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THE BEAUTIFUL AND THE DAMNED
stfuSPARKS
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of its characters. I do not own the song 'Some Say' by the Rascal Flatts either. :)
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Some Say
"And some say,
We're a couple crazy kids,
Some say,
That's exactly what they did,
I say,
You got to go with your heart,
And baby look where we are. "
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"Welcome back Itachi!" Deidara hastily exclaimed, but the bitter expression on the handsome elder Uchiha's face did not fade.
Dark, handsome and mysterious, the oldest Uchiha glared at the blond with his intimidating red eyes. His tall and slim figure loomed over him- Deidara briefly speculated on how similar he was to Sasuke at first sight. However, if you looked closely enough, there were distinct signs of age that distinguished Itachi from his younger brother.
His biggest feature that set him aside from Sasuke were his eyes. Those mesmerizing, unusual red eyes that held a lingering dangerous look. Deidara would never get used to them- he couldn't help but shudder everytime Itachi looked at him.
"Did I hear something about Sasuke?" Itachi ignored Deidara's welcome and looked around, staring at their guilty faces. Deidara not-so-subtly kicked Kisame in the shins.
"We saw him today." Kisame said with a wince, glaring at Deidara before looking straight into Itachi's eyes. He was not the least fazed by the Uchiha's cold tone- Kisame was not a man who was easily intimidated. "Interestingly enough, he was with Pinky."
"Oh?" The corners of Itachi's lips twitched upwards into an intrigued smirk. "And how is Sakura? Judging by Deidara's face, I can tell she's still as lively as ever. It's been awhile since she's visited us, has it not?"
Deidara's fingers automatically reached up to gingerly touch his bruise.
No one answered him. "I see." Itachi slowly said, taking off his cloak. "Are they having an affair? Last time I checked, she was still dating that idiot Idate."
"At last we finally agree on something." Deidara mumbled, looking away. "Unfortunately for us though, no affair. Apparently they're just friends or something."
Itachi's smirk did not waver. "I see," He replied indifferently. "Well next time you see her, you should tell her to come see us."
Without another word, he disappeared into his room.
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"Who said anything about you?"
Time stopped for a moment.
Kin's satisfied smirk immediately disappeared as she realized the pink haired girl's intentions, but by then it was far too late for her to retaliate. A horrified look overcame her face as Sakura brought the sharp blade to her head and cut through her silky long locks- they could only stare as countless strands of pale pink hair fluttered around her, as if they were delicate sakura petals.
In one swift motion, what had been her long, waist length shiny pink hair was reduced to a short, shoulder-length cut. Sasuke's eyes widened at her actions, as Naruto let out a cry of protest as she broke free of Kin's grip.
Finally free, Sakura's eyes faded from green to red, as the strange glow around her intensified. Showing off her sharp set of fangs, she gave Kin a feral grin. "Payback's a bitch." She said coldly, before swinging her leg hard against the other girl's torso. Kin flew back a couple of meters and slammed against the wall, breaking the cement. She crumbled into a heap, unmoving from her fetal position on the ground.
With a light jump, Sakura landed soundly on her feet next to where the black haired girl was lying. She swung her first forwards as soon as Kin regained her composure and tried to stand back up.
"Back off from Kin or we'll kill your little boyfriend here!" Dosu frantically shouted, bringing a knife to Sai's neck. Sakura stopped for a moment to whirl around.
To both Dosu and Zaku's surprise, Sai lips formed a pleasant smile. Before they could stop him, he brought his right arm forwards and slammed his elbow into Dosu's ribcage. His captor recoiled, letting go of Sai's arm to clutch his stomach in pain. Zaku struggled to restrain the boy on his own, but it was no use- Sai had already gained the upperhand of the situation.
He quickly used his free arm to bring it down onto Zaku's own arm. There was a sickening crack, and Naruto very much suspected that the bones were broken.
Seeing that her friend was fine on his own, Sakura grabbed Kin by the collar and proceeded to repeatedly slam her into the wall. "You should have walked away when I gave you the chance." She growled, throwing the girl's limp body onto the floor. "This is what you get for threatening my friends again." She kicked her in the head.
Sasuke was positive that the girl was going to die if they didn't stop her. Granted that it was none of their business- yet there was something unsettling about watching the innocent looking tiny pink haired girl take someone's life right before their eyes. "You're going to kill her if you don't stop now." He quietly said, grabbing her arm. She whirled around to face him, and they simply stood there for a minute, simply staring at each other.
Her eyes slowly faded back to green before they slid shut, as she abruptly passed out.
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"She should be fine by tomorrow morning." Shikamaru said, exiting the guest room where the now unconscious Sakura was peacefully sleeping. He quietly closed the door behind him, facing the taller pale boy. "You should get some rest too."
Sai nodded gratefully. "Sorry for imposing on you, she must have lost her house keys sometime during the fight." His eyes softened as he looked at the closed door. "She must have passed out from using too much of her energy. It's never gotten so out of hand before... I should have stopped her." He glanced over towards the rest of the boys who were staring at him. "I won't ask why you were following us, since you're helping her out, but I hope you won't tell anyone else about her... abnormality."
"You mean her powers?" Naruto blurted out impatiently. "Do you know anything about them?"
Sai shook his head. "All I know is that she was completely normal before her accident. Her powers only started acting up three years ago, right after the car crash, when she lost her memory." He nodded in thanks as Shikamaru handed him an ice pack for the bruise on his face.
"That must come in handy." Naruto said enthusiastically, his eyes shining. "It's like she has superpowers!"
"No," Sai said, slightly frowning. "She still hasn't learned to to control them completely. Most of the time they just act up on her emotions." There was a brief pause. "It would have been better if she knew how to control them. Today wouldn't have been so out of control if she did. Her hair..." His expression turned dark. "She spent so much time growing it out too. Most of it was cut off three years ago when she got into that car crash... she wanted to grow it out because she was told she used to grow her hair out ever since she was a little girl. It's like she wanted to follow the tradition of the life she could no longer remember."
"Sakura-chan..." Naruto muttered, his expression saddening. "She'll be fine, she's a strong girl! Shoulder length isn't too bad, at least she isn't bald!" He brightened up, trying to lighten the somber atmosphere.
Sasuke's eyes glanced towards the door. Would she really be fine? He had seen the look in her eyes right before she had passed out- it was the look of someone who was broken beyond repair, one he was all too familiar with.
"I should go home now." Sai said. "I would take her to my place but it's too far and my parents are home. It wouldn't look good if I brought home an unconscious girl."
"It's alright, we'll look after her until she wakes up." Shikamaru told him with a nod. "By the looks of it, she'll be sleeping 'til tomorrow mornng. We should just have her skip school and rest if she does. We can arrange to call a locksmith or something when she wakes up."
"No need for that." Sai shook his head. "I know someone who can pick her up tomorrow afternoon. He has an extra set of keys to her house, so she should be fine."
"Well I guess it's fine then." Kiba said, scratching the back of his head. "I don't mean to be rude man, but it's getting late, and I'm pretty tired..."
Sai gave them his trademark pleasant smile. "Of course, I should leave now." He gathered his things and headed towards the front door. His hand reached up to rest on the doorknob as he paused, looking back one last time. "I know I was rude to you in the beginning, but please try to understand it's because I was just trying to protect her. Not many people would be too keen on accepting her... nature, and she's a lot more sensitive than she tries to act. I appreciate you trying to help her."
Without another word, he slipped out of the house.
The remaining boys stood there for a second, as Sai's words sank in. "Well," Shikamaru began awkwardly, breaking the silence. "I don't know about you guys, but I'm beat. I'm going to go sleep." He let out a loud yawn. "One of you should go wake Neji up and tell him why our target's sleeping in our guest room." He disappeared behind the door to his room.
Kiba nervously eyed Naruto and Sasuke. "Wow, tonight was crazy wasn't it? Well I should really go to sleep too, you know, I need my beauty sleep!" He quickly rushed, and ran into his own room as well. Naruto's jaw dropped, as he turned to face the raven haired boy.
"I'll buy you ramen for the rest of the month if you go wake Neji up." Naruto tried to bribe him. Sasuke simply raised an eyebrow at his idiotic friend. "Okay fine, two months!" The blond added, giving him a hopeful look. "You know you can't resist!"
"Don't compare me to yourself, dobe." Sasuke snapped, clearly irritated. "We have to tell Gaara too."
Naruto's eyes widened in realization. "Are you sure that's a good idea? He might try to kill her again if he finds out she's resting in the house right now, and we can't risk to fail again or she'll never talk to us again."
"He knows better." Sasuke said. Even though Gaara's anger got the best of him most of the time, Sasuke trusted him to be professional enough to not put their entire mission at risk. "I'll go tell Gaara, so go wake Neji up."
Naruto nodded gratefully; waking Neji up wasn't going to be pleasant, but it was always better than telling Gaara. He shuddered at the thought of entering the insomniac's room. "Well er- good luck!" Naruto called out, heading towards Neji's room. Sasuke watched the blond disappear behind the door before heading towards the opposite direction.
He knocked on Gaara's door once and didn't bother waiting for a response before he let himself in. Gaara's room was bare, save for basic furniture- a wardrobe, bed and a desk. Unlike the other rooms, this one was completely empty. While Naruto's room had orange curtains, and even Shikamaru and Neji's room respectively held their own personal flair, there was nothing here to complement Gaara's personal tastes.
"Due to certain circumstances, our target will be staying overnight at our headquarters." Sasuke said flatly, staring straight into Gaara's dark green eyes. "I trust you to not let your personal feelings get in the way of this mission." The sentence sounded funny to his own ears- Gaara probably didn't even have feelings.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Gaara coldly said, from his seated position by the window. "Everything I have done up until now was only for the sake of our mission."
Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "It seems your definition of helping our mission differs with mine. It's unfortunate, but we have to learn to work as a team. Trust me, I don't like it any more than you do. We shouldn't try to eliminate our target until we find her weaknesses."
Gaara didn't blink. "I would like to get some sleep now, Sasuke. If you've said all you had to say, you should leave." His voice was ice cold, but Sasuke wasn't one to be intimidated easily. With a nod, Sasuke exited the room, quietly closing the door behind him. A slight scowl overcame his face as he made his way back towards his own room. Just who did Gaara think he was, acting on his own? Sasuke didn't usually work well with others either, but if it was required of him, he would.
He quietly slipped into the calmness of his own room- while it was also very simple, the Uchiha clan symbol hung proudly on his wall, setting it aside from every other room in the house. He slipped out of his clothes and into a pair of comfortable black pajama pants, before laying back on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
When he closed his eyes to sleep, it hit him.
Gaara didn't sleep.
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Sakura woke up with a start to an unfamiliar, dark room.
She had to rub her eyes several times to make sure she wasn't seeing things before she sat up, taking a look at her surroundings. Her muscles slightly ached as she shifted on the extremely comfortable bed. Her head felt lighter- she reached up to run her hand through her hair, remembering that it was short now. She let out a wistful sigh- oh well, it would grow back with time.
Her eyes widened as her keen senses alerted her of someone else's presence in the room. She looked towards the dark corner of the room to see a set of dark green eyes intently staring at her. She glared back, gathering her composure.
"It's you." Her tone was accusing as she pointed a finger at him in disbelief. "You're the guy who tried to kill me the other day." She recognized his flaming red hair and the unique tattoo on his forehead, though it was barely visible under the moonlight. "Did you kidnap me? What happened to Sai? What about Sasuke and his friends?" She grew irritated with his silence.
"You're safe." He said in a low voice, slowly walking towards her. "For now."
She frowned at his not-so-subtle threat. She unconsciously leaned back as he sat on the bed, the bed shifting underneath the pressure of his weight. Green met green as he brought his face right in front of her own, planting one hand on each side of her head, trapping her.
"I always liked it better when your hair was short."
It was a mere whisper, barely audible even in the silence of the room. All her thoughts flew out the window; she could only think about how damn close his lips were to her own right now. She took a deep breath, squeezing her eyes shut as she tried to lean back some more. She felt him slightly move, as his face grew closer.
"Gaara, what do you think you're doing?"
Sakura's eyes snapped back open as she let out a quiet sigh of relief. The door to the room was open now, an extremely annoyed Sasuke standing at the doorway. Gaara's hands slowly returned to his sides as he stood up, walking towards Sasuke. Her shoulders tensed up- for a moment, she was positive that they were going to start fighting.
However, nothing happened. "Nothing." Gaara said quietly, and swiftly left the room. A look of bewilderment crossed her face as Sasuke shut the door behind him. For a full minute, they simply stared at each other.
She blushed, realizing that the man standing in front of her in a closed room was half-naked. She couldn't stop her eyes from peeking at his broad shoulders and toned abs- he was quite fit. She was a teenage girl after all, and she was at the age in which hormones were at high levels. She shook her head, reminding herself that this was not the time for useless fangirling.
"So I guess that's the ex-boyfriend, huh." She said dumbly, her eyebrows knitting together into a frown. "Are all ex-boyfriends like that?"
"I wouldn't know." Sasuke replied dryly. "It's not like I have an ex-boyfriend."
She lightly chuckled at his words, before frowning again. "Where am I? The last thing I remember is being at the warehouse... and..." Her eyes widened as she recalled the events from a couple hours back. "Sai! Where's Sai? What happened to Kin and the others?" She frantically climbed out of the bed, wincing as her injured foot gave in underneath her weight.
Sasuke pushed her back onto the bed, giving her a disapproving look. "Take a seat, you're in no condition to go running around." He told her, stepping back again. "Your friend is fine. He had to go home first, but he said he'd send someone to come pick you up tomorrow afternoon. You lost your house keys during the fight so we couldn't send you back home."
"So is this... your house?" She hesitantly asked, looking around.
"I guess you could call it that." Sasuke said flatly. "I live here with the other guys. Due to some... personal reasons, we're temporarily living under the same roof."
Sakura's face scrunched up. "Why were you guys in the warehouse to begin with? Were you stalking me?"
"Don't flatter yourself." Sasuke told her, rolling his eyes. "I was just meeting up with the other guys after the movie and Naruto bet that you and Sai were secretly dating. We bet money on it, so we followed you to see if it was true." He told her the perfectly practiced lie- he had to admit, he sounded pretty convincing.
"And why did you come to my room in the middle of the night, knowing that I would probably still be sleeping?"
This girl couldn't cut him a break. Did he really look like such a suspicious person?
"Gaara told me he was going to sleep." He told her, starting to get extremely irritated.
"And?"
"Gaara hasn't slept in seven years."
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It was almost midnight when Sai casually strolled into a bar, earning a couple of curious glances from various customers. The tall bartender with long dark hair tied into a loose ponytail smiled at him, skeptically raising an eyebrow at the younger boy's appearance.
"Well aren't you bold, mindlessly walking in wearing your school uniform at night." Idate told him cheerfully, slowly setting down the glass he was washing. He motioned for Sai to take a seat on one of the stools in front of him. "I'd send you home right away, but you've never come see me at night, so I'm assuming something happened."
Sai was impressed. Idate had a keen sense for reading body language-something Sai yet had to master.
"She'll probably kill me when she finds out I told you this," Sai admitted, accepting a cup of orange juice. "But we got into a pretty bad fight, and she passed out. I dropped her off at our classmate's house, 'cause she lost her keys. You should go pick her up tomorrow afternoon before you begin work."
Idate hopelessly sighed. "Another fight? This is exactly why I told her to quit the Akatsuki, but I guess it can't be helped." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "She's still growing up, so it's natural for her to be so restless. I just wish she'd take care of herself better." He sighed again.
Sai quietly observed the older man in front of him. Most people would agree that Idate was quite good-looking; he was mature, tall and lean, with long dark brown hair that was usually tied into a ponytail at the back. His facial features were masculine- his cheekbones were high and defined, and his skin was tan and smooth. And- it didn't hurt that he had inherited a bar from his relatives at the mere age of 28.
The artist sometimes wondered what Idate and Sakura saw in each other. While Sakura was loud and rebellious, Idate was the opposite- he liked peace and quiet, and always tried to avoid confrontations unless they were absolutely necessary. Their huge age gap also spoke for itself- ten years was a big difference. Sakura was still a growing teenager, while Idate was a fully matured man.
But somehow, Sai could see how their relationship could work. Sakura had met Idate three years ago, barely after the car crash. The older man had been visiting the hospital to check in on one of his siblings, who had caught a quite nasty infection from an untended gash on the arm. He had apparently overheard about Sakura's situation- how she lost her memory and had no family to return to. He assured her that it was not pity that had drawn him to her room- it had been the lost look in her eyes.
He had approached her with a gentle smile and a how are you, it's awfully nice to meet you on a rainy day, and from that day forwards they began sharing an unbreakable bond. Idate was exactly what she had needed at the time to heal, and she was an example of what he was born to do- fix things. Idate became someone extremely important to her- he was like her family. Sai sometimes suspected that Sakura's feelings towards the older man weren't entirely romantic- but when she had turned eighteen almost a year ago, Idate confessed, admitting that he was romantically interested in her, and she had accepted. She could learn to love him, over time. After all, there was no one who looked after her the way Idate did.
"She'll grow up with time," Sai quietly said, earning a genuine smile from the older man.
"Sometimes I feel like such a dirty old man." He said with a sigh, shaking his head. "Sometimes I forget that she's just a teenager."
"She needs someone like you to guide her." Sai told him, taking a sip of his orange juice. "She would be lost without you, and you know it."
Idate's expression momentarily clouded over. His pale blue eyes looked thoughtful for a second, before he shook his head. "Anyways, I appreciate you coming over to tell me this, but you should head home." He glanced at the watch hanging on the wall behind him. "It's far too late for a high schooler like you to be wandering around. What would your parents think of me if they knew I was keeping you out at this time? At a bar, nonetheless!" He made a shooing motion with his hands.
Sai stood up with pleasant smile on his face. "I'll be leaving now then. I will send you the address of the house Sakura is staying in by text."
"Alright, you take care. If you run into any trouble, don't hesitate to call me!" Idate cheerfully waved, his eyes crinkling up into a friendly smile. Sai gave him one last nod, and exited into the cold November night.
Winter was here.
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"Gaara has severe insomnia." Sasuke explained to the horrified girl. "No one knows why."
"I see," She whispered. "It must be horrible, to not be able to sleep."
Sasuke frowned, staring at her intently. "Sakura," He started to say, changing the subject. "I have something to ask you, and I want you to tell me the truth." The tone of his voice left no room for argument, as she slowly nodded at his solemn words.
"What are you?"
Her pale green eyes widened at his sudden question. She had not been expecting such a direct question from him. Her pink eyebrows knitted together as she tried to come up with an answer for him.
"I..." She hesitated for a second, and turned away. "It's late, Sasuke, You should go to sleep."
Sasuke stepped forwards, his cold hand touching her warm, flushed skin as he grabbed her by the arm, forcing her to look at him again. "Answer my question." He said, his dark onyx orbs staring deep into her. "Tell me, Sakura."
She winced at his strong grip. "I... don't know, Sasuke, I swear to god!" She frantically answered him, trying to pull away from his tight grip. "All I know is that they call me the Damned. But I promise you, that's all I know!"
He must have realized how tightly he was grabbing onto her, because within the next second he immediately dropped his hand back to his side. "I'm sorry. You should get some more sleep." He murmured, running a hand through his wild raven hair in an useless attempt to flatten it. "I'll see you tomorrow." He abruptly turned around and walked out of her room, quietly closing the door behind him.
Her heart beat loudly against her ribcage as the sounds of his footsteps echoed down the hall, quickly fading away.
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Sakura woke up the next morning to an empty house. She curiously wandered through the empty hallway- and true to Sasuke's word, it seemed like all six of them were currently living under the same roof. She was quite impressed with the size of their house- they were probably all pretty wealthy, she thought. She knew that she shouldn't have breached their privacy, but she couldn't resist peeking into their rooms, one at a time.
It was quite easy to recognize who's room was who's, despite the fact that she wasn't close to most of them. Naruto's room was clearly the one covered in orange- curtains, bedsheets, pillows, and clothes. She grimaced at his bad taste. Kiba's room was the messiest one, full of clothes strewn all over the floor and pictures of himself and a girl she supposed was his older sister, judging by the same red markings they shared.
Gaara's room was perfectly simple. The only reason she recognized it was because of the one framed picture on his desk- a photograph of himself alongside two other people. One, a taller girl with sandy blonde hair and the other, a stout boy with strange purple markings. Fascinated, she approached the desk, gingerly holding the frame as she took a closer look at the photograph. As she fingered the wooden frame in her hands, she noticed another frail photograph neatly folded into a small square stuck at the back.
She curiously unfolded the rather old piece of paper, her eyes widening as she very much recognized the two main subjects. A younger version of Gaara stared straight up at her- not much was different, except his face was a bit rounder and he was a little bit shorter. Her eyes shifted to the person to his right, as she stared into a younger version of herself.
Sakura stared into a copy of her own pale green eyes, but they were different. They were full of life- she was surprised at how happy she looked. They sparkled as she wore a big smile on her lips, as she happily linked arms with the red head boy next to her. If she had to guess, she was no older than fifteen in the picture.
She froze as she heard the distinct sound of the front door to the house opening. She tried to stay as quiet as possible, keeping her breathing controlled as a set of footsteps got closer. She prayed that she wouldn't be discovered- but her heart fell when the footsteps came to a stop in front of the room. She hastily folded the picture back and stuffed it into a wooden corner at the back of the frame. If she was going to get caught, she would try her best to lessen the damage done.
"You can come out now, Sakura-san. I already know you're in there." A deep voice spoke up. Her shoulders slumped in defeat as she made her way towards the door, meekly peeking her head out as she was met by a pair of beautiful pearl white eyes. She gave him a sheepish apologetic grin as she stepped out of the room, closing the door behind her.
"Hyuuga Neji-san, right?" She asked him, remembering Sasuke's words. It was hard to miss Neji when Sasuke described him as the 'white-eyed freak'. "Sorry about that, I was just kind of curious."
"Curiosity killed the cat," Neji calmly stated, his face not betraying anything. "Gaara would kill you without thinking it over twice if he found you snooping around in his room. You're lucky I was the one to stay home today." After seeing the confused look on her face, he continued. "We didn't think it was good idea to leave you alone in the house, so I stayed behind. I just went out to buy some milk." He didn't mention that one of them had to stay behind to make sure she didn't look into Shikamaru's room- most of the data for their mission was stored in there.
Her face reddened as her stomach let out a loud grumble. "You wouldn't happen to have any food to spare, would you?" She asked, her face burning in embarrassment. Neji sighed, motioning for her to follow him to the kitchen. He politely pulled out a chair for her, and headed over to the refrigerator.
"We have toast. You can choose between peanut butter or jam, or both." He told her, pulling a couple of things out.
Sakura jumped up from her seat and pushed him away. "Oh no, please don't be bothered." She told him sternly, pushing him onto a chair. "I'm going to make you one of my breakfast specials!" She busied herself in rummaging through the cabinets.
Neji tried very hard to ignore the way in which the oversized t-shirt she was wearing as pajamas rode up to show off her creamy long legs as she reached for one of the higher cabinets.
After all, he was still a hot-blooded male.
His left eye twitched as she finally set down a plate in front of him. "Sakura-san, what is this?" He asked her, eyeing the piece of toast on his plate. It was coated in butter and white sugar. "Isn't this extremely unhealthy?"
The petite pink haired girl beamed at him as she took a seat across from him. "It's unhealthy, which is why I can only eat this once in awhile. But trust me, it's amazing!" She quickly delved into her own plate. Neji shot her an uncertain look, doubtfully poking at the piece of bread before taking a small bite.
It tasted absolutely amazing.
But he wasn't about to admit that to her.
He looked up into her eager face. "It's passable." He said monotonously, with a nod. She gave him a smirk, as if she had read his mind- the corners of his lips quirked upwards as he gave her a small smirk of his own.
Neji found himself slightly troubled as the thought of having to murder her crossed his mind.
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"Why do we have to come to school if Sakura-chan isn't even here?" Naruto whined, slouching over his desk. "It kind of defeats the whole purpose of being undercover high school students, doesn't it?" He pouted, looking unhappily at his friends.
Sasuke sighed at his friend's idiocy. "Dobe, don't you think she'd be suspicious if we all mysteriously decided to take a day off on the day she's at our headquarters?" He asked, rolling his eyes. "Try to think with your brain for once."
"Hey, I take offense to that." Naruto said with a frown. "I'm not as dumb as you guys make me out to be!"
"Do you think Neji's going to be alright on his own?" Kiba interrupted, ignoring Naruto's words. "I mean things could get pretty out of hand while we're not there."
Shikamaru lazily opened an eye to observe the canine boy. "He'll be fine. There's a reason he's our leader." He leaned back and closed his eyes again. It was hard to tell if he was actually awake or napping.
"Shikamaru," Sasuke called. "Sakura said something interesting last night."
Naruto's eyes widened. "What do you mean by last night?"
Sasuke promptly ignored him. "She briefly woke up last night, and I paid her a visit. I tried to ask about her powers, but she said the only thing she knew was that they call her a 'Damned' or something."
"What were you doing in Sakura-chan's room at night?" Naruto's face was turning more horrified by the second.
"The Damned?" Shikamaru repeated, ignoring the blonde as well. "Well that's quite interesting."
Kiba looked interested as well. "Isn't that the legend about the seven demons?" He asked, lowering his voice as he joined in the conversation. "The one Orochimaru told us about three years ago when we first got this mission. Didn't he say something about the legend being true? That's why we were assigned to kill seven people, wasn't it?" His eyes widened in realization. "Do you guys think it's actually true? Maybe the other six guys we killed really had weird powers like Sakura? Maybe the whole story about seven demons being cast into the world and becoming the 'Damned' is true!"
"That's quite possible." Shikamaru said thoughtfully. "We can't be sure that the story about demons being cast onto earth is true, but this whole mission is definitely related to that legend. Orochimaru might have been right."
"Why is it that we were able to kill the other six victims so easily though?" Tired of being ignored, Naruto added his own thoughts to the conversation. "I think one of us might have noticed if our victims had weird barriers surrounding them, but the other guys were completely normal."
Sasuke shook his head. "Remember what Sai said about Sakura's powers?" He cast a brief look towards the lone artist sitting in the opposite corner of the classroom. "Sakura's powers were dormant up until three years ago. Maybe it was the same with all the others as well. Or maybe Orochimaru had the wrong people. We can't be sure."
"This is starting to give me a headache." Naruto groaned, leaning back. "I don't get this whole thing about demons, Damend and superpowers or whatever. I'd rather just stay home and eat ramen."
"Uzumaki!" Asuma barked from the front of the room. "Self-study is not a synonym for 'waste your time by gossiping with friends'. Shut up and study unless you want detention!"
Naruto glared at him. "Geez, why am I the one to always get into trouble?" He grumbled under his breath.
"Uzumaki!"
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"Welcome back!"
Sasuke and the others were met with Sakura's happy greeting as they returned through the front door. The Uchiha's eyebrow slightly arched upwards at her energetic behavior, while Naruto gave her a contagious grin. He walked over to her smaller figure and patted her on the head. Neji briefly mouthed 'sugar' behind her as if to explain her out of character actions.
I'm glad to see you're doing well, Sakura-chan!" He beamed at her, before giving her a tight hug. Her eyes widened at the sudden close contact, and she pushed him away. "Sorry Sakura-chan, I got a bit carried away." He sheepishly said, scratching the back of his head. "But you looked so cute, I couldn't resist!"
"Dobe." Sasuke muttered under his breath, looking annoyed. "She's clearly not comfortable with you touching her."
Sakura momentarily tensed as Gaara wordlessly walked by her, shutting himself in his own room. "Don't mind him." Shikamaru said with a shrug, throwing himself onto the couch. "Gaara's usually like that with everyone else as well."
"Gaara doesn't like being around when there's a cheerful atmosphere." Naruto said, his nose wrinkling up. "He's such a party pooper."
"Did you just say party pooper?" Kiba asked in disbelief. "Who the hell even says that anymore?"
"I do!" Naruto said defensively, shooting the brunette a glare.
"Whatever, I don't feel like arguing with you." Kiba muttered, taking a seat next to Shikamaru. "Is anything good on tv?" He asked the genius, ignoring Naruto's protests at being ignored.
Sakura relaxed, as the atmosphere around them gradually went back to being normal. When had she grown so comfortable around these boys? Maybe Sai had been right- she did trust people too easily, but so far her judgement had always turned out to be right. She had trusted Sai and she had trusted Idate, and both people had turned out out to be extremely important people in her life.
Maybe, for once, she could stop being paranoid and broaden her world- little by little.
She was startled out of her thoughts when she heard a door being slammed open. Gaara stood at the doorway, his cold green eyes staring right at her.
"Who came into my room?"
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Someday we'll look back ,
And say it wasn't just a dream.
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A/N: You guys are absolutely AMAZING. Thank you for all of your kind reviews.