*Beep* *Beep* *Beep*

Sakura woke to the familiar beeping of a hospital monitor. Had she been so tired as to fall asleep at work? Her vision was blurry and the bright florescent bulbs of the hospital room blinded her further. She felt something foreign on her face and she reached up with her hand to examine it. Upon doing so she noticed wires and I.V. lines running from the side of the bed to her arm as she felt what must have been an oxygen mask on her face. 'Wait… I.V? O2 Mask? What the hell is going on?'

She sat up and frantically pulled at the wires that connected her to the beeping machine, attempting to make sense of what this situation was all about.

Ino was at the end of her bed, doing her hourly patient check-up. She saw Sakura sit up with a confused look on her face which displayed panic at the unusual situation. Ino dropped her clip-board on the end of the bed and rushed to Sakura's side.

"Sakura! Calm down, you are OK now. You are in the hospital."

Sakura continued to flail her arms haphazardly.

Ino gently pushed Sakura back on the bed.

"Sakura, relax! Your apartment complex caught fire last night. The fire department pulled you out. You are fine now. Snap out of it!"

Sakura's eyes looked like a veil had been lifted; as if she only just now saw Ino standing over her.

Then it all came rushing back to her.

The smoke.

Coughing.

Trying to make it to her door only to be denied exit by some unknown force.

Resigning to her fate as she was completely sure she was going to die.

Then there was the strange vision she had. The memories of her life being played for her like home movies.

She looked at Ino, tears filling her eyes as she was remembering how easy she had accepted death.

Ino squeezed Sakura's shoulders reassuringly and gave her a sad smile.

"You know Forehead, you really had me scared! When they brought you in, you were barely breathing. They had to preform CPR to get you breathing again." Ino stared at her friend blankly as if she was forgetting something. A light flicked on in her mind and she grinned that mischievous grin she gets when she is about to say something embarrassing. "Also, you don't need to burn your apartment down just to get a cute guy to notice you ya' know?"

Sakura looked at her in confusion.

Ino noticed the look and continued, "Yeah, some really hot fire fighter brought you in, carrying you in his arms like the 'damsel in distress.' It was like something out of a movie!" She grinned and Sakura blushed at the thought of a total stranger carrying her so intimately.

Sakura thought for a moment. Why does that seem familiar? The rest of the night started to come back to her and her eyes widened in realization.

"Naruto!"

Ino glanced back down to her friend. "Ah, so you know his name, eh? Have you guys met before?"

Sakura shook her head. "No. I only vaguely remember the name tag on his coat. He was the one who carried me out of my apartment." She hung her head dejectedly. "He risked his life to save mine and I didn't even get to thank him for it."

Ino perked at that last statement and another impish grin adorned her face.

"Yeah too bad. I mean, I think if I were in your situation, I would just LOVE to thank my hero. I guess it is too bad you passed out, though."

Sakura's shoulders slumped even further. Ino excused herself from the room with a, 'I'll be right back' look. A moment later she walked back in. Ino looked back out the door and said something to someone just out of Sakura's vision.

"Now look, I shouldn't be doing this, since you aren't family to the patient, but given the circumstances I believe it's warranted. Just remember, she is still a recovering patient, but I am sure she will be glad to see you."

Sakura's interest was piqued completely as she stared at the door waiting for whoever it was to walk in.

Sakura watched as a tall blond headed man walked into her room. The first thing she noticed right away, were his bright cerulean eyes. He was wearing some thick yellow pants with suspenders and one of the local fire department uniform shirts, slightly un-tucked. His hair and face were coated in soot and he similar dark smudges on his yellow pants. Recognition dawned on her face and her jaw hung from her face. She looked at Ino, trying to make sense of what was happening and how her savior 'magically appeared' to come visit her.

Ino understood the unspoken question. "He stayed here all night Sakura. He was exhausted from the ordeal and had a few heat related injuries. We had put him in the adjacent room, but he was already up and about this morning." Ino then nodded to the blond man. The Blond man nodded back and stepped into the room, making his way to the chair next to Sakura's bed.

Ino smiled and politely excused herself from the room.

Naruto sat in the chair finding it difficult to make eye contact with the girl. Shyly, he glanced up.

"Hi." He said, scratching the back of his head with his hand; a habit he developed while nervous.

Sakura still in shock from meeting her rescuer face to face; shook her head clear and attempted to utter some kind of response.

"Hi." 'Great reply idiot,' she thought to herself and blushed a deep crimson.

Forcing her blush back down, she finally made eye contact with the man.

"Thank you." She said, barely audible.

They sat there in awkward silence for several minutes before Naruto stood from his chair.

"Alright then Ms. Haruno, I just wanted to see that you were OK. I should be going now, you need your rest."

He turned and started to head toward the door.

"Wait."

Her voice sounded strained, almost weak. He felt something grab his arm.

Naruto turned and found a pair of slender arms wrap around his torso, a head of pink hair under his chin. Unsure of what to do at first, Naruto resigned himself to just putting his arms around her, returning the embrace. He felt her shake in his arms and heard muffled sobs from his chest.

She was crying.

Sakura spoke through a tear strained voice, "Thank you so much. I owe you my life!" She whimpered and her knees grew weak. Her hold on him grew tighter the harder she cried.

"I would be dead right now if you had not come to save me."

Naruto scratched his head, unsure of what to say, so he decided to just the first thing that came to mind, "Hey, don't worry about it. I'd gladly do it again any time." He silently cursed his poor choice of words. "I mean, erm-uh, what I meant was…"

She looked up at him with red puffy eyes. Not her most glamorous look certainly, she thought. "It's OK, I know what you meant.

He felt her stumble so he picked her up and placed her back in the bed. After she was settled, he pulled her blanket up to her chin, and assured she was comfortable. He gave her hand a gentle squeeze.

"I should go get the nurse to come check on you. Again, I am glad you are OK Ms. Harun-"

"Sakura." The pinkette interrupted. "Please. Call me Sakura. And it's OK, I'm fine Naruto. Just please stay with me for a while. At least until I fall asleep. I don't want to be left alone right now."

"How did you, know my-"

"It's on your name tag silly." She laughed stuffily from her crying.

Naruto blushed in embarrassment. Complying with her request he pulled his chair close to the bed and stayed with Sakura until she fell asleep.

Naruto sat there for a while, just listening; listening to her breathing as it evened out and the rhythmic beep of the hospital monitor. When he was confident that she was asleep he gently slipped out of the hospital room. He met the familiar face of the blond nurse from earlier.

"It must be nice to have your own personal guardian angel."

Naruto blushed. "I just did what I was trained to do. I was just lucky that I got to her in time."

Naruto thought about last night and that strange presence that seemed to empower him. It was still an enigma to him. Any time he tried to focus on it inside his mind, it always seemed to be just out of reach. Other than those two times that it came to him, he has never been able to replicate the feeling on his own. He glanced down at his injured arm and hand. As strong as he felt last night, he still got hurt. While his hand wasn't absolutely destroyed as it should have been from sliding down that elevator cable, he still didn't escape injury free. His hand was still slightly cut even though it was protected from that strange power he felt.

Ino noticed the blond man looking at his wounded hand.

"Here let me look at that again for you."

Before he could react, the girl hand his hand firmly in her grasp, removing layers of bandage. As she removed the last layer she gasped. Under the bandage was fresh skin were the cut should have been. It was as if there wasn't even a cut to begin with.

'I bandaged his hand last night myself. I KNOW there were lacerations to his palm, yet it's completely healed, as if there was never an injury at all.'

Ino finally found her voice, "Yeah, you were lucky indeed." Naruto broke from his musing to see Ino staring at him questioningly. He suddenly felt like a bug under a microscope. Ino rubbed her chin in thought. "After I treated your injuries I spoke with the other fire fighters that came in with you. They told me something very interesting." She gave him a 'no-nonsense' look and continued with her 'interrogation,' "I am one of Sakura's best friends. I know she lives on the top floor. I find it amazing that you had the stamina to run up 11 flights of stairs, find Sakura, and then make it back down without help."

"Well, you see Miss-"

"Ino, call me Ino please."

"Right, well you see Ino, we are all physically conditioned to complete tasks like that. It's part of our job as firemen."

'Bullshit, there is more to it than that' Ino thought to herself.

She wasn't backing down without an answer.

"I understand all that, but what I want to know is how you managed to do all that in just a few minutes. It would have taken someone in top physical condition at least 5 minutes just to get upstairs, not to mention carrying another person back down. On top of that, your own crew men said that you weren't even slightly winded. It was as if it was as simple a task as breathing or you." She continued with the questioning gaze. "Not to mention the miraculous recovery of your hand injury."

Naruto began to shrink under the scrutinizing gaze. He wasn't even sure himself what was going on, how on earth was he going to explain it to someone else. It was all too sudden for him to think logically. Luckily, his pager beeped, giving him a stay of execution.

"Ah look at that, gotta go, sorry!" He turned and ran, literally, as fast as he could toward the stairwell.

Ino huffed at being dismissed so easily.

Something didn't add up. Several things were out of place in this puzzle known as 'Naruto.'

Yes, Ino Yamanaka was going to get to the bottom of this mystery. She was going to get answers.

A thought occurred to her and she smiled. She walked over to the reception counter and checked the files that were in the 'admitted' box. Finding what she was looking for, she smiled. Inside the file was a driver's license.

The blond in the picture had the largest grin you could imagine and the brightest blue eyes you had ever seen. A plan began to formulate in the platinum blonde's mind as she decided what she had to do next.

She snagged the license from the folder and went back to her rounds, confident that the discussion she had with this mysterious fireman was far from over.