Standard disclaimers apply. I'm just borrowing these characters for a little while.
Author's note: Kishimoto-sensei's plan is to fit the entire 4th Shinobi War Arc into a matter of days in the Naruto timeline, but I'm taking the liberty of extending it since war is never so quick and clean-cut. Events from the manga will be added, removed or shifted around. Please pardon my impudence.
Alas, I was hoping that we would have broken 1,000 reviews by the previous chapter. And the lack of long reviews makes me doubly sad.
When the smell of disinfectants and medical cots stirred her senses, Sakura's first thought was: hospital.
Her second thought was: yay, that means I'm not dead!
Her following thoughts were a mish-mash of wondering about the fate of her teammates, how careless she had been, how she got to the hospital, and oh, stars, Tsunade-shishou is going to murder me for failing my mission!
In the midst of her mental arm-flailing, coupled with the soothing familiarity of her surroundings, Sakura was wonderfully unaware of the commotion that she was causing as she unconsciously exhibited signs of waking from her medically-induced sleep.
The medic-nin whom just happened to be in her tent to take her readings never knew what hit him when he popped out of her tent to announce to the small crowd outside that Sakura was awake.
He was given two days of medical leave, but the trample marks on his body would take a little longer to fade completely.
The commotion, paired with her dawning realisation that she was hooked up to at least two drips of sorts, only made Sakura want to open her eyes less.
Luckily, Ino was there to rectify that little problem: by throwing her arms around Sakura's torso and giving her one of their patented girl-meeting hugs.
"Forehead-girl, you idiot! You almost got yourself killed! What the heck were you doing to get all messed-up like that?!" Only the slight quiver in Ino's voice gave away the fact that she would have already burst into tears if it was not for the crowd with them.
Sakura knew she had to say something; it was the least she could do. Literally.
"S-rank mission, Ino. You know I can't tell you what happened." she tried to smile, but it came out lop-sided and a frankly, little creepy-looking.
Blinking to clear away the grogginess from her long sleep, Sakura looked around the room slowly, allowing each figure to come into focus before moving onto the next one.
Shikamaru was standing along the edge of the crowd. From his closed eyes and the expression of deep concentration written across his face, Sakura surmised that he was probably sending a message back to the Intelligence Division to inform the Hokage that her apprentice was finally back in the land of the living.
Not a very pleasant prospect to look forward to.
Lee's presence immediately set alarm bells off in her head: was the rest of the team okay? Was anyone seriously injured aside from her? What happened after she passed out? Where were they now?
Fortunately, Lee noticed her distress, correctly guessed the storm of questions she was mentally tossing out, and silently mouthed, "Everyone is safe."
She did not know what was Sai doing in her tent, but in light of the war, Sakura was glad that at least one of her many friends could be accounted for.
There was a conspicuous lack of Sand Siblings, or more importantly, the absence of her boyfriend (Sakura was still trying to wrap her head around that concept). But again, she chalked it up to the ongoing war. Rationally, she knew the Regimental Leader had far more important things to do than to wait around outside his medic's tent for her to awake from surgery.
That did not stop her from feeling disheartened to not find him close by, though.
At least they thought to send Baki, who was watching her and the tent's occupants like a hawk.
Also: no Mr. Fluffy-kins.
"Mr. Fluffy-kins?" Sakura directed her question to everyone in the general vicinity.
Baki took a step forward, coughed into his fist, and replied, "Kazekage-sama has him, Sakura-san."
There was something off about his tone, and the manner in which he was deliberately avoiding Sakura's eyes only served to unsettle her more.
"What about Naruto and the others? Are they alright?" Sakura was becoming more alert now, driven by the adrenaline now pumping in her system.
To make matters worse, everyone in the tent suddenly started looking to each other, as if wondering who should be the one to provide Sakura with the answers she was asking for; it was setting her on the edge. If Sakura was not still sluggish from her sedation, she would have kicked something or punched someone by now in frustration.
"Ino, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be by Kazekage-sama's side as long as he is at the camp?"
Ino had somehow acquired Hinata's habit of tapping her pointer fingers together in obvious nervousness. "Well, you see… erm… how should I…"
A thunderous clap of palms, followed by the unmistakable command of: "Okay, everybody out. Now."
Shishou.
As if on cue, everyone parted to create a direct path from the tent's entrance towards Sakura's bed. Tsunade had her hands on both hips, and the aura of authority enveloping her marked her even more distinctly as the highest-ranking shinobi in the Land of Fire.
"Out, out," hissed Sakura to Ino who was frozen on the spot; the last thing she needed was for anyone to be caught in the crossfire.
Tsunade's scowl deepened; the tent emptied out in an exodus of panicked footsteps.
By the time Tsunade turned to face Sakura full-on, she realised that she had been trying to shove herself into the medic cot.
The blonde Hokage strode over to Sakura's bedside, pretending not to have noticed how she had just scared the living daylights out of a handful of battle-hardened shinobis – her own apprentice included.
Sakura tried her best to maintain eye contact with Tsunade, but broke it on reflex when the Hokage plopped herself down on the edge of the bed.
Here it comes.
"A ruptured kidney," began Tsunade, arms folded across her chest as she leveled Sakura with a professional medic's gaze and tone, "You were extremely lucky that the clone did not pierce clean through you, and that Naruto actually remembered some of the emergency medical care knowledge you have drilled into him; he broke the White Zetsu's arm off instead of pulling it out and that stopped you from bleeding out while he carried you back here to the medic base."
Sakura's hand unconsciously moved to gently press against her wound – the bolt of sharp, searing pain hit her harder than she expected.
But what stung more was the realisation of how easily she was taken down in a fight, and how she had to play the role of the damsel in distress.
There was no use in running through the may-bes of if she was able to fight as a regular combatant rather than a medic-nin – she was assigned to be the medic-nin of the team, and even if she was given the go-ahead to use her chakra to fight, there would always be a part of her fretting over the possibility of a teammate being injured and how her chakra drain would have damned him to unnecessary pain and probably even… death.
Still, a punctured kidney was not an immediately fatal condition; Sakura had survived and continued fighting on her feet even when she was stabbed clean-through by Sasori. What made this injury so different that she had blacked out almost instantly?
Tsunade's gaze softened when she noticed a tear slip from Sakura's squeezed-shut eyes. After watching Sakura's growth as a medic-nin over the years, Tsunade did not have to guess that she was probably beating herself up mentally for getting injured on such a crucial mission.
"It was not just a punctured organ, Sakura," Tsunade said kindly, correctly reading Sakura's thoughts as she shifted closer to her student, "Katsuyu had to deploy some of her healing abilities while you were being transported back – the bit of Zetsu embedded inside you was somehow alive and growing, your insides were still being pierced and torn afresh when Naruto arrived with you; it took Shizune over eight hours just to completely remove any foreign presence in you before we could even begin healing you. I cannot imagine anyone staying conscious when under such physical stress."
Sakura shook her head, scowling, "I should have noticed this when we were doing the autopsy on the White Zetsu clone all those weeks ago, then. It's my fault for missing his ability to spontaneously grow and change his body parts into weapons."
"No, we should have noticed this. We were all so caught up in trying to tell apart the clones from our own numbers that we missed that chance to study the physiology of the White Zetsu clones.
"Furthermore, neither Naruto nor Killer Bee-san reported any such abilities being displayed by the White Zetsu bases that they had been clearing out. It is not too far-fetched to assume that Akatsuki planned to play this as their trump card. They might have intended to play this hand against us once they whittle down our numbers."
"… Or they could have only recently developed this ability," Sakura muttered glumly.
Tsunade cocked an eyebrow, and asked, "What makes you say that?"
Sakura twisted the sheets in her fists, the self-reprimanding in her eyes giving way to something more serious; more angry.
"When Kakashi-sensei took down one of the White Zetsu clones that had grown its arm, the pattern of twisting and knotting in the bisection was very similar to how Yamato-taichou grew wood from ground-up," she clenched her fists, forcing herself to say the next thoughts in her head, "They are displaying more and more of Yamato-taichou's Wood Release Technique. I don't know if that means that they have completely assimilated taichou into whatever cloning device or technique they came up with, but it can't be anything good."
Both of them knew what Sakura was really trying to say:
I don't know if Yamato-taichou is still alive, or have they already accidentally killed him by draining too much from him.
"We will know the answer soon enough."
"Oh?"
"The Kazekage has mobilised half of all current and reservist ANBU to assist Naruto and Killer Bee in wiping out the remaining White Zetsu bases," Tsunade turned to Sakura with a knowing smirk that bode no good news, "Gaara himself is away, leading the Ambush Squad on the same mission with the aim of meeting Naruto at the abandoned Akatsuki base to secure it and retrieve whatever intelligence they can. But most importantly, they want to eliminate the source of the clones once and for all."
Tsunade leaned in close and grinned at Sakura, "I think we all know why the Kazekage dropped everything and decided to lead a team personally, especially since Naruto sent the Hachibi-form of Killer Bee to drop in on the 4th Division to relay news of your injuries."
And really, a gigantic, bull-headed octopus creature storming into a shinobi camp during war time, rapping out his reason for setting everyone's nerves on the edges, was just adding fuel to the fire.
Sakura supposed Killer Bee probably moved a lot faster in his Hachibi form, and Naruto must have meant well when sending his fellow jinchuuriki to inform his best friend.
It was over-the-top.
It was nevertheless effective (she grudgingly admitted that a bijuus sudden appearance would get any message across).
It was just. So. Naruto.
The blonde Hokage was positively enjoying the situation now, not that Sakura was in any mood to appreciate the absence of the reprimanding that she had been dreading.
"Now, as you know," Tsunade was, strangely enough, starting to sound a little like Ino, "The War Council has agreed that all our combined ANBU forces will masquerade as regular, jounin-level shinobis for the duration of the war, and we have deployed them evenly across all Divisions in case of emergencies. Only the War Council had absolute authority to command the ANBU to mobilise them for the war – for them to go in during the final assault and do the unspeakable.
"I have no idea what Naruto had Killer Bee say to Gaara, but the next thing the War Council knew, the Kazekage had arrived with his proxy Commander and laid out a full strategy on how they planned to flush the White Zetsus and destroy them for good."
Tsunade tapped her lower lip, rolling her eyes back as if recalling something, then said, "I believe the Kazekage's exact words were 'the gloves are now off'."
Shikamaru pointed at the red crosses dotting the spread-out map, saying, "These are the known White Zetsu bases that Naruto and Killer Bee-san has eliminated. Based on this information, Kazekage-sama had me calculate the possible locations of the other bases. There appears to be a pattern to their locations, and I've marked them out in green."
A looked from Shikamaru to Gaara, then back again. Finally, he spoke up, "So you are saying you want to assist the Kyuubi jinchuuriki and my brother in wiping out the White Zetsu bases. But we have already eliminated most of the assassination threats from among our own shinobis. I cannot allow the reckless deployment of our most powerful shinobis against such a mild threat."
Shikamaru sneaked a look at Gaara –the Kazekage's arms were crossed, and his knuckles were deadly pale; Witnessing the rage of Suna's Ultimate Weapon was not something he was keen on again.
"The issue is not so simple, Honorable Kages," explained Shikamaru, "Based on the field report by Naruto and Killer Bee-san, the clones seem to have evolved, and are displaying the rare Wood Release Technique in a lethal manner. We have lost too many lightning element shinobis in this war already, and since lightning is wood's only weakness, we are setting ourselves up for a crushing defeat if we do not eliminate this threat for good."
But A was having none of that. Instead, he turned his steely gaze to Gaara and pointed at him, saying, "And are you going to tell me that this sudden change in our plans has nothing to do with the fact that your personal medic was nearly killed by one of the clones?"
Gaara, Fifth Kazekage and Regimental Leader of the Allied Shinobi Forces, decided to prove that he could be as brutally blunt towards another Kage as he was with his own Senior Council:
"This has everything to do with Haruno-san. She is arguably the best medic-nin to have come out of any of the Five Shinobi Nations in the past decade, and Hokage-sama has informed me that even as we speak, she is fighting for her life. The cause is a stab wound – something that every shinobi should be able to shrug off; Haruno-san did not even have the chance to begin healing her injury before it incapacitated her, and she is not an ordinary shinobi to begin with," Gaara's words were clearly directed at the Raikage, "Do not forget Haruno-san's position as an apprentice to the last of the Legendary Sannin. This is an unforgivable insult; the gloves are now off. Nara-san will now give the War Council the necessary rundown on the manpower we need to pull off this assault."
Then Gaara turned on his heel, and promptly swept out of the room. His message was clear: he would not be dissuaded from his course of action, and anyone who might attempt to do so is likely to find themselves in a potentially lethal and very sandy situation.
A sound of palms meeting a tabletop violently, followed by a slow, splintering creak. Oonoki and A turned in time to see Tsunade rising from her seat at the War Council's table, the portion in front of her clearly damaged beyond repair.
"Shikamaru," Tsunade's tone was enough to make the Nara prodigy flinch, "By the power vested in me as Kage of Konohagakure, I hereby give you my formal consent to utilise whatever manpower you need from amongst our own shinobis. If the other Kages will not offer their shinobis for this long-overdue mission, bring it to my attention immediately. I shall speak to the Mizukage personally."
"Yes, Hokage-sama," Shikamaru mentally shook his head to clear away the visions of his own mother – the Nara matriarch more often than not stated her terms, and gave whoever that was on the receiving end no choice to refuse her. And more worryingly, the Hokage had one huge advantage over his mother: Tsunade could put him six feet under with just a touch of her pinky, and there would be no maternal guilt over the act.
Oonoki closed his eyes and stroked his beard contemplatively, and finally spoke up, "I suggest we go along with this madness, Raikage-sama. It is apparent that the power of young love can inspire much bodily harm, and to destroy such a bothersome enemy once and for all will be the icing on the cake."
A's glare turned positively murderous.
"You… you crazy old coot! You talk as if the power of love can solve everything all the time. When this war is over, I swear, I am going to pay your village a visit, and I'm going to make sure they elect a new, younger Kage instead of letting a senile old fool like you rule under the influence of your second childhood!"
"… Who are you calling old, Raikage-sama…?"
Sakura gawped. Like a fish out of water.
'Haruno Sakura: The Face that Wiped Out the White Zetsu Army' certainly had a ring to it.
"Close your mouth, Sakura."
Sakura struggled to find her voice, "Shishou, if I may ask, how long have I been out for?"
She needed to know how long this craziness has been going on for, and Tsunade was happy to oblige.
"Well, you were brought in five days ago, and have been placed in a medically-induced sleep for the following seventy-two hours. However, your body decided that it needed longer to recover and you didn't wake up on time, thus the little gathering outside of your tent."
It was nice to know that her friends were worried enough about her to drop whatever they were doing to keep vigil on her, even if there was that small part of Sakura now giving her a guilt-trip on worrying everyone.
And it did explain Ino's presence: the Kazekage was away, and he never felt the need to keep a medic by his side at all times.
Especially not Ino – she'll talk his ears off. Sakura concluded with a silent giggle.
But just as quickly, she sobered up and asked the question Tsunade knew she was dying to ask – "Is there any news from Naruto or the others on the mission?"
Okay, perhaps Tsunade was expecting something more along the lines of "is Gaara safe?", but she knew that the tent fabrics were thin, and Sakura had to keep her affections towards the Kazekage a secret from prying eyes and ears.
As if every shinobi and their dog did not already have their own speculations about the Regimental Leader and his personal medic.
"The latest report came in just as Shikamaru informed me that you were awake. It seems like they have located the abandoned Akatsuki base, and were ready to breach and takeover the base."
"And the casualties?"
"Much fewer than expected. Naruto had a day's head start compared to the ANBU and cleared out most of the clones before our men even had a chance to get to them," Tsunade crossed her arms under her ample bosom, huffing, "I don't even know why we bothered to send the ANBU with him if they're left to pick up his scraps.
"Killer Bee-san and the Kazekage moved in from a different direction with the Ambush Squad, and they encountered a number of White Zetsu bases as well, but not as many since they took the over-sea route to meet up with Naruto."
"Shishou," Sakura found herself interrupting, but knew she had to, "You did not inform the Kazekage that I'm awake, did you? Because I don't want him to be distracted by anything while he's out on the frontlines, and I certainly do not want him to come rushing back and wasting his chakra reserves in the process of that."
Tsunade smiled softly; trust Sakura to think more like a medic than a patient even in her situation.
Assigning Sakura to Gaara as his personal medic was a correct decision, even if Tsunade was now faced with the prospects of a major political shift in power, seeing how her apprentice was dating a Kage.
Once the war is over, the political arena will become a new battleground for the Five Shinobi Nations. Although she was certain that her fellow Kages would not object to the individuals involved, they and their councilmen would no doubt raise a ruckus about the implications of the strongest Shinobi Nation developing such close ties with another nation.
Then again, Tsunade knew that the title of 'Hokage' was a magnet for trouble to begin with.
"He will be informed in due time, Sakura. Now, let's have a look at how your wound is getting along, shall we?"
It took Gaara a good thirty-eight hours and twelve minutes to finally arrive at the medic base.
Not that Sakura was keeping count, or anything.
And she certainly was not on pins and needles since twenty-one hours ago when Shizune and a platoon of jounin-level medics were suddenly called away to rendezvous at the abandoned Akatsuki base; Shizune did not leave the base unless her extraordinary medical skills were called upon, and this was the first time she was called away to be on the field in the Fourth Shinobi World War.
Even if Tsunade had not banned her from consuming stimulants such as coffee, Sakura found she was unable to sleep the entire time, twitchy as she was.
She missed Mr Fluffy-kins pressed against her neck, purring her to sleep.
She missed the Kazekage's robes that she donned in the privacy of her own tent to keep warm; the medic base blankets were itchy and stained in disturbing places.
But most of all, she missed him.
So when a hush fell over the medic base, and the shinobis milling about started to speak in politer tones, Sakura could not stop her heart from practically bursting out of her chest.
In the end, she did the next best thing to calm her frazzled nerves – she curled under her blanket and feigned sleep.
There was an oh-so familiar flare of chakra from outside the tent, but Sakura simply swallowed and squeezed her eyes shut a little harder.
Gaara hesitated outside, as if he did not know if he should enter the tent or not given that he had received no response from Sakura.
Finally, the need to see Sakura, face-to-face after fourteen whole days apart, won out; Gaara lifted the tent flap and walked in, his footsteps ever so quiet. Then he was next to Sakura bed, his presence looming over her and almost forcing Sakura to open her mouth and demand that he said something instead of being so mysteriously quiet.
What Gaara did next shut Sakura's brain processes down completely.
There was a soft "thud" and a rustle of the tent fabric, leading Sakura to assume that Gaara had taken off his gourd and was going to sit down on the edge of her cot. Gaara did that, and much more – he carefully sat down besides Sakura, lifted his legs onto the cot, and very, very slow, shifted himself entirely onto the cot.
Sakura promptly stopped breathing when Gaara laid himself down beside her and placed a hand on her unhurt side, then gently folded Sakura against his curled up form. He nosed her jawline, careful not to rouse her from her (pretend) sleep, lips placed tenderly over her pulse as if to reassure himself of her being alive.
Oh my stars, Gaara is spooning me…!
Sakura also had the sinking feeling that Gaara knew she was pretending to be asleep, but decided not to call her out on it.
Perhaps she was being punished, in some twisted manner.
Gaara pressed his chest a little closer against Sakura's back.
Sakura's shoulder gave an involuntary twitch.
The jig was up.
"Kazekage-sama?" she asked, faking a sleep-laced voice as she turned her neck slightly.
Gaara's brush of lips against her pulse point did not just send a shiver down her spine.
"We can dispense with the formalities, Sakura; I have a dome of sand erected around the outside of your tent."
Sakura first concern was: airholes.
Her subsequent concern was: the Kazekage just barricaded himself in with his female personal medic, and the evidence was sitting right outside.
People would soon be chopping down the Rumour Forest to house an entire village with it, and the villagers would spread their gossip far and wide while riding on the fancy horse-carts made from the trees.
Sakura's train of thought, however, was nicely derailed when the enclosed space that she was now in alerted her to a strong scent in the tent aside from that of cold surgical steel and medicine. She would have sat right up if Gaara's arms around her did not prevent her from doing so.
"Gaara, are you injured?" She could not mask the worry in her voice as she struggled slightly against his hold.
Gaara responded by tightening his arms a little more around Sakura, not wanting her to agitate her wounds, and replied calmly, "It's not my blood."
Sakura did not know if she should be feeling relieved that Gaara was unharmed, feeling flattered that Gaara decided she was more important than a change of clothes, or just outright panic over the very sudden and unexpected development in their physical relationship.
Gaara. Was. Still. Spooning. Her.
Sakura needed something to distract her from Gaara's tickling breath on her neck. Anything.
"What happened during the mission, Gaara? Shizune nee-san was summoned, and you don't mobilise the head of the medic corps unless it was close to a pandemic situation."
She could feel Gaara's adam's apple bob against the back of her shoulder, followed by his quiet answer, "We located a Konoha shinobi who has been missing since before the war started. Naruto referred to him as 'Yamato-taichou'."
Sakura's blood turned ice-cold.
"Akatsuki was using him in the cloning process of the White Zetsus. It was a massive, tree-like structure located underneath the now-abandoned base. I don't think they could have moved the structure, or even if they could, have moved it before we got to them.
"The medics with us did not possess sufficient skill to safely remove Yamato-san from the structure; he has been kept alive but comatose for a very long time through the infusion of foreign chakra, and to remove him from his life support system without the required know-how was going to kill him. I summoned for Shizune-san, informed her of our findings, and she is currently working with a team of her best medics to find a way to remove Yamato-san safely and bring him back for healing.
"I have ordered the cloning device to be thoroughly dismantled. A sample will be brought back for study by the Intelligence Division, but from the complexity of the structure and the need for Yamato-san to be part of the cloning process, I am confident that we have seen the last of the White Zetsu armies."
Even without wishful thinking or romanticised ideas, Sakura found it hard to believe that Gaara would have ordered such a mission if she had not been injured badly enough for the Hokage and her first apprentice to attend to her personally.
"I'm sorry for making you worry, Gaara," her voice was soft and steady, "But they had to remove the bit of Zetsu that was growing inside me, and the procedure required me to be placed under a medically-induced sleep."
Gaara, unfathomably, went completely rigid behind her.
"Gaara, it's not as serious as it's sounds. Zetsu…"
Gaara sat up abruptly, then promptly placed both arms by the sides of Sakura's head. He was careful to avoid putting any weight on her abdominal area, but that was not Sakura's concern at the moment.
She was startled by how murderous Gaara's eyes were there and then.
"Zetsu impregnated you?"
Sakura's jaw fell wide open.
She decided that the next time a medic-nin came to check up on her, she would ask for her hearing to be tested.
"I beg your pa…"
"I asked: did Zetsu violate the Kazehime?"
Sakura would have burst out laughing if Gaara did not look ready to go charging out of her tent like an enraged bull to wipe out all of Akatsuki single-handedly.
"Gaara, you misunderstood," Sakura quickly clasped both hands against his cheek to stop him from running his mouth off, "I was pierced in the kidney by a White Zetsu clone, and for some reason, like some sort of plant, it continued to grow inside of me. The only way to remove it without my chakra system tangling with it was for Shizune nee-san to place me under a medically-induced sleep."
Gaara stared owlishly at her.
"It was a part of Zetsu's arm," she elaborated, just in case Gaara started wondering which part of Zetsu's body was previously embedded inside her.
Gaara exhaled long and loud like a deflating balloon, and then rolled over to lie next to Sakura once more.
Only this time, he was facing her.
"No one who tries to take advantage of the Kazehime will be allowed to live," he reached over to caress her cheek, making Sakura blush, "That shall be the privilege of the Kazekage alone. Always."
Before Sakura's brain was completely fried by the fire in her cheeks, she did what she always did best in awkward situations: she diverted the topic.
"Gaara, where is Mr. Fluffy-kins? I was told he went back to you."
At this, Gaara's hand paused. He reached a thumb out to gently massage at her forming eyebags instead.
Almost as if he was trying to avoid the topic.
"Gaara?" Sakura's voice held just the mildest hint of anger.
"He is inside my gourd."
Now Sakura was absolutely certain that she needed to get her hearing tested; from the very first day, the sand-cat had refused to turn back into sand and return to Gaara's gourd, going as far as to hiss in protest if Gaara merely looked ready to command it to do so. As far as the sand-cat was concerned, it was now a living, breathing (well, not so much) creature, with a pink-haired owner that it would protect to the ends of the earth.
Gaara pushed himself up into a sitting position and gestured towards his gourd, saying, "Mun accompanied Killer Bee-san back to inform me of your injuries, and before I could stop him, he turned back into a cloud of sand and slipped back inside my gourd. I've been trying to coax him out without success."
The redhead saw the look of horror etched across Sakura's features, and quickly reassured her, "His consciousness is still in there, but I think he may not want to face you.
"He failed to protect the one he loved most, after all."
Sakura held a hand out, calling her beloved sand-cat's name softly, "It's not your fault, Mr. Fluffy-kins. None of us were prepared for this deadly new ability from the White Zetsus, and by stopping the Zetsu from piercing clean-through me, you actually saved my life.
"Please, please come out, Mr. Fluffy-kins.
"I missed you, and I have never once blamed you for this."
At first, it seemed Sakura's words had fallen on deaf ears. However, the sound of moving sand was detectable from inside the gourd after a moment.
"Please," she pleaded once more.
The gourd's cork popped off quietly, and a tendril of sand rose from the opening almost indecisively. It hovered above the gourd, refusing to move any closer to Sakura.
She forced herself to sit up so she could walk over to the gourd, but before Sakura could lift more than her upper torso off the cot, the tendril of sand whipped over to her side and pushed against her, supporting her back in the process.
"Mr Fluffy-kins…?"
The sand shifted and slowly took the form of a familiar feline once more. But it still did not turn around to face Sakura. Instead, the sand-cat purred half-heartedly from behind her.
"I was… so scared that something had happened to you," a tear slipped from Sakura's eye, but she did not seem to have noticed, "When no one was willing to tell me what happened to you, I thought… thought the White Zetsu…"
She could not finish her sentence.
The sand-cat finally turned its head, glancing guiltily at her. After a pause, it walked over to Sakura's side and pressed its back against her, purring quietly. Sakura placed a hand over its hindquarters and stroked gently, finally feeling relaxed for the first time since Gaara's entrance.
"Sakura," began Gaara, "Can I see your injury?"
The blood drained from Sakura's face, only to be immediately replaced by a very fetching blush.
"I… I… it's nothing serious now, Gaara," nope, she was not nervous at all, "And besides, shishou closed my wound using advanced chakra techniques, so you won't be able to see anything there."
Gaara continued to look at her as if he had not heard a single word; Sakura knew that giving in to this request would help the young Kage feel at ease, knowing that she was in no danger. At least, not one that was visible to the naked eye.
Still blushing madly, Sakura shimmied her thin hospital pants lower to rest mid-way on her hips. Gaara completed the job for her by hooking a finger under the waistband of her undergarments and lowering it enough to see that her kidney region was nicely unblemished.
Thank you, Ino, for reminding me to toss out any panties with holes in them.
"I am… relieved," Gaara whispered.
And he was starting to snake down the length of her body and oh, stars, he was going to place a kiss over her healed injury.
Sakura could read him like a book, and she was torn between being glad about how far their relationship had evolved, and how this was going to look if anyone saw them.
Fortunately, she received the answer to one question the very next moment.
The sand dome that Gaara had erected around Sakura's tent was an excellent sound barrier, and Gaara himself was currently very distracted by the softness of Sakura's skin, so he was not paying much attention to the world outside, if at all.
A thunderous crash, during which Gaara was not focused enough to strengthen the sand dome, and moments later, the tent, now weighed down by sand, shifted and oh-so-slowly leaned and leaned until it toppled over, quite exposing Gaara and Sakura in the way that it fell.
Tsunade was standing outside, slack-jawed and her fist still raised from punching down the sand dome.
The scene had everything needed for a classical misunderstanding of huge proportions:
Firstly, Gaara just had to erect a privacy screen around the tent of his personal, female medic.
Secondly, Sakura was still holding onto the waistband of her pants, which was much lower down than it should be worn.
Thirdly, Gaara was sprawled across her lap, his head positioned near the lower region of her torso.
And finally, the sand-cat was hissing loudly at Gaara for being so close to Sakura physically.
Tsunade, still holding her pose, stated rather bluntly – "No strenuous physical activities for Sakura until I say so."
The lovely denizens of the Rumour Forest, once content to spread their gossip far and wide on their travels, finally discovered the art of paper-making by pulping the wood of the Rumour trees. With this latest invention, they were now able to spread their gossip in the form of pasted words on whichever place they visited, as well as conveying them to faraway friends that they would have otherwise have been unable to communicate with.
Sakura wondered glumly if she would live to see the end of the day, let alone the end of the war.