On the morning of their departure for the Land of Iron to answer the Raikage's emergency summons, Sakura, Lee-chan and Shizune were intercepted at the An Gates by Shikamaru. Huffing and puffing, he delivered his message, but much to Sakura's surprise, he was actually bearing good news, for once!
"What do you mean, the moon isn't falling any more?" Sakura said, goggling at him. "I got the R&D department to manufacture these cool doomsday watches for us," she added, brandishing her watch-clad wrist for emphasis, "and now you're telling me the moon arbitrarily decided to just sliiiiide back into orbit!?"
Naturally, Sakura was relieved that the world had been saved without her even having to lift a single finger, but she was still a little disappointed that she would not get to wear the gadget she had commissioned after all. However, and much more importantly, this did not align with the canon she knew, which could only mean that one of the many timeline alterations her actions had brought about was responsible for this…
"Here's the latest report Sasuke sent us from the astronomical observatory in Redaku," Shikamaru added, handing Sakura a sheet of paper. "The details are all in there, but keep in mind it takes around two weeks for the messenger hawk to make the return trip from Konoha to Redaku and back again, so at best, the info's a week out of date."
Without wasting any time, Sakura grabbed the document and scanned the complex mathematical formulae describing the relationship between the shinobi planet and its satellite, but much of it was beyond even her. She could only skim through the information, making a mental note to master these equations later to gain a better grasp of the Rinnegan's gravitational abilities, before skipping ahead to the conclusion.
"[…] as can be seen in Appendix A, Figure 3.2, the moon exhibited fluctuating irregularities in its orbit starting on October 22nd," Sakura read aloud. "Starting November 12th, during the new moon phase, the satellite resumed the downwards trend it had been following the previous month, but otherwise, during the day and for a few hours during the night, the moon actually showed signs of reversing its fall with ever-greater amplitude, see fig. 12 […] especially during the waxing gibbous and waning gibbous phases, and to a lesser extent during the waning crescent and waxing crescent phases, at the hours described in Table 3.3 […]"
Sakura grew thoughtful.
The moon displayed signs of having re-entered its proper orbit come nightfall, meaning it happened during the day… and at certain hours during the night… but why the day? In general, the moon was visible at night, when it faced their side of the planet, and only a few hours during the day, depending on the moon's phases…
Toneri clearly wanted to crash the moon into the earth, but someone else was pushing back against it, someone with the sort of power only the Rinnegan could display, someone who should have been dead in the original timeline by this point, someone living on the other side of the world, someone like…
"Madara," Sakura blurted out. "Uchiha Madara is saving us!?"
"Pardon?" Shikamaru said confusion.
"Eh?" Shizune gasped.
The last traces Sakura had found of Madara were from around two years ago, on the eastern coast of the Land of Lightning. After Kakashi massacred the authors of the plot to steal her unborn children, he and Terumī Mei had fled across the ocean in pursuit of Madara, who, to Sakura's knowledge, had never once returned to the shinobi continent… could it be that, on the other side of the world, that man was using his ocular prowess to push back against the moon whenever it hung in the sky above his head!?
"That's why the astronomical observatory kept recording the moon falling from around the same altitude night after night," Sakura muttered to herself. "Our daytime, from Madara's perspective, is his nighttime!"
Even Madara couldn't repel the moon when the planet beneath his feet stood in his way, and during the new moon, the satellite hung in the shinobi continent's daytime sky, completely absent from Madara's nighttime sky, since it was floating halfway across the globe above the shinobi continent's hemisphere. Furthermore, according to the observatory's measurements of the moon's displacement, Madara was growing stronger by the day…
"Waaaait! Don't leave yeeeet!"
A Flying Thunder God kunai whistled through the air, planting itself in the ground at Sakura's feet, and half an instant later, Tenten's fingers closed around the handle as she teleported to their side.
"That still doesn't resolve the underlying issue that the moon is falling on our heads," Tenten said breathlessly as she pocketed the kunai, dusting herself off and straightening to look Sakura in the eye. "You know, it just so happens that I've developed a super-long-range space-time ninjutsu that could take us to the moon, but it would require a special location from which to initiate…"
Sakura's lips twitched as Tenten took out a map and pointed out a certain location in the Land of Iron… by sheer coincidence, it was the exact same spot where Black Zetsu had told her the Moon Cave was concealed.
Yeah, right! Super-long-range space-time ninjutsu, my tits! That's just the Moon Cave!
"With your permission, I would like to form a squad, composed perhaps of Naruto, Hinata, Karin and a few others, to travel to this place," Tenten said, lying as easily as she breathed, "With the Flying Thunder God Jutsu, nobody would ever have to know we were there, and we could put a stop to whatever was going on directly from the moon…"
"Fine, I'll entrust you with the moon while I attend the Gokage Summit," Sakura snapped. "But knowing those geezers, it'll only be another waste of time, and they'll probably just try to backstab me again."
"And Shizune and I shall protect Sakura-chan to the best of our ability!" Lee-chan exclaimed, squeezing her biceps with a hand. "Uooh… my youth is overflowing!"
"I'll be counting on you, then," Sakura said, before turning to Shikamaru. "Shikamaru, you heard the girl, have Naruto, Hinata and Karin meet Tenten at the gates as soon as possible."
Shikamaru bowed slightly.
"As you wish, Milady," he said, before vanishing in a swirl of leaves.
And as always, Shino was going to be left behind.