Wincing in pain, Sakura sat against the bark of a tree, heaving a contented sigh when her oversized belly finally permitted her bottom to hit the ground. It was wet and slightly mushy from the downpour the other night, but her swollen ankles were willing to trade clean pants for a moment of respite.

They had relocated for the last time before they were scheduled to head home, and the arduous walk uphill (even though she was carried for most of its duration) seemed to be worth it. The clearing was perfectly concealed by tall, beautifully scented linden trees and the chilly air announced an early arrival of spring. There was plenty of room for an inconspicuous fire, their bedrolls and whatever other mundane tasks her husband had taken to doing, and Sakura ultimately decided she was happy to spend her last weeks as a traveler in the dim, uneven sunlight protruding through fresh leaves.

She didn't spare her husband a glance, but she heard his familiarly quiet, yet firm steps heading to what she assumed was a running water source, and smiled sheepishly at how much trouble she was probably causing him: besides the fact she had persuaded – threatened – him to detour in order to buy her hundredth dose of black tea, Sakura knew better than anyone that she was not going through a light pregnancy (not only in the literal sense).

Her active lifestyle would have normally prevented her from being bothered by the common woes of bearing a child, like swollen ankles and wrists or a constantly overflowing bladder, but no one had prepared her for the complications of carrying a child with what she had to call abnormal chakra needs.

Given that the Uchiha clan had been nearly completely wiped out and the matter had been swept under the rug in the most repulsive act of cowardice her village had ever committed, the rosette had never once examined the body and chakra pathways of an Uchiha woman, much less the pregnancy and birth of an Uchiha child. Therefore, she had assumed that the matter would be similar to a Hyuuga in the same position, whose fetuses seemed to automatically channel the mother's chakra towards their eyes, both in in-clan or outside mating, and that was that.

She couldn't have been more wrong.

Her and Sasuke's baby – and, she assumed, all the Uchiha infants before them – was basically a living testimony of why in-clan marriages used to be an unquestionable requirement for the members of the prestigious clan. As her husband had told her in his rare moments of reminiscing, his entire clan prided itself on their shared fire chakra nature. They considered themselves the symbol of Konohagakure, the "fire" in Fire Country, because all Uchihas possessed the affinity, either as their primary or secondary.

In order for that to be the case, decades of careful inbreeding had needed to happen, and it was thus written in every Uchiha's genetic code, along with the dark hair and impossibly chiseled features probably.

Sakura, with her pink hair, round face and Water and Earth affinities, had no special chakra to offer the baby, who had spent nearly nine long months constantly (and desperately) asking for it. As such, over time, her uterus became damaged and caused her piercing pain to the point where she had to meticulously heal it every day, sometimes twice a day, and no matter what she did, she was low in amniotic liquid.

Cradling one of the many boxes of black herbal tea her husband had acquired to her chest, she smiled wistfully as Sasuke returned with a pot full of water and set to making a small fire for her tea. She would remember the conversation that had followed her diagnosis forever: it had made her feel the saddest and most loved in her life, at the same time.

'Sakura did not know how to say it and she almost did not want to. How was she going to tell her husband that he might never get to experience teaching his son or daughter their clan's most valuable techniques? That she couldn't guarantee that even the Sharingan will develop to its best potential?

That she might not be able to offer him other children?

She was ready to bail for the hundredth time and blame her nearly compulsively frequent examinations on her belly on motherly paranoia, but if he'd seen through her before and allowed her to get away with it, this time Sasuke rolled over from his comfortable position on his back and watched her intently. She didn't need him to speak to understand what that meant.

The moon was full that night and they'd chosen to forego setting up the tent. Though it was October, Fire Country was notoriously friendly weather-wise, and the temperature felt like a refreshing drop of dew. The rosette could see every detail of her husband's features in the moonlight, from his beautifully sculpted cheekbones that she was still getting used to seeing up close, to the slight crease between his brows that signaled his concern.

They normally talked rarely during the day, choosing to enjoy each other's company, the sights and the quiet that had missed from both of their lives for so long. However, at night, while lying down next to each other, they had built an endearing habit of talking for hours on end before sleep embraced them. That was how Sakura came to know the truth behind the Uchiha massacre, the whole story of her husband's path from the moment he set foot outside the village to the rainy day when he touched her forehead with his and invited her to come with him. And likewise, he came to know of her childhood, he smiled at the irony of her being bullied for the forehead that seemed to be his favorite object of affection and muttered silent, but heartfelt (and always rebuked) apologies whenever she told him stories of her trials as a ninja, trials that would have been infinitely more bearable if he were there with her, he knew.

Therefore, when Sakura started to only absentmindedly partake in these precious conversations and instead favored the green glint of her chakra roaming her protruding belly, it was only a matter of time before Sasuke confronted her about it.

As it was, as Sakura struggled to find the right words – or any words – to say in response to his enquiry, she felt the ghost of a touch tingle the skin of her stomach and looked down to see her lover's long, elegant fingers gently tracing the outlines of her belly. When her gaze met his again, the emotion in his mismatched eyes almost brought tears to her own.

"I know you are the medical professional and there is not much I can do to help," he began calmly, without a trace of reprimand in his tone. "But this is my child too. If there is anything wrong, I want to know."

She instantly averted her gaze and, for a moment, she felt frozen, as if no words could come from her throat. A moment later, she did the first thing her brain suggested, and that was confusing him with medical jargon he couldn't understand so that she could stall – what for, she had no idea.

"There is a chakra incompatibility that is causing minor uterine lacerations due to a push-and-pull cycle in chakra pathways. They are manageable, however, the resulting oligohydramnios has to be systematically tended to-"

A chuckle interrupted her and, despite herself, Sakura blushed.

"Sakura," was the only thing he said. Sasuke was still smirking, obviously finding his flustered wife if not adorable, then at least entertaining, so he was understandably caught off guard when she countered his laughter with a choked sob.

Now, in the year they had been married, Sasuke had learned a thing or two about relationship etiquette. He knew that, even though she never wanted to pressure him, Sakura highly enjoyed physical affection, so he tried to make efforts to come out of his shell and surprise her with a kiss, an embrace and even the occasional lovemaking. He also knew that a crying wife – which, during their marriage, had thankfully only happened due to the more recent development of rampaging hormones – was best handled with soothing caresses and silent support, and even though opening up and giving comfort like that had been difficult at first, Sasuke could say he normally did a rather decent job.

Normally.

Right then, because the reason his wife was crying was definitely something related to their unborn child's health, something he did not yet know about, a foreign instinct compelled the usually composed Uchiha to react in a manner that conventionally went by the name of panic.

In a second, he was in a crouching position and helping his wife sit up, and he was a breath away from forcibly prying her palms away from her tearstained face and demanding explanations when she took a shaky breath and spoke.

"The problem is that I'm not an Uchiha."

Sasuke visibly froze, relenting immediately and sitting down slowly. He said nothing, even though she paused, and just listened.

"Your clan… they… They only married each other. To preserve the b-bloodline," she continued, inwardly cursing her hormones for turning her into a crying, stuttering mess, even though a part of her knew that she didn't need too many hormonal imbalances to act this way around Sasuke.

He nodded.

"I-it wasn't just the Sharingan they were trying to preserve."

Sakura saw his confusion, but as she progressively calmed down and continued to explain how doujutsu, due to its unique genetic makeup, only needed DNA from one parent to develop at a basal level, but the artificially designed chakra nature the Uchiha had been spawning required two very similar DNA samples, which they did not have, understanding began to dawn on Sasuke's face. She went into the possible repercussions and consequences of her conditions, which, due to her skill as a medic, were not severe save for the existing chances of her not being able to conceive other children (which she was pouring all her expertise into preventing but she had no real way of controlling), and finally fell silent in expectation of – she didn't know, really.

But she definitely didn't expect her husband to sigh and, with a crooked smile, to tell her: "I guess this is the benefit of my clan being gone."

Sakura spluttered. "W-what?! How can you ever say that?"

Sasuke simply laid back down on their combined bedrolls, urging her to slowly do the same, and when she tentatively interlocked their fingers in a search for reassurance, he gave her hand a squeeze.

"If my clan were still here, I would have married the perfect Uchiha lady and had the perfect Uchiha children."

Sakura recoiled, feeling the sting of tears again, but before she could say anything, Sasuke touched his forehead to hers, the way he always did whenever he said something of importance to their relationship – the way he'd allowed her to come on his journey, the way he'd told her he loved her that one precious time, the way he asked her to marry him, the way he always made love to her.

"But since they are not, I married an annoying crybaby who can smash bones with one finger and heal them with another, an imperfect, temperamental woman who loved me at my worst and deserves me at my best. And we will have an imperfect son or daughter who maybe won't have the best Sharingan or my clan's fire techniques, but they will be an Uchiha, they will be strong and I will love them more than you and me both."

No other words had needed to be said that night.'

"Your tea is getting cold," Sasuke's velvety voice snapped Sakura out of her reminiscing. Her tea had apparently already finished brewing and was indeed cooling in a ceramic cup beside her while her husband made himself busy by drying their clothes on some rope. The view was so picturesque and domestic at the same time that Sakura had to thank the gods Sasuke trusted her medical proficiency enough to allow her to keep traveling despite the complications.

"Thanks, love," she said gratefully, bringing the cup to her lips but making a mess of the liquid when she suddenly began to laugh, realizing that the only reason why Sasuke brought that unimportant fact to her attention was because he'd gone through so much trouble to satisfy her silly craving and now she had the stupid tea right beside her but she was too engrossed in her thoughts to pay any heed to it.

The fact that he deliberately stopped what he was doing to give her a very nonplussed look only made her laugh harder.

Sasuke trudged uphill with much less grace than he normally would.

Having to make time to earn quick money to sustain his pregnant wife who required a varied, nutritious diet, periodically relocating both of them to new, untraceable places and simply doing his best to be a supportive husband to a hormonal, constantly peeing, hungry and, in the thankfully rare occasions where a mirror was available, self-conscious woman was a full-time job and arguably more taxing than the shinobi duties he had performed all his life - in various ways and in periods of varying severity of mental illness, granted, but he'd exceled at them nonetheless.

He wasn't so sure he had exceled at this in the months he'd been doing it, nor that he would be able to complete this trial without premature aging.

Sometimes, distant sounds of roaring laughter filled his ears and the Uchiha had to push the mental image of Naruto rolling on the ground in hysteria at seeing him scrub urine out of various pieces of clothing (accidents happened), roam towns in the middle of the night on a quest to find coconut curry prawns or allow himself to be used as little more than an object to satisfy unforeseen nymphomaniacal needs.

Sasuke did all of this dutifully, without complaint, though, because he realized how lucky he and Sakura were to even be able to go through these moments that made them both want to scream now, but they would look back on fondly later.

In the past, the agony of having everything he loved taken away so cruelly had caused him to view everything related to his clan obtusely: his clan had had no fault, his clan had been noble, brave, legendary, superlative. He had never once questioned their strict policy on marriage or the fact that his own parents had been second degree cousins. After all, few Uchiha failed to awaken their Sharingan, and those who did were sterilized, no questions asked.

His and Itachi's kekkei genkai had thus been so potent that they had awakened it before even reaching the age of 10.

If someone had explained to him in his late teen years, when he'd been so deluded that he'd even reached the sickening conclusion it was his duty to preserve the Uchiha blood and select 'vessels' to carry on his family's line, that 'tainting' the blood (as the terminology went) would alter the potency and quality of the Sharingan… Sasuke likely would have stricken to kill.

However, upon clearing his soul of darkness, he was capable of accepting this as a possibility himself. He did not put the ring on Sakura's finger without being aware of it and, frankly… he did not care anymore. He had not lied to her. It was not blood that was important to him now.

The unpleasant surprise was a different one altogether: his clan had manipulated even its members' chakra development, and though he'd been reaping the benefits all his life, to an extent it was sickening. Not to mention that, based on his observations of Sakura's behavior, health and general wellbeing throughout the months she'd been carrying his child, Sasuke did not need to have any medical training to deduce that she was going through hell to keep his – their – baby safe and ensure their normal development due to this 'tradition'.

So he worked and cleaned and cooked and made use of his manhood.

To his surprise, upon entering the little clearing that had been their home for the past two weeks, Sasuke was met with the sight of a large bowl steaming as it heated on top of a small fire and rows of clothes – basically everything they weren't wearing – hanging up to dry, while his wife folded the dried ones on top of her big belly.

"Darling! You're back. Dinner's going to take a few more minutes. How was your day?"

And she was chatty. That had been out of the ordinary lately.

"What do you think you're doing."

Sasuke's voice had no infliction whatsoever, but he hadn't meant to sound rude. He just was not particularly fond of sudden changes – the more her pregnancy progressed, the more pain she was in. As such, recently, Sakura was either drinking tea and trying to relax after a long healing session or performing said healing session. The fact that she was up and about and looking like she wasn't in pain so unexpectedly seemed more foreboding than relieving.

"I'm not being a chore for once," she chipped, working on getting to her feet and obviously making a jab at herself for no reason other than having probably sat there alone with no pain to focus on for once and she ended up overthinking like she usually did.

Sasuke sighed. "Sit down. I'll take care of the rest of these."

"No, I can do it myself!"

"Tch. I said sit down."

She was already bending over to mix whatever concoction she was making and Sasuke truthfully wanted to rip his hairs out. She was due in two weeks, and since she had decided induced labor would be the safest option, they were supposed to return to Konoha in a week to sign her into the hospital, leave her in her master's care and do all the necessary preparations.

If the woman caused her water to break right there in the open with barely any civilization in gently-and-slowly-carry-her-because-you-can't-shock-her-belly distance, Sasuke was filing divorce.

He told her as much.

Sakura was not childish enough to take what he said seriously, but she still sat down with a mighty pout, crossing her arms and legs sloppily and deciding he was worthy of the silent treatment.

Now, even though most men are fully invested in their loved one's happiness and they are willing to put up with their quirks, sometimes the silent treatment is the blessing they need and don't know how to ask for.

It was definitely the case for Sasuke, who – mind you – found absolutely no joy in knowing that his wife, who seemed to finally be relieved of the uncomfortable ache she had been dealing with for months, was suddenly upset with him, but the last thing he needed on his plate was the baby to come out right then.

In the past, they'd always ensured they were at least close to a town or village in the unlikely, but possible event of premature labor. But that was before the rumor that Sakura was pregnant with his child spread and Sasuke's newfound paternal instincts went into overdrive.

He would have taken his wife back to Konoha the second she uttered the words 'pregnancy complications' if it weren't for the gnawing certainty that, if word of her pregnancy broke out, she would be targeted by the multitude of people out there who wanted the Sharingan but were too afraid to confront him personally.

If they returned to Konoha, he would be back on the mission rotation by law and thus unable to be near her at all times, and their village was as perfect a place for gossip as were excrements for flies. He was simply too paranoid.

Therefore, when he overheard a miscellaneous conversation between two civilians, pertaining to how someone-who-knew-someone-who-knew-someone told their mother's sister's cat that the mighty Uchiha clan might not be forever gone after all, Sasuke handled it in a characteristically Sasuke-esque manner.

He brought his wife uphill in the middle of nowhere and took it all upon himself to protect and feed her until it was time to go home.

Of course, Sakura knew none of this, so the Uchiha much preferred her annoyance to having to confess that, in the event of her going into unplanned labor, her best shot at a midwife was the neighboring squirrel.

He cursed fetuses for being physically unable to survive teleportation.

Understandably relieved that Sakura was staying put for the time being, Sasuke took a seat next to his wife and began folding the clothes lying at her side. Her head was turned and he did not glance her way anyway, but as the seconds passed, he began feeling more and more remorseful. The Uchiha was admittedly notorious for his temper, but not in the domestic department and not in the company of comrades; he could now wholeheartedly understand those who claimed marriage was one of the greatest challenges in life.

Steam rising from the pot alerted him that it would probably be an inspired idea to check on the food Sakura had been making, but his hand froze on the handle when he looked inside and he couldn't help turning towards his wife.

"You… put tomatoes in miso soup?"

Sakura seemed like she wanted to continue acting upset, but the bizarre mixture of emotions she encountered on Sasuke's face had her shoulders slumping in a shrug. "I just… You've been doing so many things for me and I wanted to thank you."

A dark eyebrow rose. "And saying 'thank you' seemed unoriginal?"

Sakura's flabby arms (yes, they were flabby, though Sasuke had been cured of suicidal thoughts long ago and he kept that information for himself) went up in frustration, as she clearly did not know how to respond to the onset of enquiries – it had seemed like a sweet thing to do!

"I don't know! You're always eating tomatoes with everything, so I figured you liked them, and there was a bag of them, and I thought… never mind."

Something tugged at Sasuke's lips. He didn't know what it was. Honestly, it could have been anything, from the stress and mental exhaustion to the way Sakura thought to mix two things that one would not mix in their wildest dreams instead of making anything else that had tomatoes in it, to the way this somehow made sense in her brain and how endearing it was that she did it anyway.

No matter what it was, Sasuke was holding his side and laughing freely, and despite being all too aware of how precious this moment was, Sakura burst into laughter too.

She took full advantage of his mood when he rejoined her on the ground, meaning that she very nearly pounced on him, and he had to deal with some very annoying sensations while she found her preferred cuddling position. Resigned, Sasuke finally placed his hand on her belly and his chin on her head and they were silent.

Though, by all means, it should have been a comforting silence and a moment of affection they were guilty of not having indulged in for a while, Sasuke's brain was in overdrive. He hadn't given serious thought to the possibility of the best medical ninja in the world going into labor just like that until he'd seen her waddling with her big belly left and right, and he was berating himself for it.

She might act like she had everything under control, and she seldom did not when it came to any medical aspect, but sometimes things just happened. He knew that better than anyone. He'd wanted to be able to control the entire situation so badly that he'd basically placed all his bets on Sakura's medical proficiency and that was unfair.

Sasuke would have to convince – bribe, threaten, kidnap – Kakashi to allow him off the roster for a few weeks, official pardon conditions be damned. They were going back to Konoha.

He didn't sugarcoat it either.

"We're going back home, Sakura."

The expected reaction didn't come. Instead, the rosette shifted and sighed heavily. "I agree completely," she said, nuzzling his neck and deliberately ignoring his surprise at her reply. "I… have something I need to tell you, Sasuke-kun, but you have to promise you won't divorce me first."

Now thoroughly confused, Sasuke very nearly rolled his eyes. Of course she would tease him about his earlier comment. And people wondered why he never joked.

Before he could urge her to say whatever was on her mind, he felt something wet and warm on his thigh and sighed at her dramatic little version of apologizing for her bladder giving out again, only slightly annoyed that she would rather spend time teasing him instead of getting up to go pee somewhere else.

He was already marked as her territory forever though, so he figured he wouldn't bother to get her off him now. "Never mind that. I need to tell you something too."

Sakura finally looked up at him and opened her mouth to say something, but he'd already begun his own statement, so they ended up speaking over each other.

"We are thirty miles away from the nearest village."

"My water just broke."

Many years later, when Uzumaki Naruto finally managed to get his best friend inebriated enough to share details of his journey with Sakura, Naruto asked:

"And then what did you do?!"

And Sasuke, a wiser, enlightened, experienced man, replied:

"I still don't know what I was thinking."

What Sasuke was thinking, in fact, was that he had three options: aimlessly run and potentially hurt Sakura, deliver the baby himself or try his luck with the aforementioned squirrel.

Two of these options were ludicrous and one was horrifying.

"Do you have a brain?!"

And there was that, too.

As Sakura berated him like she never had before, Sasuke stood upright, unmoving, and tried to think. He tried to think of any knowledge he had of the area, any possible salvation, anything that might have escaped his wit initially.

And, as rare as it was for the Uchiha to overlook things, a distant and repressed memory scratched the surface of his troubled mind, begging for a say. He normally blocked most memories of his tainted past, as they only brought remorse and shame, but the situation was so critical that he allowed the flashback to flow.

Realization hit, and it was all Sasuke could do to refrain from grimacing. No. That was the last place he wanted his child to be born in or his wife to be anywhere near, for that matter. There had to be something else.

Then Sakura gave a heartbreaking shriek, and they were off.

All in all, everything was unexpected.

The pregnancy was unexpected. The complications were unexpected. The labor was unexpected. Giving birth at Orochimaru's hideout was more than unexpected. Finding Karin there was unexpected.

The way she and Sakura almost instantly hit it off was unexpected too, but as Sakura stared at the little girl in her arms with such pure, immense love, Sasuke couldn't help but decide that nothing was to be regretted. The birth had been difficult, of course, overwhelmingly so for Karin's very limited medical expertise, but their baby was healthy, Sakura was healthy, and he was feeling too many emotions at once to be able to tell how he was, really.

For the first time, he looked at the infant's face. She was a brunette and definitely had his eyes too, but Sasuke saw his wife in her, as well as something wholly new, that had not been there before, that he was afraid of – but he couldn't live without from that moment on, he knew.

This was his daughter and he was a father.

"I'm a mother," Sakura whispered softly, thoughts in sync with his. She pried her eyes away from her daughter with difficulty to look at her husband, because she had wondered what his reaction would be for months – no, longer than that. For the longest time, he had lived alone, without a family, but now he finally had one again. Sakura couldn't imagine how that must feel.

Sasuke was frozen. The only indicator of what was going on inside of him was the emotion slowly accumulating in his eyes as he stared, and stared, but Sakura knew him well enough not to rush him. She kept outlining her child's fingers and toes and tiny nose and waited patiently.

Karin, not so much.

"Hey, ice prick!" Sasuke's hotheaded former teammate promptly smacked him on the back of his head, not realizing that her volume caused the child to give a little start in her mother's arms. "You're a dad! Aren't you going to say something?"

Sakura watched the short exchange with an expression of fond understanding. She could pinpoint the exact second Sasuke wanted to snap for having his private moment interrupted, as well as the moment he decided that Karin's intervention was not wholly misplaced, and perhaps he would have remained speechless had she not called him out on it. The rose-haired kunoichi smiled, happy to have found a friend in these unlikely conditions – Karin was obviously irritated on her behalf, since she would have been hurt if she were in Sakura's place and she naturally assumed it was the case.

The simple truth was that Sasuke could be understood only by few.

Karin seemed to grasp this when he didn't respond, instead leaning into his wife's side and allowing such a tender expression to cross his features that she automatically turned away to give them privacy.

Sasuke wordlessly slipped his arm beneath the tiny human he had created and lifted her from Sakura's arms with such care that she felt tears tingling the corners of her eyes. He held her to his chest and, for the first time in a long while, wished he weren't handicapped, so he could trace the girl's soft skin like he'd seen Sakura do earlier. It was maddening; as he held her, Sasuke felt his heart constrict and swell and he would say he was in pain, if it weren't for the sheer happiness consuming him.

His child. His family.

"Sarada," he said, merely a whisper that Sakura's ears barely caught.

She was wiping tears from her vividly green eyes as she watched her little family. "What was that, dear?"

"Name. Sarada," Sasuke choked more than he clarified, unable to form a coherent sentence but trusting his wife to understand. She always did.

He sat down beside her, unwilling to let go of his daughter just yet but wanting – needing – to somehow express what he was feeling, for he couldn't bear to hold it inside any longer.

Sakura's pale fingers stroking his dampened cheek made him realize he really wasn't.

"Sarada," she agreed, relishing the way her daughter's name flowed off her lips. She had not expected so much emotion out of Sasuke and, if she was honest, not even out of herself, but Sakura supposed that was silly. They had suffered too much, they had been too close to missing the chance to be together and even the peacefully asleep creature they both adored had made it difficult for this moment to happen.

Which, in turn, shifted Sakura's thoughts to a much less pleasant matter.

"Karin," she suddenly called out, and the redhead emerged from behind the wall she had politely retreated to. The seemingly modest, but infinitely meaningful picture that greeted her sight brought a melancholic smile to her lips. "Are the tests ready yet?"

The smile fell. She hadn't wanted to give them the news now, when they looked so happy.

"Yes… but I still believe you shouldn't trust me. It'd be better if you did them in Konoha with people who actually know what they're doing and…"

Karin trailed off. Sakura knew what her awkwardness symbolized, and it showed heartbreakingly.

Karin's first instinct was to rush across the room and squeeze her friend into a supportive hug, and she was a woman of impulse and intuition. Sakura weakly, but gratefully returned the gesture, sighing dejectedly and barely suppressing a sob, as understanding finally dawned on Sasuke and the man set to carefully lower his daughter into the pitiful excuse of a crib he and Karin had managed to put together.

Once the two separated, he shared a look with his former teammate, conveying how grateful he was for her help, but then he caught himself and remembered that Karin wasn't one to catch subtleties. So he gave her a warm smile and a nod of his head. "Thank you, Karin."

She smiled back at him as if he'd offered her a diamond and left.

Sakura was holding her head in her hands. Coming to terms with the joy of being the mother of a beautiful baby girl and then finding out she was sterile was… enough to severely disrupt one's natural flow of emotions. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Instead, she found herself blurting out absurdities.

"I'm so sorry, Sasuke-kun."

After making sure his daughter was as comfortable as she could be and sleeping just as soundly, he returned, made room for himself in the bed Sakura had been placed in and allowed her to rest her head on his chest. His fingers took to twirling a lock of rosy hair, something he knew relaxed her, and he hummed patiently.

"What are you apologizing for?"

"B-because…" Sakura started, but her throat constricted and she had to close her mouth to swallow a sob. "S-s-she's so beautiful… and…"

"Aa."

"But I c-can't give you…" she couldn't finish, and began to sob freely as Sasuke held her. He said nothing, allowing her to release all stress and exhaustion and what had to be months and months of unnecessary overthinking.

When Sakura's breathing finally eased into a more normal rhythm, Sasuke shifted them so they were lying down, facing each other, and his warm breath caressed her oversensitive skin as he spoke.

"Even if we still could, Sakura, I would need no more than we already have."

Emerald eyes widened. "What? But… Sasuke-kun, haven't you always wanted-?"

"To restore my clan?" he finished for her, but the reprimanding tone in his otherwise soft voice prompted Sakura to avert her gaze guiltily. "Can you stand?"

The question surprised her, but she nodded and, with his help, slowly rose and followed him to where Sarada was resting. Such a peaceful baby, she was.

As he did on occasions just because he wanted her to be happy, Sasuke wrapped his arm around her. "Do you think she's here because of that?"

Sakura had no response. She knew it wasn't just for that, she knew Sasuke loved her and was happy to be with her, but at the same time she had always believed it to be an unspoken requirement, though one she would have been happy to fulfill.

The guilt that showed on Sasuke's face in response to her silence caused Sakura to want to punch herself, but before she could say something – anything – his soft lips came in contact with her forehead and she didn't dare speak.

"She isn't," he muttered against her skin. "She exists because I love you, Sakura."

"Because you exist, Sarada."

"Papa, can I ask you something?"

Sasuke looked up from his meal to offer his attention to his daughter, who had decided to spend her day off at home with him while her mother worked her shift. They were enjoying a relaxing lunch together, and Sasuke was proud to testify that she took after him in regards to cooking skills.

He knew she was going to ask a question related to his past the moment she began fidgeting with the chopsticks.

"Why did you and Mama never have other children?" Sarada blurted out. She instantly disliked the way it sounded to her ears and sought to amend it. "I mean, it's not like I'm asking for a sibling at this age or anything like that, it's just that I know you were the last member of our clan and I was just wondering-"

Sasuke's chuckle interrupted her little nervous rant and he leaned over to affectionately stroke her cheek. "Because you are more than enough."

AN: The main message of this story is that pregnancy isn't as flower power as I feel it's portrayed in fiction, and that a real relationship maintains love even when it's not as exciting (and sometimes even gross).

People encounter complications very often and they don't get nearly enough representation, in my opinion, so I hope you enjoyed a more human take on SasuSaku. The fact that they only have one child (a girl, at that) has always been very meaningful to me and it really stands to support Sasuke's claim that she represents her parents' love for each other. It is maybe the most beautiful nuance the creator gave this pairing and such a powerful message that deserves to be honored.

Lastly, I've risen from the dead. I don't know why I thought I would 'outgrow' my obsession for fiction and passion for writing, and I congratulate whoever is still here. I forgot how therapeutic it was. Hopefully I will delight you more than my 13 to 15 year old self once I get some practice in me. All the love.