AN: I listened to the Book of Mormon, and that 100% didn't help me at all get in the mood for writing this chapter, haha! This is the first chapter, and the first story Sakura tells Sarada of her father's journey. Not sure how much should the present interrupt the story. They'll definitely have concequences for Sarada and Sasuke's relationship in the story later on.

My only regret is that I cant find a way to do hardcuts to and from present/flashback. It'd make things less jarring considering I use the same cut for the ANs.

Thank you so much for your comments/follows as well! It definitely motivates me to continue!

As always, still open to critique! Thank you very much!

UPDATE: Once again, this chapter has been fixed with the help of Littlepocky! I deeply appreciate your efforts thus far.

Chapter 2: Aphelion

He left the previous village on a cold winter morning, and he rubbed his hands furiously as the wind picked up, chilling his entire body. Perhaps this was not his best idea, but he needed to leave as soon as possible. He couldn't get comfortable anywhere. He couldn't let a domestic life continue to entice him into forgetting what had to be done. The journey he had to take was to cleanse his soul with open eyes and absolve him of sin through helpful deeds. Neither Kakashi nor Naruto could absolve him of the guilt that weighed in his heart, even if they had pardoned him for his crimes.

The days bore no signs of good luck as they passed. Sasuke wandered aimlessly through the roads, meeting no one as an early freeze began to set in. Yet the beginning of another day made more difficult by an unforeseen , with the way the dark clouds billowed over the area, it didn't even seem like it was day time anymore- let alone the morning. It wasn't long until it was obvious that the man could not traverse much further, and he turned towards a massive tree on the side of the road. Making a hand sign, he blew a small, yet concentrated ball of fire. However, instead of up and lighting the tree on fire, it made a very large dent into its trunk, which he was quick to squat into. The snow that had accumulated on Sasuke's head instantly melted from the heat of the hole, wetting the man's head. His hair drooped over his face, momentarily blinding him before it was quickly parted—at which point there was already someone standing over him, looking down at the man pushed up into the small crevice.

It was a woman- a strange sight to behold. Her skin was almost pale enough to compare to the snow, with piercing grey eyes to match. Her bluish-slate hair, though thick, fell limp over her back and shoulders. Fine boned, with narrow shoulders and a gaunt face, her lithe, delicate form made her feminine features all the more otherworldly. Sasuke was taken aback after first glance, and flicked his eyes away from her. Looking back up, his gaze met her's, and he noticed that her pupils held no life in them.

"You're a long way from home." She held out a hand to him, and though it was warm, the snow on her hand only melted the slightest bit. Sasuke watched a single drop reach the ground from her hand and instantly turn back into ice. He frowned slightly at this, and looked back up to her. "Why are you out here in this storm? It's impossible to walk around...especially in civilian's clothing." He took notice of the clothes she wore, and the lack of any shinobi's gear raised his suspicions.

"I was sent out to see if there were any stragglers in the storm. I'm used to tough terrains so the last thing that's worrying me right now is the storm." Her hand was still outstretched to him, and he looked to it once more, before taking it. The warmth of his hand steamed the snow on her hand, but the touch was still cold. Thinking nothing of it, he pulled himself up before following the woman. It was difficult to brave a storm such as this. For Sasuke, this woman provided him an easy out.

Following behind her, he watched as she skillfully made her way from the snowed-in road and onto the brittle branches, delving off the road and into the otherwise dead forest. Sasuke went on behind her, but with every step, the limb that held him would snap, causing him to have very little balance. This was only made worse by the very small amount of visibility he had in the storm. Despite this, he saw her shadow not too far off in the distance, and managed to make it to what seemed to be a small town of about a hundred people. There were few homes scattered over a far, visible distance. They too were fallen into a strange state between disrepair and abandon, where the windows and doors were boarded, but they all seemed as though they'd fall apart at once with a single strong gust of wind. The wood used to build them was cut down while the trees were far too young to provide structural support, and yet, they were expected to keep someone or something out. There were no roads...no lights...no semblance of modern civilization. If it wasn't for the woman that had lead him here, there was nothing that wouldn't give him the idea that this was the scene of a long gone society. There were no welcomes, only a barren snowscape dotted with clusters of home which surrounded a massive lodge in the middle. Considering how there were no people walking around however, he knew immediately that helping this place would be difficult.

The woman opened the door to Sasuke and he was quick to walk inside, ready to welcome the warmth of a cabin. He found the home to be only slightly warmer than the cold that had chilled him to the bone outside, and so the man was now shivering.

"Sorry, with a house like this, I can't afford to light a fire. It'd catch alight in a second!"

"You don't need to explain yourself for me." To be out of the snow was decent enough.

The Uchiha merely watched as she went from one end of the room to the other, the hearth so unused that it had collected what seemed to be a year's worth of dust. He looked back to her and furrowed his eyebrows. "What's your name?"

She turned back to him, approaching with a somewhat tattered set of blankets. "Yuki," she told him whilst handing him what would most likely be his only reprieve from the cold night. "I'm from the south, but I came up here to help as many people as I could when the war was over."

"I see. Are you some sort of medical-ninja?"

"No. I'm just someone who knows a lot about getting people patched up. My medical know-how ends at herbs, bandages and medicine. No ninjutsus here."

Sasuke seemed to scoff at the thought. How could someone who didn't know the first thing about medical-ninjutsu help in any significant way? How much could twigs and bandages help when someone has a fatal wound or even loses an arm in battle? The man caught himself in the midst of these thoughts, and it was only when he looked around to see the state of disrepair of the home that he realized that these people didn't need a properly trained medical ninja. There was little to furnish its interior. Holes let in the draft at any point of breach, with boards covering up older damage to the house. Where there would normally be an array of knick-knacks on the shelves, these held an assortment of homemade ointments and remedies, as well as worn rolls of bandages which seemed suspiciously used and reused. Medicines came in old bottles made for alcohol. The stents that would normally hold a leg in place after being broken were being used as a door holder for the bedroom. These were only civilians- poor and destitute. What they could get was all they needed. Hell, it was probably more than they could have asked for. He shook his head and scoffed again.

"Is something wrong with wanting to help now?" Yuki seemed insulted by the way her guest reacted to her words, her eyes fixated on the man himself.

"No," he spoke to her as he looked towards the hearth and started to make his way to it. "It's hard to keep perspective. I was spoiled."

Her expression softened slightly. "How so?"

There was a moment of dead air between them. Not even the ruffling of garments as they moved broke the strange silence between them. He lowered his head as he thought about it. About her. "I know a very good medical kunoichi." Feeling his body on edge, he wondered to himself why he got a sinking feeling. Almost as if to immediately shut down her existence in the conversation, he summarized her role succinctly. "She'll be the best one day."

"You definitely have some faith in this woman, don't you?" It was a question that strained him. Why was she trying to continue this? Was it guilt he felt in his chest for her? The pangs came like pulses, faster and harder with agitation. Still, he tried to cover up how he felt by simply continuing to try to end the conversation. "I only say it because it's fact. She was trained by the Fifth Hokage, who is the greatest medical shinobi of the age. The torch will pass onto her eventually." He turned away from her at this point, and his face was no longer visible. Still, it did not end.

"Has she saved your life?"

"Multiple times."

"Do you know her personally?"

"She was my teammate."

"I see..." Yuki folded her arms, a smug look on her face, eyebrow raised and a grin as she smiled. No wonder he was so sensitive, she thought to herself. Why would he be so fast to drop a conversation if he wasn't emotionally invested in her? It would be so much easier to speak of someone you didn't know or didn't like than the opposite. "So are you sweet on her? Interested in this 'greatest kunoichi of the next generation'?"

"No." It was stern and solid, but the fact that he did not say this while looking the other in the eyes seemingly made her more suspicious of his words. She couldn't believe that such wasn't the plan.

"If you say so~" She chimed.

An opening to anything else at last! Sasuke was quick to take it by not delving on the matter further. Instead he would ask about something a little more in line with his goals. "Tell me about this village." It was a good start. Perhaps there would even be the chance for him to do his work in the humble little town.

"Well, the village is pretty new. Half the people here are veterans and the other half are people displaced by the war. Enough of them found their way to this opening in the forest and… well, here we are."

"So the people here aren't simply civilians."

"Well, only half of us aren't. But then half from that are crippled in some way. Missing an eye or a limb is commonplace. People who are heroes… people who can afford to go home, often do."

"Hm," He shifted under the cloak and pulled the nub arm closer to his chest. "Makes sense."

"Well… should be time to sleep. It's only going to get colder out."

Sasuke nodded and took to cleaning out a spot for himself before the opening of the fireplace. The hearth was bitterly cold—just as the rest of the house, and as he drifted off to sleep, he noticed that the said fireplace itself was as unused as it was on the day it was first built.

The next morning, the storm had died, but the wind itself was strong, and the snow blew at an angle.

Still, people attempted to go about their business as much as possible.

Walking around the village, Sasuke was left to his own devices as Yuki had left to attend to the sick of the village at a longhouse that had been converted into a makeshift hospital. Walking near it, he could hear the pained wails of those fresh with the grief of death. Groans of those still suffering echoed as well, adding to the song of misery. The air around the place made him slightly uncomfortable. He resisted the idea of entering unnatural elements, but in the end decided that where he was most needed was in there.

He stepped into the longhouse—a building packed with people, beds, and makeshift equipment. There were easily sixty people completely pressed together in the small room, visiting their respective friends or family. Rings of people around the ill or dead left only a small crevice of space that allowed Sasuke to move forward. However, it was when he reached the end that he found the thickest crowd. Slowly, he made his way to the front, squeezing in between balding men and unkempt women.

"What happened here?" He asked as he finally managed to reach the front, only to catch sight of Yuki. Her hands were drenched in blood, and her clothes were splattered with it. It was a senseless appearance, but he did not flinch at it.

"A couple was found dead not too long ago near a frozen river. I tried… I tried to help them but I failed."

He simply narrowed his eyes at this. "What did they die of?"

"Murdered."

"Are you sure?"

It was a question that brought ire into the woman's eyes, and she was quick to uncover the bodies. However, she only did so until the shoulders. Their necks were visibly cut, with one of their tongue's prodding out the slightest bit, almost as though someone tried to yank it. This was enough to cause a scene, including the shrill screams of one woman in particular and two others screaming towards the bodies. "My baby," one of them cried out. It made the man feel smaller… more grounded to hear the despair that others experienced. Never had he actually heard a mother's wail as he did, nor seen a father suffer at the sight of seeing his daughter's body desecrated and displayed for others to see. He felt drained experiencing this all, but soon found reprieve in Yuki calling his attention.

Yuki, seeing the distress of the people around them merely covered them with tarps once again. "The slits in their throats had to have come from a knife or a kunai. Their bodies are stiff from the cold, so the rips were preserved well enough."

He did not wait to turn around and squeeze his way out of the crowd again. It became unbearable. The sounds… the looks on the people's faces… he couldn't possibly have enough empathy to continue. "I will look into it."

"What?"

"You and your town have let me stay so far… just let me look into matters." It was definitely better suited for him than to stay here. He just wasn't able to take something like this with his new perspective. At the very least, he was good at tracking things down.

"And what makes you so certain that you can find anything? You're an outsider."

Glancing back at her, his sharingan was activated, and he narrowed his eyes at her, letting her catch a small glimpse showing before he turned away. "So are you." And with that, he was out of sight.

The doors flung open as he disappeared, letting in a gust of wind that blew the blankets off of those who were either too ill to hold them down, or were dead.

The Uchiha himself appeared halfway across the village and started to walk slowly again, making his way to the frozen river. He had heard from echoes around the small town that it lied south of the village leader's home. Making his way past it, he stopped and looked towards the building.

It was certainly nothing impressive- a small shanty of a cabin, certainly one of the smaller homes. The wood that formed its walls were old and rotting, and there were places where a single careless bump would threaten its structure. It was a place not befitting even a scoundrel of a prisoner, let alone a leader of any village. However, the sign did say it was the leader of this particular village's home, and so he stopped. Looking towards the direction of the river and back to the home, he gave both a thoughtful look. In the end, Sasuke ended up opening the door to the home, only to see that a man sat at a table with two young boys and a girl.

All three had eyes that shone as green as endless fields. They were beautiful. It was jarring. Out of strange instinct, he took a step back.

"Who are you?" The father's eyes were similar to his own- a soft onyx hardened with years of life. They eyed the cloaked man with suspicion, and in turn Sasuke approached the man carefully, making sure of course, to reveal his hand as he did so, as to not allow himself to be mistaken for a threat. "My name is Sasuke. I have come to ask you about the murders." He looked to the children, and saw that their eyes were also a shade of black. A trick of the eye? At this, he lowered his glance.

"Alone."

Looking at his children, the father motioned them to leave the room, outstretching his hand to one of the many unpushed chairs left by the younger ones. Sasuke took the one closest to the father and put his hand on the table gently. "I need to know what you know."

In response, the man leant forward. "I saw you this morning with Yuki. I know as much as her about what may be going on. By that of course, I mean I don't know a damn thing. They just all show up the same way. Slit from the throat, frozen from the cold. Never do get the courage to see the rest of their bodies after Yuki's covered them up."

"So you're saying that there has been a string of murders… and they all started after it got cold? That can't be too long ago." It shouldn't have been happening to begin with! Of course, saying that would be far too obvious, no matter how frustrating.

"You assume right. The deep freeze started maybe a week ago."

Sasuke pressed his hand against his forehead, trying to hold back the headache that was forming. The two things were connected, he knew. "Did anything happen before that might have triggered it?"

"Well, there were these ninjas from the Hidden mist village who moved in… but we can't pin anything on them. They've taken to ice fishing and tend not to bother anyone."

A lead? The younger would take anything at this point, and simply decided to go along with it. "I suppose I'll have to start there." And with that, he stood up, bowing with respect to the man. "Excuse me for having intruded." Of course, before he got the chance to leave, the leader had reached out to him.

"Hey… Sasuke, is it? Say… before you go, Yuki came in today saying you knew some top-notch medical ninja. One of them trained with the Fifth Hokage?"

He didn't like where this was going. "Yes, I did mention her in passing." His eyes darted in another direction. "Could there be someone who hated all the victims acting out in revenge?"

"We could really use the help."

At that moment, he had remembered that she had wanted to come along with him on his journey. How he had told her that she couldn't come because it wasn't her journey to take. It still wasn't. He still wouldn't allow her to distract him from his healing and atonement.

"I don't like the implication. It's not as though I can call her to my whims whenever I ask of her." Sasuke resisted the idea of inviting her. "I can find others from the same village who can do what is needed." He looked out the window at that moment, and saw a tree in the distance. There was something glimmering from it, but before he could focus his attention on it, the older man spoke up again.

"Please. We need the help! We need someone who can do something in the longhouse! At least a quarter of the village is lodged up in there dying or dead! We'll die out before this damn snow's melted!"

Sasuke was silent as he stood up, and walked slowly from the table to the door.

The leader protested this. "Hey! I'm talking to you!"

Opening the door, he saw things more clearly. He activated his sharingan to catch the shimmer that caught his eye upon the tree. It was something that made his eyes widen slightly. A single pink petal clung to the branch of a tree. Alone but still there, it was surviving an unnatural winter, still clinging to the tree that gave it life. He shut them at that moment, the color of blood draining from his iris as he relented with a sigh. In a way, he felt it coming. The last thing he wanted was always the first thing in his hand. And this time, he was doing it to himself.

"I will send a hawk."

Sarada watched as her mother fell silent, and her cheeks puffed up gradually, a deeply upset frown replacing what had originally been shivering excitement!

"This… this has almost nothing to do with you and Papa! I mean, you were mentioned but you weren't even in the picture! You even said that dad didn't care about you!" Old feelings began to resurface, and the expression of discouragement on her face was damning proof that she now questioned something as pivotal as the love between her parents.

The Uchiha matriarch tried her best to keep her daughter calm as the frustration began to build within the little one. She noticed it in her eyes. "I never said that he didn't care about me. He just wasn't interested at the time! That's the whole thing with stories that involve change. First you are or aren't something, and then you… well, change."

"But Papa says people don't change!"

"Your father says a lot of things. Not all of them are true. Besides, there's a lot more to tell before we actually get together."

"Are you serious?! Shannaro, this is ridiculous! I never get a straight answer when I talk to you!"

And with that, Sarada stood up and bolted out the door of the house. Sakura stood up behind her, but knowing there was literally no way that she would be able to get her to come back and listen to the rest, she simply sat down again in the living room sofa.

"That child of mine… unbelievable sometimes," she sighed, pulling her cellphone and placing in the password. The moment that it booted up, she pressed the number "7" speed dial and put the phone up to her ear. After only two rings, a muffled voice answered on the other side.

"She's headed your way."