7.
- K -
Receiving a scroll from Sakura's apprentice had started as a surprise, but quickly became an annoyance that he was going to talk to her about when she returned.
"Hatake-sama – Sakura has asked for your help in training Izumaka-sama and Uchiha-sama in your absence. She requests you join us at the training grounds tomorrow at 7."
Making himself a cool 2 hours late seemed to fail when he found the rest of the training group arrive at the same time. Dammit, Sakura. She was going to get a further talking to for playing with his sense of time. He had a reputation to uphold after all.
"Kakashi! This is so cool!" Naruto shouted with more excitement than Kakashi had heard from the boy in years. Despite his discomfort at a Team 7 reunion, minus Sakura for now, the silver haired Jonin could still recognize how important this was to Naruto.
Hell, even Sasuke showed interest at his appearance.
"I can't wait for Sakura to get here, it's going to be all of us again!"
Yet another reason Sakura owed him many drinks, she hadn't even told the two dumbasses and left he and Izuhara to play messenger. The brown haired young man looked faint as he seemed to have the same realization and Kakashi decided to spare the young man in order to make Sakura further indebted to him.
"She's on a mission. I'm here in her place." Kakashi didn't want any misunderstandings that he had come skipping down to the training fields looking to get everyone back together. There were still many unspoken issues among the ex-genin team that he had no desire to trudge through.
He'd failed Sasuke, failed Naruto, and failed Sakura. They'd all gone on to train with Sannin and turned out well, if one ignored the years of Sasuke running wild on a revenge path. But none of it was thanks to his work. It made him feel out of place coming to them in a shinobi setting. They weren't quite equal, but they were long beyond being his students.
If they ever really were.
"Did that scroll of Sakura's say what we're supposed to do?" Kakashi asked the nervous young man.
"Uh, yes. She wants us to work on genjutsus which is why she requested your presence. She said, um, please understand she asked me to quote – 'I don't want anything occurring physically that would backtrack their progress or I will castrate all of you.' "
Kakashi grimaced internally at the idea of his former student taking a sharp object to his more sensitive parts. How lovely and graphic. It is Sakura after all.
"Well, let's begin."
- S -
As they finally went about settling the man back in comfortably, the woman seemed to be holding her breath as if she had something to say.
"Is there something else?"
Silence followed for a moment before the woman seemed to gather the courage to speak. "There's another house nearby where a child has fallen ill. I know I've already asked so much of you to care for my husband, but the boy is so young…."
"If you tell me the way I can see what I can do. I was able to give your husband, but I'm sorry I couldn't resolve his condition." Ami waved her hands dismissively at Sakura's comment.
"You have given him peace, that is more than I could have ever given him." Sakura went about returning her items to her pack when the dreaded question arose. "What brought you here?"
Never pausing in her motions, Sakura simply responded. "I was a medic in the war without any real association with the village, but I fought for the Leaf and travel using my skills how I can now that my skills are mostly without use."
Ami hummed in acceptance of Sakura's response and once the pinkette had packed her things she departed with the directions of the woman. Night had begun to fall so Sakura was incredibly careful in masking her chakra from any unwanted individuals nearby.
It only took half an hour to reach her destination and the house closely resembled that of the older couple if only slightly larger. Walls were worn, steps creaked, and windows lay cracked open. Her knock was left without response for a long stretch before a woman answered the door nervously. Hands shaking against the door, she quickly asked, "How can I help you?"
"I'm a friend of Ami and Hirata." The response seemed to soothe the woman, but only in her exterior. Sakura continued to detect the woman's jumpy attitude, but she supposed it was to be expected with random poisonings happening in the area. "I was told your son is ill."
Stepping back immediately, the woman waved Sakura in. "Oh please, thank Kami. Are you here to help him?"
"Hai, I'm not able to cure it but I provided comfort to Hirata." That seemed to be all the woman needed to hear as she ushered Sakura into another room where the boy lay in a similar position to Hirata. The boy looked near 12, the age Sakura began her genin training, and a pang of sadness struck her at the idea of having a life cut short so early. A life was a life no matter the age, but sick children had always struck her particularly hard. Thus her choosing to open a children's clinic in the Konoha hospital alongside Ino and with the support of Tsunade and Shizino.
Sakura settled into the mat beside the boy and was conscious of a man joining the room – likely the boy's father. She held her breath and sensed out the family's chakras finding nothing abnormal or amiss. Repeating her earlier ministrations, Sakura decided to collect a sample from the boy as well once she gained the permission of his parents. The process mirrored that of her earlier one and Katsuyu returned to collect the second sample before disappearing in a puff of smoke.
Once the boy was settled and his symptoms lessened, the parents both expressed gratitude in the way of thanks and insistences she stay for dinner.
"I really must go, I'm hoping to continue my travels," Sakura politely declined.
"You must be exhausted! The life of a nomad medic must be trying," the woman pleaded.
"Ah, I don't remember talking about my lifestyle." Sakura's eyes narrowed. Tsunade would be giving her a next level scolding for "playing medic" as it seemed her patients were not so innocent.
The nameless woman's face dropped into a tragic frown that almost made Sakura pity her. "I'm sorry, Haruno-sama."
Every alarm in Sakura's head rang, but she barely made it a few steps before the room was flooded with multiple enemy nin. Chakra exhaustion had clearly impacted her ability to sense attackers because there were five men staged around her.
"No, I'm sorry," she growled. Smashing a fist down in the floor, Sakura tried to ignore that crushing of the house would disturb the ailing child. Right now, the safety of many relied on her returning safely and creating an antidote.
The thought did little to comfort her.
Pulling senbon from her pouch, she spread an array of them in a circle around her as she leapt from the now caved in floor of the house to dodge the falling ceiling. Screams erupted from the woman as she ran to gather her child. Not sticking around to see the result of her damage, Sakura continued to smash her way through the weak walls of the collapsing house in an attempt to slow her enemy. It was foolish of her to get complacent so quickly at the hands of an older couple and a child, she needed to reign in her sensitive heart.
Sprinting through the forest in the dark, she was forced to veer from her path to the house in order to avoid a likely ambush back the way she had come. If this enemy had the numbers to send five ninja into one house, they likely had at least a few dozen at their disposal. A few chakra signals flared to life around her and the gravity of her mistake.
She ground to a halt and charged her fist with chakra to smash it into the ground an create a rippling earthquake that disturbed the hiding spots of some men. Oddly, most of the attackers had very low or nearly non-existent chakra signals making it clear they were more civilian than ninja. Yet, they had clear intention to hurt or possibly even kill her.
While most of them barely had chakra, there were several strong fighters and at least one of them must have been able to see through her henge.
The first man to approach her was swiftly knocked out with a roundhouse kick to the temple before she was rushed by three following. All of them stepped carelessly over the body of their comrade which signified a lack of loyalty and care for one another. While they may have a united aim to go after her, they couldn't really be classified as a team.
Several well placed senbon to chakra points felled another 10 men and it seemed her non-lethal attacks were still terrifying the men who weren't able to wield their chakra or properly fight. Turning to make a break for it, she met a set of dark eyes belonging to a man whose chakra signature was entirely masked. Before she could put distance between them, a needle and attached vial were stabbed into her upper arm.
He didn't attempt to follow her as she leapt away and yanked the needle from her body, but they both knew she wasn't going far.
Swimming in her ears radiated throughout her skull and her limbs began to fail her soon after. As her strength fell away, she was forced to the ground by legs unable to hold her up and a hand on the back of her neck. Falling lids stripped her of the ability to gain any visual information on her enemy before she lost consciousness entirely.