(A/N: Thank you to all who reviewed! Your feedback is very encouraging, and it makes me smile. To any would-be anonymous reviews, I'm sorry I had the blocker on. I didn't know it was an automatic setting, but I've since fixed it.
As far as actual storypart of this announcement is concerned, I forgot to mention that Gaara is twenty and Sakura is nineteen. As far as the conditions of the other Konoha shinobi are concerned… You shall see in time…)
The Floating Council
Kankuro and Matsuko were immediately enveloped in a swirling wind of sand, and both men felt the nauseating sensation of being hurled weightlessly through the air. A moment later, they found themselves suspended hundreds of feet above Suna by a platform of sand. Dizzied and disoriented by the affects vertigo, they hastily sat down.
Gaara sat cross-legged before them, eyes closed. "We need not fear interruption up here, and the wind will hide our words," he said softly. He opened his jade orbs then, taking in his comrades. The two shinobi were travel-worn and anxious, and blood stained their clothes and hands. None of it was theirs.
His eyes turned to Kankuro. "Deliver your mission report."
C'mon Sakura, Ino thought, teeth gritted as she ran her chakra-infused hands over the long gash that ran the entire width of her friend's lower back. Such an injury should not have been difficult to fix, but this particular wound was strangely resistant to her healing jutsus. For some reason, the flesh stubbornly refused her aid. Ino scowled and pumped more chakra into the gash. Redoubling her focus, she tried another, more advanced jutsu – one of the last ones Sakura had taught her before she transferred to Suna. Slowly, she was able to force the skin and muscle to knit back together. Perspiration glittered in a fine sheen across Ino's face and the back of her neck. Dammit… Forehead, how do you always make this look so easy?
When Ino's arms began to shake with fatigue thirty-two minutes later, the skin had satisfactorily sealed over the lesion, though the injury had left a scar. The medic heaved a sigh and ran her hand gently over her unconscious friend's shoulder. "I'm sorry about the scar, Sakura. I have no idea what the hell you did to yourself, but at least you and Shika are safe now."
For a moment, she frowned at the new band of white tissue now marring Sakura's once flawless back. None of her jutsus had been at all successful in making it fade. It was clear to her that whatever had made this wound was no ordinary weapon or attack. Only something of tremendous power could make an injury so resistant to her medical jutsu.
Or something cursed.
Kankuro paused in his report, taking a moment to rub the inner corners of his eyes with the thumb and forefinger of his left hand. The light of the failing sun dyed his skin a battle-worn crimson. When he looked up at his brother once more, his russet orbs were troubled. They bore promise of only dark tidings.
"After nightfall on the second day, we found them."
"Hey cut the dawdling" Kankuro shouted over his shoulder at Matsuko. The two shinobi leapt from tree to tree. Their movements were rapid yet masterfully precise. "We're not stopping for another hour, got it? And they told me you were supposed to be fast. I've trained genin that could out run you," he said while shaking his head, trying to goad another ounce of speed from his comrade.
Matsuko scowled at his captain's back. "Why the hell are you being so gung-ho about this? It's not like we have anything important to do in Konoha. Are you really that excited to get your ass chewed out by Yamanaka-san?" He pumped more chakra into his step.
"Ever heard of a little thing called 'professionalism?'" Kankuro answered back. He knew it was weak.
In all fairness, the puppet master could not hold Matsuko's slowing pace against his fellow sand nin; Kankuro had driven them hard for the past two days. He might have thought that Gaara was overreacting to the messenger hawk incident, but out of respect for his younger brother, he would do everything he could to put him at ease. That included getting to Konoha as soon as possible to prove to Gaara he was being paranoid.
Kankuro shifted his summoning scrolls mid-leap, and his trademark grin returned to his face. "And just think: once we get there, we can have a nice, steaming bowl of ramen – no more of this powdery ration shit –"
Kankuro immediately silenced and came to an abrupt stop, crouching on a tree limb. The grin had vanished, replaced by a serious frown. He held up his fist, signaling for Matsuko to cease running. The nin came to rest next to Kankuro, suddenly alert. "What is it?" he asked of his captain.
"Two Konoha shinobi up ahead, about fifty yards. I almost missed them; their chakra signatures are so weak. They must be wounded." His eyes scanned the area.
Kankuro dropped to the forest floor, brow furrowed. As he cautiously approached the thicket he determined in which the nin had fallen, he felt the muscles throughout his body contract and tense; he was able to identify one of the signatures. Kankuro doubted he would ever be able to forget the chakra of the woman who had pumped it into his organs to save his life.
The two men passed into the thicket.
"Oh shit," was all Matsuko said. He took the words straight from Kankuro's mind. There in the gloom lay two bodies, battered and unconscious. Blood soaked their skin and clothes. Even through the darkness, Kankuro knew their faces: Nara Shikamaru and Haruno Sakura.
Sakura sat with her back against a gnarled tree. Her head drooped to one side, and her blood-stained bangs hung in her face, shielding her closed eyes from view. Shikamaru lay across her lap with her hands placed over a nearly-healed wound on his abdomen. It looked like Sakura had been healing him when she fell unconscious.
The moonbeams filtered through the branches and leaves to paint the Konoha shinobi in a dappled silver glow. If it weren't for the blood, they might have appeared to be sleeping peacefully. For one moment of disconnected thought, Kankuro thought they looked beautiful.
"What the hell happened?" Matsuko asked as he squatted next to the unconscious nin, snapping Kankuro back to rationality.
"No fucking idea." The puppet master crouched beside him and checked Sakura's pulse. It was steady but dangerously faint. His own pulse quickened. He then brought two fingers to Shikamaru's neck, searching for the primary artery. Beneath his touch, the shadow nin shifted, grimacing.
His eyes had flickered open, gazing up at the Suna jounin with an unfocused, glassy stare. "Kankuro," he said softly, his voice breaking, "your fingers are cold…So troubleso-" He groaned then, in pain.
"Whatever, Lazy-ass," Kankuro said, trying to bury his relief at Shikamaru's regained consciousness beneath a half-smirk. "Are you badly hurt? We've got to get you back to Konoha. Temari will have my ass if I let you die out here."
He began to gather the barely-conscious man in his arms when Shikamaru let a stangled, urgent sound escape his lips. His grimace deepened. "No… you can't," he faintly murmured, shaking his head weakly.
Kankuro froze in his movements, not wanting to make Shikamaru's injuries worse by shifting him. It disturbed him to see the shadow nin in such a fundamentally weakened state. Had that been a sob?"You mean, you can't be moved? Have your organs been damaged?"
"No… Ssakura… must have healed the worst before," he let out a shaky breath, "before she passed out." The war paint on Kankuro's face swam and twisted. He closed his stinging eyes. They burned.
Just like the corpses.
Shikamaru goaned again, rolling his head to one side. He couldn't believe it. He just couldn't believe it. It was just too horrible to be true… Not Chouji…
"She's hurt… She needs help," he murmured after another moment. It was so hard to think. "Something… her back. Lots of blood."
Kankuro nodded. The small pool of liquid in which the unconscious medic sat confirmed this. He nodded to Matsuko, silently instructing him to pick up the dark-haired nin. When the older man began to comply, Kankuro said, "That's why we need to get you back to Konoha."
Shikamaru shook his head, eyes clenched shut, tight. He could feel his consciousness slipping away again, like strands of silk being pulled from between his numb fingers."No," his voice was choked, and the back of his throat ached. He had to tell them. The Kazekage had to know. "Konoha has been destroyed."
"That was all he told us before he passed out again," Kankuro said. He looked up at his brother, whose eyes were trained on the star-eatten sky. "We came immediately back to Suna. If what Shikamaru said about Konoha is true, Sakura-san would never have made it here if we had tried to take her back to her village first."
Gaara nodded but remained silent. As Kankuro relayed to him the details of his would-have-been holiday and Shikamaru's grim proclamation, he had remained perfectly calm, unshakably collected. He would not reveal his ever-growing sense of foreboding. After all, the Leaf nin had been wounded and only half-conscious when he talked with Kankuro. Perhaps Shikamaru's report on Konoha was nothing more than the product of a powerful genjutsu or blood loss-induced delirium.
Yet the Kazekage's headache worsened.
Finally, he said, "You must tell no one of this, not until Konohagakure's true status has been confirmed and the council has been informed. Understood?" He was addressing both shinobi before him. Both nodded, pale and solemn.
Satisfied, Gaara willed the sand platform to lower easily to the ground, much to Matsuko's delight. The jounin might have smiled if he weren't so exhausted. The three stepped off the sand and onto the dark street. "Shinobi," said the Kazekage, "you are dismissed." His voice was tired.
After a slight bow and a brief, "thank you, Kazekage-sama," Matsuko set off for his apartment. He wanted three things: a shower, sleep, and sake.
With a swish of his dark cloak, Gaara turned and headed for the hospital. If either of the Leaf shinobi were conscious, he would get as much information as possible of Konoha's alleged fate.
Then a thought born of another layer of his mind – a newer, somewhat unfamilliar one that he would at times struggle to understand – seemed to make his already unsettled stomach twist uncomfortably. Haruno Sakura was Naruto's precious person. What if her injuries were too advanced or grievous for Suna's fledgling medic program to handle? What if Tsunade could have saved her? By heeding the words of a potentially mentally-deficient shinobi and taking her to Sand's inferior medic nin, had they needlessly doomed her to die?
Gaara's face betrayed nothing, but painfully fought the urge to swallow. Would Naruto hate him if she died?
The crunch of gravel registered in the Kazekage's mind, alerting him to his brother's otherwise silent presence at his side. It shook him from his clenching reverie. Gaara watched his third-in-command from the corner of his eye. He looked uncharacteristically somber. "Kankuro…?"
A ghost of a smirk lit his lips, though it looked a little forced. "We can handle this, Gaara. We'll figure this out." No wisecracks. But there was resolve. There was support. His brother believed in him. For reasons Gaara had been gradually coming to understand since his battle with Uzumaki Naruto, this reassured him.
Gaara nodded, stoic. With his brother's steady presence beside him, he arrived at the door to the hospital and entered without hesitation.
(A/N: Yeah, I know that it's kind of slow at this point, but right now, I think everyone's operating in a certain level of shock. They're having enough fun trying not to get caught in a fugue. A warning to the faint of heart: somewhere within the next couple chapters, things are going to get a little graphic. And I'm sorry if any of you hate the long flashbacks, but that's what happens when you start a story in medias res. Let me know your thoughts!)
