The Turning Leaf

Chapter One- The Deal

Tak. Tak. Tak. Tak. Tak.

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Two people stopped abruptly.

"…Naruto?"

"Sakura?"

"What're you doing here?"

"Granny Tsunade wanted to see me."

"Weird, Lady Tsunade called me too."

"…"

"…"

"…"

"Well," Sakura sighed, "I guess we better get to Lady Tsunade's then."

Naruto nodded, and the two sauntered on their way towards the Hokage's officer.

"You have any idea what she wants?" Naruto inquired as they made their way down the halls.

Sakura shook her head. "She just sent Shizune out and said I needed to come to her office as soon as possible."

"Huh, that's exactly what Kakashi-Sensei told me."

"Then…maybe we're being sent on a mission."

Naruto shrugged his shoulders. "I dunno. Maybe."

Sakura stared down the hall as they neared Tsunade's office. When they got there, Sakura knocked on the door.

"Enter," Tsunade's voice called.

Sakura took one last glimpse at Naruto, and then she turned the knob and pushed the door open. When they entered, Tsunade looked up from her desk with a light smile.

"Ah, good, you're both here."

'"'"'"'"

Naruto slammed his fist against the wall behind him with a resounding thud. "What are you trying to say, Grandma?"

"Naruto, calm yourself." Tsunade snapped irritably. "I mean exactly what I said."

"But you can't do this!" Naruto roared. "What gives you the right to—?"

Tsunade's hands slammed on the table and she stood up momentarily in her anger. "Naruto, I and every other Kage out there have every right to do this! Now be quiet!"

Naruto growled and then looked over at Sakura for support. However, she simply stood there, staring at the floor with widened eyes.

"But…" Sakura muttered, too shocked to look up and meet the gaze of her mentor, "Sasuke…."

Tsunade's eyes softened as they landed on her student, understanding how she felt. She sat back down in her chair and folded her arms in front of her. "Sakura…it was the only thing I could do."

Naruto's breath hissed out through his teeth. "So that's all you can do, huh? All you can do is sit back idly drinking your tea while people are out there hunting down Sasuke to…to kill him?"

Tsunade shot Naruto a very stern gaze. "If you're going to continue acting like a child, then I will have you thrown out of my office, Naruto."

"Like hell if I care! I'm not going to let you send a bunch of ninja out to kill him! You have to give him another chance! He's a Leaf Ninja! He's our friend! He—"

"Naruto," Sakura suddenly interjected, turning her head to see the blond beside her, "please…just calm down."

Naruto's head whipped towards his pink-haired friend. The look she gave him was pleading, yet behind it she held back all the emotions that he knew bubbled inside her at that moment.

"But…Sakura…" Naruto replied, his whole body shifting to face his teammate, "they…they plan to—"

"Naruto…it hurts me too…." Sakura responded, fiddling nervously with the end of her skirt as her gaze dropped back down to the floor. "But there's nothing we can do. We've only met failure every time we tried to bring Sasuke back. He…. It was…probably the only thing…that Lady Tsunade…"

By now the tears had finally overcome Sakura, and she began to cry. Naruto took a step closer to her and put a comforting arm on her shoulder.

"Sakura."

Sakura sniffed and looked up as she recognized her master calling for her.

"Yes, Lady Tsunade," Sakura sniffled as she wiped away her tears, "I know I shouldn't be crying."

"No you shouldn't." Tsunade agreed.

Naruto gawked for a moment, unable to believe that Tsunade was acting so heartless to Sakura's feelings. He opened his mouth to retort, but Tsunade spoke first.

"After all…tears didn't bring Sasuke back the first time, and I don't think they'll bring him back on this last try."

Tsunade's statement surprised the two. Their eyes widened as they stared at the Hokage.

"On this…last try…." Naruto echoed, disbelieving.

Tsunade nodded. "The Kages decided to leave the hunting and fate of Sasuke Uchiha to me, claiming him to be my problem. I did note that they said 'fate' rather than 'death', which is why I've postponed the launch of the anbu to give you two one last shot to find him and bring him back to the Leaf Village."

When Tsunade finished her explanation, amazed grins began to etch their ways onto the faces of the two shinobi. Tsunade gave them both a contented smirk as Naruto began to pump his fists excitedly. Sakura merely gazed at her mentor, caught between awed surprise and gratefulness.

"Well, you two better hurry then." Tsunade declared. "I've only allowed you two a week. No more than that. It should be enough time if you're fast enough to do a decent sweep of the areas that Sasuke could be traveling through. If you're not back or on your way with Sasuke by the time the week is up, then I'll have no choice but to deploy the Anbu to take care of him."

Naruto grinned confidently and held up a fist in Tsunade's direction. "Don't you worry, we'll get him back! That's a promise! We'll be back in under a week with his sorry ass!"

Tsunade smiled as Naruto ushered Sakura out the door and the two took off down the halls to their houses to pack for their journey. Tsunade sighed and leaned back in her chair.

"For their sakes…they better come back before a week is up…or more than just our Anbu will be after him…."

'"'"'"'"

Sakura snapped together the last buckle on her bag and looked down at it. She was all packed and ready for their journey. She picked up her bag, threw it over her shoulder, and stopped. Ahead of her on a dresser was the picture of Squad Seven. The three of them were young Genin at that time, but now they were much older, wiser, and changed.

She took a few steps closer to the picture and picked it up. She stared down at Sasuke, whose Leaf Headband shone while he frowned at the camera and glared sideways at Naruto. A small smile played at Sakura's lips as she looked at herself in between the two boys. Sasuke had been so young, so deeply loyal to the village, and their best friend. At that time thoughts like Sasuke leaving them for darkness never really crossed their minds, but now here they were, about to go try to track him down one last time.

Sakura gulped as she placed the frame back where it belonged. Their new assignment flitted through her mind. This was it. It was their last chance. Their last shot to find Sasuke and bring him back. If they failed or if they couldn't find him…it was all over.

"We have to find him." Sakura thought as Naruto's confident face came to her mind. "We have to…we're going to find him. We're going to bring him back to the village. We can't fail."

With that thought, Sakura adjusted the strap of her backpack on her shoulder, and turned to leave. She had to go down to meet Naruto at the village gates, and then it would all begin.

'"'"'"'"

As Sakura grew closer to the village gates, she could just start to make out Naruto's bright form waiting by the wall. He looked up and grinned confidently as she neared him.

"So you're ready?" Naruto asked, pumping a fist in his excitement and anticipation.

Sakura nodded her head. "Yes…and this time," she smiled, trying to match Naruto's confidence, "we'll get him…together."

Naruto's grin widened at Sakura's statement, and he nodded his head eagerly. "Let's do this!"

The two turned to face the exit, and then they strode forward. They waved at the guards, who waved back as the two crossed the concrete threshold of the gates. Once their feet touched the gravel of the path outside the village, they turned their heads to look at each other sideways for a moment, hopeful smiles on their faces, and then they were gone.

'"'"'"'"

Naruto and Sakura leapt swiftly through the branches of a forest, both keeping idle attention to exactly where they stepped. Their eyes scanned around, looking for any signs of life that maybe, with a lot of luck, could be their old Uchiha teammate.

Sakura huffed. "One of my shadow clones just fell out of range…but they hadn't picked anything up."

Naruto nodded briefly. "One of mine just did the same thing."

The two then swiftly made the hand signs for shadow clones, conjured them up and then sent them out to replace the ones that had just disappeared.

Naruto let out a huge sigh. "We may have to rest soon…keeping up as many clones as I am over such a large distance while running is taking quite a bit out of me."

"Yeah…I know what you mean." Sakura responded. Her hand came up to wipe a bit of sweat from off of her brow. "If we hit a good clearing we'll break and get some food."

"Alright." Naruto agreed as they picked up their speed a little bit.

Half an hour later the two came into a clearing. They leapt down to the ground and almost immediately fell into sitting positions.

Sakura fished around her bag for a water bottle. "None of my clones spotted anything."

"None of mine either." Naruto puffed through a couple gulps of water. "We don't even know if Sasuke is anywhere near us."

Sakura sighed. "I know…but it's possible. Based off our knowledge it's safe to assume that Sasuke didn't go into any places like the Land of Lightning or nearby the Sand Village. If he did it's almost for certain they'd give him some hell he'd rather avoid if he's travelling."

"Yeah, and I doubt he'd go anywhere past there. He's still got that connection to that Madara guy, and they say he's targeting the Kage's, so he wouldn't want to go too far from the five nations."

"Yeah…" Sakura muttered. She then looked over to Naruto. "But anyway, let's get ourselves something to eat."

Naruto nodded enthusiastically. "I heard that!"

The two got to work setting up a meal. After it was prepared they ate swiftly in silence, wanting to move on quickly so they could keep searching the area. They left a while later after they felt they were rested enough, and continued on their way.

That was the schedule they followed for three days after that. They would stop only to eat or sleep, or in the other case where one's chakra became too low for them to move on and they would take a longer break.

On the fourth day everything was set up so routinely that it was easy to forget exactly what it was they had set out to do. Everything passed by in such a blur it was hard to believe that only four days had passed.

It wasn't until the mid-afternoon of that fourth day that anything happened.

Naruto and Sakura sat in another clearing, eating and resting. All four days they had seen nothing of any sort of interest, and no sign of Sasuke at all. The past four days had taken a large toll on their hopes of finding the Uchiha, but with the other around for moral support, they never gave up completely.

Sakura flattened out a map next to her cup of instant ramen. "So if I'm right about the track we've been taking, we must be about…here." Sakura gestured with her finger to a place on the map. "We're pretty close to the Land of Lightning."

Naruto let out a sigh. "Then I don't think there's much hope that we'll find Sasuke here. He knows they're after him. Only a suicidal idiot would get near them in Sasuke's position."

Sakura nodded her head. "I know…but it's still worth a shot. We've only got three days left."

"Yeah…three days." Naruto echoed, looking down at his own cup of instant ramen. "So we have three days to find him, beat the crap out of him, and drag him back to the Leaf Village."

"Basically," Sakura responded, "though I don't think it'll be that easy. Just because he'd be in the village doesn't mean he'd like it, and just because he's beaten to a pulp doesn't mean he will come back."

"You'd be surprised how much violence there is in convincing a guy to do something." Naruto grinned with a chuckle.

Sakura shook her head, a light smile on her face. "I think it takes more than a fist to the face to convince a guy of something."

"Don't knock it till you've tried it."

Sakura laughed. "If it did work, I think guys would be less perverted."

"Well, I didn't say it'd worked all the time."

Sakura laughed again. "And besides…I think we may need some words to convince Sasuke that being in the Leaf Village is better. He may be a hard-head sometimes, but he is logical."

"Hm, yeah, logical." Naruto huffed sarcastically, and then held up his hands like he was a scale. "Grow alone with hatred or grow together with friends. Stay out and be hunted and killed by Anbu, or come home and get to live a few more years. Sasuke is really stubborn, but I don't think he's a total idiot."

"Yeah." a moment passed as they both ate some of their ramen. "It's that stubbornness that concerns me though. He's always been the same way. Once he has his mind set on something, he'll stick to it."

"Then we'll have to give him that stubborn mindset that being with us is about a million times better than being out in the wild, considering that it is."

"Heh, I guess."

"You know it's true."

Sakura looked up at the sky. "Yeah…you're right."

Naruto gazed up at the sky for a moment as well, and then returned his attention to his ramen. Sakura's gaze stayed fixed on the sky. She could see a few clouds, and a flock of birds flew up in the air, migrating for the coming winter.

"Sasuke's kind of like a bird…" Sakura thought as the flock disappeared behind the trees. "He migrates to another place when he thinks it's right. But…that doesn't mean he won't return. That's what we're trying to tell him. Just like a bird, he moves when it becomes too cold, but I guess we'll have to convince him that it's warm where he used to live again, and maybe that'll make him come back."

Sakura sighed as she looked down at her ramen cup. It was empty. She reached into her backpack and pulled out a bag where she stuck her trash. She crushed the cup and dropped it inside. She then put the bag back and zipped her pack closed.

Naruto stood up a moment later, having also discarded his cup of finished ramen. "Then let's hurry! If we have three days left to beat his face in and convince him to come back, then we have to find Sasuke by tomorrow!"

"The only problem is that if we want to make it back to the Leaf Village by the time our week is up, we'd actually need to find Sasuke and convince him to come home today…but I doubt that's going to happen." Sakura thought sullenly, but she kept that fact to herself and stood, putting on a positive smile for Naruto. "Right, let's go."

Naruto and Sakura quickly made the hand signs for shadow clones, and within a few seconds they were surrounded by a big group of them.

"Let's move." Naruto and Sakura declared simultaneously, sending both of their packs of clones leaping off in separate directions in search of Sasuke.

Naruto and Sakura exchanged brief glances, both smiling, but knowing that behind their smiles was the exhaustion, worry, and even doubt that they felt about their chances of finding Sasuke. Nevertheless, they both leapt forward to hit the trees running.

However, the second they made contact with a tree limb, they both felt it. Clones were disappearing, being destroyed, and the last thing they saw before they were beaten was a flash of familiar black hair.

"Sasuke!" Both Sakura and Naruto exclaimed, and they whipped their heads in the same direction that their clones had been defeated. They took off like bullets towards where they now knew their old teammate was.

Sakura stared forward, her eyes landing on Naruto who ran a few steps ahead of her.

"So I guess this is it…." she thought. "We're about to start the final battle…and this time…there's no room for error. We have got to take him back, and we're going to do whatever it takes to make sure we do."

And that's a wrap for chapter one! Dear lord, I have no idea why, but it took me forever to write this out! I started this like…two months ago at least! All my other stories just came ahead of this one, and I was just uninspired. Sigh…anyway…but I got this chapter done! And BIDoID isn't even fully published yet! So Yay! I am pulling well ahead! And it looks like my hopes for a long story are being answered! If I can make the "retrieve Sasuke" arc last at least two more chapters then I'll be well on my way towards creating my longest story yet! So till then!