A/N: Surprise!

Disclaimer: If I did own Naruto Itachi would be alive, well, and in love with me. Since he is none of those things it's clear I do not own Naruto.

Chapter 7

Hell's Theft

Sakura awoke with a start the Saturday morning after the party. She was surprised to find herself in her room in her most comfortable pajamas. The last thing she could remember was a pair of terrible yellow eyes that gave her the first headache she'd had since the car accident with her parents. It was a little frightening.

However there were worse things in the world, such as waking up in bed with a complete stranger, which was exactly what Sakura was dealing with at the moment. Naturally Sakura would have screamed bloody murder at the man, but unfortunately her voice had abandoned her and her mind happened to be out to lunch. The most she could do at the moment was to stare at the (very hot) stranger and attempt to put the pieces together.

Without warning the stranger opened his eyes, saw her staring, sat up and smirked at her. Oh, let's not forget to mention he also turned out to be shirtless. Sakura's mind came back from its brain food and kindly decided to start working again.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" She shrieked with as much noise as her lungs could possibly produce. The white haired, green eyed man with strange red markings on his face made a show of ignoring her. He yawned silently and stretched and only when he was finished did he look at Sakura.

"Your face is very red." He said without a care in the world. He stood up and dodged her oncoming fist. Mystery man then decided it would be fun to provoke her even more by quirking his eyebrow at her. She decided she hated quirky eyebrows. "I'd better go make breakfast. A demigoddess collapsing is never a good sign."

"How do you know about that? Just who are you?" Sakura demanded after looking in his eyes to judge whether or not he was sane and knew what he was talking about. He looked right back at her with the gaze of someone who had cornered their enemy.

"I'm Kimimaro. As it so happens I serve a demon. For the record, I'm not referring to a half demon like your friends Gaara and Naruto but a creature that is your biological mother's opposite." The man called Kimimaro explained as he wandered out to the kitchen motioning for Sakura to follow. He pulled out pancake mix and a pan like he owned everything he touched. He looked like he was enjoying her confusion and shock at hearing that Gaara and Naruto were half demons. It pissed her off.

"You know I'm a demigoddess and yet you're deliberately trying to get a rise out of me. Do you really think that's smart?" She sneered at him. Something about him just brought out the worst in her.

"Just following orders Sakura. There's no need for you to go and insult my intelligence." He replied totally unfazed. She hated how he was deliberately messing with her and making her look like the bad guy.

"How do you know my name, and do you expect me to believe you were just following orders when you crawled into my bed? What kind of sick perverts are you and your boss?" Sakura was pleased to see that her remark had hit a nerve. He turned to glare at her before giving her the most evil smirk she'd ever seen a man give.

"You know Sakura a few drops of divine blood won't protect you from pain or death. I would remember that the next time you feel like insulting my master."

"How dare you threaten me in my own home? What do you want, and who exactly is this master of yours?" Sakura demanded.

"My master seeks your power, and he'll stop at nothing to get it. I would take that into account before you oppose him." Kimimaro warned before flipping the pancakes he was cooking.

"That's nice to know but it isn't what I asked. What do you want? What is driving you to serve a demon? I don't know if you realize this but I blame you for invading my home and choosing to obey such ludicrous orders. Just so you know, I don't plan on eating anything you cook either. For all I know you could have poisoned the food."

Kimimaro smirked at this. "I thought I told you the boss needs you alive." He stated as if it proved his innocence.

Sakura sighed as she felt her headache return with a vengeance. "That might make a difference to me if he were the one making my food." The pain increased until she was so nauseous she had to run to the bathroom to vomit.

Kimimaro took the pancakes off the stove and went after her. She shut the door in his face but didn't take the time to lock it. He let her get sick in relative privacy but when he heard a strange thump he knocked loudly as a warning and opened the door. He was greeted with sight that chilled him to the core as a highly unnatural occurrence. He saw a demigoddess of health and strength collapsed on the floor.

XXXX

"Damn you bastard! I'll kill you!" Sakura's hearing was the first of her five senses to return to her. The first voice she was able to clearly make out was Madara's.

"Sasori, is she going to be alright?" That was Pein's voice. He sounded more distressed than she had ever heard him.

"You can kill me if you want, but my master will just send another. The next one will not treat her as gently as I have." There's the little bed invader. That thought brought feeling back to her and she realized she was in a bed.

"Judging from the way your eyes stray to her every 2 minutes, like clockwork, I'd say you've grown rather fond of her. That or you feel guilty over what happened." Kakuzu murmured causing another burst of chatter that couldn't be made out. Smelling was back now and she detected several different colognes. Then Itachi's calm voice sliced in like a katana through air.

"Both of which would be highly unusual for one of Orochimaru's men."

"She's waking up." Sasori's single sentence brought relative order to chaos. Not a soul spoke and somehow Sakura knew that a few of them were even holding their breath. She took it as her cue to open her eyes. More chaos ensued. Sasori and Madara had latched on to her hands. Itachi was uncomfortably close to her face. Deidara buried his face in her side and she felt a bit of dampness there indicating tears. Kakuzu was gently stroking her cheek with his knuckles and Pein and Nagato were lightly running their hands over every part of her they could reach from their place at the foot of the bed. Kimimaro was in the background looking directly in her eyes with a worried expression. All of them were asking about how she felt, what she had been doing, and when Deidara asked/screamed if she was dying, things escalated to impossible degrees of loud. She felt like there was a verbal tug-of-war going on and she was the rope. Note to self: Smack Deidara later.

"What happened to me?" Sakura could barely get the words out with her chest feeling like it had been crushed repeatedly. They were nothing more than a whisper but the men were silenced by the first movement of her lips.

The Akatsuki looked from Sakura to each other then back again. None of them wanted to say anything but when the white haired man was about to speak Pein cut him off. "Your heart stopped for a minute. Even if you're half human, someone with the blood of the goddess of health should never collapse the way you did last night. We were worried and invited ourselves over, but we found him," he gestured to Kimimaro, "and when we got to you…" Pein didn't finish. He looked like he was about to be sick. So did the rest of the Akatsuki members.

It didn't surprise her at all that the Akatsuki knew. She had always known they were the best at gathering intelligence and being so close to some (okay all) of the members was bound to make them wonder. She'd even used her powers on Sasori to help him recover from surgery.

Sakura looked up again and felt something tug at her heart seeing them so desperate to help her. On pure instinct she reached out to Sasori and Madara first, as they were closest, but in the next instant Kimimaro was pulling her away from everyone. He glared directly at her.

"Are you insane? Do you not understand what happened to you at all? If you use your powers now it could cause irreversible damage even to a demigoddess like you!" Kimimaro growled out. Madara looked ready to pull out a gun and shoot him (which was highly possible) but Sakura knew that there was a great deal of worry and guilt behind his anger. She could sense it ripping at his heart and wanted to take away that pain as she did with many emotionally tormented people. However she knew in her current state it would only be counterproductive to push her body to the point of collapse again.

Kimimaro gripped her shoulders and forced her to face him. Sasori was reaching for his belt where he kept a poisoned knife. "Listen to me. What happened to you last night was something called "Hell's Theft." When weaker gods or demigods are in the presence of a demon of a higher level, that demon automatically takes away holy energy, the life's blood of the divine. You're a doctor so you know what happens when you lose too much blood. It's the same with holy energy. If you lose too much you die. You being half human won't help you."

"That's enough." Nagato interrupted. "Sakura needs rest right now. She won't get it as long as we're here fussing over her. I suggest we take our leave so she can recover properly. Kakuzu call that Ino girl and have her come over to take care of Sakura. Once you do that we'll leave."

"What makes you think that I know her number?" Kakuzu grumbled.

"Here Kakuzu, you can use my phone." Sakura offered handing her phone to him. He blushed slightly and took it.

The Akatsuki stood and made their way to the door with Itachi dragging Kimimaro. Just before Kakuzu turned to follow them he gave her phone back and kissed her forehead. A few seconds later he was closing her door behind him as he followed his comrades to their car.