Her Experience

by Tiny.Dncer

Sakura has been taking care of her sick civilian mother alone since she was 8. But now a full fledged ninja placed on team 7, she must learn how to stop holding herself back and let her team in, although, that proves challenging when her teammates are the wild and childish Naruto Uzumaki and her cold closed off long time crush, Sasuke Uchiha. (Better explanation inside.)

16. The Land of Tea

"Inner Sakura..."

"Sakura's thoughts..."

Memory...

"Dialogue..."

I don't own Naruto.

---

They'd been walking for a while when Naruto suddenly turned to her.

"Hey Sakura-chan! Aren't you hungry?"

"I'm always hungry." She answered without thinking, before her mind caught up. "But w—"

"Then it's decided!" Naruto cheered loudly. "And perfect timing! There's a tea house right over there!" He immediately took off.

"Wait, Naruto! That costs—"

"It's too late, he's already inside." Sasuke observed, glancing over at her. "I'll cover you."

"Eeeeeek! It's like a date! Sasuke-kun's offering to pay for us! Ahhhhhhh!"

"Last time I checked, dates were only two people…"

"Ah, y-you don't have to do that, Sasuke-kun! I have some money from Ikehara-san, I just…We don't know how long this mission'll be and if we'll need to buy more supplies or pay someone off or…"

"Why have I become a babbling idiot recently?!"

"It's fine." He had more than enough money anyways and didn't spend it often so he may as well. And even if Sakura had some money now, years of saving and rationing had made her hesitant to spend it. Since it didn't matter to him, he had no issue with covering the costs of her food if it meant she'd actually eat a full meal for once.

"Let's just get in there before the Loser breaks something."

---

"Welcome!" The owner greeted warmly, setting tea out in front of each of them.

"Ma'am, I'll have sweet bean soup!" Naruto ordered excitedly.

"I'll have dumplings, please." Sakura was determined to keep the manners her mother drilled into her, even if her two teammates completely lacked them. "How about you, Sasuke-kun?"

"Coffee jelly." Sasuke sat with his arms crossed and eyes closed. It would be the least sweet thing on the menu.

"Alright, please wait for a moment." The older woman disappeared into the kitchen.

"You could at least say please, you know." Sakura admonished her teammates.

"Does that really matter Sakura-chan?"

"Yes it matters!" She snapped.

"Whatever." The blond dismissed, his mind landing on the mission at hand. "An escort mission! I'm so excited! I'm gonna work so hard!" The last escort mission they'd had had been to the Land of Waves, and they'd gotten to fight a lot of strong enemies. He'd definitely gotten stronger cause of that mission, and if this one was anything like it, there was a good chance he'd be able to put his training to good use!

"Naruto, don't take any unnecessary action by yourself. We're a team, remember?"

"I know! Don't worry! This'll go great!"

"You're gonna jinx us!" She protested.

"Aw, c'mon, you don't really believe in stuff like that, do you?" Naruto laughed.

"Have you met me?! I have the worst luck!"

"Yeah! We weren't nicknamed the Walking Jinx for nothin!"

"Don't say that like you're proud of it!"

"Having sweet bean soup when it's so nice outside? The ninja profession sure is carefree!"

Sakura looked up to see a boy of about 15 standing in front of their table.

"What did you say?!" Naruto growled.

Sasuke's eyes opened, scrutinizing the boy, open hostility in his gaze.

"Things must be really peaceful for the leaf village, to make such a dense looking guys ninjas."

"What?!" Naruto shouted, pounding his hand on the table as he stood. Seriously, he was one second from decking this guy!

The boy's gaze landed on Sakura. "Oh hey! I didn't know there was such a cutie here! What I said before, I didn't mean you of course." He said leaning in closer to Sakura, with a flirtatious smile.

"Uh…huh?!" Sakura inadvertently felt herself lean back more on the bench.

"My name's Morino Idate. What's your name cutie?" He leaned his head on his hand so he was at her eye level.

"Cutie? This guy thinks we're cute?! Well it's about time someone appreciated our beauty!"

"This is so uncomfortable…"

"Don't talk to Sakura-chan in such a familiar way!" Naruto shouted. Sasuke twitched, his muscles tensing.

"Sakura, huh? That's a pretty name. You know they say even a chance meeting is due to karma from a previous life…I must have saved a country. So how about you and me talk about our future?"

Sakura had been singularly focused on her mother and making money for so long, that boys had never really been on her radar, with the exception of Sasuke. And even then, for the most part she'd believed that was a one-sided crush that she didn't have the time for, and would fade eventually. She knew better now. She didn't think she'd ever stop loving him. But even so, she never flirted with him. Flirting was a foreign concept to her, whether she was the active one or on the receiving end. Naruto called her pretty sometimes, but that always seemed like when he wanted something. The only boy to ever really ask her out in earnest was Lee and that…well she wouldn't call Lee's love declarations flirting…nor was she interested. All and all, she had no idea how to handle this situation.

She flushed, her eyes wide.

"Uh…t-talk about our future?"

Sasuke had yet to uncross his arms, his fists tightening against his sides. What the hell was this idiot implying?! Did he really think he had a chance with Sakura? As if! He didn't even know her!

"I'm talking about you quitting the ninja life and becoming my bride." He answered with an easy smile.

"Whaaa?! We don't care how flattering it is, or if he's kinda cute! We're not marrying anyone who makes us quit our job, shannaro!"

"Is this guy for real?!"

Sasuke's head snapped towards Idate, giving him a withering glare, catching a view of Sakura's pink cheeks in his periphery. A grating, bitter, annoyance shot through him…she couldn't really be falling for this could she?! No. Definitely not. Sakura wasn't that kind of girl. She was probably blushing from embarrassment or discomfort, the thought of which made him even more annoyed. His glare growing more hostile every passing second.

"Hey you! How dare you hit on her all of the sudden!" Naruto bellowed, pushing up one of his sleeves in his preparation to take a wild swing at him.

"Tch. I'm just joking." Idate said, with an annoyed glance at Naruto, before straightening up. "Except for that first thing I said. I hate ninjas! If you wander around the Land of Tea anymore, there'll be a price to pay!"

"Fine by me! Bring it on!" Naruto growled, the two glaring heatedly at each other.

"Wait Naruto! Don't go making trouble!" Sakura cut in, finally finding her voice, now that Idate's attention was elsewhere. "Just ignore him. We don't have time to waste, picking fights."

Both her teammates' eyes landed on her, Naruto's irritated and disbelieving, Sasuke's straight up and down annoyed.

"I can't just forgive a guy who makes fun of shinobi like that Sakura-chan! C'mon, this was your dream too! You're really just gonna let him bad mouth it like that?!" It was never right to belittle someone else's dreams! Dreams gave people the strength to keep going, and it was wrong for anyone else to talk down about them. Maybe he was sensitive to it because of how often his dream of becoming the Hokage was belittled. Naruto still didn't understand Sakura's passivity defense. He'd been kinda happy cause it seemed she started taking a more active defense against bullies, but it looked like she was back to her original play right now, and it made him annoyed. Some people really deserved a punch in the face! Like this guy!

It didn't happen often, but Sasuke found himself agreeing with Naruto, though for different reasons. Sakura had said that she'd been pissed off about all of those inn keepers in that seedy town thinking she was a prostitute, but she was fine with letting this guy talk about marrying her and making her a house wife? Sasuke couldn't think of a position Sakura would be less suited for than a house wife…she wouldn't trust a single income household, not after the way she'd had to grow up. Not to mention she was too restless. She was the type who always needed things to do. Really, she'd said it herself, she was an angry person. So why was she letting this guy off the hook for his gross flirting? It was annoying.

"It doesn't matter. Just let it go." Sakura waved it off.

"We shouldn't waste our energy on some jerk. We've got a job to do…it's our first assignment without Kakashi-sensei and I…I don't want to let Hokage-sama down…she placed a lot of trust in us by giving us this B-rank mission without any higher rank shinobi leading us. I can't explain why, but I really want her to like me…"

"Tsunade-sama's the coolest! She woke up Sasuke-kun and Kakashi-sensei like it was nothing when not a single doctor in the hospital could do anything! She's a legend! She's gorgeous, she's got a sexy voice, she's—"

"Ok. I get it. You're a Tsunade-sama fangirl…you sound like TenTen."

"What can we say? Girl's got taste."

"No way! this guy's asking for it! I'm gonna—huh?" Naruto turned to face Idate only to find him missing.

Sakura looked around in confusion. "He's gone…"

Sasuke jerked sharply. It was impossible! He hadn't even noticed! How had he missed that?!

"Running away like a coward…where'd he go, anyways?!" Naruto raged.

The shop owner returned with their food. "Here, sorry for the wait."

Naruto plopped down grumpily, his arms crossed. "Damn it!" He muttered.

"Thank you for your patronage!" The woman said, setting down two slips of paper.

Sakura's brow furrowed. "Two bills?"

"Excuse me ma'am, there must have been a mistake…why do we have…?"

"Oh, that boy who was here earlier said you guys were covering his meal."

That set her off. Her fist pounded on the table in annoyance.

"How dare he dump his bill on us! Ugh that jerk shouldn't be allowed to travel freely if he's gonna pull stunts like that! I was gonna ignore all the crap he said about ninja having an easy life and all, but this I can't look the other way on! Shannaro!"

Caught up in her own internal seething, she didn't hear a word of Naruto's own tantrum or notice Sasuke sliding under the table and pressing his ear to the ground.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed. The sound of his footsteps were far off…that punk had considerable speed.

"That's it! No one makes a fool out of us! I'm chasing after him!" Naruto called, throwing on his pack and sprinting from the tea shop.

Sasuke threw money for their meal down on the table, taking off after Naruto. Sakura hesitated, loathing to waste food, and feeling bad that Sasuke only covered their meal and ignored the other bill.

Quickly shoveling the dumplings she ordered into her mouth, she dropped the money for Idate's bill on the table…she may not have wanted to cover him, but this was this woman's lively hood, and she didn't want her to get shorted.

Swallowing her food quickly with a word of thanks, she took off after her teammates.

---

She caught up to Sasuke quickly, though he wasn't running at his full speed. She was thankful for her training with Kiba, otherwise, she wouldn't have stood a chance.

"He has incredible speed. He must have gotten specialized training." Sasuke informed her.

"Who is he?"

"Morino Idate…why does that sound familiar?"

"Doesn't matter! We're definitely catching up to him! Believe it!" Naruto shouted, leaping up into the trees. Sasuke and Sakura quickly followed suit.

Idate maintained his lead in front of them, but they lucked out when he tripped. His fall gave them the chance to catch up and surround him from up in the trees.

"Serves you right!" Naruto laughed.

"You have a lot of nerve, trying to run away from us." Sasuke said cooly.

"I'm so sorry!" Idate cried, falling into a deep bow.

"Huh?"

"I'm sorry…My wallet was stolen and I was at a loss, then you guys showed up, so I tried to dump my bill off on you."

The three jumped from the trees to the ground, staring at the man on his knees.

"I know that feeling…wondering how you're gonna pay…being desperate enough to try stealing or dumping it on someone else…I've felt that before."

Despite her previous annoyance, her heart went on to him.

"They took all your money? I'm so sorry, that's terrible." Sakura said, kneeling down in front of him. She felt even worse about it knowing that she'd been the thief on more than one occasion. She'd always tried to be discerning with her marks, but still…

Sasuke didn't buy it. Naruto and Sakura were too soft…especially Sakura, since money and not having it were sensitive topics for her. But it was too convenient. This guy had been too brash in his earlier approach to them. No one trying to bum their meal on someone else would have picked a fight with their target first. That was just plain stupid.

Idate smirked at the ground, his face hidden from view. This was too easy. He did feel a little bit bad about lying to the girl though…his flirting earlier hadn't really been a lie. She was cute. And she sounded genuinely upset on his behalf. But oh well. She'd thrown her lot in with those other two, and ninja just couldn't be trusted…he knew first hand what happened when you trusted a ninja. It didn't end well for you.

"You should have said that from the start." Naruto muttered, feeling a little bad for the guy.

Naruto didn't get the chance to say anything further, when something small but heavy dropped on his head and bounced to the ground.

"Ow! Huh? What's this?" Naruto asked, rubbing his head with one hand while reaching for the fallen object with the other.

Idate glanced up, his eyes widening in recognition at the ornately carved handle of his switch blade. All bets were off. There was no way in hell he was letting a stinking ninja touch his most precious possession.

"Hands off!" He snatched the knife away before Naruto had the chance to make contact, pushing off the ground in a back handspring to face them. "This belongs to me!" He declared, glaring at the three shinobi with distaste.

Sasuke glared back. He knew this guy's story had been an act. This was how the majority of people were, filthy liars. Just like Itachi. The only exceptions he'd ever met were his team…and now that he thought about it, Kakashi had lied to them on more than one occasion and Naruto, while flagrantly honest, had one time tied Sasuke up and borrowed his face with a henge jutsu back when they first became a team—he still didn't know what that had been for. The only one who'd never lied was Sakura. Of course, Sasuke was conveniently forgetting that Sakura had lied to her team frequently through omission, largely because he had always been able to see through those lies and when he confronted her with it, she always ended up telling him what she really felt and thought. But that was besides the point. Sasuke knew how the world worked and how people were because he'd been betrayed by the person he held closest. This guy, Idate, was just like the rest of them. And now he was revealing his true colors…

Naruto almost growled. Here he'd been starting to feel sorry for the jerk and he turns around and gets all hostile. He knew this guy was bad news! It was obvious from how he'd been hitting on Sakura and saying all that crap about how easy life as a ninja was! What did this guy even know about it!?

Sakura's brow furrowed.

"What's with the personality switch?! Aw crap! We didn't fall for his act, did we?! How embarrassing…"

"Maybe but…it might not be an act…" She thought back to how she'd attacked that civilian pickpocket who'd robbed her while Sasuke and Kakashi were comatose. "It might be the only thing of value he's got left…"

Idate bent down, unclasping his leg warmers.

"What are you doing?" Naruto asked, torn between suspicion and curiosity.

Idate held the leg warmers up, revealing the weights sown inside them.

"On your mark…"

"Huh?"

"Get set…go!" Idate dropped the weights with a loud crash, dust and dirt ballooning up in a cloud around him, but he didn't wait for the dust to settle, immediately taking off running, kicking up dust in his wake. "Give it up idiots, you'll never catch me!" He called.

"There! 20 meters ahead! He's off and running again!" Sakura cried in disbelief.

"The dust hasn't even fully dispersed yet and he's already that far ahead! Sasuke-kun was right. He's definitely had specialized training…Morino Idate…why is that name so familiar?!"

"We'll see about that!" Naruto shouted, taking to the trees to follow, Sasuke and Sakura doing the same. He really didn't like that guy.

"This kid's asking for it." Sasuke growled in agreement as they raced after him.

Idate was still outpacing them with relative ease…it didn't even seem like they'd decreased all that much in distance.

"Is this guy for real?!" Sakura muttered in exasperation. Sasuke was fast, as was she without her weights, but that was short burst speed. Sprinting meant to be utilized in battles to blitz, dodge or outmaneuver an enemy when there was a limited range of space…neither of them were able to maintain that kind of speed in a long distance run or chase.

"I told you, he's fast." Sasuke answered.

Idate somehow sped up more.

"What's going on?! He's gettin further away every second!" Naruto whined.

It was true. Where Sakura and Sasuke were trained for short burst speed, Idate seemed to have trained for long distance running. He didn't appear to have any issue maintaining his fast pace or even speeding up more despite the length of the run or change of terrain.

Team 7 came to a stop on a branch, breathing hard as they watched Idate's figure and dust trail grow farther and farther away.

"There's just no way…We'll never catch him, he's out of our league." Sakura panted.

"Okay. But if I ever see that stupid jerk again, he better watch out!" Naruto relented.

Sasuke was inclined to agree with Naruto. Sakura's statement grated on his nerves. Her acknowledgement of that flirtatious, lying, asshole made his stomach churn with anger. She wasn't supposed to give any acknowledgement to creeps like that. It tasted just as wrong as when she called Gaara, "Gaara-kun," and smiled at Naruto for his successful defeat of the sand demon that Sasuke had been useless against. Once again, he'd lost…to a perverted nobody at that. What was wrong with him? He should have been able to at least keep up with that guy! What happened to all that training he'd done with Kakashi to get Lee's speed? Why wasn't he getting any stronger?! Sasuke's jaw clenched painfully.

"We should go. We're wasting time. We've still got a mission to complete." Sakura felt the need for this mission to be a success, more so than any other mission they'd been on. Part of it had to do with desperately wanting to impress their new Hokage. Yet another piece was that she was determined to complete this mission without activating her curse…she needed to know that she could be out in the field on high rank missions, and be able to handle it. But the other part had to do with what she'd observed of Sasuke's behavior since he'd woken up from his coma. He was more withdrawn and quicker to anger…He was…darker. There was no doubt in her mind it was because of his encounter with Itachi. Both Orochimaru and Sasuke's words from the chunin exams still plagued her.

I just gave him a little gift to remember me by…Rest assured, Sasuke will come to me…in his quest for power.

I'm an avenger…'Am I strong enough?' Finding that out is all that matters to me right now…Not even for your sake…will I turn away from the path that leads to my goal!

She still prayed it wouldn't go the direction she was fearing it would, but with his recent change in behavior, her mind refused to let go of her doubts. So maybe if this mission was a success, maybe if they completed this likely A-rank well, he'd see how strong he was. He'd see that he didn't need to go anywhere to get more power. If this mission was a success, maybe he'd prove Orochimaru wrong.

Sakura jumped to the forest floor, determined to make it to their destination before sun down. Naruto and Sasuke followed suit.

---

They reached the large manor of Boss Jirocho in the late afternoon. They were immediately lead to the Boss by a servant. Sakura observed the woman's back as they followed her through the large manor.

"I suppose this would have been the other option if I hadn't become a ninja…"

"Not too many people in Konoha have servants like this…they just have lower clan members."

"That's right…damn, there really aren't any other options for me but being a ninja, not that I want there to be. This is what I want to do…I still haven't started training to control my curse again. I need to get back to that if I continue walking this path."

"Ughaaaaah! We really hate that training, shannaro!"

"Yeah. I really really do. But I'm gonna do it anyways…I think…I think now that I've stopped fighting my anger at the very least, it'll take a lot more for that emotion to trigger me…since I'm sorta always a little annoyed and easily angered, I think it'll take a lot more to get me furious now that I'm not trying to swallow it all back."

"There's still worse emotions though…" Her inner voice grumbled. Sakura's fists tightened on the straps of her pack, her eyes narrowing in annoyance at the thought of having to feel the extreme terror and anxiety required of her training.

"Yeah. Fuck those!" She thought forcefully. Just because she agreed to do it didn't mean she had to be happy about it. She knew that now.

"Jirocho-sama, the leaf ninja are here to see you." The servant called through the tatami door. They'd come to a stop outside of what was apparently the Boss's meeting room.

"Send them in."

"He sounds…kinder than I was expecting." Sakura had never had any interaction or dealings with Yakuza, crime and gambling families, or gangs before, so she'd been a little apprehensive about meeting the Boss of one. But his voice was surprisingly nice.

They slid open the door and entered the room, standing in front of a man who appeared to be in his fifties, with a bigger build and gray hair, but…a surprisingly gentle face.

"Welcome. And thank you all for coming."

"This is Boss Jirocho?!"

Naruto stepped forward and held out his hands.

"I bid you greetings and offer you my services. I have come from the Village Hidden in the Leaves, which is also the place of my birth! I was raised on ramen and hard work, and given the family name of Uzumaki! But I'm known to everyone—"

"As the knuckle head." Sasuke cut in from where he stood next to Sakura, whose jaw had dropped at Naruto's reckless and disrespectful approach, his arms crossed and eyes closed in irritation.

"—As the knuckle head!" Naruto accepted Sasuke's answer before his mind caught up to his mouth. "Ah man! Very funny!" Naruto flailed in a tantrum.

"What the hell was that, you idiot?! How could you be so disrespectful to our client?!" Sakura shouted in annoyance, her fist shaking threateningly.

"Seriously he's the Boss of a gang! What the hell is he thinking?!"

Jirocho burst out laughing. These three certainly were an entertaining bunch.

"You haven't changed at all I see." He said calmly, his warm grey eyes trained on Naruto.

"Yeah well you haven't changed much either, big guy!" Naruto smiled back, his hands going up to rest behind his head.

Sakura couldn't take it anymore, smacking Naruto in the back of the head.

"What did I just say about being disrespectful?! You got worms in your ears or something?! How many times do I have to tell you that you have to show some respect to positions of authority, shannaro!"

"Ow! But Sakura-chaaaan…" Naruto whined.

Jirocho burst out laughing again, drawing the pink haired girl's attention to him. She visibly paled at her outburst and immediately opened her mouth in what was clear to be an apology. But he simply waved a placating hand at Sakura. "No, it's alright. The boy has spirit. As do you, I see. I like that."

"Now that we're done with the greetings, maybe we should get down to it. The Fifth Hokage told us you'd explain what you wanted us to do." Sasuke cut in, deciding to be the adult in the room, since apparently no one else wanted to be. Normally that was Sakura's role, but she seemed to decide on not playing it at the moment, and while it was annoying, Sasuke was kind of…glad about it. It was a little…intimidating wasn't exactly the right word, but it was the closest fit he could find, that she was always so grown up and adult-like. Even in her tide of emotions after her mom died, there was a level of maturity in the way she handled things that made him feel…unworthy? Of what, he wasn't sure. But he certainly didn't mind her having moments like this, where she let her emotions get the best of her and spoke without thinking, even if they were in the middle of a mission. It made it feel more like they were…on the same level…

Jirocho nodded, his mood turning serious. "Alright then. You know about the dedication ceremonies held at the Great Todoroki Shrine every four years, don't you?"

"Oh well, uh, not really…" Naruto answered carelessly, his hands still resting behind his head.

"Go on, have a seat." Jirocho suggested with a wave of his hand that made it clear it was more an order than a recommendation. Not that anyone wanted to protest, they were all a bit tired from the unexpected race with Idate in the middle of their journey here.

Once they'd all settled, Jirocho took a deep breath, ready to begin his tale.

"It all started long ago. The legend goes that in ancient times, in order to subdue a terrible storm, the Ryuko Jewels were dedicated to the Great Todoroki Shrine. It worked. The storm subsided. It became a customary event that happens once every four years. At first it was just a rededication of the jewels. But several decades ago, it became a festival, then a race, the winner of which being hailed as a great hero. But in recent years, what once was a friendly race has taken on a more troubling aspect. For generations, this town known as port Degarashi, has been divided between two families. The Wasabi and the Wagarashi. Two rival gambling organizations. Both families wanted control over the town which naturally lead to disputes and turf wars. These clashes became increasingly violent, sometimes resulting in all out battles with the rest of the towns people caught in the cross fire. Many were injured…some lost their lives. In order to put a stop to the conflict, our lord of the land called for some kind of mediation. And it was agreed that from here on out, control of the town would be determined not by street brawls, but by a competition."

"The race?" Sakura guessed.

"That is correct. The Great Todoroki Shrine Ceremonial Race, held every four years. Four years ago, the Wagarashi beat us solidly by hiring shinobi, and we learned they've done so again this year. In order to counteract that, we sent messengers to Konohagakure with a request for your help. It was our only way of leveling the playing field. But as I understand it, before they could reach your village, they were attacked. Ambushed."

"By an enemy who uses senbon, poisoned with a concoction commonly found in Ame…so the Wagarashi have hired Ame nin as their escorts."

Sakura was jarred from her thoughts by Boss Jirocho bowing low, on his hands and knees, his head dropping towards the floor.

"I beg you! Please lend our family your strength! If we lose again it means the Wagarashi will control this town for four more years!"

Never in a million years had she ever thought the head of a gambling family would be bowing low to her, asking her and her team for help. These were the kind of people that people like her took loans from and bowed to, because they couldn't afford to pay it back…which never ended well for people like her. It was one of the reasons she'd avoided taking out loans, no matter how hard her and her mother struggled.

"Leave it to me! Believe it! Uzumaki Naruto is on the job!" Naruto cheered.

"So who are we supposed to escort anyway?" Sasuke asked, since that point seemed to have gotten overlooked throughout the man's story.

The man straightened. "Excellent! That means you'll take the job!"

Jirocho clapped twice, a calm smile on his face. The tatami door to his right slid open.

"Did you call for me, Boss?" A familiar voice asked.

"No way…it's…it's that guy! Idate!"

The brown haired boy straightened, his eyes falling on the three ninja.

"Huh?"

"HUH?!" Naruto gasped, pointing in both surprise and irritation.

Both boys let out a shocked cry, while Sasuke's brow twitched in annoyance, his fist clenching. This was just great. If they had to escort this creep, that meant having to hear more of his and Naruto's senseless bickering, and worse, more of his disgusting flirting with Sakura. And Sasuke wouldn't even be able to put this low life in his place because he was their client.

"Well this is off to a good start…seriously?! Naruto really did jinx us earlier—that or my luck just keeps getting worse. Of all the clients we could have, it just has to be the one that Naruto's gonna fight with the entire time…Although, I couldn't think of a better runner to pick for a race. Idate is fast."

"Oh so you already know each other! That makes this easy!" Boss Jirocho cheered jovially.

"I wouldn't be too sure…" Sakura murmured with a brief glance between Idate and Naruto, noting the heated glares the two were giving each other.

"This works out perfectly! Idate will show you around the port so you lot can get to know each other better!" Jirocho smiled, either woefully ignorant of the tension between Naruto, Sasuke, and Idate, or pointedly ignoring it.

"But Boss—"

"It'll be a good time to talk out strategies as well." Jirocho plowed on, continuing to ignore the tension…boys were always like that anyways, all territorial and whatnot. The pink haired girl seemed to be clever and unbothered by the development. She'd probably rein them all in.

Similarly to when he'd told team 7 to sit, it was more like an order phrased as a suggestion. Though his tone was amiable, it left no room for argument, and so team 7 and their escort found themselves leaving the room to head for the town together.

---

"Boss Jirocho is an important person around here! He shouldn't have to bow and scrape to the likes of you shinobi wannabes." Idate said, glaring at Naruto as they walked through the market.

"He can bow and scrape all he wants, I'd still flatly refuse to escort a jerk like you!" Naruto shot back petulantly, his hands resting behind his head, trying to look unbothered. This was a mission after all, even if he didn't like it, he still had to do it.

"Fine believe me! If I wanted an escort, it certainly wouldn't be some snot nosed runt like you! Sakura's the only escort I need so why don't you buzz off!"

That one got to him. He jumped in front of Idate's path, cutting him off, fists raised in challenge.

"Leave Sakura-chan out of this! And who're you calling a runt, you ignorant hick?! I'm Uzumaki Naruto and I'm gonna be Hokage some day, believe it!"

"Heh! Hokage, big deal!"

"It's a lot better than being the boss of a bunch of sketchy gamblers!"

"Hey squirt! My boss is an honorable man and a great leader! So watch what you say!"

"Great leader, huh? Would he sacrifice his life for his village like the Hokage would?! That's what a real leader does!"

"Are you kidding me?! He'd sacrifice his life, his heart, his soul and the souls of his children's children for all eternity!" Idate shouted back, wildly gesticulating with how absorbed in the argument he'd become.

"That's nothing! The Hokage would do all that stuff and more and do it twice a day!"

The two growled at each other, completely forgetting about this supposed tour they were on.

Sasuke and Sakura had walked well ahead of them. Sasuke because he didn't want to spend any more time than absolutely necessary in that perv's slimy presence, and Sakura because she was really tired of playing mediator between the three boys. The more rude Naruto and Sasuke were to Idate, the nicer she felt obligated to be to him, since he was their client and mission after all. But that only encouraged more of Idate's flirting and she had absolutely no idea how to handle it. Absently, she wished Ino were here because she'd definitely know what to do, but there was also a good chance Ino might encourage Idate's flirting to try and sway Sakura away from Sasuke, so maybe it was better that she wasn't here.

"So this town is run by the Wagarashi, huh?…The people don't look too happy…"

She approached a shop selling little odds and ends, scanning over the merchandise, not to purchase, just to check something. There was a little box of baubles or maybe they were keychains, that looked to be of the Legendary Sanin's infamous three way deadlock animal summons, as well as one of a pig in a vest and a droopy dog that looked suspiciously like Pakun.

"The Land of Tea doesn't have it's own hidden village, so I guess the Legendary Sanin of Konoha must be pretty big around here, since they don't have their own ninja to worship…"

She picked up the slug bauble, her brow furrowing.

"You'd think this was a tourist resort with how expensive everything is…"

Sasuke observed her carefully from the corner of his eye, drifting a bit closer to her when she'd stopped at the small market stall. Sakura wasn't one to look at non essential items. Having walked through the Konoha market with her enough, he knew her habits. She usually kept her eyes resolutely forward and away from shop windows so as not to be drawn in. She only ever looked at stalls and stores for food, ingredients, or supplies, and even then she pretty much shopped exclusively from the sales boxes and racks. The only time he'd ever seen her walk into a shop for something arguably non essential was a book store. The fact that Sakura was allowing herself to look at a merchandise shop, specifically picking up a useless decoration, meant she wasn't shopping, but looking for something.

"I know what you're thinking. Too expensive, right?"

Sakura jerked, turning to the kind looking shop keeper who was giving her an apologetic smile.

"Oh no, I—"

"I truly am sorry about that, I don't want to charge that much, but the Wagarashi family sets the prices." The woman explained apologetically. Sakura gave her an understanding smile, while Sasuke listened in closely, his eyes scanning the area for trouble. If the Wagarashi had such a firm handling of the market, then there was probably someone close by to monitor and keep the shop keepers in line…and they probably wouldn't take kindly to the woman's implication that there was a problem with the way they ran things.

"Don't worry about it. I actually figured that was the case." Sakura explained. "I just wanted to check if I was right…but how do you stay open? Does anyone actually buy anything with these prices?"

"Well, that's part of the prob—"

There was a loud crash from the shop across from them. Both Sasuke and Sakura ran over to check out the situation.

The tatami door to the shop had been kicked completely off track and now lay on the ground. A man had fallen to the dirt next to the door, and three surly looking thugs stood around him. It didn't take a genius to know who they were. Wagarashi family money collectors.

"P-Please forgive me!" The man in the dirt pleaded.

"How dare you?! When we want somethin' we take it, y'got it! You wouldn't even be in business if it weren't for the Wagarashi family, so you better not be trying to turn against us!"

"I know. I know! But…I need to get paid, or—"

"You're really not gettin' this, are ya?" The thug in the middle asked, cracking his knuckles menacingly. "Yo!" He signaled to the two others.

"Right!" They turned to reenter the shop—obviously to raid the place.

"P-Please stop!" The shop keeper begged, struggling to his feet to go after them.

"Alright then, since you're not gettin' it, I'll start with destroying you first!" The thug said, grabbing the man by his collar and pulling back for a punch.

That was about all Sasuke could take. This man was a defenseless civilian and this was a flagrant abuse of power. Power was only supposed to be used to take down others with equal to or greater power than yours. This was just pathetic bullying. And Sasuke hated it.

Next to him, Sakura was shaking with anger, her fists clenching tighter and tighter. How dare these people ruin these civilian's chances at livelihoods!

Sasuke and Sakura shared a brief glance. It was like a full silent strategy session. They immediately knew what the other would do. Sakura would get the shop keeper out of harms way and tend to any injuries he had. Sasuke would take on the thugs. They weren't even ninja, so it wasn't like he'd need back up.

As the thug swung his fist forward, Sasuke appeared in between him and his victim, catching his fist and forcing the thug to release the man's collar. Sakura gently pulled the man away and guided him further back, closer to the shop she'd been looking at earlier, the female shopkeeper standing in front of it, watching the scene unfold and wringing her hands in concern.

"Wh-What the?! Who are you?!" The thug sputtered, his muscles twitching against the twelve-year-old's shockingly strong grip.

"Why don't you and your friends get lost before you get hurt." Sasuke answered coldly, his voice full of menace.

"What was that?!" The two other thugs growled.

"Are you hurt anywhere, sir?" Sakura asked the man she and Sasuke rescued calmly.

"Wha—I uh…my back…"

"Do you mind if I take a look?"

The man shook his head, still bewildered by everything that had happened in the span of a few seconds…one moment a fist was flying at his face and the next he was being taken care of by a pink haired child!

"You need to get your friend out of there! Those are the Wagarashi's men!" The female shopkeeper cried to Sakura.

"Don't worry." Sakura answered with a calm, placating smile. "Sasuke-kun will be fine."

She lifted up the man's shirt and gently probed around with her fingers. "Alright sir, it looks like it's only a bruise. I'm going to put some ointment on it, but you should get some ice for it as soon as possible. Do you have access to any?"

"I…yes, I do." How was a little girl this calm in this situation?! And how did she know all this?! But despite the man's skepticism, when her fingers gently applied her ointment, the pain really did soothe a little…maybe she did know what she was talking about after all.

"You punk!" The thug growled at Sasuke. "You asked for it!"

The female shopkeeper let out a scared cry and covered her face with her hands. She didn't want to watch how the Wagarashi's mercilessly beat the child. The sound of fists meeting skin filled the air for a brief moment, and then there was nothing. The woman looked up slowly, fearful of what she might see, and let out an audible gasp.

"Not acting so tough now, are you kid?"

"If you've learned your lesson, never defy us again, brat!"

The two thugs, who'd been about to raid the shop before Sasuke's interference, turned, revealing the left side of their faces to be bruised and bloodied. They picked up the third thug who was on the ground, completely down for the count, his face busted up worse than theirs.

"Don't mess with us or next time you won't get off so easy!" They called in poor attempt to seem in control, as they started dragging their friend away, and tossing whatever they'd tried to steal back to the shopkeeper. Sakura easily swiped it out of the air for him, as the man was still too shocked by the turn of events to catch what was thrown his way, which turned out to be an envelope of money, likely from his cash register.

Sasuke stood completely uninjured, watching them cooly. He cracked his knuckles menacingly, fighting the sick satisfaction he got when he saw them stiffen and take off running. Those losers clearly didn't know their place, but he'd shown them.

"Th-Thank you both…whoever you are." The man murmured in awe, bowing to Sasuke, as Sakura was still behind him.

"What a refreshing feeling, seeing those thugs on the run!" The female shopkeeper smiled. "We definitely need Boss Jirocho's Wasabi Family to win the upcoming race. Then we'll be through with those damn Wagarashi's for good!"

Sakura felt her heart go out to these people. They were being denied their livelihoods cause of the Wagarashi's.

"Alright. I don't care how much of a flirt Idate is, or how nice I have to be to him—I'm making sure he wins that damn race no matter what! Shannaro!"

"Sasuke-kun…"

"Yeah…"

Just like before, they seemed to read and understand each other with a single glance. He could tell how much she wanted to help these people. And she could see how annoyed he was by the Wagarashi's flagrant abuse of power. They were on the same page. No matter how much Idate annoyed him or made her uncomfortable, they were winning this race.

---

They stayed the night at Boss Jirocho's home. He offered them each their own room, but to his surprise, they turned it down, opting to stay together as a team. The race would start early in the morning at the crack of dawn, so they'd decided to turn in early, but Sakura wanted to make sure they were all on the same page first.

"Do we really have to protect this guy?" Naruto whined.

"For the last time, yes! He's our client, damnit! If you want to be Hokage, you're gonna have to suck it up and take missions you don't like once in a while!" Sakura snapped, tired of his immature behavior. "Besides, he might grow on you over time! Tazuna-san did."

"Snowball's chance in hell of that happening."

"No way! Not with this guy! He's such a jerk!" Naruto and her inner thoughts seemed to be in agreement.

"I don't care about your personal feelings on this. We gotta make sure he wins. The towns people need this." And she needed this. She needed this mission to succeed, and she needed it to succeed without her curse activating. If she could make it through this B to potentially A-rank mission without triggering a reaction, there was hope that she could really be a shinobi.

"Alright. Fine." Naruto conceded. He had no idea how Sakura did it, accepting all that creep's gross flirting.

"Good. Now that we're all on the same page about that…there's something I need to tell you guys."

Both straightened and looked at her, noting the serious tone her voice took.

"One of our enemies uses poisoned senbon."

"How do you know this?" Sasuke asked, his eyes narrowed. Was this another one of her startlingly accurate deductions?

"Hokage-sama called me back as she dismissed us…She told me the bird that had brought the message also carried a senbon with it, which had been analyzed to reveal it was coated with poison. The kind commonly used in Ame."

"So the enemy ninja are from the Hidden Rain." Sasuke stated.

"Yeah. Assuming they're operating the same way we do, it'll be a three man squad, and likely a squad leader of Chunin or Jonin ranking. The only reason we don't have Kakashi-sensei with us is because of the recent attack…" She trailed off. She may have begun to accept her mother's death and move on, but that didn't make it hurt less. Luckily her teammates knew her well. She didn't have to finish the statement for them to know what she meant. Naruto gave her a soft, warm, smile which made her feel a little bit stronger.

"So…in other words, don't get hit, yeah?" Naruto asked.

"Since we don't know which member of the squad utilizes this kind of attack…or maybe it's all of them…" Sasuke thought out loud before locking eyes with Sakura. "How lethal is this poison?"

"Oh it'll kill you…once it enters your system, you have about 3-5 hours before you're done."

"So don't get hit." Naruto restated.

Sakura shifted a little. "I…I have an antidote that should work…but I made it myself and it's my first time trying anything like it so…I don't know if—"

"It'll work. We've got nothing to worry about." Sasuke stated, dismissing her concern. This was the same girl who'd managed to keep an unknown illness effecting her mother at bay for two years. He'd trust anything medicinal she handed him. Plus, if the Hokage saw fit to share this information with Sakura in specific, it was probably because she trusted the girl's skills. And their current Hokage was the best medical ninja in the world. As far as he was concerned, Sakura's antidote was Tsunade-certified.

"But if it's a variation on the common poison, my antidote might not work…it's not…I didn't get a detailed break down of the poison, and this antidote isn't tailor made—it's generalized. We shouldn't blindly trust that—"

"So don't get hit." Naruto said again, more forcefully, before giving her another warm smile. "Don't worry Sakura-chan! The bastard's right! Your antidote will definitely work, believe it! But it won't matter cause we just won't get hit, so it'll be fine y'know!"

"…So you just won't get hit…" Sakura repeated dryly.

"Does he even know how much skill it takes to not get hit by an enemy attack at all?! And he's never been that agile…he's the kind to tank a hit rather than avoid it…seriously where does all his unearned confidence come from and how can I get in on it?"

She also wished she had the same confidence in her concoction that her teammates seemed to have. Tsunade had approved her calculations and ratio tables, and she and Ikehara tested them, but not on the full poisons, only on the key ingredients. Her antidote for common Ame poison had effectively neutralized rattle snake venom. But that didn't mean it would work on a fully mixed poison.

Sasuke studied the way she anxiously bit at her lip and tugged on a lock of silky pink hair. She was still worried, obviously, and he had no idea what to do about it…being direct seemed to work last time when he wanted her to cry, so he may as well try that approach again.

"Tch. Why bring it up in the first place if you were so convinced we're screwed no matter what?"

Her jade irises locked with his in surprise.

"You guys told me to stop withholding what I was thinking or figured out…"

"Hn. Then you've done your part. You warned us of the danger, gave us an idea of who we're up against, let us know you're in possession of an antidote but also warned us of the possibility it might not work. We know to be cautious now…if one of us does get hit and poisoned, it'll be on that person and their lack of skill, not on you for withholding useful information. You said it yourself, we can't back out of this and need to win. There's nothing more you can do preemptively, so don't make it a problem until it is one."

"Sasuke-kun's trying to calm us down and cheer us up! Eeeek! He's such a cutie! You think he was jealous while Idate was flirting with us?"

"Don't make it a problem until it is one…heh, sounds like something mom would say…thank you, Sasuke-kun!"

"You're right. Sorry." She said, giving both him and Naruto a soft smile.

Sasuke huffed, ignoring the warm, sunshine-like feeling that spread through him at the sight of her expression. It wasn't like she needed to apologize…why'd she always do that when she had nothing to apologize for?

"Well what do y'know? You actually can hold a conversation huh?" Naruto teased. If there was one thing he definitely beat Sasuke at, it was verbally expressing himself. He was kinda shocked to hear the bastard say so much at once.

"I was just stating facts." Sasuke rebutted, the warm feeling replaced by irritation and embarrassment at Naruto's teasing.

"You want a fact—"

"No."

"—Here's a fact for ya! No poison's gonna stop me, cause I'm gonna be the Hokage one day! Believe it!"

"Doubtful."

"What'd you say, Bastard?!"

"Keep it down you nuisance!"

"How bout I just—"

Their pointless argument was interrupted by the sound of giggling. The two boys turned to see Sakura sitting on her bedroll, her legs in a butterfly stretch, one hand covering her mouth to try and hold her laughter back, her eyes closed in mirth.

Naruto stared at Sakura in confusion…he had never really heard Sakura laugh this much. It was really cute…but weirdly, as he watched her, he had a flash of memory—Hinata's laughing, cheering face after he'd beat Neji in the Chunin exams. He shook the image out of his head, confused about why he had suddenly started thinking about Hinata laughing, and why he felt kinda warm.

Sasuke stared at Sakura, he hadn't heard her laugh like this since she tree danced in the Land of Waves. Actually, that had been fleeting. This was more full and continuous. At that time, he remembered thinking laughter sounded fitting from her, but it had been too brief to really know. Now he knew he'd been right. Her melodic voice, which occasionally became powerfully volcanic when her temper was triggered, was well suited for laughter. It washed over him like the chimes of a bell, the vibrations soothing.

"What's so funny, Sakura-chan?"

"You two," Sakura giggled, "could turn arguing into a spectators sport! Seriously! You guys just create arguments from thin air! It's so ridiculous, it's funny." Another fit of giggles escaped her lips.

The two boys stared at her for another couple of seconds, still not over seeing their extremely mature, polite, and frequently stressed female teammate caught up in a fit of laughter. But it was contagious. After a few seconds, Naruto began to join in, all his tension from his argument with Sasuke, and his confusion over Hinata's sudden appearance in his brain, forgotten to the sheer enjoyment of the moment.

Sasuke didn't join in. He didn't laugh. But as he watched his two teammates collapse in a heap of giggles, his expression softened, the faintest smile tugging at his lips. This was why these two were his precious people…because in moments like this, for just a little while, he was able to forget about Itachi and his revenge, his hatred and sadness. When he was with these two, brief moments like this one became the only thing there was: past, present, and future. And as he watched Sakura come undone in her fit of laughter, he felt like this brief moment needed to last. After all, it wasn't often she let herself laugh like that. Normally it was Sakura who took the adult responsibility of calling them back to reality when they were floating away like this, if Kakashi wasn't around to do it. Sasuke didn't mind taking that responsibility from her this time, letting her have this moment to be the child circumstances never allowed her to be.

He waited until she naturally began to calm, stretching the moment as long as he could before deciding it was time to bring reality crashing back down.

"We should get some sleep. We have to be up early."

"Yeah, yeah…I still don't like that guy though." Naruto grumbled after finally settling.

The three put out the lights and climbed into their bedrolls.

"G'night Sakura-chan! Night, bastard." Naruto mumbled instantly falling asleep. Neither Sasuke nor Sakura understood how he did it. They never fell asleep that easily.

"Good night, Sasuke-kun." He wasn't facing her, and his eyes were closed, but he could easily picture the gentle expression that matched her tone.

He wanted to say the words back to her, but it caught in his throat when her expression in his mind's eye was replaced with his mother's, his mother's warm tone replacing her gentle one. All he managed to give her was a grunt, as he was once again hit with the familiar sadness, loneliness, anger, and hate he'd briefly forgotten.

That was the problem with those kinds of moments. They always ended.

---

The sun hadn't even broken the horizon yet, but still a large portion of the population of the small port town had gathered in front of a large ceremonial gate. Fireworks were being set off, and, despite the early hour, the excitement from the crowd was palpable.

Sakura, Naruto and Sasuke stood not far from where Idate and the other runner were stretching. Naruto looked around in awe.

"Whoa! I had no Idea this was such a big deal! So what kinda race is this anyway?" He asked, turning to Sakura, his go-to source for answers.

"Oh now he finally asks…good thing I read up on the whole course and rule book yesterday."

"You know, the kind with a start and a finish." She answered teasingly, pulling out a map. "Listen carefully and I'll explain it, if you can handle a long explanation that is." His whining about explanations and lectures way back in the Land of Waves still annoyed her, and she saw it fit to make fun of him for it.

"I'll pay attention this time Sakura-chan! Believe it!"

"Good. The starting point is here at Port Degarashi. After that, they travel across this stretch of ocean to the Modoroki Shrine on Nagi Island, which is the midpoint." She said drawing a line with her finger on the map.

"That's the Modoroki Shrine?" Naruto asked pointing at the spot she indicated.

"Yes…it seems the fastest way to get there is by boat. Anyways, The runners pick up the Ryuko jewels from Modoroki shrine and brings it to the Great Todoroki Shrine at the southern tip of Ouzu island. Whoever dedicates their jewel first wins." Sakura folded the map and placed it back in her pack. "That's it as far as the basic rules go, but other than that, anything goes. Shortcuts, obstructions, and secret maneuvers are all allowed."

"So hiring a ninja to help you isn't a violation of the rules either." Sasuke clarified. He'd been secretly wondering about that.

Sakura nodded.

"So where are the ninja that the other side hired?" Naruto asked. He hadn't seen any other hidden village headbands around.

"They're keeping a low profile and monitoring the situation." Sakura answered. She'd been on the look out too and hadn't seen anyone obvious, so that had to be the strategy they were taking.

"It's not a bad one either…not announcing their presence to catch us off guard…given how they even preemptively attacked the Wasabi messenger convoy to Konoha, they're probably going to take an offensive approach. They're going to be less worried about guarding their client and more likely to try and obstruct ours…we're starting on the defensive from the get go…"

"Based on the moves they've already made, and how they're hiding, they're likely going to be on the offensive. So we need to keep our guard up. Don't do anything reckless Naruto!" She warned.

"Yeah, yeah…" The blond sighed in exasperation. She'd told him that exact sentence so many times the words were burned into his brain.

Sasuke eyed her carefully. Between her and Naruto, she was honestly more of the wild card…Naruto took more bold and reckless actions, but because that was the way he always operated, it wasn't surprising and could even be somewhat expected. He could count on the blond to go charging in and do something loud and stupid yet somehow smart at the same time. Sakura on the other hand…She was such a logical, smart, and calculating person, yet she seemed to have unexplainable bouts of recklessness. And because they weren't consistent, they couldn't be accounted for.

"I don't care what you guys do, just stay back and don't get in my way." Idate sneered, glaring at Naruto and Sasuke. The hostility dropped a little when his gaze settled on Sakura. "I wouldn't mind you getting close, of course." He only half meant it. He wouldn't mind Sakura getting close with him, she was really cute. But ultimately she was a ninja, which meant that she couldn't be trusted anymore than the other two could. Besides how could a little pink haired girl be an effective guard. He didn't say it so much as permission for her to guard him, but more so just to goad the other two. Which worked. Sasuke gave him a frigid glare.

"Say what?!" Naruto shouted, his fist raising in front of him.

"You heard me runt! I've got a race to run! I don't want an impediment like you messing me up!"

"Impediment?!" Naruto shouted, attempting to step closer to him, but Sakura immediately held him back.

"Calm down. Hey can't we all just join forces here?" She tried to soothe.

"No way! Not with a guy like him!" Both Idate and Naruto chorused, pointing accusingly at one another.

"These two are strangely in harmony…this could be a long race." She sighed.

"Attention! Attention! The Great Todoroki Shrine Race is about to begin!" blared the announcers voice over a loudspeaker. "Running for the Wasabi Family: Morino Idate!" The crowed cheered and clapped. Boss Jirocho stood, his face solemn as he applauded his choice of runner. He had no doubt in his mind that Idate was a great man that would bring the family to power again. He'd bet his life on him.

"Morino Idate…why's it so familiar?" A face flashed in her mind of an imposing, scarred man with a head wrap standing in front of a classroom full of potential chunins. "Wait, no…it can't be…maybe it's just a common name…"

"Running for the Wagarashi family: Hikyakuya Fukusuke!"

A loud cheer went up from the Wagarashi family. Sasuke glared at the runner, thinking back on the way that family abused its power. No matter how much Idate annoyed him, beating them would feel good.

"On your marks!" Both runners dropped into a low lunge as the gates swung open. Sasuke, Naruto, and Sakura readied themselves as well.

"Huh?" Idate grunted as he eyed the horizon. Those clouds…those were cumulonimbus clouds. They were still a distance away, but with the wind speed, they were bound to blow in while he'd be out on the water…that was, if he was going the normal way. He smirked.

"Go!" Both runners took off.

"All right! We're going too!" Naruto declared, but as he turned to face the gate, his eyes bulged out of his head. "What the?!"

Idate had peeled off to the left, running away from the dock where their boat was waiting. The three immediately took off after him.

"What's that idiot doing?" Sasuke growled. Was he really running away?!

"Idate, where are you going?" Sakura called after him.

"Hey, wait! You're going the wrong way!" Naruto shouted.

"Heh!" Idate glanced back at Fukusuke, who was still heading for the docks. He either hadn't noticed yet or didn't know to look in the first place. Either way, he was buying himself a lot of trouble by following the standard route given the incoming weather. And that boded all the better for Idate.

"Hey Idate, the ocean's the other way!" Naruto shouted again. "Where the hell do you think you're going, you idiot! You have to turn around!"

"Hah! There's no way I'm going back!" Idate countered, speeding up his pace.

He ran through a heavily wooded area, making his way towards the mountains, the three konoha ninja trailing behind him.

"Have faith in me boss…I won't let you down. I'll win this for you." He murmured, thinking back on how he'd first met Jirocho. He'd been starving and attempted to rob him at knife point. Jirocho had immobilized him easily, disarmed him and kicked his kunai away before shoving him to the ground and tossing him a switch blade with a beautifully carved handle and an apple. He'd then taken him in, given him a home, food, and a purpose. Boss Jirocho was everything to him, and he wouldn't let him down.

Just like the first time Team 7 had chased him, Idate had a frustrating lead on them. They took to the trees to travel faster.

"We'll catch up to him pretty soon!" Naruto said forcefully.

"It might not matter, if he's this far away from the port, it's unlikely he'll be able to win." Sasuke answered, annoyed that they'd lost by no fault of their own.

"I don't know. He may have planned to come this way from the beginning…" Sakura hoped that was the case anyways, although it might just be wishful thinking.

"Huh?"

"What makes you say that?"

"Shortcuts are allowed…"

"But…"

"How could this be a shortcut?" Naruto demanded, voicing her own inner doubt. She didn't have an answer for him, so they picked up their pace, unaware of the three Ame nin watching them.

---

"This was lucky. Let's put an end to this right here, what do you say?" One asked. They tossed their civilian disguises away, revealing pale full body suits with oxygen masks on their faces. The Ame genin team 7 had faced in the second round of the chunin exams.

"At any rate, who would have thought those three would be escorting him." Another commented.

"Double lucky. Now we can pay them back for what they did to us in the Chunin exams." The first to speak answered. "You two go on ahead. I'll keep them tied up here."

"Alright!" The two leapt off, leaving the first to handle the Konoha genin.

---

Sakura felt the faintest brush of something tingle over her skin and stopped short. Sasuke noticed and immediately drew to a stop as well, looking back at her in confusion.

"I know this feeling."

She locked eyes with Sasuke just as he noticed it too.

"Release!" They both broke out of it, and turned to Naruto only to see that he'd kept going.

"Shit! He just had to go running ahead." Sasuke cursed. He could always count on Naruto to be a reckless and unobservant idiot.

Sakura and Sasuke both took off again, their guard up knowing they were already being watched.

"Finally! Caught up to you!" Naruto muttered, as he jumped down next to Idate, who picked up his pace. "Hey wait up, will ya? So what gives? Why'd the hell did you come this way?"

"Shut up! It's none of your business!" Idate snapped.

"What's with the attitude, pal?" Naruto growled.

"I said shut up!"

Caught in the genjutsu, they thought they were running along the forest path, but actually they'd started up the narrow rocky mountain path, some of the ground crumbling as the two sprinted over it.

"Watch out!" Sakura called.

"They aren't aware of it, are they?" Sasuke asked somewhat rhetorically. Idate wasn't a ninja so he likely wouldn't have been able to tell, and Naruto never was particularly good at sensing and casting off genjutsu.

"Hey I said wait up a sec!" Naruto shouted at Idate, who once again ignored him.

But as the older boy drew up to a particularly distinctive tree, he did slow to a stop. He looked around staring at the tree for a second.

"I've already been here. Damn! Looks like I've been tricked by genjutsu."

"Say what?" Naruto gasped, finally catching up fully to him.

"In that case…" Idate put his fingers together in a tiger hand sign and closed his eyes. "Release!" He located the break in the genjutsu and ran towards it.

Sakura's eyes widened. "He just…he just broke a genjutsu on his own…Morino…maybe those two really are related. At the very least it confirms part of where he got his speed from. He definitely spent some time in a Hidden Village training to be a shinobi. And I'm betting it was Konoha." She filed the information away. They had more pressing concerns, like the fact that Idate was heading straight for the edge of a cliff.

"H-Hey!" Naruto shouted, reaching to go after Idate.

"No! Don't go that way!"

He stopped short when he heard Sakura's voice from somewhere above him, but he didn't see her anywhere. "What's going on around here?"

Idate hadn't heard her, or if he had, he didn't listen. He ran ahead towards the break in the genjutsu he spotted earlier, and when he reached it, he saw the scenery change around him. He smirked.

"Heh, I'm out—" But his victory was cut short when he pitched forward. The scenery changed again and he saw the rocky face of a mountain, just in time to run right off the edge of it. He screamed as he began to fall, but was suddenly stopped by a hand closing around his belt. He looked up to see Naruto holding on to him, a rope tied around one of his ankles.

"Hold still! I'll have them pull us up now!" Naruto grunted.

"That was close!" Sakura muttered, holding the end of the rope. Sasuke stood in between her and the edge of the cliff, the rope wrapped around his shoulders, each hand clutching a section to help mitigate the weight and keep the tension controlled.

"Someone layered one genjutsu on top of another. That's a pretty elaborate trick." Sasuke grunted as he tugged the rope up.

"A double genjutsu…didn't we face something like that in the chunin exams…a genjutsu that looped us around and tired us out, and then another that made us see clones of the enemy that came out of everywhere and multiplied when cut…not quite the same thing but it was a genjutsu inside of a genjutu…and those enemies were Ameninja!"

"Sasuke-kun!"

"What is it?" He grunted. The combined weight of Naruto and Idate wasn't exactly easy to lift, and the two of them kept squirming and fighting, making it all the more difficult. Sakura was helping and it was thanks to her he wasn't pulled over the edge with them, but because of his positioning, he bore the brunt of the weight.

"Do you remember those ninja we fought with Kabuto during the second exam?"

"What about them?"

"They layered a genjutsu too. And they were Amenin."

Sasuke paused briefly, glancing back at her, before continuing to tug Naruto and Idate up.

"So you think it's those three we're facing?"

"I…I'm not sure. It could very likely just be the way Amenin are trained, but…They were hired before we were, so the mission ranking at the time would have been C-rank with the possibility of becoming B-rank, instead of B-rank with the chance of becoming A, so it'd be reasonable to put genin on at the time, especially if they have a Jonin squad leader with them. The only reason we were given a mission of this rank without a Jonin sensei is because Konoha's still recovering and our forces are spread thin. They're using a similar trick, only it's more advanced now, which makes sense because they've probably been training since they failed."

"At that time, none of them used poisoned senbon. They favored Kunai."

"Which means someone learned a new trick, or it was their Jonin leader who used it."

As always, her analysis was sound. "Probably their Jonin leader. Those three used genjutsu, earth release, and ninja tools back then. We didn't get a good look at all three individually, so the last one's a wild card. But poison senbon would have been a good choice of weapon in the position they had us, if they didn't use it then, then it's likely not a trick belonging to those three. It requires a lot of precision for senbon to be an effective weapon."

Sakura nodded in agreement. There wasn't a lot to do with the information right now, but it helped to be more prepared.

It took them six minutes to get Naruto and Idate back onto the mountain path. Both plopped down cross legged facing away from each other, Naruto muttering about how Idate made him drop his ninja gear, while Sakura coiled the length of rope.

"Look I didn't need your help, ok?" Idate sneered at the blond as he stood up.

"You didn't need it?!" Naruto shouted in exasperation. "Hey you jackass, can't you even thank us for saving your life?!"

"You only saved me because you were hired to! There's no need for me to thank you!"

"What did you say?" Naruto growled.

Sakura paused in her coiling. "Is that really how he thinks? Technically he's not wrong, but does he really think that if we were here and not hired to guard him, we'd just watch him run off the edge and not lift a finger to help?" Sakura felt a kind of sorrow well up in her on Idate's behalf. No one thought that way in a vacuum. Idate must have experienced some kind of betrayal like that before.

"Stop it Naruto. He's right." Sasuke cut in calmly. It was a stretch to say that if he wasn't being paid to watch out for Idate, he'd just have let him fall. He wouldn't do that. But he sure as shit didn't like the guy, and he definitely wouldn't put his life on the line for him if it wasn't his mission to do so. He fixed his cold glare on Idate. "Look, if you don't want to end up dead, you should stick close to us."

Idate huffed and turned his back to them, continuing down the mountain path.

"Hey where are you going anyways? What happened to Port Degarashi?" Naruto asked.

"Stupid, I'm heading north from here!"

Sakura, having finished coiling the rope and stowing it in her pack, turned to Idate.

"So it's faster to go north?"

Idate glanced back at her and smiled. She really was a cutie. "That's right…"

Sasuke didn't understand why he tensed. It wasn't like Idate threatened Sakura or belittled her in anyway. It hadn't escaped his notice that she was the only one he was remotely nice towards. But that was part of what set him on edge. From the way Idate had flirted with her earlier, it was obvious that he had ulterior motives for his kind disposition towards Sakura.

"Whatever, I really don't trust this guy." Naruto muttered dismissively.

"That's the problem with all you ninja." Idate shot back, annoyed.

"What?" Naruto growled.

"Look, at this time of year, there are some pretty strong seasonal winds blowing across the sea. At the starting point, I saw the clouds and realized the wind was blowing toward us. Plus, it looked like storm clouds on the horizon. On top of that, there's a port to the north, where the ocean current flows directly into Nagi Island. Instead of having to fight the wind and a storm, and can rely on the current to carry me where I need to be. That's what I was saying, you outta use this a little more, right here!" He said tapping his temple.

Sasuke scoffed. If only this jerk knew just how smart Sakura was. After all, she just deduced their opponents with only two clues to work off of. Granted, they didn't know if she was right yet, but he had little doubt that she was.

---

The three followed Idate as they continued north.

"Hey! I can smell salt on the wind!" Naruto called.

"We're getting near the ocean." Sakura said, calling up her mental map of the peninsula. Sure enough, not long after, they crested a hill to see the sparkling blue water.

They walked down some stone steps towards a beach where a few row boats and a sail boat were waiting along the shore.

"Across the ocean, is that Nagi Island?" Sakura asked, looking out across the water.

"Yeah. That's the halfway point where the Modoroki shrine is." Idate confirmed, his eyes trained seriously on the Island. He had to win for Boss Jirocho, no matter what. "I can get there within an hour. Wait here for a sec." He ran towards a small house to the left of them and knocked on the door.

"Hey gramps! It's me! Idate of the Wasabi Family!"

Immediately the door slid open, an old man leaning in the doorway.

"Hey! I've been waitin' for ya!"

"It's going just as I thought it would. I'm gonna need you to lend me a boat."

"You bet! I have it all ready for ya! You can use that one, right over there!" He said pointing to the large sail boat. "It's the fastest boat around!"

"Thanks a lot, gramps!"

"No problem! Boss Jirocho has done a lot for me over the years. So just make sure you don't lose to the Wagarashi! I'm fed up with how they handle things."

"Leave it to me! I may be the underdog, but I'm Idate, the number one henchman of the Wasabi family! I won't fail, I promise."

"Yeah, right. Whatever." Naruto muttered, his arms behind his head.

---

Sakura had never sailed before. The first time she'd ever been on a boat had been on their way to the Land of Waves, and there had been someone rowing for them. Sasuke and Naruto had never sailed either, but they'd all learned the theory of it…it wasn't rocket science. Sasuke manned the rudder while she and Naruto tied off the sail, she on the port side and Naruto on the starboard. And having always done odd jobs and miscellaneous crafting, Sakura was rather skilled at tying knots, so she finished securing her side long before Naruto.

She straightened and studied Idate's back as he looked out at Nagi Island growing closer and closer. They'd be able to see the its port soon, he just hoped they'd get there before Fukusuke. He pulled out his switch blade and held it tight, like a talisman for good fortune.

Sakura approached Naruto, as he finished securing his knot.

"Hey Naruto, what do you think?" She asked quietly.

"What about?" He said, matching her volume.

"About Idate…he's not just some ordinary boy. The speed he runs at is extraordinary. He may have received some special training…"

"What kind of special training?"

"So he hasn't noticed…"

"I think he's trained in a Hidden Village…Konoha."

Naruto burst out laughing, his hands resting behind his head.

"Get real! A guy that stupid could never be a ninja!" The volume of their conversation rose, allowing both Idate and Sasuke to hear.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed. He could infer they were talking about Idate. So Sakura thought he'd gotten some ninja training. It made sense given his speed…the question was, which village. Morino Idate sounded familiar for some reason…

"Look who's talking! Last I checked, you were the reigning king of stupid!" She snapped, unappreciative of his dismissal of her theory.

"Aw c'mon, Sakura-chan! Give me a break! I did make it to the final round of the Chunin exams, didn't I?"

Idate jerked. "You were in the final round of the Chunin exam?!" He asked, rounding on Naruto.

"Yeah, that's right! We all were! And if I hadn't been interrupted in the middle of it, I could have won the tournament and become a Chunin!"

"Yeah well, who ever your proctor was must have been a real push over."

Sakura's eyes narrowed. "His reaction…he definitely sat the exam before…specifically mentioning a proctor…he couldn't really be related to Ibiki-san, could he? They don't look too much alike, although I guess the face shape and skin tone is similar…the slant of their eyebrows are pretty similar too…"

"Sounds like the Chunin exam has lowered its standards." He gasped, realizing what he'd just let spill.

Sakura's eyes widened, a smile making its way to her face. She loved when she was proved right.

"Idate, so you were…"

He turned away quickly, not wanting to be forced to admit he'd been a Genin at one point.

"I remember now. Morino Idate." Sasuke said, the pieces falling into place, he eyed Sakura wondering if he'd figured it out before her, for once.

"Morino. Our first test proctor carried that name." Sakura supplied, her tone unsurprised.

Sasuke sighed. Of course she'd already known. A small piece of him whispered that this was just another failing, another thing he hadn't figured out first, another blow to his ego. But it was overshadowed by the rest of him, which felt…pride that once again, Sakura had figured something out faster than anyone. She was the only one he didn't really mind losing to, in this capacity, at least. He knew pretty much everyone universally looked at her and assumed she was the weak link on the team. Part of it came from the fact that she was female…kunoichi were commonly viewed as weaker than their male counterparts. But Sakura's overall appearance certainly didn't help to dissuade anyone from that belief. She was so small and slim, her features so delicate, and her coloring so…flower-like, that it was easy to assume she was there simply to fill the squad and take up space as a pretty decoration. Everyone underestimated her, thinking she was a shinobi in name alone without the skills to back it. And yes, physically speaking, Sakura was weaker than him and Naruto. But what she lacked in physical strength, she made up for in intelligence, deductive reasoning, and other useful skills. They were the strongest of the rookie nine, the only team to have all its members reach the Chunin exam finals. That was something Sasuke took pride in. All of team 7 was strong…as much as he and Naruto butted heads, there wasn't a single member that dragged the team down, at least not when it really counted. Or that was what Sasuke had thought…but more and more recently, it felt like he was the weak one. He was the one unable to do anything useful against Gaara. He was the one who ended up comatose and hospitalized for five weeks, courtesy of his dear brother. He'd even failed to catch up to Idate when speed was supposed to be something he had in spades. He should have been stronger, faster, more powerful…Once again, he found his thoughts turning dark and his mood growing stormy.

"Morino Ibiki." Sakura continued, oblivious to Sasuke's change in mood, her mind occupied with proving herself right.

"What did you say?" Idate whipped around to face her. "Ibiki-niisan is alive?!"

"Yes…" Sakura answered, caught off guard by the question.

"Why would he think otherwise?"

"Ibiki-niisan? We knew they were related! We're a genius, Shannaro!"

"Of course he's alive! Why wouldn't he be? He threw such a curve ball at me the tenth question in…" Naruto jumped in, attempting to play off the fact that he'd been wrong. Seriously, it was awesome how smart Sakura was and all, but he was getting really tired of being wrong and feeling stupid. He supposed this one was on him though…he'd assumed from Idate's attitude that there was no way he could have ever trained as a ninja—or more like he'd hoped that he hadn't. It felt somehow better than the alternative—something happening during his training to make him hate ninja. It was much more preferable to believe that Idate was a really fast civilian with a misguided view of shinobi, than someone who had been part of the life style and had enough backing for his negative opinion. But bad things or not, he was still wrong about shinobi on the whole! Even if something bad had happened to him, it didn't mean all shinobi were untrustworthy and bad. Naruto knew that deeply. There was a time when he'd hated everyone in Konoha because they all seemed to hate him…but then Iruka had been kind to him. Sakura, Sasuke and Kakashi had accepted him. Shikamaru had taken the time to visit him when he'd been in the hospital. Hinata believed in him, was inspired by how he kept trying. You couldn't let one incident or one person's negative attitude stop you from trusting anyone. Even a bastard like Sasuke knew that, with how he let team 7 in even after everything his brother did…and if Sasuke could get it, then this guy had no excuse for writing all ninja off the way he did!

"That's true?! He's really alive then?!" Idate asked, his mind simply refusing to comprehend what they were saying.

Their conversation was cut off by an arrow whizzing past Idate's face and sticking itself into the floorboards.

"Wh-What's this?!" Naruto shouted.

"An ambush." Sasuke answered, turning his head to retrace the arrow's path and seeing another boat coming at them from their starboard side. He internally growled at himself for not having paid more attention…he should have noticed! He'd been too caught up in his teammate's conversation that he hadn't focused.

Another volley of arrows rained down on Naruto, Sakura and Idate, who dodged, the latter two blocking the barrage with kunai and switch blade. The next round of arrows was aimed at Sasuke, forcing him flip away from the rudder with a curse, and join his team and Idate.

"Naruto and I will fend these guys off. Sakura, take care of Idate!" He ordered. He didn't think her weak, but it was a fact that he and Naruto were stronger and better suited for ranged combat, given that they were better at ninjutsu. Plus, even if she didn't show it, Sakura was handicapped by her weights. They slowed her down and gave her less chakra to work with, so the less she had to unnecessarily waste, the better.

"Maybe we should all just run…" She countered eyeing the encroaching ship.

"It's too late for that!" He answered, watching as the next set of arrows with ropes attached, struck various parts of the ship, allowing the enemy boat to pull up beside them.

"He's right…if we run now, it'll actually be a disadvantage—we'll be out in the open and easy to strike. We'll need more cover to attempt something like that…"

"Start working on these ropes! I'll cover you." He ordered Naruto.

"Gotcha!" For once, he didn't complain about being bossed around by a bastard. Sasuke was right, and they had to act fast. He briefly attempted to untie the ropes, but quickly realized they were too thick and well knotted. "Damn, I'm gonna have to cut these!" He reached into his weapons pouch but found it empty. That was right…when he'd caught Idate on the cliff earlier, the jerk wouldn't stop moving and all his ninja tools had fallen out!

"That's perfect, I had to lose all my gear." He grumbled, before turning around, his eyes immediately landing on Idate's open switch blade. "Hey, lend me that thing, will ya?"

"What?" Idate gasped.

"Just hand it to me, hurry!"

"Forget it, you imbecile! This is more important to me than my life! There's no way I'll let you use it!"

"This is no time to be saying stuff like that!" Naruto admonished, stepping closer to try and grab it. He'd ask Sakura for a kunai, but she needed to be armed to guard Idate, and she didn't have very many kunai and shuriken to begin with, since they tended to be outside her comfortable price range.

"S-Stop you idiot!" Idate said, pulling away from him.

A kunai thudded into the floor near his feet.

"Hurry up already, you loser!" Sasuke growled.

Naruto picked up the kunai without further argument, and raced to the ropes, slicing through them easily. Naruto watched as they sailed away from the ship with ease. "Heh, well that was a piece of cake!"

"You jinxed us, damnit!" Sakura shouted, placing herself firmly in front of Idate with a kunai at the ready, as she watched three bodies rise, clad in off white jump suits rise up from the floor. She felt her anxiety beginning to rise.

"Right again! It was those freaks from the Chunin exams!"

"Not the time to be celebrating, Shannaro! Alright Sakura, deep breath, stay calm."

"Don't worry Sakura-chan! It's just a bunch of clones! Only the real one can actually attack us! We're gonna be fine!"

Sasuke activated his sharingan to confirm Naruto's statement, absently noting that Sakura had been right again about the identity of their enemies. And since there was no sign of poison senbon yet, it was likely that trick belonged to their Jonin leader, as she had hypothesized.

He scanned the clones in the area, his eyes widening.

"Sakura! Naruto! Watch out, the real one is hiding among the clones! Be careful!"

"Sasuke-kun! Guide us!" Sakura answered, stepping closer to Idate, her eyes bouncing from one clone to another.

"This is bad…The Dancer's Barrage is best for a one on one battle. It won't work surrounded by multiple enemies at one…and it won't work on a clone either…maybe if the clone has substance like an element infused clone or Naruto's shadow clones, but even then, it won't be effective since it won't do anything to the main body's chakra network…plus it'll take too much time and leave Idate open to attack. My best and only offensive move is pretty much pointless in this situation!"

Stay calm…

"Just focus on the mission. Protect the client, figuring out fighting when it comes to it…"

"Stay close to my side, Idate." She ordered, turning slightly towards him.

"I don't want a ninja's help!" He argued. As much as he liked Sakura, especially compared to the other two, this was exactly the kind of moment where a ninja would abandon him, or use him to take the hit for them. And as nice as she was, she was a ninja. She couldn't be trusted.

"Look around you, pal! You still saying that in this situation?!" Naruto challenged, missing the enemy that jumped at him.

"Naruto, behind you!" Sasuke warned.

He looked up in time to see the white suited Rain ninja bearing down on him. The enemy landed on him, knocking him to the ground.

"Naruto!" Sakura called in concern, though she didn't move towards him, no matter how much her instincts screamed at her to help.

"My job is to protect Idate right now, I just have to trust Naruto will be ok!"

There was a poof of smoke as Naruto disappeared.

"A clone?! Ah, crap!" The rain ninja hissed, looking up as four Narutos came bearing down on him.

"Clone for clone!" Naruto shouted, but before he could land a hit, the Rain Ninja dove into the sea. Naruto's clones vanished as he looked over the edge of the ship. "Damn! The real one got away!"

"Nice work, Naruto!" Sakura encouraged. If the real one was gone, then the clones couldn't do any damage to them.

But their illusion of safety didn't last. The clones started attacking. Naruto swiped at one causing it to burst into water.

"Sasuke! They've changed into water clones!" Naruto warned. The extra substance would allow the clones to do damage.

"I know!" Sasuke answered, fighting off four at once.

Sakura stood on high alert in front of Idate, her keen eyes seeking out any enemy who dared enter a five meter radius of her and her client. She jolted when she felt a drop hit her cheek.

"It's raining?" She reached up, brushing the liquid off and studying her fingers. "No, this is oil!"

Sasuke's attention was on the never ending water clones. How annoying…it'd be better to take them all out at once. He began forming the hand signs, ignoring the seemingly harmless black rain.

Sakura saw Sasuke's hands race through hand signs.

"That's a tiger seal! Which means he's gonna use fire!"

"Sasuke-kun, don't! This isn't rain, it's oil!"

Sasuke looked up at the rain, thankful for her catch, but once again frustrated by his own lack of awareness.

When Sasuke failed to ignite the oil himself, the enemies took it upon themselves, sending a flaming arrow to the floor of the ship. It caught on a puddle of oil, sending it up in flames, which spread rapidly.

The fire danced through Idate's wide eyes, triggering the memory of when he'd watched his brother die…tied to a chair and set on fire. His commanding tone echoing through his head.

Go! Having you stay with me will only be a burden to me!

"N-Niisan!" Idate gasped, trying to shake free of the memory.

Sakura whirled towards him, seeing his state of panic.

"Idate?" She asked, her tone a well practiced mix of gentle calm and firm urgency. Her own emotions always seemed to take a back seat when she saw others in states of distress, replaced with the need to help them.

"N-Nothing! I'm fine!" Idate muttered, almost moved by her concern, but not enough. He couldn't trust her. She was a ninja.

Sakura eyed how the flames were spreading.

"Sasuke-kun, Naruto! We can't stay here. The fire's too strong!"

"We'll have to dive into the ocean!" Sasuke agreed, after destroying yet another water clone. "We should be close enough to swim to the port from here!"

Sakura nodded. There was no other option.

"Idate, can you swim?" She asked, turning to their freaked out client.

"Y-Yeah of course…"

She coughed a little from the smoke, her eyes stinging.

"Hurry! I'll cover you, so go first!" She ordered, fighting to keep her eyes open against the stinging smoke. As annoying as it was, it was actually the perfect cover they'd need to get away. "This smoke will help you escape unnoticed."

When he didn't move, she gently grabbed on to his arm. "Idate—"

"You can forget about it!" He said, abruptly jerking away from her.

"Huh?"

"You're tricking me into becoming a decoy!" He accused.

"What are you talking about?!" Naruto shouted back in exasperation.

"You're trying to get the enemy's attention on me while you guys get the hell out of here!"

"Is that what happened before Idate?" Sakura asked gently, nearing him again. He was thrown off by the understanding concern in her eyes—but that had to be a trick to! After all, Aoi-sensei acted like he understood him…

"That's nonsense!" Naruto argued, before being drawn back into combat with another clone.

"No! I don't trust ninja!" He was frantic.

"Just get out of here already! Having you stay will only be a burden to us!" Sasuke shouted back, once again flooding Idate's mind with images of his burning brother.

Go! Having you stay with me will only be a burden to me!

"Hurry up and go!" Naruto growled.

"There's no way we'd use you as a decoy!" All gentleness had dropped from her tone, replacing it with only a firm, commanding, understanding.

"N-No…I won't…" Idate muttered backing away.

Sakura gasped as she saw a water clone rise up behind him…she quickly ran for the ship's mast, and tugged with all her strength…she hadn't been walking around lugging twice her body the past two and a half months for nothing.

"Shannaro!" She growled, uprooting the mast in a force of pure muscle and will. "Idate, get down!" She commanded, swinging the heavy beam, taking out all of the clones in the mast's radius.

She brought the beam back up, facing him with a stern look.

"You have to trust me, Idate! I promise I'll protect you!" She caught a glint out of the corner of her eye. Behind her, a water clone had risen up and thrown a kunai straight at Idate. Her eyes widened.

"Watch out!" If she tackled him out of the way, he'd hit his head on the ships floor or side…he wouldn't be able to finish the race with a concussion. Her only option was to intercept. She ran to Idate sliding in front of him and throwing her arms out to the side in time for the kunai to bury itself in her shoulder instead of his side. She gave a quick cry of pain, her right hand flying to the wound to hold the kunai steady.

Sasuke's head shot towards her, his heart hammering, eyes wide with concern. It didn't take him long to put together what happened as he took in the scene. She'd been reckless again and used her own body to shield Idate from danger. And she'd been injured because of it. Just like when Gaara had attacked him…except that at least made sense. He was her teammate, but this jerk didn't deserve her risking life and limb for him, so why'd she go that far?! More importantly, he should have been able to take care of these clones before she'd had to get herself hurt. This was his fault! He wasn't strong enough, just like before!

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto called in concern, before his attention was driven back to the clone that was attacking him…it would be fine. Sakura would be fine. She was tough and had survived way worse before. And she knew how to take care of wounds…she'd be fine.

"Sa-Sakura…" Idate gasped, wide eyed. Why would she—but she was a ninja! Why would she risk her life for him?! Was she serious when she said she wouldn't use him as a diversion? She had to be…why else would she have gone so far, even using herself as a shield to keep him safe? Could he…could he really trust her?

"Hurry, go on ahead. I promise we'll be right behind you." Her voice was high with pain, but even. Her viridian eyes stared up at him determinedly, reassuringly.

"U-Uhuh…" He nodded, unable to even formulate words. The girl he'd written off as cute and seemingly kind, though ultimately a ninja and thus untrustworthy had been anything but…she was cute, kind, caring, strong, and dead set on protecting him. He couldn't argue with that. Not anymore. Not when it might get her more hurt. He turned around and dove straight into the water on the port side, the smoke and ship blocking him from view.

Sakura glanced back at the kunai in her shoulder.

"It's pretty deep. Normally I wouldn't risk taking it out but…I won't be able to swim well with it in. Not that taking it out will be all that much better, my shoulder's damaged either way…but it'll be slightly easier to maneuver without it in…I would just use my chakra to run on the water, but it'll make me too easy a target…so out and swimming it is."

She carefully grasped the kunai handle and did her best to pull it out straight, unfortunately because of the angle, she didn't quite succeed, making the wound larger.

"Damnit!" She hissed in pain. She didn't have time to treat it now, she'd take care of it when they caught up with Idate and got to shore.

Sakura, Naruto, and Sasuke dove in to the water, not long after Idate. Their client had proven himself to be a strong swimmer…he was no where in sight when they jumped in, having already nearly made it to shore.

They started paddling their way to shore, Sakura biting her lip hard to keep from the shouting in pain. Compared to her kekkei genkai, it was really nothing…she could deal. But just because she could handle it didn't mean it didn't hurt a lot. Every move of her shoulder sent a sharp wave of pain through her, the salt water of the sea stung at the cut, and she was still bleeding pretty badly.

"Sakura-chan, is your wound ok?" Naruto asked, worried. She was moving slower than them, and with the way she was biting her lip, he could only guess how much pain she was in.

"I'm fine. A wound like this is nothing." But even as she said that, both boys could detect the pain in her voice. "Just keep going."

"Those Ame Ninja, you mean?" Sasuke asked looking back at her.

"Hah! They're nothing!" Naruto waved off.

Sakura shook her head. "We didn't beat them, they're still out there. And more than that, they used water clones, which means we're in their element right now. As long as we're in the water they have the advantage. And since none of them attacked us with poison senbon, that means it's their leader's trick. He wasn't with them, which means he's probably on the Island already. Idate's in danger."

"Oh my god! Idate might be in danger!" Naruto shouted, the thought just dawning on him.

"Yeah…that's what I just said!" Sakura snapped, but her annoyance died when Naruto suddenly disappeared under the water. "Naruto?!"

"They're here!" Sasuke growled, diving down after their teammate.

Sakura took a deep breath and followed, praying her shoulder didn't get too much in her way.

"Naruto!"

Sasuke's eyes narrowed in annoyance. These guys were so frustrating.

One of the Ame nin summoned more water clones, which immediately surrounded Sakura and Sasuke, grabbing them and dragging them further under.

Sakura struggled against them, but she could already tell this was a very bad situation for her. Her shoulder injury reduced her maneuverability and made it much harder to swim. The pain of it made it difficult to fight them off. She was tired from pulling up the mast, the added weight of her chakra cuffs, and continuing blood loss. The biggest issue was her lung capacity. She'd trained herself to breathe as a dancer, primarily holding her oxygen in her upper chest. Her breaths weren't as deep as Sasuke's, who was used to breathing all the way through his diaphragm for his ninjutsu, or Naruto's, who always made sure to load up on air so his voice carried. She was going to run out of air faster than them.

The sight of Sakura in danger spurred Naruto's will to fight. He managed to wriggle free from his captors and kick them away, summoning his shadow clones.

"What good will those do you? They might work on dry land, but down here, water clones rule." An Amenin informed him. Those oxygen masks weren't just for show. They allowed them to breathe and speak under water. "In any case, those clones don't fool me. I've got a hold of the original, and I'll keep holding on until he runs out of air."

Naruto's shadow clones all swam to the ocean floor, settling in a circle and holding out their right hands. Each clone summoned a rasengan into their palm, the swirl of chakra causing the water to churn and rotate as well, creating a whirlpool.

The chakra infused water cyclone was enough to dissipate the water clones, and catch their enemies in the swirling current.

"Incredible…his chakra's infused with the whirlpool…"

Sasuke stared down at Naruto. What the hell was this? When had he learned this power?!

Naruto kicked up towards the surface, happy to have finally been able to put his training to good use.

Free from the clones that'd been tugging him down, Sasuke swam up against the spiraling current as well. Sakura, though, was not so lucky. The whirlpool was too strong for her to swim against with her shoulder injury, and she was just about out of oxygen. She didn't have the strength left to get back to the surface, and felt herself being pulled deeper under the water, her vision fading.

Naruto and Sasuke both broke the surface gasping for breath.

"Where's Sakura?" Sasuke asked, immediately noting the absence of pink anywhere in his line of vision.

"Shit! Her shoulder!" Naruto gasped.

Sasuke's eyes widened in fear and both were diving back down the next second to find her. Sakura was always easy to spot, even under water, her coloring stood out, vivid and vibrant against almost any scenery. Naruto swam faster, reaching her first. He carefully brought her uninjured arm around his neck and immediately kicked towards the surface.

Seeing that Naruto had her, Sasuke swam for the surface as well, trying and failing to ignore the bitter feeling that Naruto had reached her before he did.

"Hold on, Sakura-chan! I've got you! Hang in there!" Naruto shouted. The second he was above sea level, he'd pulled Sakura on to his back and pushed himself on top of the water…running her to shore would be faster than swimming.

Sasuke watched Naruto run by him, piggy backing a clearly unconscious Sakura as he went. Again, that bitter feeling coursed through Sasuke, his jaw clenching painfully. He took a deep breath before pushing himself on to the water as well and running after them.

---

When Sasuke reached the beach, he saw Naruto kneeling over an unconscious Sakura, gently shaking her. Sasuke joined him, kneeling over her as well. To most his expression looked serious but more or less unbothered, but to those who knew him, namely Naruto, he could see how worried and upset Sasuke was.

"Hey Sakura-chan! Come on! Come on, pull yourself together!"

When Naruto received no response, he gulped. He guessed…he had to do it…mouth to mouth was the only way. His face felt warm as he began to lean in, and he just knew he was blushing.

Sasuke watched him at first, his brow furrowed, confused about what Naruto was doing, but when he realized he was leaning in towards Sakura's face with his lips puckered and red across his cheeks, Sasuke put two and two together. And he was not having it. That was not the correct way to do CPR! Didn't the Dead Last learn anything at the academy?

"Out of the way, Loser! That's not how you do it!" Sasuke said, roughly shoving Naruto aside.

"Ow! Hey!"

Sasuke straightened Sakura so she was lying on her back. He gently tipped her chin back to open her airway, then placed his ear to her chest to listen for her breathing, counting to ten in his head. When he heard nothing, he folded one hand on top of the other and placed them at the center of her chest, recalling the rhythm and strength he was supposed to use as he administered chest compressions. He wasn't sure if he was doing it right, this was out of his comfort zone…this sort of thing was always more of Sakura's department. But there was no other choice, and he wasn't about the let the Dead Last do it wrong and molest Sakura while she was unconscious and dying. When he counted thirty compressions—that was how many he was supposed to do, right?—and there was still no change in Sakura, he leaned over to her face, pinching her nose with one hand and gently opening her mouth with the other…his heart hammered uncomfortably hard as he brought his mouth to hers. But this was no different than Sakura pressing her lips to his for a massive chakra transfer…their mouths were open this time, but in reality it was really no different. Before was a lip contact chakra transfer, this was a mouth contact air transfer. It wasn't a kiss. She'd understand that and wouldn't freak out…thank gods she wasn't one of his obsessive fangirls though, otherwise he'd have probably just let Naruto do it, incorrectly or not. If he had to be administering mouth-to-mouth to someone, it was better her than anyone else he knew. He couldn't remember how many breaths he was supposed to deliver…was it two of three? He went with three, before returning to chest compressions.

It worked. He'd only had to press down twice after mouth-to-mouth for her viridian eyes to fly open as she coughed up water, immediately rolling to her side. Sasuke was breathing hard, the faintest flush coloring his cheeks. He felt his heart hammering against his ribs, and noticed one of his hands was faintly shaking as he pulled away from her. He quickly fisted it, burying it deep in his pocket. Shit, she'd almost died! She'd almost died because he hadn't been fast enough to help her out of the water, which wouldn't have been a problem for her in the first place if she hadn't gotten that shoulder injury protecting their asshole client, because he hadn't been strong enough to handle all of those damn water clones! When had he gotten so damn weak?!

Sakura gagged and spluttered up water, taking large painful breaths.

"Drowning sucks! Let's never do that again!"

"Sakura-chan! Are you ok?"

Sakura, finally managing to fill her lungs with enough oxygen and calm her coughing, looked up at the two of them, taking in Naruto's concerned face, Sasuke's frustrated gaze with hints of worry, and a profound lack of their client.

"I'm fine." She gasped out.

"That's a half lie…" She could feel her shoulder burning, hot blood still spilling over her sea-cooled skin. Her lungs burned and she had a headache. But that would pass, and her shoulder, while definitely an annoyance, wasn't life threatening. She wasn't gonna die or anything, but she was pretty far from fine.

"Where's Idate?" She asked, pushing herself up so she was kneeling with them.

Sasuke felt that bitter feeling roil through him again. She almost died and the first thing out of her mouth is 'where's Idate?' She really was way too responsible. She should be more concerned about herself for a change…or at least, that's what he felt, although he knew it was irrational. Logic and duty told him she was right. Idate was their client. This was their mission. They'd just been attacked…they had to find him as soon as possible.

"We don't have any time to spare. We need to meet up with him." He answered brusquely.

Naruto grumbled under his breath, but stood up none the less. Sakura struggled to her feet as well. Sasuke lead the way down the beach…it was easier to focus with his eyes forward, not having to look at Sakura and being reminded of his failure.

---

"Idate!" Naruto called when their client finally came into view, and the situation wasn't good.

Idate was on a rocky outcrop of the beach, lying on his back, looking pale and badly kicked around. It had begun to rain, the cold drops hitting his skin and lowering his temperature, making him look even more pale. A man with turquoise hair in a full sleeveless lavender and plum bodysuit stood not far from Idate's unconscious form, casually holding an umbrella. As team 7 got closer, they could see he was wearing an Ame hitai-ate.

"So this is the Jonin squad leader who uses poison senbon…and that umbrella…I get the feeling he doesn't just carry it around for inclement weather…If he's here, then Idate has probably been poisoned!" Her eyes widened and she wasted no time in darting to Idate's side, much to the surprise of the boys.

The Ame Jonin eyed her with cool curiosity, taking a step towards her and Idate.

"Are you the boss of those Ame ninja then?!" Naruto accused, drawing the man's attention to him and away from Sakura.

"Apparently they weren't up to the job. In a contest of Genin, it appears the Konoha genin are the stronger." He answered, noting how Naruto and Sasuke didn't even appear injured. At least the girl had been, so his underlings weren't complete flunkies. But if her shiny pink hair was anything to go by, she wasn't even all that much of an opponent.

Sakura ignored the man in favor of assessing Idate's condition. She spotted a cut that must have been the entry wound for the poison, given its discoloration. His hand was bruised, as was his chest, though thankfully nothing appeared to be broken. There was a rather large bump on the side of his head, which might mean he was also dealing with a concussion, but it was impossible to tell, given that the haziness of his eyes could have equally been due to poison as it could have been from the concussion. The cold of the rain wasn't helping his condition either.

"This isn't good…"

But she didn't voice that assessment out loud, instead giving Idate a reassuring smile when his cloudy eyes focused on her, as she bandaged the cut.

"But Genin, no matter how strong they are, are no match against me." The man continued, smirking at Naruto and Sasuke.

"Well let's find out!" Naruto shouted, rising to the bait.

Both he and Sasuke leapt at the man, who dodged around their taijutsu with ease, before leaping into the sky.

"Above!" Sasuke warned.

The man smirked evilly, giving a powerful swipe with his umbrella. A rush of impossibly strong wind forced Naruto and Sasuke to the ground, the rock cracking around them. Sakura quickly threw herself over Idate, trying to shield him from anymore damage.

The gust ended as the Jonin landed, observing the children cowering on the ground.

"Hmph, so that's your level, after all. No more of a challenge than Idate, really. I'll use the same method I used on Idate to take care of you brats then. No need to waste any of my chakra." He said, launching a barrage of senbon at them.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto cried in concern, trying to block as many of the needles as he could from hitting her, but he failed.

"Idate!" Sakura pressed herself against him again, trying to keep him from getting dosed with anymore poison. She didn't know how long it had been since he first had it introduced to his system, but she didn't want anymore added. She already was uncertain of her antidote, and if there was too much poison in his blood stream, it might not be enough. Her flinging herself over his body to shield him was the last thing Idate registered before going unconscious.

Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura had all taken a varying number of needles to multiple parts of their bodies. Sakura unfortunately, had taken two to her good shoulder, since she'd been using her back to shield Idate.

"D-Damned needles…" Naruto grunted, attempting to lift his arm, and wincing through out the process…He could feel his limbs slowly growing numb. So much for not getting hit…

"Those are specially poisoned senbon made by Amegakure. No matter how strong you are, in a few minutes, you'll be in hell."

"Does that mean the poison is that fatal? Or is that when the pain starts? Judging from Idate, I'm guessing pain, not death. He's still alive, but he doesn't look good. More importantly…a few minutes might be hyperbole, but we are on a clock now…We need to take the antidote as soon as possible before the poison has a chance to do too much damage. And we've only got a few hours at best before time's up."

"Don't look down on us, asshole!" Naruto grunted, shakily pushing himself onto his feet. This tool didn't know that they had an antidote and would be totally fine! They had nothing to worry about if they could tough out the pain and take him down! But he didn't manage to stay up long, collapsing back to his knees.

The sound of distant cheers made them all pause. The Jonin turned his head in the direction of the sound.

"Looks like Fukusuke reached The Modoroki Shrine." He glanced back at the weakened and wincing genin. "Die gasping. It's a death that fits you Genin brats well." He smirked before jumping away.

Sakura waited until she couldn't sense him anymore before she got to work. She leaned Idate up a little and slipped one of her pills into Idate's mouth, along with some water, covering his mouth and nose to force him to swallow. All the while ignoring the pain now from both her shoulders. He'd been exposed to the poison the longest, so he needed the antidote first…she just hoped it worked.

She then turned her attention to Sasuke and Naruto.

"We need to get the senbon out first."

"Sasuke-kun, Naruto, lean towards me so I can remove the needles."

They were too weak to actually get up and go to her, but they leaned in as close as they could. Sakura took a deep breath, to steady her hands. Poison was making her light headed, and every movement of her shoulders sent rippling pain down her arms and back. She took another deep breath and decided to work on Sasuke first. Because of the Nine Tails, Naruto healed very quickly…she didn't know if it would apply to poison as well, but she figured he was a bit more likely to survive without third party intervention than the rest of them were.

She quickly but carefully pulled the needles out of Sasuke's arm and shin, before shifting to Naruto and ridding him of the senbon as well. She handed them the bottle of pills, before turning to examine the senbon in her shoulder.

"Take one…Idate should recover consciousness soon. We need to get him out of the rain to somewhere warm and dry. I'll be able to patch up our wounds better somewhere that isn't down pouring anyways…" She frowned, given the injury to her left shoulder, she had no way to accurately remove the senbon from her right.

Naruto and Sasuke each took some of Sakura's antidote. They could start to feel the effects immediately. Their heads began to clear, their limbs feeling a less heavy. They weren't instantly cured, but they were definitely getting better. To say Sakura's antidote worked was an understatement.

Sasuke quickly moved to Sakura's side to pull out the needles for her. Since her other shoulder was hurt, he couldn't brace himself against her normally, so he awkwardly laid his hand on the middle of her back.

"S-Sasuke-kun?" Sakura was glad he was behind her and couldn't see her face…the touch had been so sudden and unexpected…she knew what he was doing and why he was doing it, but in her poison induced haziness she hadn't mentally prepped herself for the physical contact his actions entailed.

"Tch." He wanted to yell at her for not having taken care of her own injuries and poisoning before theirs, but he couldn't, seeing as she was physically unable to do so thanks to the needles location. Still, it annoyed him that she spoke as if she wasn't injured or hurt at all. Out of all of them, with the exception of Idate, she was the one who'd taken the most physical damage.

He pulled out the senbon, impressed but not all that surprised by the minimal reaction she gave. Sakura's pain tolerance had grown tremendously, since she'd started training to control her curse.

Sakura quickly swallowed a pill, relieved when she felt the effects kicking in.

"It works! I actually made an effective antidote! Shannaro! I hope Tsunade-sama will be impressed."

Naruto and Sasuke each wrapped one of Idate's arms around their necks, dragging him up, while Sakura walked ahead scouting for some shelter. Thankfully, she found a cave in a wooded area more inland. She multitasked, gathering the driest wood she could find as she went, and it took practically no time at all for them to settle in and get a fire going, courtesy of Sasuke's jutsu.

Now that they were no longer out in the open in a downpour, Sakura set about drying Idate off and applying her ointment to his bruises. She didn't have any ice for the bump on his head, but she took care of everything else within her power, before turning her attention to Sasuke and Naruto. They weren't in all that bad condition, aside from the few needle pricks, which Sakura examined. The edges of the small wounds were no longer discolored, and she had to fight the smile making its way to her lips.

"My antidote really worked! I can't believe it! It didn't just work a little, it really neutralized all the poison!"

She had taken care of Naruto first this time, and just finished bandaging Sasuke, when Idate stirred.

"What do y'know! He's waking up!"

Idate pushed himself on up on to his elbows, one of his legs bending up, wincing in pain. Sakura was immediately at his side, her arms reaching for his shoulders to help him sit up, oblivious to the dirty look Sasuke sent their way from the corner of his eye.

"How are you feeling? You were exposed to the poison longer than we were so you're going to feel a little achey. You need to take it slow."

"Where is he? Where's Aoi?"

"He disappeared…" Sasuke answered, angling his head to face him more. "So that Ameninja's name is Aoi?" And how exactly did he know that? Sasuke's eyes narrowed on Idate suspiciously. If those two had history, it made their job harder. When personal feelings were involved, things tended to become lethal.

Idate looked resolutely away, still unsure about how to feel towards team 7. Could he trust them? He almost had given in and let himself, but then he'd seen Aoi and was reminded of why he didn't…

"You know him, don't you Idate?" Sakura questioned, her voice the same gentle but firm tone she used while administering first aid.

"When we got in Aoi's way and he attacked us, the way he was talking about Idate was way too familiar to have just met him. Same with the damage he did…he could just be a sadist, but the satisfaction it looked like he was getting seemed too personal and smug, like he'd just proven himself to be right about something. We weren't away from Idate for that that long. Twenty-five minutes tops…that wouldn't be enough time to establish a deep enough disagreement for Aoi to get that level of satisfaction from being proven right, unless it dates back to something long standing…"

Idate looked up at Sakura from the corner of his eye…she still hadn't taken care of her shoulder, which she'd wounded taking a hit for him. Before, he wanted to trust her but didn't because of the ninja she'd thrown her lot in with. But she'd used herself as a shield to protect him twice now. She'd taken care of his injuries, worried about his condition, even tried to help him sit up. She didn't look at him like it was his fault she got hurt, she didn't blame him. When she spoke to him, even after everything, she was gentle, kind, and worried for his safety. He could trust her…and if she trusted the loud mouth idiot and constipated jerk, then maybe he could trust them too.

"He was…" He couldn't bring himself to look at any of them fully, even as he heard Naruto shift to face him. "…a sensei I knew when I was back in Konoha."

"What? You really are from Konoha then?!" Naruto gasped. They'd talked about it on the boat and Sakura had said he probably was…he wasn't in the habit of doubting her. But with Idate's whole attitude towards ninja, specifically from Konoha, he just couldn't wrap his head around it.

"Aoi…after he…betrayed Konoha, he became a Jonin of Amegakure."

"Hang on, back up! What the hell are you talking about?"

Idate grunted as he pushed himself into a more fully upright position. Immediately Sakura's gentle touch was on his back helping him.

"Don't push too much, take it easy. You still need to rest a little more." Once he was sitting, and she was sure he wouldn't collapse, she glanced down at his hand. "That thing you've been holding, your switch blade…was it a gift from someone? You're very protective of it…you haven't let go of it once, not even in your sleep." Her own hand went to her neck, tracing the chain of her mother's necklace. She would have clutched at the pendant, but she kept it tucked under her dress during missions, not wanting it to get damaged.

Idate looked down at the knife, his fingers shaking and stiff as he forced them open. He let out a growl of frustration. "Damn…I'd come all this way but it's all for nothing!"

"You're giving up too early!" Naruto growled. "And you're telling us you were a shinobi of Konoha?!" No way! Konoha Shinobi never gave up! Not him, not Sakura, not Bushy Brows, definitely not Hinata! They kept fighting no matter how impossible it seemed! And if this guy even once had been a Konoha shinobi, he should know that, damnit!

"You got the wrong guy…I haven't even thought about Konoha since the day I walked away from it." Idate answered, his voice low and dejected.

"Why'd you leave?" Sakura asked softly.

"I was depressed after I failing the first test of the Chunin Exams…I didn't know what to do. That's when Aoi-sensei approached me. He told me not to take it so hard, that there were other ways to become a Chunin. He said he knew a way. I…I was so hopeful and desperate, I believed him. I still had a shot. I could still prove to my brother I wasn't a disappointment…that I could be a real ninja. He said I'd have to do exactly as he told me, and I easily agreed. He said there were some items I needed to bring him…the legendary scroll of sealing, and the hilt of the Blade of the Thunder God, believed to have been wielded by the second Hokage. I had done what he said, so I thought he would make me a Chunin…That's when he revealed himself. He told me I could be a Chunin in Amegakure. He said we'd leave Konoha together, and take those objects as gifts to our new home. He told me I couldn't stay, because Konoha would severely punish me for stealing their treasures. It didn't matter that I did it because he tricked me. He told me…If you ever want to succeed in this world, you shouldn't put so much faith in others. He asked me if I was coming with him of not, said that no matter what I did, I was a rogue ninja now. I'd be chained in jail for life…if I was lucky. Ever since then, I haven't returned to Village. I'm an irresponsible man who can't do a single thing right. I've never been of any use to anyone, but even so…Boss Jirocho believed in me. Even though he knew I was no good, he still put his faith in me. And yet I…!" His hand tightened around the his knife.

Naruto watched him, his face serious. Idate was just like him. The old him. A Jonin had tried to trick him into stealing a scroll with a forbidden jutsu…the shadow clone jutsu. He'd been the one to first tell him about the demon he carried in him. He'd told Naruto that he'd never be accepted in the Village and tried to kill him. If it hadn't been for Iruka-sensei, he'd have died right there…Idate had said he never felt of use to anyone. It was just how Naruto used to feel. He'd go around and around and get nowhere. Even as it got better, with Iruka and team 7's support, he'd still felt it until recently. Until the Chunin exams…

"I'm completely worthless…" Idate mumured, tears pooling at his eyes and dropping down his face. "Aoi said it and he was right…I'd be better off dead!"

"Idiot!" Naruto growled, jumping to his feet. "You just said it yourself! There's a person who still trusts you!"

And even if you do mess up…I-If you ask me, you're a proud failure…Y-You're really inspiring to watch, because you're not perfect…and…because you make mistakes, but still have the guts to get back up and keep fighting. That's what I consider true strength…I…I believe you're an incredibly strong person, Naruto-kun.

He stepped closer grabbing Idate's shoulders. "One person is enough! This race isn't over yet, so don't even think about quitting! You never know how things will turn out unless you try until the very end!"

"Yeah but…" Idate mumbled, tears streaming down his face.

"Stand up now!" Naruto ordered, tugging Idate up.

"Stop it Naruto! He's not recovered yet!" Sakura interjected.

"If he can't run, then I'll carry him on me back the whole way if I have to!" Naruto argued stubbornly, dropping Idate unceremoniously and making Sakura scowl at him.

"The other runner has already reached the Modoroki shrine by now!" Idate shouted in defeat.

Naruto grabbed him by his collar, getting in his face.

"You're not quitting!"

"Stop it Naruto!" He was handling Idate too roughly! She rose, but before she could even take a step forward, Sasuke's hand shot out wrapping firmly around her wrist.

"Sakura…"

"What are you doing?" She asked, surprised by his sudden actions.

"Stay back. Leave them." Naruto might actually be able to get through to him, and they had a job to do. They had to make sure the Wasabi won the race. This might be the only way right now. More importantly, Sakura hadn't attended to her own injury at all. She should stop worrying about that jerk and let Naruto take over.

"Boss Jirocho's counting on you and you don't want to keep him waiting! Pull yourself together! If you run away now, you'll be a loser for your entire life! For all the people who are depending on you and believing in you, you gotta show 'em what you've got!"

Idate stared up at him, wide eyed. All the people counting on him flashed through his head. Boss Jirocho, the rest of the family, the old man who'd lent him the boat…all of port Degarashi was counting on him! His brows furrowed in determination.

"Alright! I'll do it! Naruto, please take me there!" He had people he couldn't let down. And he trusted Sakura, and Sakura trusted Naruto and Sasuke. So he would too. He had no choice. He had too.

"You got it, now let's go!"

Less than a minute later, Idate was situated on Naruto's back and they were sprinting from the cave out into the rain.

Sakura stepped forward to follow them, but Sasuke still had a firm hold on her wrist.

"Uh, S-Sasuke-kun, we should follow them. If they get attacked, Naruto will have a hard time fighting with Idate on his back."

"Your injury comes first." What was her problem anyways? Did she forget she was still bleeding?

"Oh." Sakura glanced back at her shoulder. "Right…"

"I've kinda been putting it off since I can't really reach…it's an awkward location to self treat, and with how deep the kunai went, it's gonna need medical ninjutsu or stitches…I can't do it myself…I was hoping if we finished the race quick enough I could ask one of the healers for the Wasabi to deal with it."

When Sakura didn't immediately move past turning her head to look at her shoulder, Sasuke sighed. So that was the problem, or part of it anyways.

"Sit." He ordered tugging her down. She didn't fight him, settling down gracefully and facing away from him. Her hair was still pretty damp from sea and rain, darkening some of the strands from their usual petal pink to a deeper sunset pink. The salt from the ocean making the ends curl and wave a little as they dried. He studied the two wounds on her shoulders hesitating a little. Sakura didn't have many clothes. Clothes were usually expensive. And unless she took her dress off entirely, he'd have to rip the area around the wounds to access them…no wonder she'd tried to leave them be, and hadn't tried asking for their help in treating them. But it was stupid to prioritize modesty or money over health. Although, as far as the latter went, when hadn't Sakura prioritized money over her own health?

Sakura was once again grateful that she was facing away from him, so he couldn't see how red her face was. She could sense his hesitance. Clearly he hadn't realized what treating her wounds entailed when he took the responsibility upon himself.

"…Just rip it." She said quietly.

He nodded and removed a kunai carefully slicing wider tears in the back of her dress. The puncture wounds from the senbon would be the simplest thing to deal with, and he more or less knew what to do for them after watching Sakura treat his and Naruto's, so he dealt with those first without a problem. Once a bandaged was in place, he turned his attention to the more serious injury. It was deep and still sluggishly bleeding, and he wasn't entirely sure what to do…again, Sakura seemed to pick up on his hesitance.

"Clean it first, the way you did with the senbon injury."

"And after that?" He asked, already beginning to wipe the area clean with the disinfectant.

"Since neither of us know medical ninjutsu, it'll need stitches for now. I have dental floss and a needle, but I won't be able to do it myself…"

"Walk me through it." He ordered.

He closely followed each of her instructions, but Sasuke was a fast learner. After getting the first stitch, he didn't need her to continue telling him what to do.

"Thank you for this…"

He gave no acknowledgment he heard her, although she knew she'd said it loud enough for him to hear. In his mind it was a ridiculous thing to thank him for. She took care of their injuries all the time and they didn't thank her for it. They were teammates. They worked together. Doing this for her was a given.

They were both silent as he worked.

"This feels so…intimate." She tried to push the thought away, because it sent her heart hammering, and she feared the increase in blood pressure would only make her lose more blood, not to mention making Sasuke's task more difficult.

"Medical ninjutsu…why didn't you ever try to learn it?" Sasuke surprisingly broke the silence…since she'd mentioned it, it had him wondering.

"I did try…When mom got sick, it was the fist thing I tried. But…it's not really something you can self teach or learn from a scroll. High risk too. The way you have to move and apply your chakra is completely different then normal jutsu, and nothing explained it well enough for me to get. I still tried hoping I could figure it out on my own…but…" Sakura suppressed a shudder as she remembered her failed attempt to heal an injured animal she found in the woods. It had gone gruesomely wrong. "If you do it wrong, you just end up killing of maiming whatever you try to heal faster…After murdering an injured bunny I was trying to heal, I decided to switch gears and just focus on trying to mix medicines and learning non-chakra based procedures…"

"Hn…" That made sense. Even for someone as smart as Sakura, you couldn't learn everything on your own, otherwise they wouldn't need sensei.

"This'll probably scar. The benefit to medical ninjutsu is that it doesn't leave scars, unless the wound is truly terrible…I don't mind having scars though."

"They mean I didn't just sit back and let someone get injured for me…they mean I was useful…That I tried."

"You should." Sasuke's eyes narrowed. She shouldn't have had to have scars. Signs of injuries she'd gotten by taking hits for others…Injuries she shouldn't have gotten in the first place, because he should have been able to stop them. He should have had enough power to keep her from getting hurt. That was the bare minimum amount of power he should have. But he didn't. He was lacking. Too weak to even keep his teammates safe. Definitely too weak to kill Itachi…why was he so weak?!

She felt his mood darkening, but didn't know why or what to say to comfort him. Instead, she took a drink of water. She hadn't lost enough blood to be in any danger, but it was enough too make her a little light headed…

"Done." He murmured.

"Oh, right, so now put some ointment on it and bandage it. Then we should pack up and go." She was still worried about Idate and Naruto. They had to catch up fast.

"Hn…" Despite his darkened mood, his touch was gentle. The last thing he wanted to do was cause Sakura any more pain.

As his calloused, warm fingers brushed over her shoulder, it took way more mental effort than she liked to keep the thoughts away from the arousal genjutsus Kurenai ran her through.

"Eeeeekkkk! What if he just turned us around and kissed up right now!"

"No. He won't do that and we're absolutely not thinking about that!"

"Oh yes we are!"

"Why are you such a pervert?!"

"You mean, why are we such a pervert. Besides, it's only natural. We've read the medical books, we're exactly the age to be going through puberty and thinking about this kind of stuff."

"Yeah but now's not the time!"

"Have you seen our life?! It's never the time! We gotta take our kicks where we can get 'em, shannaro!"

"I hate you sometimes, you know that?"

"Um…Sasuke-kun?" She asked when he finished bandaging her shoulder.

"What?" He moved away from her, as she began gathering her first aid supplies and he set about putting out the fire.

"I needed CPR earlier, didn't I?"

He froze for a second, staring into the fire. That had been an unexpectedly scary moment for him…she hadn't been breathing.

"…Yeah." He muttered softly.

"Was…was it you who did it?" Sasuke and Naruto had both been kneeling close to her and she'd turned on her side away from them the second she regained consciousness, too caught up in coughing up water to be sure of who actually had given her CPR.

"Aa…" His eyes pulled away from the fire, settling on her face.

"Thank you…for saving me, Sasuke-kun." She said, a soft, shy, smile on her face. Her cheeks a light pink, though it was hard to tell in the fire light, and most of all, her eyes were shining with that emotion he couldn't name that warmed and lightened his entire being. Unintentionally, his mind shifted away from how he'd been too weak and too slow, to how soft her lips had been against his own. Realizing what he'd just thought, his eyes widened, quickly snapping away from her and back to the fire he was supposed to be smothering.

"…Aa…" He acknowledged, the warm, pleased feeling yet to fully settle.

---

Sakura and Sasuke hadn't exactly caught up to Naruto and Idate, but they were finally within view. Naruto had just begun charging up an incredibly long stone staircase that lead to the Modoroki Shrine.

They paused staring up at the monster set of stairs in exasperation. Sasuke had his hands on his knees, while Sakura rested against the wood beam of the arch framing the steps to the shrine, her breaths heavy. She was tired from the blood loss she'd suffered.

"He's kidding right? How does he do it?" She panted.

"No one ever accused that kid of not having energy." Sasuke muttered. What kind of stamina did Naruto have?! The trace remains of lingering light and warmth he'd felt from Sakura were replaced once again by the dark, cold feeling that he wasn't enough. He was losing, to the Dead Last of all people!

Sasuke took off up the steps, his annoyance and frustration taking over his actions.

"Why am I not surprised. Those two are always so competitive…It's nothing new but…it's starting to worry me…it feels different now. More intense…"

Sakura shook her head and took a deep breath, summoning her energy. She couldn't fall too far behind them, or she'd never catch up…despite her exhaustion, Sakura started up the steps as well, Sasuke well ahead of her, Naruto and Idate well ahead of him.

---

When Naruto and Idate reached the shrine, Idate finally felt strong enough to run again. Sakura's special medicine was working, and while his body still hurt, he knew he could push through it. While he had sort of bonded with Naruto a little on the way up, comparing their chunin exam tenth questions his brother had pulled, there was no point to letting Naruto continue to carry him. The blond was too slow with his added weight and getting up the stairs with him on his back was a huge feat in and of itself…he may have been underestimating Naruto a bit. But now he needed to catch up to Fukusuke and make up for lost time. And he couldn't let team 7 run the whole race for him, he had to do this with his own two feet or there was no point. He needed to be fast. So he'd sprinted ahead, deciding to trust that Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke would catch up when they could.

He could finally see Fukusuke ahead of him, a bit passed half way over the rope bridge connecting Nagi Island to Ouzu Island. He'd almost caught him!

Suddenly a jolt of electricity sliced across his chest, sending him falling backwards, his muscles spasming.

"This is quite something…" Aoi said, smug smile in place. "I never thought you'd make it this far."

Idate stared wide eyed at the hilt in Aoi's hand. It was The Blade of the Thunder God…one of the items Aoi had tricked him in to stealing.

Aoi noted that Fukusuke cleared the bridge, making it to Ouzu Island, and immediately cut one of the ropes holding the bridge up. If the bridge was rendered impassable, Idate would have no chance. He held his thunder blade up to the other rope.

"Stop!" Idate shouted, which went unheeded by Aoi. He sliced through the second rope, loosening the bridge even more.

"Stop it!" Idate ran at him but once again, Aoi slashed at him with his sword, sending him reeling back again.

"Stop kicking a dead horse. Nobody on earth is a match for the legendary Blade of the Thunder God, said to have been used by the second Hokage. But then, you already know that…you are the one who stole it for me."

"You snake…" Idate growled, pushing himself up again, holding his side where the blade had struck.

A mud ball suddenly came whizzing past his ear. Aoi acted on reflex, opening his umbrella to block the completely pathetic attack.

"Mud balls…it's just like a kid's fight." He sighed.

"Sorry but I didn't have any Kunai knives." Naruto answered boldly, uncaring that this guy had kicked their asses earlier.

"Naruto…" Idate muttered…the blond really caught up with him already? That kid's stamina was crazy!

"You're gonna need more than an umbrella to catch the next ball I throw at you! Shadow clone jutsu!" Three other Narutos appeared, one of them focusing chakra into a swirling ball of energy in the real Naruto's palm. "Here I come!"

Two of the clones charged at Aoi, but were dispelled with one swipe of the Thunder Blade.

"One more time!" His last clone jumped off the real Naruto's shoulders, coming at Aoi from above, but he too was dispelled with a swipe of the sword. Naruto attacked quickly, taking advantage of the brief opening Aoi had left. His rasengan collided with Aoi's Thunder Blade in a clash of energy.

Aoi chucked. "I don't know what you intend to do, but…" He pushed his sword forward, cutting through Naruto's rasengan and pushing Naruto away and to the ground. Aoi grabbed his umbrella.

"Ninja art: Senbon Shower!" He tossed the umbrella in the air. It opened spinning rapidly and sending needles raining down on Naruto, who took several in his legs.

"Too bad. The Blade of the Thunder God cuts through anything." Aoi said, easily catching his umbrella as it fell. "Even chakra itself."

"Naruto!" Idate called in concern. The boy had earned his respect and trust, and he didn't want to see him die now!

Aoi turned his blade on Idate.

"I'm going to make doubly sure this time so nothing troublesome happens again."

"I'm your opponent! Keep your hands off Idate!" Naruto growled, though he could feel the poison starting to seep into his system.

"Humph…still saying such things? Saving each other, protecting each other, trusting each other…pathetic nonsense! Only a weakling needs to depend on others to survive. So they trust people and are easily betrayed. For weaklings like you, it's better to just run away. Isn't that right, Idate? That's what you did, after all…after you stole The Blade of the Thunder God."

Idate stared up at him, jaw clenching. He remembered it…he'd followed Aoi almost all the way to Amegakure, when Konoha ninja caught up with them…Aoi had abandoned him, letting him get caught. His brother had been leading the anbu squad chasing the down. Ibiki had been furious with him and ordered him to surrender himself. He'd refused…he couldn't go back to Konoha, he'd be executed. That was when Aoi showed up again, with a slew of Rain ninja. It had been a trap. Aoi needed Ibiki, a Jonin, to decipher the Scroll of Sealing Idate had stolen for him. Both brothers were taken captive. Ibiki was tortured continuously in front of Idate, but refused to tell Aoi what he wanted to know. So Aoi had threatened Idate instead. His older brother dismissed the threat, saying that whatever his little brother was a shinobi and accepted death without fear. He was wrong. Idate was terrified and didn't want to die, going so far as renouncing his ninja status. That had been the day Ibiki disowned him. Idate was no longer his brother to him. The Village was more important than his blood ties. Ibiki had managed to trip Aoi and knock him into a pot of oil, partially freeing one of his own arms in the process. He'd used a Kunai to free Idate and told him to run, and then set the whole room on fire, trapping himself with Aoi.

Go! Having you stay with me will only be a burden to me!

And he'd left…as the whole room burned down, he'd run away and left his brother to die. He'd turned back just in time to see the warehouse they were kept in explode, the whole thing going up in flames, and taking his brother with it…

"It's appalling that he'd risk his life for such a useless weakling." Aoi taunted, bringing Idate out of his memories. "You could have run back to the village and summoned help, but that would have meant facing up to your crimes. So instead, you just ran away. You don't even have the excuse that he'd died so there was nothing you could do, because the fact was, Ibiki was alive…In that regard, Ibiki was admirable. Not only did he completely endure my interrogation, but he even managed to get back the Forbidden Scroll of Sealing, all without having confessed anything. And to think he did it all for his worthless little brother's sake. You betrayed your village, abandoned your older brother, and came to think only of yourself. You don't trust anyone. You didn't trust your own blood brother who would have given his life for you. Afraid of being accused of your crime, you didn't trust Konoha, your birthplace. You trust nobody, and nobody trusts you. You've learned your lessons well, I couldn't have asked for a better student. As a reward, I'll kill you quickly!" He raised his sword, but three kunai thudding into the ground at his feet stopped him.

Sasuke and Sakura stood not far from Naruto, Sakura breathing hard. Both had one kunai in hand, ready to throw again should Aoi make a move.

"Idate!" Sakura called.

"Sasuke…Sakura-chan! Perfect timing!"

Sakura's eyes immediately took in Naruto on the ground with needles in his legs, and she was by his side in a second, already starting to pull them out.

"Rest Naruto! This ones mine!" Sasuke said, his eyes narrowing.

"Don't act so cool, believe it!" Naruto huffed.

Sakura tried not to wince at how dark Sasuke's tone was.

"This guy's a Jonin. I know Sasuke-kun's gotten stronger, but it's no different then Kakashi-sensei and the bell test. Genin like us can't beat him one on one…but he's too worked up, I already know he won't listen to anything I say right now. On top of that, I'm not in great shape to be all that helpful in a fight, and Naruto needs another dose of antidote…I want to stop him, but there isn't really a better option at the moment."

So even though it felt like a bad idea, even though she was sure something was wrong with Sasuke, she kept quiet and focused on getting all the needles out of Naruto.

"You can't beat me no matter how many of you brats show up." Aoi dismissed. "You'll never defeat me. I'm Aoi of the Rain, Jonin who possesses the Blade of the Thunder God."

"Is that so?" Sasuke activated his sharingan, and grasped his left wrist. "Interesting. The Blade of the Thunder God against my Chidori!" Blue lightening gathered in his left palm and danced up his arm, filling the air with the crackling sound reminiscent of bird song. "Let's test which is better!"

Sakura pulled the last of the needles out of Naruto's leg, handing him the antidote bottle, which he took, popping a pill immediately. He sighed with relief as his head began to clear and his limbs lighted.

"Are you hurt anywhere else?"

"I'm fine, Sakura-chan, believe it!"

With that boisterous affirmation, she turned her attention back to Sasuke and Aoi's battle.

Sasuke's Chidori met the Thunder Blade, energy crackling, but it wasn't long before he was pushed back, residual electricity from the Thunder Blade dancing around him painfully. He didn't stay down long, pulling out a kunai and immediately attacking, but each blow was blocked and parried, until Aoi struck down, Sasuke forced to block with his kunai. They pushed against each other, Sasuke struggling much more than Aoi.

"That Blade of the Thunder God…in history class at the Academy they said that it belonged to the second Hokage…while it looks like pure concentrated lightening, it's actually a solid blade. What was is they taught us about it? The hilt focuses the user's chakra, solidifying it into a blade and infusing it with pure lightening or something like that…and it doesn't require too much chakra either since the lightening comes from the hilt, it only needs a little bit of the wielder's energy, the hilt and lightening does the rest…let's just hope Aoi hasn't mastered it to the level of the Second Hokage…"

"I see the rumors were true. The survivor of the Village's honorable Uchiha clan is a hopeless loser unworthy of his family name. "

Sasuke faltered, Itachi flashing through his mind's eye.

…you are weak…you don't have enough hatred.

He was thrown to the ground with a grunt of pain.

"Sasuke-kun!"

"That asshole doesn't know anything about Sasuke-kun, shannaro!"

She immediately moved towards her fallen teammate, but was stopped short by Idate.

"Run Sakura! He'll show no mercy no matter who the person is! He'll kill us all!" Not her. Idate couldn't let her die. Not the first person he'd let himself trust since Boss Jirocho. Not the cute, kind girl that had jumped in harms way for him and took care of his injuries. If he couldn't finish the race, at the very least he could try to protect her the way she had him. "Get away while you still can!"

Sakura's fist tightened on her kunai. "No way!" She growled.

"Huh?" Why? Why wouldn't she run? She had to save herself!

"We'll protect you no matter what! We promised that, didn't we? You can trust us Idate!"

Aoi smirked. She really was weak if that's what she stood by. She had to see it was hopeless. Her obviously stronger teammates had been taken down easily. What did she think she could do?

"Well then, now all that's left is the wounded rabbit," he taunted eyeing Sakura's tired form before glancing back at Idate. "And my excellent student of course. I'll send you two into the afterlife together, since you seem to care for each other so much."

Sakura tightened her grip on her kunai. She had to do something. Naruto still needed a few minutes for the antidote to fully take care of the poison, and Sasuke was wounded on the ground. Her mobility was reduced…she doubted she'd be able to pull off her dancer's barrage effectively, but it was all she had. She'd just have to rely more on her feet and right arm. She took a deep breath and called up a song, finding her count.

She skipped towards him, leaping when he swung at her and planting herself briefly on the shoulder of his sword arm. She dropped into an arial attempting to use her planted left foot and momentum to throw him but she barely managed to lift him up. He took advantage of her less than ideal position to uppercut her, breaking her contact with him. She managed to catch herself and leap at him again, once more planting herself on his sword shoulder.

"If I can't get him into the air, I can at least try dancing on him while he's grounded the way I did with Kiba when I was first figuring this out…He's more likely to be able to counter, but it should still mess with his chakra somewhat!"

She let herself slide to his back and spun as much as she could, but to her frustration, Aoi twisted and dropped to a roll making it difficult for her to account for his position and keep herself anchored to him. She somehow managed to shift herself through his roll, managing to keep herself on him until he was kneeling, with her once again on his shoulder to stay on, but in the second it took her to readjust, she didn't move quickly enough and he'd grabbed her ankle, roughly throwing her off of him.

She managed to catch herself in a one armed handspring over Sasuke's prone form, skidding back with the momentum, breathing hard.

"Damnit! I'm too tired to move quickly enough for this to work, and if I can't get him in the air where it's harder for him to counter, there's no chance…He's not just gonna stand still and let me drill my chakra into him after all! Plus he's a Jonin, even if my movements don't follow standard taijutsu, he's got more battle experience and found a way to counter my moves without directly countering me…Still, I managed to stay on a bit, especially on the shoulder of his sword arm…it might not be much but hopefully it weakens his control of that Thunder Blade at least a little…"

"I don't know what you hoped to accomplish with that little maneuver. It wasn't even real taijutsu. I could tell you were weak but you really have no talent at all, do you? Maybe I was too kind earlier calling you a wounded rabbit. You're more like a wounded, weak, little bunny. It'll be an act of mercy to put you down."

"That son of a bitch! Underestimating me and talking down to me like that!…On the bright side, it means he hasn't noticed yet…I just hope it was enough to effect him at all…"

Aoi only made it one step towards her…she once again readied her kunai. If her Dancer's Barrage wasn't feasible, then she'd have to rely on her brain and ninja tools. At least, that's what she thought she was going to have to do. But she was suddenly staring at the Uchiha crest on Sasuke's back, as he slowly rose to his feet between her and Aoi.

"Take it back." He growled. His tone was dark. Aoi's smirk fell, his eyes narrowing. "Take back what you said!"

"What are you talking about?" Aoi asked snidely. He'd said a lot of things. Was this about the little pink bunny girl? Apparently she had quite a few knights wishing to defend her honor. Why anyone would waste their time on that useless decoration, he would never understand.

"What you said earlier…" Sasuke's voice was gravelly with rage. He thrust out his left arm, once again calling forth his Chidori, larger and more powerful than his last. "Don't mess with the Uchiha…don't mess with me!"

He charged at Aoi, who brought his sword up to block the attack. Once again the two sources of electricity collided. Sasuke shoved all his energy at the damned lightening sword, blue lightening flying everywhere.

Aoi's eyes were wide, taken aback by the force of the kid's attack…he tried to concentrate more chakra to the blade to make it stronger, but…he was having trouble controlling it…why wasn't his chakra moving easily into his sword? His sword arm felt like it was burning, and the kid's lightening actually seemed to be forcing him back a bit. What the hell was going on?! But it was no matter, the brat still stood no chance against him or his blade.

The electricity around them exploded in a huge flash of blinding light that forced Naruto, Sakura, and Idate to close their eyes and look away. The light faded and Sakura's eyes snapped open at the sound of Sasuke's pained scream.

Aoi had his sword raised up, pointed at the sky, and Sasuke was floating in front of it, being held up and continuously electrocuted by rings of electricity emanating from the Blade of the Thunder God. Sasuke screamed until the electricity became too much, and he passed out. Aoi smirked and flung Sasuke onto the unstable rope bridge with a swipe of his blade. He'd won, like he knew he would…of course, what he didn't notice was the crack that had formed in his blade where Sasuke's Chidori had struck.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura tossed her kunai at Aoi, who easily jumped out of the way, clearing the path to the bridge. Sakura sprinted to Sasuke immediately. She kneeled at the foot of the bridge, her hand wrapping around his wrist.

"Sasuke-kun! Get up!" The bridge wasn't stable and she needed to get him off of it fast.

"How very cold the bottom of the ocean must be." Aoi sneered, raising his blade to cut the bridge.

"Stop!" Idate cried, charging at him, but Aoi batted him aside easily with a swipe of his sword. He fell back with a gasp of pain…but in the back of his mind he noted that this hit wasn't as painful as the last hit he'd taken from the sword.

"No! Idate!" Naruto shouted. Damn! He needed to do something! He didn't care if the antidote wasn't done working yet—if his limbs were still a little numb! He couldn't just sit back and watch his friends get hurt like this!

Sakura gasped and turned at Naruto's cry, trying to see if Idate was badly hurt, but in that moment, Aoi severed the rope for one side of the bridge. The bridge tilted and Sasuke slid off. Sakura's hold on him tightened as she tried to stop his fall, but he was heavier than her, her weights also pushed against her, and gravity was not on her side. She'd barely held him up two seconds before she was pulled over the edge.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto shouted, when he heard no shout back, he feared the worst. "No! Sakura-chan!"

---

Sakura watched the water growing closer and closer, her breathing picking up.

Stay calm…

Kakashi's voice bounced around her head.

"Right. Stay calm. Don't panic. If you have an attack now, it'll probably kill you and Sasuke-kun will either die on impact or drown. So, calm the fuck down and think, damnit!"

She took a deep breath.

"There's a cliff face right there…control your fall and concentrate your chakra!"

Sakura pulled herself closer to Sasuke, wrapping her arm tightly around his waist, and shifting their position so they were facing the cliff, falling feet first. She summoned her chakra into her feet and right hand, catching them on the cliff face. Unfortunately, their weight and momentum continued to drag them down, Sakura's fingers leaving a trail in the rock as she pushed her chakra to keep them attached to the cliff. The stone cut into her hand painfully as they slid down.

She was finally able to catch them on an edge, her body straining to hold both their weight, her left shoulder throbbing painfully…at least one of the stitches had probably burst. The edge she was holding onto began to crack.

"You've gotta be kidding me!"

"I hate our luck!"

The rock she was holding crumbled away from the cliff and once again they were falling. She glanced down and noted that they were angled toward a shelf of rock that looked study enough to support them, instead of the water. Sakura's grip on Sasuke tightened, repositioning them so she'd take the brunt of the fall.

"It's roughly a four meter fall…it'll hurt but it's survivable."

She did her best to relax her body to lesson the force of the impact, but none the less, when they collided with the rock, she still felt it rattle through her. Sakura didn't move for a few second her eyes closed tight in pain, just trying to breathe and settle.

"Ow—Fuck! Ow!…Ok. Breathe. Ok. You need to assess the damage now."

She carefully moved Sasuke off of her, before slowly pushing herself up. She felt pain radiating down her right side where she'd concentrated the impact, but she was able to move, and when she prodded around her side, she felt certain nothing was broken…badly bruised…maybe a few minor fractures, but not fully broken. She then turned her attention to her left shoulder. It was bleeding and the first three stitches had popped, but the others were still in place. Her right hand was pretty scraped up, and mildly bleeding. But other than that, she was ok. A visual scan of Sasuke revealed that no bones seemed to be broken. She'd blocked his head from taking any impact in the fall, or at least she thought she did. There were no outward signs of any trauma injuries, and without him awake, she wouldn't be able to poke around and find out. He was breathing, which was reassuring, though his breath rate seemed a bit fast. She lowered her ear to his chest, listening to his heart beat. As she feared, it was very fast…far faster than it should have been for someone unconscious, but consistent with electrocution.

"Damnit! I don't know what to do to treat this! If his heart rate picks up anymore, he might go into cardiac arrest, but…What do I do? Do I give him a sedative? I don't know if that'll help. I never read up on what to do for something like this—it's outside the realm of basic first aid and it never had anything to do with my mother's illness…seriously the chance of being struck by lightening is so small, this was never something I thought I'd have to deal with!"

Stay calm…

"Ok. For accelarted heart rate, you usually administer a sedative. If I give him a half dose of my weakest one, it shouldn't do any harm and at least it'll be doing something that'll hopefully hold him over til we can get him real medical attention…it's a miracle he didn't die on the spot from an attack like that. Aoi must have been starting to feel the effects from the Dancer's Barrage and Sasuke-kun's attack…let's just hope it was enough to weaken his sword so Naruto can win."

Sakura checked through her weapons pouch, pulling out the mild sedative she used on herself during her chakra attacks. She opened Sasuke's mouth and poured a few drops in, forcing him to swallow. Since that was about all she could do for him, she turned her attention to her own injuries, spreading ointment along her side, and bandaging her hand. Since she couldn't redo the stitches on her shoulder, she opted instead for just pressing a wad of gauze against it and leaning back against the cliff. She laid Sasuke's head in her lap and took deep breaths to calm the adrenaline and pain coursing through her. Anything to keep herself from having a chakra reaction now.

"Naruto, I'm counting on you to protect Idate." She murmured glancing up to the top of the cliff.

---

"Hate to break it to you, but Sakura-chan saw to it that your poison won't work on us!" He growled, pocketing the bottle of pills…she'd forgotten to take them back, which was for the better at the moment. "How dare you do that to my friends?!"

"Take it easy. I'll send you to the place where they are real soon."

"I won't go so easily!" Naruto growled.

Aoi's eyes narrowed as he reactivated his Thunder Blade, the crack was visible, but he didn't seem to notice.

Naruto grit his teeth. He didn't know what to do. The rasengan wouldn't work against that sword. Naruto shook his head. "That doesn't matter now! Those two need my help!"

"Still trying to save each other, huh? Forget about it. Those two are already dead. They wouldn't survive falling off this cliff."

"Shut up!" Naruto shouted, refusing to believe him. Sakura was smart. And she'd never let anything happen to Sasuke. She'd do something to save them. They'd be okay. He had to do his part up here to help them out. "Multi Shadow clone jutsu!"

An army of Narutos popped into existence, surrounding Aoi.

"Oh…you're going to run away from here using such a diversion?"

"Don't mess with me! Who's running away, cause it sure ain't me!"

Despite the mass amount of Narutos that charged him, Aoi cut through them all easily, running at the real one who stood a little ways back, a clone gathering a swirl of chakra into his palm again.

"It's no use Naruto! That jutsu won't work on that sword!" Idate cried in a panic.

"You better listen to him." Aoi jeered, raising his sword and swinging, cutting the rasengan and throwing both Naruto and the clone away with one swipe.

"Naruto!" Idate shouted.

"Just like that Uchiha loser, and that weak little girl from earlier. Why is it that each and every Konoha ninja is a total idiot?"

"Shut up already!" Naruto grunted, pushing himself up slowly. "I'm saving them, you hear me?!" That hit…it hadn't hurt as much as the first time. Sakura's Dancer's Barrage had done some damage, even if it hadn't been completely successful.

"You really still think they're alive after that fall? You should have gotten out when you had the chance."

"As if…" Naruto muttered, pushing himself up to standing. "I'd abandon my comrades and run away!" He looked up with firm, dead set determination. "I haven't forgotten my answer to the tenth question!"

"What are you even talking about?"

"One more time!" Naruto said, holding out his palm. One of his few remaining clones ran forward, once again preparing the rasengan.

"Eat this!" Naruto said, charging.

"Idiot." Aoi dismissed, once again cutting through the jutsu and sending Naruto careening backwards in a shock of electricity.

Naruto grunted pushing himself up yet again. It hurt…but it was definitely weaker. He could do this! He had to!

"You still don't get it?! You don't have a chance of winning!"

"Damnit!" Naruto growled, staring at the sword that was giving him so much trouble…it defiantly didn't look as bright as before…and what was that? Was that a crack?! Sasuke must have made a crack in it! That was it! If he aimed for that, he could win!

"You saying you still want to fight? Give it up already!"

"Y'know I'm tired of hearing you talk! Shadow clone jutsu!" Four Naruto clones appeared. "This is it! Sasuke and Sakura-chan gave me a chance! I won't waste it!"

"Naruto…" Idate murmured, thinking about everything team 7 had done for him…Naruto catching him when he ran off the cliff, Naruto and Sasuke fighting off an endless amount of water clones to protect him, Sakura shielding him with her body and tending to his injuries, pleading with him to trust them. "I have to do something…"

A clone once again charged up his rasengan.

"I hate people who don't know when to quit!"

"This is the end." Naruto growled, determined.

Two clones sprinted at Aoi in criss crossing patterns, leaping up and chucking two stones at him. He blocked them without batting an eye.

"A foolish cheap trick." He admonished, swiping and dispersing the clones in a puff of smoke. From the smoke, another stone came flying at him, which he leaned away from easily. "What the…" He turned retracing the path the stone had taken to Idate. "I really can't stand all this saving each other nonsense…That's enough heroics for one day, don't you think, Idate!" He said charging at his former student.

"Your fight's with me!"

Aoi turned to see Naruto charging at him, but the blond wasn't even close to reaching him before he disappeared in a puff of smoke.

"Above!"

Aoi looked up to see Naruto bearing down on him, rasengan in hand. He immediately put up his sword to block it.

Naruto's rasengan squarely hit the crack in the blade, forcing it wider. Naruto pushed harder, with all his strength. The blade split in half.

"Wha—" Aoi was reeling, too in shock to block or dodge as Naruto thrust his rasengan into the Jonin's chest. Aoi was sent flying in a vicious and uncontrolled spiral straight over the cliff and down the center of the ravine.

Naruto stood, exhausted and breathing hard.

"Naruto…you're really something…" Idate breathed, shocked the leaf genin had actually broken the Second Hokage's legendary sword and bested a Jonin.

"Yeah, well…" Naruto looked back at him with a wink before his eyes widened. "Sakura-chan! Bastard!" He ran to the edge of the cliff and looked down, Idate running over to join him.

---

Sakura looked up at the sound of screaming, watching the turquoise haired Jonin spiral straight past her and into the ocean with a loud and painful sounding splash.

"Naruto did it!"

She looked up to see both Naruto and Idate looking down over the cliff.

"Naruto! Idate! Are you two hurt at all?" She shouted up.

Naruto smiled. "Sakura-chan's ok!"

"She's still alive!" Idate murmured gratefully. He didn't know how, but she'd survived.

"We're fine! Are you ok, Sakura-chan!"

"I'll be fine! Sasuke-kun need's serious medical attention, but he's okay for now!" Sakura shouted back.

"I'm coming to save you now! Believe it!"

"Is he nuts! We don't have time for that right now! We've got a race to win shannaro!"

"You idiot! Forget about us and get to the finish line, quick!"

"Oh yeah, that's right!" Naruto and Idate only now just remembered that they were in the middle of a race.

"But uh, what do we do about this?" Naruto asked, looking at the lopsided bridge, only being held up by one side.

"Leave it to me!" Idate announced, jumping up and grabbing hold of the rope. "If we cut this rope, we can swing to the other side in two seconds!"

"Oh yeah!" Naruto followed suite, swinging himself up as well.

"You know…I always thought the worst of myself, but Boss Jirocho always trusted in me. It was the fist time I was trusted by someone. So I wanted to win this race for him, no matter what. But in reality, I can't win with feelings alone. So many times along the way, I felt like giving up. But whenever that happened, you guys risked your lives to save someone like me, no matter how useless I'd become. Naruto, I'm sorry. I should have trusted you guys from the start."

"What are you saying that stuff now for? Save it for after winning the race, when we can all hear it, y'know?"

"You're right!" Idate said with a smile. "Here use this." He said, handing Naruto his switch blade.

Naruto stared down at the blade for a second before smiling. "Idate!"

"Okay, let's do it!"

"Right!"

Naruto cut the rope and the two went swinging across…heading straight for the opposite cliff face.

Sakura watched as they nearly swung into the opposite side of the cliff…

"They definitely could have planned that one better."

"Naruto, at this rate, we'll crash into the rocks!" Idate shouted.

"Yeah I know! Don't worry, I'm on it!" He focused chakra to the soles of his feet… "Ah crap! I'm almost out of chakra!"

Naruto caught Idate right before they smashed into the cliff, sticking to the rocks with his chakra. "Just a little bit more!" He sprinted up as far as he good, leaping the last couple meters when he knew his chakra was seconds from giving out, safely depositing Idate on the ledge.

"Not exactly graceful, but they made it!"

"Way to go Naruto! Now hurry up and dash to the finish line!" Sakura shouted.

"Sit tight Sakura-chan, I'll come back right away to help you! Alright, let's get going Idate!"

The two disappeared from view, and Sakura leaned back for a second, closing her eyes.

"Gods, I hope they make it."

She checked on Sasuke's heart rate a bit, noting it had slowed a little, and sighed. She hoped he'd be okay.

---

It was about a half hour later, after Idate had crossed the finish line, that some of the Wasabi men were sent to help get Sakura and Sasuke back up the cliff. The process was less than ideal for her. They'd thrown a rope to her, saying that they'd pull them up, but since they were on the opposite side of the cliff, there'd be a bit of a swing, and with Sasuke unconscious, she refused to send him up alone and let him get more hurt, smashing into the rocks. That was no problem for the men. There was enough of them that the weight wasn't an issue, especially since they were fully grown men talking about pulling up a very small thirteen year old, and a twelve year old…but for Sakura, it meant once again having to hold Sasuke secure with her injured arm, having a rope dig painfully into her bruised side, and hold onto the rope tightly with her cut up hand to help control their ascent…all in all, not a fun time.

But she was able to ignore all that, standing at Naruto's side, Sasuke unconscious but being supported by one of the Wasabi, watching Idate be officially announced as the winner. It felt good. This mission had been a success…hard earned with a lot of injuries, but a success none the less. And her curse never triggered. There'd been a few moments where she thought it might, but it didn't. She'd calmed herself down.

"I can do this…I can be on a B/A-rank mission without my chakra reacting. I still have a real shot at a ninja career! Shannaro!"

Jirocho had sent for a convoy to come pick up team 7, given their injuries, which had arrived quickly, since Konoha and Port Degarashi weren't too far from each other.

Sakura and Naruto stood in front of Jirocho and Idate, saying their goodbyes.

"I can't thank you enough for what you both did for me."

"Yeah well, so this is good bye, huh?" Naruto muttered with a smile holding out his hand, which Idate shook easily. Idate then shifted his attention to Sakura.

"Sakura, uh…about what I said back at the tea shop…" He blushed, his hand scratching at the back of his neck awkwardly. "I stand by what I said about you being really cute, and that I must have had some seriously good karma saved up from some past life to have gotten the chance to meet you, and I'd be the luckiest man alive if you ever considered going out with me—"

"Hey! Watch it, pal!" Naruto growled, but Idate continued on as if he'd never spoken.

"—But I was wrong to say you should quit. The world needs more ninja like you, so…no matter who you end up with, don't let them make you quit…"

Sakura was bright red, quite unsure of what to do with all that.

"I, uh, wh—um…th-thank you."

"Gods what are you supposed to say to a confession like that?! And there are so many people around too!…well I can at least respond to the late part."

"Don't worry, I'm not quitting, now or ever, and no one's gonna ever be able to make me." She answered with a warm smile. "Take care of yourself, Idate!"

"You too!" He answered, giving her a big grin, his cheeks still red.

The boat sent to take them back was surprisingly being captained by Morino Ibiki.

"I've come to get the wounded." He said, his manner still as imposing as it had been during the first exam.

"Ibiki-sensei!" Sakura gasped.

"Woah, fortuitous that he's the one to show up."

"N-Niisan…" Idate gasped staring up at the brother he thought had died.

"Where is the wounded?" His face remained impassive.

"Over here!" Naruto said, pointing to Sasuke, who was on a stretcher carried by two of the Wasabi men.

"Okay, get him on the boat, quickly." He ordered.

"R-Right." Naruto answered, leading the way. The men carrying the stretcher immediately followed. For all his courage, Naruto couldn't deny it, Ibiki was terrifying.

"Do I involve myself, or don't I…I shouldn't, it's not my business…oh screw it."

Sakura approached Ibiki, steeling her courage. If she could ask Kotetsu for a favor right after watching him violently fail several candidates during the first exam, she could talk to Ibiki about his brother.

"Um, excuse me."

"What is it?"

"He didn't acknowledge Idate at all when he called him Niisan, so…"

"Morino Idate is a good man…" There was nothing more Sakura wanted to do in that moment then break eye contact with Ibiki, but she forced herself to keep looking him straight in the eye. "Incase you were curious…" She had never walked away from another person faster in her life.

Idate's eyes were wide, staring at his brother, Sakura's words ringing through his head. Ibiki didn't move for one long moment, continuing to stare at the space Sakura had rapidly vacated.

Finally he turned and began to make his way back up the ramp to the boat.

"Niisan! Niisan, wait!" Idate called, finding his voice.

Ibiki froze. "Who are you? Only one person called me that and they died three years ago." Ibiki turned to face him, staring him down. Idate held his gaze for a long moment, unflinching. He swallowed hard.

"My…my name is Morino Idate." He finally answered. Ibiki continued to stare at him unblinkingly.

"Morino Idate…I hear you're a good man." He finally answered.

A smile made its way onto Idate's lips. He'd finally figured out the answer to the tenth question. He'd never betray a comrade again. He could trust in others now! Idate bowed to his older brother, who turned away and continued up the ramp, a smile on his face. His little brother had grown up well…he was a good man now.

Their ship set sail, Naruto and Sakura at the railing to shout their final goodbyes.

"Bye Idate! Let's meet again!" Naruto shouted.

"Good bye! See you around!" Sakura added her own parting.

"Yeah! You guys come again, too, okay!" Idate called, waving.

"Hey Boss, take care of yourself! Okay?" Naruto continued.

Jirocho smiled and nodded. "Yeah…"

Ibiki smirked, watching them from the corner of his eye as he leaned against the mast. Always interesting, that Naruto kid…no wonder Hokage-sama had taken a liking to him. The girl too…she was surprisingly brave.

Sakura went and got herself patched up by the medics. Since her wounds weren't that severe for the likes of medical ninjutsu, and she'd already done the basic manual first aid, it was nothing too complicated for the medics on the boat to handle. She wouldn't even need to go to the hospital once they were back. She was just thrilled to be able to have full mobility back in her left shoulder again. She'd be able to dance without pain radiating down her arm every attempt to move it.

Once she was patched up, she went to check on Sasuke. The medics on board had given him enough basic first aid to help him regain consciousness, though he'd need to be hospitalized when they got back to Konoha. He sat along the side of the ship, his elbows resting on his knees and his eyes closed in pain and frustration.

"Sasuke-kun, does it hurt?" She asked gently.

"No. It doesn't." He lied, his tone rough and gravelly as he opened his eyes and looked up at her.

"Thank goodness…don't worry, those wounds will heal fast once we get back to the Village. With full medical attention, it should only really take a day. Two at most. You'll be back to full strength in no time!"

"Sure…" He murmured, his gaze dropping to the floor. What did it matter when his full strength was so weak. Sasuke's teeth clenched, his brow furrowing in anger and frustration.

I see the rumors were true. The survivor of the Village's honorable Uchiha clan is a hopeless loser unworthy of his family name.

He hadn't been able to beat him! And yet, Naruto…Naruto had! Just like with Gaara…Why was Naruto so strong?! Why was he so weak?! He needed more power!

Sakura watched Sasuke's change in expression, a bad feeling creeping into her stomach.

"He's so upset…maybe…maybe it's just because he's in pain. People are more short fused when they're in pain…it'll be fine once he get's to the hospital…he'll be fine…"

But no matter how many times she thought it, she couldn't shake the bad feeling away. The feeling that said she was wrong. He wasn't fine, and she had no idea how to help him.

"For now…I'll just give him some space, for now…"

"Get some rest, Sasuke-kun…" She murmured softly, before walking away, unsure what else to do, and praying to every god she knew that her mind was right and her feeling was wrong.

---

Author's note: Not gonna lie, I'm really proud of this chapter. Ok first thing I feel the need to specify: when I say "Arousal simulations," that's not like full out sex fantasies. They're 12-13. It'd be kissing and maybe over-the-clothes touching at most. That is the age where you hit puberty, so it is age appropriate for them to start to have those kinds of thoughts/desires for each other, especially if they've had to mature as quickly as Sakura has. So, my Sakura has attempted to learn medical ninjutsu in the past. I think it would have been unbelievable for her not to attempt it, given her circumstances, but I think my reason for her moving away from it is solid. The manga makes it clear that medical ninjutsu requires a totally different skill set, and since the anime decided to color code all medical chakra as green and all standard combat chakra as blue, I feel like there is something fundamentally different about the way medical chakra is utilized/released. There's no indication that they learn any medical ninjutsu in the academy in Naruto's generation, so it would come down to scrolls or mentors. So yeah, Sakura attempted to self teach medical ninjutsu but it went very badly. Kinda like in Boruto when Sarada burns her fish, accept since Sakura's a water type, I imagine she ended up drowning the rabbit she was trying to heal in its own blood-super gory. Aside from the completely new scenes I added, as far as changes went, Idate crushes on Sakura much harder, the wound Sakura gets from the Amenin is more serious in this version. She really does drown and actually needs cpr (in the anime that moment is comedic), Sasuke's the one to actually give her cpr. He does follow the proper steps as according to the Red Cross, except for mouth to mouth, it's only supposed to be two breaths not three. There are other changes as well, but as far as long term plot goes, I think the biggest is that Naruto's thinking of Hinata in his whole "You only need one person" speech to Idate. In the anime, he's thinking of Iruka, who is the first person to accept him. But it would have made the whole NaruHina ship so much more believable if they'd actually let her words have a really deep impact on him.

Anyways, next chapter's the big one-Sasuke leaves. Yikes, I hope I don't disappoint! But thank you so so much for staying with this this long, and for all the favs/follows/reviews. Please keep reviewing! I love reading what you have to say!

Thanks for reading this far :)