-1A/N: Hello! This is my first Naruto fic, and it is an idea that I have been sitting on for quite some time and definitely needed to get out of my system.

Anyway, hope you enjoy

Summary: Sakura's mother had always told her that each person as a guardian spirit. But death reveals that there was more truth to that belief than anyone alive could ever know. That, and the after life has a very strange sense of humor…Itasaku

Chapter 1: For Beginnings There Must Be Endings

I'm dying…

Haruno Sakura never thought her life would end this way. She always had a glorified, yet simple image, that she would die at home, in her bed, in the arms of someone (Her faceless lover, who ever he might have been) and with children at least. She thought that Naruto would be there, and Sai, and in a perfect world, Sauske would have been around too. She would have come home to her boisterous, orange and black clad friend who would demand ramen together while Sai wore those smiles that were just bordering on fake, yet were growing more real. Kakashi might show too, reading those filthy books and run away at the last minute when anyone mentioned paying amidst a bickering between 'her' boys. Sure, an unpredictable end was the way of a shinobi, but she had always been the one on the outside of what that kind of life meant. She suffered wounds like everyone else and she had her close calls but it was always she that returned home. Dying for home and friends was something she should be proud of, yet she could not quite manage to be nice and giddy when she was laying on her back, bleeding out into the freezing snow.

The mission had been an important one, so important that the entire ANBU unit had been sent out to retrieve it in Snow Country. Target? If she was honest with herself, she would admit she really did not know. Tsunade had been vague, but the money offered for what their team leader knew it to be was so high that Konoha would have no fear of debt for years to come. Sakura's vision was growing blurry. With tears or the snow flakes falling into her face, she did not know. She closed them, and recalled the very scene of what brought her here to this spot, bleeding and listening to the thunderous echo of explosions and the screams of dying men…

"Haruno Sakura. Come to the Hokage's office immediately." said a deep, male's voice through the animal-face of an ANBU mask. To say that Sakura was startled was an understatement. She was going through her morning routine of dressing, bathing, the works, before she would leave for the hospital.

"Wh-what?" she sputtered as she pulled on her vest with haste. No matter who it was, when a shinobi adorned that mask and uniform, he or she became completely professional. She should not have been so perturbed that one stood and watched her dress, but she could not help her natural modesty and alarm at finding a man in her room so suddenly.

Patient as ever, the man waited, then gave a vague nod. "Yes, immediately. Come in uniform." And with that, he vanished from her sight completely. Sakura's heart was pounding in her chest, though she did not know why. This was simply another mission, most likely, and something she had done many times before. Yet…Yet, this felt different today.

When she did reach the office, she could immediately see why she might have had a feeling of apprehension cease her. There were so many masks, so many forms both familiar and not, standing together with Tsunade at the front. Her eyes were more tense than Sakura had ever seen on the gambling alcoholic. She twisted her fingers in towards her palms and waited, tense in the stillness of the room.

"I have a mission for all of you." Tsunade started out by saying. "This may be different, but your skills will be required for this and no less." A retrieval mission, she said, for something 'important'. No one muttered or shifted about to ask what this might be, but if Sakura had telepathy she might have heard the questions ringing out in everyone's mind. Was this so dangerous that a whole ANBU team needed to go at once? And what about Konoha? This could not be wise, yet Tsunade proved time and again that her decisions were good, and well thought out. Their leader, the man in the kitsune mask, was the only one to have the exact information to prevent potential leaking should any of them fall into enemy hands.

Six hundred million ryo…

Sakura never thought she would see a mission with such a high price, and could not help but wonder what this item or person was. Or better yet…Who was the buyer? Tsunade clearly was not going to disclose that information. They disbanded, as did she, all with the specific warning not to give a single clue as to what was happening. No letters to friends, no good byes. Business as usual.

The trip to Snow Country was not eventful. No one ran into trouble, and surprisingly for such a high class mission, everything was running smoothly. Sakura was not the only one that felt uneasy.

No, it was not until they reached the snowy wilderness that all went downhill. The chaos began with an explosion that sent more than half of the team into the air. They had gotten too comfortable with the idea that the mission was going to go smoothly as it had been since they left Fire Country. This single misstep left many of them in pieces. That was when the cloaks of black, with the white outlined red clouds came into view.

Akatsuki.

They stood no chance at such a surprise attack, and what was more disturbing was that it seemed every Akatsuki member was present. From the information Leaf shinobi managed to extract, they never gathered all at once like this. Sakura, as she tried to fend off a shower of kunai, tried to think of what could possibly bring them all here at once. What was worse was that they had been prepared for the ANBU's arrival. Only then did she consider that this might have been a trap from the start, and a well planned out one at that.

She found herself face to face with a familiar, grinning blue face that belonged to none other than Kisame…

But Kisame was not the one that landed her where she was now. Another bomb dropped from the air sent her in the air with others. Somehow she was able to survive the blast with her limbs intact, but she was bleeding profusely from the wounds inflicted from stray (or maybe not so 'stray') kunai that managed to lodge into her ribs, arms, and she was sure one was stuck in her femoral artery. Kisame could be blamed for her nearly obsolete chakra to heal any of it.

'Don't give up now! We can't die like this!' a voice demanded, somewhere within her. In her frozen, listless state, she wondered if her Guardian Spirit was talking to her, if that was what 'Inner Sakura' had been all along. Her mother always did tell her, as a child, that everyone had a guardian spirit. A special spirit that would watch over and protect a person until the day they finally died, and then lead them into the after life. Supposedly, this was a belief that many of the Haruno clan liked to think of. The thought certainly was comforting, to think that there may be someone waiting with open and loving arms, to make right all that had gone wrong, or at least to say: 'It will all be okay now.'

'I will not cry…'she thought, but tears were stinging her eyes now that silence was all that she could hear. They were all gone. She could not feel the familiar chakras any more. This mission had killed them all and no one in Konoha knew. No one would know why, or how they died. She did not even know what she was dying for now, and more than ever, she wished she could have worked up the nerve to ask Tsunade what they had even come out to Snow Country for.

"This one is still alive, un!"

Sakura's eyes were still closed, but she could hear the crunching of snow as someone stepped in beside her, and then another, and another.

"Damned stubborn, that one."

She felt something jab into her side.

"Tobi! Don't poke her with a stick, damnit!"

A twinge of annoyance rushed through her. Could they at least let her die with dignity?

"Hey! I'm dying here!" she hissed out, then opened her eyes to glare. Her vision was blurry, but she could see at least five forms standing around her. Her biting remark was met with chuckles and a 'Tobi's sorry.' She wanted to jump up, then, and knock them all into next week for killing everyone and for laughing at her as she slowly died. Luckily, the freezing snow numbed her body to the point that she could no longer feel her wounds.

"What are all of you standing here for?" came a softer, quieter voice. Quiet as it was, each of the men seemed to grow still. Kisame was the only one to answer.

"One of them lived. What do we do with it?"

Sakura's eyes narrowed. It? She would show him 'it'. With a strength she was not supposed to even have in this condition, she pushed herself up onto her elbows and leveled a heated glare through the eye-holes of her mask in the direction she felt the shark-man to be in.

Uchiha Itachi was not impressed often. He had succeeded and witnessed far greater things than a girl struggling from death in order to sock someone in the face. Her aim was off, far off, for she landed the punch in Deidara's face and not in Kisame's who had instigated her ire in the first place.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" screamed Deidara when he landed unceremoniously on his ass in the snow. Kisame guffawed, but soon was in no better shape when the wounded girl managed to get him under the chin. Despite the attack, the blue man could not find it in himself to be angry at such an amusing sight. The girl's hits were weaker, but she was doing all she could to make a lasting impression for sure. None of the Akatsuki standing in a circle around her would forget the girl that had crawled right out of death to start swinging at feared, high class criminals.

The time for amusements was over, though, when Deidara rebounded and shoved the girl back so that she landed back into the blood red snow. Itachi waited, but she did not move this time. His eyes narrowed when he noticed that she was still breathing, however. He could not understand why she would continue to cling on to the thin threads of life. To do so was obviously futile. They were going to kill her, and he did not see why they were even standing around like this right now and watching. Perhaps the sheer amazement was what stilled their weapons from ending her immediately.

"What is your name?" Itachi asked, much to the surprise of the others. He did not care about them, though, and kept his dark eyes on the girl. When she did nothing, he began to believe that she really was dead.

Feeling was something of a distant memory, but her life was not. Sakura laid still after she gave her final fight and mulled over everything. She could say that she accomplished a lot in her life, enough to be proud of and have others proud of her. She was a good person by most standards, had loving friends and family…

'Oh Naruto…I'm so sorry…'

She would be another friend gone to him. He would have others, she was sure. Naruto was strong and he could move on no matter what.

"I asked your name, kunoichi." That voice again, drew her out of her daze. Sakura turned her face towards it. They were Akatsuki. Her murders. Still, she reached out and grabbed the ankle of the one closest to her and the sharp intake of breath from near by did not go unnoticed. Who did she grab? She figured that did not matter any more.

"Haruno Sakura…Please send me home…" she murmured, very well expecting instant refusal.

Instead of sharp remarks or refusal, she was surprised to find the weight lifted off of her face and her vision a little clearer. A pair of red eyes bore down into hers. She knew these eyes, and so she smiled softly.

Sauske…?

He had come to take her home? Was he finally going to go home to Konoha?

"It will be done." that low voice said to her with a gentle tone she had not heard in it before.

With those final words, Sakura felt her body relax. She would go home, dead or alive, she would go home. Tears finally leaked from the corners of her eyes, but the light smile remained.

Everything went dark, and sweetly peaceful.

Then Sakura was no more.

With the cat mask still in hand, Itachi stood up and kept his eyes on the lifeless form of a girl he had only just learned the name to. He recognized her name as the girl who had been friend to his younger brother, and of course the girl that was pupil to the famous Sannin and Hokage. It seemed a terrible waste but there was no use dwelling on what not even the Akatsuki's to lose. She was clearly an enemy.

"Are you really going to send her home?" Tobi asked, his voice curious. Itachi looked back at him and saw the rest were staring, except for Zetsu who eyed the dead girl with a hungry look to his eyes. He was annoyed that this question would even be asked. He, Uchiha Itachi, kept his word. If he said the girl was to be sent home, she damned well better be sent home.

"Deidara, bring the girl to Fire and leave her at Konoha's gates."

No sooner had the words left his mouth did an outraged sound leave Deidara's mouth. He glared incredulously and Itachi could already predict what was going to come out of the blonde's mouth.

"Me?! Why me, un? You made the promise, un!" he shouted out. Itachi parted his lips to respond, but Tobi sauntered up to his partner.

"But you can fly, right senpai?" he asked, sounding as if he were being helpful. Deidara snapped his mouth shut, glared at the orange-mask clad man, then promptly walloped him over the head. Tobi whined out and rubbed his head, but Deidara was already forming his bird, muttering. When all was done and the lifeless girl was placed carefully between Tobi and Deidara, they set off into the sky towards Fire Country.

Itachi turned away when the bird was out of sight and to the remainder of their group that had gathered. The massacre of ANBU aside, they were here for a reason. Wiping the ANBU out merely had been an obstacle to overcome.

Now they could search for the Shinigami Scroll without interference.

TBC...