((Okay, don’t scream at me- I am SOOOOO honestly working on chapter 11 of Leaf Masquerade, it’s just that while I was writing it, this fic popped in my head, and I literally couldn’t think around it.))

My name is Haruno Sakura . . . and I am a professional thief.

Chapter One

A Job Well Done

To say that I have no idea how I got into this line of work would be a bold faced lie, and yet still I wonder, Sakura paused in silently tapping into her palm-sized computer to look down as she dangled easily a hundred feet from the museum’s polished floor- could be more or less, she’d never been terribly good with measuring distance- and let out a quiet sigh, how did I get here?

Slipping the tiny device into a pouch on her belt, she touched a gloved finger to the skin of her throat just below her ear, activating a state of the art communication relay microchip that had been implanted in this same spot on all three members of her ‘item procurer unit’. Interesting little things they were, made of a durable poly-ceramic, completely indiscernible to even the most sensitive metal detector. It allowed them to sub-vocalize, picking up on the tremors in their throats so they need not open their mouths to speak to one another, cutting down any chance of a third-party overhearing anything unfortunate.

“Sasuke, are the lasers in place yet?”

“Just one more second, princess, keep your cool,” the deep voice of Uchiha Sasuke muttered back, bored and even- as though he was doing nothing more taxing than compiling a grocery list.

“I’m perfectly cool,” she rasped, unable to keep the irritation out of her tone.

“Riiiight.”

Alright, so perhaps she wasn’t. The aforementioned lasers were their latest toy; pin pricks of light directed painstakingly at the sensors so she could break the security beams and not trigger any alarms, set to the exact frequency and spectrum of the museum’s set-up. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Sasuke to do his job- actually, she was pretty sure the man plotted out floor-schemes in his sleep- he was the eyes of their operation. Surveillance and sniping seemed a perfect fit for him, he was calm, quiet and had been born with naturally perfect vision; the latter part of his job, though, only came into play if a situation became particularly messy.

No, it certainly wasn’t that she didn’t trust him- though, she could still remember the embarrassment of blushing furiously when their ‘recruiter’, Hatake Kakashi, told her that the tall, dark haired, dark eyed, positively modelesque man’s job was to watch her ass- it was that no matter how many times she found herself dangling some ungodly height above their objective, she could never quite quell the nervous flip-flopping of her stomach. If not for having mastered a steely-gaze in the face of authority and steady hands long ago, she knew her ass would probably be in jail by now.

“Okay, they’re set- one hundred eighty seconds- move!”

Nodding, Sakura released the cable-clamp, descending quickly, and locked it again when she was directly over the glass case. “Where’s Naruto?” she asked as she took out a laser-cutter and proceeded to remove the case’s top section- since most museums had the display beds set to trigger the alarm if the case was lifted, and a circular cut in the glass would be detectable in daylight, taking the top square off was the safest bet.

“Doing his job- imagine that,” Sasuke replied as Sakura silently set the glass aside and reached into another pouch.

Uzumaki Naruto was the unit’s safeguard. As a walking distraction-tactic, he was the perfect person to run interference if Sakura was ever in danger of getting caught and needed to make a quick get-away. Most of the time, the bubble-headed blonde man complained about his lack of use in the field, to which Kakashi had told him he should be proud, because it only meant that the unit was functioning perfectly.

Extracting an ideally weighted cubic zirconium replica- ensuring that the theft would not be discovered until the display was shipped to another museum and examined upon arrival- from the pouch, she clenched her other hand into a fist for a moment, trying to calm her nerves as she let out a deep, subdued breath. But, she reflected, nervous was good. When you stopped being nervous in a line of work such as this it could only mean you’d become over-confident, over-confidence shared an apartment with cocky, and that could easily lead to an oversight that got you caught. Nervous meant that you double-checked all of your double-checks; that you went to pains to make sure everything would go according to plan . . . and hearing that their distraction-tactic was ‘doing his job’ made her worry.

“What do you mean doing his job?” She shook out her free hand and reached into the case, lightly clutching the diamond as she placed her other hand levelly beside it. “Did something go wrong and you just aren’t telling me?”

“Would I do that?”

“Yes,” she hissed, painstakingly making the switch and pocketing the large gem. “You would if you thought it could be handled and I could still accomplish the objective.”

She heard him sigh and she could tell by the tone of the exhalation that he was shrugging almost imperceptibly, “You’re right, I would. He got bored and decided to pass the time by making small talk with the security guard- seems spending the night pretending to buff the floor-tiles wasn’t quite his thing.”

Again she nodded, “Time,” she said as she silently replaced the top of the case.

“Fifty nine seconds- get clear of the lasers.” Sadly, the laser-rig was a prototype and could only hold the beam for four minutes, tops, so they tried to keep its use to anything markedly below that as a safety precaution.

“On it,” she pushed a small button on the clamp, gritting her teeth at the nearly inaudible- but frighteningly loud to her nervous ears- whirring sound that accompanied the upward motion as the device shot her back toward the ceiling.

Gripping her hands into the sun-roofs’ pane, she pulled herself onto the roof, planting her black-sneakered feet firmly on the tar-mat floor before unclamping the cable and hurriedly pulling it up. Unhooking it, she then placed both items quietly down and slowly lowered the glass back into place, removing the foil that had disrupted that particular alarm.

“Done,” she muttered as she knelt down, stowing the cable and clamp into a duffle bag.

“You know, with the way you report in one would almost think I’m not doing my job- I can see that you’re out.” Though his voice still sounded bored, Sakura could tell that the implication had ruffled his feathers a bit- the only thing that could likely vex Sasuke was someone doubting his ability to do anything.

“Sorry,” she replied, biting her lip as she hoisted the bag over her shoulder and scurried across to the roof of an adjoining building.

“Whatever, it’s fine, but you’re not done until I get the equipment broken down, Naruto’s clear of the area and you and I are long gone from this building.”

“Right, almost to you,” she tapped the chip again, deactivating it.

Gritting her teeth again, she took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Closing her jade eyes, she counted in her head before running at the ledge and launching herself across the five foot gap, landing steadily on the balls of her feet, knees bent and palms flat against the floor. So perhaps a background in gymnastics and martial arts training did suit her career well. Rising smoothly, she jogged to the door of the abandoned building and pulled the creaking mess of wood open, shutting it tightly behind her and proceeding down the steps to the floor where Sasuke waited.

As she entered the room, she found Sasuke dismantling the sniper rifle; amazingly everything else was already broken down and stored away in two more duffle bags. “You sure do move fast,” she said quietly, placing her own bag down and beginning to unzip her matte-black jumpsuit.

“The longer you work with this equipment, the easier it gets- kind of makes me wish they would stop making up-grades. You sure you wanna do that?”

Shrugging out of the suit to reveal a fitted red turtleneck she blinked at him. “Do what?”

“Remove the suit.” He shook his head, not looking at her as he packed the gun pieces and laser sight away. “Maybe we should work some ginko-boloba into your diet- we have to go back the way we came.”

Sucking her teeth, Sakura nodded as she pulled the sleeves back up. “Right, damn it.”

The way they had come was through the sewers- a blue-print oversight had left an unattended manhole in the basement of this building. The pre-plotted map on Sasuke’s PDA would lead them directly back to their SUV; with a pop-up door built into the vehicle’s floor, it was conveniently parked over another manhole on a deserted dead-end street. The covers were damn heavy, but Sasuke and Naruto working together had managed to lift it and work it aside just enough for them to slip in, making her wonder why the things always looked so easy to move on TV.

Sasuke tossed her a cell phone. “You’re on.”

Clearing her throat, she dialed the museum’s front desk, pressing zero to bypass the voicemail. “Good evening, Museum of-”

“I’m really sorry, is- is Uzama Namaru there? This is his fiancé, it’s an emergency!”

“Okay, calm down, miss; just a second.”

A few silent moments passed before Naruto picked up, all but screaming into the phone. “Saiya, what is it, what’s the matter?”

“Oh, Namaru, it’s terrible,” Sakura keened loudly, knowing the security guard was likely close enough to overhear, “you have to come right away- it’s your mother, she-”

“She what, where are you?”

“I don’t know, I think it’s a heart attack- they’re taking her to Konoha General, please hurry!”

“I’ll be right there!”

Sakura hung up, promptly deleting the museum’s number from the system and tossed the phone almost angrily back to Sasuke. He caught it easily and pocketed it, going to the window to watch Naruto exit and frantically hail a cab.

“What was that for?”

“Hmph,” she breathed, pulling a duffle bag onto each shoulder, “you almost made me laugh.”

“I didn’t do anything,” he replied with a light shrug as he hoisted up the other two bags.

“You were smirking- that smirk you do when you find something funny, but won’t dignify it with an actual laugh.”

“I would apologize, but it wasn’t my fault. Those phone calls are amusing,” he started out of the room, heading for the stairs. “So, when’s the wedding again?”

“Funny,” she huffed, nudging the back of his knee with her foot- a move that likely would have had anyone who wasn’t Uchiha Sasuke falling to the floor, but only made him still his steps for a moment to regain his balance. “Can we never do the sewer-thing again?”

“I thought you didn’t have a problem with rats.”

“Rats, no, but there was this huge, mutated daddy long legs down there,” she shuddered with revulsion at the memory, “it was just so gross and I swear it was watching me!”

“Well,” he began evenly as he pulled open the basement door, “if you see it again, let me know and I’ll tell it to stop making faces at you.”

She laughed- Sasuke wasn’t normally the type to joke, no that would throw off that whole cool, aloof, disinterested in life thing he had going, and the fact that he was probably only doing it to ease her apprehension made a tiny butterfly zip through her stomach. Any more butterflies that might have accompanied it had been squashed by the reality that he probably didn’t see her as anything more than a valued coworker, but the lone little creature was given life by irrational, girlish hope.

Fuck . . . it’s only because he’s so damned pretty. Of course, Kakashi- and more importantly, Kakashi’s boss Tsunade, reigning queen of the Japanese crime syndicate, ANBU- had already said that he didn’t care what they did with their personal time so long as it didn’t disrupt the job, but that didn’t mean she envisioned Sasuke ever breaking his seemingly twenty four/seven dedication to honing his skills long enough to have a romantic interlude with anyone. Target practice, electronics training courses, even martial arts . . . she wondered when the man found the time to sleep.

Reaching the foot of the stairs, she followed him to the open manhole. “And if polite talk doesn’t make it go away?”

Sasuke shrugged as he turned and dropped into the opening, catching the top rung with gripper-gloved hands. “Then I’ll politely introduce it to the bottom of my boot.”

She waited until he was a few feet down and then began her own descent. “That’s almost sweet of you.”

“Nobody scares the hell out of you on my watch,” he muttered, his tone just as bored and level as always.

Sakura stopped for a minute, glancing down at him. Watching his own footing, it was clear that he’d not even realized what he’d said, but the words gave life to another hopeful little butterfly.

ooooooooo

Three figures stood several roof-tops away, two of them lowering pairs of high-powered mini-binoculars. Hyuuga Neji’s pale gaze narrowed as he watched the dark haired man so efficiently breaking down the equipment through a shattered windowpane. Less than three minutes . . . that was all the time they’d needed.

“She’s good,” Hsu Tenten said beside him, “almost as good as me.”

“Don’t get jealous,” he said shortly, “there’s no room in this business for that.”

The brunette shrugged, “You’re right- it’s . . . it’s just not fair that I’ve been doing this for years and she’s only been in this line of work for- what’d Gai say- something like eight months and she’s that good.”

He crossed his arms, shrugging broad shoulders. “He did say that Kakashi’d told him the new girl he’d found was a natural.”

“And she’s so beautiful . . . .” Rock Lee’s voice chimed in and they turned to see his mini-binoculars still raised and Neji- the eyes and leader of this unit- could discern easily from their angle that the bushy-browed man was still watching the girl through the window.

“That doesn’t matter,” Neji said, perfectly arched chocolate brown eyebrows lifting fractionally, “and quit ogling her- you look like a stalker.”

“God, Lee,” Tenten said, making a face as she turned and started for the door of the roof, “she’s not that pretty.”

Lee didn’t seem to hear her, “That long pink hair, those huge green eyes . . . she’s like some delicate blossom.”

Neji let out a sigh as he followed Tenten down the stairs. “Don’t let him bother you, and stop getting jealous- it’s not as though her looks help her on the job.”

“So you agree with him?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think- they’re our competition, after all. So they’re pretty, so what? You were clearly eyeing that Uchiha guy and Lee and I aren’t getting all knotted up about it.”

The calm tone of his deep voice doused her fuse. “You’re right,” her small, rounded shoulders slumped, “could you guys at least stop talking about it then? I am kind of self-conscious.”

Rolling his eyes, Neji then narrowed his gaze at the back of her head. Gee, I hadn’t noticed.