Not Beta-ed

Word Count: 4,820 words

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Sakura's thoughts: 'Are like this'

Inner Sakura's thoughts: 'Are like this, yah dig?'

Normal Writing: is like this.

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Mood ring color chart meanings:

Black: tense, nervous, harassed, overworked.

"When dealing with the insane,

the best method is to pretend to be sane."

-Hermann Hesse

.o.O.o.

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Wednesdays were supposed to be her days off. Yet, Sakura found herself being woken at 2:53 in the morning to the soft tapping of an ANBU officer at her window.

Sitting up slowly, Sakura released the kunai she had clutched instinctively beneath her pillow before lazily pushing off her comforter and blankets and swinging her legs over the bed to delicately set her feet upon the ground. Silently she stood, simultaneously pulling down on her large t-shirt before padding over to the window.

Flipping the small latch and forming a few quick hand seals, Sakura released the genjutsu she placed upon the window before opening it and waiting silently for the ANBU to speak.

"Sorry to disturb you Haruno-san, but two ANBU squads were ambushed while returning home from an S-ranked mission," he spoke tonelessly, concealing his identity, yet his long dark brown hair gave him away as Hyuuga Neji.

"Neither Tsunade-sama or Shizune-san is available at the current moment," he continued, "None of the medic-nin on staff have the level of expertise needed - report to the hospital as soon as possible Haruno-san."

Nodding Sakura gave her agreement, and with his message delivered the ANBU flickered away returning to his normal duties.

Letting out a tired sigh, Sakura quickly set about to getting ready. Snapping the window shut, she reached down to the hem of her large shirt before pulling it over her head and tossing it into the hamper.

Briskly walking over towards her dresser, Sakura pulled out a white camisole top and pulled it over her head before pulling open the next drawer and grabbing her spandex like shorts.

Knowing that she would be putting on scrubs as soon as she was in the hospital, Sakura didn't bother putting on anything else besides her ninja sandals and medic coat, before she bolted down the stars and grabbed her keys. Hurrying out the front door, Sakura sprinted to the hospital two blocks away without the aid of chakra.

'What the hell are Tsunade-shishu and Shizune doing?' inner Sakura grumbled while angrily crossing her hands across her chest and tapping her other foot.

Sakura just shrugged, 'Tsunade is probably hiding somewhere and sleeping… while Shizune is systematically looking for her. Both will more than likely be found after I finish these surgeries.'

Inner Sakura groaned loudly before repeatedly hitting herself on the head.

'Stop that.'

Sakura snapped before forcing her inner more towards the back of her mind, 'It's distracting.'

Entering the hospital, Sakura frowned darkly. The staff had been reduced to pathetically running around like chickens with their heads cut off, and the nurses who had some relations to the ANBU who were just sprawled across gurneys in the waiting rooms sat in corners weeping.

'Hasn't it been only 4 hours since we were let off of duty?' Inner Sakura asked surprised at the drastic change.

'Yes, and Shizune's staff has taken over.' Sakura answered her inner with a clipped and agitated tone.

Scanning over the ANBU Sakura noticed the pools of blood that had formed beneath the gurneys where men were sprawled, and she growled before quickly barking out orders. If no one got their shit together soon, these men were going to die.

"I want each of these ANBU prepped for the ER!" Sakura shouted, causing the entire staff to give her their undivided attention while she made her way to the sterilizing station.

"Bring them in depending upon the severities of their injuries and the amount of blood lost. Those who are waiting for surgery need their wounds compressed, cleaned and they need to be given more blood so they don't die of blood lost. Got that?"

Everyone nodded yet when they didn't move immediately Sakura snarled, "Go, now!"

The man who was first brought to her was almost hardly recognizable. Blood was everywhere and each of his injuries were still seeping. There was a large gaping gash from his clavicle to his hip and each of the ribs that the weapon had passed had cleanly cut them in half. Protruding from his left thigh was his thigh bone, and each of his arms were pulled from the sockets.

'Oh kami-sama this is going to be a long morning,' Inner Sakura groaned before silencing herself, allowing Sakura to concentrate.

Standing alone in the ER still in her scrubs and practically covered in blood, Sakura let out a tired sigh. Silently she made her way towards the showers not even bothering to stop at the cleaning station and waste her time.

'We did well today,' inner Sakura grinned.

'I should still be sleeping right at this moment,' was Sakura's only response.

Entering the female locker room, Sakura quickly stripped off her scrubs before putting them in the trash. Her clothes managed to stay clean, so when Sakura took them off she carefully folded them before jumping strait into a shower and hitting a button causing the water to sprout out. The shampoo the hospital offered smelled too clean, and Sakura wrinkled her nose in distaste before she caved and used it.

When she finished her shower, Sakura quickly dried and put her clothes back on before heading to the staff conference hall where she told everyone to meet her. Just liked she planned; her shower had given everyone enough time to finish their cleanup duties and cram themselves inside the hall.

Quickly walking towards the head of the large round table, Sakura stood silently before the hospitals back up staff and she allowed her displeasure to show upon her face.

They all worked under Shizune's shift, and Sakura never really had to work with any of them until today – and to put it simply she was very disappointed. Placing her palms flat upon the desk she leaned forward and simply stared at them all until they fidgeted.

"The reason I called this meeting should be obvious." Sakura spoke, her voice low and she made not attempt to make it friendly.

"The way the hospital conducted itself tonight was appalling. If the guard ANBU who had brought these men to the hospital hadn't fetched me immediately those men would have died." She paused and glared at them all before correcting her stance and standing tall with her hands crossed over her chest.

"Would you like to guess why they would have died? No… I'll tell you. It's because you all couldn't operate and properly compress and clean their wounds, or hook them up to an IV and give them blood. Just because Shizune or Tsunade had stepped out, you suddenly forgot how the hell to do your jobs! I shall leave a report for Tsunade-shishu and you all shall be re-evaluated. Those who don't get fired will have to go through training once more."

Scowling at them all once more, Sakura left the slightly crowded room to head home and get ready for training with team seven.

"What the hell is her problem?" Haru Takahio, a new nurse, grumbled while glaring after Sakura.

Cho, a resident nurse under Sakura's tutelage, glared at Haru before crossing her arms angrily across her chest and tapping her foot agitatedly.

"Oh I don't know… she just finished a 30 hour shift before she was let off for her day off and then she has to wake up 4 hours later after she was released to heal 2 critically wounded ANBU squads to find that the hospital staff couldn't handle their duties! I'd be pissed too."

Huffing and glaring at Haru, Cho left the conference room to tend to her patients muttering darkly under her breath as she passed Haru, "I hope you get laid off..."

Once she was out of the hospital, Sakura forced herself to take a deep, calming breath. The slightly established calmness didn't last long, and Sakura soon found herself glaring at anything and everything along the walk home.

Taking off her coat after five minutes of walking, Sakura murmured curses to the sun under her breath for creating heat, and hurried to reach her cool apartment.

Yet when she reached her apartment, Sakura swore loudly when she realized she forgot to turn on her air conditioning that morning before she left for the hospital.

Cranking up her AC, Sakura stormed into the kitchen and turned on the stove and put a pot on the burner for the quickest meal she could make – ramen noodles. Grabbing a measuring cup, she quickly eyeballed the amount of water she would need before dumping it into the pan and then grabbing two packets of ramen and tossing them onto the counter by the stove.

Deciding she'd have enough time to repaint her nails while the water came to a boil, Sakura headed upstairs and plopped herself in front of her vanity. Grabbing a ponytail holder she placed her hair up into a messy bun before she began to systematically remove her old nail polish, a pretty pastel pink. Glancing at the numerous bottles of nail polish she had, Sakura plucked up the one she found most appealing at the moment – black.

Neatly she put on two coats of the dark color before she went over it with a quick drying clear coat. Blowing on her nails, she gingerly grabbed her kunai pouch and tucked it under her arm before heading downstairs to finish making her lunch and to catch a quick little nap before she had to go to practice.

'Why the hell can't we have practice at 10 on our days off?' Sakura thought to herself angrily as she glared at the clock.

'I shouldn't be having lunch at six in the morning.'

Inner Sakura just shrugged, 'Because our teammates are stupid.'

'I guess you're right.' Sakura agreed, still frowning.

By the time she finished eating; Sakura only had enough time to take a ten minute nap. Sprinting upstairs she set her alarm and was out cold the moment she hit the sheets.

Yet, when the alarm went off Sakura found herself even more tired an agitated than she was before she had settled down. Cursing loudly Sakura rubbed at her eyes before reluctantly leaving the warmth of her bed to head to practice.

Going willingly was always less troublesome than having Naruto hunt her down.

When she neared the bridge, Sakura was listing each an every way to kill a man without leaving any traces behind while cursing Wednesdays and old people with a vengeance.

'Just who does that old lady think she is telling us that we need to get laid?!' Inner Sakura squawked indignantly.

'I mean seriously… "You'd be so much less tense if you just got yourself a boyfriend or some good sex!"' inner Sakura mimicked, ' … why is an old lady giving out sex advice anyway?!'

Sakura just shrugged, 'I don't even want to think about it.'

'Yes but it's like a train wreck! You don't want to but you can't help it!!' Inner Sakura roared while rolling around with her hands over her eyes.

'Make the mental images go away!'

Shaking her head at her psychotic inner, Sakura decided the best way to get the images to go away was to bully Inner Sakura into the back of her mind where she could deal with the horrible mental images alone.

Inner Sakura's pained scream of 'The horror! The horror!' made Sakura grin wickedly, causing villagers in the street to slowly inch away from the frightening konoichi.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto screeched when Sakura finally reached the bridge. "I was just about to go looking you!"

Sakura just nodded waving him off and watched as he barreled towards her to give what Naruto believed was a hug, while normal people thought of it more along the lines of an attack or tackle. When he was just about to leap at her, Sakura ducked down and he flew over her and right into the river.

When he surfaced Naruto whined, "Why did you do that Sakura-chan!?"

Not feeling in the mood to answer or speak to anyone remotely happy, Sakura stomped over towards a dead tree stump and sat down, crossing her legs and attempting to meditate to get some piece of mind. Or at least get the mental image of some old lady getting it on out of her head.

Yet, she wasn't granted much peace because soon she felt the stares of her other two teammates upon her. Slowly opening her eyes, Sakura glanced at both of them.

Sai was sitting up in the tree and must have finished what he had been sketching because he closed his book and was staring at her intently.

Sasuke was leaning against the railing and had focused his attention upon her with one eyebrow cocked up as if asking 'What the hell is the matter with you?'

Since she didn't feel like answering or talking to two emotionally constipated males, Sakura briefly cast a glance to make sure Naruto was still swimming before she closed her eyes and went back to attempting to ignore the world.

When things became too quiet, Sakura realized Naruto was up to something. Snapping open her eyes, Sakura was about to jump out of the way but a hand clamped upon her shoulder before she could even leave the ground, and a very wet Naruto barreled into her.

"Good morning!" Kakashi chirped before glancing quizzically at the heap of his teammates upon the ground his hand still outstretched where it had rested upon Sakura's shoulder.

"Naruto," Sakura spoke, her voice dangerously low and restrained.

"You have three seconds to get off me before something horrible happens to you."

Sputtering apologies, Naruto quickly leapt off her and offered his hand to help pull her up.

"Sorry Sakura-chan!" Naruto whined.

Glaring at him, she ignored his offer to help and stood up herself. Crossing her arms across her chest and ignoring the fact that she was wet and wearing a white shirt, Sakura turned her temper towards Kakashi knowing that she'd kill the blonde if she wasn't careful.

"What are we doing today?"

Kakashi too arched his eyebrows like Sasuke had when he received a bit of her barely restrained temper, but shrugged in answer before he actually spoke, "Just the usual. The boys are probably going to spar and you can join if you want to. Or, you can do your yoga stuff you like to do."

Sakura growled, pissed that she could be sleeping but had to do yoga, before nodding and making her way towards their favored training ground.

"What's up with her?" Naruto whispered to the other males of team seven, glancing nervously at Sakura's back as she stormed away.

"I think she's on her period," Sai grunted bluntly.

"I think she needs to get laid," Kakashi grimaced before chuckling and shaking his head, looking pointedly at Sasuke. Sasuke ignored him.

"I think Sakura-chan was abducted by aliens and that is really an imposter!" Naruto shouted.

Sasuke scoffed, "She's tired. Look at her eyes, dobe."

Everyone shrugged, deciding that Sasuke's observation was the most likely to be accurate and set off following Sakura.

"I still think she needs to get laid… and get a day off or something," Kakashi spoke from behind his favorite porn novel.

"She hasn't had a vacation since two years ago," Sai supplied from behind his own copy of Icha Icha he had bought for research on human interactions.

Naruto quickly latched onto the idea. "Hey! We should go to Tsunade-baa-chan and make her give Sakura a nice, long vacation!"

Each man of team seven grunted deciding they'd do that right after practice, as long as Sakura didn't kill them first.

When they found her they had to concentrate very hard on not drooling or getting bloody noses. Sakura was going through her customary routine of sun salutation poses yet something about today was different… like the wet white shirt that clung to her body and revealed her tan chest bindings, the light sheen of sweat across her body, or the fact that she was wearing far less clothing than conservative Sakura usually tended to wear.

When she felt their stares upon her, Sakura cracked open an eye and glared at them all.

"What?" she grumbled confused as to why they were all standing in a line just staring at her.

Sai was the first to answer, "Nothing Ugly, just making sure you didn't die."

Sasuke and Kakashi visibly flinched and silently inched away from the very, very socially stupid man who was bound to have something broken across his head.

Sakura just glared and calmly lifted up her right hand, giving him a finger that clearly stated something along the lines of 'fuck you.'

The fact that she didn't murder Sai put Kakashi and Sasuke on edge, and each man decided to make a point of avoiding the poor future victim of Sakura's wrath.

'Flipping Sai off felt really good.' Inner Sakura grinned.

Sakura just grunted, glaring at each of her teammates again before she resumed attempting to calm herself and gain some flipping 'inner peace'.

Once she had finished as much yoga as she felt capable of doing without collapsing from exhaustion, Sakura sat down and leant against a tree to watch the boys practice.

It was nicer in the shade and Sakura almost thought the day was getting better until she heard the insane giggling of Sasuke's fan girls behind her. Deciding to ignore them, Sakura kept her eyes closed and tried to keep her inner peace by fighting against the sudden anger blooming within her.

It was almost working until they ruined it by opening their big mouths and talking.

"Kami-sama, that Haruno girl is so pathetic. She's not even practicing!"

"Do you see her shirt? It's white, and it's almost see-through!"

"What a slut!"

"How did she even get on team seven anyways?"

"She sucks… she doesn't deserve to be on Sasuke-kun's team!"

'It's one thing for them to call me a whore or slut…' Sakura thought viciously, 'I can handle that… But once you imply that I'm weak – those bitches are going down.'

'Shannaro! Teach those bitches who really earned her place among team seven!'

Slowly standing Sakura gently brushed off any dust or grass that might have stuck to her clothing before masking her chakra and calmly climbing up into the tree she had been resting on while the girls were distracted.

Silently she leapt from branch to branch until she crouched over them in the tree they were hiding behind and silently she formed hand seals for an advanced genjutsu that she trapped all of them in. Grinning to herself she silently made her way back to the boys, a wicked smirk across her face.

Not even minutes later, the sounds of pathetic screams resounded across the entire training grounds and Sakura watched with a smile upon her face when the group of girls blindly ran by and into the village where they were bound to make fools of themselves, or at least until someone would eventually take pity upon them and attempt to remove the nasty genjutsu.

Kakashi glanced down at her, noticing her wicked smile, before asking a quiet, "Do I even want to know?"

Sakura just shook her head, "No. Unless you ever imply that I'm weak – then the wrath of hell and Haruno Sakura will be after you."

Kakashi arched his eyebrows and nodded, wisely choosing to keep quiet and not anger the temperamental konoichi before him.

Glancing over at the boys, Sakura noticed that they were no longer sparing and were instead sprawled across the ground panting heavily with weapons strewn about them.

"Done with practice?" Sakura asked, still smirking wickedly as she scanned each of them for injuries. When she found none Sakura plopped down upon the ground and began pulling out blades of grass.

"Yeah Sakura-chan," Naruto smiled awkwardly.

"Want to go get some ramen?" Naruto smiled.

Sakura shook her head no, "I'm going to go home and get some sleep."

"Want one of us to walk you home?" Kakashi offered, tucking his book away just incase Sakura felt the need to vent her anger upon it.

She shook her head no again, "No. I'm fine."

"Are you sure, ugly?" Sai piped up smiling.

Sakura smiled back at him before reaching over and hitting him atop his head, "Call me ugly and I'll castrate you before you can say u-g-l-y."

Sai's eyes widened slightly and he nodded while rubbing at the tender spot she created upon his head, inching away slightly with his left hand protectively covering his crotch.

When everyone stood to go their separate ways, Sakura to her house and the rest to the ramen stand, Sasuke hung behind a bit with Sakura.

"Sasuke-teme!" Naruto shouted when he realized that Sasuke wasn't with him.

"What are you doing? We're going to Ichiraku!"

Sasuke shook his head, "I'm walking Sakura home."

Both Naruto and Sakura frowned until Sasuke sent Sakura an 'if-I-eat-any-more-ramen-I'll-die' look.

Rolling her eyes, Sakura nodded at Naruto feeling nice enough to spar her teammate from being forced to watch Naruto inhale noodles.

"Okay," Naruto shrugged quickly grabbing Sai and running after Kakashi.

"See you later!" he yelled. 'It's your funeral,' Naruto added in his mind, glancing back once towards his friend before increasing his pace incase Sakura decided that she for some reason suddenly wanted to attack him.

Turning towards Sakura, Sasuke smirked, "Hn, let's go Sakura."

Nodding at Sasuke, she rolled her eyes once more for good measure before following him obediently. The walk towards Sakura house was mostly uneventful, or at least until Sakura saw the same old lady from earlier walking towards them from the opposite end of the street.

"Oh good lord," Sakura grumbled rubbing her forehead, bemoaning the fact that she just couldn't get that crazy old lady out of her head.

"Hn?" Sasuke grunted, glancing at her from the corner of his eye before following her gaze to the disheveled old lady heading towards them.

"I see you took my advice!" the old woman yelled when she spotted Sakura walking down the street with the very handsome Uchiha Sasuke.

"Oh-ho!" the old lady laughed, "I see you hooked an Uchiha to get some with! Lucky, lucky. You wouldn't mind sharing the boy would you?"

Sakura looked appalled and about ready to pass out and throw up all at the same time.

'Just what is up with this crazy old lady?' Inner Sakura squawked indignantly, wrinkling her nose.

'Oh my god… can you see her? She… she… she has sex head! What the hell is wrong with the world? I mean seriously! And old lady can get some and we can't?!'

Sakura groaned and rubbed at her forehead, trying to get the mental images of the old lady getting it on out of her head once more.

'Will you just let this freaking subject drop?! I just got her out of my head and now you're tainting it again!'

Surprisingly, Sasuke seemed unfazed that the old lady implied that he should willingly sleep with her.

Instead, he simply engulfed Sakura's small hand with his own before shaking his head slowly at the odd little woman with an extremely wrinkly face and bright white perm upon her head.

"Hn, no thank you Oba-san," he spoke politely before slowly walking away tugging Sakura behind him.

When they reached the front door, Sakura's left hand still tucked inside of Sasuke's right, Sakura burst into a set of near hysterical giggles.

"I… oh my…" Sakura gasped between her giggles, tears leaking from her eyes as she clutched at her sides as if they were ripping apart.

"I can't believe she asked you to sleep with her!"

Sasuke calmly nodded his head at Sakura's amused wails, "She asks me that weekly."

His blunt answer of something that would embarrass most men made Sakura's eyes widen before she was overcome with another set of giggles.

Once her giggles subsided, Sakura instantly sobered and frowned at Sasuke before crossing her arms across her chest and pouting slightly.

"She told me I needed to get laid this morning."

Sasuke's lips quirked up at the corner of his mouth as he fought his smirk before he placed his hands upon her shoulders and bent forward until they were eye to eye.

Sighing he grunted a plain, "It wouldn't hurt… it might even get rid of some of your stress."

Squeezing her shoulders once when she rolled her eyes at him, Sasuke quickly ushered her inside her front door that he had managed to open while she giggled.

"Just get some sleep, and don't bother going to work tomorrow," Sasuke ordered before shutting the door in her face and calmly walking away towards the Hokage's office while his teammate screamed indignantly at him though the door.

With one glance over his shoulder at his teammate's usually immaculate house, Sasuke decided he'd raise hell in the Hokage's office and get her a vacation. Kami-sama knows she needs one.

Standing alone in her dark house, her chest heaving and throat sore from her useless yelling, Sakura stood still and confused for a full five minutes.

'What the heck was that?' she thought to herself, thinking back to Sasuke's odd comment of her needing to get laid.

Shaking her head, and deciding nothing was really important for her to think about until she at least got ten hours of sleep in her system, Sakura headed upstairs fully intending to get into her horribly comfortable bed and sleep. For a long, long time.

Her last thought as she climbed into bed, finally rid of her sweaty clothes, was just a simple question she wasn't sure she wanted answered…

'Just what is up with everyone being interested in my sex life?'

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