Title: Paying The Price
Fandom: Naruto
Pairing: SasuSaku
Summary: And maybe the price was too high to pay to become a shinobi but they conned us with medals, ranks, and tales of heroes immortalised in stone. Sakura and Sasuke learn how much it costs to be a shinobi.
Disclaimer: Naruto © Masashi Kishimoto.

Suddenly, it hits me that in just a mere dozen hours, I would be leaving home.

For the past week, I have felt unrested panic and–

anxiety of having to give up everything I've ever loved and cherished, exchanging it for a place in the ground and a tombstone, and it just fills me with

–fear.

Fear of that moment when I will have to walk away from him.

Funny how we've known each other since we were twelve, and yet we've chosen the very end for love.

"So then Tsunade-baa-chan got all grumpy, and you know her breasts always look bigger when she's–"

"Okay, Naruto, we now know exactly what you and Jiraiya-sama used to talk about when he trained you. How was your day, Sasuke-kun?"

Sasuke-kun merely grunts and continues eating his noodles.

My smile falters a little, but I'm going to make the best of this situation, and I wish I hadn't cut Naruto off; I wouldn't be able to hear him talk of such things again.

"Oi, teme, stop being such an asshole, or I'll steal Sakura away from you and then you won't be able to repopulate the Uchiha clan and – oof!"

Sasuke-kun punches Naruto with his free hand and I laugh.

I'll miss this.

"Bye, Sakura-chan!"

"'Night, Naruto. Remember; meet me at the front gates at 6 o'clock tomorrow, morning, okay?"

"But, Sakura-chan! Tomorrow is my day off, and I want to sleep in!"

"Don't worry. It'll only be for this once," I say, ruffling his hair and waving at his retreating back.

"Hn."

I turn back to Sasuke and beam. Together we make our way back to my house, and it is silent, until we reach my front door and Sasuke speaks up.

"The dobe's gone now, Sakura. Are you going to tell me what's wrong?"

I laugh at how well Sasuke-kun knows me–

or am I that transparent?

–and turn around to face him.

I look into his eyes and memorise his face; I've waited so long for this, and yet I have to give him up now, and it's just–

horribleterrifyingheart-breakingmiserable

–unfair.

I smile as prettily as I can, so he won't think anything's wrong–

but he's Uchiha Sasuke; I'm not talented enough to fool him even for a second

–though he knows something is anyway.

"I've got a mission. Tomorrow. I can't tell you much about it, but basically, it's a reconnaissance mission. Into the Akatsuki."

Sasuke-kun's eyes widen a fraction, and he's so perfect at masking his emotions, that if he let that out, he really must have been taken aback.

"If we succeed – and we will, Sasuke-kun, trust me, with the people Tsunade-shishou has assigned to this mission – then we'll have all we need to bring them down. Then, we'll be free, Sasuke-kun. Everyone will be. Civilians won't be afraid to stay up after dark anymore and good shinobi won't have to die meaningless deaths. And Naruto – Naruto won't have to run away against his will every time he sees one of them. Naruto will be safe. That's what matters, isn't it?"

Sasuke-kun isn't fooled for even one moment.

"What's the catch?" he asks.

My smile falters, and I recite as nonchalantly as I can, "Greater love has no man than this; that a man lay down his life for his friends (1)."

"Don't recite Bible verses to me, Sakura."

I shrug.

"You get what I mean. Sacrifices will have to be made."

"And you'll be one of them?"

"I'll die a hero, Sasuke-kun, and that's the greatest honour any shinobi can have."

Sasuke-kun doesn't say anything, but just stares at me, and I can't take it anymore.

"No one's going to remember you," he says matter-of-factly, and it's the truth in his words that hurt the most.

"But you will, won't you? And Naruto will, and maybe – maybe some of the rest of our friends. You guys will remember me, right?"

I get no reply, and I look at my feet for a second before looking up again at Sasuke-kun.

"I love you, Sasuke-kun. And I don't want to do this, but both of us knew what we were signing up for when we became shinobi–"

signed away our freedom, our childhood, our families, friends, loves, lives, and maybe the price was too high to pay to become a shinobi but they conned us with medals, ranks, and tales of heroes immortalised in stone

"–and it's my duty. You should know that better than anyone."

"I do," he says calmly, coldly and much too casually for my liking.

I look at my feet, at the doorknob, anywhere but him, but his voice cuts through me, and I can't help but look up at him when he asks, "How long have you known about this?"

Lying wouldn't work against Sasuke-kun, I know this, and I'm surprised I managed to keep this from him for so long, but now it's out, I whisper, "Two months."

He looks at me stonily, and I can't help but make excuses for myself, because he's still Uchiha Sasuke, a god, and I am–

uselessnotasgoodasNarutoorSasuke-kunsecond-bestneverenough

–Haruno Sakura and I adore him and I don't want him to go away hating me.

"Don't you see, Sasuke-kun? I put this off for as long as I could, because I didn't want things to be awkward among us. I wanted to spend my last days with our Team 7, not a couple of anxious boys looking at me as if they were seeing a dead person, and I didn't want Naruto to go rampaging into Tsunade-shishou's office, demanding I be taken off this mission."

Sasuke-kun remains silent and I want to scream at him; why won't he say something?

My voice breaks as I say what I'm about to say next: "We've been together for a few months, Sasuke-kun, and that might not seem like much to anyone else. But in those few months, between us I found something that made me wake up every morning thanking a god I shouldn't believe in that I still have some time left, whether it would be two months, two weeks, or two days. But–"

now I'm scared to go to sleep because I know that when I wake up, there wouldn't be days, only hours left.

And for the first time, I was afraid to see you because I knew it was only for goodbye.

But I don't regret it because

"–tonight was wonderful."

I kiss him softly on the cheek and take his hands into mine, hopingwishingpraying that he would just see.

"And as for you; you have always been amazing," I say, placing a gentle kiss on each of his hands.

He does nothing but look down at our entwined hands, and as he looks back up at me, I swear I see something in his eyes, something akin to sadness, or is that just wishful thinking?

"Thank you," I whisper softly, sweetly. It's amazing how much this boyman scares me; my soul still tip-toes before him, lest the spell be broken.

"Thank you for the way you smiled at me this evening because somehow, you knew I wanted you to, and even now for being strong enough for me to lean on, because this is just so much harder than I thought it would be.

"Thank you for being understanding enough that I could tell you this right now, instead of me having to wait till tomorrow to tell you like Naruto.

"And thank you for–"

the way you love me, the way you make me smile even when you're not around, and for

"–the billion other things you've done to make me love you like I never thought I could–"

sometimes, you don't even realise you're doing it

"–and maybe, if we were different people, with different lives, it would have turned out better."

Sasuke-kun takes his hands out of mine, and uses them to wipe away the tears I hadn't noticed I had shed, with a gentleness that was completely foreign yet familiar at the same time. "But we aren't, are we?"

"No," I say, choking. "We're not, Sasuke-kun, but I wish we were, I wish we were so badly."

I lean into his touch and for a while, both of us are still. I should probably head inside and go to sleep in preparation for tomorrow, but I'm never going to see this sad boyman again, this broken childprodigy with the perfect emotionless façade, this perfect lover.

And if I have to give him up, and every other inhabitant in my world–

but he is my world

–then I think I'm allowed to be greedy and selfish, to want to stay in this one perfect moment for a little longer, where we aren't shinobi, where we didn't have to give up our past, our present, our future, where he wasn't an Uchiha who wasted years off our lives chasing an empty dream for the sake of pride, and where I wasn't a no-named girl from a no-named clan who just couldn't cut it.

He holds me in a way he's never held me before, and I'm left to wonder how my heart can be breaking now, when it's already broken.

The next morning, I tell Naruto.

Understandably, he doesn't take it too well.

Sasuke-kun stands there–

so calm, so tall, so strong, the perfect shinobi, does he even care

–and tells Naruto to shut up.

I hear a cough behind me; Ino is here and my eyes crumble at the sight of her.

We stare at each other for a few minutes, Naruto and Sasuke-kun silent in the background. She looks so grown up, the perfect kunoichi, and it makes me wonder, who is this girl, this–

murderer, prostitute, slut, whore

–child?

"Forehead," she starts, and I can't cry, not in public, so I hug her for the first time since we were ten, my best friend, the one who still knows me better than I do after all this time.

"I went to see Tsunade-sama to get a mission this morning," she whispers to me.

"Oh," I say mutely.

"She says they're carving your names in marble as we speak."

-

Author's Notes:

-

HO YEAH. FIRST CANON!UNIVERSE FIC!

But it's still angst. Beh, I can't give Sakura and Sasuke a happy ending to save my life. Please be gentle.

And. I had to add Ino. Her and Sakura's petty, destructible friendship is pure love.

This fic was supposed to be slightly introspective as to the lives of shinobi and the sacrifices they have to make which, as Sasuke so eloquently put, no one would remember after a generation or two. But shinobi in general are... kinda screwed up and scarred for life, so that must be why. I've always thought Sakura to be a normal-ish shinobi though, just a little girl who joined the Academy because everyone else made out being a ninja to be some great honour.

(1) The Bible verse Sakura quotes is from John 15:13.

Lessthanthree.