Challenge Accepted

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

"I think we should move in together."

To his credit, Sasuke didn't react outwardly to his teammate's sudden declaration. He merely stared blankly as the chair beside him was roughly pulled out and Sakura fell heavily into it. She poured herself a generous helping of sake before settling back to observe Naruto and Hinata across the room. "Those two are so cute together, don't you think?" she continued, as if she hadn't just dropped a bombshell on him that sounded suspiciously like a proposal. "They're so totally engrossed in each other and—Oh look! Naruto has to bend his head to hear what Hinata was saying. Isn't that the most adorable thing—"

"What."

"We should move in together," Sakura replied easily, never taking her eyes off the glowing couple. "And Hinata isn't blushing too terribly! It's just a light dusting on the cheeks, perfect for a demure proper—"

"What."

She sighed. "You heard me."

When Sasuke continued to stare unblinkingly, she finally turned to him and said exasperatedly, "Oh, don't look at me like that."

"But why?" he demanded, utterly perplexed.

Sakura fidgeted with the hem of her sleeve. "Well, Naruto and Hinata are married now," she said thoughtfully. "And knowing Naruto and his past as an orphan and no siblings, they're going to have a lot of kids—and I mean a lot. Like we'll probably have a tiny little Naruto junior running around within the next year. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if they just keep popping out kids—possibly because Naruto might not understand how babies are made."

"So?"

"So as his teammates, we're going to be their go-to babysitters! So what with Naruto becoming increasingly involved with Konoha politics, he's going to be really busy. So Hinata has opted not to retire–much to her family's horror, I might add–so can't you see that we'll be taking care of their kids a lot?"

In truth, Sasuke looked halfway horrified at the thought of babysitting miniature Narutos. The other half was still just very, very confused. "I don't understand why that necessitates us moving in together."

Sakura rolled her eyes. "Honestly Sasuke, you can be so dense sometimes. You're a bachelor, right? And you like things pretty neat and organized–a little on the stark side, if you ask me. Now, imagine having to take care of a kid on a regular basis. You see, babies cry a lot. They need to be fed at regular intervals, and don't forget the nasty diapers you need to change. And then on top of that, they start teething in the first three months, so you have to start carrying bibs, changing bibs, buying teething toys. And when they start crawling, you have to baby-proof your house, which means all those neat right angle edges on your tables, your counters, and your walls go bye-bye! And then–"

"Okay, okay, I get it!" Sasuke practically yelled. Horror had definitely prevailed as the dominant expression on his face.

"Basically, kids will ruin your bachelorhood. It's like having a family without getting married," Sakura concluded frankly. "The benefits of living together include more living space for a cheaper price. We can split an apartment that's got two bedrooms, a common living room space, and a spare room that we can set up as a baby room! That way, the mess is contained, and it makes it easier for Naruto and Hinata. They don't need to take the kids to different locations depending on who's home. So can't you see? It's the best case scenario for both parties!"

Sakura chanced a glance at him when Sasuke didn't speak immediately. He was staring at the ground, brows puckered together as he measured the pros and cons of her offer. She prayed he would take it, but judging by the way that frown kept deepening, she had a feeling he was about to ask another silly question.

"And what if one of us were to become… involved?"

Definitely a silly question.

Any other time, Sakura would have snorted at her friend's pointed avoidance of the word "relationship." But today, she was too nervous, too desperate for this to work. "Well, you're not known as the Ice Prince for nothing, Sasuke," she remarked, tactfully ignoring the murderous glare he sent her. "And I…" Her voice lost all its levity, and for a brief moment, she looked lost. "And I'll probably end up following in my mentor's footsteps."

"Besides, husbands and men in general are overrated anyways," she added, trying to inject humor back into the conversation.

"We're twenty-five, Sakura. I hardly think that warrants such a pessimistic view of your love life," he pointed out and immediately regretted ever opening his mouth.

"Twenty-five and single for all twenty-five of those years," she snapped. "Even you had that brief thing with Karin-san. I think that's a pretty good indication of what the rest of my life will look like."

Sasuke cursed his ever-logical brain for ever bringing up the topic. He really didn't want to talk with his female best friend and teammate about men, but she looked so utterly forlorn (like a kicked puppy with freaky pink hair, he thought), that he sighed and said, "So then go… find a boyfriend."

"It's not that easy," she whined, almost immediately and much to his dismay. "I've tried! But no one meets my expectations. They're either too nice, or too aggressive, or too rude. And some men only want to know that I can cook while others seem to live vicariously through my work. I don't even think what I'm looking for is all that hard. I just want a man who's intelligent, and loyal, and elegant–a guy who will respect me, but also push me to be greater. And in return, someone who I can respect and love. He doesn't need to be perfect; in fact, I'd rather he wasn't. I want to grow old with a man who ten years down the road, I'm still learning about and falling in love with all over again, like a jigsaw puzzle I spend my entire life piecing together. And there's no one out there like that, Sasuke."

Sakura's voice had trailed off as a dreamy expression stole across her face. It was the same expression Sasuke had been noticing on her face more and more often in the past year, usually when she thought no one was noticing. And then, she would invariably look down at her hand and smile.

Sure enough, Sakura glanced down at her hand, her lips curving up ever so slightly.

"Liar."

Sakura's head whipped up. "What?"

"You do know a man like that," Sasuke countered, lips twitching into a smirk.

Immediately, Sakura flushed and looked away. "No I don't," she said petulantly.

"You do."

Sakura immediately clammed up, crossing her arms and pointedly turning her back to him. "I know a man with long, dark hair who sits with his tea and reads all day. Women are always gushing about his long elegant fingers, and men admire his unwavering loyalty. Not to mention–"

"He's an asshole with a propensity for insulting innocent pink haired girls who were twelve and stupid," Sakura interrupted fiercely. As her lifelong friend, Sasuke instantly noted her bright red ears peaking out from underneath her pink hair and decided not to comment on it. "Of all the people you bring up, you think he would be a good match? Well, your judgment is just a little off, Uchiha, because we would never, never, work. He's a no-good, arrogant, entitled bastard who–"

"Sakura."

"–judges before he knows anything about the person. And winning his regard is not only impossible but also pointless–"

"Hypocrite," he muttered.

"—Just because he's a national hero, doesn't make him an instantly likable person. In fact, I think it's just a case of overblown hero worship that's led to an over inflated ego—"

"Sakura."

"–Which can never be good for anyone! And yet, does anyone listen to me? NO! I'm just that crazy girl who—"

"He loves you too, Sakura."

"—Has an unhealthy obsession with—what."

Sasuke gave a world-weary sigh. "He loves you too, Baka."

"Wh-what are you talking about, Sasuke?" Sakura laughed nervously. "And who are you talking about?"

Another sigh.

"You know who I'm talking about," he replied enigmatically.

She flushed. "No, I don't know who you're talking about, especially that 'too' part. I'm not in love with anyone. Where did you get that idea? When, throughout this entire rant, did you get the idea that I'm in love with someone? Did Naruto say something? It's probably Naruto. He should be glad it's his wedding day so I have to be nice. Sasuke, I'm hurt that you would believe that Baka over—"

"Uchiha. Itachi. My brother," Sasuke finally enunciated carefully, eyes almost burning with triumph.

Sakura's mouth snapped shut. She gulped.

Uchiha Itachi: famous for many things, but in this case, notoriously known as Haruno Sakura's arch nemesis. To this day, he still doesn't understand how exactly that came to be.

It started (as Sakura implied in her earlier rant) when Sakura was twelve and very much obsessed with Sasuke:

A few weeks before the Chuunin exams, she had followed Sasuke secretly after practice one day in the hopes of perhaps scoring a date with him.

To her surprise, he didn't go home. Instead, he made his way back to the gates of Konoha and then proceeded to wait patiently beside the guardhouse. The sun was setting and she had almost fallen asleep twice when he finally straightened and started sprinting out to greet the approaching shadows on the road.

Sakura, fearful of being caught, shrank back behind the bushes where she was lurking. She was stunned, however, when the figures came into view again and Sasuke was smiling. He was also speaking animatedly; cheeks flushed a dull pink as he narrated what sounded like their latest mission—exaggerated and egocentric—to the other figure.

"That sounds highly improbable," the mysterious person said. Sakura had to swallow her gasp because this other person looked like an older version of Sasuke. It was only once they'd drawn nearer that she saw the defining stress lines and his long hair. "Your teammates must have done some of the work."

Sasuke snorted. "Naruto's an idiot who usually messes the mission up somehow before he gets his act together. If he'd stop goofing around, we could be done a lot sooner. And Sakura's just annoying."

She would be lying if she said that didn't hurt.

By sheer dumb luck, the two boys stopped in front of her hiding spot as Itachi signed in. "Annoying how?"

"She's never focused on the mission. She's always looking at me with these hearts in her eyes and following me around. She's smart, yes, but she doesn't use it," Sasuke complained.

"That is because no one expects her to use it," Itachi replied with the wisdom of a much older man. "In all likelihood, she will marry a middle class shinobi and retire after she has achieved the Chuunin rank. Women like that are not meant for our line of work. She will not bother you for much longer."

In hindsight, with many more years of experience, Itachi had been right. For as long as she could remember, Sakura had been told that she must find a husband who would let her retire and raise her shinobi sons to be strong and brave. That was what was expected of her. She herself had looked forward to the day when she could settle down to live with her husband as a homemaker.

But as she crawled out of the bushes that day—long after the two boys had departed—all she felt was self-righteous anger and humiliation at the perceived derision she had just overheard. In her young mind, he, a perfect stranger, had written her off as useless in one passing glance, and that hurt.

As she cried herself to sleep that night, she swore on her chopped hair, which marked her first sacrifice, that she would change. She would make Uchiha Itachi acknowledge her.

"I thought you of all people would understand, Sasuke. I don't love Itachi. I hate him. I've hated him for years, and I've never been shy about vocalising my opinion," Sakura said in a tone that even she didn't believe.

"Uh-huh."

"I do!"

Sasuke regarded her fidgeting figure thoughtfully, and then a devious smirk spread across his face. "Okay."

Sakura blinked. "What?"

"I believe you," Sasuke shrugged. "You say you don't like Nii-san, so I don't see the need to fight you on your own feelings."

Sakura opened her mouth dumbly before closing it again. She stuck her chin out mulishly and turned around again to look out on the dance floor. "Good! It's not like I cared anyway!"

Sasuke continued to watch her with a knowing smirk. Every so often, she would peek back at him only to snap her eyes away the second she realized he was looking at her. He noted how often she would cross and uncross her legs and began to count down silently from ten.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

Five.

Six.

Seven—

She turned back to him with a glare and muttered, "I hate you."

"What?" he asked innocently.

"Sasuke!" she whined.

"I don't know what you're talking about," he answered coolly.

"You said… you know."

"No, I don't know. Could you remind me?" he asked, unable to hide his smug expression.

Sakura glared a little harder. "You said… something about… Itachibeinginlovewithme," she mumbled.

Too wide eyes looked back at her blushing complexion. "I thought you said you didn't care."

No response.

"That he was the last person you would ever fall in love with."

Sakura still refused to look at him.

"And––"

"Alright, alright!" she finally shouted. "I admit that I have… feelings for your brother—"

Sasuke gave her a look.

"—That may or may not include romantic inclinations," she added grudgingly.

The next moment, she was rolling her eyes at Sasuke's smug smirk. "Oh, shut it," she muttered. "It's just… I've spent so much time hating him and trying to be better than him… It feels like I'm going against everything I've worked for… falling in love with him and all…"

The Challenge: The Chuunin exams came and went; Team 7 had failed. Knees shaking and knuckles white, Sakura approached Tsunade-sama just days after her instatement as the Godaime Hokage and asked for an apprenticeship. To everyone's shock, she was accepted.

Emboldened by her perceived victory, she marched up to Uchiha Itachi in the middle of the market and challenged him to a match.

He refused as politely as he could, though that did not stop the cruel whispers that followed her as she left.

However, Sakura was not to be deterred. Under Tsunade's careful teaching, she learned how to break rocks with her bare hands, how to make the ground rumble with a footstep, and every once in awhile, she would challenge Uchiha Itachi.

On her hundred and ninth challenge, he accepted and beat her to the ground with a single kunai.

That should have been the end of it, or so Itachi thought. But Sakura picked herself up again, and the next month, Itachi was mildly surprised when she challenged him yet again.

This time, he needed two kunai.

It became something of a spectator sport for the Konoha residents. At least once a month, Haruno Sakura would challenge Uchiha Itachi to a match, and he would accept (because as he'd found out in the beginning, she was incredibly stubborn). People would gather around the training grounds to watch in an almost sadistic fascination as Sakura had her ass handed to her time and again.

No one in the audience noticed that the dynamics of the fight had begun to shift. The Uchiha's sharingan was now activated every time they fought. And eventually, she wasn't the only one finishing the bout with bruises and cuts. Itachi quickly learned to get out of the way of her punches after she broke four of his ribs with a single punch. Her bruises and cuts were darker, bloodier, not the controlled nicks they had been previously because now, Uchiha Itachi was fighting back.

And then one day, Itachi was slammed onto his back while the heaving form of Haruno Sakura stood above him.

The silence that followed was deafening.

And Sakura, after all her hard work and training, turned around and walked away without another word.

Sasuke blinked in surprise. "You mean you haven't been in love with him all these years?"

"What? No! Of course not! What made you think I did?" she demanded.

"Those challenges, your aggressive, one-sided competition with him—I mean, you went after him with all the intensity of a fangirl."

"That was the complete opposite of what I was trying to prove!" Sakura protested, horrified. "I challenged him because I wanted to prove that I wasn't useless. Kami, for the longest time I resented him so much because I overheard him telling you I wasn't worth your time. He was this…this measuring stick I compared myself to. I thought by beating him in a fight, I would get the recognition I wanted. It was only after that incident a year ago that I started seeing him differently."

The Incident: A year ago, Uchiha Itachi was admitted to the hospital for a collapsed lung, which quickly escalated to something worse when he began coughing up blood. Every time the medics re-inflated his lung, it would collapse again a few days later.

The medics searched for a possible cause. They took x-rays, analyzed blood samples, flushed his systems with healing chakra…

Nothing.

They called in Tsunade-sama, consulted medical specialists, took more samples…

Nothing.

The doctors gave him a week at best, with machines continuously removing the blood from his lungs while they fed donor blood intravenously, all in an attempt to keep his blood pressure up.

She was there when his doctor relayed their conclusions: he had somehow contracted an unknown and incurable lung disease. His entire family was present to hear the verdict. Mikoto shed silent tears as she stroked her son's hand. Fugaku's mouth tightened into a frown and for a moment, he refused to look at anyone in the room. Sasuke didn't waste time with emotions. He took two long strides to Sakura, grabbed her by the arms, and said, "You have to save him."

Sakura herself had been consulted on the case and had been just as baffled by the mysterious symptoms. And as sorry as she felt for Sasuke and his family, she also agreed with the medic in charge that there was nothing to be done.

But just as she opened her mouth to tell Sasuke that, she caught sight of Itachi's expression. He was lying on the hospital bed, face barely visible behind all the equipment, and she could see the quiet resignation in his eyes as he tried to comfort his mother.

Sakura's eyes narrowed. Perhaps it was a product of all those years trying to earn his respect, an old unbreakable habit, but in that resignation, she saw a challenge.

You cannot find what is wrong with me, his eyes seemed to say.

Yes I can.

So instead, she politely excused herself from the grieving family and requested a copy of Itachi's charts as she made her way back to her office.

It took two days, fifteen hours, and thirty-seven cups of coffee for her to find it: a piece of shrapnel lodged a finger's width away from his heart. After checking the hospital logs, she confirmed her suspicions when she found a note that not a week before Itachi's first hospitalization, Itachi's team had been in a nasty explosion at a metal plant.

"The shrapnel entered through his right armpit, cutting through both lungs before stopping just short of his heart," she explained to his family as Itachi recovered from the successful surgery. "We couldn't find it before because it was incredibly small, and the angle made it hard to see on the x-ray. I missed it the first dozen times I went over the pictures. This last time was sheer luck."

"He was so fragile, even after the operation. It was the first time he'd ever looked so human in my eyes," Sakura recalled through clouded green eyes. "I think that was when I started to forgive him and realize how truly incredible he was…"

"Spare me the details, Sakura. It's bad enough that you're crushing on my Nii-san and that I'm playing matchmaker for both of you," Sasuke griped, visibly cringing.

Sakura refocused on him. "But that's just it, Sasuke. He can't possibly love me back," she said weakly, a growing note of desperation in her voice. "When would he even begin? I was just that annoying little girl who kept pestering him for a fight. And he spent most of the time in the hospital asleep or in physical therapy. There's no way he would fall for me."

"Sakura, he's been in love with you since the moment you threw him on the ground," Sasuke snorted.

"Wh-what?" she stuttered.

"Fangirl persistence, remember? Aniki admires dedication, and despite the fact that you were seriously outclassed at first—"

"Hey! I resent that!" Sakura interjected.

"You never gave up," Sasuke continued, unperturbed. "Towards the end, you guys were fighting at least every two weeks. He told me once that you never fell for the same trick twice.

"When you won that last time, you didn't just get his respect, you also won his heart."

Sakura was speechless. Foolishly, she could feel the beginnings of tears well up in her eyes—from sadness or happiness, she wasn't sure. "Why didn't he say anything?" she finally managed to ask in a semi-clear voice.

Sasuke shrugged. "You walked away without looking back. I think he figured you were only into him while he was an unattainable goal. The minute you became his equal, you realized he wasn't special."

"What—that's the stupidest—who would ever think such a thing about Itachi?" she demanded.

"He's a masochistic idiot with extreme altruistic tendencies. Aniki has always placed other people's welfare before his own."

"That…that dork!" she exploded. "I can't believe him! How can he be so blind?"

"You mean the same way you didn't realize that you've been in love with him all this time? Or that maybe, being the high-level shinobi that you both are, you weren't just fighting him; you were courting him? And that maybe, by walking away, you broke his heart?"

Sakura looked away. "Right."

Sasuke's eyes softened. She looked guilty yes, but underneath that thin layer, he could see the hope getting increasingly stronger.

"You should go over to him," Sasuke urged gently. "We both know he won't make the first move."

She seemed lost in thought, head bowed so he couldn't see her expression from behind her bangs. Therefore, he was mildly taken off guard when she stood suddenly. "I think I will," she said absently, apparently still in her own world as she started towards the dance floor.

She had taken two steps when Sasuke called after her again. "Sakura."

She turned expectantly, an elegant eyebrow raised in question.

"Knock some sense into him for me."

She grinned.

Author's Note:

I'm back! With a legit author's note this time too. First of all, I'd just like to say thank you in advance to anyone who reads this. I've had this idea swirling around my brain for almost as long as Fanboy, so I'm really happy to finally be posting it!

This will be a two shot that will hopefully be updated soonish. Depends on whether life will grant me free time or not.

Pertaining to the story and characters, I know I write Sasuke as more talkative than most people are used to, but I'd like to think that in an AU, Non-mass world, he would be more of an introvert who opens up (and talks to) his close friends. About Sakura, I thought it was important to acknowledge her crush on Sasuke, and also to point out the fact that it was because he left that she got stronger. And that's possibly why he means so much to her in the manga/anime. So I tried to create a scenario where Itachi would supplant Sasuke as her motivation for improving.

Also, fun fact: the shrapnel bit was inspired by the assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan. I read somewhere that as the door to his car was being close, a bullet got squished, entered through his armpit, and almost reached his heart. For awhile, the doctors had no idea why he wasn't recovering. UNFORTUNATELY, when I went online to verify my facts, I couldn't find any mention of this story. :( True or not, I used it and can only hope that it did/can happen.

Ughh, this is getting awkward, so I'll end it here. Please review and tell me what you think!

~dydshark