- Titans -
Sakura looks down from her vantage point in the trees, legs completely paralyzed.
Even with the light nearly gone, she would know Shikamaru anywhere. She hasn't seen his face in months. Her eyes are starving for the details of him. Only a few hours ago, she'd believed him to be dead. And yet, he was here.
He was alive. Alive.
When she'd found his boot tracks deep in the woods, she'd told herself it was okay to hope. She'd given herself permission to believe. And yet, like her panic attack in Suna, she'd been powerless against voices of doubt.
Maybe she'd been holding herself back. Maybe it was a form of self protection, but she hadn't truly allowed herself to hope, to believe. It was tempting fate to think she would find either of her boys intact at all.
But against all odds, she'd found him. Her best friend. Her entire world.
Only yards from where she stands now, Shikamaru is sprawled out, bloody in the dirt. Her eyes take him in, desperate and ravenous. Forest debris clings to the wounds on his face. He's trembling from weakness and he's trembling from pain. His hair has grown long, either by choice or neglect. But even in his current state, Shikamaru alive is the most beautiful thing she's ever seen.
A monster snarls to life in her chest, eating it's way through her disbelief. Old Sakura claws savagely at her box, demanding to be set free immediately. She wants to possess Sakura's body and sob hysterically in relief. She wants to run like a mad woman and pick Shikamaru up from the dirt. She wants to sink serrated teeth into the throat of the monster standing over the man she loves.
As New Sakura grips the reigns on her threadbare temper, Old Sakura wills her restraints to snap.
Sakura watches her enemy pick a crumpled bomb-tag off the ground. They pinch it between heavily bandaged hands, unable to flex their fingers. Even from this distance, she can recognize the signs of repetitive fractures forced to heal incorrectly.
Are those…torture wounds?
Old Sakura spits on this question and the empathy it evokes. She repeats Kiwa's parting words like a battle cry.
'Bring war. Show no mercy'
But Sakura plans on bringing more than war. She plans on bringing strategy. She hasn't just been standing here feeling big feelings and biting back rage. She's watched Utsuho lift a knife to his own throat. She's watched him boot Shikamaru hard in the chest. She observes how the enemy controls Utsuho by stitching a melody through winter air. This confirms the scraps of information Kiwa had been able to provide her.
Who ever this enemy is, Utsuho is their puppet now. Sakura would be battling for more than just one life tonight.
It's taking everything she has just to remain rational. She's waiting for the right moment to launch her assault. Her timing has to be perfect, flawless-
The monster watching Shikamaru is goading him now, whispering taunts into his good ear. Their cotton breath condenses thick in the chill. They stare covetously down at Shikamaru, wanting his pieces rather than his sum.
They move like the mythical Dragon of the Mountain, bellowing smoke while stalking their prey.
But Sakura doesn't just know her myths, she believes in them. Myths don't just teach us that Dragons are real. They teach us that Dragons can be beaten. What ever monster this person thinks they are, Sakura has come prepared. She doesn't need to let Old Sakura out. New Sakura is already much, much worse.
Her hands tighten to fists in her gloves. She'd clawed her exhausted body up this mountain. She'd lost her way and nearly lost her mind. She'd wasted valuable seconds doubling back through twining trees, hunting Shikamaru's blood trail through fading dusk light.
She'd screamed at decoy mark after decoy mark. She'd imbedded her fists into an ancient Pine, shattering it to splinters with just her rage.
She'd found Shikamaru's real marks carved into the tree just behind it, exactly where she should have been looking all along.
'That's my girl.' The voice inside her had whispered. Yume-Kakashi was still watching her, even if he couldn't be by her side.
She'd followed the haunting melody after that. She'd timed her footsteps to the tempo of the whistle in order to conceal her approach.
Now she was here, staring down her Dragon, calculating exactly how she was going to rip it apart.
Her heart pounds louder with name after name. Ruya. Kiwa. Utsuho. Shikamaru. The villagers. Their kids. Innocents. Friends. For every ounce of pain this person had caused, Sakura would make them suffer in turn. She just needs an opening. She needs Shikamaru armed.
'Up.' Yume-Kakashi floats an idea through the primal rage of her animal mind.
No, not an idea. A plan. A wonderful, brilliant, stupid plan that dumps all their eggs into one dangerous basket. It was a double or nothing bet. It was...perfect.
But it wouldn't work with Shikamaru still on the ground. He needed to get up. Please, get up-
She thinks of every afternoon they'd ever spent sparring together. She thinks of their countless hours trading punches and sharing secrets blade to blade. She thinks of all the times she's sunk her fist into his gut. Of all the times he's bound her up in his shadows.
She thinks of how he relates everything back to chess. They won't be on opposite sides of the board this time. This time, they will be playing together.
They would finally be able to finish that unfinished game.
Maybe it's because she knows her best friend inside and out, but she knows the moment he's about to stand. She knows it in the way he sighs, like he can't believe he's actually being forced to try. She feels his defiance in the set of his arms as he pushes himself back up to his feet. She sees his inner strength shining through, even if he can't see it himself.
Because Shikamaru doesn't need Old Sakura to pick him up out of the dirt. She watches him stand up on his own, something powerful and new. She watches him tilt the edge of his blade, angling it for his enemies throat. She times her actions to the coiling of his muscles, dumping molten chakra down her arm.
'Now!' Yume screams.
With a heave of strength, Sakura launches Shikamaru's backpack into the evening sky. Her palm flares with the light of a bright green sun, igniting every flash bomb inside at once. His backpack catches fire as it rockets from her hand, scattering light above them like solar fire.
The tag pocket erupts into a burning ball that sears the back of her retinas white. Overhead, the Midnight Sun transcends being a flash bomb. It is Shikamaru's weapon and Sakura's hope. It's the beacon that will lead Ino and Choji right to them, just in time to watch them slay a beast.
But Sakura isn't here to launch missiles and wax poetry. She's come to claim a head. She's here to shred this enemy to pieces for the things they did to Ruya's body.
Across the clearing, two sets of eyes find hers in the dark. The light above carves her silhouette out of the shadows. She bares her fangs, staring down her enemy. They picked the wrong day to fuck with the people she loves.
Her gaze finds Shikamaru's next.
Alive. Alive. Alive.
Because he is alive, she is invincible.
She is not the weak girl she use to be. She is an Giant walking through an insignificant world. She could rip Konoha's great gates out of the ground with nothing but her little fingers. Her body courses with untapped power. She's about to beat somebodies face in the way she's beaten every lost cause she's ever won.
Sakura drags in a ragged breath. She lets it fill her with fire and brimstone. She takes a step forward towards the man she loves.
Her titan heart walks out onto the battlefield, preparing to rain down war.
- Midnight Sun -
Shikamaru stares over the edge of his blade, legs completely paralyzed.
Sakura's body is a night dark Reaper under the flare of a flash bomb sun. The light carves her silhouette across the forest floor, making it dance like a bonfire shadow. The only reason he even believes she's there is because Tayuya turns to find her too.
"Oh, this just gets better." Tayuya smiles.
She thinks she knows demons just because she can control some. She doesn't understand that the real demon has finally entered the arena.
It's okay. She'll know soon enough.
She isn't paying attention when Shikamaru unspools talons of darkness across the field. He seizes Tayuya's shadow in his Jutsu's grip. The flash bombs overhead scar the sky, percussive with detonation after detonation.
Tayuya looks down, unimpressed. "That's cute. But don't be in such a rush to die. Let's watch my puppet kill your girlfriend first, shall we? Move a muscle and my demons will eat through his heart."
But he had Sakura in his corner now. She was here and she was his miracle. Sakura was here and she could save anybody.
He isn't scared for Utsuho anymore. Tayuya doesn't know she's about to die.
Several things happen in rapid succession. A piercing whistle splits his eardrum. Tayuya mobilizes Utsuho with her deadly song. Sakura's body flickers, then disappears. Shikamaru's jutsu wrenches Tayuya's arms up, stuffing his bomb tag into her mouth.
"Eat this you fucking bitch."
Tayuya's face detonates before Shikamaru's eyes, blowing them to opposite sides of the clearing. For the second time that day, someone hits him with a planet. He rolls across the earth, finally coming to a standstill.
He can't tell if his ears are ringing or if Tayuya's whistling at him from beyond the grave.
'They thought it would be enough to break my hands. They should have taken my fucking tongue.'
He'd known her story would be a resource in the end. He's so unbelievably glad he'd stood there listening while she recounted the details of her incarceration.
Shikamaru sits up, scanning the battlefield. Utsuho's body hits the ground like a puppet whose strings have just been cut. Across the clearing, Tayuya's twisted limbs sag into a heaping pile. Sakura reappears, running towards him. She is an angel of salvation in man-made light.
'They didn't know my demons can't die until I do.'
Utsuho...was free. He knew he needed to check on his captain, but he needed to worship his savior first. Gods above, she needs to run over faster because he's about to kiss the shit out of her.
Even through his adrenaline, Shikamaru's brain starts asking question. What was Sakura even doing here? How had she even known to come find him? How did she make it from Konoha so fast?
Sakura's outstretched arms are yards from him now. Feet. Inches.
A flash in the dark. The twitching of limbs.
No…no-
"Sakura!"
Utsuho is breathing down her neck before Sakura even knows he's there. He's still too fast, inhumanly fast. Shikamaru tries desperately to stand but the ground slips like water beneath his boots. He's helpless to do anything but watch as Utsuho wraps fingers around Sakura's outstretched arm. At the shrieking cry of a bi-tone whistle, he pitches her like a baseball into the forest.
Sakura doesn't land, she impacts.
He can't tell if the cracking sound flooding his brain is from the tree or her head or her broken bones. He's already moving when he feels the static. The electric hum of unleashed chakra coming alive behind him. He ignores it to run for Sakura's side, desperately lifting her face from the ground.
"Wake up, wake up, please Wake Up-"
He understands distantly that his mouth is begging. It dribbles pleas into Sakura's shellshocked ears, not knowing if she can even hear him. He's trying not to shake her, but it's just his hands. His whole body is wracked with earthquake tremors.
His subconscious registers the dangerous thing behind him. The thing that had just been force fed a bomb tag and somehow survived even that. What kind of monster had Tayuya become if she was even bulletproof from the inside?
Shikamaru does the one thing he doesn't want to do. He listens to the fear that careens down his neck. He listens to the warning bells firing panic through his body. He does what Sakura is too busy dying to do.
Taking her in his arms, he turns around.
Tayuya stands. She simply stands in the middle of the clearing, jaw unhinged. When she steps, it swings loose around her neck. Orochimaru's marks burn across her body as she slips strait into second seal. Five points protrude out from her hair, forming a wicked crown of horns.
She reaches up with bandaged hands and clicks her jaw back into place. She works her mouth back and forth like she's just popping eardrums at high altitude.
"Ive been eating nothing but chakra for months. You think a bomb-tag is going to kill me?"
Overhead, the midnight sun sputters wildly in and out. The burn-temp has always been erratic. He hasn't perfected the time release yet.
Tayuya's voice goes thin and quiet. It sounds like the last thing candles hear before someone snuffs the life from them.
"You thought I was powerless because someone broke my hands. You thought I needed puppets for something as fucking rudimentary as fingers." She cracks her neck, left to right. "You're going to pay for underestimating me. Stand up. We fight for real now."
"Do you have a plan?"
Madness. He's descended into absolute madness. He has to be hallucinating Sakura's voice right now because there's no fucking way she's actually talking to him.
Shikamaru looks down, prepared to commit himself to an asylum. Instead, he commits himself to her for life. Sakura looks up at him with the most perfect green eyes the Gods have ever put on this earth. She flinches when he squeezes her shoulder in shock, unable to comprehend how she's even conscious. He has to forcibly keep his body from disassembling, that's how bad he's shaking with adrenaline.
"Hi." His idiot brain says. Because that's what you do when you're having a melt down.
"Hi. The plan, please?" She repeats herself.
Shikamaru cobbles his last two brain cells together, striking them for sparks the way cavemen make fires. But his mouth must be doing the thinking for him, because it moves now despite his shock. "Of course I have a plan." It says, which is fresh news to him. "Do you remember our last chess match?"
This sentence should have made no sense what so ever. And yet, the statement apparently delights her. She sits up smiling like her shoulder isn't dislocated and they definitely aren't about to die.
"I understand." She says, because of course she's a mindreader too.
In his arms, Sakura's dead shoulder shimmers with the pale green light of healing energy. He realizes she's manipulating chakra without even lifting a finger. Gods, she was so ridiculously smart. How had he waited so long to fall in love with her?!
"How much time do you need?" She asks, panting. She's tough, but she's still in pain.
"We have maybe fifteen minutes before those flares go out. I'm going to need every second of it...Sakura, she's controlling Utsuho."
"I know. I saw." She says. Her eyes are worry and her voice concern.
"I need you to keep him off me while I work. What ever you do, don't let him touch you. The things inside him can eat chakra. They'll drain you dry in seconds if you let them."
Her eyes leave his to jump around the clearing. She's taking in the field, calculating her odds. It's like she's remembering a previous fight, forming a new plan from old memories. "Don't let him touch me. I can do that."
He doesn't know where she gets her courage, but he tries to absorb some of it now. He helps her up from the broken ground. She stumbles briefly, letting out a sharp cry. Then, to his horror, she takes her limp arm and puts her wrist between his fingers.
"Squeeze tight." She says, gritting her teeth. He realizes what she's about to do a second before she jerks her shoulder back. He feels the pop when it clicks back into place.
A corona of green chakra licks at her collarbone, welding her tendons down one by one. She rolls the bone around in its joint, not quite healed but good enough. He watches Sakura shrug off her injury like it's nothing more than a paper cut, simultaneously terrified and turned on by her pain tolerance.
When she's done, her fingers brush his for the smallest of seconds. It's too short to even be considered a touch, but too much to be nothing at all. "Stay safe. You still have a promise to keep, you know." She says.
'I'm coming back Sakura. I swear it.'
"I knows." He says, blearily staring down into the miracle in his hand. Holy. Shit.
"I hope you're done saying your last words. My demons are going to carve your bitch hollow."
Tayuya has clearly finished waiting for her fight. Shikamaru doesn't need to shore up his courage. He's ready to finish this too.
With a treble note, Utsuho's body vanishes into thin air. In unison, Sakura's body disappears too. The forest rings with the clatter of steel and the pounding of footsteps trying to outrun each other.
Tayuya bares down on him, but Shikamaru has become brave. "You've missed a few things while you've been locked up." He says. Because Tayuya isn't the only one who can carve out a threat.
"That bitch is Haruno Sakura. She can put a body back together faster than she can take it apart. I watched her reach beyond the veil and drag the Kazekage's soul back from the other side. She's the disciple of the Sannin Tsunade and the best medic I've ever seen. I'm telling you all this so that, when I'm finally done breaking you, when I drag you back to your prison cell kicking and screaming…
When you reach for the hope of a quick death…You won't even have that."
It's here, beneath the light of a synthetic sun, that Shikamaru finally gets a taste of their end game. He takes possession of Tayuya's earlier words and shoves them back down her bloody throat. Even if it's just for the briefest second, he swears she hesitates, fearing him.
But that second passes as all seconds do. Tayuya lunges for him in slow motion. His brain clicks alive, jumping strait into third gear. He slips her liquid punch at the last second, bringing his fingers to his mouth.
When he turns, he holds his knuckles high, cracking the shell of Sakura's soldier pill between his teeth.