Like A Woman Scorned
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or its characters. I own only the plots/situations/ideas that I have placed them in.
“I'm sorry, but I have my orders.” She closes her eyes as her sleeping gas engulfs the small clearing, Sakura steps out from behind the tree and starts dragging her team into the bushes. Sai's body twitches when she draws closer, she isn't surprised.
“Naruto's had his chances to convince the traitor and failed, its my turn.” She says as she props him up against a tree, answering the question in Sai's dark eyes.
As she turns to drag Kiba and Akamaru out of the clearing, his hand grips her cloak and he tugs on it. She spares him a smile, a real one, “Don't worry, you'll get to call me Ugly again real soon.”
Her hands are steady as she unseals her armor plated black gloves. The seals buzz with chakra, seven earth clones and six water clones appear, awaiting orders. “One of you stay here to watch over them, four of you start the prep for the medical stasis seals, and the rest of you are to delay Kaka-sensei and Naruto for as long as you can.”
Without waiting for a response she sprints into the trees toward the mountains, it was time to bring Sasuke to heel. It took little time to reach the mountain top and even less time to pinpoint Sasuke's exact position. She cataloged the damaged bridge, Danzō's corpse, and the rapidly growing pool of blood underneath a downed nin. A nin he was standing over with lighting crackling in hand.
'We'll need to get them out of the area as fast as we can while the water clones engage him or at least long enough to put them in stasis.'
'Aren't you glad I insisted Shishou teach us Ration release, now?' She taunts, relishing Inner's grumbling about how smugness and arrogance is ugly and that's probably why Sai calls her that.
'Are you ready, I need you on your A game today.'
'I was born ready,' Inner's nod is sharp enough to cut glass, and as she leaps off the mountain, Inner smirks. 'the bastard won't know what hit him.'
“See ya.” His voice had no right to sound so smooth and flat, not from the obvious damage he sustained during his fight with Danzō.
“Sasuke!” Her tone remains even, its a struggle to keep the disdain and bitterness out of it. His head snaps up and those dark eyes narrow at her.
'So those records were right, he's lost some of his vision already.' Inner's mirth is hard to shove down, but she manages. 'This is going to be fun.'
Blood drips from his left eye as he sneers. “Sakura, what do you want with me?”
“Konoha's gone to the dogs,” She says, kicks Danzō's corpse viciously before jumping over the gap in the bridge, she lands in a crouch and is content to stay in that position. “so I left.”
'Sage's shakujō why's is he still so pretty?!' She laments to Inner when Sasuke's brow arches above an incredulous expression.
“You went rogue?”
'He's also deranged as fuck, Saku.'
'To be sure, but his face is so feminine.'
Inner is stunned into silence, she really shouldn't be as they were weak for pretty girls; Sasuke had the looks of a very pretty girl. 'He almost killed our Snapdragon.'
Sakura clamps down on the surge of killing intent and plasters the sweetest smile on her face; her fake one, according to Sai, and her murder-y one, according to Yamato. She shrugs. “What's one insignificant chūnin, in the grand scheme of things?”
“Are you still interested in me?” He asks, allowing his chakra to subside and turns to face her fully, completely disregarding the injured person at his feet. Now that she's closer, she recognizes the woman on the ground; she was the genin in the chūnin exams from Kusa whose entire team died.
“Are you still an asshole?” She fires back, as she injects the ground with earth chakra and rises to her full height.
“Touché.” His assessing look and subsequent dismissal sets her teeth on edge. “Hmm...I hear you're a competent medic, and mine reached her expiration date, would you be willing to join me in crushing Konoha?”
“My services won't come cheap, and were I to agree to this, I'm in charge of all medical aspects of your conquering army.” Her smile doesn't dim when he grunts, it was an agreeable grunt. A second later he lobs a scroll at her, she purposely fumbles the catch, but doesn't let the the scroll drop completely.
“Sorry, its been a while since I was in the field.” Her cheeks grow pink as she ducks her head and tucks the scroll into her weapon pouch.
“Just as long as your medical skills are as good as the rumors suggest, I don't care how unfit for battle you are. There's almost four billion in the scroll,” She lets her eyes sparkle with disbelief, and he waves her off, “a down payment with more to come, but first I need proof you're committed to joining me,” He gestures to the injured woman, “kill this useless dead weight.”
“No problem, fast or slow?” She says without a second of hesitation as she steps forward.
“What?”
“I'm a med-nin,” She waves her hand through the air as pale green medical chakra coats her hand. “I can sense you've used a variation of Chidori to inflect the wounds. I did a little research and developed a Ration based medical jutsu for use in Interrogation, from the few times I've used it, it looked quite painful.”
“I wasn't aware med-nin could do that,” He steps back to allow her access to the woman, and if it weren't for Inner, the gasp would have escaped, the woman was an Uzumaki. “don't you have oaths or something?”
“Shinobi,” She bites out, her voice hard and cold as she liberates a kunai from her holster. As she leans down to deliver the final blow, she whispers the rest under her breath, “hold themselves to their own code; survival.”
The kunai is a inch from the skin of the Uzumaki's neck when the water clone senses the raging coolness closing in. “W-Watch out-”
'Doton: Moguragakure' The Uzumaki's vivid red eyes dilate as Sakura pulls her deep underground, the Uzumaki starts thrashing and catches her under her jaw, she hisses. “-take it easy, I'm going to put you in medical stasis while I deal with my traitorous former teammate.”
“The fuck can't y-you just h-heal me?!” The Uzumaki manages to wrestle free and rounds on her 'savior'. “or are those r-rumors untrue.”
“I don't have time for this.” She switches with the loose soil behind the Uzumaki. Her hands blur into motion slapping the separate parts of her stasis seal onto the Uzumaki's injuries. The moment the last one is in place, her hand grasps the Uzumaki's shoulder, and she switches with her earth clone. She jabs the two pressure points on the Uzumaki's neck, her earth clones catch the unconscious Uzumaki and gently set her down on the other part of the stasis seal.
Once the Uzumaki is safely sealed away, she rolls the scroll up, handing it off to her earth clones. “Take her back to where Sai and the others are. Switch out with the other clones playing Keep Away with Kakashi and use the Immersion jutsu as needed.”
Her hands form the sign for Shunshin, she arrives at the top of the mountain's ridge in time to see her clones initiating phase 1. Her resolve hardens, her focus narrows to her plan, and as she begins to sink into the ground to set up phase 2, Haruno Sakura falls into the deep abyss of her mind; Toku-Jo Haruno rises to the surface.
“Nice try, but I see right through you.”
'Mizu Kawarimi ' Pale jade meets startled black, a grin spreads across her face as her hand lashes out and catches his wrist. The raging coolness surges through the clone's body, but her hold does not waiver. The grin gets wider when she sees the realization dawn on him. “Checkmate.”
'Suiton: Mizu Kamikiri ' The clone releases the blade of water she's been building up, it slices down the bridge at her water sister and Sasuke, sticking up from the rock like a shark's dorsal fin from the ocean's surface. When the blade hits her water sister, she dissolves and adds her chakra to the water blade. A grunt echos in the air as he's sent flying over the gap in the bridge. Half-way over it, another water sister is thrown to intercept him.
The water clone thrusts her palm out, aiming for his chest. At the last second he twists to avoid the blow. He's blindsided by a water sister landing on his back. Lighting crackles in the air and her water sister explodes. She takes a running leap off the edge of the bridge, the last of her chakra reaching to encompass the remnants of Danzō's and the boss's chakras. She only has a split-second to get it right. 'Water Release: Liquid Memory' As she evaporates into a thin sheet of water, she feels the boss's chakra take hold of the jutsu. The last thing she sees is the first sphere of water take shape above Sasuke.
With a gleeful shout the airborne water clone angles her body to dive for one of the forming spheres of water. Her transition from below to above is seamless, she dodges off of one of her water sisters' bodies and slams into his side. Her impact jars him into the path of another water sister. Her palm is flat on his left shoulder, she pulses her chakra and swaps her water sister with an earth clone. 'Doton: Keijūgan'
“Tch, annoying.” Sasuke sneers as he feels himself go weightless. His black eyes turn red as he looks down at the lake. “Amater-”
'Oh no you're not. Saku he's gearing up for those black cheater flames!' Burnt sugar permeated their surroundings. 'Water release: Water Blade' All of their water clones took hold of the rising blades of water, shaped like the boss's tantō. One after another they launch their blades, boosted by chakra, into the air from all directions.
-uhaah!” Through the haze of agony running along his spine, he catches sight of the endless blades of water sailing through the air.
“Ama,” 'Saku we need to surface.' Between one breath and the next Sakura is standing on the top of the lake. Her hands holding one sign, for one particular jutsu. 'Suiton: Suikōdan ' She lets herself sink into the massive water shark forming underneath her feet. As the shark dives to the bottom, she draws on the water in the lake for the last time. 'Here I come. Water Release: Towering water clone. '
The second her massive water clone rises from the lake, the shark merges into the new water source, racing upward to the crown of her water clone's head. Her shark breaches the water clone's head at the same time Sasuke finishes. “terasu.”
“Doton: Keijūgan!” She shouts, her arm wrapping around his neck, her other hand grabs a fistful of black hair, and she wrenches his head back. In her desperation, she pours too much chakra into the jutsu and they plummet like a stone. The black flames shooting straight up into the air; they show no signs of stopping. A rush of raging coolness sweeps through her, she flings him away from her. She Shunshin's right next to him and drives her fist into his solar plexus. Blood flies through the air, but she pays it little mind as she lifts him up, balancing him on her fist, and lets her yin chakra flood her tenketsu. “Shannaro Barrage!”
Inner's fists rain down on him, each strike lands with bone breaking force, on the last punch. Sakura plants a kick in his stomach and sends him flying. He's saved from smashing into the side of the mountain as one of her earth clones snatches the purple rope around his waist, halting his momentum. She signals for the earth clone to switch over to them, she slaps seals to his injuries and has the earth clone switch them. Two water clones rush over to her and take over sealing Sasuke into the other half of the stasis seal. The second she no longer feels the raging inferno of his chakra, her vision is swallowed by darkness.
She hits the ground right in front of a shell-shocked Naruto and a blank-faced Kakashi; neither one are quite prepared for the flurry of ink hawks that descend on their heads.
“Dickless, Hatake, if you're going to be useless,” Sai jabs his finger at the bridge. “go be useless over there.”
The two quickly move aside, but don't go any further.
“Sai-”
“-Don't you dare 'Sai' me, Ugly.” He snaps, cutting her off.
The earth clone feels warm at the weird mixture of concern and pride at war on his face. So she nods and waits for him to get his emotions under control. A few moments later and he waves his hand. “I take it your mission was successful?”
“Hmm-hmm, the boss's S-rank mission was the detainment of Uchiha Sasuke at all costs. Him and his associate, whom also happens to be an Uzumaki, are in stasis seals.”
“Where-”
“-hold on a damn minute!” Both her and Sai turn their heads to face Naruto, eyebrows raised at his rude interruption. “ What the fuck S-rank mission are you talking about?”
“Shishou sent me to capture him, as there's no longer time to wait for you to Talk No Jutsu Sasuke back to the village. He needs to undergo trial for his crimes before the other villages will agree to the Shinobi alliance.” The earth clone's smile is all teeth.
“Be that as it may, it was a dangerous stunt you pulled and I want to see a mission scroll.” Kakashi said, complete with his stupid eye smile.
She switches and appears right in front of the boss's good for nothing sensei, “I suppose I did ruin your 'knight in shining armor' routine...what with being assigned my first solo S-rank as tokubetsu jōnin.” Her smile shrinks until her face is blank of all emotion as she moves over to the boss, kneels down, pulls out the mission scroll, and lobs it over a shoulder. “Why doesn't it surprise me, that you didn't know that?”
Her face stays blank even when she hears the quiet thump of the scroll hitting the ground. “Sai, the boss is only suffering chakra exhaustion,” She brings her hands up to form the sign to dispel. “ Lee, Kiba, and Akamaru have the scrolls. They should've reached the village gate's by now.”
“I wonder,” She sighs, rolling over on the bed and burrowing deeper into her pillow. “how the rest of the the village would react to knowing all of the heirs to the most prominent clans in the village, are the biggest mother hens in existence.”
“Forehead-”
“-Troublemaker-”
“-Atlas-”
“-our Mini-Tank's got a point.”
“Asuma-sensei...”
She giggles at hearing her three friends whine in unison at their sensei. “And,” She feels four sets of eyes zero in on her. “ the biggest bunch of whiners too.”
“Another excellent point.” Asuma says, she's trying not to giggle at the rising killing intent in the air, she fails.
“Thanks Asuma-sensei, but I know you're only siding with me because I'm in the hospital.”
“Yep.”
“Training is going to be brutal, isn't it?”
“Yep.”
“Worth it.” She exhales, giving up on drifting back to sleep and moves to sit up.
Her movements halt under Ino's intense glare, but she sees the underlying tension in her body language; Shikamaru, Chōji, and Asuma have the same tension. The tension skyrockets when there's a commotion outside the door and it swings open to admit a red-faced Naruto. His eyes shift from one side of the room to another before landing on her.
“Sakura,” Naruto's growl is loud as it echos in the room. Team ten close ranks, Ino is standing in between her and Naruto. Asuma and Chōji flank her right as Shikamaru expands the shadows beneath her bed. “how could you sell him out for a promotion to jōnin?!”
“You have some nerve barging in here and slinging such accusations around, deadlast.” Ino hisses with more venom than any time before. “Not after you and that useless lout you call a sensei abandoned her. Your teammate was assigned an official mission from her Hokage and she was assigned said mission because of her skills, her intimate knowledge of Uchiha Sasuke's fighting style, and to full-fill a promise to our clans, the Inuzuka, and the Hyūga as well; not for something as meaningless as a promotion.”
“Naruto.” Her voice is calm, but promises misery if she's not heeded. Naruto's attention rests on her, his eyes are kyuubi red.
“What?”
“Me and Team 10, crossed paths with Sasuke a year after you left with Jiraiya. He almost killed all of us, but he,” She takes a deep steadying breath to remind herself that Ino was alive, that she kept her alive long enough to get her back to the village. “rammed a Chidori through Ino's chest in front of me.”
Vivid red is swallowed by black and blue as he stumbles backward, pressing flat against her room's door. “He wouldn't do that. There's no way he would, surely you know that?”
“What I know is the feel of tacky warm blood splattering across my face as blue-white light crackles in the air. I know the sound of Sasuke's laughter juxtaposing with an agonizing scream. I know and understand Kaka-sensei so much better now than anyone else ever will. What I don't know,” She pushes down the sob rattling at the back of her throat as her tears spill over. “is the warped version of Sasuke you blather on and on about.”
As Naruto's mouth opens, she holds her hand up and, to her surprise, he closes it. She nudges Shikamaru, nodding to the window when he looks askance at her. He sighs, but walks over and slides it open. A familiar head of gravity defying gray hair is the first thing to appear, before Kakashi climbs through the window completely. “As soon as I'm cleared and discharged, I'll be requesting an immediate re-assignment to Team ten.”
“Without you, Team 7 will be a man short.”
“Mou, Sakura, would you abandon us so readily?”
'I can't fucking deal with this.'
Inner was at a loss for what to do or how to help. 'Neither can I...tell 'em how we feel?'
“I guess Sai's chopped liver, eh cousin? And Kaka-sensei, I can't really abandon something, I never belonged to in the first place.” There's a small part of her that preens at the blanching of Naruto's face and the stiffening of Kakashi's body. “Just leave, after all, its what the two of you are best at.”
The second the door closed behind the two of them, the hold over her grief slipped and the first sob shook her frame. “I-Ino.”
Ino's arms pull Sakura flush against her chest. She clamps down extra hard on her fluctuating chakra, so the nurses don't come running, and tucks her head underneath Ino's chin. Each sob hurts worse than the last and she hates every hiccup, every tear, and every whimper that escapes; she is tired of crying because of team 7.
Ino
“I-Ino.” The Yamanaka clan's heir moves so fast, she's sure she broke the record for the fastest and first ever chakra-less Shunshin, when she hears Sakura's plea.
Once she's holding Sakura, Ino opens communication with her team.
'I've got her. You guys get the hell out of here and start planing out a way to make team 7's deaths as painful as possible.'
Rather than waste time to acknowledge they'd received her orders, the men of team ten slipped out of the room. Asuma lingered briefly at the door and locked eyes with her, his hand flashed through signs. 'I'll leave a shadow clone nearby. She's right about us being mother hens.'
“There n-not w-worth the trouble.” Her grip tightens on Sakura, fierce and protective and angry like a wild boar.
“We're not doing it for them. You're our combat medic and our friend, you saved me, Asuma-sensei, and so many others. You are worth the trouble.”
“I love you.”
“I love you too,” She shifts into a more comfortable position on the bed, but refuses to let go of her Blossom. “and don't worry, we'll spare your two bookends from the slaughter.”