Daring To Dream

by SharinganAkiro9991

Sakura was tired of not knowing. Tired of trying and failing. So, she closed them all off. Her dreams had been torn assunder, now pushed to the darkest corners of her mind. She was powerful. Dark. A killer. A SHINOBI. But, dreams do catch up with you, if you let them. Now, she has the opportunity for a new dream...one of potential love and a new life she had always wanted.

SERIES: DREAMS

BOOK 1: DARING TO DREAM

CHARACTERS: UCHIHA ITACHI/HARUNO SAKURA

RATING: M

CHAPTER ONE: The Sun, The Trees and The Rain...

The sun shone high and bright in the forests of Hi no Kuni, casting light onto every surface. The tall trees provided a nice shade from the searing heat, one that Haruno Sakura was grateful for. She slipped her ANBU mask up after checking the nearby area for foreign chakra signatures, swiping her brow with the back of a gloved hand. Looking down at the perspiration clinging to the leather material, her eyebrows lowered into a glare. Emerald eyes turned up to the treetops, ANBU mask dropping back in place as she felt the chakra of the intruding shinobi.

"Kuro-Taichou." The voice was from that of another ANBU, this one dressed much the same as she, save for the difference in masks. A hawk painted the white mask of her ally, further enhanced by the soulless, silver eyes of the male with long, obsidian hair tied back securely in a low tail.

"Taka-san." She replied emotionlessly, raising her chin in formal greeting. "The sun grows high."

"And the hawk flies low to greet the snapping teeth of the tiger." He responded stoically, a smirk lifting his lips from behind the mask, unseen by the female. Emerald eyes narrowed before she darted back as four kunai landed where she had been previously standing, skidding along the dirt.

"The cry of the eagle suggests rain." She murmured, eyes traveling the canopy before they located the slightest shift in the terrain. Her hands flashed before a grunt was heard, another ANBU appearing beside the hawk-masked ANBU. Pineapple-shaped, charcoal-black hair stuck out from the eagle-faced ANBU. "Washi-san." She greeted formally, a hint of smug superiority tinging her voice. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"The leaves are changing with the season, Kuro-Taichou." The eagle-faced ANBU responded emotionlessly. Tsunade-sama needs you for a mission. The cripted message was clear. War was coming, if the information was true. "The rain cannot keep the leaves green." Amegakure has betrayed us. Dark eyes searched for a reaction, which he found in the tightening of fists and the barely audible click of teeth snapping together.

"The leaves are the same in the dark, Washi-san." Sakura responded. I have no information about this.

A sigh. "The roots of the trees are growing restless." Tsunade-sama ordered immediate action. "Right now, they are getting too much rain. They have to be cut down." Assassination.

"Can we just not put them in shelter?" Is there no other way?

"The dawn approaches with the rain." Her heart stopped, just for a minute. This news was the worst, but exactly what they had been waiting for over five years to hear.

"I hate early mornings." She muttered. "The best we can hope for is to shelter the trees from the rain, until the season ends." It will be dangerous. I might not succeed. Protect Naruto, at all costs.

"We need the cloud to disappear, that's what." The hawk-faced ANBU replied. "The trees cannot grow without the sun." The village leader. The threat will be eliminated with him. Tsunade-sama's orders.

"..." Sakura nodded, emerald eyes sliding closed as the two disappeared. Her fist collided with a tree, digging a deep hole into it's trunk with the tiny amounts of chakra laced into the punch. She took a deep breath before looking up. "I will protect the roots."