Genma is generally feeling good about life.
He's back to the normal jounin roster, which means that he's got more free time now than he had as an ANBU operative.
He actually gets to spend time with his friends now, and he managed to meet up with his old genin team twice in the last month, which is twice more than he has in the year before that.
Izumo and Kotetsu are still in one piece, which is always a plus, and they seem to have taken Iruka under their wing (and their last group spar showed Genma just what that has done for the already unexpectedly terrifying teacher).
He got to see Kakashi's reaction to the revelation that his innocent-genin-student was actually an ex-ROOT, chunin-level revolutionary (and that memory is easily in his Top 5 fondest memories when it comes to Kakashi).
So yeah. Life's good.
"I still can't believe you've got your own labs! I thought I'd have to blackmail someone in R to let me use the public labs for the more volatile poisons!" Sakura chirps from a few meters away, diligently slicing away at her bloodroot stems, then chucking the sliced roots into the pot nearby to simmer away.
It's the first time since their team was temporarily dissolved that she's been in the Village for longer than three days at a time, and Genma can see some of the mission-tension finally easing from her shoulders. He winces in sympathy, remembering how difficult it had been for him to part with that sense of constant alertness that came with ANBU life. And sure, some might not think of poison-brewing as particularly therapeutic, but Sakura's not fully out of that mindset yet – he reckons just sitting and chatting over food like Yugao had clearly wanted to suggest would've only made her tenser.
So he'd offered her use of her labs, when she'd off-handedly commented that she'd ran out of that batch of senbon tipped with lidocaine he'd given her after their team spar before everything went to shit. And now, well. Here they are.
He'd had to activate the old fuinjutsu around the stove to filter the air when Sakura let slip that she wasn't actually immune to any of the poisons she worked with, merely relied on medical-ninjutsu to fix up any accidental nicks or mishandlings.
He'd been comparably surprised to finding out that she wasn't immune to the poisons she worked with to how surprised she'd been upon learning that he was.
"Yeah, well. My family was never particularly big, but we had a poisons specialist in every generation since joining the Village." he explains, getting back to her remark and smiling fondly at the thought of his family. "The labs were actually a gift from the Sandaime when my sister made jounin."
"Mhm." Sakura hums, tongue between her teeth as she distils a part of another concoction she's working on. "I don't know of a single official poisons specialists in Konoha apart from you. I suppose having a full Clan of them, no matter how small, was too great an opportunity to let it pass by."
And Genma sends a quick prayer of thanks to any gods who may be listening that despite her apparent exhaustion and having grown up in ROOT, Sakura actually has more tact than most people her age or with her background, and doesn't press the matter of his sister.
After all, 'MIA presumed KIA' is no more satisfying to hear than it is to say.
"Probably." Genma agrees idly, scraping at the bottom of his pot to check the consistency of the powder he's working on.
"Why the sudden interest in making your own stuff, though?" he asks absently, picking up his petri dish with the botulinum cultures.
Because as nice and nostalgic as cooking up poisons with someone is making him feel, he reckons Sakura could do better with focusing on her existing fighting style, rather than adding even more elements.
"Poisons are cool." Sakura grins, her rarely-heard childish side shining through in her relaxation and startling a laugh out of Genma with the suddenness of its appearance. It's easy to forget Sakura is actually a child with how she acts most times. The reminders of her actual age are few and far between, so he knows that he and Yugao treasure them whenever they do show up.
"And I ran out of batrachotoxin a few months ago now, and the mass-produced stuff is either too weak or too expensive, and I don't want to keep relying on your handouts, no matter how useful they may be." She shoots him another quick grin at that last part, letting him know she's not actually cross at the handouts, but rather at needing them in the first place.
Genma huffs, fondly exasperated. With a roll of her eyes, Sakura adds:
"Besides, Shin was rather clear in his opinion that my aim is crap, so until I have the free time to consistently work on my marksmanship, I need to compensate for my decreased effectiveness somehow."
Genma frowns at the explanation, more at the fact that Sakura has noticed the danger of back to back missions than anything else, but Sakura must somehow sense his frown and misinterpret it as confusion, because she offers a half-shrug though she doesn't turn away from her beaker.
"I haven't stayed in the Village for longer than a few days at a time in the last three months. Wolf-taicho says we're too good at what we do. "
The petri dish slips out of his hand and shatters when it hits the ground.
Genma doesn't have it in him to react to the noise, even as Sakura jumps, turning to him with wide eyes and raised hands, scanning for whatever startled him so.
No, he's too busy being horrified.
"Wolf-taicho?!" he demands, sharper than he means to, but his brain isn't computing what his ears just heard. How had he missed this?! "Your new captain is Wolf?"
"Yes...?" Sakura replies, hesitant, as if unsure why he's so freaked out all of a sudden, and he comes to the rather daunting realisation that she might actually not know the reasons behind Wolf's infamy.
"Ask to transfer." Genma orders, not a hint of hesitation in his words. "God, what was Bear thinking-?"
Sakura though, now that the earlier worry has been placated, scowls at him.
"Why should I?" She demands, putting down her beaker and turning to fully face him, crossing her arms over her chest as she frowns at him. "Yeah, my teammates walk on eggshells around him, and even Bear-sama said that this team isn't 'known for long assignments' or whatever, but nobody has said why, and senpai hasn't done anything wrong."
Genma feels his blood drain from his face at the title 'senpai' and wonders when Sakura had the time to get personally acquainted with the Nightmare Walker of all people.
"I mean it, Sakura." he repeats, worry and anger warring within him in equal measure. "And you're saying that his own teammates acting weird towards him wasn't enough to clue you in to the fact that something's wrong? His ANBU teammates, at that?"
Sakura's earlier frown has shifted into a full-on scowl, and Genma thinks it's only thanks to their relationship and the fact that Sakura is somewhat fond of him that she isn't outright insulting him yet, or worse, already gone.
"I thought he was ROOT at first, if you must know." She tells him evenly, and as she speaks, the damn ROOT blankness steals over her face, wiping away all expression barring a raised eyebrow. "And don't pretend like ANBU are fantastic judges of character. I know what the majority of them think of Kakashi, but you've never told me to be careful of him."
"Kakashi's different." Slips out before Genma can bite it back, and he winces when he sees Sakura's other eyebrow fly up to join its twin, the look in her eyes challenging. He huffs, finally bending down to gather as many of the broken pieces of his petri dish as he can
without cutting himself.
"People process trauma differently. Kakashi's safer in a way, because he's only self-destructive-"
"'Only'?!" Sakura parrots incredulously, and Genma winces again, realising belatedly how that came out but not willing to lose his train of thought to rephrase.
"The difference between Kakashi and your new captain is that Inosuke has a habit of taking people down with him." He stresses, and he sees the moment Sakura's momentary ire is replaced with curiosity and he jumps on the opportunity.
"And while the Yamanaka are valued for their work in Psych and Intel and their usefulness with POWs, most people are still wary of someone who can read their mind like a book, and shinobi aren't exempt from that subtle prejudice."
He tries to be patient in his explanation, but when he straightens and sees Sakura open her mouth to undoubtedly refute him, he raises the hand not holding broken glass to cut her off.
"Inosuke took the already unpopular Yamanaka jutsu and added genjutsu to the mix. He earned the moniker Nightmare Walker before he disappeared into ANBU because he tended to use his Clan jutsu to find out his opponent's worst fear or nightmare, then incorporate it into a genjutsu so layered and convoluted most people lost their minds or got cut down before they managed to break out of it."
Sakura quiets during his explanation, her eyes wide and seemingly far-away, and Genma absently wonders what she's thinking about, before she zones back in, and her frown returns full-force.
"So what?" She asks, and Genma despairs the fact that she's apparently attached herself to her new captain in less than four months. "He's good at what he does. So? We're trained to exploit any weaknesses available."
Genma sighs, turning to throw away the broken glass so Sakura doesn't see his face.
"Exploiting physical weakness is automatic because they're visible, but mental weaknesses are different."
To his surprise, Sakura laughs.
"Is that it?" She asks lightly, and though her words are snide, she seems genuinely amused, the earlier ROOT blankness gone, though suddenly, Genma isn't sure if that's a good sign
.
"Genma, I was ROOT. My own brother can ferret out weaknesses and insecurities by observation alone, and his words can cut deeper than any knife I've ever been on the receiving end of. Your warning, while touching, is lost on your audience. And while it sheds some light on why senpai might not be the most popular, it doesn't explain why I specifically should go so far as to ask to transfer teams."
More than a little exasperated, Genma yanks off his bandana and runs a hand through his hair.
"Sakura, he lost his entire-!" but, much like he did to her minutes earlier, Sakura raises a hand and cuts him off.
"-if that's the problem, I don't want to hear it." she announces stubbornly, placing the hand she'd held up to stop him on her hip. "Especially not from you. Why do you think I haven't pressed Kakashi to tell me more about himself? About his past? That stuff's personal, Genma. If senpai decides to tell me, then I'll listen, but I want it to be his decision."
Genma is simultaneously endeared and unbelievably frustrated. "It's not his decision if it affects his conduct-!"
"-but it doesn't!" Sakura finally snaps, apparently reaching the end of her patience too. "If anything, it affects the conduct of everybody but him. I've been on his team for over three months and I haven't had a single problem with him!"
Genma stares at the girl for a few more seconds, then sighs, all the fight draining out of him.
"I hope he deserves the loyalty you're showing him." he finally concedes, knowing Sakura well enough to realise she isn't going to budge on the subject.
Then, as he's about to grab a dustpan to clean up the glass he wasn't able to gather, Sakura's suddenly in his space, deceptively strong arms sneaking around his waist and squeezing, the hug tight and warm and grateful.
"Thanks for looking out for me, Gen." she mumbles into his shirt and Genma smiles fondly, letting his hand drop onto Sakura's hair and ruffling gently.
"Anytime, kid." he replies and means it, and he knows she knows it.
With a final squeeze, Sakura lets go, and with a swift Shunshin is back at her workstation, stirring worriedly at the bloodroot still bubbling away.
Genma sighs, finally cleaning up the glass, and allows the topic to drop for the time being.
Still, just because he can't tell Sakura the full reason for his concern doesn't mean that he can't push somebody else into solving the problem for him.
"Don't freak out." Genma greets by way of hello, sidling up to Kakashi where he's watching on the bridge as his brats tackle water walking.
"What?" Kakashi asks absently, eyes trained on his students, the way Sakura's brother seems to be coaching Minato's son through controlling his chakra while the Uchiha pretends not to listen, but how none of them so much as think to turn to Kakashi for advice.
Genma hides a wince. Apparently Inoichi wasn't exaggerating in his claim that their last mission really did a number on the genin's trust in Kakashi as a sensei.
"I have some info you might find interesting, but you have to promise to not freak out first." Genma repeats, and Kakashi huffs, but he looks tired, fatigue and worry and self-loathing writ into his posture even if not immediately obvious on his face.
"I am not generally known to 'freak out', Genma." Kakashi shoots back, and Genma can tell that he's still not entirely forgiven for keeping Sai's real identity a secret.
"Sakura's been assigned to Wolf's team." Genma drops the news without fanfare, because if Kakashi doesn't want to beat around the bush, then he's not going to coddle him.
Kakashi stills.
"I caught Bat in HQ and apparently, the reason for the assignment was the rising demand for infiltration missions. Crow is well-suited to it, and with the addition of Sakura, they can get into places most squads could only dream of. It's why she's been out of the Village so often." He adds, monitoring Kakashi for his reaction.
So far, all he's seeing is shock, but that soon transforms into frustration.
"And what do you want me to do about it?" Kakashi demands, sharper than he'd usually be, but Genma's willing to let it go this time. "I've been benched."
"Get her out." Genma says simply, and he can tell he has Kakashi's attention when the frustrated expression turns contemplative. "Go to the Hokage, say that in the wake of your last mission, you want an assistant-sensei. Say that Sakura is familiar with you and one of your students, so she might help to bridge the chasm that's formed between you and your genin recently."
Kakashi winces at his wording, but Genma can tell that his words strike home, because he's not immediately refuted.
"You think the Hokage would agree?" Kakashi asks, the frown audible in his voice, and Genma shrugs.
"It's worth a try." he replies, then adds, "And if anyone could hope to petition for an assistant sensei and succeed, it's you."
"You've thought about this." Kakashi accuses, turning the full weight of his focus on Genma. "Why?"
"Wolf doesn't have a good track record for being put in charge of kids." he explains, which feels like the understatement of the century considering the man's 0% survival record for anyone teen-and-under placed in his care. "And as much as it serves as a convenient explanation, I genuinely think Sakura could help you with your team's situation. I don't like to see you struggling either, Kakashi."
Kakashi appears a little taken aback by his honesty, then, if he's reading the mask's shadows correctly, he smiles slightly.
"Thanks." he clasps Genma's elbow momentarily, then creates a Shadow Clone in the next second, positioning it perfectly between his real body and his students. "I'll see what I can do."
Then, the real Kakashi disappears, leaving his clone on the bridge to watch over his students.
Genma catches a flicker of dark eyes, Sakura's brother apparently being the only one to catch the replacement, but he doesn't say anything, merely focusing back on his attempt to create water tendrils while simultaneously coaching his Uchiha teammate through the difference in density between the surface of water and that of trees.
He thinks he catches a hint of a smile on the boy's lips though, and wonders how much of their conversation he overheard.
Even Sakura could admit that she got used to her new team rather quickly, all things considered.
She hadn't expect to feel anything beyond professional respect towards her captain and casual camaraderie towards her teammates when she joined, her heart firmly belonging to Team Ro. She'd thought that prediction a nigh certainty after it became apparent that her new team would be nothing like her previous one.
Given that, even she had been a little surprised at her vehemence on Inosuke's behalf in the face of Genma's warnings.
Yet, after their conversation on the roof in Wave, how could she have remained detached?
Beyond that, she'd been cheered when the initial distance and distrust she'd seen from her teammates towards Wolf had waned slightly. She thought they were getting better after she consistently refused to shy away from their captain, and though the camaraderie was still lacking, there was no obvious distance between Bat and Crow when it came to either her or Wolf, and the outward hostility had certainly all-but ceased.
Which is why she almost doesn't believe what she sees, at first.
Two days after her conversation with Genma, her team's sent out again, the unexpected reprieve from missions barely lasting a week.
And, naturally, they get ambushed, because of course they do, it's just her luck at this point.
By Kumo-nin this time, missing-nin at that, anywhere between chunin and jounin if she has to guess by chakra.
It's four against nine, an unusually large group for missing-nin, especially with all of them being from the same Village, but Sakura's too busy dodging lightning to puzzle out why the size of their group rubs her the wrong way.
She's the only one who chose to stay up in the outcroppings of jagged rock, Wolf, Bat, and Crow having jumped to solid ground the moment they sprang the ambush and the enemy revealed themselves. Wolf has a deep gash in his thigh, not having been able to dodge the fuma shuriken completely when he'd moved to push Crow out of the way of a blade that would've likely decapitated her.
Only one of the enemies is fully down so far, the others either still on their feet and fighting, or recovering from a hit.
Still, she can tell that Wolf is more preoccupied with guarding Crow than he is with gaining a quick advantage, and Sakura can understand why: Crow is a Hyuuga, after all, and Kumo doesn't have a great track record when it comes to the Hyuuga Clan.
Not that their current enemies know Crow's identity, hopefully, but the caution is still warranted.
Wolf is being unusually vicious as well, from what she manages to glimpse of her teammates' fights in the brief milliseconds she gets to recover from her own enemies' attacks, swinging his tanto with wild abandon and throwing senbon left and right with his other hand, a stark contrast to his usual quiet calm and swift illusions, and Sakura can't help but wonder whether there's a reason behind the change in approach.
Still, she tries to stay focused on her own opponents, cheered by the fact that Crow is steadily overwhelming her opponent with taijutsu, though Sakura can see that she has to concentrate to avoid using her Clan's style.
Wolf takes on any of the enemies who try to capitalise on Crow's exposed back, and Bat is flitting between Wolf and their female teammate and trying to catch the Kumo-nin with his ninjutsu. Sakura remembers Bat's quiet admission that he used to be a bodyguard before his assignment to Team 4, and that background is evident now as he skilfully keeps their enemies from his teammates' backs.
Sakura's own opponents had proven more difficult than she'd expected, and the wetness quickly seeping into her shirt on her left side is proof of that.
They were barely phased by her Shunshin, and given that they'd been the ones to orchestrate the ambush, she never had the element of surprise she usually relied upon to begin with. That, combined with the fact that she's still hesitant to use Mokuton in the field, both because she doesn't know Bat and Crow personally yet, and because it's Kumo, and with the limitation of the terrain and her opponents' age and height advantage over her, made for rather unfavourable odds.
It turns out that A and B hadn't been outliers, and Kumo-nin really are built like the mountains they live in.
Not ideal.
Sakura curls around a rock-plated fist from the opponent behind her and barely dodges the curved, glistening kunai that comes from the one in front and would've likely taken out her liver, turning so she earns a gash across her upper arm instead. It's deeper than she would've liked but it's not life-threatening, She'd long-since lost her ANBU cloak when one of her opponents had grabbed it trying to snag her and she'd simply released the clasps. Now, she ducks under her front attacker's still-extended arm and flashes into his personal space, pressing a blue-glowing hand against his chest, stopping his heart with a pulse of her chakra.
He falls, and as he does, she chances a glance back at the ground, where Wolf is guarding Crow and Bat is guarding Wolf. She turns just in time to see Crow finish off another one of their enemies, while Wolf holds off two more, the tanto wielding arm keeping one Kumo-nin at bay, while he holds the other one off with a forearm block, Bat at his back.
Sakura sees a third man approach, sword crackling with lightning in hand, intent on her taicho's unprotected back, another Kumo-nin at his heels, and Bat-
-Bat steps aside.
He steps aside and meets the second shinobi, but the first one slips right past him, and Sakura watches with her heart in her throat as the Kumo-nin rams his crackling sword straight through her taicho's kidney.
Her shout of alarm gets stuck in her throat because her second, still-alive opponent has not been idle, and she doesn't react in time when he moves.
She doesn't manage to dodge the spike of earth that pierces through her left foot, shattering the delicate metatarsals and shredding the tendons. She staggers, tears springing to her eyes, then decides to fuck subtlety. She pumps chakra into her fist, Tsunade-style, and a quick, six-foot Shunshin later she's in her opponent's guard, bringing her fist forward and towards his gut.
He raises an arm to block it like he'd blocked all her previous blows, the kunai he suddenly has in his hand catching on her wrist painfully, jarring the bone, but it's not enough. In his surprise at her reckless charge he doesn't reinforce his arm with the rock barrier that had protected his skin from all her other hits and Sakura's punch meets his forearm and shatters it with a single touch, then keeps going. The Kumo-nin is sent off his feet and off the branch, plummeting towards the ground, his organs ruptured and spine shattered even before his back meets the dirt beneath them.
Panic and pain rise within her, her foot and wrist and side screaming in agony yet her heart screaming to check on her captain. Healing herself takes a backburner to making sure Inosuke lives, so Sakura bites her hand and pumps a generous amount of chakra into the summoning technique.
Ryū and Yū materialise on her branch, and it takes her summons one look at her posture to quell whatever smartass remark Ryū likely had on the tip of his tongue, their bodies shifting into battle-readiness without her having to utter a single word.
She sways momentarily before she firms her stance, and as one, they converge on the ground, the twin summons tag-teaming the remaining missing-nin, jaws snapping and sharp teeth tearing delicate skin to shreds, while Sakura tries to keep her weight on her uninjured foot.
She flashes to Inosuke's side, vision briefly fading at the motion, and focuses on the shinobi still standing over her captain, sword raised.
She doesn't hesitate - chakra extends from the fingers of her uninjured hand, sharpening them to claws, and she digs her hand, fingers-first, under the Kumo-nin's left shoulder blade. Blood squelches between her fingers, the third and fourth rib shatter beneath her touch, but she doesn't stop her motion until her fingers close around the man's heart, at which point she wrenches her hand back and rips it out.
The whole process lasts less than two seconds and she drops the heart almost immediately, and there is a single, disembodied moment where the man who'd been about to decapitate her captain stares at where his own heart is laying on the ground, before he drops to the dirt like a puppet with its strings cut.
She ignores the retching she hears in the background and falls onto her knees next to her fallen captain.
Her vision swims and her heart stutters at her sudden movement, but she ignores that too and spreads her numb fingers out, blood-stained hands glowing green as they ghost over his body, trusting her summons to have her back.
(Unlike Bat, a voice whispers in her mind, but she shelves the thought for the moment, unable to afford any distraction, her head already feeling like it's full of cotton.)
She's not comforted by what she finds: beyond the wrecked kidney and surrounding electrocution, there's poison in her taicho's system, both old and new. The origin point of the new poison is the gash in the leg he got at the very start of the fight, and it's going to spread to the rest of his body if she doesn't do something.
She reaches for her pack but her fingers are unexpectedly uncooperative, her hands suddenly shaking too much for her to be able to unclasp the pouch, and she becomes aware of a soft but persistent pressure against her shoulder.
"-ime, hime, hime!" Ryū - or maybe Yū? - whines desperately, and it's his muzzle that she feels poking against her back. "Your arm!"
It takes her a few seconds to process his words, but she finally manages to mechanically jerk her head to look at her uncovered arm where she distantly remembers getting cut by one of her earlier opponents.
The skin around the gash is an angry red and glistening with something green-brown and sickly-smelling.
Poison.
Her brain feels muddled, but the realisation that she's also been poisoned spurs her into motion. Blood-stained fingers fumble for her pack until Ryū gets the hint and rips it off her belt, spilling the contents on the ground, but instead of annoyance, Sakura feels like she could cry with relief.
(The still-sober part of her brain contemplates the irony of having to deal with a poisoning yet again, but she pushes that thought away too.)
"-w can I help?"
Ryū nudges her temple, and Sakura blinks, raising her gaze from her shaking hands and the contents of her pack to Crow's mask, the kunoichi crouching beside her, her neck and shoulder smeared with blood and her arm bent at an odd angle, but all-in-all still decidedly in one piece.
"Water." Sakura croaks, her tongue feeling wooden in her mouth, her throat sore, her head pounding. She's got enough conscious thought to realise that she should be cycling her chakra faster to try and burn the poison out, but she can't do that and extract whatever's in Inosuke at the same time.
So she doesn't.
"Pour water on my hands."
She holds out her hands, attempting to gather chakra, and Crow does as asked. It takes Sakura three tries before she manages to keep the water within the bubble, her control shot to hell with the poison coursing through her body, but she turns to Wolf, only belatedly realising that she hadn't made the second incision needed for the extraction.
Tears spring to her eyes and she makes a frustrated noise, but she keeps the water in her hands even as her control threatens to wobble.
"Cut him." Yū's voice comes from somewhere to her right. "On the hip. Hime needs an exit wound."
Crow is two seconds slower to follow this command than she'd been to pour water on Sakura's hands, and in any other situation, Sakura would be gratified at the fact that the kunoichi hesitates to harm their captain. But eventually she does it, steady hand grabbing a kunai and slashing it determinedly across Inosuke's right hip.
"The glass tube. On the ground." Yū adds as Sakura leans over Wolf's prone form, trying to pull her poison-addled brain into focus. "She'll need it for the poison."
As she feels Crow move to fish for a test tube, Sakura sees large paws settle on Inosuke's shoulders, holding him down.
With a desperate, shuddering breath, she pushes the chakra water into his poisoned wound.
His knee jerks up and catches her ribs, jarring her bleeding side and knocking the breath out of her, making her bite on a sob, but she keeps her control on her chakra with the last scraps of her concentration, her hand shaking where it hovers over the exit wound.
With the water she pulls out of the cut on his hip come two globs of green-brown fluid, and Sakura hopes that the pre-Tsunade medics will be able to make an antidote with just that amount, because her control shatters the moment she manages to make sure that all of the poison she extracts ends up in Crow's test tube.
Crow corks it and moves to hand it over, but Sakura reaches for Yū's muzzle, ends up grabbing his cheek with uncoordinated fingers, and pulls him to Crow's hand instead.
Her summon gets the hint and grabs the corked vial delicately from her teammate's hand, and Sakura's semi-delirious brain muses that it might be a good idea to fashion her summons some sort of bag or scroll-pouch.
"When you're home safe, hime." Ryū mumbles from her left, pawing at her uninjured hip, and Sakura realises she must've spoken out loud.
"Take it to the hospital." She orders Yū, her voice sounding foreign even to her ears, and she's sure she's slurring. "Find Shin and Genma."
Yū blinks in affirmation, then turns and shoots off, in the direction of what Sakura hopes is Konoha.
"Ryū-chan," she mumbles, her vision greying and her eyelids growing heavy, but she can't sleep yet, she has to- has to-! "bite my hand for me?"
Ryū whines, louder than all the times before, but does come closer and gently clamps his teeth over her palm, sharp incisors doing their job.
Sakura barely feels it.
"Thank you." she slurs, then, with a last, ditch effort and the hope that the abundance of blood will make up for lack of hand-signs, pours all her chakra into the ground and prays for Eki-sama.
She hears Crow curse though it sounds distant, even though she knows the kunoichi is right beside her, and the shadow that falls over her lets her know that her desperate play worked.
"Disposal, or transport?" Eki asks, none of the usual cheer in the massive summon's voice, and Sakura gladly lets Ryū answer for her.
She's absently aware of time passing, but she snaps awake when teeth clasp around the collar of her shirt and throw her onto the tiger's wide shoulders, her shin colliding painfully with her taicho's still knee.
Then, not sparing a thought to Crow or Bat (stepping aside, stepping aside, stepping aside-!), she lets the stiff fingers of one hand wrap in Eki's fur, while the other clutches desperately at Inosuke's pant leg.
Lulled by the motion of Eki's shoulders under her and with the poison dulling her senses, Sakura allows her eyes to close, Shin's words from their spar a few months ago echoing in her mind in the few seconds before she finally loses consciousness.
You won't always have the element of surprise on your side. What will you do then?
Kakashi doesn't sense any chakra approach, yet in one moment he's sitting on Minato-sensei's hair spike by himself, and in the next, Shin is six feet away from him, perched casually on a nearby spike and staring out at the Village beneath them.
"Is this the part where you tell me you'll kill me if I let anything happen to your brother?" Kakashi asks idly after a few minutes, his nonchalance sounding fake even to his ears.
He's dreading this conversation, but he hates the silence even more, because with people like Shin, silence is more dangerous than a shouting match.
To his surprise, Shin snorts.
"Nah." he waves him off, though he doesn't so much as glance at Kakashi. "Sai is more than capable of killing you himself."
Kakashi huffs a laugh, amused despite himself, then he almost jumps, because Shin is suddenly next to him, and he didn't even see him move.
"I'm here for you, Hatake, bizarre as that might sound." Shin adds, and he seems comparably surprised at the admission as Kakashi feels. "My siblings were probably harsher than you deserved because they both know you, and they respect you, and because of that, they have certain expectations of you."
Kakashi is openly staring at the teen now, and when Shin feels him looking and meets his gaze, he smirks.
"I never pretended to respect you, and I don't claim to know you." he tells Kakashi frankly, offering a half-shrug. "No expectations here."
The admission, despite how blunt and plain rude it is, lifts a weight off of Kakashi's shoulders. No judgement. No disappointment.
"So." Shin drawls after a beat, and the look he sends Kakashi is almost amused. "You're not at the Memorial Stone and you're not reading your porn, but you're avoiding people and lounging on your old sensei's head. You're sending out some conflicting signals, Hatake."
And Kakashi can't bite back the snort at the words, and he doesn't try to. Not just because it's a scarily apt summary of his usual coping mechanisms for someone who claims they don't know him, but also because it's the closest to 'are you alright?' anyone has asked him since his team came back from Wave a week prior, and it comes from Sakura's bastard of a brother.
"My C-Rank turned into a clusterfuck, my genin don't trust me, Psych is on my ass, and everyone who questioned the Sandaime's decision to put me in charge of kids has been gloating whenever I'm in the room." He lists off, tone saccharine-sweet, and he finds that he doesn't care enough to censor his feelings in front of Shin, though he's not particularly keen on looking into why. "So I've no idea what could possibly be 'confusing' about whatever signals I'm sending."
"It happens, they'll come around, fuck 'em, and fuck 'em." is Shin's assessment, and the wording is enough to make Kakashi pause and stare at the teen incredulously.
"What?" Shin demands when he notices Kakashi's raised eyebrow. "You told me yourself your easy missions go to shit. So, nothing new. The kids will come around in a few days because they're kids, especially if you admit to fucking up and answer some of their questions. Sai too, before you ask, and don't look at me like that, he's used to dealing with obstinate assholes, trust me. He'll move past this, just tell him straight-up how you're going to treat him, 'cause that's his biggest hang-up now that you know who he is. And as for Psych and everyone else, what does it matter what they think? Ergo, fuck them."
"Even if they have a point?" Kakashi pushes, masochistic streak making a reappearance in the face of his uncertainty at how to deal with Shin's unexpected pragmatism.
"Hatake, I'm not going to coddle you." Shin scoffs, scowling at him, but his expression still lacks the judgement Kakashi has been seeing on the faces of some of his comrades in the last week.
"Yes, you fucked up, but what did you expect? You can't give a traumatised, orphan child-genius a bunch of children and expect him to know what to do. You reading porn in public should've been enough of a clue that you don't exactly have people-skills. The fact that people expected you to be fine as a jounin-sensei is more of a reflection on them than on you."
Every sentence that comes out of Shin's mouth carries some sort of an insult to his character or his competence, yet to Kakashi's ears, it sounds like absolution.
"Was there a point to you coming here, or did you just want to prove that you're not entirely a stone-cold bastard?" He asks instead of voicing that thought, and Shin's scoff morphs into a wry smile.
"I wanted to thank you, actually." He announces, and Kakashi nearly loses his hold on his chakra and freefalls off the Hokage Monument.
Judging by Shin's quiet snort, the lapse of composure didn't go unnoticed.
"Sai told me you didn't hesitate to act when you found out who Sakura's captain is." Shin explains, oddly gracious in that he doesn't comment on Kakashi's reaction.
"You know about her captain?" Kakashi checks, frowning behind his mask.
Sure, it's not exactly top-secret, especially if you're his age or older, but he hadn't expected Shin to know.
According to Genma, Sakura has no clue, and she regularly works with the man.
"Not many things happen in this Village that I don't know about." Shin replies, and Kakashi blinks at the frank admission. "And while I don't necessarily think he's a danger, I am more than in favour of getting my sister out of ANBU."
There's too much to unpack there. Moving swiftly on!
"Why seek me out?" He asks instead, asking the question that's poked at him since Shin announced his presence. "I didn't exactly get the impression that you like me in our last few interactions."
Shin snorts, but it lacks the usual derision and disdain.
"Because the mission going wrong was out of your control, but what you do next is your decision." And then, Shin pins him with a look that makes Kakashi feel like the teen sees right through him.
"I understand not wanting attachments, trust me. Particularly young, fragile ones with tragic backstories. But Hatake, you're infamous. You're in every Nation's Bingo Book – you literally have a target on your back wherever you go. And your kids will get tangled up in your shit whether you want them or not. By not teaching them to the best of your ability, you're denying them even the possibility of a fighting chance against whoever and whatever might come after you."
When Kakashi just stares at him, Shin sighs and gets to his feet.
"So either pass them off on someone else or get your act together." he concludes. "But start by talking to them. If nothing else, they deserve an explanation."
There's a beat, and then Kakashi mutters a quiet: "Thanks, Shin."
And then, as if the words are a trigger, all expression gets wiped from Shin's face and Kakashi's left staring at a blank mask and flinty eyes.
"This conversation never happened." Shin warns, voice an inflectionless monotone, and within the next second, he's gone.
Kakashi sighs.
(In the back of his mind, he briefly recalls Hayate's 'is he yours?' and finds himself reluctantly amused. He and Shin certainly have the same reactions to the full spectrum of human emotion, but the kid's still a brat.)
Unfortunately, it seems fate is not too keen on letting them avoid each other; not three hours later, as he's strolling to the Memorial Stone for a much-overdue chat, he catches sight of a familiar tiger sneaking through the shadows at breakneck pace, what looks like Genma hurrying behind it.
Kakashi changes direction and sprints to catch up before he even realises what he's doing.
"What's happened?" he demands as he catches up to Genma, and he's thrown by the clear concern shining in the tokujo's eyes.
"Kid's in the hospital." Genma holds up a hand with a corked test-tube of something grim looking. "Kumo poison."
Kakashi doesn't deign that with a response, and he's not surprised when they suddenly turn towards one of the more remote training grounds and find it already occupied by Shin and Sai.
Shin zeroes in on them immediately, before they even properly make it past the treeline, and his gaze flickers between the summon, Genma and Kakashi, and the vial in Genma's hand.
An ugly curse falls from his lips and he whirls on the summon with a demanding glare.
"Poison." The tiger pants, and Sai moves for the first time since he froze upon their arrival, kneeling by the summon and uncorking his water canteen, pouring some into the cradle of his other hand, and the tiger drops its head and drinks like a housecat.
"Hime shouldn't be far behind." The summon tells Shin once it's done drinking, rubbing its head against Sai's shoulder in what Kakashi interprets as gratitude. "But Ryū won't be able to carry them, and if you want to keep our contract a secret, you should head for the gates."
Shin's gone before anyone can say anything more.
"I'll-" Genma begins, frazzled, glancing between the summon and Kakashi's student, "I'll get to work on the antidote."
And then he, too, is gone, and Kakashi's left in the field with Sai and Sakura's summon.
"Thank you, Yū-san." Sai murmurs, raising a hand to pet the tiger gently, nimble fingers scratching at the summon's thick neck. "You can rest now."
Yū rubs his face against Sai's forearm one more time, then unsummons himself in a burst of smoke, and now Kakashi has no choice but to interact with his student.
"Do you-" he starts, drawing Sai's gaze onto himself, and he has to swallow to get the words out, "do you want to go wait in the hospital?"
Sai blinks, and Kakashi's sure he's not imagining the surprise he reads in the boy's eyes.
"You don't like the hospital though, sensei." He points out, and Kakashi wonders whether he really is that pathetically easy to read recently, or whether it's something about this family in particular that makes all of his many masks redundant.
He almost pulls out his book, more out of habit than any need for distraction or entertainment, but he keeps his hands still and forces himself to hold Sai's gaze.
"I don't." he agrees, because pretending otherwise would be an insult, and he's had both Genma and Shin tell him to be honest, and he can take the hint sometimes. "But I am an adult, and your teacher. I can manage."
Sai studies him for a second longer, then he smiles, small and genuine, and rises to his feet.
"I'd like that." he agrees, walking over to Kakashi and falling into step with him as they move to head for the hospital. "Thank you, sensei."
Kakashi twitches.
He hadn't realised none of his students had called him 'sensei' since they got back from Wave until the word spills from Sai's lips, and he can't help but feel like he passed some kind of test.
(He wonders if this is forgiveness.)
"But really," Sai continues once they're out in the main street leading to the hospital, eyes on the road, his lips barely moving and feet making no sound as he walks, and Kakashi once again can't believe he hadn't picked up on the fact that Sai was never a normal genin himself, "you don't have to sit and wait with me. I appreciate the offer, but I don't want you to be uncomfortable."
Kakashi bites his cheek to avoid saying 'I'm already uncomfortable' and opts for his eye-crinkle instead. "I'll manage, Sai. Don't worry."
Sai doesn't turn to look at him, doesn't say anything else, but his smile grows slightly wider all the same.
Sakura wakes up slowly, and as consciousness returns, so does the pounding headache when she makes the mistake of opening her eyes.
"Ow." She groans, her throat feeling like sandpaper and her voice sounding like she'd chain-smoked a pack of cigarettes, "Light's too damn bright."
There's a quiet shuffle, then a 'click', and even with her eyes closed, she can tell the offensive light has been switched off.
"Thanks." She mumbles, then tries opening her eyes again.
The room is indeed darker now, the sky outside hinting at dusk or early evening. She squints at her unexpected saviour, and finds him already looking, and she knows that face- "Senpai?!"
Inosuke nods at her, pale eyes contrasted by dark circles visible even in the low light of the room, his scar stark against his pallid face.
Sakura breathes a sigh of relief.
"You're alive. Good." She mutters, falling back against her pillows, suddenly realising just how exhausted she feels. "I feel like shit."
Inosuke snorts at her observation and she cracks an eye open – when had she closed them? – and finds him smiling wryly.
"You can thank the poison for that." he tells her dryly, and he sounds exhausted as well as looks it. "There's water on your bedside table, if you want."
Sakura waves an uncoordinated hand and tries to make her fingers do a 'thumbs-up' in thanks, then tries to take stock of just how badly that mission had messed her up.
Beyond the general sluggishness, cotton-brain, and heavy limbs she attributes to the aftereffects of the poison, there's a cast on her right foot, a thick bandage on her wrist, and she can feel the tightness of stitches in her left side as well, but beyond that, she can't feel anything that could be debilitating in the long-term.
"Three cheers for contact poisons. Gas woulda sucked." She mumbles at the ceiling, then wiggles to a more sat-up position so she can reach for her glass of water, because her voice sounds like death warmed over and her mouth tastes like something died in it.
"Charming." Inosuke intones flatly, and Sakura glances at him over the rim of her glass, noting his raised eyebrow and quirked lip. For a man who got poisoned to kingdom come and whose kidney got skewered like a kebab and deep-fried on top of that, he doesn't actually look too bad.
She's almost jealous.
Inosuke laughs suddenly, and that's when Sakura forces her brain to actually pay attention because she doesn't think she's done anything to warrant that reaction.
"They've got you on the good stuff, kid." Her captain informs her, amusement colouring his voice, "You've been thinking out loud."
Sakura blinks, thoughts whirring.
"Oh." Shit. "They've got me on morphine? Really? That's a bit of an overkill, isn't it?"
Inosuke shoots her a look that's drier than the deserts in the Land of Wind.
"Out of the 26 bones in your foot, you shattered thirteen and broke or fractured nine others." He relays flatly. "You wouldn't stop screaming when they were trying to heal it."
Sakura…doesn't remember that.
But then, something Inosuke said makes her tired brain snap to attention, and she sends her captain an alarmed look.
"How long have I been asleep?" she demands, because if she was sleeping off a poisoning, chakra exhaustion and had morphine in her system, that should be at least-!
"Eight days."
Sakura closes her eyes at the news, dreading Shin's lecture that's undoubtedly coming next time she sees him. He had warned her, after all, and she was sure that her explanation of 'back-to-back missions' won't be enough of a justification for why she hadn't listened.
She wrenches her mind away from that line of thought because there's nothing she can do about it now, and turns her gaze back to her captain.
"How're you feeling, senpai?" she asks quietly, not sure if she's breaking some unaddressed taboo by asking.
"Like I got poisoned to kingdom come and skewered like a kebab." He retorts, and it takes her a moment to realise he's echoing her earlier musings on his appearance, but once she realises, she can't help her quiet laugh.
"That's fair enough."
They lapse into silence after that, though Sakura knows neither of them are likely to be getting any sleep any time soon; she's still too keyed-up from the memory of their mission (steppingaway-!) while Inosuke, judging by the bags under his eyes, hasn't had a restful sleep in days.
After a few minutes, a thought occurs to her, and she's speaking before her brain quite catches up with her mouth.
"With the Mind-Walk, do you just see the surface thoughts? And can your target steer what you see, or are they more like observers?"
Inosuke eyes her sharply, and Sakura realises that she probably should've explained her thought process a little more.
Flushing, she hastens to do just that: "I remembered you saying that you'd have liked to see ta- Hound's face after he found out about my brother's identity." She explains, cursing her earlier blunder. "Depending on your answer to my previous two questions, I might be able to show you what he'd looked like."
It's Inosuke's turn to blink at her, an odd expression momentarily flashing across his face before he finally speaks.
"Both. People trained to detect mind-manipulation, or with well-constructed mental spaces are often aware of a Yamanaka's presence in their mind. Unlike the Mind Transfer technique, there is no possession involved, so the target's mind is still their own. In that respect, if you make yourself think only about one thing, like a mantra, the average Mind-Walk user would struggle to see past that thought without forcing the mental landscape."
Sakura frowns as she mulls that over. "So, if I think hard about what I want to show you, you'll only be able to see that particular memory?" at his hesitant nod, she smiles. "Alright. Let's do this!"
When Inosuke merely stares at her, eyes wide and mouth slightly open, her smile slowly melts away. "…Wait, have the nurses cleared you to use chakra?"
Two weeks after first receiving the report from the ANBU gate patrol about half of Team Four approaching the Village walls on the back of an enormous tiger summon, Bear is sitting at his desk in HQ, going through the most recent paperwork submitted by Mouse's squad on the situation on the border of Sound and Hot Water.
Suddenly, there's a knock on the door, and he flares his chakra twice in the ANBU-standard 'come in', and feels his eyebrow climb up his forehead behind his mask when Mongoose slips into the room, crutches first, her mask over her face and hood up.
Someone must've fetched the kid a spare standard uniform or she 'borrowed' from Laundry, because the loose navy long-sleeve and trousers she's sporting are a good two sizes to big for her and definitely not up to ANBU regulations. At least it's a step up from a hospital gown.
He bites back a snort when he notes she's barefoot, though.
"Bear-sama, hello." she greets quietly, hobbling closer to his desk without hesitation, the motion a bit comical seeing as she's on crutches in ANBU HQ.
In the ANBU Commander's office, even.
"Mongoose." he returns dryly, wondering what could've prompted the visit. Shouldn't the kid still be at the hospital? "Something you need?"
"I want to talk to you about Team Four's latest mission." she explains, stopping about a metre from his desk and inclining her head respectfully.
"If you want a reassignment sheet, you need to hunt down Spider." Bear informs her, sighing inwardly and mentally resigning himself to suffering through Spider's gloating for the next few days.
But Mongoose doesn't move, and he can hear the frown in her voice even through her mask when she next speaks.
"I don't want to be reassigned. I'm happy on my team." she almost snaps, and Bear puts down the report he'd been reading and gives her his full attention. "Sir." She adds belatedly to soften the earlier sharp tone, but Bear pays it no heed.
(Privately, he wonders whether anyone before Mongoose could ever have claimed to have been happy on Wolf's team.)
"Then what brings you here?" he asks evenly, because the kid hasn't ever caused any problems despite her age, and she's long exceeded the time he thought she'd last on Team 4, and, from her words, doesn't seem eager to leave, so he's not sure what she could want.
He hears the deep, grounding breath Mongoose takes before she speaks, but he's still not prepared for the words that come out.
"I would like to request that agent Bat be temporarily suspended from the team and undergo a full psychological evaluation." she announces, the words polite and clearly rehearsed, but her spine is ramrod-straight despite the crutches and her chakra so tightly-coiled within her that he can't glean anything from it.
He takes a second to fully absorb the words as he leans back in his chair.
"That's quite a big request." he observes, keeping his tone as bland as he can, but Mongoose doesn't let herself be baited. "Your reasoning?"
"I believe he intentionally allowed an opponent to slip past his guard so that our team leader would come to harm."
Bear straightens immediately, pinning Mongoose with a sharp look which she must feel even through the mask, but she doesn't backtrack.
"I realise the gravity of the accusation." she assures before he can speak, but her voice doesn't waver. "And I'd be willing to allow a member of the Yamanaka Clan access to my memory of the mission to corroborate my claim, if needed."
Bear blinks behind his mask, mind whirring. "Your team would be Village-bound until Bat is either cleared or removed permanently."
"I'm aware. But taicho and I still have some recovering to do, and after that, well. Fox has been on rotation between Infiltration and Seduction – she could just as easily fill in for Bat if our team's specialty was needed in the field."
"You've thought about this." he observes, and she inclines her head even though it wasn't a question.
"I witnessed the moment Bat stepped away, Commander." She tells him evenly, though her chakra escapes her tight hold for a split-second and he can feel her anger at the fact before it's hastily smothered once more. "It's been difficult to think of much else, to be perfectly honest."
"I'll take your request to Psych." He tells her after a minute of contemplative silence. "Don't be surprised if you get a summon from them in the next few days."
"Thank you."
"In the meantime, I believe the Hokage wanted to see you as soon as you were awake and moving about."
"The Hokage?" she asks, frown audible even through her mask, and the wariness in her voice is…alarming. "Why?"
"Can't tell you that." he sighs, then slips his hand under his mask and rubs his fingers over his eyes, the genjutsu over his face assuring Mongoose doesn't glimpse so much as his chin. "But, Mongoose? Whatever happens, you're still ANBU. You're one of my best infiltrators; I'm not giving you up until you ask to be benched."
He can feel the thoughts whirring through her mind at his words, his assurance likely raising more questions than answers, but either the kid's smart enough not to press or has already drawn her own conclusions.
"…Noted. Thanks, Commander."
And so saying, she hobbles out.
Standing in front of the Hokage feels surreal, particularly considering the words that come out of the man's mouth.
"A request has come in for your skills outside of the shadows of ANBU." Sarutobi tells her evenly, and maybe the man has gotten better as an actor, or maybe he's stopped perceiving her as a threat, but his words appear honest, and she can't detect a single trap in the set-up. "I've decided to grant it."
Nara Shikaku's presence by the window is also helping her unease, somewhat.
When it becomes clear they're waiting for her reaction, she makes sure her tone is even, though she allows some of her surprise to leak into her voice.
"Outside?" she echoes, unsure what the man is getting at. "With all due respect, Hokage-sama," which is none at all, "I don't exist outside of the shadows."
Sarutobi sighs, though it was his decision that resulted in her spending the last three years in ANBU, so she's not sure why he's pretending remorse at the fact, but the way Shikaku's mouth curls down in displeasure is definitely genuine, and Sakura feels…somewhat touched.
"I am aware." The Hokage agrees, then gestures to the papers spread across his desk, and Sakura only now notices Kakashi's familiar scrawl on some of them. "And I believe we have found a way to rectify that. Your field commanders' reports all indicate that you're a highly capable shinobi, and your recent mission has proven that you possess the leadership qualities we were looking for."
He pauses, eyeing her for a second, gaze flickering from her mask to her hood and hospital pyjamas.
"Take off your mask, please."
Sakura freezes.
While the wording is different, the order is the same as the first time she had been in this office in this life, when she'd taken the gamble to expose Danzo and secure Sai and Shin's safety in exchange for her own.
With jerky movements, she lifts a hand to her face and pushes her mask up, to the top of her head, pushing her hood off at the same time.
Shikaku moves then, pulling out a familiar vest from behind his back and handing it to the Hokage, who also rises to his feet.
"Sakura of the Leaf," Sarutobi intones, and Sakura can do little more than stare as he extends the chunin vest towards her, "you are hereby awarded the rank of chunin of Konohagakure and assigned under Hatake Kakashi, as the assistant sensei of Team Seven."