All the shinobi training in the world couldn't have prepared her for this moment while the pairs of eyes that were currently burning holes through her body made her feel extremely uncomfortable. It was ridiculous. She had grown up with them, healed them, fought by their side. Sakura cursed her perfect Academy attendance. She had never missed a day so, she couldn't blame her classmates for being curious. Such a childish thing, curiosity. It made them look so vulnerable, innocent, a far cry from the strong hardened shinobi that she had learned to trust with her life.
"Sakura-chan! Over here! I saved you a spot!"
Torn apart from her musings, she rushed to the blond' side and sat. Gasps echoed around the room and though she knew how it must have looked like, she paid them no mind. They were used with her beating Naruto and ignoring him like he was nothing but dirt beneath her fingernails.
Well, that ends today.
"Thanks Naruto." she said with a smile, turning her head to face him.
"No problem Sakura-chan!" he exclaimed, fighting a blush from showing on his whiskered cheeks.
When Iruka walked inside the classroom, he smiled at them before he began the lesson. Fifteen minutes later and Sakura could tell that Naruto was growing impatient. He was a ball of unlimited energy. It wasn't surprising that he found it hard to stand still during class. Were all Uzumaki like this? The Yondaime was said to be a calm and composed person. Naruto must take after his mother regarding his tendencies.
Not that she found the history lesson any more interesting than he did but the reason behind her lack of focus was simple and well justified. Her strength, at this point in her life, had been her knowledge. She was book smart, always absorbing information like a sponge does to water. Everything Iruka was talking about, she already knew. Naruto, however, had a small attention span to things that weren't 'cool' as he would put it.
We will have to fix that. Because knowledge is power. At least I understood that back then.
When lunch break arrived, he all but jumped out of his seat, relieved that the theory part of the day was done with.
And here comes the part that my past always loathed.
Sakura thought, cracking her knuckles with excitement. While her current strength came nowhere as close to the one that she was used with having, a small part of it managed to survive her journey to the past. Now it was only a matter of figuring out just how much she had to improve before she regained back her former power.
"It's time for the amicable spars. Boys, I want you to form a circle. Since the girls won't take part today, we will use the other half of the hour for target practice."
Mumbles of agreement could be heard and for a moment Sakura found herself judging her own gender. No, that won't do. She was not going to happily sit on the sidelines and cheer Sasuke on while talking gossip. Not again. She was going to train. There wasn't any rule to forbid her from doing something productive while the guys paraded their muscles, was there?
"What is she doing?"
"Shouldn't all the girls sit back and watch us?"
Ignoring the stares and the talking (something that she seemed to be doing a lot lately), Sakura walked to where the weapons were stationed, picking up a bunch of kunai before standing in front of the targets.
Iruka glanced between the pink haired girl and the crowd of boys before he cleared his throat. "First match: Inuzuka Kiba and Akimichi Chouji."
Her first tries at throwing kunai were mediocre at best. Not because she had bad aim (she was no Weapons Mistress like Tenten was, will be, Sakura corrected herself, but she was decent enough); The reason behind her failed throws was her stance and once she remembered that she was not seventeen, not anymore, it was a simple feat to correct her position so it would fit her small, twelve-year-old body.
The next objective on her list was re-learning tree climbing which, wasn't an effort from her part since she had this mastered the first time around very quickly. Sakura decided to label it as one of her irrational fears. She just wanted to make sure that the abilities that she was supposed to have at this age were actually there.
"The last spar of today is Uchiha Sasuke and Uzumaki Naruto."
Nani?!
As Iruka made the announcement, Sakura fell off the tree but years of fighting out in the field had sharpened her reflexes. She regained her balance and gracefully landed on the ground. Maybe her mind had suffered some sort of trauma that she never bothered to cure, maybe it was a protective instinct that she had developed or maybe it was her guilt, demanding that she pays back every favour that Naruto had ever done for her. Whatever was the thing that compelled her to ditch training had one main point as focus: his safety and Sakura, with the mind of a seventeen- year-old who had witnessed the dark-haired boy try to kill Naruto several times couldn't register, couldn't make the difference between this Sasuke and her Sasuke, who became someone that she could barely recognise. Now, the one standing in front of her, kind and unaware of the truth behind his clan's massacre, free of Orochimaru's cursed mark, was the foreign picture that she could only recall echoes of:
"Sakura, get off. You're heavy."
"Sakura has the sharpest mind in our team."
"Who did this to you?"
"Don't tell Naruto."
"Thank you, Sakura."
With a determined stride in her step, the pinkette walked towards the crowd of boys, stopping behind the Uzumaki troublemaker. "Give your best, Naruto!" she encouraged him, placing a supporting hand on his shoulder. She knew her gesture couldn't possibly change the inevitable outcome of the spar but this, this wasn't about winning or changing things. No, it was about the times Naruto had been there for her when Sasuke wasn't. About the times she hadn't stood by his side when all he wanted was to know there is someone out there who was cheering for him too.
"Don't worry about me Sakura-chan! I will kick teme's butt, believe it!"
And she smiled because he smiled and whenever Naruto smiled the world seemed a little brighter, a little better.
Their spar, unfortunately, had gone as awful as Sakura had predicted and it took every bone of restraint in her body not to run between them. For some reason, even though she had witnessed Naruto getting beaten and hurt many times before in her past life, now, every kick, every punch that Sasuke managed to successfully perform made her sick to the stomach. The worst thing of all was how Naruto refused to accept his defeat. It didn't surprise her but she was selfish enough that she couldn't bear to watch. Throwing Iruka-sensei a pleading look proved to be useless. More often than not, teachers, especially if we are talking about ninja ones were under the impression that sometimes only experiencing rough moments would teach children a good lesson and quitting with your dignity still intact seemed to be the one held today. A lesson that Naruto would never even consider learning; Iruka didn't know that. Nobody knew that when Naruto said he is never going to give-up he means it with his all being. Nobody knew that he'd sooner have his arms and legs cut off before he quit. Nobody. But she, she did.
If Sasuke won't stop, Naruto won't quit and Iruka won't step between them... Sakura let her thought trail off, as she gripped tightly the material of her red dress.
Despite common belief, medic-nin were taught a lot more than healing. In order to handle such fragile, delicate things as internal organs and external body parts, she had to know them first. Tsunade, being one of the few medic-nin to also join combat situations, showed her just as many ways to destroy somebody's body. Fake fainting didn't seem like a bad way to fix things. Sakura refused to believe the spar would continue if there is a "sweet innocent girl" laying on the ground. It didn't take much pretending for her to pull it off. Just thinking of the war's cruelty and seeing Sasuke beat up Naruto were enough for her blood pressure to drastically drop. Besides, this made for a good chakra control exercise because if she wasn't careful, she'd end up fainting for real. It wasn't exactly childplay per see but was it ever in the shinobi world?
.
.
On the bright side, her stunt had saved Naruto from more bruises and humiliation. On the other side, pretty much everyone, her parents included, were now under the impression that there was something wrong with her health. She lost count of how many reasons and excuses she gave just so they wouldn't take her to a doctor. She also drew the line when they wanted her to stay home and rest. In less than a month, she'd become a genin once more. Before that happened, she needed to train, she needed to be better than last time. Other than attending the Academy and doing individual training, Sakura took teaching Naruto the things that nobody bothered to very seriously. He had complained in the beginning but she knew him well enough in order to convince him. However, she didn't know how to do her lessons so they wouldn't be too much of a headache for him. Thus, that's where Shikamaru came in. In her past life, Sakura saw him as a rival but later on she had come to admire him as someone superior, she had come to understand than no intelligence could rival that of a Nara's and Shikamaru in particular was pretty brilliant. Besides, it wouldn't bring anybody harm if she tried to befriend people before chaos got thrown in their lives, right?
Making up her mind, the pinkette closed her hand into a fist, knocking lightly on the door. She didn't have to wait for long because soon enough, a woman in her thirties with black hair and equally black eyes answered. From the hardness of her stare to the strength that seemed to radiate off her, Sakura deemed it safe to assume the woman was no one other than Shikamaru's mother. "Good afternoon Nara-sama! I'm Haruno Sakura, Shikamaru's classmate. Does he happen to be home?" she asked politely.
"Finally, someone has come to drag my lazy son out of the house. Yes, he is here Sakura. Come wait inside until I wake him up." the woman replied with a determined glint in her eyes that made Sakura feel sorry for Shikamaru.
"Ano...it's alright Nara-sama. I don't want to bother Shikamaru when he is sleeping. If you could please let him know I came when he wakes...up." she finished her sentence in awe at the fact that the Nara matriarch was already walking down the hall and yelling loud enough so the entire household would be able to hear.
I forgot how much it sucks to be a pre-teen, having to obey your parents...gomen Shikamaru.
A few mumbles of "troublesome woman" and "girl", that Sakura was sure was meant for her later, the Nara heir came with a lazy slouch in his step, hands inside some invisible pockets that by the look on Shikamaru's face, should have been there.
The pinkette scratched the back of her neck in a nervous manner, a dead giveaway habit that she had taken from Naruto — there was only so much time you could spend with somebody before some of their tendencies rubbed off on you.
"I tried telling her not to wake you..." she began but before she could hope to continue what she had to say, Shikamaru silenced her with an understanding nod.
"It's a drag but she means well. Sometimes. Dad says so, at least."
Sakura adverted her eyes for a second at the mention of Shikaku Nara, another name that made her stomach twist in guilt. Why guilt? She didn't know. For not preventing it, for not having enough guts to say something about it now; it was a blurred sensation. She just knew she found it hard to look people in the eye these days without thinking about their injured bodies or the scattered corpses of their loved ones.
"All mothers do. Including the one of bad habits." she said, smiling slightly at Shikamaru' surprised expression who eventually nodded with an amused half smirk.
"Well...not to sound like a jackass or anything Sakura but why did you come?"
Is it really that obvious that I came with a purpose? She found herself groaning internally before another part of herself whispered in a knowing kind of way. For a Nara? Duh!
"I wanted some advice about..."
A/N: I decided to end the chapter here so it won't be too long. Firstly, I want to thank you all for giving this story a shot. I was surprised when I received such positive feedback after only posting one chapter. I also apologize for the delay with this one (school had just started and it already feels like a pain in my butt). I hope you will like this chapter and as for those of you who are waiting for more action to happen, it will, I promise...I'm just taking my time. Rushing never did people any good after all. Now to answer a question.
Annecastillo1727: I'm afraid yes. The Uchiha Massacre did happen since Sakura time travelled back when she was twelve, two months before the Genin Exam.