a word more.
Konan took advantage of the moment she saw Sakura enter the library to go to the girl's room. Pain had given her orders to search for anything that she could use as a tool to flee from there and confiscate it; even if they trusted the seal, precautions were never unwelcome. As expected, the young kunoichi carried nothing of interest to them, as they had already confiscated her pack when they captured her in the first place. After searching through all the drawers, something caught Konan's attention: a neatly folded, red hitaiate. Looking behind it, she found the word 'FOREHEAD' written with a heart in the end, and it only made sense to her when she finally remembers Sakura's appearance and that she, indeed, had a big forehead. Probably a very dear friend of hers had written it on her headband.
Sakura had a close female friend —probably several more—, something Konan never had and always wished to have. She dropped the headband as if it burned, almost disgusted by it. Konan never felt envious, she was a resigned person in regards to the life she had, and the sensation of envy angered her. How could she, after everything she went through and everything she and Akatsuki achieved, still wish other people's lives?
Disgusting, indeed.
Putting back the headband where she found it, she was now absolutely sure Sakura didn't carry anything that could compromise Akatsuki. And even if she had, Konan wasn't so sure she could bear to be in that room any longer. The room of the little, dispensable girl she hated to envy.
Four days had passed since the not very amicable encounter between Sakura, Hidan and Deidara. Not long after, Sakura met an even more bizarre person (was he even human?) named Kakuzu and he, for her happiness, ignored her as much as she ignored him. She also met a masked man named Tobi, with a childlike personality that didn't seem legit to her. She knew he was no ordinary person to enter in Akatsuki, and she doubted that Pain would accept a person this insane in the organization. So, as any normal-minded person would do, she did not underestimate what Tobi could really be.
The days started to get more unbearable and, even if nothing directly hurt her, being confined in that hideout was slowly driving her insane. She still couldn't get to what was causing Itachi's trouble, but she found a way to occupy herself with studying the properties of every medicine Itachi took in the past. Most of them she only heard of, so it was a nice thing to learn about different drugs from around the continent. If she kept up with her research, she was positive she could create new remedies for Itachi's condition.
However, even if she was buried in books and even if studying and creating was one of the things she loved the most, even if she slept so well at night in her comfortable mattress and even if she had hot water and fresh food… she felt every part of her sanity slip between her fingers. She knew she was cattle; only treated with care before being killed for her keeper's benefits. She vowed to break free from there or die trying, and she knew the seal should have some flaws, but every day spent there made her believe less and less in going back to her village.
She was still exploring and discovering Itachi's condition, and the process would be very long. She suspected he had some sort of autoimmune condition, and if it was the case, the treatment would be very tricky. Those kinds of sickness were discovered around seven years ago and still lacked deep understanding. The medical ninjas could treat the affected antibodies, but it was a kind of work only top-notch people like Tsunade and Chiyo would be able to do without dooming the patient's life. Sakura was confident of her skills, no more that insecure and scared genin left behind by Sasuke and Naruto, but she never experimented with autoimmune diseases and, if it was indeed Itachi's case, all she could do for the next weeks was change his prescriptions and study to no end, as she was doing.
At least she knew she would not be killed right away. Pain was satisfied with her job, watching her aid Itachi exactly as she was expected to. Her only source of hope was the knowledge she would take a long time with Itachi, and it gave Konoha time to find her or further neutralize Akatsuki's forces. She knew no one would think of her as dead, as it was obvious she had a purpose to them. They would try to do something when the opportunity arose, she knew it.
"Are you guys serious with this bullshit you came up, Kakashi?" Shikamaru asked. He just encountered the copy ninja in the Hokage Tower after a meeting to talk about Sakura's situation. Kakashi knew people with exceeding intelligence, like Shikamaru, could put two and two together, but he was very unfortunate to meet Asuma's apprentice so early. He expected at least one more week before being cornered like that.
"Excuse me?" the older one answered, trying to play the innocent card.
"C'mon, you are so damn obvious. You guys went looking for Sasuke, then you were intercepted by two Akatsuki —one of them being Uchiha Itachi— so you got backtracked and managed to return to the village. Then Sakura suddenly had an urgent mission. Seems too much of a coincidence, don't you think so?"
Kakashi never answered.
"They got her, didn't they?" Again Kakashi didn't answer. He knew very well that he couldn't deceive Shikamaru, so he wouldn't even try. "The Hokage can forge documents and records about this mystery mission, but I don't give one week for the truth to blow up. What will happen, then?"
"We are taking care of everything as fast as we can." Shizune appeared with Tonton in her arms, saving Kakashi from having to say something. "Please, don't tell anyone about this for now."
"Sure, sure." The youngest one resumed his way out of the tower, then suddenly stopped and looked behind. "Have you told her parents yet?"
"... Good afternoon, Shikamaru," Kakashi avoided the question, giving the most fake smile in the world, turning back and also walking away, with Shizune by his side.
But then they were stopped again just in the hallway corner. Naruto stood there, and he seemed to have been there long enough to hear what he needed to. The young boy's face was abnormally expressionless, but his fists trembling with anger told enough about his thoughts.
"Naruto, we…" Shizune tried to speak, but was quickly cut by the boy's angry voice.
"You what? You are fucking liars!" He screamed. "You guys left me thinking Sakura-chan was fine! Each and every one of you, what are you even fucking DOING? How longer did you pretend to leave me in the dark? Sakura-chan is with Akatsuki! Alone!"
Kakashi felt the menacing chakra from the Kyuubi flaring and Tsunade must have felt it too, as she came almost hurryingly from her office. Standing behind Naruto, she caught his attention with the tapping of her heels on the ground.
"Baa-chan! How were you capable of lying to me about my best friend?! After Sasuke, after everything! What the hell! So you just expect her to rot god-knows-whe—"
"Shut up, Naruto," Tsunade demanded. "As you said, Sakura is with Akatsuki and we can't lie to you anymore. But you know what her condition implies. We all are worried sick of what could be happening to her, and this is exactly why we can't tell the truth yet. Eventually it will blow up and I'm not naïve to say otherwise, but we need to hold it the longest we can. And in the end, what are you supposed to do with this information, Naruto? Jump from the window and start searching for Sakura without any clues? Believe me, if this was a possible choice, I would have done it already with my own hands."
"We can make it out! There must be some way, we can't possibly let her die at those monster's hands!"
"Nobody wants this, Naruto, but please, for once think straight with me," Kakashi entered in the conversation. "This abduction can raise more political crisis. A few days ago Suna was invaded and bombarded with no effort, the Kazekage lost his bijuu, died and was brought back to life. The world is fearing Akatsuki, and now they are aiming for us. They want you, Naruto, and they got Sakura because of that. They want to lure you and they have a big plan for it. What would happen if it became apparent to the village that their next goal is you? Konoha would live in fear to end in the same way as Suna did, or maybe even worse. What Shizune said to Shikamaru is true: we are trying to think of everything we can to bring Sakura back, but any wrong step and we may be doomed."
"And not only that. Of course Konoha and Suna are joining forces to defeat the Akatsuki, but what about the other hidden villages? Iwa, Kumo and Kiri hold loyalty only to themselves and you know it. If they found it beneficial to ally with Akatsuki for their own interests, they would not hesitate to do so and attack us too. Actually, Jiraiya discovered last month that the Mist indeed worked with Akatsuki under the Fourth Mizukage's control. Terumi Mei is changing things, and even if she is the most reliable one out of the kages from these three villages, she still isn't trustworthy."
Naruto, hearing their words, seemed to come to his senses and calmed down. With a defeated tone, he asked, "and how far did you get until now?".
"We got nowhere yet, Naruto. No one saw Itachi and Kisame, neither did people have seen Sakura. Believe us, we asked and searched in a perimeter of two hundred kilometers. There are no footprints, no chakra or scent trails. When Itachi knocked you out, Yamato tried to pursue them, but after a few minutes he lost his trail," Tsunade said.
"So if we are getting nowhere, it would be a lot easier if we spoke to Gaara right now! He will surely help us!"
"You're forgetting they have their great deal of problems to deal with right now. And as I said before, the other villages could ally with Akatsuki. If we joined forces with Suna to directly attack one of Akatsuki's bases if we manage to discover one of them, there could be a big backlash to us," Tsunade scolded the blond boy. "We cannot risk war. We of course would ally with Suna if completely necessary, but the village is already scared enough and doesn't need any more panic. If the Council started to think of me as unfit to deal with the problem, they even would put the wrong person in charge of dealing with this. A person just as untrustworthy than the Kages I mentioned earlier."
"Who is that, Baa-chan?," Naruto asked, clearly confused by the allegation.
"Walls have ears, Naruto," Tsunade implied. "Now, if you and Kakashi can excuse yourselves, I need to prepare for another meeting. Shizune, you stay with me."
Defeated, Naruto obeyed his Hokage's command and avoided any contact with Kakashi. The Copy Ninja also quickly disappeared after an awkward farewell, so the jinchuriki numbly walked back to his apartment. Finally in his bed, he cried for the girl he loved.
Sakura clicked her tongue triumphantly after finishing her written prototype of a formula that would replace Itachi's drugs for his lungs. She almost went crazy in the process, as working with foreign ingredients was insanely hard, but in the end she could say it was somewhere in her 'Top Ten List Of Incredible Feats', because she learned so much, and oh how she loved to learn and create! And even if it was for the most wanted criminal in her village, it was her beloved creation. Imagine what she could do in Konoha with all the new things she learned!
In a confidence outbreak, she left her room full of books and papers piled on the ground and her little desk, aiming for Pain's office to tell him the news and ask for the ingredients she needed. She knew well she was forbidden from walking around like that, but Sakura supposed she would be forgiven when she explained her disobedience.
Luckily she encountered the blond guy still within her 'walking-safe zone' that maybe could get her to Pain's office. Yes she was getting crazy and yes she was maybe a little too happy with herself, so she did the last thing any well-minded person would do: she spoke to him.
"Excuse me. Pain's office is this way I'm going, right…?" She pointed to the direction she was walking to.
"Yeah," the rude answer Deidara gave to the young girl made her open her mouth to speak, but she soon closed it. He shrugged and started walking again, but she called him again. What was that, the 'Test Deidara's Patience Day'?
"Well… I'm not allowed to go alone," she implied, her voice almost squirming. "Could you take me there? I don't want anyone watching me breaking the rules and, you know, putting a kunai into my throat."
Deidara almost laughed at her embarrassment of asking him, having to throw away her pride. So maybe he could play with her for a little bit. "And what will I gain with that?"
Sakura had to repress her irritation, but her face gave her out. She took a deep breath and tried to control the unevenness in her voice.
"Please," she asked.
"Okay, but only because your helpless face almost makes me cringe in shame for you, hm."
Sakura again avoided saying anything, and resumed walking when he did. The silence was very uncomfortable, but the absence of any relevant sound to concentrate on gave space for Sakura's sense of smell to rise. Deidara smelled of fresh soil…? No, fresh clay, it was definitely clay. And a trace of smoke that stung on his clothes. When he turned his head to watch the window at their side, his hair gloriously shined and it smelled as good as it looked. The medic-nin almost smiled at the thought of a S-rank criminal spending so much effort to make his hair beautiful, but refrained herself when he turned to her.
"Here," he said as they stopped in front of Pain's office door, carved with the Zero kanji. "You owe me one now, girl."
Sakura frowned, and Deidara couldn't resist asking. "What?" he said.
"My name is Sakura. You know that. And I think I don't owe you nothing, since you get a free —and forced— medic to fix you when you blow yourself up like when we met in the Wind Country."
The pink-haired girl expected an angry answer or for the seal to do its work, but none of them happened. Okay, so answering back like that didn't trigger anything in her body. As for Deidara… she was actually surprised to see a crooked smile in his lips, pleased with her answer.
"Guess you're more funny than you look to be, hm. See you anytime, Sakura," he played with the name in his tongue while he turned and left, leaving her alone and kind of stunned. Okay, so the guy was into this kind of mental games.
The moment almost made her forget why she was in front of Pain's door in the first place, so she hurried herself to knock before someone found her there standing. When the deep voice inside the office welcomed her, Sakura opened the door and he gazed at her while she put herself in front of him.
"Where is Konan," he demanded to know, clearly meaning it as 'why are you here alone'.
"I don't know, I'm sorry. Deidara brought me here," she told him. "I wanted to tell you that the prototype of one of Itachi's new drugs is ready. The most important of them all. But I need the plants to make it."
The iryou-nin handed him a sheet of paper and the man accepted it in silence. "Seven of the nine ingredients are from the Earth Country, and the other two from the Tea Country. And I have to say that this is a prototype, so it has a chance of failing."
"And how high is this chance?", Pain asked.
"Very low. I haven't failed in a long time," she assured, her pride from minutes ago resurfacing.
Pain nodded. The Tea Country was very close to the Fire Country and it would be risky to get near, so Zetsu would have to do this job. The Earth Country was the destination of the next mission, though, so he could kill two rabbits with one stone.
"Very well. I will quickly provide you with what you need. Is there any other progress besides this prototype?"
"Yes. There are other formulas I'm working on, and I'm getting there, but I want to research more. We want a cure, not a decelerator of the symptoms," Sakura related. She refrained from the passing thought that she was very much interested in never finding a cure for Itachi, though.
"I see. Anything else?" Upon hearing a 'no', Pain dismissed Sakura. He would make the final arrangements to capture the Four-Tails in the next hour and would send Deidara and Tobi as soon as possible with the list.
Harsh knocks on Sakura's door woke her up in the middle of the night. The girl quickly put on her bathrobe, covering her warm PJs, and hurried to the door. When she opened it, expecting to be Konan or Itachi, she was very unpleased to find Hidan impatiently looking at her. She shivered.
"... Yes?" she asked, now wide awake.
"I just finished one of my rituals for Jashin-sama and I think I broke my bone ugly with my scythe. Look at it for me," he demanded.
"Uhhh of course. Just a minute. You can go to the infirmary while I finish waking up?"
"For fucks sake, hurry up. Ain't got all night for your girl shit," Hidan complained, but started walking before even finishing his sentence.
After closing the door, Sakura finally allowed herself to breathe. He flogged himself with his own weapon?! Okay, so things were getting crazier and more dangerous. She surely didn't feel safe with him before, and now it only got worse, considering he was a sadistic, assassin, insane and now masochist individual.
She washed her face and put on the same clothes she used the day before, hurrying to the infirmary as she didn't want to test Hidan's patience. He was there, sitting in one of the beds.
"Can you please show me where you hurt yourself?" She asked.
The nukenin removed his cape, revealing he was shirtless. And what the hell was that?! In his right shoulder there was a big, gruesome and bloody hole. She could see his exposed flesh and she almost didn't believe it was a self-inflicted wound. How did he bear that kind of pain, and even more, how did he manage to act so casually about that?
Without saying anything, she approached him and used her chakra-infused palm to analyse the area, confirming that, indeed, there was a very broken bone there. The man's expression remained impassive, almost annoyed. She avoided looking at him when she finally spoke.
"Yeah, somehow you managed to break your clavicle. I can fix it now and try to repair your tissues, but you will have to use a sling for a few days so you don't rip everything open again."
"Whatever, just fix this shit," he cursed and Sakura, wordless, just started to work. "Y'know, girlie…"
"I have a name. It's Sakura," she interrupted him, just as she did with Deidara earlier.
"Whatever. You were in that Naruto's team, am I right?" He asked.
"Yes, I am in that Naruto's team. Why do you ask?"
"I'm curious how it was dealing with the boy and the beast inside him? Considering which one it was out of the nine, he must get angry very easy when things get ugly. Tell me, did he fuck up a lot because of that?"
Sakura didn't understand what Hidan just said, and the bewildered look she gave him made him frown.
"What, I'm just curious 'cause we only get to beat the fucker's up and do our job." Suddenly, Hidan got some sort of insight and smiled with evilness. "Oh. You didn't know."
Suddenly stopping working on Hidan's shoulder, Sakura stood in shock. Quickly thinking, she unfolded all the events in the past. She understood the rejection Naruto suffered when they were kids, a thing she also did going with the flow before really knowing him. She understood why Shizune was so afraid of sending Naruto on long missions. Why Jiraiya's training took so long and worried Tsunade and Kakashi. She understood how Team Seven got away alive in so many situations, like when fighting Zabuza and Haku or Gaara. She understood why Kakashi always chose to 'keep an eye' on Naruto whenever they had to fight someone.
Naruto was a Jinchuuriki. And Akatsuki was after Jinchuurikis.