Previously on The Longest Year Ever:
The girl trapped inside her mind has almost no will to live whatsoever, and Orochimaru takes advantage of it and traps the girl. He traps her body with a katana and then makes a cage of white snake scales appear and surround her, trapping her in the small restricted area of her mind.
Christmas and the New Year went by, and a group of 9 people sneaked out of the celebrations to spend their evening with their friend at the hospital. Gifts are shared, and Sasuke is 'invited' to spend the holiday with the rest of the group.
Confrontations between Sai, the young Kazekage and Sasuke occur, and Sasuke finds himself wanting to know what happened to Sakura while he wasn't there, he also finds himself not able to stop thinking about her.
As Tsunade enters Sakura's room to do the check-up, she screams. As the nurses look where she points, they see an empty bed and an open window.
At the same time, Sai has a bad feeling that makes his stomach swirl in a sick manner, and Sasuke gets the sickeningly familiar eerie chill he had when he was 8.
So many things happened since the survivor of the Uchiha massacre came back, and all in only 6 months and 3 weeks.
To all my dear readers, i'm really sorry for taking so long to update, but i've been loaded with school work and studying and all...
i could only work on my fic in the little free time i had, but even with so much stress i think this chapter's pretty good, but as usual, let me know what you think, your opinions help a lot!
now, a small, but important note, i'd like my reviews to reach at least 95 for the next chapter, but well...
and c'mon everyone, i've got 8560 hits and only 86 reviews, be nice!!
now, enjoy and review at the end!!
Disclaimer: Naruto is owned by Kishimoto-sensei!
Shizune hurried down the hallways of the hospital, her destination: the main office of the building, Tsunade's office.
After Tsunade had found Sakura's empty room, the nurses had escorted the shaking woman to her office and called Shizune.
Her steps echoed in her ears as she made quick steps (because you can't run inside a hospital) and her heart pounded inside her ribcage, was it really true?? Was Sakura really missing??
She stopped, panting lightly, in front of Tsunade's office door and took a deep breath to calm herself down.
After a few seconds she knocked lightly and opened the door.
"Tsunade-sama." She called out almost in a whisper, but no one answered her, so she entered, softly closing the door behind her and then searched the office, to find Tsunade sitting in the couch of her office. She was bending over, her face in her hands, her body shaking, and soft sobs could be heard. Shizune sighed sadly, so it was true…
One step, and another, and one more… they all echoed in Shizune's ears as she walked closer. Another step and another and just one more… she stopped in front of Tsunade, what could she say? She stood there for a few seconds, before she couldn't take the silence and the soft sobs any longer.
"Tsunade-sama… are you… all right?" she asked hesitantly in a whisper.
The older woman sniffed and shook her head, not finding her voice at the moment.
Not knowing what to say, Shizune sat down next to her shishou and did the only thing she could. She wrapped her arms around the woman and stayed silent, simply comforting. The silence wasn't unbearable now, it was just… a silence of mourning.
Chapter 13: Calculating eyes, The 3rd and the maps!
After he had that eerie chill, he definitively couldn't sleep. He tried, he tried hard, but he couldn't. He just couldn't ignore it, not when he knew, yes knew, something so very wrong and bad was going to happen, if it wasn't already happening.
As the years went by, he learned to trust his gut feelings, they were always right, especially when those feelings that something would go wrong came with chills. And when they came with eerie chills, it was something big, bad and wrong. And he didn't like it, not one bit.
He was currently on his balcony, well… more specifically on his roof, just sitting there. From where he was he could see the Nara forest, he had heard 2 Akatsuki were killed there, but he didn't knew the details about it, only that Team Kakashi (as they called it now, it was still Team 7 for him, even if there were some extra members, not that he'd admit that out loud) had fought those Akatsuki.
He broke from his thoughts seeing a shadow enter said forest, who the hell would enter the Nara forest at 4 a.m.??
Finding that this could be a distraction form his current thoughts, that he was sure would lead to a certain person, he decided to follow the shadow, he was just going to check it out, what harm would it do?? "None… right??"
"Right." He uttered to himself and started to move. It was late, already Monday, and he knew Yamato would only come to him in a couple of hours, so he could just go and be back in time for the tasks the Hokage gave him, and then for training, which no one except Yamato knew about of course.
"Yeah, sounds good." He concluded and then started to jump from roof to roof, his destination, the Nara forest, his goal, a distraction.After a few hours, Shizune had managed to get a shaking Tsunade to the Hokage mansion and in bed, but before she left, Tsunade had spoke for the first time that night.
"Tomorrow… I want everyone in my office." She had said shakily, sitting in her bed, Shizune had nodded. "I want all of Rookie 9, Team 7, 8 and 10, Team Gai… everyone, Sai, Yamato and Sasuke included." Shizune had agreed and then told the woman to get some sleep until the morning.
Shizune was currently in Sakura's hospital room, since the kunoichi was gone, she would take all the things that had been given to her to her house, getting inside her apartment wouldn't be much of a bother, Sakura had her house keys in the pouch she had when she was admitted.
Shizune would only enter, put everything in the living room or kitchen and then leave, she wasn't going to 'spy' on her friend.
"Do you need help Shizune-san?" one nurse asked from the doorway, seeing a very charged Shizune.
"Well… yes." She admitted.
"Then I'll help you." The nurse said as cheery as she could and took half the things.
The walk to Sakura's apartment was quiet, and once there the nurse that had accompanied Shizune left, leaving the things she had been carrying near the door.
"Thank you." The nurse nodded.
"Anytime Shizune-san." The nurse had replied while walking away.
Once Shizune had entered, the first thing she noticed were the walls, filled with paintings of the most different kinds, some dark, some light, some of forests, some of the sea, and as she walked further, she couldn't stop being amazed by all of the paintings.
She also noticed Sakura's home was simple, but cosy and stylish.
Smiling lightly at her friends' and kouhai's tastes, she left the apartment. She locked the door and kept the key, she would give it to… she didn't knew, either she would keep it or give it to someone close to Sakura and responsible, maybe Kakashi, or Yamato, definitively not Naruto, or maybe Sai.
As he watched Sasuke from the balcony, he frowned, Sasuke was acting strange. Not that the kid acted normal like a normal person (because someone like him, with such a past, couldn't be normal, just like he wasn't normal either), but there was something different about Sasuke today, he usually acted cold and emotionless, but today, ever since he had arrived to watch him, he had noticed it right away. He probably wouldn't have noticed a few weeks ago, but ever since he had begun training him, he had managed to 'read' his demeanour and personality, even if just a little. Well, at least he could see when something was bothering, or annoying, or amusing him, something one would only get to know after watching him and 'studying' him for a while.
Either way, he knew something was bothering him. It was now around 6:30 a.m., usually at this hour Sasuke would be in the shower, or getting out of one, then he would come back to his room half dressed, he would check his PDA as he dressed a shirt or a jumper or whatever, then, after he was fully dressed, he would shove the PDA in his pants and would come out of the house for the tasks the Hokage gave him. And if there was something about Sasuke, when he made a plan for his days, it didn't change, he knew it for a fact because he had memorized his routine.
But today, Sasuke wasn't going accordingly to his routine. He was already dressed, his hair lightly wet from a shower taken around 30 minutes before (the water dried slowly, seeing it was still winter), and he was sitting on his bed, his knees half bent up, his elbows resting over his knees and his face against his folded hands. He had been perfectly still ever since Yamato ha arrived. Something was definitively wrong.
15 minutes passed and the PDA buzzed on the bed-table. Yamato noticed Sasuke taking a deep breath before straitening himself and swinging his legs off of the bed. He took his PDA and as he read the message he got up and walked to the balcony.
He opened the window and shoved the PDA in his pants.
His eyes were cold, calculating, blank and void, he hadn't seen this look on him for months. The teen used to have this kind of look for the first days he had been back to the village, after that his eyes had changed to just blank.
"The Hokage wants to meet us in her office at 7:30." He stated in a void, calculating tone before he re-entered his house, closed the balcony door and took his jean jacket that was over his bed.
Now Yamato was 100 sure of it, something was wrong.
As they walked to the Hokage building, Yamto realized something, Sasuke was acting exactly like he acted when he came back to the village, exactly like he acted when he was with Orochimaru, cold, calculating, blank. But just 2 days ago he was 'fine', in a way of speech. He was… sociable in some kind of way, but now… not that much. Damn, is it hard to characterize Sasuke's demeanour.
As they reached the Hokage building, 10 minutes early, at least his daily habits were the same, he was always 5 to 10 minutes early, the ANBU got curious as to why the Hokage wanted to see them when, 5 minutes later, Sai walked down the hallway to then stand leaning against the wall opposite of the one where Sasuke was leaning against. He had thought Tsunade had wanted to see them because of Sasuke's situation, it wasn't about that apparently.
When 7:30 sounded (maybe not literally), Yamato was even more curious, all of Rookie 9 and Team Gai were there, well, Kakashi wasn't there, he presumed his sempai was just late.
Sasuke who was the one nearest to the door, was ignoring all the looks everyone was sending him, he wasn't even bothered by it.
He straitened himself and, unceremoniously, entered the office, not even bothering to hold the door to anyone. Ino stared at his back biting her lower lip.
"What's wrong with him?" she whispered.
"He's got a stick shoved up h-"
"Sai." Yamato cut the teen off, he knew he shouldn't, but he just couldn't help himself but feel like he couldn't let Sasuke be verbally trashed, perhaps because he trained said teen, he didn't know. The artist-nin shrugged and entered the office after the one who cut him off.
Everyone else followed them, and once everyone was there, everything was quiet, until the door opened and closed one last time.
"Sorry I'm late." Kakashi didn't even bother to make up an excuse.
Tsunade was behind her desk, she looked depressed… and pissed.
Never having liked awkward silences, Naruto spoke up the question everyone wanted the answer for.
"Why'd you call us Tsunade-baa-chan??" he asked, not as loud as everyone would have expected, in a 'composed Naruto' tone. The older woman cleared her throat and then looked at all of them.
"Sakura's gone." She stated bluntly. Gasps were heard.
"Tsunade-sama, you don't need to be so blunt." Shizune whispered, seeing Hinata had fainted in Kiba's arms, Naruto had his head lowered, tears threatening to fall, Ino was crying softly in Shikamaru's shoulder, Sai had his fist clenched and was glaring at the floor, and the reactions continued.
"What Tsunade-sama means isn't that Sakura's dead." Everyone calmed down and looked at Shizune.
"W-What do you mean??" Ino inquired cleaning her eyes.
"Well…" Shizune took a deep breath. "Sakura's gone, but not dead, just gone." The woman said sadly.
The sound of the door opening broke everyone from the trance they had been in and they all turned to see Sasuke opening said door.
"Where do you thing you're going Sasuke?" Tsunade demanded. He looked over his shoulder.
"I don't think that concerns any of you." He stated bluntly.
"You're not going anywhere until I say so Uchiha." Tsunade hissed and got up, to which Sasuke fully turned around, staring blankly at the woman and closed the door.
"Then what do you want?" he asked, clear annoyance in his cold tone.
"I want to know where she is?" Tsunade said, trying her best to ignore his disrespectful tone towards the Hokage.
"She?" he asked raising a brow. "Who?" Tsunade twitched lightly.
"Where is she?? Where's Sakura??" the Hokage demanded, her aura dangerous.
"I have no idea." He stated shrugging.
"Where'd you take her to??" Tsunade yelled, everyone was quiet and looking at him.
"I don't know." He hissed. Tsunade was about to snap again, but Naruto intervened.
"Teme, if you know where she is, just tell us." Naruto said, taking a step towards Sasuke.
"I don't know." He repeated.
Sai wasn't buying his words, maybe because he didn't want to, and maybe because he was too shaken with the news, and in a blur Sasuke found himself against the wall, a kunai against his neck, onyx eyes glaring at his. He could have evaded, he just didn't feel like it, not now, he wasn't in the mood.
"Where is she?" Sai hissed.
"Get off me." Sasuke hissed back, his cold onyx eyes boredly staring at Sai.
"You know where she is, so talk." Sai hissed again, not even bothered, and pressed the blade tighter against Sasuke's neck.
"I. Don't. Know." Sasuke hissed again, emphasising each word. The blade against his neck was pressed with more force, and he could feel blood running down his neck.
"Where." Sai demanded.
Everyone was too shocked about the news they received to do anything about the situation, so they simply stared, all of them against Sasuke.
"Let go." Sasuke stated in a void tone. Sai only pressed the blade harder.
Seeing Sasuke's look change lightly from cold and calculating to cold, calculating and murderous, Yamato decided to intervene.
"Stop it you 2." He got closer and put a hand on each of their shoulders.
"Sai, let go before you do something stupid, and Sasuke, don't think about doing anything stupid." The words directed at Sai were an advice, but those directed at Sasuke were a warning, everyone was puzzled, and they became even more puzzled by Sasuke's reaction to the ANBU's words.
"Hn." Sasuke sounded. Sai kept glaring at him but drew back nonetheless.
"Now, do you know anything about Sakura?" Yamato asked Sasuke, everyone was amazed about how Yamato was handling the young Uchiha.
Sasuke glared at the ANBU before directing his gaze to the Hokage.
"No." he stated bluntly and clearly, so there would be no confusions.
Tsunade sighed and sat down.
"We have to find her." She said in a small voice.
"We could do teams and go look for her Tsunade-baa-chan." Naruto suggested, determination in his words, determination to find his friend, his team-mate, his sister.
"For once I agree Tsunade-sama, with all of us we could make 3 or 4 teams and search around Konoha, she might still be near." Neji intervened.
"Yeah, let us go search Sakura-chan." Kiba agreed.
Tsunade pondered for a while, and then reached a conclusion.
"Ok." Cheers were heard in the room.
"I'll make 4 teams with all of you." She looked at everyone. "Neji will go with Kakashi and Gai, his Byakugan is a good method to see everything, Kakashi is a long range type and Gai a close range type." She stated.
"We shall do our best Tsunade-sama, and if I fail this mission I shall run 500 laps around Konoha!" Gai exclaimed.
"Gai-sensei!!" Lee exclaimed, and his sensei and him hugged, a beach appearing behind them, the waves splashing with the sunset.
Everyone rolled their eyes.
"Kiba will go with Shikamaru and Chouji, Kiba's sense of smell can detect her, Shikamaru's jutsu is useful and Chouji's a close range type." The 3 nodded, for once Shikamaru didn't think of the task given to him as 'troublesome'.
"Yosh! We'll do our best." Kiba exclaimed, his determination at the top.
"Ok, then Shino will go with Tenten and Lee." Shino nodded, Tenten uttered a 'yosh' and Lee made a dramatic scene with his sensei, to which everyone rolled their eyes at their antics, again.
"And Hinata will go with Ino and Naruto."
"Hai." Hinata said, her eyes holding determination to find her friend.
"We'll find her Tsunade-sama." Ino said, her eyes too holding determination. Tsunade was surprised when Naruto remained quiet, his fists clenched at his sides.
"Naruto?"
"We'll bring her back Tsunade-baa-chan, I promise, even if it takes my life." Kakashi looked at his student wit a small smile, he was as determined like when he promised Sakura he would bring Sasuke back.
"What about me?" Sai asked from where he was.
"You're staying, just like Yamato is staying too." The Hokage said evenly.
"Yamato is in charge of watching Uchiha, I have nothing better to do-" before he could say anything else, Tsunade interrupted.
"You're staying." Tsunade said, leaving no place for discussion.
Once more, the sound of the door opening made everyone look at said door, and once again, Sasuke was the one opening the door.
"Where are you going?" Tsunade demanded.
"I believe that whatever is further said in this office will not concern me, so I have no reason to stay." He stated, this time Tsunade had no objections, he was right.
Before he left, Sasuke looked at Yamato.
"I'll be in the 3rd." was all he said before he left, to which Yamato gave a curt nod, which made everyone stare at the ANBU.
"What?" he asked, not really at ease with all the stares.
After the final remarks were made, everyone had scattered and went to get their equipment to leave right away, and has Yamato was about to meet Sasuke, he stopped, sensing Sai behind him.
"Do you need anything Sai?" he asked turning to face the teen.
"Where are you meeting him?" Yamato raised a brow under his mask.
"I am not about to tell you anything knowing you'll only go searching for a fight with him." Yamato replied.
"Is it the 3rd training field?" Sai persisted, to which Yamato sighed. "Where?" Sai asked again.
"It's confidential." At those words Sai snapped.
"He's a fucking traitor, there should be no confidential for him." Yamato sighed again, without Sakura, Sai was a complete emotional mess.
"Don't try to know something you won't like to know." Yamato stated before he disappeared in a pouf of smoke, figuring this way he wouldn't be followed by Sai.
As for the artist-nin, he kept in place, he didn't care about what he would find out, he just wanted to know just what Sasuke did in his free time, and he was going to find out.
As he walked down the streets of Konoha he kept thinking of where Yamato and Sasuke could be. He had though about tracking the PDA device, since it had a GPS, but he wasn't an informatics technician, so he had to think about something else. He couldn't trail their chakra since they had it hidden.
"What to do?" he though to himself and then stopped, he was in front of the library. "He said the 3rd, maybe it's a training field, or a street, or something that is on some type of record books." A determination to find what Sasuke did, where and why he did it, made him enter the library.
The woman at the front desk was the same, but he hadn't come here in around 1 year.
"Sai-san, it's been a while since you came!" the brown haired woman exclaimed. "How can I help you? Do you need new psychology books?" he shook his head.
"Are there books about Konoha's territory?" she tilted her head.
"Well, there are a lot of books about Konoha's territory, do you need something specific?" she asked again, typing some things in the computer.
"Any books that had the territory numbered." The woman nodded and typed a few more things before she got up.
"Follow me, I'll show them to you." He nodded and followed the woman.
After a quick walk the woman stopped and turned to a shelf.
"These books are all the books about the territory that belongs to Konoha." She said pointing at the shelf. "If the data is correct, these ones have the territory numbered." She said pointing at the top shelf. "Some are very old, they're from when the Shodaime was still Hokage, the most recent are from when the Sandaime was Hokage, they stopped numbering the territory, instead they name it now, since there are already many numbered areas and all." He nodded, counting how many books he would have to examine.
"Thank you Hana-san." He thanked, the woman nodded with a smile and then left him alone.
"Let's see, 29 books in all." He mumbled and started by taking 9 of the oldest books, those would do for the moment.
It was around 9 p.m., the sun was long gone and we could find Sai in the library.
Around him were open books, a pile of books in a corner, several sheets of paper with drawings and notes in front of him, a pencil in his fingers and a book in his hand as he sat in the floor against a wall in deep though as he analysed the book.
The small pile of 9 books was the ones he considered not useful, the other were all scattered around him and the several sheets of white paper, opened revealing what he considered important and relevant.
He put the book down, making a mental note of the page, and searched for the sheet he needed, after finding it he took notes of what he had found of relevant in the book he had been reading.
His sheets were marked, the marks being the periods, the period of the Shodaime, Niidaime or Sandaime, and then there were the sheets with notes, others with drawings, and others with both.
Hana walked silently and stopped when she had him on her point of view. With a smile she took a camera from the small pouch at her waist and turned it on.
Sakura had asked her, a few years back, to take pictures of Sai when he came to the library, she had though the girl's intentions were very sweet.
"Could you please take some pictures of him when he comes around and stays long, I just want to make and album for him with all he does that… well, I just wanna make an album so he can remember how hard he tried to understand emotions!"
It was a good example of a good friend, and she would help.
Sai took a book from the floor and flipped some pages, with the pencil he wrote a few things on a sheet near his knee, and at the same time Hana took a few pictures.
She checked the photos on the digital camera and smiled to herself, they were good. She turned the camera off and looked at Sai again, he looked devoted to what he was doing.
With a smile on her face she walked away silently.
Sai checked all the books he had read and nodded to himself, he had analysed all of them and already had everything that he had considered relevant, information of numbered areas of Konoha territory, training fields, streets, houses, he had also drew maps of them all, you'd be surprised by all the changes the territory had had from when the Shodaime was Hokage to when the Sandaime was Hokage, areas had been changed, a lot of things had changed.
With that done, he got up and started putting the books in their due place.
After 2 minutes or so, he walked out of the library.
"Bye Sai-san!" Hana exclaimed as she followed him out of the library, she could have closed it hours ago, but she knew Sai didn't leave until he had everything he wanted.
"Hn." Sai sounded and waved his hand as he walked away, the sheets where he had taken his notes in his right hand, his left in his pocket.
"Kids these days." Hana mumbled shaking her head, a smile on her lips.
Once inside his apartment, some onigiris from the previous day in his hand, he took his notes and put them all over his 'living room' table and analysed them as he took a bite from his onigiri.
He put the onigiri in his mouth and walked over to a cabinet from where he took a sheet big enough to draw a map, some brushes and several paints, 5 to be exact, black paint to draw the map of all of Konoha territory, blue paint to draw the important areas from the Shodaime period, red paint to draw the important areas from the Niidaime period, purple paint to draw the important areas from the Sandaime period and orange paint to draw the important areas of the present days.
And the important areas were all of the areas that had the number 3, streets, houses, gardens, training fields, parks, forest areas, everything.
He took a bite of his onigiri after putting his materials on the table and stared at everything.
Taking another bite he sat down and organized his table so that he could draw properly and so that he could see all of the maps he had done in the library.
Finishing his onigiri he started painting, his skilled fingers drawing quickly and expertly in the paper.
Sai stood on a random roof watching the streets, the teams that had left to try to find Sakura hadn't arrived yet. And he had nothing better to do. The map he had drew last night was neatly folded in his pouch, and he was wearing his regular ninja attire, something he hadn't done in a few months.
His eyes narrowed as he saw a raven haired teen walk by, an ANBU trailing behind him from the roofs.
Said teen was going to his daily tasks, what could it be today? Probably helping someone, go shopping for some old lady or something.
He jumped from his spot and landed just in front of Sasuke, who stopped to look blankly at him.
They stood facing each other for a while, and Yamato observed the teens curious to what would happen.
After a moment Sai looked up at where Yamato was.
"I need to talk to you Yamato-taichou." He spoke in a void voice, just like when he had first joined the team. Yamato raised a brow under his mask and landed next to the teens.
"What is it Sai?"
"I was wondering if you have any news from the teams that left yesterday." He answered.
Sasuke stared at Sai, wasn't he trying to murder him yesterday? So why was he acting like this now? In any case, he didn't care.
"No, I haven't." Sai nodded.
"Thank you Yamato-taichou." He said with a respectful bow.
"I hope they find her soon." Yamato mumbled to himself, and that's when Sasuke was noticed.
"Tsk." He muttered and shoved Sai aside to walk past said teen.
"That is not very polite Uchiha-san." Sai said, to which Sasuke turned to him with a raised brow.
"Got a problem?" he muttered, to which Sai smiled.
"None." Yamato watched Sai, he was acting like when he had joined Team Kakashi, and he wasn't trying to kill Sasuke, nor trying to find anything.
"Keh." Sasuke muttered and turned away from Sai's smiling face. Yamato noticed how Sai's smile was fake, but Sasuke didn't seem to notice.
When Sai turned to him, Yamato got curious, the ex-ROOT had a slight smirk on his face. As he walked past him, Yamato almost didn't hear him.
"I'll find out." And then he was gone in a twirl of ink.
"That can only mean trouble." He though sighing as he followed Sasuke.
A shadow moved in the darkness clad in all black clothes, short hair under a hood, a dark smirk at the person's lips as he moved through the shadows, a bag filled with money in one hand.
"Kakuzu's money will be useful." The shadow hissed under it's breath and kept moving, the bag of money held tightly not to make any sounds.
As the shadow moved past a clearing, the moon lighting it for only a few seconds, the shine of a ring could be seen.
"Things couldn't be better for me." The shadow hissed and then chuckled darkly, making the animals in the forest run away in fear.
So?? how was it?? please tell me your opinions!!
now, to my dear readers that haven't read the manga yet, i'll explain the last part where i mention Kakuzu, one of the Akatsuki members.
Kakuzu was killed by Team Kakashi and Shikamaru's Team in the Nara forest, for more information you can go to wikipedia!!
luv ya all, Kaori-chan!!