Chapter 3- Understandings
"Why did it take you so damn long to get here, dammit? If I send a letter telling you to haul ass home then it is in your best fucking interest to do it!"
He was angry, beyond so actually. Unknown to her, his letter had arrived at her office about ten minutes after she was forced to go to training with her team which meant hours and hours were unaccounted for. She wouldn't dare tell him that she was with her friends; he would hate them even more and her punishments for being seen with them would surely increase tenfold.
As she turned her back to him while she stood in front of the stove, numbness was spreading through her like a bacterial disease. She mechanically flipped the eggs and sausage but his words continued to wash over her like a boulder caught on the very edge of a sea-rimmed cliff. They were drowning her, if anything.
"You're pathetic."
"You're nothing."
"You're a waste of space."
"You're better off dead."
"You're lucky that I pitied you. I'm the closest thing to love you'll ever get."
That's what hurt her the most and as if knowing it, he told it to her every chance he got. It was like taking a kunai and thrusting it in her chest to stop her breathing; to wound her already scarred heart. Saying that he pitied her made the pinkette resist any such form of it whether it was from Tsunade or Sasuke or Naruto or anybody. Now, being pitied was just as bad as being hated by your own flesh and blood; it was worse than anything in her books.
The love thing was completely different. That hurt her because it was like hitting a refresh button on everything that had happened between Sasuke and Naruto. She could only imagine how far she had fallen from having one man love her unconditionally and another (that she was completely head over heels for) love her as a sister (only since he returned to Konaha). The very subject of love was like a stake to the heart now, because she knew from Kai's words that she was lucky that he loved her. No matter how bad he treated her and no matter how much she resented him, at least someone looked at her more than just a loser; an extra weight.
She ignored him, even when his hands landed on her hips; too tight. It was always like this, his touches were either too hard or too tight or too heavy or too rough. He was never gentle, never caring, never considerate to how his digging nails made her skin crawl with disgust.
She wondered what happened to kunoichi that didn't take shit from anyone.
"How long are you going to ignore me, huh?" His hands tightened on her, unaware of the scared little girl in her mind that cowered in a corner. Maybe he was aware of it; she didn't know.
"I'm not ignoring you." Her voice was breaking and she winced, knowing what was going to come next.
"Stop fucking crying!"
A sudden harsh push sent her flying onto the stove top, particularly her hand into the sizzling oil that contained the small meat patties. She cried out at the unexpected escalated violence. He usually never did things that would leave marks on places that she was unable to cover with clothing. Her hands, which touched and hovered over and healed thousands, would be a sure conversation started with just about anyone judging by the extreme pain that raced up her arm once it was healed.
Sakura's legs collapsed under her as she cradled her right hand tightly to her chest. She could feel her heart race on as if it were battling to survive.
A black boot connected with her exposed thigh and in response, her pained hiss filled the air. The strap of her beige tank-top fell off of her shoulder and left a dark, hand-shaped bruise to be completely visible. She shook, her entire body rejecting everything that it was being forced under. She could hear him screaming above her but she desperately tried to force him out. Her sanity was at stake.
A sudden knock on the door silenced the sweating, heaving man in front of her. The glare he sent her made goose bumps erupt on her skin and the look was quickly deciphered; 'Speak of this and you won't live another day.'
She stood the best she could on shaky, loose legs and stumbled over to the couch to wrap herself in the red blanket that sat upon the back of it. "I'm coming!" She winced at the sound of her own scratchy voice while sending hoards of chakra to her burnt hand, turning it to an angry, blotchy red that wouldn't ever go away, she knew. The burns were permanent just as the pain in her life was.
The kunoichi wiped furiously at her face to clear away any traitorous tears that had dared to fall within the span of the last ten minutes.
She recognized the chakra signal and as she opened the door slowly, she was proven right.
Genma stood in all his cocky glory, sporting the same provocative smirk that he always wore as his tongue gently bobbed the senbon up and down that hung from his lips. Just as his best friend and her sensei did, his hands were buried deep into his pockets making his posture seem all the more relaxed. She saw past it though; she could see the tension in his shoulder and the small tick in his jaw.
"Hey, Sakura," he began. "I can see you're looking just as beautiful as always." Genma, always trying his damned hardest to charm her into leaving Kai for him. Genma, always being there at the worst of the worst moments. Genma, making Kai probably begin to plot her death as they spoke.
She replicated the best smile that she could, a skill that she learned from Sai. What better way to learn how to pretend a smile than from studying someone who could do nothing more than fake it? "Genma, what are you doing here?"
He smirked and leaned back a little. "Well, Tsunade said she wanted to see you; urgent business. I was asked to escort you."
He was usually so truthful, if not then just a little over-the-top. This was different though; her trained eyes caught the slight flinch in his pockets, indicating that he was flexing his fingers as well as the quick flutter of his eyes. Genma was blatantly lying to her face.
She smiled at him and nodded her head once. "I'll meet you downstairs in the lobby; please allow me to just change into more appropriate clothing."
A smile lit up his face, showing off his straight, white teeth. "Alright, gorgeous."
She closed the door silently and cheered in her head at the fact that Kai couldn't do anything to her now that he knew someone was attuned to them and would discover the secret if he blew his own cover.
She completely regretted allowing herself to think that the second her backside made a dent into the wall next to the kitchen. Kai held her by her neck and growled in her face. "Why is that… bastard here?"
Sakura closed her eyes as his foul, hot breath spread across her face. "The Hokage wishes to speak with me. I must change; you know how she hates to be kept waiting."
The flicker of emotions was clear in his eyes and made it that much easier to practically read his thoughts. He was debating—debating if keeping her here with him was worth it; if letting her go would save him more grief or not.
He made a quick decision and grabbed her neck, shoving her away from him and towards the bedroom. "Go; I no longer wish to look at your pathetic little face. Don't come back until tonight and don't forget to pick up sake before so."
A flame was lit up in the kunoichi, lighting up the dark void in her mind. She became excited and was quickly sprinting to her closet and yanking on the training clothing that had become worn from years of wear and tear. She didn't want to glance in the mirror for fear of the dark bruises under her eyes ruining her sudden good mood.
Sakura decided that the window would be a much more efficient exit and proceeded to lift the heavy, wooden frame and slide out from under it. Air rushed past her face until her feet quietly touched the ground beneath her.
Genma turned to her with a grin and he slyly wound his arm around her waist. He guided her at a slow pace and didn't bother to speak, even when they began going in the opposite direction of the Hokage tower.
Her eyebrows dipped as she twisted to get a good look at his face. "Genma, we're going the wrong way and Tsunade-sama will be angry about being late. We should hurry."
His handsome grin widened but he only spared her a small glance before pulling her closer to his side. "I just wanted to get you out of the house for the day. The only people looking for you are your team and it so happens that we are headed to see them right now."
She watched his senbon bob up and down as he spoke on his lips and she gulped, feeling the difference of his gentle grip on her from Kai's rough and painful one. She didn't have a thing for Genma; she knew that, but she felt safe with him just as she felt safe with Team Seven who happened to come into view just as they made it to the edge of their usual training ground.
Naruto furiously waved his hand in the air at them and called her name loudly which drew more attention from Sasuke and Sai. Kakashi wasn't staring at her as the others were, more at the arm that was drawn around her. Was he glaring at it?
"Sakura-chan!" Naruto screamed, running forward but stopping about five feet from her. "I'm so glad that you could come here and we already agreed that it was going to be a full team spar team and since you were last then we just chose a team for you so it's going to be Kakashi and Genma and you against Sasuke and Sai and me. That's why he is here, by the way. It's fairer that way."
Naruto spoke so quickly that Sakura actually had to put effort into hearing and understanding what he was saying but she captured the just of it and strangely it excited her. She would be able to expel some of her built up anger without being questioned about her random violence. She couldn't count the amount of times that complaints were reported from the villagers from excessive explosions coming from deep in the forest. At least she put some distance between them so that their buildings weren't destroyed.
Sai and Sasuke approached her with Kakashi leisurely walking behind them. "Hello Sakura; how has your day been?" Sai spoke calmly but his eyes weren't on her in the beginning, they were on Genma who oddly enough was sending a very peculiar look to the emotionless boy.
Was that why he didn't call her 'hag' today?
"My day has been… pleasant. It's better now that I can spend time with my team." She glanced at the beaming Naruto. "Didn't want to me on my team today, huh?" She teased, with an easygoing smile that was rare for her team to see nowadays.
The blonde sputtered for a second, his words unable to find their way to his lips. "I- I… No! I mean, I wanted to be with you but- but Kakashi thought it would be better to have you with him and Genma so that… so that you would participate more."
He said one thing but she heard another. He said that it was so that she would be more involved but the underlying truth was clear to her. The older, more experienced Jounin wanted to keep an eye on her and make sure Naruto and the others wouldn't hurt her too much. Even in a regular practice, they felt the need to protect her.
As she had become perfect at, she shielded her thoughts and true feelings with a bright smile. "I'm just playing with you, Naruto. It's fine. What does the winner get?"
Sasuke immediately rolled his eyes and Genma sighed because they already knew the answer. Naruto's eyes grew in size until he looked like a hyperactive bug. "The losers have to pay for the winners' dinner at Ichiraku's tonight!"
She giggled, Naruto cheered a little more, and the rules didn't cross any of their minds as the two groups slowly pulled into their respective sides of the grounds. Citizens would look on and groan at the disaster that was sure to ensue in just a few minutes. With six of the greatest shinobi all out to fight each other, training or not, the environment never made it out in one piece… or themselves for that matter.
"No brute strength Sakura-chan! I don't want to end up in the hospital before you're going to pay for my dinner!" Naruto screamed at them.
"If I can't use that then you can't use your clones and Sasuke can't use his sharingan and Sai can't use his ink. You can't take away my biggest asset on the field and still expect me to let you use yours," Sakura argued.
"Dobe, shut up and deal with the pain. It's nothing that you haven't felt before," Sasuke chided, his voice portraying how bored he was.
"But I don't want to feel it again!"
The blonde was ignored as the two teams squared off; Genma, Kakashi, and Sakura staring across at Naruto, Sasuke, and Sai. Everyone's expressions leveled to nothing as tension began to fill the area. It had been too long since they'd trained like that, and it was to be taken seriously.
Suddenly, a blur a pink could be seen heading for the tree line before it disappeared completely in the shadowy foliage. As she fled to take cover, she quickly shoved her fingers into her gloves that had been tucked away in her shorts while ignoring the sharp stings she felt because of the action.
If we are in close combat, they will surely see the burns on my hand and that is a conversation that I don't care to have.
As soon as she was gone, Kakashi and Genma looked at each other before dispersing as well. They knew she couldn't have gotten far but it was an unsaid agreement that they needed to stay with her to watch her especially with her actions as of late. Self-destruction of one of their favorite kunoichi's didn't fare too well with them.
As soon as his opponents had dispersed and gone into hiding, Naruto shrieked with anger at the lack of immediate fighting. "This is a spar, not a game of hide and seek!"
Even though Sasuke and Sai didn't say anything, they felt the same as their obnoxious comrade. The three that they were up against were masters at hiding and un-detectability and it would take a stupid amount of time to find them unless they wanted to be found.
...
Sakura's breath was ragged and loud as she stood across a clearing of broken trees with Naruto on the other side. He was flanked with two clones but even he looked a little winded at the wild chase and fight they had been caught up in.
His skin was bruised in some visible places but he was fine other than that. Sakura, on the other hand, was struggling with chakra depletion and a slight concussion.
She couldn't draw chakra to her right hand to fight without at least half of it being absorbed by the singed skin that desperately needed relief. It didn't heal as it should have though, and she knew it was because of the extensive damage done to it.
Naruto, of course, didn't know this and fought with his excitement (which usually meant he wasn't careful about the injuries he gave his partner until after he realized what he had done) and Sakura was putting her all into avoiding his worse attacks, the ones that would no doubt put her in the hospital for a few days.
Unbeknownst to the two standing against one another on the ground, Kakashi, Genma, Sasuke, and Sai sat on one branch high up in a tree not too far from them. They were agitated, the lot of them.
"Dobe is forgetting to cut her some damn slack," Sasuke grumbled, intently using his sharingan to inspect the girl on the battleground.
"You would think that dickless would be especially careful with her, but he is surprisingly not." Sai was not happy, even though he didn't show it very well.
Kakashi and Genma said nothing, but continued to watch the disaster continue. The four had promptly given up in at least ten minutes to one another when they found that their little Cherry Blossom had to really fight against Naruto. The original plan of the spar was to see how her fighting was and the entire thing would be a fluke but it was starting to take a serious turn.
"And her chakra shouldn't be that low, Kakashi. We've been watching her this entire time and she's barely used any. Why is she weakening so much quicker than usual?" Sasuke was growing increasingly anxious but he received no answer from his silver-headed sensei.
They watched as Naruto's clones suddenly flew forward in a serpentine formation, all wielding multiple kunai but instead of fighting against them head on, Sakura just flipped to avoid the attack.
"She knows something is up. This is not her fighting method."
Sakura suddenly caught herself trapped between the real Naruto and his two clones, having to choose whether she wanted to run from the inevitable or risk a major injury right then.
Her choice was made for her when all the Naruto's darted forward suddenly, the clones holding a rapidly spinning ball of deadly chakra; the rasengan.
"Naruto…" Kakashi spoke finally, a low warning and a plead that this was just a ploy and that he was going to stop the potentially fatal jutsu just before it got to his best friend. The real Naruto was running towards her as well, trapping her and giving her nowhere to run. She had to fight her way out of this one.
The boys could practically see the wheels in her head cranking up an idea and she quickly drew chakra into her right hand but their eyes widened in immediate horror when the mint green glow sputtered and dimmed into nothing. She wasn't able to use her chakra.
The four boys were already screaming their names and jumping from their perch but none of them could have possibly been fast enough.
Sakura twisted her body at the last second to keep the jutsu from penetrating her but it still caught the left side of her abdomen, tearing clean through her red shirt and skin just as the real Naruto delivered a firm and strong kick to her chest. She went flying over the heads of the rest of her comrades and directly into the middle of the very tree that they had been sitting on.
Her body made a sickening thunk as it hit the ground with the undeniable force of gravity. Naruto's clones dispersed at once and then his face morphed into utter terror, as did the rest of them.
Kakashi's heart was running a race in his rib cage almost the speed of his feet as they harshly pounded on the ground, bringing him closer to the immobile girl. The second that he was on his knees next to her, he touched two fingers to the side of her neck to check her pulse.
It was going just as fast as his was which was surprising but pleasing all the same; it meant she wasn't dying just yet. The deep gash in her side was covered by her hands, and when he attempted to remove them to assess the situation better, she groaned and nudged him with her knee.
"Leave—leave me alone. I'm fine." Her voice was nothing but a whisper; a soft demand that she should have never bothered to waste her breath on.
Naruto was screaming her name in the background, sobs of panic and anger at himself filled the air. He kept apologizing, over and over for being stupid and not realizing how she never would have had the chance to avoid it. He said for the hundredth time that he should have remembered that her stamina was never going to be like his, since he had the Kyubbi to help.
Kakashi watched with hidden franticness how her eyes squeezed shut with the increasing pain, her hands continuously turning a deeper and deeper shade of red with the blood staining them. Her breathing was labored, but for the life of her she couldn't figure out why her chakra failed her in her moment of need. It shouldn't have happened, but it did.
"Sakura, can you hear me?" Genma shouted near her head, unable to move his eyes any lower than her twisted agony of an expression. He wasn't one to deal with blood and gore well when it was a close friend that was hurt.
Her eyes opened suddenly and for the first time in months, they saw the first sign of the old Sakura that they missed dearly; the defiant one.
The girl's pupils narrowed considerably and she grit her teeth. "Yes, I can fucking hear you, dumbass. I'm bleeding, not deaf."
Sasuke let out a shaky laugh, barely audible but still there. He knew then that she was going to be okay, at least later on. "You're so stupid, Dobe. Look what you did to her…" He had reached forward and tugged on the hem of her shirt to better view the damage, something that they all had done at least a thousand times as teammates to one another, but froze upon a new discovery.
Scars, long and thin, stood past the layers of blood on her skin. They lay in an organized row and then dipped under the hem of her shorts, definitely not something that had happened during a fight or spar with another Nin.
Without knowing or trying, the sharingan turned on and scanned the area with hyper-definition, narrowing when seeing how truly clean the slices were. He remembered seeing them on almost every prisoner held by Orochimaru; on their wrists and other accessible places… They were self-inflicted. Fuck.
He tried to squash his anger like a bug under his foot but that little bug had already crawled right under his skin and refused to budge again. Sasuke couldn't, for the life of him, stop the rising tension in his shoulders or the tightening of his fists.
No, no, this isn't her. This isn't Sakura; this isn't her.
Kakashi, noticing the young Uchiha's sudden downturn in mood, gave him an odd stare. It was a threat of sorts, demanding to know whatever had made him upset. Their old sensei had seen his brief happiness at her being alive but now something else was bothering him; things rarely bothered the Uchiha anymore.
Sasuke stared back for a moment and then dropped to Sakura's hip, where the white lines disappeared but the tops were still visible.
Kakashi's eyes did the same and then narrowed just as much as Sasuke's had, knowing immediately what they were. He watched as the older Jounin rubbed a gloved hand over it and again, smearing the blood thin enough so that it would be more visible.
Naruto was still oblivious as he blubbered by the pinkette's head and she pressed down harder on her side. Sai watched from a few feet away but he was slowly catching onto the new problem and crossed his hands over his chest.
"Ah, can you just move some Naruto? My gosh, you're acting like you killed me; back the hell up! And what are you two staring at?" She added gruffly towards Sasuke and Kakashi.
Neither answered, instead opting for icy glares that made a chill run down her spine. What had she done wrong? She did her best to avoid the attack so surely that wasn't…
Kakashi's hand left her right hip and allowed her to see what they had seen as well, the scars of her anguish and emotional pain. Her hands moved slowly from her wound to pull her shirt back down and sit up.
"Sakura, I'm so sorry and I promise that I'll never—!"
"Naruto, stop; I'm fine and it was my mistake anyway. Why don't you just help me up, okay?" Sakura's tone had dropped from angry to timid, just as she had been for a year now. She wouldn't meet the eyes of the angry men and she certainly tried to pull herself as far away from them as she could.
Kakashi stood stiffly as Naruto helped her do the same and his cold eye followed every one of her pained movements. "We need to get you to the hospital."
"No," she responded immediately without even a second's thought; like a knee-jerk reaction. It was odd to them, to see Sakura hurt but not wanting the attention of it. She had grown so much from the vain girl that she was as a child, constantly looking for affection. No, this Sakura didn't want to depend on anyone but now the cards had turned and everyone wanted to help her; begged her to let them help her. It was almost comical.
Naruto let go of the top of her arms as she propped herself up against a tree and threw his arms into the air. "But Sakura-chan, you're bleeding a lot! Grandma Tsunade will kill me if I don't—!"
"And I'll kill you if you take me there! I'm fine Naruto; just give me a damn minute to catch my breath!" The anger was in her voice but they could tell that she was drawing back into herself, like a scared turtle pulling itself into its shell if threatened.
Kakashi's lone sharingan roamed over her body, looking for similar lines that he had seen before but began to notice that small things that he hadn't before; the ways that she had changed her attire to probably hide them better.
Her arm protectors extended further down her arm and the wrappings around her thighs went down a few inches longer than they once had. Her hair was much longer but she never pinned it back, carefully hiding the thinning in her cheeks that he hated himself for not noticing earlier. Her once bright, green eyes were dull and lifeless, just as his had been for so many years. What was happening to his student? Was she even his student anymore?
With a sudden tightening in his chest, Kakashi strolled forward with obvious purpose and knocked her off her feet… literally. In less than a second, she was held sideways in his arms and pressed tight against his chest but she couldn't see his eyes; he wasn't even daring to glance at her.
"What—what the hell are you doing? Put me down!"
"No, you won't take care of yourself so I have to make sure someone does." There was a tone of finality in his voice and she knew that he wasn't going to budge on his decision but she wasn't a kid anymore and she was damn determined to let him know that.
Sakura ignored the throbs of pain from her side as he began flying in the air towards the village since they had traveled deeper into the forest then she had originally thought to have. "Kakashi, I'm not going to tell you again. Put. Me. Down." Damn, she tried to make her voice sound intimidating.
"No," came his short and stern response but she obviously didn't take the hint of 'this conversation is over and you're not going to win.'
"I don't know what happened with my chakra but Tsunade won't be able to do anything about it. This isn't a bad wound anyway, trust me. I'll be fine if you just take me… home." A sudden blur of images of her being thrown against walls and being cut with a kunai passed through her mind and made her shudder.
Kakashi glanced down at her quickly when he felt the movement but looked back up again before she could notice. He ignored her rant which only added fuel to the fire.
"I told you to put me down! I'm not a child anymore and—,"
"Sakura!" He suddenly snapped, immediately shutting her up as her voice died in her throat. The kunoichi, much to his surprise, curled more into herself as if she were… afraid of him.
He was ashamed of himself when she didn't utter a single word again.
