AN: This chapter has some mature humor (well, at least it's supposed to be funny) so be aware that this story is rated M. Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, unfortunately. But you knew that.
For a second time, Sakura woke up in the strange little room, lying in an unfamiliar futon. Her eyes stung, her throat was hoarse, and it felt like she had just ran a marathon. Sakura was so put out, that she was sure that she didn't sleep at all. There were no windows in her room, so there was no way for her to tell what time it was. An unexpected rumble sounded from her stomach, breaking up her thoughts. She shouldn't feel hunger, she was dead, and yet she did.
Sakura didn't want to go out there, there was a high chance of her seeing someone she would rather not. As the grumbling of her stomach continued, she knew there was no avoiding it. Eve if she were dead, she needed to eat, or... Well she wasn't going to die, but she stomach was going to drive he insane. Disregarding stealth in favor of speed, Sakura ran down the halls in a flurry of pink and white.
Absent-mindedly, Sakura noted that the lights in the hallways were dimmed, perhaps signifying that it night time. She couldn't be sure though, as she had yet to see a window. Sakura randomly wondered if there even was any windows in wherever she was. Was there a way to tell night from day in the afterlife? Her stomach complained at her again, and all thought besides those of food left her mind. Even her anger and hatred for the people she was stuck with for the rest of eternity was momentarily forgotten.
Without any disturbances, Sakura reached the kitchen and switched on the light. It was generically designed, with white tiles and simple cabinets. She looked into the refrigerator, wondering where they even bought their food, she found some rice and ikura. Her stomach still growling, she ignored the ikura, not having the patience to make onigiri, and popped the rice into the small microwave.
Much to her enthusiasm, after a two minute wait, her rice finished with a resounding beep. She quickly pulled it out and excitedly took a bite of her (midnight?) snack, her stomach instantly begging for more. She slowly continued, knowing better than to shovel everything at once. She would only end up regretting it if she did. Jumping up onto the kitchen counter, Sakura sighed in considerable happiness and ate her food. She wanted nothing but her rice until she finished, and when she did, Sakura's mind began to wander.
Sasuke... She wondered where he was, and where he was going to end up. He wasn't a bad person, even if he did kill her; he had a justified reason for doing so. she would have killed him if he hadn't stopped her, it was her own fault that she was dead... No. She had to stop making up excuses for Sasuke, what he was doing was wrong, no matter how many times she told herself that he had a reason for his crimes. Nothing could ever justify murder. Karin was an S-class criminal, but she had been his teammate, perhaps even friend, and he had killed her despite that. Then there was her, who he supposedly loved; he had killed her in cold blood any way. Itachi she couldn't blame him for, Itachi had wanted his own death, had planned for Sasuke to kill him. Still, the idea of killing your own brother, no matter what he had done to him, was highly unthinkable to her.
Itachi had woken up at the sound of someone running past his room. It was such a soft sound that he hadn't been sure that it was anything at all, but Itachi had decided to see what it was anyway. Apparently, Sakura had woken up and found herself hungry, because she was sitting on the counter, eating a bowl of rice. He watched as she finished, and then as she glared into space. It didn't take much for him to guess who she was thinking about, it had to be Sasuke. He couldn't blame her for thinking about his younger brother, she loved him.
For the first time in his short existence, Itachi wondered what it would be like to have a woman pining over him, he had never considered it, even wanted it. She looked utterly miserable, so he still wasn't sure if he ever could want to put someone through such torture. But imagine, being reunited with that woman, and getting to see as her face lit up with excitement, relief and happiness. What if a woman did have such powerful feelings for him? If someone loved him, of all people, would he love her back? He had never really loved someone outside of his own family, but he wondered if it could be so much different.
Poor Sakura, she loved Sasuke with everything that she was, but even if he did die, they would never be together again. She had to realize it, that everyone in this world were people he killed, no one else could ever get in. Even if Sasuke had somehow made his way to them, he would never be fully welcome by anyone except perhaps him and herself. Her agony was as clear as her abnormally large forehead.
Itachi realize then how much of a pretty girl she really was, and how much of a fool Sasuke really had been by letting her slip through his fingers. Sakura was an exotic sort of beauty, with her unusually colored hair and emerald-green eyes. He hated himself for even looking, but he could see her subtle curves through the thin material of her white kimono.
It wasn't right, he shouldn't be looking at her in such a degrading way, not when she wasn't even his. Sakura was the woman he had chosen for Sasuke, and he had done a good job, because Sasuke was the only person she could possibly love so passionately. He shouldn't be looking at her like he was, she was never going to be his. He always seemed to do this, he always wanted the things he could never have.
Itachi had to reassure himself that this was a natural reaction for him, for any man. He had never 'had a woman' during his life, not in any way, shape or form. He couldn't recall even ever having seen a woman entirely naked during his life, so it was perfectly normal for him to want something after getting a slight few of her smooth body. Nonetheless, it was wrong of him, he didn't even know her.
Itachi left her in her confused state of being, hoping that she hadn't noticed his being there, and that she would get back to bed soon. She would get over Sasuke eventually, she wouldn't survive if she didn't, and no matter how much he wanted to be, he couldn't be involved with that painful process. It wasn't in his place to do so. He shouldn't have even the right to look in her direction, after the way he had ruined her chances at a happy life.
His room was as plain as any other, and after returning to it, he considered changing that. It looked like nobody was living in it, not that anyone really was, but more like residing in it. Itachi put put these thoughts aside, and lay down on his futon. His earlier thoughts about Sakura were hardly forgotten, but he decided it was nothing more than sexual attraction. He most definitely did not love Haruno Sakura, nor did he want to, and she certainly would never even look in his direction except but to glare at him. His newly discovered desire for a woman would pass in time, and then everything would go back to the ways it always had been. He would ignore his inmates, and they would do the same. There was no reason for this to change now, just because Sasuke had failed to realize he was supposed to continue the Uchiha line with Sakura.
When Sakura woke the next morning, there was a short, quick knock on her door. She wasn't in the least inclined to answer it, but after a few minutes, there was another knock. Knowing all too well that the insistent knocking wouldn't end until she got up, Sakura rolled out of the comfort of her futon, and stumbled to the door. When she opened it, she found a very impatient Karin standing there.
"I see you decided to wallow in self-pity." She snorted, walking right on past Sakura and entering her room. She ignored Sakura's glare at being intruded upon, and sat down at the little table in the middle of the room. Seeing that Karin had no intention on leaving any time soon, she sighed tiredly, then closed her door. Settling at the table across from Karin, Sakura crossed her arms and huffed.
"What do you want?"
"It really is sad, how the one girl who might have been worthy of Sasuke turned out in the end." Karin sneered slightly, giving Sakura a smirk that was bound to get on her nerves. Sakura ignored her remark, and looked down at her fingernails, inspecting them with disinterest. The best way to get a girl like her out of the way was to pretend that they weren't there. It had always worked with Ino, so it should work with Karin as well.
Karin sighed, seeing what Sakura was trying to do. If there was anything that she couldn't stand for, it was to be ignored. She had spent too many years being ignored by Orochimaru and Kabuto, and then by Sasuke. She had never had any real friends, and had never talked with another girl just to talk. She seriously doubted that Sakura could be a girl who she could tell everything, but after so many years of neglect, she needed to talk to someone, anyone who was a girl.
"I didn't come here to make fun of you, you know." Karin muttered, wondering when she had become such a bitch. Perhaps it had been a defensive mechanism she had created for herself when joining Orochimaru. It had been hard in sound, especially when you were considered no more than an experiment. If you wanted to eat, you had to fight for your food. It was no different than being a dog.
"Then why did you come?" Sakura asked, irritation coloring her voice. She didn't want anything to have to do with the red head, no matter how wrong of Sasuke it had been to kill her. She didn't want anything to have to do with anything to do with anyone she was stuck there with. Sakura had been determined to not say a thing to any of them once she got up in the morning; she would go about her business, they would go about theirs.
"I wanted to know what else Itachi-kun told you about what happened." Karin whined, instantly reminding Sakura of Ino, and Sasuke had been 'Sasuke-kun,' and he had been more of a possession, no a status symbol. She snorted. Itachi-kun?
"You call him Itachi-kun?" Sakura asked, trying to hold back the laughter. It was hard to picture Itachi being called '-kun' and not killing someone for it. Or it least trying to, since everyone was already dead, and you couldn't really die twice.
"Not ever to his face!" Karin said, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose to hide the fact that she was blushing. Sakura couldn't believe it, the obsessive red head had switched from Sasuke to Itachi. She was besides herself.
"You like him."
"Have you ever seen that guy shirtless? He's freaking hot!" Karin exclaimed. She was pretty sure that normal kunoichi (the word normal being relative) talked about hot guys, and though she was a girl, she had never had such a conversation. It had been hard to keep silent about Sasuke when she had been alive; sometimes Suigetsu would swear that she talked to herself in her sleep. Talking to another girl was something she desperately needed.
"I have seen him shirtless, and still wet from the shower, for that matter."
Karin's jaw dropped, wondering how Sakura wasn't chasing after him after seeing such a delectable scene. If she had ran into him in nothing but a towel, she wouldn't have been able to stop herself from jumping him. Yet, Sakura remained indifferent.
"And you're not trying to jump his bones?! You must be crazy!" Karin said in shock, not understanding what could possibly be wrong with the girl. Sakura's eyes widened fractionally in surprise, she had never expected Karin to be so blunt about a guy. It reminded her of Ino, and all of the times she had tried to convince her to go with someone other than Sasuke. It hurt to think of her best friend though, and she couldn't help but to wonder what Ino was thinking then.
Surly Ino knew of her death by then. Hell, Sakura might have already been buried. Shinobi spent no time wasted when it came to putting their fallen comrades into their coffins. Bury the dead, they stink up the place, Tsunade used to always tell her. Hopefully they wouldn't go after Sasuke, her death should have been a lesson well learned. Sakura didn't want to be avenged, she didn't want any of her friends to fall down the same path that Sasuke had.
Still, was Karin being completely serious in her wanting to 'jump his bones,' as she had so intelligently put it? It was hard for a kunoichi to do, but Sakura had been saving herself for Sasuke. To do such a thing with Itachi instead went against everything that her heart demanded. Besides, Sakura was pretty sure that Itachi didn't have a hormone in his body. Otherwise, he would have wanted to rebuild the Uchiha clan himself, instead of leaving it to his younger brother.
"I hate to break it to you, but I think that Itachi is asexual." Sakura said bluntly, causing Karin to gasp in horror.
"There's no way someone with such a big-"
"Don't even finish that sentence." Sakura cut her off abruptly. Sakura was pretty sure that she didn't want to hear how wonderfully large Itachi's package was. Part of her was curious how Karin had seen them though. If Itachi had the tendency to walk around with nothing on, however unlikely it was, she was going to be hiding in her room even more than she had originally planned.
"Trust me, judging on the size of his, there's no way that he doesn't have hormones." Karin remarked wisely. It was just like being with Ino. Okay, so Sakura would avoid everyone except perhaps Karin. She wasn't so bad once you got past the bitchiness.
"Why, and how are you checking out Itachi's penis?" Sakura sighed, unperturbed with the turn of the conversation. She was a medic, and therefor, knew how to be a little bit more mature about sex, seeing as she had to study it under Tsunade. She didn't want to know how big his was, but she was curious how Karin had snuck a peek. Itachi didn't strike her as someone to walk around in the nude, even if everything she did know about him was falsely founded and incorrect.
"Oh! Orochimaru put a video camera in his shower. You can watch with us next time, if you want to."
Sakura blanched.
Karin answered the other half of the question as such, "I decided that if I couldn't be with Sasuke, then I could be with Itachi instead."
It was so wrong. Orochimaru was seriously putting a video camera in his shower? She admitted she wasn't innocent of such acts, but he was a fifty year old man, and she had been thirteen. If Sakura had any reason to feel bad for Itachi, it wasn't because he had been forced to massacre his family, but because a gay pedophile and his goony was spying on him in the shower. She wondered if she should give him a warning, or let Karin and the Fag Lord be. It wasn't really her problem if they liked to watch him wash himself. In fact, it was sort of funny that he hadn't figured it out yet himself. He was supposed to be a legendary shinobi, a prodigy, and yet he was letting people spy on him when he was naked? It didn't add up, making the entire situation amusing to her.
"Wow, this all reminds me of the time me and my friend Ino put a camera in Sasuke's shower. I remember how she had such a bad nose bleed that it wasn't even funny." Sakura smiled to herself in reminiscence. After watching that short, twelve minute clip, she and Ino hadn't been able to look at Sasuke with a straight face, much less without laughing, of blushing wildly. Those were the good days, when the most you ever had to fear was of Sasuke finding out why you laughed whenever you saw him. He must have figured it out though, maybe he had overheard them talking about it, but when he did, he wouldn't even look in her direction for a whole week. And he put traps in his bathroom.
"Wow, you got to see Sasuke's? I don't think that anyone in sound ever saw it except for Orochimaru and maybe Kabuto, What was it like?" Karin asked, her eyes lighting up in excitement. Sakura sighed, remembering her escapades to see the all-mighty Sasuke naked. It had been so much fun to scheme with Ino, and neither of them had been disappointed with the results.
"Well, if what you say about Itachi is true, then big dicks must run in the family." Sakura said. A moment of silence passed between the two girls before they both rolled over, laughing. Sakura was short of breath, her lungs begging for oxygen, before she could calm down. Despite everything, Sakura found herself liking Karin. She was a lot like Ino had been, and Ino had been her best friend. At least she wouldn't be completely alone for all of eternity.
"You know that he can never come here, right?" Karin asked quietly, sobering the mood. Yes, Sakura was already aware of this one point, and yes, she had accepted that she would never see him again, but that didn't mean that she was over him. This epiphany had the opposite reaction in her, she was thinking about Sasuke more than ever, even when he had left Konoha. Then, he had only been gone, she always had the chance that she would see him again. Now, however, she had nothing to hope for, and she saw Sasuke's face in everything. In her pillow as she lay her head down, in the ceiling as she woke up, in the grains of wood in the table she sat at. He was everywhere, and he apparently had no intention in leaving soon.
"I know." Sakura finally sighed.
Well, if anything, that was interesting. Itachi stood motionlessly outside Sakura's door, just having heard a good part of their conversation. Deidara, the person who was designated to cook breakfast that morning, had sent Itachi to get the girls so they could eat. He hadn't planned on bothering Sakura, knowing that she wouldn't trust anything a terrorist made, but when he had gone for Karin, her signature led him in Sakura's direction. He learned a few things, if nothing else. Karin's insistent affections had moved from his brother to him, which he wasn't sure he appreciated. He didn't appreciate the fact that she and Orochimaru were taping him in the shower, nor that he was taken as a robotic-asexual man by Sakura. The former point did explain why Karin was always giggling around him like a school girl.
Another thing he learned: obsessive girls seemed to want to see their crush's dick. The fact that Sakura had done the same as Karin for Sasuke was slightly alarming to him. Even at the age of thirteen, for her to be involved in such schemes; he didn't like it. Perhaps it was because she had seen someone of the opposite sex naked before, while he had never. It felt as if they now stood on uneven grounds. Not that he really cared.
Glad that the conversation on how Uchihas seemed to be larger then most was over, Itachi knocked on the door. A few moments passed before the short, pink haired girl answered it, her hair sticking up on end more than usual. They stood there for almost a minute before he figured she had no intention in speaking to him at all.
"Deidara has requested that I find you two. He has prepared breakfast." He said calmly, and in utter politeness, being sure that his face didn't crack and give away that he had been eavesdropping. He had already seen Sakura reduced to a fit of tears, but he knew her fists were even more fearsome than that. She had been the pupil of the Sannin Tsunade, whose spitfire personality had been passed on, according to common knowledge.
"He will be highly offended if you do not join us. it is not the wisest thing to do; setting someone you will spend eternity with against yourself." Itachi told her softly, seeing her distrust. Her facial expression told him he was right in assuming she wouldn't want to eat breakfast with everyone.
"He's a terrorist." She replied bluntly. Itachi sighed in disappointment. She needed to stop holding grudges, at least if she was planning on surviving any length of time in such a diverse crowd.
"One would think you would learn to not judge a person by their outward appearances." He replied, trying to remain polite, and to stay on her better side. When it came to Sakura's horrendous mood swings, there probably wasn't a good side to her, just from what he could tell. He hadn't talked with her more than once, but her face, her eyes more specifically. gave away her quick temper.
"Yourself being a prime example, of course." She answered him haughtily.
"Perhaps."
She stood in silence for a moment, knowing he was right in her coming to breakfast. Her thoughts recollected, she momentarily sighed deeply, shutting her eyes and massaging the bridge of her nose in distress.
"Fine, I'll come. Just give me a moment to run a microphone through my hair." She told him with a straight face, sliding the door shut before perceiving his reaction. He stood behind it in horror, not believing that she had the nerve to bring that up. He had silently hoped that she would have forgotten seeing him singing Three Days Graceinto a hair brush. It was unpardonable that he should be caught doing something so embarrassing. She deserved to tease him though, for his lack of discreteness. He couldn't even recall the last time someone had something to tease him for. Oh, ha, ha, you killed your family! Ha, ha, ha... Snort.
No, nobody had ever had a good reason to laugh at him, but she clearly did. He was never going to sing again, even if he was sure nobody could hear. Even if it was to his favorite song. She would never have something worth teasing him for again. No doubt, she thought he was incompetent, being spied on in the shower, and then her hearing him sing with a brush as a microphone. That was enough to die of embarrassment. Perhaps he should see if the theory that you couldn't die twice was true or not. He had some rope in his room somewhere. A short drop and a quick stop...
Asexual was he? She was the medic, so she should know that was physically impossible. He turned and left, not wanting to still be there when she opened the door again. He processed everything that he had heard, and finding that to be an awkward thing to do. He remembered what Karin had said, and wondered if it was true. He had never compared himself to other men, but he supposed that what he had was above average. What he wanted to know was who she was comparing him to. Another thing that was bothering him, did having a large penis run in the family as Sakura seemed to believe?
He groaned in frustration, entering the small kitchen. Itachi took a seat at the table, sipping at the cup of tea he had left when going to retrieve the girls. Orochimaru was at another one of his scrolls, he seemed determined to find a way to come back to life. After eyeing the Sannin warily for a few moments, he sighed in exasperation and rubbed his temples.
What right had they to talk about his penis anyway? That was something personal; had they no decency, no morals? It was his business, not theirs, so they shouldn't have been speaking about it so freely. They had been laughing, for God's sake! Itachi wondered if kunoichi talked about a male's sexual organ on a regular basis, or it if was just those two. He wasn't sure which of the two would be worse. Either he was stuck with two perverts for the rest of eternity, or the whole shinobi population was doomed.
Then there was Orochimaru, to add to the mayhem. It truly was a terrifying thing when a full grown man was putting a video camera in your shower, a full grown man more than twice your age. If that pedophile creep was doing such things to him, Itachi morbidly wondered what he did to Sasuke. Surly his younger brother had been practically tortured with the perversions of such a pedophile. Orochimaru had to be the epitome of sick bastards. He chased after little boys, and gave the hickey of death as an attack. Now that he thought about it, he should have prevented Orochimaru from contacting Sasuke, or stopped Sasuke from leaving Konoha. He had so much to regret.
It was then that the two girls filed into the bathroom, both of them giggling together. Itachi assumed that they had gone back to the topic that amused them so much: Uchiha dicks. He didn't look at them directly, but when he saw from the corner of his eyes that Karin was looking at him, he noticed the faint pink of her cheeks. Great, so the completely insane one really did like him. He was sure that she was a perfectly nice girl, but he wasn't interested. He wasn't even really sure if he was interested in Sakura.
He just wanted to be left alone at that moment; he didn't want the mentally unstable redhead to brag about his penis for him, and he certainly didn't want his hormones to finally awaken, after so many years of being dormant. Stupid mind-controlling hormones. Stupid, irresistible pink haired kunoichi who was causing this hormonal change in him. Stupid, hate blinded Sasuke, for killing her, and putting him into his own, personal hell. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
He noticed, with annoyance, how Karin sat directly next to him, so close that he could smell her obnoxious perfumes, while Sakura seemed to distance herself from him as much as she possibly could without leaving the table. Was it necessary for her to do so, he asked himself angrily. If anything, she should be trying to get closer to him, seeing as he was the only person there who had stayed loyal his entire life. He was the good, sacrificing shinobi, and this is how kami knew who was repaying him. He supposed this was what he got for doing the right thing, for being the nice guy.
This was going to be a long eternity.
AN: Thanks for reading my second chapter! Please leave me a review!