Sakura hesitated at the foreign feel of silky hair brushing against the small of her back. She hadn't had the long hair her current henge provided since her genin days, so long ago. It was a strange yet familiar feeling, and she wasn't quite sure she liked the accompanying feelings of inadequacy and weakness it dredged up within her. She was so small and feeble then, so naive, and so utterly, hopelessly, stupidly in love wi—no. She would not allow those painful memories to fully resurface.
Shaking her head lightly as she continued determinedly down the moonlit corridor of the seaside inn she was staying at deep in the Land of Waves, Sakura quickly repopulated her mind with the most mundane details of her current mission.
She was here to obtain information about a series of attacks currently plaguing the peaceful, now-prosperous islands in the area. This mission also held somewhat of a personal challenge for Sakura, considering the last time she was in the Land of Waves was for Team 7's first C-rank mission together. This being her first solo mission as a newly-minted Jounin, the faux-brunette hoped to prove to herself that she could put her past where it belonged by methodically writing over every trace of him, one cherished memory at a time. She wasn't off to a very good start, Sakura thought broodingly to herself.
When Tsunade-shishou sent her on this mission with a knowing look in her eye, and told her to take as much time as she needed, Sakura had registered that this was her master's way of forcing her to take a vacation from the hospital, but she'd nevertheless accepted immediately. After all, it was one more crucial memory to cross off the list.
Sakura found herself craving a stiff drink, perched atop a barstool at the seaside bar she'd wandered to when the last one didn't provide her with any meaningful intel. She resolved to try again tomorrow night as she motioned to the bartender for something a little stronger than the water she'd been drinking all night while she worked.
Content with a pink martini in hand, not unlike the bright color of her usual hair, she tried to let her mind go blank with the soothing sound of gently crashing waves in the background. She almost succeeded, too, until a tap on her shoulder brought her back into her current, not-so-real reality.
"Uh, hi. I- I don't think I've ever seen you around here before…" Sakura was met with a pair of inquisitive blue eyes as she slowly turned to her side to meet the affronting distraction that had pulled her from her near-meditative state. "Name's Kaito," the man beamed with a smile that could light up the whole bar. "So, what brings you to Nami no Kuni?"
Sakura decided she really wasn't in the mood for any more small talk with the locals tonight and made a motion to get up and leave, but something in the way his expression downturned just the slightest as she half-stood made her reconsider her atypically standoffish demeanor.
Sighing lightly under her breath, she readjusted her seat and gave—Wait, what did he say his name was?—a tired half smile. The man's face instantly brightened, and she couldn't help but think that he resembled Naruto in that brief moment.
"Sa—Satsuki! My name is, eh, Satsuki." Sakura couldn't believe she had almost just told this absolute stranger her real name just because he reminded her of an old teammate for a moment. 'Maybe my drink is stronger than I thought…' she mused to herself with flushing cheeks at her near-misstep.
Kaito didn't seem to take any notice of her odd behavior, and simply beamed all the brighter as he continued to try to make conversation with the shy new face he'd found at the bar.
When Sakura finally finished her drink and made to leave with a hasty 'Nice meeting you' thrown in Kaito's general direction, she was halfway out the door already when her new acquaintance suddenly appeared beside her, holding the door open for them both to exit.
"At least let me walk you home, Satsuki. It's really not safe out there anymore with the attacks that have been going on recently." Kaito's suddenly determined and serious face made her snap her mouth shut before the ready refusal could roll off her lips. With a small, resigned nod, she followed him out into the night.
Kaito reinstated his genial small talk from before as the pair walked side-by-side down the dark, emptying side streets of the small fishing village. Sakura nodded and responded with one-word interjections, just enough to keep up the dialogue, but her focus was elsewhere.
She felt like she was being watched, no, scrutinized even; the weight of the feeling was almost palpable on her skin. She discreetly scanned her surroundings as they walked, and tried to subtly probe the scene with her chakra for any discrepancies. Nothing.
Now almost visibly perplexed as the uncomfortable feeling compounded on her psyche with no evidence of any real threat, Sakura almost didn't notice as she and a blissfully-oblivious Kaito nearly walked clear past her inn.
"Oh, uh, this is me." Sakura sheepishly interjected as she stopped near the inn's door. Kaito turned abruptly and gave her his most dazzling smile yet as he proudly proclaimed that he'd fulfilled his mission of getting his charge safely home.
"Yeah, well, thanks, although you really didn't have to…" She smiled awkwardly as she turned to go inside and bid him farewell [forever]. Sakura was too stunned to react when the man grabbed her wrist and pulled her into a warm embrace. "I hope I see you around again soon, Satsuki. Goodnight."
Sakura just stood there, blinking slowly, as Kaito vanished back into the night, managing to get a meek 'You too…' out before he was completely out of earshot. When she looked around again after he was gone, the feeling of being watched from before was gone, replaced with a slight chill in the breeze that skirted over her exposed skin and urged her to get inside before the steadily-brewing rains arrived.
Outside, a bolt of lightning struck close by just as Sakura shut the door to her bedroom, illuminating the dark room for a moment and briefly giving her the same chill that the suddenly cool wind had earlier that night.
Sakura rolled over to face the early morning light filtering through her blinds, lavender under-eye circles accentuating her jade-green irises, but also sorely indicating her lack of restful sleep.
She'd had all sorts of unsettling dreams during the night. Perhaps the most jarring of them all occurred shortly after she'd first drifted to sleep, when she awoke suddenly in a panic just as another powerful bolt of lightning struck the churning ocean outside her french doors.
The sheer voile curtains covering half-open windows twisted violently in the gale-force wind now rushing into her bedroom as a tropical storm raged outside. For a split second, they perfectly framed a pair of furiously glowing red eyes just above the railing of her balcony. Sakura blinked and they were gone.
That same pair of distinctive, malevolent red eyes plagued her dreams for the rest of the night.
Sakura unhurriedly made her way down the teeming main village street in search of some produce she could cook for dinner. She'd decided to take the day for herself earlier that morning, realizing just how exhausted she was after she fell asleep at her kitchen counter while waiting for her tea to steep.
There wasn't a cloud in the cerulean sky as the disguised kunoichi adjusted her wide-brimmed straw hat to lie a little lower on her head. In this heat, she was thankful she'd elected to pull her requisite annoyingly long brown hair back into a low braid that still reached past the arch of the small of her back, until, that is, her head was yanked swiftly backwards by it.
Sakura furiously whipped around to face the source of the pain now pulsating in her neck, one hand gripping her still-concealed kunai knife. She was met with a pair of tear-stained, saucer-wide eyes staring up at her in horror.
"You- you're not my m-mommy!" The small child let out a distressed wail and ran off in the opposite direction, only to be scooped up by a woman sporting the same brown, braided hair as Sakura's henge. She quickly released her grip of the kunai and mentally chastised herself for her over-reaction to a civilian child that posed zero threat to her.
'I suppose I am still a little on-edge after last night,' Sakura mumbled to herself as she swiftly continued on her way, vowing to allow herself to indulge in some much-needed relaxation time when she got back to her inn.
Sitting poolside with a cold, fruity drink and the most pompous piece of literature she could find—an over-the-top romance novel that would put even Kakashi-sensei's Icha Icha books to shame—Sakura let out an exasperated sigh as she felt herself succumbing to boredom after only one short hour of 'relaxing'.
"Oh, honey, no. It's a sin to look so glum on vacation."
Sakura looked up and met the gaze of a gorgeous blonde woman lounging in a chaise adjacent to her own, oversized sunglasses lowered down the bridge of her nose as she looked Sakura over. She looked to be only a few years older than Sakura, and somewhat resembled an ultra-cultured, tanned version of her best friend, Ino.
Blinking slowly, Sakura flitted a fake smile in her direction and began, "I'm just a little tired today, that's all. It's more of—"
"I can see right through that flimsy excuse, babe. People who are 'just a little tired' don't sulk through romance novels like that," the smug blonde purred with an equally feline smile. "Now tell me who the boy is that's got you all bent out of shape."