Bang. Bang. Bang.

"Dr. Haruno! This is the police."

With wooden movements, she rose from the chair; feet dragging across the plush rug until the floor turned less forgiving to the heavy hollowness. She wiped her sweaty palms on her black shorts. She sent a prayer to anything that listened - the Universe, God, Mintao's intuition - with words and structure she was not completely certain of. Sakura - Dr. Haruno - peered into the peephole with zero expectation of mercy. A pale face with dark eyes stared back at her. Right back at her as if there was no barrier at all. Her heart made a strong case for jumping out of her chest. She closed her eyes. Her hand went around her throat.

Bang.

It jolted her before she could press her fingers into her skin, biting. She jumped.

"Sakura Haruno!"

The whole door shook. The vibrations carried into her person. She twisted the deadbolt latch. She licked her lips. She moved to the lock on the knob, she turned her wrist to the right, opening the door a sliver until it caught on the brass chain. The jerk of metal on wood covered the hitching of her breath. Her green eyes landed on the symmetrical face staring at her with an annoyance not bothered with concealment.

Is this it for me?

"Dr. Haruno," he flashed a badge too quickly for it to mean anything other than an intimidation tactic. "I'm Detective Sasuke Uchiha and this is my partner Detective Deidara Domeki," he confirmed her worst suspicions before gesturing with the hand still curled around his badge to someone who was out of her line of sight. She moved her eyes as far to the right as she could. A flash of yellow had her stomach dropping to her toes. She broke out into a sweat. Head of blonde hair and a blue eye eked closed to the man who had been speaking.

Not an Uchiha. But still Akatsuki?

"Hello, Dr. Haruno," he smiled and waved at her brightly in stark contrast to his partner who was eyeing her subtly, making snap judgments and corroborating it with what was present in plain view. "Call me Deidara. No need for such formalities." His long blond hair was in a high ponytail. A long blond bang obscured his right eye. He was wearing dark straight-leg pants and a black windbreaker. "Hope we didn't wake you. Or your neighbors," his apologetic utterance was paired with a sheepish smile that took up his whole face just about.

He's trying to build rapport. Make me feel at ease.

His partner - the Uchiha - sighed in agitation. His gaze was sharp and critical, a far cry from his partner who was not shy about his ample disdain.

Are they good-cop, bad-copping me?

She furrowed her brow, pulling the seams of her cardigan closer together, trying to retain her warmth despite perspiration beading on her upper lip.

It's normal, Haruno, to feel nervous when talking to the police.

Only that was not true for her. She was desensitized to it because of her job. It was rare that a shift went by and she did not converse with a first responder - police, paramedic, firefighter - in some shape or form. Daily she saw guns on holsters. This should have been routine if she were innocent.

Do they know that too?

"We're here about the incident in the Tani Station of the subway. Were you there?" The Uchiha asked her, his upper lip stiff and his eyes narrowed in accusation.

A leading question.

She cleared her parched throat, heart pounding in her chest. "I was," she was surprised her voice did not give up its integrity. Her morals were more easily swayed it seemed.

The raven-haired man - who looked so much like the man who haunted her dreams - pressed forward. She nearly took a step back to compensate for the distance he encroached. Her hand tightened around the door knob.

Sasuke Uchiha. This is detective Sasuke Uchiha?

Tall. Imposing. Intimidating. Cold. Confident. The face of potential death never looked so enticing. Beauty cut with the set of agitated contempt.

"We have some questions we would like to ask you," he attached his badge to his belt with the ease of a repetitive gesture, tucking it behind the flap of his navy suit jacket. Expensive. Not that different from one of Minato's suits. "May we come inside?" He asked levelly, regaining some more composure. It was harder to read his impatience at a glance.

"No," she shook her head on the off-chance they misheard her.

His brows connected in the middle, a mark of his displeasure at her abysmal level of cooperation. "No?" He asked, slowly - like she was dumb. It gave her more time to assess - to break the problem down to a sum of its parts: two detectives, one with ties to the clan of the man she shot - sworn enemies of the clan the man in her home belonged to.

"If it's all the same," she glanced at Deidara whose smile was noticeably smaller in size. His hooded eye watched her closely. "I feel more comfortable answering any questions you have out here."

"Ma'am," the Uchiha began with a scoff, only to catch himself and correct his churlish tone before the damage it so carelessly did was irreversible. "Dr. Haruno," he started over. "It's an ongoing investigation," he glanced to the right at the face in the window. He stepped closer angling his back, effectively blocking their vantage of the situation.

"I understand that," Sakura said levelly, voice not shaking. "But it does not change anything for me." Every time she finished talking - the words she measured twice before cutting into sound - she made sure to close her mouth fully, lest a moment of weakness or fear do her in.

"Dr. Haruno," Deidara stepped in front of the Uchiha, smiling warmly. Suddenly she was feeling claustrophobic but her feet remained planted. "As you probably know, we still don't have anyone in custody. We're trying really hard to get those bad guys behind bars. Please cooperate with us. Help us to help you and this neighborhood. Otherwise, we can always do this back at the station."

"Then let's do this back at the station," she chose without blinking. "Should I get my wallet and keys?" She looked between the two with more confidence than she felt. "Do I have enough time to change?" Out of her shorts and into a pair of socks and something more presentable. It could be her last outfit after all and Ino would never forgive her if she died looking like this.

If you're going to kill me - finish the job - it's not going to be in front of my neighbors, outside of my door.

Because she knew her chances of survival were drastically cut when they moved her to a second location.

Deidara faltered at the display of bravado. Moxie. He looked at his partner.

"Dr. Haruno," the Uchiha was back prominently in her line of sight. The blond was pushed to the wayside just on the outskirts. "Innocent people don't have anything to hide."

She snorted. "Innocent people - all people - have rights." And she was not foolish enough to invite two detectives into her home for them to snoop around and collect evidence - Minato or no Minato. Besides, she was not convinced they were not Akatsuki here to clean up their mess. She was nowhere near ruling that out. "Come back with a warrant. Let me set an appointment at the district. Or we talk here and now. Take you your pick, detectives."

"Uchiha," Deidara addressed the man with hair as dark as a raven's wing. An unspoken conversation took place within a single shared look that was just a glance. The blond nodded his head and slinked back. His elbows pushed back on the black railing as he loitered casually- out of sight for Sakura.

"Fine, Dr. Haruno, have it your way," Sasuke said with a cold aloofness. She watched with bated breath as he pulled a notepad from this breast pocket. He flipped to a new page. A black ballpoint pen rested between his index and middle fingers. He sighed, gesturing to the door. "Can you at least move the chain?"

She hesitated. It could be a trap to get her outside or to see more of her apartment inside. The chances of them shooting her at her door were low but not zero. There were witnesses. She nodded her head after some thought. It was a small enough request that it opened more avenues for scrutiny if she denied it. She was defensive because she had something - someone - to hide but she did not want them to know that. Or at the very least, she did not want to confirm any biases they had against her before she ever even opened the door.

Sakura closed the door. She pressed her palm to the painted white slab. She ran her hands through her hair, she found her reflection in the oval mirror right over the console table. She breathed shakily before opening the door. She slipped through, closing it behind her with a soft click. She stood in front of it with her arms crossed. Her cardigan was held close by her tight arms.

"Nice to see you, Dr. Haruno," Deidara held up his gloved hand in greeting, smiling at her like he was greeting an old friend.

Afraid I can't say the same.

She scratched behind her ear, sniffling in the cold air.

Sasuke touched his pen to the blank sheet. "Now, Dr. Haruno," he paused as if gathering his thoughts but maybe it was to contain his annoyance. "You were there on the 17th, the night of the shooting?"

"Yes," she nodded her head. "I take the subway home from work."

"Where do you work?" He asked, his wrist moving across the page. The leather groaned with strain.

"Konoha Medical."

"You have a car registered to you," he frowned and looked up from his notepad. His eyes blacker than she thought possible were a void. The image of a crow came to her mind for some reason she did not get into.

"Is that a question?" She asked him with a raised brow.

He pushed air from his nose. Thin nostrils flared as the white puff disappeared in the stillness. "Do you have a car registered to you?"

"Yes. A red sedan," she answered.

"Konoha Medical is three stations and a number of blocks away. Why not drive?" He blinked at her slowly.

Five blocks. Three blocks from the Yuma Station to Med. Two blocks from Tani Station to my apartment.

"I like taking the subway."

"Even at night?" His tone implied that he did not believe her. "Tani is not the safest place to be at night." He pointed to the dark streetlamp.

"It's not as dangerous as everyone would have you believe," she did not back down from his bullying gaze. Her neck did not bend anymore under the pressure applied by such a gaze.

"Hn," he kissed his teeth. "So you were there." He tapped his notebook against his leather-wrapped palm three times. "Did you see anything?"

She closed her eyes. "I saw blood when I got off the train. There was a popping sound sometime later. People panicking. They were running away. There was more popping. It was chaotic. It happened so fast." She blinked her eyes open. The way her voice caught was not purely dramatized. She wrapped her arms around herself even tighter, fighting off a shiver. A foot rested on top of the other, never straying from the safety of the doormat.

"Did you see anything?" He repeated. She did not find anything new written in his notebook that was too far to make out.

I just told you.

She furrowed her brow. "I'm confused by the question."

Sasuke sighed. "The way you described what you saw is interesting."

"How so?" She asked before she could think about it.

"You said 'they were running away'," he paused to let it sink in. She kept her features schooled to the best of her limited ability. "They," he repeated, adding more weight. "As if they - the other victims, people just like you - were somehow different, separate from yourself."

Shit.

"I-I-," she bit down on her lip. The footing on which she stood was starting to feel less solid, there was more give. She had just made her first mistake - that she knew of.

He's good at this…almost as if he does this for a living.

And her second-hand experience from watching perps being questioned in various manners was coming up woefully short. Laughably.

"So I will ask you again, Dr. Haruno," he exhaled through his nose slowly. Audibly. "Did you see something?"

Strike one…or was not letting them in the first strike?

She first looked at Deidara who was silent but attentive before shifting her focus back to Sasuke. A name she had heard before and a face she was not expecting to see because she never considered him to be anything more than a name; text on a phone screen.

"No, Officer-"

"Detective," Sasuke corrected, tursley.

"Detective Uchiha, was it?" She blinked slowly, keeping him in her gaze for as long as she could. She even minimized her blinking. "I did not see anything beyond what I have already stated."

"An eyewitness gave a statement," he flipped through the pages of his notebook in what had to be a charade. Something about him putting on a production crossed her mind. "Ah," his eyes lazily scanned the page. "The woman with pink hair ran down the stairs to the under level, where the gunshots were being fired."

"Ballsey," Deidara pipped up with a low whistle, hardly adding anything of value to either of the two individuals; the questioner and questioned.

"Incredibly foolish," Sasuke moved the pages back to where he had his notes on her. "Pink hair is not common, Dr. Haruno. In fact, you are the only woman in ten million people that seems to fit that bill."

Really? Not even one box-dyed head of pink hair - pink adjacent - in this miserable city? You expect me to believe that?

"Is that why it took you so long?" She challenged defiantly, eyes blazing. "You were looking for a needle in a hackstack?"

"Dr. Haruno," Sasuke smiled at her; cold and condescending. "I am the one asking the questions."

"Funny," she clicked her tongue. "You used many words and yet none of them came together in the form of a question."

Do you like hearing yourself talk? Do you like toying with your food too?

Deidara's barking laughter was accompanied by the loud clapping of his hands.

"Sakura, can I call you Sakura?" Sasuke asked, his nostrils flared, teeth touching in a forced smile that held back the venom on his tongue.

Her skin crawled. "No," she pressed her teeth together in an attempt at the same thing. "Dr. Haruno is sufficient."

"What did you see, Dr. Haruno?" He hissed out the question, moving closer to her.

"Detective Uchiha," she spat his name, "I have already stated-"

"Okay," Deidara clapped a hand on Sasuke's shoulder, another resting flat against his chest. "Maybe I can give it a try. It seems we have gotten a little cyclical in our conversation." He laughed, unbothered that no one joined him.

Listen to your handler. Back off, Uchiha.

She for the life of her could not remember the last time she had taken such an instant dislike to someone. Maybe he was the first. Hot, hot emerald glared at cold obsidian. A door opening had her momentarily breaking contact. It was enough to bring her back down to earth.

"Sakura?" Ms. Honda's neatly pinned-together snow-white bun poked out of her door. "Is everything okay, dear?" She asked, staring right at Sasuke. Her hand was curled around her phone. Two-thirds of an emergency number was already dialed and ready. Sakura could see the large black digest against a white screen from where she stood.

Go back inside Ms. Honda. Don't try to help.

"Everything is fine," Sakura smiled brightly, full of reassurance. "Everything is fine, Ms. Honda. Detective Uchiha and Detective Deidara are just asking me a few questions about the subway shooting," she supplied much too much information not knowing if it helped her odds or hurt. "I'm just trying to be helpful."

Ms. Honda's eyes widened. "Sakura," she covered her mouth with her liver spot-covered hand. It shook. "You weren't there were you, dear?" She moved two steps closer. Sasuke's hand lowered. Sakura held out her arm out of pure instinct.

"Everything is fine, Ms. Honda," she said with more strain. She looked at Sasuke, eyes livid. "Right, Detective Uchiha?" She worked out through clenched teeth.

What the hell is wrong with you? Her eyes communicated - screamed - to him.

"Fine," Sasuke relaxed his hand, letting it fall past his weapon holstered at his hip.

Sakura half-turned to address the woman - never letting the door break contact with her back, fearful that Sasuke would kick it down if she gave him a chance. "Ms. Honda, I will come to check on Mr. Honda when the detectives leave okay? Please go back inside," she just managed to stop before her voice broke into even more pleas.

Ms. Honda's weary eyes made dull with the cataracts moved from face to face. "You two leave her alone. She is a very busy girl! She works so hard. Don't you have better things to do than harass good people?" She pointed a bent-with-arthritis finger, wagging it indiscriminately at who her ire landed on between the two men. "If you have time to bother her, you have time to change that lightbulb." Deidara and Sasuke followed past the tip of her finger to the street lamp.

Deidara cleared his throat. "It will be taken care of, Ma'am." He dipped his head. "You have my word. You have Deidara Domeki's word."

Ms. Honda huffed. "I will come check on you in ten minutes, dear. I'm going to call my son if you're not gone by then," she warned the cops. "He works for the government."

Sakura chuckled at the stretching of the truth. She waved at the woman only to resume glaring at the detectives the second Ms. Honda's door closed. "Are you kidding me?" She hissed. "You went for your gun on an old lady?"

"She made an aggressive move," Sasuke gave her outrage zero respect with a dismissive shoot-down of her very warranted concern.

"Out with it," she looked between the men. "Why are you here?"

And maybe cut the shit this time?

"Why didn't you come forward? Why didn't you give your statement to the police?" Sasuke abandoned all decorum and pretense of propriety as if answering her silent demand.

"You called emergency services," Deidara added with more reproach and tact. "Dr. Haruno we're just curious as to why you didn't call again when the line disconnected and why you were not at the scene."

"I was scared," she admitted with less attitude when addressing the blond detective. "There was so much adrenaline in me that I didn't notice the call dropping. I wasn't thinking straight. I just reacted. I went downstairs because I saw the blood, I thought there were more victims. I thought I could help. I went downstairs and I heard gunshots. I breathed in smoke. It made it real. I panicked. I ran away."

"You saw nothing?" Deidara was the one to press. His partner's silence was maintained by the results the blond was getting.

She nodded her head without hesitation.

"You didn't go to work the next day," Sasuke added without color or sympathy. "Or since."

Again, not a question.

She exhaled through her nose, holding back her frustration by a hair. "I heard a gun loud enough that it felt like it went off in my ear. I could have died. I'm taking a sabbatical."

"You're an ER doctor. You didn't see anything you're not used to."

This asshole.

"I have never been that close to flying bullets!" She nearly shouted at him. She held back because she remembered her neighbors and the thin-thin walls of their communal living. "I was scared. I am scared. Just because I didn't see them, doesn't mean they didn't see me. And you said it yourself. Pink hair is not common!"

"If you were as scared as you would like us to believe, why did you not go to the district? Why not call the police?"

I would've. I would probably be dead if I did.

"So I could be treated like this? Like a criminal? The shooting was almost two weeks ago and I am sick to my stomach talking about it and you think I could handle this back then?" She narrowed her eyes. "I am traumatized."

And your face, your questions, are not helping.

"Who were you talking to?"

She blinked. "What?"

"Earlier," Sasuke said calmly. "We heard your voice. Who were you talking to?"

She hoped her face did not betray her. "My mom," she pointed to the lone headphone still in her ear.

"I'll give you one more chance, Dr. Haruno," Sasuke blinked impassively, voice not changing in the slightest. She wondered for a second if he was enjoying this - watching her squirm like a fly caught in a spider web. "And it would be to your benefit to keep in mind we can check your phone records," he paused to let it register; both what he was saying and leaving implied. "Who were you talking to?"

"My mother," Sakura seethed. "Mebuki Haruno. M-e-b-u-k-i space H-a-r-u-n-o," she crossed her arms. "Why aren't you writing that down?"

"Dr. Haruno," he gestured to Deidara. She noticed for the first time that the man was holding a manilla folder in his hands. He stepped forward. He pulled out a glossy sheet of paper. Her eyes went from face to face. Two rows of six columns. In the corner, she saw the last face she wanted to see in a photo array.

She raised her eyes to Deidara. "What's this?" She asked, not allowing herself to dwell on it.

"We have reason to believe that one of the suspects involved in the shooting is here," Deidara tapped the sheet. "Can you please take a look and see if any of them are familiar?"

Suspect. She inwardly clenched at that word. The association between Minato and that word - and its annotation - felt wrong. But that was what it was right? Minato was a suspect. Minato was there. They were just doing their job.

"Don't worry, Dr. Haruno, I always get my suspect," Sasuke assured her with nearly believable levels of genuineness.

You won't bully me.

Sakura raised her eyes to hold Sasuke's with defiance, jaw set in a tight line. She tapped the picture, looking away from the flat blue eyes because it felt too much like she had just betrayed him to bring her any comfort. She handed it back to the detective not nearly fast enough. She clasped her hands in front of her.

"You saw him at the subway?" Sasuke perked up, eyes sharpening with interest and maybe traces of disbelief.

She shook her head. "No. I didn't see anything in the subway," she maintained adamantly.

"So where have you seen this man?" Deidara asked her, ignoring Sasuke's frustrated grunt.

"At Naruto's Gusty Cafe. He gets coffee there," she licked her lips. "Was he involved?" She asked, boldly.

"Can't say," Deidara answered before Sasuke could, he shook his head once. "Ongoing investigation," he explained with a small sigh, his one eye straining with wariness .

Does that mean you have something?

"From the blood at the station," Sasuke was watching her like a hawk, his voice drew her attention back to him. "It's safe to assume one of them - the suspects - was injured. You have a clinic downstairs, correct?"

"I do," she nodded, relying on the gesture to cover for the fact that she flinched. She knew it was coming but there was nothing she could do to prepare herself to actually have to face it.

"Can we see it?"

"Not without a warrant."

"Dr. Haruno, I don't think you understand the serious-"

"No, Detective Uchiha, you don't understand. My clinic, despite how you're incorrectly connecting the dots, is legitimate. It is my passion. It is my private property. It is a safe space. I worked hard to build it from the ground up. It is mine to advocate for and protect. If you think there is reason to believe that something amiss happened there, convince a judge. Get a warrant and I will unlock the doors for you myself." She tapped her foot. "And until then, I have no more answers to your questions." She looked between them, searching their closed-off faces that revealed even less than hers.

"Fair enough," Deidara, leaned back against the railing once more. He let out a long sigh. "We'll be back with that warrant, Dr. Haruno. Thank you for humoring us."

Sasuke was smirking to which she eyed him warily. He leaned forward until his lips were level with her ear. "Do you have company over?"

She blinked, stiffening at the question. She dared not breathe too loudly, much less move.

"Have a good night, Dr. Haruno. Stay safe." He reinstated the distance between them. His eyes shone with something unreliable. She nearly shuddered. It felt like a threat. His expression was smug. More smug than it had been. He wheeled on his heel and bounded down the stairs, taking two at a time.

"And we'll get that light fixed. You tell Ms. Honda that." Deidara smiled at her sunnily. "Hey, asshole, wait up!" He ran after the Uchiha.

She stood there, breathing in cold air, trying to cool her too-hot face even as snot practically dribbled down her nose. Her hand trembled as she groped around behind her for the door. She watched the dark car peel off. She all but fell back as the support of the door vanished momentarily. She swallowed thickly. Legs shaking. Throat dry. Blinking rapidly. She pressed the back of her head against the rigid barrier. She blinked at the inside of her apartment. A red mark on the side of her neck displayed on the creamy skin of her reflection. Just centimeters from where Sasuke's mouth had been when he taunted her with the question he already knew the answer to.

Just how many more was that the case for?

He was there. Silent. Still. Steady. His eyes were warm and welcoming, asking her to take solace in them. His face was solemn. Her legs folded. He caught her before she fell to the floor. He held her against him, holding her together.

"It's going to be okay," his fingers promised with each motion through her hair. "You were convincing."

Sakura closed her eyes, shutting them just as she shut down.


"Sakura," he said her name with concern. He placed the sage plate with a turkey sandwich with cheese on white bread - with the edges cut off just like she liked even when it meant he had a pile of crusts waiting to be eaten by him - in front of her. "You need to eat." She needed a lot more than that but it was a start. Maybe it would be a catalyst for betterment. After eating she could try to nap, if she was feeling up for it, she could shower. It would go a long way in making her feel more human - a sense of normalcy. Or the issuing thereof.

"He's an Uchiha," she murmured, pulling at the drawstrings of his dark hoodie as tight as she could. It came nowhere close to cutting off and isolating her problems. Her knees were pushed up against her chest. Her face curled into the upholstered chair; the textured fabric leaving lines and grooves over her cheeks. An imprint.

"He's the black sheep of the family," he explained patiently, not for the first time. In the recess of his mind, he allowed himself to wonder if his voice could still reach her. He had no way to measure just how far in her head she was. He sat on the coffee table, relocating the plate under the brass table lamp. "The clan head's youngest son. He's legitimate. One of the only ones in the force. He's trying to make a name for himself."

"He's from the eleventh district." Each word seemed to cost an exceeding amount, draining the life right out of her. "He doesn't even have jurisdiction here," saying what they both knew to be true. So much for legitimacy. Corruption was corruption. It did not matter if one carried a badge and a permit for the weapon he wielded.

He must have pulled in a favor to get the case.

"Sakura," he pressed his palm to her bent knee. "It's going to be okay." He did not care to keep track of how many times he spelled out the words for her. He would say them as many times as needed until they became true - until she saw them become more than temporary vibrations.

"I shot his cousin," she confessed what she believed to be the truth - a lie he fed her.

"Maybe they're not close?" He offered up lamely and without conviction. "He could really hate him."

She did not react. She did not smile. Just like he knew she would not. She blinked slowly, fingers twisting and twisting. They would turn purple if she kept this up.

"Sakura, it's not the end of the world," he maintained the line in the sand fighting the sea, shoreline, tides, wind, moon, and just about everything else.

"He had a picture of you," she lifted her head just long enough to lock eyes with him. She did not believe him. At all. She just did not feel the need to waste what little energy she had putting it into words that would bring about nothing positive.

"Sakura," Minato leaned closer, encroaching into her space even more than he already was. What he had was not enough. He needed to breathe the air she expelled. He needed her to see what he saw. "He has nothing."

"He has your DNA," she shot back with adamance, her eyes piercing in their gaze. Accurate. Unforgiving. Effective. Like the tip of an arrow, she cut into him. Too many cuts to count. "Samples," she stressed the significance of it being considerately more than nothing.

"Samples get damaged or lost all the time," he continued to meet her gaze without a shield to defend himself. "Or the chain of custody can't be corroborated."

Her pink brow furrowed. A thin line against her strong forehead. Her lips were pressed together. She blinked - equal parts intrigued and perturbed, and much too exhausted to lean one way over the other.

"If I walked out of here today into the District Eleven Police Station, Sasuke Uchiha would not have enough to arrest me," he said with conviction rooted in every fiber of his being. And that was precisely why he was so angry. Anger that beyond a streak of navy in his cobalt eyes, he kept to himself. Locked away where it could not get to her.

"What does that mean, Minato?" She croaked out her question, it was practically a gasp. Her hand - shaky and timid - cupped the side of his face. He leaned in. Covering her hand with his own. Holding it to him. His thumb traced circles on her kneecap.

"It means, you don't have to worry about me. Or this. I will handle it." He smiled at her, reassuring and placating. "He won't get a warrant for your apartment." He would not violate its sanctity, no matter how badly Sasuke wanted it.

"You don't know that," she breathed the words with shame. Her eyes looked and stayed away before she was even halfway done. Her shoulders moved closer together, forcing her collarbones to protrude from her skin. The taunt skin drew back, forming shallow pools that held the regret that dripped from her.

He debated it quickly in his head - in between blinks - how much of his theory to reveal to her. The line was thin. Drawn by a twig in the sand on a windy day; the line between information that would put her in a marginal state of ease, and information that would weigh her down even more. He brought her hand to his lips. He kissed her knuckles. Slowly. Deliberately. His eyes never left hers and they held her with such intensity that the thought of looking - glancing - away could never occur to her.

"This is a good thing," he breathed conviction into an idol made of clay. One that would grow and shield her. Protect her when he could not. She would be safe. At all times. "As long as Sasuke Uchiha - the fallen son - is interested in you, you're under his halo. His protection. No one in the Uchiha Clan will dare approach you."

Her green eyes were alert, not cloudy. She was blinking not too quickly or too slowly. She was understanding. She was listening. It was promising. So he kept going, trying to string together his thoughts, interrupted by recollections of another's.

"Silent, contentious stares collide, mirrors of a fractured bond - familiar shadows," he recited soft and clear. Low but not without impact. "Resentment whispers, in every stubborn heartbeat. History repeats." He waited for her to pick up where he left off but she only stared. Lips parted in fear she did not legitimize with voice. "Father's echo thunderous - son fights with words that spread fire, yet he threads the same. Grudges worn like scars, love, and hate intertwine; a cycle unbroken."

A head cleared of clutter. The backdrop was set by someone with much better words than he had. Context. He gave her context into the no love lost between father and son. A son who was most like the father he resented more than anyone else in the world and for the son, there was nothing more maddening.

"Uchiha - Sasuke - is in the police force because Fugkaku - his father - and his older brother, let him be. And no amount of brooding changes that fact." He held her face in both hands, steadying her. Anchoring her to him. So that she could borrow from and steep in his calm. "You're safe." No one would touch a hair on her head. Not now. Not ever. Not as long as he was alive.

"M-Minato," she shook her head so slightly that had his hands not been there, he never would have noticed. It was practically an involuntary spasm. "I don't understand." This was his world and she was not used to either the gravity or the quality of the air. She was struggling. And he kept adding more and more complications and he revealed yet another reality on what made it spin in a reverse orbit than what she thought she knew.

"All you need to understand now is this: trust me. Know you can trust me. I will take care of you. Nothing will happen to you."

I will not let it.

Sasuke was smart but he had a glaring flaw. In his pursuit to right the wrongs of his family - of generations before him - he had tunnel vision. He could only focus on one thing at a time. And if a part of the picture was painted and placed before him, he would not think twice about whether or not there was more to it.

"This is the out, Sakura. This is how it ends." He stroked her cheekbones with his thumbs. "This is how you get your life back." The life she had worked so hard for. The one she had struggled for. Worry warmed his eyes to a homogenous hue. He was reaching for the plate. He held it over his knees. "Please try to eat something."

She blinked twice. Slowly. He let out an audible sigh of relief. He brought one half of the sandwich cut vertically to her lips. She opened her mouth and took a small bite, hardly a nibble. It brought a smile to his face all the same.


Silent hours creep slow,

Days like shadows fade away-

Time slips through fingers.

She parted the plastic blinds that were manufactured to resemble a caramel wood. The street was flooded with light from the lamppost that was far brighter than any of its brethren. An unmarked police car with two uniforms inside sat on the other side of the street parked along the curb. They were not even trying to be subtle. They either lacked the skill to hide in plain sight or had an abundance of confidence in the ability to slap silver handcuffs on her dainty wrists. She was not sure what mind game they were playing, if any. The floorboards creaked purely for her benefit. He knew how to move soundlessly in her space better than she did. The random unaccounted-for bruises she found in the shower were a testament to that fact.

"Are you sure we shouldn't give the clinic another cleaning?"

Or the apartment? Shouldn't we be doing something? Anything other than just waiting.

Waiting for the warrant to come in. Waiting for the Uchiha to kick in her door. Waiting for boots to stomp into her home, violating all rosy notions she had about privacy and sanctuary. What would her neighbors think? Would years of planning and literal blood, sweat, and tears be undone in mere moments?

Was it really that easy to lose just about everything?

"The clinic is clean," he restated his belief and stance. The evasive and abrasive cloud of bleach had just dissipated to the point it was no longer pungent enough to coax tears from their eyes, sniffles from their nose, and burning in the back of their throats. And now, with the state of things, it would be harder to transfer the empty cleaning supplies and rags to Sasori so that they could be disposed of properly.

Even if they found something. A hair. A drop of blood. A fleck of skin, he was confident it would not be the end of the world - her world. He had not simply been talking nonsense about samples being mishandled. There were ways around that. And besides, he had his own suspicions about the motivation of detective Sasuke Uchiha.

"I've turned into my mother," she pressed the tip of her tongue to the wall of her cheek. There was a theory that such a thing was inevitable. Children grew to become like their parents - the people that raised them. Adopting and accepting their flaws as their own. She just thought she would be on the other side of fifty when it happened. Perhaps she was simply too generous or completely delusional.

"Maybe it's time to go visit her," Minato offered up the suggestion gently. Encouragingly. As if it was her own idea. He was careful to stay away from the influence of the yellow light that cut the darkness between the slants of the horizontal blinds. Perfectly masked in the void. "It will be good for you to do things in public. Get back into a routine. It shows you're not worried."

But she was. Sakura rubbed her arm with her hand. Goosebumps adorned her skin even under a layer of dark fleece and ambient air temperature that was so warm that Minato elected to don a thin t-shirt. This was not routine for her. And she was getting very tired of alluding to that fact. Lying to authorities - lying on this level - was beyond her.

"What will you do?" She asked, her eyes watching while her ears imagined the conversation going on in the cop car across the street. "When I'm away."

"Errands," he called out from behind her. Out of reach but never out of influence. "Chasing a lead."

She nodded her head as if that meant anything concrete to her. Maybe it did. Or maybe it would. She was learning so much. Day by day.

Maybe the less I know the better. My testimony against him would be less damning that way.

Worst case scenario - because her mind did go there despite his reassurances out of habit - would be testifying in the court of law against the man who indirectly saved her life. She could not picture it - maybe she could, teary eyed and hysterical as she apologized profusely to him all the while losing the respect of her peers, neighbors, and colleagues; maybe even her mother - sitting on a cold, hard, chair in the witness stand, forced to answer question after question the district attorney hurled at her in exchange for charges of co-conspiracy being dropped. Maybe she would get off with something as small as a hefty fine and no jail time as she did not have any priors.

Would she take the deal? What did it say about her either way?

Sakura cleared her throat. "I'm glad," her voice was raw and stretched thin with her vulnerability. She lowered her fingers to her side. The black stripes broken by warm, yellow light became uniform once again across her face, neck, and torso. "I'm glad you're here." She inhaled deeply. The only thing worse than this would be doing this all alone. Without his guidance. She did not read into his silence. His warm hand that had slipped into her own was more than enough assurance that she needed at that moment. She closed the blinds. Pulling the string through her fingers. Just managing to avoid cutting open her skin.


The loud electric - buzzing click - followed by the bolt being undone, and the door closing with an unforgiving thud, felt like a lifetime ago just as soon as a waterfall of vibrant red registered by his eyes was translated with his brain.

She moved to perceive his presence with a turn of her head, peering over her shoulder. She did not, however, move away from the edge of the pool table. Her arms were bent and her violet eyes glittered with recognition that he was not a threat because he was no longer an unknown.

"Long time, 'ttebane," her full pink lips pulled into a smile that was neither unkind nor warm.

"It has been," he suddenly found his voice just in time to pass along the sentiment. "It's good to see you, Kush."

She sighed perhaps even long-sufferingly. Her eye - the one he could see - narrowed in annoyance. "I wish I could say the same thing, Flash," she spat the identifier she hated so much. "From what I heard you got yourself in quite the fix, dattebane!" Her expression was stern. Maybe. He only had the left side of her face to work with. "And here you are showing your face like nothing happened, dattebane!"

"It's just a regular Friday for me." He flashed her a smile. Confident enough to be mistaken for cocky by most. But she was not most.

She opened her frowning mouth with harshness ready to weave into her words. A soft coo had her turning away from him. His brow furrowed. Something poked over her shoulder. She bobbed up and down. She half turned revealing the source of the sound - something that had not even been a blip on his radar.

His heart skipped a beat. His face was slack but his eyes - his eyes - held his emotion. He blinked. He blinked again. His thoughts had come to a screeching halt. He could almost smell the burnt rubber from the sudden breaks. They had been going full speed after all just seconds prior.

Yellow…blue….

A small face with a droll-covered fist crushed up against its - his - mouth, stared up at him. Hair as yellow as the yellow crayon used to draw a half circle in the top corners of a sheet of paper: the sun. His hair was yellow. And his eyes were blue. Staring right at him. It into the depths of his soul. Shamelessly open. Maybe even in accusation.

Is that….

He dared not finish the thought as if even thinking it would somehow manifest it to be reality - the truth. That he was a sack of shit - a deadbeat. One that never deserved to be forgiven.

The boy cooed loudly. Pulling his fist from his mouth. Shaking both of them. A line of clear saliva connected his pink bottom lip to his leftmost knuckle. An orange bib with a green frog on it was donned over his blue shirt and brown pants. He was young. Near or around one. The baby smiled, revealing one lone white tooth - barely the width of a grain of rice - among his pink, fleshy gums.

"Da!" He shrieked and Minato's knees somehow managed to catch him at the last minute, preventing a rough fall on his face. His cobalt-colored eyes darted to the nearest door in front of him.

The air was suddenly too hostile to breathe. The steady, stray ground he once stood on top of was tremoring under him. Even if the rational part of his brain - the area was growing smaller and smaller with each excruciating breath - screamed at him to not panic; to not jump to conclusions. Even if it was much too late. Because he stared at the complication - the baby - with a slack jaw and his stomach in his toes. His world had just stopped spinning, finally catching up with his muddled head.

Kushina watched him with flat eyes, wide nostrils, and an air of unimpression. "He's not yours," she said the words that liberated him from his thoughts of new responsibilities. "He calls everything 'Da'. It's the only word he knows," she explained with more than a trace of bitterness. Minato blinked, not allowing himself to relax just yet. She could still be pulling his leg. Kushina was a prankster at heart and more than a handful had been tone-deaf from the stories he heard both from her and various other sources. And if he skimped out on roughly two years of any kind of support - he was guessing - he deserved it; he deserved no mercy. Monumentally. "He's big for his age - in the 99th percentile," she added with pride that quickly faded when her eyes moved from the boy's face to his. "So you can stop doing the mental math. You'll give yourself an aneurysm, 'ttebane."

Thank you.

He exhaled slowly - inwardly vowing to donate to the nearest shrine or charity he encountered - audibly. Relief. With palpable relief. The sour look she shot him was warranted, he believed. It was now, without a clouded mind that Minato could register the differences. The blue of the child's eyes was lighter than his own. They were sky-blue, not cobalt, and oh-so big like his mother's. His face was round - cheeks chubby and skin fair. And his hair though the same shade did not seem to have the predisposition to clump together in shaggy spikes. It was close to his head. Aside from being in the same color family, the boy looked nothing like him.

"You have a type," he chuckled, unable to help himself, practically giddy. The need - the call - to flee was becoming fainter and fainter.

"You're as pale as a sheet," Kushina huffed. She gathered the end of the soft bib. She dabbed her son's - just hers and not his - mouth. "You should sit down before you crack your skull open."

"I'm fine." He was great. He had just shed about twenty-five pounds of weight that had sat squarely on his chest. "Cute kid," he said because that was what people said around babies.

"Thanks," Kushina uttered as disingenuously as him but she made no effort to hide the fact. Kushina held up her left hand, she wiggled her fingers to draw in his eye to the shiny, gleaming stone on her third finger. "Remember my no-good, annoying as H-E-double-L ex?" She asked him dryly.

Minato nodded his head, regretting his decision to joke too soon because if she was leading him where he thought she was, he wanted no part in being associated with her ex whom she complained about nearly as often as she breathed.

"I married him," she grinned from ear to ear, she nuzzled her nose into the side of her son's cheek soliciting deep-belly-filled laughter. And a spit bubble. "Say hi to Uncle Minato, Menma." She bounced the boy on her hip, holding his damp fist in her hands without a lick of disgust.

"Congratulations," Minato shuffled on his feet. "For both things," he added to clear the ambiguity, awkwardly.

"Who knew that Uncle Minato not wanting anything serious would be the best thing that happened to Mama?" She cooed the boy, speaking in a higher-pitched tone that he was completely enthralled with. Wide sky-blue eyes stared at her, enamored. "Who would have thought?" She asked her son with a big smile. "Who would have thought, Menma? Not your mama. Not your mama, that's who."

"Da!" Menma flailed his arms, shrieking in delight.

"No, Menma," Kushina corrected him. "Mama," she said slowly with intense focus on her son. "I'm Mama. You know the one that changes half of your diapers, does all your feedings, buys you all your clothes and stuffies. Not Da. Mama."

Menma pinched his face together in concentration. He opened his mouth, "Da!" He sang with pride.

"Why me, dattebane?" Kushina hung her head for all but a moment, she nuzzled her nose into his cheek once again soliciting a sting of deep-belly rumbling giggles.

Minato smiled at the sight of them. Just the two of them in their own little world, completely indifferent to him. "He has your face."

And your spirit.

Kushina beamed at him, she patted the baby's back. "And thank God for that."

You can say that again.

Minato kept this agreement to himself. It was the smart thing, as heavy footsteps clambered down the stairs. Boots hitting concrete - echoed - bounced off the close-together walls. The rasp of a voice - whine - soon filled the air.

"Okay Babe, I think I got the right stuffie this time. Why in the name of all things good on God's green earth does he have so many damn frog to-" The blond man frowned when his lone blue eye landed on Minato's face. He stood there still as a statue in a dark black jacket lined with pockets over a navy v-neck form-fitting t-shirt. He was holding a stuffed animal in his hand. Yellow with an orange belly.

That's a toad, not a frog.

"Oh, it's you," Menma's actual Da said in a deadpan.

"Da!" Menma screeched, arms extended toward the man, wiggling in his mother's grip who adjusted quickly to keep the boy from tumbling out of her arms. His son more than made up for his father's lackluster greeting.

"Hey, little man," the blond's softening face impacted his voice. He reached for the toddler - Minato knew next to nothing about babies and the various labels for their development stages - taking him into his arms. Menma promptly shoved as much of the toad's head in his mouth as he could. His pupils dilated. He kicked his chubby legs. Content.

"He has so many of them," Kushina took the diaper bag slung on the man's shoulder and brought it to rest on the pool table. Her tan wool wrap-around coat had a sizable drool stain on it. She shook her head, straightening her hair over her back. "Is because Jiraiya and Tsunade got him that mobile for his crib that they helped put together. He's been obsessed with them since even before he came out, you know."

The blond made a face somewhere between hurt and annoyed. Defensive. "How could I know? You weren't even talking to me then," he grumbled, moving Menma to the side where his blond bang obscured his scar and missing eye. A firework accident from when he was a teenager. A very dumb teenager.

"Well you did knock me up, dattebane," Kushina huffed with her arms crossed over her chest. "And you ran away when I told you! After asking if I was sure he was even yours." The accusation had real heat behind it.

"It came out of habit! I ask follow-up questions for a living, Babe." He insisted. "And I had a call!" He defended himself, with real indignation. "Tell her how things are, Namikaze."

Minato found himself in the middle of their mess. Two and a half pairs of eyes stared at him, expectantly. Minato glanced toward the direction the man had come, wondering when Jiraiya would grace them all with his presence and hopefully defuse this bomb that was ready to burst in his face.

"Well?" Kushina demanded, foot tapping. "You going to tell him he's a coward or what?"

Maybe. But he himself was thrown in those very shoes not too long ago and his first instinct had been to run. Far away and fast. Really, really fast. Cowardly? Yes. Human? Absolutely. He would have done the right thing by the boy - he liked to believe - like Deidara did so was it really fair to fault him - harbor resentment - for being frozen in place by the weight of an expanding world?

Just rip the bandaid off.

"Domeki has an important job," he said in a monotone. Allegedly. He was not sure after hearing the man at work through the slab of Sakura's door, watching with a fish-eye view from the peephole that she did not cover with the back of her head. There were advantages to being short.

"Thank you," Deidara let out a validated sigh.

"You men are the same," she griped, "figures that you would cover for him," her tone dripped with disgust. "You're not going to be like them, Menma. Over my dead body," she told the boy with a stern expression. Menma tilted his head to the side, confused. He blinked slowly.

"Honestly, Babe. I groveled for thirteen whole months! I sent over enough flowers to put Yamanaka Flower Shop out of business. You letting me in the room was a split-second decision." Because she needed to break someone's hand from squeezing too hard while she pushed, and why not his? Since it was his fault. Never mind the fact that she - the sad, angry, unstable mess after her situationship with Minato ended - had approached Deidara the first, second, and every subsequent time after. "How much more? How much longer before you forgive me?" He asked his wife.

How much longer do they plan to keep at it?

Because he was close to apologizing for showing up when he had. His cobalt eyes were trained on the stairwell, willing something - anything - to enter through it.

"I haven't decided yet," Kushina deadpanned without any consideration for Deidara's plight.

The blond - Minato - cleared his throat to remind them that he was very much still there and he was gathering much too much information that was next to useless to him.

"Why are you here?" Minato addressed the bickering - formally bickering, he hoped - couple.

"We're here to see Tsunade," Kushina answered. "She's the only one that Menma doesn't get all fussy for." The exasperation was clear in her voice.

Is it for all the drool?

He kept his upper lip stiff, he had to, otherwise, it would have curled in disgust. The yellow synthetic fur on the toy was damp and clumpy as the baby gnawed on it. He dare not ask his question out loud. Kushina would kill him with zero remorse or hesitation. And Deidara would hide his body where no one would find it. They would get it together enough to orchestrate that, Minato was certain.

"My boy takes after his old man," Deidara was brimming with fatherly pride. His eyes were on his wife - a particular part of her. Her crossed arms pushed against her bust practically put them on display much to the man's pleasure.

"You pervert!" Kushina shook her fist at him. Had her husband not been holding her son, Minato would have witnessed a different murder. One that he would be forced to dispose of the remains of because otherwise, she would talk his ear to death trying to convince him. "That's the last time you go out for dinner and drinks with Jiraiya!" She promised him darkly. "Peepers! Are you for real?!"

They're doing this on purpose.

"For the last time, Babe, it was a very important discussion on a new business ven-"

"What's Uchiha playing at?" Minato asked, cutting Deidara off before he signed his own death warrant with his own tongue. "What was the other day about?"

"Babe," Deidara murmured, staring straight ahead at the lieutenant. Kushina gathered Menma into her arms. She walked back to the pool table, to rest him on top of it. She moved a ball back and forth. Menma gasped in excitement. Deidara crossed his arms and frowned. "He thinks that if he turns up the heat, he can flip her."

Minato's stomach clenched at his suspicions being confirmed. "He wants to use her as an informant." It was not a question but Deidara nodded his head anyway. "He wants to pressure her into giving me up."

"Bingo," Deidara shot him with a finger gun, punctuating with a click of his tongue. "He has a very vivid imagination. Wild actually. Talks of her wearing a wire. Infiltrating in the Nara Clan. Being his little pink-haired mole."

They would kill her. If they found out. Without hesitation.

Minato's teeth pressed together of their own volition at the thought of Sakura anywhere near the compound.

"How much does she know," Deidara's eye was critical on his face. "How much did you tell her?"

"Nothing," he answered. "She knows nothing." It was true. Beyond a name or two, the vague hierarchy of the Clan, and an even vaguer idea of his job responsibilities she knew nothing of value to Sasuke.

"He disagrees. He's like a starving dog with the scent of a bone," Deidara kissed his teeth. "He has a couple of unis staking her house."

"I noticed," his lips barely moved.

Deidara raised his brow. "They don't know their hand from their ass. You're welcome by the way," he shook his head with resignation. "How do you know?" He scoffed when Minato did not answer. "You're staying with her. Wow." His judgment hung in the air.

"She shot an Uchiha," Minato did not bother to lower his voice. Kushina would have just gotten it out of Deidara later. He was saving the man some time; time he could use elsewhere, perhaps in even aiding Minato. "Because of me." It was his mess. Not Sakura's.

"Ah, shit!" Deidara whooped as loud as it was unexpected.

"Language!" Kushina scolded him even louder. Menma let out a sharp screech, joining in the chorus with his high-pitch range.

"Sorry, Babe," Deidara said automatically without even pausing to think about it. "That was her?" His eye was wide with something akin to admiration. "She got him right in the hand. Masanori, a real rough twenty-three," Deidara supplied. "That's the Uchiha she shot."

"I've never heard of him," Minato shook his head once, clearing it of the faces he went through trying to place the name.

"A lowly soldier. Sells pills and powder on the side to subsidize his dues - not very good at it from the looks of things. A little brother. Saw an opportunity. He was out to make a name for himself. To stand on his own two feet," Deidara pinched the bridge of his nose, for the first time resembling very much the part of a sleep-deprived father of a young child. "Sound familiar?"

A story as old as time.

Minato scoffed in response.

"Fugaku and Shisui are pissed. I heard it straight from the weasel's mouth." Deidara seemed to age right in front of him. "They're not too happy that Sasuke has latched on. They want this gone. They want this behind them. It's not good for morale or business." Casinos. Gambling. High-end booze. Even more high-end prostitutes. Entertainment. Clubs. Massage parlors. That was where the Uchiha made most of their money. Money that was now threatened by the whisper of a war waiting to break out. "Their clientele don't want their brains to be the thing that gets blown if you catch my drift." It was impossible not to. He was not as subtle as he believed himself to be.

"You're disgusting," Kushina threw her eyes heavenward. "Don't be like Dada, Menma," she told her son with grave seriousness. The boy was in the process of trying to shove the orange billiard ball in his mouth in its entirety. And upside-down number five faced Minato.

That cannot be sanitary.

He made a note to never play pool down here again. Not before he could bleach everything first and foremost.

"Occupational hazard, my beautiful wife." Deidara gestured to the smoke on Minato's ear. "Got another?"

"No," Minato lied, the box burning a hole in his inner pocket.

"You said you quit!" Kushina accused from across the room, fuming.

"It was a test, Babe," Deidara sighed. The thrill he got from lighting things on fire had not fully worked out of his system even if he was a far more upstanding adult than his rough teenage years implied. "You left your DNA everywhere," he said with annoyance like he was personally tasked with cleaning it up.

"I'll try to be more careful the next time," Minato promised dryly.

"You're one lucky bastard. You got shot out in the open," Deidara brought two fingers level with Minato's chest. He cocked his handgun up, grinning. "And not a single witness could point you out of a photo lineup. You must have a forgettable face," he clicked his tongue, remorseful to be the bearer of bad news. "Or you got to them first?" He asked with half interest.

"Minato's not like that," Kushina chimed in before Minato could shake his head. Sound really did travel before light. Before he could thank her for defending him - or his face not that it mattered all that much - she was beating him to it again. "You didn't pay them all off, did you?" She asked him with concern. "Talk about wasteful expenditure."

So you can put a price on freedom.

Kushina certainly did even if it was just his.

"You can't control his wallet too, Babe," Deidara rolled his eye. He jerked his head in the direction of his wife and mouthed the word "women," directing a knowing look at Minato.

"How did Uchiha find the connection?" Minato tried to rein things back into the realm of productivity. He had already lost so much time.

"You're shitting me. Sorry," he apologized before Kushina could berate him. "You're not," Deidara sighed long sufferingly, rubbing the side of his face dumbfounded that he had to spell it out. "You were hardly discrete. You were directly under the cameras outside. For weeks." He rubbed his eye. "You're the reason my vision is starting to go in my one eye. Do you have any idea how much footage I volunteered to watch of you? Way too darn much," Deidara answered before Minato could get a word in edgewise if he would have bothered to. "It was so dry too. I didn't even need to scrub anything." He sounded almost disappointed. At least he got to doctor scramble audio of him and Hora yapping - the redhead had called him his nickname. It could cause problems so Deidara took care of it before it could become one. If Minato went away - a moderate - who knew what crazy would come to replace him? The devil you know and what have you. "I know your face better than you do. It's been harassing me in my dreams more than my wife's!" He smiled sweetly, laughing sheepishly at said scowling wife.

"Jiraiya gave him the footage," Minato shook his head. He could not blame the man. He had to give the appearance of a clean business.

"The past couple of months. The old man got new cameras. The timing was serendipity. He fed Uchiha a lie about switching cloud providers and forgetting his password. He thinks with that big Uchiha brain of his, that he can put enough pressure on her to get to you," he snorted. "You left a hickey on your neck. What are you twelve? And she didn't have the decency to cover it up before she answered the door. What is wrong with you people?"

He saw the mark. He saw us on video. It's all circumstantial and a long shot but if anyone can make it stick, it's him.

Minato briefly closed his eyes. He did not have a palatable answer for Deidara because the man was right. He should not have left marks - proof. The primal part of him - the possessive part that he did not even know he possessed - relished the fact that it was his mouth that did that to her neck. He had not bothered to curb his impulses. He had given in and it must have slipped Sakura's mind if it came to her notice at all. It had happened so fast. It was not as if they gave them a heads-up. It was not as if Sakura could keep them waiting while she applied cover-up.

Shit.

"Whose neck did you suck on?" Kushina was suddenly there, with Menma in her arms. Her violet eyes were glittering at the prospect of juicy gossip. Some things really did not change. "Tell me, 'ttebane," she whined, her patience reaching its shallow end.

"Hot. Pink hair. Doctor. She seems nice," Deidara filled her in quickly with the highlights. "Great legs. An ass-"

Minato narrowed his eyes, effectively shutting up Deidara before he did something he would have to affront to regret. Deidara lowered his hands which were engaged in a gesture that was so far from innocent that even Jiraiya would not attempt it in front of the present company. Menma did not need to be in the room when his daddy was knocked on his ass.

"Oh!" Kushina's eyes lit up. "A doctor," she gushed, breathily. Her selective hearing did not hear anything past that point. She smacked him on the shoulder in a congratulatory gesture with the back of her hand. A hearty whap. "Sorry, dattebane! I totally forgot!" She covered her mouth with her hand at his hiss and recoiled away. Minato brought his hand to the site of intense throbbing. "Got any pictures of her?" She asked not even seconds later.

Still as trigger-happy as ever with those hands.

Bricks. Her hands were as solid and hard as bricks. Maybe even cinder blocks.

Minato ignored her. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"Everything," Deidara snapped at him, growing impatient. "I have pictures and videos on my work phone, Babe. I'll show you later," He promised with a smile. It slipped off his face when he locked his lone eye with Minato's. "You're his dick."

Did she hit his head one too many times?

"Excuse me?" Kushina asked so Minato did not have to. "I didn't know you're into-"

"I'm not," he interrupted with more tightness than he should have. The pangs of pain were not helping his case. His eyes stung with moisture.

"Hey!" Deidara's face pinched together. "Watch how you talk to my woman, Namikaze!"

"It's fine," Kushina touched her hand to Deidara's arm. The agitation left his face immediately. "He's gorgeous. Shame, you two would be so cute together. Golden retriever and black cat energy," Kushina gushed, smiling prettily at the glare Minato directed at her.

I would rather peel off my own skin and hand-feed it to Cheddar.

Because being around Sasuke Uchiha a second more than strictly necessary was a second too many.

Focus.

Minato reminded himself, lip curled. "Explain," he directed the order at the detective.

Deidara sighed, preemptively. "Sasuke thinks you're his whale. You know, like the one from the story."

"Oh!" Kushina slapped a hand to her forehead. Menma was held to her chest in a chair hold. He kicked up his pudgy legs, abandoning trying to peel off his orange socks. Listening seemingly intently to the ways their voices fluctuated and rose. "Moby Dick, you idiot!" She scowled at her husband. "How can you not know that?" She smacked him. Hard.

"Isn't that what I said?" Deidara asked her, genuinely perplexed, rubbing the back of his head that throbbed from a contained location with a pout. "And what happened to watching our language around the boy?" He asked, accosted.

"Da!" Menma laughed heartily at his father's pain - deep-bellied. He was definitely his mother's son.

Minato was reaching the end of his patience, wondering who was holding their lone brain cell between them now. "Domeki, focus." He hoped it was Deidara. He needed it to be the detective.

The blond was less than pleased to have to look at him or spell this out for him. "He's obsessed with you seeing how he can't go after his own clan. Not how he is now. He doesn't have enough allies or backing to his name yet. No one takes him seriously and it doesn't help that more than half his coworkers are moonlighting as police. He's been building a profile. Collecting everything he can. Working around the clock. Rumor. Stories. Innuendo. Everything. For almost three years now. He lives, breathes, you and only you."

Three years? Why is it that I'm just hearing about this now?

"Could you have found a more creepy way to say that?" His wife asked him irately.

"He didn't have anything before because you've been well you," Deidara said with palpable annoyance, seemingly reading Minato's mind. "He probably has one of those crazy people conspiracy boards on you in his penthouse apartment. He's been dreaming about this day. And it's finally come." Deidara pointed at him. He spun his index finger clockwise. "You, locking you behind bars is his obsession," Deidara's frown only grew. A divot formed between his brows. Worry. Concern. Annoyance. The line contained it all. "He thinks - he believes - you can bring down the Nara Clan. He wants you to be the first piece that falls. He wants to destroy the Akatsuki. He wants to burn it all to the ground. And you're his accelerant."

Accelerant? Bring down the Akatsuki?

"No way," Kushina gasped, mouth open and eyes wide. Menma peered up at her, almost concerned. He fisted his hands in her hair, calling for her attention. Kushina patted him on the back without tearing her eyes off of her husband's face.

"He's ambitious," Deidara rubbed the back of his neck. "He's protected - Daddy looks out for him. He thinks he can pull this off. He has his eye on some up-and-coming ADA's. Hotshots who aren't afraid of anything. They're sharks. You know the type. The kind to willingly go head-to-head against that sleazeball Hoshigaki and that freak Momochi."

Defense attorneys. The worst - the best - money could buy. They have a ninety-nine percent win rate. The Clan has them on retainer. Just in case.

It seemed everyone was out to make a name for themselves. The next generation. They were not trying to work within the system like he had. They were trying to completely obliterate it - burn it to the ground. And from where he stood - somewhere closer to the top than the bottom he did not know if he admired or pitied them.

"If he gets you…this way, no one will dismiss him. No one will think he's just another Uchiha in a long line of corruption."

He's trying so hard to not be like him, like his father, like who he thinks his brother is.

Sasuke was marching toward something. Destruction. It remained to be seen whose.

"He's insane," the redhead shook her head. She looked between the blonds, searching their faces for traces of dishonesty. Cues. Kushina was looking for a cue to follow from someone better versed in this world than she was.

"He is. He's crazy enough to try," Deidara let out a dry, humorless chuckle. His hand rested on top of Menma's soft hair. "He's crazy enough to burn the whole world just to get back at his father. And your pink-haired doctor, she's his match."

Sakura.

The detective's words left a bad taste in Minato's mouth. The bitterness must have reflected on his face because Deidara moved further on the offensive - digging his fingers into the exposed nerve.

"You did this Namikaze when you didn't come here. Or go back to the Clan for treatment. Everyone had their mother knows you were at that station and that you got shot. That you were the target. Even if there's no evidence to back that up definitively, he - in what I thought was a stretch - claimed that you went to her, with her. That she treated you. He thinks the two of you are sleeping together." The blond paused his tirade, he pushed his jaw to the side, thinking better of whatever thought entered his mind. Or maybe not. "And you know, I thought he was bullshitting, grasping at straws."

"Minato," Kushina's voice was hollow, her face lost color. "She's a civilian," she uttered, her eyes were wide. "How could you…what were you thinking?"

Why does everyone keep asking me that? It's not like I wanted this to happen.

"He wasn't!" Deidara spat, with vitriol. "Not logically anyway. And now we have this huge mess. The young bloods are foaming at the mouth at the thought of war. The old hats are trying to figure the hell out what just happened. What happened?"

He did not know. His head was spinning. He needed to find Inuzuka. He needed to go to the source. The only one that was in the room with the key in his hands. "How is the warrant coming?" Minato asked, trying to steer the conversation back down the productive path.

"He's going to get it," Deidara was none-too-happy about the fact. "For her clinic. The old prune won't sign one for her apartment. No judge wants to touch that with a ten-foot pole. Expect a visit early next week. Monday."

Monday. Okay. That gives us time.

It gave him time. Minato nodded his head. He tucked the information away. The old prune - Hiruzen - was their go-to judge of choice as he was in the pocket of the Clans. He played both sides. And neither side wanted what Sasuke was pursuing. It was probably the easiest decision he made all week. He gave Sasuke enough that the detective would be occupied while also shielding them.

It's not the end of the world. I can work with this.

"I'll let you know as soon as I know," Deidara sighed warily. The bags under his eye sockets were not simply cosmetic. Deidara was not kidding when he said Minato made more work for him. Kushina - who was uncharacteristically quiet - was studying him intently. Judging openly as she no doubt connected the pieces of the puzzle why lieutenant Minato Flash Namikaze acted and continued to act so out of character - without a plan.

There was a groan. Wooden sandals and plastic heels tapped against concrete. Tap. Click. Tap. Tap. Click. Tap. Click. Click. Tap. They all - with the exception of Menma who was sleeping against Kushina's chest - turned in silent greetings of the two new faces. Kushina pulled away from the rough triangle she had formed and made her way to Tsunade. The two women and the baby ducked into a room. Deidara dipped his head. He grabbed the diaper bag on the pool table on his way to the door being held open for him by the blonde woman. Her amber eyes found his for a moment. Minato nodded in acknowledgment. Tsunade's lips twitched. Deidara was gone without a word. The door swung closed.

"Did Domeki fill you in?" Minato did not allow any grace period for his former mentor.

"Enough," Jiraiya crossed his arms over his chest. "You got an Uchiha tail on you."

Not on him but close enough for it to be a factor. A big one, potentially. "Do you want to yell at me too?"

"Remember the last lecture I gave you," the very tall man with white waved his hand dismissively after reading Minato's face. "Before this mess?"

"The one where you told me I was making the biggest mistake of my life letting Kush walk out of it?" Minato asked him impassively, shoving his hands in his pockets all the same as he repeated the grave words verbatim. They stayed with him all this time - to haunt him when he was at his most alone to wonder if Jiraiya was right.

A big head nodded sagely, convinced his lesson was not lost to the passing of time. "No use digging up corpses that have turned to dust. I have nothing more to add to that at this time." He let out a sigh. "What now?"

"A patsy," Minato answered without having to think twice about it. "I need a patsy."

"It's going to cost you," he warned just for the sake of it - checking off a box from a checklist.

What else was new?

"Anything on my mutt?" Minato's eyes narrowed a margin. He owed him some discipline. It did not do to pee on your master's shoes. And very expensive shoes they were.

"No callbacks on the flyers," Jiraiya sighed, he pressed his fingertips to his eyelids. The heat was not nearly hot enough nor pressure long enough for any real relief. "He'll turn up," his voice was textured with his weariness. He was beginning to feel his age. Truly. And the yoga, smoothes, and injections his wife mandated for the both of them could not change that fact. "We all need to come up for air."

A free breath inhaled,

Trapped in enclosure of bone,

Expelled, unconfined.

Air. Minato tilted his head back. The canned lights burned in his vision as he blinked. He wondered if she was in any place of mind to register the crispness of fresh air after this period of estrangement.


Loud clock counts ticks slow,

Moments stretch like endless skies,

Stillness echoes deep.

She recalled the Haiku Sumida wrote about the passage of time. The way it dragged when he was in a house that was made too big and too empty by the leaving of his first love. The solitude that pushed him to write just so his loneliness could mean something other than his despair. The clock was unforgiving for him. It was not a friend he could seek solace in. The clock tormented him. As it did to her now.

Or I'm just being dramatic.

It was a toss-up really, how anxious she was to leave the house and be somewhere - anywhere - and now she found herself just as anxious to go back home. She told herself it was because she wanted to learn what Minato had. It would go a long way to alleviating the restlessness that built up in her. He had a way of putting her at ease. That was why. It had nothing to do with the fact that she had gotten used to him being there. Always there. On more than one occasion she found herself looking for him to see if he was seeing the same funny commercial she had on the TV or the way Cheddar's whiskers had scrunched in annoyance when she dared to do more than blink or breathe while on his sofa. It had not been that long. It was rather not very long at all. But she had gotten used to him. In her home. In her bed. In her life.

And now there was yet another thing to deal with.

She kept her elbow off the table despite the heaviness in her head. Sakura poked the salmon on her plate. The dark grill marks under the shiny walnut sauce were perfect. It was even more impressive considering how her mother had grilled the stakes inside. The whole kitchen was perfumed with the smell. It made her stomach churn. She sucked on the piece of hard candy she had snuck into her mouth when her mother was not looking. The artificial orange flavor was helping with the nausea brought on by the bouts of overthinking.

She had driven down with a white knuckle grip on her steering wheel. She was sure that her nails had left marks on the leather. She had been looking at her mirrors with even smaller intervals, checking for an unmarked car following her. She had clocked it. It was parked at the next cul de sac over. Two plainclothes officers donning sunglasses were inside. If her mother noticed, Mebuki made no indication.

The fish isn't the only thing she grilled.

Sakura; Mebuki thoroughly grilled Sakura, giving her the third degree that would impress even detective Uchiha. Maybe she was not being fair. Mebuki did not have to worry about maintaining appearances of due process and the presumption of innocence. She could go straight for the jugular like a jungle cat - kill Sakura before she had a chance to eke out a sound.

"Mom," she picked at the conversation just as her fork did the same to the fleshy fish, not fully committed to anything just yet. "How do you know Ms. Uchiha?"

"We went to school together. We were classmates. She was always kind. She checked up on me when I dropped out when I got pregnant. She sent care packages. She called. Like everything it lost frequency with time. I got busy with Sakuto and she graduated and had her own son. She never did go to law school. That makes two of us," Mebuki's voice was reflective as she thought of her classmate for the first time in a while.

"Did we ever go to her house? Or invite her over?" Sakura feigned her level of interest. Her tone was conversational - light - it did not speak to the churning of her mind or the heaviness in her stomach.

"What, invite her over to our shack?" Mebuki let out a puff of air. Demeaning. "She came from and married into money, Sakura. Her husband owns half the spas and hot springs from Mori to Yuma! They have a real estate business. And that's not even half of it."

You could say that again.

"You must have met her sons, or heard about them," she kept her gaze trained to her plate. Why else would she set her up with them? Sakura did not know what she was looking for - digging for - but she held a belief she would know when she found it. Conspiracy theories. Did her father know about the Uchihas? His wife was dark-haired and dark-eyed with pale skin. She could pass as an Uchiha - just from what Sakura saw at a glance on the flat billboards she told herself she did not notice. She did not check because that was one rabbit hole she would never find her way out of.

The barrage of questions did not end there. Did they - the Uchihas - have something to do with the rather sudden and almost astronomical level of Kizashi Haruno's success? Her mother - she did not think her mother truly knew the true face of the Uchiha. Maybe she just did not want to believe it.

I don't know how many earth-shaking revelations I can take anymore.

"No," Mebuki shook her head. "Her youngest - the one I gave you the number of ages ago - was featured in a news article. Twice; once when he joined the Academy, then again when he became a detective because of the arrests of the manufacturers and distributors for that party drug that killed so many young men and women. He was the youngest in over a decade to be promoted to detective. It was all anyone could talk about for weeks. I reached out to her. I called to congratulate her. She had sent flowers for Sakuto. She was there at his funeral. You probably don't remember. She came alone. She hadn't changed her number. We chatted a bit. She asked about you - if you were seeing someone," Mebuki frowned at her. "Why are you asking about my classmate and her sons? Why now, all of a sudden, when you have Minato?"

When you have Minato, how strange it was to hear. The only thing it felt like she had was problems. A surplus of problems.

"No reason," she said quickly. Maybe too quickly.

"Sakura, for months - over a year - I've been pestering you to call him. Only for you to tell me you're not anyone's charity case! You used every excuse to the moon and back from they're rich, to he's a cop, to your schedules would never work out. All the while you had a great man like Minato hidden away from me! Do you have any idea how much work I went through to get that number?" Mebuki's tone was teetering dangerously close to demeaning. "The lengths I subjected myself to to secure your future?"

I didn't ask you to. Especially not for that family and that jerk.

"Forget I said anything, Mom," Sakura chewed on her tongue. Her stomach felt as if someone shredded it with a grater.

"Are the two of you having problems?" Mebuki was quick to ask and even quicker to assume.

"Nothing like that, Mom," Sakura tried to placate her, as draining as it was. "It was just a question."

"Are you in some kind of trouble, Sakura?"

The pinkette froze. Her mind raced with possibilities. Either her mother knew or her shrewd perception was on the money once again. She shook her head free of her debilitating, circular thoughts that spun her around and around all the while answering her mother's inquiry.

"I'm not in trouble, Mom," she raised her eyes to her mother's face. Verbal confirmation was necessary for someone like Mebuki.

"Would you even tell me if you were?" Now, it was more accusatory than a question and it left her insides aching. It took everything to not wrap her arms around her mother and seek comfort, to ask her to play with her hair until she fell asleep; to show weakness. To go back to feeling like she was fourteen years old again and it was just the two of them.

I wish I could, Mom. It's better this way.

"I would," she lied, tasting the acid of the tears she could not allow to well up in her eyes in the back of her throat. It burned. She regarded her plate with interest. She did not trust her ability to hold it together if her head was raised any higher.

"Where's Minato?" Mebuki finally asked the question from across the table. The frown lines around her lips were visible though her expression was neutral.

"Work," she pulled off a corner piece with her fork. The slightly overcooked asparagus was no more appealing than the pink, fleshy fish.

"Hm," her mother hummed in neither approval nor disapproval. "Something wrong with your salmon?" She asked into her plate, her knife sawed once and cut through it like butter.

"Not that hungry," she tried not to sound gloomy. She wondered if Minato told her mother that he liked salmon - an offhand comment he made while they were watching their cooking show - or if her mother just guessed with her boy-mom senses. Sakura tucked her chin into her black turtleneck. The mark was fading but her mother would have noticed immediately and let her disapproval be known.

You were raised better than this, Sakura.

She could hear Mebuki's judgment in her head.

"Are you pregnant?" Mebuki demanded, mind jumping from one scenario to the next as to why her daughter was being the way she was.

Where did that come from?!

Sakura fumbled her fork, just managing to catch it before it hit the table. "No," she said quickly, face red and ears burning. Her heartbeat picked up a couple of notches. "It would be fine even if I was," she could not help but add. "The salmon!" She blabbered - she was blabbering and unfortunately knowing that was not enough to stop herself. "Not the other thing. Salmon is perfectly safe for pregnant women," she spoke so quickly that her words tumbled over each other. "Which I am not," she added in a whisper into her plate. She could feel her face. Mortified.

God. I'm such a freak.

"Then you have no excuse," Mebuki huffed a hot breath in between her chews, seemingly unbothered by the sputtering it made the whole thing inconspicuous better than Sakura could purposely make it. "I'm surprised that you just showed up, asking about Uchihas on top of it."

Let it go. Please.

"You need groceries. Cheddar needs his food and litter," she sighed, lowering her fork. She let her hands rest atop her thighs. Just foregoing jeans or slacks for sixteen days, made her skin feel as if it were coated in burning tar. It was so unbelievably uncomfortable. She did not have the words. "Besides," she trawled. "Do I need an invitation to come home?" She raised her eyes until they landed on identical ones; ones that nearly had her convinced she was peering into a mirror.

"Home?" Mebuki blinked slowly. A home that had her name on the mortgage but Sakura never spent more than a couple of consecutive nights.

Her stomach twisted into a knot. "Home is where you are, Mom," she tucked a strand behind her ear out of nervousness.

You know that.

Mebuki's lips twitched. She dipped her head lower, focusing on her plate.

Sakura's heart migrated to her throat, rattling back and forth. Cheddar flicked his long tail. Back and forth. The nub at the end was hairless from where he most likely got into a scuffle with another cat. The hair never grew back.

"He misses Minato," Mebuki hummed, focusing on the cat. "He likes having another boy around. It balances things."

Sakura could only manage a grunt past the obstruction that had taken up temporary residence there.

"I made plenty of salmon and sauce. Take some back for him. Make sure he eats it within three days. Don't freeze it. It won't taste the same. It will dry out when you thaw and reheat it. Speaking of reheating, don't microwave it when you serve it to him. You might as well give him slop with lemon at that point. It would taste better. Sakura? Are you listening to me?"

Loud and clear Mom.

The pink-haired doctor nodded her head. She listened mutely as her mother listed care instructions for Minato's salmon.

xXx

"Dinner was delicious," Minato spoke from the sink. The tap was off and his plate, fork, and glass sat on the bamboo dish rack. "Ms. Haruno outdid herself. Do you think it's too late to send a thank you text today?"

Would it be more or less rude to wait until the morning?

"That reminds me," Sakura murmured, getting up from her seat on the couch and padding over to the door.

Minato wiped his hands on the blue towel that hung from the oven door handle, cobalt eyes tracking her movements silently. She was rooting through something by the console table. From the earlier sound of a zipper parting it was her purse.

He was standing by the couch by the time she had turned around. There was something small - wrapped in red tissue paper - in her hand. She crossed the room, sitting down in the middle cushion she had vacated. He followed suit, sitting to her right, the TV at a low volume with the closed captions flashing across the screen.

"Mom said this was for you," Sakura held out the rectangle toward him. "She planned on giving it to you today but she got me instead, so, there you go," she explained partially.

"For me?" He asked out loud, surprised.

"Hm," Sakura's eyes were on him. He could feel them. He flattened his palm. The paper crinkled as it transferred hands. She turned her gaze back to the screen, busying herself with covering their laps with the throw blanket. "You don't have to open it now," she said with a detached casualness that was convincing on the surface level. She was curious, he knew but she was not admitting to it.

It had been a while - he did not actually remember the last time - since he received a gift outside of a special occasion so he was out of practice. Rusty. Minato shook his head, bringing his right hand to flip it over so the seam side was facing up. He picked at the tape, carefully. She was watching him from the corner of her eye. His expression was neutral. He moved the paper to the side. He blinked. He took in the painted face on the white head. Red ears. Yellow eyes and nose. Black whiskers.

"Maneki-neko?" Sakura asked, frowning. "She got you a Maneki-neko keychain? Why?"

I've had more than my fair share of bad luck when it comes to relationships.

"Make your own luck," the cat seemed to convey Mebuki's message to him. He smiled. His fingers curled around the cat. "Maybe she thinks I need a little help," Minato regarded her with soft eyes. "Thank you, Sakura."

"Me?" She frowned at him, confusion still visible on her features. "What did I do?"

"For bringing it to me," he leaned forward and pressed his lips to her forehead, eyes fluttering closed.

For being here.

"Okay weirdo," she tsked, wrapping her arms around his, resting her head on his shoulder. "You have salmon-walnut breath," she scrunched her nose.

He laughed, falling back against the cushions. Sakura came along with him. "So do you."

"Well," she smirked, eyeing him in some type of way. "Then I guess this isn't a problem then."

Before he could ask what she meant by this, she was kissing him. With vigor. No. it was not a problem at all. Not in the slightest.


"You're getting better," Sasori noted dryly, a purple sucker left his mouth with a popping sound - held between his fingernails painted in a dark maroon. The door closed with a groan from the hinges that called for grease, not silent in their neglect.

"Some days it's like nothing ever happened," he agreed with a slight nod. It also did not hurt that Sakura was on top of his physical therapy and incision site monitoring. She missed being at work. Her actions said it louder than her voice ever could. The need to feel useful was ingrained in her, propelling her work ethic.

"How did you get past Holmes and Watson?" Sasori asked in a tone dripping with sarcastic scorn.

"Shift change," Minato ran a hand through his hair. His eyes narrowed slightly. "I don't have much time. Move my money." It was high time that he got serious.

"Sure thing, Boss," Sasori inserted the lollipop back into his mouth. His left cheek expanded to accommodate the globe of sugar. "Nephew heard from Grand-teach about our fall guy. He still doesn't like me that much," Sasori played up the hurt feelings. "How much?" He asked when Minato's reception was frosty to the unnecessary quip.

"One fifty," Minato answered without missing a beat.

Sasori just avoided choking on the stick. He coughed indignantly, face red. "A brick and a half?" He asked, voice two octaves higher than usual. His eyes were wide, wild. He shook his head. "I'll get him to agree to half that."

Minato turned in his seat. His expression was stern with an edge. Dangerous. Not to be challenged. "No more negotiations. No more talking. Just move it." He did not have time for one of Sasori's schemes where he pocketed the difference. "I need your word that every last ryo goes to Haruto Nara. I need to hear it."

Tell me you understand. Tell me you'll obey.

Sasori puffed out his cheeks before begrudgingly lowering his head. "All a hundred and fifty thousand will go to pencil-neck Haruto Nara." He held up his hands to show that his fingers were not crossed. "On my mother's grave."

"Your mother isn't dead," Minato reminded him with disapproval.

"I've been a good boy this year, maybe Santa will make it so," Sasori's grin was stained purple from artificial coloring, same with his tongue. It was unsightly.

"Tell him - remind him - that the ADA will give him a lenient plea deal for coming forward on his own. His family will be taken care of," he stressed the importance of that point for his conscience perhaps.

He doesn't have to worry about that.

"They'll be living like kings," Sasori said with a scoff. "It would take Nara more than five years to make that much. They're going to think they won the lottery."

"This was a mistake," Minato's hand was around the chrome pull handle of the door. He tried. He would be able to look Sakura in her green eyes and tell her he tried. "Rihito will handle it."

"Lieutenant," Sasori just stopped himself in time, his fingertips nearly grazing Minato's back. "I'm sorry, okay?" He looked absolutely miserable. Hunched over and his hands in his lap. "I use humor to cope."

That's not entirely breaking news, Hora.

Minato was not phased in the slightest. The set of his jaw was sharp enough to carve into rock. His eyes were cold. Calculating as they assessed.

I'm trying, Sakura.

He was trying. He was trying to be patient but Sasori made it difficult. He did not know if his rope was shorter or if Sasori was going out of his way to be like this. There was only so much Minato could do.

"Haruto Nara will get the money. He will get the talk about a generous plea deal. He will be reminded not to name names on the Uchiha side. He will be debriefed on the details - the sanitized details Big Boss is okay with the public knowing. The reason for the shooting was a business misunderstanding. He will be reminded that his family will be taken care of and that when he gets out, his loyalty - his silence - will be rewarded handsomely again. No need to get Nephew further involved, right?" Sasori's eyes rolled to Minato's. All he saw was a genuine desire to please, to do something right after nothing but a string of wrongs.

"Yeah," Minato reached into his hoodie pocket. There was a crinkle of a bag. Clear and rectangular. He passed it to Sasori. "Seventeen rounds. That's how many I got off."

Sasori held the gun in his hand. He regarded it solemnly. "You're not going to have much left over to buy you freedom, Broskey."

"I'll figure it out," Minato's response was curt. He would find a way even if it meant playing hardball with the Big Boss. He was out once this was all over. One way or the other. "The replacement?" He stared straight at the ally, not witnessing Sasori tuck his service weapon - one that served him for over a decade - inside the inner pocket of his acid-washed jean jacket.

"In the bag." Sasori reached forward to lower the rear view mirror until a black duffle came into view. "It will be handled, Lieu. I'll make sure of it." He sighed. Soft and short. "Do you want me to stay? To watch her while you run errands?" He raised the mirror back into position. A brick wall reflected on its surface.

"No," Minato was already outside the door with the duffle bag slung across his shoulder. He tapped the roof of the car, opening his mouth but thinking better of it at the last moment.

Be good.

His would-be parting words remained inside the walls of his mind. Reverberating.


The bright white spots of the canned lights shone through the thin navy fabric that was adorned with horrible inaccurate half-moons and stars with five points. Her folded hands rested over her bellybutton. Her ankles crossed together as she continued to peer at the artificial blue night sky. It had to be deliberate, the choice he used for the topmost layer.

"Three," she said slowly, closing her eyes as if that would ease the sting of his judgment. "Including you," she added after some time when his silence was something she could not interpret one way or the other. She turned her head, eyes still closed, toward the direction of the warmth coiling off of his body. The sole reason she had shed her outer layer. The thin straps of her gray camisole bunched together, dangerously close to slipping from her shoulder entirely. Her pink lashes parted. Her breath nearly caught in her throat. Those minutes away - not looking at him - were all that was needed to make her forget just how beautiful he was. Stunning. "Is it higher or lower?" She asked; voice but a whisper.

"Lower," he answered her with as much transparency as she had broached the topic.

"Hm," she hummed, rolling onto her side - curling an arm until her palm was folded around his shoulder. "I guess I could have been less selective," she wrinkled her nose. "There was just no time or interest during undergrad."

"You were a double major," he reminded her astutely of what her priorities had been. The very priorities that served her well. "Summa cum laude?"

"And Dean's Scholar," she scoffed with feigned offense at his glaring oversight.

"My apologies," his lips tucked into a smile that was more playful than anything else. "I barely graduated high school." Minato's brow furrowed as perturbedness settled into his eyes and the curve of his mouth. "Did I actually graduate?" He asked with the same level of concern that overthinkers woke up from the dead of sleep to ask themselves or their partners where their birth certificate was.

She laughed. "Sorry," Sakura covered her mouth to hide yet another giggle that spilled through her fingers. He was just so adorable. "Do you want to know?" She asked him, her fingers tracing the side of his face from his chin all the way up to where his hairline began. His blond hair was held back by a black, spirally, metal headband. His skin was glowing softly and smelled faintly of rose petals. Lingering scents from their face masks. An at-home spa day of sorts. Minato had even painted her fingers and toes for her. A sage green color. Because it was supposed to be calming. And she had returned the favor with clear polish. He claimed the brush tickled. She had never considered that before. He had nice nail beds. She was slightly jealous.

"Only if you want to tell me," he answered with perhaps less honesty. She could see the curiosity behind his eyes. She moved officially off the pillow under her head and rested against his uninjured shoulder. She never had to think too deeply about her actions when he was concerned. Good or bad. She did not want to think about it - to have to label it.

"Number one," she popped her lips. "Was there, convenient. We were in med school together. He was from Kiri and intended to go back. So there was always an expiration date. It progressed naturally. It started off as a study group of half a dozen of us which turned into study dates. Late-night dinners at 2 AM. Ramen. Everything else was closed or serving cold food only. Some joke kisses between two people. Egged on by stress and pressure from friends and…," she felt herself grow embarrassed surprisingly.

"And vodka?" Minato asked lightly, filling her silence as if it were intentional on her part. Without effort, he covered for her shortcomings. Naturally almost.

She nodded, her thumb rested down his cheek, her fingers curved around his face. He did not complain or berate her for contaminating his newly cleaned pores. "Yes. Vodka. Blame Ino. I never drank vodka before I met her. She's a terrible influence."

His skin stretched under her hand. He turned his head slightly, kissing her palm. Their noses touched every now and then. She could count his lashes. She wanted to. But he kept distracting her, the bottom of his foot moved up and down her calf. She had made the right call wearing shorts.

"He was there. He was familiar. He was decent-enough looking. He wasn't going to hurt me. And he didn't. Not even when he went to complete his residency in Suna."

"He was what you needed at the time," Minato put it together succinctly for her.

"Yeah," she breathed, feeling her skin ignite when his hand settled on the curve of her hip. "The second," she tucked her bottom lip under her teeth in doubt of whether or not what she was about to say was that good of an idea after all. It was less palatable. Less clean. "He was in my brother's company. Remember Uncle Sakumo?"

Minato blinked twice, his face free of conclusions to jump to.

"His son, Kakashi," she pulled at the cotton of his shirt. "He was there, he came back after a few more tours, eight years after the accident. He kind of disappeared for a while. He does that; comes and goes as he pleases. Joined the Police Academy. District Seven. I didn't see him again until I was doing my residency at Med. He was a detective by then. He never paid me much mind growing up. He tolerated me because he wanted Sakuto's attention. He had a hard case, the first time. A woman and her children were killed in a domestic. He had set the suspect free just hours before the time of death. They didn't have enough to detain him. Kakashi blamed himself anyway. He was a mess. I was worried about him. I couldn't handle having someone else I knew dying on me. We started talking."

Never about Sakuto. She figured he was as conflicted about sleeping with his friend's little-little sister as she was about sleeping with her brother's friend. Sakuto was a line neither of them was willing to cross. The illusion - the promise of something that was slightly more than nothing - would be gone if they did. They knew that. Sakuto's name uttered out loud would be enough to bring one - if not both - to their senses. And that was all without the sizable age gap even when taking Kakashi's stunted emotional intelligence into account. It was not the greatest of looks for Kakashi. He had more to lose if people found out.

"We drank. We sat in silence. And then," she sighed, "we did more." Then it became all they did. They stopped talking. They kept drinking. The silence became everything. A bit like now, how the silence surrounded them thicker than any of the blankets or sheets overhead. "The last time I saw him in that way was a couple of weeks before everything. Nothing planned. It just kind of happened."

It just happens with him. That's how it works…worked?

She played with the fabric of his shirt, having no reason to feel as nervous and exposed as she did. It was none of his business. They were nothing. And yet she was sharing. Sharing the nature of her interactions with Kakashi. A man who dared not arrive at her doorstep without her permission usually granted via text. Lest it spooks her and whatever it is they did came to the end.

Comfort. That was the long and short of it. It was just seeking comfort in a world that hurt them both.

"Am I…?" Minato cleared his throat. He had gone still beyond his face. Even that part of him was reserved, guarded. "Am I impacting anything…by being here? Your understanding with him," he asked. Her unease found a home with him. It spoke to her.

She worked past the instinct that said to deny immediately. Just because she had never been in a relationship, it did not mean it gave her a pass to be careless with someone's feelings - no matter how good he was at concealing them from her.

"No," she furrowed her brow, frowning to herself. She could not read him. "Yes…I mean…I don't know what the right answer is," she admitted timidly. She did not have the combination of words that seemed more right than the others.

"There's a right answer?" Minato questioned her.

She peered at him through her lashes, lip parted and breath heavy. Shattered. He would shatter her if she gave him the chance; like a stone thrown at a crystal sculpture - her glass heart. Did she imagine the intensity in his eyes increasing? Or the way his grip on her hip became harder to forget.

"Do you want there to be?" She found herself asking without fully understanding if she wanted to know her answer much less his.

"Guard not inside out. No walls or shades, just pure light - Thoughts set free, open," Minato smiled. Her heart fluttered, lips parting to draw in a breath because suddenly it was not enough through her nose. He stole it all. The air from her lungs. And just like that, as quickly as it had come it was gone. The emotion left his face and eyes, only to be replaced by a smirk. Confident. He pressed his lips against hers. Barely. Just because he could. Because she was there. She nearly whined and contradiction: simultaneously too much pressure and nowhere near enough.

"Six," he breathed hot, expelled air into her open mouth, tickling her uvula. Adding to her agitation.

"What?" She blinked away the lust, the emerald envy.

"Six," he was just far enough that she would have to move to kiss him again. He ran the top of his blunt thumbnail along the bottom swell of her lip. A taunt. He was in control. He was always in control. "Not including you."

"So seven," she pouted. Her brain was still able to do that level of remedial math. She was expecting double digits at least - at best. Maybe her most intrusive thought called out triple-digit numbers at one point or another. Her insecurities were loud enough.

"Disappointed?" His smirk grew in smugness at the rise of her ire.

Sakura rolled her eyes, shedding what lingered over her vulnerability. She did not debate long whether or not to just stay silent. He was not going to elaborate. Not right now. And she did not have the patience to wait for a possibility.

"Have you heard me complain?" She asked him haughtily, as if it were an accomplishment on her part somehow.

"No," he smirk softened into a smile. And her stomach fluttered again. Embarrassingly. She wondered if he could feel it. They were pressed so close, somehow that happened and it escaped her notice. Maybe if she noticed, she would have to do something about it.

"Ino," she traced a line from his jugular notch to the underside of his chin with a painted nail. "Said that it's a red flag when a man asks a woman about body count."

Minato's lips tugged into the smallest of frowns for the faintest of movement. His nose grazed against hers. His lashes dropped heavily over his eyes. "I dislike that term."

"Red flag?" She asked, innocently, mesmerized by the movement of his lips. Enthralled.

He nipped the corner of her mouth. She squirmed just enough to tease him further.

"Body count," he left no more space for misunderstanding - genuine and intentional - just as their bodies connected, leaving fewer gaps for air. "It's dehumanizing."

"I agree," she murmured, tilting her head just enough that he both heard and felt her words. Her top lip was tingling. "And you didn't ask. I think it's just being responsible. Candid." She was not ashamed. She did not think she would be ashamed if the number was ten times what it was. Maybe even more. Maybe.

"I agree," his palm was wide and flat against the small of her back, encouraging her to him.

"Did you love any of them?" She asked, inhaling his scent deeply, eyes nearly closing sealed. How strange of a question to ask surely while they were in each other's arms. Legs tangled and sharing breath. Having to breathe in multiple times to meet the requirement for their brains.

"No."

"Did any of them come close?" Her chin pressed against his. "Have you been in love before?"

"No." He adjusted to catch her eye. "You?"

"Love's overrated," she exhaled through her nose.

"Is that a no?" He asked, not satisfied with her flippant and rather bitter statement. A cliche. Maybe it was still too soon for her to admit it outloud - to anyone (maybe even herself) - that she wanted what they all did: to love and be loved. At the very least, she could do better. She could put a bit more effort into it.

She sighed, peeling her face from his. A knot twisted in her stomach. Or maybe it was her gut. She was so tangled it was hard to know. His eyes - his gaze - were no-nonsense. She had the sudden urge to correct the slide of her strap. The one that hung between her shoulder and the crook of her arm.

"Yes." Her tongue clicked when her lips parted to push out a sound. "I have not been in love. Before. Ever." She tilted her head up. The bright white light through the thin navy fabric. She swallowed.

"But you had fired a gun before, what a world," he sighed deeply.

"I was," her voice trailed off. "Eleven," she squinted in concentration. "Yeah, between eleven and twelve the first time. Kizashi and Sakuto would go to this open field and disappear for hours. I was so jealous. So one day I told myself I would sneak into Sakuto's truck and go with them. Make them deal with me. I was convinced they weren't on to me. My hands were sweaty. My heart was pounding. I was too worked up to wonder why they didn't put the guns in the backseat like they always did but rather in the trunk. They knew. They absolutely knew. I grew bored after some time of them just shooting and talking. So I came out of the back seat - he never locked the doors. It was cold that day. Sakuto made a big show of being surprised. I was beside myself. So proud. They had some cans lined up. Sakuto said if I could hit three out of the six, he would buy me ice cream."

"He taught me how to line it up and pull the trigger. I hit four cans. About seven yards away. He bought me ice cream. It was a good day. A really good day. He was so proud. He said it was a skill that was important to know. I think in his own way he was trying to prepare me for the world without completely shattering my innocence if that makes sense?"

"It does," Minato was quick to validate.

"The next year he tried to take me to an indoor shooting range. The man next door in the stall had a short gun. I had two layers of protection. Over the ear and in the ear earplugs. The man got off one shot. My whole body rattled. I couldn't stop shaking. I was having such a different reaction. Visceral. Sakuto got me out of there. We just made it in time. I threw up in the parking lot. He felt so bad. Guilty for a long time. He didn't try again. And that was the last time I held a gun in my hands, well before you know."

Sakura took in his pale face. He lost all color. "Minato?" She called out to him, nuzzling her face into his neck. "What's wrong?" She breathed against his skin, placing a tentative kiss before peeking up at him.

"You told me you fired a weapon," he said, voice weak.

"I did because I did," she tugged on his hair with a force that was far from painful. It was meant to ground - to keep him from being whisked away by the wind.

"When you were eleven!" He countered with wide eyes. "Important information I wasn't given at the time."

"Or twelve," she corrected with a giggle. "What?" She asked his openly gawking face. She pushed his jaw closed with the back of her hand. "Have the mechanics of guns really changed all that much in twenty years?" She tilted her head to the side and smiled prettily. "Can you blame me? I wanted to instill confidence," she said with disingenuous levels of sincerity. The mirth of her face did not help. "And it's not like you had a whole lot of options."

Minato shook his head. He tucked her under his chin. "You're something else, Sakura."

"You're too nice to say crazy," she sighed in contentment. He smelled so good. He was so warm.

"Words reflective glass, truth unveiled in each verse said. In sureness, I speak," he spoke Sumida's words that he felt to her. "I say what I mean, Sakura. You respond well under pressure. Don't look for conjecture."

"I don't like being told what to do." A scowl and roll of green eyes accompanied her words. "And duh, I am a doctor, you know," she shot back with sass at his under-pressure comment. A squeeze to her rear had her squealing. "That was dirty," she accused him with red flushed cheeks.

"My sentiments exactly," he delivered his point with a wink.

"While we're not the topic," Sakura tracked a finger from one collarbone to the other, slowly. "Why the suits, Minato?" She changed her mind last minute to warm him up with a question adjacent to the one she was curious about. "Does the Clan mandate a uniform?"

"Mandate might be too strong a word," the opening was followed with a small sigh. The corners of lips pulled into a ghost of a smile - a teaser of what it could end up being. Dazzling. Breath-taking. So damn pretty. "Traditionally suits were worn. How you present yourself matters."

"Hm, just like in civilian society." Her finger traced circles on his warm skin. Anywhere it could reach without much hassle. She mused internally that Minato really was just human and not some extra-terrestrial being from a planet with humanoid like creatures that were evolutionarily more advanced or something - not that she spent cycles thinking about it with his chest pressed against her back at three in the morning or anything. He was just a human man who liked to wear really nice suits because of tradition - apparently.

Why he wore a suit had an additional more personal reason. If he met his end unexpectedly, the intention was that when he saw his parents and Shika again, he would already be in appropriate attire. A suit. A suit that he lacked when he said goodbye to his parents. A suit he donned - that still hung in his closet in the suit bag - when said goodbye to his best friend and brother. He wanted to be presentable. At his best even in the face of the worst.

"I look good in a suit."

She let out a tiny laugh, nothing more than a puff of air. "You do," she nodded in ready agreement. "You look good in anything." Her face turned sour. "It's not fair really. What do you need such long and thick lashes for? You're already tall and fit and have a symmetrical face."

"How did I miss all this resentment?" He poked her cheek, his eyes sparkled with mirth. Delight.

"You're unobservant," she managed with a straight face. "Was," she smoothed out the wrinkles she made in his shirt. "One of the six before me, Konan?" She asked him demurely, looking at him through her lashes. "Before you get too far in your head," she traced his lips. Confusion cut with curiosity reflected on his face. "Ino," she smiled preemptively at his soft huff. At least he was polite enough to not outright roll his eyes. "Is under the impression that the only way to get on Konan's shortlist for non-celebrities or billionaires is to sleep with her. Now, it's probably not the only way," she paused to regard him measuredly with different parameters. "I can't see you pursuing other untasteful avenues. So either you spent an obscene amount of money - which if you told me, I could tamper Ino's expectations, or you…," she wiggled her brows less than innocently, "put out to get put on the list."

Minato opened his mouth and bit down on her finger, just enough to elicit a reaction. Sakura glared at him, retracting her hand away, disgruntled.

"None of the above," he answered, flat.

"There were only two options," Sakura said with a frown. "Neither, that should have been how you answered that."

"College dropout, remember?" He grinned at her, not one to pass up on an opportunity to tease.

"Konan and I go way back," he clicked his tongue and rolled his eyes at the expression she donned on her face. Like a cat who just captured a canary. "Not like that." Sakura held up her hands in mock acceptance. "Back when she was still early in her career, she was having some trouble with some Akatsuki affiliates loitering around her shop - before she was on Shiso Street in the Fashion District - making it uncomfortable for her customers and her."

"And let me guess," Sakura tapped her chin to ponder what possibly could have happened. "You took care of it?"

Minato's eyes moved from right to left giving the impression that he was trying to recall. "Something like that. It's been so long." Humility. He wore it well. Almost as well as those suits Konan made for him.

"So you save the day, her shop takes off, and she gives you a discount?" Sakura summarized. "In some order," she added with a hand wave.

"More or less. No discount though. Her work is art. She's earned every last ryo. She's ruined me. I can't go back to anyone else."

"Good for her," Sakura tried her best to keep the sudden spike in jealousy out of her voice. She had seen the social media posts - the clips of her packed shows. Ino even managed to get them tickets once - secondhand - standing room only. Konan was beautiful. Gorgeous. The woman could model her own designs every bit, as any of the professionals walking down the runway in six-inch heels with the ease of flip-flops. And from the interviews Ino forced her to watch during the rare lunch breaks they had together, Sakura had built the impression that the-very-secretive-about-her-private-life-Konan was truly a good person. Kind. Thoughtful. Smart. Humble. Waste-conscious. She had no shortage of good qualities. Just like she had no shortage of excuses - reasons - to summon Minato for a fitting or consultation for a new design. Sakura herself knew just how quickly things could escalate - ignite - if sparks were there. Just a glance. Just some contact that was on the surface level innocent enough, her long, thin fingers resting on Minato's thigh, slowly inching up to check the fit of his pants, maybe undoing the pins that held them in place.

She - at the incessant pestering of one talk host in a promotion circuit of her new line - had let it slip she was single. Konan had eloquently said something along the lines of seeking the perfect match with someone's soul beyond their current physical temporal form - she was very into spirituality - although she would not be mad at having something "enjoyable" to admire with her warm amber eyes as well.

They're both equally attractive - inside and out. They would look so good together.

Sakura turned her head away to hide the way her teeth came together, straining her bite. It was rather hard to do when a hand on her chin - fingers curled around and thumb pressing in - coaxed her back in the opposite direction.

"Sakura," he rolled the syllables off his tongue, sending warm fuzzies down the length of her spine. "Where did you go?" He asked in a gentle voice, a pleasant warm breeze on a sunny beach day. "You drifted off on me." He kissed her eyelids. The right first then the second. She kept them closed, taking the excuse. It was easier than having to read what he contained. The delicate skin burned.

"I'm here," she said with suspect levels of conviction. She was thinking but she was not one to admit that.

With you. Right now. For right now. For however long that may be.

Because everything was temporary.

"Have you ever considered that Ino's not always right?" He posed the question; his smooth voice filled her ears to the brim. "She doesn't know everything." Thumb migrating along the path of her jaw. He had started from the shell of her ear. Pink lashes parted. "I don't mix business with pleasure."

Ino would debate you down until you lost the will to live - ripping it from your soul - if she heard any of that.

"Hm," she held complexity in her expression as she regarded him, languidly. "I should remember that for next time." Because she was committed to being difficult. Even if she was the one to hurt her own feelings. That was neither here nor there.

"Next time?" He choked a brow. He had a perfectly proportional forehead for his face - for what it was worth.

"A little late now don't you think?" She pinched his cheek, patting it to soothe the injury that preceded the insult. "For us."

"Us," he stated, face completely neutral. "I was never going to pay you." It was never business. Not for him. Never for him.

"So all those breakfasts and impromptu cooking classes weren't payment for services?" She asked, playfully. "I thought you were familiar with my sliding scale policy," she piled on perhaps more than a little tone-deaf.

"Just pulling my weight," he matched her tone and the air that surrounded her - them. "Otherwise why else would you keep me around?"

"The danishes," she nodded solemnly at the enlightenment.

"And the coffee."

Her smile was distracted so it never reached her eyes. "Can we try those noodles I was telling you about? While we wait out grand-reopening rush?" The shop had been closed for renovations after a kitchen fire gutted the hidden gem - a secret Tani would take to the grave before they let anyone north of them catch wind of it. The threat of the horror of having to stand in line behind thick clouds of perfume and expensive fur coats was enough for them all to keep their lips sealed. "I found a recipe online that a small forum said was as close as you can get. And we can even compare the two!" She gushed with building excitement. Her mouth was practically watering.

"Send it to me. We'll give it a try," he was quick to answer.

Sakura smiled at him. His mere presence was enough to offset her anxiety. But what about when heaviness settled onto him? "Tomorrow's Monday," she finished with a sigh. It was nice while it lasted. But reality always had a way of winning. The prospect of reunion with noodles that she was deprived of for eighteen months was nowhere close enough to combat that.

"Hm," his fingers on the small of her back twitched. It was unmistakable. Undeniable. "Are you okay?"

"I think so," she harassed her lower lip between her teeth. "You're incredibly talented," her eyes moved the length of the expanse. She turned her head, voice containing marvel. "This is immaculate work."

"You like?" He grinned, moving his hand up and down her arm, giving her camisole strap a home over her shoulder on his first pilgrimage as he worshiped the skin.

Sakura nodded her head. "You have a calling," she mirrored his smile. "If you ever find yourself needing a career change, you should consider this full-time."

"Building forts?" His question was teasing, light - without seriousness.

"Seems like less of a hassle than your current job," she winked to punctuate her point.

"It's good to have options if I'm not cut out for owning a club," was his answer that accompanied a chuckle that she experienced more than she heard.

"Hm," she hummed with contentment. "Thank you, Minato," her eyes held her gratitude. "For doing this. For humoring me. For helping me get my mind off it all." She teased her fingers through his hair, unable to help herself. The sunshine yellow strands were so silky. Soft. "So a club?" She raised her brows.

"As an investment," Minato sighed preemptively for what had to be another round of playful jest, lips tugging upward with amusement.

"I can't imagine you as a club owner. A bouncer maybe…but even that is a stretch. You'd probably be the only bouncer in history that smooth-talks someone into leaving without them even realizing it," she let out a small laugh at the picture she imagined. "You know they're people and loud at clubs right?" She tapped his nose.

"It would be the safest club around. You would never need to stand in line. A VIP table waiting for you whenever you're in the mood to dance and not be harassed. No funny business," he vowed almost excitedly at the prospect. "Half off all the vodka you want."

"VIP and half-priced drinks," her eyes lit up. "Did you tell the other six that too? Is there a chance we'd all end up sharing a table?"

"Sakura." He could not imagine a worse scenario for him - not that he was willing to give it much of an effort.

She giggled; mouth moving and scenarios spinning of this supposed club and club owner only teasing him with torment every fourth word.


Her stammering heartbeat had not come down to a normal rate in the entirety of the time she had been in here. Since the door was opened and the boots clomped in. A couple of the crime scene team had been kind enough to wipe their feet but she could see the muddy footprints tracked in on her once glistening floors under the harsh fluorescent lights. It had rained last night. It was not entirely its fault she had not slept, staring at the dark ceiling while her thoughts spun her around and around. She had tossed and turned, tossed and turned until she found the perimeter of patience. She stood with her hands folded by the wall that contained her later brother's military photograph. The most recent one they had before his demise.

She watched - as was her right - as they tagged, photographed, and sampled everything. Her skin was itchy under her jeans. Her red sweater felt like barbed wire on her skin. She tried not to tug on the neckline of it. She could not put it past detective Uchiha to read into it as an admission of her guilt. She had plenty of it. The Sakura that had gone down the steps - blindly, foolishly, dumbly - was a stranger to her now. That Sakura got a pass. She only had one goal: to help people. She was admirable.

The Sakura that now stood under the picture of her dead brother was less straightforward. For her, things were less cut and dry. Yes, she has saved Minato's life. But she fired a weapon to do it. Yes, she stitched him together. But she had threaded lie after lie together as well to uphold it all. And today was no different. Perhaps it was the biggest lie of all. A complete waste of time, money, and effort.

She pushed up against the cubbies as much as she could. She was in everyone's way. There was no place where she could step into her own clinic that was not an impediment to someone else doing their job.

They're just doing their job.

And she needed to do hers. She had to stay calm. She had to stay in control. Her silence, her aiding and abetting, her lies were so much more than what she did in that station. Self-defense could not be argued now. She did not want to argue that now. That door was closed. That path was left well behind. She only wanted to look forward.

"Dr. Haruno?"

Sakura blinked, broken from her stupor by an authoritative voice. Polite but stern. "Yes?"

The woman with dark green hair held in a sleek ponytail pointed to the cabinet behind her. "The key?"

"On the counter," Sakura took one step forward - momentarily forgetting that her help would not help here - she crossed her arms, mouth clamped shut as the woman in a blue jumpsuit with 'CSI' in bright yellow block letters across her back slid the key from the countertop to her awaiting cupped gloved hand. She stepped to the side to allow the photographer to take his photographs before she touched anything.

Click. Click. Click.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Sakura watched the second hand of the clock ticking moments of her life away. Despite knowing that, she found herself wishing it moved faster. She remained rooted, eyes darting to the door that led to her home. He only had permission to search the clinic and she was not dumb enough to give him a chance to expand the parameters.

Rooted, stagnant tree,

Shadows' and light's allotter,

Secrets strangled, soft.

Sumida helped her pass the time. A grip held onto reality as she recalled and silently recited. A common link that connected her to him wherever he was currently. Like a tree, she remained rooted firmly in her convictions. The ground would shake before she did.

Stubborn.

xXx

"Do you know he is affiliated with the Akatsuki?" Sasuke asked her smoothly, not gracing her with his gaze. He crouched down, eyes squeezed closed as he peered at the underside of her exam chair through the lens of an expensive camera. He clicked a picture.

"No," she answered the question just like the rest: without color. Sasuke had been so smug when he all but slapped the warrant to her forehead. He was part of a team of five - a photographer, two CSI technicians, and his partner Deidara. But that was hours ago. Now it was just him, clicking and asking away. Warrants she learned did not come with time limits beyond the twenty-four hours of a day. He could milk every second if he damn well pleased. She tried and failed not to stare at the yellow tape with bold letters that spelled out "Crime Scene" in all capitals. It crossed over the street entrance of the clinic. A sash of shame.

He's trying to humiliate me on top of everything else.

"What do you know about the Akatsuki?"

More than I ever would have liked.

"They're bad news." What was more to know? Decent people stayed away. Never did she think decency could come from an unlikely place. The whole nurture vs nature theory. Ino would have a field day, chomping at the bit to interview Minato. Her dirty little secret that was starting to feel like anything but.

"What did he tell you he did for work?" Sasuke tilted his head, pausing from his task just long enough to regard her. White rubber gloves were stretched over his hands. His tie was held back by a gold clip decorated with a red and white fan. A symbol synonymous with the clan he claimed to renounce.

"He didn't," Sakura cleared any innuendo of weakness from her throat with a cough. "We didn't talk much."

"Oh?" Sasuke had risen to his feet. The camera with the expensive lens hung carelessly from his hand. "The nature of your relationship is not conversational?"

"There is no relationship to have a nature," she held his gaze. She would not be reduced to anything less than she was under it.

"Dr. Haruno," Sasuke sighed, he placed his hand under his nose, fingers curled toward his lips. "The bleach smell might be getting to me. The fumes."

"Sorry to hear that," her face did not align with the sentiment of her words even remotely. "A certain standard of cleanliness needs to be maintained for medical clinics. Environments like this can be difficult for individuals with certain predisposed biases. Medically speaking of course," she added with a twitch of her lips.

"Of course," Sasuke smoothed down his fine brow with his gloved hand. "Perhaps a drink will help?" His eyes flickered to the door. Restricted.

"Absolutely," she kicked off the wall. Her black ballet flats clicked off the white tile streaked with brown. Mud that she would have to clean later. They brought in the smell of rain with their work boots. "Please have a seat," she gestured to the exam chair.

Sasuke, with a wry smirk, instead opted to walk to the far back wall of the room. He sat against the chair closest to the stairwell. The camera was deposited on the open seat to the right of him. "Do you have tea?"

"All kinds," she reached for the coffee maker on the counter closest to the street entrance. She pulled an insulated single-use cup from her cabinet, she pressed down on the red lever, filling the cup with hot water. "White, Black, yellow, orange, green, matcha, oolong, floral, citrus, decaf, pick your poison."

"Surprise me."

"Black it is," she fluttered her fingers over the canisters that contained individually wrapped packets. "Do you like it with sugar and cream?"

"No," Sasuke rolled his shoulders, grunting.

"I must say you're dedicated," she gathered the red packet and the cup and made her way to him. She held out both - one offering in each hand. Sasuke nodded his head in thanks before taking them from her. "Taking your own pictures and samples. Is that standard procedure for detectives?"

"No," Sasuke tore open the package with his canine tooth, setting the wrapper next to the camera. "Just thorough."

"Sounds like trust issues," she crossed her arms, eyeing him top to bottom as he steeped the tea bag.

"Could be," he did not argue. He scratched the corner of his mouth. "Did the two of you really not talk?"

"You're not the only one with trust issues," she noted without bitterness. "I just thought he was a pretty face. Nice to look at. That's it. I actually thought he might be a lawyer or something." It had been Ino but he did not need to know that.

"The last patient you treated was Hiro Kimura? The neighbor boy," he added as if she did not know who that was.

Sakura shook her head. "No. Mr. Aoto Honda. My elderly neighbor. Apartment 2-D. The emergency call was associated with my name." It was a necessary evil. No ambulance would have come under an hour and a half had Ms. Honda not used her name. And they would not have driven him to Konoha Med that was for sure. Anko and Asuma did it out of a favor for her. They were who she rode with the most back when she was burning the candle at both ends. It also opened her up to this - she gave away her location. Reminded the force of her existence on the off chance they forgot.

"In the clinic, I meant," Sasuke clarified with a surprising level of patience.

"Yes."

"And that was before the subway incident?"

"Yes."

"Why is that?"

She pretended to weigh the question, trying so hard to have it not come out as rehearsed. The bags under her eyes were a witness and symptom of the fact that she did not sleep at all last night and did not allow him to either - on accident. So Minato had grilled her. Over and over. Asking her questions. Rapid fire. Outlandish. Rough. Gently. And she felt all the better for it. She was prepared.

"Just how things are I guess. Sometimes the need for the clinic is more than I can handle. Those are bad days. Other times I can go weeks without patients. It is not that out of the ordinary. I also hold classes every other month that go over basic first aid and signs to look out for - stroke, choking, and the like. I think they are helping." She was honest in her lies. The truth made it believable, she hoped.

"He hasn't reached out to you?" Sasuke asked her the same question in a third unique form.

"No," she answered the same way she always did.

"He is not threatening you?" Sasuke was leaning forward. She noted that he had yet to drink his tea. "We can protect you. If you saw the shooter - the shooters. If you saw him. I can protect you."

"I saw nothing," she said firmly. "I was too scared to see anything. I was a coward," she let her voice catch. Just enough to remind him that she was not familiar with this world. She should know nothing. She was nothing. She could not be what he sought.

"Dr. Haru-"

A loud buzz for a couple of seconds at a time interrupted him. With an annoyed huff, Sasuke reached into his pocket. He pulled out his phone. "Uchiha," he said his greeting, making it known just how inconvenienced he was. "What?" He stood up quickly. Sloshing his tea onto his hand. Burning the skin. He shook free of the scalding liquid. "What?" He repeated again, this time angry. "No, I-," he clenched his jaw tightly enough for her to hear his teeth clack. "Yes," he murmured with his shoulder facing her; head bowed. "I understand." He glared at his phone, pulled from his ear. "Stay in town," he said to her, barely stopping to duck under the crossed crime scene tape leaving her standing there, bewildered eyes tracking the steam from his discarded cup. It fogged the lens of the very expensive camera.

What was that?


Her head felt heavy with thought and emotion but against his shoulder, it felt light. Sakura curled into him, knees drawn and angled toward his lap. The backlight of the TV was the only source of glow in the room. His hand worked in her hair; massaging and having her fight off sleep. Sleep that her body and mind so desperately needed but she was too stubborn to admit.

She has nearly succumbed, belly full and her body warm. A scent that was now registering as familiar filled her nose - the majority of her senses occupied by Minato. She was jostled slightly into the realm of the conscious by the light on her eyelids intensifying. She blinked. The channel had been changed. She rubbed her eyes. Her mouth opened before she herself was even aware. She slowly sat upright but she still managed to feel lightheaded.

"Is this real?" She asked in a voice heavy with sleep, scratchy and thick. "Tani subway shooter surrendered himself into District 11 station?" She read the headline next to the red "Breaking News" banner. "Haruto Nara?" She frowned at the headshot with a blue background - the same background used by the government when issuing driver's licenses. He was a man with black and white hair who just stepped into middle age. His face was foreign. It was even more different than the grainy CCTV footage of a man with bleached blond hair walking to the police station.

"It's real."

Minato's voice, although gentle and low, startled her. She tore her eyes from the TV and the talking heads to blink at him. He took both her hands in his. It was a good thing too because he stopped her from doing something childish, like pinching herself.

"It's over?" She asked the question that was burning inside of her - the only one she could handle right now.

"Publically," Minato answered. "It will be over soon."

What does that mean?

She ground out in frustration, or rather she wished she did. She could not bring herself to ask. She sank back into the couch, exhausted. She blinked lethargically when he covered her with her dusty pink throw. His hand was back in her hair. His lips were at her temple. She fell asleep before she was any the wiser left to grapple in her subconscious if it was all a dream or not.