The next morning I woke early and left the room quietly so I wouldn't wake Sakura. I went to the bathroom and fixed myself up before leaving the house for the backyard.
"Miss Haruno!" I turned and saw Tsunami looking at me with shock. "I didn't expect anyone to be up this early."
"I'm sorry." I told her. "I didn't mean to frighten you. This is an old habit of mine, waking up early and meditating."
"Oh. Then I shall leave you alone." She told me and I nodded to her. She left and I sat on the ground centering myself. An hour later I made my way into the dining area as Sakura walked in yawning.
"Ah…" she said looking around at those of us gathered for breakfast.
"Naruto didn't come back again last night?" Tazuna asked.
"He's been climbing trees all alone since he heard your story." Kakashi told him. "He's very simple."
"He may have used too much Chakra and died by now…" Sakura added.
"No." I told her sitting down at the table. "He won't die that easily."
"I hope he's alright. A child all alone at night in the woods…" Tsunami said thinking of the young ninja.
"Don't worry!" Kakashi told her. "He might not look it, but he's a true ninja."
"I don't know… It wouldn't surprise me if he was dead… that moron…" Sasuke said.
"Like I said, he won't die that way." I told him.
"Sage…" I turned to Sakura curiously. "What did Zabuza mean when he called you the Demon Sage?" that of course got everyone else's attention.
"I haven't been called that in five years." I said. "Not since I first got that nickname." Out of the corner of my eye I saw a crow sitting on the window sill. I held my hand out to it and flew to me landing on the back of my hand. I brought it to the table where it stared at me.
"How did you get it?" Sakura asked me.
"It's more of a why, than a how." I told her. "Before I'd found out I was pregnant…
FLASHBACK
"Sage. We need you to go do reconnaissance on a nearby village." The Third Hokage told me. I nodded and he gave me all the information I needed to know for the mission. "We will assign a partner for you to replace –"
"Lord Hokage." I interrupted him. "I ask that you don't. I won't need a partner for this mission."
"You know why we assign partners for missions even as simple as this. No one can know what will happen on a mission." He told me.
"I understand this, but my request remains the same." I told them. He thought about it for a moment before nodding his head. "Thank you." I stood and went back to my house.
PRESENT
"Why didn't you have a team go with you?" Sakura asked me. "I thought all Anbu missions had to be done in teams."
"Most are, yes. But some missions just require one or two. We have partners, even in our teams, to watch our backs. Make sure that if we do get into trouble we have someone to help us." I explained to her.
"Why didn't you want a partner then?" She asked me confused. "What happened to yours?"
"He…." I said, trying to find the words. "He's been on his own mission for a long time." I sighed before staring back at the crow, trying to avoid their eyes. "I'd been in the village a few weeks before I noticed anything out of the ordinary…."
FLASHBACK
"Mira!" a woman called to me and I turned and smiled at her. She was a young girl, barley older than myself, but that meant nothing seeing as how there were men and women both younger and older than myself more powerful than me.
"What is it, Mai?" I asked her.
"I heard that someone was looking for you." She said with a sly smile on her face. In the time I'd been here I'd caught the eye of a man I never wanted to. Marcus was a lewd man who only really wanted one thing from me and every beauty he set his eyes on.
"Then he can keep looking, because I refuse to go looking for him." I told her and she sighed.
"Mira, girls our age can't always be picky about a man. We have to continue our bloodlines." She told me. I learned quickly that in this village people cared a great deal about bloodline and expanding their families.
"I'm already taken." I told her with a smile, remembering him.
"You keep saying that, but no one has ever seen you on a man's arm." She reminded me.
"He's been away on business." I told her.
"When will he come back?" she asked me and I shook my head.
"I don't know. When the time is right, I suppose." I said thinking of what the last thing he told me was.
"Then I suppose he won't be around to hear you." She told me and I looked at her confused before my eyes widened.
"I should have known." I sighed before I was attacked. I did my best to fend them off, but there were too many. They captured me and pulled me to the center of the small village where they tortured me for information, and just to hear me scream.
"What does your village plan to do with us?" one of the men asked me.
"Bonfire." I said. "Invite everyone." He glared at me before throwing a kunai at me. It's implanted in my shoulder making me scream out slightly before glaring up at the man. When they stopped their questions they had a healer heal my wounds, but left me in the village square throughout the night.
The next day it started all over again, but I noticed something. While on the previous day they didn't care what they hit, they now avoided my torso entirely. I'm no idiot, I knew they thought they knew something I didn't. But what was it?
"Did you know, Sage Haruno," I looked up at Marcus giving nothing away on my blank face, but how did they know my name? "We found out something about you yesterday."
"How did you know my favorite color is red?" I asked sarcastically. Yesterday it seemed to get under his skin. Today it amused him. What changed? He moved closer to me and gripped my chin harshly making me look into his amused dull brown eyes with my blank green.
"You're carrying something that could help us take down your precious village." He told me.
"And what would that be?" I asked him.
"Life." He told me and I thought to his meaning before it dawned on me. They avoided my torso after the healer healed all my wounds yesterday. I'd only ever been with one man in my entire life. After we'd secretly married we spent a week together alone with the Hokage's permission. He was the only one allowed to know of our marriage having performed the ceremony himself before we were forced to do as he had asked of us. Of him. I was carrying his child in my womb.
"What's that to you?" I asked him.
"After you give birth to your child we will kill you and raise it as one of us." He told me smirking and I glared at him.
"You can try to take it from me, but you will die before you get your hands on it." I warned.
"How are you going to kill us when you are tied up?" he laughed at me.
He is right. I heard a voice say. I casually looked around me, but I saw no one the voice could have belonged to. I can help you. Call my name.
Who are you? I asked the voice.
You know my name. Call my name.I felt my blood dripping onto the ground and I stared at it. I could almost see two faces in the pools they formed. One had red filling her eyes and black hair framing her pale face. The other had blue filling her eyes with blonde hair framing her tan face. No one hear looked like these woman. I searched my memories for the name of these women, but nothing came to mind. Call my name.
"Mira, I summon you." I said and the blonde woman's face smiled before my wounds suddenly healed on their own. I broke the restraints on my wrists with a strength that didn't come from me. They all stared at me in shock and I smirked at them. "Rossa, I summon you." I felt more power and strength fill my body from Rossa before biting my thumb. I performed the summoning signs and placed my hand on the ground "Summoning Jutsu!" smoke covered the area and when it started to clear a woman was standing in front of me. I'd never made a contract with an animal so the black haired woman standing before me was a surprise, but I knew she was the one I was summoning. She turned to me with her red eyes as though asking what I wanted her to do.
"The Demon Summons." Marcus said, his eyes wide.
"Rossa," I said darkly and her eyes watched me expectantly. "Kill them all." I ordered. She smirked before going about her task and killing them. I pulled out my kunai and attacked the villagers with her at my side. The fight didn't last long at all. Many of the ninja there were still training when they'd abandoned their home villages. A couple even had a Kekkai Genkai. Marcus and Mai were all that stood between myself and completely destroying this village. Rossa stood at my back, blood covering her arms from her elbows down with no sign of injury on her pale skin. I had new injuries, but I didn't care about them. The two were bound at my order not to kill them and knelt before me. I squatted to their level and looked blankly into their eyes. Mai's eyes held fear while Marcus' held confidence. "What are you so sure of?" I asked him.
"You won't kill us." He stated not questioning his thoughts.
"Oh?" I asked him. "And what will stop me?"
"A Leaf Nin could never kill an entire village." He told me, still confident in his words. I drew the sword at my side and slowly ran it through Mai all while staring at him. I watched fear finally enter his eyes as she slowly died on my blade. Once she drew her last breathe he looked to me once more. "You are no Nin. You are a Demon!" he spat in my face. I stood and brought my sword up over my opposite shoulder before swinging it down on his neck.
"Maybe I am." I said before sheathing my sword and going home covered in healing injuries and a mixture of blood.
PRESENT
After I finished my tale (with it censored for the civilians) I pet the crow in front of me as it stared at me. He hadn't heard the true story, just the myths behind it. I looked up at them. Tazuna didn't share my gaze and neither did his daughter. Kakashi looked down at his lap and Sasuke stared into nothing before getting up and leaving the house. I finally met Sakura's gaze and she looked shocked and horrified at the events that she'd just heard. Most of my missions were classified, but for some reason that one wasn't so many people heard about it and they gave me my new name in the bingo book. The Demon Sage.
"Sakura. You and Sake guard Tazuna again today." Kakashi ordered we nodded at him. We all shared a meal before we set about our day.
The next day was the seventh day of their training and the sun found Kakashi, Sakura and I in the forest.
"Where's Naruto?" Sakura asked.
"He left again by himself last night." Kakashi told us.
"He's missing breakfast." Sakura commented. "Plus Sasuke went off on a walk and hasn't come back."
"They are most likely training to catch up with you, Sakura." I told her with a small smile. She glared at me slightly before we continued to look for the boys. She and Sasuke (when he'd come back to the house last night) acted as though the story I told them had never been spoken. They understood what a mission might entail from a Nin. What they might have to do themselves one day. We looked in front of us as two kunai dropped from the treetops above us. We looked up to see Naruto laying on a tree branch looking exhausted and laughing.
"He can already climb that high?" Sakura asked.
"What do you think?" he called down to us. "Look how high I can climb now!" he tried to stand up but lost his balance and fell backwards.
"AHH! IDIOT!" Sakura yelled at him worried.
"OH NO! IF YOU FALL FROM THAT HEIGHT…!" Kakashi started saying but from down here there was nothing we could do!
"Just kidding!" he told us and at the moment I wanted to kill him. "HAHA! YOU FELL FOR IT!"
"YOU SCARED ME IDIOT!" Sakura called up to him. Suddenly his feet let go of the branch he was standing under.
"STUPID NARUTO! STOP SHOWING OFF!" Sakura called up to him. He screamed until Sasuke caught him by the ankle and stood where he did only moments before.
"You moron…" he said.
"Sasuke!" Naruto called to the boy.
"Yay! Sasuke! You're the best!" Sakura called up to her crush. I sighed before smiling. Soon this calm would end and the storm would come rushing at us from two sides. We just didn't know how hard home the storm would hit us.