A/N: Now that the story's over, I've decided to repost all the edit/spelling mistakes I've corrected since the story began- which is why every chapter is going up again. For the record, there will be some (small) story corrections too, but nothing too big.

For those new to the story: It's NarutoxSakuraxHinata, HinataxSakuraxNaruto, etc etc. The three end up 'happily ever after', more or less. (Not to spoil the surprise- I know a lot of people who look for stories based on pairings)

For those new to my work, a word of warning: While I consider myself a pretty good writer, I don't write kid stuff. If you aren't 18, this story probably isn't for you. It deals with a number of adult issues, and while a teen might be able to 'get' most of it, there's a lot of it you won't. I'm not trying to be mean, just honest- you won't enjoy it as much as you would if you were a bit older.
That being said, I'm not your parent, so...

The story contains lemons (fairly graphic), blood, violence, gore, mentions of rape, childbirth, and other fun and interesting things- if you're into that. Some things it does not contain are Yaoi, underaged sex, (the main characters are 21 and 22, respectively, at the beginning of the story) smut written for smut, etc.

I'll say this with every chapter now that I'm doing my reposting, but it bears mentioning anyway: I don't own Naruto, never have, and probably never will. Don't make any profit from it, probably never will, etc etc.

But for the record, I'd love to write for the manga... please?

Enjoy the 'final' version of Late Blossoms!

Chap. 1

"Naruto!" The woman's scream rent the early morning air, but it was not the only sound. All around her, she could hear their team leader, and the other two members of her squad fighting, possibly dying. She struggled once more against the wires holding her arms tight against her sides, and then in fury, focused just enough chakra into her shoulders and wrists, bursting the bindings in one motion.

Her eyes blurred through the surroundings, but she couldn't see much through the darkness.

There was a faint whistling from straight ahead accompanied by a flickering, blue-white glow. Kakashi sensei. He'll be all right.

She dashed around the big tree, still looking for her two companions. That was a tiger's roar... probably Sai. I should check on him first. With a sudden leap, she was flying through the air toward the sound, and now that she was listening closer, the woman could also pick out the sounds of dogs or wolves, maybe some cats or a lynx. He should be all right, but just in case...

Then she saw him. Bloody, but unbowed. His last two opponents were in far worse shape, the ground around the tall, thin man now littered with bodies, living and dead both. "Sai... you got this? I need to find Naruto."

The man didn't even glance in her direction, but gave a slight nod and a crooked smile. One of the enemy thought he was sufficiently distracted to attack and jumped toward him, the other toward the new arrival. The ghost-white tiger caught the first man by the thigh in mid-air and flung him to the ground, where the rest of the leg was removed in seconds.

The man wearing a Chunin vest, the middle rank of Ninja, met Sakura's faintly-glowing fist in midair, and the combination of his momentum and her incredible Chakra control turned his face into a fine mist of blood and bone before he'd even started his legs forward in a kick.

"All right then, Sai. Kakashi sensei's that way-" she said, pointing back towards their team leader, "I'm going to find Naruto. Keep safe, there may be more out there."

He paused for a moment, giving her an appraising, but expressionless look, then nodded. "Yes sir, Sakura."

With a flash, her teammate was gone again, and she continued with her search for the last member.

Oh Kami above, I should have known... they were after him, not us! Sakura had, finally, found her last teammate. Many of him, in fact. Once he'd been separated from the group shortly after she'd been bound to the tree, he must have been attacked by at least fourteen Sound, all Chunin or Jonin. Their bodies were all over the place, some of them cut into pieces by the raging winds of Naruto's Kazerasengan. The only clue she had that her oldest friend was still alive was the fact that there were so many of him around. Shadow clones. Can he even fight without them any more? He uses them all the time! Now I've got to find the real one...

She moved forward into the mess quickly, checking each of the Naruto clones by the simple expedient of flicking them in the forehead, much as his adopted grandmother did frequently, with a Chakra-fed finger. The clones would disappear in a puff of smoke, and Naruto would get a bruise that would heal in minutes. She'd gone through four clones when she heard the one at her feet stir just slightly. Crouching down, she put one hand on the man's chest and breathed, "Naruto... is this the real you?"

The blue eyes she'd come to know so well flashed open, and both of his arms gripped hers just below the shoulder and elbow. Sakura had just begun to gasp from surprise when he'd used the leverage to flip her over, landing himself on her back, with her arms pinned behind her. "Hey, you slackers! Get up, I've got the medic!" the sound ninja called out, and Sakura was horrified to see at least four of the Naruto clones rise up in response, each one grinning. They... oh Kami! They used Naruto's move to confuse him... is he... where is he? "Where is Naruto?!" she roared, and in his slight distraction, Sakura flexed her legs and back. He grinned, with such little leverage, there was no way she'd be able to kick him off. But he hadn't counted on the Gondaime's training. All it took was the slightest impact... and the ground beneath Sakura's lower half when her knees struck was pulverized, giving her enough room to kick the man off completely. Taken by surprise himself, this time, Sakura had her hand around his throat, and it was all she could do to keep from squeezing the life out of him.

The eyes she turned on the other ninja were cold, hard, and those few who had, by chance, fought against this particular Leaf Ninja before were shocked at the change in them from years before. "Where... is Naruto? If your damned Orochimaru or Kabuto have taken him- hurt him in any way- I will personally pulverize your entire village to dust!"

Two of the sound ninja scoffed, but one of the Jonin and another Chunin- who'd fought her before- took an involuntary step back. "No... she means it, and she can. She was trained by the Hokage bitch. She can... well, just look at the ground. She's as dangerous as the Kyuubi."

The ninja whose throat Sakura was holding was beginning to turn blue, but she did not relent. "I'd say this one's got about ten seconds before he's out forever. You should decide where your loyalty lies. To your friends who fought beside you and your Hidden Village, or the scum who leads you."

The group hesitated for about five seconds, and then each head in the clearing, including Sakura's, turned toward the sound of quiet clapping.

A tall, long-haired man stepped from the trees, dragging a shorter, yellow-blond haired man behind him. "Naru.... Sasuke?"

"It's good to see you again, Sakura. You've grown... colder... since we last met." He dropped the apparently unconscious man to the ground, and he didn't stir. Her eyes were finally torn away from the black orbs of the man she'd loved for years to rest on the only one who'd stayed true to her. He didn't move at all, she could barely hear him breathe.

"You can let him go, Sakura. As strong as you've become, you can't beat me, and I'd hate to lose another loyal subordinate." Sasuke's voice hadn't changed at all in the three years since she'd last seen him.

"Sasuke... what did you do to Naruto?" she asked, gently releasing the other man, who did not gasp for air- he was already dead.

"Nothing much. Just a few drugs I picked up from Kabuto before I killed him. He'll wake up in a few hours. Tell you what... since I can hear Kakashi and my... 'replacement' coming, I'll even let you keep him for now." Sasuke stepped a few paces away from Naruto, and gestured for his men to get behind him. Those who had risen, plus a few more who'd woken since then, stumbled or walked to follow his instructions.

Without a glance down, the black-haired man smirked and said, "Ah, killed him already. You're so heartless, Sakura... I love it. Now... take him and go."

The last eight words had been spoken in Orochimaru's voice, and she knew. Knew that the sannin had performed the soul transplant. Knew that Sasuke, while maybe not gone forever, because just as she knew it was too late, shecould feel that the Sasuke she'd been talking to was really him, was no longer someone she wanted to return to Konoha, except maybe as a corpse.

"So, which is it, Sasuke? Or Orochimaru?" a deep, male voice said behind her. Kakashi.

"It's a little of both, actually," the villain replied in Sasuke's voice, "when Orochimaru tried to do his soul transplant on me, I used the Sharingan at the last second and copied it- and performed it on him as well. The results were..." and in Orochimaru's voice again, "unexpected. Two souls in one body, two minds... mostly. My original- well, the body I was in- was empty, and both of us were in Sasuke. Now... he knows all of the thousands of Jutsu I had learned over my lifetime, and I have the kekkei genkai of the Uchiha. Only..."

Here, Sai interrupted with a casual tone, "It's not what either of you wanted, was it?"

For a brief second, regret filled Sasuke's face, but it was quickly tamped down, and he replied once again in Sasuke's voice, "No, no... but it works. Interestingly enough, we've been in the same body for five years now. Since just before you last tried to bring me back to Konoha. Do you know what that means?"

Kakashi and Sai were confused for a moment, but Sakura grasped the truth at once. "You've... either perfected the jutsu, or your bodies are such a close match that there is no rejection. You could live like this until the body gets old and dies."

"Yes," Orochimaru replied, "we believe the latter. I don't think there was anything wrong with the jutsu to begin with. It was... merely the remnants of the old soul fighting back that caused the degradation. While this wasn't what either of us wanted, it has worked so far and we get along as well as could be expected. For instance... we were able to fight as one to finally kill Uchiha Itachi."

The grin at this was purely Sasuke's.

"So you got all you wanted... Orochimaru's power, your brother dead... and the closest thing you've ever had to a friend is lying beaten at your feet. Are you happy now, Sasuke?" Sakura whispered, but it was only to buy that last little bit of time before the trap was ready.

He smirked one last time and said, "Poor Sakura... you're still hoping that you were the one thing I realized I still wanted, weren't you? No... no, I'm happy to say, you were always to observant for me. I needed someone I could use to restart the Uchiha. And Ino... she was the perfect match. Did you know that her child is mine? Look at the hair... only the Nara boy's and mine are that dark in the whole village. And Nara has that sand bitch. In just a few years, her eyes should begin to awaken, and I'll come to claim her."

Sakura screamed out in rage, almost breaking his attention before the snake- white as paper, but incredibly detailed, down to the last scale, dropped from above to hold Sasuke tight.

Kakashi walked forward slowly, his arm beginning to flicker and glow with the energy of the Chidori, "Sasuke... Orochimaru. Fitting that traitors like you should be destroyed by your own pets."

Just before Kakashi's fist, now lightning-bright, struck, the snakes fell away and Sasuke side-stepped the blow toward Naruto.

"Stupid sensei. Did you forget I can run my Chidori through my body? Nothing like that can hold me!"

Suddenly, Kakashi was flying backwards, a fountain of blood gushing from his throat.

"Kakashi sensei!" Sakura yelled. I didn't even... see him move! Na... Naruto!"

The blond man, finally awake, had both arms wrapped tightly around their former friend's legs and he grunted over the pain and electrical current running through him, "Sakura... do it now! I can't hold him long!"

The indecision lasted only a moment. He'd shown himself beyond redemption, beyond any capacity to love. While Naruto's grip quickly weakened, she burst into motion. She knew her fist wouldn't connect- Sasuke was too fast, even with his legs pinned. But there was one move, a move she'd painstakingly learned over the last nine years...

"Leaf... Barrage, Medic Style!"

Sasuke's sharingan was brilliant, but even it couldn't see, much less copy, the sheer number of jutsu Sakura unleashed at once. Taijutsu mimicking Lee's just as both Sasuke and Naruto had done, a small Rasengan- it'd taken her two years to master that- in her right hand, a Chakra scalpel in her left, and each foot carrying a mountain of momentum crashed into Sasuke in a blink, one right after another.

In the instant before internal pressure caused his lungs to spill out through the hole in his chest, Sakura could see the forest behind him, and the villain gasped, "You... did get stronger..."

A lifetime of seconds later, Sai's hand gently touched Sakura's shoulder, "Sakura... Kakashi-sensei might be alive. Please try to help him. Let me take care of... him."

Woodenly, Sakura nodded and turned away, letting her training take over. Distantly, she could hear Naruto's groaning words and Sai carrying on a discussion about what to do with the body. Naruto was all for burning it on the spot, rather than contaminating Konohagakure with his filth again, but Sai was insistent that the body be returned, if for nothing else that to glean what secrets they could from it.

"Sensei..." Sakura said, tears running unheeded down her face. His body was already growing cold in the early spring morning. There will be two bodies to take back...

* * *

"Report. What happened out there?"

Sakura spoke first. Sai was still supporting Naruto, who was barely conscious, though he himself was exhausted from carrying Kakashi back to the village. It had been three days since they were ambushed- and on a routine scouting mission, no less- and Lady Tsunade couldn't believe that such an elite team had lost it's leader, as well as received this kind of injury.

"Shi... Master. On days one through fourteen, we found nothing amiss. No signs of banditry, or ninja infiltration from the land of Stone. On the night of the fourteenth day, we were ambushed by what appeared to be a small group of Sound ninja looking to make a quick bounty."

Tsunade watched as Sakura spoke. Her voice was controlled, her hands at her back, but she could see her elbows still trembling. It was bad...

"At the beginning of the attack, I was bound to a tree and couldn't free myself until the rest of the team was separated. When I freed myself, Kakashi was in front of me a ways through the forest, but I knew he could handle himself. I found Sai next, and together we easily dispatched the two he hadn't taken care of. When I went to find Naruto, I... found lots of his bodies, all over."

Her voice trembled... Sakura, he's right here. Naruto's alive. You don't need to...

The Hokage's thoughts trailed off as her student continued the report, her voice still as professional as she could make it, despite the anguish she could hear, "I began to check the clones for the real Naruto, and... found a transformed Sound ninja. He pinned me and roused a few others, but I freed myself and turned the tables, just as Sasuke dragged Naruto out of the forest into the clearing I was in."

"Sasuke? What did that bastard do to my boy?" Tsunade was suddenly standing, but couldn't remember getting to that point.

"I... don't know. Naruto's been mostly unconscious since then. Mostly."

Sakura continued to relay the events of the ambush, but broke down at the point where Kakashi had jumped forward to kill Sasuke. From there, Sai, as dispassionately as he could, finished the tale. Even he was a little wet around the eyes when the report was finished.

"I... see." Tsunade said, her own voice shaking slightly as she slumped back into her seat. "I suppose, from a strategic point of view, that losing Kakashi was a fair trade for at least nine Sound and Orochimaru and Sasuke... in fact, we made out like... bandits. But losing Kakashi... that's no jackpot."

The old woman buried her face in her hands for a few moments, and Sai had just turned to leave when she spoke again, her voice muffled a little by her arms, "Sakura. This is the first time you've lost a patient in the field, isn't it."

The pink-haired kunoichi tried to speak, but her mouth only moved soundlessly. Then, suddenly, she was kneeling at the Hokage's side, sobbing and begging for forgiveness.

"Sakura... No! Sakura! You listen to me right now."

The anger in Tsunade's voice caused the woman to look up in shock and fear, but she found her master's eyes to be compassionate, warm. "We all lose people, people we care about, as medics. Look at Dan, Nawaki... I'm still here, I'm still strong. Right?"

Sakura nodded weakly, but said nothing, only buried her face against Tsunade's thigh once again, still crying.
"Sakura..." Sai began hesitantly, "Naruto and I... we know other ninja who have lost someone close to him and kept going. Both of us... and Kakashi sensei. You remember Obito, right? Kakashi kept going. He would want you to as well."

"That's... right," Naruto choked out, half conscious at best, "Don't... don't you ever give up, Sakura. I don't know if I can be on the same... team... as someone who gives up. Kakashi wouldn't... you can't either."