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Why He Stayed	By : Phishouttawatta Category: Naruto > Het - Male/Female > Itachi/Sakura Views: 2678 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of its characters. I do not make money from writing this story Any original characters are the product of my imagination.

Chapter List
- 6
- 7
- 8
Chapter 7: In Which We Meet Mei Lee
Where was Sakura? He had specifically told her to stay put, and what had she done? She went and disobeyed not only his orders, but in turn, she disobeyed the wishes of Leader, who was already not really digging this whole let-this-kunoichi-who-really-hasn't-shown-how-she-can-benefit-us-yet-stay-at-our-SECRET-headquarters plan.
So now here he was, losing his temper, though to the untrained eye, he looked perfectly calm, not even one tense muscle in his jaw, all because of a stupid slip of a girl that he couldn't bring himself to get rid of. Maybe if the other Akatsuki hadn't gotten themselves attached to her, it would have been able to kick her to the curb by now. That was his best excuse so far, the attachment excuse. But back to his main objective, which was to find the kunoichi.
At first, he had thought that she had gone out to train just like she did everyday like the dilligent kunoichi that this Sakura Haruno is, but he soon realized that something was amiss when she did not turn up for lunch, since Kisame had a thing now about habitually, accidentally, making too much food.
A thought crossed Itachi's mind. What if she had just up and left? He didn't picture that happening, but he made his way up to Sakura's attic-like room. He grabbed the doorknob, pausing to knock once politely, and he stepped in without waiting for a response. That's where he found her, sitting on her small bed, writing in a small notepad, a small file open beside her, a picture of some person unknown to himself inside. Her eyebrows were drawn together with consentration, so much in fact, it seemed that she didn't even notice him enter her room. Itachi walked to the edge of her bed, and cleared his throat.
The pen Sakura had in her mouth dropped onto her lap as her head snapped up. Her face was one of suprise. She gave Itachi a small, slightly unsure smile that he did not return.
"Er, hi. What is it?" she asked. His eyes flicked down to the paperwork strewn across her bed.
"You left the grounds." It was a statement, accompanied with a not-so-happy tone.
Gees. what are you, my mother?, she thought, inner Sakura's eyebrow ticking in annoyance. Sakura shifted uncomfortably under his unwavering gaze.
"Er...," she began intelligently. Itachi crossed his arms. Sakura changed the way she was seated so that she was facing him.
"Okay, well, you can't expect me to sit in my room all day," she said began complacently.
"You could train. Kami knows you could use it." Sakura's face screwed into a frown and a bit of light color rose to her cheeks, her temper immediately rising.
"I have to do something more than train," she said, her voice raising an octive. "Besides, I should be able to do something in order to earn my keep here."
Kisame strolled down the hallway and heard voices coming from Sakuras room. He could clearly here Sakuras, arguing with, he could only guess, Itachi about the freedoms she had around them. He made a detour up the small flight up steps and slowly opened Sakura's bedroom door. There, Kisame found Sakura standing, her hands pressed down at her sides, clenched into fists, her voice controlled, but the color in her face the absolute opposite. Itachi was standing in front of her, his arms crossed losely, though he still had an air of firmness about him. Itachi made a comment that either enraged or embarassed Sakura. She poked a hand to his chest, opened her mouth to retort, her lungs full of air ready to be most likely shouted out, when Kisame thought it would be best if he intervened.
"What seems to be the problem?" he chortled, and both Sakura and Itachi moved to look at him. Sakura huffed, threw out one of her hips, and crossed her arms.
"I want to get a job at the village's hospital," she all but pouted. The shark man raised an eyebrow as he look to Itachi, whose eyes were hard with annoyance.
"How do you propose to do something like that?" Kisame asked, turning his attention back to the flustered cherry blossom, whose shoulder muscles relaxed slightly as she turned her torso to gaze at her bed.
"I have a file of a missing woman, not a ninja, but a normal citizen from the village below. I figure a few changes to her appearance, a new name, and background, and I should be set with a fake identity I could use."
"And how do you plan to explain your exceptional medical expertise?" Itachi questioned. Sakura turned to him, the fact that he had just complimented her, even if he hadn't meant to, jumbling her thoughts.
"I could explain that I was taught by my mother, or grandmother, who is now deceased, so I won't really have any referrals, but if they allow me to demonstrate my skill, I don't think it will even be a problem," she said confidently. Kisame looked to Itachi, who kept his same calm facade in place.
"It sounds as if she has really thought this through, Itachi," Kisame shrugged, seeing as Sakura was more or less Itachi's captive. Itachi let out a sigh and closed his eyes. He turned from Sakura and began walking out of the room.
"Itachi?" she called out, her voice had died down a few notches, still not used to his name rolling off her tongue. He paused as he passed his partner.
"Do as you wish," he said, not even bothering to turn and face Sakura, whose face was now alight with joy, and then he strode out of her room.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Sakura sat at the kitchen table to next morning, eating breakfast, when she heard Deidara enter the room. She looked up at him as he entered with a smile.
"Morning," she greeted. He turned to return the greeting, but immediately reached for his weapons pouch. Sakura jumped up and put her hands in the air.
"Whoa wait a minute!" she shouted, "Deidara, it's me Sakura!" Deidara paused, a confused look crossed his features, or at least the half she could see, then his eyes narrowed.
"How do I know that you're really Sakura, yeah?" he asked suspiciously. Faster than he could blink, her appearance became normal.
"It's just a henge." Deidara nodded. Sakura had turned herself from delicate blossom to absolute plain Jane. Her jutsu was so good that he couldn't even read her real chakra signal. All that was available to him was this altered (low) chakra signal this dark haired, dark eyed, pale girl in front of him was giving off. There was almost no way to tell that it was her unless she momentarily lifted the jutsu.
"So," she said changing into the dark-haired woman again, standing and twirling to give him a better view of her new self, "What do you think?"
Deidara considered her use of the jutsu. He definitely liked the way she looked naturally, but he couldn't help but admit how thorough and skilled she was with this henge. Instead of saying all of that however, he opted for,
"Good job, but, what do you need that for, hm?" Sakura sat back down and returned to her tea.
"Oh, today is my interview at the hospital," she said. Deidara looked confused.
"So you really wanna help out that bad, huh? " Sakura responded with a nod.
"So, you're going to keep your identity completely secret, though you could let everyone know who you are and go home, yeah?" Sakura's expression dimmed somewhat,
"I can't go back home. I left of my own free will, actually, against the wishes of my mistress. I'm basically a missing nin now."
"You're the hokage's apprentice, right?" Sakura nodded.
"That must mean you're pretty talented, huh? Well, if I were the hokage, I wouldn't just let my apprentice go missing, especially when I spent a butt-load of time teaching her my art, yeah." Sakura had to admit he had a point. The truth was, she didn't really want to go back, not yet anyway. There were too many things in Konohagakure that she felt that she was too weak to handle. She was really surprised with the way she was taking Sasuke's death. Maybe the fact hadn't had time to really sink into her brain matter. Well, one thing was certain was that she wouldn't want to head home and do nothing but cry all of the time. She didn't want to go back to her village and be some useless, mopey kunoichi. The moment that she had clasped Itachi's Akatsuki cloak between her fingers, she had made a conscious decision to not go back, at least not until she was ready to return. She would have to become stronger on her own, become her own person, find her own ninja way.
However, first thing's first: go get a job. That way she wouldn't be so self conscious about eating all their food, not that she had the biggest appetite, but she ate her fair share.
"What did Itachi say about this?" Deidara asked curiously. He saw a little color rise in the plain Jane's cheeks.
"I really could care less about what Itachi thinks," she said, turning up her nose.
"Is that so," came a cool voice from the kitchen entryway. Sakura turned to glare at Itachi, refusing to take back what she said just because he had confronted her about it.
"Yeah, that is so," she said, waiting for his reaction. She had expected him to blow his top at the way that she talked to him, but instead, he shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly and made his way to the fridge. He pulled out a water bottle and took a quick swig from it. It was then that Sakura noticed that Itachi hadn't been wearing his normal Akatsuki cloak, but instead was wearing loose pants and a black shirt. He also had a small sheen on his brow. He had been training. While Sakura had been giving his appearance notice, Itachi made a point to have his back turned to Sakura, though he knew that her eyes were on him.
"Whatever you say," he said walking out of the kitchen. Itachi was long gone before Sakura had a chance to say anything back. Sakura let out a growl, and took the last of her tea into her mouth with one swift gulp and roughly slammed her cup down onto the table. Her flush had become more pronounced now that Itachi had wriled her up.
"I'm out of here," she seemed to be speaking to Deidara, though he couldn't be sure because she hadn't even looked at him. Sakura just continued to glare at the kitchen entryway wear Itachi had just so casually walked out sipping on a water bottle. She grabbed a stack of papers that she had next to her on the table and briskly left the kitchen via the large sliding glass door, leaving Deidara chuckling in his seat at her expense.
Sakura made her way down the tangled hill, and burst out onto the dirt road. She looked down at herself and, using quick motions, brushed herself off and straightened her shirt. When she walked down the street today, Sakura's eyes didn't linger on any of the merchant's stands, nor on any of the restaurants or motels. The only thing her mind was on right now was to get that job. She had made it so that her appearance looked common enough that if she did run into any trouble, or if she ever mysteriously disappeared, the memory of her wouldn't imprint itself on really anybody's mind. She walked into the hospital and she walked up to the reception desk.
"Excuse me," she began to the woman behind it who had just put the phone on her desk down on her reciever. She glanced at Sakura and shoved a clipboard toward her.
"If you're here to get treated, you'll have to sign in for urgent care," she said. Sakura figured she had walk-ins a lot.
"Um, actually, I'm here-" Sakura started but was interrupted.
"If you're here to visit, then you'll have to come back during the designated hours, unless you are immediate family, then you can stay with your loved one for longer," the woman said, twirling her chair to pick up another clip board which she slid in Sakura's direction. Sakura her fingers and gently pushed the clipboards pack towards the woman behind the desk.
"Actually, I was wondering if you could tell me wear the human resources office is."
"Oh, yes," the woman quickly directed her down the hall on her left, turn right at the second hallway, and go through the door at the end of the hallway. Sakura quickly thanked her and trecked down the hallway towards the human resources office. When she reached the door, she quickly composed herself and stepped through the door. The woman behind this desk looked up from her paperwork and sent a smile Sakura's way.
"Can I help you?" she asked politely. Sakura smiled back and walked forward and held out her hand.
"Yes, my name is..." she paused, pretending to clear her throat, but she was really trying to remember her name, "Excuse me, sorry. My name is Mei Lee. I am looking to become employed here." The woman's face brightened. She leaned toward her intercom and said.
"Ichibachi-san, there is a young lady here to see you." She released the button and a woman's voice came through the speaker.
"Send her in," Sakura heard. The woman stood and signaled Sakura to follow her. Sakura was ushered into an office wear another woman, older this time, was waiting to see her. The woman had pale brown hair that was slightly sliver at the temples and fine wrinkles and the corners of her eyes and around her mouth, but besides that, she looked pretty youthful.
Sakura took a moment to readjust her grasp on her resume.
"Good morning, Ichibachi-san. My name is Mei Lee." The woman stood and shook Sakura's hand.
"So you are interested in working here then? Did you happen to bring a resume?" Sakura took the manilla folder from her grasp and handed it to the woman who took it and sat down in her chair. Sakura sat down in one of the two chairs places in front of the Ichibachi's desk as Ichibachi opened the folder and read Sakura, er, Mei's resume.
"You're from what village, Mei-chan?" Ichibachi glancing up from the papers she was examining.
"I am from a small, rural village in the water country. We didn't have a set name, mostly because lots of families were nomads. People came and went a lot, including me." Ichibachi nodded.
"So did you attend a ninja academy there? How is it that you have come across medical training?"
"Not everyone in the village was a ninja. We didn't have an academy. We were mostly civilian except for people who settled there and passed down their training to their children, such as my grandmother did to my mother and my mother did to me. However, I did come across shinobi that had battle wounds, so I was able to get specialized training in battle medicine. That is where I prefer to work." Ichibachi nodded again, continuing to read over Mei's resume.
"Well, Mei, this is an impressive resume. I would love to offer you a job," Sakura smile widely,
"However, since I cannot formally check on your background, I am putting you on a sort of probation. You will not know how long it lasts, nor who will be watching you. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't trust you or that you seem to want to decieve me, I'm just taking extra precautions that are required in situations like this."
"Oh, I completely understand, Ichibachi-san," Sakura said. Ichibachi smiled.
"Okay then. I'd like to see you here and oriented as soon as possible. How about tomorrow? Are you available? We have a new training session starting," Ichibachi asked raising an eyebrow. Sakura nodded fervently, causing Ichibachi to chuckle.
"Of course, I'll see you tomorrow then, at, what time would you need me?" Ichibachi leaned forward in her chair, put her elbows on the table as she laced her fingers, and rested her chin on her knuckles.
"Orientation is at 9am, but I'd also like to start you off on night shift. I am short for the battle injuries wing. Shift starts at seven. Make sure are prepared. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have mounds of paperwork that needs to be completed," Ichibachi said, sending a inconspicuous clue in Sakura's direction.
"Of course, don't let me be a hindrance. Thank you, Ichibachi-san," Sakura said with a polite bow.
"You're quite welcome, Mei-chan."
Yay, all done. Now, be wonderful people and leave me reviews cause you love me... I love you, I'll respond to you, you know I will
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