xvii. Aftermath

Kakashi stood teetering atop the sloshing waves, his thoughts adrift; the lone survivor amongst his wrecked students. He had lifted Naruto, who was still too stupefied to speak, onto his back; sakura hung limp by the scruff of her dress from Bull's soft mouth; and despite the annoyed press of his lips, Sanosuke had yet to dump Sasuke's ragdoll body into the surging water below.

He turned towards Sanosuke. He hadn't lowered his hitae-ate yet, and Sharingan glowed red in his right eye. "You're going to take us back to Amakusa."

The other man cocked a brow. "What?"

"You're going to put us on one of your ships and take us to Amakusa."

"No, I heard you the first time. What makes you think I'm going to drag your sorry asses to Amakusa?"

"Because if you don't, I'll sink all seven of your ships."

That gave Sanosuke pause as he considered the weight of Kakashi's threat. "How much are you paying?"

"I don't have money."

Sanosuke scowled before his gray eyes slid onto the blonde brat at Kakashi's back—the one who had saved his brother—and he ground his teeth. He turned around with a proud huff, and still carrying the Uchiha boy, he strode over the rolling waves in the direction of his seven ships, the blue coat around his shoulders flapping in the blustery winds.

Sanosuke told himself his crew needed to stop on land to load up on supplies anyways. Besides, he had seen the look in Kakashi's eyes—the same empty gaze that he'd seen in mad men, unseeing of the world beyond them, the ones who had nothing left to lose— men like Kakashi went down roaring, taking with them whatever they could.

Kakashi repositioned Sakura across Bull's back, lowered his forehead protector, and trailed Sanosuke on the seas, his beast of a dog trotting close to his waist. The growing day had stretched the mist thin, and the seven ships materialized in the gray distance like a herd of giant ghosts. Beside them floated the Shimotsuki's few remains, and bobbing beside those were the handful of lifeboats crammed with the drowned ship's crew. The men sat hunched in their boats, glowering at Sanosuke as he passed because all the ship's cargo—and by extension their next paycheck—now rested at the ocean's bottom and land was a three days' row away. They glowered at Kakashi for the same reasons. Both men ignored their angry audience, Sanosuke because he could care less about a bunch of ill-begotten sea dogs, and Kakashi because his team was broken and he was a shinobi, not a goddamn philanthropist.

"Kakashi-san! Kakashi-san, over here!" A familiar voice cried out.

Both Kakashi and Sanosuke paused, turning to look at Murata who stood flapping his arms, the men around him hugging the sides of the boat as he rocked it beneath them. Sanosuke recognized him as one of his brother's favorite egg layers. Pity the merchant had lost his ship and all his worth as a result, though to be honest, Sanosuke never cared enough to bother himself with the financial side of things—that was always Kenji's wheelhouse.

"Kakashi-san!" Murata continued to howl. "Take me with you! I'll pay you double the agreed upon price! Where you going?" His voice took an indignant turn as the other man turned his back to him. "You can't just leave me here like this! What about this seal you left on me?" But his shouts and threats of retribution fell on stone ears.

Aboard the Kokuran, Sanosuke's pirates received Kakashi with as much warmth as the shipwrecked sailors in the waters below. Beside him, Bull rumbled a low growl, his ruff's fur standing stiff, disliking the volley of hostile glares being shot his master's way. Kakashi didn't pay them any heed, his attention preoccupied by the load on his back. He adjusted his grip on Naruto. The boy wasn't heavy, but he was so silent Kakashi felt the need to reassure himself his student was still there.

"Follow me," Sanosuke said to Kakashi without so much as an introduction to the crew, and Kakashi, fine with that arrangement, followed the other man down into the creaking passageways below deck.

Sanosuke halted before one of the many doors. While Sanosuke busied himself trying to figure out how to get at the door knob while still holding Sasuke, Kakashi heard someone else call his name.

"Kakashi-san?" It was Kenji, who appeared a little roughed up, but fine otherwise. "What're you all doing here? Oh! It's the kid. I never got to thank him for saving me from that snake—wait, what happened to his arm? Jesus, you all look like hell."

Sanosuke nudged the door open with the tip of his boot. "Tell the boys we're going to Amakusa, Kenji," he said to his brother without looking over his shoulder.

"Sure, I will," Kenji said. "But—hang on, isn't that Sasuke—" Before he could trail the two other men and the dog into the room, Kakashi kicked the door shut behind him.

"You can use this room," Sanosuke said as Kakashi looked around. The room had all the luxuries of a sailor's sleeping quarters: no windows, two bunks built into the opposing walls, and a wooden slab attached to the wall farthest from the door in a ploy at being a table. A stool had been tucked beneath it, the lit oil lamp on its surface the only source of light.

Sanosuke deposited the Uchiha boy onto one of the lower bunks before straightening—the low ceilings and bunks on either side crowding his broadness. Beside him, Kakashi crouched to slide Naruto off his back—the had kid had passed out, likely from blood loss— before tucking him into the opposite bunk, then reaching down to grab his female student off that giant beast's back. The muscled dog disappeared with a pop and burst of smoke, and Sanosuke watched as Kakashi strained on the tips of his toes to lift the girl onto the top bunk.

"The Kokuran's fast. It'll take a little over a day to get to Amakusa," Sanosuke said. "I can send the ship's doctor down for the kid's arm."

Kakashi pulled the thicken woolen blanket around Sakura, nodding without turning around and Sanosuke knew that was all the man had left to give. He edged past him sideways, opening the door to where his younger brother was still standing, an expectant look on his face.

"Aniki!" Kenji said. "What's going on—"

Sanosuke closed the door behind them, leaving Kakashi alone in the middle of that small creaking room, one eye looking up as if he were searching the ceiling for something to hang on to.

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Sakura was drowning again, this time held beneath unconsciousness, trapped in sleep's thick, viscous liquid. Her thoughts broke through the surface twice. She was confused and desperate each time, gaping for understanding before exhaustion dragged her under again.

The first time, it was horrific. She woke from darkness into another darkness, groaning as she turned onto her side, clawing at the scratchy material against her skin, wondering why she was drenched—was it water or sweat? She couldn't tell if her head was spinning or if the room was rocking around her. A small whimper slipped beneath her teeth. Had someone called her name? Then the great hand gripped her and pulled her under, and then she didn't have to think anymore.

The second time, Kakashi's face came into view, hanging over her like a near planet with the sky gray behind him. He said something garbled, and her tongue felt too heavy to ask him to repeat himself. Thankfully, she didn't have to concern herself with it for too long as the darkness wrapped her around her again.

The third time Sakura awoke, she did so slowly, rising up from the murk piece by piece. Something groaned loud in her ear, and she opened her eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling. It was her, she was the one who had groaned. She tried to sit up and electric pain surged through her body. She slackened against the futon, deciding it'd be better to not move for the time being.

"You're awake," a voice said from somewhere to her right.

Sakura's head flopped towards it, her neck hurting from the exertion. "Kakashi-sensei," she said. Her voice scraped against her throat like handfuls of gravel.

Her teacher sat cross-legged against the wall a few feet away, barefooted, his flak jacket and gloves removed, and the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to his elbows. His forehead protector was gone, too, the scarred eye squeezed shut on the Sharingan, while the dark one remained open on his book. His finger turned a page—of course he was reading. Sakura had gotten a better view of her surroundings as well. From what she could see, they were in a small room at an inn. Behind her, both gray light and the sound of a busy street filtered in through the papered window.

Then the fight against Orochimaru kicked against her memory and her heart gave a painful start. She rolled to her side as she tried to rise; it felt like someone had cranked too tightly all the screws on her body. She grit her teeth as she heaved herself up onto her arms, eyes wild and roving.

"Where're—"

"Sasuke and Naruto are in the hospital," Kakashi said without looking up.

Sakura took a full breath. Hospital wasn't good, but it was better than dead. The frantic spurt of energy went just as quickly as it came, and her elbows almost collapsed beneath her. "What happened?"

"You used up too much chakra."

"I mean the fight."

"The fight's over, Sakura." He closed his book and set it in his lap, finally looking at her, and Sakura noticed then the dark circles beneath his eyes. There were other things to notice too: the small basin of water by her side filled with ice; the damp wash cloth that had peeled off her forehead and onto her the back of her hand.

Sakura knew her teacher's general philosophy on injuries. She remembered one mission where Naruto had eaten some wild berries that had turned out to be toxic. Kakashi's response to the seventeen-year-old's despair over his impending doom had been, "Drink lots of water, and when you throw up, do it far from the camp so it won't attract the raccoons." He was the kind of adult who thought there was no harm in letting kids eat bugs, and all most wounds needed to heal was a little air and sunlight and maybe some band-aids if the bleeding was really bad. The fact that he had stayed by her bedside spoke more to his how worried he must have been than to the actual severity of her injuries.

Sakura watched her teacher massage a tired eye with his hand, saw the angry red of busted capillaries around the whites from sleepless nights.

"How long have I been out for?" She asked.

"Six days."

The number bowled her over; she would've guessed three at most. Hers mind raced, scrambling to find its footing when she realized there were no holds—she still barely knew nothing—about the fight, about Orochimaru, about her teammates. Why wasn't Kakashi explaining anything? Her green eyes locked in on him, practically straining in their sockets as if they could press the information out of him.

"Where is this? What happened to Naruto and Sasuke? And Orochimaru? Is the curse mark still there?" She asked.

"They're alive, Sakura," Kakashi said, setting his book aside before he began the arduous process of getting to his feet. He fished out his hitae-ate from his pants' pocket and re-blindfolded his scarred eye. "Sasuke's been awake. He's been watching over Naruto while I was here. We're in Amakusa. I'm guessing you want to head to the hospital, right?" He cracked her a smile beneath the mask.

Sakura knew her teacher had kept his voice light to skip over details and questions, tossing her answers with hollow centers. His offer to head to hospital was meant to divert her attention, but it only cause her to hunker down in her pit of questions. Still, she knew her teacher, knew no amount of brute force would pry away any answers he didn't want to give.

"Okay," she said, her hands curling into fists against the futon's thickness. "The hospital."

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Kakashi and Sakura headed out soon after, donning their travel cloaks—one of the few belongings that had not gone down with the Shimotsuki —before stepping onto the busy street. Above them, Amakusa's perennially drab skies didn't lend an inch to the sun, spreading gray over the city dull and unbroken. The teacher and student pair moved through the thick mist, which almost qualified as a drizzle, matching their pace with the bustling crowd shuffling through the old, narrow streets, the cobblestones beneath their shoes slick with wetness.

The air thrummed with commerce, filling the gaping silence between them. Kakashi had remained deflective of most of Sakura's probes. Still, she had managed to scrounge a few key details: he had kept watch over her at the inn because Amakusa, a civilian town, had no doctors at the hospital who were familiar with chakra-related complications; the mission had been aborted, Konoha alerted by messenger bird of Team 7's status and the unfortunate run-in with Orochimaru. Most importantly, it had not been Kakashi who had bathed her and dressed her while she was unconscious, but the inn-keeper's wife, who had taken pity on a frayed Kakashi after he'd shown up drenched at the inn's doorstep with three unconscious children in tow: two in his arms and a lion-sized creature—she was almost certain it was a dog—carrying the third child in its jaws.

At some point on their walk, Kakashi placed a steamed bun into Sakura's hand, saying something about eating and getting better. She bit into it, expecting meat and tasted cloying sweet red bean paste instead. Her teacher might as well have shoved a slice of cake into her hands, but the bait of food woke the monstrous hunger she'd been harboring in her body, and in two rapid gulps, the bun was gone.

"Did you want more?" Kakashi asked.

"Is there more?" She asked and received a steaming paper bag full of buns in response. "You don't want any, Sensei?"

"I'm not a fan of pork," he said.

Sakura took a bite of the bun. It was filled with red bean paste. All of them were. Sakura kept this fact to herself as she finished the treats, only wishing she had some milk to wash off the thick sweetness laying on her tongue.

Kakashi had always carried himself with an air of detachment, but now he seemed untethered, giving the impression he'd drift off into the gray beyond above at the slightest push. She didn't blame him: apparently he had spent the past five days shuttling back and forth across town between Sakura and the two boys at the hospital. No wonder he didn't want to talk, and the more they walked in silence, the more Sakura understood—and appreciated—it. She was beginning to realize she didn't want to think too hard about anything either, at least not yet. Her joints still crunched with stiffness, her muscles felt strung too tight, and the punches of pain on her bruised, purple-mottled hand had only gotten worse since she had opened her eyes. She was too tired to extend her thoughts beyond the boundaries of her own pain, and her roar of questions had died down into a kitten breeze.

Kakashi set an easy pace—probably for her—and after an hour and a half of shouldering sudden turns around corners, slipping between buildings, and walking up a long line of stone steps shrouded by trees, they emerged at the old hospital. It was located at the edge of Amakusa, perched atop a hill overlooking the city's dark, wet rooftops.

Rain had begun to sift down when Sakura and Kakashi pulled open the hospital's glass doors and stepped into the building, the door swinging shut behind them in a gong of shuddering glass. Kakashi went to the front desk to check in, and Sakura stood off to the side in the lobby, shivering in the A/C-ed air, breathing in the scent of rubber gloves and bleach sealed into the white linoleum beneath her feet. Behind her sat heinously orange rows of plastic chairs, all empty.

"Let's go," Kakashi said after signing in, and Sakura followed him through the groaning double-doors down the hallway into the patients ward. They passed some closed doors and a few open ones that gave glimpses of sick green-floored rooms with rows of empty, perfectly rectangular beds with flat white sheets stretched tight over them.

Kakashi drifted to a closed door, and pushed down on the handle, the other hand hiding in his pants' pocket as he pried it open.

Sakura heard Naruto's voice float out into the hallway, bright and crisp as day. "Kakashi-sensei?"

"Sakura woke up. She wanted to come see you," Kakashi said into the room.

"Whoa, what? Sakura-chan? Where?"

Kakashi turned, his one eye steady on her, and she realized then she had been hanging back in the hallway. She hurried to fill the gap in the door. "Here, I'm here," she said.

"Oh, Sakura-chan! You finally woke up!" Naruto's mouth curved into an excited grin. He was sitting up in the hospital bed, maybe a little gaunt, but vibrating with energy. He was alive. A weight she didn't know she had been carrying fell from her chest.

"Jeez, you dummy," She said, annoyed—mostly at herself—of having made mountains out of molehills. "How'd you get yourself landed in the hospital—"

Naruto shifted and the empty sleeve beneath his hospital shirt fluttered into view. The world lurched beneath Sakura, knocking the rest of her words loose from her head, scattering about her ankles in scrambled heaps. Naruto's blue eyes followed hers, slipping down to his missing limb and the smile shrank on his face for a moment, but he caught it before it could collapse, forcing the edges back up. The rain had quickened outside, drumming loudly against the window beside him.

"Oh this? Haha, Yeah, it sucks. I kinda messed up." Hi remaining hand curled tightly around the blanket.

Sakura swallowed thickly hoping to find something to say, but her throat came up empty. All that managed to crawl out was a faint, "What happened?"

She knew Naruto had been holding her while she was trying to root out the curse seal on Sasuke, but her consciousness had been slipping and the last clear thing she remembered was gulping down a mouthful of seawater, then things went dark.

Naruto's blue eyes darted around, trying to escape the insistent press of her gaze. A horrible thought wriggled its way her brain like a tiny black worm, eating away at her bit by bit until it grew fat like a squirming thumb and split, and then there were two worms. Then four. Then sixteen. And suddenly the dark maggots were spilling throughout her body, their writhing mass taking her over. Her breaths began to come shallow.

"Naruto," she began, voice trembling like a curve of water about to overflow in a glass. Everything about Naruto tightened—his shoulders, his smile, the fingers clutching the blanket. Everything about this was all wrong, wrong, wrong. Then Kakashi's arm landed across her, holding her up like a stake does to a drooping plant.

"It wasn't your fault," Kakashi said, and the tired gentleness in his voice made her wish the monstrous little worms would devour her heart and leave her for dead. As if her thoughts had sounded out into the booming silence, Kakashi's hand tightened around her shoulder. "Sakura, it's not your fault," he said again, and in that moment Sakura wanted to tear away from his hand and run out of that freezing little room and its rows of empty beds and gray rain-streaked window, Naruto's wooden smile—get away from breathing in this scene's strange, stale air. She rocked back onto her heels.

None of this was real. She needed to get back. Back in time, before all of this.

"Sakura?" A voice came up against her back. She twisted around and caught Sasuke in the doorway, his clothes and black hair sopped with rainwater, all of him dripping small wet puddles onto the linoleum floor. "You're awake," he said, wiping the back of his arm along his jaw to try knock some of the water away. He caught the frantic look in her eyes and a small frown tugged at the corner of his lips. "What's wrong?"

"Sasuke!" Naruto greeted from the bed, and Sasuke's dark eyes pulled away from her to the blonde. "Did you find it, asshole?"

Giving Sakura one last look, Sasuke sidestepped her towards the blonde's bed, the black plastic bag rustling in his hand. He dropped the bag in Naruto's lap before plopping down into the chair by the bed. The plastic bag crinkled as Naruto's searching hand rummaged through it.

"What the hell?" Naruto's shoved his face closer to the bag's mouth, consternation wrinkling his brows. "What's all this?"

Sasuke's hand scattered rainwater out from his hair. "You said you wanted a snack."

"No, asshole, I told you I wanted cup ramen! Ramen." Naruto reached into the bag and procured a red, fist-sized orb and thrust it out before him for all the world to judge. "This is a tomato!"

Sasuke reached over, and plucked it from the other boy's hands. "That's mine."

"The rest are apples!" There was a flurry of rustles as Naruto upended the bag to prove his point, and the damning fruits tumbled out onto his lap. "Where's the ramen?"

Sasuke's incisors tore a hunk out of the tomato's flesh, masticating the vegetable in silence, unbothered by the set of outraged blue eyes trying to nail him to a cross. He swallowed. "There weren't any convenience stores."

"The hell there wasn't!" Naruto threw the empty bag at his head, and the flimsy plastic floated down the gap between them and onto the floor. "I asked the nurse yesterday! She said there was one at the bottom of the hill! I told you there was a convenience store there, you jerk!"

"Too far away," was all Sasuke said, before shoving the tomato into his mouth, cool black eyes watching the blonde explode into an aneurysm. "Stop complaining. I got your stupid snacks, didn't I?"

"You call these snacks? You could've at least brought back some potato chips! You did this on purpose!"

"Just shut up and eat the apples, idiot. The nurse wouldn't have let you eat the ramen, anyways."

"Well I'm not a goody-two shoed prick like you. Augh! What was that?" Naruto peeled off the leftover tomato nub Sasuke had flicked from his cheek. "Gross! You asshole! Just go down the hill and get me my cup ramen, damn it!"

"Sakura, make the idiot shut up ," Sasuke said, leaning back out of his chair to crane his head towards her, dark eyes waiting.

"...well, I mean...cup ramen's probably not the healthiest," she said, hanging back from the fray.

Victorious, Sasuke turned to gloat over the blonde.

"But Sakura-chan." Naruto wailed at the treachery.

"Just eat the apples, Naruto," she said. Both boys glanced her way and Sakura winced—she hadn't meant to sound so short. "You need to eat healthy to speed up the healing," she added as an apology before turning to escape the hollowness nipping at her heels at her heels.

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Kakashi found Sakura in the hospital's small lobby, sitting at the edge of one of the rows and rows of plastic orange chairs that had been set up for visitors. It was late in the afternoon, and the space was just as empty as when they had first arrived. The young woman at the front desk had her head bent over a binder full of forms, a page rasping now and then when she flipped past it, engrossed in her work; she didn't even look up to acknowledge Kakashi when he pushed through the patient ward's double doors.

Sakura didn't look at him either when he settled into the empty seat beside her. He threw a tired arm over the back of her chair and left the other to fend for itself on his lap, his one eye on the giant clock hung over the double-doors. The sound of rain poured over the open silence between them, undercut by the A/C's roar as it shuddered through the vents.

Sakura kept her face buried in her palms, hunched over with her elbows on her lap, when she asked him, "Why didn't you say anything?" Her voice was dry of tears, but still raw—she had been crying earlier.

Kakashi watched the minute hand tick by. Ten seconds went by, and still no answer, no flash of brilliance came to him. "I don't know, Sakura," he finally had to admit. "There are some things you have to see for yourself."

Five seconds. Her hands fell away from her face, but she remained bowed. "It's my fault," she said with so much assurance that Kakashi knew she had likely been practicing the phrase many times over in her head. He stayed quiet, knowing it was best to let her get the rest of the lines off her chest. "If I hadn't missed Orochimaru, if I hadn't used up all my chakra so early, if I had justtrained a little bit harder as a kid—" her voice hitched, and she gripped the fabric of her dress in her lap, grinding her teeth against the sob bubbling in her chest. "It's all my fault."

If they were playing The Blame Game, Kakashi knew he could probably go one-for-one with her, and end up on top. After all, he was their cell leader—their fucking goddamn teacher—it was his responsibility to keep them all safe. He could-have, should-have pulled them out as soon as things were getting sketchy—hadn't he learned anything from that terrible mishap with Zabuza?

But, Kakashi had played this game so many times before—he was privy to all its insidious little traps and pitfalls that held its victims prisoner for years, sometimes until the end of their days. It was also a game he had learned long ago was pointless: the dead remained dead, and the living had to decide whether to continue on or stop, and he hadn't stopped just yet, even after he had put a fist through Rin's heart.

"Naruto must've turned a corner somewhere in the future," Kakashi said out loud.

Sakura sat up for the first time to look at him. "Huh?"

"Well, judging by your reaction, it seems like he'd have given up after losing an arm."

"What? No—I never said—"

"Given up on being a shinobi. Given up on becoming Hokage. A quitter."

"Naruto's not a quitter," Sakura cut in. "Actually, he becomes the village hero—the nation's hero. He saves the world, more times than you ever will, Kakashi-sensei."

"The world sounds like more than I'd like on my plate, anyways," Kakashi said with a good-natured smile. "But I'm sure if anyone's up to the task, it'll be Naruto, so let's have a little more faith in him. He's lost an arm, not his life."

"But—"

"I'm not saying it'll be easy, but it's not impossible either."

Sakura had meant Big Naruto—her best friend with a chest large enough to engulf her in bearhugs and shoulders broad enough to carry the weight of the world, the one who exerted the gravitational force of a small sun, pulling his friends, foes, entire nations even—entranced by his glow—into his orbit. That Naruto. Not this one, with his little bones and unkempt hair and thin smile that couldn't hide the empty sleeve at his shoulder.

Still, Kakashi was right, she had said so herself: Naruto was not a quitter.

"...you're right," she said, but she could still hear the doubt ringing loud through her voice.

"He's going to be okay, Sakura," Kakashi said. Then he told her what he had been telling himself since last week when he stood above the agitated waves holding Naruto at his back. "It's going to be rough, but he's going to be okay."

Sakura had no choice but have a little faith and trust her teacher. "How's Sasuke?"

Keeping his on the clock, Kakashi picked up his arm from the back of his chair and ran it through his hair and the movement sent a jolt of panic through her heart—she was familiar with his nervous ticks after so many years.

"What's wrong?" She asked.

"Nothing's 'wrong,'" Kakashi said, working to keep his tone even, the way they were taught to do when addressing civilians during emergencies, Sakura thought. She drilled into him with her green eyes, searching for answers. "That was quite impressive, what you did with the curse mark's chakra. How did you know how to do that?"

Her teacher had always been stingy with praise, and in any other situation impressing Sharingan no Kakashi would have tickled her pride, but she refused to him derail her. "Just a theory. What's wrong with Sasuke?"

"Just a theory, huh?" He said to himself. It was the first time he had ever heard of it—dragging out chakra using one's own, and not just any chakra, but a second invasive chakra. Locating, capturing, and expelling aside, she would have first had to distinguish between Orochimaru and Sasuke's chakra on feeling alone, all feats that demand god-tiered chakra control. Yet Kakashi had seen the purple globs weeping out of Sasuke's neck from beneath Sakura's palm—what a little monster he had on his hands.

"Kakashi-sensei."

"Orochimaru's chakra is still there." Kakashi rubbed out a crick in his shoulder. "You rooted out most of it, though—the mark is barely visible."

"Most of it?"

"There are still traces of it left, but it seems dormant for now; I don't think Sasuke is really even aware of it."

Sakura's brow crinkled with worry. "Will it stay dormant?"

"Maybe."

"What happens if it awakens?"

"Maybe it'll consume him, maybe it'll just harmlessly float through his system. Maybe he'll turn into a butterfly, I don't know," Kakashi said, and before she could raise any complaints about his cavalier attitude—and by the looks of it, she was gearing up to do exactly that—he turned to face her, stooping low so their gazes were level, his one eye pegged on her wide bottle-greens. "What I'd like to know more about is how you knew about the curse mark."

"Well...I just...remembered it."

"You seemed to have remembered a few things from the future during that battle. You mentioned Sasuke cut off your arm. Do you still remember that?"

Sakura shifted in her seat, her gaze dropping to the side as if she'd find an escape hatch by her foot, but Kakashi was merciless, and his unblinking black eye kept her nailed in place. "...I do. Sort of," she said.

"Sort of," Kakashi repeated, clearly wanting more.

"I don't know, sensei," she said, suddenly exhausted. All this talk about Naruto's missing arm and Sasuke's curse mark had left her drained. Her plate was loaded, and there sure wasn't a whole lot of room left for a heaping hot side of Time Travel Theories at the moment. "I remembered bits and pieces, but none of it feels like real memories that I lived through. I remembered Orochimaru, and I remembered him putting a curse mark on Sasuke...but I really can't tell you where or why it happened—they're just images in my head, like a dream, you know? But, there's one that's really clear, though, the one with Sasuke. The sky behind him is bright blue, and the sun's out, and he's holding this blade and I'm pretty sure he..."

"Cut your arm off," Kakashi said for her.

Sakura gave a small nod, mouth tight and lips rolled inwards as if she were afraid she would accidently speak it all into existence.

"Sakura, when was it that you first realized you had forgotten the future? Right before the Chunin Exams, right?"

"...right."

Kakashi finally released her from his scrutiny, his hand wandering to his chin as he considered the clock. "Huh. Sakura, do you remember why you chose to not take the Ehunin Exams?"

"I..." she began, then stopped, her expression slumping into consternation when her answer didn't come. She blinked, her brows knitting together as if the reason was a lack of focus. Her fists clenched at her dress again. "I...I knew something bad was going to happen with the Chunin Exams...I wanted to change the future."

"Wanted to change the future," Kakashi repeated, sounding far away as he dove deeper and deeper into his thoughts.

For a moment, Sakura's creases cleared as hope broke out over her face. "You figured something out?'

He unfolded himself from the seat, arms reaching for the ceiling as he stood to stretch. "Maybe," he said through an exhausted yawn.

"Sensei!" Sakura knew she was fast losing her hold on the man.

"I'm still trying to make sense of it myself, Sakura." He smiled at the suspicion lurking in her eyes and bent over to place a reassuring hand on her head like a promise. "I am not, in fact, the time traveling prodigy you seem to take me for. When I think of something, I'll let you know, don't worry. It's going to be okay."

He then sauntered off towards the hospital's glass entrance, curious about the convenience store Naruto had mentioned earlier. He hadn't seen one on his way up, and wondered if it was on the other side of the hill. He could really use a walk with his thoughts anyways. They may even have a nice magazine selection stocked with busty blondes and sultry-eyed brunettes; if lady luck's head was less inclined, he'd still be able to grab a bag of potato chips at the very least.

Sakura watched her teacher step outside without hesitation into the heavy downpour spilling out from the dark skies. The glass door swung shut behind him. It's going to be okay— Kakashi had said this to her so many times that day. As she watched his drenched back drift deeper into the blue rain, she wondered how many times those words had been meant for her, and how many more times he had been speaking to himself.

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A/N:

1. Whew, giving everyone a breather here. Kakashi unexpectedly stole the show, though we'll be back to team 7 shenanigans soon enough (Yes this is still a SakuxSasu, I promise lol).

2. Thank you all again so much for sticking with the story! I'm still learning and growing as writer, so any feedback is always appreciated!

3. On that note: A shot in the dark, but I need an editor/beta reader for this story. Looking for someone to give feedback on general story flow and correct technical errors. Would prefer someone with an established track record for writing/editing. Perks include my undying adoration, suffocating friendship (optional) and uninhibited access to the screaming fire tornado in my head, i.e. my brain (though some might call that a drawback). If anyone is interested, please PM me!