SasoSaku Month 2k22

Sakura’s guiltiest pleasure was that she loved paperwork. 

Ino never let her live it down but it had turned out to be a stroke of luck for Tsunade. 

Sakura learned more at Shizune’s knee than she ever thought was possible in the realm of organizing and filing a myriad of forms. She loved the clear papertrail of purchases, the way a story could be put together with just the formal documents of a mission.

 Which was a very poetic way to say that Sakura was a nosy busybody who loved to know things. 

Her “thirst for knowledge,” as she called it, had landed her in Sunagakure’s tiny medical library. Or maybe condensed would be a better word, as there seemed to be papers stacked haphazardly - diagrams mixed with antidote recipes mixed with medical records - which was really a breach of medical conduct, having someone’s personal health information where anyone could access it. 

Sakura grumbled at the carelessness of people, remembered that it was likely Chiyo’s carelessness, and began making half-hearted excuses for her. It was Chiyo, after all, who had asked for her help. Tsunade was unwilling to let her perfect little organization machine go, but surely it wouldn’t take that long to organize a few documents. 

She had been wrong. Obviously. 

It had taken a week of honest work in the cramped, dusty room to finally say it was serviceable. The shelves she had commissioned from a carpenter down the road had been installed this morning, thank goodness. There had been a wayward scroll tucked away in an unreachable corner, brought to light by the tradesman before he installed the shelves, and Sakura did what she always did - open the scroll. 

The handwriting was sloppy, the diagrams little more than simple scratches, but there was a word that practically grabbed her eyes and shouted, “Hey! Look at me!”

It was a resurrection jutsu, probably one she knew Chiyo had developed but never disclosed the specifics. She squinted at the scratches on the thin paper. Sakura knew Chiyo’s handwriting, and this was not it. Her eyes scanned the scroll and started back at the top. She would just have to suffer through the poor penmanship. One never knew when this kind of knowledge would come in handy. 

But as she came to what she assumed was the most important part, how to implement the writer’s suppositions into actual jutsu, the scroll ended. Her fingers ghosted along the tattered edge of the ripped scroll and she heaved a sigh. She thought she really had something, but of course someone had beaten her to the punch. Probably Chiyo. 

“What are you moping about?”

Sakura wasn’t sure if she should shake her fists at the gods or praise them. 

On one hand, she had found Chiyo’s grandson to be a wealth of knowledge on medical practice (occasionally malpractice) while she was in Suna. On the other hand, he was an arrogant, insufferable menace who haunted her steps through the hospital. 

She turned slowly, trying to figure out how best to get rid of him, but he was much closer than she thought. He had been peering over her shoulder at the scroll, which she now hastily rolled back up. 

“Where did you get that,” he said sharply, reaching down to grab it from her hands but Sakura held fast.

“Don’t pull, you’ll ruin it,” Sakura hissed. Whatever she had in her hands, Sasori wanted it which meant she wanted it. 

He stopped trying to take it from her but did not remove his hands which, Sakura was starting to realize, were partially gripped on top of hers. 

“Don’t make me repeat myself.” His low voice was enough to send an involuntary shiver down her spine, but Sakura would not be quelled. She was used to Sasuke’s methods, and Sasori seemed to differ little in his tactics.

“I found it in a corner. Lost to time.” She shrugged. “You wouldn’t happen to know where the rest of it is, would you?”

“Hand it over,” he commanded, not bothering to answer her question.

“Or what?”

“Or I report you for trying to steal hidden village secrets,” Sasori all but growled. He must really want this scroll.

“And if you take it, I’ll tell your grandmother,” she sang back. “It seems we’re at an impasse.” 

Sakura tried (and failed) not to enjoy the way he fumed silently. It was almost too fun.

“There must be an archive somewhere,” she continued. “If you take me with you to look for the missing piece, Chiyo doesn’t have to know about this.”

“You’re trying to blackmail me,” he groused. 

Sakura only grinned brightly as he grimaced. 

“Meet me at the west wing of the hospital,” he said after a moment. His face had also slowly grown more pink. “At dusk.”

“So mysterious,” she smirked. “And I’ll be keeping this,” she gestured to the scroll. “As insurance.” 

“Whatever. Just don’t be late,” he muttered, and stalked out of the room. 

Hours later, Sakura waited just inside of the hospital’s west wing. 

The wing was largely unused and a layer of dust coated the walls in a generous layer. 

Sasori had annoyingly impeccable timing, but Sakura couldn’t be irritated when she was so jittery with nervous excitement. 

The scroll topped the list of ‘Top 5 Things Making Sakura’s Nerves Fray’, but she couldn’t ignore the fact that something in her liked the secret rendezvous with a guy her own age. And, begrudgingly, she could admit he was not horrible to look at. 

He motioned silently for her to follow him, a torch held loosely in his left hand. 

She followed him to a door neatly labeled ‘Archives’ and noted that he made sure the coast was clear before opening it. Interesting. 

Suna’s archive was nothing like Konoha’s, she thought as she looked down a spiral staircase that disappeared into darkness. 

“Scared?” Sasori asked with a smirk. He seemed to have recovered his usual air of arrogance. 

“Of stairs?” She snorted. “Lead the way.”

Her companion lit the torch and they began their descent into the cool, wet darkness.

It was hard to discern how much time had passed, but Sakura was sure they were well beneath the city when they reached the end of the staircase. 

“Where are we?” She asked quietly, and her voice echoed in the chamber. The light from Sasori’s torch flickered, sending shadows dancing on his face and the walls of what seemed like a cave. 

“This is the Old City. It used to be above ground before Shukaku buried it. Now it’s used for long term storage, among other things.” 

Sakura couldn’t help but gape. She had never heard that the One-Tailed Beast had buried the entirety of Suna under the desert. It must have been before it was sealed in it’s first host. She looked closer at the walls around her and saw not just rough stone, but pieces of crumbled ruins. 

“This is certainly the best place to hide something,” she marveled, only noticing that Sasori was walking away when the torch light began to fade. She quickly followed. “Do people come down here often?” 

“It depends,” he shrugged. Sakura couldn’t tell in the warm glow of the torch, but Sasori’s face began to pink again. “This place has varied uses.” 

“I see,” Sakura nodded. Konoha used the mountain behind the Kage faces as a shelter in times of danger. It would make sense for Suna to utilize such a place in a similar fashion. 

They walked in silence for some time. Occasionally Sakura would poke her head into open doorways, the wood long since rotted off the hinges, just to see what was inside. Sasori obviously had a plan in mind and Sakura was grateful. It would take them forever just to search even a quarter of the ruined city. 

“If I were to guess where the rest of that scroll would be, it would be here,” Sasori said as they came to a halt outside of a partially crumbled building. 

“Do you spend a lot of time down here?” She asked him lightly. She was impressed. This building didn’t look particularly remarkable to Sakura, yet he knew it by sight.

“Less now that Chiyo found out I’ve been coming to explore. It’s unsafe. She makes me scrub the bed pans if she catches me,” he grumbled, hopping over a pile of rubble. 

From what Sakura knew of Sasori, which was precious little, he didn’t have many friends. The image of him exploring such a dark, dangerous place on his own was enough to break Sakura’s heart in a small way. Sakura cleared her throat.

“Why are you convinced the other half will be here?” 

Sasori busied himself shuffling through the old debris of the house for so long that Sakura thought he hadn’t heard her.

“The handwriting in the scroll. I recognized it even though there are very few artifacts left with his writings.” He paused to sneeze, all of the dust he had kicked up was making the room a little hazy. “The scroll was written by Monzaemon Chikamatsu, the creator of the Puppet Technique. This was his house,” he gestured vaguely around, still not bothering to look at her. “So if Chiyo would hide something like that, why wouldn’t it be here?” 

“Do you think she would hide it somewhere so obvious?” Sakura asked, now feeling like the interloper in this wayward adventure. She wanted to know how theory became jutsu, but this seemed more and more like she was crossing some line that she shouldn’t have.

“Perhaps,” he said slowly. He stood and turned toward her, disappointment quickly overcoming his face. “I have searched this place as much as I could, but I haven’t found anything like the other half of the scroll.” His shoulders sagged as if his disappointment weighed heavily on him.

“Hey,” Sakura said, her voice soft as she walked slowly to him. “It’s okay. Maybe we can get Chiyo to tell us more about it.” She placed a tentative hand on his shoulder. 

His front was slipping down here, she realized, far from familiar faces. Where there was once the sharp line of his frown there was soft resignation. The rigid line of his shoulders had broken as the tension of finding the other half of the scroll had. He didn’t pull away from her hand, and that sent another thrill through her. 

“He was the greatest puppeteer and a master of his art. I thought if I could find another piece of who he was…” He let the sentence trail off. “I don’t know why I said that.”

“Chiyo might give up her secrets for me. I know you know she plays favorites,” Sakura said with a small smile. 

“That’s an understatement,” he snorted. “But I supposed it would be easier to con it out of her than search the whole city.” 

Sakura opened her mouth for a rebuttal but she jumped at a new presence. 

“Sasori!” He laughed, and Sakura whirled around. Her hand gripped Sasori’s shoulder, and he was likewise gripping her arm. “I never thought I’d see you down here with a girl. Congrats!” He beamed, and Sakura recognized him as one of Sasori’s only friends: Komushi. 

“What do you mean?” Sakura asked with narrowed eyes. “What does he mean?” She released Sasori from her grip and turned on him. 

“Well, you see, I told you this place serves more than one purpose,” he said, shuffling his feet in an uncharacteristic display of shyness. 

“Of course he didn’t tell you,” Komushi laughed, and the sound ricocheted off of the surrounding stone. He tugged something - no, someone - into view, some girl Sakura didn’t know. The other girl’s face was bright red with an insane blush, and Sakura tried to fight her own blush.

“Sasori!” Sakura tried to sound mad, but her voice was a few octaves higher than usual.

“...Teenagers also come here. To makeout,” he muttered, looking at his best friend as if he were about to do murder. Komushi, immune to Sasori’s glare, only chuckled. 

“We’re leaving now!” Sakura demanded, face now beet red as she grabbed Sasori by the arm. “I can’t believe you conveniently forgot to mention that part! You’ll be lucky if I don’t get Chiyo to disinherit you!”

The echo of Komushi’s mirth followed them back the way they came, and so did his parting words: “Be careful with her, Sasori!”