Chapter Text
The forest was thick with the sweet scent of loam and moss, the warm afternoon air brushing against their skin, stirred by the occasional breeze that filtered through the canopy above.
Sasuke and Sakura walked side by side beneath the arching pines, their fingers interlaced. A silent ritual after missions like this, each small touch grounding them in the present. The weight of travel faded in the familiar comfort of being together, headed home.
Every step that Sasuke and Sakura took homeward seemed to draw the day’s exhaustion deeper into their bones. A fatigue that was physical, yes, but also quietly sweet, threaded through with anticipation and longing.
The mission took one month, longer than they expected.
She shifted the strap of her pack on her shoulder, flexing tired fingers. The faint burn in her palms was a reminder of the jutsu she casted earlier. She glanced sideways at Sasuke, silent as ever, his expression unreadable.
The ends of his hair caught by the warm light, the line of his jaw sharp, the way it always was when he was thinking too much. She wondered, as she often did, what it looked like inside his mind when he thought of Sarada. If the memory of their daughter glowed as fiercely for him as it did for her.
She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, chewing lightly on the inside of her cheek, a nervous habit she’d never quite shaken, not even after all these years and everything they’d been through.
Home, she thought. We’re almost home.
Sasuke slowed a little to match her stride, and for a brief, simple moment it was just them: husband and wife, winding their way through the trees.
Sakura’s mind wandered ahead of them, picturing the soft yellow light spilling from their kitchen window, Sarada’s small face pressed to the glass with hopeful anticipation. She was probably pretending not to wait up, but Sakura could see her already: arms crossed, a stubborn pout barely concealing her excitement.
Sakura smiled to herself and let her arm slip to Sasuke’s. “She’ll want grilled fish,” she said, her voice low. “And probably that egg soup again. I told her she’d get tired of it.”
Sasuke made a quiet sound that was half a laugh, half a sigh, softer than anyone else ever heard from him. “She never gets tired of anything you make.”
Sakura snorted, then caught herself fussing with the hem of her sleeve, rubbing her thumb over the seam as if she could scrub away her own nerves. “You know, sometimes I wish she’d complain more.”
They’d almost reached the gates when Sasuke stopped short. His hand came up, slow, to rest on his left shoulder, fingers splaying over a scar Sakura hadn’t seen him touch in years.
Sakura’s heart jumped. “Sasuke-kun?” She watched his jaw clench, the faintest hiss escaping between his teeth.
He didn’t answer. His brows had drawn tight, his gaze distant, troubled. For the briefest moment he looked almost uncertain. Sakura stepped closer, concern overtaking caution.
“Sasuke-kun, what is it?” She stepped in front of him, anxiety flaring in her chest. Her mind went to a thousand places at once. Old injuries, chakra overuse, a lingering curse that had never quite faded. His fingers were splayed over his temple, eyes squeezed shut.
Sakura reached for his arm, the motion practiced from a thousand missions, a thousand shared injuries. “Is it your shoulder?”
Her fingers found the curve of muscle, and beneath her touch she felt it, something old, something wrong. She pressed her chakra in, searching for the echo of pain she remembered from the days when that mark had been a curse and a threat.
A pulse. Faint, cold, not quite his own. It sent a shiver through her palm.
She froze. “The curse mark?” The words came out before she could help herself, half a whisper, as if the night might overhear.
Sasuke’s jaw tightened. “My brother sealed it years ago,” he said, but his voice was too flat, too wary.
“It shouldn’t hurt you anymore,” Sakura said, almost to herself, but she could hear her own anxiety now, sharp and clear.
The air changed, then a heaviness settling over them, as if the forest was holding its breath. The ache in Sasuke’s shoulder grew sharper; he staggered, barely catching himself. The old scar that was dormant for years, burned cold beneath Sakura’s palm.
Sasuke’s eyes flew open, both black now, panic clear in their depths. He gripped Sakura’s shoulder. “Sakura—”
The ground seemed to shift beneath them. There was a pressure, a soundless ringing in her ears, the sudden, sick certainty that something was very wrong.
The forest spun wildly, the trees bending and fracturing as if they’d been caught in a storm. Sakura’s world shrank to the touch of Sasuke’s hand and the surge of adrenaline flooding her veins.
Instinctively, she reached for her chakra, but it slipped away, dissolving in a rush of white-hot light. The blue sigils wrapped around their feet, and a rush of wind howled in her ears.
Her last thought was of Sarada, her child’s face flickering through her mind, a memory so intense that it ached.
Then everything turned black.