the Leaves of the Tree Chapter 2: The Leaves of the Tree - 2 Edited, a naruto fanfic

Disclaimer: All Naruto characters and plot references are property of Masashi Kishimoto.

Edited: 07/02/2021

The Leaves of the Tree

"This looks weird," Sakura murmured dejectedly.

"This was recommended by eight different books," Inner Sakura snapped.

"It still looks weird."

"Because it's your face," Inner Sakura huffed. "Now come on! Our sabbatical's up!"

Sakura took another mournful look at her reflection and sighed. She'd braided her hair as tightly as she could, into a wounding bun right at crown of her skull. It was a rather thick bun, which made her entire head look rounder than usual. She kept her bangs covering her forehead, though, with the standard Konoha forehead protector on top. No need to show off that particular feature.

"This is practical," Sakura said, determined to convince herself.

"Just ask Ino for another style next week!" Inner Sakura howled, "we're gonna be late!"

Sakura grabbed her weapon pouch and sprinted out the house. Her speed and stamina were abysmal, she'd be late no matter what.

"But still earlier than Kakashi!" Inner Sakura encouraged.

At least that was true.

Sakura was the first to arrive on training field 7.

She blinked dumbly at the empty space and briefly panicked at the thought that her teammates had abandoned her, moved on without her, when she heard Naruto's loud voice curse obnoxiously from behind.

"Screw you, teme! You're a jerk!"

"Better than a loser, loser," Sasuke-kun's baritone snapped back angrily, and Sakura restrained herself from undoing her braids immediately.

'I won't be useless,' she chanted in her mind. 'My hair gets in the way. Sasuke-kun won't notice!'

"Ah! Sakura-chan! Your hair!"

Trust Naruto to make sure Sasuke-kun did, in fact, notice.

Sakura bit her lip and glanced nervously at her teammates. Sasuke-kun looked confused, like he didn't recognize her, for all of five seconds before he snorted and stomped a little way away to begin stretching. Naruto was smiling brightly, as always, and nodded enthusiastically at her.

"I like it!" he said, and gave Sakura a thumbs up. "Your hair looks really nice like this! Like it's got a lot of different shades!"

"What?" Sakura asked, before she could control herself.

"I mean, it always has them, you know? It's not the same color all over. But when it's braided like that, the colors stand out!" Naruto rambled and Sakura could've sworn he blushed. Like he hadn't meant to say this at all.

Something inside her warmed, and she lost a some more of her animosity towards this sunny idiot.

"Thanks, Naruto," Sakura said, a little stiffly, but it was enough to make Naruto grin even brighter and excitedly bounce in place.

"Why?" Sasuke-kun asked. His sudden direct address of her made Sakura jump and then blush heavily.

"I- I read that it's recommended to braid hair back for beginner kunoichi," Sakura stuttered, "in e-eight books this s-s-style was recommended, so…"

"Hn."

He didn't mock her.

Granted, Sasuke-kun hadn't complimented her like Naruto did, but he'd not mocked her. Sakura almost thought there was a brief glint of approval in his dark eyes.

"As if!" Inner Sakura guffawed.

Team 7 was taken off the mission roster for the next three weeks, not because of their massively screwed up C-rank turned A-rank, but because Kakashi-sensei was needed elsewhere. He gave them the laziest training schedule ever drafted in the history of ninja, warned Naruto to not get his teammates into trouble, blinked at Sakura's braids and patted Sasuke-kun's shoulder. Then he was off, and the three genin were left to their own devices.

The second day, Sakura came prepared, armed with her research notes on chakra-control and ways of improving it. While Sasuke-kun practiced as diligently as always, and Naruto slept in the sun, Sakura read and summarized books into tiny little paragraphs. When her teammates decided to spar together – read, recklessly beat up each other – Sakura was still studying. She continued on through lunch and then into the early afternoon until it was time to go home. She repeated this for another two days, until she decided she had enough theoretical knowledge to try and practice.

"Say, Sakura-chan," Naruto blinked at her from beneath the tree Sakura chose as her practice spot. "Why're you hanging upside down from the branch?"

"I'm practicing chakra control," Sakura answered tightly.

She'd been hanging like this for the past hour and a half. With her meager amount of chakra, such a feat was immensely difficult. But she'd read that by continuously practicing and straining herself like this, her chakra reserves would begin to grow. Another way was to build up stamina and muscle power, but Sakura had no idea how to do that without damaging herself. She'd decided to ask Kakashi-sensei when he returned and to practice like this until then.

"I don't understand," Naruto told her after a few moments.

Sasuke-kun snorted from where he was sharpening his shuriken.

Naruto threw a stone at him.

Before this could escalate to a fight, Sakura quickly spoke.

"I don't have a lot of chakra," She said, feeling her face redden even further with embarrassment, rather than strain. "I read that if I practice my control and strain myself like this, my reserves might grow."

"Really?" Naruto tilted his head. "But Kakashi-sensei said your chakra control's really good!"

"It's not perfect, though."

'Yet,' Sakura added in her mind. She'll definitely perfect it.

"Can you teach me?" Naruto asked curiously. "Is this the same as tree walking?"

Teach him? Naruto wanted her, Sakura, to teach him? She was so surprised she promptly fell off and would've landed on her face, had Naruto not caught her. Again.

Remembering the amount of times he'd helped her, saved her life, even, Sakura couldn't find it in her to tell him no. So instead, after she awkwardly pried herself out of Naruto's hold, she sat down and thought about it.

"I don't know how exactly to help you," She said hesitantly.

"Oh," Naruto immediately deflated, "that's fine, then –"

"But I know how to start. I think," Sakura took a deep breath, nodded and then fixed Naruto with her hardest glare. "Do a cloning jutsu."

Naruto jumped to his feet excitedly, but Sakura was quick to cut in with a suspicious glint in her eye.

"A regular cloning jutsu! Not Shadow Clones!"

"Aw! But I suck at that, Sakura-chan!"

That's was exactly why she wanted him to do it.

How the hell could Naruto master an S-rank technique, forbidden or not, in less than a day but fail miserably at a D-rank jutsu designed for children? The readily available answer was abysmal chakra control. But Sakura still remembered that cloak of dangerous red chakra that Naruto summoned up on that damn bridge. It seemed endless. It felt powerful. It was more chakra than she ever felt from anyone.

"Do it anyway!" she barked.

Naruto hurriedly obeyed and as expected, he failed.

Sakura frowned.

"Okay," She muttered and raked her brain for any sort of high level jutsu. The first that came to mind was a B-rank, but it was an elemental technique which upped the difficulty to a solid A-rank for fresh genin like themselves. She'd researched it for an assignment back in the academy. A water jutsu because water was one of the natures of Sakura's chakra. "I'm going to show you some hand signs. Pay attention."

Naruto nodded hesitantly.

"Boar," Sakura said.

"Boar," Naruto repeated, his tone surprisingly serious.

"Tiger."

"Dragon."

"Rabbit."

"Ox."

"Boar."

Even Sasuke-kun was watching them now, a frown on his face. Sakura had no doubt he recognized the jutsu.

"Okay. It's a water jutsu. It's called 'Dragon Whirlwind'," She told Naruto. "Try using it."

Naruto nodded, repeated the hand signs twice more for practice and then stepped away carefully. Sakura knew this jutsu could level seasoned jonin and drain their chakra to nothing if cast more than twice by most professionals. Honestly, it could probably kill her if she tried to muster up enough chakra for it. But something told her Naruto would be just fine. She watched carefully as Naruto began to knead his chakra, and her hair almost stood on end when she felt it move with each hand sign formed. A little to her left, Sasuke-kun was watching just as carefully, to the point even his sharingan activated.

"Dragon Whirlwinds!" Naruto yelled.

For a long moment nothing happened at all. Sasuke-kun snorted again and turned off his doujutsu. Sakura was almost ready to frown, too.

Then, two massive whirlwinds of water erupted out of nowhere directly in front of Naruto. They shot out, collided with a tree at the other end of the clearing and completely destroyed it. Naruto didn't even break a sweat.

Sasuke-kun looked stunned, to the point he dropped the kunai he'd been sharpening.

Sakura jumped to her feet and clapped excitedly.

"I was right!" she cheered, "I knew it wouldn't kill you!"

"What?!" Naruto yelped, "it could've killed me?!"

"Only if you didn't have the chakra, but you've a ton of it!" Sakura waved him off. "You're completely different from me, Naruto. I barely have any chakra at all but you – you have so much you can't use it!"

"What do you mean, can't use it?!"

Sakura spent the rest of the day hanging form a branch while forcing Naruto to do the same. She needed it to expand her reserves, Naruto needed it to get a feel for just how much freaking chakra he had and how to properly draw on it. Then, she dragged him to the library instead of going home. Sasuke-kun had stared at them as if they've lost their minds. Naruto had flat out told her she'd lost her mind. Sakura smacked him on the nose and told him to buckle up.

They were building a proper training schedule.

And that's how Sakura found herself spending the rest of her Kakashi-sensei free time glued to Naruto's side.

She'd wake up at five in the morning, make her way to Naruto's apartment and drag him out for a run. At first she could barely make half a lap around the village. By the time Kakashi-sensei returned, she could run three-quarters of the way before needing a break. After their run she made Naruto spar with her. He'd been horrified by actually raising a hand at Sakura, but when she told him it was mostly for her own benefit – to turn her into something other than useless – Naruto had firmly told her to never, ever, call herself that again, and proceeded to enthusiastically thrash her. He'd held on to that enthusiasm so far, and Sakura couldn't be more thankful. If Naruto didn't hold back, she had to struggle. When she struggled, she improved. After her scheduled morning beat up, the two separated for showers and breakfast, and then met up again on the training fields, where they continued to practice chakra control.

Slowly, over the first two weeks, and the following two weeks after Kakashi-sensei's return, Sakura found herself settling into her strange new regime.

She spent most of her waking hours with Naruto: training together before team training or another D-rank mission, followed by at least three hours at the library in the afternoon. Naruto hated the library, but he still sat trough it even if all he did was get Sakura more books, read her notes and ask asinine questions. Her weekends were the only time Sakura spent away from her blonde teammate, and with the other blonde in her life.

If Ino noticed Sakura's strange new lifestyle, she made no comments about it, and Sakura was glad.

She didn't know how to explain why she dragged Naruto into her quest after perfect chakra control, or why she began to shape this quest around Naruto's need to control his seemingly endless chakra reserves. Sakura had no idea why, at some point, she started bringing lunch for Naruto, too, and not just herself and Sasuke-kun. Maybe it happened because she noticed that more often than not, Naruto didn't eat. Maybe it's because she'd been to his place, had seen his terrible living conditions and realised there was no functioning adult to teach Naruto how the hell to live healthily.

So she took it upon herself.

On their first day off after Kakashi-sensei's return, Sakura manhandled Naruto into cleaning his apartment. It took close to six hours to completely disinfect the place. From mold, to unidentified stains and sheer mountains of trash that needed to be taken care of, Sakura was surprised Naruto had survived for so long – and in perfect health to boot. She'd then drawn up a cleaning schedule and hung it up on Naruto's fridge, along with exact instructions on how the fuck to clean, do laundry and sort his belongings.

On their next day off, Sakura dragged Naruto shopping. For food, yes, but also for clothes, sheets and extra living necessities.

"Sakura-chan," Naruto said quietly, as Sakura channeled her inner Ino and screeched at a frowning seamstress who refused to sell Naruto anything. "It's alright."

"No it ain't!" Sakura screeched and pointed a finger in the woman's face. "Listen here, you old hag! I'm Haruno Sakura!"

The woman paled, and Sakura knew she hit the jackpot. She started screaming louder, drawing absolutely everyone's attention, and made sure to wave her arms around too for extra effect, the way she'd seen her own mother do on occasion.

"If you don't want my money, fine! I'll never step foot in here again! My whole family won't!" Sakura announced. "In fact, the Haruno family won't spend a single ryo in any place that mistreats Uzumaki Naruto!"

Her mother would object to that, at first, but she'd probably be so overjoyed Sakura finally started throwing her financial weight around, that she'll cave quickly enough. If Haruno Mebuki wanted anything, it's for Sakura to quit her shinobi career and join the family's financial empire. Sakura never would, but she wasn't above using that empire when her friends needed it.

"Oh, so Naruto's your friend, now?" inner Sakura drawled mockingly.

"Damn straight!" Sakura answered aloud and stuck her nose in the air. "Anyone who mistreats my friends, mistreats the Haruno family! Let's go, Naruto!"

"What –" Naruto started, but he was promptly cut off by the frightened seamstress, who was desperate to not lose one of her best clients.

In the end, they'd gotten everything Sakura wanted, and at half price as an apology.

"Don't worry Naruto," Sakura said as they dragged their purchases up the stairs to his little apartment. "None of those merchants will ever mess with you again. I can't say anything for the shinobi district, though."

"You didn't need to do it," Naruto mumbled. "I don't need your pity."

"What pity?!" Sakura snapped and immediately bonked him on the head. "Listen here, idiot! I didn't do it out of pity! You're my teammate! I'll be damned if I let you starve and live in a dumpster if I can help it! What if you get sick? It'll affect all of us!"

"I never get sick –"

"That's not the point!" Sakura roared. "You're my friend, okay? Friends help each other! You help me train, and I help you take care of those jerks who gang up on children! What's up with that, anyway?"

Sakura determinedly ignored Naruto's teary eyes and marched on. By the time Naruto caught up, she was done stashing the contents of her bags in the appropriate spots and was about to head back home.

"See you tomorrow," Sakura told him, a little bit softer than ever before.

"Yeah!" Naruto agreed loudly, "Believe it! Say, Sakura-chan, why'd you threaten those old jerks with your family not buying there anymore?"

"Ah?" Sakura blinked. "Oh, I guess you wouldn't know about it. I'm from the Haruno Clan."

Naruto blinked his eyes at her, completely uncomprehending.

"My family's the richest merchant clan in Fire Country."

"What?!"

This is how Sakura became friends with Naruto.

She never regretted it.