It was nearly two o'clock on the morning of the fifth of December in Konoha Main Hospital when the wails were first heard. There were four of them in total inside the private room of the Senju Maternity Ward – though that number was soon brought up to five with the delivery of the baby.

She was a small, loud thing, and the midwife soon passed her over to the father in order to take care of the exhausted mother who slumped down in the bed.

"A girl," he mumbled, thumb tracing across the small bright pink cheek even as the child screamed his ears off. "She has your hair," he said, eyes drinking in the sight of his first, and only daughter. "Well, mostly…"

The thick coat of hair already lining her head was almost all the same bluish black that both his wife and his youngest son had. A part of it, however, was nothing like either his or his wife's – being a cherry blossom pink. It was unusual yes, but the midwife had assured him it was likely to do with a mutation rather than anyone else's genetics. He trusted his wife, and the child's chakra was similar enough to her siblings and his own from what he could tell with his meagre sensory abilities. That would have to be enough for the Council of Elders. The stodgy old coots were likely to raise a fuss over the pink tuft of hair. Fugaku sighed, a sinking feeling of dread building in the pit of his stomach as he thought about having to meet with them and present his youngest daughter up for inspection.

They would want to find a betrothal for her, he knew, to improve their slipping standing in Konoha. But, he mused silently, he could worry about that when the time came. His daughter had just been born, and that was enough cause for celebration.

"Itachi," he spoke, turning to his eldest who waited silently by his side. "Meet your newest sibling."

Itachi reached out, and Fugaku couldn't resist the small smile which slipped onto his lips when he spotted the look of wonderment on his eldest's face. He was a gentle boy, Fugaku knew, and he loved his brother Sasuke with a gentle ferocity unique to him. Sighing, he let Itachi hold his wailing sister – knowing he wouldn't drop her. He had been careful enough with Sasuke and he had only been five years old at the time. Now he was eight, and already well on his way to becoming a shinobi – a better one than even he had been at that age.

Fugaku only hoped his and Sasuke's relationship wouldn't turn out like his and his brother's own. That was bad enough as it was. Perhaps that was why he was so soft on his children. Because he didn't want them turning out like he and his brother had under their father's careful watch.

The same father who had been cold and distant, forcing them to compete to see who was better. And he'd showered Fugaku in praise whenever he had trounced his little brother. It was why he had vowed to be closer to his children than most Uchiha usually were.

He liked to think both his sons were better off because of that.

"Otou-san." Large black eyes peered up into his own, capturing his attention. He'd hated it when his father had ignored him. "What is her name?"

"We were thinking of Kagami – after your maternal grandfather… but now I'm not so sure," he said, eyeing the pink tuft of hair along with his eldest. "What do you think?"

Large black eyes fixed on the pink tuft of hair. "Her hair is pink… pink like sakura blossoms," Itachi remarked, and Fugaku chuckled.

"I thought the same."

"So it'll be Sakura then?" Mikoto's voice reached them both, even as tired and weak as it was. Sakura's birth had been a long one – longer than both their previous, which had been a minor cause for concern, but for naught it seemed. Their daughter was healthy, if the strength of her lungs were any indicator. Though she certainly wasn't happy. Her tiny, squished face was wrinkled, a frown already settled on her brow even as she was passed back over to her mother.

She was undoubtedly an Uchiha, or so Fugaku mused with a small chuckle.

"Welcome to the family, Sakura-chan," Mikoto whispered, and suddenly the cries died away as their daughter snuggled into the warmth. "That's a good name… Uchiha Sakura."

And suddenly the cries were back in full force.

Warm.

It was so warm and comfy.

Then it wasn't. Cold. So cold. But then she was warm again, but it wasn't the same. The heat wasn't all encompassing. Nor did it seem to pulse anymore. Her eyes were too sticky to open properly, so she was left in blindness as she tried to work out what was going on. Someone was crying loudly – a baby's cries, she noted blandly as she tried to grasp a hold of her memories. How had she ended up there? Blind and seemingly alone?

The flashes came to her slowly.

Lilac hair. Blonde and black. Red. So much red. Anger. Roar. Snarl. Rage. Lunge. Punch. Miss. Hand. Nails. A hand spearing through her chest. Pulpy red organ. Her heart—

Sakura whimpered, screaming as she remembered. She had died. She was supposed to be dead, in the Pure Lands. This wasn't the Pure Lands. Everything felt wrong. Her skin was too tight, and she couldn't move her limbs properly. Not to mention she was also seemingly blind. Sakura didn't like this. She didn't like it one bit.

The baby kept screaming, and Sakura jolted as she realised those were her screams. They were coming from her mouth. Murmurs around her made her screams taper off, a soothing finger brushing at her pudgy cheek. Why did she sound like a baby?

"That's a good name… Uchiha Sakura."

Sakura screamed. Fuck. She was a baby, and her name was Uchiha Sakura. She didn't know exactly when it happened, but eventually, blissful oblivion came for her once more, and she slipped into an uneasy sleep.

She kept drifting in and out of consciousness after that, her itty bitty brain too small to fully cope with the idea she had apparently been reborn. She was supposed to be in the Pure Lands. Not wherever the hell she was, inside a bitty little Uchiha's body.

She was a Haruno, wasn't she?

Not anymore, a snide voice whispered, and that was about when the blackness rolled in. A white ceiling was the next thing she recalled when she woke, though it was partially blocked by a fuzzy dangly object.

She kept trying to bat at the dangling fluffy objects, little giggles escaping her when she heard the rattling of bells or the crackle of strange textures under her pudgy little fingers. Not that she had much sensation in them just yet. That would come later. Once she had grown a bit. Gotten more used to her strange, tiny new body.

All she could really do was lie there and blink up at the fuzzy faces which occasionally peered down at her. She liked her new mother the most. She also smelt the nicest. Plus she was the best at comforting her when she woke up.

Because there was too much time for her to dream – to dream and remember. Kaguya had killed her. She had killed her precious teammates. She could still see those images, those memories, whenever she closed her eyes.

She couldn't save them.

She wasn't good enough to.

A failure. Her tiny lip curled as best she could. Always running behind her two idiots.

Blank eyes staring up at the sky… She could never forget those. Forget the patients who'd slipped away under her hands. Corpses littering the battlefield. The stench of rot and ash as the bodies were hauled away to be burnt. They didn't have time to deal with an infection. Fire was the quickest way to solve that.

Sakura shook her head as best she could – which wasn't much.

The fact she had been reborn as an Uchiha meant she had undoubtedly been born in a new dimension. She'd had months of drifting between nightmares and her thoughts to figure things out. Naruto had been starting seal work, in memory of Jiriya, and any work revolving around time-space fuinjutsu had those sorts of warnings. There were other dimensions out there – Kaguya had only proven that much, though hers had been barren and devoid of life.

And if in her new dimension the Uchiha existed, then Indra had once existed, and that meant Kaguya had as well.

Fear stole through her at the realisation.

What if Kaguya came back? The thought had made her cry and scream, and not even her mother could calm her down – only her own exhaustion had, and she had woken to two very concerned parents hovering over her. There was a smaller figure there too sometimes, and Sakura liked his voice… it sounded oddly familiar. As though she had heard it some place before, but the only Uchiha she had ever met were Itachi and Sasuke. So she was probably just confusing things.

It didn't matter too much to her at that moment in time.

Kaguya was the more pressing issue. If she came for that dimension she had to be ready… She couldn't afford to lose anyone again. Sakura curled her chubby fingers into the fabric of her mother's shirt as she came to in her arms. She was an Uchiha now… and that would hopefully open up a whole new avenue of skills for her – on top of what she already had.

Even if she never awoke the sharingan, there would still be genjutsu and shurikenjutsu – two things the Uchiha had been famed for back in her old dimension. But first she would need to get a bit bigger.

Sakura scowled up at the ceiling. Kaguya would never touch what was hers again.

Ever.