Chapter Text
The Choice
She must have eaten rotten food—if that was the case, fuck you Kabuto. There was no way that she was that married to her work during what was supposed to be her lunch break that she couldn't distinguish mushy, expired salmon from the tasty, freshly grilled one. The only reasonable explanation for food-poisoning was her boss' ill-will, Sakura was sure.
Because beside food-poisoning induced hallucinations, there was no other logical excuse for her brain to produce that intense of image. She refused to believe that she was actually seeing what she was actually seeing.
There was no way that that lump of body was actually a body of a very much breathing merman over there, chilling on an island of thick ice with eyes closed tight, muscles relaxed and tail moving languidly with the flow of the sea. No. Way.
That was why Sakura did the only one thing everyone else would probably deem illogical, maybe even right out idiotic. She approached the mysterious creature, with light steps—well, as light as one could manage with her yeti boots—and baited breath, all while tempted to just make as much noise as she could.
If a mere hallucination, he wouldn't move anyway.
If not, well, Sakura suspected she was fucked.
As she was an aspiring marine biologist turned researcher, in her field of work, she had heard all kids of gossips of merfolk—well, sure, not particularly about merman, but still!—and if he was real, she didn't really want to get on his wrong side. She most certainly wouldn't want to end up drowned in the middle of the Arctic Sea just because she did something extremely stupid. The Ino-kind-of stupid. She still had a bright career in front of her!
On the second thought, she started regretting her decision. She should have just left him in peace and trekked back to the research lab, but curiosity got the upper-hand here and she was sold on the idea of testing him.
It might be a smidgen ridiculous as she awkwardly crouched right in front of the creature—which had yet to move an inch. Looking at him up close, he was fairly handsome, maybe even falling into the beautiful category too. His wet, raven-colored locks framed his aristocratic face and he had a completely straight nose, not the most ideal, those thin lips, but his skin. His skin was immaculate. He had a face that deserved to be on the Big Screen, she was sure of it! Hollywood would have loved him!
Not entirely sure why she was even doing this, Sakura hesitantly reached out towards him, with a single, gloved finger outstretched. Just like that, she tempted fate: she tried to poke him right on the forehead.
The very next thing she saw was plain red and she immediately felt sharp pain from her wrist and Sakura tried moving away, but the obviously real, and definitely not hallucinated merman held her firmly, with a brusque, clawed hand. Then, vicious hissing and snarling, deep and menacing—that promised her no mercy—hit her ears and somehow, it was more intimidating to Sakura than a roar could ever be.
Sakura swore she nearly pissed herself.
He was quick and brutal and it was clear he didn't intend to let her go without a proper explanation.
And then, as if taking a one-eighty, the mermaid abruptly quit hissing, his body lost its tenseness as he watched Sakura with eerily glowing red eyes, lazily blinking down at her—and oh boy, was she ready to call on God for a swift exorcism—and the marine biologist was tempted to just… scream in his face. It might startle him enough to let go of her hand, which started going numb from the sheer force he was gripping it with. Not to mention his claws that tore through the material of her favorite glove.
She tried tugging on her hand, but against his powerful clutch, she had no chance. Then, a whimper escaped her lips as those sharp claws got bloodied and just like that, he promptly let go, as if Sakura had burned him. He started studying her face with equally as wide eyes as Sakura's, his head tilted to the side.
His eyes bore into hers, and she felt hypnotized by their red beauty all while her heart didn't cease to thump so fast and so heavy that she was sure her ribcage would break any minute. Her mad pulse ringing in her ears was the only thing she could hear—she knew, if not the merman, than a nervous breakdown would surely put her six feet under.
She nervously gulped, too afraid to broke the uncomfortable silence that sat over them.
Then, she heard him sigh tiredly, somewhat dazedly as he breathed out the words, "Your eyes…" He lifted those clawed fingers, the sharp tips getting entirely too close to her face to her comfort and Sakura acted on instincts.
With the thought of What if he wants to rip them out? she awkwardly crawled backwards, her eyes not wavering from his red, angry gaze. It started off as a slow, methodical thing as she moved as careful as she could so as to not startle the creature, but she knew it was just the matter of seconds before it turned into a mad goose chase.
And oh boy, was she right.
To her horror the merman advanced right on, his speed rapidly gaining as Sakura did the fastest crab-walk she had never though she could pull off in her life. When her back touched a wall of ice, she couldn't restrain her battle cry anymore as her fight-or-flight instinct kicked in. Hard. She could only managed to hurl the only available object to the merman.
Which just happened to be her priced bag, full of top secret research papers.
But Sakura reached a kind of mentality where she couldn't even care about what she had just sacrificed. She broke out in a kind of sprint she hadn't managed ever since she graduated high school, but still, she hardly managed to reach the entrance of the ice-cave before she heard the distance splash of the merman hitting the ice-cold water.
The sound of his hissing still fresh in her mind, Sakura ran away without a backwards glance at the mysterious creature.
Three days later, she still hadn't managed to sleep much after her encounter with the bloodthirsty merman, but that slavedriver son of a bitch named Kabuto made it clear: get ready with the case on the pufferfish or else. The or else part probably meaning the irreversible demise of her soon-to-be blossoming career, Sakura had no doubts.
Also, that fuckface called her an idiot for losing those papers.
"Where could you have left them huh, Sakura?" He prodded with a voice so honeyed she wished his teeth would just rot out already. "We're at the Arctics, in this tiny base. How could you lose them?"
Okay, so he had a point. But what was she supposed to tell him? Sorry, I had a run-in with a Hollywood-worthy, bloodthirsty merman and I used my bag as lethal weapon?
Alas, she needed to go back in the cave for her backpack.
Sleep-deprived, afraid for her life and wearing maybe far too many layers of clothing and in her unforgettable yeti boots, Sakura trekked down all the way to the ice-cave that she had occurred upon by chance on Monday afternoon.
And he was there.
Of course he was, Sakura grumbled, reluctant to continue towards the creature.
Though, this time, he looked entirely relaxed, sitting on his favored island of thick ice, with his enormous turquoise tail flirting with the gentle waves of the water. That was when she noticed how much bigger it was compared to his torso. He must have reached the length of a great white shark—Sakura speculated with keen eyes.
But before she could have approached—this time, with extra caution, a shot of sedative hidden securely in her yeti boots, feeling somewhat armed by its mere presence—he raised his head and looked straight at her, his eyes seeking hers out. Sakura was surprised to note that his formerly red, eerily glowing eyes were now pitch-black, almost pupilless.
Then, he snorted, as if Sakura's presence was only a mild nuisance to him.
"I'm not going to hurt you," was what he said and the look on his face completely apathetic, neither inviting nor dismissive. "It wasn't my intentions last time, either," he added after a bit of heavy silence that sat quite comfortably over Sakura's nerves.
And that's why you attacked. Logical.
When she still didn't voice her thoughts nor did she move an inch, not even indicating if she had heard him, the merman's features contorted into a vile frown and he turned away from her, showing his back to her in silent dismissal.
And that was when Sakura could have a proper look at the art that adorned his entire back—and Jesus, did it look good. His detailed tattoos ran from the line of his scales up to his neck, curling over his muscled shoulders to his arms and ending at his fingertips. His entire body was a masterpiece in Sakura's eyes.
It was all about distinct silhouettes of marine creatures, loose tribal patterns woven through the lines of the arrays of animals. The harsh black made a sharp contrast with his fair skin and even from her spot, standing all way across from the cave, she could easily see that the black ink had texture to it.
They were probably made in a method that was unfamiliar to mankind, as she was sure, merfolk probably had no access to local tattoo parlors. Especially not at the Arctics.
Biting her lip, lest she laughed at her own ridiculous thoughts, Sakura decided, it was time for taking action. So she confidently strode forward, ignoring the vivid memory of his hisses ringing in her ears and those eerily glowing red eyes.
"Look, I just—"
Then her fully-packed backpack nearly crashed into her body, had she not jumped to the side. Still, it was close and it was thrown hard enough for her to hit the floor face-first from its sheer force. The bag banged on the ice and Sakura was enraged by his audacity.
The. Disrespect.
With a simple breathing technique—which she had learned from her yoga-crazed friend—to cool the boiling anger and keep herself level-headed, Sakura huffed at the rude creature not even ten feet away from her. It seemed, men of any kind and specie, they still came in the brand of utter assholes.
So she channeled her energy into occupying herself with the long-missed research papers—fuck you Kabuto, once again—and opened up her slightly damp, fully-packed bag. It took some time for her to locate the exact pile that her little cockroach of a boss was hounding her for, but she was delighted to see her papers intact and in order.
Wait, they weren't in order before.
"You read them?" She asked, eyes widened and the words out of her mouth before she could even think it through. Though, at least she wasn't foolish enough to ask if he was familiar with the activity. Sakura suspected that there weren't many library at the bottom of the oceans.
Well, there was the possibility of Atlantis, but it just seemed unreal. Then, once again, she was talking with a local merman of the Arctics, so…
The creature abruptly turned towards her with a distinguished expression of annoyance and simply nodded, and then, reluctantly added as in afterthought, "I couldn't understand all of it."
It seemed like as if it had hurt him to admit to her that bit of flaw in his person.
So Sakura only nodded back at him and smiled, finding that tad-bit of conversation relaxing her nerves and with it, easing the memory of him hissing at her viciously. Dismissing her quite vivid imagination, she willed the tension to fade away from her shoulders as she let out a huff of amusement. "Well, no wonder. Most people wouldn't understand the biological terms either."
If you ignored the fact that he was a total douche, he might not be that bad.
But then, the conversation halted promptly as he didn't dignify her with an answer.
And that was why Sakura did what she knew how. She chatted away as she hopped down cross-legged on the ice, doing a fast scan of her papers because even though he had put them in a reasonably logical order, it wasn't Sakura's order.
"Shouldn't you be a bit more afraid of us, humans?" She babbled the minutes away, knowing full well that she had his undisturbed attention, even though he didn't interrupt her mad chatter in any way. "I mean, in this wasteland, you must not meet a lot of us, humans," was what how she continued.
Thinking about it, he was probably more rattled by her sudden appearance than anything else. Well, not because she was a human, more like because she dared disturbing his one-person slumber party. Now, he just acted annoyed mostly.
Then, he snorted indignantly, his enormous tail carelessly splashing the freezing water anywhere in his vicinity.
"I've seen seals more intimidating than you," came the chipped answer that he surely just intended to mutter to himself but just managed to say loud enough for her sensitive ears to have it picked up.
So as an answer, Sakura contemplated introducing him to her middle finger, but instead, she just puffed up her face that annoyed she was by his sharp tongue and mean attitude. He really was a male through and through, huh.
"Now, you look like a puffer fish," he commented absently just to take one more jab at her and Sakura couldn't miss the smirk that had graced those thin lips as she glowered at the merman with the enormous turquoise tail and artistic tattoos.
"I'm trying to work here." And this time, her irritated words effectively killed off all of the conversation they might or might not have had in the distant future.
Well, that was it for about ten minutes when she sorted through all of those top-notch secrets Kabuto was so intent on presenting to the government officials one month from now and she had managed to loose.
Then, he sighed, a slow and excruciating one, his enormous tail—that she was sure could easily karate-slap through ice had the merman decided on it—curled around him, still dripping wet, its turquoise color seeming luminescent once the light had properly hit his scales. He slowly turned towards her, his claws scratching against the solid ice, obviously refusing to let Sakura do what she needed to.
So Sakura gave up and started packing up, not bothering to inform him what she planned to do. And he didn't ask, either.
That was how she left him, lounging on the ice and waiting for the day to pass.
It took them a few more not-so-accidental meetings, with him swimming around the water and with Sakura awkwardly scribbling in her notebook when she finally dared asking, scientist brain let lose and her curiosity overzealous, "Can I take notes? Of you?"
And then, came the questions that were not so appropriate for a somewhat-like-friendship of one week, but she couldn't stop and even though he complained about her overbearing personality and about those informations being personal, he did his best to answer her properly.
He shared that merfolk could turn into humans if completely dry when she asked how they would copulate. He then explained there were places on his body that were overly sensitive and that there were several others under the deep, deep seas and rivers. He also claimed those eerily glowing red eyes of his was something exclusive to powerful males. And that he had lived the majority of his life in the Caribbeans.
"Your proportions are off," was how she started today as she studied him with critical eyes. "You'd surely be larger than an average man when you turn into human, right?"
To which, the merman only narrowed his own—not red, thankfully—eyes at her, thinking about how to give away the very least with his answer. Then, he lifted his enormous, dripping wet tail up for her to inspect, his fins—she swore that those were the width of her arms outstretched—only a mere breath away from her face.
"I am only rationed, girl," was the only thing he said and Sakura scowled and leaned away from the vicinity of his muscled tail. He might be a quite Hollywood-worthy merman, with tattoos any girl would die for and spiced up with that typical asshole-attitude, but those filled out criteria did nothing to make the fish-stench disappear.
"You speak strangely," Sakura prompted, artfully avoiding continuing the last topic of their somewhat forced conversation. "Last time, your grammar was terribly off. And you did use some strange expressions I'm not familiar with," her scowl deepened at that, not liking to be outsmarted even by a merman.
She liked winning at best—let that be athletics, wits or work, she was there for the prize.
Then, she could clearly see his face contort into a more serious expression, fine eyebrows drawn together and lips squeezed into a firm line, "I'm not form this time." Just like that, his pupilless gaze turned towards the ice-wall, as if reliving a particular moment in his life. "I wasn't always a child of the Oceans."
Sakura, not really knowing this expression either, prodded further, fishing for information that could give her a better understanding of a new specie. "Then, what were you?"
But at that, he looked back at her with a condescending gaze as if she should have figured it out by now.
"I was a human, a pirate, in the mid-seventeenth century," he confessed with a no-nonsense voice as if that should have been obvious to his human companion.
Sakura's eyes widened comically, her jaw dropping by itself as she looked him up and down, trying to find signs of his real age, wrinkles or gray hair or whatever.
Mid. Seventeenth. Century.
When she couldn't find anything proving his claims, she cautiously continued, not knowing how this ancient would react to anything anymore. This simple data threw her off in a way that his sub-marine sex life formerly didn't. "That was an awfully long time ago… What happened ever since then?"
Which was a round-about way of asking him what the heck could he occupy himself with for the last three-fucking-hundred years under the seas. Because he surely didn't sing in choir with crabs like in The Little mermaid, right?
She wasn't surprised when he didn't confirm that particular theory of hers.
"My wife turned me into one of her kind," and just like that, the merman's smile morphed into a strangely cocky smirk and Sakura felt her insides anxiously quiver with something she wasn't willing to recognize as anything yet. "She bribed me into marriage, actually. More like kidnapped me from my crew," at that he playfully clicked his tongue and looked up at her expectantly, noting the way how her scribbling stopped.
A wife, huh?
Not knowing how to react, Sakura bit into her lower lip, her eyes firmly locked on her journal, on a drawing that turned out pretty good—depicting the probable bone structure of the merman's tail.
After a few seconds of uncomfortable silence, she willed herself to speak, aware of his suspicious look following every flinch of her facial muscles. "Did you regret it? That abduction, or what your wife did to you, I mean."
"No," was the firm answer as he turned back towards the ice wall, his forehead wrinkling in thought and Sakura squeezed the pen in her hand a little bit harder. "If I could, I would spend my eternity with her," he confessed and the marine biologist was suddenly itching to go back to work.
Her lunch break was almost up, anyway.
"Why not?" It escaped her lips before she could have thought it through, even though she knew she didn't want to hear the answer.
Then, he abruptly flicked his tail in irritation, splashing the both of them with freezing water and Sakura yelped. He really was so inconsiderate most of the times.
But before she could have harped on him like she usually did at least three times during every of their not-so-accident encounters, her blood chilled with the words he let escape from between the tight lock of his teeth, "She was killed."
And Sakura felt the that strange something that shook her insides strengthened as she asked, "How?" her voice was small and breathy in the pregnant silence of the cave.
"Humans."
Sakura wanted to say she was surprised or that she was sorry, but neither came to her mouth as she only left an errant breath out as it wreathed in the cool air in front of them.
Even when she went to bed, she couldn't stop thinking about that particular part of his life he had shared with her and she shivered, undoubtedly, not from the warmth the half-broken heating system of their research lab forgot to provide. Sakura didn't sleep that night, thinking about the mysterious life merfolk could lead under the water.
The next day, Sakura—ever so squeamish and ruffled—finally worked up the nerve to ask his name. And he huffed without care as if he was annoyed that she hadn't earlier and simply told her, "Sasuke."
He didn't ask for her name.
Exactly one week later, disaster happened.
Caused by that fuckface. The particular fuckface that posed as her boss, because that slavedriver son of a bitch called Kabuto had not only used up all of that partly warm water right before her showered, but the last bottle of that expensive, revitalizing shampoo too, which could only be bought in fucking Mexico.
And that was how Sakura was left with the itchy dry shampoo she hated from the bottom of her heart and a fury so wild it developed itself into a splitting headache and a foul mood so severe, she felt like punching something—preferably Kabuto's irritating face. And it was never good to go to visit Sasuke when both of them were grouchy. It always ended with throwing a few objects at each other.
He particularly liked to aim at her with shells sizes as big as her face. They were also sharp, he claimed.
That was why she least expected his comical reaction to her pink hair—hatless and messed up was how she arrived at their cave.
With eyes widened and lips slightly agape, he crawled closer to Sakura as she sat cross-legged on the island of thick ice, with a warm blanket under her booty.
The merman seemed right out fascinated by the color—Sakura mused as Sasuke reached out a clawed finger in daze, cautiously flicking her pink strands as his eyes zeroed on it as if it was the very thing he had waited centuries to witness.
With barely contained laughter Sakura whispered to him, "Well, you don't see colors so vibrant down there, do you?"
To which, Sasuke was roused from his reverie and only nodded dazedly, as if remembering the marine biologist was also there, not just her peculiar hair. Then, he nodded absently once more, his finger wetting her curls and gradually getting tangled in it.
"Can I?" He asked but before Sakura could have answered, he curled his enormous tail around the both of them, sitting right behind her and without any hesitation, he touched her hair with all of his clawed fingers, his absurdly warm body temperature even giving Sakura a kind of buzz as he sat so close to her. His blood usually ran on higher temperature, maybe it was a method to endure the harsh conditions of the North, maybe, it was just a merfolk thing.
Without further ado, Sasuke started braiding her barely shoulder-length, pink, bouncy curls, his fingers taming her wild locks expertly and Sakura leaned into the touch in contentment, not caring about her hair getting wet from his touch. And just like that, she abruptly realized that she was not worried about his oversized claws getting so close to her face or his eyes that started gleaming with the eerie red once more.
Slightly bothered by her new discovery, she once again, did what she knew how. Chatted away about things that still intrigued her, even though they may not have bothered her more than not being afraid of the Arctics' local merman.
"So you are social creatures?" Was her first question as she looked upwards, barely even being able to sneak a peek at the ridiculously focused Sasuke as he promptly tilted her head forward to get a better angle to work with. The only thing she could see were his red eyes and his prominent frown that made his lips look even thinner.
Maybe it was better this way as he couldn't see her bewildered expression when he managed more than an entire sentence without the need of forcing it out of his mouth with some kind of medieval torture device—because yes, Sakura entertained that possibility when he was content with playing mute.
"Normally, every children of the Oceans has their intended. A mate, so called," then he tugged on her hair firmly, but not enough for it to hurt, his claws grazing the line of her neck and Sakura sighed at the comfort of his warm touch. "I lost mine, so mother gave me another chance. My punishment for not protecting her daughter from the humans was that I need to wait a bit."
Not quite understanding his strange wording, or even how it was an answer to her simple and not-quite-so-innocent question, Sakura decided to prod further with something at least she knew she would understand the reply for.
"How much more? Time, I mean."
He abruptly let go of her head and Sakura realized bewildered that he had finished with the creation of a hairdo that would put hairdressers to shame. She looked at her reflection in the freezing water— nearly tripping over the end of Sasuke's tail on the way there—and was awed by the sight she saw. Her too-short-to-do-anything-with hair was now in several neat and firm braids, half of it sitting on her head in a shape of a crown, the other half falling down.
But before she could have praised him, the side-glance he shot her way, threw her off track and his eyes, once again, gleaming with that strange red made her insides quiver. From her spot she could easily see his well-hidden fangs with a smile that had curled on his thin lips.
"Not long."
And Sakura left the cave with a kind of bewilderment that left her speechless for the next couple of hours.
She knew Kabuto would laugh at her new hairdo, but personally, she thought it was amazing. She couldn't even guess how Sasuke had managed to pull off something like this. Even Ino, the uncrowned queen of anything even remotely involving beauty would have had trouble braiding something so intricate and yet so stabile.
Sakura sighed as she dropped her now damp clothes into the bathroom. She would do the laundry later—she decided, her new journal never leaving the grasp of her hand. She had notes so many and so detailed by now that she needed two books to store the knowledge in. She had even made drawings of his peculiar anatomy, of his supposed bone structure, of his scales and even a few pictures of him lounging in the water—she had snapped all of those in secret.
It wasn't like he was going to demand a trial for not asking for his consent on that, right?
On the other hand, it was strange how much she could fill up about a specie they hadn't known before—Sakura mused, fingering through her first journal with a particularly good doodle of Sasuke's peculiar tattoos. Well, obviously leaders up at the top would probably know about the existence of merfolk, she suspected that already, but not lone marine biologists turned researchers for sure.
With a sigh, she sank the first journal into her suitcase, vowing to not even touch until she was out of Kabuto's reach.
Even more shocking than his talent with hair-dressing was how Sasuke had expected her the next day. He had a curious smile on his thin lips as he studied her as she entered the cave with a somewhat proud look in his now pitch-black eyes, obviously delighted by the fact that she had yet to undo the crown-shaped masterpiece on the top of her head.
When she settled next to his warm, but wet body, he immediately tucked something in her hands, the claws of his fingers tickling her skin.
It was a pair of earrings—Sakura noted, her keen eyes already studying its details. It was an unique pair, golden with pearls so big that it actually had a weight in her hand. It was obvious that they didn't spare the gold from it—the earrings were far too expensive for someone as average of a girl as Sakura and the pair looked old, probably even antique.
"Where did you get that?" She asked with voice so small that the quite waves of the Arctic Sea glossing over their favored island of thick ice could have overpowered it.
And why are you giving that to me? Was what she originally wanted to ask.
And that, Sasuke shrugged as if the probably high-cost jewels had meant nothing to him—and Sakura remembered his confession of merfolk being notoriously greedy. Oh, she remembered clearly.
"The ocean is cramped with shipwrecks. We raid them."
Sakura decided to accept that as an explanation, not wanting to argue with him over things he wasn't willing to share as of yet. But before she could express her dismay though, he expertly got her own pair of crappy bijoux out of her ears with his clawed fingers—gentle as ever—then cautiously put the new earrings in them.
She immediately knew her blush wasn't just the results of the chilling temperatures of the Arctics.
Then, slowly, her collection of ridiculously overpriced jewels grew and when she had rings on every of her fingers—and strangely, all of them fit her—and three more pairs of earrings Sasuke insisted she wore, Kabuto noticed that something had changed. Heck, he had been sending her side-eyed glances for days.
It took just a bit when the fuckface grew a pair and confronted her about it.
"Pray tell me, Sakura, from where are you getting all those new accessories? You go out for hours. Not to mention that lately, you seem to be unable to focus on your assignments. So," he started, deliberately leaving a breath of pause, his glasses threateningly glinting down at her, "what is happening, Sakura?"
He was preparing for something—and Sakura already suspecting what was going on, stopped with removing her warm clothes, giving her undivided attention to Kabuto while making sure her expression didn't give away anything to the cockroach.
As she didn't open her mouth to explain, Kabuto let an ugly smirk settle on his lips and he showed a journal—her first journal, filled to the brim with information about merfolk—in her face.
That was the moment when she paled to the point that the outside snow looked tanned compared to her complexion. And that exact moment, her slavedriver son of a bitch boss thought he had won.
"You forgot to inform me about your new findings, Sa-ku-ra," he taunted, flaunting her prized research materials as if they worth nothing in his eyes and Sakura swore like a sailor under her breath. "You know what that means?"
"Promotion?" She bit out, knowing full well that her preposterous humor would make no amends with someone as wretched as the man in front of her. No, not man, a cockroach, he was nothing but a cockroach—she reminded herself.
His smile became wolfish at that, "More like a trial against the U.S. government, sweetheart." And he pushed his opaque glasses up on his nose, his delight clear to see for all—but mostly to Sakura. "The charge is felony."
And just like that, Sakura wanted to scream her throat raw and flip tables at this miserable son of a bitch, knowing it was The End—yes, with capitals—of everything she had worked her ass of for and it was all because she was cursed with a boss so damned and ill-willed.
Still playing partially mute, Sakura bit her lip and looked up at Kabuto with her eyes narrowed and expectant, sensing that his speech was still not finished. He still had the worst news and he wanted to deliver it a way that would surely destroy her.
The. Fuckface.
"Now you have two options," and he counted them on his fingers as he continued on spewing his shit, "One, easy way out, you could do a trial against the U.S., all fair play," and he said it a manner that suggested it was going to be nothing, but a fair play. "Or you could give up your merman and let a proper research team have him for further inspections," and he pointedly looked at her journal and Sakura scowled. He wasn't just threatening her and Sasuke—he was also belittling her as a researcher too.
She already—heck, immediately—knew what her choice would be.
With her fury hardly contained, she spewed back at Kabuto,"You forgot the third option." To which he had the gall to look amused and Sakura clicked her tongue in irritation.
"Oh?" he wiggled his eyebrows and Sakura muttered once more: son of a bitch. "What would that be, huh?"
Without a moment of hesitance, she whipped out the sedative shot from her yeti boots and smacked it straight in his neck. Straight in the artery, without an ounce of doubt.
Kabuto fell. It was no wonder, after all the concoction was able to put a whale into a week-long coma.
Then, expertly ignoring the fact she had probably just got herself in an even bigger mess than before, she started looking through Kabuto's pockets, taking away her belongings, the journals and all those secret pictures of Sasuke, and finally checking his phone to break it into tiny pieces.
Will be there for the capture in two hours.
Sakura broke out into a sprint.
It took less than ten minutes to reach their ice-cave.
She arrived with her limbs shaking, her chest heaving and so flushed from the cold and the adrenalin coursing through her veins that Sakura was sure she was on the verge of passing out. She had her two journals in her hands and all of his gifted jewels on display—meaning all of the belonging she could save.
She easily found him, swimming in the freezing water, his eyes already studying her form, speculating. Sakura suspected that he knew that there was something amiss.
So she stomped closer to the edge and when he tried to crawl out of the water, she rudely pushed him backwards by his forehead. He gurgled but then immediately broke the surface once more, his features contorted to something like irritation, but mostly to worry.
"What happened?" He asked urgently, not even getting that angry by her actions. His eyes narrowed as he took in her ruffled form.
The neat braids he had created only an hour ago were now loosened, she didn't have enough layers on, that could successfully protect her against the harsh winds of the Arctics and she looked like she was tiptoeing closer and closer to a nervous breakdown with every passing second.
Sasuke didn't like that look on her.
"You need to run for it," she breathed out, the air escaping her lungs and showing in the cold of the ice-cave. "My son of a bitch boss busted me. I'm going to court against the U.S. government," at that, she rolled her eyes and slumped down in front of him, cross-legged and already contemplating giving up. "Apparently, it's illegal that I have a merman friend and I didn't inform them about it."
"That government?" To her nod of confirmation, he let out a growl, vicious and full of ill-intent. "Are they dangerous?"
She smiled a sad smile, her lips trembling in the process. "Right now, I'm uncertain."
"Sakura," Her eyes widened at that, because it was the first time he had called her by her rightful name while she was pretty sure she hadn't even told him, but she willed herself to listen to his distinct, firm voice laden with threat and menace. He was angry on her behalf—and even if that was kind of sweet, Sakura couldn't stop her brain from overthinking and worrying.
"What?" She breathed out, her eyes bearing into his certain, ever-present pitch-black orbs and her insides quivered with the knowledge that she would never see him again. She tried to gulp down the lump that was already logged inside her throat.
"There's another way," he said, unwavering and so confident, "Both of us can and will run for it."
"How?" She huffed at that, disbelieving. It sounded just too good to be true. "There is no way. It won't end well, anyway."
Then, after a breath of silence while Sasuke's Hollywood-worthy face turned into shapeless blobs of colors, he answered her with a voice so tempting and so sweet, her entire body shook and her skin prickled. "I could turn you."
Her breath hitched when his promise full of the better and the future hit her ears and her fingers unconsciously found his tattooed shoulders, finding support and force beneath his skin. With all that, she also felt his warmth and the wetness there and Sakura slowly nodded. Even if she didn't know what would happen or what she should do, she trusted Sasuke plenty to believe it was really their last chance.
Because he wouldn't offer to drown her if it wasn't their last resort. She was sure of that, at the very least.
"Undress," was his firm command, the pirate Captain in him shining through the thick layers of scales and three-fucking-hundred years and Sakura did so. She soon stood in only her underwear in front of him, trembling as the impossibly cold air of the cave had no mercy. "Off with those, too," his eyes were not wavering from her form as she discarded the last pieces of her attire.
It was humbling yes, but she was sure, in the coming years, he would have more glimpses at her, so it really didn't matter—or that was what Sakura insisted on. She trusted Sasuke and she wanted this. Even if he still loved his dead wife—she wanted this.
He nodded at her approvingly, his pitch-black eyes raving over her naked skin with satisfaction all while he urged her closer, as if luring a willing prey to the predator.
She walked—with her feet already numbing and steps weighing a tone at the barest minimum—to the edge of the water where he casually was swimming, his tail flicking the water up in her face, as if he was excited.
Well, if that was the case, he made a magnificent work of hiding it.
"Ready?" Was the only thing he asked.
Sakura's voice was too weak for a proper answer, her body was too cold, her throat had a lump in it and she was suddenly hit by the weight of her actions. She realized she was afraid of losing the life she had lead so far. Her parents. Ino. Her big dreams as a successful researcher.
She squeezed her eyes shut to stop the flow of the angry tears.
But before she could answer him with words that might have showed fears and doubts, his muscled arms circled around her hips, warm and wet and he lifted her into the freezing water without any efforts.
Sakura wanted to yelp, but a sob broke through instead.
"You didn't even wait for my answer!" She accused him with fat tears rolling down on her cheeks which he smeared with his clawed fingers as he smiled down at her with a sad, cruel curl of his thin lips. Abruptly, his eyes turned to that eerily glowing red and at that very same moment, Sakura's memory of him hissing and snarling started playing in her mind.
He was dangerous—she realized entirely too late.
Sasuke leaned closer to her, his lips cautiously kissing the jewels in her ears. Each at every one with care and love, promising her more and more of those when they were down in the deep, deep, deep oceans.
And Sakura needed to take a shaky breath, but her sobs only continued on. Even if she tried to wiggle out from his strong hold, even if she could get out from the freezing water, she would die of hypothermia before she could get back to the research lab. It would be all over before she was able to get a fair trial against the U.S. government.
Simply put, it was all futile.
"You-" she choked out and Sasuke stopped with his ministrations, his warm lips leaving the juncture of her neck as he once more, bore his eerily glowing red eyes into her own. "You couldn't wait for my consent?"
Just like that, his smile tuned carnivorous.
"I never intended to."
And Sakura screamed in fear, her throat getting raw in the process as Sasuke dragged the her down, down, down to the very bottom of the sea and—not like last time, never like last time—he never-ever intended to let her go.