The Miracle

When terrible things come your way
We always find someway to make it through
And when you do make it
That's the sign of your miracle

Sakura cringed from the pain that was hitting her stomach.

"Ah Mika please hurry." Sakura clenched down her teeth as she held her stomach. Her other arm was around Mika's shoulder as the older woman supported Sakura while they walked to the hospital.

"I'm going as fast as we can Sakura, I don't want to go too fast for fear of hurting you even more." Mika stated worriedly just as they stopped outside the hospital entrance.

Naruto suddenly came running up to them after spotting them from the rooftops that he was jumping on, his face contorted with worry. "What's wrong?"

"Go get her parents Naruto." Mika ignored his question.

"But what-"

"Now Naruto!"

Naruto nodded his head and disappeared from their sight as Mika took Sakura inside the hospital. Tsunade, who was grabbing some paper work from the receptionist, glanced over as her eyes widened. She dropped the papers to the floor as a passing nurse picked them up. Tsunade ran to her side and looked at her hand that was resting over her stomach.

"You can't be, it's too early." She stated with surprise.

"I don't know what's going on...ahh," Sakura nearly fell to her knees, and she would have if Mika hadn't had a hold of her.

"Let's get her to a room." Tsunade took Sakura from Mika and led her away.

A couple of people ran into the hospital, Mika saw them and called them over. It was her sister and brother-in law, the woman whose pink hair resembled Sakura's ran up to her first. Her red dress in a disheveled mess from when she ran here. The man next her had dark hair and forest green eyes, no doubt that he was the one Sakura had gotten her emerald orbs from, his clothes consisted of a pair of black pants and a brown shirt.

"Where is she?" Kiyomi Haruno questioned as her husband, Takao, glanced around looking for his daughter.

"Tsuande has taken her to a private room to settle her in." Mika explained. "Come on, I know where they went."

Sakura laid in the hospital bed and cringed from the pains she was having in her stomach, she wasn't supposed to be having contractions this early, it hadn't even been the full nine months yet. The door to her room opened and her mother rushed in and went over to her bed side. Sakura smiled weakly at her before having to rest her head back on the pillow. Her father entered just after his wife as Tsunade excused herself from the room.

"Hey honey, how are you feeling?" Kiyomi asked.

"It hurts, Tsunade is going to have to give me some sort of drug, I don't know what its called, but its to stop the pain." Sakura mumbled out.

"Where's Sasuke?" Sakura cringed again as another twinge of pain hit her stomach.

"I'll go send a messenger hawk, he's out on a mission with his team." Takao said as he left the room with quick strides.

"He'll be here Sakura, don't worry." Kiyomi grabbed her hand and gave it a comforting squeeze as Tsunade returned to the room

"Oh god it hurts." Sakura cried out as the pain came back.

"Alright Sakura, I'm going to give you the medicine, it'll help with the pain." Sakura nodded as Tsunade injected it through the IV in her arm.

"Tsunade, will she and the baby be alright?" Kiyomi asked.

"I don't know, we're going to try and delay the birth as long as we possibly can so she can have more time inside the womb to develop." She paused before finishing. "But if this continues, we'll have to deliver the baby, we won't have a choice."

Sasuke turned and punched the rogue ninja that came at him as another tried to stab him with a kunai. He ducked the attack and delivered a punch to the enemy's stomach which sent him flying back into a tree. Neji landed by his side as they stood back to back when several more ninja came their way.

"Where the hell are they coming from?" Neji growled in frustration.

"I don't know." Sasuke said as they jumped at the the enemies and took them down one by one. "This can't keep going on."

"There are too many." Kiba shouted as he and Lee were engaged in their own battles.

Sasuke jumped back and performed the hand signs for the fire style jutsu, which several of the ninjas had gotten injured from. "That didn't work out so well." Sasuke muttered as they came at him even when they were bleeding.

"What the fuck is up with these guys?" Kiba shouted as he and Akamaru attacked several of the men at once.

Activating his sharingan, Sasuke dodged the attacks aimed at him and killed the men with a single strike to the heart. Neji activated his byakugan and performed his techniques which took down ten of the ninjas attempting to kill them.

Lee jumped back and kicked and punched down the shinobi, before landing at Kiba's side who was breathing heavily from the battle he and Akamaru has just ended.

"Neji are there anymore?"

Neji scanned the area with his byakugan and when he confirmed there weren't anymore they turned to see Shikamaru and Choji running their way. "Sasuke, you need to get back to the village!" Shikamaru shouted.

"What? Why?" He asked.

"Its Sakura she's in the hospital." He explained causing Sasuke's eyes to widen.

He didn't notice a ninja come from the top of the trees above them with a sword, Sasuke didn't dodge quick enough when the man stabbed him in the shoulder which knocked him to the ground. Sasuke kicked him off before jumping to his feet, he pulled the sword from his shoulder and dropped it to the ground. He fell to his knees as he held the wound, his blood was spilling out from the gash and he nearly blacked out.

Just as the man was about to attack him again, Shikamaru stepped him and used Shadow Possession to stop him. Neji gave the killing blow as soon as Shikamaru released him and they rushed to Sasuke's side. His ANBU uniform was already stained with his blood, and Lee told him to sit back as he helped him remove his shirt to bandage up the wound.

"We'll have to get that looked at when we get back." Lee stated and pulled Sasuke to his feet after the male had put his shirt back on.

"I need to get back." He muttered when he nearly lost his balance from the dizziness he felt.

"Lee go back with him, make sure he gets there, we'll handle the clean up here." Lee nodded as he and Sasuke took off into the trees.

Kiyomi entered the room again, as Sakura looked up hopefully, she had a downcast look on her face, she was still waiting for Sasuke. Her mother looked to her before speaking.

"The message got to Sasuke successfully, but he was injured on the mission."

Sakura's eyes widened. "Is he okay?!"

"Hey, hey, he's alright, once he gets here, he just needs the doctor to look at the injury to make sure its not infected and get worse."

Before Sakura had a chance to say anything, the door burst open and a raven-haired male came running inside the room, his breathing heavy since he ran the whole way here not giving himself a break. A ninja still had to breath, no matter how much stamina they had.

"Sasuke." Sakura breathed out when he came over to her side.

"How are you doing?" He asked worriedly as she reached up and hugged him causing him to flinch.

"Is your wound bad?"

"Not as bad as I think it is." He said as he kissed her on the forehead.

"You need to have it re-bandaged, knowing you, you more than likely ran all the way here and caused it to bleed even more." She gave a weak smile.

"Come Sasuke, I'll take a look at it," Tsunade said as she led a reluctant Sasuke from the room.

"Get yourself taken care of first." He gave a nod to her words.

Sasuke was pushed into a room as Tsunade told him to remove his shirt. "I'll have a nurse bring you a different shirt."

She tossed the shirt into a plastic bag, it would need to get thrown out, there was no point in trying to clean it. Sasuke was stiff as Tsunade worked on the wound, she would heal it to a point where it hopefully it wouldn't reopen but it would still hurt.

"Tell me Tsunade, how is the baby?" He inquired as he looked to the floor.

"To be honest, if we can't delay the birth, we'll have to deliver the baby, she'll be premature," Tsunade explained to him.

"What are the chances of survival for the baby?"

"They are slim, but all of the cases I've dealt with that involved premature births, most of them have survived. They had to stay in the hospital for a few months but they pulled through it."

"But there's still that chance that the baby won't make it."

"Sasuke, I'm sure your child will be fine, but we can't rule out anything, since anything can happen at his point." Tsunade finished wrapping another bandage as a nurse walked into the room with a black shirt.

He slipped it on as the nurse said, "She's waiting for you." He gave a nod and left the room and headed back into the one Sakura was in.

When he entered he noticed that her parents had left, she looked up to him as he gave a soft look at her. She smiled slightly and reached out her hand for him to come closer. He went forward and grabbed her delicate hand in his larger one, she sighed and released her hand from his before placing it against his cheek.

"We'll get through this." She murmured softly.

"I hope so." He said. "Where is everyone?"

"They wanted to give us some alone time, they went down to the cafeteria to get something to eat. They didn't want everyone barging in here, you know how Naruto and Kakashi are when one of us is hurt or something," She said. "You should go too."

"I'm not leaving your side." He stated, the look he gave her told that there was no room for arguments.

The pain in her stomach suddenly caused her to scream, his eyes widened as he ran to the door and shouted out into the hallway. "I need help in here."

He moved out of the way as numerous nurses came into the room with Tsunade right behind them. She turned her attention to Sasuke after examining quickly over Sakura. "Sasuke you need to leave."

"What?"

"We are going to have to deliver this baby, there isn't anything else we can do."

"I don't want to leave her." Sasuke said.

"You have to, we need all the space we can get in here, we have to take all precautions and you can't be in the room." She said and pushed him out into one of the seats just outside the door.

His heart seemed to stop, There's nothing I can do...

Standing to his feet, he began pacing back and forth, his hands were shaking as he tried to calm himself down, he wished he could be inside with her, but he would only get in the way, and the doctors needed any spare room they could get if they were going to have several machines in the room. He stopped himself and sat back into the chair as his hands continued shaking.

He dropped his head into his hands, when he heard the sound of people talking, he knew it was the gang: Sakura's parents, his friends, teammates. He breathed out and tried to keep calm but his nerves just wouldn't settle, he was never been this scared in his life, this was just as bad the night the Uchiha Clan was slaughtered.

Kiyomi spotted him first before her eyes widened, Naruto noticed the expression on her face and turned to see what she was staring at. He didn't waste anytime and sprinted over to his best friend. "Sasuke, what's going on?"

"They have to deliver the baby, they didn't have any other options." He muttered when he refused to meet their gaze, he didn't want them to see the tears that were brimming his eyes.

He hasn't ever let tears come to his eyes since the day his parents died, now they were just surfacing, he was blaming himself because this was happening to them. God was making him pay for what he did all those years ago when he betrayed the village. Damn it, what the hell was I thinking back then?

Just then the door to Sakura's room opened causing him to look up as they took a small incubator and pushed it down the hall. Tsuande stepped from the room and gestured for Sasuke to go inside. He stood nervously and walked inside and spotted Sakura laying on the bed, the back was propped up so she wasn't laying down fully on her back.

"Sakura how are you feeling?" He asked.

"How's the baby?"

"I don't know, I can go check if you want?"

"No, its fine." She paused and looked at him. "This is really happening to us isn't it?"

"I'm afraid so."

"What made this happen? I mean...What did I do?"

"It wasn't anything you did." Sasuke assured her.

"I'm not a drinker, I don't smoke. Could I have eaten the wrong thing?"

Sasuke tried to speak but Sakura just kept ranting.

"Maybe it was something physical, like a genetic defect or something."

"It wasn't anything like that."

"Well than whats the answer Sasuke, I mean we know the question, why was our baby born prematurely, and why is she probably going to die?" She cried out as tears fell down her cheeks.

"No one can answer that." He told her.

"Well if its not something physical maybe I'm being punished for something." She said.

"Sakura, don't do that to yourself, that's ridiculous."

"Well, why is it ridiculous? We don't know everything, maybe there's some unknowable power at work, like some kind of universal force, that's punishing me for something that I did."

"You didn't do anything wrong." Sasuke grabbed her hand.

"I must have Sasuke, because if there isn't something physically wrong with me, and I didn't do anything morally wrong nothing makes any sense." She yelled. "Why do I deserve this?"

"No. No you don't deserve this, you don't. I don't deserve this, our baby doesn't deserve this." He placed his hand on her cheek and she wrapped her arms around his torso as he rested his head on top of hers. "Things like this happen all the time, no one deserves them."

She cried into his chest. "I'm here for you, I always will be."

The gang waited outside the ICU room doors, Sasuke and Sakura had gone inside a few minutes ago so they could be with there daughter while Tsuande examined her to get a more accurate detail on her condition. The others weren't allowed inside as they examined her, only the parents were.

Naruto had been pacing back and forth. "I must have walked across this floor a thousand times."

"How long has it been?" Kiyomi asked her husband.

"An hour." Takao responded.

"How long does it take to examine a baby, I mean she's only this size-"He gestured with his hands, he paused with his eyes widening realizing his mistake. "I'm sorry."

"Its alright Naruto, just calm down." Kiyomi said.

Tsunade suddenly came through the door as they all jumped to their feet. "How is she?"

"Well...being so premature, the lungs are not sufficiently developed for her to breath on her own. At this point she can't even cry." She explained. "She's in an incubator on a respirator and IV. The next twenty-four to forty-eight hours are going to be very critical."

"Do Sasuke and Sakura know?" Kiyomi asked.

"Yes, we've gone over everything with them." She continued. "You should know, everything that can be done is being done."

"You sure you've tried everything."

"Yes."

"Wait, isn't there some kind of experimental drug or some machine or something."

"I'm sorry, but we can't duplicate the conditions in the womb." Tsunade stated.

"There has to be something you can do."

"I'm sorry Mrs. Haruno, we've done all we can."

"Can we see the baby?" Takao asked.

"Yes, but don't be shocked when you see her, she doesn't look like a full term baby looks, her skin is a little translucent and...she's very tiny." Tsunade said as she turned and held the door open to allow them to go inside.

They stood around the small bed that the infant was sleeping in, machines, tubes and wires were attached to her frail body. "She's beautiful."

"That's our daughter." Sakura said as she turned to Sasuke.

"I can't stand to look at her like this." Sasuke said as he glanced down to the floor before turning his attention to Tsunade. "Is there any point to this?"

"Well in some instances like these, parents decide to unplug the machine and let nature take its course."

"Well Sasuke, I think we have a decision to make." Sakura said to him as she gripped his hand in hers.

"Wait, are you saying that this is it for her?" Sasuke ignored what Sakura had said.

"If your asking my medical opinion, I say she has very little chance of survival."

"Well I think she deserves to experience life not hooked up to all of these machines." Sakura's voice cracked as she looked to Sasuke.

Sasuke hesitated. "I think she's right." Sasuke said to Tsunade as Sakura pressed her face into Sasuke's chest.

"Alright, I'll send in a nurse with some papers for you to sign." She said.

"Sasuke lets take a walk." Takao said as gripped Sasuke's shoulders from behind.

"I don't want to leave."

"Come on it'll only be a minute." Takao said as he led Sasuke out of the room.

"I'll go with you." Kakashi said.

"Me too." Naruto threw in as they followed Takao and Sasuke out of the room.

Sakura tried not to cry as she turned around when Ino called her. She hugged her friend tightly wishing there was something she could do for them, but she knew she couldn't, not even their healing techniques would be able to save her.

Sasuke exited the room and went to lean against the wall. "You hang in there Sasuke."

"I don't know if I can."

"Hey its hard I know its hard," Takao said as he gripped onto Sasuke's shoulder to keep him from fidgeting. "Sometimes you just have to put one foot in front of the other even when you don't know where you are going."

"I feel like I'm going to lose it." Sasuke admitted as Naruto looked to his best friend.

"You're not, no your not Sasuke, I've never seen you as together as you were in there." Kakashi said. "You're going to make it through this."

"Yeah, you're doing great." Naruto threw in not really knowing what else to say.

"Sakura needs you Sasuke, you need to stay focused, just when you think you've got nothing more to give, you've got to find more to give." Takao told him.

"I don't know if I can Mr. Haruno." Sasuke admitted as his eyes became glossy.

"Sasuke. Sakura needs you to be strong right now."

"I know I know."

"Kakashi." Takao gestured to Naruto.

"Hey Naruto lets go get a drink." Kakashi said and pushed him down the hall.

"But I'm not thirsty."

"Yes you are."

They disappeared from sight and Takao looked back to Sasuke.

"Look Sasuke, I know I'm not your dad, but you're like a son to me, you've made mistakes in your past but you have redeemed yourself for them, and I'm going to get you through this."

"It just happened so fast, a year ago things were simple, and then Sakura got pregnant and we got married. And I'll admit it took me a long time to get used to the idea of becoming a father, and now I am, I realize I want it, I want more than anything in the world." Takao smiled at him as Sasuke wiped at his eyes. "Its too much, how do I handle it all?"

"I can't answer that, but just know you have me, Kiyomi, Sakura and all of your friends here, and we'll help you through this." Sasuke nodded at what he said.

"I'm not going to let her down Mr. Haruno."

"I know you're not."

"Can we walk?"

"Yeah," Takao rested his hand on Sasuke's shoulder and they headed down the hallway so Sasuke could calm himself down.

Sakura held her daughter in her arms, each of the occupants in the room had held her and said a few words. And now Sakura stared down at her baby girl as her eyes grew glossy.

"Hey there, Sasuke and I finally thought of what to name you." Sakura smiled sadly. "Kamiko Mikoto Uchiha. And we really want you to stay with us, but if you feel like you are slipping away, we want you to know we'll do our best to pull you back. Because we don't want to let you go."

Kamiko rested in Sakura's arms, her eyes closed, she was wrapped in a pink blanket and there was a pink hat on her head to keep her head warm. Sakura began to cry as Sasuke came into the room with Takao, Naruto and Kakashi behind him. He wrapped his arms around her as he didn't bother to hold back his tears. They slid slowly down his face as he rubbed Sakura's back in a comforting manner.

Tsunade came over to her and took Kamiko from her arms, the infant hadn't moved at all, not even her chest gave a sign that she was alive. When Sakura felt her leave her arms, she wrapped hers tightly around Sasuke's chest. She sobbed into his chest and gripped the back of his shirt in her slender fingers.

Tsunade put Kamiko and placed her into a small bed and was ready to tell the nurse to take her when she paused upon seeing Kamiko's eyes slightly open. She took her stethoscope and held it to the baby's chest. There was a heart beat, and she was breathing on her own, Tsunade's eyes widened in surprise.

"Oh my god." Sakura and Sasuke both turned to her as Tsunade gazed back. "She's alive."

"What?!" Sakura asked breathlessly.

Sasuke and Sakura ran over to the bed that she was lying in and gazed down. Kamiko's eyes were open and she suddenly gave out a soft cry, Sasuke felt like his heart stopped beating as he saw her actually start crying out, she is alive. Tsuande lifted the infant and handed her to Sasuke who looked down to her with a soft gaze, his eyes were slightly red from earlier.

He smiled down at his daughter as he placed his finger in her hand, when he felt her grip his finger he looked to Sakura. The pink-haired woman smiled and hugged him as she cried happily, she gently touched the side of her daughters face and she saw Kamiko's lips twitch as if she wanted to smile.

"This is the most amazing thing I've ever seen." Tsunade stated as she glanced down at the baby in Sasuke's arms. "It truly is a miracle."

A/N Just another one-shot, its based on one of my favorite episodes of Roseanne. Hope you liked it. :D