Title: Three Days 'Till Home
Author: Winter Ashby (rosweldrmr)
Disclaimer: Naruto © Masashi Kishimoto-sama
Rating: K+
Summary: Three days can be a very long time to get home and out of the sun, especially now that Sakura holds a precious piece of information. But, in the presence of the right person, perhaps three days isn't quite long enough… (Sakura & Neji)
Authors Notes: Well, once again my never-ending obsession with the 'Rescue Gaara' arc has taken hold of me. First is the first part of a three part story, obviously, taking place over three days.

The title: 'Three Day's Till Home' is because Shizune says that it will take them three days to return from Suna after their mission and an extra day they spent there. (I've checked the time line!) So this is the three days it takes for Team Kakashi and Team Gai to journey back to Konoha. Therefore, this is my alternative ending to the arc.

I was going to do three versions of this... one for Sakura and Gaara and the other for Kakashi and Sakura. Maybe someday I will, but not right now... I have other things on my mind.

Have you ever felt like your only comfort was your cage? You're not alone.

Have you ever felt like your secrets give you away? You're not alone.

Lifehouse – Quasimodo

"What happened in the cave?" Sakura glanced to her left, and into the pale eyes of the Hyuuga prodigy. He stood, arms crossed, the midday sun hitting his face and almost making his eyes shine. The image unnerved her, even more so because his cold voice cut through the sweltering heat. She couldn't recall a time when they'd spoken in the past, and certainly not when he'd initiated the conversation. So she stood, mouth gapping, holding the strap of her pack, trying to picture him with a less menacing expression. It wasn't working.

"What?" Her mouth finally caught up with her mind and excreted the question almost vehemently. She regretted it immediately, because his shinning eyes slimmed and watched her squirm under his gaze. It was hot enough trekking through the desert, never mind the fact that she was feeling fatigued from so much exertion two days ago. Even the extra day they'd spent in Suna to see Chiyo-sama buried and to rest wasn't enough to fully recharge her.

"What happened with Chiyo-sama when you two fought Sasori?" His strides were even and decisive. He had no trouble keeping instep with her short gait and that infuriated her a little. He just popped out of nowhere and asked her a personal question like he had all the right in the world to do so. He didn't know her, and she was pretty sure he didn't really want to. But she looked at him and tried to think of any possible motive he could have for asking such a thing.

"I don't know what you mean." She quickened her pace in an effort to signal to him that this conversation was not something she wanted any part of. But his steps were painfully accurate, and he merely watched her from the corners of his large, pupil-less eyes as she pressed on. Home was only three days off, but somehow in the last two minutes, this thought had become impossibly less comforting. Three days wasn't nearly short enough.

"I saw the cave, Sakura." She stopped at the sound of her own name. Something about it coming from his mouth and passing over his lips seemed wrong, like this was all just in her imagination. Because in the real world, Neji would not be speaking, let alone to her. But she blinked, only to find that he was not a mirage and now stood a meter in front of her, waiting. He sighed, and she suddenly felt very dejected. "There was quite a bit of blood." She shuddered involuntarily at the memory of a blade piercing her gut. He didn't seem to notice. "Even if he was a human puppet, he could not have bleed that much."

He said it so matter-of-factly; like it was common knowledge that a human puppet can't bleed like a normal human. She hadn't even been aware of the existence of such an individual until two days ago. "I did what needed to be done." She had no interest in recounting the story, or hearing his objections to whatever decisions she'd made. It was her life, and it had nothing to do with him. She stepped around him and continued on, but still staying to the rear of the group. She was in no mood to deal with Naruto. But he and Gai seemed to be too preoccupied with their discussion about training to be of any nuisance. Even Lee was engaged in a quiet exchange with Ten-Ten.

"What did Chiyo-sama mean when she said '…don't risk your like for an old hag…' What did you do?" He couldn't just leave well enough alone. In no time, he'd close the distance she'd managed to put between them. But he still showed no interest in the questions he was asking. It was strange, really. It was as if he had put no effort into the act of asking, but there was obvious thought put into the situation. He was a strange mix of cold heartlessness and twisted duty. She felt a swell of pity for him, but immediately reviled it as she knew he would too.

"It was a fight Neji-san, things happen." She tried her best to pull the strap of her pack up and relieve the pressure on her shoulder for a moment. The sun was beginning to take its toll as her sweat beaded on her forehead in its wake. She wished they could have spent a least one more day in Suna, but she knew well enough that they would only just make it in time to get back and travel to Grass for the meeting with Sasori's spy in Orochimaru's organization.

"Fair enough." He turned from her then and faced the backs of his comrades. If she didn't know any better, she'd say he was pouting. But the expression passed in a second and she was left with the sour idea that she was watching him. She returned her line-of-sight ahead and relaxed. It seemed that her curt answers had sufficed. It still bothered her that he'd been bold enough to broach the subject with her, but as long as it was over now, she was glad. There was nothing about that day she ever wished to relive. But then there was a gripping worry that sprang from the tone of his question. The last thing she needed was this exact same conversation with any more people.

"Did the others see; Lee-san or Gai-sensei?" He turned slightly, and the sheen on his forehead glistened. It was unusual to think that anything could get to him. She scoffed at her ridiculous thought, it wasn't as if he was an immortal, she'd seen him be defeated, after all. But there was just something so, unflappable about him. His eyes lingered on her face for an instant more than she was comfortable with and for one abhorring second, she was sure he was a mind reader. But then he blinked and turned away again. She released the breathed she'd been holding and waited for his answer.

"No." He was once again the same removed shinobi she'd grown accustom to over the years she'd known of him. "I viewed the cave with Byakugan to see if you still needed assistance." There was a tangled little voice in her mind that insisted she be relieved but even the thought that he knew was one more than she was okay with. "When I verified that you and Chiyo-sama were no longer there, we moved on." So he never actually went into the cave. She marveled at the idea that he could identify blood with his white eyes and then was secretly jealous of his kekkei genkai. She wondered what people looked like from the inside-out.

She smiled, but only on the very edges of his lips and then let them fall back into a rigid line. "Good. There's no need to tell them." She wasn't sure if he would let it pass as just that, just a comment. But she was beyond caring, or having any desire to expound on her desire to keep this little secret between them. But he looked at her again and she knew she'd made a mistake.

"Sakura…"

"I'm fine now…" She cut him off, and was infinitely proud of herself for it. He hand no right to lecture her, to look down on her because she was injured, because she'd been nearly killed. That information was hers and hers alone. She hated him then, for intruding on what was none of his business. And she had the sickening impression that she somehow owed him an explanation. Her heart dropped bitterly at the thought that she was capable of owing something to someone she barely knew. "Chiyo-sama…" she caved in, she knew eventually she would, so she hated herself a little then in the absence of words. But she didn't like the feeling of self-contempt, so she switched back to hating him while he slowly came to the right conclusion to her unfinished statement.

"The Tensei ninjutsu." His perception was frightening. And she was sure he could feel her uneasy grow in his shadow. He seemed pleased, and yet at the same time as the smug little smirk quirked at the bits of his mouth he could use, he almost managed to look simultaneously disapproving. It baffled her. "But that would mean…?" She swore she could hear the gears in his head ticking away, formulating his own incorrect theories about what happened. She considered, ruefully, that the only reason he may even be interested was because he was envious of her chance to fight a member of Akatsuki.

"Yes, but I wasn't dead, yet… so…" She answered him nonetheless. Even if it had nothing to do with him, she was compelled by the memory of a great and powerful woman to answer. It was for Chiyo-sama that she indulged his curiosity. She hoped that she'd get Good Karma points for this and watched his mind grind and twist though the implications of her answer.

"Soca." The sun was beginning to burn brighter and a bead of sweat escaped her hair line and slid down the side of her face. She glared at him and repressed the urge to complain. Sweating always made her feel so dirty. She looked at him carefully and entertained the idea that he was just as uncomfortable and sweaty as she was. This thought was very satisfying. So she took a little extra bounce in her step and dared to look at him. He was looking so pleasantly uncomfortable that she decided there would no harm in actually telling him what happened.

"It was my fault." She turned from him then because the courage she's just so triumphantly gained was torn to shreds. She could still feel as the poison blade was pulled from her midsection. "I should have made more antidotes." She could feel the prick in her thigh as the hiss as the pneumatic injection device pumped her with the antidote. "I shouldn't have been hit; I am a medic-nin." Her confession was bitter on her tongue and she knew it was probably better when it was unsaid. Her guilt was suffocating. "That's one of the first lessons Tsunade-shishou taught me. A nedic-nin's first priority in a fight is to avoid their opponent's attack." She could feel the iron needle slice through her forearm and cursed deep and vengeful in the back of her mind. "We're supposed to avoid being hit." She heard a small, disapproving noise slip from his throat and cringed. "I failed, and Chiyo-sama paid the price."

"I'm sure you would have avoided it, if you could have." His response was disconcerting, and uncharacteristically humane. She eyed him suspiciously and quickly reassured herself that he was real, and not a kage bushin. But she was alarmed to find that even if he was, she would have no way of telling. She frowned. "I doubt very much you would have willingly let yourself almost die." Her steps faltered and she fell behind. She didn't have to say anything, not that she would have, but the look on her face was enough for him to surmise the fallacy of his assumption.

"It doesn't change what happened." She turned her head up, just enough to show him he had no right to look down on her for her choice. After all, it was her decision to jump in front of the blade. And no one, certainly not some snotty, stuck-up, aristocratic, obsessive, nosey, self-righteous, antisocial, power-hungry, occasional heartless psychopath was going to make her second-guess herself. That was her job. "If only I could have…"

"That is useless." She carefully considered the implications of killing him and begrudgingly decided it wasn't worth the trouble. "Your fate is not something you can change." Perhaps just one murder wouldn't be so bad.

"Don't, not now, Neji-san." Her voice was thin and shrill and she was in danger of succumbing to the anger that swirled in her stomach. She almost left off the honorific, but years of proper etiquette engrained into ever fiber of her being made sure she remembered her place. But if she was ever going to disgrace the social hierarchy; it would have been then, against him. "I don't feel like hearing about fate and destiny." Even if she didn't know him all that well, and hadn't ever really carried on a conversation with him, he was widely known for his long, infuriating monologues about fate. She felt empathy for his situation and the entire Hyuuga Branch family, but that by no means meant that she could stomach his insightfully little pearls of wisdom.

"Ah, I see." The tree line was emerging in the far distance, and for one second she thought it might have been a mirage. But then Naruto gave a long howling yelp of joy and she felt the clamping hand of misery ease on her heart. Shade, darkness, cool breeze… they were getting closer to home. Even if they still had two full days of traveling, at least it would be in the forest. That was Fire Country, it was familiar. He still kept in stride with her and she desperately wished he wouldn't. He towered a good foot and a half over her and it just gave him the perfect excuse to look down at her. She squirmed.

"No, you really don't." her solemn resolve melted in the burgeoning prospect of wilderness. She let the flood of recent memories bombard her senses. She could still feel the blood spill from her gut and soak through her gloves. She could taste metal in her mouth as her vision blurred. The last things she remembered before she fell into darkness were those haunting boyish eyes. She picked up speed unconsciously. She knew that any trip to Suna in her lifetime would be too soon.

"The cave was demolished, Sakura." She bit back the urge to ask him not to say her name. She just didn't like the way it sounded coming from him. She might have recognized how insane that was, but there was just something so unnerving about it. It was familiar, but in a way that's just far enough from the actual memory that you know it's wrong but still close enough that it messes with the right memory. And there was a great looming shadow that cast down on her. She recognized now that the sun was descending in the sky at their backs. But he stood firmly rooted in her path, so she planted her feet and crossed her arms. "I understand quite well what the situation was." She glared at him while he spoke. "Sasori was an elite member of Akatsuki. You are lucky to be alive."

She slit her eyes into dangerous emerald half-moons. "Luck had nothing to do with it." She would not be patronized by him. It was a difficult fight, but she was alive and now held a precious piece of information because of it. She was inching closer to her goal, and she'd managed to cause a lot of damage in the process. She was no longer the frail, weak little girl she'd been. She didn't cry anymore, or whine, or fuss over trivial things like her appearance. She was a strong medic-nin and a powerful kunoichi. She took a defiant step towards him and was surprisingly awarded with his waver.

"I… I did not mean that you are inadequate." It was only a second, but she'd seen it. She intimidated him, and for that one second, she was the most powerful shinobi in the world. It didn't matter that she was the only one who would know this simple truth, she wasn't power obsessed like Neji, Naruto, or even Sasuke. The only thing that counted was that she knew it, and she savored the victory as it rolled over her tongue. It tastes sweet. But then he regained his composure and spoke and her moment of glory was gone. "I only meant that it was a difficult fight, one that perhaps you were not quite ready for." He just didn't learn, did he?

"You are in dangerous territory, Neji-san." She stood defiant and irrevocably fuming from head to toe with frightful contempt overflowing from her fingers and slipping from the strands of her hair. She looked directly into his white eyes and took another step closer. This time he didn't flinch. She wished he would have.

"Foolish woman, I only wanted to say that there is no need to feel remorse for your role in Chiyo-sama's passing." He turned from her, like everything was fine, like he hadn't just insulted her abilities as a ninja, or casually removed the guilt that ate away at her soul. He spoke to her like he had all the answers, like he had the right to absolve her mistakes with the swish of his hair in the setting sun. "She was alive because of you. She was able to revive the Kazekage-sama because of you." Even with his retreating back to her, she was able to make out the sincere gesture on the wind because it passed over her like fingers on her skin. He just stood there and presumed to know what she felt.

"If we'd made it there in time, she wouldn't have needed to trade her life for his." Her rebuke was thick on her tongue and heavy on her mind. She counted the seconds they'd wasted and blamed them for the life taken. Seconds in the air from one branch to the other, seconds spent considering what kind of antidote to make, finding the proper ingredients, mixing the extra vials… time she wasted. The life that was traded was her responsibility. A mission she failed. A life she couldn't protect.

"She died to protect her country." He was already three strides in front of her and she took five to catch up. He had now deemed this conversation past his interest, and this drove the stubborn streak in her core to explode with unresolved fixation. She would not lose to him now, not after she'd won, not after she'd fought so hard to match his pace. "Don't belittle her sacrifice…"

"I am well aware of what she scarified." She didn't let him finish, it wasn't his right to tell her what sacrifice was made. Once again, she was at his side, looking past the growing challenge she'd thrown his way. Instead she fixed her eyes on the growing trees and counted the seconds it would take to enter the plush forest, and finally relax. The forest looked dark, and cool. Even if the sun was slowly sinking from the sky, she could still feel it on her back and resented its presence.

"No doubt you are." He glanced down at her and she suppressed the urge to smash his face into a million splinters of bone fragments and muscle. "But regardless of your ill-timing, she would have traded her life for his. It is in no way your fault." Her fists clenched at her sides, stretching the material of her glove taut over her knuckles that she was sure were white under the black fabric. She wouldn't give him the satisfaction of letting him see her lose control.

"I was careless." It was a quiet succession, but in that moment, she could see the torch of victory slip from her hands and fall into his grasp. He was centimeters from her, and every cell of her right side ached with the desire to rain down hate and abuse on him. She hated him and all the introspection his stoic features and emotionless eyes seemed to hold. But she couldn't bring herself to look away, almost like she'd now fallen hopelessly into his trap. And now she looked to him for validation, like he was the only one who could give it to her. She was weak, again. So she decided that it might be more beneficial to hate herself for a little while instead.

"I doubt that." Her eyes shot open, wide and completely overcome with the terror that his reassurance brought. She was painfully aware that his faith in her was comforting. Then she decided that it was definitely in her best interest to hate every millimeter of herself than to admit that Hyuuga Neji made her feel even the most miniscule amount of ease.

"Why are you interested, Neji-san?" the bile rose in her throat and she bit back the urge, yet again, to conveniently lose the honorific somewhere in the space that separated their bodies. The trees were now coming closer and with every step she could sense to relief that was threatening to overtake her. With the emerging feel of home washing over her, the confidence that only moments previous were dashed by the supreme fear of his ability to read her so perfectly, had returned with a vengeance. So she turned her head to look at him and summoned all the clout she could manage. "Why do you care if I was fatally wounded?" She was utterly rewarded, yet again, with the slightest, faintest, and some would argue, non-existent vacillation in his step. If she hadn't been looking so intently, so single-mindedly for it, she might have missed it. Or she might have made it up altogether.

"I care not." They were only one painful meter from the shade of the trees and her entire body ached for the familiarity of bark under her sandals and leaves in her hair. "I only wished to assess your condition. After all, as you pointed out earlier, you are out medic-nin on this mission." She smiled then, oddly glad to find a verbal spar with such an unlike source. But the conversation evaporated as her feet hit the first grain of Fire Country and she sighed with great pleasure for the end of a long day and an even more frustrating companion.

"Fair enough." She smiled, despite her better judgment and left him in her dust as she took to the trees in a move that was both completely familiar and comforting as it was powerful and poignant.

Dedication:

This is for Chica De La Luna Fantasma

Because she has been there to give me unconditional encouragement since I started this idea. I would never have had the courage to post this without you. Have fun in California! We'll talk more when you get back.