AN: Nothin to see here, let's do this!
Jiraiya:
"First fight, Gaara of the sand versus Sakura Haruno."
From his position beside the Hokage, Jiraiya glanced across at the covered face of the fourth Kazekage.
"That Gaara boy, he's your son, correct? Is he strong?"
The blue clad ninja nodded, not taking his eyes from the field. "The girl doesn't stand a chance," there was a strange note in the Kazekage's voice as he spoke, somewhere between pride and distaste. Jiraiya turned his eyes to the field with a shrug, he couldn't say he disagreed.
Sakura:
The girl had to admit, she was nervous. Gaara was a strong enemy, strong enough to take out someone like Hinata with little effort, but she was determined. More than that, she had a plan. Sakura squared her shoulders, setting her lips in a determined line as she made her way towards the stairs leading to the pitch. As Sakura passed her teammates, they both tried to give her a little boost. Naruto gripped her shoulder for a second or two, giving her an encouraging smile, it helped a little. Sasuke followed Sakura towards the stairs, taking her hand in his and walking with her to the edge of the arena. As Sakura tugged her hand free, the boy spoke softly.
"You can do this Sakura, I know you can."
Sakura smiled a little at this, pulling her boyfriend into a quick hug, before moving to the center of the arena.
Gaara stood opposite her, face showing nothing more than slight concern. Sakura took a deep breath to calm herself. She was ready, she could do this.
Iruka stood a good few meters off to one side, very much staying out of the way. He raised one hand, letting it drop as he spoke. "Ready… Fight."
Sand flowed from that strange gourd once more, surrounding Gaara with a small circle that was simultaneously a dangerous weapon and an adamant defense. Sakura gulped, but did not hesitate. She reached up to the zipper of her newly acquired flak jacket, drawing it downwards and slipping the piece of gear off of herself. There were a few moments of silence as the stadium as a whole gazed in confusion and perhaps a little horror at what Sakura wore concealed underneath the jacket.
"A-are those… paper bombs?" Gaara asked, his head cocked to one side, his tone surprised.
Sakura grinned. "Yup." It had taken her a long while to construct, even with Ebisu sensei's help, but she had eventually managed to piece her new weapon together properly. The item in question was a series of string nets, each one tied together to cling tight to Sakura's torso. Each net held a number of paper bombs tight against the girl. A number of small strings dangled from her waist. Sakura took advantage of the momentary confusion to perform the necessary hand signs, activating her newest jutsu.
Shadow clone jutsu!
A single duplicate of Sakura appeared beside her, a look of determination on its face as it leaped backwards, making as much distance as possible. With no further elaboration, Sakura charged forwards, letting out a blood curdling roar as she did so. Gaara's sand extended towards her in thick tendrils, reaching out to ensnare her. Sakura reached down to her waist and pulled at the first of the dangling strings, feeling the outermost layer of explosive tags coming loose around her, held in a rough shape by the net. The tendrils closed in on Sakura, less than a foot away, as she ran, the girl made a new set of hand signs, focusing her chakra and praying that this would work.
As the reaching arms of sand closed on her, Sakura transformed, taking on the shape of a perfect sphere, roughly eight inches across, and seemingly made from solid steel. The majority of the paper tags, still held tight around the girl's body, transformed with her. Those that had been loosened in the seconds before, did not.
The sand closed around the sphere, encasing Sakura in a tight grip. Some distance away, the shadow clone activated the paper bombs.
Haruno style: Earth Shaker Jutsu!
It had all happened so fast that to the untrained eye, it simply looked as if Sakura had exploded. The arms of sand disintegrated, scattered to the wind by sheer concussive force, the metal sphere that was Sakura was launched forwards by the blast, landing just ten or so feet from Gaara. Sakura disengaged the transformation, regaining her human form. When she emerged, she was wearing a manic grin. Gaara flinched.
It had been surprisingly easy to learn how to reinforce the defensive strength of the transformation jutsu, Ebisu had advised that it was easier if one took on a form of roughly equal weight to their original body, so Sakura had planned accordingly, finding a sphere of the perfect size and weight, roughly eight inches, or forty two kilograms. The rest had been a matter of practice, learning to hold the form, becoming familiar with the shape and feel of the steel, it hadn't been long before Sakura was as hard as steel in that form. From there it had been a simple matter of figuring out how to keep attacking as an inanimate object, child's play.
Sakura took advantage of the momentary absence of Gaara's sand arms to pull another string, loosening a second set of explosives, this one positioned at the front of her body in order to blast her backwards away from Gaara when it detonated. The girl dashed in as close as she could, making hand signs once more, she made it to within a few feet of the boy before his sand once again ensnared her. Sakura took on the form of steel once more, the clone activating the tags.
There was a great flurry of noise and sand as Gaara was caught by the point blank explosion. For her part, Sakura was thrown backwards to safety, landing some thirty feet from the boy.
Up in the stands, under the disguise of the fourth Kazekage, Orochimaru rubbed his eyes, trying to clear them, for a second there, he had been convinced he saw a familiar figure down there. He looked again and saw that yes, this girl did indeed have pink hair, not blonde.
In the chair beside him, Sarutobi Hiruzen chuckled, murmuring to Jiraiya. "Reminds you of Tsunade a little, doesn't it."
Jiraiya laughed, Orochimaru allowed himself a fond grin under his mask. The resemblance was indeed, quite striking.
Sakura allowed her steel shell to dissolve once more, gazing intently at the dust cloud that still hung where Gaara had been. As the cloud slowly cleared, Sakura felt her heart sink. Damn, there goes that strategy. The red haired boy had formed his sand into a sphere around himself, surrounding his entire body with an impenetrable wall. Sakura wondered just how much damage she had managed to do under that sand. Probably not enough. She squared her shoulders.
As the girl watched, more sand slowly began to coalesce atop the sphere, forming into a tiny white ball marked with a small dot of blue and black. Sakura blinked, was that an eyeball? Without warning, a spear of sand shot from the ground, aiming not for Sakura, but at the clone, dissipating it into smoke. Sakura winced, if Gaara had figured out that she needed the clones to activate the explosives, her whole strategy was ruined. She needed to give herself time to think. As the eye turned on her, its attention focused now on finishing the real Sakura, she made another set of hand signs.
Clone Jutsu!
Ebisu's training had been harsh, taxing Sakura to her limits every day, but it had been worth it, as a result, she now had far more chakra to play around with. All around her, the illusionary clones burst into existence, at least thirty of them. Without missing a beat, Sakura dropped to her knees, allowing the illusions to scurry around her, confusing the location of the original. As the clones milled around her, Sakura summoned another shadow clone, pumping it with all the spare chakra she could manage before handing it the scroll she carried at her waist. With this, the multitude of Sakura's dispersed, each running in a different direction. Sakura stayed close behind her shadow clone as she ran, Praying that Gaara's seeking tendril of sand would go for one of the others first. Behind them, the great tendril of sand moved with incredible speed, lashing out and destroying the false Sakura's by the dozen.
As she ran, Sakura began pulling exploding tags off of herself, sliding them into the shadow clone's free hand. Sakura had hoped she wouldn't be pushed far enough to use this technique, it was her biggest secret jutsu, her deadliest weapon, she had been hoping to save it for the finals. Oh well.
When they had reached a sufficient distance, the shadow clone knelt to the ground, opening the scroll out and revealing, with a puff of smoke, a hollow metal tube, twelve inches long and open on one end. Sakura once more engaged her transformation, taking the form of the steel ball for a third time. The eye noticed their movements almost immediately, the sand redirecting mid-flight to strike at the shadow clone. Moments before the sand hit it, the shadow clone used all of the spare chakra Sakura had supplied it with to summon more shadow clones, three of them this time. The tendril of sand struck, destroying the clone and leaving the explosives she carried to flutter to the floor. The three clones moved, each with a singular purpose, one dashed to pick up the metal tube, another grabbed the orb that was Sakura, the third picked up the fallen explosive tags and lunched itself at the tendril of sand.
The great appendage moved like a whip, cutting through the clone as if it wasn't even there, dispersing it with ease. The clone that carried the metal tube channeled its chakra, activating the explosives. They detonated around the writhing tentacle, scattering sand everywhere and buying precious seconds.
The clone that held Sakura moved towards the clone that held the tube, sliding the steel ball into the hollow tube where it sat snugly, just as it was designed to. The tentacle re-formed and moved to attack, only to be distracted for a few moments when few remaining illusions took initiative and charged at Gaara with a furious cry. The clones were harmless, mere shadows, but Gaara had no way of knowing that for sure, he also had no way of knowing whether they held more paper bombs. The tentacle lashed backwards to destroy the remaining clones, giving Sakura's shadow clones the precious seconds they needed.
As the last illusion vanished with a tiny puff, Gaara's eye returned its attention to the two remaining shadow clones. The first sat on one knee, holding the metal tube pointed at Gaara's sphere, straining with the effort of carrying something heavier than Sakura's whole body. The other clone held its hands in activation stance, channeling its chakra. Gaara realized what was about to happen only a few moments before it came to pass, thrusting his sand towards the clones with desperate speed. Too slow.
The standing clone activated the explosive tags lining the inside of the metal tube all at once. The other clone held the tube in place, keeping it steady even as the recoil caused it to disappear in a puff of smoke.
Haruno Style: Wrecking Ball Jutsu!
The charges within the tube detonated with a bang that shook the very foundations of the arena, and the steel ball that was Sakura Haruno slammed into Gaara's perfect defense like the fist of an angry god.
In the moments that followed, all was eerily quiet. A thousand people stared as one in perfect silence. The great sphere of sand had moved, shifting as much of itself as it could in the half second of warning it had been given, reinforcing Gaara's defenses with a solid foot of unyielding sand. Even that had not been enough, Gaara lay some yards away, choking and gasping for air, clutching his stomach as a small trickle of blood trailed from his mouth.
Sakura lay in among the mound of inert sand, panting with exhaustion. After a few moments of total silence, Sakura raised her arms to the sky, fists clenched as she let out a loud whoop of sheer exhilaration. "OH MY GOD YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH FUN THAT WAS!"
Gaara remained where he lay, curled on the floor. Several medical ninja ran onto the field, an emergency stretcher carried between them as they began loading Gaara onto it.
Iruka stood to the side, shell-shocked, just what was with these kids? In a quiet voice, barely audible in the near silence, he murmured. "Winner… Sakura Haruno."
Sakura pushed herself up into a sitting position on shaking arms, giggling slightly as she moved to collect her jacket and her cannon. As she slowly made her way back to the observation platform, a single voice let out a strangled cry of triumph, a cry that was echoed by voices all through the stands, people leaped from their seats, roaring for the victory of Sakura Haruno.
From that day forward, Sakura Haruno was spoken of with respect and fear, as the legendary Iron Blossom of Konoha.
Up in the stands, Sasuke was the first to speak "Someday, I'm marrying that girl." He murmured breathlessly.
"Nope, I am," Haku interjected. "I call dibs."
"You're a girl." Sasuke pointed out, deadpan.
"Don't care, still marrying her." Haku responded, eyes on the pitch.
AN: Not gonna lie, I've been sitting on this idea for a while, was kinda itching to tell you guys about it. As always, thanks for reading, hope you had fun, feel free to review if you like, it feels great when people do.