A/N - Hi. Yes, I'm alive. Sorry for the long wait, my phone died and when it started working again, all my stories were gone. I managed to get them back, so yeeeeah here's chapter 6 !

Btw, I still don't understand the difference between a story and a document in the document manager. Can someone please explain ? And when I upload the text to write chapters, it gets stuck in bold and I have to rewrite all the italics and non-bold again. Did I mess up somewhere ? XD

Anyway, enjoy !

CHAPTER 6

Splintered.

Dismantled.

Shattered.

Suffering.

Agonizing.

That's how Sakura's body first entered the hospital a week ago. Now, after spending the entire night trying to reanimate her, Tsunade couldn't find more than a single adjective fitting the broken body lying before her eyes.

Lifeless.

Nothing had worked. Heart massage. Chakra pulsions. Reanimation jutsus. Blood pumping. CPR. Defibrillation. Haruno Sakura hadn't even gasped as her slumped form lost all life and died. Peaceful on the outside, tortured on the inside.

Tsunade, who had considered Sakura as her own daughter ever since she met her, couldn't bring herself to pull the white sheet over her pink haired student's pale face.

Sniffing and sobbing could be heard behind her. Probably Naruto and some nurses. Kakashi and Sasuke were stoic, but anyone could guess that some personal battles were raging inside them. The Hokage, for her part, was too shocked to cry. Sakura wasn't supposed to die so soon. The blond expected herself to die before her student, certainly not the other way around.

Throat constricted, the broken-hearted woman uttered the dreaded words in a small voice.

"Haruno Sakura passed away. We shall inform the village and prepare the funeral... Please take her to the mortuary."

"N-no! Granny, don't- you can't-"

Stiffly gripping the damn sheet and covering the deceased's face, Tsunade could feel her anger and desperation mixing, blowing up. Her voice was strained but firm.

"It's my duty as the Hokage. I have to do this, Naruto. Now step aside."

Said boy was blocking the door with his broad stature, tears streaming his face, denial written all over his features.

"But- no!- just... TSUNADE NO", the Hogake was forcing her way through the door, pushing Naruto with her inhuman strength and frightening the nurses, already hurrying away at the whiskered boy's outburst. "GRANNY STOP! YOU JUST CAN'T, IT'S NOT FAIR, THIS- YOU'RE BEING HEARTLESS, THIS IS- NO STOP NO NO NO NO NO STOP-"

He was losing his mind.

"Quit it. She's fucking dead."

Everyone froze, the ruckus stopping as Sasuke's even voice reached the shinobis' ears. While his cool demeanor angered the blond woman more than she already was, Naruto found himself completely shook by his raven haired friend's words. He collapsed to the floor, flopped against the wall and clutching his head with his hands, pulling at his hair. Heavy and shallow breaths were escaping him, accompanying racking sobs and painful cries. Rocking himself back and forth on his heels, his palms digging into his eyes, a spark of lucidity flashed deep inside Naruto's gaze as he harshly murmured a shaky reply. "I know."

"She's not coming back."

Sasuke couldn't help his cold attitude could he ? Bastard.

"I know. "

"Stop behaving like a fucking kid. It's not going to help."

"I KNOW, SASUKE !!"

Naruto was back on his feet, towering over Sasuke with a judging glare. The bitterness and grief lacing his voice was overwhelmingly poignant. Hizoshi was petrified, too stunned to move, Kakashi and Tsunade worn out but weary, ready to jump in and stop the incoming fight.

"Now you shut the hell up, because stone hearted scumbags like you are not helping anything either."

"I-", and he saw it. For the fraction of a second, Naruto saw Sasuke's unconcerned mask crack, and the massive hurt and utter fear behind it shocked the blond boy profoundly. Sasuke was broken. Because of Sakura's death.

As fast as it came down the Uchiha's mask was back on, his hesitation long gone. "At least I'm not the one losing my shit."

Oh, he was.

Sasuke never talked that much, especially not to let out spiteful and useless comments like what he had just told the jinchuriki.

Terse and heavy silence fell upon the glowering room once more.

His thoughts collected, Naruto took a slow and painful breath before opening his mouth again.

"Oi, Granny, I-"

Only to be interrupted by a loud gasp coming from Hizoshi.

Half-heartedly glaring at the man, the blond glanced at what he was pointing towards. His face fell.

"TSUNADE !!"

Startled by the cry, Tsunade watched Naruto's arms flailing until she found what exactly had alarmed both men.

Sasuke was desperate. His teammate couldn't just die like this. She didn't have the right to die, damn it !

Truth to be told, Naruto was way stronger than him. Already coping. Dealing with those overwhelming emotions. Accepting.

Sasuke would never accept her death.

Not another one.

He knew he took many lives from the world, but that world couldn't take her from him. This punishment wasn't fair. It was too much.

His whole life was lived on his own. Now that he finally had a living family, some stupid genjustu was taking it all away ?

Deep inside, he knew it wasn't the genjustu. That couldn't kill her. It wasn't the poison either ; this thing was too slow to take her life so soon. No, what had actually killed her was her heart. Her heart had given out.

Deep inside, he blamed himself.

Maybe he had hurt her too much, until her heart couldn't take it anymore.

Maybe... he had ended up breaking Sakura to the point of no return.

This scared Sasuke more than anything else.

Kakashi could practically feel the guilt gnawing at his student. Because he felt the same. For different reasons, yes, but regret and sorrow were hard to suppress when facing the fact that his only female student was crippling away from him, away from his grasp, while he hadn't done anything to protect her, to preserve her. He hadn't trained her to overcome such things. He had discarded her, and now she was dead.

With a clenched heart, the copy-nin saw the resemblance with the biggest mistake of his life. Only this time, Rin wasn't leaving him, Sakura was. And the new pain felt foreign. Stronger, but not entirely. This time, Kakashi wasn't the one who could have saved the medic on his team. He was the cause of her death.

Both sharingan wielders hung their head in shame, looking everywhere but the ghostly pink figure, in fear of seeing their own disgust mirrored in the stillness of her body, the whiteness of the sheet.

I killed her. I'm the reason behind her death. She's dead because of me. It's all over now. No one to blame but yourself. How pathetic. And you call that a ninja ? She was your teammate. You were unable to protect her. Better yet, you fucking go and end her-

Beep.

-life.

Beep.

Is that...?

Beep.

Kakashi slowly lifted his head.

Beep.

No way.

Beep.

Naruto shouted. Kakashi stilled. Hizoshi gaped. Sasuke froze. Tsunade ran.

Sakura revived.

Beep.

The beeping of her heart monitor was overwhelming, sudden, shocking but present. Real.

And that warmed the emptied and cool hearts of two culpable men. Before a wrecking feeling of angst hit them in the guts. How ? How ? Wasn't she... dead ?

But the beeping continued, steady and normal.

Tsunade, being the first one with some sense knocked in her when the initial shock was over, arrived at her apprentice's side faster than the still bewildered others, in time to catch a glimpse of what was actually going on.

Naruto began yelling about sorcerers and curses, Sakura's fairy heart too pure to give in to evil, instead resisting the spell and being immortal and a hidden goddess. His cold-blooded Hogake snappily shut him with a condescending tone. "Folks, shake your asses and make yourself useful, Sakura's not completely safe yet !"

Although she was known for her short temper, Tsunade knew how to stay level headed during stressful situations. Being one of the Fire Country's best medic required calmness and fast reflexes, and the sake addict was not letting her fiery temper get in the way of her success.

"We need to replug the machines and re-implant the IV ! Naruto, go get the nearest surgeon, Yaiwaka-san, find as many nurses as possible and Uchiha and Kakashi I need your sharingans RIGHT NOW !!"

Doing as they were told, the first two ran out of the room at full speed, while the red eyed men obediently approached Tsunade, waiting for further orders.

The woman was deep in thought, eyebrows scrunched and knuckles white from gripping Sakura's bed railing. What was happening before her eyes - her prized student reviving, that was unnatural. Impossible. So how ?! Tsunade was helpless. For the first time in her entire medic career, she didn't know what to do. Clearly, plugging the machines back in would just serve as an indicator of Sakura's condition, certainly not help her get... somehow better. The blond woman was torn. Torn between trying the methods she had used all night to no avail with the possibility of killing her student again while she was in such an unstable state, or just sit back and watch while Sakura's heart fought in ways she could not understand, with the probability that it would lose its battle. Tsunade didn't get the whole process, how the corpse before her had an actual beating heart, how it started beating again in the first place, why nothing else was waking up, or-

Chakra.

That was it. There. Frail, weak, almost inexistant. So faint, barely awake was Sakura's familiar chakra, humming hesitantly. And it wasn't just there. It was located very precisely.

Under her left breast.

Understanding finally dawned on Tsunade as her eyes widened considerably, hand shooting up to check Sakura's consciousness state.

Confirming that she was still unconscious, Tsunade let out a small shocked gasp and murmured softly. "No way..."

She almost didn't see a blur of orange flashing before her eyes as Naruto bolted into the room, Hizoshi and a surgeon in tow. A few out-of-breath nurses quickly entered afterwards, panting from trying to catch up with the fox boy. The surgeon didn't even have the chance to ask what was going on when his ears heard the regular beeping of the heart monitor which hadn't been plugged out. He stuttered incoherent sounds, promptly silenced by one of Tsunade's hands. She was getting excited. This, this, what was happening with her student... it proved that Haruno Sakura was a fucking badass.

"False alert. You can get out." The eagerness could be heard trembling in her voice. Everyone in the room gaped at her. Many 'buts' and 'whys' echoed the bewildered and confused expressions. This only made Tsunade's heart swell and pride grow. Her face broke into a huge grin.

A beaming Hokage was certainly not what the surgeon was expecting when she had supposedly lost what she held as family. But the heart monitor.. it was telling him otherwise. He wasn't a medic nin, therefore couldn't feel the pink haired girl's chakra pulsating in her heart, however he could sense some sort of tension. A soothing tension.

Sasuke scowled.

Tsunade was fucking giggling.

Sure, he was happy, in ecstasy even, that Sakura was not dead. Confused too. As long as she was fine, he didn't care for the details.

However, when his Hokage broke into a fit of girlish giggles, his anger rose to dangerous levels. He couldn't explain why. But seeing that woman give up on saving her student to GIGGLE was driving him on edge.

Right then, all tension disappeared from his body. All rage disappeared from his heart. He was left with peace and calmness. Clarity, too.

And, of course, confusion. What the hell was happening to him ?!

Too busy figuring out where this warm feeling came from, Sasuke didn't notice the other people present in the room visibly relax. Tsunade did.

"It's her chakra."

The raven haired boy's head snapped up.

Tsunade couldn't help the proud smile making her face glow in pure glee. She had figured it out. A small part in this huge puzzle, a seemingly useless one, but a piece nevertheless.

However, the pride wasn't for her discovery. It was directed at the body lying next to her. The breathing body. Because once it was sure that it would keep beating, the chakra has slowly moved from the heart to the lungs, then made its way to the brain.

"My Haruno Sakura here is a hero." Tsunade practically laughed, pointing at the source of the emanating confortable feeling lingering in the air.

Relief, joy, pride, disbelief, shock, angst, sadness, fear, all in too much amount mixed up together and poured down the Hogake's face, messing her up. But Tsunade was still laughing through her tears, praising Sakura for doing the impossible.

"She... My babygirl here, she's unconscious, completely knocked out, heck, she was DEAD but she still managed to use her chakra, see, you feel it, and then she gave herself a heart massage, I mean she was dead and she healed her dead, unbeating, bloodless heart, then she pumped air in her lungs and reconnected the lesions in her brain all the while being unconscious, barely alive ! She resuscitated herself, you hear that ?! My babygirl is a tough bitch !! She's.. she's... she's ALIVE !!!"

Yeah, all that crap-talk about Tsunade being cold-blooded was bullshit. Right now, she couldn't care less about her Hokage image. She hardly ever called Sakura her 'babygirl', only when she was drunk or sporting dangerously high levels of emotions. Tsunade guessed she was a bit of both. She was high on pride for her student. Her living student.

The crying blond woman let herself fall next to the now warm body on the hospital bed, cradling it with so much love and utmost care in her arms, laughing through the pink strands.

Soft, watery murmurs could be heard in repeat in the confines of Sakura's pillow. "She's safe, she's gonna be fine. She's safe."

The nurses and the surgeon politely retired, silently slipping out of the room, a relieved but still confused Hizoshi following soon after. Kakashi, although wanting to stay with his beloved student, and knowing that the two others desired it as much as he did, grabbed them both by the collar and dragged them out of the hospital, deciding that first, Tsunade needed to recover from that fright, which was undoubtedly one of the worst she had ever faced. Kakashi hadn't seen her so broken and out of her mind in a very, very long time. Even drunk, Tsunade was in a better state.

Sighing, Kakashi looking at his two exhausted boys. He was equally worn out, but sleeping wasn't what they needed.

"Wanna go grab ramen ?"

Both teenagers absentmindedly nodded, Naruto too tired to holler and Sasuke too tired to grunt.

Casting a last glance towards the emergency wing of the hospital, Kakashi told himself that he would deal with his messed up relationship with Sakura later. When all the emotions from today would wash away.

Even if he knew that it would forever stay like a stubborn stain.

Tsunade took measured breaths. She had spent three hours in her pink haired kunoichi's room, passed out from exhaustion, hugging her student carefully but tightly.

Losing Sakura had reopened an old wound in her chest that she had forgotten was there, slowly but surely cutting deeper and deeper in it, enlarging it mercilessly.

Witnessing Orochimaru's death after having completely reduced to zero their chances of a romantic relationship had left Tsunade suffering for a while. Even though she had tried convincing herself and her dark haired object of affection that she loved Jiraya, it had fooled absolutely no one. But he hadn't insisted. He had left, broken heart hidden behind a confident smile, and never came back. He was gone now, and although Tsunade still reminisced from time to time, sorrow constantly present in her heart, she had actually taken a liking to Jiraya, who never stopped teasing her, bordering on the flirt. She had slowly begun to forget her heartbreak.

Until Sakura went and died.

This had revived the old pain, empowering it tenfold. Tsunade had tried keeping a straight face, but deep down it was killing her. Seeing the only person she could love without a tinge of guilt hovering in her heart disappear and falter in her grasp like that, it hit home hard and pierced right through. The Hokage hadn't found the strength to battle her growing pain, and soon had succumbed to it. Sakura was the one person she could laugh with, bicker with, discuss with, cry with, all the while feeling - knowing - that everything was real. Not a mascarade, a show, a pretend. Simply genuine.

While she undoubtedly looked strong and unshakable, Tsunade was extremely sensible. She had the soul of a lost fifteen years old girl with a broken heart who did not know how to mend. Tsunade couldn't bear being alone. She needed to know she was thoroughly loved. The Hokage was probably even more insecure than her apprentice, their similarity in that matter one of the main reasons which compelled Tsunade to take the hand Sakura was presenting to her the day they first met.

Shifting to a sitting position, Tsunade raised her head, smiling softly at the ceiling. She gently removed a few strands of pink hair from her sleeping student's face, relishing in the feeling of her warm breaths on her cold fingers.

Tsunade recalled the day she had first seen the small woman lying in the hospital bed. It was eleven years ago, she was headed to the hospital. For once it wasn't for work, but for personal reasons. She wasn't going as doctor, but as a patient, and somehow it made the blond woman excited. Rounding a corner, she came across Konoha's playground. Smiling at the screaming kids, Tsunade was observing them chasing each other for a moment until her eyes caught on a tiny child attempting to climb a massive tree way too big for her. Frowning, the blond began walking towards the struggling girl until another kid's voice reached her ears.

"Sakuraaaaaa, hurry up ! Sachi's gonna fall !", a freckled boy whined.

"Y-yes, don't wowwy, I'm almost..."

The previous whine was rejoined by other childish moaning until the small figure, already high up in the tree, beamed down at who Tsunade supposed were her friends. "I've got her !", holding up the frightened cat, the small girl, apparently named Sakura, proceeded to come down. Judging from the facility she showed, Tsunade decided that everything was fine and she could keep her stroll.

However her appointment at the hospital hadn't gone well.

"You're infertile. I'm sorry."

The doctor had left her alone so that she could accept the news. Tsunade remembered clearly the pain she had felt that day. The huge hole it had carved in her heart. She had spent the entire afternoon on that uncomfortable chair, aghast and shocked. All her efforts of moving on from Orochimaru and finding a suitor to bear her children. All for nothing.

But what she remembered most was the fact that she wasn't the only one in despair.

In was late in the evening when Tsunade finally found the courage to get up from her chair. Walking like a ghost through the hallways, not noticing her surroundings. She was mortified and hated the world. As she was passing near the emergency wing, the fog in her mind slightly cleared to tell her that the child being hastily transported into an operating room looked familiar. Her tiny form and pink hair really seemed... Ah, wasn't her name Sakura ?

Temporarily forgetting her sterility issue, Tsunade's eyes widened as her brain started working again. Without really thinking, she started running after the cart and the nurses pushing it. However the emergency room couldn't allow visitors, therefore she was forced to wait outside. Wait for what ? She didn't know. She still didn't. Tsunade never knew why she had anxiously waited behind the closed doors and the blinding red light flashing above them.

After an hour and a half the doors had finally opened and the girl was taken to another room. Visitors were allowed, but Tsunade was shy. Why shy with a seven years old ? This didn't make sense. But she was shy nonetheless. She decided to wait for Sakura's friends to come visit her before doing so herself, even if she didn't know what she would say to her. An hour passed and no one came. Another followed, Sakura's room still empty. Just as Tsunade was beginning to feel suspicious, the three kids who Sakura had been with at the park earlier showed up. The wounded girl happily started chatting. Tsunade couldn't see her, but she could hear her smile on her voice. That is, until the whiny boy cut her off rudely to tell her they only came to inquire about the cat's whereabouts. Tsunade was fuming, angry at those kids for disrespecting a child she didn't even know.

"Sachi's alright. I'm sowwy for dropping her."

The soft voice wasn't accusing, or sad, or angry. Just soft. Tsunade was so surprised that she let out a gasp. The kids didn't seem to hear it as they promptly left the room, having no business with knowing how their friend was doing. "You can come in, you know."

Her soft voice was hypnotizing. So Sakura had noticed her. Tsunade hesitated for a second before entering the room. Taking in the bandages around her head and right forearm, the blond woman grew sad. "Hi, I'm Sakura. And you are ?"

The girl had impeccable manners, lifting her hand politely and brightly smiling up at Tsunade. Too stunned to move, the latter simply observed the tiny child in bewilderment. After a long pause, she remembered the girl's question. "Tsunade. My name is Tsunade."

"Nice to meet you, Tsunade.", she replied as the woman shook her hand. "What brings you here ? I believe we have never met. Maybe you're in the wrong room ?"

Her tone was too pleasant. Tsunade was growing anxious, and abruptly interrupted her. "You shouldn't hang out with kids like them."

Sakura's smile faltered but never disappeared. "I'm sowwy, I think there's a misunderstanding here..."

"No you don't." Tsunade was exhausted and angry. She didn't care that she was talking to a child at this point. "Those kids are mean and they treat you wrong. How the fuck can you call them friends ?"

"Miss Tsunade. If your goal here is to insult my comrades, I ask that you leave at once."

Sakura still had a polite smile on, but a terse one. Her eyes told Tsunade that she wasn't joking. Even her tone sounded that of an adult's, the impression reinforced by the language she used.

"Excuse me.", was she really apologizing to a kid ? "But let me ask you one thing. Just one thing", she added, noticing Sakura's dismissive glare. When the girl nodded, Tsunade continued. "Why do you keep up with them ? And where are you parents ?"

The girl looked out her broad window, a new kind of smile blossoming on her face. Sad, but incredibly beautiful. "That's two things, miss Tsunade. However I can answer. Firstly, I don't have anyone to play with, putting up with them is all I can do. And secondly, my parents are probably on a mission somewhere in Fire Country. Or maybe they're home. I'm not sure."

How could the girl not know ? "Sakura, you head was fractured. How can your parents not visit you if they're home ?"

"Miss Tsunade, you said one question, I indulged in two, but will not push up to three. I would like it if you would please leave me alone. Good night."

And so Tsunade was royally dismissed by a seven years old girl whose language was far better than hers.

However when she left the room, the blond woman still lingered long enough to hear the faint sobs coming from the lone hospital bed.

That day, she had sworn to never shove her nose in a kid's business ever again. Little did she know, five years later, she would break this promise by unifying her own life with the same pink haired girl's.

Grinning like a madwoman, the stumbling Hokage got up and wobbled out of the tall white building, giddily greeting some nurses on her way out and towards Ichiraku, where she was sure to find her student's team drowning under Naruto's never-ending orders. Before rushing to Sakura's side, Tsunade had made a discovery. A huge one. The boys had to know.

Their Hogake had found a valid counter jutsu.