The Last Ones Standing

Chapter 2

Two days later the boys still weren't back. Sakura's jitters subsided somewhat in meantime. She wasn't anymore expecting the heavens to open and her teammates to fall from the sky any moment.

She decided to share her soldier pills with Madara, mindful of giving him only the ones that didn't boost chakra too much. Her pouch and storage scrolls were getting empty quicker than she had anticipated. Plus, she needed to find some real food anyhow. Her stomach was rolling and doing funny things from how empty she felt.

Pushing revulsion into the deepest corners of her mind she turned to browsing the belongings of the fallen. They stunk and she did her best not to breath too deep. The first two corpses she found didn't have any supplies. The third had only a pouch of soldier pills, which she took, but decided to use as a last resort because the shinobi to whom they belonged had hailed from Iwa and Sakura had no idea about their pills' recipes. The fourth corpse had a storage scroll, but since it was a Suna shinobi, she didn't know the seal. The fifth corpse was from Konoha. She had to turn it around in order to reach the flak jacket and it was a grave mistake. Because she recognized the face – it was a boy who took Chuunin exams with her, those Chuunin exams that had taken place in Suna, when she participated along Ino and Choji. The boy had brown curly hair, and was so nice to her… He had borrowed her his blanket when she had been cold at night…

But this time he wasn't of much help - his storage scroll held only a water canteen and a small package of biscuits.

Looting the corpses wasn't getting her far. She needed civilian supplies. Making up her mind Sakura returned to where Madara was lying.

"I'll go to the nearest village to find some food," she told him kneeling by his left side. Only then she realized that she approached him directly, without a clone as a proxy. She stopped her hands before she could touch him, but he didn't make an impression that if he would want to exploit her oversight.

"Why? You can browse further. There are enough bodies." It always amazed her how much he could perceive despite being blind and immobilized. Or did she stink so much?

"Easy for you to say. They start to rot," she answered lowering her hands to his left arm. "Plus one cannot live on soldier pills. It's unhealthy. They are supposed to boost your energy, but they burn you out when you don't get proper nourishment. Don't you feel it?"

"I don't feel anything."

Sakura chose to ignore his haughty tone. "I'll go to the nearest town… which is… which is…" Where was it actually? Sakura turned her head around. Well, no matter, she will find some town. And she was glad that it wouldn't be Konoha. She couldn't imagine facing Konoha in this state. "Anyway, wherever it is, it will have some supplies. I'll leave some pills and one canteen in your reach. That should be enough, I'll be back in two days." The shard of his forearm's bones were coming together, getting glued back into one by her chakra. "There. Ready." In retrospect it was pretty reckless to heal him without a clone, but Sakura couldn't muster anxiety anymore. She was so done.

The first town that wasn't completely leveled to the ground lied day and a half away from the tree and there she spent long hours browsing through the rubble. She packed her storage scroll full with canned foods and water bottles. She even drew water from the well and filled and sealed all kinds of containers she could find. She was about to head back, when she came to conclusion that packing only food and water was a bit too optimistic. With heavy heart, she started to sort through houses' debris, piling timber for firewood on one side, and undamaged everyday objects on the other. She was half way through a third house when she realized that the canteen, she had left to Madara, was closed. Did he manage to open it with one hand?! Cold sweat ran down Sakura's spine. Had she just left him to die? She haphazardly sealed whatever she had scavenged – timber, blankets, soup bowls, unpaired socks – and ran. Swallowing one soldier pill after another she covered the distance in sixteen hours. Did she sentence him to a slow, torturous death?!

When she came back she found out that he had managed to open the bottle. Nevertheless, the painful pangs of anxiety left traces in Sakura's mind. Somehow, even though he was an enemy the thought of leaving him to die, just out of her own negligence was a horror.

She couldn't wait any longer. If they weren't coming back, she would start freeing the trapped ones herself. Sakura rubbed her forehead – it was a daunting task, if the tree had indeed captured all life. On the second thought maybe it wasn't that bad – every person she frees will support her in the task. The progress will be exponential.

Encouraged, Sakura faced the cocoon hanging from the nearest branch and clutched the katana that she picked from some samurai's corpse.

But wait. All animals were trapped as well. The plants were withered and lifeless. What would they all eat?

Either she finds a global solution or she must first bring back the plant and animal life to the world. Animals could probably be cut away same way as people, but plants? Does she need to plant seeds and wait until they grow? Wait entire season or maybe more? And what if the seeds had been also rendered useless?!

Despair expanded its tendrils into Sakura's mind. No, she cannot bear this burden alone any longer. She needed someone, anyone. Couple of people should be able to live off of the looted goods. And she couldn't do it alone.

With renewed resolve she slashed the stem of the cocoon and it plopped on the ground with a disgusting, wet sound of an overripe fruit. Sakura wedged her kunai between the folds of the cocoon and unwrapped the first layer of tendrils. The shinobi inside wasn't moving, but she could see parts of his flack jacket already – he was from Kumo. She pulled at white tree-flesh with more force.

"Hold on in there! I'm getting to you!"

The back of Kumo's shinobi head was already visible. Sakura tore at the last tendril and uncovered his face.

It was a face of a dead man. Eyes open with Rinnegan immortalized in them. Face contorted in convulsion of pain or fear. Or both.

Sakura stared. But he was alive when she had cut the cocoon! She had sensed the gentle hum of his chakra! She wasn't much of a sensor, but she wouldn't have done such a mistake! What happened? Did she hurt him somehow when she was cutting the cocoon? Frantically, she tore off the remains of the white substance. Kumo shinobi sported a gash on his supper thigh. The blood was congealed, could it have been this injury that did it for him? Or was it the fall of the cocoon? Did she kill him?! Sakura couldn't believe it, but the man was dead.

She stepped backwards, trying to distract herself from horrible guilt she felt.

Alright. Alright. She will be more careful with the next one. She turned to the cocoon that was lying on the ground – the tingling of chakra was definitely there. She slashed the stem. The hum disappeared in the very same moment.

"Noooo!" she screamed and tore at the cocoon with her bare hands. The face that she freed long minutes later was twisted in the same grimace of pain.

Katsuyu found her an hour later, curled under the rock and crying.

"Sakura-chan," the slug tried, "you said you've sensed a hum of chakra… Maybe those shinobi were just very low on it? Maybe they were on the verge of dying already? Let's look for someone who has a strong chakra signature."

It was in a direct vicinity of the tree that they found a group of cocoons radiating chakra so strong that Sakura didn't even need to concentrate to sense it.

"Alright. One last try. It has to work, right? This person here is strong."

Sakura slashed at the closest cocoon. She knew already how to lever the tendrils so that they would pry open quickly. Long, auburn hair spilled out of cocoon. Mizukage's face, once so breathtakingly beautiful, was twisted beyond recognition. And dead.

"No! No! She was alive! She has to be alive!" Sakura hit the cocoon with both of her fists. And collapsed to her knees. She looked around at the other four cocoons hanging from the same branch. They all were emitting very strong chakra-field. One of them was extraordinarily large, and the other – child-sized. Sakura clamped her mouth and held back the urge to puke. The Five Kage. They were fighting together. If Mizukage was right here, it meant, it meant… Oh gods. Sakura spun and touched a cocoon to her left. Chakra emanating from it was so warm. It felt familiar. "Shishou… shishou… Is it you?" Sakura's hands clenched on the katana's handle.

"Sakura-chan, hold on, don't do anything rash." Katsuyu crawled to her side. "Don't cut another one."

Sakura nodded and willed her fingers to relax.

"We need to figure out what's happening with them…" offered the slug.

Sakura stood up. "Well, there is someone who should know."

"What is it doing to them! Answer me you bastard!" All that was boiling in Sakura on the way back from the tree, exploded at Madara's sight. She dropped on her knees next to him and dug the kunai into the hollow of his throat. "What is this damn tree doing!" She pressed the blade enough for him to feel it. "Answer me!" she screamed when he didn't indicate that she made an impression.

A grave mistake. She made an impression. And the reaction she provoked was a lightning-fast grip on her throat. "Go on, push it deeper," he goaded. "Let's see who dies first – me with the pierced windpipe or you with the broken neck?"

Katsuyu spat acid onto his face, but he didn't even wince. The slug was small and his eyes gauged out anyway. He gripped her throat tighter. Sakura slowed her heart rate to reduce the amount of oxygen her body was using. And simultaneously lifted the kunai away from his throat and batted his hand lightly away. "Let go," she said offhandedly. She should establish that she didn't feel threatened by his behaviour. And that he depends on her. Five seconds later he let go of her throat.

Sakura drew an unrestricted breath, trying not to make sound desperate. She smoothed her voice into calmness. As scary as this clash was, its outcome has re-established the rules. She still did have the upper hand. "You claim this," Sakura gesticulated at the thick tree root next to them, only too late realizing that she was speaking to the blind, "this tree – you claim it's your invention. Your jutsu designed to save the mankind. I've just cut three cocoons. I killed three people. Why? Why were they dead the moment I disconnected them? How and why?"

Madara was silent.

"Should I assume you don't know yourself?" she mocked and preventively moved out of his range. "You do realize that I could torture you until you tell me?"

"That is very, very courageous for you to say that. But you won't. You're not the type. You're a medic through and through."

Sakura scowled. She could afford making a face - one of many advantages of him being blind. But he was right. Or at least right for the time being – she still wasn't in emotional state where she would lower herself to torture. And it seemed he wasn't going to tell her anything. She stood up and walked towards the limb of the tree. Even if he doesn't want to talk, she can for sure figure it out by herself. And if not, she will re-examine her stance on torture.

The root was thick, several meters wide in diameter. Sakura placed her palms against the surface and, fighting revulsion, dove inside with her chakra. Immediately, the slender stream of her energy was enveloped and carried away by the current of chakra streaming through the root. Sakura head spun – so much chakra, and of so many different kinds… Myriads of life-forces, all in movement, endless stream surrounding her…

"Sakura! Watch out!" tiny Katsuyu clone exclaimed from her shoulder. Sakura's eyes snapped open the same moment that the white tentacle tightened around her chest. How could it be – there were no branches in this area mere seconds ago!

The white protrusion spun her around her axis as it wrapped itself around Sakura. She focused her chakra trying to break the hold – that should be nothing for her enhanced strength. But all the chakra that she summoned got sucked out immediately. Sakura struggled harder – there must be a limit to this thing's durability! On vain – the tree held her tight and drainage started to reach her chakra reserves. Katsuyu jumped off her shoulder landing on the part connecting the trap that held Sakura to the root proper. She spat acid onto the narrowest point. But it didn't do much damage and Katsuyu clone sank and disintegrated into the flesh of the tree.

"Katsuyu!" screamed Sakura. She shouldn't have – when she let the air out of her lungs the tree squeezed her tighter. She couldn't take the inhale. Her ribs were starting to give in under the pressure. "Ugghh…" she grunted as one of the snapped.

What to do? Using chakra against that monster was contraproductive. But earlier she managed to chop the branches off easily just with a blade. A blade. The katana was lying next to her backpack, some twenty meters away. She couldn't reach the kunai from her pouch – she was tightly wrapped shoulders down. Her left arm somehow remained on the outside, so she still could slash the branch, if only she had a weapon…

"Madara! Madara!" She hated how the way she sounded – pained and desperate. But that was what she was right now.

"What's happening?!" And there was a note of alarm in his voice. He was flat on his back, but Sakura could see that he was on full alert.

Talking was a near-impossible task. With her every exhale the damn tree was pushing tighter. She needed to spare her air. "The tree. Caught me." He should figure out from the way she talked that she was being strangulated. "Cannot use chakra because it sucks it away."

"Quench it."

"What?" she coughed out.

"Quench it. The tree is chakra-sensitive. I don't know why it captured you, but it reacts to chakra of living beings. Quench your chakra and it will cease to notice you."

Fighting through oxygen depletion Sakura forced her chakra down. The tree stopped tightening the hold. It didn't help much; her torso was already half-crushed. At least two ribs punctured her right lung.

"Ok. Ok. It stopped crushing me. But it didn't let go." Three more breaths. She couldn't use chakra to direct the oxygen to strategic organs, so most of it went to waste. Black spots danced in front of Sakura's eyes. "There is a katana. Some ten meters away from you."

"Right or left?" Madara stretched out his arm – the only limb that she had healed to operational state.

"Left and behind you. I'll direct you."

He could only extend his arm that much and then painstakingly pull his entire body weigh maybe thirty centimeters at max. Then he had to repeat the process. Sakura focused on not blacking out. "More to the left."

"Which left?"

"Your left!"

"I'm lying on the ground! How do you define 'left'!?"

Alright. Alright. She cannot pass out. "Extend your arm at 90 degrees from you body. Now a bit more towards your head." The broken rib was scratching something inside her and she actively didn't want to think what it was. "There. That's the direction."

Another arm extension. Another pull. His body dragged limply across the rubble. "Hurry. Please…"

Madara bit his lips. And pulled his weight with more force. Five iterations later his hand landed on her backpack. "What is it?" He palmed the pack.

"My stuff. Move it away and keep going. Just one meter more. There, there, feel more to the right!"

His hand closed on the handle. "Alright. Say something. Keep speaking. I need to localize you."

"Ugh… what should I say… I cannot speak, my lungs are collapsing."

"How high up are you wrapped? Where should I aim? Level of your chest? Waist?"

"Chest." Another inhale. "Otherwise I won't reach it. But you realize that we have just one…" Katana swished through the air and lodged itself in the cocoon enveloping Sakura. "… chance…" She wanted to yell 'you should have warned me!' but the strain on her chest made her save her breath. Unnaturally twisting her wrist she managed to reach the handle.

"That bastard tried to suck me dry!" Sakura yelled kicking at a chopped-off white tentacle after she freed and healed herself. "It's draining chakra, that's what it was doing to me, and that's what it is doing to everyone else!"

"What do you mean?"

"It sucks chakra from the victims and transports it towards the trunk. Before it caught me, I saw it! An entire river of stolen chakra runs there!"

"It shouldn't be doing that." There was something in Madara's voice that she couldn't put her finger on.

"What do you mean?"

"The tree is supposed to support the dreamers. Sustain their lives that they don't starve so they can keep on dreaming… That's how I designed it."

"That's clearly not what it's doing. The chakra flows to the tree."

"Are you sure you've seen it correctly? Maybe you've mixed up the directions?"

Sakura threw her most indignant look at him. Too bad he couldn't see it. "Mixed up?!" She tried to make up for the lack of visuals with her tone. "Mixed up?! I can see this fucking tree! It's just there! Five kilometers from here, I see it plain as a day! And, oh wait, isn't it you who is blind?"

Madara pursed his lips. "You can be saying this to put doubt in my mind."

Oh, there she got him. Right, he wanted to be the saviour. She didn't quite buy into it during his speeches, but now – he seemed genuinely unsettled by her revelations. That gave her an additional advantage. "Well, you would like to know, wouldn't you?" She put all the poison she had into her voice, repeating his own mockery from couple of days prior. "You can only lie there and go crazy with uncertainty. And you can do nothing. Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Welcome to my hell."

"Your hell?"

"My teammates are somewhere… Stuck in other dimension together with the rabbit goddess. I don't know where. I don't know if they are alive. When and if they will come back. And I cannot do anything…"

"Your hell, as you've phrased it, is none of my doings. I would say it's pretty circumstantial. My hell, on the other hand is entirely your design."

"Serves you well."

"You are not like that. Let me make sure. If it really is like you're saying… I cannot believe it, but if that's true… If that is true, then I am also against to what is happening to them. I didn't… I didn't plan it this way… That would position us on the same side."

"What are you suggesting?"

"Heal me. Let me make sure what is happening myself."

"And what will I get from that?"

"Consciousness that you didn't torture me."

"And why should I care?"

"Because you value your humanity."

"Oh, what a high opinion you have on me. Maybe I'm not as righteous as you imagine…"

"If you are telling the truth, then you have nothing to lose. Because if it is true, then I am on your side. You are a logically thinking person and I know you recognize it. That's why, if you don't let me check it by myself, I will have to assume it was a lie."

"Well, you forget about one detail – I may simply not trust you. Your 'logical argument' can be a ruse."

"A ruse? What incentive would I have for a ruse? If that," he made a gesture with his only working hand, "was my plan, then I wouldn't need to do anything. I could contemplate my victory, until I died and reunited with my loved ones in Pure Land."

"Or you can want to regain your power to prevent Sasuke and Naruto from breaking the jutsu once they return." Sakura crossed her arms over her chest.

"You really believe that they will return?"

"Of course!"

"Then why haven't they yet?"

Sakura bit her lip. She was wondering herself. Since over two weeks.

"I not a clairvoyant to know exactly 'why', but I can tell you all possible reasons," Madara continued. "Why don't you sit down, the list is long…"

There he was – mocking her again. Sakura felt like boiling. "Why don't you save the snark for someone else? Oh wait, there is no one else around to listen to your pompous bullshit. I guess you'll have to talk to yourself. But that shouldn't be a problem, you like the sound of your own voice, don't you?"

Madara laughed. "Your attempt on offending me only proves that you are scared and insecure. You doubt your own words."

"I don't! They will come back! Sasuke has Mangekyō Sharingan in one eye and Rinnegan in the other! He knows time-space ninjutsu as well!"

Madara arched his eyebrow, which looked disturbing with his eyes closed. And the knowledge that his eyeballs were missing. "Does he now? And who made the jump? He, himself?"

Sakura shook her head. "No. From what it looked like it was Kaguya."

"Then there is no knowing if he will find the way back."

"What do you mean?!"

"There are hundreds if not thousands dimensions reachable through the dimensional travel. Just that." Sakura fell silent. "Not to mention more prosaic reasons like simply death. From the hand of the rabbit bitch or from the conditions in another dimension."

"Stop!"

"Why? I'm only voicing that what you think already, am I not?"

"Why are you doing this? Why are you so hell bent on torturing me? I'm feeding you, I'm taking care of you, I've healed you!"

"You're keeping me alive. Healing me would be something else. And saved you from the tree, so we're even."

Sakura glared. And remembered for the nth time today that he cannot see her face expressions.

"Coming back to the topic at hand…" picked up Madara as if they were discussing an issue at the meeting table. "Heal me. Heal me enough so that I could walk up to tree and check it by myself. I'm not much of a sensor but if you say you saw hundreds of different chakras in a form of a stream, I should be able to perceive it as well. And distinguish it from the chakra of the tree that should be floating through these channels instead."

"If you probe with your chakra the tree will attack you. As it did with me."

"I trust that you will be able to free me."

Sakura bit her lip. He seemed very determined. She considered all that she knew about him. He always seemed genuine to her. Insane, but genuine. He had honestly believed that he had been freeing the mankind from suffering. Shodai's attitude towards him seemed to confirm it…

"Alright. I'll bring you to the root. But I won't heal you."

"Fine."

Sakura jerked her head. He agreed too quickly. Either he really didn't have any ulterior motives, or he had a back-up plan that would allow him circumvent his broken bones. But at that point she was ready to take some risks.

He was damn heavy as she dragged him over the rough terrain towards the tree root. It must have been painful for him, but he never made a sound. Positioning herself in a sensible distance from the root, she unsheathed the katana and placed his palm against the surface of the tree. "There. Sense if you want."

She wasn't sure what he did, because his chakra was so low that undetectable, but suddenly something changed in his face. Something like recognition. And whatever he did was enough to rile the tree up. Three protrusions sprouted from the body of the root. Sakura slashed at closest two. The third one found Madara's torso, flattened and sucked itself to it with speed that no plant-like lifeform should possess. Sakura shuddered and cut it off as well. New protrusions started to grow to her right, so she deemed it enough and grabbed Madara under his arms to pull him away from the root.

"And? Satisfied? Saw what you wanted?" Madara didn't respond. "Won't you even deign me an answer?!"

"What do you want me to say?!"
"That you admit a failure? Yeah, that might make my day."

"They are dreaming," answered Madara but he didn't sound as certain as before. "They are happy. Even if their chakra is being sucked out."

Sakura got under control an impulse to gloat at his acknowledgment even if it wasn't verbal. Moreover, he was still defending Tsukuyomi! "You don't even know if they are dreaming at all! I saw the faces of the ones I cut off. Those were faces of people in agony! No one dreaming a happy dream looks like that!"

"I know the jutsu I casted. It was genjutsu of my design. I know."

"But you didn't plan for them to be sucked out. I was looking at your face when you were probing the tree. You didn't plan for that."

"No. I didn't."

"This is not your jutsu anymore. Face it! You had been used as they are being used now. You were just a puppet. The quicker you swallow this pill, oh great and invincible Uchiha Madara the better for us all."

"Still, they are at peace. The end effect has been achieved. Who cast the jutsu is irrelevant."

"They are used as fuel, as life-feed! Do you think the tree cares if they dream their happiness? Do you think it cares when it eats them?! Do you think the rabbit goddess cared?!"

Madara pursed his lips

"Oh, I wish you could look around! Then you would can see, oh great savior of mankind, what have you achieved!"

Madara turned his head away from her. There was so much anger in that one small movement that she didn't see from here during entire war.

They didn't talk for another week. Sakura gladly would have, because the silence and loneliness was killing her. So, when she was feeding him, she would say things like 'Lift up you head', 'I'm gonna give you water' or 'Those are crackers, so be careful not to choke'. But he never uttered a word.

Finally, one evening, he spoke up. "I made a mistake." Sakura lifted her head from the kunai she was sharpening. "In my pride I made a mistake that costed entire mankind their lives. Is that what you wanted to hear? I made an unimaginable mistake and I survived long enough to recognize it. I survived to be reduced to helplessness. You know nothing about me, so you would have to take my word for this, but there is no greater torture for me than to be deprived of agency."

Kunai was lying forgotten on Sakura's lap. She wanted to be happy about her moral victory. She really wanted. But she couldn't. Even though his voice was leveled he sounded so utterly broken. Sakura bit her lip. If it was anyone else, she would try to offer some consolation. But it was Uchiha Madara. And, frankly, she didn't know if there was any consolation available in his situation.

"For the first time in my life," he continued, "I am rendered powerless. And believe me, I would do anything, anything, to reverse what had happened."

Sakura dug with the kunai in dirt, careless that she was blunting a freshly sharpened blade. Was he genuine? Was his regret real? Was he trustworthy in any way? And how much did she have to lose? The boys weren't coming back. Sakura sucked in her lip – probably they weren't coming back at all. She lifted the kunai and weighted it in her hand. Ah, let all be damned! She threw the kunai so it buried next to Madara's head.

"My teammates," she started and paused. She felt as if she was about to leap into a precipice. "My teammates, they receive seals from Sage of Six Paths. Those marks are supposed to break the Tsukuyomi. Reverse the flow, shrink the tree, reverse it back to the Jūbi and split it back into nine tailed beasts."

Madara jerked his head. "But they've been teleported into some other dimension. You're out of luck."

Sakura drummed fingers on her knee. She didn't have the kunai to play with. "Maybe not quite. I have…" The moment she says it she will put her life into his hands. Can she manage such level of trust to the man who tried to kill them all? Sakura looked inside herself. Was she ready to entrust herself to him? Not only herself. Her future, her dreams… Lives of everyone else… Sakura swallowed. Yes, she was ready – simply because the alternative was worse. "I have a pair of Sharingan eyes… Extracted from my sensei before he died, sealed in a scroll. I could… I could give them to you."

He didn't respond, so she just kneeled next to him and started healing him. "We could go and look for them… Bring them back…"

She was feeling lightheaded and almost dizzy. That what she was doing was absolutely insane. But - concluded Sakura in a flash of clarity – it was the most logical thing to do. His bones were coming together under her fingers as her chakra poured into his system. He slowly closed the fist of his newly healed hand.

She rolled out her medical supply scroll - the jar with bloodied eyeballs popped into existence. When she was connecting the optical nerves, Sakura wasn't even sure if she was performing the procedure correctly, so high on adrenaline she was.

He kept his eyelids closed after she was done. She wrung her arm around him and propped him up. "Can you stand?" She gently guided him up until he was on his feet. After she made sure he was standing stably she took two steps back. She almost forgot how tall he was. Madara slowly opened his eyes. The same shade of black that she remembered from Sasuke fixed on her.

Sakura sucked in a breath. Her head was spinning, between the two of them she might be the one to trip and fall. "Will you… Will you kill me now?" she whispered breathlessly.

Black eyes focused on her. "No. I will help you."

AN: Thanks for reading and I'm very curious about your opinions!