The One Night Henge

Chapter 5

Thank you so much everyone for the follows and comments. Knowing how much you all enjoy this story encourages me to keep writing, you guys are amazing. Special thanks to my beta CherryBerry12. As always please read and review, thanks and enjoy.

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Monday morning, Sakura was up bright and early for her shift at the hospital. After leaving Sukea at Genma's apartment Saturday night, she hadn't returned home until about 6:00 am. After showering and changing into her comfortable clothes, she dove into bed and quickly fell asleep.

She had woken later that afternoon and went about her normal Sunday chores, laundry, cleaning and weekly shopping. After finishing her meal preps for the week and putting away her clean clothes, she relaxed in a hot bath for a while before going to bed for the night. It would definitely help with her soreness.

She arrived early for her shift at the hospital, which Tsunade was relieved to see. Two ANBU members had just been brought in, and Tsunade was dealing with one while Shizune was struggling to keep the other alive.

Sakura had been told that the man Tsunade was working had taken a heavy blow to the face with a blunt weapon. He had multiple skull fractures and several chunks of skull lodged in his brain with severe brain damage. He had also taken several blows to the body with the same weapon.

Despite its complexity, Tsunade could handle the operation on her own with the help of some support nurses. However, the man Shizune was working on was the one that needed Sakura's help. When she entered the room and stepped up to the operating table, she had to hold back a gasp—the man couldn't have been much older than Sakura herself. Yet here he was, dying right in front of her if she didn't snap out of it and do something.

He had a large open wound in his chest and several lacerations all over his torso. Once Sakura got started with the healing process, she realized that he was still bleeding out. Her medical training told her that it must mean he had internal bleeding, some wound inside the body that was causing mass blood loss.

Doing a full body scan on the man, Sakura found that he had additional damage to his kidney, spleen, and lungs. He would need a lot of work to save his life, but Sakura was prepared to give him her all. She took a steady breath and focused her chakra, then began to use it to mend his internal injuries before moving to the external ones.

Having Sakura show up at that moment had provided Shizune with the extra help that Tsunade was too busy to give her. Ultimately both men made it through surgery. Both were still badly injured and would need weeks in the hospital and several more healing sessions before being able to leave, but they were no longer in critical conditions.

Sakura was now sitting at her small desk filling out the paperwork for her patient. He had lived and it was thanks to her; times like these were why she loved her job as a medic so much.

She always felt a sense of pride and accomplishment after a major surgery that was successful. She always held her head a little higher, her shoulders a little straighter, and kept a small smile on her face. How could she not? He would live and it was because she refused to give up on him.

It was her greatest strength and her greatest weakness—Sakura could never bring herself to give up on anyone, no matter how hopeless things seemed.

Her thoughts about the ANBU member had led her mind to wonder about her former sensei. She wondered how his mission had gone, how things had been for him lately. She wondered what all in his life had changed since the last time they had seen each other, if he had any interesting stories to tell, if he had been getting letters from Naruto as well.