Sakura and everybody are now seventeen and have changed greatly from what they used to be when they were thirteen. Everybody had become stronger and were recognized as great shinobi from their village.
"talking"
'thoughts'
She was tired, dead tired she had just finished training with Tsunade and her friends and she didn't have much energy or chalkra left. She took her time and finally after a short walk from the training grounds she was home. She took off her shoes and walked up stairs to her room to take a shower. She grabbed a red tank top and a pair off black shorts with two white stripes on each side of the shorts. She made her way to the bathroom and into the hot steam filled shower.
When she came out it was pretty late so she made her way to the very comfortable bed, before she fell asleep she gazed out her window to the hospital she worked at across the street from her apartment. For the first time in a while she slept soundly and didn't have any nightmares.
She woke up an hour before she normally did and got dressed in her normal attire. She locked the door to her apartment and walked down the street to a café nearby for breakfast. For awhile she sat there relaxed and enjoying herself. She opened her eyes as she noticed three familiar chalkras coming towards her. She smiled her three best friends were coming. Ino, Tenten, Hinata, and her had become the closest of friends and trained with each other to improve.
Ino yelled to their pink haired best friend "Hey forehead!"
Sakura smiled at this "Hey pig, Hinata, Tenten!"
The three happily sat down at the same table as their friend and placed their orders as well.
Sakura noticed something was wrong with one of her friends. "Hey Tenten whats up? You seem kinda down."
She gave a weak smile and her other to friends seemed to notice that she wasn't acting like herself. "Well, I'm starting to feel useless on my team I don't feel like I've improved."
Ino decided to speak up at this point. "I know I feel the same way to, it seems like I don't improve no matter how much I train with my team."
"Yes, I feel the same way." Hinata had stopped stuttering a long time ago in front of her friends.
"You know I feel the same way as you guys." They were all starting to feel a little down. Breakfast was quiet until Sakura spoke up.
"You know I just thought of something. Why don't we ask Tsunade-sama if we can have permission to leave the village for two years to train? Just the for of us."
Ino looked up from the food she was previously pushing around the plate and smiled. "You know what Sakura that's not such a bad idea."
This was finally starting to lift everybody's mood. Tenten smiled to. "I think we should. Besides it would be fun to come back and to be at a higher level than what we would be if we stayed here."
"I also agree let's meet at the hokage's tower at seven tonight to talk to Tsunade." Hinata liked the idea of becoming stronger so people would give her a little bit more of respect.
"Okay then, its settled see you girls tonight after I get down with my shift at the hospital then!" Sakura got up and paid her bill then left to get to work a little early so she would get done sooner.
As Sakura walked through the glass doors of the office she noticed that there wasn't to many people. She walked up to the secretary and got the information on the patients she would be treating that day. They were all simple cases that she could handle easily.
About two hours later she had finished her first round of patients that needed to be treated and headed to her office to relax and make a mental list of what she would need to take. When she thought about it there was a lot but luckily she knew a shrinking jutsu so she would be able to fit everything into one bag.
She smiled at that and was glad that Tenten had showed them and they were able to improve it so the items would shrink more. Of course Tenten was happy because it meant she could fit more weapons in her scrolls to eliminate her enemies with. She had just about every weapon imaginable too.
Ino would be happy because it meant she would be able to fit all of her clothes and accessories not to mention a few other things, and still have room for all the things she would buy on the journey.
Hinata wouldn't bring as much as Ino but still a decent amount. She would probably include her medic-nin things like Sakura and Ino but probably some of her books as well.
Sakura started to gather some medical supplies from her office and started to shrink them so they would easier to travel with. As soon as she was satisfied with how much she had she carefully put all the supplies into a small bad that would fit easily in her bag. She went over to her couch in her office and took a short nap to regain the chalkra she used quicker.
She woke up forty-five minutes later and stretched out. She walked back to her desk and sat there before deciding to see if Tsunade had anything for her to do.
She walked up to her door and knocked twice before hearing the reply.
She slowly opened the door and saw how bored her sensei was. "Ah, Sakura you don't have any more patients?" She shook her head. "No, I came here looking to see if there was any new patients but I'm guessing not."
"Well, since work is slow today why don't you go and train for a little bit." Sakura nodded her head and closed her sensei's door and walked down the hall to her office to get her things and left to go train before heading back to her house to rest and pack.
When she got to the training grounds she noticed that Ino, Tenten, and Hinata were all here as well.
"Hey guys! I guess you didn't have much to do either." Ino looked at her with a bored expression. "Nope. We finished it within a few hours."
Tenten looked at Sakura. "Not busy at the hospital today?"
She shook her head. "I just had a few patients today so Tsunade let me go early."
Hinata stood up and brushed the dirt off her clothes. "Why don't we talk to Tsunade now so we can get ready to leave?"
The other three got off the ground from their sitting positions and chorused "Hai."
They walked through the city and into the hospital to talk to Tsunade. Sakura went up and knocked on the door. A "Come in" was heard. They opened the door and walked into the room.
"Ah, girls sit down, what do you need?"
They sat down and began telling Tsunade about their conversation earlier and how they wanted permission to leave the village for two years to train and become stronger for themselves and the village.
She sat there and watched the girls tell her everything. 'They truly want to become stronger and I believe they are doing it for the right reasons.'
"Girls after what you have just told me and giving it thought I will let you go but we will call it a mission." They girls were happy but used their self-control to keep from jumping up and down knowing that she wasn't done yet.
"If you girls find out any information that would be useful to Konoha then send a message through my messenger bird it will locate you by your chalkra and it will come once a week also give me updates on your training and how everybody is doing."
Sakura, Ino, Tenten, and Hinata knew she was done and jumped up and gave Tsunade a hug and continually yelling "Thank you!" After a few minutes they looked at Tsunade.
"Tsunade-sama we would like to leave tonight if it is okay with you."
"Yes Hinata and I would like to see you off. Meet me at the gates at dusk and don't tell them anything except it's a mission and don't tell them how long you will be gone for."
"Hai, we'll see you in a few hours then."
With that the girls left and went to Hinata's to help her pack. When they entered the main courtyard of the Hyuuga complex they immediately noticed her father and her sister Hanabi sparring and Hanabi wasn't holding up to well. Seconds later her father ended the match and turned to face his eldest daughter.
"Hinata you're back early." The girls noticed that he wanted to know why.
"Hai, Tsunade-sama has given me and my friends here a mission and they came along with me."
Her father nodded his head and turned back to his youngest daughter.
Hinata led her friends through the twists and turns of the Hyuuga house and came to her room. Tenten and Ino sat on her bed while Sakura was helping her shrink everything she was going to need and other things that might come in handy.
Tenten stared at the ceiling for a while before speaking up breaking the silence in the room.
"Hey do you know when the boys are getting back from their mission?"
Ino sat up and started to think. "Shikamaru said something about they were going to be here today at the latest."
"Hopefully they get back before we leave I want to say good bye to Naruto-kun."
After Sakura finished shrinking Hinata's last item she stood up and started to stretch. "Yeah I want to say good bye to the boys to."
"Okay let's go to Tenten's to pack up her things."
They got up and quickly made their way to Tenten's apartment and helped her pack everything, most of which were weapons. Every nook and cranny that Sakura, Ino and Hinata looked there was some type of a weapon or something that could be used as a weapon.
Ino was looking through Tenten's closet and saw something that caught her interest and pulled it out. Ino screamed bloody murder and dropped the item. Sakura and Tenten ran into the room ready to attack anyone who wasn't welcomed. Tenten and Sakura stood there for a second and then dropped on the floor laughing hysterically clutching their sides.
Ino was still in shock but then she started to get angry. "Why in the world do you keep a fake skeleton covered in fake blood in your closet?"
Sakura rolled on to her side and used the bed to support herself and stood up. "Ino you should've seen your face!" She couldn't help her self any more and started to laugh again.
"Ino it's in there because I didn't have any where else to put it after Halloween."
After a few seconds Ino started to laugh to after seeing Tenten and Sakura on the floor laughing and rolling around on the floor like a bunch of idiots.
Meanwhile Hinata had just finished packing some of Tenten's weapons and decided to see what was so funny. She walked in the room and the first thing she saw was the fake skeleton with blood on it and fainted.
Sakura had stopped to take a breath when she heard a 'thump'. She turned around and saw Hinata on the ground. She immediately ran over to her unconscious friend and made sure she was all right.
The other two noticed this and ran to their friends aid as well. "Sakura is she okay!!" "Yeah Ino, she just fainted and probably because of that." She pointed into the direction of the skeleton. She turned her attention back to Hinata and saw she was regaining consciousness.
Hinata sat up. "Ugh….what happened?"
Tenten started to rub the back of her head as she explained everything to her best friend. After Tenten was done explaining Hinata started to crack up like her friends had earlier. Within a matter of milliseconds they were all laughing hysterically.
When they finally calmed down Ino stood up. "Ugh my head hurts. Tenten do you have any aspirin?"
She nodded and walked to her medicine cabinet and handed everybody two caplets.
"Okay let's go to Ino's house then mine because mine's across the street from the hospital." They nodded their heads and took off.
"Okay we're here." Ino opened her bag and looked for her key. For the next few minutes she looked in her bag but wasn't having any luck finding her key.
"Ugh! Where could the stupid key have gone?!" Ino finally got frustrated enough and dumped the contents out of her bag and on to the ground at her feet. After a few more minutes she dropped on to the ground on her knees.
"Ino could you have put the key into your pocket by any chance?" Ino looked at Hinata and dug into her pockets.
"Hehe, I guess I did put it in my pocket."
She stood up and unlocked the door to her house and then ran straight upstairs to her room to start packing. Tenten, Hinata, and Sakura immediately started to shrink all the clothes that Ino was throwing out of her closet.
Tenten was getting tired of this. "Ino how many more pairs of clothes do you need?"
Ino walked out of the closet. "This is the last pair of clothes then we can shrink any thing else you think we'll need and then we can go to Sakura's to help her pack and rest before we meet up with Tsunade at the gates."
The girls nodded and finished shrinking the remaining clothes. Sakura stood up and walked to the doorway. "Since we're almost done I'll shrink some other things of Ino's that will come in handy at some point."
The girls nodded and soon finished and met up with Sakura in the living room. Hinata was the last to walk in. "Okay let's head over to Sakura's to help her pack and then rest."
The girls nodded and left to finish packing. When they got to Sakura's they only needed to pack a few items because she had already packed up all the medical stuff they would probably need and a few other things.
It only took them ten minutes to finish packing. Sakura stood up and walked to her bedroom and lay down on her bed to rest up. Hinata had made herself comfortable and slept on the couch. Tenten and Ino each slept on a chair on either side of the couch.
They woke up about two hours before they were to meet Tsunade and decide to change their outfits and hair so they wouldn't be recognized as Konohoa shinobi.
Hinata had dyed her hair a dark chocolate brown color and put in blue contacts. She now wore a lilac tank top under a long sleeved gray shirt that hung off her shoulders and wore black capri's.
Tenten dyed her hair a medium blond and put it into a single high ponytail. She now wore a dark green shirt similar to what she had before the time-skip with a black and gold dragon on it and black pants.
Ino dyed her hair a light brown color and cut her hair to her shoulder blades. She also put in contacts that were a pale purple so her eyes looked a purplish, bluish color. She now wore a sky blue sleeveless shirt with a black fish net shirt under it and a black skirt.
Sakura dyed her hair black and put in darker green colored contacts so her eyes were between their natural sea foam green color and an emerald color. She now wore a dark blue sleeveless shirt with white on it. She also wore a black skirt with short black shorts under it and light blue arm warmers that started e few inches below her shoulders and covered half of her hands. (A/N It has a top band to keep them on but they don't have a bottom band.)
They girls grabbed their bags and set off to meet Tsunade at the gates. They took their time and gave their village a look because they wouldn't see it for two more years.
"Ah girls there you are." They smiled at Tsunade and walked over to say good bye to her and Shizune.
"Tsunade-sama we're going to miss you but we promise to write when we can."
"Good bye girls and if anyone asks I'll say you're on a mission."
The girls gave a final wave and set off and ran in the forest to their first destination. The land of waves to begin their training.
Mean while in another part of the forest.
"Teme I can't believe you're actually coming back to the village without us forcing you to."
"Shut up dope. And like I said before I've already killed Itachi so I might as well."
"So I bet you missed Sakura-chan too." Neji smirked and Shikamaru muttered "Troublesome."
"No dope." But force once Naruto had been right he did miss the village and mostly Sakura and he couldn't wait to see her again.
They continued their way through the forest and the village started to come into view.
'Home at last'