Infatuation, Chapter 5

But long before,
Having hurt,
I'll send the pain below,
I'll send the pain below.

Much like suffocating,
Much like suffocating,
Much like suffocating (I'll send the pain below),
Much like suffocating (I'll send the pain below).

I liked,
Having hurt,
So send the pain below,
So send the pain below (Much like suffocating) (I liked),
So send the pain below (Much like suffocating) (Having hurt),
So send the pain below (Much like suffocating),
So send the pain below (Much like suffocating),
So send the pain below.

- Send the Pain Below by Chevelle

Uchiha Itachi.

Sakura instinctively yanked her heavy traveler's cloak around her as tight as she could.

Sasuke's brother.

One of Konoha's most prized ninjas, Uchiha Itachi had been a god, literally almost worshipped. A child prodigy admired by many for his skill, intelligence, subtleness, and tactfulness. He became ANBU's youngest captain in the history of Konoha at the tender age of 13. He eventually had said slowly gone crazy slaughtering his entire clan, excluding Sasuke for some unknown, twisted reason.

Too bad, Itachi didn't finish him off, she thought. He would have saved me a lot of trouble.

According to the bingo book, over ten countries wanted his head for various crimes.

The correct term here was, had wanted.

Declared dead, in the latest battle between the Uchiha brothers, Uchiha Itachi was no longer alive. Sasuke, after destroying his brother's genjutsu and enabling and trapping his brother in his own genjutsu, he manipulated chakra, said to equal the amount it would take to use Chidori over five times, into his chokoto, and blew a hole the size of a crater into his brother's body, destroying over two vital organ systems.

There was no way a human could live after so much damage to the body, Sakura reasoned.

However, the stranger clearly indicated he was none other, than the notorious Uchiha Itachi.

Apparently, Sasuke didn't finish him off, she thought, slightly irritated. She was not in the mood right now to deal with an enemy ninja. Tired, hungry, smelly, and dirty, Sakura wanted nothing more but to go home. It was almost dawn, she was drunk and her next mission would be starting in a couple of hours. Besides, she needed to clean her weapons, which were already crusty with dried blood and gore, from the previous mission.

This wasn't the usual ninja either, which would make things complicated.

Then she snickered. Sasuke lavished in the admiration, praised for weeks on end, and deemed as a "hero", for finally relieving the world of his brother's troublesome some existence. However, it was released that he didn't quite yet wash his brother of his hands, he would be humiliated and she would be deemed as a martyr.

Sasuke had dreamed, eaten, and slept of killing his elder brother for revenge ever since that faithful day, Itachi decided it would be fruitful to rid Konoha of the Uchiha clan. In fact, Sasuke had lived to kill his brother. The public humiliation would be nothing compared to the distress, despair, mortification, shame, fury and indignation, Sasuke would suffer from his own ego at himself. It would probably kill him, combined with the enormous amount of guilty self-piety he'd wallow in. The thought of it, brought an warped grin to Sakura's face. He would deserve it, of course. Every single moment of it.

She had two choices, which both anyhow, would piss Sasuke off to hell exceptionally. He'd never forgive her and would hate her to death, which was what Sakura was aiming for. The bastard deserved feel bitch slapped by her.

She could either capture the Uchiha alive in battle and force feed him drugs so she would drag him back to Konoha for interrogation or she could corner the Uchiha and kill him right then and there, taking his head back to Konoha as a souvenir.

She quickly weighed the pros and cons of the situation. If she brought Itachi back to Konoha alive and drugged for interrogation, ROOT could gain some precious information from him before killing him. The reward for highly sensitive information would most likely be for her rank to rise and her salary to double.

But of course, Sasuke would not let any one in Konoha annihilate Itachi, except himself. He would no doubt for sure: make sure he would be doing the honors of exterminating his elder brother. Even though, he would still suffer humiliation both publically and privately, he would still be able to clear his conscience by making sure his elder brother is dead this time by his own hands.

No, cornering the man, ending it quickly, swiftly slitting his throat, and bring it back to Konoha as a prize would cause Sasuke so much more pain. It would literally a slap across the fact, to him. He'd be in pure agony, that he, the one who had vowed to avenge his clan, had not been the one do the honors.

Ooh, this was good. Sakura licked her dry, chapped, lips. In any situation, her rank number would be bumped, her status as a ninja skyrocketing. Her paycheck would be much, more, fatter, and she would literally be known as a god, for exterminating for the man who slaughtered the entire Uchiha clan and had survived the death his now powerful younger brother had planned out and dreamt of for years. The reward in the bingo book for the Uchiha had been 8 million ryo. If she brought his head back as a trophy, when he was rumored to be dead, she'd receive double that amount.

She nearly rubbed her hands together in glee, but instead she fumbled with her heavy, thick, traveler's cloak, reaching into the pockets, grabbing a fat stack of Ryo bills clumped together and nearly chucked it at the bar tender's head.

"That's for the bill. Have a good night." She managed to say, before disappearing out of the bar in a poof, missing the astonished look on old man's face.

Sakura sniffed the cold, crisp, winter, air. There were still faint traces of his chakra in the air and the path he had taken quickly formed in her mind. This was a very lucky night, as either, the Uchiha had been lazy or stupid to not cover his tracks or he simply wanted her to find him. Whatever way, he had been very, very, foolish to allow Sakura to discover his tracks.

Succumb and become another victim to death by my hand, Uchiha, she thought, as she gripped a shruiken, hidden in the numerous folds of her large traveler cloak.

Now, it was time to decide what weapon, strategy, and what technique, she should use. Her katana would be out of question, since it was already rusty with dried blood from her previous mission. She had plenty of weapons, such as senbons, shruikens, poisons, kunais and much more. However, this was no average opponent. Weapons would not help her much in this situation.

Ninjutsu? Taijutsu? Genjutsu? Which one? Sakura closed her eyes to clear her head.

Taijutsu would not be her best option since Itachi was a far-range fighter and it could probably make it very easy to evade of all of her attacks. He would have the upper hand.

Ninjutsu or Genjutu?

The two main ways of canceling genjutsu, the first way was to stop the flow of chakra or to cause severe pain to one self to cancel jutsu.

Her best bet would be use a mix of genjutsu and ninjutu.

Her heart quickened with each breath as she quickly raced through the allies.

Ah. There he was. His dark shrouded figure stood only a few meters away. He had been waiting for her.

Sakura exhaled sharply. It was time. Her nimble, quick, fingers made the signs of the basic Shunshin no Jutsu to raise her senses by a tenfold.

She disappeared in a flash, her figure now behind Itachi's dark, large, shrouded, mysterious figure, placing the sharp edge of a kunai against his neck.

"Uchiha Itachi. Former ANBU captain. Wanted traitor by Fire Country and twelve other countries, accused of treason, murder, embezzlement, torture, the slaughter of the Uchiha clan, and etc. I'm here to bring down your judgment. Konoha's wanted your body for many years now. You've escaped the clutches of death too many times." The words rolled smoothly and professionally off her tongue.

As soon as the words came out of her mouth, he quickly disappeared and reappeared.

"Sakura Haruno, member of the first squad of Root, the hush-hush, secret division, consisting of Root's strongest members. The team ready to comply to any preposition in order to protect Konoha." His dark, deep, velvety baritone voice, which was cold as ice at the same time, rumbled through out the small, dirty, alley.

He seized the hood of his dark, black, cloak and revealed his true face. The Uchiha was handsome indeed and looked very similar to his younger sibling. Long, black, silky, bangs framed his eyes. His hair, neatly tied back, was as dark as night, sleek, and flippy and his skin was colored a smooth, waxy, milky, pale white. He had a sharp, straight, nose and a sharp, proud jaw with flawless, blunt, angular features and high, razor-sharp cheekbones. His lips were not full but were not thin either, were a light salmon pink.

But his oval eyes fringed with thick, long, black, lashes, inset in his sunken face was the feature that drew you in the most, dark as murder's soul and bottomless and never ending as the pits of hell. The lack of sleep, stress, and years of insanity were visible, as lines under his eyes, starting from his nose and ending at his cheekbones marred his Adonis face, making the elder Uchiha look years older.

"The former pupil and apprentice to the one of the three great Sannin, Tsunade, one of the most respected and renowned ninjas in the category of Ninjutsu. Thought to continue her master's legacy, but she threw away everything, and became a legacy, a fallen angel from hell, slitting the throats those who wary away from the path of justice." His pink lips curled up in a smile. "You were acquainted with my younger brother, weren't you?"

"We know each other so let's skip the pleasantries or shall I say, the introductions, hm, Uchiha-san? Let's get this over with quick and fast." She managed to say coolly, ignoring his mention her relationship Sasuke.

The sky suddenly turned a deep red and crows surrounded Sakura, with their ominous black, beady, eyes and onyx feathers.

A genjutsu. She quickly dispelled it and created her own genjutsu, changing and warping Itachi's surroundings into a brightly-lit world filled with moving shapes and falling cherry blossom petals. The bright light should burn the retinas of his almost ruined eyes, causing pain, a distraction, which would cause Itachi to delay his immediate reaction to dispel the jutsu, buying Sakura time to attack.

She calculated the scenario perfectly, as the Elder Uchiha grimaced for a slight second. She attacked immediately. She immediately immbolized him and stabbed the elder Uchiha with a Kunai, inches away from his femoral artery. Blood immediately started oozing from the area in great amounts.

However, seconds later Sakura smirked. Sweet victory.

However, she was wrong, the second after she smirked, Itachi disappeared in a poof of smoke. It was a kage-bushin.

Her pink lips puckered down into a frown and her perfectly plucked pink brows became furrowed. This was going to be hard.

The Uchiha moved ultra-fast and he excelled in creating an illusion to escape from an attack at the last minute. Not to mention, she needed to fight this battle from far-range since most of his genjutsus were short range and she excelled at close-combat fighting; fighting from afar had been her weak spot. She had to be careful of his Demonic Illusion: Heaven and Earth change genjutsu on her, with that jutsu he could easily turn her genjutsu against her.

She could never look at his face that was the key of the fight. If she looked into his eyes, she would be finished, sucked into an illusion she would probably never be able to defeat. She could only tell where he was located and his attacks based on the movement of his feet and arms. She had to base her attacks on his movements.

The gears whirred in her brain and she thought of all the possible ways to fight the Uchiha. Then she remembered Chiyo-baasan's words. "There are plenty of ways to fight eye techniques. When it's one-on-one run away. When it's two-on-one, get him from the back. If it's one-on-one, you cannot win, run away. But if it's two-on-one, if one person get's caught in a genjutsu, the other one can attack from behind. And if you attack the user, the genjutsu would disappear. Of if an attack isn't possible, you can dispel the genjutsu by hitting your ally. One person needs to be the diversion and the rest will attack the Sharingan's blind spot from behind.

She could have easily defeated the Uchiha if it had been two-on-one, however that wasn't an option she now. She needed a distraction. Then it hit her, her distraction would have to be Kage-bushins. Multiple Kage Bushins would save her.

She would need to use a combination of Ninjutsu, Taijutsu, and Genjutsu, mixed in with medic nin techniques and her lethal strength by storing chakra in her arms and legs, in order to beat this revered yet feared fallen prodigy.

First, she would use medic nin techniques, to disable his muscles. Chakra no Mesa would be the first starting technique. She quickly created a number of kage-bushins in order to distract Itachi to get that extra seconds she needed to in order to create the right seals for the medic jutsu in order to charge her hands. She felt her fingers tingle in anticipation, as soon they would be able to slice and dice him with precision.

Faster than the speed of light, she began to move, her abs contracting, legs and legs pumping harder and faster in order to get to the target quickly: Itachi. As the kage-bushin attacked from the front and back, she was coming from the side. Her hands charged with chakra immediately began to strike him, the moment he spun around, ready to counter her attack. He dodged her moves and managed to use genjutsu to disappear. However, it was already too late. The chakra had already reached his body internally and muscles, veins, and organs were already damaged. She had managed to get his eye and an area of his heavy black cloak that swathed his entire body near his stomach was already wet with blood, indicating she had damaged either his intestines or hopefully his liver.

The attack had been successful but she couldn't get over her head. The attack had severely drained her chakra supply and there was no time to rest. She began to build chakra in her first, gracefully leaping up and dodging attacks in order to release the chakra at Itachi. Releasing her chakra at her surroundings, the sky was immediately full of debris, which would constrict the elder Uchiha's vision.

Wasting, no time, her nimble fingers promptly removed a kunai from the weapons pouch strapped to her knee. She spun it around on her dainty ring, appraising it while racing towards the Uchiha. The kunai was old and most defiantly rusty. Nevertheless, a weapon was still a weapon and it she didn't have enough time to grab another. She needed to attack. The discolored kunai gripped tightly in her fist, she stabbed the elder Uchiha's hand as he was dodging debris; slicing the bone in his thumb.

The elder Uchiha did not even grimace; he began to create another genjutsu for Sakura to get stick in.

Dispelling the genjutsu, she moved her hands swiftly; it was impossible for the human eye to catch a glimpse of even her fingers moving. She formed the seal of the kage bushin no jutsu. Seven identical Sakuras appeared.

Two of the Sakura kage-bushin immediately distracted Itachi from the front; they began to build up chakra in their fists and started to release it. Chakra oozed out and crackled from their fists, as the bushins raced towards Itachi, their target, attempting to throw punches at him.

Simultaneously, Sakura quickly created genjutsu the moment the bushins were ready to attack and she was getting ready to attack him from the back the moment he dodged the attack.

Without question, Itachi quickly dodged their attacks. He wasn't fooled, he knew if he suffered even a poke from one of the bushins, it would be deadly. Sakura's fatal strength from her excellent ability of chakra control had gained her renewed fame across all the hidden villages and lands. The immerse amount of strength she gained from storing chakra had one of the many amazing ninja characteristics that made her legendary. It was almost unheard of a kunoichi who had such tremendous extent of strength.

She appeared directly behind him and she thrust a deadly senbon into his lumbar portion of his spine. Blood immediately gushed the area and she caught a glimpse of shattered bone. The attack also probably severed nerves, meaning the Uchiha would be feeling great pain.

The edges of her lips twitched slightly into a smile. She had got a hit. Maybe it was a sign of victory. She shouldn't get her hopes too high.

She saw a flash of pain expressed on the normally stony face of the elder Uchiha for a fleeting second, before his face reverted to the usual emotionless expression.

Then she realized her mistake. The main rule against fighting an Uchiha was never to stare them in the face.

It can't be…

The elder Uchiha slowly opened his closed eyes, penetrating her with his eerie blood-red sharingan eyes and the tomoe in his eye were spinning ominously.

Suddenly, the atmosphere was changing and everything was swirling around her.

The moment his eyes fully opened, the surroundings immediately changed into the dire burgundy sky with dreary ink-black stained clouds and a foreboding crimson sun hung in the sky.

Tsukuyomi.

She had only heard rumors and warnings about this elder Uchiha's amazing and blood curling jutsu. The stories were enough to send chills up your spine for hours. The victims of this jutsu were said to never be the same afterwards. It was impossible to recover both mentally and physically. Tsukuyomi broke a shinobi's spirit in every way possible. Tsukuyomi was jutsu enabling the user to force the vicim to endure torture in the cruelest ways both mentally and physically for what seemed an eternity or an endless amount of time in this malefic world in actuality what was only a couple of minutes. In the world of Tsukuyomi, the elder Uchiha controlled time and space. A wound may seem real in Tsukuyomi, although it wasn't, the pain was still real.

Kakashi had been the only victim to recover physically and mentally for Tsukuyomi. Sakura remembered how frail and thin he had looked in the hospital after fighting Itachi. Dark rings circled his blood-shot wide eyes, and new wrinkles had appeared on his face, making him look years older. A thick stubble of covered his waxy, pale, face, which was very unusual, since he was anal about being very hygienic. His smooth, thin, pink lips were cracked, puffy, and bleeding and his usually proud, aristocratic, straight, nose was crooked and broken. He was unable to pronounce words, let alone speak sentences. His voice was hoarse, raw, and cracked.

Kakashi had always been a proud, honest, handsome, man with who took pride his honor and dignity. To him, the village always came first. He took great pride in being a ninja. He'd do anything in order protect those who were precious to him.

But during that time period, after he endured the attack of Tsukuyomi, he was a unresponsive, vegetative state for weeks. The sensei, the man, who she had greatly admired, had seemed to diminish in those weeks. She watched in horror by his bedside, as he threw fits like a small toddler, screaming about the demons in his mind and the things he had done. He could no longer even attempt to do everyday things by himself and always needed assistance in eating, walking, and even going to the bathroom.

It was like he was now an entirely different man.

That was not how anyone should ever see his or her sensei or someone they admire in a state like that. From seeing her sensei in such a state, Sakura learned something important: Even the strongest man has his weakness. Everyone has a weakness and Sakura discovered that once you find a person's weak point and exploit it, that person would always crumble. She had learned this the hard way, when Sasuke broke her heart the day he announced his engagement to Karin.

After, that she had managed cut off and remove obvious weakness she had. Before, the old Sakura had been naïve, innocent, convinced that no one would try to hurt her and had plenty of weaknesses. The new Sakura had tried to remove herself from anyone or anything that was considered a "weakness". She refused to crumble again and to be exploited again. It was simpler to live a life with all ties cut off, life was less complex and it had become easier to be a ninja and to abide to shinobi rule 25: never to show any emotion. It was her winning card in a battle, she had nothing to loose, no weaknesses to be exploited. Having no weaknesses, it was one of the things that had brought her so far.

She dug her fingernails into her sweaty palms, until she drew blood. She took a deep breath and closed to her eyes. There was nothing she could do except endure. She had nothing to lose. She braced her self and opened her eyes.

She found herself bound to a black cross. Am I going to be crucified?, she thought as she stared up at the endless crimson sky. The elder Uchiha appeared immediately in front of her, in an entirely odd black silhouette. "I wonder how long you can last, Sakura-san, since you do not posses the sharingan or a blood line limit. This is the end." His words echoed through the strange world. He held a black, sharp, kantana and raised it, immediately thrusting it into in an area near her right hip. She remained stoic, as felt the thousands signals of pain her brain sent out. She refused to give him what he wanted: a sign that she was in pain.

The wound quickly disappeared, shrinking into a tiny speck before there was nothing. Soon, there were multiple clones surrounding the cross, revealing kantanas from their black cloaks and all of them began take turns, piercing her with the kantanas, like mindless robots.

The mental pain her brain was enduring was horrendous; her body was confused as the wounds began to disappear without a single trace. The intense amounts of pain she was feeling were getting worst. There was no way to voice her pain except emotionally, she couldn't even grab the ends of the cross. Her hands and feet hung uselessly; bound to the cross. Even with feeling so much pain, Sakura refused to even sweat or show an ounce of pain she was feeling.

"So, far, I have been stabbing you for approximately 124 hours. I was planning to continue for another 24 hours until you were dead. However, it seems, Sakura-san, this is children's play for you…" Itachi's voice rang in her ear drums. "Perhaps, you would enjoy this better?..."

The scene changed and Sakura was now immobilized, her long lean thin body stretched out downwards and chained to a long board, face-first, her hands and feet bound by chains. She wasn't quite sure what kind of torture this was, since there was so many different types of forms of torture that included the victim to be immobilized in such a way. Suddenly, Itachi hovered over her and began to pour large amounts of water over on top of her head, the water immediately went into her mouth and nasal passages, making it impossible for her to breathe. She immediately began to gag in order to try to get the water out of her breathing passages but it was to no avail since the water constantly poured down on her. There was no opportunity for her to take a breath and she closed her eyes as she felt the water burning her nasal passages and lungs. He was using the water torture technique of water boarding, to create a drowning experience to cause asphyxia. The key was to not to choke and to believe she wasn't drowning and she began to concentrate her mind of meditation in order to relax her mental state. It wasn't easy as the pain was immerse, as it felt like her lungs were going to burst.

Finally, after what it seemed like days, reality returned. She felt the hard, cold, gritty, ground underneath her and soaked up scene around her and accessed the damage to her body. The red, crimson, liquid was leaking from everywhere unto her tiny, porcelain hands. Her own blood. Half of her fingernails were ripped off, a bloody, gorey, mess. Nearly fifty bones in her body were broken, some felt so damn painful, she would't be surprised if they were shattered. The kunai, which was slick with blood – she wasn't sure if it was sure blood or if it was the Uchiha's blood, slid out of her uninjured hand.

She was in disbelief. She had never spilled this much of her own blood in months. If she did not return from Konoha soon, she would die from blood loss.

Her knees were weak as they began to buckle and her limbs and ached. Her entire body writhed in agony as it if was being torn in two from the affliction she was in. Her mind screamed in anguish and distress, and her head pounded. Snapshots, shards, of old memories began to flash through her head. Black and white blurry spots and bright circles of light plagued her sight. It felt like her heart was having a heart attack, as if something was squeezing it very painfully until it could burst. Her heart rate was irregular, above 200. It felt like every single fiber of her existence was being shocked by electricity over and over again.

Her travel's cloak was barely a bunch of rags now, heavily soaked in her own blood.

However, Itachi looked ten times worst. Blood trickled down the masculine bulge of his adam's apple, from his mouth and he was weakly coughing up blood almost every ten seconds. Nearly every organ in his body was crushed from the impact of Sakura's attacks. His left hand was missing two digits, bleeding profusely and Sakura would faintly see her rusty kantana had not done the job cleanly and that bits of bone poked out from the bloody stumps that were formerly his thumb and his index finger. His left eyelid was slit, puffy and red, bleeding into his already nearly blind eyes.

However, his heavy traveler's cloak wasn't damaged as badly, with only tears and holes everywhere. With his hands trembling, he still managed to move away the left side of the cloak, with a half-smirk on his face.

Sakura gasped. There was hole the size of his fist on his right side body, exactly after the ribs. The hole looked a quarter healed, a thin silvery membrane covered the very edges, but it appeared to be oozing a mixture of blood and weeping a yellowish looking liquid which was probably pus. Not to mention, reddish, pulp-ish like, gore was slowly escaping from the hole. The skin around the hole was red, hot, and appeared inflamed and large, red, angry blisters marred his pale skin nearby the wound.

Although, his entire body was tremble and Sakura could guess how much pain he was in, the elder Uchiha opened his mouth to speak. Surprisingly enough, the man could still perfectly articulate his words with the eloquence he had before, not showing a once of pain.

"This is the result of the wound Sasuke gave me with the kantana of his infused with his chidori. I barely managed to survive. I managed to reconstruct one last powerful genjutsu for Sasuke to believe I was dead, to give myself enough time to escape from the scene. He missed my heart by minor inches. For the last year, I have been on run and I've cut all my ties with Akatsuki in order for others not to become suspicious. I've encountered many medic-nins but none could seem to fully heal the wound, let alone at least 20 percent of it. I've been hanging on by the edge and I will only have a few meager months to live if I do not heal the wound completely. I will die.

However, due to the recent wounds you've inflicted on me, Sakura-san, I will die much, much, sooner."

His eyes were bloodshot and then rolled in the back of his head. "However, I still have enough strength to cast Amaratsu with Mangekyo Sharingan. The entire area will envelope in flames, and I will die. So, will you, Sakura-san. You too, are fatally injured and will not have enough time to escape. I have deal to offer to you. If you want to live, you will heal the wound, Sasuke inflicted on me. Otherwise, you and I, can burn in the black flames of hell, bathing in Amaratsu's fury for eternity."

Tricky bastard. Her choices included either, to relinquish her claim to the bounty on his head and be deemed as a traitor to Konoha or death. There was no easy way out of this situation. Her choice needed to be wise. This would be no quick decision. It was like, choosing one door, out of two doors, one door was the right door and the other would be leading to immediate death.

If she chose to heal him, she would eventually be found by Konoha and execution with out a trial, would be her immediate sentence. She would forever have the stigma of a traitor branded on her name, even after her death.

She owed nothing to Konoha. She didn't deserve to be a slave to Konoha. What had Konoha done for her? Konoha caused her nothing but nauseous guilt, pain, sadness, and anger and in return, she had given Konoha, her honor, her duty, her life literally, and her virginity. She was a social outcast and the residents hated her. Her existence in Konoha made worth nothing.

It had been a very long time, since she had felt any love towards Konoha.

There was no way to escape. Her chakra was very, very, low. Her head was still spinning, from when he had casted Tsukuyomi. Besides if she ran, she would be a dog running with it's tail behind it's legs. A shinobi always fights until he/she wins or until death was a popular quote from the shinobi handbook.

If she chose death, it would be a very, very, painful death. She had heard rumors of men dying of Amaratsu and it wasn't pleasant. It would be honorable, dying for Konoha. However, deep down in her heart, she knew it wasn't something she wanted to do. She loathed Konoha for the suffering it had caused her.

She remained silent, silently thinking through all of her options.

"Hurry, Sakura-san. You don't have much time to decide. Please, make the choice now." His voice sharp, as he tore a piece from his travel's cloak, applying pressure with it to the fatal wound under his ribs, trying to stanch the gushing flow of blond erupting from it. In seconds, the cloth, heavy with dripping blood, was stained a crimson red.

"I choose to live. I shall heal your wounds." Sakura said quietly. God forbid, she hoped she had made the right decision.

"Very well, Sakura-san. I shall keep my word. However, we have to decide on some terms. Please don't decide to try anything such as disclosing the information I just told you or slitting my throat in the dark of the night, while I'm sleeping. I will know if you try something. Always remember, Sakura-san, even though you might have enough anger and hatred in you unlike my brother, I am stronger than you. It may not seem like it, but I have some tricks up my sleeves. I will keep my word as long as you keep your word. Do you agree to these terms?"

"I accept these terms. I have no qualms." Sakura managed to say coolly, with out a quiver in her voice, tightly clutching her firsts.

"Then the deal's sealed." She watched, hypnotized, as dark, cerise, blood slowly dripped from his pink, lips.

That was her last thought before she felt an excruciating amount of pain like her skull was being crack in half and her surrounds swirled before her, slowly disappearing before her.

End of Chapter Five.

Playlist:

Butterfly by Crazytown

Higher by Creed

Bodies by Drowning Pool

Sour Girl – Stone Temple Pilots

Liar Liar (Burn in Hell) – The Used

A/N – I know I haven't updated in some time. I was so busy with finals after April and things went downhill from there for a short time. I was piled with shit and I absolutely struggled with school, trying to balance out work at the same time. Now, it's summer and I'm trying to get back on track with all my fics. I'm sorry if I haven't replied and I'm so sorry and now I am able to reply again so ask and request all you want right now. I apologize for any grammatical or spelling errors since I'm in need of a BETA again. Anyways, I'm wishing all of you a happy fourth of July!

Sincerely,

MagenKyotenChiten.