Arc 1: Escape Iwa
Chapter 2: To a Daughter
Haruno Sakura wondered, as she stared into the dark, silent night, what she could have done to change everything.
Life was simple up until now. She had been born on March 28th, on a clear spring day in Iwa. Spring was an auspicious time in Iwa, as it signified the slow release of the land from winter's cold grasp. Though she did not remember much of her own infancy, her mother other told her stories of her curious nature and good behavior. A healthy baby, she was—one that liked to laugh.
To be truthful, her most stand-out memories were the ones that included Squad Six-Delta. Everything else seemed like a blur of fuzzy images surrounded by the clear movies of her and Deidara playing with her toys. She, despite being a happy child, did not have many friends back then. She was just too young to begin school, and her mother too busy with the store to bring her to the park. The team of three genin filled up a hole in her life, and remained a fixture there for days.
Sayuri faced her toward a group of four ninja. Hesitantly she handed off her child to the least threatening of the squad, the most beautiful blond-haired girl Sakura had ever seen. That hair was just like gold, and shimmered in the sunlight like fairy dust.
'I must pull it,' she thought. Slowly, her chubby hands reached out to caress the silken locks, and then… TUG!
"No kidding she pulls! Yow!" Sakura gasped in surprise, staring up at her caretaker.
"You're just a wimp," Rumi joked, pushing her teammate into the playroom. Deidara sat her down, and stared at the little girl, who hadn't taken her eyes off of him yet. He tilted his head, and she followed, mouth hanging open. In an instant he flinched and embarrassedly scratched his head.
"Sorry, I forgot to put on my gloves today," he admitted. Still, the little girl kept staring. Rumi sighed, and huddled closer to Omaru, waiting for the crying. Deidara held out his hand, and the tiny mouth there grinned and stuck out a tiny tongue. "I guess I must have pinched you, my bad." Sakura didn't move or even look at the odd appendage. The three shared a look, wondering if their charge was a little on the slow side.
"…You're a boy!" The little girl's voice sounded so awestruck that Rumi snorted into peals of laughter. Deidara, not expecting that, chuckled to himself, rubbing his palm into his forehead. Sakura joined into the laughter, reaching out to grab the hand Deidara showed her. The blond froze as the young girl stared at it with twinkling eyes. "Hello, Mr. Mouth," she spoke to it, shaking Deidara's one hand. "It's nice to meet you. Do you talk?"
Rumi and Omaru fell over at the blush that raced up Deidara's neck and tinged his ears. To save face, he coughed and refocused on Sakura. Grinning, he took his other hand and stuck it out, palm facing the little girl. At the little girl's delighted squeal, Squad Six-Delta knew they landed themselves a winner. Instantaneously Sakura formed a close relationship with the ninja, taking to them immediately.
In fact, she would be embarrassed to admit that when her father had returned from his mission, she was less than pleased.
"What do you mean Dei-nii won't come back anymore?" Sakura huffed, crossing her arms up at her father. Daisuke, a bit stunned at the visible preference for the blond nin, was stuck in his hugging pose, arms wide open to the empty air. Sayuri laughed.
"They were only here to help out while Dad was gone," she explained slowly, edging Sakura closer to her father. "Aren't you happy Dad is back?" Their little girl just puffed her cheeks and begrudgingly accepted her father's love.
"You wound me, Sakura," Daisuke cried slowly. Sakura's expression eased, and her lip trembled.
"I love you, Daddy," the older man brightened up considerably, "but Dei-nii is more fun!" and he instantly crashed back down. Sayuri just continued to laugh.
Despite his broken heart, her father managed to work past the pain and told her stories all about his exciting mission. Her eyes, wide open, absorbed the grand gestures he used to imitate powerful jutsu and wicked combat. These tales, paired with her older friends' entertaining stories, only made her decision more concrete: become a ninja. While Sayuri hadn't been too expressive of her support, Sakura knew that her mother was just worried and wanted the best for her little girl. The shinobi in her life were much more ecstatic, finally able to influence their own little student.
"We'll have to start practicing how to throw weapons," Omaru said, his chin cradled in the arch of his hand. "And start her stamina routines." Rumi huffed.
"I will take care of that, thank you!" she said daintily, easily grabbing Sakura's thin limbs and rubbing her thumbs into their muscles. Rumi hummed and moved onto the girl's legs. "Her legs are pretty strong already, but over time and practice her arms will have more impact."
"Ew, stop molesting her!" Deidara teased, taking Sakura into his arms. She wrapped her arms around his neck out of habit. She tried to hide it, but Sakura had an obvious preference for the blond male of the squad. Their personalities were the closest, Rumi coming a close second. Sakura and Omaru were friendly, but their orange-haired teammate spent most of his time with Sayuri. Deidara leaned in close to Sakura's ear, and whispered like it was a secret, "We all know that she's going to be Iwa's Next Best Bomb Expert!" The two shared a laugh, and Rumi growled playfully.
"Well then!" The girl tackled the pair to the ground, quickly initiating a wrestle. "The first thing to teach Sakura—don't ever listen to Deidara!"
Regardless of what the kunoichi had said, Sakura found herself under the tutelage of so many instructors she could barely count them. Though they had to wait until she officially began study at the academy to start chakra exercises, Squad Six-Delta worked her body, mind, and weapon skills. Her father took over training when he was in town, and focused on her techniques and application. However, the squad covered her most often.
Deidara managed to squeak by Rumi and begin her crash course in the fine art of art. Well, he called it that, at least—Sakura called it explosions, but tried to understand his viewpoint. The blond understood that the young pinkette had a distinct disadvantage when it came to creating the casings, as his family had developed a kekkei genkai specific to the task. So Deidara had instructed her on the basic aspects of pottery and clay. Instead of the method he used to develop bombs, Sakura would have to create each case and pack it with the correct amount of gunpowder.
"Eventually, when you have enough chakra, you'll be able to set them off without fire," he explained. To show, he took one of their tiny works that packed the power of a single firecracker, and threw it into the air. It exploded shortly after. The trick was to saturate the gunpowder with chakra, a step naturally done by his other mouths. As well as the basic of bomb-making, Deidara went over the ways to effectively use explosive tags, bombs that didn't make fire, and promised to teach her at a later date the basics of clay manipulation.
Omaru took up chakra theory with her, having little else to offer—Sakura understood that the Okutsuki clan held their teachings close to the chest, and anything detailed could classify as Omaru leaking clan techniques. He was stellar anyway, she proudly told him often. The orange-haired genin made sure that she understood all facets of chakra: its use, composition, nature, and affects. Once she memorized that information, Omaru had moved onto a more complicated school of learning in the ninja world: seals and the power of paper. Though she only managed to understand the aspects that directly related to Deidara's teachings at the time, Omaru tried his best to help her understand basic countermeasures against seals.
Rumi, as the taijutsu and frontline fighter of their squad, took care of all of her physical conditioning. Rumi was part of the Hadami clan, a relatively small clan that did not have a bloodline, but instead a specialty. Founded by a group of physicians and doctors, the clan was one of the leading experts on body physiology and manipulation. They knew the tricks and quirks of the human body, and had single-handedly created the standard used to teach and test hunter-nin. Rumi, the heiress of the clan, eagerly wanted her own subject to test her knowledge on. Patiently, she and Sakura worked almost every day on her muscle density and strengthening bone. Over time, she also introduced a special focus on flexibility meant to help the young girl overcome her genetically-determined low level of sheer muscle fibers.
The most surprising source of help came from the squad's taciturn leader himself. Morimoto-sensei never really seemed like a person to Sakura, until he had begun his own regimen with her. The jounin, when she wasn't being dogged by his three students or her own father, would sit down with her and cover genjutsu. She was still too young to be taught genjutsu, but basics and dispelling was okay—something about genjutsu backfires scrambling the brains of their young academy students kept Iwa from delving into that subject until later in their career. Despite that policy, Morimoto-sensei seemed like he really wanted to teach her a specific technique, but never would speak up about it.
The days flashed by under the tutelage of her dear friends, and finally the first day of the academy began. She walked out of the house wearing a huge smile, her hair styled after Deidara's high ponytail. Her mother wanted something more stylish, but the young girl had insisted, claiming it to be "sensible" for a young kunoichi to tie her hair up, if not shear it short altogether. The minute Sakura mentioned anything about cutting her long pink hair Sayuri grabbed her hair and threw it up in an elastic band.
Other than that smug moment in her life and the occasional days she met up with Squad Six-Delta, Sakura found her academy life to be defined by two words at the same time: interesting and disappointing all at the same time. Interesting because they began lessons on ninjutsu that her friends had never talked about, and disappointing because all of her classmates were just so beneath her. It was with no small amount of pride that she looked at her report cards every few months to see her class ranking as "1," but the knowledge that amongst her peers she had no improvement to make saddened her. One of her favorite parts about learning new things was that she could work toward bettering herself, and competing with her friends on developing skills. Here, she was already clearly too prepared, but Iwa procedure outlined a full stay at the academy, no matter how gifted its students were.
She found it mildly annoying, but after hearing word of Konoha's youngest ever genius going AWOL and it being chalked up to the system's heavy expectations and his rapid raise in ranks, Sakura quieted down and accepted that she'd just have to urge her classmates to be as good as her. She certainly didn't feel like going crazy anytime soon.
The years passed by. Seasons changed, punctuated by an eventful birthday here and there. Her time in the academy was slowly coming to an end, with only one final year left. She was nine, but her birthday was soon coming. Deidara hinted at something special, but that just made her blush. As young girls were wont to do, Sakura had sortofkindof developed a tiny crush on the boy she could call her best friend. She thought it was almost reciprocated, if she looked beyond their five-year difference. The young girl really looked forward to her birthday, since it meant that everyone would be together again. She hadn't seen her father for a month now, and ever since Squad Six-Delta's recent promotion their mission frequency had gotten a promotion too.
The war ended that wish.
Sayuri had explained it to her in censored words, but Sakura understood a lot more than her mother wanted to acknowledge. The civil war destroying Iwa was brought on by an unhappy series of outside burgs rising up to overthrow the Iwakage and install a new one. In essence Iwagakure was like a pond after a single raindrop, with circles spreading out father than the tiny center. She lived in the center of the village, the safest section with its high walls and deeply running tunnel systems designed for escape. However, a lot of that safety went out the window when dealing with ninja raised in the same village, who had intimate knowledge of the precautions and defenses set before them. Civil war was terrifying for a ninja village, because it took civilian and shinobi life equally—it simply had to do with which side of the city you were on. And she hated to admit it, but Sakura knew that the outer rings of the village had the highest concentration of ninja. The innards had the best trained kept there to protect the weak fledgling academy students, but when it came to ninja of similar type the battles boiled down to who had the numbers or strategy.
From the ever-encroaching sounds of warfare and death, Sakura knew that numbers would win this time. Refugees that somehow escaped the madness found themselves huddled in the streets of central Iwagakure, adding to the never ending sense of activity now present in their previously quiet neighborhood. More and more wounded people poured in, and the scurrying of ninja tabi continued well into the night. Sakura gladly volunteered to relinquish her bed to a refugee family so that she could rest in the living room. It was open and had a large window with a view into the street. Being there, wide-eyed and pensive as she sat on the couch, was much better than pacing her tiny room, paranoid and shaking.
Eventually, a month into a cycle of constant tremors and nightmares, something began to change. Sakura could hear it in the night—or rather, the lack of it. It hadn't been completely silent in weeks, and yet tonight it was. Schooling her breathing into a sleeping pattern, Sakura feigned sleep to catch the conversation that marked the end of a passive war life for her and her mother.
"They're going to be here soon."
"We're doing our best."
"Morimoto-sensei?"
"You have two days." Sakura held back from the desire to gasp. Two days? Even for a civil war, this had been short compared to history's bloodied pages. What kind of weapon was the revolt packing that they could end a civil war with a major shinobi power in a little over a month?
"What can we do?"
"Listen." Sakura paid careful attention to Morimoto-sensei's plan. Squad Six-Delta had been turned into a recon squad, and would be the first to abandon the battlefield. Then her father and the Morimoto-sensei would desert under the cover of intense Earth-style techniques, which were known for kicking up tons of dirt and obscuring a battlefield, if not changing it completely. They all planned to cross paths at this point as a chance to pick up the only two civilians of their group without having to stage a huge cover up. Morimoto-sensei was probably worried about being overheard, but he wasn't using very complicated code, if any at all; most likely it was for her mother's sake than anything else.
Right after completing his mission, Morimoto-sensei left just as the sound of ninja feet ran across their roof. Suddenly, the silence of the night took on a whole new meaning for Sakura. Morimoto-sensei was adept at genjutsu, and the lack of other shinobi meant he had trapped their house in some kind of distraction jutsu, or had hidden it from their eyes. If a jounin from central Iwa, with the ability to trap an entire bulding in a genjutsu without alerting the other jounin, was so worried about their survival, then there was no ignoring the real danger outside.
Steeling herself for a long night, Sakura opened her eyes and sat up on the couch. The blanket she was using pooled in her lap, leaving her chest open to the night's chill. She and her mother's green eyes met in the darkness. People said that the two Haruno women had the same irises, but her mother was adamant: Sakura inherited her eyes from her father. Daisuke's eyes twinkled when he laughed. The way her mother's eyes reflected the moonlight gave her the uncanny appearance of a cat.
"How long have you been awake?" she asked. Sakura calmed her emotions and hopped off the couch.
"Long enough," she answered shortly. Sakura looked up at her mother, closing herself off from the woman—the academy often stressed that personal attachments could cloud your judgment during battles, and Sakura needed to keep her head clear. Sayuri, she was keenly aware, was not able to protect herself. Even if she hadn't graduated, Sakura knew it was her responsibility as the closest thing to a shinobi in that house to protect her weak mother. Her father once told her it was her responsibility to keep an eye out for the woman, who often overlooked the darker aspects of ninja life. Especially after hearing harrowing details from a shaken Deidara, who spoke of civilians ripped to pieces or displayed as a sign of the revolt's presence, Sakura understood just how much Sayuri would need protection.
The little academy student reached for her backpack. Following standard academy procedure for preparing for emergency situations, Sakura had created her own panic bag. If she ever had to leave the house suddenly, she could count on this bag having all her essentials; all it needed afterword was just a few of her more sentimental gifts, which she had stored inside right after choosing to move out of her room. Reaching inside it, she found the compartment she desired—the weapons pouch. Carefully she extracted a case of her weapons and released the clasps. Her mother gasped at the rows of new kunai and shuriken. A holster was also included, a nice durable leather pouch she could strap to anything by tightening a tiny buckle. Ignoring the horrified look her mother was sending the metal, Sakura slipped the holster on her thigh and crammed it with as many weapons as possible.
"Sakura…" her mother began, but Sakura was too high-strung to deal with it.
"Mom, I'm not dumb. I saw this coming a long time ago." It was true, but her childishness kept her from believing it fully. In essence, that tiny piece of hope left in her probably kept the young girl from giving up entirely. Sakura looked at her mother, disappointed by her unwillingness to accept that her daughter really was entering this kind of world. "I need you to understand that the only reason I'm not out there right now is because this started right after the year began."
Her mother tried to deny it. "They wouldn't do something like that!" But Sakura might have been the only one to really comprehend how close she was to ending up on the battlefield. The last part of the year was just a grace period to work out kinks in team selection. As the top kunoichi of the class, her position would have been simple to place, which meant that even if Iwa had graduated them early, she would have been sent out first while the lagging students were buffed up a little more. Sakura had already guessed that, with the two other highest-rated students, they would be stationed as a relief squad. They'd have an even more dangerous job than a recon squad—their job would be to help at the frontlines with administering basic healing, restocking supplies, and setting up traps around the main base. She would have constant contact with the enemy, and their tiny stature and lack of experience made them easy pickings.
"They would and can," she growled. Iwa, even with all the praise her father and Morimoto-sensei gave the system, would still easily send out their weakest ninja against a foe they could not beat, just for the use of slowing them down by a matter of minutes. Sakura wasn't blind to the stubborn nature of the Iwakage—if Morimoto-sensei said they were going to lose, he meant it. At least their leader could come out of his fort to negotiate terms with the rebellion, to minimize their losses. But no—the Iwakage refused to do anything, preferring an all-or-nothing mentality. He'd get them all killed, his village destroyed, and his head on a pike, all for what?
'Some kind of pride,' thought Sakura as she got up to find a bag for her mother. She dug in the closet for a second before her hands felt the durable fabric. Handing it to her mother, she ordered, "Go and fill this with your things, Mom. Make sure you get everything you need, first—nothing perishable or fragile, unless you have to have it." Finding that it was easier ignore her raging emotions while working, Sakura busied herself in the supply closet again. Her mother whispered her name sadly.
The way her mother had sounded so lost just struck something in the young ninja. She could feel the telltale prickling at the corners of her eyes, followed by a burning sensation. "We… We have to be strong, Mom." Sakura sniffed pitifully and hurried to wipe her face. She needed to be strong enough for both of them! If not… "That's a real war out there, and anything can happen. If we don't prepare for it, we'll…" Sakura tried to not flinch back when Sayuri rushed to embrace her daughter.
The physical touch made her want to just curl up and hide away in her mother's arms, turn her face away from the war literally outside her door. She shook, her mother trying hard to mask her own fear. Sakura willed herself to contain her tears, knowing that the minute she let them fall meant defeat.
"It's going to be okay, Sakura," her mother uttered to her gently, swaying in a slow motion. Inwardly, Sakura tried her hardest to keep herself from pushing the woman off of her. While she wanted to be coddled, she had absolutely no view of the window. She was pinned down, unable to react fast enough to anything that might put them in danger. At the same time, another part of her clutched onto her mother's scent desperately. "We're going to make it okay. Somehow, someway." They sat in the silence. Sakura calmed her haggard breathing, trying to open her senses. There were no ninja in the immediate area, all probably holed up near the wall for a final push against the rebellion. If Morimoto-sensei wasn't exaggerating, then they'd be mowed down effortlessly.
'I don't want to die,' she whispered to herself. Her mother was so warm, so soft. They didn't deserve to be in this place. 'I don't want anyone to die.'
All too soon Sayuri pulled away from Sakura. She stood, knees creaking as they straightened. With false bravado she looked down at her little girl and grinned. "I better start packing, huh?" Sakura nodded solemnly, doing her best to forget that feeling of comfort. It would only distract her when the fighting came closer.
"Yeah." Sayuri ascended the stairs, stepping carefully to not creak the floorboards. Sakura stared after her for a moment, lost in a lack of thought. Abruptly she rose, turning away from the closet and deigning it pointless. The girl hurried herself into her backpack, pulling out a wrapped bundle. Pulling the twine quickly, the paper gave way and her own little bombs rolled out. In the darkness they looked like tiny marbles running away.
While she still wasn't perfect, Deidara had declared her passable and thus allowed to use explosives offensively. Sakura now had the ability to channel her chakra correctly into the gunpowder, so fuses became irrelevant. The bigger ones were more difficult for her to handle, but it was just a matter of building up the chakra to control them. Clay manipulation, on the other hand, was still a work in progress. It required more chakra than she currently could muster, and the finesse needed to achieve elemental chakra was still a little out of her reach. Deidara said it probably would be that way until she was genin for a few more years because her coils still had a little more maturing to do before elemental tricks were available.
She didn't feel comfortable until she had a tiny bag of bombs added to the belt of her outfit. She'd been dressed in the same brown pants and shirt since yesterday, feeling naked and unprotected in her regular clothes.
Before discarding the wrapping Sakura slipped free her explosive notes. While it was generally frowned upon for academy students to own them, Sakura found a way around actually purchasing them. With a little coordination between Deidara and Omaru, they taught her the basics of making her own notes. It wasn't too difficult, since she had memorized the seal array on common explosive notes, but it was modifying them that proved tricky. So far she had managed to figure out how to replace a seal so that she could store different powders in them, creating flash tags and gas notes. Anything else just made her paper burst into flames when she channeled some chakra into them.
Grabbing a kunai, she lifted it to the light. Its sides reflected the little light in the room, almost matching the dark night sky. Her grip was firm and she summoned her courage. In a couple days she may be forced to end a life with this knife, to mortally wound someone to protect her precious people. Death was the way of the ninja—in order to carry out their missions or defend their villages, someone had to die on the other side. At that exact moment there were people dying to save their beloved village.
She began wrapping the handle with her explosive note when she heard her mother's footsteps. "I'm going to be okay," Sakura said to herself more than her mother. She was going to be okay with hurting someone, if it meant that she and her family could live another day. She was okay with killing for peace. "I'm going to be okay." Her mother didn't comment, instead heading to sit on the couch. After preparing a few more kunai, she joined Sayuri. Her eyes slowly closed, suddenly exhausted. She and her mother fell asleep.
Sakura was up far earlier than her mother. The chakra blasting off in their village almost choked her. The ground shook, and she could hear their fine china rattling in its cabinet. There was a high-pitched whistling, and suddenly a huge blast. Sayuri jumped awake, looking like a deer. Sakura could hear another whistle, this time closer. Gasping, she rolled off the couch and fisted her mother's shirt.
"Mom, move, now!" Sakura yelled, pulling her mother to the floor. A second later an explosion tore out a hole in the wall, sending wreckage everywhere. The girl could feel a bit of glass drag across her forehead, the wound inflicted so quickly it barely hurt. She didn't even think it had hit her until blood started to drip down her face. Sakura had to blink constantly to keep it from getting in her eye. She glanced at Sayuri and breathed in relief at the relative wellbeing of her mother.
Gulping, Sakura ground her teeth and looked above the couch for any sign of another ninja. The swirling dust obscured the hole heavily, like a thick fog. She almost cried when a familiar shadow jumped before her.
"Sakura!" Deidara called out. He was standing on the rubble of the hole, using a piece of concrete as leverage to swing around. The pink-haired girl was quick to scramble out from behind the couch.
"Here!" she replied cheerfully. She grabbed her backpack and swung it onto her shoulders. Other than some superficial damage, her best friend was unharmed. There was a nasty burn on his neck that would later scar, but it was small. Sakura felt herself catapult into Deidara's arms, happiness flooding her when his long arms surrounded her. It was a just a quick squeeze, but the contact assured the two that both were alive and well. She always knew it in the back of her mind, but the war cemented it: life, like a candle flame, was delicate and snuffed easily. One wrong move, one bad injury, and that was it.
An explosion sent them jumping into battle stances, breathing heavily and staring out into the billowing smoke. Slowly Sakura could see a shape appear through the curtain of dust, a much larger and masculine form. She grit her teeth as a rebel ninja materialized before them, dressed in a uniform that hid all distinctive features. Deidara armed himself beside her.
'Okay, he's coming closer. This is an enemy, another shinobi that will not hesitate to kill us,' Sakura coached herself mentally, everything moving in slow motion. 'If we don't kill him first, he will kill us. There is no mercy. This is an enemy. You can't choke. You can't freeze.' The sound of the nin's footstep was like a drum. Sakura gulped and reached down for a knife, pupils dilating to capture more details. Her chakra churned within her, eager to be used. Another step.
'Don't choke. Don't freeze. Don't die.' Sakura inhaled deeply and squeezed her muscles tight, coiled like a viper. Time almost stopped completely, the two young ninja preparing to take down their foe.
…All for nothing. Before any of them could react, the rebel was struck down by her father's signature weapons. The curved knives sailed through the air, their circular motion allowing them to either dig into the ninja's flesh or shred it to pieces. Sakura, mystified by the ribbons of blood squirting into the air, didn't even register her father's form.
"You have to go, now." Sakura jumped out of her daze, quickly looking at Daisuke. He was worse for the wear—she could see him favoring one side and hunching over to alleviate some internal pain. Her father didn't look like his usual composed self, caked in blood and dirt as it were. "There's a team oncoming. He was just a scout." Instantly Sakura fell back into that cold place, her mantra quietly buzzing at the back of her mind. Her mother kept trying to prod the man, worry painting her features.
The moment her father mentioned staying behind, Sakura instantly knew how this would end. Her mother could cry and refuse it, but the jounin standing in the middle of the room was serious. The rebels would easily overpower one wounded jounin, one green chuunin, and technically two civilians. If they didn't go now, there was no going at all. But if they left without some distraction, they wouldn't get very far. The brave man that was her father had to make a difficult and heroic choice to protect what was most important to him. Sakura looked up into her father's green eyes as her mother bawled.
Memories of piggy-backs and ice cream cones, high swings and quiet afternoons came to Sakura, her most favorite times with her father. He was hurt and dirty, but that man in her recollections was here in front of her, for what she distinctly knew to be the last time. The next time she would see him, it would be at a headstone.
She couldn't help it when her legs carried her to Daisuke's side, or when her arms reached out to clutch at his pants. His large hand came upon her head, rubbing soothing circles into her hair.
"I'm so proud of you." Sakura stubbornly kept her eyes dry as a desert. Her father's eyes scanned her face, memorizing every detail of his daughter's face to recall as he died. He hummed as something came to him, reaching into a vest pocket. He pulled out a surprisingly clean scroll only marred by constant use. Sakura accepted it delicately, frowning at the memento her father was leaving her. "It's just a storage scroll, but it has something in it I always wanted you to have. Become strong for me, okay?"
All she wanted to do was run with him. Sakura wanted to go back in time, back to a place of peace and happiness and smiles and sunshine, where her family was healthy and whole, and her friends laughed and played with her. She wanted to go back to a place where her teachers praised her and her classmates looked on jealously. War was tearing everything apart, leaving her with nothing but a scroll and fond memories.
"Y-yeah." She hated how weak she sounded. Her father opened his mouth to say something else, but snapped his jaw shut when screams broke the silence. Deidara, who had been idly standing by and the tragedy unfolded, jumped a foot in the air and hissed.
'Those were from upstairs!' she panicked, turning around quickly to watch the stairwell. Deidara nervously looked around and grabbed Sakura, ready to bolt at a moment's notice. Sakura kept her eyes trained on the stairs, trying to ignore her mother's emotional goodbye. She ignored the stray thought that flit across her mind, 'Will I ever get to cry over this?'
The door upstairs exploded into shards of wood, the revolting ninja spilling out like rats. Daisuke slipped back into his own dark place, wasting no time in cutting out the jugular of the nearest enemy. "Go!" Sakura latched onto her mother as Deidara started to move, keeping her face forward. She would only remember her father by the way he stood as a human shield, using his entire body despite how badly it must have hurt. Her father was so many things that she could only aspire to be. Deidara lunged forward, and just like that, they were sprinting in the streets, leaving the most important man in their lives as a sacrifice.
Her mother was faring surprisingly well, Sakura acknowledged, knowing that traversing the uneven and constantly shaking terrain was difficult even for her. Explosions followed them on all sides as the rebellion crawled forward. Shards of metal and the occasional weapon flew through the air, Deidara doing his best to deflect them while simultaneously dropping little gifts for any pursuers. Sakura wanted to help, but both of her hands were occupied. She could feel one or two little rocks tear into the skin of her ankles. Other than the mild irritation and the mind-numbingly constant presence of fear, Sakura thought that things were finally looking up.
Of course that meant that things had to instantly go to hell the minute she thought that, Sakura raged as her mother crumpled to the ground in pain. Trying to distance the wounded woman from the title of "mother", Sakura mechanically started dressing the wound. The metal poking from the civilian's abdomen was sharp and jagged, most likely deep enough to damage an organ or two. The blood poured forth, coating Sakura's small hands as Deidara focused on the removal of the bar. The woman's head lolled back the second it dislodged from her stomach with a loud sucking sound. The two ninja did their best, but field medicine wasn't going to cut it for long.
Deidara glanced between her stony face and the woman's pale pallor. Beads of sweat formed at his brow as his brain worked overtime. "I don't know how we're going to carry her… If only Rumi were here…" Sakura just stared, unable to come up with anything.
Yet again, a jounin came to their rescue. Morimoto-sensei's arrival was like a gift from the gods.
"Morimoto-sensei, I love you, un." Deidara could have collapsed from his relief if Sakura hadn't been there to press an elbow in his side. Morimoto-sensei simply hummed and looked forward, his student knowing his code well enough to get the message to take point. Sakura followed closely, risking a single glance at her pale mother. The woman was breathing in short bursts tempered by pain, and one of her arms hung limply in the air. Her green glazed eyes stared at the sky, focused on nothing. A sharp turn later and she was staring at Deidara's stiff back, determinately jumping behind him.
The three of them moved in unison, jumping over sharp debris and fire. Morimoto-sensei spoke up as they drew closer to the edges of the battlefield.
"Rumi and Omaru are waiting ahead of us at the tree line. Once we meet up, we'll head out for Suna."
Deidara groaned, his adrenaline wearing out his body. "Great."
Sakura kept her attention at the front, trying to ignore the desperate argument her mother was numbly waging with the jounin that held her. Her father—there was no surviving for a man in that situation. What did she expect? Sakura swallowed thickly, her grasp deadly strong on her father's scroll. Hope was something they had no business trying to hold on to, at this point. Their home was in ruins, loved ones dead, and government collapsed at their feet.
For a brief moment, she hated her ailing mother. She hated her for being civilian, for not understanding, for daring to let her tears fall. But the moment passed quickly as they came upon yet another scene of grief at the treeline.
Rumi fought against two rebel nin by herself, firmly dug in over the body of Omaru. As she defended against their taijutsu with a kunai, she noticed their arrival. "Morimoto-sensei!" she cried out, lashing at the nearest enemy. Deidara's breath left him in an audible whoosh.
"Omaru..." he whispered, slowing in his run. Sakura watched his muscles load like springs, his body sharpen into a blade fueled by anguish. "OMARU!" He sprang forward, and with his added power the two members of Squad Echo-Two quickly beat down the rebels. Around them laid the other rebels Rumi had downed, blood streaking their battleground.
Sakura witnessed their hearts shrink and decay away as they looked at Omaru's lifeless corpse, his face turned away from her. She could see a nasty gash on his neck through his hair, and she easily pinned it as the fatal wound. Rumi was damaged in multiple ways as well, but it appeared mostly superficial. Sakura came closer, unable to tear her eyes away from her fallen friend. She and Omaru had never been the closest, but something was undeniably different now. It wasn't completely solid, but she could feel the ghosting of a hole in her safety net, like her back was unguarded. It was an eerie, troublesome feeling that threatened to break her careful mask of apathy.
"Th-they came out of nowhere. We were waiting for you guys to arrive, bu-but then this team of rebel nins arrive-ived. O-O-Omaru and I managed to keep them away, but wo-one got through and… and…" Rumi's words tumbled out, her sobbing punctuating each word. Deidara couldn't control his emotions, feeling too many things at once. Anger, sadness, grief, guilt—he lacked the proper way to express them all, so he went to the easiest path: physical aggression. He pounded the ground with his fists, imagining the faces of all the Iwa nin he had killed today.
"Team," Morimoto-sensei hushed, his voice more hollow than his expression. Deidara and Rumi didn't need much else, and slowly pried themselves away from their best friend's body, reluctant to leave him. Finally Deidara and Rumi shared a pained look. Rumi nodded, sucking in her lower lip. Deidara, trying to stifle his tears, reached into his pocket for a bit of gunpowder. He tossed it into the air and used his chakra to light it, sending tiny sparkles into the air. They drifted slowly down, and with each dying spark a flame bloomed to life on Omaru's body. Sakura watched every moment of the hasty funeral, searing it into her memory. This was what war did to you. It stripped you of your life and love, leaving nothing but burning husks and broken souls.
Without coming to terms completely, the group was again moving into the forest. Rumi limped slightly from a wound, but otherwise held up well enough. Deidara, always the point man, kept his face high and wet eyes open. Just as they hid the thicker forest line, an explosion rocked the ground, making everyone turn around in a shock. Sakura witnessed a fireball rise into the air like a phoenix right over the area her home was in. Her mother cried out in terror, coherent enough in her pain to pieces the puzzle together.
"DAISUKE!" she wailed as the flames danced across town, hazing everything they has grown to know and cherish. The smoke blacked out the night sky, reflecting the embers burning below. Her mother struggled to sit higher, but fell back down in Morimoto-sensei's arms in a heap, bereft of any residual strength. She cried outright, strong and deeply pained. Rumi, still emotionally unsound, also became worked up. Sakura let the fire burn into her retinas, trying to not trip up running sideways.
And that was it. The final goodbye. Iwa was no more. If they had ever dreamed of returning, those aspirations went up in smoke with that fireball. All around her her life was falling apart, her friends ripping at the seams, her family dropping off one by one. It was just too much for her to handle—everyone was crying! They were too loud, too noticeable—nothing was going right and everything was spiraling into a nosedive into the ground in hellfire...!
"ENOUGH!" Sakura bellowed, unable to keep her silence any longer. Her body shook with emotion, trying to contain the rage and despair all at once. She stopped running to look her companions in the eyes, her own threatening to spill over in tears. She knew her face was pulled as neutrally as possible, but the tears rolled down like soldiers marching to their deaths. "Enough… If we keep this up, why are we even trying to hide? They'll hear us bawling from a mile away." She clutched her scroll to her chest like a lifeline. This was too much for her to take on. She was only nine! Nine, homeless, and lost. Sakura nearly wanted to lie down and let the flames take her.
Morimoto-sensei apparently realized the derailed situation and brought his mind back into perspective. He coolly began giving orders again, sending their group into movement yet again. "We must continue on, so that Omaru's and Daisuke's efforts do not go to waste," he said, leading them into the dark forest stretching out before them. The ninja latched onto their emotions and smothered all of them, only allowing an iron will drive them forward. Sakura finally let out a breath, and wiped away her tears.
They continued on for about fifteen more minutes before Deidara broke the silence. He turned around so that he was twisted at the waist, skillfully still running in a straight line. "Sensei." Sakura watched Deidara raptly, her stomach dropping like a dead weight. There was something terrible going to happen.
"Are you sure about this?" the older man asked, his eyes searching Deidara's soul. Rumi caught on and began to nearly break down again—confused, Sakura reached out with her senses, trying to figure out what just was happening.
With a startled gasp she came across four other chakra signatures, all following their trail. Sakura let her gaze pierce Deidara's blue eyes, trying to discern his reasoning. No... Not Deidara!
Rumi voiced Sakura's personal thoughts. "You can't be for real! There are too many—" The older girl wasn't ready to just let go of her other teammate like this, not when Omaru had been ripped from their clutches so violently.
Deidara did his best to explain calmly why this was the only course of action. Being the only decently fit and available person on the team, he had the best skillset to throw them off the trail. Rumi wasn't hearing any of it and shook her head repeatedly, her nose beginning to bleed. In order to continue talking, the group fell from the tree branches and landed to the ground, standing in a circle.
"I have the highest chakra levels right now," he said, holding up his hands, which stuck out their tongues. I'm the best at causing distractions, so you guys can run away safely. Don't worry—I'll catch up, okay? It's a promise between teammates, Rumi!" Rumi's breath caught pitifully. Deidara looked at Sakura, his gaze softening at her stony expression.
"Deidara," Sakura muttered, her hands shaking. She couldn't say anything much else in her rollercoaster of emotions. Deidara just smiled charmingly and opened his arms, welcoming Sakura's tiny trembling form. He held her close, trying to keep his own hands from shaking too badly. Rumi joined in the hug, just as desperate for some assurance. They stayed like that for a moment they all desperately wished to last forever. Deidara was the first to release them, however, and he marched up to his sensei. He gazed down at the civilian he had tried to protect all this time, worried at her dazed expression.
"You don't have much time, un," he said, cocky determination masking any anticipation he felt. "I'll do my best, sensei!" Morimoto-sensei nodded at his student, and he reorganized them into a new formation with him at the front, flanked behind by the two girls. Deidara stood behind them, standing strongly, smirking all the while. Sakura looked behind her as they jumped into the forest. She stared at the backs in front of her and realized she had forgotten something.
"Wait!" she yelled, falling from the branches again. Thankfully Deidara hadn't leaped away yet, and looked at her questioningly.
"Sakura, if you don't leave now, you'll make me change my mind—" he began to tease right as the younger girl jumped up and kissed him on the mouth, wrapping her arms around his neck. Deidara's eyes shot open in shock, and on instinct brought his arms up to hold Sakura. The pinkette held herself there for a few seconds before hiding her burning face into the crook of Deidara's neck.
"I like you, you know!" she whispered harshly, struggling to keep her tears inside. "You better come back, understand! Now that you know, you can't not come back!" She hesitantly pulled away, letting Deidara see her incredibly red face. His cheeks were dusted pink too, and only darkened further by the loud, feminine gasp from the trees.
The blond pulled his lips into a goofy grin and squeezed Sakura around the waist, winking at her. "You know it, babe. What kind of knight would I be if I never came back to see the princess?" He let her go, and Sakura's feet met the ground.
"A terrible one," she muttered angrily, and turned around again. Sakura couldn't keep her scowl for long though and sent Deidara a shaky smile, trying to quell the whisperings of the chances of his survival that flit across her mind. "Don't disappoint me, Deidara." She jumped into the trees, ignoring how Rumi hawkishly watched her with a tiny grin. Deidara just laughed below, and the crunching of leaves signaled his departure.
"We need to go," Morimoto-sensei intoned, gesturing to the unconscious woman in his arms. Instantly their somewhat good mood was gone, and the trio resumed their monotonous tree running to Suna. Sakura prayed for Deidara, prayed for her mother, prayed for herself—this was their final stretch. She wouldn't dare begin to hope, but she could begin to prepare herself for it. They ran for an hour and a half before the ground started to show signs of a sandier consistency—another twenty and they were making large leaps between the sparse trees before they had to stop entirely as they thinned out to mere bushes. The desert stretched out before them, and the desert wind blew over them. Morimoto-sensei set a course southwest of their current position, straight for Suna's capital. Suna was a dangerous place to be in, but it's capital offered more sanctuary than their own home did right then.
Cautious of the weather, Morimoto-sensei tried to keep them traveling with the wind rather than against its buffeting force. They traveled the landscape for some time before he suddenly veered off course, heading straight for a rock formation that provided some protecting from the wind. Sakura and Rumi shared a look and followed obediently, arriving to the cave just as he laid out Sayuri on the stone floor. He struck a match and lit a nearby bush, providing some measly light.
Sakura took in her mother's condition, her somewhat neutral feeling falling right back into the sullen and broken tone it had been for the most of the night. The woman's skin tone had faded into an ashen tone, her veins pronounced and running deep blue. Her muscles weren't doing anything—leaving her mother as complete dead weight. Her breaths, small and quiet, grew shorter with each inhale. Her wound had stopped flowing blood, but that could just mean that she had run out of blood to bleed.
"Mom?" she called out to the wind hoarsely, reaching out a hand to touch her mother. Her father's scroll had been stashed in her pack upon entering the desert to protect it. The prone woman didn't respond, and Sakura began shaking her in earnest, panic setting in. "Mom! Mom, come on! No, not now, please!"
Rumi and Morimoto-sensei shared a look and stepped back, giving Sakura and her mother some room. The pink haired girl frantically did everything she could to rouse the woman—shaking, pinching, hitting, yelling, even slapping—but nothing worked. Tearfully Sakura let her hands fall to her lap, and allowed herself to cry over her mother's body. "Mom..."
With a faint moan, Sayuri stirred and settled into the sand, her eyes blearily opening to the world. Sakura gasped and leaned over, her tears pittering onto her mother's cheeks.
"Why's it so cold...?" she murmured, slowly looking around. Her strength was fading fast, and Sakura could watch as her muscles gave out one by one. She reached out and grabbed one of Sayuri's hands, trying to give the woman some sensation.
"Mom, hold on!" she cried, squeezing tightly. Her mother just weakly looked up and attempted to smile.
"Yerr so pretty, Sak'ra..." Sayuri slurred heavily, her tongue heavy. With wide eyes Sakura held on to her mother's every word, trying to latch onto her dying flame. "Love you... s'much... yerr the most important thing... inma life..." Each word was a new struggle, a new sob from Sakura's chest. They had come so close... So close!
"Mom..."
Sayuri looked up to the sky and sighed peacefully. "Yerr gonn be strong, jus like... father... I... I feel like... I'mma see im soon..."
Sakura felt her heart twinge and she shook her head, "Mom, don't say stuff like that! You're going to be fine! We're almost to Suna!" Sakura broke down and clutched her mother in her arms, alarmed at how cold the woman's skin was, how feeble she felt.
"Sunaaaaa?" Sayuri asked, no longer comprehensive. Her eyes circled around to Sakura's face and she moaned. "I lah... you... Beee ss... saaafe..." She sighed and closed her eyes. "So... tired..."
"Mom! Mom!" Sayuri reached up, hand shaking to gently touch Sakura's cheek before it fell to the ground lifelessly. Sakura stared like she had been stung viciously.
"Jus... gonn take... nap..."
"Mom, n-nooo…!" Sakura cried as her mother faded away before her eyes. Sayuri smiled gently and let out a final breath.
"Wake me... inth... morn'n... honey..."
With that final whisper Haruno Sayuri left the world of the living, her daughter bent over in melancholy. Rumi and Morimoto-sensei come closer to take Sakura by the shoulders. The young girl let them move her, and fell into an autopilot mode, just letting Rumi walk her around. Morimoto-sensei waited until Rumi was around the corner of the rock formation before he made sure the woman was dead, feeling her neck for any pulse. Not finding any, he stood up resolutely and lit a matchbox, dropping it onto the woman's body gently. The flames quickly found sustenance and grew quickly, eating the woman away.
The jounin sensei grabbed up the bags and met with the two girls at the mouth of the rock formation, where Rumi was rubbing comforting circles into Sakura's hunched back. The smell of burning flesh was slowly filling the air, making his eyes water. Yes, definitely.
"We're going to keep moving," he told them, slinging two bags over his shoulder and dropping two before the younger nin. "The day temperatures aren't suitable for travel in the desert, so we need to cover as much distance as possible right now." Rumi looked up at him and shook her head.
"But what about Deidara?" she asked quietly, unable to bring forth any more strong emotions. Sakura's head snapped up, and she bored her green eyes into Morimoto-sensei's stretched face.
"We can't leave without Deidara!" she hissed, grabbing her bag and holding it to her chest like a lifeline. "He promised... He's coming back! He will!" Sakura buried her face into her backpack, muttering Deidara's name like a mantra. The jounin looked at her and then at the distant smoke, his lips pulled into a taut line.
"We'll wait for another hour, but that's it. If Deidara doesn't come, he knows that we're heading for Suna and then Konoha—he'll be able to meet up with us then."
Sakura quieted up as her acknowledgment of his decision, and Rumi gave him a thankful smile. She wasn't prepared to leave this desert without her only other teammate with them. Now that they had some time, the boyish chuunin reached into her backpack and pulled out some medicinal tools, intent on performing some first aid to keep them going. She started with the young pinkette first, trying to work around the near catatonic state she was in. The little girl was lifeless, and Rumi wished with all her heart that she would eventually perk up—
Because if she didn't the kunoichi didn't know how they'd both last in this desert, emotionally broken and numb.
shh i know everything about canon is messed up but
i dont care lol