Chapter 1
Iwa declared war one-hundred and ninety-four hours after she turned thirteen, but Haruno Sakura considered it a birthday present anyway. They had spent the last five years on the brink of it, and now that it was here the announcement brought a kind of rejuvenation with it. She stood at attention on the dusty parade grounds with the rest of the Genin Corps, squinting into the harsh bands of the afternoon sun that outlined the Hokage in gold where he stood on a platform in front of his rocky image in the mountain.
“The blood of our mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers,” he said. “The Will of Fire that guides us onward,” he said. Behind her, someone was talking in ranks: Happy Hour at Kano’s. There was a hiss – shut the fuck up, show some respect. To Sakura, their voices were muffled and far away, barely audible over the throbbing of her heartbeat, pounding loud in her head. The sun beat down, the Hokage spoke, and Sakura’s leg itched. Stiff at attention, she did not move.
“The government of Suna has pledged itself to support our cause. Their soldiers are already mobilizing to the border, where the brave heroes of the last war fought side by side to victory.” The Hokage paused after the word victory, as though savoring it. Despite herself, Sakura found her eyes drawn to the stark shadow of the mountain, looming behind the Third Hokage. The bravest hero of the last war looked down at her, impassive as always, staring down from unreachable heights. The Fourth Hokage was looking East, towards the rising sun. Behind him, to the West, Iwa was lurking. This time they would fight without him.
“Shinobi!” The Third was finished. “To victory!”
As one, they roared out their bloodlust in response. Sakura added her voice to the crowd.
“Ko-no-ha!” Three syllables, repeated until they were nothing but meaningless sounds. Fists clenched, back straight, eyes ahead.
“Ko-no-ha!” A nail broke skin, and she winced, lost her perfect posture. She quickly righted herself, but it did not matter. No one would notice in such a crowd.
“Ko-no-ha!”
The last shout was still echoing in her head long after they were dismissed by the Corps commander. She had been under his command since Academy graduation: state of threat meant that there was no point wasting a jounin on any no-name graduate. A year of training was what separated those that would be something from those that would languish there forever, doing supply runs, working in logistics, analytics, keeping the peace with civvies.
Sakura knew she was destined for something better. She would show Ami, Hitoka and their gang of jerks. She would show Ino – stupid pig. Most importantly, she would show Sasuke-kun. She had studied hard for him and she knew that the Capability Test in a week would prove it. She and Sasuke-kun would be assigned to the same team, under a real jounin, and, well, everyone knew genin teams got…close.
Sakura cast one last, lingering look at the Fourth before joining the stream of shinobi headed to the city center.
Beer and laughter mingled in the dusty air, and she found herself channeling chakra to her feet to glide over the colorful streamers and trash already littering the streets. Out of the corner of her eyes she could see the blurs of shinobi with air access nimbly hopping from roof to roof as they dispersed. Here, in the heart of Konoha, with the shouts of the assembled Genin Corps and 3rd Army still echoing in the thrumming in her pulse, Sakura knew that the war was going to be glorious. So did the grocer on the corner of 15th Ninjutsu Division, and she gladly helped herself to a bright green cup of melon soda from one of the barrels by the entrance. As she poured, someone tucked a flower behind her ear with a giggle. She turned too late to catch who it was in the press of people. It was as a pink as her hair, and Sakura laughed too.
She had dropped her empty cup to be trampled underfoot and was flowing with the crowd towards Mokuton Square when her father caught her, literally, from behind. He spun her around to face him before swinging her into the air.
“C’mon, Sakura,” Haruno Kizashi smiled, planting a kiss on her cheek. His mustache bristled against Sakura’s skin. “You’re not thinking about abandoning your dad to go off with your friends, are you? The Hokage said we should give our troops a good send off, didn’t he?”
“Dad!” She wiggled out of his arms to throw her arms around his neck, standing on tiptoe to reach. “Of course not! I was gonna go home right after I saw Mokuton. I know mom’s got something planned!”
“No spoilers! Let her surprise me!” She leaned back to catch his conspiratorial wink.
He kissed her again, then straightened, and she slid off of him. His uniform was freshly pressed under the heavy chuunin vest, and Sakura thought he had never looked so good.
And just to think, after her test, she could be next to go off and join him. To war. War! What a word. Sakura liked it better than peacekeeping operations. It was like a dam of tension had been broken. Or of lies. They had been waiting for it for the last five years, since the skirmishes started on the border. Or maybe they had been waiting for it since the Fourth Hokage died.
“You wanted to stop by Mokuton real quick? I’m sure mom won’t mind too much,” Kizashi said.
“Just for a few minutes!” Sakura said. She had promised that she would go straight home, so they could celebrate together, but… She could not help her somewhat guilty smile. “I heard Itachi-sama’s going to be there.”
Her father laughed. A boy hit Sakura’s elbow as he raced by, calling for someone to wait. The contact snapped her chakra control, and the thin barrier separating her from the dirt road disappeared, sending her teetering for a moment. Kizashi laughed again, throatily, and then kicked up a cloud of dust all over her standard issue sandals. She shrieked in indignation, but he was no longer listening.
“C’mon, kiddo,” he said, and she grabbed his hand to follow him through the crowd.
But by the time they made it to the wide expanse of Mokuton Square, Uchiha Itachi was already gone. The choir was still there, and a kunoichi was fire-dancing, surrounded by a ring of entranced spectators, but the disappointment of so nearly missing her idol left Sakura uninterested. She did not even bother trying to push her way closer when she spotted Jiraiya of the Sannin giving autographs and taking pictures as he mingled with the crowd.
Her father did not seem interested either, munching on a pastry he had gotten somewhere while she was searching the square. “Ready to go?” He asked, dropping two wrappers to the ground.
“Daddy!” Sakura squealed. “What are you doing? Mom’s gonna be so pissed you’ve already eaten!”
“I promise I’ll still be hungry,” He tousled her hair and they set off again.
“I promise she’ll still be pissed,” Sakura warned, but wiggled her arm around the crook of his elbow to follow.
“Only if you tell her!” Kizashi’s nudge to her side sent her rearranging the chakra flow to her legs yet again to keep from slipping.
They pushed against the crowd for a few blocks, before turning off of the large road for a smaller side alley. The crowd was thinning out gradually, before they turned to take a left and it disappeared abruptly.
Her father glanced down the nearly-abandoned road.
“Let’s take another route,” he said, and turned back to the path they had come from.
Sakura swallowed. “Yeah.”
Uzumaki Naruto scared her too.
In the end, it only took an extra fifteen minutes to take home, and it was not as though they had put in an effort or hurried. Her mother did not seem to notice, or mind, when she greeted them at the door, but after a brief kiss for Kizashi, she started frowning, licking at her lips. Kizashi was already laughing as he wiped at the sugary powder stuck in his pink stubble.
“I spent all day making your favorites,” Mebuki said, speaking slowly. “Kizashi!”
Sakura took off her dirty shoes and slipped into the house before they started fighting, headed straight for the kitchen. It smelled like fresh bread, and she helped herself to a warm bun from a basket on the table. She paid no mind as her mother raced into the room, grabbing at a dish rag before disappearing to chase after her father with the makeshift whip. It was going to be quieter, without him.
For the first time, Sakura felt apprehensive.
Her mother was still a genin, only nominally in the Konoha Mother’s Force. If she passed her test, if the jounin-sensei wanted her –– when she passed her test, when she proved herself to all of them! –– it would mean Sakura would be more likely to be the one sent off to the front than her own mother. Mebuki had never even left the village. But her father was in the Ranged Division of the 3rd Army. He could spend the entire war on the front. He had been on long-term missions for months before. But Sakura might not see him again for years!
She put down the bun, no longer hungry. Then she picked it back up: when she was accepted onto a Genin Squad, they would be sent to fight outside of the village too. She should probably study some more.
As if sensing her minute of worry, her father reappeared, booming with laughter. He backed into the kitchen, still wearing one sandal, and waving the other in front of him like a talisman to ward off the increasingly irate Mebuki following him.
“You could at least pretend to take this –– !” Mebuki stopped. She caught Sakura’s eye. Then she laughed too, quieter, but good-naturedly. “Well, Hokage-sama ordered a good send off, so I suppose we better get down to it! If I think you’ve spoiled your appetite, though, you better believe I'm going to make you run laps around the block!”
Sakura rolled her eyes as her father flung away one sandal and kicked off the other, before flinging himself down on the nearest chair. “You’re in my seat,” she protested.
“That’s my girls,” Kizashi said fondly. Then: “So what’ve you got?”
Picking carefully at her mother’s best (yeah, today was not a good day for the diet), as her parents joked, then squabbled, then started laughing again, Sakura thought about war. Defending the border, or deep undercover in enemy territory, deadly and beautiful, a princess and a warrior. And of course –
Kizashi gave her a nudge: “Whatcha thinking about, kiddo? You’re too quiet!”
Sakura blushed. “Just Sasuke-kun,” she said truthfully.
Her parents exchanged a look and laughed together.
Sakura quickly changed the subject. Her mother went to get drinks (she even let Sakura take a sip, which Sakura gamely pretended tasted good). They did not send her to bed until it was almost two in the morning, and even then, lying upstairs, she could hear their quiet talk, sometimes punctuated by a bark of low laughter or the clinking of glasses. She let her father’s voice lull her to sleep. She would miss him, yes, but she would join him soon, once she passed the test. Besides, they were shinobi.
It was that thought that kept her from crying the next morning when they saw him off. She knew Rule #25, and she was no kid. Her mother did not either, but made him promise to write every day, and got angry and smacked him when he pointed out that the post would not come every day. Or maybe it was because he was using his own spoon to scrape the serving bowl of oatmeal clean.
Sakura was cleared for Genin Corps duty in preparation for her exam, and Mebuki left to do cleaning rounds with the neighborhood patrol the moment Kizashi was out of the door, so Sakura was all alone at an ungodly hour in the morning with nothing to do.
She let herself ease into consciousness with Suzume-sensei’s ab routine, before setting off for the recommended ten mile jog. She went to the academy training grounds for her run, because the city was busy with outgoing soldiers and cleaning brigades, and it was still too early for classes, so they were almost completely abandoned. When she was finished she went back home and pulled out the war science books that she had not looked at since graduation. It was time to study. The last year might have been good for her physicals, but there were more important things.
The week passed in a blur of frantic, frenetic memorization. And math. Sakura was ready.
On Sunday, she went to the Hokage’s tower. She was asked for identification (“012601!”) twice before she could get inside. In the first-floor mission room she queried her assignment off of the unfriendly-looking chuunin at the desk.
“Registration?” He asked.
She gave him her ID and he passed her a scroll: 0600, Training Ground Seven.
When she took it from him, she knew she was holding her destiny.
When she arrived the next morning and saw Sasuke already waiting, it was like seeing all her dreams come true.
When Naruto arrived, she started second-guessing.
Four hours of waiting for their jounin-sensei later, Sakura was worried. She did not really want to think it, and she pressed herself harder against the tree she was sitting under so Sasuke could not see her fall to superstitions like knocking on wood, but she hoped their teacher was alive. Could they have assigned someone who was already…? Was the war going bad?
…It was probably just a typo on the timing.
Sasuke had not said anything since she had given up her attempts to talk with him, hours ago. He was resting quietly under an adjacent poplar with his eyes closed, though, so at least she could look without having to worry that she would be caught. Naruto had given up his attempts to talk to her too, hours ago, and after running around the clearing doing something or another, had disappeared into the forest behind them some time ago. She thought it was stupid that he would waste his energy, but she did not want to have to talk to him, so she kept the opinion to herself. She was sure Sasuke agreed. If he was awake. She could not tell from so far away. She leaned closer, trying for surreptitious. When he made no movements, she gave up on subtlety, and turned her head to the side to stare directly. The light breeze rustled his bangs and she wondered what his hair felt like. He really was so cute.
Sakura knocked on wood again.
“How unprofessional,” a deep voice drawled from right next to her.
The jounin was crouched in a squat right next to where she had been sitting. Sakura screamed. Then jumped to attention, scrambling to her feet. How had he gotten so close?
He was gone, and she spun around, just in time to catch Sasuke jerk to attention as well.
“Did you – ” she started, but the jounin was already back. He stood, slouching casually in front of them, both hands shoved deep into the pockets of his standard cargo pants.
“The third one is on his way,” he said, and, sure enough, Sakura heard a loud ruckus in the underbrush that could only be Naruto’s approach.
She did not turn to look, keeping her eyes on the man in front of her. One dark eye stared back from the small strip of skin visible in the gap between his mask and slanted hitae-ate. Silver hair spiked out from his face at impossible angles. Sakura swallowed. Her eyes jerked to his neck, but under the dark fabric she could not see it moving as he breathed. Slowly, she raised her eyes back to his face.
“Well, kiddies, I guess I’m going to be your examiner today,” the man said.
Hatake Kakashi did not need to introduce himself.