IV. Wind and Rain
By the time they arrive back in Konaha several days later Sakura could walk without assistance. The whole mission had been overall exhausting, not just physically or mentally but spiritually. Sakura yawns, face breaking out into a tired smile as they walk to the Hokage tower. All she wants to do is collapse into bed and sleep, but they've been asked to give their mission reports in person. It's probably because of the rank change, Sakura thinks as they enter the room. She, Sasuke and Kakashi all break into bows with polite greetings of "Hokage-sama," Naruto does no such thing, bounding over and greeting the elderly man with a cheerful "Jiji!" Luckily for Naruto, the third doesn't seem to mind Naruto's disrespect, instead greeting him with a smile. Sakura watches the third's smile waver for a moment when he turns his attention to the rest of the team. No one seems to notice.
"Good afternoon, Team Seven. Please give your report."
Naruto launches into the story, making wild gestures and motions to go with his epic tale. The short debriefing seems to drag on with Naruto's recounting, everything sounds more epically heroic then it'd been. Sakura finds that it's begun to irritate her. By the time the blonde is at the part when they beat Gato, there's a bright grin on his face and buzzing energy (or more so than usual) is spinning around him in equally exited intervals. Sakura is partly unsure of how he isn't exhausted and feels a flicker of jealousy at his stamina and brightness. There's a warm look on Lord Third's wrinkled face when Naruto finally finishes. He dismisses them shortly after, making an offhand comment to Sakura about writing a report on what she'd done when the boys weren't there. It really pisses her off that the boys don't have to write such reports, but Sakura doesn't let even a drop of malice show in her chakra and nods, exiting the room with a fake smile.
Upon reaching the base of the tower, she catches Sasuke's eyes momentarily. His posture is tense like he wants to run off and not stay around for an early dinner at Ichiraku or for when she inevitability asks him on a date. If it wasn't so exhausting, it would've been funny. He looks handsome in the afternoon's harsh lighting, Sakura can feel the fragments of her old self, obsessive crush and all, flare up at it before she crushes them to dust. She has no use for such feelings when she's trying to become a strong Kunoichi. His eyes are cold and glaring, disapproval at her is written all across his body language. He's waiting.... Testing to see if she'll drop this tough kunoichi thing and skip back to him. Sasuke says nothing, but the words, "you are useless" are written all over his face. Sasuke notices her staring at him and smirks, he thinks he's won. I will prove you wrong, she thinks holding back an animalistic snarl. If their other two teammates notice the psychological battle, then they don't say anything.
Sakura turns on her heel and walks down the street, blissfully disappearing into the crowd before Naruto's shouts about going on a date can reach her. Kakashi holds the blond back from running after her with a hand on his collar, the other flipping through his wrenched orange book. Sakura can feel her Sensei's eyes on her as she escapes blends into the crowd, she can picture his single visible eye widened a fraction and eyebrow reaching for his hairline. Somehow the accurate image only pisses her off more and Sakura thunders down the street heading for the civilian district and her empty house.
When she arrives at her house, everything is silent, the front door and back door are both locked. So, they're not home yet huh, Sakura thinks, heading upstairs to her room to unpack and shower. When she sets out all her supplies on the bed, Sakura comes to one of the afternoon's first painful realizations, her shinobi supplies suck. Only a half dozen kunai and shuriken, a single spool of ninja wire and bandages; there's a single set of explosive tags. Not good. In the heat of the momen,t Sakura throws her closet open and clicks her tongue, seeing all the expensive and brightly colored, delicate clothes. Okay, first a shower then she needs to go shopping, there can't be much food in the house either....
Hot water is a blessing she fully indulges in. Scrubbing every bit of sweat and grime from her hair and body, she sighs; it feels amazing. The hot water is wonderful on her sore muscles and body; the assortment of high quality foreran oils and soaps she uses feel delightful and smell even better. Rinsing off and stepping out of the shower, Sakura dries her body and hair. The Pinkett frowns when she sees her closet again. She decides to put on a pair of black spandex shorts and a dark mossy green tank top. What to do with the dresses, though? After contemplating her options for a few minutes, Sakura decides to donate all but a few the most beautiful and expensive clothes. She never knows when she'll need to infiltrate a high-class area or just go out for the night. Twenty minutes later, with a closet over 3/4ths of the way empty and money in hand, Sakura exits the house heading for the market, and after the shinobi district.
Sakura picks up what she needs from the market quickly, then giddily heads for the shinobi area. She hadn't yet explored the area despite her now being a shinobi. Older shinobi eye her with equal parts amusement and irritation. Most are expectedly good at hiding the second, but the small flicker in their chakra doesn't hide a thing. After wandering aimlessly for a few minutes, Sakura ducts into a clothing store. The shelves are not full of easily-tearing, bright fabric like civilian stores, but more camouflage flexible, and sturdy clothes. Sakura skips from one side of the store to the other, browsing the selections with a trained eye. She's got no shortage of experience with fabrics, civilian or shinobi, with her merchant parents. Money isn't a problem either. Sakura decides on an assortment of tank tops, long sleeves, leggings, shorts, standard shinobi pants, mesh leggings and undershirts, bandages, sandals and a few extra high-quality & expensive vests. The colors range from a coal black to sandy beige; greens, blues and browns filtering in between (except the bandages, those are black and white only).
It's almost time for her to start on dinner, so rather than going to a weaponry, Sakura decides to head home with her clothes and nutrient rich food.
The sun has yet to rise when Sakura wakes up. The last of the stars are twinkling out by the time she makes it out the door. After running through a few basic stretches, Sakura heads for the wall around Konaha and begins to slowly jog the perimeter. It's difficult to not instinctually push chakra into her legs and lungs to strengthen and enhance them. Sweat is soaked into her dark red tank top and black spandex shorts before she's even been going for thirty minutes. A quarter of the way through, and chakra rushes into her legs and lungs; she's unable to go further without collapsing if she doesn't use the support. It's not much, but the distance is more than she'd hoped and by continuing to do this she should gain strength and be able to go for longer as long as she keeps at it. It's only the first day, after all. The challenge is one the kunoichi embraces, even if the burning pain has her cussing the whole time.
Four hours. That's how long it takes her to finish the run, even with chakra enhanced muscles for the last three-quarters. Her body is screaming in protest with every step back to her house. Hot water, good pressure and muscle relaxing oils are gifts from the Kami. Sakura steps back out of the house half an hour later, washed and fed. Dawn has broken by the time she reaches the library.
It comes as no surprise that the library is so empty. Even if a shinobi village never truly sleeps, Sakura rightly thinks that few are going to be at the library during the wee hours of the morning; or at all, really, if they can help it. Such is not the case for two men she finds guarding what must be either the chunnin or Jounin section. A man with spiky, charocoal black hair and a bandage over his nose, notes her as she walks into the library and heads for the genin section. His attention is pulled from her when his partner, a brunette, who's got hair covering half his face, makes a poor joke, but the other laughs like it's the funniest thing in the world.
Half an hour into her time at the library, piles of books and scrolls litter her table. They cover several subjects, chakra (formation, reserves, tenketsu points/pathways, control, sensing, enhancement), genjtsu (the basics), Taijutsu (how to build strength, basic workouts, katas/styles), medicines, poisons and herbs, a title called The Basic Shinobi Guide, and a single scroll set on hand signs for genjutsu and ninjutsu. Sakra knows that she doesn't currently have the chakra capacity for strong or even medium ninjutsu's, so she at first decides to grab scrolls and books on other topics. Or really, whatever caught her eye, since she doesn't actually know where to start outside of chakra. But then, recalling Tsunamis destructive low-level earth jutsu, she ends up grabbing a scroll or two on low level ninjutsu.
When Sakura was part of the way through her tenth chakra scroll, Sakura hears footsteps and looks up to see the two men from before. She holds no doubt that they'd let her hear their footsteps. Mentally, she adds awareness & observation to her ever-growing list of things to work on.
"You've been here a while, Pinky-chan, it's almost lunch; you've got to be hungry?" the spikey haired one questioned. As if on que, her stomach rumbled.
Sakura felt a light embarrassed flush color her face and redden the tips of her ears. Now that he'd mentioned it, Sakura noticed that it actually was later than she'd thought. The brunette walked over to stand beside her and peer over at the collection of scroll and books she had. He gave a low whistle, "That's a lot of topics. How can you even sit still to read for that long?"
Sakura crossed her arms and faced away from him while turning up her chin, "It's not like I've got anything better to do."
"Oh? Why's that?" the brunette questioned, his partner chuckling at her antics.
"Well, there's no one to train with me, for one. My team has a few days off, not that they'd train with me anyways.... Actually, sensei said he'd be better, but I wouldn't be able to find him if I tried. Maybe not, though; he's incredibly lazy, and late," Sakura replied, her words sharp and direct.
Sakura looked back at the pair to find them standing together, matching grins on their faces.
"Are you Hatake's gennin by any chance?" Spikey asked, eyes screaming mischief.
Sakura nodded giving a little huff of exasperation.
Spikey grinned wider while the other one cried "Jackpot!"
"Say Pinky-chan, we-" spikey gestured between himself and his partner, "are chunnin and would be delighted to help you train if you could give us some good material on your sensei!"
Sakura's eyes widened in surprise, "Seriously!"
A nod.
The pink haired girl grinned sharp and wicked, making the duo feel excited and slightly fearful.
"Alright, I'll do it." She didn't have anything too bad to give them, but even if he was going to try and be better, Sensei had been a bad teacher, not to mention he was a late, lazy bastard, so Sakura felt that a little pay back was justified. Plus!, she got the opportunity to work with two chunnin who were willing to actually train with her!
"Sweet a Kohai!"
"Awesome, Pinky-chan!"
-Somewhere on the other side of Konaha-
A chill went down his spine making him shiver. Kakashi looked around to see nothing out of the ordinary, no one was trying to attack him, and Guy had left for a mission so there would be no challenges for the next week thankfully. But Kakashi had a very, very bad feeling. He just couldn't tell what it was about. Another shiver wracked his body spontaneously. The silver haired Jounin turned to face the memorial stone,
"Obito, Rin, Sensei, please help."