7 Interlude
Black abyss meets slitted gold.
Suna's unforgiving winds whip long pink and black strands around them.
She meets her partner on the battlefield.
The team she had been reassigned to lying dead on the ground around them. They fight back to back against a mix of Iwa and Suna shinobi.
She is ten when she meets Orochimaru of the Sannin.
They meet in a war zone, both of their teams dead, fighting a battle of attrition agains a small army.
72 hours. When the last of their enemies has fallen they seal their comrades bodies, loot anything useful from their enemies and retreat into the stone formations a scant few hours away from the sight of battle.
Too exhausted to do anything other than sleep they use the last drags of their chakra to put up illusions of misdirection and basic alarm seals, then they sleep.