Her Destiny

Ambushed

The following morning, Shisui, Tobirama, and Sakura met at the main gate to depart. The Inner Circle was there to see them off.

"Be safe, Sakura-chan!" Hashirama exclaimed, crushing her into a hug.

"Don't die, Ugly. We know you have a remarkable ability to find trouble."

Sakura rolled her eyes. "Thanks, Sai. Real vote of confidence there. Shisui and Tobirama will be with me to help me out in that case."

Tobirama and Shisui nodded, faces hidden behind ANBU masks. Sakura herself had a mask ready to put on. Her pink hair would still be a dead giveaway, but she had a hood over it to hide it as best she could.

With a final wave, the three ninja were off on the journey to Ame.

Two days later, the three were sitting around a campfire near the border of Taki and Kusa, eating some rice and rabbit. They had made decent time, even skirting around Fire Country. With any luck they would be in Ame within the next two days, if they traveled at the same pace that they had been keeping. With any other ninja, they probably would have still been in Taki, but they had crossed the border an hour or so ago. They'd been going for nearly fourteen hours, only stopping briefly to eat and take the necessary bathroom breaks. With two days traveling at such a pace, they had traveled further than most ninja were capable.

"I'm going to go get some water from the river. I'll be back in a few minutes," Sakura said, getting up from where she sat and disappearing into the tall grass. If she had been thinking about it, she would have kept her mask and hood on, but she had thought that in the darkness, she would be fine. She was wrong.

She had only just reached the river, cutting its way through Grass Country, when she heard something behind her. Sakura froze, knowing that Shisui and Tobirama were still sitting at the fire, based on their chakra signatures.

She tried to feel around her with her chakra, but she didn't sense anyone. She turned around, and was immediately met with a kunai to the throat. She managed to pull back enough that it didn't sever anything vital, though the pain was immense, as blood gushed down her neck, soaking her uniform. She gasped, finding it harder to breathe. Fuck, they nicked my air pipe.

As the person came back into view, no doubt for another attack, she suddenly realized why she hadn't sensed them. ROOT.

"What are you doing here?" she managed to rasp out through her damaged airways.

"We have been sent out to find and kill you, Sakura Haruno," the operative stated, before two more appeared. All three lunged for the pinkette. Sakura was a very good shinobi. Easily Kage level, but even she had her limits. With her throat already sliced open and bleeding heavily, she was at a disadvantage. She spiked her chakra, attempting to draw Shisui and Tobirama to her. She knew that the two of them would feel the sudden panic in her chakra flow.

As she waited for the two to arrive, she fended off the three ROOT operatives as best she could, but her movements were becoming sluggish, the blood loss leading to clumsy movements when she really couldn't afford them. She landed a roundhouse kick to one of their heads, knocking the operative out, only to receive a deep gash to her shoulder, destroying the wrappings that usually hid her soul mark.

"Sakura!" Shisui yelled, voice ripping from his throat in an anguished cry.

Within moments, the other two ANBU were dispatched by Shisui and Tobirama.

They turned to Sakura when they heard a muffled thump. She had fallen to the ground, bleeding from various wounds. "Get me to Ame. Now!"

Shisui picked her up, gingerly, while Tobirama flashed to the camp and retrieved what supplies he could carry in a spare storage scroll.

When he returned to the other two, he noticed Shisui staring at Sakura's shoulder, horror dawning on his face, before morphing into a world ending rage.

"She's my soulmate!" Shisui exclaimed, anger clear in his voice at the thought of his soulmate being injured. The ANBU member that Sakura had knocked out started to stir. With a snarl, Shisui rammed a kunai through the man's eye socket, killing him instantly.

"Poison," Sakura rasped. "Their weapons were poisoned."

Shisui and Tobirama looked at her with alarm. Shisui resituated her against his chest before he and Tobirama made a headlong dash toward the Rain Village. Tobirama put a seal on Shisui, and each time Shisui would Shunshin, Tobirama would follow with the Hiraishin technique that he and Minato had perfected over the past weeks. With this mode of travel, they made even better time, though it depleted their chakra levels faster.

By the time they had made it to Ame, both men were exhausted, Sakura laying limp in Shisui's possessive grip.

Sakura stirred, feeling the various powerful chakra signatures, before pinpointing one. What?

"Get to Sasori, now. He's the only one out of them with a poison background," She rasped. Then she went completely limp against Shisui's chest. This was alarming. She had been tense the entire way here, no doubt fighting the poison however she could, but she had never done this.

Alarmed, the two men raced toward the gate to the village, not caring about anything other than getting their leader to Sasori, but the two men were abruptly stopped when two cloaked figures jumped down in front of them.

"What is your business here, ANBU-san?" a dark-haired man with an orange mask asked.

"This is the Otokage. She was to meet with your leader, but she has been attacked and there is poison in her bloodstream. She told us to come to Ame anyway. She needs to be seen by Sasori-san," Shisui explained from behind his mask.

The blonde snorted. "He's not going to do it. That girl killed his puppet body."

"Look, unless you want to deal with several Kage Level shinobi raining hell down on you when they find out that you refused her treatment, I would lead us to Sasori, now."

"We don't even know who you are," the blonde stated.

"You will just have to take our word that we mean no harm, Akatsuki-san," Tobirama said, his chakra signature becoming very oppressive the longer they were made to wait. He thought of the girl as a close friend, and he would be damned if she died on his clock.

The man in the mask started to jump around, exuberant for some reason. "Tobi will lead you, ANBU-san! Tobi is a good boy!"

The blonde gave a very put-upon sigh before gesturing for them to follow.

They were quickly brought to a tower and let in, then lead through a series of hallways to a large office.

"Leader?" the blonde asked, knocking on the door.

"Come in," a deep voice said from the opposite side of the door.

They were brought into the office, where they faced a man with orange hair. "What is the meaning of this?"

"The Otokage has been poisoned, Leader-sama. They request Sasori's help."

"The Otokage? We are supposed to meet tomorrow morning."

"Well, you're meeting her now, because she was ambushed. Now could you please have Sasori look at her? She can't heal herself because of the poison."

Leader looked at the two ANBU, suspicious of the two men.

"And who are the two of you?"

"We are not at liberty to tell you. Only the Otokage can tell you."

The man's lips thinned in irritation. "Very well, but only because you are possible allies. Deidara, Tobi, take them to Sasori."

The two men were lead down another series of hallways before coming to what looked to be a laboratory. Deidara opened the door and lead the two in. "Danna, these guys need you to heal their leader," he explained to a red-head standing near a microscope.

The red-head looked to the two men, before his eyes fell upon the pinkette in Shisui's arms. "My, my. I never thought I would be asked to heal the girl that killed me."