No man or woman born, coward or brave, can shun his destiny.

Within the first hour on the road, Sakura had already begun to theorize about the plans described by Pein—who had also, conveniently, left a black robe embroidered in that red-cloud pattern just the exact right size for Sakura. She'd taken it from Kisame with a heavy roll of her eyes, stuffing the stolen cloak she'd worn until now into her bag.

"Oi, aniki," she began late that same afternoon. Summertime bugs buzzed and chirped all around them as they made their way through the sprawling green foothills of southern Earth Country, the breeze warm and pleasant despite her downcast mood. They never broke into a dash as was so often prioritized on official missions back home, opting to walk most of the time unless certain circumstances necessitated a swift escape or even a battle.

"Speak up," he grunted, his way of pressing her to continue.

"What'd you mean by a world without lies?"

"Exactly what it sounds like."

"Is that really the same as peace?"

"I don't recall saying anything about my personal beliefs lining up with the boss's. I'm here because my options are regrettably limited. Next question."

It was the most closed-off he'd been since that first day they'd met, and she was smart enough to know the true meaning behind his words was Shut up. She rolled her eyes and glanced over to Itachi instead, who kept pace with them with that signature stone-faced look.

"What about you?" she asked cautiously.

For a long while he was silent, so long that Sakura figured he simply wouldn't answer. She turned back to face the road, unhooking her new cloak to let the breeze of the day cool her skin.

"I suppose," Itachi finally said, "that what I want could be called 'peace,' in a way."

And what the hell does that mean, genius?

"Care to elaborate?"

She could've sworn he smirked behind the high collar of his cloak. "Not really."

Kisame grew tired of her near-nonstop pestering, but it couldn't seem to be helped. She needed some way to convince herself that she'd made the right decision, that these were somehow good guys even if the means were sinister. Should she have fought them off instead, ran away again? Or would that have been the cowardly thing to do?

And with her mind now on the subject of the means, she launched into her next train of thought, uncaring if the boys were annoyed.

"So neither of you know any medical ninjutsu?"

"Not beyond the basics," Kisame answered, the words clipped.

Sakura sighed—more a groan, really. If Orochimaru, Kabuto, or even Karin alone were here, she could spitball to her heart's content. She'd taken for granted their intelligence and love for learning, and their affinities for all manner of scientific endeavors. Without them around, she felt seriously out of her element.

If she was going to prevent the jinchuuriki from dying needless deaths, she'd need her found family's guidance and expertise. Sakura herself knew many things now, like how to identify viruses and cancerous cells as they appeared under a microscope, what chemicals burned which color, and how to gather ingredients from the wilderness to create her genjutsu and medicinal pills even without the assistance of a laboratory. And she'd seen plenty by now, too, like delivering children, or cleaning many various bodily builds from floors (and occasionally needing to help calm those bodily fluids before they made mess enough to clean), sticking her hands into the open cavities of all sorts of bodies—whether alive and sedated, or cold and unfeeling corpses.

Surely there was some knowledge she could draw from to supplement her thoughts, bolster her ideas, shed light onto her theories.

"Maybe," she said without meaning to, still lost in her own mind, "it's fate."

Which part, though? That she was here with these two strange guys who could probably kill her in half a second if she tried to escape? That the hosts of the Tailed Beasts—of course her heart was with Naruto—were being hunted down without a care for their own choices in the matter? Was it the plan of the world for them to die?

"Fate, luck, simple poor timing," Kisame said with a shrug. "Does it really make any difference?"

They carried on, and Sakura kept to herself as much as she could. She focused on her own footsteps, on the landscape, on carefully checking for any approaching chakra signatures, and on her near-obsessive double-checking that her own chakra was concealed a proper amount. She flexed her hands, feeling for the chakra she kept gathered there for easy genjutsu application or explosive force, whichever was needed, and finally her swirling thoughts began to calm.

Another hour passed before they happened upon a lake, so wide that the treeline on the other end of it was hazy off in the distance. The setting sun sparkled over its gentle, rippling waves in a way that was so delicate and beautiful it almost made Sakura sad.

When she noticed that Itachi and Kisame were no longer at her sides, she glanced around to find them veering off of the main path and towards a traditional-style building. She was so used to them stepping into the wilderness from trails and setting up their small camp that she hadn't considered they'd ever want to stay at an inn—and the two of them seemed to agree upon stopping there without saying a single word to each other. She followed, readjusting her bag over her shoulder.

The clerk at the front desk was a pleasant elderly woman who explained that this was the last bastion of those gorgeous grassy plains before the rock forests signature of Earth Country began, about five miles down the main road. And apparently they'd stumbled upon the inn in the off-season, so some of their best rooms were available.

When Itachi turned, Kisame opened the bag that hung from his shoulders and produced a sack of coins. The gestures were so smoothly executed that Sakura had the immediate impression that this was something they did often, and she narrowed her eyes over pursed lips.

As Kisame paid and made small talk with the clerk, Sakura slid towards Itachi. "Where'd the money come from?"

He peered at her curiously, the slight twitch of his brow silently asking her Don't you listen? "Payment for securing you."

She thought on that, wondering where Pein even procured money enough to pay these idiots. The three of them followed the old woman as she showed them to the room, hobbling atop a gnarled cane that looked more like driftwood than anything. With great care she knelt at the door, sliding it open for them to enter. Kisame stepped through the threshold, followed by Itachi—so much for "ladies first," Inner mumbled—when the clerk struggled to her feet.

"And...a separate suite for the lady?"

Oh.

Sakura gave a kind smile and a short bow. She'd spent many a night being the only girl around, and learned after Team 7's very first overnight mission—during which Kakashi had smacked Naruto upside the head for attempting to peep as she changed her clothes—how to be careful. Besides, she'd camped out with these men for over seven days straight. If either of them had nefarious intentions, she figured they would've acted on them alone in the wilderness rather than an inn with other people around.

"I appreciate your concern, ma'am, but I'll be all right here."

The clerk eyed her suspiciously, but it didn't take a genius to guess that the three of them were shinobi, who were known to have strange habits and sleeping arrangements.

"If they give you any trouble," she whispered anyway into Sakura's ear, "you come get me."

With that, she slid the door shut and let them be. Sakura set down her pink bag, examining the room, which was very nice, indeed. A hearth sat sunken into the middle of the floor, the deep cherrywood polished with extreme dedication. The futon were put away somewhere, and as she kicked off her boots she found the hardwood floors cool against her bare feet. At the back of the main room were large glass windows, framing the lake and the trees on the horizonline in a picturesque way.

The men hung their cloaks, and Itachi made to kneel at the hearth, calling forth a fire-style jutsu to light the small wood planks beneath the hanging kettle. She sat atop one of the mats as he stood and shuffled through his bag, producing two porcelain teacups painted a matte black, his brows furrowing slightly.

"Kisame," he said, his expression unreadable to Sakura, "when you go for dinner, kindly ask the cook for a teacup they wouldn't mind parting with."

The other man gave a lazy grunt of acknowledgment. He'd pulled down a futon from the closet and was lounging on it like Sakura had seen Ino do on her childhood bed. She sat back on her hands, looking out the window and at the just-setting sun. It dyed the sky brilliant shades of pinks and oranges, and far out in the sky she saw a bright star peek out. The water in the kettle began to boil, and she laid back on the floor, her arms stretched out over her head.

As Kisame left to procure their meals, Itachi finished with the tea. It was a strange thing, to sip tea with Sasuke's aloof older brother while a well-known comrade-killer brought bowls of steaming rice and fish and set them down on the table.

It was even stranger when, just as night fell and moonlight fell through the lattice windows, Kisame suggested that they go for a late-night swim.

Perhaps, though, the strangest thing was that Itachi had answered yes.

She stared, dumbstruck. "Aren't you guys, like...S-class missing nin?"

"What of it?" Kisame asked, pulling his pants off as if he had no shame at all. Sakura tried not to blush, looking away and thanking her many days spent in the weird confines of Orochimaru's estate. She'd seen weirder, surely. "Think that means we shouldn't be able to enjoy ourselves?"

"Guess not." But when she remembered the sack of coins that Itachi carried in their pack, she pursed her lips in a teasing distaste. "This is what you spend your boss's money on? Shouldn't that be going towards his big, grand goal of world peace?"

"Fuck that," he said with a wave of his hand. "Money isn't what'll get us there."

"Besides," Itachi said quietly, "from what I understand, your name is a recent addition to the bingo book. Perhaps it's in your best interest to...lighten up."

This idiot!

And was such a thing even true?!

"Coming from you?" She didn't think she had the mental capacities to dwell on the first thing he'd said right now, choosing instead to make a jab at the second. "I'll remember that next time I wanna meditate 'til I starve to death."

His answer to that was simply to smirk as he stood to pull a small stack of towels from the adjoining washroom. He offered one to Kisame, who shook his head with a grunt while he pulled open their room's back door. An old covered walkway of deep brown wood hung off the back of the inn, with a short staircase leading down to the shoreline and a rickety-looking pier jutting out into the lake. The late-summer crickets chirped all around them, frogs crying out somberly at regular intervals.

Itachi removed only his shirt, and Sakura caught sight of something most curious. The same sharp, swirling tattoo that she'd seen on Kakashi's bicep was also on Itachi's. She stared at it only briefly before Kisame broke into a sprint, whooping loudly despite his nudity while the other man slowly made his way down the stairs.

She herself shrugged, undoing the thick, braided cord of a belt she wore around her baggy pants. It was as if she was the middle point between their states of undress as she took to the walkway there in her sports bra and compression shorts. It took a light jog to catch up to Itachi, who'd reached the hard-sand shore that was rough beneath her bare feet. He stood there quietly, as if he did not quite know what to do.

"Wanna get in?" she tried. Kisame was already in the middle of leaping off of the small dock and jetting into the water. From what she could see before he disappeared into the dark of night—and what she felt of his chakra darting back and forth—he was having the time of his life.

"It's best for me not to swim," Itachi said after a long moment of deliberation. There was the faintest hint of sadness to his voice, as if he'd really wanted to after all.

She hummed in response, guessing it had something to do with whatever sickness he had. "Then let's go sit on the dock."

"You're free to swim, if that's what you want. No need to worry about me."

Pursing her lips, she looked out over the water. Kisame almost seemed more serpent than shark for how smoothly he spun and darted around, free and uncaring.

"Aniki seems fine on his own. Besides, it's not good bedside manners to leave my charge by himself while everyone else goes off to have some fun."

The dock was old, the wood slats worn and creaking beneath their feet and swaying in the gentle waves of the water. They reached the end, stooping to stick their feet into the water, which was still warm from the sun shining on it all day. Kisame leapt out of the water in an arc so graceful she could hardly believe it, dipping back into the surface so cleanly that there was hardly any splash at all.

Show-off.

They sat for some time, admiring the quiet night and the gentle moon overhead. Sakura's thoughts wandered back to the jinchuuriki, but it seemed such an overwhelming thing that she shook her head. She needed a distraction, and she started with the first thing that came to mind.

"So what're you sick with?" She did not turn to face him, worried he may be angered by such a personal question.

"Don't know," he answered, and she could've sighed her relief. "My mother tried to get me to the hospital many times, but my father insisted against it. He was quite the slave to my shinobi training, you know."

"Sounds like a real asshole." She hadn't quite meant to voice that out loud, and she winced. If Sasuke's situation was any indication, their father was murdered along with the rest of their clan! The longer she went with Orochimaru's curse mark, the more Inner seemed to bubble up to the surface, it seemed.

Luckily, though, Itachi laughed—it was the first time she'd heard it in anything other than a quiet huff through his nose, and she faced him with a slight wonder in her eyes. She'd scarcely even heard Sasuke laugh, and certainly never that openly.

"I suppose that's not an incorrect observation. He meant well, I always thought."

She tried to bite her tongue, but couldn't hold it back anymore. She cocked her head down toward Itachi's bicep, asking in reference to the tattoo there, "That why you joined ANBU?"

He gave a short hum. "Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised you recognized it. Briefly I was partnered with your Kakashi, you know."

She frowned; he hadn't really answered her question, but had given way to many new ones instead. "You must have it mixed up. Kaka-sensei is way old."

But his expression changed to something almost smug, a toned down version of that near-sneer she'd seen on Sasuke's face when someone dared to challenge him. "I was quite young upon being accepted to ANBU."

These Uchiha were all about their egos, weren't they? With a roll of her eyes, she pressed. "How young?"

"Eleven."

This idiot...! Did he seriously think she'd believe something like that? Or maybe her incredulity was due to the fact that there was no way she could've possibly met so many prodigies in her short life, let alone be teamed up with them.

She sat back on her hands, looking out over the water. "I don't believe you."

"You don't need to," he said lightly. "But I warn you, there's little of my life you'd take as fact if that's what leaves you in disbelief."

Gently she kicked her feet in the water, thinking on whatever kinds of things he could mean by that. Her thoughts were many, threatening to spiral with so much new information, and when they landed again on what Itachi had said only a few minutes ago, she sighed.

"Is my name...really in the bingo book?" She thought of what her parents would think, what Kakashi would say, how the boys would feel. All of the opportunities that she'd now be barred from forever, all because she'd tried to save the whole damn world on her own as nothing more than a stupid twelve-year old girl that hardly anyone noticed at all.

"It's what I've heard, yes."

Could she trust that? "And how exactly do you hear these things?"

He hadn't the opportunity to answer, for Kisame had called forth some water-style jutsu that splashed lakewater at the both of them. She yelped in surprise as Itachi sat still as a statue. In the voidlike water below them she saw the shining glint of Kisame's eyes, so animalistic that she had to fight her own instincts to run, just before he pushed his head up through the surface and smoothed his hair from his eyes.

"You two are getting depressed up here, I can feel it," he said. "Cut that out. We'll need all our focus if we're to find this guy and take him down."

"That's tomorrow, maybe even next week," Sakura countered with a wave of her hand. "Not now."

"A troubled mind rarely heals overnight," he said as he bobbed gently in the lake. Then he held out his arms as if he expected the other man to leap into them. "Come, now. A dip in the water does wonders. Itachi-san?"

She did not know what history they had with each other, and though Itachi had softened in his conversation with her, he looked downright gentle when he smiled at Kisame. He pushed off the dock and into those outstretched arms, treading water there as Kisame gave him space and bent back, the both of them disappearing into the dark.

"Oi," Sakura started, her stern tone meant to be teasing. "What happened to swimming not being what's best?"

It was quiet but for the wildlife around them, and somewhere far off on the breeze she swore she heard the melancholy call of a crow. Just before she came to the conclusion that she should jump in after them, a wet hand grabbed her by the ankle. She gave another yelp as it yanked, pulling her down into the water. She crashed into it, the force of the splash in her ears and the sensation of bubbles rising up all around her body.

When she surfaced she flung the hair from her face, wiping at her eyes and nose with her hands. She smiled and sucked in a breath, ready to call out to chide Kisame for doing such a cheap thing, but she could feel that he was way off in the depths somewhere. It was Itachi who appeared before her, tugging his soaked hair free of its tie as it pooled around his shoulders. He'd been the one to pull her in, she realized.

"Your concern is a comfort," he said then, his eyes kind and sparkling in the moonlight. He was so handsome it was almost painful, the evidence of he and Sasuke's shared blood there on his face in a way that made her ache. "But sometimes what's best for the mind isn't exactly what's best for the body. Surely you haven't already forgotten what I said before we left?"

Her smile was wry, and she swept her hand across the water's surface to send a splash of it toward him. "Lighten up. I know, I know."

With his own smile, he kicked off and swam out into the darkness once more. It was there beneath the dock that his words had reached Sakura in an unintended fashion, and she zeroed in on the idea in an instant.

What's best for the mind isn't exactly what's best for the body.

She brought her hand from the warm water, staring down at the curse mark on her wrist. In the time since its application, she'd lost sight of her former master's original plans for its use: to recreate Lady Fifth's Rebirth jutsu.

Her whole body began to tingle, going nearly numb at the thought. She'd never tapped into even the First Hokage's ability to self-heal even through otherwise fatal wounds—she'd never needed to, so far. And though she knew she was good, she wondered if she were good enough to activate a jutsu she'd only heard of once, while under the intense stress guaranteed when trying to keep someone alive when a soul was being torn out of the body.

But as she pushed off from the dock and sunk beneath the water to swim, her path became clearer and clearer. She was Haruno Sakura, and—at least so far—all of her stupidest ideas had only made her stronger.