Hiya, everyone!
You guys were so amazing with your reviews last chapter! Thank you so much 3
I'm actually super excited for this chapter hehe Enjoy ;)
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Sakura adjusted a piece of her hair in the mirror and sighed for the third time that late afternoon.
The morning after she had accepted Toshio's offer, a courier had delivered a formal letter from her parents. Apparently, the Tachibana would be around for some business meetings and would attend the Spring Festival that night and it was important for Sakura to show her face.
Of course, the letter was filled with empty platitudes made to appeal to her softer side and guilt trip her into going.
We respect your choices, would have sounded nice and all if it hadn't been followed by: but please understand how your presence is indispensable.
Sakura had agreed in part because she didn't want to let the resentment she felt towards her parents fester but mostly because her mission schedules were still being worked out and she had nothing better to do.
She had outgrown all her yukata a while back and mostly used them around the house so a shopping trip had been in order. Not that any of the girls had complained when she roped them into coming with her but it had been a slightly uncomfortable afternoon for Sakura.
It had been jarring to be lazily walking around the village, picking out clothes while her friends chattered away. It's not as if she was like Kakashi, who barely stepped foot inside the village, but it was still weird for her to not be busy either training or getting ready for some mission.
She had refused to buy the overly expensive pink yukata Ino had pushed towards her and settled for a simple midnight blue one with silver and white petals adorning the sleeves and hem. It came with a pretty silver obi with a white flower pattern that had been a bitch to tie and Sakura tried to convince herself that her parents wouldn't mind her not wearing a kimono.
Technically this festival wasn't supposed to be any kind of formal and while she may have agreed to go she was absolutely not gonna spend the night in a constricting kimono.
"Can't you tell people I was suddenly called away on a mission?" Sakura asked when she noticed Tsunade leaning against her bedroom door.
"I could," Tsunade shot her a cheeky grin, "but I won't."
Sakura sighed again and gave her shishou a pointed look through the mirror.
"Any particular reason?" She noticed the blonde woman holding a wooden box in her hands and raised an eyebrow at it.
"Because then you wouldn't have a place to make a dramatic first appearance with the gift your poor shishou spent a lot of time thinking on." Tsunade presented the box to her and this time her grin was small, more uncertain.
Sakura took it into her hands and stared at the gold engraving of the Senju symbol on top of it.
"Shishou…" Sakura looked at Tsunade with wide eyes. "You didn't need to get me anything."
"This is a… representation of my Jounin graduation gift to you, Sakura."
The use of her name had Sakura's heartbeat doubling inside her chest. Whatever this box held inside was something Tsunade was serious about. She was surprised her hands didn't shake as she opened it.
Tsunade stepped forward to take the box so Sakura could take out the fabric inside it.
She unfolded a haori, just like Tsunade's in shape but instead of green it was the same shade of red from her old qipao dress. The linings were white and it would have fit right into a Haruno clan gathering if not for the kanji etched in bold black strokes inside a white circle right in the middle of it.
火の娘
Hi no Musume.
Daughter of Fire.
"I know it's not much alone but I figured if you're going to be my heir you should have a piece of my legacy with you at all times." Tsunade was speaking while Sakura stared entranced at the haori in her hands, her voice a little wobbly but she powered through it. "My own haori was a kind of a middle finger to everyone who shamed me for gambling too much but in my head it was a physical representation of my spirit, my defiance. It's what my ojii-san told me when he had it made for me when I was still a little girl.
You're not a little girl anymore, Sakura. You're a woman forged in fire. You're loyal and fierce and smarter than anyone has any business being. There's no one else worthy of continuing the Senju legacy like you are. You're a true daughter of fire."
"Shishou…" Sakura whispered, with tears in her eyes. When she finally managed to tear her attention away from the haori and meet the blonde's amber eyes, she saw them burning bright with tears as well. Tsunade's familiarly fierce grin was stretching her painted lips.
"For a long time, I tried to forget Konoha and my clan. I ran because staying was too painful for me to bear at the time. Ever since I came back, taking you in as my apprentice was the best decision I've ever made. You made me remember how in love I've always been with this village, all that my family built and cherished. I can't thank you enough for standing beside me while we fight for Konoha."
"You don't need to—there's no need—" Sakura gasped. "Shishou. It's an honour to be able to fight by your side."
"Well," Tsunade clapped her hands and let out a loud bark of a laugh, "I take it this means you understand everything behind this gift."
"You mean…" Sakura trailed off uncertainly because she didn't want to assume anything.
"I mean that, as my apprentice, I expect you to take on the Senju legacy when I die. My Will of Fire will pass on to you and with it comes everything in my name including this estate and everything in it. Every fuinjutsu scroll, all the properties and money we have left. Anything with a Senju symbol in it will be yours." Tsunade's smile showed a hint of nervousness now. "That's it… if you want it, of course. It's a lot to take on."
Sakura just gaped at her for a second before hurriedly putting the haori on top of her newly bought yukata.
"Shishou…" Sakura smiled at Tsunade and if there were tears in her eyes, they didn't bother commenting on them. "I'd be honoured."
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Finding her parents had been easy. She'd taken Ino as a buffer to the stands that held fine silks and, behind it, a traditional tea ceremony was being held for some of the civilian clans.
Technically, she should have been wearing a kimono for this, but she figured her parents were already asking for a lot and they should be grateful she even showed up at all to stand by their side.
So what if she wasn't wearing the appropriate clothing for a fucking tea ceremony. She was also serving as a representative of the Hokage that night. She was the Godaime's apprentice, a jounin of Konoha and most recently appointed co-captain of an ANBU squad.
Appropriate clothing for her meant at least five hidden knives and a small pouch with some of her shishou's undetectable poison.
The exchange between her parents and her was strained but Ino and her own parents were there so it wasn't anything she couldn't handle. Even though she didn't really know anymore how to interact with her mum and dad, her personal brand of detached politeness she wore when dealing with clan elders at the office seemed to do the trick.
She knew they were thrown off guard by it but it kept the conversation civil enough that no one could say anything about it.
She focused her attention on talking office work with Inoichi-ojisan, who had been appointed as the newest council member a few weeks before. It was gratifying to see the look on her dad's face when he realised just how much she was involved in Konoha's political game.
Tachibana Sadatoshi arrived just as the ceremony ended and their small group started moving towards the eastern bridge so they could watch the fireworks. The fact that the oldest of the brothers addressed her right after he did her father and before anyone else wasn't lost on anyone.
Sadatoshi was an imposing man in theory—he was one of Iron's most prestigious merchants on top of being a skilled samurai, after all—but nothing could prepare someone for how dominating his presence was in person.
He was lean and tall, his fair skin contrasting attractively with his dark hair—always up in a high ponytail. He wore traditional hakama and kimono, both black with white linings, and a dark green haori on top of everything. Even inside the village, he wore his katana on his hip. The corner of his mouth was elongated by a fine silvery scar that stretched upwards slightly when he saw her.
"Sakura-san." He bowed his head and Sakura acknowledged it with a nod of her own that went no lower than his. "It has been a while."
"It has, Sadatoshi-sama." Sakura couldn't help the tiniest of smirks at her and Ino's mother's sharp intake of breath. They hadn't been expecting this level of familiarity and respect between them. "I hope we can properly catch up tomorrow at the meeting."
"Oh?" Her father interjected. "I wasn't aware we would be having a meeting so soon after you arrived, Sadatoshi-sama."
"The meeting with the other merchants is still firmly scheduled for the day after, Kizashi-san," Tachibana explained, the scar on the left side of his lips stretching his tiny smile further than it actually went. "Tsunade is an old friend, she kindly invited me to have lunch at her estate tomorrow. I could hardly expect Sakura-san not to be at her own house for lunch."
It was the first time anyone had even mentioned her moving out that night. The pause that followed it was thick with tension and Sakura could only try to defuse it as she hoped that something would happen to break their little group up.
"I should probably mention that I'll be a bit late, Sadatoshi-sama." Sakura smiled disarmingly at him as she explained. "I have some business during the morning that can possibly take a few hours longer than expected."
Tomorrow morning would be her first workshop for ANBU and it was nerve-wracking enough that Sakura wasn't even anxious about the following 'lunch date' with the Tachibana. Speaking of, where the hell was Shinsei when he was needed as a distraction?
"Arriving late for lunch is deeply disrespectful, Sakura," her mother chastised her even as her face kept placidly polite. "Surely you can move that… business to another day."
"Other people depend on me, mother. I can't just simply move the date on a whim." Sakura kept her voice light enough even when everything inside her was fighting an eye roll. Inner cursed loudly in the back of her mind.
"A mission, I gather?" Tachibana asked, his blue gaze fixed on her. There was respect in his voice and it seemed to stop her mother from further commenting.
"Of sorts…" Sakura trailed off, uncertain on how much to reveal while still being polite.
Her eyes sought out Inoichi-ojisan to see if he would be of any help.
"Most of Sakura-chan's work nowadays is strictly classified, I'm afraid." He laughed and put a hand on her shoulder. Sakura smiled at him in gratitude and it was maybe her first genuine expression of the night since joining them. She felt Ino shift slightly closer towards her.
"Yamanaka-san, I hear congratulations are in order—" Tachibana started but was promptly interrupted by a body dropping from one of the trees closest to them.
It was a young man, mostly hidden in the shadows but the light was enough for Sakura to notice his hair was up in a ponytail. He was wearing a traditional hakama and kimono set much like Tachibana's, only his were blood red with a black haori on top. Sakura didn't startle like most of them did but the hairs on the back of her neck still raised on end because she hadn't felt him.
There was mostly no chakra coming from him and he had stayed quiet enough since they arrived at the bridge that she hadn't been able to locate him earlier. He was definitely a civilian, then. Only, what was a civilian doing jumping from a tree so carelessly like that?
The man took a step forward and Sakura's breath caught in her throat. It was—
"Shinsei," Tachibana greeted him with his usual monotone voice and slightly narrowed his eyes at him. Shinsei smirked at him and threw a careless arm around his shoulders. Sakura thought if Tachibana was less stoical, there would be a vein on his forehead.
"Aniki!" Shinsei called loudly and cheerfully as if they weren't standing side by side. Tachibana's eyebrow twitched. "Ooh~! What a gorgeous sight for sore eyes!"
The young man grabbed Ino's mother's hand and placed a gentle kiss on it while roguishly smirking at her. Sakura watched with detached amusement as her own mother clenched her jaw.
She had always competed with Yamanaka Honoka in almost everything since moving to Konoha. Ino and Sakura had learned from them quite a few bad habits.
"Shinsei," Tachibana warned, his voice monotone as always but with a tense undercurrent that made Sakura slightly nostalgic. When they had first met, he'd always admonished Shinsei for anything and everything, amusement always hidden behind harsh words and looks. Sakura smiled at them.
Shinsei, on his part, simply ignored his brother as his eyes roved over their party. His eyebrow lifted when he saw Ino but then his gaze met Sakura's and he stopped completely.
"Kunoichi-chan?" His shocked face was slowly morphing into a grin that only grew as his eyes roved appreciatively over her figure. "Well, I don't know about you, but my night just got deliciously better."
He unceremoniously stepped forward and grabbed her wrist before beginning to pull her back towards the woods.
"What are you doing?" Ino exclaimed both at Shinsei for dragging her and Sakura for letting him.
"Shinsei." Tachibana was glaring now but he didn't protest much more when he saw the slight smile on Sakura's face.
"What, aniki?" Shinsei challenged with a careless and slightly mischievous grin. "Isn't this the whole reason for coming all the way to a festival we couldn't care less about? Possibly securing a match between the exquisite Haruno Sakura and I?"
There was a tense pause and Sakura caught Ino gapping at them while the others showed various degrees of awkwardness. While Sakura had come to that conclusion long ago, she didn't expect it to be spoken so freely like that. She thought that while the Tachibana visited she was safe with playing the same old veiled threats and posturing that came with clan politics.
"That's never gonna happen," Inner blurted through her mouth without her consent. Deciding to go along with it, Sakura scoffed. Fuck civilian politics. She was a kunoichi and no one could possibly expect her to enter an arranged marriage forced by her civilian clan. She was done pretending to be someone she wasn't.
Shinsei laughed.
"Well," he teased while stooping down to throw her over his shoulders. Sakura rolled her eyes but let him. He looked like he had a plan to get them both out of that mess. "I think it's perfectly acceptable for me to get to know my possible future wife, seeing as she needs a bit of convincing. Ta~!"
And with that he jumped.
Sakura had let him put her over his shoulder because she sensed he'd be getting her out of this stupid night but she hadn't expected that. Because it wasn't a normal, civilian jump. It was an enhanced one that only a higher calibre of shinobi could pull off.
And she didn't even feel any chakra fluctuations. He moved so fast through the trees that they would probably be only a blur to the untrained eye.
As soon as Shinsei's feet touched the ground, Sakura had her senbon-turned-hairpin prickling the skin of his throat, her own feet firmly bracing against the forest floor so she could reach him.
"How did you do that?" Her voice was deceptively calm as her eyes adjusted to the darkness. While red lanterns lit up the bridge, the waxing moon was the only source of illumination this far into the woods but it took less than a second for her trained eyes to pick up everything around them. Including his raised hands.
"Relax, kitten." He smirked at her and Sakura lowered her weapon when she saw there was no hostility in his posture and eyes. "Did you really think samurai were that useless? We have a reputation for a reason, ya know."
Sakura blinked at him. While she had wondered why samurai were considered such a threat that no one dared challenge their territory even with war waging all around the Land of Iron, she had never really stopped to think about it.
Shinsei winked at her and took a step back. Sakura slowly secured her senbon beneath her sleeve and accepted that she wouldn't be able to put her hair up again without a mirror. Shinsei pulled a familiar pipe from inside his vest and slowly lit it.
"How? I can't detect any chakra above a civilian's level." Sakura shook her head slightly.
"Sorry, can't tell you, beautiful." Shinsei's smirk grew when Sakura's cheeks flushed. He reached inside his vest again and came back with a leather-bound flask. "I can, however, offer a proper apology for the dramatic exit in the form of booze."
Sakura huffed a tiny laugh. What the hell. After having to see and interact with her parents after more than two years of silence, she deserved it.
Shinsei smoked while she took a few sips before he offered to trade with her. Again, what the hell.
"You're telling me that we fucking walked all the way to Tetsu no Kuni while we could have been there in a fraction of the time we took?" Sakura glared at him, her eyes twinkling with amusement as she exhaled a cloud of smoke on his face. Shinsei shrugged.
"Y'all assumed we couldn't take a harsh pace through the trees so we decided to keep up pretences." He grinned like the big jerk he was and traded with her again so he could take another gulp of the cheap whisky inside the leather-covered flask.
Sakura shook her head but didn't say anything else. She wondered why he was carrying a worker's drink when he probably had more money than a small village.
"So." He pushed the flask into her hands again and took back the pipe. "Did you know about their master plan of rudely marrying us off?"
Sakura scoffed.
"That would never have happened." After a second of consideration, she added, "No offense."
"None taken, Kunoichi-chan." He shrugged. "You're wonderful but that doesn't mean I want to be married off to you either."
Sakura cocked her head to the side and eyed him contemplatively before taking another swig of the flask.
"Why not?" She handed him the drink and refused the pipe before leaning back against a tree. "I thought it would be a good thing to have me as a Tachibana. If my father's cousin doesn't produce any offspring, I'll be heir. Not to mention my connections as the Hokage's apprentice."
"Would you look at that." He laughed. "Looks like someone got more confident with age."
She had. But this wasn't about her getting cocky or anything. These were just the facts.
"Besides, I imagine you're required to produce some heirs of your own eventually." Sakura decided to ignore his comment. She continued, "But I guess it's more important for your brother to continue the Tachibana lineage than you."
"That would be true." Shinsei smiled but there was nothing humorous in the expression. Something so wry and… sad didn't fit on his face. "Except he can't."
"Can't?" Sakura raised an eyebrow.
Shinsei—who she suspected had been more than a little bit tipsy by the time he reached their group—leaned his weight against the same tree as her and told her a story while they drank.
Without looking at her, his eyes focused on the moon, he told her how Sadatoshi was in love with a woman that had been a high member of one of Iron's clans but had disguised herself to fight as a samurai.
They met both in battle and in court and when they married, he had supported and even helped her keep her identity a secret. They had been happy for a few years before Death had taken her and their unborn child.
Shinsei didn't falter in his words even though Sakura could see how much he had also cared for the nameless woman. Sadatoshi hadn't been the only one to lose her.
The Tachibana's loss had happened a few years before Sakura met them and likely made them who they were today. Sadatoshi, a stoic man bound by tradition and honour but still enamoured by the idea that shinobi were to be respected, especially kunoichi. Shinsei, tirelessly flamboyant and flirty to compensate for how sad he truly felt.
Sakura felt sorry for both of them. Sadatoshi couldn't and wouldn't marry again and now the duty to uphold their family name had fallen on Shinsei, who she couldn't even imagine settling down and having children.
"So he's forcing you to continue the family name?" Sakura asked quietly because she didn't want to break the sadness filled silence that had fallen upon them.
"No," Shinsei breathed after a beat. When he didn't offer anything else, Sakura turned her head to properly look at him. After he took another sip, he turned his head so their eyes could meet. "Aniki knows I don't intend on settling down and never wanted kids of my own. We've settled on adopting young samurai but some clan elders insisted we considered you first, so here we are."
He smiled when he saw her shocked face and then offered the flask again. Sakura released a barely audible laugh and accepted the drink. She was surprised by their decision, adoption rarely was an option for high standing clans like theirs. Their decision to deceive the elders into thinking they would comply with their requests was also something she very much sympathised with.
"Your mission back then was to seduce me, wasn't it?" He said after a quiet moment of them drinking, surprising the breath out of her lungs.
She was already feeling tipsy to show that much emotion. And also for answering with the truth.
"It wasn't the primary mission, no." She offered the flask back towards him and swore off it for the rest of the night. "But it would help if I did so I set it as an on-field objective."
Instead of being angry like she half expected him to be, Shinsei laughed. His shoulder shook where it met hers and she felt the air shifting when he finally turned his head to look at her. Sakura was reminded of how nice his laugh was, her whisky warmed belly heating even further.
"Kunoichi-chan," he whispered mockingly at her, intimately. When it was clear he was waiting for her to look at him, Sakura turned with a slightly raised brow, her face reflecting nothing else. "Not so little anymore, are you?"
An involuntary shiver ran down her back. She could feel his warm breath on her face and see that his eyes were darkened. He smelled like the pipe he'd smoked and rich foreign spice. Sakura wondered if that's what he'd taste like. She couldn't quite remember.
Then she thought why work in speculation when she could test her memory?
With calm curiosity, she closed the distance between their lips and breathed him in. Shinsei wasn't startled into inaction like he'd been on their last, untimely kiss. He simply raised his warm hand to cup her jaw and slightly angled her face up so he could slant his lips properly against hers.
Sakura didn't know who instigated the deepening of the kiss, only that suddenly she could confirm that yes, he did taste like rich spices and smoke. She wondered now how he'd taste elsewhere.
During the many missions Team Ro had taken, Sakura had played many roles. Medic, assassin, backup.
Then there were the truly undercover ones.
Daughter. Sister. Orphan. Bait. Always bait.
The missions had never been classified as honeypot missions but there had been an amount of physicality involved. It had never gotten too far, though. With her medical abilities, she only needed to do enough to get their targets alone in a room and then put them to sleep. Still, Sakura had learned a lot and most importantly she had learned how to take a certain kind of pleasure from that.
The first time with Shinsei she had watched the bright eyed, cheeks flushed state she had put him in and felt powerful. She loved the idea that she could have that kind of control over someone even as in her mind she separated any idea that the act was anything intimate.
Some targets weren't young and nice but even those disgusting men that had taken an interest in her mostly because she was young, she could take some satisfaction in knowing that in a few moments they'd be tortured for information or even straight out killed by Team Ro.
This felt nothing like those missions. This time it was real in a way that both scared and thrilled Sakura. There wasn't anything deceitful about what they were doing. She was simply Sakura. Hiding in the dark with an attractive boy and enjoying his warm kisses.
She didn't know how long they stood against the tree, kissing languorously and unhurriedly. It was only when the festival's first fireworks exploded the sky in colour that they parted and, even then, it was only so he could rest his forehead against hers.
Sakura felt him steeling himself, muscles tensing so he could push himself away from her but she didn't let him. With the hands that had sneaked themselves around his back, she brought him closer to her. Her left hand slid up his body so she could reach the back of his ponytail and angle his head further away from hers.
Shinsei let out a strangled sound that Sakura could feel beneath her lips where they met his throat in open-mouthed kisses.
In the next second, he was pressing her firmly against the tree bark. Between his traditional get-up and hers, it was hard to feel anything, but the sheer warmth and presence of him both sent her senses into overload.
Deft fingers brushed her yukata and haori from her left shoulder so he could return the favour there and Sakura couldn't hold back the sigh that wanted to escape her lips. That felt nice.
"Shit," he hissed against her neck. With what seemed to be incredible reluctance, Shinsei leaned back so he could place a chaste kiss on her lips that felt anything but innocent. "We have to stop."
"Do we?" The words were breathy as they left her mouth and Sakura felt herself flush at hearing the want behind them.
Shinsei groaned and pressed another kiss that felt like punishment.
"Is this your first time?" The question was asked gently even as Sakura felt tension tightening all of his body.
It didn't exactly catch her off guard but it did make her pause slightly. He was looking at her now, eyes dark and hands firm on either side of her jaw. Sakura could only look at him and nod slightly.
She hoped he could see in her eyes that despite admitting to her inexperience she was far from innocent and unwilling. Sakura hoped he saw the desire and curiosity she felt. For a second she couldn't read the look on his face but then he was leaning forwards again to kiss her yet again.
This kiss was deeper than any they'd shared before and it only made the fire in her belly burn hotter. His tongue caressed hers like he was trying to memorise her taste before he parted with a slight bite to her bottom lip.
"Not here, then." The words were murmured against her lips so quietly she almost didn't hear them.
Sakura wasn't too far gone to realise that they couldn't possibly go through the festival.
"You're staying at the foreign dignitaries' housing, right?" She asked, tilting her head further back so she could look at him, his bright blue eyes were almost black.
"Yeah, they gave us two suites at the tower." Shinsei tilted his head in question and Sakura smirked.
"Hold on tight." Without another word, she tugged him closer and used shunshin to get them to the upper floors of the Hokage Tower. In the next moment, they were quickly moving through the dark, empty corridors to reach the foreign dignitaries' housing. She knew they'd be in the best suite and wasn't disappointed when Shinsei produced the key to the doors from beneath his gi.
Sakura didn't have time to look around because as soon as they were inside, Shinsei's mouth was back on hers, coaching embarrassing sounds from her throat with his hands and tongue.
She felt him moving her but only took notice that they had reached a bed when the back of her knees hit the edge of the mattress. He seemed to shift gears when her hands started pushing his gi from his shoulders. With slow, sensual movements he helped her unwind her obi before he harshly pulled his hand away with a hiss.
It took a few seconds for Sakura to realise what had happened. She'd forgotten about her hidden knives.
With an unapologetic laugh she grabbed his hand in hers and healed him. He was looking at her with awe clear on his face even in the dark room. Sakura smirked.
She removed her hidden weapons with slow, deliberate moves, not letting her gaze drift from his. While she placed them on the bedside table, Shinsei took off his own wakizashi and then they stood facing each other again.
With boldness she wasn't completely feeling, Sakura let her yukata and haori fall to the floor.
Shinsei, now only wearing his hakama pants, kissed her hotly. It was an act so raw and with so much intention behind it that it took Sakura's breath away.
When he laid her down in the middle of the bed and pressed his body on top of hers, Sakura started to feel the first tendrils of anxiety. His body between her legs felt wonderful, honestly, and his warm chest against her bare breasts was definitely doing something for her but it was like it hit her just then that this was her first time.
She never truly had the time to create any romantic notions about sex. Even though her first years at the Academy were spent in special classes for civilian kids and were not really 'ninja-heavy', she was still fairly young when she got to a point where she started going to class with the rest of the clan kids. And that included kunoichi classes.
So while her parents tried to give her a proper upbringing as a high member of a merchant clan and to expect a nice husband to come along, the only time Sakura had ever had any romantic plans for herself was with Sasuke. And even then, it wasn't about sex, it was about being able to be there for the incredibly sad boy.
Later on, when they were closer to graduating the Academy and then during their short months as Team 7, her thoughts often took a decidedly more mature turn but everything had been dampened by how much she just wanted to take care of him. She wanted to make him smile.
The thought of Sasuke made her pause.
Why the fuck was she doing thinking about him, specially such thoughts that only lead to her feeling sad. She was with a nice, hot guy that looked at her and admired her.
Shinsei made her feel wanted and special. He appreciated her strengths, complimented her on her looks and, goddamn it, she deserved it. She couldn't be with brainless civilians like Ino, but Shinsei was a warrior like her and he understood.
So Sakura breathed out a shaky sigh to dispel her nerves and focused on the boy that was now sucking on her pulse point.
"Are you okay?" He murmured against her skin, probably having felt her tense up.
"Yeah," Sakura sighed.
She was. Because she wanted this, and she wanted him. Also because she came to a point in her career that pesky labels like virgin weren't exactly helpful. She'd rather do this on her terms.
Shinsei put a bit of distance between them, just enough so he could look her in the eyes. The black bleeding out on bright blue took Sakura's breath away.
"Are you sure?"
Sakura smiled at his consideration. Yeah, she'd made a good choice on having Shinsei be her first. With a cheeky grin, she wrapped her legs tighter around his waist and brought him closer to her than before.
"Yes," she whispered against his lips.
Even though she didn't feel any inclinations towards backing out then, when he reached for her panties, she paused.
She wasn't exactly nervous, but her heart was still beating quicker than usual. It seemed however thoroughly she had squashed that silly little part of her that was raised on proper manners, it still managed to rear its head from time to time. It was ridiculous and she felt stupid as soon as the thought installed itself in her head so she quickly kissed Shinsei to distract him from her momentary pause.
Fuck insecurities. She had made her decision and she was going to make everything during that night about her.
Sakura was expecting a lot more pain than she felt but Shinsei had prepared her well and seemed to know what he was doing even when she floundered. For a second, the pressure was too much and she caught herself thinking: Well, there isn't much to this, is there?
She didn't quite know what to do with her hands but just as she was about to overthink their position of grabbing his biceps, Shinsei was suddenly all around her and inside her.
Then he changed his angle and—
Oh.
Oh.
Okay, yes. She could see why people did that.
Sakura left a few hours before the sun began to rise, her features relaxed in a way they hadn't been in a long time. Things had been a bit awkward at first but she could definitely see herself meeting up with him for as long as he stayed in Konoha.
She had just reached the Senju estate when a stray thought crossed her mind. She suddenly understood her older friends when they came back from missions, met up at the Rusty Kunai and then went to bed almost never alone. It had been a great way to decompress and relax.
She was already asleep by the time her head hit her pillow and she didn't have a single bad dream.
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Sakura walked into ANBU headquarters with a lazy smile on her face.
It was roughly fifteen minutes before her workshop was due to start and she wanted those extra minutes to put on her mask. While the whole experience was entirely too nerve-wracking for her to be completely confident, she had to rise up to the occasion.
Objectively speaking, she wasn't the first young shinobi to be given such a high position inside the ranks but it would still ruffle some feathers. She had to put on her game face.
Sakura decided that for this, she would try to be as close to herself as possible while leaving no room for others to question her authority and expertise. She was going to be brutally efficient and to the point while treating everyone like she would an unruly member of the civilian council. Respectful but firm.
Even with all of that in mind, she couldn't help the slightly self-satisfied look on her face. She'd had a great night.
No matter how extensive her training routine was, there were still some muscles she had to soothe with chakra while in the shower and she had to admit the slight burn of them had felt marvellous.
Her whole body was pleasantly sated and her mind clear even though she hadn't gotten much sleep. She felt languorous that morning, despite everything.
It was safe to say, Sakura was heavily considering seeking him out again that night.
With a quiet sigh, Sakura reeled any wayward thought in and settled for a slightly more professional face. She got to Toshio's office and flared her chakra before stepping inside.
"Yo!" He waved carelessly at her while still keeping his eyes on the pile of paperwork in front of him.
"Will you be there?" Sakura didn't bother with pleasantries.
Toshio looked up at her with an amused expression on his bland face.
"Will you need me to hold your hand, Wolfie-chan?"
Sakura just tilted her head to the side and slightly raised an eyebrow at the man, not indulging his goading. She was satisfied when he seemed to pout for a second and muttered under his breath something that sounded suspiciously like, "So serious all the time…"
"I figured it would be best for you to do this on your own," Toshio said after a beat. And really, he didn't need to explain anything else for her. He wanted her to be in a position of absolute power when she stood in front of more seasoned shinobi, not to have him hanging over her shoulder like a supervising parent.
She was glad they were on the same page.
With a perfunctory nod, Sakura turned to leave the room.
"I'll report as soon as it's over." She threw one careless wave over her shoulder before the door closed behind her.
With determined but near silent steps, Sakura made her way across headquarters towards one of the many empty rooms available. These rooms could be accessed through a corridor on the right side of the lockers but Sakura took the long way through the mess hall.
Heads followed her but she didn't stop to talk to anyone, only nodding back to the few who acknowledged her. She was still a novelty. A young kunoichi recently made jounin that quickly moved through the ranks to not only be a co-captain to one of the highest profile teams but also a sensei.
While the world outside the shadow ranks was pretty black and white in regards to rank, ANBU was different. Outside, if you made it to Jounin it meant you were elite. You passed a few tests then you had the qualifications. ANBU ranks were all about merit.
Sakura still had a lot to prove to her fellow masks.
While she had great accomplishments for her age—and she did, no matter what her self doubt told her sometimes—she really hadn't worked with many people outside of her teammates. She kept mostly to herself and didn't really frequent the mess hall all that much compared to the people who lived in ANBU headquarters.
This was an opportunity for her to show them who she was. She had the means to help her fellow shinobi and to put a little bit of herself in the foundation of a program that would help many others in the future.
She loved this feeling.
Sakura stepped inside the room at exactly ten o'clock.
Not earlier because that could be interpreted as nervousness. Not late because she was already lax enough with the rules around headquarters and she had to show she was respectful even if some of those rules just didn't apply to her.
The room reserved for her wasn't big but it wasn't tiny by any means. There was a white board like the one on Team Ro's office and below it, a chest filled with scrolls Sakura had asked for.
In the middle of the room stood a small round table with no chairs and a large bowl of water on top of it. The fish inside it was swimming in frantic circles, making the water splash slightly.
There were ten operatives standing around the table, talking softly to themselves. All of them wore the full uniform and their masks.
Sakura watched, slightly amused, as one by one they noticed her presence. Her head tilting to the side as she felt a slight breeze. Her eyes went to the wall furthest from the entrance and roved over it as she carefully prodded it with her chakra. It seems like they had given her a room with a false wall to work with and behind it stood Toshio, Tsunade, Shizune and… was that Ibiki? She wasn't familiar with his chakra enough to confirm.
Whatever, she thought, let them watch.
When the workshop had been announced in HQ, the only information given was that Wolf-taichou would be administering lessons on field medical ninjutsu and that everyone who had a high level of chakra control was strongly advised to participate.
Whispers of her name had risen amongst the ranks but no one really knew much about her. The people standing in front of her clearly weren't expecting someone so young and… pink.
Inner Sakura snorted in the back of her mind.
Sakura held eye contact with everyone for a few beats before raising her chin a bit.
"Take off your masks." Her voice was calm yet firm, the command clear behind the words. Sakura herself had pinned her own mask to her belt so there would be no mistaking who was going to be teaching them.
There seemed to be a slight hesitation from a few of her students but she ignored it, merely filling away their faces. There was only one of them that she recognized. Operative Kitsune, the ninja that had been in Kakashi's squad and had healed Ino on her first mission as a chunin.
"I'm Haruno Sakura." Inner Sakura wrapped a cloak around her shoulders made of memories of Tsunade's fierce grins, Tenzou's calm face, Toshio's borderline disrespectful cheeriness and Kakashi's aloofness. "Or Wolf, while inside these walls. I completed my medical training with Tsunade-shishou a while back and, in this workshop, I'll teach you how to keep your teammates alive."
Sakura picked the bowl of water with just one hand, a small smirk on her lips when she noticed one of the few women raise her eyebrows at her, and put it down on the floor.
"Grab one of those scrolls for me, will you, Kitsune?" Sakura didn't look at the Hyuga while she crouched to pick the fish from the bowl.
"Hai, Wolf-sensei," he said and immediately got to work.
Sakura held the fish firmly between her hands as it took its final breaths and Kitsune spread the scroll on top of the table where the bowl had been previously.
Sensei.
This was so fucking weird. To have this level of respect shown and this kind of responsibility placed on her shoulders felt so daunting. But at the same time, she remembered the old kunoichi shopkeeper's words about trusting her superiors to know what she was capable of. Unmei-obaasan had been right.
She could do this.
With steady hands, Sakura placed the recently dead fish on top of the intricate seals marking the scroll and looked at her students.
"If this was a normal lesson and you were all aspiring iryo-nin, I would give each of you a fish and have you resuscitate it." Sakura carefully worked her chakra into the fish's chakra network to coach it back into motion. "This exercise teaches you how to control your chakra influx to tune it to the same or at least similar wavelengths of your patients'. It helps hone your control and gets you familiarised with changing the chakra intensity while using medical ninjutsu."
Sakura was happy to see they were paying attention to her even if some of them had a bit of a sceptical look on their faces. She put the live fish back into its bowl.
"I'm not here to teach you how to become an iryo-nin." Sakura straightened up and squared her shoulders, letting a bit of danger slip into her tone. "I'm here to teach you how to use iryo-ninjutsu well enough so that when the time comes when you have a teammate bleeding out in front of you, you have the skillset to make sure they don't come back home inside a body sealing scroll."
She let her words hang so they could appreciate their meaning. One of the guys who had been hesitant before, a tall man in his twenties, exhaled loudly in something like annoyance.
The woman to his right, the only other woman aside from the one that had raised her eyebrows at Sakura's show of strength, elbowed him sharply on his ribs.
Sakura shifted her eyes towards the disrespectful little man and looked him over, her gaze completely disinterested in him while still cold enough to make him freeze.
Most of them seemed to respect her already and those who weren't quite there would be soon enough, Inner reminded her. Soon, she would be able to be more like herself, show camaraderie and build rapport. For now, she had to gain their trust and respect. Completely.
"The first few months of these workshops will be on the simpler side of things so that the operatives who couldn't be here can catch up when they come home from their missions." Sakura gestured to the overflowing chest with her chin. "The scrolls in there have a medical seal to help focus your chakra. Pick one and take them home with you to practice this exercise. Tell everyone interested in this workshop that that chest will always be filled with them. The amount of time and effort you put into it should be the same as the will to ensure your fellow teammates stay alive."
Sakura felt the corner of her lips pull up into a crooked smirk when she saw how she was making most of them uneasy. Inner had slowly started leaking her killing intent. Not enough to scare them or for them to really notice she was doing it but just enough so that they would feel off-kilter, so that they would heed her words carefully.
It was a bit of an underhanded tactic, sure, but she had a lot working against her there.
Despite not looking or even acting like it anymore, she was still a few months short of sixteen and didn't have half as much experience as anyone in the room. Right now they were wondering if privilege had put her there and she had to squash any kind of thoughts right at the beginning.
When she saw Kitsune swallow dryly, Sakura slowly started to reign it in.
"So!" She clasped her hands together, making some of them flinch, and smiled disarmingly at them all. "I want to know how much knowledge each of you has even if it's as simple as knowing how to make a tourniquet. Since we don't have many people, we'll be working almost individually." Sakura nodded, almost to herself, and called Kitsune back to her.
"Taichou…?" He asked her hesitantly as he stepped closer. Sakura ignored him and took a kunai from her pouch.
"But before that, a little demonstration on how our lessons will go." Sakura had barely stopped speaking before she slashed her kunai through the skin of her forearm. Blood immediately gushed out of the deep wound. "Go ahead, Kitsune-san, heal me. Preferably before I bleed out," she added wryly when the man gaped at her.
As he set forward with green chakra covered hands, Sakura turned to the rest of her class and continued explaining.
"I'll inflict upon myself almost everything I'm going to teach you how to fix, this way you get more hands-on experience which is what ultimately counts. You're not trying to close my tenketsu, Hyuga, chill out on the chakra intensity for a bit." Sakura spared him a raised eyebrow before turning back to her group. "As you progress, I'll start pairing you off with more experienced operatives and give you the green light to practice on each other. For now, please do try to keep me from the embarrassment of dying inside HQ."
Sakura was rewarded with a few slight chuckles even as most of them either gaped at her like she was insane or scary. Maybe both. Oh, how she loved shinobi dark humour.
"That was a great job, Kitsune-san!" Sakura smiled warmly at him and watched as a slight flush rose on his cheeks. "Barely even left a scar. Of course, on the field you shouldn't waste any chakra into making sure your teammate can wear short sleeves in the future, yeah? Just encourage as many white cells to replicate as possible in the shortest amount and with the least chakra expenditure you can perform with."
She pocketed the kunai she'd used on herself and brought that same hand to cover the silvery line Kitsune had left behind. With barely two seconds of her palms softly glowing green, it was gone.
"How?" The disrespectful little man from before was now staring at her arm in wonder.
Sakura smirked and waited for him to look at her so he could see how cold it was.
"My chakra control levels are as high as 99,5%." Sakura didn't let any indication that she was bragging show in her voice as she stared calmly at her students. "I don't waste any chakra."
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SOO!
A lot of things going on in this chapter 'cus we're getting super close to a time skip, yay! Tbh the last couple of chapters and the next one weren't in my original plan/outline for this fic haha But things just kept popping up and suddenly I had this HUGE plot and extremely descriptive chapters so... yep, a lot of things got added that I was NOT expecting. At all. I'm telling you this fic has a mind of its own.
I think I already said it before but like... Originally? There were supposed to be just a couple of chapters of the time skip, each chapter covering about two years of Sakura's life and then I was gonna get into the KakaSaku goodness... yeah. That didn't happen. So, after a bit of crying, I sat down and wrote what would happen on each chapter until chapter 40 (roughly). I have it all handwritten in my notebook. Anyway!
I totally forgot to mention in the last chapter's notes that being a sensei is a HUGE thing in Japan. Like, they're the only ones who don't have to bow to the Emperor huge. So in my head it makes a lot of sense that they would get paid more and stuff, especially 'cus in canon, only really good jounin become jounin sensei. It feels like a promotion. Oh if us westerners could learn from that. '.'
*cough*
Sakura is no longer a virgin. Yay for her! I hope you guys are satisfied with Shinsei's comeback! This is one of his final appearances though... I hope it was satisfactory hehe ;) Speaking of satisfaction, I just wanted to say that HOLYSHIT it was hard to write that non descriptive sex scene. Like, I didn't want to put too many details bc this is a KakaSaku fic and it felt kinda like cheating for some reason? But I actually suck at _not_ describing things so it was kinda hard to give it meaning while not explaining a lot. GOD I MISS WRITING SMUT. KakaSaku smut. On that note, I'm sorry for taking SO LONG to get to the KakaSaku goodness. Like, I feel y'all, really. I'm as desperate as you guys to get them together already but I want Sakura to have more experience before it comes to that even though she'll be quite young when it happens (late 17/18). I don't mind the age difference and the whole ex-sensei thing as long as there isn't a huge tip in the power balance, you know what I mean? So, yeah, she's gonna have some more experiences before that. As I told some of you guys already, the slow burn is _soo_ slow at this point, it isn't even on yet.
I recommend you guys heading to my one-shot called "Shades of Red" to read some good old fashioned borderline PWP to tide you over.
(yep. here there be shameless self promotion)
Also! My baby girl, A, the wonderful beta, writes an AMAZING KakaSaku College AU called 'Running Out of Reasons' and you guys should definitely check that out sometime.
Let me know your thoughts on the whole workshop thingie and how this chapter went! I'm dying to know what you think on this chapter hehe
Love, J 3