Sakura

by lilac haze

AU. Non-Canon. Time Travel. Please see inside for full warnings. Cross posted on Ao3. On his deathbed he was granted eternal peace and place to rest for all of time. Of course that was not appealing to him. Ever unpredictable to the end he had a counter offer. One that the Sage had to consider. In which Sakura's going to have a rough time. A really rough time.

7. Part Seven: War

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

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A/N:

Welcome back! Got another long one for you here.

Warnings: Blood, gore, violence, and language. This chapter is violent and there is references/implied sexual content.

Thank you for continuing to spend the time to follow this story. Let's get to it!

~L.H.

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Part 7: War

It was humbling if she paused to think about it. The way she had regressed or rather the appearance of it. Her shadow was practically breathing down her neck. He had promised her no missions but he was in a bind as much as her. Despite her failures in Iwa, she was his best operative. By far. She was the most versatile. She was the cleanest. She was simply put, the best. Minato had not said everything that he had just for the sake of it. It was the truth.

And that's why she was here. West of Konoha and South East of Iwa where most of the troops that were not deployed to the North East - Kumo - were. Amegakure. A shady alliance that the Hokage himself did not know about.

Loris held her breath as pairs of senbons were held between each knuckle of her hands. Her chakra regulated her heartbeat. It was slow. It was deliberate. She narrowed her flat eyes obscured behind the facade of her mask.

The man under the purple hat - the leader - spoke through a gray gas mask to a man hunched over at the right side of his plain wooden chair with the long back. A hat modeled after the ones the Kage of the Five Great Nations wore. It was a farce. He was no more the leader than she was free. The people of Amegakure no longer had confidence in him but he had force. It was apparent under the purple robes he wore over his naked, tanned torso.

The Salamander.

Harsh. Paranoid. Not one to trust anyone. Ruthless. Decisive. Ruled with an iron fist. He had no interest in discourse, only security - meaning, his security. The security of his rein. The one and only thing he loved was the seat he guarded. The guards around him were on edge. They always were. They worked for a madman. She should know.

Hanzo had lost his way. His notions and ideal of peace were ripped from him harshly when the Five Nations left his little hidden village behind. They did not extend aid or humanitarian efforts after the Second War despite him having named and spared the Sannin. It left him reeling. He had nothing but regret and a single question. How did this happen? He was jaded from watching his people suffer and die. Amegakure was far from ideal conditions for food to grow. They relied on trade. They relied on Grass, Fire, and Waterfall for crops. And they did not receive as much as they needed. A great famine nearly wiped out half their populace. It was hard to have faith in those conditions. It could not flourish with so much darkness on all sides.

And Danzo did exactly what he excelled at: manipulating the situation. That was why she was here. With her handler with the purple mask. Being close to him again - to where she could hear him breathe - had Inner on edge. Sakura had resorted to tuning her out, banishing her to a place where even she could not go because she could afford another distraction.

He sat with his back straight, his ankle over his knee. There was no shortage of people in the room. Five other bodies beyond the leader, if her and her shadow were not to be counted.

Witnesses.

Her joints protested from being folded for so long - hours if she had to hazard a guess. It was hard to tell with the constant rain and very small windows. There was no clock in his room. A gale of wind hit her in the back of the neck. The signal.

Small, square, white sheets of paper no bigger than Loris' palm filled the room. There was first confusion. Then commotion. Then came chaos. There were shouts of surprise and anger. The paper filled the office until there was nothing left.

Loris held her illusion. One cast over each of the five witnesses. Loris released all the senbon in her hands. They moved in complement to the pictures being shown. They cut and sliced as they hit their target. She pulled back on the thin strings, manipulating them in the air. Screams broke out as the men swatted at the paper that was not there, overlooking the razor-thin metal instruments that harmed them, completely oblivious to anything other than the reality she pushed forth on them.

The senbon connected to the strings vanished with a soft popping sound that was drowned out by the raining sheets of parchment. She threw one last one, holding her breath. It embedded itself into the back of the chair, hitting a vital point. A body fell to the ground in a heap.

Dead.

She missed.

Eyes without sclera stared straight at her. He pulled the senbon from his advisor's neck. It disappeared into the deep pocket of his purple satin robes. She nodded her head. The completion of the first part of the contract. Now all that was left was following through.

The papers - the sustained fragments of her illusion - fell to the floor, burying the plush red carpet in a layer of bone. Loris and the Root with the purple markings on his mask vanished as chaos continued to rain.

Acceptable loss.

xXx

She stood still without moving. The sound of heavy rain pelted the tin shingles of the roof. Why they used such material that only served to amplify the sound of rain in a place where it rained every day was beyond her.

Maybe it has to do with preventing mold.

I would ask if you've lost your mind but it feels like a waste at this point.

Sakura's lip twitched under her mask. She almost smiled.

The man with a bandana over his shoulder-length hair scowled at her. The patchy sandy-blond hair on his chin was unkempt, almost dominating his features. It was the first thing she noticed. Then it was the gold left front tooth. He was missing his right and more than a handful more. Everything about him was grundy and grimy. He smelled of opium, alcohol, and stale sweat.

Hardly a credible witness.

But the truth often had no place when it came to politics. It meant nothing when it could be bought. Sakura brought a hand to her hip. Her patience was all expended.

"One more time, repeat it back to me," she said, breaking the consecutive string of days she had not used her voice. She had been up to seven.

The man rolled his black eyes. "I'm not err idiot."

I would not go that far.

She threw up a small purple pouch, up and down, up and down, up and down. There was no sound of coins. That was how full it was. The man licked his lips, never tearing his eyes away from the sack as it moved.

"I saw 'em," he scratched at his neck with a dirty fingernail. "I saw 'em leaving. A fella with orange hair, one with red, and a pretty little thing with purple. They were running away looking real suspicious. From where Hanzo-sama was nearly murdered."

"And?" She asked with an unimpressed lilt. Her shadow was not needed for this. He had orders to go over to Grass right after the 'failed' attempt.

"And," the man gulped. His dark eyes were wide as he pictured holding the coins in his hands. "They left that," he gestured to the scrap of clothing on the desk behind him. It was black on one side and red on the other. It was ripped like it snagged on something. "In their hurry to get out of there real fast like."

"Good." She tossed the pouch toward him, underhanded. He barely caught it. He pulled at the velvet tie. His eyes glittered brightly at his loot earned through ill-gotten means.

"I'll take care of it, lady," he pocketed it quickly as if she would rip it from him if he was not quick enough to hide it. "Don't you worry," he cooed.

She was not. Not of this anyway.

He lifted his head and blinked. The room other than him was now empty.

xXx

Sakura sighed, sitting in the window seat. A part of her brain was keeping track of the seconds that ticked away. Always on and always keeping track. She watched the rain fall. The sky was gray. It had been less than ten days but she was already feeling the depression that she kept locked deep away on the inside - ignoring - now on the outside. She pressed her forehead against the cool glass. Her breath fogged it up. Her mask lay on the desk.

The sound of his breathing was raspier. Almost as if a wheeze was simply too much for him to manage. The rain continued to drop down in sheets. The changing wind had it pelting the windowpane.

Plick. Plick. Plick.

He inhaled but he did not exhale. Sakura stared at the despondent eyes of her reflection for a moment before she hauled herself to her feet. She put on her mask. The white face with red markings stared at her, popping out like a ghost against the gloomy gray. She walked over to his bed. It was without sheets. The mattress was yellow and soiled. She watched his chest waiting for it to rise but it did not. His gold left tooth glittered.

Another acceptable loss because like Hanzo, Danzo did not do loose ends. She pulled her cloak around her shoulders, fastening it to her. She gathered what was left of the coin and put it in her pack. She moved through the dimly lit studio.

By the time her boots were walking along the covered awnings of the market, she was wearing the face of a civilian. Nondescript with brown hair. No one bothered her. No one looked twice at her. She swiped a small black book from the stall, depositing the correct number of coins on the counter without a sound. She passed some children playing in a covered area without disrupting their game where they rolled a can down the walkway, laughing. In each of their pockets, they would find ryo to give to their families to put additional food on the table.

Sakura leaned against a wall, ankles crossed and head bowed. Her fingers were cold. She thumbed through the black book until she reached the last three pages. The first face was one she recognized from memory. Only his eyes were not purple like she remembered and his face was without metal spikes. Her heart skipped a beat. He looked so much like Naruto that it hurt. It really hurt.

Yahiko.

She exhaled shakily as she looked to the right. A woman's face and one she did not know from memory but Naruto's description had been surprisingly accurate given how many years it had been since he saw her.

Konan.

She was beautiful with her purple hair and amber eyes. She flipped to the last page.

Nagato.

With fiery red hair and purple eyes - the Rinnegan, another thing she learned from Naruto - the distant Uzumaki affiliation was just the same as the others as was his crime.

Current Affiliation/title: Member of the terrorist organization Akatsuki, led by Yahiko.

Former affiliation/title: Ame Orphans

Crime: Wanted for the attempted assignation of Amegake's leader, Hanzo.

Rank: S

She closed her eyes and pressed the bingo book to her chest, tapping it twice. She could not stay for long. She could not reach out to them. She could only hope that she gave them - him - enough notice.

The woman leaning against the brick wall vanished. The open bingo book fell to the damp ground. A drop of rain landed on Nagato's face, warping the ink until the image was indistinguishable. It did not matter, the damage was done. But she would do everything in her power to ensure that the Ame Orphans did not become an acceptable loss.

Nearly everything.

---

She saw him standing as a formidable force with his arm crossed and long white hair flowing in the breeze, in the same direction his maroon haori moved. His posture was relaxed but the pitch of his face along with the slight squint of his eyes spoke to the level of his distrust. His was wary and that gave her hope. This meeting was long overdue. More than two years. One burned away in a war that she could delay but ultimately could not prevent. Time no one would get back.

"Since your last intel proved to be spot on, you have five minutes," he said with an impatient frown.

It seems he learned to speak to women at a later age.

She smirked behind the mask. Leave it to Jiraiya to frame the narrative as if he had any more control than she did. The need was mutual otherwise he would not be here. She was more amused than anything.

"Are we alone?"

He brought his palms together as the only resounding answer. She was swallowed by the darkness. The firm ground she had been standing on now had more give. It was wet and damp, and the odor was far from pleasant. Sakura sighed as the realization came to her. She was quite literally swallowed. She tried not to shuffle on her feet as the discomfort set in. She was standing on the toad's pink tongue.

"Subtle," she said dryly to his crossed arms and lips pulled low into a set of deep concentration. His judgment of her, the situation, and her intentions was palpable. "I need a toad contract." She spoke with clarity and authority. Just as Tsunade did whenever she needed something from the Elders. No room for negotiation or dissonance. It never worked but it did not hurt to try.

"Fresh out of those, last I checked, I'm afraid," he scoffed with the full force of his diaphragm. "Unless you can give me a compelling enough reason to look a little bit harder?"

"Do I get more time?" She raised a brow behind the mask.

"Depends on what you have to say," he leaned back against the sealed opening that could only be the toad's mouth.

If he doesn't like what you have to say, he can turn you into stomach acid.

It was true. She was sure her chakra was damped in this controlled environment. Harder to use. It sat heavily in her coils, mostly uncooperative beyond what was needed for very basic jutsu or jutsu that required next to no chakra to cast. It severely limited her options if it came down to it, even with her unmatched control. She tilted her head back. The seal on the roof of the toad's mouth all but confirmed that.

Impressive. I wonder if he taught him this one?

She pushed down the inklings of jealousy and copious amounts of admiration. He was truly an expert. A seal like this could be very useful. She committed the intricate patterns to memory to research more later.

He doesn't know about our strength yet.

She reminded Inner in hopes the being would behave and not clog up her thinking space with exit strategies. Inner had less faith in Sakura's soft skills than Sakura, herself, did. It remained to be seen if it was for good reason or not.

"I need a way of contacting you. I can't keep relying on scrolls and playing a very one-sided game of tag with you across the world."

The war like everything else provided her with an opportunity. Instability. Her slightly longer-than-average absences could easily be explained by roads, bridges, and paths no longer being there or hostile shinobi. The conditions were far from friendly with respect to efficiency and reliability. Her summoner had his hands full and his mind stretched to spend too much time wondering what she was doing with hers. As long as her missions were complete - and they were, they always were - he did not care to look too closely.

"To share information," the white-haired Sannin understood where she led him. She nodded her head. "That makes sense but you have not answered the question of why?"

"Are you asking?"

"I believe I already did," his eyes narrowed slightly as he did not know what to make of the ANBU in front of him. She was a conundrum. Potentially a red herring at best and a spy at worst. "You're Danzo's dog."

"I am," she was mildly surprised he did not use the term 'bitch'.

He's on his best behavior.

Sakura thought of the two to three ways she could play it. "My loyalties are like yours."

"Is that so?" His white brows disappeared behind his headband with the insignia of Konoha. He had yet to opt for the one Future-Sakura remembered, the one that tied him to Mount Myoboku. "Remind me, where do our loyalties lie?"

"Our mission," she answered without hesitation or fluctuation in voice or stance. "My mission," she reached behind her, not missing the way he stiffened. The floor under her rose. The mucus rose up to her ankles in a very thick, odor-filled warning. The promise of pain if she did not tread carefully.

"Is explained here." She held out three scrolls. She tossed the one in red to him. He caught it with an expression of blankness, despite his eyes glittering in sharp focus. "Uchiha Madara is alive."

He fumbled the caught scrolls in his hand. His jaw sprung open and his eyes were wide enough that she was morbidly curious if the toad they were in would mistake them for a delicious snack.

It did not.

"That's not possible," Jiraiya shook his head. "He should be dust." Not even Uzumaki lived that long.

"Not quite," Sakura sighed. She regarded the two remaining scrolls in her hand, tapping them against the outer side of her thigh, reminding herself to be patient. It was a lot. She just had more tolerance built up than most.

"He will take an interest in Namikaze's student, the Uchiha," she moved her tongue all along the cave of her mouth. The weight of her seal was immense. She could not communicate that Danzo was already monitoring the Uchiha, which meant that she was monitoring the Uchiha. If Minato did his job and kept Obito safe, Madara would need a backup plan; another vessel to carry on his dream for him when he ceased to be amongst the living. "Keeping him alive and out of Madara's influence is instrumental to the success of my mission and the fate of the world."

"Is that all?" He rolled his eyes slowly so that she would feel every bit of the open judgment behind the gesture. "I don't have time to listen to the delusional ravings of an ANBU operative who's in the middle of a psychotic break. Go tell your theories to a bottle of sake like the rest of your peers."

Ouch. That hit close to home, huh?

"Jiraiya-sama," she called for his attention with the uttering of his name, refocusing her own mind to align it with her movements. He raised his eyes just as she reached behind her mask. Sakura lowered it.

His mouth hung open, he peered into her flat green eyes. "Gods, Sakura," his voice was aghast. "What have you done? What has Root done to you?"

"Nothing," she could not prevent her voice from being a little offended. She was a kunoichi - Root as he specified - she was not supposed to wear her trauma on her face. She was not supposed to be transparent. Like he was. She saw the effect the familiar tone and pitch had on him. Some of the aloofness melted. She had not seen him since she was twelve years old. Nine years. A lot has changed since then. Too much had changed.

"Is this convincing enough for you?"

His forehead bunched together and his lips pulled into a frown. "Don't get me wrong you turned out to be a real looker, easy on the eyes and everything, but you taking off your mask - which was very stupid of you by the way - does not provide any additional useful information."

Baka.

Her eyes widened just before she brought her palm to smack her forehead. "Sorry," she rolled her eyes in disbelief at her own stupidity. "I forget that's even there." She tapped her forehead to reveal a purple diamond.

He froze, inhaling sharply. "That can't be-"

"It is," she cut him off. "And no, I'm not related to Uzumaki Mito or Senju Tsunade in any way by blood," she added, offhandedly.

"How?" Jiraiya gasped. "Hime said she was decades out from developing the Byakugo. That is what that is right?"

"It is," she answered his disbelief in his own eyes with steadfastness. Sakura crossed her arms, her mask hung at her hip. "I think you just answered your own question if you take a little more time to think about it. I'm sure everything will be clearer in the not-to-distant future," she provided the not-so-subtle hint with a deadpan and a face that held disinterest.

"But that's beside the point," she ignored his indigent sputtering. She missed Older Jiraiya. He was less phased by these things. "Tell Namikaze to keep a close eye on Obito and Rin."

"Rin?" Jiraiya stopped his unintelligible muttering to himself long enough to ask her.

"Kiri - Madara - will try to kidnap her to use her as the Bijuu for the Sanbi, the Three-Tails, assuming things aren't too different in this timeline. It's what happened the first time. It can't happen again." She imparted the drops of knowledge on him with the gentleness of a raging waterfall. She did not have much time for long chit-chat. "Trust me." Her expression was bleak; it gave an opportunity for something pitiful to shine through: pleading.

"Why can't you just tell him?" The Sannin frowned as his brain continued to work through what he had learned. The scroll in his hand was practically burning his palm. The prospect of opening it to read its contents was daunting. There was no other way to put it. He did not know if he wanted to know. Jiraiya cleared his throat, roughly.

"He will listen to you."

"He'll ask too many questions," she snapped, letting him know exactly what she thought of his suggestion. Minato would not accept it as easily as Jiraiya did. He would demand more. And right now the last thing he needed to be burdened with was everything. His only goals should be to keep his students alive and make a name for himself in this war. Now was his time to earn the moniker.

"He needs to keep his hands clean if he wants to be Hokage."

She brought a hand to her hip and shifted her weight. She saw something in the way he was looking at her. It was similar to the look one wore when pieces of the puzzle finally came together. Perspective. He had the twinkle of perspective in his dark eyes.

"That's why you have no scars," his eyes darted from her bare shoulder that poked out of her cloak, down all the way to the crook of her elbow - the only skin other than her face and toes visible. "Konoha does not have that caliber of medic to pull that off after you took Orochimaru's acid the way you did." He scowled at her, face becoming lines of disapproval at the memory of her unconscious and missing the top couple layers of her skin.

"Which was incredibly stupid." Tsunade would want him to impress upon her apprentice. "Byakugo or no Byakugo."

"You were there?" She asked in surprise. She shook her head. "Stop distracting me."

"I assume he doesn't know. That you didn't tell him." The man frowned, not heeding her feedback. Judging from her dead, dead eyes he was right. Minato did not know the truth about her.

"He misses you." He was watching her closely to gauge her reaction. Perhaps even more closely than before just to see how much humanity was still left or if it all had been stripped away by Danzo and Root.

"Kami," she rolled her eyes and clicked her tongue. "We are at war. We've been at war. I just told you that Uchiha Madara is alive and after one of Namikaze's students - and he's willing to use another to get to him - and that's what you have to say?" She asked in exasperation. "We have real problems!"

"What?" He shrugged. "I'm a romantic at heart. And you're hurting my prized pupils'."

"This was a mistake," she groaned, covering her face with her hands as she pictured herself screaming until she lost her voice. It was always at the edge of a cliff. Long blades of lush grass under her feet. And nothing but the ocean and rocks in front of her. She willed herself to remain calm. To not fall back into the ways of who she once was.

Why did Tsunade-sama have to be the one to leave?!

If Jiraiya was the one who left the village heartbroken, it would mean that Tsunade was the one who died.

She forced her clenched jaw open. Centimeter by centimeter. She exhaled slowly through her nose. They all had to work with what they were dealt.

Jiraiya scoffed in clear offense at her lack of any and all confidence in his abilities. "Calm down. I can multitask," he rubbed his chin with a reproachful look. "I won't tell him anything, beyond need to know," he said what should have gone without saying.

Sakura for her reasons trusted him. She needed him. Jiraiya needed the information she had. Konoha needed that information. So he had to trust her. From one stepping stone to the next, until the creak underfoot was crossed and his feet were safely, securely on the other side.

"How are the Ame Orphans doing?" She asked him in a measurably calmer tone. "I'm technically an orphan so I can call them that."

"Danzo is a problem," Jiraiya's eyes narrowed into slits, remembering what earned the Mask the meeting in the first place. The trio were going to be forced to become what the Leader of Ame - Hanzo - was trying so hard to make them: terrorists. Her tip allowed him to intervene before they were put in a situation where they had to fight for their lives.

"I don't know how I still manage to be surprised by the fact that he would go to such extreme lengths to prolong the war. That he would go after them, using their own home to do so."

He shook his head and blinked rapidly trying to contain his anger, his disappointment and his fear that such a man was growing his own army. His dark eyes found her washed-out face. Her pink lashes and brows along with her dull green eyes were the only color on her person. Her hair was tucked away behind a shroud of thick black silk. She was his crown jewel, not that Danzo would ever admit it - he would sooner eat his own tongue - and she was on their side as far as appearances went. No, it was more than that. It was his gut telling him that. And it was rarely wrong about these things.

"Leave him to me. You focus on getting them out of Ame with minimal bloodshed. Convince them to stay underground for a bit. It's not cowardice. Tell them change is coming and it doesn't always have to be achieved through the sword. Once the war is over and the Yondaime is settled in, then they can talk."

She looked at his solemn face. "Do you think you can manage that?" She knew it was no small task. She could barely imagine Naruto sitting still - hiding away - while his home was ripped apart. Even if that very home labeled him as dangerous and tried to kill him. And Jiraiya had three of them on his hands.

"I can try," he clenched the scroll she had given him. "Danzo's a dog, be careful." He tucked it into his maroon haori.

"So am I," she smirked.

"I'll get them out of Ame," Jiraiya said with a definitive nod. "Rest assured."

"Good," she tossed him the remaining scrolls that he caught with one hand. "That should be more than enough for now. I will send more with the summons when I get the chance. I can't stay much longer."

"I understand." The pair of scrolls joined the others. "You know how I die."

"I know how we all die," she corrected him without emotion, matching his tone effortlessly. "So let's get to work fixing that, okay?"

He nodded his head. She watched as he made the hand seals. A large scroll sat across both of his palms. He crouched down. His forearms rested over his knees. She moved to be closer, apologizing in her head to the toad for any discomfort she caused it. Inner scoffed at her priorities.

She crouched forward just as he did. She removed the black glove on her right hand. The toad opened its mouth just enough to let more light in. It hit the center of her forehead. Her eyes found the last name written on the contract neatly in blood, signed with his thumbprint. She swallowed before she brought her hand to her mouth, she bit down on her thumb with her canine tooth hard enough to taste the crimson coating the ivory. The iron taste was as strong as her resolve. She inhaled deeply and began to sign her name.

She finished with a thumb print., exhaling through her nose. They waited for it to glow white before it dried instantly for many, many, many human lifetimes.

"Welcome to Mount Myoboku," he said without warmth.

Her lip twitched as a wave of nausea rose through her. She existed and that contract proved it, undeniably. She was here.

"What the hell is your mask supposed to be, Gaki?"

She sighed.

---

The map was as good as right in front of her as she continued to chomp away at the rice ball in her hand. Her home had been without a single grain of rice so she had no choice but to make her way to the corner convenience store that was open at all times of the day, even during war. Sakura sighed softly to herself. She took the stairs two at a time because she did not have the energy to dismantle the traps. She was wearing Sakura's face today so the traps had been activated.

She opened the door with the key, and with one hand - the hand that had been holding the rice ball, deactivated the seal just long enough for the closing of the door to reset it. Coming from the clear air outside brought to her attention just how musty and gross the inside of her house smelled. She would have been embarrassed but she was no longer taking company so it was low on the list of priorities.

Sakura stepped over the empty ramen containers, snack wrappers, and cans of tea, soda, beer, and chocolate milk as she set the brown paper bag on the countertop of her kitchenette. She did not have rats.

Yet.

Her thoughts were not too busy to judge her.

Her apartment looked worse than Naruto's did at any point. Even when it had reached such inhabitable levels that she had caved and cleaned the whole thing all out of worry that he would die from ingesting too much mold which grew because the Baka did not throw away his ramen containers that still had liquid in them. She shuddered at the memory as she put away the processed food in her cupboard. It would buy her a week at least. She did not plan to be in the village that long.

Danzo was still occasionally setting her out on grunt work to remind her to not get too comfortable but she did not complain. What good would that do anyone?

Sakura moved to her bedroom. She set her grocery bag on the end table by the lamp. None of it was perishable. She could restock the dusty shelves later. She peeled off her pants, not caring where they landed. She did not even have the energy to brush her teeth or wash her face. She fell asleep on her unmade, messy bed with sheets that should have been washed last week in a long-sleeved black shirt and her black cotton hip-ridder underwear.

Later.

She lied to herself. She would address housekeeping later.

---

She studied the scroll with hypercritical eyes. This was the third time overall and the first to do so in the light. She brought it close to her mask.

Stroke seven looks funny in the 'air' character. I think I drew it too straight. His lines are usually at more of an angle, maybe as much as five degrees off.

No one is going to notice.

I noticed. Sakura huffed.

You also drew them. You're catastrophizing. No one is going to notice an acute difference of five degrees. You forged the Daimyo's penmanship perfectly.

If you say so.

She sighed and tucked the scroll - the one marked with the official emblem of the Daimyo's house - into her hip pouch.

Let's hope the Tsuchikage doesn't notice the five degrees.

Why couldn't I be in anyone else's head?

Rude.

Sakura frowned behind her mask. She was still in the Land of Fire. She needed to move faster if she wanted to intercept the real message the Daimyo had for the Tsuchikage with her fake one.

She thought of the face of Team Seven - Minato's not hers - and that curbed the budding feelings of guilt.

Sooner or later I will have to answer for these sins.

Worry about that after you die.

Sakura nodded her head, despite that being a very real worry of hers. She pushed forward because she could not go back any more than she could remain standing still.

---

A gasp of breath. The way the light from eyes dulled forever captured in a fearful expression. The resignation. The acceptance. There was nothing they could do. It was too late. Their fates were sealed by the blood caused by the steel blade across their jugular right before their head was cleaved from their bodies. Left to roll and roll and roll until something stopped them. Sometimes it was a limb. Sometimes it was a torso. Sometimes it was a tree, rock, boulder, or stream.

Crimson. Curses. Screams. Grunts. Gasps. Tears. That was the accompaniment to her moves.

She twisted and turned never staying in one spot, one position, one stance longer than the time it took to blink. She in her ascent to Root - or descent as it was all a matter of perspective - had traded her fists for twin axes. They were far more efficient in killing and with her strength their weight was negligible. They were practically as heavy as her hands; an extension of her. Looks were deceiving. It was only when the axes fell and a sizable crater formed in testament to their weight, did one realized that the small woman was more than what met the eye.

Much more.

It was not often she got involved in the conflict at such a granular level. Carnage was not what she excelled at. But they had been on the way on to her mission assignment - the gathering of Kumo nin just outside the northeast side, right where the Land of Hot Springs touched Fire. so she chose to satiate some of her bloodlust. She was, after all, having a rather difficult week between dealing with Danzo and his indecisiveness on whether he hated her or needed her. Maybe it was both. Maybe it was because he needed her, that he hated her. It did not matter all that much.

She continued to move with her brain switched off. She was operating on pure instinct and muscle memory.

Sakura swung her left arm before the right. The man's eyes went wide before his right arm fell to the ground. His left was seconds behind. Blood gushed out like an erupting geyser, it made her feel like she was in a movie or something. She gave one more slice. His head rolled. She was merciful in making it quick. She flickered and continued the deadly dance as she made her way closer and closer to the land that would one day call itself Oto.

Their screams and begging were music to her ears and her mask - coated in blood - was a true work of art.

---

She hung from the ceiling, hidden behind layers and layers of genjutsu. Layers that his Sharingan would be able to see through if it was not hidden away behind layers of its own. His bandages obscured a true act of evil. His former friend's eye rested in his socket. Even if she were to rip off the bandages and expose him to the world, what would be gained?

Danzo locked up? No, he would simply tell them he was honoring a dying man's last wish. The Uchiha outraged? Yes. Maybe she would even push up the attempted coup by several years.

The Sandiame would be put in a position between the Council and the Clan. During a war, that would cripple Konoha. That would make Danzo a martyr for his brainwashed zombies if the Sandaime actually showed a backbone. Maybe Orochimaru would defect sooner. There were so many scenarios with seemingly infinite possibilities. And every single choice she made seemed like the wrong one.

The war still happened. Danzo was still alive. Orochimaru was still alive. Madara was nowhere to be found. She did not know who the Uchiha was.

Sakura. You need to focus. Breathe.

Her heartbeat was being purposely slowed down to the point that it was cut in half. She was at the resting heart rate of sleep, but the rate at which blood flowed to her ears had been nearly doubled. She could hear every time the Root operative's lashes brushed against his mask. She was nothing but a very quiet, stationary fly on the wall. She continued to listen in, willing the noise in her mind to settle.

"How many?" Danzo asked the man with a purple mask with the markings of a boar. His tusks kept drawing Sakura's attention. Boar joined Root at the same time she did. She had come to learn her class only had four candidates. And three - including her - passed.

"No more than three hundred from the latest message we were able to decode. They will be at Kannabi bridge in nine day's time, Shimura-sama."

"Has the decoded message reached the Hokage's desk?"

"No," Boar shook his head once.

"Good, burn the message." Danzo's head moved in the faintest of nods. "And get me, Loris."

The man rose from his kneeling position. He disappeared after bowing one more in an excessive show of loyalty that no doubt did nothing to move Danzo. Danzo lifted his head and narrowed his eyes at a blank spot in the ceiling. Nothing but paint was there to witness the act.

---

"Found you," Kakashi said in an unimpressed deadpan. His chin was tilted up. "They must really let anyone into ANBU these days."

Loris did not take offense, instead, she lowered down onto the branch and kicked her legs back and forth, idly. She knew that drove him crazy - having to wait. "I'm impressed."

He rolled his dark eyes. "It's no big deal. I am a Jonin, after all." He pointed to himself with his thumb. "The skill jump between ANBU and Jonin is not all that much. Don't feel bad that I was able to detect you. I am the youngest Jonin ever. I broke my own sensei's record."

Loris let out a low whistle. "Really?" She lowered her hand into her fist, egging him on subtly. Her eyebrows were raised behind her white mask with the red circular eye markings.

Kakashi nodded his silver solemnly, his arms were crossed over his chest. He was the picture of nonchalance. "Try harder next time at chakra suppression. It will help you in the field. It might just save your life."

This little shit.

"You don't say," she drawled in hidden delight. Loris bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing. The deeper of a hole he dug, the greater the satisfaction would be to pull him out of it by the scruff of his neck. She might even shake him a couple of times for good measure. That was how dogs established boundaries with their offspring and younger packmates right?

"I can give you some pointers," Kakashi offered impassively like he was doing her charity.

Let me take a swing at him. I can hit his ego from here.

Okay. That's enough, really.

Loris smiled sweetly behind her mask. "You shouldn't brag about the one you noticed."

"And why not?" Kakashi countered, arms still crossed over his chest. His eyes held disinterest that she knew was feigned.

"Because it highlights the seven times you didn't notice." She took great pleasure in watching his face twist into a scowl the second he registered her words.

"No way," he shook his head, to the point it was nearly excessive, in his denial. "There's no way I didn't notice you seven times!" He huffed in his self-righteous indignation born from his steadfast belief in himself. "Lair!" He pointed at her.

"Sure," she shrugged in casual disinterest and sarcastic acceptance. "I'm a liar." A wary look settled on his half-covered face. "I'll accept it if you can say it to my face knowing for a fact that you did not miss detecting me those seven times." She held up seven fingers as trophies to his wounded pride.

"Your tussle with Obito-kun," she lowered the index finger of her right hand. "You bell-test with your team," her right hand came to rest on her thigh. "You visiting that bookstall for the latest edition of a book you are way too young for," she tucked in her thumb, as she tutted her tongue. She did not miss the way Kakashi's ears turned red. "That time your beloved sensei confiscated that very book before you were even fifteen pages in during your team lunch, forcing you to socialize," she lowered her index finger. "Shall I continue?" She wiggled the three remaining fingers of her left hand while tilting her head to the side.

Kakashi deflated right before her eyes. "Whatever," he turned his head away from her. "You're a creep," he said in a halfhearted insult. A part of him was disappointed she did not feel the need to say "hello". But Loris was not sentimental like that.

"It's called taking an interest," she mused with a small sigh. Loris grinned in triumph behind her mask not too long after. "Chin up, Kakashi-kun. Look what I got you." She undid her hinge to reveal a grocery bag by her hip. "Wanna see?"

The Hatake did not acknowledge her comment because of his dismantled pride but she watched as he sat down at a nearby bench. Loris moved with slow movements to join him. The waning sun was warm on their backs. The sky was painted in oranges and pinks. She turned her head to look at the teen.

"How's your ice cream?"

Kakashi paused, licking his ice cream cone - vanilla because it was Kakashi - and frowned at her. "Sweet."

Loris rolled her eyes. "Would it kill you to act like a kid every once in a while?"

"I'm eating it, aren't I?" He shot back. "What kind of question was that anyway? It's convenience-store soft-serve; it's always the same."

"Well, excuse me," Loris scoffed, "next time I'll go to a fancy shop."

Kakashi eyed her with a petulant look on his face. "When are you going to teach me that?" And by 'that' he was referring to her ability to eat the ice cream cone without taking off her mask.

"You're a Jonin, you'll figure it out," she grinned.

Kakashi scowled. It did not take him long to think of something to sling at her. "You could bring me real food, you know? Home Cooked meals instead of making me do all the work."

Loris snorted, she relished the sweet artificial strawberry flavor on her tongue before speaking. "Trust me, Kaka, if you saw my cooking skills you would not be asking me to cook for you."

"So besides being ANBU, you have no noteworthy skills?" He pulled his navy mask back up to his nose, having finished his ice cream cone.

"Absolutely none," Loris said with a small nod.

Kakashi puffed air out of his lungs. He began to root through the paper bag that was between them. None of the items inside required immediate refrigeration.

"How are things going with your team?" Loris asked him gently. "Are you being more friendly now that you've had a chance to get to know them more?" She regarded him with a measured scrutiny that she was sure would come across even behind the mask. "Not reminding them every five minutes that you're a Jonin will go a long way in making friends."

"I'm not here to make friends," he reminded her with an attitude that she did not care for. She nearly pinched the bridge of her nose, she did roll her eyes, however. "Obito is Baka. He's so loud. On our last mission, he nearly gave away our location, the mouth breather." Kakashi grumbled darkly. "And Rin is too nice!"

"Too nice?" Loris asked with a frown.

"Too nice to be a ninja," Kakashi explained with exasperation. "She's always asking how we're feeling and if we're comfortable; if there's anything she can do to help us." He looked at the ground between his feet, his expression was thoughtful. "She should quit before she gets hurt"

Damn, guess he's always been perceptive.

"She might surprise you, Kaka-kun," Loris sighed. It was hard not to go back to her own Team Seven days. Kakashi had tried to discourage her then too from pursuing this path. And she did not understand until much later why. It was nothing personal. It was not a dig or bais on or against her for not being from a clan or having civilian parents. She had no direction, no drive, and no real desire to be a kunoichi. She was just doing it because Ino and Sasuke were. Everyone she knew was. And she did not want to be different so she did too.

Rin was not like that. Not from what she saw with her eyes and heard with her ears from Naruto. "Keep an open mind. And if she offers help, it's okay for you to do the same. Train together. It will help you be a better teammate."

"You don't have teammates. You do missions alone, always," he looked at her with calculating eyes. "I can go straight to ANBU after this war is over. Why should I let others drag me down, hold me back?"

Oh, Kakashi-sensei.

She closed her eyes. Another face filled her mind. The face of a self-appointed Avenger, he was half turned away from her. She had spent more time looking at his back than his face.

"I know it might not make sense right now, it might not feel like it, but your days as a team shape who you are. You're going to look back and smile when you think of these days. Sure, if you train by yourself and isolate yourself from the world you might grow really fast, especially in the beginning. But eventually, you'll hit a wall and when you turn around you'll realize everyone you left behind has already passed you. And they did it together. So learn from my mistakes. Don't strive to repeat them." She ruffled his hair. "Use your teammates - your bond - to push you forward."

"That was so sappy that I threw up in my mouth."

Kakashi brought his hands to his now throbbing head and glared at her. "Hey!"

"Sorry," Loris smiled. "My hand slipped."

"My ass."

"Language," she admonished him playfully. "You'll think about what I said?"

Kakashi sighed. "I mean you made my ears have to listen to it so I might as well." He leaned back against the bench, his head cradled in his hands. "Hey, Loris?"

"Hm?" She turned to look at him.

"Why did you pick me?" He was not looking at her and she understood why. It took quite a bit for him to gather the courage to ask for he might receive an answer he was not mentally prepared for.

"You remind me of someone I used to know," she smiled softly, not even having to think about it. It was automatic.

"Gross," he ruined the moment. "So you're some kind of kiddie-creep?"

This time, she did not make excuses or apologize for clocking him on the back of the head. He earned it.

"From when I was your age," she added with heat.

"I was kidding! You'd think you have something to hide given the way you reacted," Kakashi whined, his lips pulled into a pout against his navy face mask. "You hit really hard."

She snickered. "And I have a soft spot for messy hair." She ran her fingers through it, ruffling it while she sent chakra to ease the pain because she was growing soft in her old age.

"Stop it!" Kakashi shrugged out of her hold. "It's not messy." His tone was defensive as offended.

"Did you get that drawer unstuck?" Sakura asked him as the thought suddenly occurred to her. He nodded. "Good. And please, Kakashi, next time you need to open a can, don't use a knife and hammer. It's dangerous. Ask Oda-san. She will be more than happy to loan you one." All it would do was cost him a cheek pinch and maybe half an hour.

"I'm a Jonin," Kakashi reminded her in a deadpan. "I can handle a knife and hammer." She stared at him with her mask. "Fine," he relented, unable to hold her gaze. "I promise."

"Good boy," she patted his head because she could not help herself. Chibi-Kakashi was the one and only person that conversing with did not bring up a bunch of pain and unwanted thoughts. She liked seeing this version of him. What he could have been, rough edges and all.

"I remember seeing lorises in the zoo back before the war broke out. It was part of a field trip at The Academy. They didn't do anything. They just slept in the sun. Is that why you picked that new mask? Because you're lazy?"

So maybe I don't like everything about him.

Sakura let a couple of seconds pass to reign in her knee-jerk reaction which was steeped in anger. "Not quite," she looked down at her hands. "Maybe I'll tell you the reason why one day."

"Okay," he yawned loudly, he stared at the dark sky through the gaps in the leaves. "I won't let you forget. Just like how you promised you'd teach me the mask trick."

"Deal." The light left her eyes as she thought about the likelihood of her being able to do either. "It's getting late, you should go."

Kakashi nodded but he did not get up. The sun had gone completely behind the horizon. Blues and blacks cut the oranges and pinks, darkening everything. "Be careful out there, Loris."

Sakura smiled so that her voice would be light. "You just accused me of being lazy. And now you're telling me to be careful. So what am I? Lazy or Amazing?"

"Accident prone," Kakashi expelled air from his nostrils. "I've seen you nearly cry after breaking a nail."

"Have you ever broken a nail, Kaka-kun?" She asked him levelly. "It hurts like a…" she paused to try to salvage the sentence. "Like a lot. It hurts, like, a lot." She was proud of herself for recovering because he may be a Jonin but he was just a kid. A kid dealt a bad hand. And he turned out pretty great. She fought the sudden urge to hug him. That would really make him uncomfortable to the point that he might start to avoid her and that would make her more than a little sad. Kakashi showed affection on his terms - like a cat. A statement she dared not say out loud.

"I'll take your word for it," he said dismissively. She watched him stretch his arms over his head. Before he got up to his feet, the action screamed of his reluctance. He picked up the groceries and held them to his chest. "Loris?"

"Yeah?"

"You're neither," he said flatly. "You're not lazy or amazing. You work hard. You are good. You wouldn't be off on missions all the time if you were bad. But even good ninja get careless. So be careful."

She blinked owlishly behind her mask.

Did he just Kakashi-sensei me?

She almost rubbed her eyes to make sure she heard him correctly. She was so out of sorts. Sakura watched Kakashi slowly start to walk away in the direction of his home. Something welled up inside of her that was too strong for her to fight.

She cupped her hands over the breathing slit in her mask. "Keep both eyes wide open, Kakashi-kun!"

"How else am I supposed to see?" He held up a hand in a classic Kakashi gesture all without looking back at her.

"Asshole," she grumbled to herself, her shattered heart skipping a beat in fondness.

Why did you have to get so grown up when I wasn't looking?

Two years. She nearly missed two years between Iwa and today. And she hated they were taken from her.

---

She spotted them pinned against a crudely dug trench. No doubt by jutsu cast by a handful of shinobi. From her vantage among the trees, she could barely make out their faces. They were covered in so much dirt. It was only the metal of their hitai-ates that glittered in the afternoon sun that made them visible to her. She counted seven. Seven Konoha nin with depleted chakra, maybe even drained reserved against - her eyes moved past the trench - twelve…no thirteen Iwa nin. The math did not look good. Not good at all.

She jumped down to the ground. She repressed her chakra. Her hands sped through signs. Dark green vines raced towards the Iwa nin, ensnaring them. More signs were cast, two earth clones pulled up from the ground. They ran into the trenches. Loris kept going, jumping right into the fray with her axes drawn.

"W-what?!" A wide-eyed Chunnin asked, jaw going slack.

"You're safe," her clone answered without looking at him. It was too busy triaging. Its hands were already coated in a green light. The cuts began to mend themselves.

"What?" The Chunnin frowned, the swelling in his brain was starting to ease. The adrenaline was waning and exhaustion was setting in.

"Eat this," the clone shoved something toward the Chunin. "It will help you get back to the camp." The camp was less than half a mile from here. "There are no enemy nin in your path. Help who you can."

He nodded his head only understanding about a third of what was said to him. He bit down on the pill. Strength rushed him almost immediately, like a suck punch. Only he was left less disoriented. He almost felt human again. The clone was gone. It had moved onto an unconscious nin with a broken leg.

"What about…?" The Chunin lifted his head from the safety of the trench. Just enough for his eyes to clear the ground. The pair of gray irises widened. "W-whoa."

The ground was saturated with blood. Not a single Iwa shinobi - the ones they had been trying to hold off for hours now - was alive. Dismembered. In a matter of seconds. There was a gust of wind. He jumped, whirling to look back.

A bloodied mask stared at him. He blinked, freezing.

"Move," the voice commanded.

"Yes, Sir!" He clambered to his feet, head bowed. "I m-mean ma'am. I mean ANBU-sama." He held his position for fifteen seconds before a hand clapped his shoulder, giving him permission to straighten.

"She's long gone," a voice said tiredly. "Come on, help me get Hitomi up." He gestured to the still unconscious nin. His leg was in a splint, partially healed.

"R-right!" He snapped to attention before following the raven-haired man - his superior. "Um Sir, who was that?"

"Take it from me, Hitomoi." The man sighed tiredly, rubbing the back of his neck. "If you want to have a long career and still have some sanity left over for life after it's over, stop asking so many questions now. It will only get you in trouble."

"Yes, Nara-sama!" He saluted before hurrying over to his fallen teammate.

Shikaku sighed deeply. He looked up from the ground, specifically the drops of crimson that were where she had stood. His dark eyes were in the direction the ANBU had left. He only knew one person who could heal like that and cast a genjutsu of that caliber. His squad was going to all go to the camp safely tonight because of her.

Be careful, Sakura, and thank you. Again.

xXx

"Shit," she leaned heavily against the bark of the tree. Her dark ANBU uniform was dripping, saturated in blood. She grimaced as she peeled off her chest plate, biting the inside of her cheek from screaming out. She was panting heavily. She overdid it with the healing.

You got careless.

No shit, Inner. Thanks for the groundbreaking news.

Sakura pulled her black knit shirt up past her navel. She inhaled sharply as a layer of skin came up with it.

So much blood.

She sighed as she brought a green glowing hand to correct first the ruptured organs before knitting her skin back together.

Being immortal isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

She still felt pain. Too much pain.

The second the skin was shiny and new, she pulled down her bloodied shirt and reattached her chest plate. And she was off once more.

---

It was strange the way words and time could change perception. She had images in her head of this grand, formidable bridge that swayed the tide of the Third Great War in the favor of Konoha. But it was just a bridge. It was nothing worth looking at twice, much less grand or formidable. It was a turning point. She wondered if there was a fire hot enough to deposit her soul into for purification.

No one remembers their past lives.

Inner tried to provide a modicum of comfort.

Sakura winced. It did not come naturally to her.

But someone will. Someone - a lot of someones - will have to live with the consequences.

You did not make the game, Sakura. You're just a piece within it. Remember that.

She hummed. It was a signal that the topic was dropped. She left it behind her just as she left Konoha toward her back. Her feet were firmly now on the Tsuchi side of the bride. She broke into a run until she was about twenty miles into enemy territory. The time for thinking was over. She had done all her thinking and her planning. All that was left was executing.

This mission was redemption; in the eye of Danzo and Minato's legacy would forever be changed. For she would not allow this battle to be the catalyst - the justification for him leaving his team behind to fend for themselves. She would not allow this turning point to come to pass. Konoha would not lose either this battle or the war. Not the third and most definitely not the fourth.

Sakura vanished only to reappear beneath a tree with sparse branches and sparser foliage. Her white mask - cut with a dark triangle right where her nose was - was stark against the ashen gray of the tree trunk. The four squiggles on her forehead denoted her supposed allegiance.

She brought her hands together in seals she knew in her sleep: Ram, Monkey, Horse, Ram. Her lips moved wordlessly as three clones appeared fashioned out of the ground. She nodded in

the faintest of gestures, head barely moving at all; the three clones dispersed to their posts.

Seamless.

Sakura remained where she was standing, Northeast of where the bridge was. She breathed, counting to three before she started to move her hands in a string of seals at a blindingly quick speed. Her hands held the Ram seal as did her clones. Everything was completely in sync. A barrier - rectangular and no more than seventeen kilometers - appeared for but a second before blending in with the natural backdrop. A clone rose from the ground, taking her place without so much as a fluctuation in the barrier.

It was perfect.

But it was only the beginning, the easy part as her emotions were repressed by the hefty weight of her purpose. It only got harder from here. Exponentially.

Breathe.

She inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly. In complete control.

Her playground awaited her. Sakura placed her hand on the barrier, pulsing her chakra. She saw the yellow hexagons - thinner than spider's silk and just as reflective - respond to her touch. They recognized her essence as being the one that sustained it, the hexagons folded giving her entry all before becoming seemingly nothing in the air once more. She pulled the two scrolls strapped to her back to her forefront. They expanded. The seals made of ink contained the kanji for 'Water'. She pulled out a smaller scroll from her hip pouch. She too lowered that to the ground. She closed her eyes behind the mask. Weaving her signs, chakra, and concentration together until the purple sludge rose from the smaller of the scrolls. She mixed it into the water, diluting its potency all while spreading the area of mass calamity. The poison glistened in the water. Two vortexes of it shot straight into the sky. She saw the clouds form, they were gray and heavy with rain. Filled to the brim with death.

She stood in the middle of the storm clouds, weaving her signs, still. A thin fog obscured everything, clinging like a fine mist. She waited; counting her breaths because she knew her oppositions' were limited.

She watched them run into the barrier with next to no regard for their safety. They were in Tuschi. They had fallen prey to the illusion of safety that borders provided. There were no reports of Konoha nin and thanks to her genjutsu on the other side of the bridge, it would be hours before they realized they were moving in circles. The mist thickened to a drizzle. She could see them, hear them, smell them as she was hidden in plain sight - amongst the falling rain. The last red sandaled-clad foot passed through the barrier. She had the number down to the head.

Precision.

She had them all in her midst.

With a flick of the wrist into the Tiger Seal, the barrier became solid all while remaining invisible to the unassuming eye. As long as she had chakra, nothing was getting in, and more importantly nothing was getting out. She slowly started to become solid as she rose from a puddle of water. The drops fell from the sky at quicker intervals.

Her white mask, with black markings, and four wavy lines greeted them. She raised her voice over the clambering. She saw them all stiffen at the sight of her. Ease settled into their features after several tense moments of no one moving. They were expecting her reinforcements to come.

"I will only say this once," Sakura projected her voice with the help of an amplifying jutsu. Her voice was like a clap of thunder. Sudden. Loud. unforgiving. A force of nature. All of it was contained in her neat little box. A coffin that they did not even know they were in.

If they did, they would already be panicking - displaying signs of claustrophobia.

"You have the option to turn back and live or you can stay and die." The vibrations that left her throat bounced off of the six faces created by the four corners of her barrier.

Take it. Take mercy.

The first one to react was just to her right. He was a burly man almost seven feet in height. His rough features reminded her of a rock formation as if his face was just meshed together without thought of placement for optimal function of the senses. He threw his head back and laughed cruelly.

"Look around, Kiri-Bitch," he jeered. "You're surrounded."

Take it.

What was left of her humanity begged.

Just take the opportunity! Save yourselves.

The rain was falling in sheets now. No one moved towards the edges of the barrier.

She sighed. "Wrong choice," her voice echoed hollowly. She began to pull back, closing herself off from the world.

Disassociating. It was the only way to survive any of this. Because it did not matter how much she told herself that she did not have a choice. Because he was in the area - they were in the area. Close enough to arrive to save the Konoha nin that were moving in circles at a distance she deemed safe. None of that mattered because the medic in her was screaming that she was violating every single oath she took. She was no healer.

I'm a monster.

The water seeped into their epidermis in any way it could: their bare faces, their necks, their hands, their feet, through their clothes. She stood still as it completely drenched them; migrating deeper and deeper until it reached their bloodstream.

Straight to the heart.

It did not take long. Their adrenaline was racing, pushing the blood faster and faster all over their body. Their hearts pumped quickly due to the elevated heart rate. They did not even have a chance to fire a single kunai. They slowly sank to their hands and knees, clutching at their chests almost in unison. They fell in waves around her like they were bowing or kneeling in prayer. She was, after all, the face of death.

She did not have time to feel guilt. It was either them or Naruto's dream, Kakashi's guilt, and Sasuke's redemption. Iwa and its soldiers never stood a chance.

You gave them a choice, an out. Inner tried to alleviate the way her stomach would twist into knots once the mission was complete.

There was never a choice.

Not for them and not for her. She tuned out the sounds of gasping, the rain was back to being nothing more than a drizzle. Not a drop hit her as her jutsu created a barrier around her. A halo where the poison rain could not touch. She extended her chakra to where the Konoha nin were ensnared in her genjutsu. She could not risk them falling victim to friendly fire.

They were all going to die anyway, Sakura. Their fates were written long before you, before us. At least this way, you're preventing thousands from dying in war. A war that took two gods and the Sage to end.

Inne could justify it all she wanted to but the end result was the same. Mass death. Mass death now versus mass death later. It was inevitable when there was no peace; when there was no interest in peace.

She did not sense his chakra. Neither his nor Kakashi's and that fact brought her some form of relief. It meant that they were on their original mission, they did not get side-tracked. They did not split up.

There's that at least.

Today would not be looked back in the history books for the single most important event where everything started to fall apart. Slowly. Silently. Without anyone noticing. Because she knew. Because she was here. Because she noticed.

There was no movement or sound around her. She sighed as the last of the rain stopped. The storm clouds cleared.

Sakura sighed. She pulled out two more scrolls identical to the first batch. She began the preparations for the next wave of soldiers. She had ten minutes before the reinforcements arrived no doubt with their hearts racing and their minds spinning scenarios as to why they could not reach the first battalion. It would be the second of three.

She covered the bodies littering the ground with her illusion as she lay in wait, melting in a puddle that contained more than just water.

xXx

Sakura wove the ten seals to undo the damage the poison had done to the groundwater. It could affect generations if left unchecked. She pulled two scrolls from her pouch and set them on the ground. The water and poison rose in countless droplets, joining their neighbors until they were big enough. She could see the purple poison swimming in the bubbles of water. She sealed away both completely in her scrolls. She curled them tightly. A ball of flame set them to ashes. She released the genjutsu. She lowered the barrier.

Sakura turned in a circle slowly. Thousands were dead at her feet. Not a single nin had taken her up on her offer. They died where they stood. Bodies were piled up on top of each other. She could not see the ground from which she pulled the poison.

It's over.

She vanished. It would be minutes later that the Great Kannabi Bridge was blown up. Konoha did not lose a single soldier in the non-battle battle while Iwa lost much, much more.

xXx

She stood with her hands behind her back and her legs shoulder-width apart. She had finished giving her summary of the events over half a minute ago. She was suspended in anticipation of the repercussions of her actions. Danzo was more than capable of striking from either direction.

"Were there any survivors?" His tone was colorless. It did not betray what was possibly going on in that twisted head of his.

"No, I checked for heartbeats." She had been thorough. She left no witnesses just as she had not left any survivors.

Not. A. Single. One.

"And Kiri?"

"They will receive the credit." She got to the heart of the matter, speaking completely detached from all emotion. "The poison used was the same base that they developed in the last war. It is what they were known for. It is what will show up in the autopsies. Even a medic with just weeks of training will be able to find it."

She could see the smug satisfaction settle in his lone eye. Iwa would back out of the war. They had no choice but to. But before doing so they would likely retaliate against Kiri. Kumo had its own reason for going after it. Kiri would be left so devastated - there was no doubt that their Mizukage would survive the onslaught - that Madara would have to find another country to pin the abduction of Rin on. An abduction she would not allow to happen as long as she lived. She left Minato no excuse - no reason - to leave his team now. Rin was safe. Which meant that she had not failed too badly as of yet.

War - the reality that had been their lives for nearly two years now - was on the verge of coming to an end.

"Is my immunity still valid?" Danzo pulled her from her thoughts with his question. He was studying her intently.

"Of course, Shimura-sama. You are immunized against all known poisons." She paused as she remembered a caveat. "The next booster is in five years."

"Good," he nodded his head curtly. "The process is taxing on my body." He sighed. There was something less than pleased about him but he hid it well. She only knew to look for it and that was why she noticed the slight strain in his eyes, the way his lips pinched together at the ends. Admitting weakness even if it was expected was not easy for him.

"I'm keeping you in the village until further notice, in case I need you."

So you can hang her to dry if this all gets blown back on you and Konoha.

"Of course, Shimura-sama." She dipped her head. She wanted nothing more than a warm bath before she slept. She had half a day before Minato's team was slated to come back. She wanted to be the one to heal them if it came down to it. But she needed sleep, just a couple of hours to feel somewhat human again. If that was even a possibility after what she had just done.

Sakura began to turn on her heel towards the only door in the windowless room. Her sheets were calling to her.

"You were not dismissed."

She froze.

Fuck.

You have got to be kidding me. Mass murder gets him in the mood.

Call it what it was, Inner. Genocide. I committed genocide.

They were dead anyway, Sakura. Minato would have mowed them down. Every last one of them. You know that.

It did not matter.

She bowed like the loyal dog that she was, closing herself off where even Inner could not reach her anymore. Sakura reached behind her and lifted the mask from her face. She attached it to the loops of her pants. Right at the hip. She took as many steps back before turning around slowly. Her knees creaked as she settled onto them. He was already waiting for her, exposed.

I'm a monster. Might as well embrace it.

Her eyes glazed over as she pictured him. She opened her mouth.

xXx

"You have pink hair," Kakashi noted dryly, with his keen observation skills.

"I do," Sakura prodded the extent of the fracture with her hands. She did not want to send any chakra in the Hatake more than strictly necessary. She was suddenly very worried about him recognizing it just as Minato had. Kakashi was young but he was still Kakashi. She would not put it past him.

"I can't believe you said that, you moron!" Obito scowled at him. "We have eyes we can all see. Not everything needs to be said."

"I for once agree with Obito," Rin sighed, shaking her head in disbelief. "Hold still!" She chided the wiggling Uchiha.

"That stings!" Obito pouted after whining loudly. He winced as Rin brought the cotton ball dipped in antiseptic to his cut cheek. "Why can't you just heal it?"

"I have to disinfect it first," Rin reminded him with an air of impatience. "Otherwise I'd just be sealing the infection into your skin making it fester and harder to heal."

"You guys talk too much," Kakashi grumbled, his one finger stuck in his ear was not enough to block out their voices.

"All of you talk too much," Sakura frowned at the trio. Only Rin had the decency to look sheepish. She muttered an apology before turning to address Obito's cheek with a serious expression. Sakura nearly smiled but she did not want to encourage them.

"My arm is broken! Show some consideration," The Hataka glowered at her. "This is why I hate hospitals."

Sakura rolled her eyes.

Another thing to add to the ever-growing list of 'Sakura's Fault'.

You could threaten to find Gai. That will keep him quiet.

Then I'll have a fourth idiot to deal with and I'm already two past my capacity.

Both in terms of the number of bodies physically in the exam room and the number of voices bouncing off the walls of her head.

Good point.

"What?" She asked the teenager testily, nearly bringing her hands to her hips.

"Do I know you?" Kakashi tilted his head to the side, narrowing his eyes in scrutiny like she was something under a microscope to be studied. "You feel very familiar."

"Kakashi!" Obito threw his sandal at him much to Rin's chagrin and Sakura's exasperation.

He missed. Badly. It hit the wall next to Kakashi's head. It landed on the bed haplessly. Leaving dirt on the edge of the white pillow and sheets. Her two-hour nap had not nearly been enough but she had to spend an hour disinfecting her mouth. And Minato, and his team, for once had been early.

"This is why you don't read that garbage Sensei took from you. Stop hitting on her! She's too old for you." Obito snapped at him, not at all apologetic for his behavior, unaffected by the two glaring pairs of eyes.

"Old?" Sakura raised a brow, she could feel her eye start to twitch. "This is why reptiles eat their young," she huffed with envy.

"I know they can be a handful but I'd appreciate it if you didn't eat my students," an easy, smooth, voice said from the doorway.

Sakura did not look at him. Thankfully the trio had all exclaimed 'Sensei' at various excitement levels and that was keeping him otherwise preoccupied.

"Are you hurt, Sensei?" Rin thankfully - mercifully - asked the question so she did not have to.

"This will hurt," Sakura warned Kakashi a second before snapping his bone back into place, using his momentarily distracted state to her advantage. He cursed darkly but the pain was quickly wiped away by the sweet relief of her chakra. Chakra, that he was too busy dealing with pain to notice the feel of.

Obito looked a little green from having both witnessed and heard the act. He swayed on his stool that Rin had propped him on because they could not leave Kakashi alone, something about moral support but Sakura knew her sensei well enough to know the real reason was Kakashi would pull a vanishing act if they took their eyes off of him for more than a second. A broken arm or not. And truth be told, she found the display of comradery to be heartwarming.

"I'm fine, Rin-chan," Minato's low voice pricked her ears. He was smiling, she could tell that from his voice. "How are you holding up, Kakashi?"

The silver-haired Jonin lifted his left thumb while Sakura continued to mend his right arm.

Minato grinned. "Good," his eyes pulled away from taking in Sakura to his other male student. "Obito, you alright?"

"Fine, Sensei," Obito practically moaned in anguish.

"No throwing up on my floor!" Sakura told him sternly, her jade eyes promised to make him clean it up with a toothbrush if he so dared.

"Aren't doctors supposed to be nice?" He whined in distress. His head was between his knees. He could still hear the sound of Kakashi's bone snapping into place. Over and over and over again.

"Only if you're not good," Sakura answered breezily, without remorse. "And I'm very good." She put her hands on her hips. "How's that?"

Kakashi looked at her dubiously. Sakura only blinked expectantly. He lowered his gaze to his arm which was propped on the long side of the pillow. He took in a breath, squeezed an eye shut, and curled his pinky finger. His eyes widened.

"It doesn't hurt." He looked at her in marvel, mouth hanging open under his mask. "At all."

"What did I tell ya?" She winked at him, taking great pleasure in the flush that dusted his cheeks. "Do you want a lollipop?" She did not give him a chance to answer. She opened the pantry and pulled out three. "They're cherry." She explained to the three pairs of faces looking at her completely stunned.

Obito was the first one to recover. He smiled unevenly and reached for the middle lollipop. "Are you single, Doc?" He asked, pulling the clear plastic wrapper and ticking the lollipop in his mouth. It bobbed up and down on the corner of his lip. "Because I have this cousin…."

Sakura tuned him and the chaos that followed his statement out. Her skin was starting to burn from the heat of the gaze directed at her suddenly intensifying. She tucked a strand of pink hair behind her ear - it had escaped her low ponytail. She put the remaining two lollipops on Kakashi's pillow. She left the bickering trio in her wake. She walked to the door. She stared at the flack jacket.

He made no move to do the same. He stood in her way being exactly what she accused him of nearly two years ago.

Like him, she did not speak. But unlike him, she did not fill her line of sight with the hues of his eyes. Sakura relied on her nonverbal communication to make her intentions clear.

Move.

The hardline of her jaw and rigid set of her shoulders was a force that would steamroll him if need be and without a shred of consideration or remorse.

Minato took half a step back from the doorframe giving her additional inches but not too much space. Because she still had to brush against his shoulder on the way out. She clenched her teeth at the way her stomach fluttered.

"I like her. Her eyes were glittering like diamonds."

"Emeralds, Dumbass," Kakashi corrected not-so-gently. "Her eyes are green, not white. Are you color-blind or just dumb?"

"Kakashi-kun," Rin slapped her palm to her forehead.

"You understood, Asshole!" Obito snapped, showing no interest in falling for the blatant trap. "The point is, she's pretty!" Obito's loud voice echoed in the quiet hall. "Like Kushina-san!" He gushed.

She lengthened her strides even more so that she could put as much distance between him and herself. Any and all relief at him being alive with his team still intact was replaced by her anger at him for being so damn stubborn.

---

She fell off the bed. Shaking violently. The faces, the lifeless faces stared up at her. Eyes dull, glossed over with a blue film, and impossibly wide. Mouths open. As far as the eye could see. She was surrounded by them. By the dead. By death. By those, she made that way.

Hot, thick tears streamed down her face. She dry-heaved. Once. twice. Thrice.

Sakura! Get a grip of yourself.

She shook her head. Her eyes were squeezed shut. Picturing. PIcturing it all. Remembering. Kami, what had she done?

One face, one face stood out. She remembered seeing him towards the edge of the border of the barrier, in Iwa land. He was so young. His hair was a rusty red. More orange now that she was forced to stare at him with all the details retained by her photographic memory.

He was just a baby.

No more than twelve. Younger than even Minato's kids.

Her eyes jerked open. The chin. She recognised his dark hooded eyes.

He was eleven.

Koji-kun.

She covered her mouth with her hand, knowing she would not make it to the bathroom. Sakura threw up.

I'm so sorry Mori-obaasan.

She started to hyperventilate.

That's it Sakura, I'm sealing your memories.

Inner could not stand to see her torture herself anymore, in this way. Over and over again. Sakura needed her rest. She needed sleep but she kept fighting the walls Inner put up to block her memories of that day. The day the bridge was blown up. The pinkette kept reliving it in her head every spare second that she was alone which was a lot considering she only had shifts at the hospital to occupy her time.

The woman shook her head violently, sobbing hysterically, nearly choking on her own vomit.

N-no, I-Inner. I want to remember. I have to remember.

But it was too late. She was already starting to forget the extent of the aftermath. The faces.

Future Sakura remembered the name and face of every single person she killed. She even knew most of their parents' names and maybe even a factoid about them. It reminded her that at one time they too were human. Every single one.

She did not even know all the faces of the people she killed. She lost count. She lost track. She lost the stomach to do so. And now she was forgetting just how much blood she had on her hands. And she was too weak to stop it.

Sakura curled into a ball. The smell of acid burned her throat. She cried. She prayed that the boy's grandmother was already dead. Otherwise, she had yet another body attributed to her. Another civilian.

I'm so sorry.

---

She kept her head perfectly straight because she had learned the hard way of trying to follow his movements. The wave of nausea had just died down. She was covered in thin perspiration. It was unclear if it was from the nausea or the nerves. She held her hands behind her back in a relaxed 'ready stance'. The ANBU with purple markings on his mask was just as surprised by her presence as Sakura was.

I wonder what he's playing at.

She resisted the urge to gnaw on her bottom lip, chewing it until it was raw.

Maybe he's suspicious of us.

Inner provided a very unhelpful and unwelcome take.

We gave him no reason to be. We were careful.

Sakura countered with testiness. We were careful.

He's capable. He's a monster. You don't get to stay where he was for as long as he did. He's more cunning and conniving than us.

Inner, with all due respect, shut your whole mouth.

Her left eye was twitching. It was bad enough that she had to be in the same room with the man who did not think twice before complying with Danzo's order to take her, she did not need Inner's "support" or whatever the hell the entity thought she was doing.

Don't let your guard down. Keep regulating your heartbeat. I wouldn't put it past the bastard to be listening to it.

Sakura nearly hummed in agreement.

"How could this have happened?" He stopped his pacing to place a look of utter contempt at the ANBU to her left. A single cold bead of sweat made its way along the curve of her spine. She nearly shivered.

"From the intel, there were only supposed to be hundreds of shinobi!" The ANBU started with a stutter. "Not thousands," he added with traces of panic.

It's not easy completely stripping the humanity out of a human.

She grimaced behind the mask. He was terrified because he knew just how ruthless and unforgiving Shimura Danzo was. To be his tool or his enemy were both very precarious circumstances. Neither side came up on top.

"Three thousand," Danzo barked. "You were off by a magnitude of ten!" His voice was like a whip cracking through the air. Menacing. Unhinged. Dangerous.

The man flinched.

"Enlighten me on how we could obtain our objective of prolonging this war to further distance ourselves from our enemies by what happened. We were supposed to apply more pressure onto their necks to make it hard to breathe, not completely snap their necks into two!" His spit sailed through the air and he leveled all his outrage on the man right then and there.

Sakura was mildly impressed that Boar did not take a step back out of sheer instinct. She knew that she wanted to.

Why am I here?

She kept asking herself over and over. Danzo never made his intentions clear to her before. This level of candor was making her incredibly uncomfortable.

"Loris did not back out."

Her breath turned to ice where she stood causing her blood to congeal into a thick mass that she could feel.

Are you fucking kidding me with this guy?

Inner gaped at his audacity and total lack of any redeeming characteristic.

Shit. Shit. Shit.

He was looking at her, really looking at her. His lone eye was narrowed in his calculating scrutiny. She dared not move lest it remind him that he had a literal kill switch at his disposal. She really did not want to test if her Byakugo could save her. She really did not want to put that to the test.

Is this why I am here?

It was only in her thoughts that she was shaking. She was too petrified to move out in the open; where Danzo could kill her with a single twitch of his hand.

Stay calm!

Inner's voice called out over the swells of her panic.

Stay calm. Can't put it past the sadistic bastard to jump at the chance to have the Yamanaka scoop out your memories again.

How is this helping?! Do you want me to be calm or not?

Inner did not answer her mostly rhetorical questions.

"Loris," Danzo prolonged the suffering as he stretched her code name. "Was ordered to execute regardless of circumstance." Her heartbeat was so loud she nearly missed what he said. He tapped his staff on the ground angrily three times.

"Compartmentalization," Danzo sighed slowly as if he was trying to regain what was lost: his composure, an opportunity.

Boar was standing with enough tension in his frame that even the slightest shift in the air could cause him to break and snap into pieces too small and insignificant to count.

It was true. All Danzo had told her was to prepare enough poison to bring down a nation. Verbatim. And she had. One drop of her poison could kill ten grown men. She did not need much. Even if she knew exactly how many to prepare for. Danzo did not believe in a single point of failure. He had contingencies for his contingencies. No one Root operative knew the whole picture lest a Yamanaka go their hands on them and pried beyond Danzo's seal's capabilities.

"You are the one that failed, Boar. Not Loris." The metal staff came down one more time.

Sakura closed her eyes behind her mask but managed to just not turn her head away. Boar arched his back off the ground; the lifeless eyes of his mask stared up at the ceiling. The tusks were set in a soundless scream. He convulsed violently once, twice, thrice before stopping abruptly. Boar did not even have permission to utter a sound as the seal activated.

She stiffened into a fully alert stance as she felt Danzo's eye on her face. "Leave," he commanded.

She dipped her head and vanished. She grabbed the side of the structure. Her fist against her chestplate. She had an answer to the question that was eating away at her. She was there so that he could send a message. That was the cost of failure. She witnessed the price of unacceptable loss.

---

"No way," blue eyes blinked in disbelief. He stooped over the counter staring at the seal. "That can store a whole commercial refrigerator of stuff? And nothing will spoil?" He leaned back to stand at his full height. He crossed his arms around his chest. "You're totally messing with me."

"I'm not," Sakura laughed. "It's a basic seal. It's not a big deal. Just pulse some chakra and start putting things into it. It will make the whole process of cleaning out the stock rooms so much easier," she insisted. "I can help, you know." She was in between things.

"There is no scenario where Haru-no-bun's best customer lifts a finger!" He shook his head. He pushed away the scroll. "You know if The Academy had a sensei even remotely like you, I may have actually retained something," Kizashi laughed.

Sakura rolled her eyes. "Kizashi-san," she said his name slowly with patience. "I explained the mechanism of the seal to you three times in three different ways and you retained nothing," she tutted goodnaturedly.

"You're right, Sakura-chan," he rubbed the back of his head, not even slightly sheepish. "I'm just dense," his eyes glittered.

"Like whole wheat bread?" She asked.

"You're getting it," Kizashi slammed his hand on the counter in delight. "You have no issues with retention. If you were a cake, Sakura-chan, you would be a sponge cake."

"I'll take your word for it," she smiled. "You are the expert after all."

Kizashi's eyes softened. "I like spending time with you, Sakura-chan. You're easy to talk to. You get me."

She felt a warmth shoot through her. "I like spending time with you too, Kizashi-san," she smiled towards the counter, her cheeks turned pink. It was something else getting to know her father in this form - as a friend.

"I don't know how to describe it really but it's nice. It brings me peace," he continued with a relieved look on his face. His smile stretched from ear to ear.

She smiled without thinking about it. "Me too." But she knew exactly how to describe it. She had the benefit of hindsight and perspective. Her eyes darted to the clock. He followed her gaze. He seemed to deflate. "I should be going. I have work soon."

"Not like that you aren't," he grumbled. "Let me get your goodies."

"You take such good care of me," she said almost shyly.

"Anything for my favorite customer," he ran his finger under his nose and beamed.

"I thought it was your best customer," she said with a laugh.

"Same thing," Kizashi waved his hand lazily. "I'll be right back."

"I'll be right here," she leaned on the counter. Her green eyes moved from brightly colored cake to brightly colored cake, languidly. He was not even gone a few seconds and the heaviness was already starting to creep back in.

She sighed.

---

Ignore them.

Easier said than done. Maybe one person could be ignored. Maybe two. Maybe even three. But she lost count somewhere around five. The voices. The murmurs. The lips shrouded behind hands. Eyes that darted away from her when she stepped into view. The side-long glances, full of judgment. The silence seemed to blanket their tongues. By the time she passed them, the murmurs started up again. The rumors. The words. The sense of self-righteous superiority.

They were obvious in their poorly concealed subtlety that it was all for her, all about her.

Why was it that the more one wanted to be left alone and unbothered, the more attention and commentary they attracted? Sakura did not gossip or pry about their lives. Why could they not give her the same courtesy? It was only polite.

A beautiful blonde with perfectly symmetrical features eyed her from head to toe with her mint-green eyes all before leaning to her left to whisper to the brunette standing next to her causing the woman to giggle.

Sakura heard something snap. She practically stomped over to the pair. Only the brunette's face changed. Nervousness cast over her like a shadow.

"Do you have something to say to me, Ito-san?" She seethed. Her emerald eyes were narrowed in a preemptive strike. Or was it retaliation?

"Not at all, Sakura-san," the blonde smiled demurely. "Suzuki-san and I were having a private conversation." She hummed almost absentmindedly. She brought her hand to her face. She tapped a nail painted in a matte black against her pale cheek. "Private," she kissed her lips. "Don't feel bad for overstepping, Sakura-san. The word has lost all meaning nowadays. You would not believe the things people are doing out in the open."

Sakura's right hand pulled into a fist.

Sakura. Let. It. Go.

The pinkette stared at the very smug blonde, with a tightly clenched jaw. Very, very smug.

She's not worth it.

Sakura clicked her tongue. And turned on her heel. The chunky heels of her boots were stick click-clacking when the blonde spoke again between her steps.

"Filthy slut."

Sakura rolled her shoulders, bit down on her tongue, and forced herself to keep moving. She pulled open the metal handle to the stairwell and moved up a flight, taking two steps at a time. She was breathing heavily, trying and failing to contain her anger. She stepped into the closet-turned-office. She had just sunk into her chair with a severe scowl on her face and pulled the nearest stack of paperwork toward her person when a single timid knock sounded.

"What?" She snapped, irate all without looking up. Her gaze was nearly angry enough to set fire to the document in front of her.

The door opened slowly. A head of brown hair poked out. She did not enter all the way. She wore a bright smile to cover up for the hesitation in her stance.

"Is this a bad time?" Rin asked pleasantly, she tucked hair behind her ear with her left hand. Her right was still holding onto the doorknob.

"It's as good as any," Sakura said gruffly. She slapped a sheet onto the desk. Her green eyes stared at the teen expectantly.

"I don't know if you remember me," Rin chuckled as she pulled down her dark sleeves over her wrists. "I was here not too long ago with my two teammates. One of them had a broken arm. The other was," she scratched her head literally as she thought of the right word. "A lot. He threw a shoe at my teammate with the broken arm. And," her voice faltered at the blank look on Sakura's face.

"I remember," Sakura deadpanned.

"They're idiots. But I'm stuck with them. I just wanted to apologize for their behavior, " Rin smiled as a barometer while she tried to gauge Sakura. The woman's face was unreadable.

"You don't have to apologize for someone else's behavior." Sakura pressed her lips together and turned her attention back to her paperwork. She tapped her pen against the edge of her desk, counting the seconds. It had been ten and Rin had yet to move. "Yes?" She leaned back in her chair and regarded the pinkette.

Rin straightened her back. "Sakura-sensei, please take me as your apprentice after this war is over," she said in one breath. In a clear voice despite the way her hands at her side tremored. "I want to be able to help my team. I want to be an asset to them. Keep them safe. Please help me." Her brown eyes were hard with her determination. "I won't let you down."

Oh, Rin-chan.

Sakura licked her lips, moistening them. "No."

The teen deflated, her shoulders that she had held together slumped forward. "N-no?" She shook her head, seemingly snapping herself out of it. "You won't even notice I'm here!" She said quickly, continuing her decent sales pitch. "I'll do your paperwork. I won't ask questions. I won't be a bother! I won't be in the way! Just give me a chance, please. Just one chance! I can learn so much-"

"No." Sakura shook her head firmly as she cut Rin off at the knees. She started to scrawl on the paper with her head bowed.

The teen stood there for no less than half a minute, shellshocked. She blinked slowly as she turned around on her heel with stiff movements. She slowly slinked out of the room with her hair falling over her shoulders.

Sakura sighed. She rubbed her forehead with a tired hand. Rin's disappointment lingered in the room making it hard to breathe freely. The anger had settled in her stomach, sinking it. The guilt lodged itself in the center of her chest. All she had was empty sentiment and she knew that would do nothing to alleviate the hurt she caused the budding medic. But offer them she did anyway.

I'm sorry, Rin-chan.

---

She inhaled deeply as the sweet doughy smell eased away the urgency of her problems enough that she could push them from being at the forefront of her mind for just a handful of seconds. And how beautiful those seconds were. The shelves were freshly stocked with her favorite rolls. The ones that were golden brown, flaky, and filled with a sweet and tangy cream cheese. Her mouth was watering already. She was fully prepared to ask Kizashi to heat some up for her so she would devour them in the store - like a heathen - because if anyone needed the comforts of carbs and sugar it was her.

All thoughts of doing so were replaced by the vengeful return of her problems. They were adamant about making her regret forgetting them even if it had been for less than a minute. There was one blonde-haired green-eyed woman leaning forward against the counter and she was smiling at oblivious Haruno Kizashi in some type of way and it was muddling Sakura's brain to the extent she was questioning if she was even lucid.

Shit. Not good. This is why I don't leave my room.

She grumbled to herself about herself. Just as her sluggish brain - because she was watching her mother flirt with her father; there was only so much disturbing a person could take - was thinking over how best to circumvent what Mebuki was desperately trying to cook up, she winced and nearly covered her ears with her hands.

I should go.

Baka. You need to stop them!

"Sakura-chan!" Her father's face brightened magnitudes at the sight of her. He slid away from the leaning Tamura and addressed her. "Long time! How've you been?" His eyes twinkled with mirth. He held up his hands with a frantic energy. "Wait!" His blue eyes were wide. "Let me guess," he rubbed his chin - he was growing in his chin strap already. "Busy," he grinned from ear to ear, so proud of himself.

"Well, Kizashi-san," she waved and smiled awkwardly, chuckling at his poor attempt at humor. Mebuki looked more than a little put out that Kizashi was focused on the other woman in the room. "Hello, Mebuki-san." Sakura did not know when to leave well enough alone.

"Sakura," Mebuki's smile was slightly strained but she recovered gracefully. She leaned back against the counter - elbows resting on it, looking awfully casual in a white dress with short sleeves that cut at the knee. She looked good.

When the hell did all this happen? We took our eyes off of them for a minute.

The war will be over soon. This is bad. This is really bad.

Kizashi blinked owlishly. It darted from side to side as he looked at the woman, back and forth like a ping pong ball. "How did you know, Sakura-chan?" The question sounded almost like an accusation.

"Sakura's the one who actually introduced me to Haru-no-bun," Mebuki giggled excessively. "A while back, before the war." She said in a voice that was two octaves higher than her normal pitch.

What the hell was that?

Sakura threw up in her mouth a little bit. Mebuki's slender hand came to rest on her father's forearm which was contained in a dusky blue kimono top.

"I thought immediately that the name was so darling, just perfect for this place." Mebuki practically purred.

How attached are you to your mission? We could just keel over dead right now. Save ourselves from having to witness this.

Holy shit. Kaachan is so forward.

Her eyes nearly popped out of her head. She wished she had her mask. She did not want to be accountable for all the faces she was making out loud.

She's staking her claim, Sakura.

Now is not the time for your twisted sense of humor, Inner.

Sakura smiled tightly as she watched her father blush and pat the back of his head. It was all very hard to stomach. She much preferred the bickering. That she could handle. She had decades of experience with that. Well, a decade and a half of memories.

"My Jiichan named the place," Kizashi beamed with pride. "He was a visionary. Opening up a bakery in the heart of the street frequented by shinobi. Who would have thought?"

Sugar is my drug of choice.

That and alcohol. The two things made up her entire support system. Well, maybe a little bit of another thing but it was mostly sugar and booze.

"Being smart must run in the family," Mebuki smiled warmly.

Laying it on a little thick there, Kaachan.

Give her a break. Not everyone's trained in the art of seduction with over four years under the belt.

Don't remind me.

Sakura's internal voice was dark.

"Sakura-chan?" Kizashi waved his hand in her face.

"Hm?" She blinked in surprise.

When did he come over to this side of the counter? When did he get away from Kaachan's clutches?

"You zoned out on me," he laughed heartily. It instantly put her at ease. Sakura smiled as she held his gaze. "You've been working hard keeping us all safe out there."

"No more than others," she felt her face flush at the praise. Her father was so open with it and she found herself craving just that: validation. It was silly. Her father was a man who understood little and took even less to heart but in that moment, she could not deny the lot of warmth that ignited in her chest. That feeling of home.

"Nonsense!" He frowned in clear disagreement. He was completely oblivious to Mebuki's poorly masked scowl. He stepped closer to Sakura. "Would," he brought a curled fist to his mouth and cleared his throat.

Sakura furrowed her brow. Her father did not lack confidence. Neither of her parents did. "What is it?"

"I'm not the type to beat around the bush," he declared in a loud voice. Even Mebuki wore a look of perplexion on her face; it mirrored Sakura's. "Would you like to get something to eat? Sometime? With me?"

All that build-up for that?

"Um…sure," she tugged her dark collar away from her neck. She looked around his shoulder at Mebuki who was looking away with feigned disinterest. She remembered her mother offering to share a meal with her. Maybe she was still interested. "Did you have a place in mind? I'm kind of hungry right now." She pursed her lips together. "Mebuki-san, would you like to come with us?"

I can keep an eye on them and see how far things have progressed.

"Uh, Sakura-chan," Kizashi was looking at the ground in a timid manner. "I meant just the two of us. For dinner. Maybe tomorrow night?"

Oh sweet, Sage of Six Paths.

She froze.

Mebuki scoffed loudly. She grabbed her red purse from the counter and slung it over her arm with so much force that it nearly hit her in the face and stepped out of the shop in a bristling huff. The bell rang before the door was slammed shut. The sound jerked Sakura out of her stunned silence.

"I'm sorry, Kizashi-san," she said solemnly in the same tone future Sakura had gently rejected an Iwa shinobi who professed his love for her during the war. "I think there's a misunderstanding."

A disconnect.

"I see," Kizashi's face deflated right in front of her eyes. The way he gave in without a fight, accepting rejection so easily made her heart clench in her chest. Something protective rose from her and it compelled her mouth to move before she even truly knew why herself.

"These feelings that you said you couldn't describe, the ones we talked about," she tried her best to explain that which could not be explained easily. "It's easy to mistake them for something else because they are so strong, so deep."

The man nodded his head animatedly, seemingly coming to life right in front of her eyes. He could see the hope he held in his eyes. "Yes! Yes! They are."

"They feel ingrained in you right?" She smiled softly. "Like you want to make sure I'm eating or that I got home safe or that you find yourself wondering if I'm happy?"

"Yes," he nodded aggressively.

"Kizashi-san, I feel the same way and that's why I can tell you without a doubt in my mind that these feelings aren't romantic. They are a different kind of connection. Deep in their own way. They are ones of a family - the ones family has for each other," she fumbled with her words. "I consider you family, Kizashi-san, and for an orphan like me who had nothing and no one, it's the greatest feeling in the world to be able to say that."

Kizashi stared at her stunned. "Family," he murmured as if hearing the word and concept for the first time.

"Family," she repeated gently with a nod, hoping that he understood.

He covered his face with his hands. "I'm so embarrassed," he nearly shouted.

Kami. You have shit genes.

"We all get confused sometimes, Kizashi-san," she said kindly. Her jade eyes moved around the mostly empty store. She found herself wondering if she was the only one keeping Haru-no-bun in business. She supposed it was the reason she came in off-peak hours.

"Thank you for helping me understand. See? What did I tell you? You would have changed my life if you were a teacher in The Academy" he nodded. "Yes, family," he smiled at her. His tan cheeks were dusted with a soft pink. "I consider you family too, Sakura-chan."

"I-I-I," she stammered at a complete and total loss at the warmth his words brought her despite her knowing he spoke the truth.

"Let me get you some day-old bread." He sighed before he turned on his heel to make his way back to the counter.

"Kizashi-san," she said his name, thoughtfully. "I think it would be best if I didn't come around for a bit. Or accept freebies."

He opened his mouth to protest, his eyebrows were set in a stern line. "I'm used to putting my foot in my mouth. Don't feel bad. I insist!"

"That may be true," she said slowly. "But," she bit her bottom lip in worry. "Mebuki-san was pretty upset…."

"What's that have to do with anything?" He blinked at her with no signs of life behind his blue eyes.

Are you sure you're not adopted?

"Nothing," she sighed deeply. "Just trust me on this, please?" She asked meekly without much hope. "Just for a little while, while things settle down."

He nodded his head. "Okay." He brought his hand to his heart. "Your withstanding order for Midori-chan and her friends will remain."

She bowed her head. "Thank you. I'll slip payment in the till box outside." She bowed again shallowly and made her way to the door. The bell sang her farewell.

Look on the bright side, they aren't getting together any time soon.

Sakura swallowed back the bile in her throat. She wanted to delay her birth, not put the whole thing in jeopardy.

---

She bent down with her hands on her hip, leaning forward with a skeptical look on her face. Purple eyes blinked slowly. The glossy clear membrane slowly retracted. It was enough to make her grimace but she did not want to hurt his feelings so she kept her expression as neutral as she could.

"Repeat back to me, Toshi-kun," each word was followed by its own breath.

"Sakura," the toad frowned at her. His long red tongue came to lick his eye. "I got it." He tapped the scroll on the desk next to him. "The list of Uchiha you think that could fit the bill. I'll get it to him."

"And you're sure he said he doesn't have an update?" She frowned. "Has he been looking?"

"Relax," Toshi crossed his sage green arms. His underbelly was a warm, dandelion yellow. The same shade lined the undersides of his hands and legs. "He's the best."

He's a pain in the ass.

She sighed before straightening to her full height. "You're right." Jiraiya was beloved - mostly - by the toads. He found his place among them. She was still new and very much learning everything. She did not know where the boundaries were so she was on her best behavior. For now.

The toad watched her with his amphibious eyes. "You look terrible."

"Thanks," she did not spare him a glance as she paced. "Be sure to tell him to watch his back out there. He can't get complacent. No brothels! No distractions."

"Yeah," Toshi shook his whole body to achieve the same effect as shaking one's head in disagreement. See? Learning.

"I'm not saying all that."

Leave it to me to have the sassiest summon.

She made a face as she remembered Naruto's. Maybe it was just a toad thing. Katsuyu was much more agreeable. She was downright pleasant compared to them in her limited experience.

"Please, please, please tell him that I have to stay in the village until further notice. Tell him I'm counting on him." She was not above begging. They needed to find Madara. She needed something to make all the bad she did worth it.

"Yeah, yeah." Toshi's tongue reached out to grab the scroll. He swallowed it. "Smell you later, Sakura!" A soft popping sound and a puff of white smoke replaced the summon.

"This isn't a mistake right?" She asked the peeling ceiling of her room. She frowned at his parting statement. Sakura lifted her armpit and took a quick sniff. "I don't smell." She scowled in offense. "Can toads even smell?" Her eyes scanned the clothes on the floor and empty containers.

I may not smell but something sure does.

She sighed as she bent over. She needed a distraction before she drove herself crazy. She might as well be productive in her choice of redirection. Because TonTon would be very much offended if Sakura's apartment was called a pigsty.

---

Their packs were abandoned by the base of the tree as they sparred. It was a good sign that they were in the village. It meant things were improving or she was getting really good at subtly gaslighting herself. Sakura reached into the pouch she knew to be Kakashi's. She deposited a box of canned salt-broiled saury skins, and miso soup base into it. Prepackaged dango for Obito. Convenience store strawberry thumbprint cookies and a couple of medical scrolls in Rin's. If Minato noticed her presence he did not make her aware of the fact.

She was however still hidden away in the shadows of the leaves when Kushina greeted the members of Team Seven with a loud voice, bright smile, and a basketful of delicious-smelling home-cooked meals. Sakura left before the bitter taste in her mouth settled into her bones.

xXx

The wind pushed her pink hair from her face; her skin was hypersensitive to the particles of air that felt like even smaller razorblades gliding across. Even the sun's waning rays were blistering in their heat. Loris's mask was tucked away in her desk drawer sealed away safely. It could not protect her now. For Loris being here would raise questions. It was starting to become harder and harder for her to determine which one was the actual mask: Loris or Sakura-No-Last-Name.

Seconds had turned into minutes as she stood there.

I guess it makes sense why Kaka-sensei was late all the time.

Time seemed not to be anything of significance once the line was crossed. Her fingers had lost circulation as she gripped the long stem of the single white lily in her hand. She had just to work up the courage to let go of it. Future Sakura was an anomaly. She did not experience loss until she was well into her teens. She did not experience a close loss at all in her life. Perhaps Granny Chiyo was the closest thing to close as it got. She never lost a loved one. She never had to be comforted in that way so she never learned.

Her eyes, which held blankness, read the headstone for the umpteenth time. There were no words. There was not even consensus in her about sentiment. She did not know why she was even here; it was not until she was already here that she realized where she was. Maybe that was not entirely accurate. She was upset and she wanted to push down those unpleasant, unhelpful, and unproductive feelings; those feelings that got in her way because they did not help in her quest to make her stronger. She was supposed to be stronger than this. More resilient. More like Root.

But he was where she would have gone on a day like today. But she could not because he was gone. Forever. Or at least, in the form she knew him to be.

Why did you have to go and die, you cocky bastard?

Sakura lowered the lily onto his grave. She left without speaking to head to the other place where she could get some comfort. It was okay. It was not like he could hear her anyway.

xXx

Her brain did not know what to sense to give priority to. Beads of amber liquid gathered and clung to her brows, burning as they dripped into her eyes turning them red as if she had spent the better part of the afternoon crying externally. Her nose was bombarded with the aroma of the scotch that she had been drinking. It appeared she took after her mother when it came to taste in alcohol. Her ears were too busy trying to tune out the sound of the harsh language being hurled at her; a landslide in the form of abuse. The faint ringing distorted the voice enough that it felt like the owner of it was far, far away. A lifetime away.

I thought she said she wasn't the type.

"You dirty whore!" A finger pointed to her person to remove all possibility of doubt on who the label was being applied. "He's a good man! A decent man! A man who deserves a good woman! A decent woman! Not everyone's sloppy seconds. Or thirds. Or fourths!" The blond with matching green eyes was foaming at the mouth as her loud voice ricocheted off of every wall, tile, and glass in the dimly lit bar.

Not dimly lit enough.

"Buki-chan," the brown-haired brown-eyed woman tried to grab Mebuki's - her cousin's - arm so that she could pull the woman back towards the exit. "Let's go," she pleaded because she, while under the effects of alcohol, did not forget that Sakura was a Jonin and they were but flies in comparison to civilians.

"I'm not done!" Mebuki shrugged out of her cousin's hold. "Is it really your life's goal to jump into bed with every man in this village?"

"Mebuki!" Tomi's mouth hung open. "We're leaving!" She spoke loudly as if volume equated to authority and control. She took Mebuki's arm in a grip that was tight enough to leave bruises.

"Fucking hussy." Mebuki sat near the floorboards where Sakura's boot-clad feet were, right before she was dragged from the spot. That did not stop her from still jawing over her shoulder at Sakura. "You give women a bad name. Mend your own damn clothes from now on. I never want to see your face again!"

The alcohol dripped down Sakura's chin. The eyes that witnessed her humiliation burned holes into her skin. She felt like an ant under a magnifying glass.

---

Sakura propped her arm holding the aluminum can painted a muted grayish-white on her bent knee. Her foot was just barely on solid ground. Her other leg swung back and forth without a care in the world. She was almost content at that moment. Her brain was as close to "off" as it could come. Inner was not hounding her about this, that, or the other. The world was still burning but right now that was not of her concern.

She did not understand it but in the still of the night, under the cool beams of the moon, a fragile peace for but a moment was extended. Because even war took breaks. And that was true for them. The animosity could not simmer all hours of the day, day in and day out. The line between love and hate was thin and she honestly did not know what side she was on. Maybe both. Maybe none. It did not matter all that much. She did have the time to invest in reading into it further.

He came to sit next to her. His shoulder brushed hers. His thigh was warm and solid near her dangling leg. Both of his hung right where the top of his head would go. It had the best views of the village. The sound of the lid of the can being opened pierced the quiet. He brought it to his lips, drinking nearly soundlessly. Beer. She was trying to be more considerate to herself and her liver. If he was less than excited at her choice of beverage, his face did not betray it.

She tried not to think about how it had been two years since she saw him last. He looked good. Even she had noticed that from her peripherals. He looked more like the man future Sakura met in the Fourth Great War and less like the boy this Sakura remembered. He was different. He felt different. Even the energy around him was not spared.

He's weathered.

She paused, mentally frowning. He was now a veteran. Just like her. She had two wars under her belt - technically - to his one. But even two wars for her could not do what the one did for Minato. She was still very much susceptible to the plights of the heart. She felt something ache inside of her. Something that was dangerously far from the near-constant state of numb she immersed herself in.

She was supposed to be happy. For him. For Kushina. For the other him. In theory. But the application was leaving much to be desired. Maybe her love for him was not not the genuine or pure kind that inspired generations of poets and musicians to write or sing about. Maybe hers was tainted by the darkness in her heart. One of them would have their happy ending and it being him should have filled her with lightness but it did not. It really did not.

A little help, Inner? Can you make all this go away?

No.

Can't or won't?

Does it matter?

Sakura sucked in the cold air of the night through her teeth. She hated herself for noticing the changes in him: his undereye bags from sporadic sleep, the reduction of baby fat in his cheeks which made his cheekbones almost lethal, and the added muscle mass to his arms, back, and legs.

He was a man. Yes. He looked closer to the Yondaime. Just as future Sakura remembered him right before she died.

"The war is over."

Sakura smacked her lips. "Premature."

"Thousands were killed by Kiri," he swallowed down a sip of beer. His eyes were focused on nothing in particular out in front of them. Or maybe he was talking it all in, all at once. "A poison rain." The fluctuation was subtle. It spoke to the depths of his quiet rage. "A Kiri trademark."

"Scary."

"It is a good thing that Konoha shinobi have been immunized against the poison. The same poison that was used in the last war." The can in his hand crunched slightly from the added pressure. The very air around him was impacted by his disposition. The winds may answer to his whims and desires but he was like water, she noted. He had the capacity to be tranquil and calm but he had the ability to raise havoc with just as much competence. Be it life or devastation, Minato could sustain and bring about both. He was that versatile.

"Lucky," she blew out a column of air. She watched her breath dissolve into the night, untouched. She could feel his face trained to hers, he was not impressed with her level of conversation tonight it seemed. A soft sigh was picked up by her ears. From the corner of her eye, she could see him shift. He pulled something from his hip pouch. A small box.

"Here," he held it out towards her. "It's anko dumplings," he said when she did not reach for it.

The same stall, her favorite store: Nobara's.

He must have waited at least an hour in line.

She pressed her lips together. She looked away to straighten her neck in clear rejection.

"I don't eat them anymore," she quipped. He kind of ruined them for her. Not intentionally. But now there was an unpleasant association in her mind between anko dumplings and Gou. She could not look at them without her stomach twisting in disgust.

"H-he didn't hurt you did he?" Minato asked her in a voice constructed from his regret.

Because of me? Because of what I did? He asked in his head.

She made no show of answering beyond what was communicated through her slow blinking. Heavy and tired. The wariness she held inside of her was felt by him.

"I'm sorry for the hardships I caused you, Sakura," he could not meet her in the eye as he apologized. "I'm sorry for everything, for it all." Since the beginning. Since they were both four years old, his comment about her hair had led to so much pain in her tiny frame that he still had nightmares about it.

"I'm sorry, Sakura," his voice twisted in anguish.

It did not suit him the way he conducted himself, so guilt-ridden as he accepted the responsibility for his actions. The actions that, as he said, brought her hardships. It was not missed by her how he accepted accountability without providing an excuse in exchange. It was the little things that set him apart from any other man she met, from the only other person that she had knowledge of loving.

I wonder if the red string of fate is real.

"It was a long time ago," she said impassively without facing his direction. "I'm over it."

She was not but the least she could do was to try to shed the weight from his shoulders. He did not need to carry this with him. She was strong enough to shoulder both of their sizable regrets. He did not need to ask because she knew he never would.

There was hesitation in his stance but he did not press. Minato tucked the box back into his pouch, where it awaited to be thrown out. No longer wanted as it did not serve its intended purpose.

"At least take this," he offered her a white bottle. "To make up for the last time, you left yours behind."

She hummed while reaching for the sake container. She grabbed it from the bottom to avoid his fingers which were around the neck. "Got any-"

"Here," he held out a cup for her before she could finish the rest of her question.

Sakura opened the lid and filled the dish. He tucked the beer can between his knees before he reached for the second cup. She repeated her motion. The sake was corked and resting on the ground. She could not avoid contact if she grabbed for the second cup and holding out her palm seemed too close to begging for her pride. She eyed the cup in his hand.

It's really not that hard.

Except that it was. He must have sensed her internal dilemma because wordlessly he set the small cup down next to the sake bottle. It was only when he was turned away from her that she curled her fingers around it.

"Iwa and Kumo decided to attack Kiri in retribution despite Kiri maintaining full denial of it." His voice was without emotion. "The Mizukage is dead. The structures where their poisons were developed and stored were burned down. Iwa is expected to announce their withdrawal from the war. Kumo will follow suit. Their economy is crumbling and their Daimyo is not interested in being the leader of a failed state. He will work with Tsuchi's to reach some kind of agreement. Suna will agree to a ceasefire."

Kumo, she knew, was decimated almost single-handedly by Minato. He took on both A and B at the same time and won - by winning she meant that he came back alive, unharmed. He was something else. A small part of her wished she could have seen it. It would have filled her with nostalgia, she was sure. Memories of his Chunin Exam performance filled her with warmth in a way alcohol never could. She was so proud of him. If she was allowed to think such a ridiculous thing. He was the Yellow Flash for Sage's sake. Who the hell was she to be proud of him? She pressed her lips together. He was being much too humble.

What a pair we make. He's not the one to scream about his accomplishments and efforts in ending the war. And I can't talk about mine. We could not be any more different if we tried.

Not all hands with blood on them were the same.

"You've been spending more time at the hospital."

The sake loosened the tight grip she kept on her tongue just a little to allow honesty to slip through.

"I'm a medic," she reminded him not unkindly, "by training, even if I choose to spend the majority of my time killing." She needed to do something other than wait in her room for her wings to grow back from Danzo's rough clipping. She needed to try to even the scales of what her hands had done. She killed thousands so the faces of those she knew did not become encased in glass that hung on the walls to eventually be forgotten little by little over time. Yellowing glossy paper and ink. Dust gathered on a black wooden frame. A relic of someone who used to be.

"You're going to kill yourself, Sakura." His frown contained his disappointment. It masked the concern in the depths of his eyes that she would never go close enough to read again. Because if she did, she would be swept away into it all.

That is the plan.

"Between the hospital and Root. You need-"

"What I don't need," she cut him off tersely, "is a lecture from the man who goes on multiple missions a day." Her jade eyes narrowed with clear disdain. The first line in the sand was drawn.

"I'm fine," he smiled disarmingly at her. She was too slow; she had caught it in her gaze and it made her stomach twist. "I'm fast."

Not nearly fast enough.

Not when she had needed him to be, not when she wanted him to be. She closed her eyes heavily. She could feel his hands all over her. His teeth grazing along the column of her neck so slowly, so sensually that it had almost made her toes curl. Sakura shook her head trying to free herself of her thoughts, feelings, and memories. Everything was conspiring against her just by his mere presence. By the scent of cedar and ocean air. By the low, soft tone of his voice.

"You're overconfident and a hypocrite," she bit out overcompensating for her lack of control. "And totally out of control," she glared toward the stars. "You need to back off. I don't need you getting into it with randoms over my honor. It's asinine. It's unwanted. It's unnecessary and completely archaic." She inwardly cursed the way her hand trembled while she reached for the bottle.

Rumors spread like fire. Even faster when it involved him. He punched a man, knocking him on his ass for running his mouth. With people around. People with eyes that saw and mouths that spoke. People that glared daggers at her as if she had anything to do with it.

Because they failed to realize that she did not control Minato any more than he could control her. They were in disharmony. They both threw the other off balance. They made each other worse, not better. Or maybe it was only she who made him worse. She tainted him.

His hand - she could see his bruised knuckles - was there before she was even halfway. "Let me," his gaze was on the bottle. She picked up her cup reluctantly but ultimately held it out for him. He filled it without spilling a single drop. He did not apologize.

"It won't happen again," he promised. It was unneeded. He doubted anyone would be foolish enough to be so blatant to talk about her in that way.

"Good." She could not leave it at that. "If you're serious about being Hokage, you need to be careful about optics. Who you associate yourself with matters."

Stay the hell away from me. I'm bad for your image. I'm bad for you.

"I couldn't care less about optics, Sakura. No one is going to tell me who I can and can't see," there was a tightness to his tone and posture. Not the Elders. Not the Clan Council. Not the ungrateful mouths of the populace.

"Here," she held out her left hand - the one not holding her cup - in an open invitation. She did not want to encourage his behavior but the medic in her won out. He smiled at her as he slid his right hand under hers. She healed it, hand glowing green as it hovered over his careful not to touch him with anything other than her soft chakra. It fell over him like spring rain. The green light flickered before her hand was only painted in the light of the moon. He moved his just as she moved hers. She brushed warm skin before she cupped her knee. Jolts of electricity worked all the way up to her elbow.

"Thank you." He flexed his hand. Gone was the bruising, discoloration, and the pain. "Good as new," he grinned with traces of pride in his dark blue eyes.

Sakura merely hummed in response.

"What Kiri did," he filled his own cup which had gone empty at some point. "Is a war crime."

Sakura pushed down the lump in her throat with the sake. She encased the cup in her lap with both her hands. Her eyes stung. "Is there anything else that happens in war other than crime?" She asked no one in particular. She was reliving the conversation she had in her head many times over. Only this time, Minato was playing the role of herself and she had become Inner, somehow.

"Thousands were slaughtered before they had a chance to even lift a hand to defend themselves." His tone carried the weight of condemnation. What he thought of the act was not left to the imagination. He condemned it with everything he had. He believed it to be vile. "There is no honor in the way they were killed. Their deaths were honorless."

Three thousand. And they were given a chance to back out.

She pressed her lips together so that he would not see them move in a whimper she would never allow past her throat.

"Honor," she sipped on her sake slowly to combat the nausea brought on by the swarm of bees in her stomach. Angry and desperate for release. A headache pricked between her brows. Dull but constant enough that it was getting harder and harder for her to ignore. "There is no such thing as heroes and honor in war. There is only death. There is only loss."

He's just fishing. Stay calm and you will remain in control of this conversation.

She nearly snorted. When it came to Minato, there was no such thing as control for her. Minato and her having control were mutually exclusive.

"We have laws for a reason," he countered with ice of pure sapphire. "To prevent atrocities of the likes of what happened in Tsuchi."

Does he know it was me?

Sakura set the empty cup of sake down. She could not get a read on him and that scared her. It did more than that. It upset her because it meant he was capable of hiding things from her, that she did not know him well enough to understand what was going on in his head. Reasonable or not, it was upsetting. She did not like it.

"Would you be this upset if you were tasked with slaughtering them all by your own hand?" She pulled her knees to her chest and lowered her chin onto a kneecap. "Or less?"

Minato blinked in surprise. It did not take long for his features to settle into a mask of stoicism. He was so sure of his convictions, so deeply rooted in them that he would not be shaken. She wondered if she had ever been that steadfast about anything before she met and joined Team Seven. She envied him as much as she admired him. She envied how clear and simple things were for him. His lens was sharp and focused. She was surrounded by the haze of obscurity and double-mindedness.

"Less," he answered. He would have been more humane if not slightly less quick than the poison that weighed down their hearts. He would have given them the opportunity to defend themselves. He would have had to look them in the eye as he killed them. They would have died as they lived, as people. As humans. He would have remembered them as such.

"War, change, peace, life is not maintained through words or philosophy," she could not account for the level of animosity in her voice. He said nothing she had not said to herself. But for some reason, hearing the adjacently similar words with the same sentiment in his tone of voice ended up cutting much deeper. It was worse than anything she could have managed herself.

"Decisions need to be made. And action must be taken to make those decisions come to pass. Not everything can be solved with thinking and talking." She wondered if Naruto learned that. That was her biggest reservation about him being Hokage - what she saw to be his biggest challenge. He could not change everyone. He could not save everyone. Not everyone was worthy of redemption.

Minato sighed. He did not come to argue to debate a tired subject that they found themselves always circling back to. He believed her to be jaded just as she thought he was an idealistic fool. He found her harsh whereas she found him unrealistic; the lenses through which they saw the world were in such different shades that sometimes he found himself asking if they were looking at the same thing or not. He knew that but for some reason, he kept trying. Logic did not apply when it came to the pink-haired woman with green eyes. Eyes that seemed to lose a little more of their light every time he saw them. Except when she was with his students. Obito had hit the nail on the head, her eyes had sparkled. They were so beautiful and clear it felt like he could see right through her soul. And all he wanted to do was stare. Stare to his heart's content. Stare until he got his fill. Stare until he grew old and cataracts obscured his vision. Stare until he breathed his last with his head in her lap.

"Is Madara Uchiha really still alive?"

She turned her head so fast that her neck made a sound. She narrowed her eyes in outrage.

That perverted bastard told him outright?! And he just said it out loud like his? Are they both really this dumb?!

Need to know, my ass.

"I sealed the area," Minato worked to circumvent her anger before she could lash out in earnest. "Placed a genjutsu too. No one will hear us. No one will be able to read our lips."

Sakura shook her head. Her reaction said it all. She did not need to answer the question. It was rhetorical anyway.

"I don't know what you're trying to do here."

"Nothing," he leaned back on his palms, unbothered by how the gravel cut into his skin, lining it with impressions. "I just don't have anyone else other than Jiraiya-sensei that I can talk about these things with."

Sakura snorted loudly. "You shouldn't be talking about these things with me."

We shouldn't be talking at all.

"We need to talk," Minato's hands were free of any objections or distractions. The full weight of his attention had settled on her, back on her. It never strayed far from her.

"The toads said," she frowned, not fully understanding what he meant. "Did he find something?"

"About us," Minato shook his head once, taking her building hope away with the action. "About what happened in Tsuchi."

"Nothing happened in Tsuchi," she stressed adamantly before disbelief colored her features. "Are you seriously still hung up on that?" She could not believe what she was hearing, what she was seeing. "You just found out that Madara Uchiha is alive!"

"I've known for a while," Minato corrected her without a change to his demeanor. "I've sat with it. I've accepted it."

Sakura could only scoff in disbelief.

"And," he directed a stern look in her direction. "We kissed," he said calmly. And they would have done a whole lot more if they were not interrupted. He believed that. "That's hardly nothing." It had the potential to be everything. "I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. About you." He wanted to make it very clear to her as he cut through her denial and any misunderstandings she may have.

She scoffed again, indignantly, sputtering. "I used you to keep my cover intact. That's all. Nothing more. That kiss, those kisses, you've been hung up on this whole time were nothing. I had to shut you up before you spilled everything to Gou and we started a war! That's all that was. It meant nothing."

"It didn't mean nothing to me," Minato admitted with earnestness. "It felt like something to me." He had felt the need. Her need for him. It matched his own. Every bit of it.

"What about Kushina?" Sakura growled in frustration. The pink of her cheeks was masked by the monochromatic light. It was either from the alcohol or the fluster or maybe even both.

"What about her?" He frowned.

"What have you been doing all this time? When I was away?" She shook her head and kept her hands clasped in her lap. They wanted to lash out and hit him across the back of the head. His stupid, thick, thick head. "You've just been wasting time?!"

At this rate, it was a toss-up if either she or Naruto would be born. Maybe she did not have to feel all too bad after all. Maybe it was just asking way too much of her - of one person.

Minato sighed. "We're friends," he scanned her face languidly just like he did in Tsuchi. Her heart skipped a beat as the intensity of his gaze grew when it landed on her lips. But by the time his eyes found hers again, it was gone. "Just friends."

"Why?" She demanded. "Why just?"

"You and I kissed," Minato's brow furrowed, crinkling in the center. "And it meant something to me."

"You're hopeless!" She chuckled in disbelief. "I can't believe you," she shook her head, nearly grabbing it in her hands.

"I'll spare you the details, but know this," she narrowed her eyes. "I am very good at that type of mission, as you saw. I make all my marks feel that way. Like we had this connection." She felt disgusting, she was disgusted with herself for saying the filth she was, designed for his ears to hear. "You're not special," she laughed.

"You, Kai, all the random nameless men I've slept with, are all the same," she tugged at her hair, pulling at the ends of it. "I used you!" She nearly screamed. "I use people. I am a user. I used you when we were kids. I used you to get Tsunade-sama to take me in. The second you were of no use to me, I dropped you." She did not let him interject. She could not let him interject. "Just like I used my Genin squad. Inoichi. Camel. Every single person in my life, I used them. I used them until I couldn't anymore and I dropped them."

"I used you, our whole lives, Namikaze. This whole time. Even back in Tsuchi. Especially back in Tsuchi. So get it through your thick skull, Namikaze. It meant nothing. There is no us. There never was an us. There will never be an us. So let it go and move on."

He had to learn that setting himself on fire was not sustainable. She learned that the hard way after being burned in one lifetime. He still had time to turn it around. He had a whole life he could live in happiness. All without her. She would turn his face away from her by force if she had to.

"I trust you, Sakura," he said with a profound level of firmness. It stunned her into silence. He was not moved by her outburst, not swayed in the slightest. "But I don't believe you."

She scoffed and dusted off her hands to open another beer can because all of this was simply too much for her to process. She was somewhere between not sober enough to have her wits and critical thinking skills about her and not drunk enough to punch him in his mouth. Like always, she was caught in between. Neither here nor there.

"I know you're Loris, Sakura," his eyes were overflowing with something unreadable to the point that it almost killed her. "You care about my kids. You've been looking out for them any way you can. You signed the Toad Contract."

His kids.

Kids that were his and not hers. The kid he would have, that was his with her.

Maybe even more than one. Maybe they will have a whole mess of kids because they're going to be so in love and so obsessed with each other. Maybe….

"Why are you saying all this?" Her voice was small, her gaze was unfocused and her heart was betraying her. Because he spoke with such a calm, with such strength, that the organ inside of her chest was trying to convince her to just let him in with each and every beat. And she had to remain vigilant. Because she only had to lose once and it would all be over.

"Because I know that she's still in there," Minato said in a sad voice. "That little girl I met all those years ago, Sakura. She's still in there. And she doesn't use people. No matter how many times you say it, it doesn't make it any closer to being true."

"She's dead." Sakura cleared her throat and blinked back the tears as she looked him in the eyes so that there would be no doubt or continued misunderstandings. "She died a long time ago."

The wind moved between them, amplifying the distance with his hollow sound. It was not inches that separated them but the length of their fundamentally different ideals and the paths they chose to walk.

"Was that before or after you remembered who you were?"

She froze with her hand holding the beer can suspended in her shock.

W-what did he just say?

You heard that too?

"Haruno." The name sounded heavy as it fell off of his tongue and down below to the unsuspecting Konoha. "That's your last name, isn't it?" Minato's level of scrutiny increased.

Sakura could only gape at him because everything else abandoned her at that moment. Even Inner.

"The only two people you never actively pushed away, the only ones you sought out on your own," Minato sighed as he dropped his notice of a particular fact. "I should have seen it sooner. I've never come across anyone with hair like yours." He smiled at her, reaching out to hold a strand of hair between his fingers. "I see a lot of Kizashi-san and Mebuki-san in you."

"I…I don't," she tucked her bottom lip under her teeth.

Baka! You never should have gone to the bakery or the dress shop as often as you did.

Even when she gave up everyone else, she could not give up on seeing her parents.

When did he even have time for all this? He was a Jonin and ANBU years before you were.

She was at a total loss for how he was able to piece together something that should not have been obvious at all.

"When did your memories come back, Sakura?" He asked her gently, his fingers brushing along her jaw from her ear to her chin. "That's what Inoichi was helping you with, right? All those scrolls you checked out from the archives had to do with the brain, the subconscious, and memory."

"Does it matter?" She asked the ground between them in a voice gone hoarse from her turmoil. He was not supposed to know. She wanted to keep him out of it.

But he knew. He was in it now and that left her scrambling.

"Was it after you graduated from The Academy? Was it when you left your team? Was it before you became ANBU?" The sense of urgency built with each and every question. "Was it when you started to ice me out?"

Is that why you iced me out?

His silent question was just as loud as the one uttered by his voice.

She shook her head, closing her eyes because she did not know what he was doing to her. He was killing her slowly. He made it hard for her to focus on her only reason for being alive: the mission. He muddled everything. He ruined everything. He ruined her.

Please. Just leave me alone. Please don't make it seem like either of us has a choice in this.

"I know why you've been like this, why you pulled away from this world; from nearly everything and everyone. I don't know all the details but Sakura, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to. You don't have to explain why you didn't tell the Sandiame or anyone. I can help you. I will help you, in any way I can. In any way you'd let me. You don't have to carry this burden alone. Not anymore. I can ease the burden," his hand dropped down to hers. He squeezed her fingers. It took all her strength not to lean into the comfort he was offering. Because she was so tired. She just wanted a safe place to rest her head.

"Let me ease the burden."

You let him.

You can let him.

He shook her hand, the one he was holding, and managed to smile sunnily at her. She stared at him warily.

"Haruno Sakura, my name is Namikaze Minato."

What is this goofball doing?

"What are you doing?" She asked him because she did not know.

"Introducing myself so that we don't have to be strangers anymore," his smile did not falter. "So we can start over. Start fresh. Leave everything behind us. Leave the past in the past." He tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, not missing a beat. Like he had been doing that for years, his action held the ease of repetition to it. Familiarity.

The smiling face under a sunhat - blond hair stuffed inside somehow - filled her mind's eye. Two little faces joined him. They all wore matching grins. Bright. Sunny. Unbothered. Happy. It was right there, right at her fingertips. All of it. Calling to her.

Us. He wants us to be an us.

She stared at him stunned. His hand was warming hers.

Sakura. You saw what happened when you led with your heart. Don't make the same mistake twice.

The image in her head and heart burst into flames. All that was left was ash that irritated her nose, throat, and eyes to the point that she had tears in her eyes. It burned. It hurt. It hurt so bad.

Sakura pulled her hand free from him, for the first and last time.

"Stop," she sniffled.

Please.

The tears did not fall. "If you truly knew, you would be staying away from me. If you think you understand me, you would be making things easier by hating me."

Because that would make it easier to let him go. If Minato hated her, she knew how to handle that. She lived a whole life where the one she gave her heart to did not protect it. He trained her. He hardened her. Sasuke made her stronger, he made her heart resilient. Minato made her weak. Minato made her heart want to give in. Minato was open whereas Sasuke was closed. And that was completely new.

"Sakura-"

"We can't keep having this conversation. I can't be anything to you," she said decisively, cutting him off before he could sway her because he had been dangerously close. Horrifyingly close. "I can't rely on you."

I can't feel anything for you. I can't be the person you want me to be. I can't be anything in your life. Because if I were, I would hate who I would have to become just to be with you. I would hate myself even more than I do now. And that…

What she felt for him was not enough to eclipse the love she had for her world, for the people of her world. One person could never be enough. Not even herself. If she let go of Naruto, Sasuke, Kakashi, and Ino - if she let go of the mission - she would hate him. She would never be happy. And she could never be his happiness.

Because who was she if she did not stand behind her decisions and her convictions?

And furthermore, in her current form she was nothing. She had nothing. She was too broken to be anything to anyone. She barely had anything for herself. There was nothing left over for him. For the full life he deserved. She had made her decision a long time ago. Without him. And she would live the rest of her limited days the same way, without him.

Sakura was dead. She simply wore her corpse as a mask. An empty, dried out husk. That was all she was anymore.

"Do you not trust me?" He asked her point blank, completely disregarding what she haphazardly threw together. "We can complete whatever it is you need to. We can be happy. You don't have to suffer to ensure a better tomorrow for those who are to come. Work with me. We'll figure it out. You don't have to keep hating yourself." Something in his voice broke. "Trust me, that's all I'm asking."

"I can't," she turned away from him. "You've missed things before."

It was as if she slapped him in the face. The hurt was palpable. Just like she knew it would be. It was a low blow. She knocked the air out of his lungs.

"If you want to ease my burden," she addressed the emptiness in front of her with an emotionless mask. "You will leave me alone," she begged him with hints of honesty. "We only know how to hurt each other. That's all we are capable of. I don't want to hurt you anymore. I don't want to keep having to hurt you anymore."

"Sakura," he licked the corner of his mouth, thinking, trying to salvage what was there. Even if it was only in his head. "We don't have to keep doing that. Neither of us has to hurt. We can-"

"We can't," she snapped. "I can't. I can't give you anything. A family, the thing you've wanted, I can't give you that," she drew in a slow, deep breath. "I can't make you the thing you wanted your whole life. I can't do that for you."

I can't make you a father. I can't give you that…but I can stop you from giving up your dream. Your dreams.

"Sakura, my dream-"

She spoke over him, louder and with a sense of finality. Her words were carved into stone. "If you want your words to be more than just nothing, you will protect them, your students. You won't let anything happen to them." Her eyes were hard enough to match the gemstone they resembled the closest. "That's what you can do for me. That's all I want you to do for me."

That's all I can ask you to do for me.

"Who was I to you, Sakura?"

His voice broke her insides. She heard something shatter into tiny fragments. Fragments she would never be able to pick up with her rough, rough hands. It could not be the same for him. When she broke him - finally broke him - it had to be clean pieces without shards so that Kushina could put him back together. So that there was enough for the redhead's love to heal. The woman had it in abundance.

"You mean to me now what you meant to me then," she paused. "Nothing." She looked him in the eye to tell a lie she knew would break his heart. "You mean nothing to me."

His Adam's apple moved up and down as he swallowed down the harsh truth, what she insisted it was.

"But you mean everything to someone I love," her voice broke; it quivered. "And I would really like to see him again." She inhaled a shaky breath as she watched his mask cover his devastation. The hope he gave himself the past two years that maybe they could figure it out. She crushed it. Two hearts broke within seconds of each other. The images they had in their heads and hearts would never be anything more than that. It could never be anything more than that.

"If you want to help me," she wiped her eyes. "If you want me to tell you something…anything, give me space. Let me breathe. Give me clarity," she pleaded her case. She gripped the center of her black turtleneck, bunching the fabric. "Because right now, it hurts to look at you, M-Minato," she stammered his name out loud for the first time in years. In as many as half a decade. It felt so wrong to be saying it following what preceded it.

It hurts to have to face the devastation in your eyes. The hope. The loss. The prospect of a shared dream. It hurts. It all hurts.

Silence gripped around him like an invisible vice. She saw it all leave him just as understanding filled him. Things were finally falling into place for him. Those countless thoughts that had plagued his mind. The why, why, why. Now he knew and he found himself wishing he was still ignorant of it all.

"That's why you've been pushing Kushina-san, bringing her up every chance you get," he cleared his throat and blinked back the tears. Minato looked past her. "I had a son. In your time, I had a son," he stated as if he knew it to be fact.

"You have a son. You will have a son," she nodded. "I knew your son." She wrapped her arms around herself. "I knew your son," she whispered. Her tears fell from her cheeks. Each one spoke to how painful this was.

He closed his yellow lashes over his eyes. He felt lightheaded. It was a good thing that he was sitting down. The alcohol affected them both enough that he did not trust either of them to shushin to safety if he fell over the edge of the cliff.

"You were in love with my son."

No. No. No.

"I love your son," she presented the partial truth in a completely dishonest way. "So please, Minato."

Don't ask me to betray him. I can't betray him. I won't betray him.

He shook his head. "But that doesn't mean what happened once will happen again. Maybe you came back for a reason. Like saving Obito and Rin. Maybe you were meant to change things. Maybe the two of us are just another change. Maybe we can-"

"Your genes are strong."

She knew exactly which heartstrings to pull to manipulate him. She pictured two faces in her head. The ones future Sakura never got to meet.

"Both your grandchildren had your eyes. One even had your hair." It was disturbingly easy to don the persona she cultivated. One face was capable of speaking so many lies with the ease it took to draw in a breath, woven together by threads of truth. She paused just long enough to allow him to inhale sharply.

"You belong to Kushina." She closed her eyes, delivering the final devastating blow. A blow from which only one of them would recover from.

"I belong to your son."

This life belongs to your son.

Everyone moves on.

So will he. Just like they did. He would be happy and live a good life, a full life, just like them and that was what brought her comfort. Because he deserved it. Kushina deserved it. They were made for each other. Meant to be.

The vibrations of the words might as well have been acid. They left her throat burning. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to hurt him in this way. She knew all too well what it was like to expose your heart to someone only to have them trample on it. Over and over and over again. She knew that all too well.

You're annoying.

You're still annoying.

His dark features, pale face and signature smirk taunted her. When did she become less like herself and more like him? Did his heart rattle so badly in his chest everytime he rejected her - destroyed her - that it was felt in his soul? Or was it easy for him? Was it easy for him because he never loved her? Because he never saw her as anything but something that slowed him down - a distraction from his true mission in life. She wanted to know because in her case, it only got harder the more she broke him. So much harder.

Why was she responsible for causing so much pain to both son and father?

"You'll tell me? When you're ready. You'll let me help?"

"I'll tell you," she lowered her hand to her lap, she released her bottom lip from under her top teeth. She did not even realize that she was gnawing on it. The cold wind hit her face, biting at her tears. Sakura cleared her throat. "When I'm ready. When you're the Yondaime. I'll tell you everything. I'll explain everything."

"Tsuchi meant nothing." His tone was as colorless and monochromatic as the light of the moon.

She nodded her head, numbly. "Tsuchi meant nothing."

I'm sorry. I'm so, so, so sorry.

Minato gazed at the village, going still and quiet.

She rose to her feet slowly and walked away from his hunched-over back. She did not have it in her to watch him cry. She could not do it. She would not do it. And being the considerate bastard that stole her heart that he was, he was waiting for her to leave so he could do it without an audience. Without adding the weight of his tears to the guilt she carried.

I'm so sorry, Minato-kun. Maybe one day you can forgive me.

Minato's reason for becoming a shinobi was to protect the village. She found her reason to be a kunoichi. It was to ensure her friends' happiness. Even if that meant putting it in front of her own.

Goodbye.

She suffered so that they did not have to.

---

She checked the contents of her pack for the third time. The long hiatus had affected her more than she had initially thought. She was nervous. Almost as nervous as her first ANBU trial mission and that was why she kept checking to see if something had moved of its own volition from where she was expecting.

You're overthinking it. You're fine.

Sakura hummed to placate the voice in her head. She slipped her hands under the waistline of her pants to neatly tuck her black high-neck ribbed shirt. Her hair was already pulled into a ponytail that awaited to be coiled into a tight serpent of pink silk right at the back of her head.

"At least I'm not nauseous all the time," Sakura said with feigned brightness.

You finally figured out the correct ratio for your latest contraception seal.

And not a moment too soon. She felt more like herself again. The self that had not been completely eroded away by the harshness of her environment. Her body was no longer failing her due to the off-balanced state of her internal ecosystem. Getting pregnant was never an option. The seal ensured that every egg that was released each month was so damaged that it could never sustain life. And with her new seal, it was as if there was nothing there at all. No side effects. She had perfected it.

She pulled her black hood over her wrapped hair. She inhaled as her mask covered her face. Eyes highlighted by red circular markings peered back at her in her reflection. She phased.

xXx

The sense of unease had reached new heights even before she set foot into the room. The all too familiar scent of metal hung in the air, thickening so that every time she breathed her lungs became more and more coated.

Blood.

Out of reflex, she sent her chakra out through the soles of her boots and the tips of her fingers to try to give her visibility before she turned the corner. The walls were low - she had to bend forwards - and the hallway was dark. She dared not activate a fire jutsu or pull out her light stick. It would make her visible and she did not have enough information to determine if the risk was worth the tradeoff.

Trade-offs, life was not without them. Her priorities changed. It went from the snake to the traitor - the Uchiha. It had to. The Third War needed her attention. Minato's students - Kakashi - needed her focus. Orochimaru moved to second place on her priority list. And she was seeing - smelling - the consequences of it. She was not the only one it brought more freedom - less scrutiny of how she spent her time - too. She was not the only one.

Her stomach twisted.

She paused. Her hand was still against the wall. Her chakra was being blocked. Suppressed. Like there was a wall or something equally large acting as a barrier. She was truly going in blind. She had hoped for this outcome. From the smell she knew it could only mean one thing, this base - the one she had marked on a map safely tucked away in Shikkotsu Forest - was bonafide. But she could not shake the fear that started to rise in her. She felt unprepared for the scenario she spent years imagining.

She lowered her right hand from the wall until it brushed up against something hard. She pulled up the hilt of the kunai. It was small but she felt less exposed and less vulnerable now armed. She picked up her feet and once again continued her progression in the direction the air was putrid enough to make her gag.

She came across one door. It was slightly ajar. Sakura pressed herself against the wall, hidden in the darker shadows where the faint light of the waning torch could not reach her. The smell permeated everything now. It gave her somewhat of an idea of what awaited her on the other side of the threshold. The amount of blood to perfume the air had to be outstanding. She could see an oozing wet substance inching its way towards her.

She counted to three and steeled herself, Sakura reached for the cold, chrome door knob. She pushed the door open even further. Holding her breath as its hinges creaked.

xXx

Glass crunched under her boots. The case that was both taller and wider than her - by double if she had to hazard a guess - was broken. The ground was the most damp where she stood. It must have been filled with water or some of the liquid. She could smell something akin to saline when she leaned forward. There was an oxygen mask hanging from the top. The glass was thick. It was reinforced. Whatever object that had shattered it must have been very heavy and moving at a great speed.

She reached into her pouch and pulled out a small glass tube. She reached an arm over the jagged ends carefully and scooped up some of the liquid that was still pooled at the bottom of the container. She screwed the top of the tube and collected her sample. She slipped it back into her pouch with her left hand. She snapped pictures with the small film camera, hoping that there would be enough light for something to be seen. What that something was, she was not entirely sure.

There were no bodies. There was no blood. The room was empty. But the smell was only growing stronger. Sakura spared the broken tank one more look before she made her way to the door on the other side of the room. The camera had been moved to her left hand and her kunai took its place in her right.

xXx

Kami.

Her eyes were wide as she took in the carnage around her. Bodies. Mutilated. Limbs ripped from torsos and stern about all around her. There were so many that she could not even quickly count to get a handle on just what kind of loss she was looking at. Hands. Much too small to belong to even the most petite of women.

The lost boys.

The two she had not accounted for. And more. Even more lost boys that she had been too preoccupied with trying to first prevent a war only to then try to everyone she knew alive, to even categorize them. She did not know their faces or their names.

I'm so sorry.

She swallowed thickly. Her Jade eyes were weighted down by the brutality of it all. The logical part of her that was still active knew that they were dead before she even caught wind of them being missing but to see - to recognize - what remained identifiable of the frozen faces suspended in terror took her breath away in the worst way possible. The little boy that she has claimed to be the sister of. She recognized his mousy-brown hair and dull green eyes. There was hardly any room to step.

The bodies were malnourished. She could see ribs and hollow cheeks. They had been starved all while undergoing horrible and unspeakable torture under the guise of science. All to have such a garish demise. A truly unfortunate existence. Judging by the lack of decay and bloat, she had just missed the massacre by hours. Rigor mortis had not even set in.

I could have prevented this.

Stop that. You can't go back. Focus.

She tried to heed the voice's advice. Her flashlight shone in her left hand. She had long abandoned trying to find survivors. The first few bodies she had come across, she had tried to look for pulses. But it was complete. There was nothing to save in this underground base. Even the corpse that was not like the rest - clad in a white coat - was not spared the same fate.

The warden.

His face was one she did not recognize. And it did not match any of the ones that Naruto described in the outburst of word vomit. He was no one to her. Even bruised and bloodied she knew that. A lackey left to keep the lights on the experiments alive. A dead lackey. The price of loyalty to the wrong person.

The Cursed Mark.

She noted grimly just to give her brain something other than the total horrors in front of her to focus on. She could see the fang marks embedded in their necks with a simplified version of a seal. More crude than the one Sasuke had. Each and every one of them was marked for death long before today. She snapped more pictures. With each press of the button, the action became heavier and heavier. She could not step without having to jostle a limb, an appendage, or something larger out of her path. She had to breathe through her mouth.

Her limbs felt as if there was liquid lead between her joints, in her marrow. Even the simple jutsu to contain a sphere of fire in her palm was a struggle. She did not think she would be so impacted by death. She had seen her fair share of it. She had been the catalyst for it countless times. She was responsible for oceans of blood, each drop belonging to a person she killed. But her body was having a visceral reaction and there was next to nothing she could do.

They must have all just torn each other apart. When the Cured Marked burned their minds.

Not unlike a rabid dog turning on everyone in its world, they turned on each other. At least that was what all the signs were pointing to. The influx of strength must have been too much. Her eyes did not miss the way the cages were pulled apart.

From the outside.

Sakura frowned. She looked over her shoulder at the room she had come from.

Maybe the experiment in the glass case when freed did this?

What led to the prison break? It's not like him to be so careless.

Maybe we'll find more answers up ahead.

Pipes groaned. Sakura lifted her head. Her eyes went wide just as a weight from overhead came barreling down at her, like a collapsed building. She barely had enough time to cover her head. The room was surrounded by darkness seconds before the ground shook.

xXx

Do something! Inner screamed at her with vocal cords strained from her desperation.

M-my chakra!

Sakura stretched her arms out as far as she could. She was still too short to reach the being that was trying to crush her throat.

I've been poisoned!

You immunized yourself against his poisons!

The heaviness was from the gas. I breathed it in, directly. It's not in my bloodstream.

Tears pricked at her eyes as she struggled to retain consciousness. She could see black spots dancing in her vision. She had overlooked this. Her liver could break down poisons if she ingested them. It was trained to do that. The antibodies in her blood - in her white blood cells - could convert any harmful substance into a benign entity. But her lungs - the thing she needed to breathe, they were vulnerable. She left them completely defenseless. Her oversight was costing her dearly. Her lungs were compromised. The poison had sunk directly into the porous organs, filling them like they belonged there.

Expel it! Release your seal!

It won't do any good even if I could control my chakra like this.

Her seal was useless against poisons. It could not help her. Just like all the chakra that sat heavily in her coils like sludge, becoming hardened cement. Unusable. She swung her legs to try to kick him. But he brushed off the blows as if they were nothing. Half his body was covered in the black ink of the mark. His eyes were yellow. They glistened in the dark light. They were completely lifeless. His torso was full of cuts and bruises that she could tell had slowly healed. It was not the prisoners that did that to each other.

It was him. He was the one who broke himself out of the glass cage. From the inside. While suspended in a substance with more drag than water.

The Byakugo!

Have you lost it? You said it can't help you.

Sakura scratched desperately at his hands. Tearing open his skin with her blunt nails, collecting his DNA as she did so.

Inner! Look!

The cuts healed revealing skin a shade lighter than what had been there, within a second.

Your seal! Inner gasped as she made the connection.

She did this. Orochimaru tried to model his cursed seal after hers. The regenerative properties of it. He used the Byakugo, the one he knew she had after her display during her examination, as an inspiration.

Immortality! How did I miss this?!

Her eyes nearly rolled in the back of her head. She gave the bastard the push he needed to commit to the dark side fully. Not the Uchiha but her. Orochimaru saw that it was possible - Tsunade's theory. But he was not a medic. He did not understand the extent of the danger of having cells divide uncontrollably. And that was exactly what was happening. Like cancer cells. Mix that in with adrenaline and whatever the hell he put into it and it was a cocktail for disaster. A disaster she was ill-equipped to deal with.

The poison was not meant to kill but to incapacitate, she realized. It was supposed to make it so that the inmates could not escape and she had foolishly been breathing it in for minutes, not noticing until it was much too late.

Sadistic bastard!

If she could, she would have grunted in agreement. It took all her concentration to keep his hands from crushing her throat like a toothpick. His strength nearly rivaled hers with the seal. She could feel the beads of lead in her lungs with each breath. She was growing weaker as her brain received less and less oxygen.

Sakura looked to the bottom left where her ax lay haplessly on the ground. The other was embedded in his back. But he was acting as if it was nothing more than a mere nuisance. He seemed impervious to pain just as the poison did not seem to be affecting him in any way.

You can't keep this up! You need to try something. Anything.

Sakura gritted her teeth as she tried to pry his fingers from around her windpipe. She felt a couple of them break. The man snarled and applied more pressure. He was pure strength laced with adrenaline. Nothing other than a ball of anger that could regenerate like there was no tomorrow.

She gasped when he let go of her neck. But before she could react, he palmed her face and lifted her clear off the ground, over his own head. He swung her side to side like a rag doll, finally releasing her. Sakura's back hit the brick wall. Her vision blurred as a pained exclaim and a burst of blood left her mouth.

You broke three ribs!

She was lucky that was all it was. It would be over if she broke her back. Sakura groaned as she tried to get up, she leaned heavily against the wall.

I can't heal anything.

Tears that she had no hope of controlling further muddled her vision.

You can't die here! Inner roared at her in what she believed to be a helpful pep talk.

Sakura brushed the blood from her lip with a swipe of the back of her hand. Everything was on fire. Even breathing was punishment.

At least she's not harping on about how stupid I was to let myself get into this situation.

A situation she did not see a positive outcome of.

Don't give up Sakura. Don't you dare give up!

She was just being realistic. Sakura inhaled shakily, only able to go about halfway on account of the pain and the bones stabbing her. The man was vibrating in his rage. He was less thought and more emotion. He was presenting his side to her. She wondered if it was her body heat or her movement that made him notice her. Some of his senses seemed to be weaker than others. His hearing for instance. The paper bomb she had exploded next to his eardrum seemed to take care of that but even a near and total cave-in had hardly left more than a scratch on him. Fortified concrete with rebar folded like paper against his bare back.

Her fists were going to do nothing. They were nothing. And she did not have her jutsu. None of the poisons she had at her disposal would do anything to slow him down.

He's unbeatable. She concluded without emotion. Just a statement of fact.

He has no weakness.

Everyone has a weakness, Sakura! Inner's exasperation bled through her hostility. I can take the pain away. I will take the pain away. I just need you to fight! Kill him and get away from this poisoned room, far enough that you can heal yourself. This isn't over.

But it felt like it was. Because she was but a heap of bone and muscle in front of a juggernaut. There was no guarantee that the poison would become diluted enough after some time for her to access her chakra again. And that did not even touch up on the matter of how she would beat him.

You've come so close! You can't die now. You can't die.

She was right. If she died now, none of it would have been worth it. Because the Uchiha was still unknown and out there. Because Minato and Kushina would still die. Because Danzo would still blame the Uchiha clan. Because Shishui would still commit suicide. Because Itachi would still slaughter his whole family apart from his little brother. They could not die. So she could not die.

Her work was not done yet. What had she really changed anyway?

Maybe it's karma. For what I did to Iwa. For those three thousand shinobi that will never see their loved ones again.

The experiment roared. He tried to reach behind his back for the ax. But he was not flexible enough to pull it out.

Did you see that? Excitement colored Inner's voice.

Sakura nodded her head. Pain. He seemed to be registering it. Her eyes widened.

It's delayed!

The adrenaline! Inner finished her thought.

He feels pain. He felt pain. He was capable of pain. Sakura felt her own start to melt away. She pushed off the wall and broke into a sprint straight from him with determined eyes. She let out a guttural yell as she jumped in the air.

xXx

Sakura staggered forward as she tried to catch herself from falling. Her ankle was broken. She had hyper-extended her knee. Her shoulder was dislocated. Her body paid the cost of one head. His blood painted the wall made of concrete. Sakura let go of the head she was holding up with his matted, bloodied, brown hair. It had been white. Completely stripped of color. From his dark eyebrows she deduced that he had been a strawberry blond. The exposed part of his brain - from when she repeatedly bashed his head into the very wall - she lost count somewhere around fifteen - made wet sounds as his body settled amongst the chaos. It had to match the rest of the pattern. He joined the pile of incomplete bodies that used to be human. There was no light behind his yellow, yellow eyes. There was not much difference between life and death in that regard.

She leaned heavily against the hilt of her ax that was embedded in the wall, her shoulder propped up against it. The curved blade was dripping in crimson.

Good. Now you need to-

Sakura lurched. She fell on her face. Her body could no longer support her even if it did not feel pain. Her structural integrity was compromised to the point it could not be ignored. There were still rules in the world after all. She tasted the blood in her mouth. She was not sure whose it was. Or even if it only belonged to one person. She breathed shallowly, creating an air pocket displacing blood from around her mouth.

You need to keep going. You have to get back to the hallway.

I-it's over.

She closed her eyes. She was going to die. Either from overexposure to the toxin in her lungs or the blood loss from the ribs that were sticking out of her back like some kind of morbid take on modern art where her body was the canvas.

Sakura!

She groaned weakly but she sank her fingernails into the wet dirt that had nearly become mud. She cried out as she pulled herself, inch by inch. The pain that Inner was keeping at bay was too much for her. Sakura was starting to feel it all over again. The fire that burned her nerves.

That's it, Sakura. Inner worked out through clenched teeth. Keep going!

The songbird cries when the sun goes down.

Tears leaked from her eyes as she let out a pained breath. Her nail got caught on an article of clothing and snagged right off.

The songbird cries when the sun goes down.

The pictures Inner showed her in her head forced her to keep going.

The songbird cries….

xXx

….when the sun goes down.

"I'm going to die." Sakura sobbed in the light of her fate. She made it five more years than her future self had. It was a pity that those five years were not good ones. There was very little good in those years. She was just one step removed from being hysterical.

You're not going to die!

"I don't want to die, Inner," her tears dripped down to the dirt floor of the hallway. The air was coming in easier now into her damaged lungs but everything was still so muddled. She was completely in a vulnerable position on her stomach. But Inner refused to let her lose consciousness. She needed to be awake the second her chakra came back to expel the lead-like poison crystals from her lungs. Inner had her muscle memory but she did not have her confidence or her exact skill set for such a risky procedure. The poison had to be expelled manually by her. The Hundred Healings could only heal her lungs once they were free of contaminants.

Sakura, listen to me. You need to calm down. Without your chakra we're blind. We don't know if there are more like him around. Your chakra will come back. The effects of the poison are starting to fade now that you're not breathing it in. You're going to be fine.

She shook her head as much as she could from against the ground. The gravel cut her cheek. "I don't want to die alone, Inner," Sakura begged with a loud wet breath. "I don't want to die alone." Her broken wails so tragic in their humanness, her weakness, echoed off the walls and entered her ears in a pitch and frequency that she did not recognize as her own. "I don't want to die." Her bottom lip trembled. "Please," she begged, shamelessly. "Please."

Okay. Inner shushed her gently. Sleep. Sleep it off. You're not going to die. I won't let you die.

I don't believe you.

She restored to thinking when her lips could no longer carry the torment laced into her words.

You're not alone, Sakura. Inner said after a long prolonged silence. I'm here. You're not alone.

The songbird cries when the sun goes down.

Over and over it repeated in her head on a loop she could not control much less stop. She was back there in the Silence Space, in the small room barely bigger than storage under the stairs. Damp. She could smell the moisture from her departed tears. She was on the floor of the cell she was not allowed to leave during her Root trials.

Her whole life was flashing in front of her eyes as her brain tried desperately to find something, anything to help her out of her situation. All the information, all the knowledge she had stored away from two lifetimes was completely useless. Despite the leaps forward she made, it ended the same way, with her dead. With her unable to do more for her people. She failed them. Again. She was useless to Naruto. To Minato. She could not save him.

She could not even save herself. Her ears rang with the high-pitched screech. Her lips moved slowly as she mouthed the phrase. She just wanted it to be over. The gritty dirt in her mouth tainted the metallic taste of her blood. There was no mercy. No escape from this situation.

Over and over again. Nothing changed. She was still useless.

The songbird….

The pinkette wailed loudly. Her vocal chords were stripped raw.

xXx

She curled up loosely into a ball. Her eyes were red but clear. Sakura set her lips into a firm line. Her right hand, pressed under the weight of her side, held the Tiger Seal. She closed her eyes.

This won't hurt. Inner promised her.

Sakura's lips twitched but she remained silent. She concentrated the second the stabs of pain became less at the forefront of it all, allowing her to think clearly. She could visualize the small, round, spheres of poison, no bigger than a particle of air, littering her lungs. She drew in her chakra. With one burst, she expelled them all forcibly. She screamed. It burned. It burned so badly. The poison shot into the air and splattered in front of her, absorbed by the ground instantly.

Her seal broke. Black lines covered her from head to toe like a warm, all-encompassing embrace. She let out a sigh of relief as the pain ebbed away for both her and Inner. It was only when she had a second to breathe without being weighed down by thousands of foreign substances that she rose to her feet.

She had to go get her discarded axes and find her mask. She had to remove all traces of her presence - her involvement.

---

The fireworks lit up the sky and shook the heavens with bursts of their prowess. Sounds of exuberance, relief, and joy - the official cocktail of victory - were all around her but she was stuck still three days in the past. She still did not know what to make of it. Sakura leaned forward with her forearms resting on her thighs, her back curved into a crescent shape. She stared at the ground between her feet. A curtain of pink surrounded her on either side.

I want you to take more missions. Of all kinds.

Danzo's voice rang in her ears. He had not paused long enough for her to formulate a thought before he completely rattled her to her core.

I am thinking of endorsing you for Hokage.

Sakura closed her eyes. She had not slept or eaten properly since the war ended, since Danzo said those words to her. How could he say such a thing? How could he endorse her?

She knew that the Daimyo was not happy with Sarutobi. He was not the only one. The Sandaime was being strongly encouraged to step down with his honor intact. In as little as a few months - when the new reality of a post-war world settled down - Minato would be named the Yondaime. Not without some drama of course. Not without Danzo endorsing Orochimaru for the post. But there was never a doubt. It was supposed to be Minato's.

But now Danzo wanted her to bolster her case for the title. She had hardly been in one place for more than minutes since he told her. He wanted to pad her resume. He was giving her ANBU missions. Not Root missions. Because Root missions were not supposed to be repeated to anyone - even the Hokage. They did nothing for her official record. Espionage, search and rescue, intel gathering, escort missions of high-ranking officials. He was having her do it all.

What's he playing at?

Sakura pressed her fingertips to her temples, rubbing circles that were too small, too inconsequential to be soothing.

Is he suspicious of me? Is Danzo testing me?

Sakura sighed and she leaned back onto her mattress. Her chest clad in her black sports bra rose and fell as she tried to work out the problem that only she could see in the cracks of her ceiling. Her knees were bent at ninety degrees. Her feet were still firmly on the floor.

Is he hedging his bets by having two endorsable candidates? Both me and Orochimaru.

She wondered not for the first time if she should expedite her plan because what she believed to be true - Danzo endorsing Orochimaru - may no longer be the case.

My resume, while impressive, is nowhere near Orochimaru's or Minato's.

Sure, she had a major contribution to ending the war but hers was in black. It was strictly off the record. There was no record of what she did. Danzo made sure of it.

Or does he get off on the idea of having a Hokage that he can do anything he pleases with?

She pushed the thought from her mind before the visions could overrun her. She sighed softly. She drifted off to sleep before she even realized what happened.

The fireworks shot off like paper bombs, shaking all the windows of her apartment that faced the street.

---

AN: Please review. Thank you!