Chapter 1: trouble

The alarm's prevalent sound filled the room, startling the kunoichi awake from her sleep. She followed her usual morning routine: shower, dress, fix her hair, and other miscellaneous tasks to prepare for her day.

Sakura Haruno was nineteen years of age now, and she was living on her own as a Chuunin level ninja in Konoha. It had been almost seven years since the day Sasuke left, and he still hasn't returned. There were a couple of run-ins with him here and there, however he had gotten away each and every time.

She had developed into a young woman, with small curves and muscular tone on her frame. She had worked hard, praying that she could change Sasuke's mind about revenge, but it seemed to have faded since then. Sakura had convinced herself that she didn't love him anymore. How could she? He never reciprocated any of the feelings she had for him.

Her roseate hair was it's usual shoulder length. She never planned on growing it out again, especially since she had originally grown it out for one, she knew, she would probably never see again. Her Konoha hitae was in its usual position upon her head, and she had made it a point to ensure it was clean every time she wore it. Her body was adorned with her red shirt, family symbol included, black shorts, crème overlain skirt, and her weapons pouch tied securely to her right leg.

She stared at her reflection in the mirror and grimaced. It had been more than a week since her last mission and the scar that was on her neck was still there. She didn't expect that clumsy mist ninja she was out to arrest to aim for her, especially since Naruto was loud mouthing and charging straight at him.

Her mouth twitched at the edges as a smile crept on her face, making it almost impossible to hide the fact that she was laughing. She had remembered the first time she saw Naruto fight against Kakashi-sensei: charging in first, talking big the entire time, yet he still failed to retrieve a bell as he promised he would do.

She glanced over to the clock: 7:30 am. Oh no! I need to get going! She rushed out of her door, running the entire way to the training grounds.

By the time she arrived, Sai and Naruto were already there, sparring against each other to keep themselves busy. The blond ninja glanced over to the pink-haired kunoichi and smiled, allowing Sai to find an opening and knocking him flat on his back.

"OW! Sai that was unfair! You know that we take a break when others get here." He started getting huffy and walked over to Sakura to greet her. His goofy smile seemed to never change, but the rest of him did. His body was more muscular, and his face showed age finding it's way to him.

Naruto has grown up. He was almost a foot taller than she was with slightly shorter hair. The spikes were still present, but not as fluffy at it was in their team seven days. He scratched the back of his head and laughed. It was a deeper tone than how he sounded years before, naturally. Somehow, Sakura had gotten used to a more mature Naruto, physically at least. It seemed like he would probably be a kid at heart for the rest of his life, but it wasn't a bad thing. Naruto was meant to be silly.

Sai had walked over to Sakura to say hello. He was the replacement for Sasuke, and, though Sakura didn't agree replacing Sasuke at first, she had also grown fond of Sai. He was a good enough replacement: strong, dedicated, serious, and a great ninja. She rarely had to tend to any of his injuries, due to the fact that he never had any, and she knew that he'd be more concerned with others before himself, every time.

He was muscular and occasionally would smile, similar to how Sasuke would only smile certain times. Sai was more emotional than the previous team 7 member, allowing himself to have fun and interact with Naruto and Sakura.

A cloud of smoke had appeared behind Sakura and Naruto's mouth had open wide to yell at his former sensei, " You're LATE!" Sakura giggled and turned around to see Kakashi-sensei scratching the back of his head, smiling underneath his mask.

"Sorry, I uh… got lost on the path of life."

With that response Naruto exploded and pointed furiously at the silver haired nin, "You say that EVERY time! How many paths of life can you get lost on?!" With that response Kakashi closed his eye and smiled. Sakura had assumed his other eye underneath his forehead protector was closed as well.

He opened his eye and immediately took note to the scar on her neck, "Sakura, I see you haven't treated your scar yet." She blushed and turned towards her two teammates to hide the scar from her sensei.

"I-I thought it would be best to let it heal on its own. It seems pointless to waste all of that time and energy on something that will heal by itself."

Naruto inched closer to Sakura and stared at the scar, as if he were in shock, "I don't remember you getting that Sakura-Chan." He lifted his hand to touch it, but was startled when Sai's voice rang in his ear.

Sai was standing just as close to Sakura as Naruto was, inspecting the scar that seemed to have everyone's attention, "It looks pretty deep. Sakura…You're a medic nin. You of all people should know when a scar is deep enough that it needs to be treated."

"As well as it's location. The neck isn't the best place to be getting cut," Kakashi chimed in. Sakura's face began to redden. It wasn't just the fact that he noticed or because he was looking at her, there, but because he was worrying about her.

She pushed back her blush and began to retort, "I understand that the neck is a bad place to get cut, but I'm injured on the crook of the neck and shoulder: A portion of the body that has high blood flow, allowing it to heal more quickly than other parts of the human body!"

Her sensei quickly changed the topic as he knew she was getting uncomfortable with their nitpicking, " Anyways, let's get to training!"

Naruto instantly snapped back into his chipper attitude, "All right time for some sparring! I call Kakashi-sensei!"

Kakashi smiled under his mask again, " Well, actually I'm not taking part today. I have some paperwork to handle with the Hokage. You three will be sparring against each other."

Naruto's smile twitched at the edge yet remained there, " So why did you come here?!"

"Well, I did make plans to see you guys and I just found out this morning I needed to handle the work, so I can't just cancel and not show up. I thought it'd be better for me to tell you face to face."

"Very well." Sai responded calmly, and, respectfully, walked towards the open field. Naruto followed suit and walked out to the field, beckoning Sakura to join them.

She started walking toward the field when she heard her sensei's voice in a hushed, yet stern tone, "You better start healing that tonight, or I will take you off of our missions until it's gone."

She nodded with her back to him and walked out to the clearing where her other teammates were positioned. Her gloved hand covered the scar, as if light would make the wound worse. He disappeared, moments later, into a cloud of gray smoke.

"Oi Sai! I'm gonna finish you off!" Naruto formed numerous hand seals and created five Shadow clones.

"I seriously doubt it. I believe I was the one winning before Sakura got here! Right?"

"Only because you cheated!" The blond shinobi turned to the young cherry blossom and smirked, "Let's take him out Sakura-Chan!"

"Naruto you know it's unfair to play two against one!" With that the kunoichi charged at Naruto with her fist ready to make contact.

One of the Naruto clone's jumped in the way of Sakura's punch and took the blow for the real nine-tailed fox boy.

"Fine! You want to play like that!" all of the Naruto's mixed up in a sequence and began to charge at Sakura.

With in an instant, one of the Naruto's disappeared with a loud poof noise and Sai landed back down on the ground, " don't forget that I'm here." With that two of the Naruto's veered off and began fighting with Sai in hand-to-hand combat.

Sakura kept her guard up as Naruto came at her with a full forced punch towards her face. She successfully blocked and reciprocated with a right swing. Naruto dodged and kicked towards her. She flipped away and landed on her feet awaiting a frontal attack from the fox boy.

She didn't see him anywhere. She noticed Sai was combating one Naruto, now, and she didn't see her opponent anywhere. Without a second's notice she turned around as Naruto punched her in the stomach. The cherry blossom hit the tree behind her with an alarming speed.

The blonde shinobi ran to her side and started to panic, "Sakura! Oh my god I thought you would've blocked that! I'm so sorry!"

Sai, taking note to what had just occurred, quickly knocked the last Naruto clone away and rushed over to Sakura. She was knocked unconscious and covered in her own blood.

"We need to get her to a medic nin, NOW!."

The blond woman placed her hands on her hips and scoffed, "Okay, Kakashi. I believe you, now. I just didn't think the assassin we sent her after would have abilities of that level."

"I had a feeling ever since she came back. Something was off when I saw her this morning, too." He turned and looked at his company, "Can you do anything, Tsunade?"

She smirked and looked at him with confidence, " Of course! I am the fifth Hokage after all!"

"Excellent."

"I must ask you something," Kakashi turned his head towards the godaime and nodded, "She may need someone around to help take care of her."

He nodded yet again to agree and turned back towards the field where Sai had the limp Sakura on his back, ready to bolt towards the Hokage's building. He felt a pull somewhere in his abdomen as he saw Sakura in such a state. It was trying to urge him to steal her from Sai and to take her to the tower, himself.

He mentally sighed. How troubling.

"We better get going, they're coming to see me for help," with that statement the two of them dashed across rooftops at an alarming speed towards the Hokage's tower.