DISCLAIMER: Naruto is property of Masashi Kishimoto

WARNING: multiple POVs, violence, crude language directed at a minor.

Edited: 01/04/2021

The Leaves of the Tree

15.

For the first time in a long time, Kakashi was only partially late. And for the second time, that he could remember, it was entirely unconsciously done.

He genuinely believed Sasuke would need every last second of training he could get before his fight – not to overpower the opponent, no, Kakashi was quite certain all three of his genin could handle themselves. What Sasuke needed was practice ignoring Orochimaru's seal.

Sasuke needed to build up a spine. That was the unpleasant truth of the matter. He had to learn to rely on his own strength and want only it, to refuse outside influences entirely, in just the span of two months at the age of fourteen. It was difficult enough for non traumatised people. Sasuke, with his thirst for vengeance, was a whole new mess.

As Kakashi discreetly snuck into the arena while Sasuke marched stoically behind him, he sincerely hoped what they'd managed to do will be enough.

Spotting Naruto in the crowd was easy enough. No one else dressed in that particular shade of acidic yellow. He was perched on the rail, excitedly swinging his feet back and forth, and deep in conversation with the familiar towering form of Jiraiya. The other genin and co gave the two a wide enough berth, so it was no problem at all for Kakashi to squeeze in, firmly planting Sasuke by his side and preventing him from antagonising anybody, as he tended to do.

"Yo," Kakashi said, as eloquent as ever.

"Gah Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto put a hand over his heart in a dramatic gesture he must've learned from Sakura. "Don't creep up like that, 'ttebayo!"

"Dobe," Sasuke said dryly. Kakashi spent enough time with the Last Uchiha to know he'd meant something along the lines of 'you're a terrible excuse for a shinobi', and he didn't doubt Naruto got the memo loud and clear, judging by his scowl.

"Up yours, Sasuke-teme," Naruto snarked, "I'm too busy watching Sakura-chan!"

Ah.

So that was why Naruto was so nervous. And why Yamanaka Ino and Gai's female student were holding hands a little to the right. Well, no matter who she faced, after two months under Jiraiya's tutelage Sakura could definitely handle it. Unless it was Gaara, of course. Or that other weird one, whatever his name.

"Yakushi Kabuto," Jiraiya said sternly, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

Yes that's the one. Wait.

What.

The fight had obviously just begun. No weapons were thrown around the arena and it was mostly undisturbed from previous duels. The proctor leaned against one of the stone walls casually, eyeing up the contestants with open boredom. Clearly, this was expected to be boring and quick.

Jiraiya almost cackled aloud at that. The poor, miserable idiots had no clue what they just signed up for. But he knew. He taught her how to do it.

When Sakura first fell under his tutelage Jiraiya was suspicious. Kakashi very rarely handed out compliments, but he seemed to be genuinely impressed with that tiny girl's ferocity and would only let Jiraiya near Naruto, his godson mind you!, if she were involved as well. Jiraiya had gone with, it wasn't like it was a loss training someone who would definitely grow up real pretty. Sakura was a good student, too. Smart, dedicated. Fucking amazing chakra control; the likes of which he'd not seen since Tsunade-hime.

But that was about it. After one week Jiraiya knew Sakura had it in her to be a very good jonin, could branch out into medicine if she wanted to and excel in that field, hell she could even make a decent enough T&I officer, what with her talent for genjutsu. But she didn't have the same magnitude of talent as Naruto. Jiraiya couldn't shape her into a legend, and so he lost interest, gave her something to work on and focused back on the brat. Of course, he'd grown tired of Naruto's obtuseness and decided to chuck him off the cliff to give the fox a nudge in the cooperative direction. That was the best decision he ever made.

Not even a second later, Sakura'd levelled him.

Jiraiya absolutely didn't see it coming. Not the disturbingly gory genjutsu of his own mutilated corpse that trapped him for a full minute, or the dainty little feet that packed the power of a raging behemoth and put him in an impressive crater – for a first timer – as soon as he got back to his senses. What really got him though, were Sakura's eyes.

The girl was anguished, completely horrified. There was a very thick sheen of tears over her green eyes, but she didn't let them fall. Instead she bared her teeth, snarled and put a kunai to his throat. She would've cut him open without hesitation, Jiraiya had no doubt about it. Sakura would've made it long, painful and absolutely nightmare inducing if she had the means to. And she wouldn't lose any sleep over her justified vengeance either.

The girl had a set of balls made of pure steel on her, and that, more than anything, got Jiraiya hooked. It changed his entire opinion of her. In his mind, he named Sakura as Naruto's bodyguard when the loud kid inevitably made Hokage, and decided to teach her properly.

Jiraiya sincerely doubted Kakashi realised he wasn't getting the girl back, ever. No sir. She was Jiraiya's masterpiece in the making now.

His little berserker was staring at Kabuto through narrowed eyes, hunched into the standard academy battle stance with a kunai at the ready. It was acting of the highest grade, in Jiraiya's humble opinion. Anybody who knew Sakura could tell this wasn't her opening stance, nor did she hold a kunai with her entire fist. It seemed that she'd taken Jiraiya's warning to heart and was going to adopt Naruto's favourite approach: fake it till you make it.

Kabuto had said something, too softly for his voice to carry over the stands. Sakura blushed a very vivid red and flung her kunai in an accurate, but too weak, move. Just like that – it was on. Or, well, it would've been if Sakura was completely incompetent and Kabuto was less that an ANBU level traitorous piece of – ehm.

"The hell?" Naruto frowned and tilted his head. "What's she doing?"

"What you did," Jiraiya drawled.

"Oh," Naruto blinked. "Why? Isn't he super weak?"

"Ma, Naruto," Kakashi drawled. If he wasn't holding on to the railing for dear life Jiraiya would've bought into his nonchalant façade. "Look underneath the underneath, would you?"

"Hn," The Uchiha kid snorted disdainfully. "Sakura's better than this, at least."

"At least?" Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. "Look well, boy. You might learn something."

It happened in the span of a second. Sakura ducked under a lazy kick from Kabuto, whipped up another kunai and with a fast, ruthless movement slashed it upwards. The sharp blade cut into Kabuto's face as if it were sculpted out of butter, tearing into skin and flesh in a rough jagged line from his chin, up and across his left eye. Through his left eye.

As soon as she delivered her strike Sakura retreated, as graceful as a cat, while Kabuto sprung away and howled in pain. If Jiraiya was any less desensitized to blood, he wouldn't have noticed something else going on. Something he should've expected, but didn't.

Truly, that girl would end up his pride and joy, he was sure of it.

"You!" Kabuto shrieked shrilly. His left palm glowed green as he quickly treated the injury, but it was pointless. He'd already lost his eye, there was no doubt about it.

Sakura'd long ago learned to poison her weapons. Kakashi himself had seen to that.

"Me," Sakura said somberly.

"Stupid little whore!" Kabuto snarled and lunged. His movements were fast, now. As fast and precise as any top ANBU. Merciless, without a shred of hesitation. First he hit Sakura in the stomach, then over the back of her nape. As she fell to her knees, the enraged nin began stomping on her thin back viciously, all the while spouting increasingly vulgar curses and threats.

Whatever cover Kabuto had tried to maintain, something about being half-blinded by a civilian born pink-haired slip of a girl just hit him too close to heart. The best spy would eventually reach a cracking point, Jiraiya knew this. It was inevitable, it was human nature. Only inhuman things maintained cover at all costs in all situations. Kabuto, as it turned out, still had some humanity in him.

And Sakura rubbed him very wrong.

"Brilliant!" Jiraiya nodded proudly. "Beautifully done."

"What?" Sasuke hissed.

"She's getting pounded out there!" Naruto wailed, "oi, Sakura-chan! Get a grip!"

Kakashi frowned and lifted his hitai-ate, revealing an anxiously spinning sharingan. He took one look at the arena and promptly sagged in relief, to the point he almost swayed where he stood.

"Of course," Kakashi muttered. "Genjutsu-type."

"Genjutsu?" Naruto demanded, "what do you mean, genjutsu?!"

Sasuke's black eyes changed into his own sharingan and he, too, studied the arena carefully. It took the boy longer than it did Kakashi to spot Sakura's work, but it spoke more about just how good she'd gotten than Sasuke's talent with his clan's dojutsu.

"That's not Sakura," Sasuke said, completely bewildered.

"Nope," Jiraiya wiggled his eyebrows, "brilliant, isn't it?"

Sakura burrowed deeper into her little den, directly underneath Kabuto, and focused on her chakra.

It really was a stroke of genius on her part, to cast that mass genjutsu when Kabuto was distracted. She hadn't expected her attack to connect, in all honesty. She was still testing the waters, trying to calculate exactly how outmatched she was, when she decided to make a spontaneous sort of swipe at Kabuto's politely smiling face. It told her more than she cared to know about just how much Kabuto underestimated her.

'Were we really that pathetic?' Sakura mused. 'It wasn't even that fast of a swipe!'

'We were pretty damn pathetic, and you know it,' Inner Sakura said candidly. 'We wouldn't have even dared do it, before.'

'Blood stains are hell to wash out, okay?!'

'Well lucky you, your hair's bound and you're in Naruto's shirt,' Inner Sakura drawled.

Which was another brilliant decision, in Sakura's opinion.

With a careful manipulation of her chakra, Sakura made her illusion-self roll away from Kabuto's furious kick, but only as far as her back. Then she spat at him, and hit him straight in the face.

"You're the wimp, asshole," Sakura made her illusion-self say, in a clear and strong voice. "Ganging up on a girl over a little cut. Pussy."

Kabuto's foot slammed down with enough force to shake the earth above Sakura's head. Had he been fighting a real person, their ribs would've concaved under the assault, no doubt. But he wasn't, and Sakura was pretty sure she'd successfully driven him into a blind rage to the point he wouldn't notice until she enlightened him.

Which would be soon enough, right after she moved a little bit more to the left and – ah ha!

'Time to come up for air,' She decided firmly.

"Any last words, trash?!" Kabuto yelled.

"Oi! No murder is allowed –" the proctor began, but Sakura's voice rang out clear and strong from behind Kabuto, just as the girl he'd been beating up melted into nothing.

"Yeah," Sakura growled, "this is how you punch, moron!"

She exploded from the earth in a dramatic manipulation of Kakashi-sensei's favourite hiding jutsu and slammed her chakra-enforced fist straight into Kabuto's head. He crashed into the packed earth and then under it, creating an impressive crater at least six feet deep and cracking the closest arena wall severely. The whole stadium seemed to shake with the after shocks of Sakura's punch, and as the dust settled Sakura could be seen poking at Kabuto's still form with the very tip of her shoe.

"I didn't kill him," She told the proctor seriously. "So you can't disqualify me!"

"I – what?" the proctor blinked. "I mean, victor! Haruno Sakura, from Konoha!"

'Damn straight!' Inner Sakura hollered.

"Hell yeah!" Sakura fist bumped the air and sought out Naruto in the stands.

He was jumping in circles around a smug looking Jiraiya, wildly waving his arms and cheering at the top of his lungs. Beside him, Kakashi-sensei gave her his trademark eye-squinting smile and Sakura returned it with a bright grin and made her way over.

"Well done, Sakura-chan," Kakashi-sensei patted her on the head fondly.

"That's one heck of a punch, brat," Jiraiya cackled, "now who taught you that, I wonder?"

"Ugh," Sakura rolled her eyes but gave into his offered fist bump. "You did, Jiraiya-shishou."

"That's right!"

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto tackled her in a tight hug while still jumping up and down, causing Sakura to jump with him. "You beat him up, dattebayo! Right smack into the earth! It was so awesome!"

"Hn," Sasuke looked at her with open bewilderment, as if he couldn't quite believe his eyes.

Sakura took it in stride.

So far, it was a very good day.