Hello! I hope you'll like this chapter!

Disclaimer: I own the OCs in this fic, the rest is Masashi Kishomoto's. Sorry for any spelling mistakes or any OCCness.

Character age:

Akane, Itachi: 22

Naruto, Sasuke: 17

Shisui: 26

Kakashi: 31

His fireball met a wall of earth. It all happened in a blur. One moment he was resting, exhaustion making itself known in his whole body, and the other there were screaming and heat everywhere. The most logical reason for the surprise attack right now was that they knew Akane and Kakashi were away. He was not at his best either, and Dai was busy in the wounded area. For now, it was protected by seals, like the whole village, but the outpost in front of it...there was nothing.

He stabbed another shinobi with his katana. How many were there? He had no idea, he didn't even know how long he had been fighting but...

Sasuke looked up at Juugo next to him.

"Karin?"

"Debating whether or not she should stay here or go to the wounded immediately. Suigetsu is with her."

"She'll be more useful here." Sasuke looked in front of him and the smoke going up in the air. "Don't lose control just yet."

"Sure." They ran toward the fights, Sasuke's sharingan burning in his eyes.

During his time in Kiri, he insisted on following Akane when she'd go around the country. She was reluctant at first, telling him she would go to places where the civil wars hit the hardest. He kept insisting though, because it was what he wanted.

Of course it was a lot to see, but it opened his eyes to what the world was really about, or at least could be about. He was...sadly not surprised to see what the wars could do anymore, especially now they were at war once more.

What Iwa left in the Land of Water...it was awful, but he was not surprised.

His sharingan and genjutsu were enough to make the weakest one run away. When he spotted the first notes of chakra in the ground, he summoned Garuda and jumped on him, Juugo following him. Ganryuu barely had the time to yell at everyone to leave the area that pillars of earth rose from the ground, sending Mist shinobi flying in the air before landing harshly on the ground.

Then, Iwa shinobi sprung from the ground, the battle among the survivors and them taking a bad turn.

"Go take care of that guy over there who just did that jutsu," Sasuke told Juugo, glaring at the imposing man clad in red and brown. "I'm going to clean up this area."

"How?" Sparks of blue danced on his hand. "I see." On this note, Juugo jumped and exchanged a few words with Ganryuu.

The Mist shinobi moved aside, using water jutsu to fill the space between the pillars, to Iwa utter confusion. Then, the Uchiha released a Chidori that spread in the water, causing screams of pain from the enemy.

Electrocuted to death.

After what he had witnessed for the past two months, he couldn't care less about sparing their lives. They didn't care at all.

Some of them tried to attack him from a distance, but his Susanoo repelled them. Some of them were visibly terrified of the spectral purple form around him. Sasuke gritted his teeth when two huge chunk of the ground tried to crush him from the side. He stretched out his arm, Susanoo following and grunted at the strength he needed to keep up.

If he hadn't been using his chakra daily for two months he would have won this. It was not the case though.

"Garuda, up!" His hawk made a sound and flew up, Sasuke surrounding him with his Susanoo. Then, the chunks of earth met each other. Sasuke landed on them and summoned a shadow windmill shuriken.

Before there was only lightning from his chidori sealed in them.

He had added one particular thing since then.

He threw the shuriken at the group of shinobi still standing and, with the strings attached to it, made it go around them. Then another windmill shuriken was unsealed, then another and another until it spun like a tornado around them. The first sparks of lightning appeared. When he heard screams of pain, their Doton rendered useless due to his Raiton, he focused his Mangekyo on his weapons.

The black flames of Amaterasu burned on each blades, blending into the blue of the lightnings. There were more screams, each of them echoing in his ears, burning themselves into his memory.

Ultimately, he brought the weapons down, lightning and black flames going high in the sky. The lightnings disappeared quickly, leaving Amaterasu burning down anything the flames was still licking.

Sasuke blinked and looked at his foot.

There was a kunai with an explosive tag. As it started to shine, he jumped. There was a yell, an insult, toward him, and it blew up. He was caught in the blow, his right leg burning. He felt his sharingan failing him, his chakra too low to do anything.

He failed at seeing an enemy shinobi coming to him, a sword in his hands. With a roar, he cut his left arm off.

There was a lot of red, the warm liquid splashing on his face and the smell of iron filling his nose. His onyx eyes just looked at his limb.

He...had just lost an arm?

Then, he started falling.

"Die!"

"You first fucker." Sasuke blinked, a body behind him and an arm secured around his torso. Another arm went next to his face, the hand grabbing the man by the neck. He paled instantly, frozen to death.

"Nee...-san?"

"It's going to be fine Sasuke," she whispered in his ear.

They were on the ground a second later, stumbled back and fell.

"Karin, Suigetsu, get…" He didn't hear the end of her sentence that he blacked out.

He was sure of only one thing.

His brother was right when he told him war was pointless. It sucked.

When I got at the outpost, it was literal chaos. Bodies and blood littered the ground, tents burning and broken down. I immediately saw Suigetsu and Karin, who was healing one of ours. They explained everything to me.

Then, there was the chirping sound of birds and a blue light. I spun around and widened my eyes at the sight of the chidori mixed with black flames. Without thinking, I teleported to Sasuke, arriving behind him in the air. I frowned at the missing arm and grabbed him before killing the Stone shinobi.

Once we were back on the ground, Suigetsu and Karin got to work to get Sasuke and his arm back together while I went to Iwa. I stopped and looked around before staring in Kurotsuchi's dad eyes. She was by his side in a second.

We stared for long, long seconds.

"Leave this country alive while you can," I stated firmly, coldly. I grabbed my club and pointed it at them. "Or I will gladly show what I learned with the man who turned Kiri into the tyranny the Bloody Mist was."

"You…"

"Dad." He looked at her and she shook her head. "Their back-up will be here way faster that ours. We've lost this battle."

"You should listen to your daughter, she's seeing more clearly than you are." He glared at me.

"This war isn't over. We will leave, for now."

"Good, then don't forget your comrades bodies. The least the Tsuchikage can do after waging a useless war and sending them to their death is give them decent funerals." He glared furiously at me.

Right, he was the Tsuchikage's son. However, while he was angered by my words, I noticed how Kurotsuchi just clenched her fists by her side, her eyes stuck to the black flames still licking the ground.

There was no anger though.

Huh...it was interesting, maybe something worth exploiting if the occasion arose.

They left, the survivors leaving as well. I had no idea if Sasuke actually realized what his attack did.

There were maybe...forty to fifty dead shinobi and kunoichi from Iwa around.

I looked back, my eyes falling onto Sasuke. When he'd wake up...I doubted he'd be fine.

For now, I had to send him, Karin and Suigetsu to safety while we...cleaned up.

Sasuke was okay apart from a scar where his arm was reattached. He was completely out of chakra though, so he had been sleeping for a week now. As they said, they did leave the country. Sensei had sent people to fix Rikubetsu from the damage the battle caused. However, good news never came on their own in war times, and Tsunade-san sent an urgent message stating Iwa was now focusing their strengths on the Konoha troops in the Land of Grass.

As if this poor country had not seen enough war before.

I gave the paper back to sensei, who had her hands crossed in front of her.

"I'm guessing I'm going?" She nodded.

"I want you to be the leader of Kiri's troops outside the country." I gaped a little.

"Wai...wait what!?" She deadpanned at me.

"You're playing surprise very poorly, I taught you better." I rubbed the back of my head, looking away.

"You did, it's just…" I pursed my lips. "You're sure of your decision?"

"Absolutely." She handed me a list of people. "Once Sasuke can move, you're leaving." I nodded.

I visited all the people involved before heading to the hospital. I leaned against the door frame when I saw Sasuke, standing and shirtless, staring at the scar on his arm.

"It better not become a habit," I told him, the smile I was trying to put on barely rising the corner of my lips.

"Hn." He didn't look at me and put his shirt back on before going back to bed.

"Did someone give you a summary of the situation?" He nodded.

"Dai did when he felt like I was awake enough." I shut the door behind me and sat down on the chair next to the bed.

"The details?"

"Get to the point, I'm not a kid."

"I know...it was the safest option, you got time for the wounded to be protected Sasuke." He pursed his lips. "It's...war. Iwa will think about it twice before trying to invade the country now."

"I killed ninety-seven people," he said coldly. He turned his face toward the window. "I better have a good moniker now." I smiled faintly.

"I'm sure you will."

"Before Naruto even." I leaned toward him and hugged him tightly, pulling his head under my chin.

I didn't comment on him sniffing, or how his fingers clenched tightly around my arm to keep me where I was.

I didn't comment on Sasuke's dry eyes, the broken look in them breaking my heart. This Sasuke...this one...I saw him growing up since he was eight. It was breaking my heart to see him going through the harshness of the world. Sure, he wasn't alone, but still.

No matter what, I guess that things were meant to happen. Sasuke, Naruto, Sakura...all of them, they had to grow up one way or another.

Two days later, we were off.

It was hell. He did not know how it was for the others, but here, in the Land of Fire it was hell. He would not be able to unsee the blood on his hands.

There were explosions nearby, again. Naruto gritted his teeth in the trench he was hiding.

When war became official, preparations were made and several outposts were built around the country. One was near the sea road between them and the Land of Water to try to reduce the shinobi going there.

Due to him being a jinchuriki, he was sent to the Hakanai outpost, led by Uchiha Fugaku himself. He was in a squad with Sakura, Sai, Itachi and Yamato most of the time. Shikamaru stayed in the outpost most of the time and the rest of his generation was spread out throughout the Land of Fire, minus Sasuke of course.

They had received a distress message earlier saying the squad posted near a civilian village was being wiped out, the civilians being the real targets. They went.

They fought Ame-nin and saw the corpses of civilians who never asked to be put in the middle of a war. Sakura was behind, her hands glowing green above Itachi's bleeding head.

They were all tired. He did save the civilians he was trying to protect, and Naruto himself in the process, but couldn't keep up his Susanoo to protect himself from a nasty explosion. He went though the hole of a now destroyed house.

Yamato used his Mokuton to give them a shelter and told Naruto and Sai to keep the enemies at bay as much as they could. But the shelter was almost completely gone and it seemed like more and more enemies were coming.

"I should...I could go into bijuu mode and…"

"And give them what they want?" Sai interrupted him harshly with a frown. "No. And who knows how long you'd stay in control?" Naruto clenched his fists hard by his side. "For now...as many clones you can. If we can't beat them we can at least slow them down."

"Shit, okay." Sai drew explosives birds and sent them in the distance, like the shadow clones Naruto made.

Eventually, Sai ended up out of chakra, panting on the ground next to him.

"Need a hand?" Naruto blinked. He didn't even have the time to turn around that a hand was firmly on his shoulder.

"Nee-chan?"

"Huh huh." She jumped up and put her finger on the ground. "Damn, with the amount of foreign chakra it's a surprise you're even alive." She made a shadow clone. As the original jumped back down next to them, her clone started to use powerful water jutsu, strengthened by wind jutsu.

"What are you…" Akane smiled at him.

"We were sent as back-up, although I was personally asked to come retrieve your squad." He blinked as she put her hand in his hair. "I know for Itachi. You're going to stay here and keep an eye on Sai while I extract them first, okay? Dai, Mom and Karin at at the outpost, they'll take care of him." His eyes drifted to them, but Akane grabbed his chin, making sure he wouldn't look anywhere but her. "Naru, I need you to stay focus for a little bit longer, okay?" Slowly, he gulped and nodded.

He watched her leave. She made a clone, who left in an Hiraishin. After a couple of minutes, she left as well with Sakura and Itachi, Yamato joining them.

Then it was their turn the second before her clone disappeared.

I did my best not to let Itachi's state get to me. His left arm was burned, his leg seemed broken in more than one spot and the left side of his face was covered in blood, his head bigger than it should be because of whatever head trauma Sakura was dealing with.

I made a clone, distractedly checking my boyfriend's pulse. It was there. I had a gut feeling and I was glad for it because otherwise, I would have let Sasuke talk me into letting him come with me.

It was best for him to not be here.

I made a shadow clone.

"Sakura, listen to me. I need you to tell everything to my clone so she can tell it to Dai and Karin at the outpost. They'll get everything ready there, okay?" She was biting her lower lip but she started to speak in a mechanical voice.

I exchanged a look with Yamato-senpai, who just closed his eyes.

Being a medic on the battlefield was hard, having to know the state someone you knew personally in every little details and being in charge of keeping them alive was something else.

Once Sakura was done, my shadow clone left. A couple of minutes later I received her memories, now knowing the field was ready to receive Itachi.

"Okay, now Sakura you've got to work with me. Your chakra control is great, right?" She nodded hesitantly. "Okay, then I'm going to put Itachi in stasis. We need to get in sync, the moment you stop healing I'll activate it." I used Itachi's blood to draw the seal on the good side of his face. "At three. One, two…" She took a deep breath. "Three." The seal spread on his face as Sakura stopped her technique. I kept checking Itachi's pulse.

It seemed okay.

I sent Sakura at the outpost in an Hiraishin and, with clenched teeth, pulled Itachi in a sitting position to slip his good arm on my shoulders as gently as possible.

"I'm back the second they got him," I told my senpai, who nodded firmly.

"Of course, I'll go get them."

"Thanks."

Yamato was gone and instead I had Dai and Karin in front of him in a spacious tent. Dai immediately took Itachi from me and started to give Karin orders.

I went back, grabbed the three others and left.

"Sai, go to the medic. Naruto, you too. Senpai, find Kakashi and tell him what happened please, I can't have Sasuke lose his temper here if he discovers it on his own. I'll report the situation to Fugaku-san with Sakura."

I left them promptly and went back to the tent. Sakura was in front of it, standing still, eyes wide opened in horror and her hands still covered in Itachi's blood. I gently took her arms in my hands, making her look at me.

"Come on, follow me to get you cleaned up." She looked at her hands and nodded numbly.

We sat down away from people and I unsealed a canteen of water, pouring it on her hands. She scrubbed them together, the blood coming off but the stench remaining.

"We need to give our report to Fugaku-san, do you think you can?"

"I…" She bit her bottom lip until it bled. It was only now I noticed she had cut her hair short to her shoulders. "I couldn't…"

"You saved his life Sakura."

"Maybe, but I just couldn't help thinking how Sasuke-kun would react if I failed, how Naruto would forever feel guilty if…" I sighed slightly and put my hand in her hair.

"I may sound harsh but...this is war. Even as a medic, you can't save everyone, even people you know and are close to. It's the awful truth that comes with the path you've chosen Sakura." She looked down. "You can talk to Dai about this if you need to, he sadly knows this too much."

"Hum...I'll think about it...thank you." I shook my head.

"It's normal. Let's go." She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes before raising her head high with a firm look on her face.

Fugaku-san was not what I would call happy when we got there. There was a map on a table in front of him as well as strategies on the board behind him.

Sakura gave her report. It was brief but straight to the point. I listened to her quietly, staring at the ground beneath my feet. I didn't have the heart to tell her that, in spite of their efforts, the village had been flooded and half the civilians drowned. It were the refugees who reached the outpost, those Itachi and Naruto saved, who told us about the situation there.

"Thank you Sakura, you can get some rest, you deserve it." She opened her mouth but didn't say a word, bowing her head instead.

"Thank you Uchiha-rikushō." She walked away.

Lieutenant General. Each person in charge of an outpost was one.

I was one too actually as I was the main person Kiri troops, although not much, responded to. Above us were the Kages.

Fugaku-san sighed deeply and leaned on the table. I crossed my arms on my chest.

"I told Yamato-senpai to tell Sasuke as he was with Kakashi. Naruto and Sai went to the medics." He nodded.

"Good, Sasuke wouldn't take the news well if he was on his own." I looked down.

First Sasuke, now Itachi...I'd rather not have to save their lives when they were close to…

"Should we go over the situation in the country? We're likely to move around the outposts, I'd like as much information as possible now if you can."

"Of course."

So...we did. Suna was sending forces in the Land of River and toward Ishigakure to counter Ame and Iwa respectively. The Land of Grass was in a very poor spot and was the scene of several battles already, Konoha not moving forward because Ame and Iwa easily worked together over there. Kusa was trying to stay out of it, but the first village who hurt someone from the Hidden Grass and they'd join in.

The few skirmishes there had been near the Hidden Waterfall could also lead to them joining the conflicts.

Overall...it was not great. Now we were on the continent, I was to take orders from Tsunade-san or Gaara depending on who was the closest. So right now, until Tsunade-san sent a message telling me to take my team elsewhere, we would remain here and work with Fugaku-san.

"Fugaku-san!" I looked back. Izumi burst in the tent, panting. She shot me a quick look, visibly not happy to see me, before looking at Fugaku-san. "The surgery is over, Itachi-kun will be fine." While I kept a blank face, I could have fallen to my knees from relief.

I refused to go and mourn Itachi a second time. It was a process I wasn't sure to be able to go through again.

"He's sleeping and won't wake up for a couple of days but...Terumi-san assured me his life was no longer threatened." I looked at the Uchiha leader. He relaxed a little, even if it was almost invisible to most people.

"Thank you Izumi, you can leave." She looked at me once more and I merely raised a questioning brow at her. "Akane."

"You want me to tell Team Seven?" He nodded. "Alright."

"And there's this I wanted to talk to you about." I blinked and caught the Bingo Book he threw me.

...it was from Iwa. I sighed and flipped through the pages until I found Sasuke's picture.

'Kuroi Honō no Sasuke, kill on sight, 40,000,000 ryō'. Sasuke of the Black Flame huh...not bad. Obvious when you know what happened at Rikubetsu.

I shut the Bingo Book, making some of my locks move. I cut my hair again, now barely below my shoulders, and kept it in a low bun most of the time, now with a bang swiped to the right that would hide my hitai-ate most of the time.

"You'll get your flak jackets tomorrow morning."

"Right, I almost forgot about this…" I muttered under my breath. I waved the book above my shoulder as I walked out. "Thanks for the book."

Finding Sasuke wasn't hard. His and Naruto's chakra were stronger than anyone else in the outpost and it was disturbed.

I found him sitting against a tree with Naruto, Kakashi, Sakura, Sai and Yamato. I raised my hand as a greeting.

"Itachi's gonna be fine, he'll sleep for a couple of days though." Sasuke let his head fall behind his raised knees with a deep sigh. "Although, I need to ask you something."

"What?" I showed him his picture.

"How come your picture is this nice when it was taken in the midst of battle Sasuke?" Naruto took the Bingo Book.

"Sasuke of the Black Flame?" Kakashi looked at me and I nodded.

"Rikubetsu, obviously. There's only that."

"Rikubetsu?" Yamato repeated with a frown.

"The last big fight that happened before Iwa left the Land of Water. It…" Sasuke scratched his arm distractedly. "A lot has happened there." I looked at Kakashi. "We'll get our jackets tomorrow morning. I think you'll get one too Sasuke."

"He's a genin," Sakura pointed out, to which he rolled his eyes.

"And Anbu too," he added.

"I know, but unless told otherwise, Sasuke and Kakashi are both part of Kiri's forces, hence I'm the one deciding. Sasuke was never treated as a genin when he was in Kiri anyway, it would have been a waste."

"Can you tell Granny Tsunade that nee-chan?" Naruto groaned and I ruffled his hair. "Wait, what's your rank right now then?"

"The same as Fugaku-san. Until Tsunade-san tells me otherwise we'll stay here and help out. Sen...The Fifth Mizukage trusted me with leading on the continent until she is sure she can send out more people. Basically…" I pointed a finger at Kakashi, who raised his brow. "You have to obey me!"

"Yes yes." I rolled my eyes.

"I'm gonna tell the rest of the team and find Mom, ask her if there is anything I should know. Rest as much as you can."

"You too," Kakashi reminded me sternly.

"I'm your Boss Hatake!"

I wish I could rest but…not yet.

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