Fake
xxredemption-love-and-liesxx

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"W… What did you just say?" her eyes were wide, and she could not believe her ears.

He stepped closer, his eyes smouldering as always. "I love you."

Sakura's heart was hammering in her chest, and she could not look away. Love reflected in his eyes, and she could hardly breathe. She had never really expected to hear those words from his lips. Nonetheless, for her. She was shocked and she could not believe it. She really could not.

The Uchiha in question was right in front of her now. His dark clothing was swaying to the left due to the wind. His hair was being held from being a complete and utter mess with a dark blue rag tied around. His cape-like clothing complete covered him, and she could see the tears from his travelling or maybe even fights.

He looked exactly like Kakashi had described him to her.

"Do you understand?" the Uchiha asked softly, reaching a gentle hand forward to move a piece of her pastel pink hair behind her ear. "I love you," he repeated as if she did not hear him properly to begin with.

"Sasuke-kun," Sakura whispered softly, moving his hand away. "You don't know what you're saying… you don't…"

"I always have," he clarified. "I love you the most."

The roseate's seafoam eyes opened again, narrowing into slits as she shifted away from him. She looked him over, and automatically noticed an anomaly. His rinnegan was gone. Both eyes were onyx. Kakashi had said that he cannot deactivate the rinnegan, so why was he able to turn it off now? Sakura looked him over and bit her lower lip.

As much as she wanted to believe those words, she did not know if she could.

The roseate glanced up at him. "Seven years ago… what happened?"

"What do you mean?" Sasuke asked, eying her with a cautious, black gaze.

Sakura repeated her previous words. "What happened?" she asked behind clenched teeth.

Sasuke tilted his head. "I left the village to seek Orochimaru."

She lowered her head. "What happened… between you and me?"

The Uchiha looked confused and thought about her words, but provided no answer. "Something happened between us? From memory, I left the village for power, and nothing occurred; nothing between you and me."

Just as he said those words, Sakura eyed him as if he were the worst enemy. And that he was. Something was even more so off, but Sakura decided to ask him one more question.

"Three times… you have called me this," she whispered, fisting her hands as she looked away from him.

If he could not answer this right…

". . ." he paused, as if he was thinking. "You're…" Sakura tensed up. "incredibly beautiful. Well, I've thought it, at least."

Sakura smiled sadly, knowing that his words were far too far-fetched to be true. This was not her Sasuke-kun. She drew back her fist and slammed it right into his chest before he even noticed.

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Sakura crouched over the now-dead Sasuke-clone. She eyed the thing cautiously, as if waiting for it to strike at her. She gently lowered her fingers and touched his face, watching as it crumbled away to dust. The roseate sat down and covered her face, cursing herself a little. She was glad she noticed but why in the hell would someone do something like this? This would have taken a lot of effort; the clone had been able to use the sharingan after all. One of the anomalies that she noticed though, that he was unable to use the mangekyou, and his usage of the normal sharingan was limited.

It somewhat reminded Sakura of those Zetsu that she had fought in the Forth Great Shinobi War.

The roseate still felt disgusted with herself for not being able to notice what was wrong. It absolutely made her feel so bad. She should have noticed the moment he had said those three words. Sasuke was not the sort to confess, especially in that sort of situation. As it is, Sakura is unsure how he really feels of her; she knows she is important, but she has no clue whether he considers her as a friend, family or even something more.

"Did you get hurt?"

Sakura felt her body tense as she heard that voice. She turned her head cautiously, and there he was. The real one this time. He was right behind her, and he was eying her with his usual cold gaze.

"Uhm," Sakura paused, wiping her eyes—it seemed she had cried a little without her own knowledge. "y—yeah, I'm okay."

The Uchiha glanced at his copy, annoyance flickering in his eyes. "Tch. So this is what they decided to do."

"'They'?" Sakura asked, confusion appearing.

Sasuke looked away. "It's my problem, Sakura. … Seems like you got involved in it, however."

The roseate stood up, ignoring the clone at her feet. "What happened?"

Wind brushed past them once more, becoming chilly. However, Sasuke had not answered. He was just watching. Silently. Sakura pursed her lips, sure that she would not get anything else out of him.

"Is there anything I need to know about these people?" Sakura asked softly, glancing at him with narrow eyes.

"They'll do anything to take your life," the Uchiha murmured softly. "I… tried to come here as quick as I could, but it seems they were moving quicker than I had expected."

The medic did not understand why they would even try to take her life. What would it even cause? Sasuke had said it had something to do with him, but that was something that absolutely bewildered her.

Sakura nodded her head, looking away for good now. "I'm sorry that you wasted your time here. I'll… defeat them. You can go back to…"

"Hn, iie," Sasuke muttered. "The reason they're after you is because of me. This guy," he nodded towards the clone. "has been causing havoc across the nations in my name. It seems that ANBU are already looking for me."

"So… you're wanting to solve all of this?" Sakura asked, still not looking at him.

The wandering Uchiha nodded his head. "Yes."

Sakura took a heavy breath and focused on him once more. "I get that you came back for that, but I'd heard that you wanted nothing to do with it because it wasn't your business."

"Yeah," Sasuke ran his hand through his raven hair.

"Then why…?"

The Uchiha shook his head. "What does it matter? I'm here now."

"Sasuke-kun," Sakura whispered. "You don't do anything without a reason. That hasn't changed, has it?"

Sasuke shook his head once more, but did not bother answering her. Instead, he turned on his heel, and decided to go and find Kakashi to sort this mess out. Sakura sighed, knowing full well that there would be no goodbye, as always. She turned her head and glanced at the fake, and wondered if those words that he had said, would ever be said by the real Sasuke.

A broken laugh filled her chest as she thought of that.

No way. It would not happen.

"Sakura."

Sakura peered up. His back was to her, but he had his head turned to the side so he could watch her.

"I'll be back. Soon."

Her heart fluttered as he said those words. He was…?

"Actually, it might be quicker than what you're thinking, Sakura."

Sasuke-kun… are you…?

Sasuke laughed; it was a joyous sound for Sakura to enjoy. "Really, I have years' worth of things to tell you. … See you soon."

And he vanished, like he always has.

Sakura smiled, feeling hope ignite her heart once more.

Maybe, what that other Sasuke had said, isn't as fake as she once thought. Though, she would not get her hopes too high. Not yet, at least.

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fin

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Okay, I might try and get one another thing done, but again, this was based off of spoilers (and actually some real stuff) from Sakura Hiden. Sasuke and Sakura didn't actually meet in Sakura Hiden.

What actually happened, was there was a fake running amok, and basically, people were thinking it was the real Sasuke. However, this was not the case. A message from Konoha was sent to Sasuke, and yeah, he refused at first, thinking the village could handle it themselves. But Sakura was snatched away by an ANBU, and the moment Sasuke heard it, he hastened back to the village, but having returned when Sakura had defeated the enemy. He did kill a few people, but yes. Of course, this is just a basic summary. From what I've gathered, they did not actually meet at all, but Sakura learnt that Sasuke had returned for a while. He left straight up afterwards (hence him leaving again in this). But you can read the rest on tumblr: just go the normal site and change the /dashboard to /tagged/sasusaku and you should get there.

Well, this was an awfully long author's note, and I apologize for that. Again, I hope you guys enjoyed :)