Disclaimer: Unfortunately, my fairy god-mother hasn't been picking up her calls, maybe getting deaf in her old age. So, no, I don't own Naruto & Co.
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'italic' – internal thoughts
"normal"- spoken words
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Love Me
The sounds of two people arguing rose steadily like a pillar of smoke, the rising volume intruding into the tranquillity of the morning, its source from a small house amongst a row of similar houses by the one of the many streets in Konohagakure.
A young roseate-haired girl rolled her eyes, leaving the house like a mouse through the front door, her almost shoulder-length hair swaying gently, obscuring her face. She brushed it away roughly, revealing bright, unhappy jade eyes.
It had been yet another fight between her mum and her newest boyfriend, and she wasn't going to stay just to get dragged into whatever pointless argument they were having now. Being a sensible and logical-minded girl, Haruno Sakura just couldn't understand why her mum couldn't quit dating all these losers.
Sakura's mum had been dating countless men ever since she could remember, with an endless cycle of dates, falling in love, breakups, tubs of ice-creams and more dates again. It was as if she was trying to fill some imaginary hole in her life, a hole that could only be filled by Love. Or so she thinks. Sakura knew better. Love is a non-entity, only useful for turning normal people into bumbling idiots, leaving a mental wreckage of a person after each breakup.
She sighed, exhaling a cloud of mist, quickly side-stepping to avoid a few errant people heading towards the morning market, absent-mindedly greeting a few that recognized her. Increasing her speed to shake off the early morning chill and to avoid meeting more people on the way, the familiar path she was practically flying on grew narrower.
The trees surrounding the area visibly thickened as the growth on the forest floor receded, accompanied with the sounds of the local wildlife. The twittering of blue jays, unhampered by the hustle and bustle of village activity, signalled her proximity to her favourite training ground in the village. She finally halted her jog in a clearing almost well known to her as the back of her hand.
It had been 6 years since she first came to Training Ground Number 115, one of the many training grounds in Konohagakure, searching for solace away from the chaos that frequently haunts her house. Here with the many training posts for throwing kunai or even just taijutsu and targets painted on the towering trees, the then small girl found that she could safely vent out all her frustrations in peace.
Now in the present, she ran through a series of warm up exercises, flowing into the academy's taijutsu katas. These actions eventually pulled up her long sleeves, exposing a series of long white scars. Her green eyes darkened as her fingertips ran though the slightly raised flesh. With her mind on that incident 5 years ago, her movements grew more furious, began rapidly speeding through her various katas, until she was moving as if she were fighting against many imaginary opponents. She stopped abruptly, turning to the training posts and let loose a volley of shuriken, each hitting dead centre on the painted targets causing a symphony of clinks.
Not satisfied, she took out a brace of kunai, nailing each post with a kunai with successive thunks. No, she would never let herself be that weak again. Still exuding anger, she collected each deadly weapon, giving each a quick wipe over. Storing them in her pouch and kunai holder, she stood and stretched, and after a few minutes, went through the same katas again with the same fervour, continuing her routine.
The sun slowly rose to the middle of the sky, dissipating the morning mists, with the tropical heat and humidity Konoha is famous swelling in response. Ignoring the sting on her knuckles from striking trees while practicing, Sakura flopped onto the ground, her normally pale skin flushed, sweating profusely, exhausted from her exertions. Closing her jade green eyes, she turned her concentration on her breathing, inhaling and exhaling slowly, clearing her mind of all thoughts. After an indefinite time, with her body cooled and mind calm, her eyes blinked open. She was ready.
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Excited students filed into the classroom at the Academy, a pandemonium of noise and energy, eagerly awaiting the start of the ninja orientation. Her first day as a ninja, Sakura sat at the back, quietly meditating to calm her nerves, ignoring the commotion that started in front of the classroom. Composing herself, she counted the number of students that managed to pass the exams. 27.
The clamour of the class died suddenly upon the arrival of Iruka-sensei, replaced instead with a sense of anticipation.
Doing his last duty as the Ninja Academy instructor, Iruka-sensei lectured them on their duties as new genin. Mentally tuning out his speech, already knowing it by heart, Sakura glanced around the room, taking note of who had passed. 'Purple hair... Wantanabe Ami, Uchiha Fan Girl No. 2, next to her... Long blond-hair... Ah, Uchiha Fan Girl No.1, Yamanaka Ino. Black hair like a duck's backside... Uchiha Sasuke, a bastard. Nara Shikamaru, lazy-ass... Hyuuga Hinata... No surprise there. No... No! That spiky blond hair and an orange jumpsuit! The IDIOT who constantly follows me, passed?' Sakura slumped into her seat, suddenly overwhelmed with an impending sense of doom.
Iruka-sensei went through a list of teams, ears of the graduates suddenly straining to take note. "Team 7", he eventually called out, "Uzumaki Naruto." Sakura prayed against all hopes. "Haruno Sakura", the hopes were dashed, "and Uchiha Sasuke". All life was sucked out of her instantly. Her team consists of idiot stalker who only knows how to eat ramen and THAT DAMNED BASTARD who stole her rightful first place position in the academy. A few miserly bonus points from those flashy fire jutsus was all it took for that bastard. Damn him.
'I am doomed'. Miserably awaiting her fate, witnessing the dobe, Naruto, celebrating his luck at landing "his Sakura-chan", she sank further into her seat. 'God hates me', she sighed. Still cursing her bad luck, she missed the assignments of the other teams, only coming back to awareness when Naruto moved to her seat and starting blabbering about how happy he was to be in the same team as her, and the bad luck about Sasuke. She couldn't become a chunnin fast enough to escape this team. At least it couldn't get worse?
A couple hours later, every team except the newly christened Team 7 had met and left with their senseis. Naruto had begun pacing around restlessly, mumbling out loudly about what a lousy sensei they had, giving her yet another headache. Finally, fed up, Sakura opened her mouth, ready to yell at the blond with fox-whiskers, only to shut it, dumfounded when she saw him grab a chalkboard eraser and wedged it in the top of the door of the classroom.
Intuitively, she knew it wasn't going to end well. "No jounin would fall for that, dobe," Sasuke berated the idiot. Nonetheless, Sasuke leaned out of his seat ever so slightly in anticipation. Sakura could merely sigh internally, closing her jade eyes, disregarding the ridiculous affair, meditating. 'Wait, I feel an approaching chakra presence?' Sakura concentrated, tuning her senses. 'No! Naruto's trap!' Snapping her eyes open, groaning, she was greeted with the sight of a dust-covered silver haired jounin wearing a dark blue mask and standard vest.
"My first impression is I don't like you." Those words made her heart plummet. Giving up on her restraint, she thwacked Naruto on the head.
"Meet me up on the roof." was all they heard before the masked jounin poofed away leaving a cloud of smoke in his place.
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Really, the Sandaime should have let him quit after he failed his 23rd genin team 3 months ago. Kakashi shook his head. This is just another typical team, the #1 rookie, a know-it-all fan girl and the dead-last. Having a tragic past, the sole Uchiha survivor will be an emo, revenge-obsessed idiot. The girl has pink hair! Who has pink hair? And that blond is a loud-mouthed, undisciplined prankster. 'Sigh, I just have to get it over quickly so I can get back to my Icha Icha.'
Almost as if summoned by that thought, the three aspiring genin burst through the door that led to the roof, all three simultaneously panting and arguing who reached first. 'Interesting,' He mused, 'So they all have a competitive streak. This has excellent entertainment potential… Perhaps I could spare a little more time with this.'
"You're late." Kakashi asserted, anticipating an interesting response.
"You… You… Sensei!" They could only stammer, not having recovered from their race to the top.
"Well, introduce yourselves," The Jounin stated abruptly, cutting through their sputtering. "Your name, what you like, dislike and so on," he said lackadaisically.
"How about you sensei?" the blond boy interjected.
"My name is Hatake Kakashi. I like some things, dislike some, have a few hobbies, and dreams... Never thought about it."
"So, all we got was his name." Sakura mused out loud.
"You, Blondie." Kakashi pointed at Naruto.
"My name is Uzumaki Naruto! I like cup ramen. The ramen at Ichiraku Ramen is good too. I hate the 3 minutes wait for the water to cook the ramen. My hobbies are eating and comparing cup ramen! My dream is to surpass all the past Hokages!"
'So he grew up rather interestingly.' Smiling, Kakashi indicated at the girl, "OK, next."
"My name is Haruno Sakura. I like meditation. My hobbies are reading and training. My dreams... I want to become the strongest kunoichi so no one can..." She trailed off. "I hate arrogant bullies and idiots who chase after others so they can proclaim their love." She said pointedly, glaring at Naruto. The orange wearing ninja could only wilt in his seat.
"And lastly."
"My name is Uchiha Sasuke. I don't like anything and I hate almost everything. My dream isn't a dream, it's an ambition. To revive my clan and kill a certain someone."
'A typical Uchiha.' He noted the cringe Naruto and Sakura made. 'Not quite fans of his I see.' "Now that everyone's introduced, your first mission tomorrow is survival training," Kakashi continued.
"But we have already finished this training at the academy, sensei!" The three 12-year olds protested in unison.
"Oh, you're going to like this!" Kakashi exclaimed with an evil grin. "Out of the 27 graduates, only nine will become Genins. The other 18 will be sent back to the academy. In other words, the test has a 66% drop out rate." Enjoying their dismayed expressions he continued. "Bring your ninja equipment and meet at 5 AM. Oh, and make sure you don't eat anything. You might just throw up."
'I am going to have fun with this.' He fought down the evil cackle that was rising up. No, it wouldn't do good to ruin his reputation. Taking out his prized Icha Icha Paradise, he settled down to continue where he stopped last, making sure to take pleasure from the ensuing chaos from his "temporary" genin team.
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Really, I really am sorry to end it here. I actually just posted this very very short chapter so I could test the FFN format. I've just realised it also kills all my previous formatting. Any one with tips of how to preserve it, or the examples of best formats to use? Any help would be great! I tried searching online (ie. google) but couldn't find the information I want or need. Meanwhile, every reader will just have to bear with me while I'm still trying to figure out the ropes here.
This story was partially inspired by the manga Skip Beat by Yoshiki Nakamura. While reading the manga, I found it amusing that every single member of the Love Me division had some sort of Love-disability. So much that I just had to attempt my own. Sakura in Love Me (temporary title pending change) simply doesn't believe in romantic love. Never knowing her father and witnessing her mum and her mom's numerous boyfriends, Sakura basically turns into an anti-love campaigner with an negative or apathetic view towards men. No love for her, no way! This is the whole premise of my story.
She is driven by this mysterious drive to become stronger. The reason will debut soon in further chapters.
I formed the Sakura in this AU more like a model of the Sakura in Shippuden as well as Inner Sakura, not being as immature or sheltered as the canon's Sakura, simply because she was forced to grow up much earlier, due to certain circumstances. These circumstances also trigger some interesting reactions, such as her revulsion to Eros (romantic) love. How would a love-hating, maturer (somewhat) Sakura fare? This Sakura will also be annoying in a sense (all teenage girls are), but it definitely won't be focused on boys (aka Sasuke)