Sorry I didn't get in a second update last week. I was busy with soccer camp. But now, for the rest of the summer, my schedule is almost completely free so I should be updating every few days or so.

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Once again, Sakura awoke to the sound of someone pounding on her door. She quickly got out of bed and pulled on her clothes. When she opened the door, no one was there, but there was a note attached to her door. She quickly scanned Itachi's note, then left for the dining hall.

After breakfast, Sakura waited for Itachi in her room. When Sakura felt Itachi's chakra in the hallway, she strapped her katana to her waist and was waiting in the hallway for him when he walked up.

He merely looked at her with an unreadable expression, then turned and walked back down the hallway. Sakura, already used to his lack of words, knew he expected her to follow. It was around noon when Itachi finished giving Sakura a tour of the complex. The last place they stopped was the infirmary.

It was immediately obvious that the infirmary had not been used in quite some time. Dust an inch thick coated everything. Simply opening the door sent Sakura into a sneezing fit. All the tools that should have been shiny and sharp were dull and rusty. Inwardly, Sakura sighed. I've got my work cut out for me, she thought. Itachi showed Sakura where all the cleaning supplies were kept, and then left her to her cleaning.

Two hours and many sneezes later, the infirmary was clean. Fresh sheets covered mattresses, rusty tools now gleamed brightly, and not a speck of dust was found anywhere. Sakura stood back and smiled happily at her handiwork. That was the last moment of quiet she got for five hours. All the injured people that had been waiting for her to finish now streamed into the room, demanding Sakura's immediate attention.

Finally, when the dinner bell began to ring, the last few people left the room. Sakura sat for a moment to catch her breath. In all, she had healed twenty-three infected minor cuts, seven infected severe wounds, thirty-three colds, and one man with severe pneumonia. That was more than she did in one week's worth of work in Konoha.

Inside, Sakura felt a rare glimmer of pride. I did all this. And those fools in Konoha thought I was weak, she thought proudly. Her moment of gloating was interrupted, however, by Itachi coming to take her to the dining hall. She ate twice as much as she normally would, because she was drained from all the healing she did that afternoon.

After dinner, Sakura was trudging wearily back to her room, wanting nothing more than to take a hot shower then go to bed, when Itachi walked up. "Leader wants me to train you." It was evident from his tone that he would rather be doing anything else than training her.

"Now?" Sakura asked, barely stifling a yawn.

"Yes, now." He left no room for arguments and started back down the hall to the training room. Sakura had to run to catch up.

Sakura had seen the training room earlier, so it did not surprise her when it looked like they had just walked outside. Trees were grouped closely together and dirt crunched underfoot. "First, I will test your taijutsu," Itachi said.

Without warning, he charged at Sakura, aiming a punch at her stomach. Hastily, Sakura blocked the punch, but the force of it sent her stumbling back a couple of steps. Itachi took advantage of the opening and kicked her into the air. He then leaped up after her and smashed her back into the ground with such force, the breath exploded from her lungs, and she could only lie on the ground, gasping. Cold metal pricked her neck as Itachi put a kunai to her throat, declaring his win.

"You are slow," he said bluntly, "and your taijutsu level is barely that of a chuunin." Sakura, still struggling to breathe, could not argue. He then tested her ninjutsu, which was even worse than her taijutsu. But when he tested her genjutsu, she even impressed him.

"Very well, meet me here after dinner every night. We will work on your taijutsu mostly, some ninjutsu and very little genjutsu since you seem to be adept at it."

When Sakura went to bed that night, she was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Over the next few days, Sakura woke up before dawn to go train in addition to her training sessions with Itachi in the evening. I will not embarrass myself again, she vowed. Every night she fell into bed, aching and sore, but feeling satisfied. The progress she had made was astounding. At first, Itachi could beat her in taijutsu in five seconds flat, but in just three days, she could now last seven and a half minutes against him. Her ninjutsu was going equally well. She learned several new jutsus, and her chakra control was as good as Itachi's.

Yesterday, Itachi had begun to teach her how to use her katana. This was slightly harder. She had never used her katana before, and using a katana was a complex art. But she felt herself improving. Her strength had been almost doubled since the first day Itachi had taught her a week ago. She felt confident that if she ever met up with Konoha hunter-nins, she would be able to win.

With the Rescue Group

The mood had improved slightly in the group upon the discovery of a strand of pink hair found near what had obviously been a camp fire. Pakkun had been able to trace the scent to a small town on the outskirts of the forest. But there were too many scents intertwining in the town for Pakkun to trace Sakura's.

"We need to split up. Ask around if people have seen Sakura. Meet back here in three hours," Kakashi ordered.

Sasuke already knew where he was going to go. Bars, as much as he hated them, were the best places to find information. He pushed open the door and was immediately hit with the scent of stale sake. Three serving girls had already noticed him, and were eying him with something akin to lust.

Sasuke sat at a table that was close to the door, so he could get out quick if he had to. The first girl that came up to him was wearing a very short dress that barely covered anything. "What would you like to drink?" she asked, giving him a sidelong glance that said more than words.

"Give me sake," he grunted, looking at the girl in the same way. He hated to do this, but he found out that when he really tried to seduce the girls, they talked. The girl brought him his sake. Before the girl could walk away, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her into his lap.

"How did someone like you get stuck working in a dump like this?" he whispered into her ear. He could feel her shiver as his breath tickled her ear.

"How did someone like you get stuck in a small town like this?" she whispered back, smiling coyly.

"I came to find someone," he said. "If you help me, maybe I'll reward you." He could see the girl was imagining his "reward."

"What do you want to know?" she asked as she turned so her bare thigh rubbed against his hand.

"Have you seen anyone with pink here recently? Naturally pink hair," he added, seeing that a lot of girls had dyed their hair pink in this place.

"I saw Itachi and Kisame come through here about a week and a half ago carrying a pink haired girl," she answered. Sasuke perked up. If she had been kidnapped by Itachi, it would make sense why he had felt Itachi's chakra near that battle site.

"Do you know where he took this girl?" Sasuke was careful to keep the excitement from his voice.

"To the Akatsuki hideout, of course," the girl snorted. "Almost anyone they take goes with them to the hideout."

"Do you know where the hideout is?" He barely dared to breathe. If this girl knew where the hideout was, he would have hit the information jackpot.

"Yeah, it's in a clearing just north of here. The ruins that are in the clearing are just a genjutsu. I know this for a fact because one of the higher ranked members took me there."

Sasuke abruptly pushed the girl off his lap and stood up. "Thanks for the help," he said, handing the girl a large sum of money. His mind was already far away as he left the girl looking disappointed behind. Impatience clouded his mind, and he almost fell when he jumped onto a branch that was clearly weak. It seemed to take forever before everyone in the group had met back.

"I didn't find anything," Naruto said with disappointment clear in his voice.

"Neither did I," Shikamaru yawned.

"Nothing," Kiba admitted, looking slightly ashamed.

"I found out everything we need to know," Sasuke interrupted. He couldn't stand being silent anymore. Everyone turned to look at him. "I found out that members of Akatsuki kidnapped Sakura and took her back to the hideout."

"That's all well and good, Sasuke, but we don't know where the Akatsuki hideout is," Kakashi reminded him, thinking that grief must have messed with Sasuke's mind. Though it was not obvious, Kakashi could see that Sakura's disappearance had hit Sasuke the hardest.

"I know where that is, too," Sasuke said as he shot a glare of annoyance at Kakashi for interrupting.

Naruto, who had been mercifully silent during the exchange, suddenly yelled, "What're we waiting for, let's go!" He made to go jump to the next tree, but Kakashi grabbed him by the back of his shirt.

"We need to make plans. We can't just storm the Akatsuki hideout. For one, we're way outnumbered. Two, they have the advantage since they know the territory. So we need to sneak in," Kakashi said.

They all split into groups, Sasuke in the main one since he had the sharingan to help break through the genjutsu. Then, they all sprinted off to where that girl had told them the hideout was.

At the Akatsuki Hideout

It was a little past midnight when someone shook Sakura awake. She blinked fuzzily. When her eyes adjusted to the lack of light, she realized that Itachi was the one who had shaken her awake.

"What is it?" she asked. Though she had been here not even two weeks, she knew that it was uncommon to be woken up in the middle of the night.

"Leader has a mission for us."

Sakura went still. Finally, a chance to prove myself! she thought excitedly. She quickly pulled on clothes then followed Itachi to meet with the Leader.

The room she stepped into was very familiar; it was the room that she had woken up in when she had first been kidnapped.

"Welcome, Sakura. Itachi tells me you have made incredible progress in your nightly training sessions. Now it's time to put your skills, and your loyalty, to the test. There is a rather large group of Konoha shinobi heading our way. Your mission is to destroy them."

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I know evil cliffie. I'm really sorry that I haven't updated in a while. I just can't sit and type for long periods of time, so it may take a while for my next update. But to make up for the late update, I made the chapter longer. Now go REVIEW!!!