Chapter 11: Sides - Sai, Ino

~omake one~

Sai was perfectly content as he sat by himself at the bar. Swirling the dark liquid in his cup for a moment, he tilted his head back and downed it in one smooth motion.

The world was loud around him—louder than he was accustomed to. Drunken laughter and banter met his ears wherever he turned. Belatedly, he wondered if 'bar-hopping' was an activity meant to be conducted with others. The book he had read had not explicitly indicated it to be so; yet, he could hardly ignore the evidence before him. The booths lining the sides of the bar were filled with groups of both shinobi and civilians who had clearly arrived together.

Perhaps…he should have invited his teammates? 'Bar-hopping' seemed to be a form of bonding. And they were, in truth, still curiously alien to him: strange creatures that scarcely seemed human, at least, in the way that Sai was. But then, Sai had yet to meet many people who were human like he was.

He was beginning to wonder, in fact, if he was the deviance rather than the norm.

Naruto—was he what the average human embodied? Loud and impulsive; by the textbook, an obvious victim of small penis syndrome. Was Sai, too, meant to live life compensating for something?

Tapping his fingers idly, he considered his other teammate. Haruno Sakura was just as puzzling as Naruto. Possibly more so. She was reserved most of the time, but possibly had anger issues as well. He remembered that she had slammed him into a tree. That had been unexpected. Unprecedented, as well, given what he had read about her from mission files and ROOT intel.

Haruno Sakura was hiding something, Sai guessed. But as long as it did not interfere with his mission, he did not know why he should particularly care.

He frowned, examining an oddity within himself, that he was curious despite the fact he had no reason to be.

That was strange. And yet, his art—not originally his, but delivered by his hands—decorated her back. It did seem concerning that his art, usually entirely subject to his control, might operate with motives mysterious to him. Sakura, of course, was not herself art; but the art existed on her, she merely its canvas. A walking, talking canvas—he wondered who had ever decided tattoos should exist.

An immobile, silent canvas, after all, could only be inherently superior in the endeavor of creating a flawless composition of ink strokes. It seemed counterintuitive that a canvas should distract from that composition.

But he digressed now. The point stood that he was inexplicably invested in the thoughts and motives of not only Sakura but Naruto too, when he had no reason to be.

A trill of sharp, bell-like laughter pierced the air near him, interrupting his thoughts.

Sai cocked his head to the side and examined the source of the noise. It belonged to a blonde girl his own age. She had soft, delicate features of the sort popularly classified as 'attractive,' though Sai personally did not see their appeal. Long, healthy hair as well—she flipped it now over her shoulder as she talked to the boy sitting across from her. She was sitting next to another boy her age with short brown hair, but her attention did not seem to focus much on him, other than a glance every now and then.

Those glances were platonic, Sai decided after moment. But not the ones directed to the boy across from her. Her face blushed an interesting hue of pale pink every time she addressed him. Her laughter seemed to become only more trill-like as the conversation continued. Her pupils grew more dilated with time, her limbs curving suggestively as she imbibed more alcohol as well.

She was exhibiting the common courting practices of individuals his age, Sai reflected. He found this incredibly interesting. He knew he would find other examples if he continued to examine around the room. Yet, he settled with observing this one. He would prioritize proximity and depth of observation over diverse sampling just now.

Curious, his gaze moved left to the object of her amorous attention. The boy across from her, also Sai's age, nursed a tall glass of what he knew to be bitter-sweet alcohol.

It was hard to tell from where Sai was sitting, but the boy did not seem to possess much musculature. Nor, he found with slight puzzlement, did he have many of the features commonly deemed 'handsome.' Intrigued, he wondered what drew the clearly socially desirable female to this particular male.

Tapping his fingers still, it took him a moment to realize his examination had been noticed. The boy's eyebrow twitched in a small, miniscule moment. Then dark, cat-like eyes slid lazily to their right—sliding straight past the blonde girl, past the girl whose hands were inching their way down her partner's pants against the wall, without pause, to Sai.

The girl continued to chatter. If the boy next to her noticed his friend's sudden inattention, he did not show it.

The eyes that met his were razor-sharp, despite the amount of alcohol consumed in the glass before them. A slight chill swept over his body. Sai tilted his head to the side, captivated by his body's reaction. He felt the urge to look away. That was odd. Was this embarrassment?

To luxuriate in the novelty of this feeling, Sai continued to return the stare. The eyes boring into his were unnervingly penetrating.

Deciding that a period of contemplation and reviewal was now due, Sai turned in his seat without hesitation to face his empty cup and the bartender again.

"Another drink?" the smirking woman asked.

Sai paused to consider the question, then nodded. He liked the sweet taste of the sake offered here.

She reached down to pull out the bottle. As she poured, the end of the bottle brushed her prominent breasts. His gaze flicked to them for a moment, then back to the cup.

She caught the movement. "Not interested?" she asked, pointing at her chest.

Sai's gaze darted up briefly, unbothered by the question. "Not particularly."

She huffed a laugh. Sai idly wondered if it were fake or genuine—he was unable to tell the difference as of yet. Her gaze moved to somewhere above him.

Grunt-like sounds began to emerge from his left.

He twisted slightly to look over. It seemed the girl against the wall had successfully made her way into her partner's pants at last. Her arm moving in a telling up and down motion. The man's expression was contorted in a tense display of ecstasy as he panted against the peeling wall.

Most averted their eyes from the sight in exaggerated horror, Sai observed. In truth, however, their body language betrayed them. The shifting of thighs, rubbing covertly together; the slight hitch in their breaths, unnecessary pauses in their story-telling.

Sai was no stranger to this conduct, though it usually arose within him independent of an individual, occurring instead as the periodic if not rare result of his body's natural call for sexual activity. He tended to address it in the usual hand to groin manner. (This was not to say Sai had never had sex with another person. Some ROOT missions in the recent past had made him a well-experienced participant in a variety of sexual acts.)

Despite the contradictory evidence in front him, Sai himself didn't particularly see the appeal of sex with another person. He was entirely sure he had never worn such a ravished expression as the man before him. One's body was known best, addressed with the most efficacy, only by oneself. This was what Sai had learned in his own experience.

It was oddly frustrating, therefore, that the man against the wall existed in front of Sai in the way he did. He was proving an exception to Sai's rule. The man continued to writhe against the wall, causing clientele to nervously stutter their disapproval, until he reached completion. When he at last spent himself into his partner's hand, he gave a loud, debauched cry before mouthing at her neck in worshipful gratitude.

While most around him continued to pretend to look away, Sai watched without qualms. The girl brushed her partner's hair back with a strong, possessive hand, the other twisting in sly, quick movements, though he must have been oversensitive. He gave more soft, breathy cries, mouth slack with bliss. Sai's gaze narrowed, wondering if the man were a masterful actor, and if so, what his agenda could possibly be.

"Noisy pair," a smooth voice—intricately modulated—commented from behind him.

Sai turned and found a pair of dark, cat-like eyes examining him piercingly from the boy suddenly in the stool beside him.

"You're the new one on Team Seven," the boy said lazily, sipping the last of his drink. He exhaled lowly, the bitter-sweet scent of his breath curling into Sai's nose.

"Sai," he answered with careful blankness. When in doubt, he resorted to this state—a fortress of impenetrability. As manners dictated, he returned: "Your name?"

"Shikamaru."

"And why are you here?" Sai asked without pause.

The boy's—Shikamaru's—lips curved. "To get another drink, of course."

He faced forward and waved a hand nonchalantly, as though the effort even this required was somewhat distasteful to him. The smirking woman from earlier noticed the motion and drew closer.

"If it isn't my favorite," the woman purred, eyelashes fluttering.

Sai watched this with persisting confusion. The reason for this boy's—Shikamaru's—apparently pervasive appeal still escaped him.

"Mirai-san," Shikamaru returned, nodding without making eye contact. He seemed suddenly distracted by a crack in his glass. "The same." He handed the glass forward.

Mirai pouted and took the glass. "You know you can't keep treating all us girls like this, right, Shikamaru? Is the Nara clan going to end with you?"

Shikamaru flashed his teeth in a convincing semblance of a smile. "You're beginning to sound like my mother. You should know that's hardly advancing the right agenda."

That was undoubtedly an insult. Yet, Mirai received it with surprisingly good humor. She rolled her eyes. "Watching the scene over there was like watching a dog get kicked. Put that dear girl out of her misery."

The boy's smile widened, but Sai felt that it has suddenly become…sharp. Was it real? Fake? It annoyed him that he could not tell.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

Even more puzzling—Shikamaru was clearly a fellow novice at social interaction. Why was he so sought after? "You may wish to take some lessons in understanding social cues," Sai offered. "If you want, there are some helpful books I can suggest."

Mirai covered her mouth behind the bar. Sai did not know why.

Shikamaru's gaze slid to him leisurely.

"The girl across from you was peacocking," Sai explained patiently. "She was repeatedly displacing her hair and laughing excessively. Her pupils were dilated as well. I don't know how you could have possibly misunderstood. Are you generally obtuse?"

Mirai burst into laughter.

"Pea-cock-ing," Shikamaru said slowly, leaning back in his chair.

The pout returned to the bartender's face. "Maybe this one does have a point. You're being deliberately obtuse, Shikamaru."

The boy's face cat-like eyes flashed. "What a pain."

Mirai's pout grew more pronounced. "What she feels is—"

"Troublesome," Shikamaru cut her off. "She's like an actual serial killer when she's horny. I'm just the latest victim, the closest person with a penis she hasn't tried yet, so she fancies herself infatuated with me."

"Actually," Sai interrupted, "I believe that that is natural, not a demonstration of psychopathic behavior as you seem to be suggesting. I've read that it is quite advantageous to choose a long-term partner that is sexually compatible; this would seem to require some sampling, of course, to make such a determination."

Shikamaru leaned forward. The bitter-sweet smell of the alcohol followed him. "Well," the boy drawled, getting uncomfortably close to Sai's face (even in Sai's perception), "then it makes sense that I don't fuck what I'm uninterested in permanently tying myself to, right?"

"Ah!" Mirai cried triumphantly, slamming down the cup for the customer beside them with this statement. The customer jumped in his seat, looking alarmed. She pointed an accusing finger at Shikamaru. "You know what I think? I think you're scared of women."

The boy had propped his elbow against the counter and leaned his face into his hand; after a delayed moment, he shifted his gaze from Sai to the bartender "If you're asking whether it is the utmost priority of my life to avoid entanglements with them," Shikamaru said coolly, "then—yes."

"Why?" Mirai demanded.

"In my experience, women are overly emotional," Shikamaru answered immediately, tone unbothered. "They are prone to bouts of irrationality I cannot comprehend. To try to understand them is a futile endeavor—it would mean engaging in a path wrought with inconvenience and conflict."

The bartender looked at him silence for a moment, lips pursed.

Then she placed Shikamaru's filled glass in front of him stiffly. "People may call you terrifyingly smart, Nara-san. You probably have all the best scrolls in the world in those clan grounds of yours—generations of money and knowledge passed down as well. I certainly didn't have that upbringing, you can be sure of that."

Shikamaru inclined his head.

"So you really do have no excuse for your instances of stupidity," she finished, flipping her hair with a sniff. She turned to Sai now. "And you?"

"What about me?" Sai responded with a smile.

"Well, while we're at it, cutie," she said, flashing a pretty grin again. It looked vaguely dangerous. "Do you have anything to add to the matter?"

Sai blinked. Words-wise, that had been a question. But it had been delivered in the tone of a threat. How…puzzling.

"Are you asking for my commentary on his thoughts?" he clarified.

"Sure," Mirai returned. "And if I like the answer, you get to walk without paying."

That seemed fairly promising. All he had to do was give the right answer. Sadly, Sai genuinely did not know what the 'right answer' meant to Mirai. He only had his own thoughts to rely on.

"Well," he began slowly, smiling all the way through, "I disagree with this Shikamaru-san on almost all counts."

For the second time that night, Shikamaru's cat-like eyes snapped to his with incredible speed. The black of his irises, Sai noticed distantly, were indiscernible from those of his pupils.

"Promising start," he thought he heard the bartender say under her breath.

"Oh?" Shikamaru prompted, face unreadable.

"Yes," Sai said, smiling still. "In my experience, I have observed very emotional persons possessing penises. My teammate, Naruto, for example. Initially, I too believed his emotions led him to act irrationally; now, however, I understand that there is compelling reasoning to his strongest emotional outbursts. In summary: I do not believe emotions correlate with irrationality. Additionally, my female teammate, Sakura, is generally very quiet during training and missions—this also is contrary to your statements."

He watched as Shikamaru's eyebrow arched at this last statement.

"I should also say that I disagree vehemently with your methodology," Sai continued evenly. "You've decided, from what seems to be obvious, incomplete sampling and observation, that females are 'inherently' incomprehensible to you. I have clearly done more diverse sampling and careful observation—I have found that most if not all individuals, regardless of gender, are completely incomprehensible to me without concerted effort to understand them. I have resolved myself, therefore, to trying to understand them. With this resolve, I have in fact made progress and learned a considerable amount. I would suggest you attempt to do the same."

The bartender was staring at him, lips slightly open.

Sai turned to smile at her. "Respectfully, Mirai-san, I must disagree with you on one point, even if I must pay for my alcohol as a result. I do not think Shikamaru-san is as smart as you suggest. The gaps in his logic do not seem to be instances of rare oversight, but rather, founded from structural issues with his way of processing information—"

"Ah," Shikamaru cut in lowly, taking a sip from his glass. His gaze was oddly bright. "Have I been found out?"

Despite the lengthiness and breadth of Sai's answer, Mirai looked confused. "It is too…simplistic, too clearly…wrong. It makes no…"—suddenly, her eyes widened—"Wait a second."

Sai was not following her thought process, so he returned to his drink.

"You don't actually believe any of it, do you?" Mirai guessed, sounding exasperated.

Sai stilled now, the rim of the cup an inch away from his lips. Was she suggesting that they had not been having a debate in good faith?

"And it was working so well," Shikamaru said boredly. "What a pain." It seemed to be a phrase he used often.

"It did," the bartender agreed, sounding impressed despite herself. "I went completely dry down there."

"Is that medically possible?" Sai inquired politely, trying to move past his annoyance. It couldn't serve him now, after all. But—why did people never say what they meant?

Mirai didn't answer, turning her attention back to Shikamaru. Suspicion made her mouth purse again. "You know, I did hear once that you refused to fight a girl to the end in your chunin competition."

"If I've ever refused to hit a girl," the boy drawled, "it was for the same reason I have ever refused to hit anyone else. First, it probably required too much effort. Second, I was probably likely to receive uncomfortable injuries in that effort. My mind has always been the tool that is going win real battles; not my body. Accordingly, I don't see the point in putting my limbs through that kind of trial by fire."

"You pretend to be a sexist to ward off unwanted romantic advances," Sai concluded blankly. So, he had wasted his breath after all. How…inefficient.

Shikamaru nodded. After a moment, he added wryly, "And sometimes, to goad female opponents."

"Fine," Mirai said, resting her hands on her ample hips. "But tell me this—what's wrong with Ino-chan? She's a sweet girl. And she's your age."

"She is also beautiful," Sai added distractedly, still frowning.

Shikamaru's eyes seemed to bore into him especially penetratingly now. "You think so?"

"Yes."

He seemed oddly intent. "For what reasons?"

"That is," Sai began reluctantly (was this a false debate too?), "she has features that are commonly praised in the texts I have read." Then, he listed: "Small nose, full lips, unblemished skin, long, richly colored hair…"

Shikamaru took a careful sip from his glass. When he spoke again, his lips brushed the glass. "Perhaps,"—he rested his cheek leisurely into the palm of his hand again—"the question I meant to ask is: do you find her to be beautiful?"

Sai paused, brows furrowing. "I do not know what it means to find someone beautiful."

He had never considered that, before. Maybe…

Maybe, this had something to do with what was wrong with him—with what made him different. And naturally, having just witnessed a sexual act he himself could not reproduce with comparable pleasure, Sai's mind went there first.

Was Sai unable to enjoy sex with other people because he had not until now found them…beautiful? What did it mean to find someone beautiful? Was that the same thing for every person? Was it the same for Sai as it was for other people?

Some of his confusion must have shown on his face, because Shikamaru's lips curled.

"For me," the boy said simply, "I find it in a glance."

"I don't…understand what that means."

"If that glance compels me," Shikamaru said lazily, eyes dark like pools of ink, "if it draws me in. If the words that follow are ones so earnest I can't put up a pretense before them. Then—I cannot look away."

Sai's limbs felt oddly heavy where he sat. If he hadn't known better, he would thought he had been drugged.

"Compels you," he latched onto with difficulty. "I must examine, then, what compels me?"

Shikamaru hummed. His eyelashes, Sai thought to himself, looked like strokes of ink as well.

"I like to paint," Sai said. "I like only to paint certain things—those that compel me. So is what I want to paint what I find beautiful?"

"What would you like to paint?" Shikamaru asked.

The alcohol must have gotten to him, he theorized. What was this odd feeling? A sort of reluctance… Shame? No. Embarrassment? But Sai had never felt embarrassed before.

"Beasts, birds, rivers, mountains—" his brother –"and…"

"And?"

"Your eyes," his mouth said quite directly. "I think I would like to paint your eyes."

Shikamaru was silent for a moment. Then, he let out a breath of air and looked up at the ceiling. "Do you look at everyone like that?"

"Like what?"

A second later, there was a hand—firm, unabashed—lifting his chin up. "I can't find a word for it," Shikamaru said, smiling to himself as though amused by a private joke. "Irreverent?"

"Ah," Sai said, wondering if he had angered the other boy. Smiles could be lies, after all. "If I have upset you—"

Shikamaru closed the distance between them. Sai watched his progress without comprehension.

It would have been an exaggeration to say their lips met; when the distance became the breath between molecules, the contact was unfailingly soft. Despite the strong grip of the hand that had curved to the side of his face, the kiss was terribly gentle, the gentlest he'd ever been given—it was almost unbearable, like being presented with a sweet, but being only allowed to just glance it with your tongue.

And yet—even in that brief, ephemeral brush of lips—the slightest taste of bitter-sweetness was imprinted, like the slightest trace of paint from a brush onto a canvas.

Sai drew back, blinking slowly. His tongue flicked out, unthinkingly, to follow the curve of his own lip. Shikamaru traced the motion with a dark gaze.

"Does that answer your question, Mirai-san?" the boy asked uncaringly.

Without waiting for an answer, he drew closer again. Sai watched him with calmly this time. When the other boy took too long, he tilted his head up in silent demand. For the sake of observation, of course, he was obligated to put himself through this again.

(So what if he wondered, suddenly: if this boy held him, would he achieve what the man against the wall had?)

"Yes," the woman said very belatedly, sounding dazed. "That, ah, explains quite a bit."

Neither ended up paying for their drinks.

~omake two~

Ino had spent most of her life loathing Konoha's Torture and Interrogation Force.

As a child, T&I had taken stolen her father at odd hours of the night, only to return him looking troubled and wan days later. Although neither she nor her mom ever brought it up, the following nights had been ones of restless sleep for all of them, perturbed by her father's shouts as he relived the things he had seen.

(The things he had done).

This was not to say her mother was without her own demons. All in all, in fact, both her parents looked much happier when they were at the clan flower shop.

From a young age, Ino had thus learned where the recipe for happiness could be found for a Yamanaka. It was undoubtedly the flower shop. It was where both of her parents would retire, contentedly tending to variations of flora for the rest of their days. Almost all Yamanakas did.

Being allergic to flowers was, indeed, an unheard of condition among members of her clan.

Ino hadn't realized she was until she was ten.

She had finally been given permission to work in the shop, but the longer hours had only revealed what she had missed during shorter visits. After her first shift, red, blotchy hives had sprouted all along her skin beneath her clothes. Ino had been angry and ashamed; she had hidden the traitor marks from her parents and friends. She hid them still, now, and continued to work in small shifts at the shop. Some jutsus were handy in covering up the symptoms.

But the dream of the flower shop had been stricken down, nevertheless. Cruelly so.

Perhaps, still, she considered now, if certain events had not occurred as they had—perhaps it was possible that she still could have avoided T&I.

The facts were: on paper, Ino had been the top 'kunoichi' in her year. But that hadn't really meant much; she had never tested at the same level as the top of her class. Like Shikamaru, she had been distracted by other things while at the academy (though not the same things): boys, dresses, crushes. Anything other than learning the skills that she knew would send her straight to T&I.

By all accounts, no one could have thought Ino would have ended up here—even her own father had believed she wouldn't make it, had seemed happier for it. She didn't have the grades, the track record, or the necessary recommendations.

Promotion of 'elite chunin' into the department should have passed over her. It had in the regular recruiting cycle.

Of course, then Ino had gone and fucked everything up.

It had been a late night out—the alcohol had been sweet but heady. She had been walking back humming to herself, when she had seen the man beating his son right there in the open, unafraid of censure, confident in his own perverted power.

The boy couldn't have been more than seven, too. He hadn't even begged for it to stop, only kept grasping at his father's pant leg, as though yearning for the one morsel of painless contact to ground himself. To survive the barrage.

Ino had entered the man's mind and broken him.

Unfortunately, Morino Ibiki (the man she knows now she had always hated, though she hadn't known it was him before, calling her father out every night) had seen it all.

Morino, the sick fuck, had calmly told her that he'd seen her break the law (apparently, what she should have done was call a military police force officer?). There had also been the slightly underage drinking. So, he posed, she could either get written up and risk jail-time—or he could negotiate a deal if she agreed to use her talents in a well-regulated setting.

And thus: just as her father had begun retreating from T&I, allowing a new generation to take his place, Ino had been handed the ugly, grey uniform after all.

Months had passed since. She still didn't know how to tell him; he came into their headquarters so rarely, it had been laughably easy avoiding him. Ino didn't want him to see her here, not when he had been so happy thinking she had escaped.

Also: it was a god ugly uniform. The fewer people who saw her in it, the better.

Really, Ino was confident she could pull off almost anything, but the baggy, grey button down jacket paired with loose grey pants did nothing for her. Worse, she wasn't allowed to wear earrings or any jewelry—apparently, those were too great a danger near high-risk prisoners determined to escape.

Ino felt suffocated here—unsexed, caged, leashed. If she dressed more flamboyantly these days than was practical on missions, it was because she felt it to be well-deserved compensation.

Ino knew she was pretty, and she liked flaunting it. She liked boys a lot, too (always had), and she liked when they looked at her like they hadn't seen anything so beautiful before. There was something especially exciting when daimyos' sons and courtiers knelt before her. For all the magnificent, unparalleled artwork around them, it was Ino they viewed as the exotic flower.

Yes, Ino liked being the most beautiful thing in the room. Which was why today had taken a turn for the worse the precise moment Hyuuga Neji had walked into their headquarters.

It was possibly a little known fact that Ino hated Neji. To be fair, there were very few circumstances where her animosity could come up. He was a jounin and she was still a chunin. They rarely encountered each other.

Just three years ago, Neji had merely been an uptight, cargo-shorts wearing prude. Sasuke had been the threat if at all, though his features were usually too contorted in annoyance for that to amount to much. He had been uptight as well, but the sexy kind of uptight; the kind that threatened to just say 'fuck it' and one day make him a rogue-nin. (Of course, it became very un-sexy when Sasuke went and did just that. And also when she had lost Sakura over him. They didn't talk much these days. Ino regretted that more than she did losing Sasuke.)

But Neji had to be a surprise, didn't he? In three years the older boy had gone on to make happy with Hinata, take a mild chill pill, and in thus doing, manage to fuck up everything for Ino.

Because in the last three years, Hyuuga Neji had (there was no other word for it) blossomed.

Ino surveyed him now as they waited for Morino to let them into the interrogation room. She still couldn't bring herself to deny it.

He was the stark opposite to her, skin pale where Ino was bronzed. His hair was a heavy curtain of midnight black-blue, unlike her blonde locks, though equally long. Where she was soft, gentle curves, he was prolonged, sloping lines and angles, an intricate composition of lean muscle and profound delicacy. If they stood side to side, she had no idea who would come out on top. She had no wish to find out.

To make matters worse, he looked otherworldly in his cream, kimono with billowing sleeves. His fashion sense, unfortunately, had also apparently improved with time.

She scowled to herself, wishing she could burn the grey clothes off her body right now.

The older boy's glance rested on her expression with indifference. "Yamanaka. I had no idea you worked here."

"Please, call me Ino," she responded dully. "It's a bit new. Just something I'm trying out."

"And how did you find yourself here?" Neji asked with distant politeness.

Thankfully, the door in front of them opened. She had been about to barf.

"Great," Morino grunted. "Glad you could make it here on such short notice, Hyuuga Neji."

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Morino-san. I always make time for matters that concern my clan. I am honored to represent them today in this capacity," Neji said, bowing. His hair looked silken as it slipped over his shoulder. Ino glared at it. What did he use? Freshly laid eggs? Milk? Honey from the heavens?

"Ino," she heard belatedly. Morino was snapping his hand in front of her face.

She sniffed. "What, old man?"

He looked frustratingly unbothered, though Neji's eyes narrowed disapprovingly. Still a prude.

"I've gotten all I can out of him. We need you to go one year back," the man instructed. "The seventh day of the seventh month of that year."

"Piece of cake," Ino muttered.

The worst thing was it was. She was unprecedentedly good at this (Morino's words, not her own).

She stalked into the room. The man was chained to a steel chair in the middle. He had clearly been roughed up, purple bruises and open wounds spotting every inch of skin that was visible.

He coughed, spitting up some blood onto the floor. "Ah," he began to leer, "aren't you a sight for sore eyes."

Ino giggled. "That's so sweet of you to say."

She could feel Neji's gaze on her, disapproving.

Without a further word, Morino shut the door behind them, leaving her in charge. He knew she got results; he would review the video tape later if he needed.

This left her in the middle of the room with Neji at its corner. She didn't exactly know why Neji was here, but apparently, somewhere, this man had made a powerful enemy in the Hyuuga.

"God, those tits," he grunted, shifting to lean closer. "Wish I could see them. Must be things of beauty."

Ino's smile twitched slightly. She hated that word—'tit.'

"They don't fit very well in the uniform," she pouted, leaning forward so that her hair just brushed the ends of his fingers. "The buttons are kind of…tight."

The man gave a small, nasty grin. He knew she wasn't the lascivious, airhead she was pretending to be; she knew he wasn't as enslaved to his cock as he was pretending to be. They were playing a game, and both knew it.

The difference was that he thought he could play it better. But he was wrong. Ino knew exactly how to do this.

The enemy-nin's gaze caught onto Neji exactly as she had guessed it would. "And who's that?" he grinned, revealing bloody teeth. "Boy or a girl? Fucking pretty too, huh."

"Boy," Ino said easily, sitting primly on the steel table she was supposed to interrogate him from. She smiled back at him. "Doesn't really matter to you, does it?"

"No," the man returned with a jeer. "It doesn't."

The older boy was beginning to look slightly pinched.

Ino rolled her eyes, then began to fold her sleeves up slightly. The motion brought the man's insincere attention back to her. "Going to hit me, darling?"

"Nope," she said with a smile. "That isn't really my style."

"Oh?" he indulged with a mocking smile. "What is your style, then?"

"Gentle persuasion. Also, it's Ino."

"Hiro," the man said with a flippant smirk. His gaze went calculatingly to the corner again. "His?"

Ino tilted her neck back, letting the light from the fluorescent lamp hanging above caress the column of her throat. She looked at Neji, letting her voice become throaty. "Neji. Speaking of which, why don't you step forward? We're feeling a bit lonely here."

Two spots of red appeared on Neji's face. Ino knew they were from fury. In the harsh light of the interrogation room, it only served to heighten his beauty, the stark pale against the pink-vermillion.

"My, my," the man returned flawlessly; his voice was a convincing rasp. "You are a pretty thing aren't you, Neji. I'd probably kill my own mother to get those lips around my cock."

"Hm," Ino hummed, drawing slightly closer to the prisoner. "I wonder if his cheeks would go red like that then, too."

"Yamanaka," Neji said tightly. "Stop."

The man's grin widened. Ino smirked behind the 'offended' hand at her mouth.

"Not used to this kind of thing, are you?" the man said lightly. His eyes were still calculating. Ino watched him with razor focus, though she pretended to play with her hair.

"He isn't," she agreed. "But he is very tempting, nevertheless. Or maybe because of it?"

"Because of it," the man agreed with a dark, knowing smile.

Ah, he still thought he was ahead of Ino.

"What would you do to him, if you could?" she asked innocently, biting her lower lip.

He raised an eyebrow at her, looking lazy for a moment before he switched seamlessly back into his lecherous persona. "Where to start. He's got a tight ass with slim hips like that. It'd be a true shame to loosen him."

"You think?" Ino pondered. She slipped off the chair and walked toward Neji. He watched her approach with a tight frown.

"What would you do, Ino-chan?" the prisoner asked with fake interest.

"Me?" she echoed. With quick fingers, she reached up and broke the tie holding Neji's hair together. His hair cascaded around him, thick, dark, and silken.

He gave an outraged hiss, but he was cornered by her body against the wall.

With a lone finger, she penetrated the space between two locks of hair, and then brushed just upward. The upper lock twisted sinuously through her fingers.

She turned to look at the prisoner. The man's cool gaze flickered between the shocked anger on Neji's face and the seductive twine of his hair around her fingers.

"I think you should loosen him, shinobi-san," Ino said quietly. "I think his mouth would slip open, making another pretty, pink hole, just like that. I think he would struggle to keep his moans inside, but he wouldn't be able to, with his mouth helplessly gaping like that."

The man didn't respond. He watched silently from the chair.

"Yamanaka," Neji snarled under his breath. "I don't care if I start a clan war, you are dead—"

She slipped her two fingers into his open mouth. He stopped abruptly, eyes flaring in incredulous rage. He looked almost too disbelieving of her gall to even move.

"I think you would wet your fingers just like this, and he would glare at you, furious, as he does now," Ino whispered. She used her other hand to grab Neji's hair and yank, just harshly enough. "And then you would pull his hair just like this, and he would keen for you—"

Neji's palms were glowing when they hit her hard in her midsection, with such devastating force, that she skidded all the way across the room until she collided with the table at its center. The steel table was nailed to the ground and, still, the nails protested under the duress forced on them, making a high-pitched screeching noise.

Ino let herself lean against the table's surface, elbows level with its surface and face contorted slightly with pain. Her hair had become unkempt too, she knew, slipping in tendrils from her own hair tie.

"I think he would play rough with you, shinobi-san," Ino moaned. She pushed against the surface and slid behind the prisoner, dropping her head to relay her words just by his ear.

"Look at him," she instructed in a murmur. "Isn't he the most beautiful thing you've ever seen? Those coveted, Hyuuga eyes glaring up at you as you would fill his mouth. As pale as he is, but his cheeks flushed with so much vitriol—"

And there, for the first time—for just an instant—instinctive, visceral lust flickered through the prisoner's eyes.

Ino sneered openly now. "Got you."

She made the hand signs and, in the brief instant of weakness birthed by his authentic lust, it was child's play to break into his mind and take over.

In seconds, she had what she needed.

Hiro was mindless with anger in his chair, pulling furiously against his chains. Pain pulled at his features, because Ino had not been gentle.

"You fucking bitch," he spat, saliva dripping from his mouth. "You fucking cunt—"

Ino glared. She hated that word too.

"After you, Neji-san," Ino said lightly, holding open the door. He didn't move as quickly as she would have liked, and so she went through anyway and let go of the door.

An instant later, she heard the door shut behind her. Another, and there was a body blocking her path.

"What just happened in there?" Neji asked, features cold.

Ino looked at him. "Lust tends to make minds vulnerable," she explained monotonously, "especially for shinobi like him, who train to reject every other emotion but choose to indulge in sex; when they feel sexual hunger—one of the few emotions they allow—it feels all the more potent to them, leaves them all the more crippled, because their minds are otherwise so undisciplined in operating with emotion."

"That may be the case," Neji returned cuttingly, "but that does not explain why you chose to exploit me in that manner. You very well know that was not my intended purpose in the room, whatever your ulterior motives."

"I have no idea why you were in the room with me. To ensure T&I was doing its best with your sworn enemy? I don't care," Ino snapped back. "But I did my job in there. We have many, many prisoners here, Hyuga-san, and my duty is to break them as quickly as I can. You were there. I used you. I played the heavy-handed femme fatale; he knew to guard himself against me. But in my heavy-handedness, I also made you seem all the more appealing, all the more credible; it made him vulnerable to you, because all your reactions were authentic. You sped up the work greatly."

His face was unreadable, now.

She drew back after a moment. "I am sorry," she said bluntly. "That I made you feel uncomfortable with my words. And for sticking my fingers in your mouth. And for…pulling your hair. I would have asked for your permission ahead of time, if that wouldn't have ruined the overall effect. I am willing to…compensate you for that, as long as what you decide it is reasonable. You can also write me up for unethical conduct; I won't stop you."

The older boy looked like a statue, now, for all that Ino could comprehend of his motives and thoughts from his face.

She sighed wearily. "Alright. If it needs to be the face, then it needs to be the face. But let me know, so I can clench my teeth ahead of time."

When he moved toward in her a sudden burst of motion, she locked her teeth together and shut her eyes.

She opened them a second later when she felt hands on her abdomen. Without causing pain. If anything, the area was starting to feel better.

"Are you…" Ino felt very disturbed. "Healing me?"

"My cousin taught me the basics."

"Why?" she asked, eyebrows climbing to the top of her forehead.

"I thought it would be useful."

"No—why are you healing me?"

Neji looked at her, unblinking. "Because you thought you were doing your job. I didn't, and I hurt you for it."

"Of course I was—" Ino cut herself off, gaze narrowing. "What do you mean thought?"

"You were doing your job," Neji allowed after a moment. "You were also unaware of what…I knew. I didn't realize that."

Ino was lost now. "What the hell are you talking about?"

The older boy looked down at her, silken hair still curtained around his pale, aristocratic features. "As you may know, the byakugan allows its user to see into the intricate mechanisms of the human body."

"Yes, yes," she waved off, "we all learned this in the academy."

"We can sense heartbeats, sense lies," Neji paused for a moment. "We can also learn, with time, to recognize…certain responses."

Ino stilled. Her ears were filled with a rushing noise, like she had been caught out, before she even knew what the ludicrous charge was.

"Oh?" she demanded. "And what did you see?"

"Yamanaka-san," Neji said after another brief pause. "You became wet."

What.

"What."

"Between your legs." As if that was the part that needed clarification.

She went deaf for a moment—the sound of the air-conditioning whirring, the rustle of leaves in the breeze outside the window—nothing.

"The hell?!" she snarled. God, she was going to slam that pretty boy against the wall. "Do you fucking get off on lies? You think I like non-consensual bad touches? Or are you going to say it's when you shoved me? News flash, that's called acting. I didn't like that any more than I did when—"

"It occurred," the older boy interrupted calmly, "when you touched my hair."

Well, she didn't have a fucking hair fetish either. Ino broke off, calming down abruptly as reason returned to her brain. "Look, you're beautiful. I won't deny it. But actually, I hate you because of it. So there's really no way I'd ever—"

She stopped when a hand, pale and slim, reached up and embedded itself in the roots of her hair. After a brief pause, he moved his hand parallel to the ground, pulling the strands gently with him so that they fanned out before falling again.

"Again," he said calmly.

"No." It had. This time, she had felt it. A hot, molten pulse between her thighs. God, Ino thought, could this day get any worse?

"Also, when I touched you to heal your abdomen," he added.

"Fuck you," she responded, equally determinedly.

He looked at her coolly for a long, examining moment. Then: "Possibly. Only after a considerable amount of consideration and some time."

Ino gaped. Where the hell had the prudish, virginal Neji gone? Wasn't she supposed to be the sex fiend? God, she had even considered fucking Shikamaru at one point during a dry spell (speaking of which, she could hardly live it down now). But this—no. This was the line. There had to be a line.

She couldn't fuck someone prettier than her. An ego like Ino's wouldn't be able to take that kind of blow. Never.

"Never," she vowed, staggering back. She must have looked terrified. Her eyelids hurt from her eyes being so wide.

"Hm," Neji hummed. It wasn't in agreement. If anything, he looked mildly arrogant now, like he had been posed with an intriguing challenge.

Fuck.

T&I was intended to be Ino's personal hell, wasn't it?

She should have just done the easy thing and gone to jail.

Chapter 12: Rounds

"This is such a waste of time," she heard someone mutter behind her. "Cover for me. I'm going to slip out the back—"

"This is a mandatory training all shinobi must go through to remain a part of the hokage's forces. No need to whisper, you are entirely free to leave. Just make sure you take your hitai-ate off first."

Despite the coolly delivered threat, the room's inhabitants still darted skeptical looks at each other. Sakura commiserated. Really—had no other shinobi-owned space been free other than a classroom in the Academy for this particular 'training'?

Perhaps, Tsunade truly was that sadistic.

Her gaze passed over her fellow members in Team Seven, then Team Eight, Team Ten, and Team Guy. All that was missing from the scenery was Iruka. And, in point of fact, every few seconds Kiba would peek over his shoulder—like he was concerned the teacher might just pop out of the wall work, catch him unawares, and smack him with a folder like he used to on a daily basis.

"Why is Team Guy here?" Naruto pondered moodily. "Didn't they have to do this last year?"

Sai's mouth twitched. "They must have missed the date last year due to a mission, like I did."

Naruto gave an annoyed groan beside them. Unfortunately, the noise was loud enough to catch the attention of their 'instructor.'

"You," the man said, his silky voice grating against Sakura's ears much like a too-sweet dessert. "Since you have so much to say, I'll leave it to you to introduce the topic of today's training."

Kiba was abruptly assailed by a loud coughing fit. Shino patted his back stoically.

Naruto's face scrunched into a look of intense concentration. "…when two people like each other very much—"

The instructor didn't bother letting him finish.

"You?"

Sai's head lifted, his face unreadable. "The topic of today's conversation is sex, an issue I have found inexplicably makes many of my peers bashful, though I am sure they regularly engage in said activity. I have also found, in my experience, that definitions are often subjective determinations," He added after a short pause. "I once read that everything in the world is about sex except sex, and that sex itself is ultimately about power. If this is in fact the case, then I suppose today's discussion will translate into a discussion on the nature of power."

"Is that so? Yes, I suppose many scholars have indeed found sex and power to be…inextricable," the instructor commented softly, eyes glinting.

It was a dangerous line of thought, Sakura realized too late. Her lips throbbed in hateful remembrance.

Fuck. And she had thought she had managed to wipe it from her mind entirely.

It had been two nights since she had returned home with a drenched uniform cold as ice, the door still swinging shut behind her as she made the hand signs to remove her disguise (sloppy, she knew, but at the moment, she could not bring herself to care). Two nights, since she had pulled off her uniform and tossed it into the corner of the room. Undid the binding around her chest. Filled the tub in her cramped bathroom to near the top. Leaned back, letting her head partially submerge in the water, just until her ears.

Forgotten shortly after. Now, her mind suddenly wouldn't let her ignore it any longer—mysteriously prompted again—and turned the puzzle over with almost manic energy.

The theory wasn't implausible, was it? It had long seemed to Sakura that the copy-nin was a force, almost above all else, of arrogance and egotism. Perhaps, his….actions had in fact been driven by some impulse to overpower her, to resort to other means when fists had failed. She would be remiss, after all, to forget the oiran, and how he had taken her: obligatorily, meaninglessly. Why did the copy-nin touch an oiran in the first place, if not to exert his power over a being obligated to comply—

"Move."

Her lips tightened. A soft imperative, which from any other would have been a man begging a boy to save his own life—but not Kakashi, because that simply did not make sense, did it? And what place exactly, Sakura reflected coldly, did that admitted oddity have in this?

"For civilians, we may settle this as a matter of opinion," the instructor said nonchalantly—she blinked, having managed to forget where she was—"As shinobi, however, what is true is that you will face sex as an instrument of power; it will be weaponized against you."

"As you all know," he continued smoothly, "there are shinobi branches that utilize and practice seduction for the purposes of information gathering and assassination. Konoha, as it happens, is one of them—it is the branch I belong to and, perhaps, one that some of you may join in the future."

Based on the discomfited expressions of the particular people in the room, this appeared generally unlikely.

"Sex may also, however, be weaponized against you far more literally—and I use the term 'sex' loosely here," he continued, still remarkably calm. "That is, as a form of violence and a means of denigrating your person—without any pretense or appeal to your consent. I am here to warn you. At worst, to prepare you."

Her gaze shot up as the instructor pivoted and walked slowly through the aisle in the middle of the room. "A common misconception," he continued quietly, "is that women alone are victims of sexual assault. If you believe this, I will have to disillusion you: the kind that engages in such behavior often does not care to discriminate."

Finally, the instructor had every member of the room watching him with rapt, grim fascination.

"Whatever gender you ascribe to, you are not impervious."

He gave a humorless smile. "Now that I finally have your full attention, let us begin."

Two hours later, Sakura and Naruto sat on either side of Sai at the counter of Ichiraku Ramen. Unlike usual, their group was entirely silent.

His words had been enough, hadn't they? To bludgeon reality over them all—and there had been so much blindness in that room, her own too, conveniently pretending what had almost happened hadn't.

Caught unawares, without weapons, thirteen and ill-prepared—civilians, not shinobi, but that mattered little. She hadn't been able to handle the reality of it then, so she'd buried it within her, housed it inside like a hidden shard that only grew sharper with time.

It pierced her again, now, as keenly as kunai blade deep within where she could not soothe the pain.

Lighthearted conversation and laughter drifted around them, but Sakura felt largely distanced from it. Lifting her gaze from her bowl of ramen felt like lifting a tree with the effort it suddenly required, when she finished her meal. She made brief eye contact with Teuchi, who shot her a look of concern before directing his gaze meaningfully to Naruto.

Sakura surveyed her fellow teammate and understood. Naruto had barely even stirred the spoon in his still-full bowl. They sat in silence for some time more, until Naruto himself broke the silence.

"That was…" he began, quietly.

Sakura nodded, unsure what to say in response. The training had been eye-opening for everyone, if in different ways—all sobering.

Her gaze flitted over the restaurant, before following the trail of condensation her glass had made as it was placed in front of her. A minute movement to the left suddenly caught her attention. It took her a moment to realize what she was looking at.

Then, her focus zeroed in on the way Sai's too-pale hands gripped the bowl in front of him. And the way they trembled, just ever so slightly.

She looked now slowly upwards from beneath her lashes. Had they been like that the entire time?

The horrible, unspeakable tightness only continued to gather in her chest.

She heard a shattering sound. Oh—that had been her. Her hand, which had been clutching the bowl, had clenched too tightly.

"Who?" Her voice was deathly quiet.

He jerked like he had been electrocuted, eyes widening.

For a long moment, it looked as though he would deny it altogether, plastering yet another plastic smile on his face. But then, consideringly, his glance flickered between her and Naruto.

"A woman," Sai said finally, blankly. He blinked again, looking down at his hands as though he were seeing them for the first time. "It was not like that. I agreed to it. I didn't find it enjoyable, certainly, but then—until fairly recently, I had thought it impossible for my body to even derive pleasure from sex with another person."

Naruto's eyes were slitted, his fingers curled into tight fists. It had been part of a mission, Sakura read between the lines.

"But you're not part of the seduction branch."

It didn't take a genius to figure out that Sai lacked the necessary social skills to have been that type of black ops member.

Sai's coal black eyes drilled into her.

No words had to pass between them.

Whatever line of work Sai had belonged to, it had been the dark underbelly of Konoha's operations, under the radar and unregulated. There had been no training, no vetting, nothing. And that was saying something, given what Sakura had already found to be the case in ANBU.

As children, they had all been told that the mysterious, masked ANBU—while enigmatic and frightening to the common citizen of Konoha—were the trusted confidantes of the hokages: eyes, ears, and, indeed, extension of heart. The hokage alone was supposed to know the faces behind the masks, the ANBU as the humans they were: their histories and their personal sacrifices for their village, when no public monument could recognize them.

Sakura knew now, of course, that this wasn't the exact case. She had no clue what went on with the captains—but she knew none of her peers met with the hokage on a personal basis. Pointedly, the organization was simply too big for Tsunade, or any hokage, to micromanage and track every ANBU to that mythologized extent. What Tsunade knew in detail was no doubt determined by a need-to-know basis, given how spread thin she was.

And look what had managed to slip through the cracks. Her teeth bit into her lip, drawing the iron taste of blood to her tongue.

"I know you can't tell us about your…background," Sakura said lowly, turning to face Sai fully.

"We'll figure it out ourselves." Naruto's back was ramrod straight, as stiff as though a string had been drawn up from his tailbone through to the top of his head.

Sai's mouth parted slightly, a small sound escaping. His eyes widened, as though shocked by the involuntary noise.

"And what if…" He paused, face smoothing. "What if what you learn changes what you may think of me."

Sai seemed to be under the misapprehension that whatever his teammates had thought of him so far had been generally positive. She didn't bother correcting him.

His face tensed as Naruto gripped his shoulder with bruising strength.

"We don't care," Naruto said slowly, vehemently. His blue eyes blazed. "What happened in the past doesn't matter."

Sakura blinked. Naruto's gaze slid to her and he stared at her fiercely, daring her to—she didn't know.

She removed her hand from the counter and, after a moment of hesitation, slipped it down to near her side. Curling, she slid her fingers into the cool, smooth ones next to hers. She didn't look away from the bowl in front of her as she did it, face stoic. But she felt the pulse of breath beside her stutter. After a moment, the fingers entwined in hers tightened their hold.

They finished the meal with no more conversation, parting ways silently just as it became twilight.

The next day, Sakura received summons via the crow.

But of all the things she had expected, the last perhaps was the sea of individuals crowded in the locker rooms when she arrived. Sakura had been prepared to charge directly to her assigned locker to pull on her armor for another unsavory mission. Shortly after entering, she realized that would be patently impossible.

The room was packed beyond the point of maximum capacity, the conversation between its numerous inmates culminating into something deafening. The movement of bodies eventually moved her in an entirely different direction than she had originally intended. Fortunately, it was there that she found Hyena and Snail.

"What's going on?" she demanded, shooting a glare as she was knocked forward once more.

"Rounds," Hyena answered shortly, tying her hair up with a leather band with sharp, economic twists of her wrist.

"Rounds. What are…rounds?"

"Black ops members have to periodically defend their positions in ANBU," Snail explained delicately. "So we have rounds of spars in the training stadium without warning few times a year."

"To determine fitness," Hyena summarized shortly, rolling her shoulders as though already priming her body. "Weed out the weak; reshuffle, if appropriate, those who stay."

"And every ANBU member has to go through this?" Sakura demanded.

"Not every person," Snail allowed. "I suppose the captains have their own system among themselves."

"But for the rest of us, yes," finished Hyena. "So you better get armor on." She handed Sakura what seemed like a spare set from her locker.

Sakura strapped them on blindly. A thought suddenly occurred to her, and her eyes widened. "Wait. So that means I could be moved off of this team?"

Hyena looked at her strangely for her tone. "If you don't perform to standards."

"And what will happen then?"

"You don't need to be concerned, Crow-chan, you'll do fine!" Snail said with a cheerful punch to her shoulder. After a moment, she let her hand swing down. "You definitely won't be kicked out—that only happens to ANBU who are no longer physically capable of the role, and you still have all your body parts."

"My bet? You'll be booted off to a lower team," a new voice added—Bear, Sakura's identified sourly—"Don't know how you got here, Crow, but you're certainly going to face the due trial by fire now."

Sakura shrugged dismissively, eyes narrowed from behind her mask. Get booted off to a lower team? Excellent.

A loud bell rang through the room, cutting through the noise easily.

Snail nudged her. "People are heading out now. Finish strapping up and follow."

Nodding, Sakura finished tying her arm guards and fell into line behind her other teammates. They crossed through the lobby she had entered just ten minutes ago into the other section of the headquarters, which housed a giant stadium (that she had until now wondered at its purpose entirely).

When they entered, Sakura's mouth fell open.

Had she thought the locker rooms had contained all the ANBU? Clearly, most had already entered the stadium. Not all the seats were filled, but there were certainly more ANBU gathered in one place than she had ever seen in her life.

"So how does this work," Sakura muttered, still gaping. "Is there one bout at a time? Who chooses who you fight?"

"It's randomized," Hyena muttered back, leading them to where Raccoon sat. "And there are usually four to five spars at one time."

"Or we'd never fucking get out of here," Bear grunted.

"We each do three bouts in a row, short breaks in between of course," Snail explained cheerily. She pointed downwards where a long line of ANBU sat separate from the normal stadium seat, looking directly onto the fighting grounds. "After, the captains vote on whether or not we stay. If yes, then they decide where we go until the next rounds."

Hyena settled down into her seat with a short sigh of relief, rubbing her recently sprained ankle. She saw Sakura watching and added briefly, "Any of the captains can make a bid on you if they think you're more suitable for their team. Your current team captain can argue to keep you or let you go. They argue their cases before the group, but ultimately, all the captains vote, and majority decides."

"Ah," Sakura said, leaning back.

One of the figures among the captains stood up, and the stadium fell into silence.

"Some of you have been here for years; for others, this is your first time going through rounds. No matter the outcome, know that in carrying the will of fire, your past year of service has been—"

"Always wondered why he's commander," Bear said, bumping shoulders with Raccoon for all the world like he was at the movie theaters, talking just quietly enough so as not to get shushed. "You know?"

"Everyone knows you don't put your best soldier anywhere other than at the center of the battlefield," Raccoon offered without pause, as though he'd answered this question many times. After a short pause, he added. "Plus, the taichou is…young. He might have more experience than most of us, but—"

"He hasn't been alive long enough to match the commander's years," Hyena finished, nodding in agreement.

Sakura's scowled, so grateful for yet another reminder of how 'prodigious' their precious taichou was. She tapped her fingers lightly against her knees. "So…how many rounds have you been through?"

All four turned to look at her in one, eerily synchronized motion.

"Five under the copy-nin," Hyena answered first. "Fifteen or so before that."

"Five as well, twenty before that," said Snail.

Bear soundlessly held both hands with all fingers stretched. He didn't offer anything else.

Raccoon leaned toward her so that she could hear his muffled words. "Two with this team," she heard. "Twelve before."

In case it had been uncertain before, it was abundantly clear now how much her teammates' experience outclassed hers.

"Why am I on this team again?" she asked aloud.

No one was able to answer her.

"It's not that you're not an excellent shinobi, Crow-chan," Snail explained hurriedly. "It's just that, well, on the past few missions most of us have each been doing our own thing. None of us have really had the chance to observe the full extent of your skills."

"As I said," Bear said, the pleasure in his voice gratingly apparent, "there's no time like the present."

Sakura cracked her neck and shifted to look back to the fighting grounds. The commander had apparently just finished his speech and was in the process of sitting back down. Just as five pairs of names flashed on the screen, the large brass doors to the stadium cracked open again to admit one more figure.

Mismatched eyes scanned the crowds of ANBU—who abruptly went silent, even more quickly than they had for the commander—before he shunshined to an empty seat on the judging panel and reclined into his seat. His temperament was one of a predator long impatient with complacency, feet on the long table but vibrating with pent up energy.

It would take an idiot to miss that this was the last place the copy-nin wanted to be right now.

Sakura's mouth went tight at the first sight of Kakashi in days. He hadn't even bothered to wear the ANBU mask—not that it mattered much, she realized after a moment. It wasn't like he ever bothered to disguise his hair.

They all watched as the commander shifted in his chair to say something to Kakashi. But the copy-nin barely even tilted his head to acknowledge the words, attention seemingly focused somewhere else. After a moment, the commander appeared to give up and shifted to the center of his seat again.

"Are the combatants ready?" the older man boomed.

Ten figures walked onto the fighting grounds in response.

Shinobi on either side of the stadium erected tall barriers, protecting the audience from the combatants and the respective fights from interfering with each other.

Coins were handed out to each pair, and then flipped. Genjutsu, taijustsu, ninjutsu, or kenjutsu, Sakura noted, were spar options given to the combatants.

And then the rounds began.

Randomization, she learned soon, was both a good thing and a bad thing. Some of the pairs on the grounds proved themselves to be so unevenly matched that the spar ended in less than a minute. Others, however, suffered from the lack of disparity and dragged on for almost half an hour.

By noon Sakura was stir-crazy, ready to create a small explosion so that she could escape and grab something to fill her stomach. She regretted immensely now skipping breakfast that morning.

Snail's stomach grumbled loudly beside hers as well. She rubbed it apologetically.

Protein bars were passed around.

By mid-afternoon, only Raccoon had been called to the fighting grounds. He had won the first coin toss and finished a taijutsu bout with fair ease. The second, though, had been rougher—kenjutsu and not his choice; his opponent, a heavy-set man wielding a blade the width of Raccoon himself, had emerged the winner. But at the third bout, she had learned that ninjutsu was, in fact, Raccoon's real forte.

"Will he be alright?" she heard Bear ask Hyena.

She had nodded without hesitation. "His ninjutsu is good enough to compensate for his kenjutsu. No one's going to take him if taichou makes it clear he wants him to stay."

Whether Kakashi had, in fact, 'made it clear' was a bit suspect to Sakura. In truth, the commander had seemingly directed another question to the copy-nin again, Kakashi had not responded, and no one else at the table had consequently bothered to speak up.

So, on Kakashi's team Raccoon apparently stayed.

By early evening, the sky outside had deepened into the purple-pink-orange of twilight. With the dimmed lighting where they were sitting, it was easy, somehow despite the noise, for Sakura to imagine herself comfortably in her own room, just about to sleep. (She was…tired.) The sounds were loud but also fairly repetitive—white noise, really.

The spars in front of her all started to become the same.

She didn't exactly remember when she fell asleep. In truth, she wasn't really surprised that she had; she hadn't been getting much sleep the past few nights, for some reason or the other.

Next thing she knew, she was being roughly jabbed awake, from both sides of her.

"Huh?" she grunted, snapping up in her seat. "What?"

Bear looked at her like she'd been running around with her head cut off.

"The board," Hyena hissed, looking both mildly concerned and generally disapproving.

Her gaze snapped downwards and landed on the list of the next ten names.

Hers was listed there.

"Oh," she sighed tiredly. "Right, then."

Swinging herself onto the staircase, she didn't bother to shunshin and merely walked the rest of the way down. In the distance, she could see another figure already where she was supposed to be.

Sighing again, she hastened her pace.

As she stepped onto the fighting grounds, the full force of the stadium lights beat down on her. Sakura grimaced with discomfort; the sheer heat radiating from the strength of the light was a force to reckon with.

There was also—uncomfortably—a sort of nervous energy in the air, which she hadn't been able to feel from where she had been sitting, distant from the action. She felt it now. The hairs on her arms pricked and blood started pumping heavily through her body.

The Voice growled in her head, emerging from total silence without warning. She hissed warningly under breath back at it—no need to get excited, she wasn't letting it out now.

Tightening her arm guards, she didn't quite look at her opponent yet, looking instead to the two names blazoned above the part of the grounds sectioned off to them.

Crow vs. Robin

Her eyes moved downwards to the ANBU in question.

Well, she knew why he was called Robin now. He had shoulder length red hair that gleamed in the light like flashing silk. It looked…oddly familiar, actually—

"No," Sakura whispered aloud. She took a stumbling step back.

But she couldn't unsee it now. She blinked rapidly.

It was the same exact color.

"Hey there, Crow," Robin greeted, shrugging his shoulders. "You look around my age. But…"

He was seemed a few years older than her. Just like Noriko had been. Sakura's hands trembled at her sides.

"As your senior, I think I'll pick first," he said with a wink. He gestured to the shinobi handling the coin toss. "Heads."

The shinobi threw the coin and snatched it from the air in a blink of an eyes. The head of the hokage gleamed brightly.

"Taijutsu," Robin decided affably.

Sakura couldn't move her eyes off him, completely oblivious to all the other coin tosses going on around them. Eventually, a dull gong rang through the stadium, signifying the start of the spars.

"Ready?" the young man asked, a smirk in his voice. He didn't wait for an answer. In an instant, his entire form was a blur. A blur that was rushing toward her.

And all Sakura could see was the ghostly mirage of Noriko's face manifesting above his mask, just because he had similar fucking hair.

Move, you worthless carcass, the Voice snarled.

Sakura blinked dazedly, but it was too late. A fist landed in her stomach and sent her careening into the opposite of the stadium. Metal railing crumpled beneath her back. The air rushed out of her as pain seeped in.

She was shaken. Sakura had a spare moment to curse beneath her breath, before Robin was on her again.

He was quick—but not that quick, not really. Certainly not near the quickest she had ever faced. But each time he twisted, the air catching strands of his hair to send them fanning out, Sakura felt like a boulder had been dropped on her all over again, and she was dazed, and precious seconds went by, and—

Wow. She hadn't gotten her ass kicked like this in a long time.

And it was the truth—she was getting her ass kicked.

You worthless piece of shit, what is the point of you if you can't even handle shit like this yourself? LET ME OUT! LET ME—

Sakura, out of the sheer rage the Voice managed to incite in her, found some clarity and landed a few well-placed blows at key points in Robin's midsection.

But they lacked her usual strength, because still, some part of her couldn't let go. And when she looked up again—a terrible, fatal mistake—it was Noriko's dying face that look back at her, a beaming smile drowning in tears.

Sakura groaned.

A fist landed soundly, truly solidly, planting into the side of her head. The force of it vibrated through her entire body, but Sakura was oblivious to it—only knew that her vision was going black.

When light returned, she was blinking up at the towering dome of the stadium.

"Robin, 1 win, Crow, 0 wins!" she heard a woman cry out.

A hand manifested above her. She gazed blankly at it. After a moment, it reached down and heaved her up.

Sakura managed to land on her feet. Everything around her, however, was a deluge of sensory and auditory information she had trouble processing.

"Stadium locker rooms," she heard someone say. "Until you're called for the next bout."

Robotically, she followed the figure ahead of her to a set of doors tucked into one of the walls. She kept her eyes on her feet and very carefully did not look at his hair. The brass doors opened and closed with a small creak of protest. And then she was in silence, in a cool, dark room, where there was a table filled with bandages.

"So," the ANBU next to her began with a slow smile. "No hard feelings?"

Sakura focused hard on his voice. A little higher than that of a fully grown man—but definitely lower than Noriko's. This was just another shinobi with dark red hair. It was just dark red hair; she'd seen other people with red hair after Noriko and hadn't reacted like this. Why the fuck now?

Inhaling, Sakura steeled herself and then looked up. Her vision swam.

"No hard feelings," she returned, looking down again.

He gave a short laugh. "Great. Have to say though, I wiped the floor with you—"

He broke off, his gaze widening at something behind her. Sakura twisted to follow his glance and then froze.

Tremulous awe glowed in Robin's eyes. "Sir, it is an honor to finally meet you."

"Scram." The word emerged in a dark rasp. Sakura grew even stiffer.

As for Robin—she wasn't sure what the ANBU thought. Whatever it was, he blinked for a few seconds in confusion. Then, the request processed. With a swift bow and a suspicious glance her way, Robin exited the room.

Sakura looked back at Kakashi with ire, waiting. "What?" she demanded finally, tone flat.

Another she hadn't really expected today was—this. Kakashi shoving her roughly into the lockers.

"What the fuck was that out there?" A guttural demand, harsh on her ears.

"Excuse me?" she gasped, mostly from incredulity.

She lifted her hands and shoved him back—he skidded a few inches. "Who the hell do you think you are?"

"I'm your captain," he said coldly back. "And you answer to me."

Sakura let out a harsh bark of laughter. "You think I give a fuck what you think?"

The Voice seared through her veins, and for one terrible moment, Sakura couldn't quite draw the line between it and herself.

Fingers clenched her chin beneath the surface of her mask, pulling her forward. And then the heat of him—the heat of his rage—scalded her there first, spreading after until her whole face felt like it was burning.

"Is that so?" he mocked, his voice low and dark. "And where was this when that dime-a-dozen was tossing you around?"

Sakura stared up at him, speechless, and then pulled back, shoving his hand away from her. "Why do you even care?" she snapped. "I can count the number of times you've spoken to me—"

The fingers on her chin tightened their hold warningly.

"Drop it," Sakura gritted out.

"Maybe I was unclear before," Kakashi told her. "You answer to me, shinobi."

Sakura was breathless with fury.

"You want to know the truth so badly?" she said, eyes spitting venom. "It's as simple as this: I saw a ghost."

Her throat closed getting the words out.

Kakashi's expression did not shift, didn't reveal even the minutest twitch of the eye.

Her eyes stung fiercely and she shoved against the copy-nin, driving him into the opposite row of lockers, hands knotted in his flak jacket. "Did you hear me?" she grunted out, "I said I saw a ghost. Someone I killed. Right fucking there. Haunting me."

His hands snapped to her wrists. Not pulling, not yet. But enough to make her feel his strength.

Her mouth was coated with blood—probably her teeth too—and she knew the same dark brown-red dripped from her nose, but she couldn't feel any of those things just now. Not really. She only felt hate. And, perhaps, a terrible, agonizing emptiness where happiness and peace once could have been.

"Don't pretend now, taichou, that you don't know what that's like," Sakura whispered, mouth trembling. "Don't."

Kakashi's dark grey and red eyes traced the pattern on her mask.

"Pretend?" he said tonelessly.

"That I wasn't there," she hissed, and her diaphragm was twitching now—struggling—couldn't find its proper rhythm.

She didn't get to gloat over his response—didn't even get to look at his face to see if there was any. Something was crumbling inside her, an inestimable force wreaking havoc on her insides suddenly. Sakura doubled over, not knowing how to fight it when it was herself, trying her best to hold herself together. Her forehead scraped against the rough material of flak jacket.

He'd felt this too. She knew he had. This feeling, like there was no more air left. Or maybe that there never had been, and she'd just been pretending the whole time.

But all the while, he felt like a wall of stone, his hands still circled like chains around her wrists.

Sakura closed her eyes, fighting for breath fiercely, fighting the pain. "You're going to deny it?"

With difficulty, she craned her head upward—unable yet to straighten her back—to survey him.

"Stop rambling," he said tightly, controlled.

"Rambling," she smiled humorlessly. Then, her mouth flattened, and her eyes were stony. Because she knew he was lying. She knew it.

His voice may have been controlled. But his gaze revealed everything.

"Fine," she said softly. "You want me to win? I'll win the next two in less than a minute: kenjutsu, genjutsu, taijutsu, ninjutsu, it doesn't matter. I'll do it."

Sakura used the hold he still had on her to yank him closer, until his eyes were level with hers and nothing so arbitrary as height could distance them any longer.

"And when I'm back on the team, I'll have all the time in the world to make you tell the truth."

Chapter 13: Scalded

Sakura stilled, the tendons in her forearm tensed as she held the chokuto's edge a scarce millimeter from skin.

The world was silent around her. She watched the pale column of skin beneath the blade retreat—swallowing, some part of her remembered—with rapt attention.

Then, slowly, sound filtered in: shouts from the crowd, the sound of mouths chewing on ration bars, the clangs and thuds from the other fights around them.

"Crow, two wins, Mouse, two wins!"

Sakura blinked. It took her another moment to pull back the blade and offer a hand to the newly-dubbed Mouse. The man ignored it and flipped into a low crouch before standing.

The shinobi who had announced their respective standing scores gestured them to the space in front of the long platform where the ANBU captains sat.

"Wait there until the other matches are finished," she said brusquely. Sakura and Mouse made their way to where she had indicated.

Mouse watched the other matches intently as they waited. Sakura, in the same time, struggled to make sense of what had happened the last two matches. She had vowed to both win and finish the bouts in less than a minute. She hadn't expected this drive to inadvertently catapult her into such a bizarre headspace, where now she could scarcely even recall the details of what had went down. She had been hyper-focusing—myopic, and now distance somehow made what she had been looking at blurry.

Almost fifteen minutes went by before the sound of the gong being struck thundered through the stadium, announcing that everyone in Sakura's set of bouts had all finished their assigned three. Nine other individuals lined up alongside her.

She fought to keep her frame steady and unflinching when Robin sidled up next to her.

"Hey you," he said lazily, "You know, I think this might just be the year the copy-nin takes me. Speaking of which, how did that chat go? Didn't look too good when I left."

Sakura shrugged in response, gaze drilling straight forward.

An ANBU with a monkey mask, who stood at the very right end of the line, was the first to go. Her score was announced—one win, two losses—and then her time in ANBU—four months. Following a gesture from the commander, the captains began their discussion.

The noise of the stadium was enough that their words had been impossible to hear from the seats; but here, every word was perfectly audible, to all ten of them. Monkey hadn't done any worse than most of the first year ANBU, but the captains didn't hold back in highlighting the flaws of her fights. In the end, both her current captain and two others made bids for her.

When the matter was settled, the captains' attention went to the ANBU to the left of her. Sakura realized, a little too belatedly, that this ordering meant she would be the last to go.

She stared stoically at a beam holding the dome aloft as she waited (she was very carefully not glancing at Kakashi). It was easy to ignore the proceedings—that was, until the captains' next subject was the figure next to her.

Robin straightened to his full height.

"Robin, three wins and no losses," the commander announced as prologue to the discussion.

"Damn right," the redhead beside her murmured, voice thick with satisfaction.

"Strong candidate," a clinical, yet melodious voice noted. "Won in taijutsu, ninjutsu, and then kenjutsu—clearly well-balanced."

"He's young too," another captain said bluntly. "A good part of his tenure is still ahead of him."

A few other captains chipped in with similar remarks, while the others nodded in silence.

A female captain with a cat mask swiftly prompted. "Who's interested?"

"I'll take him," the same woman with the clinical tone offered. "I could use someone as versatile as he is."

"His strength merits a higher level team," another captain argued.

"He is very strong," the commander nodded slowly.

"My team has been down one since Squirrel retired," a new voice intoned. "I could take him in."

"Perhaps," the commander said ambivalently. "But now that I think about it, that team of his would be a good place…"

All of the captains—and all ten ANBU lined up before them—shifted to see who he was talking about.

Kakashi's head rolled carelessly to meet the address. "Did you say something?"

The commander didn't even blink. "That kid," the older man repeated, deep bass voice resonating, "he should be placed on your team."

If it were possible, Robin's back straightened even more beside her. Sakura watched as Kakashi's mismatched eyes narrowed above his exposed black mask. He didn't even bother looking at the ANBU in question.

"No."

"Excuse me?" the commander said, tone flat. It wasn't a question.

"It appears you're becoming hard of hearing in your advanced years," Kakashi drawled disinterestedly. His tone became a fraction deadlier. "I said no."

Robin's shoulders were tight now.

"And as you are well-aware, this is a democratic process," the commander responded icily. "One in which my opinion has weighty influence over that of others', because they trust my judgement, my years of experience. So you will have to convince the council of your peers—by which I mean, you will first have to convince me—if you want anything else, Kakashi."

"My team already has six members."

"At least one spot has marked itself so far as ripe for switching."

The copy-nin's demeanor appeared to become even more irreverent. "Oh?"

"I believe he's referring to Crow," the woman with the cat mask offered lightly, abundantly aware that her fellow captain was already aware. For the benefit of the rest of the captains, ostensibly, she pointed at Sakura.

Sakura stared at the lone finger pointed in her direction, glum. Yes, she'd initially wanted to get kicked off Kakashi's team. But then, in the heat of the moment, she'd gone and made that promise. Now, it was a matter of pride; now, Sakura needed to be on this team. And, of course, very obligingly, the chances of that were looking increasingly dismal.

"Two wins and one loss," the commander recounted coolly. "Not a bad record by any means. Her two wins were finished admittedly quick, but she's not the first to finish a bout in less than a minute. And pointedly, her one loss is to this ANBU here. It's clear which one is better."

Kakashi swung his propped feet to the ground, soundlessly. He then leaned against the table, the pale of his forearms a jarring contrast to the steel surface beneath.

"Deaf as well as blind, then," Kakashi said coldly. "My current shinobi beat a kenjutsu specialist at kenjutsu and, before that, that one over there—" he pointed at a heavy set man with a shock of purple hair—"whose taijutsu is only slightly more pathetic than—alas, I can't remember his name. Her loss to him was only fluke."

"Robin," the captain seated next to him muttered helpfully.

"Robin," Kakashi repeated slowly, his tongue flicking mockingly over the syllables. "You want to place someone on my team? At least choose one who would survive more than a day."

"His ninjutsu bout," a gruff-voice captain added. "He did exceptionally well there."

"Yes," the commander built on this intently, voice booming, "his jutsus were complex and highly suited for the combat work your team works in. Not to mention, his kekkei genkai—"

"Now, I would hope you knew better than that, commander," the copy-nin said coldly. The title was delivered with as little regard as possible.

"She's two years his junior," the commander growled, "and Crow is still a first year ANBU. What have we seen today? She beat a kenjutsu specialist—great, but kenjutsu isn't the firepower we need on our elite teams. And as you stated so eloquently, neither Robin nor he—" Sakura's gaze snapped for a second to the heavy set man she had fought in her second bout—"are taijutsu prodigies. So she lost to one and beat the other. What does that amount to? We simply have to believe you when you say she's skilled enough? Well, I ask then: what makes her unique, copy-nin? What makes her stand from the pack? Robin's skills will improve with time, will become finely honed under your team's influence, and his kekkei genkai is unique. How will she compare then?"

Sakura's lips felt like they were bloodless. That's probably why she could scarcely tell when they opened of their own volition.

Fuck this. Fuck. She had driven herself into this corner now, hadn't she, where suddenly she couldn't bear not being on this team.

Sakura coughed loudly.

The commander looked at her immediately; despite the mask, she could see the way the skin around his eye was contorted upwards, as though he were raising an incredulous brow at her gall.

Sakura's mouth twitched. "Some shinobi are born with weapons in their body. The rest of us have to build them or find them outside of ourselves. Even so, I wouldn't dismiss diligence and talent so easily in the face of a bloodline limit…"

Should she?

"…especially because these renowned, supposedly all-powerful clans regularly produce idiots."

That had been a little more direct than she had intended. Oh well.

There was choked laughter from the ANBU seated throughout the stadium. The captains controlled themselves better.

"Enough." The commander slammed both his palms flat on the table. "Seeing as this asshole here will seemingly do anything to make sure that Robin doesn't get on his team, can anyone else here—someone I actually trust not to lie to my face—attest to this rookie's skill? I'm not putting this ANBU back on the most combative team there is in this organization only to serve her as cannon fodder. I am not in the habit of serving mere body parts of fellow shinobi to the parents who raised them after only months of service."

The air within the stadium suddenly became thick and bone-cold as Kakashi's killing intent washed over the stadium's occupants without remorse. Even Sakura, who was more used to this than most others, fought to control her instinctive urge to lash out in defense.

The broader, older man didn't shift an inch, but Sakura could see that his whole body was tense. "Settle down, soldier—"

"She was on my team before, commander," a familiar voice barked out.

It was Tiger, from her one of her first ANBU teams, standing some rows above them.

"I was Rabbit's second-in-command," she continued, "and Crow was one of eight others. We were attacked a hundred kilometers out in the thick of the forest by a battalion of the invisible shinobi."

The 'invisible shinobi'—as they had been aptly dubbed—had been enemy combats against Sakura on her last mission before Kakashi. She hadn't realized, however, that there were more of them.

Based on how countless heads in the stadium suddenly snapped in her direction at this news, it seemed that the invisible shinobi were a pervasive problem. Knowing how they had mowed down her first ANBU team, she readily understood how deadly they could be.

"We were not prepared for the attack," Tiger said after a brief pause. "It would have been a slaughter. Rabbit was already down. The rest of us were in disarray. We would have been slaughtered if not for Crow."

"What happened?" the commander requested with ill-hidden impatience.

"She's a genjutsu user," Tiger said faintly, "She could see them without a dojutsu. And after she could see them—I don't know how to describe it…"

Sakura's skin crawled with discomfort. It didn't help that what Tiger was describing was the Voice. For the worst of her to be exposed inadvertently like this, no matter how unknowing the audience was…

Tiger's voice emerged again, controlled, her words succinct. "They were meant to slaughter us. Single-handedly, she began to decimate them."

"How many?" the captain with the cat mask asked.

"Between fifty to sixty," the woman responded after a moment of consideration, "and then the copy-nin's team crossed paths with ours and finished the rest. After that, Crow was…essentially moved to his team."

The commander stared at her stonily for a long while, apparently at a loss for words. Sakura could read from the set of his shoulders that this wasn't the outcome he had wanted—whether that had anything to do with Sakura herself or merely wanting to impose his will over Kakashi, she did not know.

At last, he gave a low grunt. "Fine. Crow remains on the team. Any opposed?"

Not a single hand went up.

"Now, as for Robin…"

Sakura couldn't quite ignore the glare burning into from her left.

Snail whooped as they muscled their way into the bar through the heavy crowd, "What did I say? I knew we would all make it through!"

Bear grunted beside Sakura, shooting her a look. "Some of us, barely."

"Get over yourself, Bear," Hyena said dryly, sweeping a scratched hand through her hair—a purely lucky shot, she maintained. "Tonight's the one night you don't have to pay to get over that massive stick up your ass. Luxuriate in it."

That seemed to be, indeed, the attitude of every ANBU now populating The Shush-ya, the largest bar in Konoha, which was also conveniently operated by shinobi for shinobi. It seemed that it was tradition for the ANBU to treat themselves to an open bar and have the entire place to themselves following every set of rounds; the hokage, apparently, generously covered the cost.

Sakura observed around her as the music picked up, a thudding drum intermixed with the sultry wails of the biwa. Alcohol passed easily through the masses—whole bottles were handed around rather than glasses, and masks shifted just slightly to imbibe them.

Snail was the first to get her hands on a bottle. Taking a long swill, more than enough for her short stature, she passed the bottle next to Sakura. Sakura looked at it skeptically for a moment, then shrugged and drank some herself. The rich, bitter taste went down with some difficulty, burning the entire way. When she lifted her lips from the rim of the bottle, she grimaced and rubbed at her lips.

"Easy there," Raccoon remarked with some amusement. She handed him the bottle, but he only passed it onto Hyena. "I'm good tonight."

Hyena took her own portion and then passed it to Bear, only to find that he'd already gotten his hands on another bottle. Rolling her eyes, she placed the near-empty bottle on a vacated table.

Sakura examined the bottle with interest. She could already feel the effects.

She had had alcohol for the first time years ago, so she was no stranger to it. Truthfully, she knew her tolerance much better now. Sure enough, she felt only a certain extra warmth and light buzz, but nothing more. If she still needed to kill, she could do it without a second thought.

A second after that reflection pulsed through her mind, Sakura flinched.

Fuck. Was this how it was going to be the rest of her life? To kill or to be killed.

It's a dog eat dog world, the Voice crooned, before giving a shrill laugh. Sakura hissed as the sound scratched against the walls of her brain.

"I'm going to dance," Snail called out, pointing to the mass of congregated bodies at the center of the large open space. She gave them a short wave and then disappeared into the throng of shadowed figures.

There was something pleasantly bizarre about it all, Sakura reflected to herself. They all wore the same ANBU uniforms they had fought in earlier today, complete with bandages and newly won scars as well. ANBU captains were present also, though they seemed to keep entirely to themselves. The contrast between the actual rounds and the atmosphere of…whatever this was, however, was—laughable.

The next few minutes passed by easily with sporadic conversation between Hyena, Bear, Raccoon, and herself—none of them seemed desiring of a prolonged discussion, content to relax mainly in silence. Unfortunately as time passed, the temperature of the bar steadily increased as more bodies were crammed into the space.

"I'll be back," Sakura told them, fanning herself.

Muscling her way through the bodies was a task that took longer than she would have thought (sadly, she couldn't exactly drive her fist into the ground to make the sea of bodies part, though part of her considered it). Eventually, she reached an open space of the wooden counter.

"How can I help you?" a short man asked swiftly, hands busy at work preparing two different drinks.

"A glass of ice."

He didn't blink an eye at the request. Hand darting out with impressive speed, he procured a glass and used a kunai blade to slide a large cube of ice into smaller slivers. He handed the cold glass to her.

Sakura took it gratefully, allowing her hot palms to rest against the cool surface for a little while.

The music twisted in and out of the space around her—sometimes distinct and keening, other times muffled and incomprehensible. Closing her eyes, she sucked on one ice chip at a time, enjoying the spread of liquid each time the ice melted.

She felt a body slide into the small space between her and her former neighbor. Sakura's hands spasmed for her weapons instinctively at the imposition, before she eased them consciously.

"A glass umeshu, please. Actually? Make that two. One for me and one for her."

Out of distant curiosity, Sakura darted a look to her newest neighbor. That's how she realized by 'her,' the newcomer ANBU meant Sakura.

"Unless you're opposed?" the girl—she sounded only a few years older—behind the tortoise mask intoned lightly, tilting her head to the side.

Sakura considered that for a moment. She was still far from drunk; one glass wouldn't push her significantly closer there either. "Sure."

"Excellent," the word was drawn slowly, delicately, "Two glasses of umeshu then."

The same short man silently went about preparing the drinks. Sakura returned her attention to the ice chips, surveying another one with almost academic interest.

"Crow, right?" the voice beside her prompted again, pointing at her mask.

Sakura turned to look again at her. Apparently, she was waiting for an answer. "Yes," she said slowly. Then, she felt obligated to return: "Tortoise?"

Tortoise hummed in assent, reaching out to collect the two glasses from the bartender. Holding one, she slid the other to Sakura.

Sakura took a sip without much ceremony, surprised to find that she actually enjoyed the taste. She had come to believe that all alcohol tasted generally shitty, desirable only because of its impact.

"Good, isn't it?" Tortoise prompted.

"It is."

The aftertaste was also pleasant.

"You have beautiful hair."

Sakura saw the hand move toward her head—slow enough that she could shift comfortably to avoid the impending contact, which is why she ultimately allowed it. Foreign fingers curled through the strands of her hair, pulling gently so that there was a light tension at the base of her scalp.

"It's fake. A jutsu to disguise more identifiable hair."

The fingers let go of her hair as Tortoise gave a short laugh. "Hmmm," she said, cupping her chin in her hand, "you really don't know how this works, do you?"

Sakura's brows furrowed.

Tortoise surveyed her for a long moment. She had unusual eyes, Sakura noted—purple, if they were real—that stood out all the more because of her black hair.

The girl leaned forward, and Sakura saw her mask shift the minutest bit, as though she were smiling below the porcelain.

"I want to kiss you," she asked straightforwardly. "Can I?"

Sakura tossed another ice chip into her mouth, unblinking. "Why?"

"Hmmm," Tortoise hummed again, tapping her nails against the wood. "Because I like your voice, I think. A little low, a little arrogant. And I'm in—how should I put it?—that sort of mood."

Sakura glanced down at the glass in her hand, swirled its contents.

It wasn't something she had explicitly contemplated before. It wasn't the alcohol that made her consider her it now. The truth was…

This fascination of lips on lips. She'd ascribed to it as a young teenager, because that's what children did. Abstractly, it was a ridiculous thing—evolutionarily, the contact was completely arbitrary. Then, recently, she'd experienced the contact once and it had felt…

She didn't really want to think about now, but—would it feel the same with Tortoise too?

"Why not?" she wondered after a short pause.

Sakura knew by the way the mask shifted again that Tortoise was smiling again.

The other girl shifted closer to her on her chair, knees slotting into place between Sakura's perched legs. Tilting her head to the side—making eye contact the entire time—she slowly slid her mask upwards to reveal her lips. Sakura watched the subtle adjustment with interest; she was a little intrigued by how this would happen, whether or not their masks would still knock into each other.

"May I?" Tortoise asked lightly, purple eyes gleaming.

Sakura nodded, and a tanned hand rose to brush the edge of Sakura's mask, nudging it slightly upward. The increased exposure provided a new depth of sensory information. The air had become slightly humid, and she could taste the smell of incense, blood, and alcohol on her tongue.

With a curve to her lips, Tortoise approached until her eyes bore straight into Sakura's. Belatedly, she realized that this was because their lips were now touching. They shifted. A breath passed between their lips. It was swallowed. There was nothing shy or tentative about the contact.

A tongue curled lightly against Sakura's lips. After a moment, Sakura's mouth parted. In the same instant, Sakura's hand left her glass to grasp a hip, hand curling into the flak jacket there.

She had thought their masks would collide; she found the solution now, though her body moved her there unthinkingly. She pushed forward, compelling Tortoise to tilt her head slightly back, and the other girl slanted her mouth beneath Sakura's.

This was—pleasant, Sakura reflected. Her heart didn't pound, her blood didn't rush violently through her veins; it was a gentle, trickling kind of warmth, like sinking into a warm bath. Tortoise made a small, breathy sound, and then stood, slotting her body more firmly into the spaces of Sakura's.

Somewhere, somehow, even though the other ANBU had instigated the contact, Sakura had assumed control of the kiss—based on the sounds emerging from Tortoise's throat, she preferred it this way. Tortoise's moans, indeed, were a constant, throaty accompaniment to the strings singing smoothly in the background.

Curiously, Sakura let her tongue graze the roof of the mouth beneath hers. A strangled sound of pleasure was her reward. Smirking—and maybe feeling a little more now the alcohol buzzing through her system—her hand left Tortoise's hip to grasp her chin, pressing more intently.

People had been passing behind them the entire time. The bar was busy, naturally, and more than one ANBU had found their way to the counter to order drinks. So, the fact that a group of shinobi paused right behind them right at that moment wasn't an immediate cry for Sakura's full attention.

When the sound of low voices and laughter sounded, her eyes flashed in irritation, but she paid no more mind to it.

Then she heard a few jeers, clearly from the individuals standing right behind them

Sakura tensed, pulling her mouth from Tortoise's. Before she could turn, a strong hand slid from her hair to her upper arm, stopping her. Sakura looked at the ANBU, whose purple eyes were locked on the jeering shinobi.

"Don't," the girl said softly, eyes wide.

Sakura's gaze narrowed.

"Just ignore it," she pressed.

Despite her stiffness, Sakura let the other girl pull her forward again. Their lips met once more. Tortoise gave a small sigh and locked her hands behind Sakura's head.

"Hey ladies," a low, male voice called out amidst riotous laughter, "why don't you remove those masks and give us a real show?"

In the space between one breath and the next, Sakura ripped through Tortoise's locked hands. A second later, she had the ANBU pinned against the bar wall by the throat.

"Crow, don't—!" she heard behind her.

"The fuck do you think you're doing, kunoichi?" the man growled, the stink of alcohol thick on his breath.

Sakura didn't know where the sudden burst of temper had come from, but she was seeing red. "Just thought I'd give you the show you asked for."

"Easy there," a slow, lazy voice added from behind her—one of the friends—"it's Crow, isn't it? I remember you from earlier today. Nice speech."

"But you know," the man continued, laughing still, but there was edge of warning to it now, "your quota for insubordination without consequence is about filled up, don't you think?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch your name?"

"Leave it," Tortoise said lowly, purple eyes pleading. "Crow, they're—"

"You can call me taichou. Him too."

"—ANBU captains."

"You should listen to your friend," the man said flatly.

Sakura's mouth flattened. So they outranked both of them? She angled her head back, to survey the small group. She recognized them now—each one an ANBU captain who had sat at the table beside the commander. Fine. She didn't actually give a fuck.

But then she darted a glance to the other girl, who obviously did.

"No harm done," she said reluctantly, after a long pause. She brushed off his shoulders, mostly for show, and stepped back. "He's all yours."

She turned, shoulders tight and struggling to control her temper. Tortoise was pale, her purple eyes still wide, but her body slowly began to relax—

"Sluts these days, you know, someone just has to teach them a proper lesson—"

Sakura's face was contorted into a snarl. Without even turning to look, her hand snapped back and grabbed the new person who had spoken. She saw his hands move with blinding speed, no doubt to pull out weapons; before he could, she threw him toward the counter.

He slid down the length of the wood, knocking empty and filled drinks alike that had been placed there.

He would have slid further, if not for a pale, scarred arm stopping him. The owner of the arm coolly picked up the cup of sake that had just been placed in front of him and smoothly tossed it back.

Though other ANBU captains crowded around the counter around him, his feet were outstretched to prop on the adjacent stool, taking two seats for himself. His gaze was half-lidded, the hitai-ate positioned to cover the sharingan—but his lone, charcoal eye drilled into Sakura, dark and intense, looking for all the world as though he had been watching the entire time.

Sakura's spine snapped straight, face hot. How long had he been there—

She felt a hand knot itself into her hair, cutting off the thought. Silently, she reached up to cup the side of the man's head and drove it into a stool with a loud clang.

"Crow," Tortoise begged, "Stop it. It isn't worth it…"

Shut up, the Voice growled. Sakura, at this point, largely agreed. She had tried walking away. They were the ones who hadn't let her peaceably do that much.

The man who had intervened earlier now stepped forward. He was tall with a dangerous grace to his movements.

"Look, Crow," he said lightly, "my friends here have had some drink. They like to talk—" he shrugged—"it didn't really need to come to this. But now, this has become a matter of insubordination. One that I have to deal with."

He made a show of pulling out his weapons and piling them on the nearest table. "I'll go easy on you, alright?" he said mildly, "Just fists."

Sakura cocked her head to the side, dropping the unconscious man in her hand so he hit the floor. Then, without pause, she began stripping herself of her weapons too.

"Are you crazy?" an unwanted Samaritan hissed behind her, "Keep the weapons or you won't stand a chance!"

"You should listen to him," the man said amusedly.

Sakura tossed the last kunai. "Oh," she said, "Thought he was talking to you."

He shrugged again. "It's your face."

Without any further preamble, he feinted and lashed out with enough force to crush her skull against the wall behind. Sakura twisted, kicking off the same wall to drive her elbow backwards.

He evaded with a fluid motion she vaguely recognized. Her gaze moved from his palms briefly to his eyes. Pale orbs peered out between dark lashes.

Hyuuga.

Immediately, Sakura created more space between her body and his. She considered her situation. He could see into the chakra points of her body; her medical knowledge of the body made her more competitive than most, but she couldn't expect to pinpoint at the same level as he could. There was no point competing on that front.

No weapons? Fine. That didn't rule out—

"Maa, look at the damage you're doing to that wall."

Sakura was instantly an impressive example of abruptly, arrested motion. Gaping, she turned in the direction of the copy-nin, who still was seated nonchalantly on two seats.

"Taichou," the man next to her said a little belatedly, stiff as well. Some part of Sakura's mind was functional enough to realize this as strange; this man and Kakashi were the same rank, there was no need for the honorific.

Most of her mind, however, was devoted to the shock of hearing something as close to the lazy, nonchalant jounin captain from before as she had in years.

"Taichou," the man repeated again, "Crow's actions were insubordinate—"

"Renya," the copy-nin interrupted in a mild, scolding tone—the ANBU captain flinched, Sakura continued to gape—"you know the hokage isn't going to be too pleased having to cover additional costs. You should learn to relax. Have a spa day. Read a book. Take a nap."

Kakashi swiped another cup of sake, one that was not his (but other than a squeak, the shinobi didn't muster any further protest). He circled the contents with sharp, subtle motions of the wrist.

Then he looked up again, and his face—or what was visible of it—had transformed. The guise of the disinterested bystander had been all but cast off.

"Didn't anyone teach you not to make a mess?" he questioned softly, darkly.

Sakura was finally yanked out of her state of shock by that ridiculous remark. Unable to control herself, she scoffed lightly beneath her breath.

His gaze snapped to her instantly.

"You," he muttered, pacing toward her.

Her lips twitched. "I try, taichou."

"Perhaps you've forgotten. I've thrown you into a tree." A warning, she interpreted.

Sakura's gaze narrowed. "As I recall, my fist made contact. With your face. Multiple times."

His eyebrow twitched. "You shattered a boulder. When I threw you into that as well."

"A testament to my strength," she sneered.

Kakashi's attention drilled into her. He didn't seem to remember that the Hyuuga even existed any more.

"Follow," he demanded. He spun on his heel and moved toward the exit of the bar.

Sakura watched him brows raised. A hand brushed her arm, and she jolted, looking to her side.

"Are you okay?" Tortoise murmured, voice low and sweet, "I was so worried—"

"Follow," the copy-nin snarled behind him, cutting her off.

Sakura let air hiss loudly through her teeth. Sliding her hands into the pockets of her flak jacket, she gave an awkward, apologetic nod to the girl and then left her and the bar.

The cool, outside air hit her with a welcome chill, drying the slight dampness on her skin. She tilted her head back and inhaled. Her head was rushing a little—the alcohol, no doubt.

When she opened her eyes again, she saw Kakashi standing in front of her in the narrow alley way.

"…another unwarranted lecture, taichou?"

His voice was low, derisive, when it emerged. "If you can't muster the respect, shinobi, you might try skipping the title altogether."

"I see," Sakura nodded sagely. "Like how you used 'commander' earlier today."

His gaze was slitted as he peered down at her, the breadth of his shoulders silhouetted by the moonlight. Suddenly, his nostrils flared.

"You stink of her," he said, disgusted.

Taken aback, it took her a moment to understand whom he was referring to. Then, she was confused that he mentioned it. Were they merely going for the obvious? Fine.

"And you're a coward who can't tell the truth."

"Don't test me," Kakashi said, voice dangerous. He leaned closer, nostrils flaring once again.

And that was only fuel to the fire. Hot, fiery blood pumped through her veins; she had burned through the alcohol now; all that was left was the headiness from an unfinished fight.

"Coward," she charged coldly. "There's nothing to test—"

Her mask was ripped off her face. Sakura's eyes widened at the new sensation of cool air on her cheeks and forehead.

Her gaze moved, and she found Kakashi holding the mask in his hand. He stared at it intensely.

"Has anyone ever told you, Saori Mori, that you're the kind where your voice says one thing," he commented lowly. "but your face says something entirely else."

Kakashi's eyes slowly moved from her mask in his hand to Sakura's face. And as soon as his eyes landed there she was—

A manic sort of agitated rage made Sakura pale, made her lips tight and her fists clench.

He took a step closer to her, silent.

"Stop," she called out loud—commanded. The hoarse, venomous word echoed in the alley way.

Kakashi stilled immediately.

She breathed rapidly, ribcage heaving like she couldn't intake enough air quickly enough.

She saw a pair of lips curl beneath the black mask. And then he leaned, a movement so swift and sharp it was a blur, until his face was a scarce inch from hers.

The pair of charcoal and red eyes—the tomoe spinning in a dizzying revolution—were hot on her.

"Coward," he breathed.

Sakura gritted her teeth. Sneering, she straightened to her full height. "I'm not."

Raising an eyebrow, gaze still just as forcible, he raised an arm slowly—slow enough that she could move, find a kunai and attempt to stab him, or run, if she wanted. Sakura jerked her chin upward and merely stared at it in contempt.

"Go on," she goaded.

She wasn't sure what she expected. A punch, perhaps. Maybe a slap, though that somehow seemed uncharacteristic. She had thought he wanted to put her in place, and while Sakura was never a glutton for punishment, she wouldn't be called a coward in the face of it either. Did she think it would be rightful punishment? No. But Kakashi was her 'taichou'; and more importantly, she would get her own later.

Or, she would have gotten her own, that is—if that had been what he had done.

Instead, his hand reached chin first, a searing, brief touch. And Sakura recoiled. Until, glaring, she held herself steady once more.

Still mocking, he then moved to the back of her neck, touching her there just as briefly. The muscles in her upper back clenched, provoked by the contact.

Sakura exhaled a sharp breath, angry and confused.

Then his hand, calloused and scarred, paused in front of her mouth. And that's when she realized what he was doing.

He was touching her where Tortoise had. Erasing the scent.

Kakashi held himself still with the dedicated patience of a practiced predator. Or at least, that's what Sakura tried to make herself believe.

Because there was something unnerving, now, about the content of his gaze; the way his lips were clearly parted beneath the black mask; the way the arm possessed by this raised hand was an object of tight restraint, as though repressing a—a helpless urge, that his hand, fingers, and every limb had been made a slave to.

He waited. And Sakura didn't know why. It made her angrier still.

"Go on," she snarled. "Go on."

(Later, she wouldn't know why she said it.)

He did. Without blinking, without moving otherwise an inch—though it seemed like an entirely new animation could be seen in his features—the tips of calloused fingers grazed her lips, scalding them.

And Sakura burned. Hot, molten, uncontrollable. In the next breath, she shunshined to her tiny apartment thirty blocks away.

Chapter 14: Itachi

Sakura's fingers knotted in the hair of the woman pressed hotly against her.

"I—" the woman's eyes fluttered helplessly, "I'm going to—"

"Me too," the man behind Sakura whined, his hands tight on her hips.

"Not yet," Sakura hissed, teeth clenched.

"I can't," he gasped for breath. He moved against her with desperate force. Sakura snarled into the open air, needing the burning there—

The man behind her muffled his cries into her dull pink hair as he climaxed.

Let's gut him, the Voice said rasped.

"Touch me," the woman pleaded against her lips, interrupting her thoughts. Her blue eyes glistened.

Sakura shelved her own frustration for the moment. She shifted closer, hand sliding through long brown hair, down the valley between breasts, to the hot, silken space between two, smooth thighs. The woman—Hitomi, she recalled—threw her head back as she keened, hair plastered to her neck with sweat.

Fingers curled into Sakura, quick and greedy. Air hissed from between Sakura's teeth, as that—

—the pulsing below her abdomen, a throbbing that made the hair on her skin rise and her skin feel hot (scalded) and uncomfortably tight—

The man (Raido, he had declared shortly before the ongoing proceedings) shifted to mouth at Hitomi's neck. Eyes locked onto Sakura's mouth, the other woman gave a shrill cry as she came.

For a moment, the only sound in the room was that of ragged breaths. Then, the man and woman crumpled against the cool sheets of the bed, faces slack with pleasure.

Sakura leaned back against the headboard beside them. Glancing down, she contemplated herself. Had she—?

She had. Somewhere along the way. It had been so silent, so mild and underwhelming in its nature, that she had hardly noticed it.

But there was a slight soreness, deeply, invisibly—in the muscles she had never worked before, yes. Otherwise, nothing about her situation had changed. (She still felt…that infernal knot of seething, insatiable hunger in her lower abdomen, which had been brought to life as soon as those fingers had grazed her lips—)

Sakura shifted from the bed to stand, aware they probably watched. Once, she would have blushed and been horrified by the prospect of this. Now, her body had served so many more infinitely more important purposes, that she could hardly remember why she could have felt self-conscious of something so insignificant.

"You could stay…" Raido asked suggestively, his tone suggesting more would follow than just sleep.

After straightening the disarray of pale pink hair on her head, Sakura silently finished pulling on the clothes she had discarded a little more than ten minutes ago. The grey-green pants and black shirt weren't normally what she wore when undisguised, but they were all that she had managed to grab.

She would have had the presence of mind to change into her usual clothes, too, if she hadn't been—

She frowned privately, taking the moment now to finally reflect on how she had arrived here. This certainly hadn't been the plan. She had shunshined home. That had been the plan.

Only, then, she had noticed leaving hadn't been enough to escape consequence entirely from her…previous encounter. It became immediately evident that things weren't quite alright. Her hand had barely grazed the door knob, really, before she had been distracted by this lamentable itch in…

In her cunt, she thought coolly. She had killed people. What was the sense in shying away from this?

First, she had thought to ignore it. That soon appeared patently ostensibly as every step she took, every chance in which the inner skin of her thigh grazed her—it was impossibly distracting. How long would it last? How could she possibly sleep like this?

And then had she thought: an itch. Well, an itch could be scratched, couldn't it?

Why shouldn't she scratch it?

It was entirely natural, though the timing was a bit unfortunate (poor timing, that was all it was, she assured herself). All she needed to do was visit another bar to find someone to do the job. To discover what all the fuss was about.

That was how she had ended up here.

"Some other time," she answered finally. Sakura perched on the open window sill and then launched onto the nearby roof before taking off in a sprint to her apartment.

Even the vision Konoha presented at night—grim, somehow, but also beautiful—was not enough to distract her.

As she landed her apartment building, her thoughts took another direction altogether, sensing a foreign chakra presence right in front of her door. Her hands immediately went for her weapons, then stilled. She knew that chakra very well.

The figure in front of her door stopped his loud knocking, spinning to her with a pale face when she suddenly appeared.

"Naruto?" Sakura asked cautiously. "What are you doing here?"

"It's Gaara," he said urgently, voice cracking as he spoke, "He's been kidnapped by that—that group called Akatsuki."

Sakura's mouth parted; then her eyes fell to the scroll held tightly in Naruto's hand.

"We were supposed to leave ten minutes ago, but you weren't there," he said in a rush. "I thought you must have missed the summons because you were sleeping. Kakashi-sensei said we should leave without you, but the rest—"

She unlocked the door to her apartment and retrieved the pack hanging on the hook inside, precisely for emergencies like these. She wished she would have had the time to at least…shower, but—

"I'm ready. Let's go."

Naruto exhaled like a great burden had been relieved off his shoulders. Exiting the same way she had just entered, the two of them took to the roofs again and moved in the direction of the forest.

"Are we the only team being sent?" Sakura asked.

"Team 10, Team Guy also," Naruto said grimly. "And Hinata—the message said Gaara's brother had been poisoned."

They travelled the rest of the distance in silence. As they came upon the edge of the forest, Sakura swallowed hard, forcing blankness on her face.

"I told you your student would eventually find her way," Gai boomed.

"She's cost us irretrievable time," Kakashi bit out. Sakura tried very hard not to look at him "We leave now."

He took off onto the trees. After a moment, they all followed.

They reached Suna at sunset. By dawn, Hinata was able to concoct and administer an antidote to Kankuro's poisoning.

"He's still in danger, though," she told them softly. "The poison's fighting back. I will need to watch him for the next few days."

"The rest of us need to head out. We're wasting our time here."

"We need a medic-nin," Asuma responded lowly to Kakashi's looming, thunderous presence by the window sill. "You might comfortable fighting without one, but the rest of us can't just step into battle against the Akatsuki without a healer."

"We have one," Sai pointed out. "Sakura-san has learned how to treat battle wounds in combat situations specifically."

"Truly?" Gai boomed, eyes wide in wonder. "The presence of such vital youth really does bring tears to these eyes!"

"She has?" Asuma responded, looking confused.

"Yes," Sakura said, "Tsunade-sama taught me herself." She glared at Kakashi (or more accurately, around him, she still couldn't quite make eye contact). Would he deny it? Did he think Naruto and Sai's training wounds had been healed by some anonymous, benevolent benefactor?

"She's a lousy fighter," Kakashi said coldly. "We keep her to the back."

Sakura's shoulders tightened with the strain of restraining herself. A hand landed on her shoulder, and she straightened, blinking as she looked back at Naruto.

"Team 7 and Team 10 will track the Akatsuki to where they're keeping the kazakage," Kakashi commanded. "Team Guy and the kazekage's sister will watch the boundary of the villages, in case the current weakness of the Hidden Sand should be revealed."

The respective teams nodded, accepting their roles without argument.

"What Kankuro managed," Asuma murmured, handing forward a scrap of black cloth.

A wolf-dog with sharp teeth appeared in a burst of smoke, summoned by the copy-nin. With hungry eyes, it stalked toward the torn fragment of a mask and inhaled.

Sakura along with the rest of her team and Team 10 raced to keep pace when it darted. They were quickly out the hospital doors and soon under the blazing, desert sun.

Traveling in Suna was harder than in Konoha, what with the ever-shifting sand beneath their feet rather than solid ground. Near midday, thankfully, they began to reach thick settlements of trees and warm, red-brown dirt. On more familiar territory, their pace consequently picked up. But abruptly, just as they seemed to settle into the quicker cadence, the wolf-dog paused and made eye contact with its owner.

After a moment of silent communication, Kakashi stoically summoned another summon and signaled Team 10 to follow the smaller canine.

Sakura watched them depart with a narrowed gaze. When she turned back, she saw what Kakashi had already taken off, a speck in the distance.

Naruto cracked his neck and bent his knees, preparing to follow, but she stopped him with a hand to the shoulder.

"The Akatsuki are after jinchuruki, right?"

Naruto stiffened. Sai drew closer, eyes wide with interest.

"I don't care what Asuma or Kakashi said," she said gruffly, "You stay behind Sai and me, got it?"

"But Sakura—"

"What she says is a valid strategy, dickless," Sai said indifferently. "Yes, Sakura-san is functionally our medic-nin today, but it also hardly makes sense to serve you up to them on a platter."

"But—"

"There is no literal platter, of course," Sai said pleasantly, "It's only a turn of phrase. Idiomatic."

"I know that," Naruto huffed indignantly.

Sakura's hand tightened with bruising strength on Naruto's shoulder; he let out a grunt of pain. "No buts," she said pleasantly. Not willing to listen to any other protests, she leapt into the trees again. She heard Sai and Naruto follow behind her.

As it happened, they didn't end up travelling much farther. Sakura first saw the deceivingly relaxed expanse of Kakashi's back as he stood in an open space with few overhanging trees.

Then, she saw the second figure in front of him.

The first thought that came to mind when she saw Uchiha Itachi was not how much he looked like his younger brother, but that whoever had composed Itachi had done so with the notion of a shinobi as far from their mind as possible.

Calm, dark eyes peered thoughtfully at them from a pallid complexion, as though the man himself had never been built for the outdoors; the sensitive curve of his mouth and the long lines beneath his gaze would have seemed to profess to hours of introspection rather than physical training. He was neither tall nor short, neither slim nor broad. To Sakura, he looked more a poet or a philosopher than the weapon of destruction he was said to have become.

It was possible to see, in one instant, that this man was Sasuke's brother and that—also—he was worlds apart from the boy she had grown up with.

In the next instant, her gaze landed on the small, unassuming creature perched on his shoulder—unassuming, that is, except for the spinning sharingan that looked back at her, somehow both unreadable and mocking.

The Voice shifted restlessly in the back of her mind, a slumbering beast prodded awake by her panic. Clenching her fists, she forced herself to calm down. She had known for a long time now that Itachi was Shisui's other summoner. Now, the day had come that she and Itachi would stand on opposite sides of the battlefield. But whom the crow would fight for, she did not know.

Her frown deepened. If Shisui would abide by some sort of first-come-first-serve basis, of course, then she had already lost that battle…

"Sakura," Naruto muttered, voice strained, "that's him. He's why Sasuke left. I can't…just stand back here and watch—"

If Itachi came for Naruto on Akatsuki's quest to extract all the tailed beasts, he would have to claw his way over her dead body.

"You can and you will," she answered darkly.

The man who was Uchiha Itachi surveyed them all with a cool, indifferent eyes. No killing intent radiated from him; he seemed for all the world like he had merely been contemplating the weather in this empty space of forest before they had stumbled upon him.

Then his gaze flashed to Kakashi, and his almond-shaped eyes narrowed a bit. It was the first, slight evidence of fracturing in the man's seeming impenetrable calm, but it was enough.

Now, Sakura knew that while Itachi thought very little of them, he was wary of the copy-nin.

Her eyes widened. There was….familiarity there.

"Nearly a decade has passed since I left, but I remember fighting under your command once," the man said dispassionately, confirming her suspicions. "You do remarkably well for a man with a borrowed eye. The Akatsuki would readily embrace your skill."

"It has been some years," Kakashi remarked coolly. "But you might remember Kino. You may also have heard that he recently…left."

Itachi was silent, dark eyes emotionless.

"I hunted him down. Killed him in front of his own son," the copy-nin said, vicious pleasure saturating his words. He cocked his head to the side, voice lowering a fraction. "Is there any witness you would like to request for yourself?"

Naruto made a noise behind her. Sai blinked impassively.

But Sakura paused because, suddenly, everything before her had ceased to make sense.

She knew how Kakashi had been after he had killed Kino's son and Kino. This ostensible bloodthirstiness and sadism was disingenuous. It had to be. The realization was abrupt and devastating, though she didn't have the luxury to fully comprehend it now. Still, if Kakashi had lied now, feigning this devotion to savagery and blood lust, then when else had he-

"You!" Naruto growled, "What have you done to him? What have you done to Gaara!"

"Quiet, Naruto," Sai said, warning bleeding into his normally bland voice.

Sakura caught motion in her peripheral. She whipped her head around to catch Itachi's hand swiftly rise. Before he could complete the motion, Kakashi attacked.

"Don't look into his eyes," Sakura hissed to Naruto and Sai, well-aware of the sharingan's capabilities. She had more experience resisting the sharingan, but she knew it was best also to exercise caution.

"How can we know then—"

"Watch his feet and his body," Sai advised.

Sakura lips tightened as the fight between the two shinobi ensued. It was an odd feeling, to be in an altercation of this caliber—especially with Kakashi—and not be expected to fight at his side. It gave her the rare opportunity to survey him from a distance. For Kakashi in combat was terrifying and…somehow disturbingly beautiful, though she was reluctant to admit that. Both participants twisted and lashed out with inhuman grace; it seemed almost choreographed, like they were taking turns in a deadly dance.

Then, abruptly, Kakashi pulled away.

Itachi blinked slowly in response.

Kakashi let out a foul curse and tilted his head up—as though listening to some distant sound or scenting something in the breeze. He stiffened. His irritated gaze settled on Naruto, Sai, and her.

Naruto pushed against her restraining hand. "What's happening?" he asked unsurely.

"This is a convincing copy, not worth my time," Kakashi snarled. "The real one is likely guarding the kazekage."

"Save Gaara," Naruto demanded shakily.

Kakashi's body was a statue.

"I have Kurama," the boy beside persuaded desperately. "We'll be able to hold out until you get back!"

Sakura watched the complex evolution of the content of the copy-nin's gaze with rapt attention. It was clear the moment he made his decision, though his frame was tense with repressed fury.

"No stupidity," he commanded coldly. Then, he disappeared with the next breeze.

Which left them standing in the sparsely covered expanse of forest with Itachi, alone.

Naruto tried to rush forward, no doubt to stand in front of them and play the rough-tough save-the-world type of idiot he was so often wont to do. Sakura grabbed him and hauled him back.

"Sakura—!"

"Not today, Naruto," she said, unblinking. She made a few, short hand signs and, in less than a second—before he had even known what hit him—Naruto was unconscious and on the ground with a dreamy smile on his lips. Before Sai had the chance to process what had happened, she caught his chin in her hand and forced his eyes onto hers. Just as his gaze began to widen, his eyelids slid shut. He fell beside his teammate.

Then her gaze darted up and she made eye contact with Itachi. His expression did not betray any surprise, though she sensed that this was not what he had predicted.

Sakura inhaled and then exhaled. The sound seemed to thunder in her ears.

"I do not know you," the man commented distantly.

"I'm not surprised by that," she responded, standing in front of the unconscious bodies of her teammates.

"That was a foolish thing you did," he said disinterestedly. "The three of you would not have been enough to defeat me. You are…but an insect."

"So I've been hearing."

"Do you have a death wish?" he asked. The question was entirely absent of malice, merely curious.

She could feel the crow's heavy gaze on her.

"Is a shinobi a weapon for peace?" she asked instead. Part of her was incredulous at herself. What was she testing for? Sanity?

He stilled, and a wild hope surged in her chest. Then, his expression smoothed again. "The members of Akatsuki are teachers to the world of the true meaning of suffering, so that the world may finally turn away from warfare and conflict forevermore."

She gazed at the crow accusingly. It blinked back at her, placid.

What a joke, she thought, scoffing. Even if she was generous and believed that Itachi's ideals once, perhaps, may have been compelling and admirable, in the time since they had clearly become twisted. Akatsuki was no place for the sane.

"Ready?" she asked. She didn't really expect an answer.

A few minutes later, she had the small pleasure of seeing surprise flash through fake-Itachi's dark eyes as her fist drove through his midsection. It didn't feel like much of a victory, though.

It had almost felt…too easy.

But then, she hadn't been fighting the actual man. The black cloaked figure slowly melted into the corpse of a former shinobi of the sand. Sakura frowned down at it. He had died fighting for his village, and then for his body to be so grossly misused without his consent— Her stomach turned.

She made the hand formations to wake the two figures behind her.

"I told you I would do it!" Naruto crowed once he stood, unaware that he had been unconscious at all. He pumped his fist in the air. "One rasengan was all it took!"

Sakura nodded, watching Sai closely. Her genjutsu had clearly worked on Naruto, leaving him with doctored memories of the fight. She wasn't so sure how the same had worked for Sai. For the moment, he said nothing.

The sound of an unnatural breeze gathering made them all tense. They relaxed slightly when they realized the form that appeared.

Over Kakashi's shoulder was an unconscious boy with red hair, dressed in the long robes of a hokage.

Naruto darted forward, blue eyes wide. "Is he—?"

"Barely." His gaze then passed over the corpse that had been Itachi. His sharingan gleamed with feral interest as he surveyed her teammate.

"All in a day's work," Naruto beamed back.

The journey back to Suna frustratingly seemed to take longer than the trip from there. Once back, she decided to have an early night in. Scraping sand from her skin, she soaked for a little in the bath in the corner of her small room. She hadn't had time to pack much, so she pulled on the same uniform she had been wearing before back onto her slightly-wet skin (it was hard to dry quickly when the air was so hot).

At first, she paced for a little, trying to work through her thoughts. Itachi, Itachi, Itachi—either the crow was a liar or it had been mistaken. There was no third option.

Eventually, however—when no clear conclusion emerged—she settled onto her bed and tried to force herself to sleep.

It didn't work.

Restless, she left the bed she had been given to open the window. The warm breeze caressed the locks of her hair, gently sending them away from the damp expanse of her neck.

Then, a loud banging on her door interrupted her momentary peace. Scowling, Sakura stormed toward the door and yanked it open.

She blinked dumbly up at the irreverent, cool gaze that looked straight past her to seemingly survey her room. After narrowing his eyes, the copy-nin reached wordlessly behind himself to shove someone else into her.

The figure in her arms groaned before straightening. "I really appreciate the sensitivity," the boy drawled, "Damaged goods and all, here, you know."

"Shikamaru," Sakura said blankly. A second later, her gaze fell to the wound in his side. She led him immediately to the table at the middle of the room, sweeping its contents onto the floor.

"Take it easy," the lanky boy hissed, catlike eyes narrowing. "God, why is everyone so pushy with the crippled today—"

"You're hardly crippled," Sakura said, tearing off the cloth obstructing her gaze from the wound. As she worked, her gaze flicked up to the cluster of individuals Kakashi had ostensibly brought to her room.

The man himself loomed in the corner of the room, as pleasant a presence as a poltergeist, watching her like he expected her to faint from the blood any moment. An unconscious body was draped over his shoulder—ostensibly why he had been forced to come in the first place.

"Just a bit of knitting up, not even beyond my limited skill," she said with saccharine sweetness. Then, the fake smile slid off her face. This was well within Hinata's capabilities. "Were there any complications with Kankuro?"

"The kazekage's brother is fine," Shikamaru said lazily. "Lee went and got himself impaled though. He and that Suna old lady are working on him."

"His injury is taking more time to heal than Hinata-sama initially thought," Neji explained calmly, still hovering near the door. He held his left arm gingerly. "She thought it best to send half of us here. Asuma-sensei, Tenten, and Kiba-san remain there."

Sakura cracked her knuckles. "This is going to sting. Try not to move."

Shikamaru gave a derisive laugh, cut off by a wince as her hand made contact. Sakura shut her eyes as she scoped out the wound with her chakra. Not dire, but there was some internal damage.

Steadily, she directed the flow of energy into sealing the wound. It was enough to get him into fighting-shape but there would be some discomfort, a consequence of working more quickly than she would have liked because of the line behind Shikamaru.

"You're good enough for now," Sakura said a few minutes later. "But you should spend the night in the infirmary in case there are any internal complications."

Shikamaru hummed uncaringly. "No need."

Her eyebrow arched. "I might not be a full-on medic-nin, but I'm not stupid enough to send you alone to your room to pass away quietly in your sleep."

"On the contrary, I don't think there's a more desirable method of dying," Shikamaru said idly. "The point is moot, however, as I won't be alone."

None of the shinobi in the room—certainly not the one passed out over Kakashi's shoulder, whose face Sakura still couldn't see—seemed to hear or care about this remark. Sakura, herself, was no different.

"Curious?" Shikamaru asked, an odd, sharp smile on his face.

"That will do, I suppose," she said, "And—no. I don't really care about who is or isn't your bed, Shikamaru."

She paused, evaluating that statement a little. "Unless it's either one of my parents," she corrected consideringly.

"Really?" he said, almost silently now. The words were only for her ears. His eyes were cool and measuring as he gazed at her. "Funnily enough, he seems to care about you. And Naruto. He tries to hide it, but he happens to be really, really bad at that—to those who look, at least."

Sakura froze, her hands gripping the end of the table she had been leaning on. Sai?

"And you've been looking a lot these days, I take it," she said coolly, voice equally low. "Did he want me to know?"

"He wants you to know him," was the offered response, delivered so boredly one might have almost been fooled.

"And you know all this," Sakura said slowly, "because…?"

"I look." Equally nonchalant.

She surveyed him for a moment. Then she smiled just as pleasantly. "Well, that's wonderful. And in case you ever try to forget how wonderful, please remember all the hard work I just did."

"Which you can just as easily undo?" Shikamaru guessed.

Perhaps, if he had known exactly what 'work' Sakura had accomplished with her hands, he would have demonstrated more wariness than amusement.

"Precisely," she finished curtly.

Shikamaru exited the room with a lazy wave, leaving her with the three other occupants of her room.

"Neji-san," she prompted, trying to keep the latent irritation out of her voice. She had forgotten that also—how annoying Shikamaru could be to talk to. No wonder he and Sai had drifted to each other.

The Hyuuga's face was unreadable. Now, Sakura had trouble hiding her exasperation. What was he waiting for—an official summons? "You're next."

"You can address Yamanaka-san first," Neji said stiffly.

Sakura blinked first in incomprehension. Then her head snapped to the unconscious body tossed over Kakashi's shoulder.

"Put her down on the table."

A second later, Ino's unconscious body was on the table and her former carrier was back in his original corner of the room, gazing coldly back.

Sakura's fingers probed at the other girl's throat and then along her pressure points. There were no injuries—at least, none that she could find visually.

"How long has she been like this?"

"Since the end of the battle," Neji answered, an odd quality to his voice. "Shortly after using the mind transfer jutsu."

Ah. She drew her hand back and delivered a resounding slap across Ino's face.

The blonde girl surged up like a corpse rising from the dead, a truly dramatic, wheezing gasp emerging as well that soon transitioned into a short series of sneezes.

"Bitch," she complained. "What the hell was that?"

"Catharsis," Sakura muttered. Clearing her throat, she said, "I imagine Hinata was just too kind to do this herself. You're good to go."

Ino grumbled a few more times, rubbing her red cheek.

"I have a broken arm to fix," Sakura pressed blandly.

Ino's blue gaze went to the figure behind her. Sighing dramatically, she stood up. Before she left, however, something strange flickered through her expression as her eyes settled on Sakura one last time—was it sorrow? Sakura's throat felt dry.

But then, as though the look had never existed, the odd expression disappeared, and Ino smiled prettily.

"A beauty needs her beauty rest," she said primly, before stalking out, a long, rippling stream of blonde hair following her. "Later, forehead."

Sakura watched silently for a moment, watching the back disappear behind the door. She turned to face her final patient.

"You," Sakura said impatiently, pointing at Neji.

With a smooth, swift grace that spoke of a very particular sort upbringing, the Hyuuga settled serenely on the table, holding his injured arm aloft in front of him.

She prodded at it as considerately as she could; unfortunately, his winces were necessary to determining how clean the break had been.

Her examination revealed that it was a messy one. She frowned. Applying chakra, the jagged breaks in the formerly smooth bone began to close. She knew the other boy tried to hold himself as still as he could, but it was a painful, draining process, and he began to shake.

"You need to be still," Sakura warned.

"I—" Neji said stiltedly, "am trying."

Sakura didn't look up, but her jaw clenched as she directed her words to the figure in the corner of the room. "Hold him still."

When Neji continued to tremble, unaided by any other force, Sakura's head snapped up, seething.

"What are you waiting for?" she snarled, forgetting herself.

The copy-nin surveyed her coolly for a moment. Then, without a single word, he sauntered to the table and placed one, long-fingered hand firmly on Neji's shoulder.

The color drained from the boy's face. Sakura couldn't tell if it was fear or pain. Probably pain, she decided.

Sakura pressed on, watching Neji's face warily. To heal him as quickly as she was, she was drawing in part on his energy as well. Unfortunately, that meant he was likely to pass out at any moment.

"My vision is going black," the Hyuuga said lightly.

"That's to be expected," Sakura returned with some bluntness.

"Some forewarning would have been appreciated—" Neji slumped over before he could finish the words.

"Hold him up," Sakura said stiffly, trying her best to avoid Kakashi's presence in every other regard. She didn't look up to see his reaction, but Neji's body was propped up as she finished healing him.

At last, she pulled her hands away and straightened. "Done," she announced—perhaps, redundantly, but she felt the sudden need to break the silence.

But scarcely a second later, she found out that something else would have broken the silence for her. She only had a brief moment to prepare herself, before the door crashed onto the ground with a loud thud, denting the clay floor so that particles of red drifted upward in a small cloud.

It was the lady who had been helping Hinata, Sakura identified. Only, that had not been the entrance of an ally, but someone with rather hostile intentions. Not thinking twice, she grabbed Neji by the collar and tossed him onto the bed behind her and Kakashi.

Her hand immediately went for the kunai on her leg holsters, only to find when she looked back up that she was staring at a back. Kakashi's back.

Sakura's gaze brushed the ends of his hair, cut messily above the pale column of his neck.

"Copy-nin," the woman croaked, her voice hoarse.

"Lady Chiyo." Sakura couldn't see his face, but she could guess what he looked like by the way his head was tilted. She'd faced it one too many times, that infuriating look that was simultaneously disinterested and somehow relentlessly threatening.

"Konoha's dogs have always been a plague on my family," the older woman said softly. She folded her hands neatly in front of her, straightening to her full height—which was not much, but her presence seemed to expand to fill the room. "I shouldn't even be surprised, should I?"

Sakura shifted to the right. She was tall enough to just see her over Kakashi's shoulder, but not tall enough to have a comfortable view.

She only had a second to look—to take in the creased face, the dark eyes, and silver hair—before her vision was blocked again. Blinking, Sakura gaped once more at the back in front of her once more.

"Your protégé, I assume," Chiyo demanded, cold.

"A nuisance inflicted on me by the hokage," Kakashi said coolly, a grating disdain in his voice. "Have to obey certain rules, you see, or I'll get in trouble for the others I break. Getting more to the point: are you here to kill me, Lady Chiyo, for killing your traitor grandson?"

A choked, stifled noise echoed through the room, before the woman's voice emerged harder than before.

"Have you no shame, boy?"

"It was the Akatsuki that attacked your kage," Kakashi said, uncaring. "Sasori is Akatsuki."

"The White Fang took my son and his wife," Chiyo said slowly, deadly, "And now—you. You've taken my grandson from me. I don't think it's a coincidence, copy-nin, that the others got away and that he alone is dead. You hunted him, didn't you? Like the dog you are. Like your father was."

Sakura watched as Kakashi's shoulders curved just slightly—just infinitesimally. But she understood, in that minute change, that something had shifted. His killing intent had been an insidious, thrumming presence the moment Chiyo had entered the room; now, it had grown into its full-fledged form now, making it difficult to breathe, let alone move.

Sakura gritted her teeth against it. The White Fang. She had heard the name before—she hadn't known he was Kakashi's father. Now that she thought about it, she'd never even considered whether or not the copy-nin had parents.

"Did you even give Sasori a chance?" Chiyo asked, voice strained; Sakura could finally hear the grief in her voice, the pain desperately trying to be hidden. "Did you even try to—to resolve the conflict some other way? To talk him down?"

Kakashi didn't answer her questions. Instead, he watched her silently. More than ever, Sakura wished she could see his face. Was his silence admission? Or had Sasori been like Kaido—

"Of course you didn't. You've surpassed even your father in your bloodshed," the old woman snarled.

Sakura heard a deep, slow inhale, before the following words.

"At least he had the good sense to kill himself."

Sakura's mouth flattened. Whatever her personal qualms with the copy-nin, that had crossed a line. She expected Kakashi to erupt any moment now. She had no idea what to do—stop him? Fight Chiyo?

Of course, Kakashi found it suitable now to defy expectations.

"Leave," the copy-nin said, voice deathly soft.

Both Chiyo and Sakura gaped at him in shock. The older woman recovered first. Her face contorted as she took a short step forward. "You fool, you think—"

"You're acting in grief," Kakashi cut her off, turning to glance at the window. Sakura could see his profile, now. He looked like stone. "You should know better."

The older woman physically recoiled from him like she'd been slapped.

"Your kage is weak, if you may recall," he continued lowly, emotionless. "You bring war on your village, and it will be slaughter."

The small woman stared at him for a long time, eyes dark and beady.

"Bide my time—is it?" she sighed finally. She gave an unpleasant smile. "You must know, son of the White Fang, that you had a better chance of surviving now than you will against my poison in the future."

"Do I," he voiced indifferently.

"Until that day," Lady Chiyo said, acting as though she hadn't heard his words. She gave a shallow bow, before departing the room as abruptly as she had entered it.

For a long time, both she and Kakashi remained exactly as they were, silent. Sakura was still processing what had happened—or rather, what hadn't happened.

Because: how could someone so…incendiary as the copy-nin tolerate words like that? Was it Chiyo's age? Sakura doubted it; she had seen Kakashi kill older. Had it been that she was a woman? That was even more ridiculous to contemplate, because for all his flaws (and there were many), Kakashi had never been a chauvinist.

He believed Sakura to be a silly, frivolous girl, but that had less so to do with her being a girl and more to do with believing her to be…well, utterly useless.

As this thought crossed her mind, Sakura's mood took a sharp downturn again.

"Good night, Kakashi-sensei." Get out, she thought.

He gaze latched onto her with sudden intensity, like he had forgotten she was even there. Sakura tried to maintain the smile on her face.

His head snapped away dismissively, and he took a step. But there was something odd about that step, a slight swaying—

Sakura's eyes fell on a small scratch she had missed earlier on his upper arm, almost entirely unnoticeable. Hardly a millimeter in width, that was all his opponent had been able to get. But it was enough: the scratch was raised and an unusual color.

"The blade that grazed you there. It was poisoned."

He paid her no attention, moving straight towards the door as thought that moment of instability had only been imagined.

"You're breaking the poison in your system down with your chakra, aren't you?" she guessed, eyes narrow. She straightened to her full height. "You're draining yourself unnecessarily."

He paused finally, turning toward her. His jaw could have cut through diamond with how tightly it was clenched.

"You saw me heal them," she said stiffly, hating that she had to do this—to persuade him to let her heal him. Given the chance, she would have let him walk; if only there would be no consequences for such a decision. "Hinata's the expert, but I can do the job well enough."

His eyelids lowered to half-mast as he contemplated her. In that moment, Sakura felt like an insect pinned beneath a magnifying glass.

"It's up to you," she muttered. "You can travel and fight at full strength tomorrow. Or not. To each their own, I suppose."

Sakura was almost entirely certain that he would have hit her then, if he could have mustered the act, that is. Instead, he settled for glowering at her, the full force of his ire conveyed through the rapidly spinning sharingan.

"Onto the table," she gestured, mostly to be annoying.

He didn't shift an inch. Instead, his head rotated carelessly to face the window again.

Because he wasn't looking, Sakura allowed her face to become something truly fearsome.

"Your shirt needs to be off," she said through clenched teeth.

It was like Kakashi couldn't hear her. Or, alternatively—that something truly fascinating was happening outside the window that consumed all his attention. Just to double check, Sakura glanced quickly.

Nothing but night sky.

Stalking forward, she grabbed ahold of Kakashi's flak jacket—making sure to knot her fingers into the black cloth of the shirt beneath too—and rent the layers of clothing in two.

A guttural snarl emerged from somewhere deep in the copy-nin's throat, his head shifting with lightning quickness. Sakura didn't flinch, even when his face ended up a scarce few inches from hers.

"I need to track how far the poison has spread," she explained stiffly.

His shoulders were hunched inward, like he intended to intimidate her with his larger size. Sakura would have sneered, if her attention hadn't turned immediately to the task at hand.

She cracked her fingers before flexing them, lit with green chakra. She surveyed the entry point of the poison and then shifted her fingers through a short sequence of jutsus. A second later, the expanse of pale, scarred skin was lit by an intersection of glowing lines, where the poison coated his veins.

The glow was admittedly faint; Kakashi's chakra was doing a good job of breaking it down through brute force.

She concentrated the next ten minutes on drawing the poison out, vein by vein, depositing the blue, viscous fluid into the potted plant in the corner of the room.

But sometimes, every few seconds, she would get distracted—

Distracted by, that is…

She was trying her best, she reflected bitterly. To ignore it. But increasingly, it was becoming impossible to.

It was—nothing. And simultaneously, everything. The smell of him: smoke, metal, pine, and— The heat of him, his skin almost feverish every time her finger tips glanced it. The lean, scarred expanse of his flesh gleaming in the dim lighting.

It had all meant nothing to her, until the point when it abruptly did.

And now, now Sakura wanted him. She resented him, wanted to stab him several times, and also—apparently, now—to fuck him. What a devastating, soul-crushing development.

Sakura couldn't exactly skirt around it anymore. Not when she was trying so determinedly hard to suppress it. God knew what he could smell on her already, from her previous activities—but she was determined to finish her work before he could smell this.

"Done," she said a little too loudly.

He disappeared before her tongue had even curled to make the 'n,' taking Neji unconscious body with him.

Sakura cursed loudly and collapsed flat on her back onto the bed. Then, after a moment of hateful consideration, her hand left its former position at the edge of the bed to move somewhere else.

Chapter 15: Le Petite Mort

Two trees away, Snail sat perched on a tree in a bright red kimono. Nestled between her thighs was a small mirror, which she peered down at to line her eyes and paint her lips.

Between every exchange for another makeup tool, she directed a very discreet glance Sakura's way.

Hyena was sharpening her tanto against a rock a few meters away. Sakura could sense her cool attention on her as well, well-hidden by the curtain of her black hair.

Raccoon was slightly more polite about it, Sakura appreciated wryly. He had turned the opposite way as he slipped on his purple hakama, though he glanced at her occasionally as well through her reflection in the nearby river.

"So what happened?" a low voice demanded a scarce foot from her.

All three figures' heads jerked up.

Sakura finished tying her obi, then met the brown-haired man's equally unabashed nosiness with a narrow glare. Her mask was down, like Raccoon's and Snail's; Bear looked at these features, unimpressed.

"Everyone here's wondering, alright? I'm just the only one with the balls to pursue the issue. I mean, we didn't really think he'd kill you when he called you outside the bar, but—"

"Crow, I think you tied your obi incorrectly," Snail interrupted abruptly.

Sakura glanced down at the obi with the sort of familiarity one normally directed toward foreign animals only glimpsed in rare scrolls.

"Does it matter?" Bear drawled. "It's not like anyone's going to look at her with you there."

He said it like Sakura was meant to take offense, but it was rather the point. Sakura and Raccoon had been chosen for their respective roles precisely to make Snail stand out. And Snail was, without question, very pretty (or, the face she wore for ANBU missions was). Being petite, with a soft, tremulous voice and a certain air of innocence—almost certainly false, given what the shinobi did in her day to day—lent her an easy transition to her assigned role on this particular mission.

Snail slipped down from the tree, kimono fluttering in the wind as she descended. She reached Sakura and firmly took grasp of her obi, fixing it quickly.

"Done?" Hyena spoke finally, sliding her tanto back into its sheathe.

"Just a minute," Snail responded. Sakura felt the cool sensation of the red liquid on the older woman's lips being applied to her own with a steady hand. After, she grasped the thin hair on Sakura's head and knotted it loosely at the top of her head, sliding a hair comb to hold it in place.

"Get moving."

Sakura kept her limbs loose with great effort at the sound of this new voice. She looked up from beneath her lashes.

Kakashi stood as tall as ever, but his skin had abandoned its pale cast in favor of something closer to the color of sand. Other than that—and the fact that his eyes were amber and his hair black—his face and build remained largely unchanged.

Of course, the others probably didn't have any point of comparison. But if the copy-nin remembered that she had seen him unmasked (or anything from that day at all, for that matter), he did a remarkable job of hiding it.

Bear hastily took his place atop the horse tied to the carriage, complaining beneath his breath about the animal's smell. After a brief pause, Sakura, Raccoon, and Snail made their way into the modest vehicle. Hyena gave a nod their way and then disappeared into the trees.

Kakashi tracked her progress before entering the rickety carriage as well, sliding into place beside Snail. Sakura thanked the heavens that it was Racoon beside her, and not him. She gazed studiously out the window.

"Move," Kakashi demanded curtly. Bear lifted the reigns and prompted the horse into motion. The carriage made a concerning creaking noise before following.

"You have the drug?"

"Yes, taichou," Snail answered.

"When he's unclothed, inject it into the femoral vein. The aphrodisiac-sedative combination will keep him occupied for thirty minutes maximum."

"I understand."

"It's critical that he believes a sexual encounter transpired and that our 'visit' goes unnoticed," Kakashi continued stoically.

"Understood, taichou."

Sakura knew from Tsunade that drugs like the one Snail was carrying were exceptionally precious. Villages had to keep their use of such compounds discreet, as they left traces that could easily be deconstructed and analyzed given the slightest suspicion. If discovered, targets could build immunity years of work and research became abruptly useless.

Sakura's gaze fell unbidden on the copy-nin. Like many other villages' special ops, there were branches of ANBU that engaged in actual seduction. Kakashi's team was not one of them—hence the drug.

Was this mission, like the previous, meant to end in a bloodbath too, she wondered idly. Was that why their team had been chosen?

She couldn't rule out the possibility for sure. In an unusual turn of events, everyone had been informed of their roles for this mission and just that. The target of the drug, indeed, seemed to be only one minor step in a multi-layered, complex plan that only Kakashi knew the entirety of.

Which was fine with her. It was an odd mission when Sakura didn't have to kill someone.

Boring, you mean, the Voice offered.

Sakura gazed peacefully out the carriage.

Almost a full day later, they reached the sedate, unassuming establishment they had been searching for. After a brief conversation with the owner—and after a few coins changed hands—they were allowed to enter and to display their 'wares' among the private rooms. They struck gold on the third.

Seated in front of them on a tatami mat, Hachiro—their target—sipped his sake indifferently along with his fellow accountants.

From her demure position, Sakura could see that the copy-nin's shoulders were slumped and his back slightly curved, making him seem far less imposing than usual. His voice, when he spoke, was a carefully modulated tenor, higher and smoother.

"So fine a group, and yet so lacking in…suitable entertainment. Please, allow me to present to you my finest." It was a silkiness she had never heard before. Sakura detested it.

At the sounds of jeers, Snail stepped in front of Sakura and Raccoon, curtsying. The shoulder of her kimono slid down and revealed a naked shoulder.

Hachiro was a handsome man, which didn't bode especially well; he might turn them away altogether if his libido was satiated sufficiently elsewhere. But the man beside Hachiro nudged him, a slightly fearful smile on his lips. "Hachiro-san, you work so hard. Perhaps, one of them may help you…relax."

Hachiro tilted his head, seeming unconcerned by this.

"Gods!" another man laughed riotously, clearly drunk. He swayed, even seated. "Such a tight ass."

The first man's eyes widened in panic.

"By all means," Hachiro sipped his sake casually. "If you don't like your job, I can easily relieve you of it."

The drunk man seemed to abruptly sober. "H-Hachiro-san, don't take what I said the wrong way," the man laughed nervously. "I-In fact! Tonight will be on me! Pick any one of them, I'll pay for it."

Hachiro smiled unfeelingly. "No matter the price?"

The man swallowed with ostensible difficulty. "Any…one." Clearly, he was willing to take a blow to keep his job.

"What was your name again?"

"Nazako, at your service, sir," Kakashi said, bowing smoothly.

"Who is your most expensive whore, Nazako?" Hachiro asked lazily, sipping his wine.

"Why, let me introduce you," Kakashi answered, voice like velvet.

As soon as Snail was within reach of Kakashi, he wrapped his arm around her midsection and spun her around. His forearm pressed right into her ribcage right beneath her breasts, unmistakably bolstering them to make them more prominent.

His other hand moved swiftly up to grasp her chin and tilt her head to the side, displaying the long line of her neck.

Sakura's lips tightened darkly at the sight, before she gathered the wherewithal to avert her gaze to the floor meekly.

"This is Odori," Kakashi said with a slow, indulgent smile. "Odori-chan is unmistakably the best I can offer. She comes with superlative reviews."

He delivered the words hotly against Snail's cheek. Snail's cheeks flushed a pretty pink.

Kakashi pushed her forward, and she moved swiftly to kneel by Hachiro's side, resting her head against his chest. The act was deceptively innocuous, for in doing so and leaning slightly forward, she slyly allowed him a good look down the gaps of her loosely tied kimono.

He didn't look.

"How much is she?"

Kakashi's gaze shifted between them with the pretense of calculation, before listing an obscenely high price. The man who had offered to pay looked like he might keel over.

"I'll take that one," Hachiro said. "For the price you just stated."

Sakura heard only silence in response to this proclamation. She lifted her head just slightly. Her gaze landed first on a finger pointed in her direction. Then, it moved to the owner of that finger.

She blinked incredulously at it. Her eyes darted to Kakashi.

He wasn't looking at her. He was staring, with exceptional stillness, at Hachiro.

"What!" the man cried out, looking on the verge on tears at this prospect. "She's the least becoming of the lot!"

"Didn't you know?" Hachiro said lightly. "It's the whores that are unremarkable that work harder to make a living. I only want to get my money's worth, Akiro-san. Forgive me, I misspoke—your money's worth."

Sakura's mouth twisted with incredulity.

Without a further glance, the accountant gestured for 'Odori' to move away from him. Snail stood up with a ferocious pout. As she turned to stomp her way to Kakashi, the panic in her eyes was clear.

Sakura stared at him hard as well, trying to find some silent signal as to what she should do. Would they attempt to move the drug from Snail's person to her person? She knew it was probably too risky, could possibly jeopardize the whole thing, but—

But when she looked at him, Kakashi genuinely appeared uncaring, even bored. It was only when Hachiro's attention went to him again that the copy-nin's expression changed, suddenly becoming animated with a greedy smile that befitted his character.

Sakura's lips tightened. She read the message loud and clear. It seemed that this was no longer the copy-nin's—or Snail's—problem but hers. Oh yes, the mighty Kakashi probably had infinitely more important aspects of this mission to address.

Raccoon's hiss beside her jolted her into motion. She stood up swiftly, perhaps a little more swiftly than a civilian should have, and walked over to the man.

He stood up as well.

"Akiro, I'll leave you to take care of payment," Hachiro smiled. He placed a few coins onto the table. "For the drink and the mediocre shamisen." The geisha behind him flinched.

As she and the man crossed the room to exit, Sakura flicked a glance to her captain, jaw clenched.

His back faced her as he casually negotiated with Akiro for payment.

The most immediate issue, Sakura decided calmly, was that she did not have the drug.

No, the sole vial was contained somewhere on Snail's person—which would go entirely unperturbed tonight. She was beginning to theorize that she possibly had murdered an innocent orphan in a previous life; how else could she have earned herself laughably horrible luck in this one?

Snail had been the most likely choice for the whore picked tonight, if at all (they had known from intel Hachiro preferred women to men). Placing the one available dose on her had been the smartest choice. And yet—here she was.

The rickshaw slowed to a stop. A second later, the runner stepped forward to help her down. She heard Hachiro step down lightly behind her.

Genjutsu was the only feasible option. She had a seeming advantage in the fact that he didn't seem suspicious of her; but then, his face remarkably inscrutable.

A male servant greeted them at the door.

"Take her to the bedroom and draw a bath."

The servant bowed low and then directed Sakura up a staircase to a relatively austere master bedroom. It contained the bare minimum—a large mattress, bedecked by simple, unremarkable sheets and cushions. A similarly unremarkable dresser lined one wall, with a modest, serviceable mirror. Window-doors on the opposite side opened up onto a small balcony.

The bedroom was separated by no more obstacle than a curtain from the bathroom. When the servant finished drawing the curtain back, Sakura's gaze found the white, porcelain tub at its center. He filled it with steaming water, tendrils of steam floating toward the ceiling.

"Undress," the servant said, as he rotated the valves shut.

Sakura pretended she hadn't heard, continuing to survey the steam idly. The servant left the room.

As she heard footsteps approach the door, she seated herself on the bed. When Hachiro at last entered, he cast her a nonchalant glance before removing his hakama. Without a word, he slid into the tub and leaned his head against the porcelain edge.

Sakura watched him closely. Perhaps, he had simply intended to purchase her time using Akiro's money without touching her at all.

For a long moment, she thought the man had decided exactly that. Then, slowly, his head tilted upwards.

His gaze passed over body—slow and deliberate. He stood and rivulets of water streamed down the expanse of his body and onto the cold floor. He moved forward, a slow, sedate pace to his steps.

As his path neared the side of the room with the dresser, Sakura moved as well. It was more the unexpected nature of the act than the use of much strength on her part that made Hachiro take a step back as she collided with him. As she had mostly expected, he responded with force. She felt hands grasp almost at her waist, and then her back was shoved hard—hard enough to leave concerning bruises on a civilian—against the dresser in retaliation.

Sakura let out a small cry, expressing of pain she had long ceased becoming susceptible to.

"I wanted to touch you," she explained, voice weak. To control his hands so he wouldn't detect her telling musculature.

"You try something like that again, and I'll give you to the servant outside and anyone who passes by this house until dawn. Understood?" he said coolly.

Sakura's temper flared. Outwardly, she nodded and shrank back against the dresser.

His hands latched onto the sides of her cheap kimono and pulled, ripping the material. Her fists tightened instinctively as his cold hands met the surface of her flesh. She hid the action with a gasp that caused his eyes to flicker in annoyance.

As he palmed her breasts, his teeth glanced a vulnerable part of Sakura's neck that—in any other situation—would have made her tear his throat out. With her teeth.

Instead, however, relegated to the role she was tonight, Sakura clenched her teeth and gave a low, strangled moan, throwing her head back.

When she opened her eyes again, she made eye contact with Kakashi.

Her head snapped back up with painful quickness. The apparition did not disappear.

There he was, completely visible through the double doors-windows that led to the balcony. Kakashi had removed the henge and wore his mask again. His posture, she noticed, was relaxed as he leaned against the railing of the balcony.

Hachiro did not cease his rough handling of her body, but Sakura had become all but numb to it. Her body was cold, almost sensationless, as she examined the figment outside the window.

It was dark outside, but somehow she could see his eyes with unerring clarity. The crimson-vermillion red of the sharingan and brooding charcoal of his regular eye told a different story.

Despite his relaxed posture, Kakashi's gaze was savage and intent on her.

Hands gripped her knees and wrested them apart. Sakura's face contorted into a snarl, forgetting 'who' and where she was. She regained control of her expression just in time as Hachiro's eyes passed over her face. His hand moved simultaneously to slide between her thighs.

Sakura tangled one hand in Hachiro's hair—holding his head firmly in place so that he could not look behind him; with the other, she made the signs for the one-handed genjutsu.

His eyes slid shut and he crumpled toward the floor. Before he could fall completely, she picked him up with one hand on his collar and threw him onto the bed. Hair fell into her eyes with the motion. An object entered the peripheral of her vision. Her hand snapped out, snatching the incoming object out of the air. She turned it over. It was her hair comb.

Her head slowly moved up from her open palm. Kakashi now stood inside the bedroom with her.

Stoically, she grabbed the damaged halves of her kimono and pulled them together. After a moment, she paused, eyes narrowing. Her obi was strewn on the ground barely a meter from her. She looked up to examine the room's only other conscious occupant.

She didn't know what possessed her to do it. Madness, possibly. (Probably).

"Pick it up," she commanded.

Sakura couldn't see Kakashi's face, as it was cast in the shadows. But his eyes glowed—with something ineffable and dangerous—as he surveyed her. And then, as her own eyes lowered in a blink, he became a blur of motion.

By the time her lashes had lifted again, he was down on one knee, his head was level with her knees as she perched on the dresser still. His head was cocked to the side, his nostrils flared, as his fingers grazed over the white obi.

Sakura yanked her chin up and raised her hand, palm open in wordless demand.

Kakashi's mismatched eyes burned into her from his position, unmoving. The clouds must have shifted, because abruptly, light was cast into the room again from the moon. It lit half his face. But the half she saw was enough to make her still. There was insanity on the visible half of his face, a barely restrained something that had her mouth twisting.

"Give it," she whispered, the words harsh in the utter quiet.

His head was still tilted, his eyes still burning into in that peculiar, scalding manner, as his hand lifted slowly—a mockery of his earlier speed. The heavy material of the obi made a sibilant noise as it slid from the floor.

Sakura watched its progression with determined focus. She was immediately aware, therefore, when the copy-nin's hand stopped again, barely above her knee.

His hand hovered there, the heat from his radiating from his palm and making the hair on Sakura's leg rise.

Kakashi's face was half obscured by the black mask, but when her eyes darted to him, she knew what he was going to say before he had even said it.

Shock made her numb. Dust particles that had had floated through the air, steadily, gradually, stopped their natural trajectory. The whistle of the wind through the trees dissipated into sudden, deathly silence.

"I want you."

The dresser shook suddenly with the force of both the copy-nin's palms settling on it, framing her body. He looked deranged by the confession, like he would have liked nothing more than to make it untrue.

And, abruptly, Sakura came back to herself.

His eyes were half-lidded, feral, as he peered up at her from between her legs. "I want to fuck you." Her ears burned.

"Find an oiran," she snapped.

"I did," he spat back.

A humorless laugh bubbled up. But she felt the seemingly ever-present knot now between her legs clench, so exquisitely, painfully tight.

She watched his hands spasm on either side of her, his nails digging long cracks into the marble surface of the dresser.

"I don't feel the same," she tried, attempting to sound indifferent.

But she knew her fingers trembled too much, frenetic and uncontrollable, like an addict long deprived. Sakura watched as his nostrils flared, and he looked up at her, gaze terrible and knowing.

"I can smell you," he said, voice a rasp. For one, devastating second, his hot gaze flickered toward that part between her legs, which was undeniably wet.

Her shoulders trembled violently. "So?" she told him coldly.

His eyelids slid down further. "Let me touch you," he whispered, gaze simultaneously livid and hungry.

The last of Sakura's cool control snapped. Her hands knotted in the hair at the back of his neck, but it didn't feel so much that she was pulling him up as her hands were following his motion upward. In an instant, the eyes that had drilled into her from below were level with her. His palms, coarse, rough, and blazing with unnatural heat settled on the tensed muscle of her thighs.

"You want to touch me?" she hissed. "Touch me."

His eyes flashed with victory.

And then hands slid up her legs, electrifying the skin, muscle, and tissue there. He flicked aside her kimono with disparagement, like it was contemptible for obstructing him. And then, he cupped her, the weight and heat of his palm against her a fatal blow.

She felt like she was on fire, like she was liable to become ash at any moment.

The moment his fingers drove into her, Sakura's head crashed into the mirror's dresser, shattering it. Glass shards fell over both her and him, as ecstasy stole words—all semblance of language—momentarily from her. She grasped at his shoulders with bruising strength, and he took it, eyes dark, wild with equal greediness.

The roughness of the skin on his hands felt glorious inside her, the width of his knuckles spreading and twisting wrecking her with how terrifyingly well he fit, how almost-perfectly filled she felt at last.

His fingers curled, and Sakura's mouth fell open in a soundless gasp, a mere breath of air exhaled.

The world consisted only of that hot, desperate space between her legs and his fingers. And then—the iron heat of cock pressing urgently against her. Her gaze flicked down to it, rapt, then back up to his face.

The copy-nin's face was a beautiful painting of both insatiability and starvation, the tension in his jaw visible even through the black mask. Sakura's hands snapped to his hips and dragged him hard against her, cradling him—his cock, she thought, and a new rush of heat flooded her core—between her thighs.

She watched him, heady with—she didn't know what it was. An odd sense of power, perhaps. And also, a keen knowledge that—

She locked her legs behind his back, possessive and also half-wondrous. And, like that, Kakashi's face was suddenly in front of hers, his ragged breath a hot caress against her lips. For a long moment, Sakura glared at him, and he glared back at her equally resentfully.

Then, his mask was gone, and his mouth was on hers, filthy and dirty and harsh, as his tongue dragged forcefully against her own.

The full force of his body was driving her against the dresser as he rutted against her, his snarls swallowed by Sakura's mouth. His fingers, belying the savagery of his mouth, were calamitously deft inside her, manipulating that particular spot in her to the point of madness—her madness. And Sakura felt like she was dying—the most terrible, hateful death possible because it seemed both so thunderous and terribly sweet, and she wanted it so, so badly. Her only consolation was that there was equal desperation on his face, in the dangerous tightness of his jaw, in the strained veins of his neck and arms, in the hardness of his cock.

"Look at me," he growled into her ear, his newly revealed mouth—firm and sensuous—hot on her.

Sakura suddenly felt like she couldn't direct her gaze anywhere else.

"Look at me," he repeated again even though she already had, and he knew it. She saw white as she came, gaze blindly locked on his. Dimly, she felt the body rutting against abruptly still, tight against her. Possibly, he said something. Possibly, he was entirely silent. She was deaf to the world and didn't know.

He left immediately; the loss of his lips first, his fingers a second later; the double door windows parted and shut soundlessly, and Sakura didn't really care.

Disbelieving of what had transpired, she left the dresser and staggered toward the bed. She settled on it, cheeks red, marks trailing from her neck and down, and smelling like sex. This, ironically, could only aid her whenever Hachiro woke up.

But Sakura didn't have it in her to be grateful right now.

She was livid—at herself, at Kakashi, at the fucking ceiling above that had seen it all.

So she had known before this how regrettably undiscerning her libido was—she cringed just thinking about it—fine. But she had never, ever intended to act on it. Her body was supposed to defer to her mind, which very, very strongly maintained a decided stance of antagonism toward the individual she had just—

It had clearly been a lapse of judgement for the both of them. At this acknowledgement, she began to calm down. Neither of them had touched each other just now because they liked each other. This had just been…a shared momentary lapse in judgement, and it would never be repeated.

Perhaps, even, this had been a necessary evil in order to purge herself of that misdirected lust. Now, she would be able to pretend this all had never happened.

Sakura settled back against the pillows and waited for Hachiro to wake up.