"Is this really the right place?" Naruto asked, glancing left and right. "They're not here, ya know."
"How very perspicacious of you," Sasuke said drily. "What tipped you off?"
After travelling at top speed for half a day, Team Kakashi had arrived at the designated meeting point: a secluded safehouse nestled deep within a remote forest in the Land of Rivers. Yet, as Naruto had already observed, there was not the slightest sign of life stirring within the wooden cabin.
"Don't touch anything," Kakashi counselled his pupils. "We don't know if the enemy has been in here yet. There might be traps."
That being said, there were no scorch marks blackening the walls, no upturned furniture, nor any abandoned weapons strewn across the floor. Nowhere was there evidence of a struggle, which did not bode well for Team Guy— either they had never made it out of the Land of Wind's deserts, or else they were so weakened that they had been taken without resistance.
"I…" Sakura began.
A sharp crack echoed outside— someone had just trodden on a branch. Kakashi made a subtle hand signal, which Sakura recognised as meaning: hide. With a brief nod of acknowledgement, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke vanished, fading into the shadows as they rushed to conceal themselves within the room.
Sakura slipped into a sturdy oak wardrobe, but when she tried to close the door behind her, she found that it wouldn't shut properly— it bounced off her formidable chest and swung wide open. Sakura's heart leapt into her throat, but she luckily managed to catch the door just in time before it could loudly slam open and betray her hiding spot.
Resigned, she exhaled deeply and pulled the door closed as far as it would go, before pressing her eye to the crack to peer cautiously outside.
A few moments later, the door to the outside creaked open, and a slender figure stepped into the safehouse, its movements strangely robotic. Sakura's eyes widened, immediately recognising the figure as one of Tenten's autonomous puppets, whose design she had shamelessly ripped off from the hardworking ninja craftsmen of the future she hailed from.
After watching the puppet stare absently into empty space for half a minute, it soon became clear to Sakura that nothing more exciting was likely to happen. It seemed like the puppet had made its way here alone, albeit not without some difficulties. Its varnish was scratched and worn, and its left arm had been blown clean off.
Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke emerged from their hiding places. The puppet's head swivelled uncannily as it turned to look at each of them in turn. It made a sort of beckoning gesture with its remaining hand, before turning on its heel and marching out of the safehouse.
"I think it wants us to follow it," Sakura ventured.
Sasuke nodded. For some reason, when it was Sakura who pointed out the obvious, he did not see it necessary to make snide comments. For some reason.
"Kakashi-senseiii!" Naruto called out, cupping his hands in front of his mouth. "Where are youuu, we've got a lead, ya know!"
Naruto received no reply, save for the droning of cicadas and the whispering of leaves stirred by the wind.
Kakashi had always indulged in the rather irritating habit of vanishing on his students, but now that his pupils were all grown up, he no longer had to pretend to feel guilty about leaving them all alone in enemy territory.
Noticing that they had ceased to follow it, Tenten's puppet halted abruptly, its head swivelling a full 180 degrees to fix them with a reproachful stare. Sakura couldn't say what it was, but a gut feeling told her that something was dreadfully amiss.
She opened her Sharingan to be certain. There was a faint glimmer of purplish chakra concealed within the puppet's empty arm socket. It was almost indistinguishable from the blue of Tenten's chakra that powered its inner mechanisms, but it was undeniably there.
"There are two differently coloured strands of chakra on the puppet!" Sakura gasped, drawing a senbon from the bandolier strapped to her thigh. "Scatter!"
The instant those words left Sakura's lips, the puppet broke into a full backwards sprint. Most unnervingly, its head was still locked backwards as it dashed towards her, staring her down with its lifeless, beady eyeholes.
Creepy!!
High-voltage currents surged around Sakura as she swiftly took aim.
"Lightning Style: Lorentz Gun Jutsu!"
And without waiting for the technique's power to charge all the way to maximum, Sakura let loose her senbon. The needle flew straight and true, delivering its immense kinetic energy to the puppet's hardened frame, snapping it in half.
BOOOOM!!
A brutal explosion tore through the air, toppling and shattering trees within its blast radius, creating a small clearing in the forest. The shockwave knocked the wind from Sakura's lungs, but thanks to her lightning style, which had dampened the enemy's technique through its type advantage, everyone had escaped relatively unscathed at this range.
"They must have tampered with Tenten's puppet— the briefing mentioned an explosives expert and a puppeteering master among the enemy," Sasuke reasoned, once the dust settled. "They were likely hoping to use us to lead them to Guy and the others but probably had to detonate it prematurely when Sakura figured out their plans."
After capturing Tenten's autonomous puppet, Sasori and Deidara had likely jury-rigged it with a radio and a miniature bomb before releasing it—both to eavesdrop on the Leaf shinobi's conversations and to pinpoint the precise moment to detonate the explosive clay.
"That's good news, then," said Sakura pensively. "That means the others haven't been caught yet."
However, a pressing issue remained.
In Tenten's call for backup, she mentioned that Guy had been poisoned with a strange toxin. Karin had failed to compound an antidote or extract the toxin, forced to rely solely on her healing blood to keep him alive. Sakura needed to reach them without delay, or the Hidden Leaf risked losing its strongest Jōnin.
That being said, they needed to move immediately— the explosion had given away their position.
"Wait!" Tenten's shrill voice suddenly cut through the air. "Take… him!"
Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke whirled around.
Where just moments before there had been nothing, a very pale-looking Tenten now stood over a pile of bodies: a bloodied and unconscious Gaara sprawled on the ground; Guy, dark veins showing prominently on his neck and his face tinged a sickly green; and Karin, pallid and frail, her once lustrous red hair now dull and grimy, her bare arms covered in red teeth marks.
Relief flooding through her as she saw her comrade's familiar figures, Tenten finally allowed herself to collapse— but before she could hit the ground, Kakashi flickered next to her, catching her gently in his arms.
"We've got company," he said, pointing upwards. "Each of you grab someone. We need to move."
"No," said Sakura, shaking her head. "Guy can't be moved. Karin was keeping him alive with her blood, but we won't be able to do that on the move like Tenten could. I need to treat him now."
"There's no time, Sakura," Kakashi said, raising his voice. "Pick up Karin and let's move. That's an order."
"I refuse to obey that order," said Sakura obstinately, remembering how Guy's Eight Inner Gates had been essential to countering Madara at the end of the story. "I need to take care of Guy-sensei, or he's definitely going to die."
Once again, a member of the Hatake clan was forced to make an impossible decision. Whether he chose to follow the mission or not, a precious comrade of his was going to die today, one way or another.
"I'll stay behind with Sakura-chan!" said Naruto desperately.
"I'll stay too," said Sasuke resolutely.
Sakura shook her head.
"You guys go on ahead," she said softly, kneeling next to the pile of bodies. "I'm strong, and I've mastered Lady Tsunade's ultimate Jutsu. No matter what, I'm not going to die."
That was a lie.
In anticipation of filling her Yin Seal with Senjutsu chakra rather than ordinary chakra, Sakura had left it empty. But that white lie appeared to persuade Kakashi.
"Naruto, Sasuke, we're leaving," he said hesitantly. "As for you, Sakura…"
…
"I order you to stay alive."
Sakura smiled weakly.
"Will do, Kakashi-sensei."