Naruto - Sword & Shield, if only I could make you mine (SasuSaku)
Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke, life is nothing but a series of calms and crises.
Unofficially for 30_kisses.
Sword & Shield - if only I could make you mine
One day, in the late afternoon, when they were all nineteen, Sakura was heading back to her house when around the corner she heard Naruto yell, "Hey, guys!"
Sakura rolled her eyes, but she was in a good mood, so when he swung around the corner she was smiling faintly. Naruto braced a foot absently against the wall to stop his momentum, while still holding loosely onto the corner. "Hey, Sakura-chan! --Where'd Sasuke go?"
She blinked, and then frowned. "Huh? Sasuke's at home."
Naruto gave her a confused look. "What? But he was. . . ."
He trailed off at that, and then his eyes widened. Sakura figured it out a few moments later, went red despite herself, and glanced to the side.
". . . Uh," he said, when the silence had become awkward. He let go of his tight grip on the corner, and scratched the back of his head. "Okay. I must've--been hearing things. Or something."
"Yeah," she mumbled.
"Okay. I'll. Um. See you later, Sakura-chan."
"Yeah," she said again, still not quite looking over. "See you, Naruto."
He hesitated, and then went back around the corner. Sakura walked a little faster toward her house, and planned to take a good shower before she spoke to her parents.
A few days after that, Naruto finally asked a girl out.
Sakura had never kept track of Naruto's dating life, so she had to learn from Ino that he had never had a dating life, because he'd never made any initiatives and there was still enough of a stigma around him that girls wouldn't do it themselves. Ino had snickered over the totally naïve way he'd just asked Ayako if she wanted to date him, in the middle of a street, around her friends even! until she saw the look on Sakura's face. Then she coughed once and went to arrange the flowers on the shelf behind her for the rest of the gossip.
Ayako turned him down, of course. So did the next three girls.
Sakura never remembered the fifth girl's name. Every time she tried to, she could only recall the first thing she'd heard Naruto say about her, when she'd been walking up to where he and Sasuke were waiting.
"Have you seen the way she bounces when she walks?" he'd asked gleefully.
Sasuke had given him a disbelieving look. "You don't stand a chance."
"Yeah, yeah, whatever bastard."
The problem was that Sasuke had been wrong.
The girl--whoever she'd been--had accepted. Sakura had first wondered why someone so insane was still allowed to work as a shinobi, then remembered that she wouldn't have known about the fox demon, which still meant she was insane, just in a different way. Naruto had wasted no time finding Sasuke and announcing that he had been wrooooooong.
A day later, Naruto received a note saying that the Hokage requested a moment with him.
Sakura learned about it from Shizune, because Shizune was the one who came to interrupt her work when they'd been searching for Naruto an hour after he stalked out of the tower and had had no luck. She didn't know how Sasuke learned about it, because the only person she could imagine contacting him was Kakashi and Kakashi was busy with finding Naruto, but when she finally gave up knocking on his door and just let herself in, she found that he was already gone.
Sakura paced along the front room, shoving her hair back every now and then, running through all the places she could think of that Naruto would go that Shizune hadn't already told her they'd staked.
And then she stopped abruptly and realized that no one was going to find Naruto, because they weren't looking at places Sasuke would go.
Sakura had been in the Uchiha compound twice since Sasuke's return, both times escorted by him. She had visited it during their separation too, a couple times, but had never been able to step across the threshold.
This lack of terrain knowledge didn't hinder her attempt to figure out where they would be, however, because there was a faint trail of blood drops to follow.
The blood ended abruptly in an overgrown lot that had once been either a household or a small park. Sakura studied the area, and then reached for a kunai.
Sasuke broke the barrier before she could throw it. He immediately set it back up after she was inside, pragmatically using the blood from the line of gashes running along the side of his face down to his chest rather than biting a finger.
The blood had matted his bangs on that side of his face, and he hadn't taken off his shirt, so the torn ends were scraping the cuts. She would have lectured him reflexively, but Naruto was lying unconscious a couple meters away, and if he was unconscious then he was her highest priority.
"The ANBU will be able to sense this," Sasuke said, starting to gingerly remove his shirt because he'd glimpsed her expression before she'd focused on Naruto. "But only the one with the badger mask and the one in the bird mask with the stripes on the right will be able to break it."
". . . It worries me when you say things like that," Sakura murmured, as she lifted her hand away from Naruto's pulse and went to work on the deep, growing bruise on his neck over his spine.
Sasuke grunted.
"I had to train somewhere," he replied, meaning Kakashi will think of here soon.
Sakura treated the bruise and the spinal damage on Naruto, having to maneuver her chakra carefully so that it didn't touch the fox demon's that was already at work, and then went over to Sasuke. She was more grateful than she was pretty sure she should've had to be that the wounds weren't down to the bone, and that Naruto had stopped before he'd reached the more vulnerable torso area.
Sasuke didn't say much beyond a few pained noises; when Sakura was done, he soaked the sleeve of his shirt with the water in his canteen and began making an effort to clean up.
Sakura left him to do so, and paced around the area protected by the barrier. Every time she came across a place in the ground that bore the markings of a jutsu that even might have caused some talk, she trashed the spot.
"Stop that!" Sasuke had demanded, struggling onto his feet again, the first time she smashed the ground. "You're the Hokage's student. You--"
Sakura tore up another wedge of dirt and threw it much closer to the area he was standing in.
"You should probably sit down," she called, not looking back.
Sasuke said something under his breath, but moved back when the next chunk landed even closer.
It was probably the vibrations in the ground that woke Naruto up. Sasuke had settled back against an upended boulder of dirt, and Sakura had just sat down beside him a few moments earlier, shaking the dry grass and dirt off her gloves. Sasuke had been more alert than her, despite having his eyes closed, because he didn't start when Naruto rolled onto his side away from them like she did.
When Naruto finally pushed himself up into a sitting position, he looked at Sasuke first, reminding Sakura once more just how close to the artery those gashes had been, and then barely glanced at her before staring down at the ground. Sakura looked away as well.
". . . Heh," Naruto finally mumbled, voice still rough from snarling at Sasuke earlier. "They could've just castrated me at birth."
"It would have wrecked your ability to be a ninja," Sasuke replied. "You would've gained weight and lost too much muscle mass."
Naruto and Sakura gave him the looks they always did when Sasuke casually referenced something he hadn't learned around them.
"Might have made you prettier," he added, looking at Naruto and smirking.
Naruto picked up one of the chunks of dirt and threw it at him. Sasuke blocked it with the back of his arm, causing it to break into a few pieces; Sakura coughed when some of the dust caught in her throat, and waved the rest away. Naruto started to glance over at that, but stopped short, focusing on the spot between her and Sasuke instead.
There wasn't much else they could say, so they just sat there with him.
Naruto threw a rasengan across the area when he realized what Sakura had done, to make it look like she'd broken up a fight between the two of them, but couldn't get Sasuke to agree to add to the deception before the ANBU jumped the compound's fence.
Sasuke pulled his shirt back on, and then watched with what Sakura thought of as "Detached Expression #2" and Naruto called the "I'm Being a Cool Bastard Face," as Kakashi and the three others split up in different directions.
The ANBU member that came in their direction walked a third of the way past the barrier before he stopped and looked over. He threw a kunai a little beyond where they sitting, watching him, and when it bounced back smoking, he was still for a moment.
Sakura could only suspect that he'd been about to say something and then changed his mind, because after that moment's pause, he called: "Kakashi-san."
It was the most effective tactic, really; Kakashi wasn't even halfway over before Sasuke had pushed himself up and started disabling the wires.
Kakashi didn't say much, either--just looked at Sasuke's shirt, the ground, and then Naruto, and then made a small 'stand up' gesture. "Come on. It's time for you guys to go home."
Sakura rolled onto her feet, and then brushed off her skirt to cover her hesitation.
She only hesitated for a moment, though. Naruto was still shoving himself up when Sakura reached out, grabbed his wrist, and helped pull him up. When he was on his feet, instead of letting go, she slid her hand down and gripped his own with it.
Naruto looked, finally really looked over at her for the first time since he'd woken up; and while he was facing the opposite direction, Sasuke reached out and draped the other man's arm over his shoulders. He didn't let go of Naruto's wrist.
Kakashi might have rolled his eyes; he turned away too soon for them or the ANBU to see what his reaction was.
Once they were out of the compound, going through the gate this time, Naruto started faking a limp in his left leg, forcing Sasuke to drag most of his weight with every other step. He only stopped after another block, when Sakura squeezed his hand threateningly tight.
They were split up and led to their different homes not long after--Kakashi with Sasuke, an ANBU with her, and the last two with Naruto--but it was okay. The point had been made.
I love you.
Unofficially for 30_kisses.
Sword & Shield - if only I could make you mine
One day, in the late afternoon, when they were all nineteen, Sakura was heading back to her house when around the corner she heard Naruto yell, "Hey, guys!"
Sakura rolled her eyes, but she was in a good mood, so when he swung around the corner she was smiling faintly. Naruto braced a foot absently against the wall to stop his momentum, while still holding loosely onto the corner. "Hey, Sakura-chan! --Where'd Sasuke go?"
She blinked, and then frowned. "Huh? Sasuke's at home."
Naruto gave her a confused look. "What? But he was. . . ."
He trailed off at that, and then his eyes widened. Sakura figured it out a few moments later, went red despite herself, and glanced to the side.
". . . Uh," he said, when the silence had become awkward. He let go of his tight grip on the corner, and scratched the back of his head. "Okay. I must've--been hearing things. Or something."
"Yeah," she mumbled.
"Okay. I'll. Um. See you later, Sakura-chan."
"Yeah," she said again, still not quite looking over. "See you, Naruto."
He hesitated, and then went back around the corner. Sakura walked a little faster toward her house, and planned to take a good shower before she spoke to her parents.
A few days after that, Naruto finally asked a girl out.
Sakura had never kept track of Naruto's dating life, so she had to learn from Ino that he had never had a dating life, because he'd never made any initiatives and there was still enough of a stigma around him that girls wouldn't do it themselves. Ino had snickered over the totally naïve way he'd just asked Ayako if she wanted to date him, in the middle of a street, around her friends even! until she saw the look on Sakura's face. Then she coughed once and went to arrange the flowers on the shelf behind her for the rest of the gossip.
Ayako turned him down, of course. So did the next three girls.
Sakura never remembered the fifth girl's name. Every time she tried to, she could only recall the first thing she'd heard Naruto say about her, when she'd been walking up to where he and Sasuke were waiting.
"Have you seen the way she bounces when she walks?" he'd asked gleefully.
Sasuke had given him a disbelieving look. "You don't stand a chance."
"Yeah, yeah, whatever bastard."
The problem was that Sasuke had been wrong.
The girl--whoever she'd been--had accepted. Sakura had first wondered why someone so insane was still allowed to work as a shinobi, then remembered that she wouldn't have known about the fox demon, which still meant she was insane, just in a different way. Naruto had wasted no time finding Sasuke and announcing that he had been wrooooooong.
A day later, Naruto received a note saying that the Hokage requested a moment with him.
Sakura learned about it from Shizune, because Shizune was the one who came to interrupt her work when they'd been searching for Naruto an hour after he stalked out of the tower and had had no luck. She didn't know how Sasuke learned about it, because the only person she could imagine contacting him was Kakashi and Kakashi was busy with finding Naruto, but when she finally gave up knocking on his door and just let herself in, she found that he was already gone.
Sakura paced along the front room, shoving her hair back every now and then, running through all the places she could think of that Naruto would go that Shizune hadn't already told her they'd staked.
And then she stopped abruptly and realized that no one was going to find Naruto, because they weren't looking at places Sasuke would go.
Sakura had been in the Uchiha compound twice since Sasuke's return, both times escorted by him. She had visited it during their separation too, a couple times, but had never been able to step across the threshold.
This lack of terrain knowledge didn't hinder her attempt to figure out where they would be, however, because there was a faint trail of blood drops to follow.
The blood ended abruptly in an overgrown lot that had once been either a household or a small park. Sakura studied the area, and then reached for a kunai.
Sasuke broke the barrier before she could throw it. He immediately set it back up after she was inside, pragmatically using the blood from the line of gashes running along the side of his face down to his chest rather than biting a finger.
The blood had matted his bangs on that side of his face, and he hadn't taken off his shirt, so the torn ends were scraping the cuts. She would have lectured him reflexively, but Naruto was lying unconscious a couple meters away, and if he was unconscious then he was her highest priority.
"The ANBU will be able to sense this," Sasuke said, starting to gingerly remove his shirt because he'd glimpsed her expression before she'd focused on Naruto. "But only the one with the badger mask and the one in the bird mask with the stripes on the right will be able to break it."
". . . It worries me when you say things like that," Sakura murmured, as she lifted her hand away from Naruto's pulse and went to work on the deep, growing bruise on his neck over his spine.
Sasuke grunted.
"I had to train somewhere," he replied, meaning Kakashi will think of here soon.
Sakura treated the bruise and the spinal damage on Naruto, having to maneuver her chakra carefully so that it didn't touch the fox demon's that was already at work, and then went over to Sasuke. She was more grateful than she was pretty sure she should've had to be that the wounds weren't down to the bone, and that Naruto had stopped before he'd reached the more vulnerable torso area.
Sasuke didn't say much beyond a few pained noises; when Sakura was done, he soaked the sleeve of his shirt with the water in his canteen and began making an effort to clean up.
Sakura left him to do so, and paced around the area protected by the barrier. Every time she came across a place in the ground that bore the markings of a jutsu that even might have caused some talk, she trashed the spot.
"Stop that!" Sasuke had demanded, struggling onto his feet again, the first time she smashed the ground. "You're the Hokage's student. You--"
Sakura tore up another wedge of dirt and threw it much closer to the area he was standing in.
"You should probably sit down," she called, not looking back.
Sasuke said something under his breath, but moved back when the next chunk landed even closer.
It was probably the vibrations in the ground that woke Naruto up. Sasuke had settled back against an upended boulder of dirt, and Sakura had just sat down beside him a few moments earlier, shaking the dry grass and dirt off her gloves. Sasuke had been more alert than her, despite having his eyes closed, because he didn't start when Naruto rolled onto his side away from them like she did.
When Naruto finally pushed himself up into a sitting position, he looked at Sasuke first, reminding Sakura once more just how close to the artery those gashes had been, and then barely glanced at her before staring down at the ground. Sakura looked away as well.
". . . Heh," Naruto finally mumbled, voice still rough from snarling at Sasuke earlier. "They could've just castrated me at birth."
"It would have wrecked your ability to be a ninja," Sasuke replied. "You would've gained weight and lost too much muscle mass."
Naruto and Sakura gave him the looks they always did when Sasuke casually referenced something he hadn't learned around them.
"Might have made you prettier," he added, looking at Naruto and smirking.
Naruto picked up one of the chunks of dirt and threw it at him. Sasuke blocked it with the back of his arm, causing it to break into a few pieces; Sakura coughed when some of the dust caught in her throat, and waved the rest away. Naruto started to glance over at that, but stopped short, focusing on the spot between her and Sasuke instead.
There wasn't much else they could say, so they just sat there with him.
Naruto threw a rasengan across the area when he realized what Sakura had done, to make it look like she'd broken up a fight between the two of them, but couldn't get Sasuke to agree to add to the deception before the ANBU jumped the compound's fence.
Sasuke pulled his shirt back on, and then watched with what Sakura thought of as "Detached Expression #2" and Naruto called the "I'm Being a Cool Bastard Face," as Kakashi and the three others split up in different directions.
The ANBU member that came in their direction walked a third of the way past the barrier before he stopped and looked over. He threw a kunai a little beyond where they sitting, watching him, and when it bounced back smoking, he was still for a moment.
Sakura could only suspect that he'd been about to say something and then changed his mind, because after that moment's pause, he called: "Kakashi-san."
It was the most effective tactic, really; Kakashi wasn't even halfway over before Sasuke had pushed himself up and started disabling the wires.
Kakashi didn't say much, either--just looked at Sasuke's shirt, the ground, and then Naruto, and then made a small 'stand up' gesture. "Come on. It's time for you guys to go home."
Sakura rolled onto her feet, and then brushed off her skirt to cover her hesitation.
She only hesitated for a moment, though. Naruto was still shoving himself up when Sakura reached out, grabbed his wrist, and helped pull him up. When he was on his feet, instead of letting go, she slid her hand down and gripped his own with it.
Naruto looked, finally really looked over at her for the first time since he'd woken up; and while he was facing the opposite direction, Sasuke reached out and draped the other man's arm over his shoulders. He didn't let go of Naruto's wrist.
Kakashi might have rolled his eyes; he turned away too soon for them or the ANBU to see what his reaction was.
Once they were out of the compound, going through the gate this time, Naruto started faking a limp in his left leg, forcing Sasuke to drag most of his weight with every other step. He only stopped after another block, when Sakura squeezed his hand threateningly tight.
They were split up and led to their different homes not long after--Kakashi with Sasuke, an ANBU with her, and the last two with Naruto--but it was okay. The point had been made.
I love you.