Been sitting on this one for a while, but I need a dose of happy. Plus, writing snarky Sasuke always makes me happy. parts 1-14 done; not a terribly long story.

At Death's Door
1. An Unexpected Guest

Death has heard some strange things in his time.

The last thoughts of the Dead are unpredictable and varied, ranging from the inane to the profound, and the simple to the complex.

Of course, there are always the mundane thoughts.

"Why me?"

"What now?"

"Is it really over?"

Those are to be expected.

Sometimes the person is lucky enough to die in their sleep, so essentially they 'wake up' dead.

They usually ask what is for breakfast. (He suspects that is a fear reflex.)

There are those that die in fear, or trauma - and their last words are usually screams.

He does his best to calm them.

Then there are the some more amusing ones.

For instance, this week there was the man who had come in from doing sweaty work outside, and grabbed the large liter bottle of water and chugged it without thinking. Unfortunately, his wife had mixed up some cleaning solution in one of the empty bottles, had left it on the counter while she went to check the mail.

His last thought was: "Well, fuck me."

Macabre, but amusing, if you are Death.

The old woman who died in her sleep took comfort knowing she had put on clean underwear - something he had heard more than once, and he wondered why mortals thought Death cared about such things.

The best this week, hands down, was the man whose last thought was: "I knew it. I always knew my goldfish would get me in the end."

That was up until a moment ago.

He had been walking down the corridor in his own home when he heard a perplexed:

"Where am I?"

He turns in shock - for who could and would drop in at Death's door, uninvited? - and there stands a shimmering image of a young woman.

Her skin is porcelain pale, her hair pink, and her eyes emerald green.

And he is just as perplexed as she looks.

"What are you doing here?" he demands.

She blinks those great, green eyes at him.

"Your guess is as good as mine," she shrugs. "I don't even know where 'here' is."

He glares at her, wondering where she could have possibly come from. He considers the translucent edges of her aura; she is not entirely insubstantial.

She looks as though she would be warm to the touch.

He frowns and speaks sharply.

"I don't know what you're doing here," he draws back, "but you are an intruder in my home. Leave."

"You seem to be forgetting the part where I just told you I don't know where I am," she returns with a barbed patience, "let alone how I got here; how on earth do you expect me to go back to... wherever it is I was... which I just realized I don't remember," she finishes in a puzzled huff.

At least that isn't so unusual. The dead often do not remember dying, or even realize that they are, in fact, dead.

"What's the last thing you remember?"

"What is this place?" she counters.

"What do you remember?"

She gives him a hard look before blowing out a sigh. "I don't know," she admits. "I was...working? Yes. Working. It was a long night, I was working. I was at the lab...then..." her brows draw together as she tries to think.

"Then?" he prompts.

She shakes her head. "Then...nothing. I don't remember anything after that."

"So you are a scientist?"

"Doctor, actually," she corrects him. "Medical Researcher II if you want to get technical."

He arches one, slim, ebony brow.

"Sounds like a scientist to me."

"Scientist that got through medical school, thankyouverymuch," she retorts.

"And your name?"

"Sakura," she answers simply. "Dr. Haruno Sakura. And yours?"

He gives her a small smirk.

"I am the Dark Guardian," his obsidian eyes gleam. "You know me as Death..." he watches her eyes grow wide.

"...but you can call me Sasuke."

Yes a Death/Sakura AU, no, not a typical mythology AU.