Chapter Text
Some people long for a life that is simple and planned
Tied with a ribbon
Some people won't sail the sea 'cause they're safer on land
To follow what's written
But I'd follow you to the great unknown
Off to a world we call our own
Hand in my hand
And we promised to never let go
We're walking a tightrope
High in the sky
We can see the whole world down below
We're walking a tightrope
Never sure, never know how far we could fall
But it's all an adventure
That comes with a breathtaking view
Walking a tightrope
With you
Mountains and valleys, and all that will come in between
Desert and ocean
You pulled me in and together we're lost in a dream
Always in motion
So I risk it all just to be with you
And I risk it all for this life we choose
Hand in my hand
And you promised to never let go
We're walking a tightrope
High in the sky
We can see the whole world down below
We're walking a tightrope
Never sure, will you catch me if I should fall?
Well, it's all an adventure
That comes with a breathtaking view
Walking a tightrope
With you.
(C) The Greatest Showman 2017
It was early morning and Sakura Haruno sat in her bed with her knees pulled up to her chest, hearing Sasuke Uchiha close the door and walk out of her life.
He had shared her bed. Promised to come home to her. Told her that he loved her. He even introduced her to his parents as his girlfriend in the Uchiha cemetery. But the world, it seemed, would not let them be together. Circumstances were pulling them miles apart. It felt like the stars would never align for them.
Sasuke was being sent on a mission, as part of his continued probation for his war crimes. Specifically the attempt to assassinate the Five Kage and the actual completion of that in regards to Danzo who, despite being a despicable war profiteering genocidal nationalist, was technically the Hokage when Sasuke murdered him. He now had to pay a debt to society, and as much as Sakura hated that given that she knew everything Danzo had done or personally set in motion, she couldn't argue justified homicide to the Council of World Leaders. She was too biased. Too close to Sasuke. Too sympathetic.
Sakura looked over at the mess of a bed Sasuke had vacated. She was too intimate with him.
How could she convince the world Sasuke was a good man, when she was sleeping with him? They wouldn't think anything of her testimony, only that she was a silly girl who chased after Sasuke for years.
Sakura looked at the door.
Everyone said she chased after Sasuke. Always her going after him. Never recognizing his mutual feelings for her. People always took him at surface value, and never considered that just under that was an ocean of emotion, of pain and love, that he kept to himself, for better or worse.
Few saw Sasuke for who he truly was. Naruto Uzumaki being quite possibly the only exception. As it turned out, Sasuke and Naruto were the reincarnation of the brothers Indra and Ashura, the sons of the Sage of Six Paths. Their bond broken by the schism of rivalry made the two irrevocably linked, and thus an understanding like no other was born.
But Sasuke did not talk to Naruto the way he did with Sakura. The boys had an unspoken understanding, and a rivalry that had evolved to be a kinship. Now a true friendship. But it was something out of their hands. It was simply their fate. They had been reincarnated dozens of times throughout the ages, doomed to repeat their failings. To fight and suffer. Their link was the foundation of their existence. But Sakura? She was different. She was the thing that existed that was optional, elective, and she broke the endless loop.
For the first time, in all the incarnations, Sasuke's Indra was not alone. It wasn't just Naruto's Ashura who was reaching out across time and space to connect to Indra. For the first time in all of the cycle, there was someone else supporting Indra's incarnation. Love was what Indra needed, but it couldn't come from only Ashura, or it would fail. Sakura loving Sasuke, through the death horror and despair, was the single link in the chain that weakened it, and caused it to snap. It allowed the souls of the brothers to finally find peace.
Sakura wasn't even there for that event. It was the ability to invoke her, by Naruto telling Sasuke that he wasn't alone, that broke through his centuries of walls. Telling Sasuke that he had never walked a path of darkness alone, because Sakura had loved him the whole time, that Kakashi had loved him, that he had loved him. The curse of hatred had been broken because of love. But the love from the brothers incarnation had always been there, every time, and that hadn't been enough. Hashirama's love for Madara had not been enough. It was Sakura who tipped the scale.
But now, Sasuke was off, alone. Because the world made him a monster and then wanted to punish him for the monster he had become.
Sakura threw her blankets off and dressed her naked body in a rush. She threw her blankets across her bed in a feeble attempt to make it, and rushed over to her closet. She had a backpack ready to go. She had packed it quietly last night while making dinner for Sasuke and helping him pack his utility scrolls for his morning departure, not having made up her mind yet.
She was always chasing after him. People thought she was crazy. Or someone to be pitied. She didn't care what they thought. They were people who thought Sasuke was crazy, and a criminal. If they couldn't see the reasons Sasuke did what he did, then she didn't expect them to understand the reasons she loved him the way she did. They liked the safety of their simple lives. They did not dream of reaching for the sky and the limitless possibilities there was out there if they simply shed the expectations of others.
Sakura left a note, for whomever ended up coming to her apartment. It would be Tsunade or one of her friends. She asked them to use or throw out the food in her apartment and to water her plants. There was a whole maid service in the Leaf for tending to the homes and apartments of ninja who go off on long missions. But Sakura didn't have time to make an appointment. She trusted Ino to manage that. She knew her friends would roll their eyes at her for running after Sasuke. They would judge her for the life she chose. But they wouldn't let her plants die.
Sasuke would be heading to the main gate. He would be officially released by the Hokage from that point, so Sakura ran in a blur of ninja speed, prepared to reach Sasuke before he left. She wasn't going to let him leave the village alone again.
Ten years ago she had been the only one who recognized Sasuke's pain and headed him off at the gate. She was the only one to realize he was going to leave. She was the one who had offered to go with him. And then begged him to stay. She wasn't about to let him pass through those gates again, alone. But he had knocked her out,, laid her on a bench, and kissed her goodbye. Three years ago he had passed through those gates alone, but she had stood there, offering to go with him. But he had once again refused. She understood then that he needed time to see the world with clear eyes. To see the world without it tainted by his hatred. To be Sasuke and not Indra's vessel. But Sasuke had poked her forehead and told her next time.
It was next time.
Sakura moved like lightning and was at Sasuke's back within moments of leaving her apartment. She reached out for his hand and took it in hers, never intending to let go. She could see surprise on Kakashi and Naruto's faces, as she had seemingly come out of thin air to grab him. But she had only eyes for Sasuke.
Sasuke turned, and his visible eye met hers, and it widened in surprise. He clearly had thought Naruto or Kakashi had grabbed him given the tension of his shoulders. Staring into Sakura's large green eyes had not been what he had expected.
"Don't forget me, your personal Chakra monitor" she said with her infectious smile. Sasuke looked as though he was immobilized with surprise. He wasn't reluctant, he wasn't telling her no. In fact, he was holding her hand tight, like she was a life raft in a storm. But he seemed incapable of vocalizing any of this.
Sasuke was a brief man, of few words. The deep conversations she had had with him in the past few days were the most she had ever heard him speak. His lifetime of repression and isolation, and frankly natural introversion, made him incompetent when it came to expressing himself. Sakura knew this, and knew it would be a long and difficult journey with him.
But smiling at Sasuke, and him finally smiling back at her, she was willing to walk this tightrope with him.