Chapter 16
Uchiha Itachi, Sixth Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, had just returned to his office from the trip to the mortuary when a knock came on the door. "Enter," he called, shedding himself of his white coat before taking a seat behind his desk.
Izumi stepped in, holding a clipboard. "The mortuary is locked and ANBU is keeping an eye out. Did Kiba-kun find anything, Hokage-sama?"
"Nothing," Itachi said, leaning back. He spun in his chair and looked out of the window in thought. Konoha's barriers were intact. He had checked with the squad captains. No irregulars had entered the borders of the village. It had to be done from the inside. Orochimaru had not left his lab, according to the ANBU squads who monitored him, but in Itachi's experience, the sannin was a slippery one and more than capable of fooling even the best trained shinobi.
'Researching the dead for jutsu purposes,' he pondered. Was he being played a fool? No civilian could have entered the mortuary without being scented by Kiba—nor could Genin or Chuunin manage such a feat. He considered of all his shinobi in the village, all of his ANBU, faces reeling behind his eyes as he tried to find his suspect, wondering what the culprit would want with three foreign—
'Ah,' he thought, rubbing his eyes with thumb and forefinger. 'Of course.'
He exhaled, then stood and grabbed his coat.
"Hokage-sama?" Izumi asked, blinking at him.
"I'm going to the laboratories," Itachi said.
She raised an eyebrow at him just as someone knocked on his door. As he called for them to enter, the hairs on his arms began to raise, instinctively recognizing the chakra of the person on the other side. Indeed, as the door opened, Orochimaru slid through, wearing a lab coat and holding a thick file in his hands. He grinned at Izumi, who took a step back and tried hard to diffuse the look of suspicion on her face.
"Here for my weekly report, Lord Sixth," Orochimaru said, a mocking grin painted over his face.
He held out his hand, signaling for Izumi to depart. As the door clicked shut behind her, Itachi took a seat and opened the file, reading the summary of findings at top-speed before rifling through the rest of the documents—pictures of the deceased, reports of chakra natures, postulations how they could have developed further. Not of particular interest to Itachi, but fascinating nonetheless. As he closed the folder, Orochimaru crossed his arms, evidently waiting to be questioned.
"Have you left your laboratory this week?"
"At nights," Orochimaru glibly answered. "To sleep."
"Have you been to the mortuary?"
"Only to pick up the dead Chuunin."
"And you know nothing of the missing shinobi?"
Orochimaru's smirk increased as he looked out the window, no doubt at Itachi's invisible guards. "One would think your ANBU would report every step I make, Lord Sixth." Golden eyes found his. "I wonder what it is exactly you think I have done."
'Ah, so this was the game they were playing,' Itachi realized. He settled further into his chair and folded his hands together, studying Orochimaru as the sannin studied him. "There was a report some twenty years ago—shinobi gone missing, taken from the morgue. The Third was investigating, but never found a clue. You might remember this as you were examining the deceased back then, too."
"My, Lord Sixth, are you accusing me?" Orochimaru chuckled.
"Merely stating a fact."
"Facts are based in truth, Lord Sixth."
He raised an eyebrow. "Where is the lie, Orochimaru?"
"The Third did find the culprit," Orochimaru said, the corner of his mouth pulling ever higher. "It simply wasn't reported."
Itachi exhaled and leaned back. "If so, who was the culprit?"
"Oh, I wouldn't know, Hokage-sama," Orochimaru said. "As you said, I was researching the dead in the laboratories. All interesting news reached me weeks late, if ever."
Faintly, Itachi entertained the thought of forcing the truth out of Orochimaru with brute force, only to marvel at his violent thoughts. It had been a long time since he had felt any sort of animosity toward one of his fellow Konoha shinobi, and longer still since he acted on them. "How disappointing," he said.
"Indeed," Orochimaru replied. He cocked his head. "Am I dismissed?"
Someone knocked on his door.
Itachi ignored them, keeping his features smoothed out as he observed Orochimaru, the only sound to be heard the creaking of leather as he settled further into his chair. Orochimaru waited patiently, the grin on his face growing with each passing second as another knock came, this one more urgent than the previous.
"I'm unsure what to do with you," Itachi said, lowering his voice so the person banging on the door a third time would not hear. "Or how to use you." The world turned crimson then, the chakra pathways in Orochimaru's body becoming clear to him as his bloodline limit activated. The Sharingan showed the man's heartbeat increasing, the flare of the nostrils, the minute tension in his fingers. "But rest assured, my eyes see all."
A fourth knock on the door, followed by Izumi telling him it was urgent. "Enter," he said, the world returning to normal. Orochimaru glared at him, the amusement in his eyes fading, a ghost of his mocking grin remaining on his pale face. Izumi barged in, carrying something in her hands, but he stared at Orochimaru for a second longer. "Dismissed."
Without a word, Orochimaru spun around and left.
"Hokage-sama," Izumi said, rushing up to the desk as she thrust forward that which she held—a miniscule version of Katsuyu swiveled her eyestalks to him. His heart skipped a beat, mouth drying. Sakura had departed only a few hours before. It was too soon to be expecting an update—unless it was bad news.
"What news?"
"Hokage-sama," Katsuyu said. "Sakura made it through the trials."
Ah. The tension drained from his shoulders as he considered the pink-haired kunoichi. Truly, had there ever been any doubt? Relief flooded through his body, a smile tugging at his lips. "Of course," he answered, not missing the way Izumi's mouth pulled downward for a fraction of a second. "Where is she?"
"I don't know."
Three simple words. By all accounts, Itachi was a genius, but for some reason unbeknownst to him, his brain ceased to work as he struggled to decipher what she had told him. "You... don't know?"
"She said something about L E G, then ran away. I followed her, but when I got to the entrance, she was already gone." Katsuyu's eyes swiveled back and forward, as though she were expecting Sakura to walk into the office at any given moment. "I had hoped she returned to Konoha, but…"
As the words sank into him, his heart skipped a beat. He turned to Izumi next, who smoothed out the myriad of emotions on her face and shook her head. "There is no trace of her returning, Hokage-sama," Izumi supplied. "She isn't anywhere in Konoha. She's gone."
Sakura awoke in darkness.
For a brief second, the thought that her journey through Shikkotsu wasn't over, that she was still blinded and forced to crawl through the forest, shot through her mind and had her jolting up, heart racing as a blind panic surged up. It was then that she felt the sheets beneath her fingers and her eyes attuned to the dark room.
It was also then that she felt she was dangerously low on chakra.
Gradually, her memory returned to her—the old man's smile, Sarada's goodbye, standing by the white tree with an aged version of herself, the myriad of memories from the source and then the frantic sprint through the forest to the entrance where she encountered—
"Kakashi," she hissed, head throbbing. Out of instinct, she tried to release a wave of healing chakra to her skull, only to find the smidgen she had left was not enough to aid her. She looked around the darkened room—it seemed to be underground, though not far. In the distance, she could hear rain. The walls were bare, one shabby looking dresser in a corner, a chair on the other side. Apart from her bed, there was no other furniture.
She stumbled toward the door, the light that shone through the contours contrasting stark against the dark of her room, and tried the knob. To her surprise, it sprang open.
Cracking open the door just a fraction, she allowed her eyes to adjust to the brightness. Assessing there was nobody waiting for her in the corridor, Sakura carefully stuck her head out.
The hallway was empty, if not for a small brown dog that lay asleep near the foot of the stairs that led upstairs. She squinted her eyes at it—it wore the same blue cape she had seen on Kakashi's ninken, the symbol for shinobi on its forehead. As she contemplated whether she could make it past the dog, it looked up and stared at her with half-lidded eyes, before tilting its head upward and letting out a long, keening sound. Immediately after, it put its head back between its paws and continued sleeping.
'Well, he just called Kakashi, didn't he?' Sakura thought, gritting her teeth as she gathered every bit of chakra she had and sent it to her wrist, wondering whether she would have enough to break through the walls or for a quick Earth jutsu escape—but none came. 'Byakugou then.' She hesitated for a moment, loathing to unleash her chakra storage, but desperate times called for desperate measures. Taking a breath, Sakura prepared her seal.
It was then that she felt... nothing.
"No," she whispered, hands flying instinctively to her forehead, as though she could feel her seal there. But the immense wealth of chakra she had accumulated over the years had vanished, leaving only the throb of her headache and a growing sense of panic overcoming her. He couldn't have—even if he had starved her for weeks and her body had compensated with chakra, it would've taken him years to drain all of her energy.
"Kisame," came Kakashi's voice.
She sucked in a breath and glared at Kakashi, who had appeared at the base of the stairs. He crouched down beside the dog and gave it a scratch behind its ears, then rose to his full length. Even indoors, he wore his Akatsuki cloak, hands pushed into his pockets as blazing crimson and slate gray took in her appearance. "He is talented with chakra. Even chakra locked behind a seal."
"What is this place?" she asked, voice hoarse with disuse.
"An Akatsuki hideout."
"Where?"
"Somewhere safe."
She laughed humorlessly. "Safe."
"Yes." Kakashi said, his head cocking slightly. "Safe."
He took a step in her direction.
"How did you find me?"
Another step.
"Why did you take me?"
Another step.
"Why me?"
He towered over her, domineering and imposing, half-lidded eyes both calm and threatening at the same time as they darted over her face. "First things first... This hallway is guarded at all times." He pointed at the dog. "Bisuke. Once you go up the stairs, there are a few exits there too, all guarded."
"Kaka—"
"There is a kitchen upstairs, stocked with food. The bathroom is to your left," he signaled to another closed door. "Do not go outside. Do not enter any of the other rooms." He was quiet. "Kisame is a light sleeper." Some of the hostility in his eyes faded away then, reminding her of the Kakashi she had met in the forest—the affable and gentle teacher.
"Is today a Wednesday?" she whispered.
The part of his face that was visible seemed confused by her question for a split second, silver eyebrows knitting together as though trying to find a hidden meaning behind her words. "Friday," he said, concluding there was nothing to be gained by knowing the day of the week.
"Ah," she offered him. "So you do answer questions."
The Sharingan glowed so intensely she feared it would burn right through her, almost looking like it lit up in the dim hallway. He lifted his hand, and Sakura recoiled out of instinct, a lifetime of shinobi trained senses on high alert, but he brought it to his slashed forehead protector and pulled it down on one side, covering the stolen eyeball. "Only on Fridays," Kakashi said.
A shiver climbed up her back—the echo of who Kakashi could have been, who he was in another world, suddenly overlay with this version of him; a crinkly eyed smile as he told Sakura he was only nonplussed on Wednesdays. She swallowed hard at him, taking in how different he looked now that he kept his crimson eye covered. He stared down at her for a long moment, then he walked away, clearly expecting her to follow.
She balled her fists, forced herself to take a deep breath, and ambled after him. Her movements were sluggish due to the chakra drain; where she normally instinctively used chakra to steady her every step, she was as unsteady as a child now while following Kakashi past Bisuke, and up the stairs into a wood-paneled hallway. To her left was an open window, the rain clattering hard against the glass. Deeply inhaling the scent of petrichor, Sakura tried to place the smell that drifted in through the crack, something almost oily was on the wind, but Kakashi led her into the kitchen, where Kisame sat at a table, his sword propped against another chair.
"My, my, finally awake?" Kisame asked, slicing through a red apple with his kunai. She gave the man a look, wondering how exactly he had drained her completely of her chakra when Kakashi gestured for her to take a seat. Part of her wished to ball her fists and fight her way out, but that was foolish—two S-Class missing ninja wouldn't go down by a punch thrown by a kunoichi—not without significant amounts of chakra fueling them. So, grudgingly, Sakura sat down in one of the rough wooden chairs across from Kisame, eyes trimmed on the peel of his apple as he deftly circled around the fruit despite his long fingers.
"How long have I been out for?" Sakura asked, placing her hands in her lap as she surreptitiously looked around the kitchen. It was utilitarian—a small shabby looking fridge and a tiny counter made up most of it, the table being larger than both combined. There were no windows here.
"Three days. I overdid it," Kisame answered, baring his sharp teeth with a grin. "That Byakugou seal." He lifted his round eyes to her and the grin widened. "Samehada was very pleased with that chakra."
"It took me years to collect that."
"I bet," Kisame laughed. "Can't have you using it in a pinch to escape."
"Who is Samehada?"
Kisame looked at her, laid down his kunai and patted on the back of his bandaged-wrapped sword. "Samehada. It feeds off chakra."
"I see," Sakura said in a bid to remain calm. All information she could gather on the two would help Konoha if she managed to escape—and she would. She just needed to be smart about it. "And I'm here because?"
Kakashi, who had stood by the kitchen counter, looked into the refrigerator and took out a plate with two rice balls. He laid it on the table and slid it to her, then seated himself. She eyed the food.
"They're not poisoned."
"If you wanted to kill me, I'd be dead by now," Sakura said. "Why feed me?"
"If we wanted you dead, we would have killed you," Kakashi said.
"Why am I here?"
"Sakura," he warned, and in his voice she could hear the same impatience she once likened to a teacher becoming impatient with his student. "Eat."
"Fine," she said, reaching out to take the one with the pickled plum. As she bit into it, her stomach seemed to activate, rumbling appreciatively as she chewed on the rice and the sweet and sour pickle. Once she finished the first, Kakashi spoke up.
"You're a remarkable medic."
The compliment, if she could call it that, somehow warmed her cheeks. "Ah," Sakura said, realization striking her. "Who needs healing?"
Kisame burst out in chuckles, then swallowed one quarter of the apple whole, not even bothering to cut out the core. She watched him with thinly veiled disdain as he masticated the fruit with his sharpened teeth.
"How skilled are you with doujutsu?"
Her eyes met his sole eye then, finding nothing of the former hostility in the slate gray. Faintly, she wondered whether he always looked so dangerous because of the Sharingan, but beneath the impassive exterior, she could feel him and his twistedness, dark and teeming, held together by sheer willpower. It was enough to take her breath away and somewhere deep inside of her, she realized he was waiting for an answer.
"How is your Sharingan?" she asked him in return, forcing herself to calm down.
A protracted pause ensued during which they both sized each other up.
"Deteriorating," Kakashi said. He leaned back, crossing his arms and his long legs as he observed her, Akatsuki cloak pooling on the ground. There was an expecting look on his face, as though he knew what she was going to say next, and waited for her to open her mouth and speak the words. In defiance, Sakura kept her lips pursed and folded her hands over another.
"Oh," she said.
Kisame was watching the exchange with interest, Sakura could see him chewing thoughtfully on his apple while his gaze flittered between the two of them, a grin pulling at his face, wan light catching the blade of the kunai as he twirled it between his fingers. There was a ring on Kisame's finger, similar to the crimson one that she spotted on Kakashi's hand, though his was golden.
"Obito's Sharingan should deteriorate as well," Kakashi continued, voice low. "But his works perfectly."
Sakura was careful not to show any emotions—she was one of two people outside of the Uchiha clan who knew of the Sharingan's major pitfall. The stronger their doujutsu became, the more light it sapped from its users until they would eventually go blind. Obito was one of the few Sharingan wielders to awaken the Mangekyou, and as the medic of his team, she had spent months with Tsunade working out a plan to counteract the Mangekyou's destructiveness.
"I know you've been healing him."
She kept her face smoothed out like stone as she studied the empty plate in front of her. His eyes bored into the side of her head, but she refused to look up at him. Her brain went into a frenzy as she made sense of it all—Kakashi had found her, in Shikkotsu of all places, to kidnap and to heal him? He must have known Tsunade was the person who developed the healing technique, but was smart enough not to kidnap a former Hokage, or to travel to Konoha to get her. The second Sakura had left the village, she had been vulnerable, and none of them had seen it.
And if she refused? Was he going to kill her then, despite his previous bold statements about him not being in the business of killing medics? Nohara Rin's name echoed in her ears, a nearly forgotten name on a slab of stone that housed hundreds of other names.
What was the correct choice? Agree to heal him despite the threat he posed to Konoha? Kakashi only had the one eye. If his Sharingan would blind him eventually, he would be less dangerous, but Sakura knew he would only be marginally less perilous. He was a genius long before he was the Copy-Nin, destructive long before he became Kakashi of the Sharingan, lethal long before Akatsuki.
There was a tenseness that filled the room, churning potently between the three of them, as though they were all a hair away from spilling blood, the intent to kill strong. Since the Forest of Death and her Chuunin exams, Sakura had never felt as vulnerable as she was now—drained of chakra, drained of her emergency storage, alone in a foreign place, surrounded by two of the deadliest shinobi in all the Five Nations.
'I should have stayed in Shikkotsu,' she lamented, balling her fists in her lap. 'I should have stayed with Katsuyu... Learned how to use natural energy, how to become a Sage, fight like one...'
"So," Sakura spoke, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She sucked in a breath and looked at Kakashi, determined not to show him how much he frightened her. He watched her stoically, gray eye half-lidded, fingers laced together over his stomach. "Either I heal you, or you kill me?"
Kisame snorted at that, finishing up his apple. He spun the kunai in his hand, then stood from the table and slipped the weapon into his pouch, deftly tossing the peel into a trashcan. Kakashi had remained silent.
"Why would I kill you?" he asked, just as Kisame exited the room.
"Please," Sakura hissed through gritted teeth. "Don't lie to me."
"I'm not," Kakashi said. His gaze burned a trail over her body as he observed her from head to toe, and strangely, whereas Kisame's eyes on her had repulsed her, Kakashi's only heated her. His voice was low, quiet as he leaned forward and placed his arms on his legs, slouching as he ducked his head to meet her eyes. "You can heal my eyes, or you can leave."
She stared at him, uncomprehending. "Leave?"
"Leave," he stated with a nod.
A small laugh escaped her. "You just informed me about the guards and the exits, and now I'm supposed to believe you'll let me walk out of here?"
"No," Kakashi said. "I'll bring you back to Shikkotsu and you can return to Konoha from there." He looked around the kitchen. "I wouldn't jeopardize this safehouse and a little bird told me you have a perfect memory."
'What little bird?" she wondered, feeling like her veins abruptly filled with ice. "And why would I decide to heal you if I can just leave?"
"A trade." Kakashi hummed. The calm manner with which he talked belied the savage intensity of his body language. "You heal my eyes... And I will give you information."
She scoffed. "Information regarding what?"
"Akatsuki."
Narrowing her eyes, Sakura leaned closer. "Am I supposed to believe that you would rat out your own organization?" She shook her head. "Scratch that, how would I even know your intelligence is viable? You could just as well feed me lies just to get me to heal your eyes."
He pushed his forehead protector straight with his thumb, crimson and gray finding her—within an instant, she froze in her chair, the darkness that had curled familiarly around Kakashi suddenly stifling and all-encompassing, all traces of his earlier casual behavior vanished like snow before the sun. Somehow, she had nearly forgotten who he was; between the encounter with the otherworld's Kakashi and the stories she had heard of this Kakashi, she had forgotten that he wasn't anything but this—a wild animal, waiting for the right moment to strike.
"Why?" Sakura asked, releasing a shuddering breath as she forced herself to look at him and remember who he was. Not the crinkly-eyed smiling teacher. Not the boy who saved Obito's life. Not the eternal rival Gai waited for. Not one of Konoha's war heroes—a monster. "Why would you let me go?"
"I told you," Kakashi said, measured and calm. "I am not in the business of killing medics."
She was desperate to ask him what had happened to Rin, but the mismatched eyes that blazed in her direction kept her mouth shut as she struggled to deal with what he had proposed. Any information Konoha could gather on Akatsuki would be welcome—the investigation was dead in the water, save for the fact that they knew about the Jinchuuriki. But then, she could also go home now and trust Kakashi would keep his promise. Did she trust him though?
'No,' she decided.
"If you want me to heal your eyes... I'll need some assurance," Sakura said, ignoring the heavy pounding of her heart. "I have no reason to trust you."
Abruptly, the tomoe in his Sharingan started spinning, the world revolving around her. She gasped and gritted her teeth, fighting hard to correct the abnormal flow of chakra as he locked her into a genjutsu. "What are you doing?" she demanded.
"Showing you."
