part ii | part iii | part iv
after speaking to kido, sakura rushes home. when she calms down from the rage that nearly had her crush his throat, sakura can admit that she doesn’t really think this is him. he knew a lot about her for someone that was supposed to have been locked up all this time, but he seemed genuinely surprised to hear that sarada had been taken, if not disappointed. he fit the profile of what shikamaru and kakashi thought -- that someone wanted sarada for her eyes -- but sakura can’t stop the nagging feeling that somehow this runs deeper.
back in her apartment, megumi’s body is right where she left it, and sakura feels awful for having moved so mechanically. megumi was an orphan, but she was still someone’s little girl. ashamed, sakura lays a sheet over her and swears she’ll do more later.
she heads to her bedroom and begins her work. alone, she summons one of the cats she’d made a contract with shortly after her marriage. the black cat is sleek and holds himself confidently. he’s always been an efficient one, quick to do as she needs and be competent about it. he regards sakura with a cock of his head.
“sarada’s been taken.”
“your daughter.”
“yes.”
the cat nods. “i shall inform the clowder. if anyone spots her, i will let you know.”
“thank you.” sakura pauses, self-conscious for needing to rely on everybody else for this part. “if you...if any of you are able to come into contact with sasuke-kun, can you pease let him know too?”
“of course.”
“thank you.” sakura promises to provide the usual exchange at a later time and the cat disappears with a puff of smoke. she heads to her bedroom and she begins to pack in silence.
her movements are as meticulous as they are automatic, done just so she’s ready to leave the moment she knows where she needs to go. her medkit is stocked. her bag has scrolls, weapons, supplies, and sarada’s favourite toy. she changes out of her days clothes and into the leggings and turtleneck of a uniform she hasn’t worn in years. her cloak is in the front closet. she needs to change her boots. she’ll put on the boots now. she leaves the armour on her bed to don later. right now, they only hinder her movements. she goes to the drawer where her mask hides in plain sight among other trinkets and knick knacks, and on the dresser she notices a flower.
sakura stills as she takes in the detail she must have missed in her earlier haste. she considers the simple glass vase and the single red flower sitting in it. its petals curl at the ends and some are even missing.
this flower has travelled and as sakura considers what it is, she knows it’s travelled far.
-
konoha became unbearable by the time she turned twenty. it's so petty and selfish and she'd never say it aloud, but she hated seeing everyone else so happy. she's happy too -- has so many reasons to be -- but she couldn’t help the nagging jealousy she feels when ino declined her invitations because she was going to see sai or when naruto prioritized her almost always only to head home to hinata.
she wanted to be someone's too. she wanted to be their focus and heart and home, but sakura already knew who her someone was and knew that on some level she was his too, so all she needs to do right now is wait.
most of the time, sakura wasn’t bitter. being apart from him wasn't unfamiliar, nor the steadfastness, nor the hope that one day this will pay off one day, nor the self reminders that what she felt was irrelevant as long as sasuke knew and was comforted by the fact that she would always love him.
to suppress her frustrations rather than confront them, sakura worked. she worked tirelessly and relentlessly and by nineteen, they'd named her the greatest medical ninja konoha has ever seen for her accomplishments, ideas, and innovations.
this took her to suna at twenty and to ame at twenty-one to help establish their own clinics.
“i have a gift for you,” ino told her before she left.
sakura expected a ribbon or a piece of jewellery or that new book on poisons she mentioned she was interested in. instead, ino handed her a bag. its contents shift, imbalanced, and inside sakura finds a potted plant.
“a flower?”
“not just any flower, you ungrateful bitch.” ino pointed at her accusingly and then at the plant. its petals are a bright red with darker flecks at their base. “i made it.”
“you made it?”
“yes. you know me, interrogating and mind-reading by day, splicing plants together and making my own by night.”
“that’s sad.”
“fuck you. you’re sad.”
sakura laughed and ino laughed too but it got a bit sad because ino probably definitely knew that sakura was sad. “anyway,” ino continued, “we’ll call it the sakuino flower--”
“how creative.”
“--and i expect you to keep it alive through all of your travels.”
sakura frowned at ino, wondering if ino understood that a potted plant had no place in her travels, but ino didn’t seem to care. moreover, this particular thing didn’t seem to have the ability to survive in the desert climate she was going to be living in for the next six months.
when sakura expressed as much, ino waved the matter off. “deal with it,” she said, giving sakura one last hug. “you’re one of the brightest minds to come out of this village. you’ll figure something out.”
-
its common name is the fire poppy, having originated from the fire country but somehow managing to survive the deserts of wind country as well. the flower is known for its vibrant red petals, eye-catching and jarring across the barren brown it’s normally found in. sakura had to play with the original plant’s physiology when she first moved to ensure it could survive the alternate climate. in her spare time, when she wasn’t working with the kids, she deigned to work with her plant, eventually working on cloning the original. at some point she’d given one to a nurse she worked with who much admired the first, and gaara asked if he could try planting them in his garden. from there, the spores began to spread.
“why the fire poppy?”
was this someone from suna?
sakura considers the obvious motivation of revenge, but who would even want that? there were people who didn’t appreciate her friendship with kankuro or any of his siblings. perhaps an apprentice of chiyo’s who blamed sakura for not saving her when she gave her life for gaara’s. worse, perhaps someone that once worked sasori who resented her for his demise. or maybe someone she, sadly, can’t even remember. a patient she lost during the war whose family hated her.
sakura truly cannot pinpoint a motivation for this, much less a person.
especially a person that would understand the meaning of this flower for her.
ino would never give her this flower. ino would have scoffed at it and created her own. sarada couldn’t have picked it today. and sasuke certainly couldn’t have left it for her.
someone was in her apartment. someone brought it here.
was it here before?
sakura considers the poppy and forces herself to keep calm. stay logical, she demands. stay smart. was the poppy there before? no, she thinks at first. she would have seen it. she’s certain she would have seen it.
but, she can accept, it’s possible she might have missed it. sarada was taken. her babysitter was murdered. it wouldn’t be surprising if sakura missed it. but sakura doesn’t miss things. right?
“don’t gaslight yourself,” she orders.
no, she knows. the flower was not there before, meaning in between her going to kakashi, going to the prison, and then running back home, whoever took her daughter came back.
or worse, there was a team involved and one was with her child and another came back for her.
sakura curses, wishing she’d put on her black ops armour earlier, because whoever brought the flower here is now making their presence known. she senses two people before she sees them and is unsurprised to find sudden flares of strength.
the bedroom is small and they’re in a building. she needs to take this outside, but where? there’s too much risk for others getting hurt in the crossfire. that’s why this was supposed to stay quiet. that’s why this will stay quiet.
they step out of the shadows and sakura assesses them quickly. one male, one female, both fairly young based on stature and development, maybe early twenties at the oldest. they’ll have agility on her, but they won’t have her experience.
the man holds a chokuto. good. an advantage. sakura is excellent at fighting against such a weapon. if they’re foolish enough to use her husband’s favourite sort of blade, perhaps they didn’t do enough research on her. perhaps they were hired? but if they were unprepared, then were they really here to kill her?
are they here to distract her?
that thought fills sakura with dread. is someone trying to keep her busy so she can’t get to sarada on time?
the woman shifts, one leg sliding to the side as she raises her hands. she holds no weapons, therefore she is the weapon. sakura knows all about that. she’ll need to be careful with this one. but she still has a holster on her thigh. it’s thinner that the usual styles. maybe a couple kunai, but more likely a set of sebon. this one is smart then. she’ll know precisely where she needs to hit sakura to stop her.
“haruno sakura,” the man greets with a short nod.
so it is her fault.
if this was about sasuke, about the uchiha, they would know her married name. this is about her, and for that sakura feels worse. her baby was taken and why? just to hurt sakura before killing her? sarada was who knows where with surely no one that could be good and all just to hurt sakura?
sakura snarls, furious in a way only a mother could be, and she feels the chakra pulsing around her fists.
“where is my daughter?”
their masks hide any expressions. they remain at ease in the face of her rage, shockingly unafraid of this woman that can level mountains.
good, sakura thinks. let them be brave. let them come at her like fools.
she runs through the bedroom door to get to the living room where there’s at least more space to maneuver. the man leaps and brings his blade down upon her, but sakura manages to shift to the side. careful to not be forced into a corner, she spins out of his range and into the open middle until the woman runs past her partner and takes sakura on hand-to-hand.
she matches sakura’s punches and kicks blow for blow. she’s good, sakura thinks nervously. and she’s fast. she’s small, maybe half a head shorter than sakura, so she puts her weight behind every quick jab. sakura gives most of her attention to the woman, but keeps a wary on eye on the man who sheathes his chokuto.
what as he planning?
it takes that one moment for the woman to catch her unaware.
sakura chokes on her breath as the woman thrusts a senbon into her shoulder. the shock from that slows her down enough so she can lodge in a second.
“shit,” sakura curses as she stumbles back. she rips the senbon out, but she feels her left arm begin to go numb from the struck pressure point. “what did you do--”
sakura’s eyes widen she she feels something foreign begin to course through her. she considers the senbon, dark with her blood and likely something else. there’s a metallic smell that isn’t from the weapon, and sakura knows she’s been poisoned.
however, her body doesn’t bother to fight it.
sakura watches her opponents, trying to understand how she’s been poisoned with something she’s immune to and just what poison this might be. she’s immune to everything in konoha’s own collection, as well as the ones she shares with shizune.
which poison is this?
does that matter?
sakura scowls at the two people involved in her daughter’s kidnapping and reminds herself that she can take them on one-handed just fine. she pulls her right hand into a fist and charges. the man is closest, so she lunges at him with a chakra-laden punch that sends him barreling into the wall.
she grabs the front of his shirt and as she pulls him forward, his mask falls away to reveal green eyes, cold and lifeless, and a black diamond under his left eye that makes her uneasy.
sakura stares at the man, confused, because she knows this face.
she knows him.
her fear and pain and worry makes it hard to focus, but knows him.
focus.
finally, it clicks.
“isao?”
she thinks she might have seen something like recognition in his eyes. that doesn’t long though. she left herself open, and his partner stabs her shoulder. sakura releases isao with a cry before the woman punches her in the back of the head and everything goes dark.
-
the sun is up when sakura begins to stir. she hears the birds chirping and people outside going about their days. but the buzz of the television is missing, as are the small thuds of sarada’s steps. where is sarada? sakura wonders hazily, lazily, not quite understanding yet.
where is sarada?
her eyes widen and she sits up so quickly her stomach rolls.
“careful.” tsunade comes into view, steadying sakura and checking her for any problems. “you’re still healing.”
she’s in her own bed. she’s not at the hospital. she got knocked out and the assassins got away. she should’ve done something to track them. dammit. was she so arrogant she didn’t have a failsafe in place for if she didn’t simply beat them? sakura punches the bed, earning a disapproving frown from shizune on her other side.
“there was poison in your system.”
“it was one of ours,” sakura admits warily.
“yes. there are very few people with access to those, much less this particular one.”
the one that the assassin used was meant to render a victim paralyzed but still able to feel. it was a dreadful thing, meant only for the worst of interrogations. or, more accurately, for torture. sakura concocted it in her darkest moments at fourteen under shizune’s watchful eye. since then, while they’ve both had small handfuls of keen students, they’ve probably shared poisons from their personal roster with only five people at most.
for this particular poison, sakura knows only two people they showed it to, and only one of those was a student of sakura’s.
“how did you find me?”
tsunade rolls her eyes. “shizune sent you off to a prison from kakashi’s office. i figured i’d have to check on you shortly after. and it’s a good thing i did, stupid girl.”
“thank you.”
“don’t thank me. i’m scolding you.”
“did they find anything useful?”
“no one’s been able to contact your husband.”
“right.”
“and they’re still under the impression that this has to do with the uchiha blood.”
“they would be,” sakura mutters, too tired and in too good company to be anything but blunt.
shizune sighs. “do you know who came after you last night?” the flower is still where she left it on the dresser. shizune follows her gaze to the fire poppy, and all knowing with plants as well, shizune determines its origins. “how did that get here?”
“i think it was to taunt me.” sakura grimaces. “you were right.”
“about?”
“i think this is my fault.”
shizune’s eyes widen and quickly soften with sympathy. “none of this your fault,” she reminds sakura.
tsunade crosses her arms. “enemies of yours then?”
“no.” sakura looks sad. “people i once loved.”
-
tbc
