Penthesilea

Chapter Four

Chapter Beta: Sakura's Unicorn

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戦国時代

Afterward, Sasuke gasps for breath, dizzy and sated and aching all at once, and unable to regain his wits. Half on top of him, Sakura winces and rubs at her back. That pained grimace is back, and he decides he dislikes seeing it on her; he chastises himself for failing to provide more cushioning for her. Lucidity returns as their eyes meet. They both go completely still as the reality of what just happened washes over them.

And then she giggles.

Sasuke blinks and then glares—because he's fairly sure there's something fundamentally wrong about a naked woman giggling at a naked man after intercourse. Illegal, even.

"I'm so sorry," she tells him, still fighting off laughter.

"For what?" he asks through gritted teeth. He might be trying to regain sensation in certain extremities, but the Sharingan threatens to bleed into his eyes at the idea that she's mocking him.

"I shouldn't have let you do that," she apologises. He tenses up, irritation replaced with something slick and twisted. It coils within him at the idea of her expressing remorse over what just happened, but then she continues, "You're injured. And I'm your healer. I should've at least made sure we were horizontal first."

He stares at her in disbelief and then snorts in grim humour (he tells himself it's not relief).

"You're annoying," he says, falling back against the floor of the cave, boneless.

"Take a look in the mirror sometime," she replies, lying down beside him. She tugs one of their garments with her and curls into his side.

Sasuke tenses again, not sure what's expected here, but as she adjusts herself in the crook of his arm, he realises what she's doing. Slowly, the uncertainty leaves him, and he allows himself to manoeuvre an arm over her shoulder to pull her in closer. She's a soft, comforting warmth beside him.

It could be minutes or hours that they stay like that. The sound of their breathing returning to normal is the only thing that punctuates the silence.

Sasuke's eyes begin to feel heavy, sleep threatening, but he fights it off. He's never fallen asleep in the presence of someone else. While he suspects it wouldn't be such a horrible thing to do with Sakura, he still can't shake a lifetime habit. She appears to have the opposite problem—she shifts restlessly beside him—and finally pushes herself up on her side to face him.

Even if his eyes were closed, he would sense the weight of her gaze upon him, and after another beat, he turns his head to meet it.

"So..." she begins quietly, "that's officially the best payment I've ever received for medical services." But the words are tempered by a smile that is soft instead of mocking. The teasing is apparently affectionate.

His instinct is to snort in reply, perhaps offer a sardonic quip, but her second mention of medicine causes reality to rush back to him.

Itachi.

Sasuke remembers exactly why he sought her out in the first place. Before he was injured, before—

This.

She reaches out to comb his hair from his eyes, and he automatically covers her hand with his own. As he presses it to his face, he remembers the slide of her skin against his own when they were so intimately joined.

"Sasuke-kun?" she asks, sensing his mood.

He meets her gaze with resolve and absently grazes his lips against her palm. He doesn't expect heaviness in his heart at the idea of breaking the spell of this surreal day, but there it is; he doesn't let it stop him.