The Residing Void

by Fallen Crest

With her memories sealed and nowhere to go, Sakura finds herself in Konoha. As she grows, she grows attached to the village and her friends, but no matter how hard she tries, she can't forget the void residing in her from her memory lost or the name Sasori. And with that, she is determined to find the truth, even if it means abandoning all she has grown to love in her new village.

2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto

"Talking"

'Thoughts'

"Inner"

The Residing Void

Chapter 2

In the middle of the forest a little girl was sitting on her knees looking around in confusion, unaware of the eyes trained on her. Her long pink hair rested gently on her shoulders while bright green eyes kept looking at everything in the forest. She was dressed in dark blue pants that stopped right above her knees and a red shirt with long sleeves with a few cuts in them above her elbow that were part of the design. On her legs, she wore weapon pouches and back ninja sandals.

Sakura glanced down at her wrist where a silver bracelet was locked around her wrist. Her name was engraved in it with a cherry blossom next to it. Her older brother had gotten it for her when she first entered the ninja academy. It was one of the few times he actually ever gotten her something. Usually Granny Chiyo only gave her gifts like that.

As that name passed through her mind, Sakura had to blinked. "Granny who?" She whispered to herself. To her horror the more she tried to remember just who Granny Chiyo was to her, the more she forgot just who the woman was. To double that horror, she looked at her bracelet again and just couldn't recall where the thing came from. Tiny hands curled into her hair in anger and fear. Please, oh please not let it be amnesia again! She didn't want to go through the horror of not knowing anything again!

"Granny…Granny….Gra–" Sakura paused in her mumbling as her eyes glazed over for a moment. After about a minute, the glazed looked passed and her hands dropped limply to her side once more. She looked around the forest again in confusion. "Where am I?"

In the trees surrounding the one the girl was at, the ninjas watching her frowned in confusion. They had come across the girl on their way back to the village. It was a strange thing to see an unconscious girl in the middle of the forest without any signs of a struggle nearby. Before they could act on it, the girl started to wake up and the three hid in the trees to see what she would do.

"What do you think?" The ninja with shoulder length brown hair asked around the senbon in his mouth.

"Looks like a type of memory jutsu has been placed on her." His comrade replied. The comrade had silver hair and one dark eye showing as his forehead protector was tilted to cover his left eye, while the rest of his face was covered by a mask.

"A memory jutsu? Those are hard to break." The third member said. He had short spiky black hair, brown eyes, and a beard. Like his comrades, he too wore a headband and the standard ninja uniform.

Without replying, the silver haired one jumped from the trees and landed in front of the confused girl. "Yo." He greeted.

The girl stared at him for a moment before screaming and falling backwards. Wide green eyes stared at the ninja in surprise, but the man just smiled, or at least she thought he did, while his comrades jumped down next to him. They both stared at their kneeling comrade with deadpanned stares. "Is that how you treat lost little girls? Scare them?" The one with a senbon asked sarcastically.

"Well, if she wants to be a ninja, she has to get used to surprises and not scream at them." The silver haired one replied, glancing lazily at his teammate.

Sakura blinked at them. "Um, how'd you know I wanted to be a ninja?" She asked confused. Sure, she wanted to be one. For some reason it was one of the thoughts not leaving her mind.

Chuckling, the man pointed at her legs. "Your weapon pouches and sandals. They are a good give away."

Instead of blushing, Sakura smiled. "Makes sense." She looked at their headbands and frowned. "You guys are ninjas for the Village Hidden in the Leaves?" She looked around the forest once more. "Is that where I'm from? I'm sorry, but my memories seem to be slipping away."

The ninja with the senbon kneeled and smiled softly at the girl. "Is there anything you do remember?"

"Um," Sakura looked at the sky thoughtfully. "Well, when I try to remember something, it slips away farther and farther till I can't remember it." She blinked then clapped her hands. "Oh, but there is one thing I know." Sadness clouded her eyes. "Well, I know a name, but I don't know the person appearance or what it has to do with me. It's Sasori."

"Sasori? That's a strange name. What is yours?"

Sakura looked at the men with a smirk. "You know, it is rude to ask for someone's name without first giving your name."

The silver haired one chuckled. "Our apologies, little one. My name is Kakashi Hatake."

"Genma Shiranui." The one with the senbon introduced with a mocking half bow, making Sakura chuckle.

"Asuma Sarutobi." Asuma greeted. "And as you've already realized, we are ninja from Konoha."

Sakura nodded at each of them, smiling brightly. "I am Sakura. I apologize, but my last name has slipped from my mind."

"Sakura?" All three glanced at her pink hair.

"It's a fitting name for such a cute little girl." Genma said with a smile as he ruffled the girl's hair. His movement caused the girl's hair to shift and he managed to catch a glimpse of a black mark on the back of her neck, which caused him to frown. "Sakura, can I see the back of your neck?"

The girl gave him a surprised look, but nodded and shifted around so her back was to the three. She pushed all her hair over her shoulder so they could see her neck. Resting on the back of her neck was a kanji that meant memory. It was tattooed into her skin in black with a faint blue color surrounding each line. If she had been conscious for such a seal, it must have been extremely painful.

"Is something wrong?" Sakura asked worriedly when she felt a hand gently touch her neck. When the hand touched her neck, it caused her to flinch. For whatever reason, sudden pain had just flared through her body. The pain wasn't too bad, but it was enough to grab her attention.

Sighing, Asuma nodded. "It seems our earlier assumptions were correct. You have a memory seal on you."

"Way to be blunt about it." Genma said.

Asuma shrugged. "No reason to hide it by beating around the bush."

"A memory seal?" Sakura echoed fearfully. She didn't know why, but the idea of not having her memories really scared her and left her empty. She shivered and turned to face them fully. "Can you please remove it?"

Asuma gave her sad smile. "Sorry, but from the looks of it, it seems that the seal cannot be removed by us."

"What? Why?" Sakura asked, eyes widening in shock.

"Shh, calm down." Kakashi said, eye crinkling in a smile at her. "This is a very difficult memory seal that takes a very powerful ninja to do. The person infuses his chakra into the seal so only he can remove it. Though there have been some cases where the will of the person it is put on is so strong that just seeing things from his or her pass can cause the seal to crack a bit to start to undo it."

"Sheer will." Sakura whispered to herself.

Genma frowned. "That is just a guess though. We have to get it fully checked out to see if we are correct in the type of seal it is."

Sakura nodded. "So you're taking me back to your village?"

"Yep." Genma replied with a grin. "You'll really like it. It is a really happy place. We are only a few miles from it."

"Okay." Sakura said, grinning. She couldn't wait to see this village. It was curiosity that perked her interest. She wondered how it compared to her home vill– Her grin slipped from her face as an empty feeling entered her heart. What did her home village look like? And what about her family? Surely they would be really worried about her with the sudden vanishing act. Why would someone do this to her? Tears started to fill her eyes. She felt so empty inside that it hurt. It hurt that a part of her was missing. It felt like she wasn't complete without her memories.

"Sakura," Kakashi said, patting the girl on the head. "It'll be alright."

"No, it won't." Sakura cried, kneading her fists into her eyes to get the tears to stop. "I feel so hurt without my memories. Something has torn me apart and only left half of me behind to suffer."

Kakashi smiled sadly, though he was the only one to know that. "Then how about we fill that void at least a bit to get the suffering to lessen some?"

Green eyes glanced up curiously. Lessen the pain raging inside of her? "H-how…how do we do that?"

"By making new memories and friends. It won't make the void disappear completely, but it will lessen the fear and loneliness." Kakashi said in a stage whisper like he was sharing a big secret.

Sakura giggled.

"There it is." Kakashi teased. "Don't ever lose your smile." He turned around. "Here, climb on my back."

Wrapping her arms around his neck and legs around his chest, Sakura rested her head gently down his shoulder as he took off into the trees with his comrades following. Genma looked at her and smiled, making her smile tiredly back. For some reason, she was so tired, even though she just woke up not that long ago. Without meaning to, she felt her eyes shut and she began to doze off.

The next time her eyes flew open, she found herself flying through the air. Gasping, her arms tightened around the only support she had, causing the man holding her to chuckle as he landed on a roof. "Have a nice nap?" He asked as he ran across the roof.

Blushing, Sakura rested her head against his shoulder. "Yeah." Hearing laughter, she pushed herself slightly off of Kakashi's chest to glance down at the road to see some kids laughing, not noticing that Kakashi slowed down a bit for her sake. The kids pushed a blond haired down, said something to him that made a sad look enter his eyes, then they ran off, leaving the boy on the ground. Seeing such bullying made Sakura growl to herself. How can anyone treat someone like that?

Kakashi glanced back at her at the noise, but didn't ask as he jumped to the next roof, which made the girl go back to holding onto him tightly.

Soon enough, the three ninja plus a little girl landed outside the Hokage building. When they move to walk inside, Sakura tugged at Kakashi's vest. "Can you let me down now?" She asked.

Kakashi nodded and kneeled down so Sakura could jump off.

"Where are we going?"

"To visit the Hokage." Kakashi explained.

"Ah," Sakura said as a nervous looked entered her eyes. "Is he nice?"

Genma laughed. "No worries, Sakura. He is a nice man."

Sakura nodded and smiled as she followed the three men to see their Hokage. She glanced around at everything curiously, so curiously that if it wasn't for Kakashi holding her hand she probably would have gotten lost by now.

Barely a few minutes later, Asuma was knocking on a door and after a "Come in" sounded, he opened the door and led the way for the others to come in. Shyly, Sakura hid a bit behind Kakashi's leg in the hope of going unnoticed. She glanced out slightly to see an old man with grey hair and wearing a strange red and white hat sitting behind a desk with quite a bit of paperwork in front of him.

"Hokage-sama," Kakashi greeted.

Sarutobi smiled when he noticed pink poking out from behind Kakashi. "Welcome back. And who do you have with you?"

Sakura blinked at him before ducking behind Kakashi again. The ninja sighed and tugged on the girl's hand to get her to stand in front of him. "Go ahead and introduce yourself."

"Um," Sakura glanced at the leader unsurely. "My name is Sakura. Um," She glanced at the three ninjas, and Genma nodded for her to continue. "I was found in the forest. I don't really recall anything because your ninja think I have a memory seal on me."

"A memory seal?" Sarutobi said with a frown. "Such a horrible thing to put on someone, especially one so young."

Sakura blinked before smiling. "Oh, I do remember a name: Sasori, but I don't recall what he looks like or who he is to me."

"Hmm," Sarutobi smiled. "Do you remember what he is like? Personality wise?"

With a smile, Sakura opened her mouth to reply. "He is ve–" Her eyes glazed over for a moment then went back to normal. She blinked and frowned as she glanced around. "That was strange."

"Do you still remember parts of your past?" Sarutobi asked.

"Oh, yes, I guess so, but when I try to recall them they fade away. Only Sasori's name hasn't faded, at least yet. Everything else is slowly fading away, but if I think about it, it disappears much faster. So, I guess," Sakura paused with a frown. "They are there, but leaving me without me realizing it?"

Sarutobi sighed. "Well, my dear, how about I have someone check you over? Then we can go from there to see what we can do."

Sakura nodded her head in agreement. She really hoped the ninjas were wrong and they could get rid of this memory seal. She really wanted to know everything she possibly could. This empty void was really hurting with the more she began to forget about home. "That would be nice, sir."

Smiling, Sarutobi nodded. "Now, Sakura, could you wait in the hallway while I talk to the others?"

"Yes sir." Sakura gave a small bow before leaving the room. She understood that she wasn't to hear their mission report. Not only was she not a ninja, but it was likely she was not even from this village. She had no right to listen so she stood by the door outside the hall, leaning against the wall as she waited.

It wasn't that long of a wait, but it was still boring to Sakura as she couldn't go around and explore. That would just get her in trouble if she disappeared and she didn't want to do that when she only arrived in this village. It would be like an invasion of privacy. The only interesting thing that happened was when a blond haired ninja showed up shortly after and went into the office after a quick knock on the door. He gave her a glance before heading inside and leaving her to her boredom. So she had a boring thirty minute wait before the door open and Genma came out and smiled at her.

"Hokage-sama has called Inoichi Yamanaka here to look over you to see your memories, okay?" He asked.

Sakura nodded and followed the man back into the office to see the blond haired man from earlier.

"Sakura, this is Inoichi Yamanaka, he is going to take a look at your mind and the seal." Sarutobi explained.

Sakura nodded and glanced at the man then at the chair that was placed in the center of the office. Genma nodded at the chair. Taking the message, she sat down in the chair as the man came out of the corner.

"Hello Sakura." Inoichi greeted calmly.

"So," Sakura drawled nervously. "How does this work?"

The man smiled. "Just relax while I enter your mind. It will be done before you know it."

Sakura's hands gripped the edges of the chair tightly as the man put a hand to her head. She closed her eyes, but that was all she remembered as she became rigid in her sit.

Inoichi opened his own eyes once he was inside of Sakura's mind. In front of him was a long hallway with only one door at the very end of it. As he approached the door, he noticed the kanji for memory carved on it in blue. When he was close to it, he felt the power leaking from the seal on the door. 'Whoever did this must be a strong person if this chakra is anything to go by.' He thought as he reached out a hand to touch the door. The moment his hand touched it, an earsplitting scream met his ears and electricity shot through his hand and up to his shoulder.

"GET OUT! IT HURTS!"

*Sasori*

A certain redhead paused in his traveling and kneeled on the tree he had just landed on when a familiar feeling pricked at his senses. His eyes closed as he spread his senses back to Konoha where he had put his sister. Because of the chakra he put in the seal on her he would be able to find her quite easily. Though, that was not his goal at the moment.

Instead he focused on the chakra inside his sister's seal. Once he felt his chakra inside of her, he manipulated it a bit before he found himself able to enter her mind. Once he was inside, he opened his eyes and found a blond haired man standing in front of that door that sealed all of Sakura's memories. Seeing this, he had to smirk. 'So, there are already examining her seal. They are doing this faster than expected. But, I cannot allow anyone to mess with my seal.'

When the man reached out to touch the door, Sasori's smirk widened. It was time the Konoha ninjas learned just what would happen when they tried to mess with his seal.

An earsplitting scream met his ears. Sasori recognized the feminine scream from when he put the seal on her, but paid it no mind as he watched the ninja get electrocuted by his chakra. As he began to feel satisfaction about the pain he caused this man, something he did not expect happened.

"GET OUT! IT HURTS!"

'What is this?' Sasori narrowed his eyes as he suddenly felt a force push on him. Without his consent, he felt himself pushed out of his sister's mind and back into his body miles away from the village.

Sasori's eyes opened, and they did not look pleased. 'What was that? That voice sounded like Sakura, but it should not be possible for her to push me out of her mind. Did I miss something?'

The puppet master stood up with a frown as he took off once more. His sister, who was still only training to be a ninja, managed to push him, a S-rank ninja, out of her mind so easily. It could have just been sheer luck or maybe there was something more to her than he realized. No matter, he would just have to keep a closer eye on this and see where it led.

*Konoha*

Inoichi felt a powerful push against him and suddenly found himself in the Hokage's office once more in front of a screaming girl who had blood trailing down her neck. He quickly withdrew his hand and the girl fell out of the chair, but before she hit the ground, Genma managed to catch her.

Inoichi glanced at his hand to see it charred, even though he had only entered the girl with his soul. What kind of seal did this? He turned to Sarutobi with a dark frown. "It is definitely a chakra infused seal. I couldn't get anywhere near her memoires. The moment I tried," he nodded at the girl who was now gasping for air and holding her neck tightly. "That happened and I got electrocuted by the chakra."

"Electrocuted by chakra?" Asuma said with a frown. He has never heard of such a thing, unless someone was using elemental chakra.

"There is nothing you can do about it?" Sarutobi asked, shooting a glance at the girl who was sitting in Genma's lap with wide eyes and gripping her bloody neck.

The man shook his head. "Nothing. Only the person who put it on her could possibly remove this. Just seeing it for a few seconds told me how dangerous it is, especially with the amount of chakra inside the seal. It could seriously harm her and the person trying to remove it."

Sakura stared at the man with wide eyes. Just who put such a crazy, dangerous thing on her? And why? Why would she need such a seal on her in the first place?

Groaning she rubbed her head. That gave her a massive headache. No one said anything about getting a headache from that!

"But why is she bleeding?" Genma asked worriedly as he looked down at the girl's neck as she had it tilted in a way that he could fully see the seal and the blood leaking out of the mark.

"Perhaps it is a warning to not interfere." Sarutobi suggested with a frown. "Any attempt to mess with the seal will cause damage."

Inoichi rubbed his burnt hand. "That may be true. I only touched it for a second and this is the result. Who knows what could happen if we tried any more than this?"

Sakura looked at the man with pain filled eyes. His arm looked to be completely burnt from hand to shoulder because of her. It was all because of her that someone got hurt. Sure, she was in a bit of pain from that experience, but it had to be nothing compared to what he was feeling. And yet, he didn't show any pain. He was completely hiding it, that she was sure of. Why was this happening? What did the person who did this hope to accomplish?

"Perhaps it is time for you two to head to the hospital?" Sarutobi suggesting, breaking Sakura from her thoughts.

"Um," Sakura murmured, glancing up at the leader.

"And when you are done, you may return here so we can make some arrangements for you, Sakura." Sarutobi added, making the girl smile in thanks.

"Thank you, Hokage-sama." Sakura replied before Genma was suddenly holding her in his arms.

"I'll take her." Genma told his comrades.

Not long later, after flying through the village to the hospital, Sakura found herself resting on a bed with hands glowing green tracing over her neck. At first she had twisted her head around to see the strange color chakra, but she got scolded for moving around so she had to stop. The chakra was so warm and soothing as it eased the pain in her neck and got the bleeding to stop. She didn't recall ever feeling something like this. It was amazing.

When her doctor was done, the serious look disappeared as he stepped back to allow her to sit up. "Are you that interested in medical ninjutsu?" He asked.

Blushing, Sakura ducked her head. "Sorry, I've never seen anything like it before and it felt nice. It's called medical ninjutsu?"

The man nodded. "Yeah, surely you have heard of medical ninjas?"

"There are medical ninjas?" Sakura asked, mostly to herself.

The doctor laughed. "If you are that interested, perhaps you should look into it," He glanced down at his file. "Ms. Sakura. There is not that much information here, but that is to be expected with such a seal on you. Let's see about basic personal information. Do you know your age?"

A thoughtful look passed over Sakura's face for a moment before she grinned and said, "Eight. I'm eight and my birthday is March 28th!"

The doctor nodded. "Very good. Do you know anything else? Like what you want to be?"

"A ninja!" Sakura declared automatically.

The doctor chuckled. "You seem very happy for someone who just lost her memory."

Sakura deflated for a moment before a determined look entered her eyes. "I will become strong and find the person who did this to me to get them to remove the seal. Until then, I will live my life. I may not have memories, but as Kakashi-san said, I can fill that void with new memories and friends while I search for my family and who I am. If I am depressed by it, I will just feel worse inside. I don't like that feeling."

The doctor looked at her in surprise, but smiled. "That is such a mature, excellent response for one so young." He closed the file. "Well, if you want to become a ninja, I suppose I should let you get back to the Hokage so you can make your declaration to him."

Sakura smiled nervously. Oh, right, she wasn't from this village so she needed permission before she could get into the academy. But she would do it. She would make sure she was allowed into the academy!

A/N: I can't remember how they greet the third hokage. It's been so long since I've seen the beginning of the series. So if I called him wrong, tell me.

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