Sasuke sat on a branch high in the trees. In the distance, he could see the unassuming building that belonged to the Akatsuki. It was hiding in plain sight, really, appearing as an old abandoned temple. Shortly before they had arrived at the spot, Karin had told them that the two chakra signatures had left the building. Luck was on the young Uchiha's side. He didn't need any more pesky Akatsuki in his way. His team would keep Kisame out of his hair while he dealt with Itachi. All there was left to do was wait for them.

Pain shot up from his leg causing Sasuke to wince and grab at his wounded leg. A sudden movement behind him caused him to whirl around into a defensive stance.

"Hey"

Sasuke calmed himself, settling back down at the voice of his red-haired teammate. The girl came and sat beside him a little closer than he liked. He eyed her warily as her hand reached toward him. Before their skin made contact, a firm hand went around her wrist, ceasing her movement.

"Sasuke. I can tell it is still hurting you."

"..."

"Let me look at it."

Silence reigned until eventually the Uchiha let out his breath. "Hn." He nodded, letting go of her. As she inspected the wound, he heard her suck in a breath.

"I- it's started to come back again."

He peeked past her bright red hair and caught a glimpse of the skin showing through the hole in his pants. Much like the curse mark on his neck, given by Orochimaru, black markings were forming in a spiral patter outwards from the bite mark. This curse was also created by the snake sannin, but it was designed for a different purpose. Death.

"I've been holding it off, but it isn't going to keep working forever. My medical abilities aren't of a high enough level to deal with this."

She held her palms out above the injury and chakra flooded into it. Like he had noticed before, the black marks receded even less than the time before. It was getting stronger.

Having healed it as much as she could, Karin retracted her hands and the glowing faded. Then, she started to roll up her sleeve. "Here, Sasuke. Maybe this will work better." She held her arm out to him.

Sasuke hesitantly took hold of the offered arm. As he bit into it, he felt her chakra entering his system. Teeth still embedded, he ignored the girl's noises of satisfaction and watched the spot on his leg. The black marks slowly started fading, but soon stopped. He released her arm and closed his eyes. At least the pain had lessened as well.

"Thank you."

Karin pulled herself together and looked at his wound. Her brows knit in worry.

"They're still not gone all the way..."

Sasuke ignored her, turning his back to her. He tried not to think for the moment of how this would probably affect his goals. He heard Karin walk away and jump from the branch. He wouldn't be able to rely on her powers soon. He would need to find someone who could rid him of this curse completely.

A memory came to him. He had been traveling with Orochimaru near the leaf village and had encountered a squad of leaf nin in a bar. They had seemed like very weak shinobi and very foolish for they were talking about the village, paying no heed to their surroundings. From them, he had heard of the Godaime Hokage's apprentice who already seemed to have the potential to outgrow the fifth's medical abilities. His old teammate. Sakura...

The idea came with another prospect. He had heard the other rumor that was now circulating about his ex-teammate as well. This new rumor could either make things a whole lot easier for him- or a whole lot more difficult. Sasuke considered the idea. He was so close to getting Itachi though, so there was nothing he could do for now. He had no idea where she even was at the moment...

Having cut down the creatures blocking their way, the three entered into hideout through the doorway which was shaped like a giant snake head. The tunnel led deep into the ground, getting darker the further they went. Sakura grabbed one of the unused torches off the wall. She looked at it for a second before pursing her lips and looking to Itachi. She held the end out to him with an expectant look on her face. The Uchiha slightly raised an eyebrow before lighting it with a small fire jutsu and continuing down the tunnel. They met a few more of Orochimaru's experiments, but none were too difficult to handle.

As Sakura struggled to use her chakra to search for Sasuke's in this eery place, she became increasingly frustrated by her lack of chakra and the lack of a response from the surrounding area. Besides the creepy chakras from the creatures they'd been dealing with, she hadn't felt a single chakra signature. She was just beginning to realize that this place had been abandoned as Kisame and Itachi stopped in front of a sealed doorway.

Itachi motioned to Kisame who proceeded to smash down the door with Samehada. Sakura coughed as the stale air flew out of the room. It smelled of snakes and rotten things.

"What exactly are we doing here anyways?"

Itachi ignored her as he stepped into the darkness. Sakura humphed. Why did he have to be so- so... arrogant!? She turned to Kisame, just daring him to ignore her as well. She blinked as his hand was suddenly held up to her face. She glanced at it before looking back to him, confused. He pointed to his finger where the firelight reflected off of his ring.

"We're here to retrieve Orochimaru's ring."

"Orochimaru's ring?" She raised an eyebrow at him. What would the Akatsuki want with a piece of jewelry? Thinking about it, Sakura realized she had seen the other Akatsuki members wearing similar rings as well. Kisame's had a yellow center whereas she knew from memory that Itachi's was crimson.

The pinkette bit her lip. She could feel something akin to chakra coming from the ring and she reached her hand out. The closer she got, the stronger she felt it. It began to give her a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. And then the hand was gone.

She heard Kisame clear his throat. "Yes. We need it as proof. Now go and help Itachi san search for it. I'll stand guard here and keep out the li'l beasties." He grinned, and as he turned into the darkness, the firelight cast eery shadows across his face.

Sakura shivered. 'beasties'. The shark-man was just about as much of a beast as the rest of them- if not more monstrous... and deadly. She entered through the doorway, leaving him behind. She thought about what he had said. Proof? Of what?

As she entered, she saw that Itachi had found another torch and lit it. His back was to her and he seemed focused on the task before him as he lifted a stack of paper off of a desk. Sakura looked around her. The room was much larger than she had assumed when standing outside of it. It looked like some sort of laboratory. Desks, piled high with scrolls and books, lined the far wall where Itachi was still searching, having paid no attention to her entrance.

She moved towards a shelf, examining the glass jars that lined it. They were filled with dead creatures and body parts and things she couldn't name. Moving to a desk near the one Itachi was perusing, she noticed that most of the equipment on it was medical equipment. Still, there was no sign of a ring. She moved on to the next desk, looking underneath the many stacks of papers.

"So this ring... what makes you so sure it's here?" She asked the question offhandedly, finding it odd that they had come straight to this base and straight to this room and then searching so thoroughly.

"Because," Sakura jumped at the proximity of his voice. "We knew the basic location of the ring... we can sense it."

His arm appeared in her vision as he reached past her to a place above her head.

"You can feel it too, can you not? To an extent..."

Her heart was hammering loudly in her chest. F-feel it? Feel what? All she could feel at the moment was the heat radiating from behind her. Her eyes focused on the hand in front of her as it opened a cabinet. Coming from inside the cabinet... she could feel it. Slightly. It was the same chakra that came from Kisame's ring. She hadn't hardly noticed it before. It seemed that the more she acknowledged it, the easier it became to feel. She also felt another source behind her, presumably coming from Itachi's own ring.

She watched him, frozen in place, as he took something from inside the cabinet and moved away from her. She let out a breath, closing her eyes. Pulling herself together, she turned to see what he had found. Expecting a ring, she almost flinched at what he was holding. Was that... Orochimaru's hand?! It was shriveled and dried, so it was hard to tell... She noticed the ring on the finger as Itachi began to remove it. A sickening snap sounded as he finally freed it from one of the fingers.

"...Ok, that is seriously disgu-"

Sakura became silent as both she and Itachi turned toward a noise to their left. It was a faint... slithering. It sounded like it was coming from inside the wall.

"...sting..."

"It's time for us to leave." Itachi turned and started walking back to the entrance with Sakura close behind.

"Not arguing with you there..." she whispered, glancing back at the darkness behind her.

They didn't get far before the whole place seemed to explode with stone and rubble. They both jumped away from the avalanche, steering clear of the giant mass of scales unraveling itself before them. The exit was obscured from view as rocks still tumbled down around the massive whole in the wall. The serpent hissed and coiled up, rearing its fangs at the two shinobi.

Itachi vaguely noticed Kisame's muted voice calling to them from outside, but was distracted as the giant snake sprung forward at him. It was a simple matter of dodging- except his movement was halted. Moments before the snake's jaw would snap closed around him, Itachi noticed the boulder under which the end of his cloak was caught. He felt the blood vessels in his eye sting as the advanced stage of the sharingan prepared to manifest itself. It never got the chance to fully engage.

Another explosion ripped through the room and another section of wall was done away with as the weight of the enormous reptile smashed into it. The Uchiha looked to see none other than the little kunnoichi, still in stance, with her fist in the air. He didn't have time to be shocked as in the next moment he witnessed her whole body contort in pain. She clutched her arms to herself and fell to her knees screaming.

He freed himself from the stone and went to her, glancing at the snake. It was lying still for the moment, though it probably wasn't dead. Sakura had gone silent by the time he reached her. He couldn't see her face; it was hidden behind her hair, but he saw how her shoulders shook and where her nails dug into her arms. Chakra overuse? He hadn't even thought that she had had enough chakra to send a snake that big flying with just a punch. Frankly, that would have surprised him even if she had had all of her chakra. Using chakra that you didn't have like that was bound to be painful, but this was...

Itachi pried her fingers from her arms as blood began to drip from them. He felt her lose her control as she jerked violently backwards falling onto her side on the cold, stone floor.

"Ngh!"

One of her hands escaped from his grasp and went to her shoulder. Itachi was at a loss as he stared down at the tears on her lashes. He heard Kisame calling to them, but it was just background noise. Activating the sharingan, he inspected her chakra systems. Her chakra was raging through her pathways at abnormal rates. There was hardly any left, but what little there was, was attacking her own chakra paths. She was literally being torn apart from the inside. It was not her normal chakra. It was different somehow. Changing. He saw traces of a foreign chakra and traced it up to where it gathered beneath the hand she held on her shoulder.

The Uchiha lifted her hand away to reveal a bite mark. He recalled her being attacked in the tree outside the base.

Behind them, he heard movement as rocks slowly began shifting. The snake...

"Kisame."

His voice was as calm and quiet as ever, but the rubble blocking the exit was immediately disrupted. The shark-man took one look at the slithering tail of the snake and one look at the quivering kunnoichi on the ground.

"Oh man..."

"I need Samehada."

Kisame smirked at this. I though you hated Samehada... yet, look who's useful now. He went to the pair, looking down at the girl. He saw the bite mark and noticed Samehada's reaction to her chakra and to the presence of the other chakra in her system.

"Get rid of it."

"Right."

Kisame lowered his sword to Sakura's neck. The noises of chakra being eaten began coming from the sword, and the girl's eyelids fluttered open. She recoiled from the sword, but was forced to remain still as a heavy foot pressed down on her other shoulder, pinning her.

The shark-man now stood with one leg on each side of her and sword to her neck. It would look rather intimidating if someone didn't know he was saving her life.

Sakura's body began to fall still as the pain slowly began leaving her. Itachi turned from the scene to face the threat that lay behind them.

As Kisame steadily drew out the foreign chakra from the girl beneath him, bright flames lit up the cavernous room along with the high pitched screaming and squealing of the serpent. Before long, the noises died down as did the flames. Most of the harmful chakra was drained from Sakura's system, but that left her with less than she's ever been left with since he had begun periodically draining her over a month ago. If he got rid of any more, he was afraid she wouldn't survive. Her body was producing more already, as was normal for everyone, but the poisonous chakra emanating from her shoulder was fast in changing it into something deadly. It didn't look good for the girl.

"Look at you..." Kisame sighed, "...little leaf."

She was breathing shallow and her eyes were closed. At his whispered words, though, one of her eyes cracked open and looked up at him. He shied away from the almost grateful look in that eye, stepping away from her. Last time he drained her of chakra, he knew she had wanted to murder him for it. He scoffed at the contrast.

He watched his partner as he came up to them. Itachi took in Sakura's stillness. The pain was gone, he could tell, but he also saw the remaining chakra with his sharingan.

"I couldn't get rid of it all, but it looks like it won't kill her immediately."

Itachi nodded to Kisame in silent thanks. Finally paying attention to Sakura's face, he was a little surprised to see her watching them through a half-open eye. He locked gazes with her for a long moment before breaking the contact. He leaned down and picked her up, supporting her light weight with a hand on her back and an arm under her knees.

Kisame led the way back out of Orochimaru's layer, disposing of the few remaining mutations along the way. Soon, they were back out in the light of day, making good time back to the Rain village.

In the back of her mind, Sakura told herself that it should be extremely weird and uncomfortable to be carried like this by Uchiha Itachi, but she didn't dare. She was just too tired. Her mind was fighting to give her body rest through unconsciousness, but she fought, like she had been fighting since the pain first began, to stay focused. For there was something very important...

"Itachi?.."

She watched him as his face turned down to look at her. Such a familiar face...

"Orochimaru is dead isn't he. That's why you decided to come find his ring..."

The crimson eyes looking down at her withheld nothing. Secret. Guarded. Like always. But then he nodded. She was right. This meant... so many things. She couldn't wrap her mind around it all at the moment. She felt her willpower draining with her question's answer. Her eyes fluttered shut and she whispered one last thought.

"Sasuke..."

Author's note: Sorry for such a long wait. My college Comp II class started a few weeks ago and I've been wearing out my writing abilities on essays before getting a chance to work on this. That, and I've been working on my Sakura cosplay as well as trying to finish up some fanart I've been working on.

I also apologize for telling you last chapter that something really exciting (or however I put it) was going to happen this chapter. I ended up taking much more time between the events and the thing I was talking about will happen next chapter for sure.

So, I hope you enjoyed the new developments! Thank you for reading and like usual, reviews would be so helpful! ^-^