Twenty-Nine: Endure

If Sakura had thought that the arrival of the rebellion's top officials would liven things up around camp, she was sorely mistaken. If anything, her life had become more boring, because she had fewer injuries to deal with.

In preparation for the big event, all official training had been put on hold so everyone could focus on getting the camp ready. All senior officials, who usually handled the recruit's supervision, had been pulled away to take care of other matters—like security, which Sakura knew had been severely lacking.

Top officers were now stationed all around the camp, and some outside it as well. Even Pakkun would struggle to get inside the barrier now. Sakura would just have to endure the boredom and lay low for a little while longer. Then, if everything went according to plan, she would gather all the intel she and Kakashi needed, and they would finally be able to get out of the Land of Silver.

She didn't know about Kakashi, but Sakura knew she couldn't wait to sleep in her own bed in Konoha again. At this point, she'd even settle for the Land of Fire.

"What's got you so down?" one of the nurses asked, looking over at her.

"Missing the action?" another asked. "I know I am."

"Yeah, I guess," Sakura replied. "Not that I want people to get injured, of course. It's just been a little dull lately."

"I know what you mean," the first girl sighed. "There hasn't even been a cold to treat this week."

"We're either going to look like the best camp, or the laziest," the second said. "What sort of war camp doesn't have any patients? At this point, I'd take a paper cut!"

"I'd take going on a supply run. And I hate those things!"

Sakura laughed at her two assistants, glad she wasn't the only one starting to go a little stir crazy. That had nothing to do with the fact that she was a ninja.

"Well, maybe we should enjoy the peace while it lasts. Who knows how crazy things will get when the leaders show up, and who knows how much time we'll have to relax after that," Sakura said.

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

"Well, there's no sense in all of us staying put here when nothing's really going on. I'll be fine watching the tent for the rest of the afternoon. You girls can go."

Sakura felt funny calling them "girls" and giving them orders when she was younger than them, but the two nurses had gladly yielded to her authority when they realized how talented of a medic she was.

"Are you sure, Kaiya?"

"Yeah, we don't want to make you do all the work."

Sakura shook her head. "I'll be alright. I need to check on the supplies in storage anyway."

"Oh," the first girl said, biting her lip. "I actually meant to tell you that. I think we're out of a few herbs. I was looking back there the other day, and I noticed the levels of a few boxes were low."

"Hm," Sakura said. "I'll have to check on that."

"What are we going to do?" the second girl asked. "We're not allowed to leave camp anymore, because it might be dangerous out there."

"I'm sure if I explain the situation, I will be able to get permission to quickly go gather the herbs," Sakura reassured her. "I am the head medic, after all. Now go on, enjoy your afternoon. Let me worry about the herbs."

"If you're sure. Thanks, Kaiya!"

Sakura waved to the two girls as they exited the tent. Her plan was set in motion. She'd only taken slightly more of the herb than was necessary to concoct her various medications, but over the past week it had been enough to seriously dent their supply levels. The guards wouldn't have a choice. They would have to let her go out to collect more, she hoped.

Sakura wandered around the tent aimlessly. She had some time to kill before she was going to go put in the request to leave camp. The leaders were scheduled to arrive in two days' time, and she wanted to try to meet up with Kakashi the day before they came.

After making sure that no one was loitering around outside, Sakura cleared a space in the middle of the tent so she could get a few combat exercises in. She wasn't out of shape, per say, but not being able to train effectively for a few months didn't exactly help her physical condition.

She didn't dare risk using any sort of jutsu—she was still convinced there was some mind-jutsu user or sensor in the camp, although she'd never found anyone that seemed to display those skills. She suspected they kept him or her very well hidden.

Sakura spent a good hour going through some of the more simplistic exercises. It was hard without a sparring partner, but she made it work, imagining she was fighting against any one of her Team Seven boys.

It was nice to be able to train without interruption for once. Normally, when she tried to go through a few exercises in her tent, someone would come barging in with an injury for her to treat.

Most of the time she sensed them coming, but there were a few times when she'd had to pretend she was doing pushups or some other common form of exercise. No one ever questioned her—she was a medic after all, and they knew she took health seriously—but Sakura still had to be careful not to be seen doing anything too advanced.

Still, beginner exercises were better than no exercises.

Sakura wiped the sweat away from her brow, pleased, albeit surprised, to find that she'd been able to work up a sweat. It was still nothing compared to training with Naruto, but it was better than any workout she'd had in months.

It was early evening now, and Sakura decided it was late enough for her to go looking for someone who could approve her trip outside the barrier.

She went back to the storeroom and carefully made a log of the herbs that were low, and filled out a status report that she hoped would be convincing enough to warrant her little escapade. Figuring she should change after working up a sweat, Sakura headed back toward her personal tent to find a change of clothes.

She wasn't in any particular hurry. She still had all evening to find one of her superiors. She just hoped she could make a convincing enough case.


"Hm," her old commander said, looking over the formal request Sakura had handed to him. "I see. That does pose a problem."

Sakura shuffled her feet slightly. "Normally I wouldn't ask something like this, sir. I just want to make sure we're prepared when the commanders arrive. I wouldn't want us to look sloppy."

She had been around the man long enough to know he took appearances seriously, and even though Kaoru was technically the commander now, she knew the old man would still see the camp as a reflection of himself. That was why she had decided to go to him, and why she had slipped in the bit about not wanting to look sloppy.

"Yes, of course. Very well, you can go out tomorrow. I'll let the guards know to be looking for you."

"Thank you sir," Sakura said, bowing her head slightly before taking the slip he handed to her and leaving the tent.

She still had a bit of time before she was supposed to meet her friends for dinner, so she decided to take a stroll around the camp, to see if anything was going on. She wasn't looking for anything specific, she just wanted to keep her ears and eyes open.

Considering they only had a few days until the big arrival, Sakura was surprised that the camp was as quiet as it was. There weren't many soldiers roaming the alleys, and there appeared to be even less huddled in groups. She wondered if everyone else was starting to get a bit restless as well.

Sakura hadn't really been paying attention to where she was going, instead letting her feet take her where they will, but she soon found herself near one of the outskirts of camp, west of where her medical tent was located. She heard voices that she recognized, and she realized she was close to the tents where the ranked officers were headquartered.

Looking around to make sure no one else was in sight, she quickly slipped behind some boxes closer to the tent, which she assumed now belonged to Kaoru, seeing as it was the largest.

The blonde's voice drifted over to her, and she crouched down lower, flattening herself so she would be out of sight to anyone passing by. She had to strain her ear a bit, but as long as it stayed quiet, she would be able to hear their conversation.

Sakura didn't dare risk getting any closer to the tent. For one, she didn't want to make a sound that could possibly alert sensitive ears to her movements, and second, she didn't want to risk that someone in the tent would be able to sense a closer presence.

She had no plausible excuse for why she was sandwiched between the two boxes, so she would just have to make sure she didn't get caught. As long as a shinobi wasn't lurking around, Sakura was confident in her own evasion skills.

"—verything's in place," a voice said, and although Sakura knew she had heard it somewhere before, she couldn't quite place it.

"Good. I'll be counting on you to make sure nothing goes wrong behind the scenes."

That was definitely Kaoru. He was probably talking to Hideki then, his second-in-command. Sakura wondered briefly why he would leave anything important to the man. From what Kakashi had told her—as well as her own observations—Hideki seemed to be a bit of an airhead.

"Yeah, of course, Kaoru. You've got enough to worry about. I'll make sure the camp is still running smoothly."

Yeah, it was definitely Hideki. She recognized his voice now. Sakura thought she heard Kaoru sigh, but she was too far away.

"This meeting is going to be the most important meeting of our lives. Hell, it's the most important meeting of anyone in the rebellion's lives. It's by fluke that we even got to be a part of it. I can't afford to mess this up."

"It wasn't just a fluke that you caught Kakashi Hatake, Kaoru. And you're not going to mess this up. Don't worry about the camp. Leave all that stuff to me. You just concentrate on Mizushima and the others. I'm sure you will have plenty of battle plans to go over."

Sakura spiked to attention. Battle plans? She knew the meeting had to be important if it involved all the leaders, but she hadn't known that they were far enough along in their strategy—whatever it was—to have fully developed battle plans. She would have to investigate that further.

She needed to get her hands on those battle plans, but she didn't know how to yet. Telling herself she had an entire day to figure it out, she quietly removed herself from between the boxes and snuck off, now that Kaoru and Hideki's conversation had turned to something far less interesting.

She tried to formulate some sort of a plan while she got ready for bed that night, after her dinner with her friends. She didn't have any luck coming up with anything, because she didn't have any details to go on. Any detail concerning the arrival was still a well-kept secret, even from the head medic.

Maybe Kakashi will have some ideas.

Her gut twinged, and she was surprised to find that she was hesitant to tell the silver-haired jonin about her discovery. It was important for their mission, but she worried that would be precisely why he wouldn't trust her to be able to carry in out by herself.

Sakura hated the fact that she was considering keeping something from Kakashi. It was important information, and he was her commanding officer on this mission, her partner, and not to mention her friend.

The worst part was that she didn't know why she was doing it. She convinced herself that it was Kakashi, and she trusted him with her life—and had for many years now—but she still hesitated to tell him about the battle plans, not knowing if he'd trust her to be able to get them on her own or not. He was always a little protective—she didn't really blame him, thinking he still saw his team as twelve-year-olds sometimes—but she couldn't afford to have him sneaking around the camp and ruining months' worth of hard work because of one of his 'bad feelings.' And elite ninja or not, she knew Kakashi was stubborn enough to do just that.

She tried, but she couldn't get rid of the nagging feeling that he didn't trust her abilities.

She sighed, wishing they could trust each other the way it had been with Yamato. When she was on a mission with the former ANBU captain, she didn't even have to think. In fact, it was almost like they were one person.

Sakura had thought that she and Kakashi would be like that—better even, because they had known each other longer—but she was surprised to find it had been the opposite. While Yamato had easily accepted her as his equal, Sakura worried that Kakashi still saw her as she was in the past. She wondered if they had too much history.

But there was strength in that history, she reminded herself, because that history was Team Seven. And if she knew one thing, it was that nothing was stronger than Team Seven.

She smiled as she lay down on her sleeping roll, closing her eyes and trying to quiet her mind enough to sleep.

True she had a history with Kakashi that maybe made it a little difficult for the two of them to act as equals, and true this type of trust was something they may need to work on, but Sakura still knew there wasn't anyone else she wanted to have her back on this mission. Besides, hadn't Kakashi said he trusted her already?

Her grin widened. She was stupid for worrying. She had no reason to be concerned.


"Tomorrow?" Kakashi asked, looking up from his book at the auburn-haired girl in front of him.

"Yeah," she nodded, "and there's more. I overheard Kaoru in his tent one night, and apparently the leaders are going to be discussing their battle plans while they're here."

Kakashi's eye narrowed. "So they're that far along already?"

"It seems so. But if they've already drawn out plans, then that means we'll have something tangible to bring back to Lord Sasaki."

"It will be difficult to steal," he mused. "They won't be stupid enough to leave it unguarded, and Mizushima is a highly-trained shinobi. He won't be easy to slip past. Do you have a plan?"

Sakura shook her head. "Not yet, and I can't really form one until the arrivals all get here, because they're not giving us any more information than what's necessary for us to do our jobs. It's kind of aggravating."

Kakashi, to her surprise, chuckled. "That's the point."

"Yeah, whatever," she grumbled. "But I'll think of something. Don't worry about it. I can handle this."

Kakashi looked like he wanted to say something, but he saw the determined glint in her eyes and smiled instead. His Sakura had certainly grown up.

"I don't doubt it," he said, his eye crinkling even further.

She smiled, feeling stupid for worrying about his trust in her abilities earlier. He had obviously seen how far she'd come.

"Okay. Well I should probably be heading back before the guards send someone out to search for me. But make sure you're ready to get out of here in a hurry tomorrow. I can't believe that those missing battle plans will go unnoticed for long."

Kakashi nodded, and Sakura turned away, thinking that was it, but she was surprised to feel his arm wrap around her waist and pull her back. She opened her mouth to ask what was wrong, but he silenced her with a pat on the head and a serious gaze.

"But Sakura, do be careful. I'm not saying this because I think you're weak. It's the opposite. You're already stronger than me in some ways, and someday soon you'll surpass me completely."

Sakura's eyes widened at his unexpected words of confidence. Her former sensei didn't hand out praise lightly; it had to be earned.

"So don't think I'm saying this because I don't think you're strong. I'm saying this because this is a dangerous mission, and I ca—I don't want anything to happen to you."

He broke his contact with her as soon as he'd finished talking, and turned and started walking away from her before she'd had a chance to respond. He showed no sign of turning around, and Sakura didn't know what to say, so she simply watched him walk away before whispering to the air, "Thank you."