SasoSaku Month 2k22

Sakura’s not-so-secret love of organizational work had doomed her this time.

Kakashi had taken full advantage of this and had her working overtime that weekend. 

Curse him, she thought, sifting through more dusty boxes than she knew what to do with. 

This time, she was at an old outpost between the lands of Fire and Wind. Not a soul had lived here after the conflict between the two nations had died down over ten years ago, and it showed. The most sturdy of the structures, stone watchtowers hastily assembled if the masonry work was anything to go off of, housed the documents she was here for. 

Her job was (relatively) simple: bring back important documents to Konoha and catalog them for the archives. Based on Sakura’s findings beforehand, some sensitive scrolls pertaining to the second Hokage’s work should be hiding in the boxes. 

“At least they had enough common sense to set a genjutsu before abandoning this place,” Sakura muttered, coughing violently as she inhaled some of the wayward dust. It was a good thing Kakashi had sent her instead of someone like Naruto. He would have completely passed the hidden tunnel to the basement. 

Her flashlight cast a pathetic beam around her. She should really talk to Kakashi about issuing shinobi better equipment. 

Sakura had already sorted through half of the boxes, occasionally getting distracted with some particularly interesting information about the past conflict, when she hit the jackpot.

“Bingo,” she whispered, and held the flashlight between her teeth as she unsealed a fat jutsu scroll with the Hokage’s seal. 

Time travel was the Second’s special project. He was a prodigious user of space-time ninjutsu and time travel seemed like a logical next step, Sakura supposed. He had died before it came to fruition, but as she scanned the characters and symbols, it appeared to be complete. She frowned around the flashlight. Perhaps time travel wasn’t actually possible. It came as a relief and a disappointment. 

“Sakura?” A voice called out behind her. The flashlight clattered out of her mouth and she bit her lip hard

“Shit,” she muttered, tasting blood and wiping her mouth. “Sasori, what are you doing here?” She said louder over her shoulder. 

“What kind of boyfriend would I be if I didn’t take this chance to visit. You’re practically halfway to Suna.” She could hear the smirk in his voice. 

“You made me bite myself,” she pouted, absently flicking the blood off of her hand. And directly onto the scroll.

“I didn’t make you–” He started, but the blue glow emanating from the scroll gave him pause. He didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence. Sakura gave him a helpless, sheepish glance before they were somewhere and somewhen else completely. 

Sakura awoke in a canvas tent. 

It was familiar in the way that only nightmares were.

She moved to sit up quickly and winced at the throbbing in her head and her arm. White spots danced in her vision as the pain lanced through her and she gasped.

“Hey, easy there,” someone said to her left.

“Sasori?” She mumbled, his characteristic red hair was just the same, but his face was not. His hitai-ate bore the Wind’s symbol and hung carelessly around his neck - Sasori would never wear his so prominently. 

He looked just as confused at Sakura.

“You’ve taken quite the hit,” the stranger continued with an uncertain smile. “My wife and I found you not far from the field of battle. You’re much too young to be out here in the action,” he said, taking a more parental tone. 

“Thanks for saving me, but I’m not sure what you mean by…battle? Who’s fighting?” Sakura’s fingers danced over her bandaged arm as she took in her surroundings. A standard medical tent, although it was much smaller than the ones she was used to. 

“The Lands of Wind and Fire. Please,” he said, holding up his hand when she started to speak. “Don’t tell me which you are affiliated with, if either. It will make the paperwork difficult.” He smiled thinly at his own terrible joke. 

“I understand,” Sakura replied, suppressing her chakra as best she could. It was already obvious to this man that she was not a civilian and for some reason he was willing to let her get away with it. 

Her head was swimming with the thought of actually why she should be getting away with anything. The Sand and Leaf, at war? Gaara would never allow something like this to happen, nor Tsunade, especially after the Fourth Great Shinobi War…

“Subaru.” A woman with dark hair entered the tent and quickly closed the flap behind her. 

Subaru, Sakura though, now why did that name ring a bell? 

“Michiru,” the man replied, relieved. “Our young friend is awake.” 

“Oh, hello,” Michiru smiled. Sakura thought she looked very tired. “You really shouldn’t be in the middle of an active war zone at your age.”

“That’s what I said,” Subaru chuckled. He turned back to Sakura. “I healed your arm but you should still take care not to open your wound again.”

“Of course. Thank you. Again.” She gave them a sheepish smile. 

“Sakura–” 

Finally, she could breathe a sigh of relief. Sasori had thrown aside the tent flap and made a beeline for her. Before she could even say his name he had her in his arms.

“I couldn’t sense you any more, I thought something might have happened…”

“I’m glad you’re here,” she breathed, pressing her face against his vest. Things were coming a little too hard and fast right now, and Sasori always had a knack for grounding her. “These people, they saved me. Apparently I was unconscious and,” she frowned. “The Leaf and Sand are fighting?”

“I’ve been looking for you since I got here, I think–” 

Sakura cleared her throat loudly and gave a meaningful look over his shoulder. His jaw shut with a click and he turned around slowly. 

“Thank you for saving her, I don’t know how to function without…her…”

Sasori trailed off as he stared into the faces he had last seen waving goodbye as they left for their last mission. He had memorized their portraits but they always seemed hazy in his memories. 

His parents, Subaru and Michiru, stood before him as if they had never died.

“I’m trying to teach him manners. It’s a work in progress,” Sakura teased, but her voice seemed muted as if he was under water. His heart beat a frantic staccato in his chest and he thought surely, he was about to have some sort of episode and die. Yes, he and Sakura had died in a fiery explosion in that godforsaken tower because of that stupid scroll and now they were dead. That must be it. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” Subaru, who was closest, nodded with a friendly smile. “Although, you don’t look well. Are you injured?” 

“Mm fine,” Sasori muttered, but he felt that vomiting was not far from his stomach’s plans for the near future. He swallowed thickly. “Sorry, what?” He asked when his mother - his mother - asked him a question. 

“Maybe you should sit down with your friend on the cot. We’ll see if we can get you some food and water,” she said again patiently.

He nodded dumbly and turned back to Sakura, who was alarmed at his change in behavior but kept her silence when he sat down heavily next to her. 

When the pair had gone, Sakura’s healing chakra flared on her hands.

“Are you hurt? Where?” She asked frantically and grabbed his arm. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“No, I…” He began, cleared his throat, and tried again. He was hunched over, elbows on his knees as he stared at his hands. “Those people. They’re…my parents.” When he admitted it out loud, the wave of emotion that had threatened to swallow him finally took him under. 

Fat, unexpected tears fell from his eyes. When he blinked, he was surprised they didn’t cease. He clutched his head in his hands until Sakura held him, and he gasped into her shirt. 

“How is that possible? Your parents…are you sure?”

He nodded against her shoulder, still not trusting his voice. It was so embarrassing, this explosion of emotion, but Sakura was the only person he would share such raw expressions with. 

“I wanted to tell you,” he sniffed, hastily wiping his face. “I think we’re somehow in the past.”

Sasori detailed how he hadn’t passed out on the other side of the jutsu, but he had been transported somewhere in the underbrush of a forest with the time-travel scroll in his hand. He had followed the sound of fighting and seen Leaf and Sand shinobi fighting. 

The strangest part was that the famous Copy-ninja was among them, but he was much younger than when they had last seen him. About ten years, if Sasori had to guess. 

From there he had walked into camp almost perfectly camouflaged as he followed Sakura’s chakra signal. He had been close when she suppressed it, and it had only been a matter of time before he had found her again. 

“Ten years,” Sakura murmured. “I remember reading about this border conflict. If we knew what day it was, I might be able to figure out when we are. But that doesn’t exactly solve the problem of how to get back to our time.” 

Sasori scanned the tent and approached a small table with unsteady legs. He rifled through some papers and flipped through what appeared to be a journal and went still.

“Sasori?” Sakura asked, drawn out of her thoughts.

“Today is the day they’re supposed to die.” 

Sakura felt helpless, watching the color drain from Sasori’s face all over again. The silence hung heavy between them as camp activity continued on the other side of the beige canvas. 

“There must be a way to save them,” he said finally. 

“If we save them, it could change everything about the future. It could change us,” Sakura said. “It’s very risky. The world as we know it would cease to exist.” 

“They’re here in front of me, flesh and blood, and you want me to turn my back on that?” He asked with a furrowed brow.

“No, no, but I think we should proceed carefully. There must be a way to keep them safe…” 

Quiet descended upon them again as the two thought, Sasori now pacing the length of the tent. Sakura knew they were running out of time and his parents would be back any minute. 

“If…if we help them fake their death, it would be like they died, right?” She asked. “If your young self, and the Village, thought that they were dead, it couldn’t change too much?” 

Sasori stopped and stared hard at Sakura. It had been a long time since she had felt his gaze with such scrutiny. 

“So you would still grow up without them and become who you are now, and maybe…we could meet them in the future.”

Another long beat of silence passed before Sasori nodded one, twice, and crossed his arms over his chest. 

“Yes. This could work. But it hinges on them believing us. And being okay with abandoning their son,” he said bitterly. 

“Yes, but you would still have them, eventually,” she said. “And then we can figure out how to make that scroll send us to the future.”

“Well,” Sasori began, and the sound of approaching footsteps cut him off. He tried to stand casually and was unimpressed by his own performance, instead opting for sitting back down next to Sakura.

“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” he murmured into her hair and she leaned into him just as the tent flap parted again. 

Sasori’s parents entered the tent with canteens and pilfered rations. Sakura took a moment to analyze them not as people, but as parents. His mother touched his forehead with the back of her hand. His insistence of not having a fever was counteracted by his scarlet blush. 

It was obvious he favored his father in overall appearance. But she could see the delicate slope of his nose matched his mother’s, and her hands were the same as his. 

Small similarities that sketched a larger picture of the family from Suna.

Sakura’s heart ached for the family that young Sasori had chased all those years. She only hoped they would be successful in their efforts now.

“These should be enough to get you two a good day’s travel away from here,” Subaru said as he handed over the supplies to Sakura. “I suggest you both go back where you came from, if it’s safe.”

“That might be easier said than done,” she admitted. “Sasori can explain it.”

“Sasori,” Michiru echoed, surprised. “That’s our son’s name too.” 

“Sasori blinked slowly, resigned to however the next few moments were going to play out. 

“My parents are Subaru and Michiru. My grandmother is Chiyo, and her brother is Ebizo.” He could feel the stares of his parents pinning him down, but he kept going. 

“My mother and father met because Chiyo is the best puppeteer in the village, and mother wanted to learn from her. She begged and begged and begged and finally Chiyo agreed, because her son wanted to be a healer instead of learning the puppet arts. I’ve never heard the end of that,” he smirked. 

“My parents left on a mission when I was eight,” he said, the amusement falling slowly from his expression. “They never returned. Their last words to me were ‘we’ll be back soon.’ They never returned.” 

“No,” his mother whispered when he finished, her eyes filled with tears. His father was more stoic, but Sakura could see his lip quivering. 

“We are here by some accident with a time-traveling scroll, courtesy of the Second Hokage,” Sakura added. “Today is the day you’re supposed to die in a border skirmish.”

Michiru sagged against Subaru’s shoulder and they held each other as they took in the information of their oncoming doom. 

“If you want a future where you see your son again, we have a plan…” Sakura continued, and detailed it all: using a well timed substitution jutsu to fake their deaths, which far-flung border town they should hide away in for several years, and what day they should meet again just inside the gates of Sunagakure. The other pair nodded and listened, still shell-shocked but determined to live. 

“The most crucial part of your plan is missing,” Subaru said finally. “How are you two supposed to return to your own time?” 

“We haven’t gotten that far yet,” Sasori chimed in. 

“Last time I bled on the scroll…” Sakura shrugged. 

The younger redhead pulled out the aforementioned scroll and Sakura supplied her blood, but nothing happened. Four sets of eyes stared thoughtfully at the complex interweaving characters before them. 

“This sounds crazy, but what about Sasori’s blood?” Michiru asked at last. 

“It couldn’t hurt,” Sakura said, and handed Sasori her kunai as he handed her the scroll. He drew the sharp edge across the meat of his palm and dribbled the blood onto the paper. 

Nothing happened for a heartbeat, two, three, and just as he was about to say they should try something else, the scroll glowed once more. 

Sasori looked up at his parents quickly. He tried to memorize their faces all over again, fearing the worst of a plan he had no control over. Their success was in their own hands now. 

“If I never see you again,” he began, but his mother shook her head.

“We’ll be back soon. I promise,” she said, and Sasori knew nothing more. 

---

When he came to consciousness, it was to Sakura’s mumbling as she talked to herself. 

“Sakura,” he croaked and swallowed. His throat was dry and probably coated in dust.

“You’re awake,” she said, and her face filled his vision. “You’ve been out for a day, we need to get going soon if we want to make it to the meeting spot on time. Chew this,” she said before shoving a soldier pill into his mouth. 

He groaned at the revolting taste but couldn’t deny he needed his strength to return as soon as possible. It would already take a day of leisurely travel to get to Suna from the outpost. 

The sun was already high in the sky when they stepped into the daylight and they had no time to lose. Their travel took them through the greener parts of Wind Country into the rolling sand dune with the occasional rock formation to mark their passage. They traveled largely in silence, either lost in thought or panting from exertion under the sun. The last leg of the journey, Sasori’s stamina began to fail him and it was becoming obvious. 

“Get on my back,” Sakura said as they rested to drink from the last of their canteen. “We’re running out of time.”

He balked at the idea, but she made a fair point. The sun was getting lower in the sky and their time was precious. 

They entered the city gates just before the sun kissed the horizon. Sasori ignored the laughter of his fellow shinobi as he slid off of Sakura’s back and scanned the area. The hope that he would be reunited with his parents had kept him going through their arduous journey. That hope deflated inside of him as he scanned the area again, trying and failing to make out his parents’ faces in the small crowd. 

“They’re not here,” he croaked, his throat dry from the constant wind and sand.

“If we wait, maybe they’ll come,” Sakura half reasoned, half pleaded. He didn’t know why she was begging him, he would’ve given anything for his parents to be milling among these strangers. 

“I don’t feel like waiting for something that will never happen. Not again.” 

Sakura slipped her hand into Sasori’s as he walked down the familiar roads to Chiyo’s house. He supposed he should be grateful for the family he had, and he was very grateful for Sakura, but there were some voids that were only meant to be filled by one’s parents. 

Lights flickered to life in the houses they passed, the delighted chatter of children and the laughter of adults filtered onto the street in the growing darkness. 

He felt like he could sleep for a thousand years, but he could settle for a couple of days instead. His grip on Sakura’s hand tightened as they stopped in front of Chiyo’s house. As long as Sakura was at his side, he could endure anything - including the second loss of his parents.

“We’re home,” Sakura called out, shedding her shoes and steadying Sasori as he did the same. The light was on around the corner and Sasori wondered what his grandmother was cooking, but the laughter of company in the dining room. 

“I don’t really want to see people right now, maybe we should skip dinner,” he sighed.

“At least we could show our faces. Chiyo will understand if we explain it tomorrow,” she added, already ushering him towards the warm glow. 

Sasori couldn’t believe his eyes, though, when he saw his aged parents sitting across the table from Chiyo. Dinner was in front of them, untouched, and they were all nursing cups of sake. 

“There they are,” Chiyo grumbled good naturedly, raising her cup to the newcomers in the doorway. “We thought you’d never get here.”

“She saw us and recognized me immediately,” Subaru said with a sheepish grin and a shrug. “We had to come with her or she would make a scene. You know how she gets,” he said, laughing at the face Chiyo pulled in response. 

Michiru rose and held out her arms for her son with a smile.

“I’m surprised you’re so late. From what I hear, it’s not like you to keep people waiting.” 

Sasori snorted a laugh and embraced his mother, hiding his tears in her shoulder. Subaru toasted Sakura and she nodded in response, happy to bear witness to this most wonderful reunion.