I apologize for the massive delay, but I blame vacations and schoolwork, just like every other aspiring writer in here. Well, I managed to come up with a longer chapter and I also stood to fit in some humor, you can see it if you look really closely. I swear I will get to Back Into the Past, I'm working on it right now and I have virtually nothing.
Disclaimer: Standard disclaimer applies. Or SDA.
Hair
Sasuke walked on the left side of the caravan as the young servant girl gazed at him longingly.
"Why don't you just tell her to bug off?" Sakura asked from the front of the traveling carriage.
"Hn." She rolled her eyes and resumed humming the tune of the song stuck in her head. Her shining, pink hair bounced in rhythm with her step
Team 7 was assigned to escorting the Haruno Clan Princess to Kusagakure for her marriage. They were chosen specifically because of Sakura's relation to the Princess.
"She's being married off the the Prince of Kusagakure to fix the feuding between our clans." Sakura told them earlier that day, seemingly displeased about the arrangement. "People are too prideful to talk things out. They have to ruin people's lives instead."
"Okay, let's set up camp here for the night. We can start out at dawn." Kakashi announced to the travelers. Sakura twisted her body this way and that, popping the kinks in her back and neck.
"How about you kids go get some firewood?" Kakashi's eyes closed in mocking pleasure.
"Cliche!" Sakura sang, running off into the surrounding woods. Naruto chased after the object of his affections with Sasuke trailing not far behind.
Sakura was giggling madly.
"You seem awfully happy today." Sasuke said poignantly.
"Perhaps today's a good day to be happy." She twirled on her toe. A kunai shot up from her slender hand and a nice piece of firewood dropped from the tree. Sakura's knees bent and she shot up from the wet ground and a nice leap of sorts carried her to the branch, where she retrieved her kunai and landed neatly.
Naruto's arms were embracing a pile of firewood.
"You'd best get started!" Sakura recommended, she herself already with a reasonable stack of kindling. "Or at least help us."
"Oi, Sakura-chan?" Naruto's voice piped up at the riverbanks where the genin of Team 7 were hanging out.
"Hm?" The addressed pinkette's bare feet splashed in the water.
"Does everyone in your clan have pink hair?"
She pulled a blade of grass out and creased it in half.
"Only me and the head of my clan." Sakura answered, pursing her lips.
"Is it natural then?" Sasuke asked. "A rare trait exclusive to the Haruno Clan?"
"I suppose you could say so."
"So is that a yes or no?" Naruto said inquiringly.
"You guys seem unusually interested in me today." Sakura said avoiding the question.
"Which is it Sakura?"
"Sakura?"
"COMING PRINCESS!" She called, withdrawing her feet from the foamy hands of the river and ran towards the campsite.
"The Princess didn't call you!" Naruto shouted accusingly.
"She sure was in a hurry to get out of here," Sasuke observed, picking up her ninja sandals, the soles roughened and worn.
"Yup. So it's obviously dyed."
"Died?"
"Yeah, her hair is dyed," Naruto repeated, unaware of Sasuke's momentary confusion.
"What makes you say that?"
"Oh, is that a challenge?" Naruto's eyes looked sly.
"Perhaps." Sasuke's infamous smirk broke out across his face.
"So the bet: I think Sakura's hair is dyed, you think it's natural." Naruto's hand was held out.
"You're on." Sasuke's hand was held to Naruto's and they shook on it.
And so the battle begins.
"Oi! Sakura-chan!" Naruto called, all smiles. Sakura turned towards him, warily, helping the veiled figure of the Princess into the carriage.
"Yes?" She said more out of habit rather than pure interest.
"Wanna hear a joke?"
"Sure, whatcha got?" Boredom from the word 'joke'.
"Well, a man walks into a bar and . . . "
'Distraction . . . ' Sasuke thought as he slunk into the campsite unnoticed. Naruto was occupying Sakura and Kakashi was directing the Princess' additional men.
He quickly sifted through Sakura's belongings, finding a couple of -ahem- interesting things. But nothing like a dye bottle.
"You know Sasuke, you don't have to look through Sakura's things. You can always borrow this if you ever feel . . . you know!" Kakashi said sweetly, holding up his Icha Icha Paradise.
Sasuke's face went red.
"Hn."
"I don't hear a denial!"
"I found no dye bottles in her bag, nor were any discarded." Sasuke reported. Naruto sat and contemplated the information.
"Maybe it's a no-fade color thingy. I don't know the terminology of hair products."
"Terminology? Big word, your head's not going to explode, is it?"
"Haha."
"I've heard that some dye comes out with water," Sasuke added.
"Hmm . . . Well, we'll have to get her wet then."
"Hey look! A hot spring!" Naruto yelled from the front of the caravan. Kakashi peered up from his book and studied the establishment built around the hot springs.
"Sakura?" He asked, looking over his shoulder at his female student. Sakura pulled away from the screen separating her and the Princess, apparently having spoken to her.
"The Princess wants to stop by." She confirmed.
For the first time, Sasuke, Naruto and Kakashi laid eyes on the Princess. She was exactly what they expected a Princess of the Haruno clan to look like. Long, flowing hair, eyes the exact shade of green that Sakura had, fine silk clothing, pale, porcelain skin, thin, lithe body.
"Wow."
"Close your mouths boys, she's betrothed." Sakura said in a pissed off voice.
"Come, Sakura-chan, let us go." The Princess said in a regal voice. Sakura's eyes rolled in an over-dramatic manner, but she consented.
"No peeking," She warned before taking off.
"So boys . . . " Kakashi began with a mischievous glint in his grey eyes,"Shall we go peek?"
"Gee, this royalty business is difficult!" Sakura complained loudly, sinking into the hot spring waters, pink hair done up in a bun. The Princess, similarly dressed, or for that matter, undressed, sat down too.
"You're telling me," she laughed. Sakura rolled her eyes although there was a smirk on her face.
"Yeah."
"So what about your team? Do they know at all?" the Princess asked. Sakura shook her head.
"I think it'd be best if they didn't."
"Will they forgive you when they find out?" Sakura's eyes looked forlorn as she stared at a spot in the water.
"I don't think they'll really care. Naruto might at first, but he'll get over it."
"And Sasuke?"
Sakura shook her head harder this time, the water droplets landing some distance away from the strands from which they came.
"Sasuke-kun definitely doesn't care."
"They're having a cryptic, deep, intellectual conversation. I think they're using girl-code or something. Although the part about Sasuke not caring makes sense," Naruto reported from the peepy-hole on the male side.
"Aww! Naruto-chan is using big words now!" Kakashi cooed.
"It'd only be cryptic, deep, and intellectual to someone as stupid as you. They're girls, how confusing can they be?" Sasuke said. "And what about the hair?"
"Oh!" Naruto seemed to just remember. He looked back through the peepy-hole. "Her head was completely in the water, but it's still pink. Maybe it takes multiple washes?"
"Yes, but does it look any different than usual?" Sasuke said louder.
"I can't tell! The lighting is weird!" Naruto shouted back.
"Why are you such an idiot!"
"Why are you such a jerk!"
"Why are you yelling!" Sakura's voice sailed over the wall.
"BECAUSE YOU'RE BEING SO DIFFICULT!" Sasuke shouted, probably squeezing the last of his patience rations to death.
"NARUTO'S RIGHT! YOU'RE SUCH A JERK!" Her resounding sobs were now the only things heard, as well as the Princess's coos.
"Nice going, Sasuke," Kakashi said, his eyes tired and his face covered by a towel.
"What is it now, Naruto?" Sakura's voice was laced with poison.
"A-ah . . . never mind, Sakura-chan . . . " Naruto answered tentatively, withdrawing his hand. He fell back to walk next to Sasuke. "I don't think she's just going to tell us where her hair color comes from . . . "
"Well, duh, dobe."
"It'd be easier if you hadn't yelled at her, you're the REAL dobe," Naruto muttered.
A sensation similar to that of the famed "Spidey Sense" struck all the shinobi. Eyes narrowed, muscles tensed and defenses heightened, they searched for the source of the unfamiliar chakra.
"Kakashi-sensei-" Sakura whispered. He nodded and they all left a cloud of scattered dust from where their feet had originally been.
Sakura and Kakashi appeared inside the Princess's quarters.
"An ambush," Sakura whispered to the Princess.
"Ah- okay . . ."
"Shh . . . "
The caravan suddenly rocked, back and forth and side to side, like a cradle about to fall from a treetop. The items that the Princess had used to entertain herself on the trip shifted and slid, all running towards what they assumed to be their safe haven.
A black-clad shinobi came crashing through the back of the carriage, taking the Princess in his arms. Kakashi put a kunai to his neck and Sakura, one at his back.
"Release her," Sakura demanded.
The shinobi's eyes suddenly widened.
"Y-You . . . " The Princess was dropped and his fist went into Sakura's stomach as he twisted to avoid the kunai. Sakura coughed up blood and put her hand to her stomach, tracing the outline of her wound created by the poisonous, sharp protrusion attached to the ambusher's knuckles.
"K-Kuso . . ."
Sakura collapsed on the ground.
"There, she should die in a few days . . . " The rogue said, turning away from his latest masterpiece.
"You!" Kakashi's voice echoed in his mind, Sharingan red and blaring.
The assassin cried out in pain, holding his head and eyes bulging out of his skull.
"Kakashi! What's happening!" Sasuke demanded, appearing within the small room along with Naruto. The scene was tinted red and orange, the Princess in the corner, a frail hand held out towards Sakura, who was writhing in silent pain on the ground. Kakashi looked down upon a broken shinobi.
"S-Sakura-chan?" Naruto whimpered quietly.
"What happened to her?"
"She was attacked, and based on her response, with poison."
"There's gotta be an antidote!" Sasuke's voice shook and raised.
"If we hurry to our destination, I'm sure someone can heal her!" The Princess's voice was desperate and fearful. "We must help Sakura-sama!"
"'Sakura-sama'?"
"I want an explanation."
"Gee, no, 'Are you alright, Sakura-chan' or, 'Does it hurt, Sakura-chan?'" The bed-ridden girl complained loudly.
"Hn." Sakura struggled to sit up, but no one dared help her for fear of her breaking; wherein 'breaking' is not a verb, but a noun.
Everyone involved in the journey, down to the burly men who carried the carriage on their shoulders and the ninja hired for protection gathered round in the cramped tatami room, transformed into a hospital room for the time being.
The Princess approached Sakura and put her hand on hers.
"I'm the real princess of the Haruno family." Sakura confessed.
Shocked faces appeared, scattered at first among the smarter ones, the dumber ones encountering cruel lag time.
"Of course, the Princess here is the descendant of the current head, and is quite legitimately royal as well. But our system of selecting the next head is different. A long time ago, the heads tended to be corrupt and made bad decisions, reducing the population of the Haruno clan. At last, a more enlightened head inherited the throne. She cast a everlasting jutsu that the next head of the Haruno clan would be born with distinguishable, pink hair.
"I being born as such, was next in line. I am to be delivered, then married to the head of another clan-"
"But you're only thirteen!" Sasuke interrupted.
"I know. But I'm in no position to change the rules, even if I am the next head."
"But why do you have to marry at such a young age!"
"I . . . I have a responsibility to my clan! You of all people should understand!" Sakura yelled, tears streaming.
Silence fell over everyone.
"You should probably leave. Now." The Princess recommended, helping Sakura lay down. She shooed them all out and closed the day behind her.
Through the muttering of people passing through the hall, Naruto was sitting on a bench and Sasuke was leaning against a wall with his arms crossed with a trashcan in between them.
"She doesn't want to get married to this guy. You saw it in her eyes," Sasuke told Naruto. He nodded, watching the people who walked by.
"What do you think it would take to talk her out of it?"
Naruto's back suddenly straightened and he looked at Sasuke.
"You mean you're going to mess with royal affairs?"
Sasuke chuckled.
"Looks like I am."
"You know, you really over did it this time," Sakura said flatly, although there was a smile on her face. "You didn't have to crash the whole wedding."
"I know. But Naruto insisted on it."
"Yo!" Naruto exclaimed, running alongside with them, "What about the bet?"
"What bet?"
"We bet about the origins of your hair color. Naruto thought it was dyed and I thought it was natural," Sasuke explained.
"But it was a jutsu, so it's neither-"
"Yeah. So that's the issue."
"Well, what was the prize?"
" . . . "
" . . . "
" . . . Well, what is it?"
" . . . -mumblemumble- . . . "
"What was that? Sasuke-kun?"
"WELL FIRST WE MUST HAVE AN IMPARTIAL THIRD PARTY DECIDE!" Sasuke shouted, sweating like Niagara and blushing like a sunburned tomato. Picture that.
"I assume that means me?" Kakashi said. Sasuke nodded quickly.
"Hmmm . . . Eeny, meeny, miny, Sasuke!"
"So now can you tell me the prize?"
"You."
" . . . "
" . . . "
"Gee guys, get a room."
