Sasuke lay deathly still on a wheeled bed, medical staff gathered around him. One of his muscular forearms was in plaster and his chest was swathed in bandages. According to Tsunade, he had broken his wrist, arm and some ribs. He was covered in a multitude of deep cuts and gashes, most of which had been treated and dressed although there were one or two places where gaping wounds were bleeding profusely. His skin was pale, almost grey; he hardly seemed to breathe. It was a sight which both sickened and horrified her. The constant beep of the heart monitor was terrifyingly slow, filling the silence. It was as if it was counting down the amount of time he had left.
She set to work on the wounds which they had been unable to deal with, channelling her chakra into them and repairing the internal parts that had been damaged; capillaries, veins, arteries, organs, bone, skin. It was a gradual and hard process and took most of her energy.
Once she had dressed them, she then moved on to the final, potentially fatal wound. It lay in the centre of his chest, blood soaking the bandages. She placed her hands on them, the sweet, sickening stench of the scarlet liquid infusing her nostrils as it seeped through her fingers. So much blood. This is worse than I thought. He's been impaled by something…and it's pierced straight through him. I need to work fast!
Green chakra burst from her submerged facedown palms. All the while, she was very aware of the intervals between the beeps of the ECG in the background lengthening with each passing minute, knelling death closer. How long would it be before it became a continuous, monotonous -
She shook her head furiously, fiercely blinking back tears. No. I won't lose you, Sasuke!
So slowly. The wound was healing so slowly. The hole in his back had gone but her chakra had yet to repair the ruptured vital organs and veins, stop the bleeding and close the gash in his chest. The more the blood gushed, the more desperately she forced chakra into it in the hopes of speeding up the process.
Minutes crawled by like hours. Sakura managed to mend the various internal parts that had been speared and stop the bleeding from the inside but the blood from the wound on the outside still continued to cover the bandages and her hands. The beep of the ECG was so infrequent she was not sure whether she could hear it anymore. She breathed heavily; she did not have much chakra left. If she used it up she risked passing out or worse. But she could not give in now, not when she was so close to healing the wound completely and saving Sasuke.
Hang in there! thought Sakura, frantically pouring her last reserves of chakra with all her might into the wound. Dizziness threatened to overwhelm her; her breaths came out in harsh, ragged gasps, her head throbbed and swam and the blood pounded in her ears. Her body felt like it was on fire. She trembled from head to foot. Her pink hair was plastered to the back of her neck and the sides of her hot, flushed face. She squeezed her eyes shut, concentrating solely on her chakra and pushing herself to the limit.
Not long after, everything felt like it was spinning. She swayed, fighting to stay upright. Every fibre of her being protested.
Her legs buckled and she collapsed across Sasuke's still form. Tears flowed down her cheeks from beneath her closed eyelids. She had to stay awake. She had to.
"Sasuke…" was all she could utter before unconsciousness claimed her.