Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or it's characters.
A/N Okay so I managed to squeeze out the time to write this chapter before I leave for my Mary Kay seminar next week. So enjoy and I'll be back in August!
Chapter Four
The rain had stopped, but the air was still thick and heavy, making it hard to breathe. It was almost like the sky was waiting for the right time to pour once more. Perhaps it would start once the sun went down entirely, letting lightning fill the night and the trail in which they would travel. Or maybe it would wait until the sun rose again, leaving the sky dark and letting the earth be drenched in an elongated night.
Either way, Sakura hated this storm.
Sasuke returned to their makeshift campsite about twenty minutes after he claimed he would go take watch, a fierce scowl on his face and an aura of pure agitation surrounding him. When Naruto stood and went to ask him what was wrong, he quickly told him to shut up and proceeded to order that they were leaving. Sakura was tempted to get to the bottom of his sudden grumpy behavior, but as soon as that thought came it seemed like Sasuke read her mind and leveled an icy glare at her before he jumped into the trees.
Naruto turned to her and shrugged before he followed suit and leapt up as well.
Sakura felt like Sasuke's irritation was stemming from the fact that they stopped for a breather when he knew they were all perfectly able to keep going through the night. She herself thought they should have waited another few hours to stop so they could have eaten and set up camp simultaneously, but Sasuke surprisingly didn't protest Naruto at the time. Perhaps he thought it over while he was standing guard and became frustrated that he let Naruto barely goad him into stopping.
Sasuke was way ahead of both her and Naruto, moving steady enough to maintain the same distance from them without them gaining on him or losing sight of him. It seemed like all Sasuke would do was keep distance between himself and his friends. But it was always fickle, because there would be the times that Sasuke would let her or Naruto in and it would be so groundbreaking that neither of them really knew what to do.
"It was Itachi."
Sakura looked up from the clean bandages she was currently wrapping around Sasuke's amputated arm. "What?"
"Itachi," he said dazedly, a mix from the drugs he had been given and being lost in thought. "He was the reason I came back to defend the Leaf... I knew you were wondering why."
She blinked a few times, shellshocked, and then finished wrapping up his arm before she finally looked him in the eyes. "What did Itachi do to change your mind?"
Sasuke looked down to his lap and frowned as he concentrated on the single hand resting there. "I found him on my way out of Madara's hideout. I chased him down and demanded answers for what Madara had told me... But he was too focused on finding Kabuto to end the Edo Tensei, so he wouldn't tell me anything. He let me follow him, which shocked me. Together we faced down Kabuto, and Itachi controlled him so he would end the Edo Tensei. When Itachi's spirit was starting to leave the material body, he showed me what happened and why he did everything he did... Why he didn't tell me..."
Sakura saw a single tear fall down Sasuke's cheek and she hurriedly went up to wipe it away. He flinched when she touched him, but made not other signs of opposing her touching him.
He sighed and continued, "He killed my entire clan because Danzo and Lord Third ordered him to so a coup wouldn't happen. He did it to ensure peace for the entire village."
She couldn't stop the gasp that left her lips and Sasuke's eyes darted to her as she cupped her hands over her mouth. She didn't want him to see her reaction; it could make him more upset. It wasn't her place to feel pity for him. And even the shock she failed to disguise wasn't something she should feel. It was the life of a shinobi to keep peace within one's own village. Itachi's sacrifice was extreme, but if he hadn't civil war would have broken out in Konoha. Civil war in a village would give other hidden villages the opportunity to attack.
What Itachi did was an extreme measure that easily could have been avoided if the Council had done their job right. And the way he did it had ruined his brother for life.
"To me, it didn't change my mind that it was an order by the village," he continued, staring off into space with a concentrated look on his face. "I spoke with the Reanimated Hokages before they were sent out to the battlefield... It was them who reaffirmed in my mind that what Itachi believed was right, and so I decided to take the same path and protect the Leaf."
"You didn't really approach that in the best way," Sakura mumbled, not realizing she had blurted that out until Sasuke cast her a scathing glare. "Sorry, but you didn't really think it through, did you?"
"I felt like I did at the time," he growled, moving his arms as if to cross them over his chest but they fell once he remembered he couldn't quite do that with only one full arm. "Look, I messed up. And there's really nothing I can do about it now."
"You can ask for forgiveness," she suggested. "Work to gain everyone's trust again. Help abolish the unsavory ideals in the shinobi system from the inside. Itachi wouldn't have wanted you to want the entire shinobi world to hate you, and he wouldn't have wanted you to kill the only people you could call family now. The best you can do to honor his memory is do whatever it takes to protect the Leaf, no matter what."
Sasuke frowned at her, then turned away to look out the window. Sakura didn't miss the way his face pinched ever so slightly, or the second tear that fell from his eye. She made sure not to mention it.
"Maybe you're right," he whispered. "I'll do that... One step at a time."
"Sakura! Are you even paying attention?"
She blinked a few times and looked over to see Naruto staring at her with a quizzical look on his face. She shook her head and gave Naruto a reassuring smile, a silent affirmation that she was okay. But when she met his eyes and they both looked forward to Sasuke, she could tell he knew what she had been thinking about that entire time.
Sasuke stopped at the edge of a clearing right when the moon was reaching the highest point in the sky. As soon as Sakura and Naruto finally caught up to him, he said over his shoulder, "We'll stop here until dawn. Get some sleep."
"What about you?" Sakura piped up, dropping to the ground and pulling off her bag. She squatted down and began pulling her sleeping bag out to lay on the ground. "You kept watch during our last break. Rest a bit and I'll take first watch."
Sasuke dropped to the forest floor and shook his head as he approached her. "No. I'll take first watch and Naruto can relieve me. You're the medic and you need to be at your top strength in the instance that we get attacked."
Sakura stood up straight and stared him down, getting that proud look in her eyes that just screamed defiance to him. It was kind of hot. Luckily, she missed the way his eyes widened at that thought and she continued, "And I am acting Captain of this mission until we find Yamato and Sai, so as your leader I am ordering you to go to sleep!"
He frowned at her, noticing how she was on the verge of letting out a yawn and stumbling in her spot. They had been travelling almost all day, not to mention he had kept her up last night to heal him. Sakura needed her rest and he was about to force her to go lay down before Naruto stepped in.
"How about I take first watch and you both get some sleep?" he suggested, clapping his hands on their shoulders. The irony of him placing his right hand on Sasuke wasn't lost on him. He frowned at his friend before Naruto continued, "That way you can both get some rest and stop bickering like an old married couple. I'll just wake up Sasuke in a couple of hours and we can switch, okay?"
The pair glared at their friend, Sakura probably unwilling to let Naruto come up with such a logical way to get Sasuke to rest. But Sasuke knew she would still decline, being the selfless brat she was when it came to him, and suggest that she take the second watch instead. And, of course, Sasuke would tell her that wasn't going to happen. She slept at the kitchen table the night before. There was no way in hell she wasn't getting a full night's sleep and it was already getting late.
She wouldn't give in unless he used force.
Huffing, Sasuke stomped over to Sakura without another word and hooked his arm around her waist, then hefted her up over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. Her surprised squeals and shouts fell on deaf ears as he carried her over to wear her backpack had laid half-open with her sleeping bag hanging out.
"Sakura, you'll alert people of our location if you don't stop shouting," he said calmly, with a hint of humor. She was acting like a child, punching his back weakly and kicking her legs around so much that she kept hitting him in the stomach and legs. The fact that he knew she was perfectly capable of punching him hard enough to send him flying across the clearing, yet didn't even hit hard enough now to bruise, further proved how tired she was. She narrowly missed his crotch- for which he was thanking Kami above that she did- and finally stopped when he shifted her weight with a jolt. Unfortunately for him, now her ass was right next to his face and he felt a sudden embarrassment and fear that he might have just done something very stupid.
He had to mentally slap himself and will his cheeks not to turn red.
After Sasuke stopped in front of her things, he gently slid her off of his shoulder and onto her feet. She glared up at him once she was sturdy on the ground and gave him a haughty pout. "I am leading the team during this mission. I don't see why you won't listen to me."
From behind Sasuke, Naruto shouted out, "When have we ever listened to you, Sakura-chan?"
"Don't leave me! If you do, I'll scream!"
Sasuke felt his eye twitch but he pushed down that memory before it had the chance to form. Instead he took a deep breath and looked Sakura earnestly in the eyes. "Let's just let Naruto take first watch. That way you get your way and I get mine."
Sakura crossed her arms and frowned. "And then he's going to wake you up for second watch and it'll no longer be my way."
He couldn't stop the chuckle from leaving his lips before he said, "What, are we children? Just go get some sleep and we'll set out first thing in the morning, like we planned."
For a long moment, they stared at each other. He could tell she wanted to decline but was fighting with the knowledge that she would be of no use to them if she was tired. Sasuke was used to not sleeping much, having to watch his own back during his travels, and Naruto could get just twenty minutes of sleep and run for hours afterwards without tiring. She was the medic of the team, and the doctor in her knew that she needed the sleep, as well. He could see it in her eyes as she slowly gave in and nodded at him once.
"Have it your way," she sighed before turning away from him and bending over to fix her sleeping bag.
Sasuke turned to Naruto, nodded at him once and walked over to a tree to lay against. Ever since he stopped associating himself with Orochimaru, Sasuke had grown used to laying against trees when he slept instead of the forest floor. It helped him stay aware while he dozed and it was easier for him to jump up and fight than if he was laying on the ground.
He watched as Sakura got comfortable- well as comfortable as one could get in this situation- and caught her eyes as she rolled over. She stared at him, something contemplative in her eyes, and she gave him a small smile before her eyes fluttered closed and her breathing soon evened out. He could imagine what she was thinking in that moment- that she could never have guessed two days ago that she would be travelling with him, going on a mission with him for the first time in six years. How it was surreal being in his presence once more without it being strained or hostile. How she missed him so much and was so incredibly glad that she got to see him again.
Because that's how he was feeling, too.
"Sasuke... Sasuke... Yo, teme, wake up!"
Sasuke's eyes shot open and it took every ounce of self-control to not grab Naruto's neck and throttle him. That may have been the best sleep Sasuke had gotten in over a decade. He could have sworn he was actually having a normal dream instead of the typical nightmare.
It was odd, it was refreshing.
It was ruined by Naruto's obnoxious voice.
He glared at his friend and was about to demand why Naruto had woken him up, but he was silenced by Naruto staring him down with the most ridiculous look on his face, like he was trying to pass off as being serious but couldn't manage to keep himself poised.
"What is it?"
Naruto frowned and his eyes narrowed. "What's up with you?"
Sasuke frowned and readjusted himself so he was sitting up straight. "What do you mean?"
"I mean, you're acting weird around Sakura-chan. Actually, you're just acting weird in general. What's going on?"
Sasuke scoffed and looked away. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You've been in a mood since we got back on the trail. And before that, too."
A dark scowl stretched over Sasuke's face. "A mood?"
"Yeah, like you were really grumpy- well grumpier than usual- and were being kind of rude. And you were really closed-off in the village before. Is something up?"
Unable to stop himself, Sasuke looked over Naruto's shoulder at Sakura. He sighed, closing his eyes and shaking his head, and said softly, "No. Nothing's wrong. Sorry I worried you."
The look on Naruto's face was skeptical, at best, and he refrained from saying anything further. Instead, he placed his hand on Sasuke's shoulder and stated quietly, "Look, if there's something up, you can always tell me. You didn't before and you know what happened. Just... trust me enough to tell me what's on your mind, okay?"
Sasuke stared at him for a long moment. He couldn't figure out if he should really admit to Naruto what was troubling him, especially since it was this whole situation that was making him feel this way. There was nothing Naruto could say or do that would make him feel better.
"He's still Sasuke. And we still love him."
The question pestering his mind was, why should they?
It was midway through his watch that Sasuke felt her approach him. He knew she would do this; come to tell him that he needed rest and that she should take watched. And he also knew that he would decline and remain steady in his vigil over their campsite. It wasn't predictable, it was just inevitable that she would choose her concern for him over her own well-being and he would retain his stubbornness that she didn't need to.
"Sasuke-kun."
"Hn?"
She sat down next to him, close enough for him to feel the warmth of her body on his right arm. The heaviness of the atmosphere was sinking on their shoulders and Sasuke wondered if the thickness of the air was why Sakura had woken up.
"How are you feeling?"
Sasuke shrugged and took a deep breath. "I'm fine."
Sakura nodded absently, looking out towards the darkness of the forest. "Right..."
He kept staring forward, doing his best to avoid having her in his eyesight. She had the uncanny ability to get under that facade of his that kept everyone else at an arm's length. Best for him to not even look at her and actually tell him what's going on in his head, why he's been in- as Naruto so lovingly said- a mood.
"Look, Sasuke-" her leaving off her usual affectionate honorific grabbed his attention, "- I know it's been a while since we've all been a team, and you're used to doing things on your own, but I think you should try to work a little better with Naruto and me. I know it's going to take some time to get used to each other again... and we're so happy to be with you again... We- well actually, I think this more than Naruto for sure- I think it'll be best for the mission if we cooperate like we did when we were genin."
The entire time she spoke, Sasuke stared at her with apt attention. She thought that was why he was acting the way he did? She honestly thought he was in a mood because he wasn't used to working on a team anymore? It took all of his effort not to laugh at her. She turned to him then and their eyes locked.
"You're going to need surgery."
He didn't look at her. Instead, he stared at the sheets pooled at his waist and the way only one hand was balled in a fist there.
"The bone of your humerus is shattered and splintered where the bone was severed," she continued, flipping through the papers of his chart. "There are some shards of bone we had to remove in the field but upon further examination we've concluded that more splintering and breaking can occur if not properly tended to. Basically we'll need to remove about another inch or two of bone- depending on how brittle that bone is- and we'll have to put in screws where the fractures are. We've scheduled your surgery for tomorrow afternoon, but it won't take long..."
She kept talking, but Sasuke didn't respond. Instead he waited until she left him alone and laid down as soon as his room was empty. He rolled over and stared out his open window, wanting so desperately to leave. He was itching to move, to get out of here like his life depended on it. But he was stuck in this stupid hospital with a bum arm and nothing else.
The door opened and he recognized Sakura's chakra signature entering. She was alone, thankfully, but she must have assumed he was sleeping. His back was to the door, so he wouldn't doubt it appeared that way. So he just evened out his breathing and closed his eyes.
He really couldn't deal with her right now.
"I know you're sleeping, Sasuke-kun," she whispered. Her hand gently laid on his shoulder, her thumb rubbing him softly before she kept talking. "And I know it's a bad time to come talk to you. Tsunade told me of your condition, and I know this puts a damper on your plans of getting out of here... I wish I could make things better for you... There was nothing I could do for you in the field. Naruto didn't have this problem but for some reason you're having more complications. It could even explain your fever, because your body is trying to reject the disconnected pieces and heal the broken bone, but it can't because it's just too badly damaged. I'm rambling, I know, but you can't really hear me and I just wanted to talk about this to you, but I knew you wouldn't listen if I said it to you while you were awake. Shishou already said you were barely giving her any attention when she was in here... I guess it's just so much of a shock to hear that you're going to lose even more of your arm... It must be tough..."
Her hand left his shoulder as Sasuke heard her sniff. Then there was the distinct sound of his chart being lifted from the bedside table and the paper being shifted back. For a moment, the only sound in his room was the chirping of the birds outside- a sound that was making him flinch, honestly. Why did he still have that stupid window open if all he could hear was those wretched birds with their stupid chirping?
Sasuke felt the burning of tears in his eyes as shame washed over him like a tidal wave. He hated that stupid noise. He hated this whole situation. He hated that there was nothing he could do about everything, how he truly felt that he deserved the punishment he was served justly. He hated that Sakura was worrying so much about him that she sounded tired and worn down.
He wanted to tell her to leave him alone for a little bit- not that he didn't enjoy her company. He would just rather be alone right now. But turning around, revealing he was awake, and hurting her feelings just seemed to harsh for him right now. Plus, in his state he probably needed two arms to roll over in the first place.
And he didn't have that anymore.
"Sasuke-kun, I want to help you...
"You just need to let me help you, okay?"
He blinked a few times, still staring at her a little dazedly. She had been talking to him but he was too busy reminiscing about a day in the past. She was looking up at him with a small smile, her eyes full of hope and a little bit of longing. It was a look she favored whenever she was speaking to him, especially since he showed up on her doorstep yesterday.
Sighing, Sasuke looked down to where his half-arm laid uselessly against his side. "I know."
"Are you going to try?"
Her tone was teasing, but there was genuine curiosity and apprehension as well. She wanted to help him so badly, she always had, and now was the opportune time to let her. He hadn't let anyone help him in the past and things never really worked out for him. Maybe now would be a good chance to change his ways and let her in.
He nodded once and tentatively reached over with his hand and clasped it over where hers were interlocked on her knees. Her small gasp wasn't loud, but he heard it clear enough to feel the need to spare her a glance. In the dimness of the night, Sakura's cheeks still were bright red and her glowing green eyes were wide. She kept staring at where his hand was on hers and her mouth was open softly.
She looked beautiful.
"I will try," he said quietly, his voice barely carrying over the sounds of the night. "Just... give me some time, okay?"
Sakura beamed and turned her hand over, sliding her fingers in between his and squeezing him slightly. "I will give you as much time as you need."
For some reason, it didn't seem like he would need that much at all.
tbc.
