A/N - hiiiiii... sorry for the delay!! I'm busy with exams and personal stuff, so I won't be uploading fast during winter... BUT I will upload ! I'm also thinking about writing one or two one-shots, those ideas have been trotting in my head for far too long and I can't get them out. English isn't my first language, so pleaaaase correct me if I make mistakes! Constructive criticism is always accepted!

DISCLAIMER : I don't own Naruto.

With that said, enjoy this chapter!

CHAPTER 4 - TAKEAWAY

"Ugh..."

Tsunade awoke slowly. Eyes sore at the sight of the white hospital neons, she carefully sat up. And felt the pain.

Her stomach was burning, needles piercing through her insides, her core feeling as if it was being torn apart in millions of pieces. The Hogake began throwing up, hunched over with her arms tightly wrapped around her middle. Someone rushed to her side, a soothing palm rubbing circles on her back repeatedly.

"Stay calm. Do not forget to breathe. This is part of the process of transitioning back to reality."

As the pain started fading exasperatingly slowly away, Tsunade recognized the owner of the voice. Hizoshi seemed perfectly fine. Double checking, the woman discerned the contracted muscles on his face. He could feel the pain too.

A chocked cry resonated behind them, and Hizoshi left Tsunade to calm Naruto down. He did the same with Sasuke and Kakashi when they woke up, telling them the same words he told the blond woman, although both men were reluctant towards accepting the help and more keen to act tough, Hizoshi being immediately shoved aside by Sasuke.

They had all been placed on futons in Sakura's hospital room, Tsunade noticed. The nurse in charge of guarding their bodies must have worried for their muscles when they stumbled to the floor.

Sakura... reminiscing that particular memory had been displeasing. However, it was also a wake up call. Now Tsunade remembered why they had to save her pink-haired student. Not only for Team 7's sake, but for the whole country's. Tsunade inwardly snorted. Heck, even the whole wide world benefits from her existence. A medic like Sakura was extremely rare, therefore losing her would be one of the worse losts that could ever happen to medicine.

Ignoring the pain, the Hogake stood up and faced her teammates. Because they were a team now. And they had one of the hardest missions that had ever been given with so little information.

Save Haruno Sakura.

They would succeed.

"The pain you are all feeling right now is the pain that Haruno-san endured in her memory, albeit diminished tenfold."

Five minutes was all the time the ninjas could afford for relaxing before continuing their self-assigned mission. The nurse was guarding the door -for privacy- while Hizoshi was explaining to the Leaf nins how they would proceed next.

"Since your body itself didn't physically transfer into Haruno-san's mind, your brain temporarily 'disconnected' from your nerve system. Now that your mind is back in your own body, they reconnected. Haruno-san's memory is like a stimulator : for your brain and your body, everything consisting of her mind is real. Therefore, since you are able to smell what Haruno-san would smell in her memory, you are also able to feel. Your nerves, being remembered of that pain that wasn't yours, go haywire to indicate you that there is danger, when really there isn't. This will happen with every memory that we will scan. The effects wash away quickly, but the experience is still uncomfortable."

Indeed, painkillers did little to help the seething pain tearing their stomach apart. However, their attention wasn't on that. It was focused on one goal : find another word to access Sakura's other memories. But which one ? There were so many possibilities. None of them seemed precise enough.

"There's something that's been bugging me since the previous memory started."

All heads turned towards Kakashi, who was pensively gazing out the window. Seated on the windowsill, he was holding his chin between his fingers, eyes trailing from the clouds back to Sakura. "Yaiwaka-san." Hizoshi's head perked up at the sound of his last name. "You said that we would only encounter accessible memories due to the memory loop jutsu. This jutsu was identified as a bad-memory type. However, when we went into my student's head, we saw a memory that wasn't bad."

Tsunade's eyes widened. Kakashi had a point. That scene when Sakura saved herself and improved medicine was not a bad memory at all. But that would mean...

"The jutsu wasn't identified correctly."

The jounin's somber expression was contagious, and soon everybody in the room started wearing the same. They thought they were already short on information to help Sakura. Oh, how wrong they had been.

"Pain."

Sasuke startled everyone as he spoke up for the first time in days. Seeing as nobody seemed to register what he was implying, the raven-haired boy tried his best to formulate an explanation with the less words possible.

"The memory we just saw. It was full of pain." As if on cue, a wave of nausea creeped its way up Tsunade's throat. "The memory-loop jutsu isn't about unpleasant scenes. It's about pain."

"..."

"Teme... are you sure ? It could just be a coincidence ya know..." Naruto's hesitant voice was first to be heard following a heavy silence. All of them wanted to believe that the Uchiha was right. But they had learned their lesson. Too much hope does no good.

Sasuke glared at his blond friend. He had a gut feeling that his speculations were right : it was a memory-loop jutsu specialized in pain. It was the only plausible explanation. Otherwise, the memory they had just discovered wasn't supposed to be there at all.

Face-to-face with their unproductiveness, Tsunade took matters in her own hands. They had to figure out something, and quick. "If that isn't too straining for you, Hizoshi-san, we can return in Sakura's mind to confirm Sasuke's theory. If we see another memory that's not a unpleasant and traumatizing one, his theory will be wrong. On the other hand... it'll be confirmed." The Hokage paused to wait for the Sound-nin to nod approvingly. "Good. If the theory turns out wrong, I will set a major reward for anyone who correctly identifies the jutsu." In this moment, they were desperate. Ground rules were tore down, everything was a potential idea. "On the contrary, if it is right, we will need to adjust. Does anyone have an objection ?"

Upon watching the newly lit fire in the woman's eyes, no one dared to open their mouth. Determination was winning every single one of them. Hope began coming back shyly. The room appeared less gloomy.

"Now, we need a new lead. I'll check with the ANBU team I sent earlier to see if they have any useful information. You have fifteen minutes to think of a good word or phrase."

With that, Tsunade disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving four men deep in thoughts.

An eight-days mission in a small Sound village. Potential enemies ? Hardly any during the travel, even less in the village, possibly nearing the outskirts of Sound. Who would target her ? Konoha has been in the best of terms with Sound ever since the War ended. Sand maybe ? Someone from another country ? The rogue nins who poisoned the Sound village weren't using a bait to attract Sakura. Who then ?

Tsunade was fed up with this. Pacing back and forth in her office, she couldn't find any answer to the heavy stack of questions that burdened her thoughts. This was not logical. Sure, Sakura had fans that were a little too obsessed, ennemies that were a little too hating, and some villages were a little too jealous of Konoha. But she never came home looking like that. Some of her limbs were missing, for Kami's sake !!

Breathing in and out to calm herself down, the Hokage stopped her pacing. It wasn't like her to lose control like this. But this gut feeling... this gut feeling was wrecking. It was sending her a massage. A warning.

This was no simple poisoning. Sakura hadn't been infected by the toxin targeting the Sound village. Something, someone had attacked her. On purpose. And it wasn't a common attack either. Something was horribly wrong.

Things didn't concord. Something was out of place. Not logical. Not-

"Hokage-sama."

Tsunade flinched and sharply turned her head towards the voice. Four ANBUs were standing in her office doorway. They looked vigilant, but the worn out expression on their faces couldn't be mistaken. How long were they standing there ?

Hoping that they didn't witness Tsunade's moment of desperation, the Hokage pulled a professional mask on and motioned towards the four ANBUs to approach.

As one of them took his ANBU mask off, the woman immediately recognized him as the leader of the squad she had missioned to search for informations about Sakura's condition. Understanding dawned upon the Hokage.

"Report." She ordered calmly.

The leader bowed. "Yes, Hokage-sama. We traced back part of Haruno-san's travel thanks to Yaiwaka-san. He found her in a dell not far from a small town. In this town, we managed to gather enough informations from locals to have the certitude that Haruno-san was attacked in a takeaway. Food poisoning. Ambush. However...", the leader warily glanced at his companions who stiffly nodded before continuing cautiously. "We suspect the whole town to be involved."

At this, Tsunade tensed. ANBUs had to be extremely careful when it came to suspicions, especially regarding treason from another town or village. They could start tremendous conflicts, even worse, wars. "Could you... expand ?"

"Of course. The reason why we have those doubts is because we had to pry informations out of the locals. They were quite... mistrustful. We had to interrogate one civilian, who reluctantly spoke." Noticing the Hokage's expectant stare, the ANBU quickly added "We erased his memory right after."

"Good.", approved Tsunade. "We'll look deeper into your... impressions later. For now, keep searching for informations. And write a fully detailed report of the town's data and about the interrogation." After planting her own in each pair of eyes facing her, making sure that the four ANBUs understood the underlying order, the Hogake dismissed them with a solemn facade.

Sighing heavily, Tsunade took a few seconds to regain her composure and process what had just been said.

Alright, she thought. Stepping out of her office and towards the hospital, the blond woman couldn't help the relieved grimace twisting her features. Her scary face was frightening passers-by, but Tsunade couldn't care less. Hope was quickening her pace, accelerating her breathing.

Even if it was a small one, they still had a lead.

"In a takeaway ?"

Naruto was incredulous. Takeaway attacks were the easiest to block! Due to the confined space and presence of witnesses, the chances of those ambushes working were very low. This one must have been extremely well-planned for succeeding in harming Sakura that much.

"This means that if luck is on our side, Sakura's most fresh memory linked to a takeaway would be the recent attack. The probabilities of another remembrance evoking a takeaway are relatively low, but it wouldn't hurt to check. Anyone knows if Sakura had an experience related to pain in a takeway ?"

Tsunade shook her head negatively at Kakashi's statement. Naruto, deep in thoughts, couldn't remember anything that could potentially pop up in his best friend's head instead of the memory of the attack. Although he wasn't showing it, Sasuke either.

This was too good to be true. They had a lead, and it appeared to be right one. No parasite memory coming to disturb them. Hopefully, no purposeless pain.

This was it. They were going to find out everything about Sakura's state. To save her.

Placing themselves behind Hizoshi, the latter brushed the tip of his fingers over the dying girl's temples. "If everything goes well, we should be able to scan two memories this time." Taking in the sight of the Leaf ninjas pumped up with guarded adrenaline, a knowing smile graced Hizoshi's lips. "At least."

The nurse in charge arrived just in time to catch Tsunade's slumping body as her five 'patients' plunged into a deep slumber full of wonders and uncertainty.

--

Pitch black. Nothing else. Exactly like the previous transition. Sasuke's thoughts were crystal clear. He remembered who he was. Where he was. Why. The only thing he didn't know was what that lingering feeling was. In his throat. No, in his stomach. Rather, in his head. Everywhere. This sensation... close your eyes.

--

Sasuke groaned. He wasn't one to openly show his discomfort, but right now he couldn't have cared less. The heavy, crushing tension in this room was weighting on him a ton. Wait... he wasn't in a room. Cracking an eye open, it immediately widened as it noticed a healthy Sakura beaming before him. Until his brain began working again and he remembered where he was. In another person's head.

Opening his other eye and turning his head towards the rest of the 'visitors', this time both eyes narrowed. Their expressions were grim. Closed. Furious. Defeated.

It didn't take a genius to understand the reason behind this dismay. Soon after, Sasuke's expression turned sour too.

Hopes were crushed.

This was not the memory they were looking for.