Disclaimer: Naruto is the property of Kishimoto Masashi.
Summary: Sakura becomes a Missing-nin starting a fateful chain of events with drastic repercussions for Konoha. Sas/Sak, Shika/Tem. AU from Chapter 402. Major Manga Spoilers.
A/N: This is my first fanfic so constructive criticism is extremely welcome.
The Nin ran. A single line ran ragged across her forehead protector. A brutal gash, gouged in anger rather than careful, methodical deliberation. A course scar, a lightning bolt shattering the serene leaf. Branding the wearer a traitor, a betrayer, a Nin who had done the opposite of what every loyal Nin was supposed to do: fled the village that she had sworn to serve, had been born to serve. Haruno Sakura ran through the darkening forest.
Sakura smiled grimly, a forced upward curve where a lively, innocuous one had formerly resided. But it served to mask the pain and residual anger in her eyes as again she pondered the pre-eminent question her brain had considered for the last few hours, her lonely mind seeking solace in bleak reflections.
Two weeks earlier
Haruno Sakura's bright eyes shone merrily, the vivid green complementing her face as she walked cheerfully up the busy street to the Hokage's offices. It was a warm, pleasant day in Konoha and the villagers were taking full advantage of it, enjoying themselves in light-hearted pursuits, laughing, flirting and relaxing beneath the gentle summer sun creating a feeling of well-ease and innocence that belied the plentiful turmoil the village had seen in the past. Conflict and strife washed away by the laughter and daydreams of children and the hard work of Konoha's long-suffering craftsmen and repairmen.
It had been a week since their latest attempt to find Sasuke, a complete disaster where superior numbers and much more practice allowed them to surpass the previous attempts and this time fail to even catch a glimpse of her former team-mate. The week had been enough time though, enough time in trivial schemes with Ino as she tried to chase and ensnare, 'the man who had called her miss beautiful,' to wash away the lingering sadness and regret over Sasuke that the mission had brought back to the fore. She had come to terms with Sasuke's choices long ago and would not let herself be dragged down once more by her childhood love. She had rested enough and was now looking forward to whatever this new mission was that the Hokage had summoned her fore.
Naruto bounced up to her, a bundle of unstoppable energy forever eager for more action, the next chance to prove himself a worthy Hokage. The latest pursuit of Sasuke, merely serving to strengthen his resolve to find his first, lost friend, as with everything, to the point where, Sakura was sure by now, were it formed into a blade as easily as his Chakra it would cut through not just rock but slice through diamonds. He spoke to her cheerfully, "Hey, Sakura-chan, looking forward to whatever Tsunade-baachan's got for us this time?"
"Hai Naruto, Tsunade-sama really has waited long enough to give us our next mission."
"Got that right, Sakura-chan, its been a week already since we came back from searching for the dobe, I want to get out there again, who knows what trouble he'll get himself into given time. I mean last time he was left to his own devices he joined Orochimaru."
"It's highly unlikely," Sakura replied amused, glad that Naruto was able to joke about such things so freely, "Tsunade-sama will send us out after Sasuke again so soon. Especially since you've failed three times now."
"Sakura-chan!," Naruto protested, more than a little hurt, Sakura wondered if she'd gone too far in her teasing and instantly regretted it. "This one wasn't our fault at all, that guy was just plain weird, all our attacks passing straight through him like that. Besides I will definitely stomp on his ass next time," he grinned with renewed vigour, "Anyway it's good for us to be out and about, more chance of running into Sasuke and beating some sense into his stupid head than sitting about here, copying Shikamaru. Not that I've even seen much of him since he's on escort duty with that crazy girl from sand."
"Gomen Naruto, your right," Sakura responded apologetically as they reached the doorstep of the Hokage's mansion, the guards waving them through idly. "Anyway let's go see what she's got for us."
Present
Sakura's expression this time was a clear grimace, she had no idea of how her life was going to chance because of that mission, how one, "harmless," high B would turn out as it did. The Premise had been simply enough. There had been a series of attacks in a small rural area on the outskirts of the fire country, about seventy miles from Konoha. Raiders, causing as much chaos and damage as they could to sow fear among the local community and stifle opposition as they hurt, looted from, and extorted everyone they could. But then they had met Jio.
One week previously
"Jio," Naruto said gently, pain and sympathy for the troubled youth evident in his eyes. "I know your pain, let us help you."
Sakura, Sai, and Captain Yamato smiled winning in the background at the confused missing-nin from Mist. He had had a hard time there after his father had left the village for reasons unknown and his mother had killed herself out of shame. It was no wonder, that he had left the unforgiving village as soon as he was old enough and turned to the first kindly face to take him. Only in this case it was Yuushi Haori, a smiling-faced monster, leader of the vicious gang of brutes terrorising the area, who had taken in the lonely, vulnerable Genin and turned him into his personal tool. Old Lady Yuushan had taken it upon herself to defy his totalitarian control over the village and so he had sent his weapon to destroy her orphanage, breaking her heart and spirit simultaneously. It was fortunate that Sakura and the rest of Team Kakashi, albeit without their namesake who was off on a secret solo mission from the Hokage, had been there already, Sakura having been asked by the Kindly Yuushan to treat two sick children while the others cheered up the rest, depressed over the state of their home village, many of them in the orphanage having recently lost parents to Yuushi's brutal attacks made all the more deadly by Jio.
"Please Jio, do what you know to be right." Naruto continued, "you have true friends in us, you know what Yuushi's doing is wrong, forge your own path independent from your parents and that man. You have the power to make things right, don't force me to stop you."
Jio stared at the four for a long moment, black eyes glinting with an indiscernible emotion, sweat dripping off his brow, before nodding his head slowly and agreeing to come with them.
Present
Sakura felt the anger and guilt swell up again, how pleased she had been; Naruto convincing yet another adversary to make peace with them, helping cast aside their own inner demons with his earnest friendship; had she not been blinded by Naruto's simplistic views she would have realised then as she did now with the benefit of hindsight that Jio… no That Man was the better term, had merely been agreeing because he knew that it was highly unlikely that a mere Genin, possible scrapping Chuunin level, Ninja could defeat a team of four clearly high-level Nin and thus wanted to escape and warn his master to abandon his plans for now and lay low. They had all been such trusting fools.
Past
Naruto prattled happily on to his new friend with Jio making sporadic monosyllabic replies as the nin made their way out of the Orphanage. Basking in the glow of another successful mission nearing completion, they had made their way to the old wooden front-door that had still been colourfully painted by the children, when Sakura glanced back to check on Jio who had been quiet for a long time now. Nothing. For Konoha Nin but no Jio. Sakura's gasp alerted Yamato, who spinning around swore, then issued rapid orders, "Sakura, Sai, Naruto split up and look for Jio I'll stay here and guard the door in case he tries to double back."
A stunned Naruto shakily started to form shadow clones as Sakura and Sai headed back into the house. Sai headed up into the dormitories to check on Yuushan and the children, who had hidden safely out of the way, while Sakura searched the ground floor making her way towards the back door. Passing through the deserted hallway towards the kitchen Sakura's alert ears picked up a muffled wail that was suddenly cut short, it had come from a small room next to the kitchen where the orphanages laundry was done. Bursting through the door Sakura beheld two people, a startled Jio sneaking towards the back door and a baby with a Kunai, thrown moments beforehand, protruding from its diminutive chest. A Small red spatter coated the table, a sight far worse to Sakura than the floor of King's and armies. The life-blood of the forgotten infant, a pathetic dribble smearing the table-top and the clean clothes it was likely due to be changed into.
A surreal Sakura moved in the direction of the table, towards the infant of Jio she wasn't quite sure. Then a couple of Naruto's shadow clones burst through the doorway behind her, blinked a little, then charged towards the frozen Jio with a roar of primal anger as the missing-nin lunged once more for the doorway, a second futile attempt at flight with more and clones hot on his trail. Shaken into action Sakura desperately attended to the baby, pouring her Chakra, her life, her soul into its bloodied form. But even she, the famed Godaime's apprentice was not able to deny what the muted part of her brain had told her from the beginning, three years of medical training marching remorselessly across her consciousness. There was no way a child of that young an age, six months at the most could survive a wound to the lungs or the lose of so much of its blood. Captain Yamato gently removed her motionless hands from the still body.
Present
Sakura forced back those thoughts, still bitter even now. Naruto and Sai had easily caught up to Jio and he knowing the penalty for his ill-conceived murder had rejected the few offers of mercy he received . The Mission had then been finished with a clinical efficiency, Sakura's stupor only interrupted by Yuushan's apologetic moaning of overlooking one of her charges in the heat of the attack, 'Due no doubt to her age.' For the remainder she was reduced to monosyllables, Naruto's good hearted but misguided prying into her well-being gently deflected by Captain Yamato.
That evening she had recovered her vocabulary but with it a sense of guilt and horror, then anger at Jio, culminating in a profound sense of frustration, "Why had she trained for years if only to watch and suffer as an innocent life had been ended by a weak adversary, an adversary whom they had already forgiven and 'redeemed,' an adversary who had repaid their trust and kindness by looking for nothing more than a stealthy getaway no matter what the cost by which it was paid for. They had had that man in their grasp dammit. All they had to do was kill him or keep a close, less gullible eye on him. She did not blame Naruto, he may have been the one who directly initiated it, but they had all backed him and his offer of friendship to the hilt, the hilt of that Kunai bursting through the innocent and bewildered baby's lungs, crushing fragile bone and cartilage.
Sakura bit her lip, rejecting those memories again. All that could be gained from the past was to learn from it and never repeat those mistakes. Learn from it she had. That frustration and helplessness had undermined the complacency that she had built up over the years, reminding her of that fateful night when an innocent and naïve girl had attempted to stem the inevitable. She was an adult now by Ninja reckoning, capable and aware of her situation, making her own judgements, trained to take matters into her own hands. With this knowledge she was able to ignore the false platitudes and consoling words of Tsunade and Kakashi, aware of her teams shared failure and that even after all her years of hard work and success in the village she was still able to be reduced to miserable helplessness by a renegade Genin. The parallels were uncomfortable, her own inane words came back to haunt her, trying to dissuade Sasuke from his path of gaining strength by offering happiness and fun at Konoha; perhaps it was alright for some to stay at Konoha to gain strength, she thought bitterness threatening to overwhelm her, such as the eternally-optimistic Naruto, no even he had left the village for those three years. A sad smile stretched her grim lips at the thought of him, her dear team-mate and friend, he would be so upset, but she had made her choice to now. She would not sit back and play in Konoha not when it was apparently so futile and thus she like Sasuke before her had committed a cardinal sin for a ninja, abandoning the village of her birth. Unable to justify staying anymore as the frustration gnawed at her heart, an itch that no amount of training would scratch. She needed to be challenged to make her own way from under Naruto, Kakashi's, Yamato's, Tsunade's, hell even Lee's protective shadows. So had left, simple when put like that, in order to find her own place, pouring her anger, grief and frustration into a Kunai as she ripped a gash through her own forehead protector and left home for good.
Sakura stopped, breathing in the cold night air. Was she wrong? Should she go back? Return to the sweet embrace of her parents and the familiar comfort of her friends. She had never said goodbye. Not to her parents who had loved and cared for her for all her sixteen years nor to her friends who had shared so much with her, as Chuunin, Genin and Academy Students. Her will they feel, she imagined, knowing that she'd betrayed everything that they'd held dear. Abandoned them for an uncertain road. She could imagine their faces now, expressions filled with hurt, disbelief and anger, all directed at her. She could imagine her fathers crushing disapproval, he had always been strict and strongly believed in a ninja's duty towards there village, how angered he would be that his own daughter had become a missing-nin. As for her mother, a former Chuunin who had retired upon her marriage, she had always been firm, but supportive of Sakura, delighted with her child's success, how hurt she would be by the flight and disgrace of her own flesh and blood. She could imagine the reactions of her friends, Sai might not care but he'd certainly condemn her, Naruto, bewildered and hurt by his oldest remaining friend would be crushed, would he have the strength to get over a second betrayal as for Ino, her oldest friend, their repaired friendship going from strength to strength, how she would hate her for turning her back on the village they had loved so dearly.
But she couldn't. Ever. They might allow her back. Maybe in time even get over their anger and disappointment. Surely once she got over the shock of the desertion of her pupil even Tsunade would accept her. She had left once herself after all. Was it even for similar reasons to her own? Yet… yet it would never be the same, even if she snuck back quickly now, stealing back over the very wall she had left from, before they noticed her now innocuous disappearance. She could never live and fight amongst them once again. She had totally believed, a compassionate, idealistic disciple, in the work of Naruto and the others, a manifest destiny that would see all obstacles overcome until the world was peaceful and Konoha restored and happy. Everyone uniting and looking up to Naruto, eyes shining with respect. Despite her protestations, she had come to believe that he would become Hokage; but her mind had darkened, he was wrong, of that there could be no doubt. If it wasn't for his too trusting ways that poor child would never have died. The death of a baby was bad enough but for that to have happened needlessly was too much.
It had opened her eyes. Of that she was certain and she could never again live in the blinkered world she had enjoyed in Konoha. A sheltered lifestyle, where her friends were always there for her and where, at the end of the day, everything always had a happy ending, all set backs and tragedy overcome and despite everything everyone looking optimistically towards the future. Except once, except with Sasuke. The event that hadn't had a happy ending, vanishing mysteriously, elusive despite all attempts to track him. Had that changed her? Had that laid the seeds that blossomed now? Had he been right? Had he seen what she hadn't; the futility of a happy existence at Konoha, shielded by others from the pains of the world? Only he knew.
Yet now she saw it clearly, the cloying stiffness of life in Konoha, the foolishness of believing so much in the good of mankind. Her parents might not understand nor her friends but she had to leave. Make her own way in the world apart from them and their values. She could no longer tolerate it. No longer remained as a child stifled by the hopes, dreams and protections of the others. She had seen the folly of their way. She had to get stronger to never again be so inept, so foolish, so blindly trusting that she failed in her task. Stronger so that she never felt so powerless again. She had to leave, to improve her skills away from her well-meaning but still blind friends and mentors. Experience the realities of life not hiding behind sequestering walls. Sakura started running one more.
Sakura ran through the forest at a punishing pace, her every muscle in her legs protesting under the stress. Hurling herself from branch to branch, years of practice allowing her feet to unconsciously find the correct place on the branch that would at once support her weight and cause the least disruption to the fading autumn leaves, she concentrated solely on putting as much distance between herself and the hunter-nin of Konoha as possible. The single tear than dripped down her cheek was swiftly covered up by the forest floor.
The moonlight trees were growing sparse now and she was forced to run on foot now, slower but she was a good distance from Konoha she thought grimly. The Hunter Nin would have trouble finding her, if they would even trifle with her yet, but soon enough some search would be called and it would be best for her to be far away when her absence was noted. She had no intentions, at least for now, of making her way to another hidden village as some Missing-Nin did. Another Village might perhaps be better than Konoha but she knew there was a great difference between abandoning a village and actively fighting against it, no it was better to stay on her own for now, maybe join some minor group of Missing-Nin later to survive and hone her skills with whatever work came up. She no longer quailed at the thought of such criminal activities but accepted them a necessary reality of her new life, honest people did not hire Missing-nin.
Smack. Caught up in her thoughts she ran straight into a firm object and stumbled backwards. She looked up and her eyes met a pair they had never expected to see again. Sasuke's. He stood before her as impassively as usual though she thought she could detect a slight widening of the eyes. Three others stood some distance behind him, a red-haired woman a man with an enormous sword bearing an enormous resemblance to Abuse's and a second huge man looking at her inquisitively, all poised to attack the presence they must have sensed from the campsite dimly visible in a clearing behind them.
"What are you doing here Sakura? This must be the oddest attempt yet by Konoha to find me." Sasuke's voice was cold and mocking, crimson Sharingan present in his eyes.
"It's got nothing to do with Konoha," Sakura spoke evenly trying inject as much reciprocal coldness into her tone as possible and ignore her rapidly beating heart, "Our meeting is a complete coincidence, I've left Konoha Sasuke-kun."
"You've become a Missing-Nin?" Long years at sound could not disguise Sasuke's incredulity.
" I finally understand Sasuke-kun," Sakura replied, allowing affection to colour her tone again. "I realised how much life in Konoha was holding me back, no matter how hard I trained at being a medic-nin I was still weak so I left."
Sasuke stared at her with his crimson eyes for a few moments longer, but the truth in her words seemed to have got through to him and he deactivated hi Kekkei-Genkai, "Come with us Sakura," it was an order not a request, "We have need of a good medic-nin and you'll find it better being part of a group." At Sakura's grateful nod. "Welcome to Team-Falcon."