Clash

by keoo19

It was supposed to be an easy escort mission. But what was easy when you had a hotheaded Kunoichi and a stoic Ninja? Especially when their names are none other than Haruno Sakura and Hatake Kakashi. KakaSaku, Slight SasuSaku. Rated M for Language & Content.

18. Revelations

STOP WHAT YOU"RE DOING!

If you haven't done it already, please go reread the strip club scene from Clash Chpt. 13. It has been revised! If you need to, just reread the whole chapter. That's preferable because some of the rest of it was revised as well, but if you're short on time, just reread the last scene. When you've finished, you may proceed.

...

Revelations

---

"Okay…so. You dated, correct?" The interrogator asked.

"Yes."

"Yeah,"

"For…"

"2 years," Sakura said tiredly. She and Sasuke have been sitting still in the same chairs for the past three hours. No refreshments, no restroom breaks, and no lifelines.

"2 years. And you broke up because you were cheated on, right?" She nodded. "And because of this, you asked Hatake Kakashi to sponsor you for Anbu." She nodded again. "Back to the cheating." She inhaled sharply and closed her eyes.

"Interrogator-san, I really don't think this forwards the investigation in any way—"

"You called me 'Interrogator-san', correct?" She rolled her eyes.

"Correct." He hummed.

"Interrogator, questioner, asker, same difference. You have no jurisdiction to tell me what or what won't forward my investigation. Do you understand, Kunoichi?" She squeezed her eyes shut, her hands fisted at her sides. Sasuke placed a comforting hand on her thigh.

"Yes." He nodded, scribbling something in the folder.

"Now, the cheating. It was never disclosed in any files why you did it." Sasuke raised an eyebrow.

"Was it supposed to be? We weren't married. I don't remember signing a legal contract to become boyfriend and girlfriend, or consenting on termination papers to break up. Therefore, it's not mandated that there be recordings of that." He countered. The Interrogator was quiet for a moment, and they heard the shuffling of papers. Almost a minute later, he held something up.

"Here I hold up a document signed by the Daimyo, the council, the Hokage herself, and one witness that claims…" He turned the piece of parchment to himself. "I can use whatever records, information, or personal files to conduct an interrogation. I have the right to ask any question, with relevancy, of course. And that's what I'm going to do. However, this isn't in any of your records or personal files. So, I'll just have to ask. Why did you cheat on Haruno Sakura?" Sasuke's lips set in a grim line.

"As the detainee I have the right to remain silent—"

"With your careers on the line it would be a bad idea—"

"—and I also have the right to know how this forwards the investigation, because if it doesn't, you don't have the right to ask that question. Relevancy, remember?" He finished firmly, crossing his arms over his chest. Sakura covered her eyes with her hands. The interrogator ran a hand through his hair, and then slammed his folder on the table.

"You do not have the right to ask me what won't forward the investigation!" He shouted. Sakura flinched. "Now, I do my job and I think I'm pretty damn good at it. I don't need any third rate wet behind the ears ninja trying to flip the rule book on me. I am the rule book!" Sakura knew Anbu to be a calm set of ninja who didn't react under pressure. Nor did they show emotion. Apparently Sasuke has gotten under this one's skin. "Now, you cheated on Sakura, causing her to want to become a part of Anbu. She went to Hatake Kakashi to sponsor her, and he did. She was gone for two whole years and returned a different person. This different person went on an escort mission almost upon her immediate return and killed many ninja in Grass Country. This caused Grass to retaliate. Their retaliation caused skirmishes, which motivated Lady Hokage to send Squad Seven and Squad One on a mission. On this mission, Sakura was captured. Because she was captured, the remainder of her teammates and comrades waited for three months until a time where she could be brought back home illegally. On this illegal mission, the three of you alone killed more than 80 men, and afterwards, failed to receive a peace treaty from the country, which means we're at war." He finished quickly and concisely, leaning forward on the table in front of him. "Did I mention Sakura being brought home illegally? If she was brought home illegally, then your team left illegally. That's a whole lotta' illegals and that to me smells like treason. Treason is why you're in this room in the first place, and if that doesn't forward my investigation, I don't know what will." Sakura shook her head in her hands. She didn't want to hear this. "I'll ask again: Why did you cheat on Sakura, Uchiha?"

Sasuke sighed this time. He couldn't argue with basis, and he wouldn't put any chance they had of walking out of there with their careers intact in jeopardy. Sitting up, he turned away from Sakura. This chapter of their life was closed, they've turned the page. He remembers her telling him that she'd rather he keep his betrayal to himself after the fact, because she didn't know just how many feelings it would upturn. He'd rather not say anything himself either. He didn't need to bring up the past. And now he was being forced to.

"We had just come back from a mission really early that morning. I almost…I almost lost her. We dealt with the traumatic experience differently, she let off steam by training all day, I however, shut myself away from everyone, to just …think. What if I had lost her? If I had lost her and she wasn't truly mine in all senses of the word then I couldn't really claim her as mine in the first place. I was angry. I was angry at her for making me wait, and uncovered feelings that I never really knew I had about the matter were revealed. So when she came home…" He rubbed a hand down his face as Sakura looked on, her eyes wide. She didn't want to hear it, but her body wouldn't move, wouldn't react to his words. All she could do was soak in the new clarity and hope for the best. "I was rough and she slapped me, I shut down. I forced her to leave in the dead of night. Because of my anger that day, my sense blacked out. The slap was her rejection, and that got me even angrier than I was previously. She rejected me, and I couldn't take that sitting down. Two full years with her, and it just led to rejection. She took away the only way I thought that I could have full possession of her. So, I wanted her to feel what I felt. That same rejection. I wanted her to feel the same pain—" Her hands slapped over her ears and she pulled her knees to her chest.

"Stop, stop please." She whispered, rocking in her chair.

"Continue." The interrogator said. Sasuke gazed back at Sakura. Her eyes were wide and her body in fetal position, she looked…vulnerable. He couldn't do that to her. He couldn't break her heart again.

"That's it—"

"You will continue."

"No!" She screamed, tears brimming in her eyes. "You've gotten enough information, there's no more that you need!" She pleaded with the Interrogator.

"I need this information to forward my investigation." She shook her head fervently.

"No you don't. No you don't." She repeated shaking her head. Her hands had a firm hold over her ears.

"How can you—"

"Look at me!" She cried, throwing her arms in front of her, outstretching them. "I'm unstable right now! You have my personal file right in front of you, and I know you've read that I'm legally insane." The interrogator stood, contemplating the information.

"And so? You're being interrogated on the suspicion of treason. Medical background doesn't fit into this." He slammed his hands on the table. "You will continue, and that's an order!" He shouted.

"On what grounds?! We're being interrogated on the suspicions of treason. We're detainees, we're like criminals in this room! You don't have the right to continue!" She shouted. "Provoking a legally insane or otherwise mentally unstable detainee after he or she has requested a cease is unlawful unless proper restraining equipment is present." She recited, almost mechanically, from the rulebook. "I don't see any restraining equipment around! If you've forgotten, I'm Anbu as well and I've read that book from cover to cover. Unless you want your interrogation, as you claim, to be null and void, I suggest you move on because she has requested a cease, and it'd be treason against the oath you swore the second you graduated from training." She spat out, fast and barely comprehensible as she managed to finish her sentence. Sasuke looked on, shock on his face. Before anyone could say anything else, her mouth flew open. "I request an intermission." She said firmly.

"Granted." He bit out grimly. The light in the room where the Interrogator inhabited flickered off. She turned away from Sasuke, slowing her breaths until she could control her shaking.

"Sakura, I—"

"Please, just don't…Don't speak to me." She choked out, lying her head against the chair. "I don't want to hear your voice."

---

He tapped his foot and rapped his fingers against the desk as he seemingly read through the folder in front of him. He cleared his throat before speaking.

"Would you say your two years in Anbu formulated your martyr theories?" She was dozing off, and her eyes blinked open at this.

"What?" The Interrogator sighed.

"Do you think that your time in Anbu created your martyr ideals? Save everyone in sacrifice of yourself?" Her eyes narrowed.

"It wasn't like that." She said, anger rising in her.

"Oh? Then how was it like?" She rubbed her face up and down and lightly nudged Sasuke once she heard the faint noises coming from his mouth. His Sharingan snapped open as he sat up abruptly. When she nudged him again, he looked at her and deactivated it.

"We were up against 30 ninja. I had to set up a full henge that day, and I had to use Genjutsu. Both of which guzzle chakra. On top of that, I had to heal the wound from Kakashi's collapsed lung, a chest wound, and I also broke my ankle. I was practically drained by the time Naruto alerted us to the enemy force coming." He wrote something down.

"And then what happened?" She sighed.

"And then Kakashi split up the teams and we were left to fight. It was hard, and it got harder because Kakashi went and got himself poisoned, stupid bastard." She breathed. "So I threw him the scroll instead. The end." The Interrogator hummed.

"Uh-huh. Why didn't you use the transportation scroll at a more convenient time?" She frowned.

"Because they would've followed us back to the Leaf." She said through clenched teeth.

"But you would've had a head start. A head start meant that you could've told the Hokage, and the Hokage could've fortified the Village. That was three months you could've spent licking battle wounds instead of bound in enemy territory." Her anger boiled. Sasuke must've felt it because just as she was about to stand up and yell, he put a firm hand on her thigh. She smacked it away.

"We're getting off track, are we not?" Sasuke started. "I thought we cancelled out riling us up." He sighed. His power was being taken away from him.

"There wasn't a response to my last inquiry, but I'll let that slide. Uchiha, you and Haruno's relationship has been on and off your whole lives. How did you feel when you found out she was captured?" Sasuke pursed his lips.

"I was angry. We trusted Kakashi to protect his student, his sponsor, his teammate, something that should've been automatic, and he failed."

"Your ex-sensei, who was still above you in rank, ordered you all to assist him in rescuing Sakura. You were hurting for three full months of lockdown, no way of knowing whether or not she was alive. Bottom line, you were tired. Did you think the tiredness and the hurt you suffered from played a part in your agreeing so readily to authority, even when he opted to disobey the Hokage's and the elder council's direct order?" He asked. Sasuke narrowed his eyes.

"No."

"No?"

"No." He placed his folder down on the table in front of him.

"Care to explain?" Sasuke frowned.

"Kakashi didn't coerce me or any of the others into anything. We were all equally hurt, Kakashi feeling guilt more so than any of us. She was captured on his watch. And it was so much more painful because we love Sakura." She turned and looked at him, narrowing her eyes. "We couldn't just sit still while she was being tortured. She's Sakura. She's not the brightest person, or the most innocent, but she's our Sakura. She saved us all from ourselves, and when it was finally time to return the favor, we didn't hesitate. Don't get me wrong. Our loyalty as the Hokage's Shinobi can rival the Inuzuka Clan's dogs to their owners. Everyone knows that the Hokage loves Sakura as her own daughter. But her duties as a Hokage were far greater. When Sakura was captured, she hurt too. But putting some of her best ninja in danger would be a stupid mistake." He finished matter-of-factly.

This was pointless.

This interrogation was pointless. Everyone knew the testaments of Squad 7's loyalty, because they've proved it time and time again. But to take them all the way out to some island just to hear it from the horse's mouth was pointless. Deviating them from a mission was pointless. Just like everything else about this base. Pointless, pointless, irritating, and most importantly, pointless. It was a waste of time, and he hated wasting time. Speaking of time, they were going on what, four hours now?

"This wasn't an act of treason. Disobeying direct orders? Yes. But the elders never made a law against going to rescue a comrade. When lockdown was lifted, we left. Look at it as…an unofficial mission." Sasuke finished with a sly smile. The Interrogator sighed. Having to question their team was no easy task. He snapped his folder shut and moved his mask off of his face, gripping the bridge of his nose.

"Dismissed." As the light cut off in the Interrogator's room, she slumped, exhaling as fatigue overtook her.

"Are you okay?" She waved him away.

"I'm fine." She sat up, gripping the arms of the chair. He reached towards her and her head whipped around, her eyes cold with a glare. "Leave me alone." She pushed off of the chair and immediately as her hands left the arms, her legs gave out.

"Sakura!"

"Shut-up." She couldn't stop herself from her free-fall, even her hands failed to move to break her descent towards the cold, stone floor. Luckily, Sasuke's Sharingan activated in times of distress. He moved to catch her right before she hit the ground. She tried to move but…

"Don't touch me…" She whispered, her face planted on his chest and her body between his legs. He was holding her by her upper arms. "Move." She managed more firmly.

"Sakura, you just fainted. You're not fine." She frowned.

"You can't faint without your mind totally blacking out, dumbass. I knew exactly what was happening when it happened." She finished defiantly.

"And you didn't stop it because…?" She paused.

"My limbs went numb…" She grumbled. He sighed, hoisting her up and flipping her over. As he raised, he pulled her up into his arms. "Get—off of me, you bastard!" He stopped.

"And how exactly do you suppose you'll get back to the room?" She frowned, realizing her flaw.

"I'll crawl." She muttered under her breath. He continued on, smirking.

"With what legs?"

"With my face, you bastard."

"Could you stop calling me that?"

"No, you bastard." She said as he sighed.

"Sakura—"

"Don't."

"Sakura." She squeezed her eyes shut.

"I said don't, damn it!" She groaned. If she could pull her hair out, she would. He was just so damn irritating. She didn't want to hear it, he knew she didn't want to hear it, but he insisted. He was being purposely ignorant to her feelings, and it was giving her a massive headache just trying to wrap her head around it.

No. Don't think of it.

"It's an interrogation, I couldn't just lie, Sakura."

"Well shit, Sasuke! The truth hurts! The past shouldn't even exist if we can't move on from it!" He sighed again, this one more resigned. "At first I was confused as to why, but afterwards, I personally didn't give a fuck. We moved on, we broke up, we're through. I said I didn't want to know because I'd probably just end up killing her. But to find out that it was you all along...?" Her eyebrows furrowed.

"Sakura—"

"Stop saying my name!" She felt the tenseness in his body.

"Then give me a chance to fucking speak!" She froze in shock, overtaken by the sound of his voice and his anger. She quickly regained herself.

"Why? It's all bullshit! You lied to me, Sasuke. You told me that she came to you that morning. 'I wanted her to feel the same pain'" She said mockingly, "Doesn't sound like TenTen conveniently appeared on your doorstep. You said you blacked out, on top of you wanting me to feel rejection. Blacking out meaning spur of the moment. Spur of the moment meaning you went to her that same night you threw me out. Again, you lied! All this means to me is that you didn't just have sex with her twice, it was three times minimum, and since you've already gotten the hang of lying to me, only Kami knows how many more times it was!" She yelled. "How little did I mean to you that on the same night, you went looking for some other bitch to fuck? You couldn't keep it in your pants—no, you didn't even try to. Apparently, when you black out, vocabulary words like faithfulness, and cheating, finds its way out of your subconscious. To me it seemed like you didn't give a fuck about the meaning of either two." She finished icily.

"I was trying to salvage our relationship. If I had told you, we would've been worse off." She rolled her eyes.

"Well aren't we now? I just can't believe you. Sex? Sex! All along, that was what you wanted. I didn't give it to you then, so here comes some bullshit excuse. 'I almost lost you' Shit, I didn't die! You should've gotten over it! Are you that shallow that you wanted to get back at me for not having sex with you? Put. Me. Down!" She struggled from his grasp and dropped to her feet. "Unlike me, sweat and sticky bindings turn you on! You did this!" She pulled up her button-down, dropping the henge to show him her burn. "Are you proud of this? You should be, because it's one reminder that I can never rid myself of. I'll always have this nasty piece of you on me. I—" He grabbed her arms.

"I'm sorry, damn it! Can I get that out of my mouth at least?" He shouted. "Shit, Sakura! I'm sorry. Two years ago, you almost died! Yes, I'll say it again, I almost lost you! Do you know how that feels? To almost lose someone you love?" She opened her mouth. "Don't say a word. I know you do." Her mouth closed in a frown. "I wanted to take you home and fuck you in every way possible. I wanted to make you mine." Her anger flared.

"But you didn't! You fucked her." She bit out."I'm a girl, not a machine! I don't believe in patience, but damn it, you can't go around pulling my clothes off like I'm some blow-up doll! Love must've meant something totally different between us, because you claimed you loved me, but the second I left your house you went looking to cheat!" He pulled at his scalp.

"If I could go back and change the past, I would a million times over." She shook her head.

"But you can't. That's why we're here."

"I regret having sex with her. But I can't take that back. I regret—"

"Our relationship? That makes two of us." She turned and began to run. Thinking of Sasuke made her cringe, and being near him made it harder to breathe. So she would run. She'd run until she was caught. He's going to make sure he actually knows where she's going before he does something about it. When he sees she's running from him, he'll stop.

And then, then she can cry.

---

She burst into the room and immediately tripped over her two feet.

"Sakura!" Kakashi jumped out of his seat and to her aid. He knelt beside her as she lifted her face from the cold, stone floor. The Gods really wanted her to fall, the first time not occurring because of that damned self-activating Sharingan of Sasuke's. Kakashi's Sharingan is always on, but Sakura wanted oh so badly to implant his contacts before they even reached the Village. On top of that, he was asleep. Lucky her. "Are you okay?" She sighed, dropping her face back to the floor.

"I don't know." She mumbled. He moved the hair covering his eye and opened it, searching her body.

"Your chakra flow isn't necessarily disrupted, but it isn't evenly distributed to all of your networks." She frowned.

"Fatigue, then. So my body starts acting up when I'm tired, huh? Piece of shit." She said angrily. Kakashi furrowed his eyebrows.

"Sakura, are you sure you're okay?" She shook her head.

"No." She closed her eyes. "No more interrogations. I can't take it." Kakashi moved off of his knees and picked her up. He took her back towards the chairs against the wall and placed her in one.

"Sakura, what happened?" He asked, taking a seat beside her. She shook her head.

"I don't want to talk about it." Looking around, he noticed Sasuke's absence. Something went wrong.

"Where's Naruto?" She asked. She'd usually hear his mouth by now, but she didn't.

"He's in questioning. He left half an hour ago, so he should be back soon. Mine wasn't long either." She looked away and sighed.

"Kakashi, if the interrogation with Sasuke was like that…" He placed a hand on her shoulder; she flinched. Furrowing his eyebrows, he quickly removed it.

"We'll be fine, Sakura. I promise." She squeezed her eyes shut. That's what everyone said. But she supposed more truth would be uncovered. Truth, she scoffed. Truth hurts. What could Kakashi hide from her? They were never together. His past, maybe? But that had nothing to do with their alleged treason, right…? She hoped to Kami not. Kakashi got tense when his past was spoken of, and he locked up. For them to have gotten so close, for her to have gotten that first mask off of him, to speak of his past would erase all of that. Especially in front of her. Judging from their last meeting with the elders, authority doesn't care about what makes you cringe.

He saw that she was deep in thought.

"Stay strong, young ninja." He patted her head, and her hand flew back, smacking him in the face. When she turned, her hands flew to her mouth as he flexed his jaw.

"Kakashi, I'm sorry—"

"It's fine—"

"No, really." She leaned back and sighed, wiping sweat from her forehead. He narrowed his eyes. Reaching his hand over to her, it hovered above her forehead before she nodded.

"Sakura, you're burning up. You're not okay." She sighed.

"It's hot. I just have to finish up these last two interrogations, then we can head out on the next ferry out of here." He sighed at her stubbornness. Didn't she just say she couldn't take anymore interrogations a few minutes ago?

"And when you become incoherent and start babbling about all the illegal things we've done, getting on the next ferry out of here won't be that simple." She waved him away.

"It was those fluids they flushed our bodies with. It did something to me." He shook his head.

"Or maybe it's how poorly you've been taking care of your body the past few days. As a medic you should know that after that poison, you should've taken care of yourself so that you could recover properly. But you didn't." He finished. She leaned back, rubbing her forehead.

"Do I still have to remind you that this is your fault? If I wasn't poisoned in the first place—"

"We're not pointing fingers, but if it wasn't for your carelessness—" She held up her palm to stop him.

"Kakashi, don't start. I'll hurt you." He shrugged.

"Haruno Sakura," Someone drawled as the door opened, and immediately he heard Naruto's voice. She could see the irritation in the Anbu operative's face.

"Is this the last session? I'm kind of hungry. Can I get some BBQ? I think I can place some demands as a criminal." He rambled on. Kakashi helped her out of her seat.

"Good luck." He said as she took an unsteady walk to the door. She turned around and crossed her fingers before exiting.

"I'll need it." She whispered.

---

He brushed the strands sticking to her forehead out of her face.

"You look like you're dying," He commented, moving more hair out of her face.

"Thanks, Naruto. I'm glad I can always count on you to tell it like it is." He gave her a grin and she couldn't help but to smile back.

"Anytime, Haruno." The Interrogator room light turned on.

"Let's get started." Sakura sighed. "Uzumaki Naruto?"

"That's me." Naruto replied, as if it wasn't obvious. Sakura managed an eye roll.

"You were a part of the official mission to capture Tadashi Nao and collect recon on the enemy, correct?" Naruto nodded.

"Yeah."

"From your mission report, I see you were also the one to discover the wave of enemy ninja approaching."

"Yeah."

"So you, being as skilled and efficient as you are, not to mention filled with immense power, how did you let your teammate get captured?"

Silence.

Naruto gripped the arms of his seat as he unconsciously moved to the edge.

"I didn't." He bit out. The Interrogator smacked his lips.

"Well, someone did. I hope Sakura and I aren't the only ones who realized her absence for 3 months—"

"We didn't!" Naruto shouted, pounding his fists against the chair. "Sasuke and I followed orders from a superior officer. It didn't matter how stupid they were, or how irresponsible they were. They were orders, plain and simple, so we followed." She turned to Naruto. He's already flustered and the interrogation just started. He was never one to keep his cool, but…

"So you think your squad leader's orders were stupid and irresponsible?" Naruto quickly calmed himself. He realized how irrational his words were, and how bad he was making his Sensei look. But he was never one to hold his tongue, either.

"Of course I do. Kakashi-Sensei is one of the smartest Shinobi I know, so I could only trust he knew what he was doing when he split us up." He finished.

"So you took Tadashi back to the Village, and of course, he was put in protective custody. What did you do then?" He frowned.

"I waited. I waited for what seemed like hours. Then I got news that Kakashi returned, so I rushed to the Hospital. Then I found out that he returned without Sakura. Via transport scroll at that." Sakura looked away.

"Were you angry?" His eyes narrowed.

"What the hell kind of question is that? Of course I was angry! How could he? He made a vow and he broke it. I trusted him with her life, and he couldn't even bring her home." Naruto gripped his pants, looking down at the floor. "I would've killed him where he laid if I could. He's in Anbu for cripes sake, and he couldn't even save—!"

"Naruto! Stop that!" She commanded. He glowered.

"You may have been locked up for three months, but we were here. We hurt just as you did. You were dead to us, Sakura! You can't just take that away!" She held her face in her hands. "It may have been easier for the rest of them to just clear their conscious and pick up where they left off..." He trailed off. "You know the lifespan of a captured ninja of your caliber? Six weeks. After that…" He shook his head. "Because it was you, I coerced Baa-chan to wait two months. And after that, well, I was the one who had to sign off on your death certificate, so forgive me if this isn't the easiest for me to handle." Her eyes widened. "Oh, they didn't tell you?" He scoffed. "Just be grateful your parents were away." He turned to the Interrogator. "So when Kakashi gathered us to retrieve her, I couldn't help but to find out her fate." She bit her lip trying to hold back tears. "Why the hell would you give him the scroll? Why did you have the scroll in the first place if Kakashi was the Captain? You could've saved yourself, Sakura. You could've—"

"I could've what, Naruto?" She cut him off through her tears. "I could've what? Left him for dead? You weren't there, Uzumaki! He was poisoned and paralyzed. You and I both know how many Bingo Books Kakashi's in, not one of them has him listed as wanted alive!" She finished, banging weak hands on her legs. "You'd just prefer Kakashi to die, rather than I be tortured?" He threw his hands in the air.

"Look at the results! Look at you, Sakura!" She shook her head.

"That's not fair, Naruto." He looked away from her as the anger drained from his face. "The past is the past. I'm here now, so we can't sit here and argue my wrongdoings or Kakashi's; we can't change it." She grabbed a hold of his hand and squeezed. "We're ready to proceed. The Interrogator sighed.

"Very well. Why don't we start with your relationship?" They both nodded. "How long have you known each other?"

"Known each other?" Sakura repeated. "Minimum of 10 years." He wrote something down.

"10 years, huh?" They nodded. "So you can say that the bond the both of you share is strong." Sakura nodded slowly. "So when the Uchiha left, Sakura, who did you blame?" Her mouth opened as Naruto's head whipped around to face her.

"Blame? I didn't blame—"

"Back to the bond. You both had so much love for each other for so long…you were all each other had when Sasuke left. Sakura, you held so much love for him that, you even tried to release him of his vow and kill Sasuke yourself." Sakura's eyebrows furrowed. What did this have to do with anything? She was about ready to ask when he spoke again. "I digress. Anyway, the bond. You both held so much love for each other, blah, blah, blah. My question is, were there any moments where you both gave up?" She blinked.

"I mean, we lost hope a few times, considering—"

"So, your loss of hope back then, or your lack of quickness could be the reason for so many failed rescue missions. Could your last unofficial mission, Naruto, be one of which to make amends for what you did last time? Lose hope? Lose all faith that Sakura was actually alive? Could this passion to make up for your wrongs from 6 or so years ago fuel your need to do differently this time? To break even more rules to retrieve a fallen teammate, without regard to higher authority?" Naruto's eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"What?" Was the only reply he could muster as he tried to digest the information. "No, I—" He licked his lips and sighed. "It wasn't about breaking the rules. It was about doing something that needed to be done." He stressed.

"While breaking the rules in the process." The Interrogator finished as he wrote in the folder. "Okay, so…your relationships. You've agreed that there were moments where there was a loss of hope, Sakura. A loss of hope ultimately means a loss of love. Were there any moments where you gave up on him? Where you called it quits on Sasuke?" She pursed her lips, wiping her forehead.

"I—yes. But as a means to release him of the burden. At the time, Sasuke was an international criminal, and Naruto getting caught up in that would only warrant more trouble. He wanted him back as much as the next person, but his want was powered by my tears and my pleas. He tried to do this for me, mostly, and when it was brought to my attention the pain I was causing him, I couldn't…I couldn't bear it." The Interrogator nodded.

"Okay, so what if this happened again? Approximately a year later, after Naruto was almost killed. What if it was meant a little more than it was the first time? That time being out of desperation, the next time being more of…needing to find a constant." Sakura swallowed, brushing more of the falling curls from her face.

"No. I mean—" He cut her off.

"You're lying. Lying to an Anbu officer warrants punishment even outside of the ones that may be given as a consequence depending on how this interrogation goes. Lying won't push anything in your favor." She put her hands over her eyes and exhaled. "Let me rephrase my statement. After Naruto was almost killed by Sasuke at age 16, you felt something for the boy. You didn't know if it was exactly romantic, but you felt for the boy who damaged himself inside and out, so that you wouldn't cry tears of sadness anymore. So that the person he loved with all of his heart would be finally happy after five years…with someone else. No, he knew how much his dear Sakura-chan loved the Uchiha, and he knew how much it pained her for him to be a traitor, and to continuously hear of his crimes.

"Naruto knew all of this, but still, after every mission his resolve got stronger and stronger. But this particular mission, Naruto was so much stronger; he'd even made connections with the Kyuubi inside of him, increasing his already immense power. But he was no match against the Susanoo'o. Sasuke once again escaped, and Naruto had…" The Interrogator looked into his folder. "Four broken ribs, a broken arm and leg, a fractured cheek bone, and not to mention numerous gashes, cuts, and bruises. Sasuke was gone from your grasp yet again. After this encounter, you looked at the Uchiha in contempt as Naruto fell into a deep depression. Once again, you noticed how much you were hurting him. I mean, it wasn't long before that Naruto went into a coma from severe dehydration and lack of nutrients." He slammed his folder down. "You told me of this strong bond you two shared, for a minimum of ten years on top of that, yet Naruto had to fall into a coma for you to notice that he wasn't eating or drinking. Even longer to find out that he was depressed! You're telling me that for three weeks from when Naruto returned from the Hospital after the mission, you were so wrapped up in your pity party that you failed to notice the person you loved so much was killing himself? Makes even me rethink this special bond."

Sakura closed her eyes tightly as her hands dug into her temples. Naruto's look was impassive. The Interrogator calmed himself.

"After the years it took to notice his depression, what happened between you? I don't mean the road to recovery, I don't mean the steps you took to get him back on track. I mean when he took solace in you because he was truly lost, and he realized now that you were all he had. For days at a time you didn't come into work, only to be found at his house. So what was it? What was it that suddenly triggered this need for Naruto in your life?"

7 years ago

Removing a brick from the ledge, she reached inside and felt around for a spare key. Once she found it, she replaced the brick and jostled the key through the keyhole. She opened the door and stepped inside. She kicked off her boots and placed them neatly by the door, and then she threw her shoulder bag on the couch. Walking into the kitchen, she checked the fridge. The food she bought two days ago looked untouched, just like it did yesterday. Sighing, she closed it and walked out of his kitchen and onto the path to his room. She moved to open the door, but upon twisting it she found it was locked. Her fingers almost immediately glowed blue. She tried the door again and moved inside.

His room was large, way too large, for someone like Naruto. She walked over to the raised platform where his bed was located and stepped onto it. He was covered in his comforters, all that was visible of him was a lump on the bed. She sat beside him and pulled the sheets off of his head.

"Naruto," She whispered into his ear, brushing some of his sweaty hair out of his face. She pulled the rest of the sheets from his body and noticed he was still in the same clothes from the last time she was here. Making time for Naruto was top priority, especially in his state. He's made her job unimportant to her. They'd be lucky if she made it in at least once a week. It wasn't like this before, though. When they returned, as a means to block her thoughts and just forget, she swamped herself with patients and lab tests so that all she had time to do when she got home was crash on her bed…or couch, whichever she could make it to. Now she found that she should've, considering the nasty slump he's fallen into. She only stopped by to make him something yesterday, she didn't have time to actually force him to eat it, so she didn't know if he did. He could be on the verge of deprivation again, just because she didn't have time for the details. Or, she didn't want to make time.

She still can't help but argue the unfairness of her situation.

She loves Naruto with all of her heart, and she knows that she's not the only one. They all depend on him for everything, and thus have entrusted him with returning Sasuke, and that's if he could. They've given up on helping, given up on hope. They waved away his attempts to bring Sasuke home as just something Naruto could hold onto, because there wasn't any reality left in the dream. And that may be so, but does that mean that their love for him has vanished? No. They come to him requesting him as a partner on their two-man cells, but when he looks as if he needs the slightest of help, everyone's busy. Once he's turned sick, the responsibility of Naruto has been shirked onto her. Someone has yet to ask how she's managing.

She accepted it though, because it was her fault he was like this.

"Naruto, come on, get up." She pulled him up and moved to go search through his closet. She brought out his clan shirt and Shinobi pants. She picked out clean underwear and put the stack into his hands as she pulled him to his feet. "Go get cleaned up. I'm going to cook." She gave him a light push in the direction of his bathroom. She watched him as he closed the door, then she left his bathroom and headed back for the kitchen.

She doubted he had the stomach for ramen. He'd only throw it all up again. With that in mind, she found there were many things Naruto couldn't stomach now, so her list of things to cook got considerably shorter. Although she needed to make something substantial to last him a few hours. She's on call, so her pager could ring whenever. Whether or not she chose to ignore it was her choice, and how Naruto was faring today depended heavily on that. Either way, she knew she had to come back. Unattended after their last mission, Naruto forewent eating and drinking.

And it was her fault.

How could she not see how the events of their encounter crushed all of Naruto's hope? His faith? She was stupid. It was Naruto, and she used to believe that his faith and hope was unwavering. He'd get better, like he did after every one of their missions. She didn't visit him when he was in the Hospital, and she didn't go and visit him when he was cleared for release. Her way of coping was drowning herself in her work and her patients, and Kakashi is still on that mission…

She'd seen him around the Village, and they'd say hi in passing. She never thought enough of it as to go and visit him. Another week passed. She brushed off the feeling that Naruto was paler and his eyes were losing color. Also, his gait was sluggish. She asked him if he was okay, and he replied that he was fine. He gave her a smile, and she stupidly fed into it. Three days later, he passed out in his home. He was found a day later only because he didn't show up to a general meeting.

Stupid, foolish, selfish girl.

He was comatose for a week and a half. Sakura took care of him now. She found from his lack of food intake for so long, the only supplement being whatever they put in his drip, that many foods became unfamiliar to him. He couldn't stomach them because reintroducing his body to it caused him to throw up. And he ended up vomiting more often than not as Sakura experimented which foods he could take, and in what servings. She paused in front of the sink as she thought of what to make him. Sweets would make him gag at just the smell of it, and she doubted the fish smell would be any better. She settled on making him a meat dish; a bowl of soup before that to calm his stomach. She moved, set about making it. Her thoughts wouldn't leave her though, and while they weren't distracting her, a headache formed that she knew would. She pulled the beef from the freezer and started to prepare it, using her vacant glowing fingers to slowly massage her temples.

She didn't understand. A piece of the puzzle just didn't fit.

Naruto sent her and Kakashi away on a false lead while he pursued the real one, Sasuke. When she found out, she was hurt. Hurt and mad. Even more so when she found out that he'd almost gotten himself killed. And because of this anger, when they returned and Naruto was admitted into the Hospital, she swamped herself with work and refused to muster up the will to see him. Not even to check on his progress. And now, because of her pettiness, Naruto passed out from deprivation and didn't care to care for himself.

She placed the two dishes on the table and put the beef in the oven. She put water in a pot and put that on the stove, turning it on high. When she finished preparing the dough, she dropped them in the pot. Her headache pulsed behind her ears. Naruto couldn't just become depressed and give up. He couldn't. That wasn't who he was, and she wouldn't let him become that.

He's been in the shower for a while, so she decided to check on him. The door was left ajar, and she pushed it open. She blinked rapidly as the steam hit her. When she pulled the shower curtain back, the steam was mixed with the stench of blood.

She panicked.

"Naruto, what the hell are you—" She noticed the kunai in his hand, and the blood pouring from his wrist. She quickly snaked an arm around wet and naked waist and stepped one foot inside of the bath. She moved his arm and wrapped it around her neck as she attempted to pull him out, getting soaked in the process. "Come on…" She whispered, pulling one leg out followed by the other. Then she removed the bloody kunai from his hand and proceeded to clean the torn skin in the sink. His eyes were low and impassive. When he made eye contact with her, he held her haze until he felt a hand come across his face. "What the fuck were you doing?" She shouted at him. His head turned back to face her, his expression still the same. She shoved him. "I asked you a question, Uzumaki!" He stumbled back, but she grabbed him by his injured hand. Her eyes narrowed when he didn't hiss, or flinch, or show any indication that he was actually hurt by the deep gash.

"I need to feel something." Her eyes widened.

"What?" She breathed. He snatched the kunai from her hand and made another deep gash across his arm. "No!" Her hand sought for his, but he pushed it away. They dropped to her sides as she watched in awe as the gash slowly healed itself, and all that remained was the blood.

"I can't physically feel pain. My connection with Kurama is so strong that injuries almost immediately heal themselves." He placed his fist over his chest. "But when I fought Sasuke, I felt so much of it. Especially when he left me for dead. Pardon, spared me." His eyes narrowed. "I've experienced so much of the same pain for so long, I'm numb, Sakura. I can't feel anything anymore. I can feel nothing but the nagging feeling of failure that's eating away at me. I'm defeated time and time again and each time I feel more and more of that same pain. And this time, my injuries were so extensive…" He flexed his arm. "I can't fight him, Sakura. Every time I try, or every time I think I'm strong enough, he proves otherwise. I can't—"

"Then why won't you let us help?" She said, shoving him harder. His eyes blazed red.

"You're no match for him!" He growled and she flinched.

"Naruto, you didn't even let us try." She countered quietly. "You sent Sensei and I away thinking you can handle this on your own, but you just can't. You need—"

"No! I don't need anything from you! You and Sensei would've only gotten in the way! Killed even!" Her heart clenched painfully. He grabbed her shoulders and started to shake her. "Did you hear me? You would've gotten yourself killed! I did you a favor! This is my—"

"It's not, Naruto!" She shouted back, tears in her eyes. She snatched away from his grip. "We're your teammates, your family, and you keep pushing us away. I want to bring Sasuke home just as much as you do, but we can only do that together." He shook his head frantically.

"Don't you see? Sasuke's never coming back!" Her eyes widened. "Each time we fight he gets closer and closer to gaining the resolve to kill me. Sooner or later, it's going to happen. And what then? You chalk it up to the fact that we weren't together? That if you were fighting alongside me, we would've surely had a victory." He scoffed as she stood frozen. "Sakura, we can't keep doing this." She saw a tear fall from his eye as his anger subsided. "We can't keep chasing someone who doesn't want to be found. He's never coming home, and we just have to accept that—"

"Accept it?" She said unbelievingly. The tears ran down her face freely as she grabbed the part of her shirt above her heart. "How do you expect me to just take this? I can't abandon him. I just can't." She closed her eyes. "I love him, Naruto." He flinched as something flashed behind his eyes. Then they narrowed.

"Then go love him, Sakura! You go find him and persuade him with all the love you have to come home. Oh, and how many successes have you had with that tactic?" He brushed past her frozen body and picked up his forgotten clothes on the floor. He stepped into his underwear and his pants, and then he paused. "Just the thought of that kind of mission is a death wish of its own kind. I'd just rather us all accept it then you getting killed in a way that I'd hate to imagine." She choked as the first sob came. Her hand flew over her mouth. "You have to understand, Sakura. You and Sasuke were all I had, once upon a time. Now that he's gone, I have to hold onto you. I can't—I can't lose you too." He left the bathroom as Sakura wiped her face.

What happened to him back there?

She heard the door to his room closed and took her exit. She went back into the kitchen and checked on the food. She removed the dough from the pot and the meat from the open. Cutting the meat, she placed it inside of the dough and folded it. She did that until the dough ran out, and then she grabbed a pan to fry it.

There was no other way to describe his injuries other than to say mercy. The both of them went at it, she figured, and Sasuke lost it. He went to a place where Naruto never existed as his friend or teammate. Somewhere along the line, there must've been a split second of time where Naruto got close enough to Sasuke. How this affected Sasuke, she wouldn't know. But either Naruto succeeded and Sasuke brushed it off, or he failed. Either way, Sasuke took this space in time when they were so close to break Naruto's arm and leg, four ribs, and fracture his cheek bone. The damage to these bones were so extensive, they could've only had been done in close range. Naruto's attack must not have been strong enough for Sasuke to be able to get that close and injure him that badly. After this, Naruto gave up. Seeing that, Sasuke must've showed him mercy. That's what she got out of his injuries, anyway.

She just wanted him home.

She wanted them all back together again, as a team. She and Naruto couldn't do this much longer. Scratch that, she couldn't do this much longer. Naruto had already given up. Clinging to each other, feeding off of each other's need to bring Sasuke back, it's not working anymore. It's actually pulling them farther apart seeing Sasuke as a criminal. Naruto knew what he was doing. He wanted to save Sasuke before he was too far gone. But what did they really expect out of their chase? What traitor has ever been let willingly back into the Leaf? That is, without chains or Anbu escorts. And Sasuke knew this. He knew that there was nothing left for him here. He was trying to save them. How much more would Sakura hurt if she saw Sasuke in chains, drugged, beaten, and demeaned as if he was never one of them? He was trying to sever the bonds that they had. He heard them, he always did. Their cries, their pleas, Sakura's many testaments of love—

Her eyes widened as shock overtook her.

Naruto tried to tell Sasuke how much she loved him. That's why Naruto flinched when he found that Sakura was still in love. Sasuke lost it when he was told this. He knew that Sakura's love for him was pointless, and this pointless love almost got him killed.

Naruto emerged from his room, his chest bare. He wore only his standard Shinobi pants and his hair was still damp from his shower. It's usually spikiness matched his mood as it fell over his face and dripped onto his shoulders. He moved slowly and mechanically to the table and sat. Her hand covered her mouth as she tried to stifle her choked back sobs.

"Sakura." More tears fell as her sobs got louder. "Don't cry, please. Not for me. Not for Sasuke." He raised from his seat and wrapped his arms around her tightly. She cried against his chest and her fist grabbed his shoulders as she felt the water from his hair drip onto her neck.

"We can't—" She whispered harshly between sobs. "We can't keep doing this." He rested his chin on top of her hair. "We're killing ourselves, Naruto. This need to save Sasuke is eating away at us. I can't continue to love him, if hurting myself is the only result. He doesn't love me."

"Sakura…" He said into her hair.

"I was so mad when I found out you sent us on a false lead. Seething mad. Mad enough to neglect you, and I see that now. I didn't want to see your face. I didn't even visit you in the Hospital. But for that time, I forgot that we're all we have." She smiled sadly at this. "This realization was forced back into my mind when I found out that you were in a coma. And it was my fault for being ignorant to the fact that you were mad too. I'd never been able to forgive myself if something worse than deprivation happened. Sasuke's gone and…I have to be there for you, no matter what." He sighed into her hair, and then he kissed it. "Hang in there, Naruto. If only for me…us. It'll get better, I promise. I don't care how long it takes, or what it takes to get there, but we'll get better." She pulled back, smiling through her tears. He let his forehead rest on hers.

"I love you, Sakura." She blinked. His eyes…common words that they would share all the time…but something in his eyes told her that there was another depth to it now.

"I love—" He tilted his head and kissed her. His hands moved and cupped her face, wiping her tears with his thumbs. She closed her eyes and kissed him back.

There was the depth.

It ended as soon as it started. He pulled back and she looked at him through hooded eyes, dazed. Now there was something else that accompanied the soft look in his eyes, and for a moment she couldn't place it. Her eyebrows furrowed.

Regret.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that… done that." She heard it in his voice too. Taking a step closer to him, she cupped his face in her hands.

"Don't take it back, please." Naruto needed love right now. He was suffering. He was hurting, he just needed…to be needed. And these words, hearing it from him, saying it back, it might not mean anything to her right now, but that was okay. She would give him what he wanted if it could help him get back to where he needed to be. And what he wanted was a body, something real he could hold onto. And in a sense, it's what she needed, too. She moved closer and wrapped her arms around his neck. Sasuke wasn't coming back. He was slipping farther and farther from their grasp each time, and the thought just couldn't be fabricated as a reality anymore.

She didn't know how long it would take, or how much he needed from her, but she would be there. They were all they had.

"I'm here. I'll stay."

---

"Here you go, Sakura." She shook her head. "You have to drink something." Another shake of her head. "You know, for a medic, you take really poor care of your body." She looked up at him and glared, grabbing the bottle from his hands. Her shaky fingers struggled with the cap. Sighing, she handed it back to him.

"You're getting worse, you know that right?" She turned to him and glared.

"No, I'm oblivious." She sarcastically. He handed her the water bottle and she took a sip. Scrunching up her face, she held the water back out to him. Her face went back to her knees as the Interrogator light switched on.

"Okay, let's get this started." He opened his folder and placed it on the table in front of him. Then he looked back through the glass separating them. "Is she alright?" Kakashi gave him a cheeky grin and his patented eye crinkle.

"She's alright." He said cheerily. Sakura squeezed her eyes shut.

"I'm not alright." She barely finished her sentence before she gagged.

"Is she going to throw up?" The Interrogator asked. If she was sick, then the interrogation couldn't continue.

"She's not going to throw up." Kakashi said again, throwing her a pointed look.

"I'm going to throw up." She bit out, gripping her skirt. Kakashi pushed the water in her direction.

"Drink." He tilted her chin upwards and poured some water down her throat. When she swallowed, a cold look was casted towards him.

"I'm going to kill you." She slowly sat up.

"We can proceed." Kakashi said. The Interrogator hummed. She swallowed, leaning back against her seat.

"Last interrogation, huh. You four can finally get back to your mission and await the fruits of your labor." Sakura frowned.

"I know what you bastards are doing." She rasped. "You think you can get into my head. I know why you made this interrogation last." She turned and displayed her left shoulder. "You've forgotten I'm Anbu as well, so I know all of your tricks."

"Not quite. I was warned of you two by my superiors. They advised me that this would be the hardest interrogation, and because of this it should be last. Just following orders." She frowned. Her previous hunch probably brought on by Kakashi's conspiracy theories. "Speaking of following orders, Hatake, you seem to be a stickler for doing the exact opposite." He rolled his eyes.

"Should there be a consequence for that?" He asked mockingly. The Interrogator hummed.

"Well, considering we're in this room for those reasons, there might be." Kakashi frowned. "According to your file you used to follow the rules to the letter, but all of that changed." She closed her eyes as she felt Kakashi tense beside her. She knew this would happen, it was just a matter of when. To open the interrogation with this just proved Anbu has no care for emotions whatsoever. "But we won't get into that as of yet. Let's get into the relationship between you and Haruno." She exhaled. Maybe they weren't as heartless as Kakashi believed them to be.

"Sure." He said, rubbing her back.

"I don't like him." She said to the Interrogator.

"Oh, you don't mean that." Kakashi commented.

"No, I do. Truly." He reached for her arm. "Don't touch me, I'll stab you." He snatched it back.

"You're bluffing." She raised her eyebrows.

"Am I?"

"You don't have a knife."

"No, but I do have nails and chakra."

"Touché." The Interrogator sighed and grabbed the bridge of his nose. They told him that it was going to be difficult. Even he wasn't prepared for this. He cleared his throat.

"Your relationships," He finally said.

"Apparently there isn't one because of her recently proclaimed feelings of dislike." Kakashi countered with a frown, crossing his arms across his chest. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Anyway, she was a student on one your Genin teams. Squad 7." He rolled his eyes.

"Duh."

"You never took a personal interest in her—"

"I could've told you that," Sakura chimed in.

"—why is that?" Kakashi shook his head.

"It's not that I didn't take a personal interest in her—"

"Bull."

"—it's just that her predicament wasn't as pressing as Sasuke and Naruto's. Naruto having the Kyuubi inside of him, and Sasuke being a flight risk. He still left, much to my dismay. Waste of time…" He muttered. "But she was also self-sufficient. When I would teach something, she'd be the first to catch on. So, I just had her teach the rest of them. I thought she was fine where she was."

"When she was taken under the Hokage's wing, and she'd gotten more powerful under someone else's tutelage, how did you feel?" He shrugged his shoulders. "Were you proud of her?" He pursed his lips.

"No, not really." The Interrogator furrowed his eyebrows.

"How about when she was the first on your team to become a Jonin at age 18?" He hummed.

"No," He said with a noncommittal shake of his head.

"18, is that not an impressive age to become a Jonin?" Kakashi frowned at his persistence.

"Considering I became a Jonin at age 12, no. Not at all." He stated matter-of-factly. "But my feelings weren't biased by my own experience, I just wasn't that impressed because the rest of her teammates were incapable of becoming Jonin at that time, and I knew that if they could, they would've. The question was kind of unfair." He finished.

"Let me rephrase my question, then. When were you proud of her?" Kakashi turned and stared at her sleeping form in admiration.

"When she asked me to sponsor her for Anbu. And then later on when she learned to control the power in her fists, and I watched as the organization transformed her into the powerful Kunoichi I never envisioned her to be." He shook his head at her, drool dripping from her mouth and sweat droplets on her brow. Her head hung over the seat. "Most recently when she got captured for me." The Interrogator wrote something down.

"We can go from there. Wake her up, or at least get her coherent." Kakashi tapped her shoulder and she flinched awake, her eyes wide. She stared back at him and calmed.

"Sorry," She mumbled, wiping drool from her mouth.

"How did you fall asleep that fast?" Kakashi whispered behind his hand.

"I really don't know. I laid back, next thing I know, I'm sleeping soundly." She said in confusion.

"Well, you just missed me complimenting you. Don't expect it to happen again." She frowned.

"I'll try not to get poisoned next time by my bastard of an ex-sensei. Maybe I'll be able to control my fatigue more." She finished, throwing him a pointed look. He shrugged as the Interrogator flipped through his manila folder, a guideline of questions she supposed. When he stopped, she braced herself.

"Sakura, how did you view Hatake as a Sensei?" She scoffed.

"A half-assed, poor excuse of a man who was always late and never cared." Kakashi gasped and placed a hand over his heart. "But I was also in awe of him, how he never showed any other emotion but a need to protect, and he always seemed to be there when I needed saving. Even now." She snorted, wiping her brow. "Not to mention avoiding three genin attack you at the same time while reading a book has to be some feat. I thought he was a little cool." He threw her a thumbs up. "Thought, past tense." He frowned.

"So when you say half-assed…" She sighed, rubbing her knees through the fabric of her skirt.

"I mean…I got a lot of approval from Kakashi as a Sensei. I was always the first to learn how to walk on trees or run on water…therefore, I was always the one who had to relay the lesson to Sasuke and Naruto. But then, stealing bells and catching cats turned into jutsu learning and one-on-ones. That's when I started to feel left out. And despite my voiced concerns as a child, which by the way, left me feeling more left out than I did before—"

"What do you mean, 'voiced concerns'?" She sighed again.

"I asked him why he gave Naruto and Sasuke so much more attention than he gave me, when in fact there was three genin on the team and not two. He told me that they just needed more attention. That I was self-sufficient, information that I already knew. I didn't say it but, I knew his excuse that day was a poor one, as all of his excuses are. They may have needed more attention at that time, but I was the third-wheel on the team. And you're only as strong as your weakest link. Considering I was weak, there was a lot of times when I became compromised and the mission had to be deviated from so that I could be saved." She shook her head in memory. "What I couldn't believe is how time after time, Kakashi couldn't see that something had to be done about my skills if I ever wanted to make it as a Shinobi. And that future, to me, looked very bleak, taking into account the stalemate I was at mission after mission after training after training. Oh, and not omitting the fact that Sasuke and Naruto became practically S-class ninja at age 12, while I was stuck reading books." She closed her eyes. Her feelings as a child overtook her as she talked about the past. She hated talking of the past. This was a waste of time. Couldn't he just read her file?

"So, all in all, was Hatake a good teacher? Or at least…adequate." The interrogator placed his hands on his hips. She thought about lying, fabricating an answer that would fit what he wanted to hear, what Kakashi wanted to hear, or, what would look good in the Interrogation report. Opening her eyes, she frowned. Lying, he said, wouldn't push anything in her favor.

"No." She watched Kakashi's eyes narrow from her peripheral view. He didn't look at her.

"No?" 'He doesn't understand' she thought, sighing.

"Let me put it like this. Kakashi, as a teacher, gave me the essential basics that I'd need later on life. How to expel Genjutsus, how to throw kunai, how to form chakra, these were things I needed to know if I ever wanted to become a Shinobi. But beyond that, no." She finished.

"But you did evolve while in the Valley of Death, did you not?" She snorted.

"Yes, by biting someone until help came, and cutting off my hair. I was 12, and thinking back upon it, those 20-something year olds couldn't have been more than Chunin if they didn't settle for killing me on the spot. I bit them, for God's sake, and couldn't do anything else because I was bound by my hair. Nothing like that ever worked again, and I wouldn't dare try spouting Kakashi's motto to change someone's heart." She looked at him again, and she could make out the grim line his lips was in. He was angry. But why?

"So what did he do?" The Interrogator asked. He was pushing it, and she knew this. He saw the expression on Kakashi's face.

"He influenced my reasons for becoming a medical ninja." She said. This needed to be over as fast as possible, so she could get on the ferry and lick her wounds.

"How?"

"I was too scared to fight, I didn't know how to fight, and if put in a life and death situation based upon fighting, I would die." She finished, her voice resigned. The Interrogator raised his eyebrows.

"And you feel that strongly about it?"

"Yes."

"Why?" She sighed.

"Kakashi doesn't sugarcoat anything for anyone, and if he had tried to lie to me that day, then where would I be? It was because of his neglect that I sought out Tsunade-sama. It was because he let me know the extent of my capabilities that I knew I wouldn't be able to make it as a ninja, and that I should spend my career doing something that I can excel at."

"Do you think he'd help you with Ninjutsu if you asked?"

"No."

"Why?" She closed her eyes.

"Considering he left almost a week after he found out that Sasuke defected, it wouldn't be possible to even muster up the courage to ask him. Would he have stayed for me? No to that too. He's a man for excuses, and one would probably go along the lines of 'There's plenty of people more suited for the job' or 'What can I teach you with my limited knowledge of earth type?'" She kneaded her fists into her eyes. "And just thinking of that makes me want to bash my head into a wall." She bit her lip. She couldn't stop the emotions from coursing through her body, and why just the thought of Kakashi's excuses for her as a child made her want to punch something. Hard. "What did he know about the Kyuubi? He was still able to teach Naruto a considerable amount before he left. I know he could've taught me something because he's copied more than a thousand jutsu, hence his moniker. He just chose not to. In his eyes, I was waste of time."

She glanced at him for the last time. When she saw how impassive his face was, she couldn't look at him anymore. He said nothing because he knew all of her words were true. She was baiting him, trying to get a rise out of him, but what was the point really? He'd be arguing for nothing. She knew that face, and she hated that face. It meant he resigned, and he was done trying. She hated that face.

"You seem hurt by your childhood." He finally said. She covered her face with her hands and bent over. She took a moment to just breathe.

"It wasn't the best." Kakashi scoffed.

"Tell me, Sakura. Tell me about your perfect childhood." She saw red. Without another thought she reached over her seat and took his throat in her two hands.

"What do you know?!" He remained calm.

"I know that you grew up with two parents who are still alive and are still together. That must've been rough, I know the feeling." She slapped him.

"What does that mean when they were never home? And when they were home, three things happened—"

"Family dinner, family photos, and bonding time?" She brought her hand back to slap him harder.

"Sakura, do not hit him." The Interrogator growled. The hand on his throat pushed him away, and his chair skidded.

"Either they're arguing, the house is silent, or they're bringing someone else home." She bit out. "I was 13 and my parents acted like children. I needed stability, and there wasn't any of that at home. Out of the confines of my home, I was being treated like I didn't exist by my Sensei." She bent over, digging her nails through her scalp, as she looked over her shoulder and glared at him.

"Tell me about them." She exhaled.

"No."

"Haruno—"

"My parents will in no way forward this interrogation—investigation, whatever. They have nothing to do with this." She drawled. The Interrogator sighed, and she heard the noise of papers shuffling. Sakura grimaced.

"You seemed to have trouble at home as a child because of your parents fighting. The night before the mission to receive the Peace Treaty at Kannabi Bridge, you went to your parent's house—" She shot up.

"How do you know that?"

"—and afterwards, you tore up a bar. The next afternoon, you…" He looked in the file as she fumed. "Reportedly went crazy, killed two of the Grass Country leader's advisors, strangled Uzumaki, bit and threatened to kill some nurses at the Hospital you were admitted to. If you didn't know, you're here for the first one." She fisted her hands in her skirt. "So if you please, I'd like to know about your parents. Starting with their occupations, and then branching off into the recalled trouble at home." Her nails were digging into the skin beneath the skirt now as she bit her lip, hard. Then, she exhaled.

"My father was Anbu, and my mother was a prostitute." She bit out as Kakashi turned and looked at her. She didn't bother to read his expression this time.

"That was classified, wasn't it? The members of his group were on a need-to-know basis, and I don't remember your name on the list." She narrowed her eyes.

"You don't remember that his child is seated in front of you, either." She retorted. "You want to be so secretive, this organization, yet you give each member a tattoo. Especially those in your 'need-to-know basis' groups." She replied just as icily.

"Continue." He said with a wave of his hand. She crossed her arms over her chest.

"My mother's pimp beat her." She stated. "When my father saw it in passing, he bought her out of her contract. Without her pimp, she became nothing, so she joined a strip club. The next time they met began their love story. My mother was 17 when they met, and my father was 26. The age difference was only 9 years, but my father was a Shinobi, so he didn't enjoy being tied down. Despite this, they married one year later, and I was born. But because they married young they had problems. My mother didn't want to stop working at the strip club, and my father didn't want to stop going. So, they stayed together for me, but they took an unofficial break. They brought home different flings, and sometimes my mother would cry and get drunk. When she was drunk, she told me everything. I was 11. End of story." He wrote something down in the folder and nodded.

"Okay. So moving back to your relationship. It's grown over the years, during and after Anbu." She narrowed her eyes. He rubbed a hand down his face and dropped the folder on the table. Sighing, he continued. "Alright, we're going to do an icebreaking exercise." She sat up.

"What does this—?"

"One more time, Haruno. One more interruption, one more question about my interrogation, and the council can deal with you as they see fit." He threatened. She slumped into her seat. "Like I was saying. Icebreaking exercise. Hatake?" He pursed his lips.

"I have no choice but to oblige." The Interrogator nodded.

"I'm going to say something, and you both will answer to it with one word at the same time. Understood?" Kakashi nodded.

"Whatever." She said. The Interrogator exhaled.

"Okay. One word that describes the other."

"Bastard."

"Annoying." Her head whipped around and met Kakashi's eyes with a cold glare.

"Again."

"Baka."

"Smartass." Turning away from him, she huffed an exasperated sigh. It was all she could do to restrain herself.

"One word that describes your relationship."

"Teacher."

"Student.

"Again."

"Captain."

"Subordinate." She pursed her lips, sending him another glare.

"Once more." He said.

"Teammate."

"Partner." Kakashi finished. They turned and stared at each other.

"One word that describes what you are to each other."

"Good friend.

"Constant." Kakashi said with closed eyes. Sakura's were full of shock as she slowly turned to look at him.

"Once more."

"Confident." They said, Kakashi's eyes opened, staring right back into Sakura's.

"Alright, Hatake." The Interrogator started, causing Sakura to break away from his gaze, exhaling in relief. "Now, you're known to be antisocial, detached, a hermit…I don't think I need to go on. But somehow, Sakura's managed to form a bond with you that's unexplainable by everyone else." Everyone else? "All they know is that you care about her enough to sacrifice your career. So, tell me about her. Talk about her as if she isn't here." She slumped in her seat.

"Like he doesn't do that enough already." She huffed as Kakashi shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, there's really nothing more to say except that Sakura's a fighter." She turned and smiled at him. "A clingy, annoying fighter who tried her damn near hardest to break the metaphorical Village wall that I placed between her and myself. Myself and anyone who tried to get close to me for that matter." Her smile turned into a frown as she rolled her eyes.

"And here I thought you were complimenting me again." She muttered, he furrowed his eyebrows in disbelief.

"Flattery is once in a lifetime, Sakura. I'd hate to believe that you'd think this fact would change in an interrogation setting." Shaking her head in exasperation, she waved him away.

"Continue, Hatake." The Interrogator said.

"This began when I sponsored her for Anbu. Surprisingly, she was my first success. I've had three other Hokage-appointed sponsors, two of which failed the preliminaries. The last one passed, only to flunk the last mission." He rolled his eyes and scoffed in remembrance. "Because of my previous failures, I wouldn't sponsor anyone else because I wasn't producing anything fruitful—"

"Then why'd you sponsor Sakura? It couldn't be for the perks. She didn't enroll as a medical ninja. So what was it?" Kakashi sighed.

"I was getting to that." He then raised two gloved fingers. "Two reasons. One, I favored her. That and you can only sponsor one member from your squad, and I'd rather get her out of the way than to wait until her other teammates became eligible. Besides, I refused to be bunked with Naruto for 2 years, and I'd probably end up sending Sasuke to a faraway dimension." He finished with a chuckle. "Sharingan humor." He reassured. He then cleared his throat when he didn't get the laughs he expected. "The second reason being because Sasuke said that she couldn't." She turned and looked at him. "After two years with Sakura, my personal space was erased, my wall was knocked down, and she knows more drunk dirty secrets than I'd like anyone to know." She snickered.

"Thanks for reminding me. That's blackmail for later." She whispered, nudging his arm. He answered her with a glare.

"Anyway, Sakura just…" He sighed. "She's annoying as hell, irritating, and every other synonym of the word 'pest'. She's brash and headstrong, a "Kunoichi's rights activist" He said using air quotes. "Her language, I'm sure, is far worse than mine, she can't hold down a beer, she's gullible, she's always picking fights, always in a mood, I mean the list goes on and on." He stressed. "She's..." Her face slowly turned into a scowl, growing deeper after every characterization. Her eyes were glaring and her forehead was marred by deep wrinkles. She bared her teeth at each word that continued to leave his mouth. He ignored her. "But she's also intelligent, strong, and I have no problem with admitting to her superior tactical mind. She's always there for us, not to mention she's the glue that keeps each of us together. Without her…I don't know. We'd either be dead or lost in our own demons." He finished as she bit her lip.

"Here I thought flattery was once in a lifetime."

"I know. That's why I'm telling him the truth." Her baited breath released itself. "So I feel this strong sense of loyalty towards her. Protection, even. When we became partners, her life was put in my hands. She broke into my shell when I consented to trust and put my life in hers. At that point it was branded into my mind that we were a team, and a damn good team at that. We worked great together, period. So, we swore to protect each other in turn, at all costs." He ran a hand through his hair. "I…" He bit out.

"I let her get captured." He finished through gritted teeth. "I could've—" He stopped again, putting his face in his hands. "There are many things I could've done. Naruto could've stayed with us, Sasuke even. Our squad could've killed them all, shattered their hopes and dreams of war by preventing them from getting one of our best. I would've slit her captor's throat the second they burst through the trees. I would've sliced my katana into his gut before he sent out his decoy men in front of him. I would've grabbed that bitch's hair the moment she jumped in front of me, before she had a chance to even move her hands to unsheathe her sword." She cringed at Kakashi's words. She's never really thought of him as a gentleman, but even she knew that he never associated women with such a derogatory term. She couldn't help but to be surprised. Everyone told her how they fared when she was captured.

Except Kakashi.

He's smiled in her face even when she treated him like shit. He came back to her each and every time trying desperately to fix the relationship that was crumbling to pieces because of…because of her. Kakashi never showed so much so much emotion at a time, and the hate in his eyes for the people of Grass country…they matched hers. They were thirsty for war with the monsters who left her picking up the pieces of her scattered brain. Scattered personality.

Scattered life.

She slowly inhaled and stared at his form. He was leaned back in his chair, his hands gripping the arms as he continued to speak. His eyes were dark and cold, and his lips stayed in its grim straight line with every word he spoke.

"I struggled to breathe every day because of the heavy weight of guilt on my heart, and the responsibility of her life bearing down on my shoulders. God, what would I have told her parents? It was a small miracle, their vacation. If only to prolong the inevitable." He finished shaking his head.

"So your unofficial mission…" The Interrogator prompted.

"We got word that lockdown was lifted, so we left as soon as possible. We had hope in her fate. We had hope that we could save her, and that's all we needed. Not fact, not doubt, not odds. Hope. It was all we needed and it was all we had." He wrote something down.

"That's not justification nor reason." He shot up.

"Should there be one?" He exclaimed. "She's Sakura, that's all there is to it!"

"That's not enough! Not if you want your head attached to your shoulders! Hatake, you brought war. Do you know that? You forced Grass's hand. They cut us off, eliminating many of our needed imports. We can't afford war right now. All of our money is going toward finding another country to supply us with what Grass use to!" Kakashi calmed. "Your actions were rash and foolish at its best."

"Had we not had a tactical plan in mind, and had I made rash decisions in the heat of the moment like I was going to, wouldn't we all look like fools now? Grass was going to attack us at our lowest state of defense—midnight. Grass was going to extract Sakura, gaining valuable information from her mind. Now, had they gained this information, had we not tried to save our teammate, how foolish would I look then? I'm feeling like a goddamn hero if you ask me." He finished icily, "This wasn't treason. Disobeying orders, hell yeah. But we didn't do it to destroy the hierarchy. There was no malicious intent in mind, no motivation for an uprising. All we were doing was saving our teammate from a foreign country. That's not illegal." He finished, crossing his arms over his chest.

"No. But murdering innocent men, without provocation, just trying to protect their country? That is. Breaking families apart, killing husbands, fathers, sons, that's tragedy. That's devastation. Devastation creates heartbreak, and heartbreak creates vengeance. Vengeance creates war, Hatake. And that's what's happening now. War. You, Sakura, had the audacity to kill two of the Grass leader's advisors. Two! Brutally, in fact. You suffocated them inside of dirt and squeezed their bodies until they exploded." She opened her mouth to retort but Kakashi was much faster.

"They took us into custody! Unlawful custody that started this shit. You can't even blame Sakura because of what they did to her." He said with a scoff. "We were chained and drugged like criminals despite the Ambassador's pleas of his utmost safety. Despite him telling them over and over again that we were just escorting him home and not kidnapping him. Everyone has the right to due process, yet we didn't even get that! Pakkun's message to Tsunade-sama was intercepted, so they purposely didn't give us a chance to save ourselves. So, we took matters into our own hands." He finished firmly.

"Whose idea was it, Sakura?" The Interrogator started, looking down into his folder. She looked up at him. "Whose idea was it to forgo all sense of humanity and kill all of those innocent men?" She glanced at Kakashi who continued to stare straight ahead. She sighed.

"It was m—"

"It was my idea." He cut her off quickly, then his gaze switched, facing her with cold eyes. "When we escaped from the room they kept us in, at least 30 ninja were on the ground level waiting for us. We would die if we were left to our own devices, one-on-one combat that is. If we wanted to get out of there alive, we would have to use our combination jutsu."

"So it was you who forced Grass's retaliation." He grabbed at his scalp.

"Forget about your suspicions of me for a second and pay attention to the small details!" He shouted. "After we escaped, it didn't take long for Grass to get word of their casualties. For a country like that, respond time for an attack is two days, minimum. They sent squadrons out the next morning! We were never really allies to begin with, just trading partners. We were cheating them out of their money and taking advantage of the power we had over them, being one of the Five Great Ninja Villages and all. How convenient is it that they were ready with a battle plan, already trying to get past our defenses while we were ignorant to all of this? Their ninja were ready for war while we tried to smooth talk them into a peace treaty." He shook his head and scoffed. "There was once a time when Konoha wouldn't hesitate to eliminate them off of the map. And now look at us, weak, licking our wounds from the last war. Accusing its best ninja when we could be nuking the whole damn country. This is ridiculous." Sakura closed her eyes.

"War was inevitable Interrogator-san. I really don't think that it was solely the two of us who forced their hand upon us. We may have been the fuel to the fire, but their plans were premeditated." She finished sadly. He closed his folder and sighed.

"Are we dismissed?" Kakashi asked as the Interrogator continued to stare at them.

"No." Sakura frowned.

"Then what—"

"Sakura you have to be re-evaluated in order to be eligible for continuing on with this mission. These are orders beyond me. You've been in all three of the interrogation sessions, therefore it's required of me considering your mental state. But if these question get too pressing, please, feel free to plead insanity." Kakashi turned and looked at her narrowed eyes.

"Gladly." She replied. He snorted.

"All right."

"So am I dismissed?" Kakashi asked skeptically.

"No, I think you should stay." He furrowed his eyebrows.

"Okay…" He reached into the drawers connected to the table and pulled out a folder. Opening it, he licked his thumb and his forefinger and used it to turn the pages. He looked up, his eyes calculating and his face stern. "Watanabe Ren. Does that name ring a bell?" She froze almost instantly. Kakashi turned to look at her with narrowed eyes. "So you do. He's a spy from Suna. I guess our friends have their own suspicions of Grass." She swallowed the lump that formed in her throat and blinked rapidly. Ren hasn't even crossed her mind since the first night on the ferry, and now…her heart clenched painfully.

"Explain your relationship with him." She cleared her throat, wiping her sweaty hands down her skirt.

"L-lover," Out of the corners of her eyes she could see Kakashi's scrutinizing gaze. "No, Um…ex-boyfriend." He nodded.

"Now, Watanabe alone caused you to trash a strip club, and then be admitted into the Mental Hospital, for the second time that month. What exactly did he do?" She folded her hands together.

"He cheated on me." He nodded again, looking down into the folder.

"With a Kimura—"

"How do you know that?!" She exclaimed. He pointed toward Kakashi.

"They all had to be re-evaluated as well." She slumped in her seat and covered her face with her hands. "So, if you would care to explain how this night went, that would make my questioning a hell of a lot easier." She slowly sat back up and sighed, trying to regain herself.

"He proposed informally before dinner with my mother. Apparently it was a men thing, because it seemed like my mother and I were the only ones who liked Ren." She grumbled with a shake of her head. "He made my father mad, and…" Her voice broke and she sighed again, running a shaky hand through her curly locks. "Um…later that night at the strip club, I found out that he uh…had sex with Kimura. So I lost it."

"And who's Kimura to you?" She closed her eyes.

"A f—ex-friend." Shaking her head, Sakura thought back to the girl who opened her eyes by ruining her life. It wasn't her fault that all men were just naturally attracted to her. Even more subdued men like Kakashi…

"Now Hatake, will you tell me about Kimura? In your detailed point of view, please." A fleeting expression of shock appeared on his face before his eyebrows furrowed. He quickly glanced at Sakura, and then his gaze rested on the Interrogator.

"Didn't Sakura just tell you everything there was?" He ran a hand through his hair.

"You're trying to get out of here, and I'm trying to make this as painless as possible. For the loyal Shinobi you all claim yourselves to be, you sure have a lot of questions when given orders." He said exasperatedly. Kakashi sighed.

"Kimura…" He looked up to the light above them. "She was my date that night for Hanako-san's dinner. Sakura's mother." He corrected. "I picked her up beforehand. Other than that, I'm not sure I've even seen her before." The Interrogator clicked his tongue.

"So what purpose would a random stranger serve at a dinner with Sakura's close family and friends?" He asked as Kakashi tapped his foot, annoyed. What purpose did these questions serve in a re-evaluation? He was prodding more than he should've been, and he was sure Sakura did not want to relive that night, or the aftermath that followed, anytime soon. Anytime, for that matter. He pinched the bridge of his nose. He doubted he and Sakura were on speaking terms in the first place. Although, she was giving him a hell of a lot of leeway during this interrogation. But he knew that outside of the room, the words she did speak to him would cease to exist. What went on in the room was the exact cause of it. Now he just wondered, how much more damage could be done throughout the short re-evaluation?

"We, Sasuke, Naruto, and I, knew that Ren was a player, but she didn't. We thought that bringing another female would bring out his piggish ways so that Sakura could deal with him before it was too late." Before she was foolishly married. She turned and looked at him, an incredulous expression plastered on her face.

"So, basically, you brought a blowup doll into my father's home to force Ren to want to have sex with her?" She started out in disbelief. "I mean, he did either anyway, but who wouldn't?" Sarcasm was laced in her voice. The Interrogator cleared his throat.

"Okay, a beautiful woman, Sakura's ex-friend, and a decoy chess piece. Why would she do all of this? Surely not for the betterment of Sakura. What would she get out of coming to the dinner He narrowed his eyes. "You know what I'm inquiring—"

"Is this the same inquiry that came up in my questioning? If so, it doesn't need to be repeated—"

"Hatake, did you have sexual relations with this woman?" He closed his eyes as the Interrogator spit out the question. Sakura's eyes were on him, waiting with baited breath.

"Yes." Her eyes widened as her mouth dropped open.

"You had—" She started, her voice a high octave. "You had sex with her?" She exclaimed, the disbelief not hidden in her voice. Shock was frozen on her face as he exhaled slowly, his eyes still closed. "You had sex with her?" She repeated more firmly. "You bastard! Why would you—"

"I'm a grown ass man, Sakura. I think I can do whatever the hell I want." He growled. Her eyes narrowed.

"My apologies. I suppose I have to be your age to be grown." She spat. "Last I checked, I was 23. I have my own apartment, my own career, and I support myself just fine. You shouldn't be trying to tell me what the hell I'm supposed to be doing with my life!" She shouted. "Ren was none of your concern in the first place, and the fact that I even entertained your opinions is crazy!"

"Sakura," He warned.

"You had sex with her, so the coincidence must've been when she turned out to be my ex-friend. I'm sure that wasn't fixed, either." She accused sarcastically. "But also to be your date…a complete stranger? That's just foul-play." She finished, anger woven in her words as she stared him down.

"Sakura, stop." He said, this time more firmly.

"How disrespectful is that, Kakashi? Embarrassing me in my own home? Giving Kimura even the smallest satisfaction; I don't know why you didn't realize how upset that would make me. Didn't we always go back and forth about this with TenTen? Hell, I'm surprised she wasn't your date, if you really wanted to make an impact. But I guess Kimura performed just fine." She shook her head, scoffing. "You probably informed my father of your opinions as well. Taking into account the many lengths you would go to so that your point would get across, you probably got his boss to give him Sunday off. You told my mother about my boyfriend, which takes balls by the way, so I can't be far off. But the Kimura thing…it's hard to wrap my head around it." She finished in a whisper. Then her demeanor changed as anger bubbled inside of her. "So you can fuck anything that walks with breasts and ass, but the moment I finally want something real…It's a slap to the face how you act like this. Your 'Do what I say, not what I do' attitude. You don't want me happy, and I've concluded that. Only because you're going around purposely doing things that you know will make my life miserable. Fucking Kimura, bringing her to my parents' house, bringing her to the strip club, sharing her with Ren—" His eyes flashed open.

"Sakura I said stop, dammit!"

"No!" She shouted back at him. "No. I've had…I've had enough of this, Kakashi." She said, her voice small and defeated. "I don't know your intentions, or where your mind is. Are we even on the same side anymore?" She asked incredulously. "I had something good going for me. Something good I held close to my heart. And you ruined that, Kakashi. You." She whispered. "I don't know whether or not you've been in love before. I can't really tell by the way you act with women." He immediately tensed, his jaw clenching and his hands fisted in his pockets. He looked straight ahead. "But if you have, you know that if you love someone, you can look past the bad things. Its flawed thinking, but I believe that no matter what goes wrong, everything can be fixed. You didn't give me a chance to fix things with Ren. You took matters into your own hands because of what you thought, and you never took into consideration how I felt. Despite the fact that I continuously told you to butt out, you didn't. Basically, what you were saying was 'fuck your feelings, Sakura, I know what's best'." She exhaled a sigh, clenching her hands together to keep them from shaking. She bent over, holding them to her forehead. "Interrogator-san, if you know my low-tolerance level of triggers, why…" She emphasized, her voice pleading. "Why would you ask him that?" The Interrogator closed the folder and replaced it in its drawer. "Why would you make me relive this?"

"Once we're done here, you'll continue en route to your mission destination. Given your medical background, you must go through the re-evaluation process in order to be eligible to complete your mission. Because of your previous mental breakdowns—" He paused as she looked up at him with furrowed eyebrows, confused. "I.e., killing grass advisors, trying to kill Uzumaki, biting nurses, trashing a strip club…" He continued, counting on his fingers for emphasis as she sighed. "—We reviewed the situation and tried to determine the stressor. A constant in these situations would be Hatake." He mouth flew open.

"That can't be accurate! Naruto and Sasuke were present as well!" He shrugged.

"Considering they weren't the ones who directly got you captured in the first place, or one of the indirect causes that led to your mental instability, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that Kakashi had a part in all of the situations. The biggest scene occurring only recently, and based off of the conversation you two just shared, he had a pretty big contributing part in you going ballistic." She shook her head.

"It still doesn't make sense. If you're trying to make me eligible to complete the mission, why would you expose me to new stressors?" She asked in confusion.

"The situation happened very recently, so I concluded wisely that the topic was still fresh, and there isn't a doubt in my mind that the subject will raise at least once more during your month-long mission. Think about the effects in the long run. Had I not exposed you to this new bit of information, and you found out later, how do you think you'd react? I hope not calmly. Your reaction because of the exposure to this unknown stressor wasn't a mental breakdown, but think about what would happen if you found out under different circumstances, worst instances? Your reaction then could compromise the mission and thus our relations to Yugakure. Would you want that on your head as well?" She inhaled and exhaled, slowly sitting up.

"Are we…" She started, her voice small. "Can we be dismissed then? If that's all…"

"Granted." He stated, the light to the room shutting off. She stood unsteadily on her feet and turned on her heel.

"Sakura—"

"Don't." She held the back of her hand. "I just want to get out of here. Can I do that?" She continued to walk toward the door, and heard the footsteps meaning he was following her. Apparently not.

"I didn't do it to hurt you, Sakura. That was the deal—" She spun back around to face him, her eyes wide. He stopped.

"Not only did you have sex with her, you had sex with her under conditions. So if free will wasn't bad enough, she'd only come as your date if she had sex with you. Am I right?" He didn't move. "So fuck a conscious, because if warning bells didn't go off at that, then just fuck all of the bullshit you said about caring for me and feeling a sense of protection over me. It was all bullshit!" She finished, the anger in her voice rising with each word. "If you wanted to fucking protect me, you wouldn't have gone and did what you did! You would've kept Ren a secret from me, and let me figure it out for my own damn self! If you wanted to fucking protect me, you would've done it 3 months ago, the first time!" His eyes widened. "But instead, you took matters into your own hands." She exhaled breathily. "I just can't—" She covered her face with her hands. "My body just can't take this much stress anymore. Especially not from you." She turned back around and started for the large door, but a hand grabbed her wrist. She immediately tried to snatch it back, but the grip was threateningly tight.

"Sakura, stop." He commanded.

"No, Kakashi!" She cried. "Please." Tears fell from her eyes down onto her cheeks as she used her free hand to try and break free from his grasp. His anger boiled.

"Look at what he was! He didn't deserve you!" He shouted. She shook her head as more tears fell.

"No. No, no, no. Don't bring—"

"I wanted to save you from something that would've manifested into a problem for the both of us. If you're not happy, no one else is and you make sure of that. But you blatantly and outright ignored my pleas and my cries. For what? Love?" She choked out a cry from her throat.

"Stop, I said!" She said through sobs."

"No, you listen!"

"Stop…" She whispered her last cry as he watched her eyes roll to the back of her head.

"Sakura—" She fell backward, and a loud sound was heard as she collapsed to the floor. "Goddammit, Sakura!"

---

Thank you, thank you. I'm sorry this one took a little longer, but I made it a little longer as well. If you didn't catch it already, please, please, please, I've revised the strip club scene from Clash Chpt. 13 to fit this chapter, so go brush up, review, read the whole chapter again if you need to, whatever you need to do, just go reread it! I appreciate all the reviews, seriously keep 'em coming. Stay tuned,

-Keoo19