The battlefield was engulfed by a thick cloud of smoke after a deafening blast and a blinding flash of white light—Sakura remembered being caught by the hands of Kakashi's Susanoo, and even then she felt the earth shake for a good five minutes at least; the sound of wood breaking and a succession of soft thuds followed as the bodies of their fellow shinobi were released from the tree.
When it was all over Kakashi did not need telling twice; she was close to jumping off his Susanoo's hand to run to the center of the blast where Naruto and Sasuke were. They ran as fast as their feet could take them, and found the two collapsed; faces blackened with dust, their bodies faced down with an arm outstretched to meet each other.
She had collapsed as well, right after checking that the two were still breathing. Her lips uttered a grateful cry, but it was apparent that her own body was incapable of giving any more. How she ended up in an empty tent, all clean and lying in fresh sheets was beyond her, and for the past hour since she had cracked her eyes open it became apparent how spent she really felt. Her whole body felt heavy that even turning sideways in bed was an effort that she found was hard to exert, and her arm burned painfully; two odd-looking scars now beginning to engrave itself in her skin.
How ugly, she mused, pushing herself off the bed. She was panting as if she had just run a great distance, and her feet wobbled as they hit the ground. Steering herself to move with a bit more strength, Sakura stepped outside the tent with only one thought in mind.
"You should be resting," she heard Kakashi's voice, prompting her head to turn sideways at his direction. Despite his remark he knew very well why she was up, and was also sure there was no way she was going back in now. "Naruto's tent," he began, hand pointing to the tents on the far left, "is there. Sasuke's is the one next to it."
Beneath his mask a smile formed and he gave himself an imaginary pat on the back for predicting correctly where her feet would go.
A loud snore tore through the tent the moment she stepped in, and she had to bite back a laugh while approaching the bed where he lay sprawled on his back with mouth wide open. His hair was the usual mess of blonde, cleaner than when she saw last, and she whispered a thank you to whoever took it upon themselves to clean them up.
Naruto extended his arms and it appeared beneath the blanket, eliciting a gasp from the kunoichi. The arm in which he had used to seal Kaguya had taken on a darkened shade of red; from the tips of his fingers extending up to his forearm, it looked almost like a tattoo of flames but upon closer observation – where she couldn't help but touch, the skin was rough and definitely burned. It was the makings of a large scar, one that she was very familiar with having her own when he had attacked her in tailed beast mode some time ago. Her fingers gently caressed the inflamed surface, remembering how much hers had hurt. His was times larger, and she could only imagine the pain it's causing him right now.
Sakura had taken a seat on the bed and took his forearm to rest on her lap, placing her chakra enhanced hands over the skin. His fingers twitched for a couple of minutes and she could only guess that due to his exhaustion it was possible he wasn't feeling any pain, but for sure it would come creeping the moment he wakes up, much like how she felt with her acid-burned arm.
"S… Sakura-chan,"
She turned to find him smiling weakly, head slightly raised. He looked exhausted, understandably so.
"Sorry to wake you up, Naruto." She gave his shoulder a gentle press. "You should go back to sleep."
Rather than sinking back in bed he sat up slowly, his other arm hoisting him upright as he brought himself to level with her. He hissed after the action, but she could assume it was because of the pain he was beginning to feel in his right arm.
"Doesn't look too good, eh?" he managed to smirk, meeting her eyes.
"What happened, Naruto?" His fingers curled over her hand, pressing the cool chakra from her palm to his. Her other hand continued to work on his forearm, but like her old wound it was hard to remove the swell, in fact, much harder than before.
His voice was still thick with sleep, but he had no intention of dozing off now that she was here. He had wanted to see her for some time now, he even dreamed about meeting her in his sleep.
"Well, Kaguya attempted to fight off the seal by using the Juubi's chakra. Sasuke held it off much better than I did, let's just say. He had Susanoo in the backlash, while I didn't and I didn't actually expect anything like that. We had this chakra cage that formed around her, and for some reason a part of the Juubi's chakra had created a hole and tried to latch on to me, I think. Anyway, Kurama and the other Bijuu helped me reinforce the seal…"
Naruto sucked in a deep breath and she knew, it was really beginning to hurt now. She released a stronger dose of chakra, cooling his forearm in the process.
"I didn't notice this," he used the back of his hand to touch close to where her wound was. "I thought you were being fashionable with the torn sleeve," he chuckled.
Sakura had to fight the urge not to punch his face, and it was surprisingly not hard. She wanted to punch him, for sure, but maybe some other time; she could hardly ball her hands into fists and he wasn't in the best shape to take her blows anyway.
"This isn't going to scar well," she said, finally extinguishing the chakra from her fingertips. She reached for the gauze bandage on the small table near his bed and began wrapping his forearm with it.
"Yeah, I figured as much. I'll have to go check if Kurama can do something about it," he replied, swallowing up a yawn.
"You should go back to sleep." She had resorted to giving his forearm a gentle rub after wrapping it in bandage. Her eyes were beginning to feel heavy, too.
"Or I could just keep wearing the bandages. Looks cool, I think." He slid closer and wrapped his other arm around her, making her jump. Sakura turned her head to find herself inches from his face, his sleepy blue eyes made him look a little drunken, and his lazy smile was making her stomach flutter.
"Thank you, Sakura-chan," he whispered, burying his face on the crook of her neck. She turned her body towards him, letting his arms cage her in warmth. Something hot trickled down her cheeks, dripping on the fabric of his shirt as she bowed her head and snuggled in his embrace.
"Thank you, Naruto," she sniffed, half crying, half smiling. He lay down and pulled her against his chest, and with her help covered them both beneath the blanket. She pressed an open hand over his heart and took a deep breath, taking care not to bump into his injured arm before closing her eyes. It used to be that a scene like this only happened in dreams, and that reality was more like him waking up to no one near his bed and maybe coming out to Sasuke's tent and finding Sakura right there, taking care of him. Exhausted as he was there was no denying that his bandaged arm was done by her, and that it really was Sakura-chan lying with him; that it was her scent filling his nose and it was her breath tickling the side of his neck. It had all seemed too easy but it wasn't; that he had gone far and dealt with many things where she wasn't his sole purpose and was now coming back with her was the most humbling of all.
He smelled of sweat, wooden musk and rain-kissed leaves, or something of the sort that she had always known was his. She had smelled it before while he carried her to safety, or when he used his own body to block an impending attack, to protect her from harm. Unconsciously she had memorized it, just as she had memorized how a portion of his hair had stuck in a different direction from the rest and it would stay that way even when washed, how his average ramen consumption was three to four bowls in one sitting, how he walked with arms behind his head when contemplating about trivial things and hands in pockets when in deep thought, or how the bridge of his nose crinkled when he grinned. Perhaps there were plenty more and she was only catching up, just as her feelings seemed to have always been there; silently brewing and taking up big chunks of her heart.
The war felt like years and it was finally over, and when she felt a finger wipe away her tears and his warm lips press against her forehead she knew, sleep would take her but she would wake up in the arms of where she truly belonged.
Just a HC. Won't it be cool if they both walk away with scars? Pretty sure there's a HC out there that Naruto's skin is flawless ehem wasn't he hot in 663 hell yes because of Kurama healing him fast and then there's the HC of Sakura's cut to his side being a permanent scar as well so I'm just indulging with the scars while procrastinating on In You and wow this ended up being so much longer and dramatic than what I originally intended lol :D