Ino knocked softly on the hospital room door. After a quiet "come in," she nudged it open and stepped through. Sunlight filtered through the crisp white curtains and warmed the otherwise pale face of her best friend. She was sitting up in bed, reading a well-thumbed novel and looking bored out of her mind. When she saw Ino Sakura grinned and threw the book down among a large pile of 'Get Well Soon' cards, but the blonde medic couldn't return the smile until she had ascertained the damage for herself. Dropping a bouquet of purple and pink flowers on the patient's lap, she flicked through the file hanging from the end of her bed.
"Severe exhaustion, dehydration, muscular fatigue, near-fatal chakra depletion," she read aloud as Sakura admired the flowers and tried not to look too guilty. "Haruno, you idiot."
"It's not like I did it on purpose," Sakura defended, "I just didn't have as much chakra as I thought I did."
Ino huffed. "You have the best chakra control of anyone our age, as you love to remind me. You always know exactly how much you have, and how much you're using." She took the blooms back from her, arranging them in the water jug with expert care. "That's why Tsunade-shishou is so mad at you; because you broke the medic's code by risking your own life."
"How do you know Shishou's mad at me?" Sakura frowned, "I thought you only just got back from the Hidden Rain?"
"Sakura, I don't need to be a medic to spot the recent bruise on your cheek," she tapped the same area on her own face. "She usually puts off hitting us until we're out of the hospital."
"Oh this?" Sakura's hand flew up self-consciously to cover the purplish smudge. "No, this wasn't the Hokage. It was… an accident." She glanced at the opposite bed, where its occupant lay sleeping.
Ino followed her gaze. She hadn't paid much attention the other patient in the room. The part of his face that wasn't covered in bandages was obscured by the top of his blanket. But she recognised the silvery mop of hair well enough, and she gave a low whistle.
"Is that Kakashi-sensei? He looks terrible." His normally flawless physique was showing the signs of injury and inaction, and there were deep bags under his one good eye. Also, where Sakura could have opened her own greeting card business with the amount of coloured paper on her bedside table, Kakashi's was bare but for a hastily-drawn frog on what looked like an old Ichiraku ramen menu. Ino didn't need to read the inside to know who it was from.
A thought occurred to her. "Hey, he's the teammate you nearly killed yourself over, isn't he?" She turned her pale eyes on Sakura, who blushed.
"Don't say it like that," she protested, "I've already gotten the lecture from Shishou. He was on the brink of death himself, and if you remember I think you'll find that rule one of the medic's code is that we don't give up on a teammate as long as there's still breath in our body!"
The silence that followed this outburst was punctured by a rustle from the opposite bed and the girls froze; but Kakashi simply rolled over and lay still once more. Exhaling, Sakura turned back to Ino. "Hey, you want to get out of here? The usual place is probably empty at the moment."
As the door closed on the sterile room, Kakashi's eye opened and narrowed. He would have to remember to ask Tsunade about the medic's code.
A slightly chilly breeze rolled over the hospital roof, and the girls tightened their blankets around them. They had stripped Sakura's bed of its linen and set up a makeshift picnic with the remains of her lunch. Ino munched meditatively on a bag of apple slices while Sakura pulled the lid off a pudding cup.
"So where were we?" she said, picking up her spoon, "I think I was yelling at you for criticising my judgement?"
Ino snorted. "That sounds about right. Though in my defence, I wasn't really criticising. I can't say I wouldn't have done the exact same thing in your place. Kami knows I tried to."
Sakura glanced up at her friend. "You did everything you could for Asuma-sensei," she told her quietly.
The blonde smiled sadly. "I know. We were way too young and he was way too badly injured. I've come to terms with that since then." She dipped an apple slice in Sakura's pudding, ignoring her friend's repulsed look. "That's why I'm glad you could save Kakashi-sensei. It shows we've grown up, all of us. We're old enough to protect the things we care about now."
The pink-haired girl chewed her lip, trying to organise the stream of thoughts in her head. "Then why don't I feel any older than I was in Team Seven? Why do I feel so terrified, even when I know Kakashi's okay? I worry about him, and I worry about Naruto too. He's getting to be so strong and he's starting to attract a lot of unwanted attention because of it. I promised myself I'd protect him, but what can I do against people like Pein and Madara? I was powerless against them. And I worry about Sai of course, because Sai doesn't seem to worry about himself. I have no idea what he must be going through right now with everything, but I can only ever guess at how he feels. And I worry about- I still worry about…"
She buried her face in her hands. She wasn't ashamed to cry in front of Ino, but she didn't like doing it either.
Ino wrapped her arm around her friend. "Apple slice?" she offered, and was rewarded with a small smile.
"I'm sorry," Sakura groaned, "I just don't know what's happening to me lately. Ever since I fixed the sharingan, I've been feeling terrible. I can hardly sleep, and even when I do I get woken up by Kakashi."
"Kakashi?" Ino frowned.
Sakura nodded. "He's started talking in his sleep. A lot of it doesn't make sense, but every now and then he'll say something, a place or a name I've never even heard of, and suddenly my heart starts racing and I feel like I do in the middle of a battle. There's this massive adrenaline rush, but I know there isn't any danger. It's driving me crazy but I don't want to change rooms, because how do I explain why?"
Ino rested her chin on her hands, wishing she had Shikamaru's problem-solving skills. Even after Sasuke had left the village, or after one of Naruto's various near-death experiences, her friend had never seemed this shaken. "This is something else, isn't it? Something new," she guessed, confirming the truth of her words in Sakura's expression.
"When I was fixing the Sharingan, part of my chakra, it- went in," and suddenly she was recounting the whole terrifying experience. "At first it felt like something new, but I realised that I've actually felt like that before," she confessed, hugging her blanket closer, "maybe not so… condensed, but the same sort of potential. In certain battles- the worst ones- I've felt like I almost could enjoy it. Killing them, I mean," she gave Ino a sidelong glance, as though trying to gauge her reaction. "I know that's a terrible thing for a medic to think, but it's true. I just-"
But Ino raised her hand and cut off her friend's explanation. "Idiot," she told her, smiling as Sakura's eyes widened in surprise, "every ninja feels that sometimes. We lose people. We avenge people. We get caught up in the moment. We see humanity at its very worst. Of course it's hard to stay impartial about what we do; but our ability to do it anyway is what separates us from civilians."
Sakura sighed ruefully. "When did you get to be so wise?"
Ino laughed. "We've all changed since our academy days, huh? Even Naruto." She grinned, remembering the little blond terror who used to get into trouble with her teammates and act madly in love with her friend.
"We sure have," Sakura agreed, equally fondly, "though sometimes I wish we hadn't. Life was so much easier then. We could almost believe we were separate from it all; like peacetime would last forever and we'd never really have to risk anything big. Even when I visit The Blossom I can't relax anymore. I'm not the daughter of the owner, I'm a ninja who happens to eat there." The Blossom was the restaurant belonging to Sakura's mother, and it was in the predominantly-civilian area of town. Ino could see how Sakura might have trouble blending in nowadays.
But she also knew something that might help her. It would mean giving up her best-kept secret and risking everything, but it was the exact antidote her friend needed for her stress; and in any case, it might be nice having someone else in on the act. "Sakura…" she began, her voice deadly serious. "I have a confession to make."