As the Petals Fall…
Early morning light broke through the only unprotected part of Soras' window, a small sigh escaped her lips, the sun was very unwelcome to her currently. She lay idol in her bed not quite wanting to move yet, she decided to maybe just laying here will be the right choice instead of facing the world.
One more day in Konoha, one more day of missions, and one more day to count down the hours until the sun started to set. Because once the sun sets she could finally put her mind at ease, to not think, wait until everything slipped away.
Sora didn't have such a good childhood, her family was murdered when she was only 7, barely old enough to even comprehend what happened. After the tragedy she was taken in by extended family in Konoha, and for 9 years has lived peacefully. Just going through each day, to say she lived was an overstatement to the highest extent.
But she was 16, and one of the most talented kunoichi in the village, and has a very bright future ahead of her. She wasn't as intelligent as Shikamaru, but definitely could hold her own against his wit. Nor was she as strong as Naruto, but she could put up one hell of a fight. But she didn't really put herself down, she had yet to fully realize her talent, and refine it.
Sora slowly pulled herself out of her bed, stretching and yawning unnecessarily loud. Slowly she trudged her way to her bathroom, leaning over her sink she stared at herself in the mirror.
Heavy long dark brown hair framed her face, and didn't end until the top of her hips. Her gaze never strayed too far from her eyes, which everyone knew as her prominent feature.
She had a topaz colored brown on the outer part of her pupil, which then faded into an emerald green. No one in the entire village had this color of eyes, but in her actual village, Fiore, most people had this eye color. Coming to Konoha and seeing no one with these colors made her a little uneasy, Sakura Haruno had the closet color, but hers was only an apple green. Much more acceptable than her crazy eyes, or that's what she called them.
Her skin was so pale, almost a pearl color, but extremely soft like a fresh flower petal. At least one thing on her seemed to be normal, she shrugged and washed her face.
After she changed she headed out the door, walking slowly towards her destination, even though it wasn't set she would know whenever she was there.
'Thank god I realized I didn't have any missions today….maybe today won't be half bad.' she thought quietly in her mind, she leaned her head back slightly and watched the clouds. 'If only…' she never finished this thought.
"Sora!" she heard a voice call from behind her, she turned to see a little blond kid running full force at her. Her eyes widened and she didn't have time to mover before he hit her with all the force of a man twice his size, knocking both of them to the ground.
"Naruto…why do you insist on doing this every time you see me. It isn't like you haven't seen me in a year…it's been 12 hours." Sora said sarcastically pushing Naruto off her as she got up off the dirt road, then she mechanically brushed the dust off her.
He blushed lightly as he spoke, "Sorry! Heehee, I just got excited. Where are you heading off to on our day off?", there was a hint of curiosity.
"Oh, no where I suppose. I was going to try to get Sakura and Sasuke together, and the 4 of us could go out to lunch-" she was cut off by Naruto's excited outburst.
"That would be GREAT!! I know where they are at, I'll be back in a flash. Stay right here!" she watched as he ran inhumanly fast in the way she was walking.
'Wow…I've never seen him exert this much energy.' she smiled softly, 'He's a great kid.'. She looked around her, deciding to actually do what Naruto said, and she found a tree.
Sora gracefully plopped herself underneath it and laid back, 'The clouds are beautiful today.'. She watched as white clouds raced each other across the sky, she began to wonder who the winner would be.
Grass crunched down next to her, Sora looked through her peripheral vision and saw a black haired Chunin lay down a few feet away from her. "Well hello Shikamaru, what brings you out here?" she asked innocently.
He lazily answered "I came to watch the clouds, and it just so happens you're in my spot." he added a friendly chuckle at the end.
"Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to, would you like me to move?" Sora questioned kindly, she truly didn't want to be in his way.
Shikamaru slowly shook his head, "No, I'm fine here." he then added, "You know…you're too nice."
Sora was confused by his words, "Umm…thank you? Is that supposed to be an insult or a compliment?" she asked him.
"Neither, really. More of a statement." he said as he let his eyelids slowly close, and she swore she heard him say troublesome girl.
Sora rolled her eyes, she's never heard of being too nice as a bad thing. She actually prided herself in being a genuinely nice person, she wasn't too fond of being wretchedly mean to people. She found that if you were nice, they were nice back, and therefore more friends, it made sense to her.
Her internal dissection of Shikamaru's accusation was interrupted by Naruto screaming her name, she sighed lightly as she got up.
"Hey, Sakura. Hey, sasuke." she greeted her teammates as she smiled sweetly at them, Sakura gave her a hug, and Sasuke being himself just stared.
"So where are we going to eat?" Sakura asked innocently, "Naruto nearly ripped my arm off to come here, so let's hope it will be worth my time." she winked at me.
Sora really liked Sakura, even though she had a temper at times. But people were always saying how they swore they were sisters, apparently she looked almost identical to Sakura before she cut her hair.
But that was it, she cut her hair, and Sora had waist length brown hair, while Sakura had chin length pink hair. She never saw the similarities, and thankfully neither did Sakura.
"Well since there are only 4 of us, we could just go get some ramen, if that's fine with everyone?" she said to her comrades. She looked at each of them waiting for any kind of response, Naruto of course was the first to blurt out.
"Yeah! That would be great!" he grinned widely at her, she returned the gesture.
"Alright then, it's settled, and as an extra treat I'm buying." she told them with a smile both internal and external, she loved treating her friends every once and a while.
All of them gave her a smile, including Sasuke which is definitely out of the ordinary. Normally he would just look at her, roll his eyes, or just say "Hn" and that would be the extent of his gratitude. She smiled a little wider than she normally do, it was aimed at Sasuke mostly.
Sasuke noticed and raise an eyebrow playfully at her, she blushed a light pink, hardly noticeable to anyone thankfully.
"Well we should get going then!" Sakura chimed in as she turned around and started to 10 minute walk to the ramen bar. They all followed shortly after, Sora and Sasuke just a few steps behind Sakura and Naruto.
The two of them were slowing down gradually, but not enough to be detected by Naruto and Sakura, only enough for them notice.
Saskuke's hands were dug deep in his pocket, almost nervously as he walked a little closer to Sora, elbows just grazing each other. His heart started to pound harder and harder, he didn't understand where this was coming from. He was so used to be confident around everyone, but in the 9 years he's known Sora, it's been difficult.
He hardened himself so much around her, and was entirely too stand offish, but to him it was just defense. He was very rude to her most of the time, and decided to try a change today, and just be how he wanted to be around her.
Because the truth was he really liked her, she was the only girl not flocking over him, and following him around. It was a breath of fresh air to him, so instead of going out of his way to ignore her, he spent his time finding out about her. Trying to figure out who she was as a person, a ninja and who she could be as an object of affection. Little did Sasuke know, Sora has been thinking about him in those ways also.
Sora was sneaking glances at Sasuke, she felt her face get a little hot when she finally caught his eye. She looked away quickly and smiled a little, it was almost like a dream come true to have him finally notice her.
Everyday she thought about him, everyday she tried to make contact, but with no avail. Sora never did understand what she had done to make him be so rude to her, 9 years had passed and finally the sour mood had lifted from him. Like the veil was pulled back from his eyes, and he finally saw who she was, and who she could be to him.
She wanted so bad to tell him, to just confess to all the years of loving him. But she made it a point to not to act like she liked him, no one even knew, nor did anyone suspect. She was very good at hiding everything, not one person knew everything about her, she barely knew everything about herself. But she saw Sasuke as someone who she could open up to, to tell him everything about herself.
She doesn't quite know why she has this urge, maybe it's because he lost his family too, along with his entire clan. Maybe he could understand the pain she never let anyone see, to help her hold back the tears that she hasn't shed for 9 years. She has been strong for so long, and yet so weak at the same time, she needs stability and she knows Sasuke can give this to her.
Her cheeks felt like they were on fire as she continued delving deeper in her thoughts, and after all these years she felt a hint of warmth, it was small like an ember, but it was still there.
Before they both knew it they were in front of the ramen bar, they both snapped out of their train of thought, and went to sit down. They sat down, Naruto then Sora, followed by Sasuke then Sakura, this is how they split off into groups for training and missions.
Sora complemented Naruto in her fighting style, she is a long range fighter. She uses arrows like a bow and arrow, but these aren't ordinary arrows. These arrows are made by threading flower stems from the main flower in her village, called the veleno petalo, with chakra.
In Fiore, not many people have mastered this technique, and this is still under research to this day. This power is known as the Flower Arrow which is a kekkei genkai, it is shot with such speed, it is impossible to see or dodge. In case someone manages to evade the arrow, the carrier shoots the flower in it's entirety within a second of shooting the arrow.
Veleno petalo, literally means 'poison petal', people would consider this a beautiful flower. It looks like a mix between a rose, cherry blossom and a lilac, it is strange but lovely, but when you touch the any part of this petal it is deadly.
The veleno petalo is also known as the shuriken flower, because thousands of shuriken knives are grown on the petals, and the stems. All that needs to happen is they just need to knick their opponent and they would be dead within seconds from the fast acting poison this flower naturally secrets from it's petals and stem.
Even the very bow they shoot from is a weapon in itself, the inside is hollow and filled with the poison from the flowers. Decorating all around the bow look like designs but when flipped out are shuriken with a hollow center, and the poison fills up once it is turned up.
Sora is lucky to have been taught taijutsu or she would be relatively useless in a battle, considering she can't have one person defending her the entire time. The people of Fiore have that luxury, since only one in every one hundred are born with this kekkei genkai, so those who aren't born with it are trained in taijutsu.
Along with her kekkei genkai, she is also extremely gifted at ninjutsu, and genjutsu, she would like to consider herself a not fully realized jack of all trades. She didn't have much patience for taijutsu, she can do it, but she never mastered it like Rock Lee.
They all ordered and sat waiting for the food to get ready, they all made casual conversation.
"So what do you think our next mission will be?" Sakura asked, staring ahead instead of at us. She looked particularly absentminded, and uninterested throughout the entire time we were here. But now there was a hint of something in her eyes, like she knew the answer before she even asked.
The 3 of us pondered for a few minutes, then Naruto chimed in. "I'm hoping something a little bit more exciting than what we've been getting lately. I mean, just a bunch of sending messages and receiving them, I want some action.". He gave us his cheesy smile, I couldn't help but smile back, 'Such a dork.'
"Well I'm hoping for maybe a rescue mission or something, anything really. I enjoy missions…" Sora offered, she noticed Sakura stiffened slightly at her voice.
"Why do you even ask, Sakura?" Sasuke asked her as he looked in her direction out of the corner of his eye, his voice sounded vaguely hostile, but Sora couldn't pin point the emotion.
Sakura brushed it off and just shrugged, "I was just wondering.." she turned and gave us all a smile. But Sora knew there was something behind that smile she wasn't quite telling them, but she pushed the thought aside, she wasn't getting involved.
Almost like the cook sensed the tension in the air, he came with their food. Naruto gave a squeal of delight in such a high pitch it definitely broke the tension, and everyone started laughing. Naruto looked up squinting, trying to figure out the joke.
Sora put her hand on his shoulder and gave a warm smile, "Just eat." He smiled back her, and dug into his huge ramen bowl. Sora looked at her own, just ramen with some meat and carrots, her bowl looked so plain next to Naruto's, she scoffed and began eating.
The entire lunch was silent, not the usual laughing and talking, there was something off about the atmosphere today. Everyone could feel it, even Naruto who is normally blissfully unaware, could sense something different today. There was something that neither of them could put their fingers on, something intangible at this moment.
"Why does it feel so…foreboding? Almost like something is going to happen soon, something…bad?" Naruto asked, it almost seemed like a rhetorical question, but they all knew he wanted an answer, a statement, anything to relieve this stress.
No one had an answer to tell Naruto, they just sat there, wondering the same exact thing. They all seemed to become statues until a familiar voice broke the silence.
"Hey there, guys! What are you all doing here?" Kakashi asked as he stepped in through the half curtain shielding the ramen stand.
All 4 of them turned simultaneously to stare at their sensei, all with the same troubled expression, it didn't go unnoticed.
"What is wrong?" the jounin asked, concern almost dripping from his voice. No one answered for a little bit, Kakashi just took in each stare, trying to analyze it.
"Kakashi sensei?" a small, soft spoke, his attention went straight to Sora, who seemed the most shaken up out of the 4. "Something bad is going to happen isn't it?", she looked up into the eyes of the copy ninja. Her own eyes screamed for answers, those same eyes also looked so hurt, too soft….almost vulnerable.
Kakashi sensed the feeling too, and he knew something was brewing but he didn't quite know what. Instead of lying to them and giving them false hopes, he told the truth. "I feel it too, so in that sense, yes I do believe something is going to happen. But right now I don't want any of you to worry about it, jus-" he was cut off by a tap on his shoulder.
A ninja informed him that Lady Hokage wanted to speak with him and his team, and to come right away, it was urgent. The 4 chunin had almost desperate looks in their eyes, along with a mixture of horror and pure fright.
The silver haired ninja looked back at his students, and a sudden sinking feeling in his heart emerged. He did not want them involved if something dangerous was going to be inflicted upon him, he would never forgive himself if any of them got hurt.
"Is there anyway my team and be excluded?" Kakashi questioned not letting his gaze slip away from his team, even though he already knew the answer, he might as well try.
"Sorry sir, all of them have to be included." the ninja said, regret became a nearly visible mist coming from his mouth. Kakashi let out a sigh, both a sigh of remorse and acknowledgement.
He nodded for them to follow him, Sora paid the chef and also included a generous tip, smiled and lethargically followed her comrades and teacher, to what felt like their most dangerous mission yet.