Theory of Time
Chapter Two: The Reason
AN: Thank you so much to everyone who favorited this story, and especially to those who took the time to leave a quick review! Just a heads up, this was supposed to be a one-shot, but it took on a life of its own so I split it up; point being there are only 3 chapters. Here be a long one.
"Do you really not care?"
It was impossible to tell how much time had passed since they lapsed into silence, but Sakura had been wrestling over whether or not she should ask that question since the beginning of it. She desperately wanted to know, but was deathly afraid of his answer. She wanted him to say he cared, but it was so much easier to imagine him glancing up at her and saying 'no' than what she wanted to hear; which was why she almost didn't ask. Curiosity won out in the end and she tried to look nonchalant when he turned his head to look at her. She swallowed.
"About everything, about us." She continued quietly. 'about me.' She added in her head. Sasuke looked away from her.
"I don't care." He said tonelessly.
"Not about our village." Sakura pressed. He shook his head, no.
"Not about Naruto?" Another slight movement, he continued to look away from her.
"About.. me?" She finally asked, trying to keep her voice steady. He finally looked at her, and she knew what his answer would be the second their eyes met.
"No."
Sakura nodded, taking it in stride.
"Didn't think so." She replied, shrugging. She was quiet for a moment before continuing. "So what exactly happened with Orochimaru? Did you kill him?"
"Why do you care?"
"Because I'm slightly curious and have nothing better to do than ask."
"Why should I tell you?" He demanded. Sakura raised her eyebrows at him. He stared back a few seconds for good measure. "I absorbed him." He finally answered. Sakura gave him a perturbed look.
"You absorbed him?"
Sasuke nodded, allowing a few snakes to crawl out of his robes. Sakura pulled in her legs as they slithered towards her, tongues flicking out to taste the air.
"Afraid of snakes?" Sasuke asked, his voice bemused. Sakura rolled her eyes, kicking one and sending it flying back towards him. It landed by his feet and sent Sakura a dirty look before gliding back into one of his sleeves.
"Petrified." She returned, voice oozing with sarcasm. She thought he looked a bit unconvinced. She remained still as one of the other snakes began to wrap around her leg, determined to prove that she wasn't so much as uncomfortable around the thing. Honestly, did he think she was 10?
"Do you think that I haven't changed at all?" She demanded. "I'm not twelve, and I'm certainly not afraid of snakes."
Sasuke nodded, accepting this information wordlessly. Another snake began to coil around Sakura's waist and she stood up, untwining it gently. The snakes' smooth scales were cold, but not unpleasant. She bent over and allowed it to slither off her arm and back towards Sasuke, the other followed suit. She straightened up, placing one hand on her hip as she watched them go.
"This is a mission, you know. Capturing you. Naruto thinks of you as a brother, he's determined to find you and bring you back. I'm only here on orders. So if you thought that I spent every night thinking about you after you left me like that, you couldn't be more wrong." It wasn't every night, exactly. It was often enough, but he didn't need to know that. Sasuke remained silent. Sakura's brow creased angrily; why wouldn't he say anything? The last time they'd seen each other he's left her unconscious on a park bench, she wanted to erase that picture from his memory. She didn't want him to remember her as being that vulnerable to him.
"Did you think that I'd be exactly the way you left me?" She challenged.
"No." He answered solemnly. "I didn't think about you."
The words hit Sakura like a knee to the gut. She knew that, God she knew that, why did it have to hit her so hard when he said it?
"Good." She muttered, sitting back down and facing away from him. As minutes ticked by unnoted she marveled at how slowly time seemed to pass in dark silence. Air was something they might really have to start worrying about soon, shouldn't the others have gotten them out yet? What if something really had happened? Her hand balled into a fist unconsciously. She'd kill those freaks if they'd done anything to her team. She was their medical ninja, if someone had gotten hurt…
She looked over at Sasuke worriedly. He certainly wasn't someone she would look to for comfort, but perhaps his plan had been better after all. She was about to speak up when she noticed the blood. From where she'd been sitting earlier she'd only seen his profile, now she could see the back of his head. A drop of blood trickled down Sasuke's neck, he brushed it irritably. She should have noticed him doing that earlier.
"You're still bleeding?" She asked in surprise, getting back to her feet. She didn't know how long it had been since the cave-in, but the blood on her head had already clotted by the time she came to; and he had woken up after her. He didn't respond, but began to apply pressure to it with one hand, watching her approach warily. He grabbed her wrist when she moved to examine his head.
"Let me look at it, I'm a medical ninja." She said, trying to pull her wrist back. His grip tightened and she threw him an annoyed look in response. "I've been training under Tsunade for 3 years, I can fix it." She insisted, yanking her arm back.
"It's fine." He muttered wincing slightly as he pushed harder on the wound.
"Stop that, it's not helping." She ordered, actually slapping his hand away. "Now turn around so I can get a better look." He looked at her incredulously.
"Now." She said firmly. Well, he certainly wasn't going to do it after that, he'd rather bleed to death. Sakura huffed when she realized that he had no plan of complying.
"Just as stubborn as I remember." She muttered, attempting to pry him away from the wall forcibly. Sasuke panicked a bit when he realized that she was succeeding. He tried to convince himself that he was just tired from his last fight as he moved willingly to cover her success. He hoped that wasn't a self-satisfied smile he'd caught out of the corner of his eye; he might have to kill her if it was.
Sasuke tensed as he felt her fingers trace the wound on his head. Her touch was gentle; it didn't hurt, but it made him uncomfortable. He didn't like people touching him. Fists he could deal with, Sakura's tender touch was something unknown to him. He felt a warm, tingly sensation in the back of his head and was about to move away when Sakura's other hand jutted out to stop him. She held him steady as she concentrated on knitting his skin back together. The feeling faded after a few seconds and she released him; he immediately moved a couple feet away before feeling the back of his head. There was more blood than he'd thought there would be, but touching the skin didn't hurt. He felt a line of smooth skin parting his hair; scar tissue. He considered thanking her but bit his tongue, nodding instead.
"Sorry I didn't notice sooner." She said with a sigh. "I can barely see in here even now that my eyes have adjusted, you should have said something."
"I barely noticed it." Sasuke lied easily. No sense in her thinking he was a wimp. He glanced over at her and noticed her frowning at the ground. She looked upset, but he couldn't imagine why.
"What?" He'd asked before he could stop himself. Concern was not the sentiment that he wanted to project. She looked up at him and smiled slightly.
"Nothing." She answered, slouching and returning her focus to her knees. Sasuke grimaced, trying to recall anything he'd done in the recent minutes to upset her. Was she upset that he hadn't thanked her? He was pondering that possibility when his sharingan picked up the source of her displeasure.
"You're out of chakra." He stated. Surprise flitted across Sakura's face before she masked it.
"No, I still have some left." She lied. She'd gotten quite good at that, without his eyes he might have believed her.
"The sharingan can see chakra levels, you're out now." He said confidently. She scowled.
"It wasn't enough to get us out anyway." She said as offhandedly as she could manage. That was probably true, but now he could see that her irritation was aimed at herself. She had used the last of her chakara to heal her enemy, leaving herself drained and giving him the upper hand. That was very stupid, and she knew it.
Sasuke considered continuing but stopped himself, deciding to let the subject go.
"Who were they, anyway? Your team?" Sakura asked. Sasuke looked at her blankly, confused. "Where did you find them?" She supplied.
"They were Orochimaru's underlings, or test subjects." He amended. "They had abilities I needed to find Itachi." How odd, he didn't feel anything when he said that name. Not anger,disgust; certainly not remorse, but not satisfaction either.
"Like what?" Sakura quipped.
"Jugo can communicate with animals, Karin can track people by their chakra levels, and Suigetsu can turn into water." He answered. Why was he telling her that? He couldn't see any harm coming from it, but there was no reason to.
"Why would you need that last one?" She asked curiously.
"He can change his body shape too. When he increases the size of his limbs, his strength grows proportionally in the process. I wanted him to occupy Itachi's partner while I killed him." Sasuke answered. Sakura nodded, she remembered the one with shark-teeth changing his body.
"So he's really dead?" She asked at length. Sasuke's jaw tightened slightly, not approving of the direction the conversation was heading. He opted to not respond.
"What are you going to do now?" She prompted after a couple minutes.
"I don't know." He replied stoically.
"You could come back." She suggested, though he didn't detect much hope in her voice. "We're dragging you back one way or another, and you have no reason to resist anymore, do you?"
"I'd rather not be executed." Sasuke replied simply. Sakura flushed slightly.
"They wouldn't do that." She muttered. True he was a traitor to their village, a missing nin who had attempted to kill a fellow team mate on his way out; but he hadn't, and that was the point, right? Tsunade would understand, maybe not everyone in the village would understand but they would come to accept him eventually… right?
Her deliberating silence was all the strength Sasuke needed to add to his case. Noting his smug air, Sakura frowned.
"They wouldn't, I wouldn't let them." She replied, more forcefully this time. "Neither would Naruto, Kakashi sensei, or anyone from our year."
Sasuke shrugged, unconvinced. He noted her expression go from determinated to irritation at his demeanor and tried not to smile. He loved making her angry. There might have been something perverse about that; he thought that her smile was what he'd missed the most, but it might have been the way she scowled when she was pissed off. The way she was crossing her arms, stubborn to a fault, because she knew she was right. Sakura sighed in the middle of his musings, deciding to take another approach.
"Where would you go then?" She asked. Another shrug. "Do you care?" If he shrugged one more time she might have to rip his arms off.
"Have you given up on your other goals then?" That one caught him off guard.
"What other goals?" He asked, confused. Killing Itachi had been his life, his only true goal.
"Didn't you want to beat Naruto?" She questioned.
"I already did." He replied, relaxing a bit. If that was all she had-
"That was years ago, you've both grown. You don't want to see who would win now?"
"I don't care." He replied, refusing to take the bait. Sakura smiled slightly at his obstinacy. Sasuke scowled in return. It was definitely the anger he missed; her condescending, self-assured smiles were annoying. When they were directed at him, anyway.
"What about your other goal?" She continued, ignoring his attitude. He considered ignoring her, but his curiosity was sparked and he gave in after a few seconds of silent deliberation.
"What other goal?"
"The one you said on our first day as Team Seven." She replied. His brows knit together in confusion, trying to recall that day. 'I'm Sasuke Uchiha, my goal is to kill someone..' what else had he said? Sakura rolled her eyes a bit at his puzzlement.
"I doubt that you really understood what you were saying at the time." She said, smiling a bit as her cheeks took on a pinkish tint. Alright, now he was very curious.
"What did I say?" He demanded, feeling like he was being left out of a joke. She chuckled a bit before answering him, it was truly infuriating.
"You said that you would kill your brother, and 'repopulate the Uchiha clan'" She replied, laughing outright at his expression. "Well you might have said 'restore', but you get the general idea."
Sasuke turned away from her, praying that her eyes weren't good enough to detect the heat rising to his face. He knew they weren't, but he felt the need to face the opposite direction anyway. He had to ask. He mentally kicked himself as she continued to giggle at his embarrassment. If she didn't stop that in exactly 3 seconds he swore he'd kill her.
"Not something you hear every 12 year old shouting, though I'm sure every girl in Konoha was thrilled." Sakura laughed.
"Shut up." He growled. "You were one of them." He added when her expression remained bemused. Honestly, what would it take to scare her anymore? Her face fell a bit at that, and he wasn't sure whether or not he was happy about it.
"Yeah, I was." She replied, eyes downcast. She glanced up at him to asses his expression. "Was." She repeated, heart fluttering a bit. He smirked. "And I didn't want to have your babies!" She added, causing his grin to broaden. She decided to just stop talking at that point.
"What exactly did you want, then?" Sasuke asked tauntingly. He was enjoying watching her squirm uncomfortably quite a bit more than he should have. Sakura seemed to soften a bit as she answered.
"I wanted you to love me back." She replied simply. She looked offended when he scoffed in return.
"I think it's about time you got over the infatuation of yours."
"It was not an infatuation— and I'm past over it!" She mentally kicked herself for not reversing the order of those statements. And the Uchiha across from her was still smiling smugly, the arrogant bastard.
"And you said you'd changed." Sasuke remarked sarcastically. His condescending tone was enough to make her want to throttle him. Oh how he would regret this when she had her chakra back; and enough energy to stand up.
"Look whose talking," She hissed in retaliation. "You're grinning."
His face fell at that, as if he was realizing that fact for the first time. Face feeling oddly stretched, his expression returned to blank indifference.
"S'not a bad thing." Sakura mumbled, looking away from the transformation sadly. Damn, she shouldn't have said that. "Emotions aren't a bad thing, Uchiha. They only make you human. There's a time and place for them."
"Is in front of the enemy the right place?" He asked emotionlessly.
"Am I your enemy?" She challenged.
"Are we on a first name basis?"
"Am I your enemy, Sasuke?" She corrected grudgingly. His expression remained even, but he seemed irritated.
"You used to call me Sasuke-kun."
"And you found it annoying." Sakura stated, perplexed by his reaction. Sasuke clamped his mouth shut before he could say anything else he'd regret.
"Do you want me to call you that?" She prompted. No response, as expected. "Sasuke-kun." She tested, smiling a bit at the familiar feel of it. She thought she saw his eyes soften a bit, but that was ridiculous. Sasuke was many things, sentimental wasn't one of them.
"So assuming we get out of here alive, plans for the future?" Sakura asked again. They only had so much time in here, eventually they'd either be rescued or suffocate, and he was going to accept the fact that he had nothing better to do than return to her before then. With her. To their village, that they both happened to live in. Not with her. It was a coincident of shared destinations.
When he finally answered she was sure she had misheard him. He reluctantly cracked a smile at her expression and repeated himself.
"I suppose I should get to restoring my clan."
