A/N: Slightly off my stride for the last chapter, but I think I'm properly back again. Still not edited, because I'm living dangerously and you're getting short chapters so that I don't lose momentum. Sorry about that. See you again soon!

Kill Your Heroes

-Chapter Sixty-Eight-

Gaman (Part I)

Sakura had slept less than six hours in the last three days, so she intended to tell Mitarashi-san and the rest of Fearmonger that they were free and then find some dead man's bed and sleep in it. Her team would be among the last to leave and didn't have a logistical role in the withdrawal.

So when Sasuke slunk after her, Naruto bouncing alongside, she scowled.

"Man, Sakura-chan, what was that form?" Naruto asked. "I didn't get a good look, but you were standing on thin air! And it almost looked like you had a tail!"

Sakura sighed and, deciding that activating the seal would be the quickest way to quench his curiosity, did so. As her antlers came in fully, she felt the telltale pull that indicated Kakashi-senpai had followed her lead. There wasn't any strange overlay when she looked at Naruto this time, but it was hard to be a source of mystery when you were gaping that unattractively.

Tail whorling behind her as she turned to face him properly, she took in Sasuke's wide eyes and Itachi's narrow-eyed stare.

"Think of it as a combination of Sage Mode and Sasuke's cursed seal," she said.

"Who gave you that kind of power?" Sasuke asked, grimacing when Itachi cut him a sharp look. "Was it you?" he asked as he looked behind him to Kakashi-senpai, going stiff when he noticed the silver ears.

Noticing Sasuke's consternation, Naruto turned as well, his jaw dropping impossibly lower as he took in the sight of their former teacher. "Wait, that was you up there too, Kakashi-sensei?"

Kakashi-senpai's tail whished once. "You caught me," he said drolly. "And, no, I didn't teach Sakura how to do this, Sasuke. It's the other way around. She's my Orochimaru."

He let the stunned silence hang between them for a beat, before, "The good news is that I've yet to experience delusions of grandeur and the ambition to crush countries that have annoyed me in the past."

Sakura sighed, pinching the bridge of nose in such a way that kept her claws clear of her face. "Someone showed me—let's call it a map to the path, Sasuke," she said at last. "But I did the rest, with some help from a friend. Not that you'd know anything about that," she remarked darkly.

"Um, let's focus on the fact that you can fly before you two start trying to kill each other again," Naruto said with a nervous laugh. "I'm sure what Sasuke meant to say was that you were amazing, Sakura-chan. I didn't even know genjutsu could have that sort of range and while we didn't see much of your fights, the stories they're telling are so cool. You're amazing," he said earnestly.

"You're not bad yourself," she said lightly. "Especially considering you were stuck with him." A head tilt indicated the scowling Uchiha. Then she remembered she was an adult and they were no longer supposed to be antagonists. She grimaced, which probably made her look like a Kiri-nin with her teeth as they were, and said, "Sorry. That was uncalled for. I haven't had much sleep and I'm frustrated at the way things turned out. I'm not blaming you," she said swiftly when Sasuke would have made some sort of retort. "There's a reason that we handed that battle off to the four of you. Even if you nearly brought down a few buildings on our heads. And that chakra construct was something else."

"That was Itachi," Sasuke volunteered stiffly.

Sakura turned her attention to her—something, who was still studying her. He stepped closer, reaching out slowly to caress the curve of an antler. "It's sort of cute," he said with a slight smile.

She didn't recognize the embarrassed, half-strangled noise that elicited, which only tugged his smile wider. His hair wasn't worn in a low ponytail as he normally wore it; it was higher and only half pulled through the elastic, giving him something of a playful casualness and leaving the length of his neck bare. Even dusty and smudged, he looked so much better than the man she'd first met that he could have almost been another person entirely. It helped that he wasn't being swallowed up by an Akatsuki cloak or those civilian outfits he'd worn to seem nonthreatening.

Much like senpai, he hadn't made many modifications to the standard uniform, except that he wore black rather than blue beneath the green. Probably he had done so as a show of solidarity, a reminder to those who saw them that the Uchiha once again served Konoha. She hadn't really missed him—she wasn't accustomed to having him at her side, like she was with senpai, and there hadn't been a lot of time to miss much of anyone except her bed and there had been a certain awareness that somewhere on the battlefield he fought for the same cause—but that didn't mean she wasn't glad to see him. A knot of anxiety she hadn't known she was carrying in her chest eased to see he was well.

And there was a certain security in the knowledge that he would be with her on the next mission, as if with both Itachi and Kakashi-senpai at her side there was no way that they could fail. Given the kind of mission it was, that said something, something she wasn't certain she was ready to say yet.

Itachi's eyes shifted thoughtfully between her and senpai as they both deactivated the seal, Sakura shifting her head from side to side as the weight of the antlers vanished. "Seriously, though, I would kill for sleep," she quipped lightly, "so I'm off."

She turned away, mind already set on the apartment blocks that the Konoha shinobi were occupying, feeling Kakshi-senpai fall in beside her. He already had his book open in one hand, the other tucked in his pocket. That was the way it should be, but—she flexed the hand on her free side in invitation, Itachi's pinkie linking with her own as Naruto and Sasuke began to bicker behind them.

[Kill Your Heroes]

"Haruno," Tsunade-sama said from where she stood atop the wreckage of what had been the tallest tower in Amegakure, arms crossed and expression pensive as she looked out across the destruction they had caused. The sky was blue and cloudless above them—a reminder that they'd removed the God of Rain. The bulk of Konoha's forces had already withdrawn from the city; within the hour the rest of them would be gone as well. She and Sai had been preparing to remove the seal from Mitarashi-san when the summons had come; Mitarashi-san had been adamant about having it off as soon as she heard that Tsunade-sama had given the go-ahead to dissolve Fearmonger.

"Godaime-sama," she acknowledged.

"Things will change for you now," she said without preamble. "It was always a possibility that your identity would be discovered, but losing your mask with hair as distinctive as yours and then playing such a visible role in the combat afterwards—once word reaches the other villages, they'll reclassify you. Being an S-ranked shinobi is useful in some circumstances and a burden in others. Especially given your skillset and because battles as one-sided as this give rise to bullshit nicknames like the 'Angel of Annihilation' thanks to your team's defeat of the Angel of Ame. We'll have to wait and see whether they decide to attempt to eliminate you or just whine every time you enter their borders."

Sakura nodded and ignored the sick twist of her stomach, clenching her hands tighter against her opposite elbows.

"Maybe if you're lucky, someone will declare you flee on sight. We haven't had a kunoichi earn that honor yet."

"Unlikely," Sakura murmured. "Though I'm not looking forward to assassins, either. I was never enough of a name to bother with, before."

"More fool them," was Tsunade-sama's reply. "But I didn't just call you up here to warn you about the benefits of your newfound fame. This won't end even in the success of your mission. What they started when they attacked Konohagakure won't be finished. It will take us years to recover from this. And they will be long years, hard ones, where once the immediate rage and passion ebbs, people will become restless, less selfless. They'll be angry. Hungry for what they had before and don't have now and the time it's taking to have it again. For years we've shunted the duties of the military police to Anbu and others, but it's beyond time they were a visible presence in the village again.

"Your command experience is limited, but you've proven that you're composed and resourceful even when I ask you to crush a city, which proves to me that you can cope with stress and work within deadlines. The greater part of your time in the field has been spend doing investigation and pursuit, which is frankly ideal, and your newfound reputation will automatically accord you respect and fear. As a bonus, I don't doubt that doing this will mean that Hatake will actually accept what I'm going to offer him."

Sakura regarded her Hokage warily, distrusting her reckless grin. "…and just what are you going to offer him?" she asked after a moment.

"I'm going to ask if he'd serve as Vice-Commander of the Military Police. Normally I'd expect him to flee anything that looked like half that much paperwork, but he'd be working to support you, Haruno, so he might make an exception. Danzou has already approved the choice, which means that the other elders will fall in line, though I doubt they'd have protested your appointment to begin with. Also, we're in a state of martial law, so what I fucking say goes."

"You want me to become Commander of the Military Police," Sakura repeated faintly.

Tsunade hummed an affirmation that sounded like a death-knell to any dreams she'd entertained of sleeping for a month when they made it back to the village. The Seal of the False Sage had allowed her team to take advantage of the kind of chakra-bolstered healing seen in jinchuriki, but she felt ragged and exhausted. She didn't want to think beyond this next mission; she had wanted to pretend to herself that soon there would be a time where time didn't seem to be rushing toward them with all the ominous and inescapable devastation of a tsunami. Like back when Team Seven was first formed.

"Before you panic, that long peace we had between the war with Iwa and now means that there were a lot of shinobi that needed to begin their transition from fieldwork anyway. I'll be able to fill your support roles with experienced ninja; you'll select your enforcers and your hunters and grow the organization until its ranks are as full as when the Uchiha filled them. If Hatake Kakashi says yes, you'll also win some transfers from Anbu."

"People won't follow me," she protested through numb lips. "I'm not—I'm not Naruto. Or even Sasuke."

Tsunade-sama turned an unimpressed look toward her. "Stop making excuses, kiddo. Especially bad ones. Just look at your team right now. That boy from Root lost his leg and still followed you down into the throat of the beast. Hatake Kakashi, who hasn't allowed people close since he was about chest-high, is the kind of friend to you that few people ever find in their life, but he wouldn't do that if you weren't someone strong enough to survive being his friend. Mitarashi Anko's probably frothing at the mouth to be free of the seal, but that has to do with her and not with you as a leader.

"Orochimaru stole a whole hell of a lot of things from her. She'll get a promotion to full jounin status when we get back to the village for staring all her fears in the face like this to serve her village. And the Hyūga? Do you think you really could have talked him into taking the seal if you weren't suited to lead? I wouldn't really be surprised if he followed you into the Military Police if you asked. It suits his temperament and skills."

"…this isn't really about what I want, is it?" Sakura said softly. "You're telling me what's already so. It's already done. I'm…already…"

"Yeah. Sorry. Life's like that, for people like you and me. I didn't want to be Hokage, either. Still don't. Unless you'd like that better? I'd let you, you know."

"Absolutely not," was Sakura's instant reply.

"And Hatake? What do you think my chances are of talking him into it?"

"You should only try if you're curious to see how long it takes him to resign his rank and become a homemaker."

"I thought so," Tsunade-sama sighed. "I was mostly kidding about Hatake anyway. His reputation is too erratic for the village at large to trust him in the way they'll need to trust my successor. Stability, not strength, is what the poor soul that fills my seat will need to represent. And I'm not even certain Hatake remembers how to fill out most of the forms you've been filing for your team."

Sakura laughed weakly, then gathered herself.

She still had to tell the Hokage about that uncanny encounter with the goddess.