Lost Paradise

Chapter 3-Night Life

All five of the teens were in the infirmary, even Sasuke, who was not wounded in any way.

"You should start taking better care of yourself," Kakashi scolded Yuki, who was lying on a bed stained with blood from the wound on her arm.

"Yes, I know. But I needed to save my energy. I can't be too drained." Yuki answered as she wrapped a clean bandage around her arm.

"The problem with you being nocturnal is that we can't track what you're doing because you go out at midnight." Kakashi teased then suddenly kept quiet as Tsunade stormed into the infirmary and confronted Neji, who was lying down on the last bed, farthest from the door.

"What happened out there, Hyuga? How could there have been an army out there without us knowing?" Tsunade asked.

"From what I've learned, Grass has a Blessed of Hermes who teleported them there. At first, there were only five of them, like what was reported. Apparently, they found out that we've awakened another double-Blessed and called for reinforcements. They were planning on taking Sakura." Neji answered wearily.

"But how did they get mundanes to fight? From what I know, those were mostly mundanes." Tsunade asked, rubbing her temples.

"I don't—" Neji began, but Yuki, who was sitting on the sofa with Kakashi, cut him off.

"They were most likely under the influence of a Blessed of Aphrodite. They were completely loyal to their 'lady.'"

"And how did you find that out?" Tsunade said, raising a brow.

"You can go ask. There are probably a few still alive. I finished them off as much as I could, but it was kind of difficult because even though Sakura shot a lot of them, she didn't kill anyone out there." Yuki answered.

"I seriously suggest sending a clean-up crew ASAP." Naruto said quickly.

"And with all due respect, Tsunade-sama, you shouldn't have let her come with us. I know she saved Sasuke-nii's life, but she wouldn't have had to if she didn't come with us in the first place." Yuki said to Tsunade.

"I must agree with Yuki, Tsunade-sama. Uchiha got fatally wounded because he was ambushed while he blocked another attack that was meant for Sakura." Neji said.

"If I didn't, she wouldn't have discovered her healing Talent." Tsunade replied.

"But she would have, later. She could have been killed out there, Baa-chan. The enemy, they had an archer with them, a Blessed of Artemis." Naruto said.

"If I had got her out of there a second later she would have a dozen arrows sticking out of her now and she wouldn't even have had enough time to blink before she died." Yuki said.

"Plus, as a double-Blessed," Neji sighed wearily, "other nations would be after her. She's in enough danger as is."

"But Sasuke is double-Blessed as well, and you have no qualms with me sending him out

"He can handle himself, Tsunade-sama." Kakashi suddenly said.

"Please. Don't send her on missions with us. I am begging you. She's weak and vulnerable, and we can't always watch her. It's only been a single mission and look what happened!" Yuki pleaded.

Tsunade remained silent. She sighed as she stood up, "Exactly. It's only been one mission. Give her some time to adapt. Besides, you shouldn't speak so harshly of someone who's in the room and may be listening as we speak."

All three of them stayed quiet as Tsunade stood up and strode out of the infirmary.

Sakura stayed still until Tsunade got out then she suddenly sat up, startling the other four conscious occupants of the room.

She fixed her teary gaze on Yuki's unnerving eyes. "Did you mean that? That I am a liability? Well, excuse me, but this is my first mission and you think I'm incompetent!"

"Face it, Sakura! It may be your first mission, and that's only because you insisted on going. If you hadn't none of this would have happened!" Yuki hissed, gradually raising her voice.

"If this is about Sasuke-"

"No, this is not about Sasuke! This is about your damn need to fit in with us and your inability to kill! Don't you realize that you could have gotten killed earlier?" Yuki said, cutting her off.

Sakura's face expressed her shock clearly. "But when I mentioned it you didn't seem to disapprove."

"Because the situation wasn't the same- going up against five enemies is different from going against five hundred! I thought that you would change your mind, but no, you still went and stuck to that little belief of yours and you almost got killed!"

"Killing isn't a thing that I would like to do, ever. It's wrong, Yuki! Those people have families, friends…someone who cares about them! How could you just go ahead and kill them!" Sakura screamed.

"They knew what they were risking, Sakura. There's no excuse not to kill them, they'll die anyway. Killing is just speeding up the process." Yuki answered.

"Is that what you tell yourself, Yuki? Killing isn't bad? Killing isn't evil and immoral and wrong? Wouldn't you care if someone you care for gets killed?"

"When you're on the battlefield, nothing else matters but the fight at hand. When a man tries to kill you with a giant sword, you won't think about anything else but staying alive. Everything else comes later. That's how it always has been, and always will be." Yuki said fiercely.

"That may be so, but there are ways to incapacitate someone without killing." Sakura answered back.

"Suit yourself, I won't argue about this anymore. It's getting late and I don't have time for this." Yuki said before getting up and striding out of the infirmary.

"So you're telling me that you and Yuki just had an argument then she went off on her own?" Sasuke, who was sitting on the bed, said disbelievingly, "And that was three hours ago, and she hasn't come back, and you can't find her." He then rubbed his temples, he just recovered from a near-death experience, woke up at three in the morning, and then he finds out his cousin is missing because she had an argument with his hopefully soon-to-be girlfriend.

"She'll come back…probably." Kakashi said with his nose buried in a small orange book.

"And if she doesn't, then at least we know she can handle herself." Neji added.

Sasuke simply said, "Did you guys think of checking the park?"

"Oh, good point. We'll go." Kakashi said while dragging Naruto out with him.

Neji simply got out and followed. Before he walked out of the door, he looked Sasuke in the eye then glanced at Sakura.

Sasuke got the message. 'Talk to her. '

Sasuke approached Sakura— carefully, because he was aware of how…delicate a female could be.

She had a blank expression on her face, and when she looked at him, he just froze up. Sakura interrupted his train of thought by saying, "I think Yuki is right, I shouldn't have gone on that mission with you."

That was ridiculous. "I wouldn't even be alive and breathing now if you weren't there earlier."

She shook her head, "No, you would have. Neji said that you got hit when you tried to take out someone aiming for me."

And he would gladly do it again for Sakura— he would do anything to keep her safe. But he can't tell her that— she'd think that he's a romantic sap, and we can't have that, can we?

Instead, he asked her, "What exactly did Yuki tell you?"

Sakura then broke down and started sobbing, it was a challenge to make out what she was saying with all the sobs, but he understood most of it. The reason why Yuki said that stuff…honestly, how could the others not have noticed?

So while awkwardly rubbing her back, (awkwardly because no girl has ever come to me crying before. Even Yuki thought it was a bad idea.) He comfortingly told her, "She doesn't hate you, and didn't mean to hurt you when she said those stuff. She was just jealous."

Then Sakura looked at him with those large teary eyes and asked, "Of me? Why would she be jealous of me?"

He took a deep breath and answered her, "Because, she was awakened early, so by the time she was thirteen, she was fully trained. The whole thing was wrong. There are organizations that are strong enough to rival Konoha. It turns out that a classmate of hers was a spy for one of them. He was her best friend. She was ordered to kill him. You must have heard of it; the mundane police found out about it because the body was later found in the school's garden."

Sakura nodded. It happened four years ago, one of her classmates was found buried in the school's garden and so school was canceled for a week after that.

"She refused to obey orders at first but the higher ups threatened to kill her family. She had to fight him and she won. She hasn't recovered from that. She doesn't feel like its' fair that you got an option when she didn't."

"I can't imagine going through that. In retrospect, it was a smart decision for the elders to choose Yuki, but it wasn't fair for her…" Sakura said quietly before fresh tears sprung from her eyes for the injustice girl who just hurt her feelings had gone through.

He wrapped an arm around her. "Sakura."

"Yes, Sasuke-kun?"

"Thanks for saving my life earlier." Sasuke mumbled. Sakura silently leaned into his warm embrace.

"Is something happening? I mean, I'm new to all this, but isn't it strange for Grass to send a whole army just to get me?"

"I don't know. Tsunade is still investigating." He answered truthfully.

"Sometimes, I wish that we weren't involved in all this, that we could just live normally as normal people." Sakura blurted.

"Aa. And yet we wouldn't trade this for anything in the world." Sasuke agreed.

Yuki slit her arm with a blade and watched with morbid fascination as the blood pooled into a small puddle at her feet. She muttered a small incantation and watched as the blood seeped into the ground and white smoke curled around her and took the form of a man who was completely white, from his hair and his eyes to his skin and his clothes. He looked young, about her age. And there was something about him, be it the faint glow he radiated or the soft smile he gave her, that made her breathless.

"Sai." She greeted him.

"Yuki." He nodded.

"You should stop doing this. It isn't healthy for you to use so much your blood for something like this," Sai berated her.

"The summoning spell requires a blood sacrifice," She replied, "And besides, I missed you."

"Yes, it has been a while, hasn't it?" He murmured distantly.

"I did promise that I would only do the summoning once a month." Yuki said, before locking Sai in her warm embrace, but of course, he felt ice cold. Souls have no life and therefore, no warmth.

Sai pressed his chilly lips to her forehead. "You smell of death. Have you been on a mission?"

"Just a small one, there's nothing to worry about." Yuki said softly before she asked, "So how did I do this time? How long can you stay?"

"You're doing better than before; I can stay a full twelve hours now. I can only hope you aren't practicing on your own." Sai said with a small smile before frowning at the gash on her arm. "Yuki-"

"Go ahead," Yuki cut him off and raised her arm to him, "I guess I owe you much more than these few hours of life once a month."

"No, this is already more than I could ever ask for." He said before bringing his lips to the wound. Yuki winced as he drank her blood, it stung, very much, at the same time she watched him as he grew more and more substantial…more human. His hair turned black, his clothes were now black and red, and his skin was still extremely pale, but not abnormally white.

He could almost be human, she decided, except for his eyes, which were as wholly black as hers were white.

"Are you sure you've had enough?" Yuki asked shakily once he stopped.

"Yes." He caught her in his arms just before she fell, she always tries to give him more than she must, and loosing so much blood is too much even for her to take.

"Put her down!" A flash of yellow suddenly appeared in front of Sai, who just glanced at him before clutching protectively Yuki to his chest and disappearing.

Naruto blinked once.

Then he blinked twice.

What the hell had just happened? He could have sworn Yuki was right there on the ground, unconscious and held by some guy he didn't know, and then the next second, they both disappeared.

The strangest thing was the man's eyes, which were totally black, no iris, no pupil, just total darkness.

"Did you find her?" Kakashi asked as he and Neji emerged from the bushes.

"I don't know. I think I did," Naruto said, "Some guy was carrying her then they both suddenly disappeared."

"I…see," Kakashi replied before sniffing the air. "I smell blood. Neji, did she completely heal herself earlier?" he asked in a daze.

"I don't think so." Neji said.

Omake- One of the Perks

Konoha Academy is kind of fancy, Sakura mused as she wandered down the quiet halls, not exactly your normal school. The floors were carpeted, crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and there were busts of deceased principals and directors scattered around.

From the outside, it looks like…a Victorian mansion. On the inside it looked like a museum…or maybe a five-star hotel, complete with the indoor pool.

'This is probably one of the perks of being Blessed.' Sakura thought to herself. They have a whole wing to themselves. Each one of them has a room in the west wing, and each of the rooms comes with its own bathroom, hot tub, and an amazing view of the gardens and the nearby forest. Not to mention the designer furniture and the free delicious food everyday.

And, as Sakura has recently learned, they have underground training grounds and weapon vaults.

The strangest thing is, none of this comes from tuition the students pay, it isn't expensive, and the students are mostly middle-class with a few exceptions such as Hinata, Sasuke and Neji, and a few others, who are 'filthy, stinkin' rich' as Naruto puts it.

The truth is that the money comes from doing missions. Apparently, there are a few (high-class) mundanes that hire the Blessed to do some chores for them, such as cleaning, mowing the lawn, taking out the trash, and more often than not, spying and assassinating.

Sakura stopped her musings as she recovered from almost falling down the stairs. She pressed her thumb to the scanner and heard the satisfactory 'click' of the lock of her door before she quietly slipped through the door of her room and promptly collapsed on her bed.

Her room was once a lot less grand than the teachers' rooms, not because of lack of funds (Sasuke offered to cover all expenses) but because of the fact that she didn't want to decorate it. Everyone else however, made it so that she didn't need to. The only thing she did in an effort to add a bit of personality to her room was painting the walls a dark chocolate and installing lights that could be dimmed to a dull orange color, giving the room a cozy feel.

Of course, Ino (who wasn't as rich as Sasuke, but still rich nonetheless) promptly bought a full set of sakura-pink silk sheets and matching fluffy towels. And Sasuke got a few pieces of furniture (hand-picked by Mikoto, his mother) to match the new color of the rooms.

Sakura protested to them spending so much money on her but they would hear nothing of it and continued to keep adding bits and pieces to her room. By then, the mutually agreed on but still unspoken theme of the room was 'sakura'.

By the end of the week, she ended up with a solid mahogany bookshelf that had intricate carvings of sakura branches, and a small table which is actually a gorgeous aquarium complete with all sorts of exotic fishes and corals with a large sheet of glass on top. (Naruto's idea, it worked though— she only had to lift the glass to feed the fishes about twice or thrice a week) The tank itself had decorations on its bottom corners made from crystals. There were sakura blossoms made from rose quartz, leaves made from jade, all attached to branches made of tiger's eye.

A dresser made of dark wood with her name and hundreds of sakura blossoms carved into the drawers (both it and the bookshelf were custom made for her, courtesy of Sasuke).

She also had lots of stylish pink ceramic vases in all sorts of shapes and designs which came with pre-arranged artificial flowers (so she didn't have to water them), all from Ino. The smallest one is now permanently attached to the top of her aquarium-table so that she didn't have to worry about breaking it while she fed the fishes.

Yuki even offered to charm the room so now it always smells of sakura blossoms, with a bit of a woody scent. And she also gave Sakura a few bonsai plants which Sakura immediately positioned above the bookshelf and outside, on the balcony, and on the bathroom countertop.

Her favorite of all of the furniture is the canopy bed which was a joint project of Sasuke and Ino. It had all four thick posts made of mahogany and carved to look like the trunks of sakura trees and the canopy itself is made of a translucent shimmering pink cloth with layers upon layers of artificial sakura blossoms sewn on the top and a few more blossoms were randomly sewn to the curtains themselves. All in all, it gave the illusion of sleeping under a grove of Sakura trees.

Now, her room looks (and smells) like the indoor version of a fairytale garden, all it was missing was the soil and the grass...and the gazebo.

Some of the other students' rooms each have a sort of theme to them, and so they have become well-known attractions with the whole student population. It is considered a privilege to be able to enter the rooms and even more of a privilege to actually live in one.

Naruto had a ramen themed room, complete with bowl shaped furniture, curtains that mimicked noodles and pillows that were shaped like toppings. His room had a microwave and three large cupboards fully stocked with instant ramen. His room even smelled like ramen. Also he had a pet fox (nine-tailed mutant fox, Sakura reminded herself) called Kyubi.

Sasuke's room was dark. It seemed to recreate the night sky. He had black pillows, black silk sheets, sleek black and silver furniture, and black carpeting. The amazing thing about his room is the hundreds of (expensive) sparkling Swarovski crystals hung at different lengths from the ceiling with transparent string. Yuki charmed the crystals so that they twinkle like real stars, since Sasuke's secret hobby is stargazing.

Neji's room has more of an 'intellectual' vibe to it. It had cream walls covered by oak shelves containing books of every kind and many large maps covered his study table. To their group of friends, his room might as well have been a library. His bed was pushed into the far corner of the room, as if it was supposed to be as inconspicuous as possible. A large and beautifully ornate gilded cage was left open and empty in the corner as his pet dove was left free to roam around inside and outside through the open window and it came and went as it pleased, thus, leaving his room dropping-free.

Yuki's room was unique to her tastes. The room had black walls and royal purple carpets. She had manikins dressed in elaborate ball gowns and whimsical costumes lining a wall and tall bookshelves with fictional, fantasy and supernatural novels lining the other. A large white woolen picnic blanket and numerous dramatic multi-colored pillows (some of them had beaded fringes and some even had gold tassels) made her 'reading nook' in the corner. Her bed had snow-white sheets and glittering dark purple pillows. She had a long granite table that sparkled under her crystal chandelier with a fortune-teller's crystal ball sitting on top.

'Well,' Sakura thought as she drifted off to sleep, 'I guess one of the perks of being Blessed is getting your dream room.'

Hello to all my readers. Thank you for reading this chapter of Lost Paradise. Please review and give me some feedback. I'M GETTING DESPERATE...well, not really, but still.

I want to note down a few things.

1. Yuki may sound like a biotch, but in truth she's just brutally honest. And apparently she's the jealous type. But her boyfriend is dead. And in case you're wondering, she isn't suicidal, okay?

2. Kyubi here is a Shih-Tzu dog sized nine-tailed mutant (not demon) fox. He accidentally ingested some Blessed of Hephaestus' experimental concoction, thus he was genetically mutated. Naruto found him in the forest and adopted him. He now lives in a pet bed shaped like a ramen bowl. Seriously.