"Huh, Tobi was right," Deidara commented, watching as they landed within the cave. Just like the last time, he was sitting on top of Gaara. "We got ourselves a going away party. You're too late, Leaf idiots."
"What do you think you're doing?" Naruto bellowed out, his whiskers becoming more and more prominent as he took in Gaara's current state. And just like last time, he cried out for Gaara to move, even though he knew he wouldn't. "Get off him, you bastards! Gaara isn't just some thing! He's a person, too!"
Naruto's cries were even more heartbreaking this time around and it hit her that for this Naruto, he hasn't had to experience the loss (or desertion) of a friend yet. He hasn't had to feel that ache in his chest. Sasuke had filled it in their old life and it made Naruto determined to save everyone. He wouldn't lose anyone the way they lost Sasuke.
Sakura was almost afraid of what the absence of that experience could mean for his side of the battle today. Would he lose control more easily? She knew that in time Kurama and Naruto would work as a single unit, but that day was still far away. Right now, Kurama would take advantage of Naruto's emotionally unstable state and the fact that Naruto hasn't had to confront feelings like this before.
Whatever it was, Sakura was terrified it would change his actions today. And that she'd lose Naruto all over again.
"So that's the Kyuubi kid," Deidara continued, riling Naruto up more when he reached down and pay Gaara's cheek. "Tobi said we'd get an earful about Junchūriki equality and all that shit. To think he was actually right about something."
"Deidara," Sasori said, his gravely voice like nails on a chalkboard to her ears. "You're talking too much."
"Oi! I'm just assessing the situation!" Deidara immediately bit back. "Meet you at the rendezvous point, Sasori my man. I'll bring a gift if I keep you waiting. The Kyuubi is sufficient, right?"
"Kakuzo has a buyer for the Uchiha," Sasori reminded his partner and suddenly the pair's stare landed on their side of the cave. "Remember his body if you fight him."
"Tch, I know," Deidara responded and crafted a large clay bird. "I'm on a roll with Junchūrikis. Can't let my streak end now."
Deidara took Gaara's body and boarded the bird, flying well above them and out of the cave. "Well, come on! I heard you're supposed to be powerful. Let's see what you got."
Naruto didn't waste any time in following Deidara and Kakashi took off right after him, sparing them a single glance before he called out to Naruto.
Sasuke shifted his weight and she put a single hand on his arm and pushed him lightly. "Go after Naruto."
"Sakura-" Sasuke protested immediately, looking from Sasori to her.
She shook her head, with a hard stare on her enemy-- the one that gave her the first taste of a real battle in her old life. "Naruto needs you now more than I do. They're after him. And we can't lose Naruto. Ever."
"Kakashi is with him-"
"I don't care," She told him sternly, her narrowed gaze flickering towards him for a moment. "If it ever comes down to helping Naruto or I, you choose him. He's the most important one of us, Sasuke-kun. And he needs you to have his back right now."
Sasuke didn't look convinced nor happy. "Who will have yours?"
"Chiyo-sama," She answered with a smile. "Us girls have to stick together if we want to survive. Besides, you're Deidara's worst enemy and I'm the only one who can fight Sasori besides Chiyo-sama."
"You're confident for a little girl," Sasori interrupted, his mechanical tail wavering dangerously. "Listen to your girlfriend, Uchiha. I won't wait much longer."
"Go, Sasuke-kun."
He hesitated still and she berated herself for every time in the past she wished for her old Sasuke to waver in his choice between her and Naruto. In the war, she wanted Sasuke to go out of his way to save her. Because it was validation that he did care. That all those emotions welling up inside of her weren't just figments of her own fairytale perspective of things.
But looking back at the war made her think that she had it all wrong in those moments. Sasuke knew he and Naruto were the only ones who could face against Madara and have even the slightest hope in winning. Without either of them, the world was lost. And Sakura knew that. She knew it during the war. She knew it growing up.
But she witnessed a world firsthand when her boys were lost to her. She understood it more deeply and realized a bit after they had died that Sasuke had shown her countless times that he did care-- and wasn't thrilled that he did but their bodies tended to move on their own when someone they loved was in danger. And Sasuke had done that for her. But if he had to choose, he chose Naruto and that was the right choice. Her old Sasuke knew that at his core.
It took her seeing a world without them to truly understand that at her core. The romantic in her regarding her own feelings had died when her old Sasuke did.
If only he could see her now. She had a feeling she understood him even more now.
This Sasuke was also extremely loyal and protective of his loved ones but it very obviously included her and Naruto in this life. He didn't fight against caring for them in this life. He could allow himself to care and let them in. And he's never truly had to choose before.
"Go," She requested again, a note of finality in her tone and he quickly hid his unhappiness behind carefully controlled neutral features.
"Don't be stupid," He said and only left when she repeated the phrase to him.
"A touching scene," Sasori commented dryly. "Are you content those will be the last words you say to him?"
Sakura cracked her knuckles, looking at Sasori with a very calm expression. "Chiyo-sama, I'm ready whenever you are."
"You're full of surprises," Chiyo responded vaguely, before looking at her grandson. "Sasori. What have you become?"
"Impatient," Sasori answered and the puppet began to shift slightly. Sakura readied herself for the first attack.
The fight happened more or less how it did when she first fought Sasori. In the beginning, she did let Chiyo take the reigns. This battle wasn't only important to Sakura. It was important for Chiyo, too, and Sakura didn't want to be the one to take away. Even if she knew in her heart that Chiyo wouldn't survive the day, she knew that the woman needed this.
When Sakura smashed the first puppet, she threw an explosive kunai in the area she knew Sasori would land in. When he did, it exploded, with dozens of tiny papers fluttering in the air. Sasori messed with poison bombs. She messed with genjutsu ones. It's a work in progress.
She knew going into this fight that her genjutsu skills normally required her to lock eyes with her opponents or had to be physically touching them. Unfortunately, puppet eyes did not count. She had two choices. Wait until she shattered his puppet or use nifty little tags to stick onto Sasori and use those as her medium.
So long as a single one made contact, she could cast something. And it would remain there until she pulled it off.
Chiyo was taken aback when Sasori revealed his puppet self and she used the moment to sense the tag that had fluttered onto Sasori's shoulder. She couldn't help her smirk as she forced the chakra in his core to relive a part of his childhood. She let it fade but not leave his system after the memory played out, enraging her opponent.
Maybe it helped that Chiyo unveiled the Mother and Father puppets not even moments before.
"You can't make me see things," Sasori spat out, holding up his arms. "No one can."
"It's not my fault you underestimated this little girl," Sakura said triumphantly, watching his moves carefully. Parts of this battle had changed and she couldn't rely on her memory to guide her through now that she had changed her previous actions.
The dynamic turned and Sakura became Sasori's focus. When the hundreds of arms surrounded her, she remembered how thankful she was that Ino was insane about being flexible. She used to say it was a girls advantage in a fight-- they were usually tiny enough to slip through anything. And being oddly positioned to avoid the weapons called on that flexibility.
She felt Chiyo tug on the chakra strands still attached to her, pulling her from the area, only for Sasori to attach his own as poisonous gas was released from one of the puppet arms. She didn't hesitate to set off an explosive kunai and let Chiyo tug her back to safety.
She anticipated the Third Kazekage puppet and his iron sand, ensuring she didn't waste Chiyo's chakra trying to save her and instead worked to avoid or punch away any obstacle that came near her. It wasn't long before she punched an iron sand weapon through the cave ceiling, causing the entire thing to crumble.
The battle continued on for a bit with her avoiding the attacks until Sasori unleashed another flurry of poisoned needles, this time hindering her escape by attaching chakra strands to her body. The few seconds it took for her to cut through them was enough for one of the needles to scratch her cheek. She hissed in pain, distantly hearing Chiyo yell her name.
She fell to the ground, carefully hiding her antidote and injected it when she heard the creak of his puppet as it descended upon her. And if it worked the first time around, she supposed shattering Sasori's puppet would work again.
It did and she relished in the moment once again. She made her way to Chiyo and healed the woman before Sasori could get over his shock. Sakura looked towards him just before he unleashed his puppet army and this time, she didn't have to stand in awe to take in the mass amount. She's seen his trick before and was unimpressed this time around.
They fought the puppets again. Chiyo summoned her own and Sakura worked to destroy whatever puppet came towards her. She didn't need to be saved by the puppets this time-- she pushed through and decimated whichever ones dared cross her. And when one almost neared her, she played on the tag still stuck to Sasori's shoulder and forced him to think of another memory.
It served to only momentarily pause the puppet's trek, but she used it to destroy one of the last ones from his army. Once the fighting dwindled down to the three of them, Sakura prepared herself for the final leg of the battle.
Sasori attacked them with the last few tricks he had up his sleeve and when they failed, he grew angry and impatient. She could sense his frustration with the battle growing and she played on more trick on his mind to further frustrate him.
Sakura heard metal scraping behind them as Sasori drove forward with a sword aimed for Chiyo and she felt like history repeated itself and also punished her for using her memories to her advantage.
While Sasori meant to skewer them both-- one of them with the weapons attached to his puppet and the other with a chakra thread controlled blade-- Sakura took in both of them. Sasori's blade ran through her lower left stomach, just like where it was the last time. But the second blade ran right through her shoulder, the poison already numbing the skin around the metal.
Sakura had the moment of tug of war with literal weapons once again, her gaze fierce as she forced herself to remain conscious. Her chakra was already working to heal her wounds-- she just had to stay awake long enough for Chiyo to choose to give her the antidote, which she ultimately did.
She looked up at Sasori and smiled when blood trailed from her lips. She channeled her chakra and used it to cleanly break through both blades. The sudden loss of its hold on her made him stumble back and she took that moment to slam her left fist into his puppet, letting the chakra core fly out.
Sakura wasn't the one who killed Sasori in her old life. That had been Chiyo. And she would be damned if she took that from her. So when he charged at them with a different cloaked body, Chiyo used the Mother and Father puppets to stop him in his tracks for good.
Sasuke knew leaving Sakura alone with that man was asking for trouble, but he recognized the look in her eyes. Pure determination. She wasn't overconfident like he originally thought but rather set to face the puppet master. If he hadn't known she was carrying around two antidote doses, he would have fought her on her choice.
But she was carrying around the antidote. And she was right. Naruto was the target. Therefore, he was the priority.
So he headed for Kakashi and Naruto.
He caught up to them fairly quickly and he noticed how irrational Naruto's chakra was. Sasuke was a horrible sensor-- he could recognize a grand total of four chakra signatures. Itachi, Shisui, Naruto, and Sakura. And even then, it was difficult to read the chakras beyond basic understanding.
But Naruto's chakra was overwhelming-- it was angry and totally unlike the normal atmosphere around his idiotic best friend. There were traces of rage that didn't feel like they belonged too-- and he wondered if that was the Kyuubi.
"You know what to do if he loses control, right?" Kakashi asked as he fell into pace with him.
"Lock the Kyuubi down," Sasuke responded with a nod. "The Suna officials said Sasori's partner dealt with explosives."
"Not the kind we're used to," Kakashi said, gesturing to the falling white blobs. "Clay."
"He uses clay to control the blasts?" Sasuke questioned before they both scattered to sides of the ground walls to avoid the oncoming pests. When they continued to follow their movements, Sasuke threw needles at each of them. They blew up instantly and it took a moment for him to get back to Kakashi.
Except, they didn't have much time because another flock of clay bugs descended upon them. Sasuke used his body flicker to get out of the way, appearing near a seething Naruto.
"Huh, I guess fifty percent isn't horrible, but I'm surprised you're the half that survived," Deidara yelled down, causing both him and Naruto to look back in surprise.
Sasuke narrowed his eyes, catching the figure escaping the blast and using the branches as a cover to keep himself hidden. When he looked at Naruto, he saw how prominent his whiskers were-- the last time he saw them like that was when Gaara had transformed into the One-Tailed Beast.
Oh, how the times have changed.
"Naruto, focus," Sasuke said, staring at their enemy. He sent down more explosive clay figures and this time, to avoid being separated from Naruto and risking his teammate, he send lightning needs to force an early explosion.
When he did, nothing exploded. The clay pieces merely sailed downwards.
"Duds?" He wondered aloud and in the few moments he tried to analyze why they hadn't gone off, Naruto acted.
He jumped high and summoned a few clones midair to fling him even further upwards, until his idiotic best friend was right above their enemy with a rasengan in hand. Deidara jumped away, missing the attack and began to laugh as he landed on the cliff above.
"Art is an explosion!" He yelled, his manic stare focused on the bird above them.
Sasuke saw the bird begin to bubble underneath Naruto's feet and he summoned a chidori stream, piercing the bird and miraculously impeding any explosion. Naruto wasn't fazed at all, instead using the small victory to land on even ground with their enemy. Sasuke cursed his best friend's stupid tendency to be reckless and landed beside him. Deidara smirked and turned to run, only to be greeted with Kakashi.
"I blew you up!" Deidara exclaimed, pointing an accusing finger at the legendary ninja. "You're supposed to be dead! Now my work isn't complete!"
"Lightning?" Kakashi called out and Sasuke smirked.
"Lightning."
However, Sasuke's smirk fell when they heard an enormous boom back in the direction they came from.
"Go back to Sakura-chan," Naruto said through gritted teeth. "I've got this covered."
"Naruto," Sasuke said, waiting for his friend to look at him to activate his sharingan. It was a weird sensation, being in one's mind. But he understood how to hold the Kyuubi back just long enough for him to get Sakura and get back. "You have this covered."
Sakura was unsteady on her feet and she thought she felt a familiar chakra presence appear at the mouth of the cave. She coughed up blood, the striking pain in her stomach at least familiar. The shoulder-- not so much. She worked to heal the wound internally, even with the blades stuck inside her so she wouldn't bleed out when they were removed.
"Annoying," She heard him mutter as soon as he appeared next to her, a gentle hand coming to her back and supporting her as she sat on the ground.
"I thought I said you need to have Naruto's back," She mumbled out, placing her hands around the blade in her stomach, green chakra already active.
"Naruto's not the one impaled in two places," Sasuke told her in a hard tone, tapping a finger under her chin to make her look up. "Can we remove them?"
"The blade is poisoned," Chiyo said, coming over as she reattached her puppet arm. "I'll take it out. Best not to push our luck anymore."
They worked together to pull the blades out and Sakura refused when Granny Chiyo attempted to heal her.
"I'll be perfectly fine, Chiyo-sama," Sakura said. "I just need to be careful for the next few hours. And it'll leave a nasty scar, but that's okay."
Because she was a bit nostalgic. It was her first battle scar. This time she just overdid it. Now she would have two scars.
Sasuke helped her stand up and she made her way to Sasori, who was still clinging to the thinnest strands tying him to life. She knelt in front of the puppet, aware of both Sasuke and Chiyo's stare on her.
"Who has a bounty out for Uchiha Sasuke?" She asked, watching as Sasori's head slowly moved itself up to face her.
"I guess you deserve a reward for beating me," He admitted. "I don't know who. But I know where they're from."
"Where?"
"Konoha." He answered and she drew in a sharp breath. "I have a spy working with Orochimaru and I'm supposed to meet him at Tenchi Bridge in ten days. The snake is working with the buyer. That's. . . all I know. Tenchi Bridge. . . in ten. . . days."