AN: Note that I do not own Naruto, Naruto Shippuden, or any of the characters from either Anime. This work is a fanfiction written out of my love for the series and not in any attempt to make a profit. No characters were permanently harmed in this chapter.

Proofread by: Author

So, I believe I mentioned that there are after-effects to what Sakura managed to accomplish. Well, this is the chapter to explain it, although, perhaps not in as much detail as I had originally intended. I originally had a completely different idea for how this chapter would begin and then continue the story, but I remembered a few important details that I forgot to actually keep in mind earlier in the story. As a result, I was conflicted about how I wanted to write this chapter for a while and had to compromise. This is the result.

Chapter 64: Conscious, yet asleep

Sakura's good mood didn't hold up for long as she suddenly saw Anko's expression turn from confused and concerned to outright panic. As Sakura was about to ask what was wrong, she instead felt vertigo overtake her as Heikō seemed to fall back asleep. Trying to understand what was going on, Sakura tried to steady her head using her left hand, only to notice something off in her vision, bringing the hand in front of herself, she noticed it was covered in blood. Now confused, and concerned herself, Sakura looked up at Anko again to try and get some kind of answer from her, only to notice that Anko was speaking to her without any kind of sound coming out. Suddenly feeling incredibly light-headed and tasting iron in her mouth, Sakura realized something was incredibly wrong before everything went black and she lost consciousness before she could even begin to panic.

Awakening, Sakura immediately knew she wasn't truly awake on account that she hadn't actually felt herself awakening, but merely found herself suddenly snapping into consciousness and found herself suddenly standing in the black void of her mindscape.

"Heikō, are you there?" Sakura asked, looking around in an attempt to try and spot her mental companion, only to be met with silence. A little concerned with the idea of having found her way into her own mindscape while unconscious, Sakura thought back at what the last thing she could remember was and shuddered at the possible implications. Hoping to convince herself that she was indeed in her own mind, and not simply dead for some reason, Sakura allowed her mental presence to escape in all directions, looking for a way out.

The sound and sight of hundreds of doors suddenly slamming open surprised her as the black void was suddenly filled with passages and exits she had never seen before except for one or two that she recognized as the paths to her subconscious and long term memories.

Curious, Sakura went over to the closest door and shuddered at the sight of something that was beyond her comprehension, forcing her to shut her eyes and turn away as the eyes of her mental representation stung together with her head. Blindly, Sakura grabbed the edge of the doorframe and worked her way around it until she found the door before closing it. Once closed, Sakura waited for the pain to fade before she dared to open her eyes again and saw the closed door no longer visible to her. A careful mental nudge however revealed it to still be there. It was… odd, Sakura decided. She knew that Heikō had hidden many different parts of her own mind from her, mostly for her safety, but she had no idea how many such areas there had been. Neither had she realized that if she really wanted to, Heikō could do very little to actually stop her from messing up her own mind. The thought that she had nearly done just that scared Sakura.

With another careful application of her mental presence, Sakura willed all but the familiar doors and exits shut, before trying to locate Heikō. A vague trail made itself known as a trail of white smoke that flowed from Sakura's feet, leading her towards her subconscious. Feeling like it was the best clue she had, Sakura decided to follow the smoke-like trail.

Thankfully, the trail didn't lead her into any new, previously unknown parts of her mind, but to one of the rooms full of scrolls containing memories, where Sakura found Heikō, carefully trying to unroll a vibrating, inflated looking scroll that smoked, looking as if it was ready to explode.

"Heikō?" Sakura asked, regretting it immediately as Heikō flinched and tensed, giving the scroll a fearful look, before relaxing and giving Sakura an annoyed glare.

"Oh, hey. The troublemaker arrives. Glad to see you're alright, but try not to mess this up for me, it's already hard enough as it is to clean up your mess." Heikō explained, before carefully unfurling the scroll, making a point not to look at its content. Heikō seemed to be using some kind of measure to at least get an idea of what the scroll contained at least, as she seemed to be waiting for something. Once she had roughly four arm-lengths worth of the scroll unfurled, she suddenly ripped the unfurled part off, before putting the still smoking scroll down, and rolled the section she had ripped off into a new, smaller, non-smoking scroll.

"Sorry, I just got worried when I found myself here and you weren't around. I almost went somewhere I wasn't supposed to, so I was hoping you could make sure I didn't mess us up even further by seeing whatever it was I saw." Sakura informed Heikō who sighed tiredly.

"Great, something else going terrible, and we haven't even recovered from your last mistake," Heikō grumbled, before putting some tape on the vibrating and smoking scroll to keep it from unfurling, and put it into one of her pockets, ignoring the smoke that kept billowing out of it until it stopped a moment later. Looking up at Sakura, Heikō got up from where she had sat on the floor and walked over to Sakura before hugging her. "Sorry, I'm still not fully rested, and now you've given me another mess to deal with. I'm just annoyed, but I likely would have come up with the same idea sooner or later. You couldn't have known what would have happened." Heikō comforted her before letting go of Sakura who nodded in understanding. "Now then, where exactly did you end up that you weren't supposed to?" Heikō questioned, only to follow Sakura as she showed the way.

As they arrived in front of the invisible door, Heikō walked up to it and put one palm on it, frowning for a moment before shaking her head. "It's nothing outright dangerous, just… unpleasant." She tried to explain.

"What exactly is it then? It hurt just to look at." Sakura explained, making Heikō wince.

"Yeah, it'd do that. It's not something that translates very well into a visual context. Or, well, it does, but the amount of mental energy required isn't worth it this early on in the process." Heikō explained, holding up a hand to stall any questions Sakura had. "It's essentially the very beginning of your thought process back there. It's a process involving a bunch of steps that ultimately boils down to what becomes conscious thoughts for you and me." Heikō explained with a bit of a frown. "There's a lot less filtering involved in subconscious thoughts, which is something I don't think you should visit anytime soon. The number of random, cruel, or harmful ideas that are eradicated down there is terrifying, and the implications of human nature based on what I've seen down there is horrifying in its own right." Heikō explained, shaking her head as she began leading Sakura back to her room where she sat both of them down onto the bed.

"Right, so I've already had a look at your memories to get an idea of what the heck happened, and patched up the worst of the damage. Considering how it all went down and how hurt we were, you probably didn't quite get what happened, did you?" Heikō asked Sakura, who shook her head.

"I didn't. The last thing I remember is feeling terrible and light-headed while covered in blood. I'm not sure what happened. Did we get hurt and go into shock?" Sakura asked, sounding worried and confused while Heikō simply huffed in annoyance.

"We became hurt, yes. But it wasn't shock that made you pass out and dull in the head. From what I can tell, your stunt, combining our sensory technique for Natural energy with our Kekkei Genkai backfired spectacularly. The sensitivity we gained was unrestrained, and our minds were immediately overcome with the raw amount of information that you exposed our senses to. I awoke due to the shock, disoriented, but the memory you generated at that moment was so big and intrusive that it really messed stuff up. While I can take care of most of the damage dealt in here, as long as my own memories and understanding of this place aren't damaged, I can't tell you how bad things are in the physical world. From what I can guess, we sustained some kind of brain damage. The blood in your memory was from a nosebleed, a pretty bad one as well I think. Thankfully, it seems like we're mostly intact and just need some healing, rather than therapy or a serious operation." Heikō told a horrified Sakura.

"I-I gave us brain-damage? I- How can you be so calm about this?" Sakura asked, noting how besides being a little bit cross with Sakura, Heikō had otherwise explained their situation in relative calm.

"Two reasons. One, whatever you did didn't immediately knock us out, so the damage is likely, not serious enough to affect us too much besides another stay in the hospital. Two, thankfully, we were already in a hospital and had trained medical-nin nearby as we went down. We're likely being taken care of right now, or even recovering as we speak. Considering how we're both conscious, at least mentally, to this degree and neither seem to be suffering anything serious, suggests that we're good enough to wake up soon, if not already. Don't worry about it, instead consider what you've learned. I think that if you think back on this, we'll at least have something interesting to do once we wake up." Heikō explained, handing Sakura a small scroll, one she could tell had been ripped from a bigger one previously by the torn edge.

Accepting the scroll, Sakura carefully opened it and let herself experience the memory. Much like she had suspected, it wasn't a complete memory, but a particular little part of a bigger whole. Specifically, it was part of the memory where she had combined her two Energy sensing abilities and how it had felt. Looking up from the scroll as the memory finished settling, fresh in Sakura's mind, she gave Heikō a questioning look, only to receive an amused smile. "I'll let you work on that while I continue cleaning up." Heikō simply told her, before she once more brought out the vibrating and smoking scroll, and then repeated the process she had been working on when Sakura found her, only that the next part she ripped out was immediately burned, rather than made into a separate scroll.

Sakura felt like Heikō's job right now was more important than her annoyance with not being given the answer on a silver platter. If Heikō thought there was something important she could learn from that particular memory, and more importantly that she should be able to realize it herself, she might as well leave Heikō to her work and figure it out herself. At the very least, it would help her pass the time until they woke up, considering that despite Sakura's attempt to already do so, they remained asleep.

Although Sakura was almost certain that Heikō knew of a way to force them awake, she didn't think that it would be a good idea after she managed to injure them the way she had done, or before Heikō had finished working on the volatile memory of the event.

So, for the time being, all Sakura could do was keep experiencing the partial memory Heikō had left her, trying to understand the significance of the isolated sensation of feeling the two different perceptions of Natural energy. With little progress, Sakura eventually grew tired and bored. Hoping that she might somehow find a clue to what she was missing, she instead decided to try sensing Natural energy while unconscious. She was aware that it was possible using their Kekkei Genkai, but not if it was possible while asleep.

Sakura was startled to find out that not only was it possible, but that as she did, she also realized that she had succeeded in feeling Natural energy outside of her own body, without relying on her Kekkei Genkai. Of course, the fact was slightly overshadowed by the revelation that the hospital room she was currently recovering in, was actually an operating room filled with medical-nin in the process of healing her.

AN: Right, so… Sakura's condition, all things considered, isn't all that bad in and of itself. The damage suffered isn't lethal or damaging in of itself, but untreated, it could lead to some rather serious complications. Sakura's exact condition will be revealed in the next chapter, but for now, I'll, unfortunately, be leaving you all guessing. As for those of you who consider any kind of brain damage as serious… Yes, all kinds of damage to the brain are serious, but not all damage to the brain is necessarily immediately damaging in the long term, or even noticeable. The specific kind of injury Sakura invoked on herself is by all means, not that dangerous, especially so due to how the structure of her brain has changed. Of course, as much as there are upsides to this, there are also downsides. While Sakura would take a lot longer to suffer the consequences of her condition than anyone else, the consequences would end up severe and even lethal. Fortunately, we won't be exploring such a possibility, considering Sakura is already being taken care of.

Now, as for Sakura's and Heikō's ability to be conscious, yet unable to wake up, but still able to feel Natural energy? Well, easy. While being healed, Sakura is, for her own best, sedated, considering the fact she has a brain injury. Of course, the sedative in question is one that doesn't interfere with the mind, only keeping it asleep, so Sakura and Heikō remain fully functional, yet unable to wake up.

Being able to sense Natural energy while asleep is something both Heikō and Sakura have been able to do since the beginning and it is linked more to their consciousness than their ability to move or control their body, so the ability is not affected by them being asleep, but it does require conscious effort for it to become active, be it through their Kekkei Genkai or otherwise, it requires some focus.