When Sakura arrived at school the morning after her fight with Naruto, she heard his less-than-dulcet tones before she even stepped foot in the classroom. The class was already populated with several students, but she quickly located an empty row. Naruto didn't so much as utter a greeting when she walked past him with her head down, but he was speaking to a boy whose hair was pulled back in what appeared to be a painfully tight ponytail. She assumed they'd quieted down significantly when she entered, but she could still hear them exchanging words like "sensitive" and "forehead" and "troublesome" as she settled into her seat.
They're talking about us!
Sakura decided then that she would never, ever forgive Naruto for spreading gossip about her huge forehead.
She was silently fuming by the time Ino arrived. When Ino managed to make sense of the garbled recollection of events Sakura choked out, she asked, "Want me to go talk some sense into him?"
Sakura shook her head, so relieved that Ino hadn't said 'I told you so' that she could have cried. "That's okay. I should have listened to you. You were right about him."
Ino nodded, but not unkindly. "You know, since you've been here several days now, do you want me to introduce you to all my other friends?"
Sakura's heart sped up at the prospect of meeting any new people, and having to speak to them, but Ino put a hand on her shoulder.
"I'll be there the whole time," she said comfortingly. Sakura couldn't help but be amazed at the way Ino knew how everyone was feeling, all the time. It was like a superpower.
"Okay. I'd like that!" She couldn't hold in her excitement. She'd never had friends , plural, before, but then again, she hadn't had a lot of things before she met Ino.
It didn't take long for Sakura to decide that she didn't like the first cohort of Ino's friends one bit. They were all clan heirs, and they made it known to her in their introductions.
"I'm Sakura," she said lamely. What could she add?
Ino looked between Sakura and the array of girls in front of them, who were all staring at her expectantly.
They're waiting for a reason to care about who you are. You haven't given them one.
"All right, great!" Ino said warmly to the girls, flashing them a million-ryo smile. Then she tugged on Sakura's arm, whispering, "You can get to know them better later. Moving on," as she whisked Sakura away.
She dragged Sakura to a row of seats with two other boys.
"Hey, you two. Listen up!" Ino said with authority. It was a stark contrast to the way she'd been behaving just seconds earlier.
Sakura recognized both of them. One was Choji. Ino hung out with him a lot in class, but Sakura hadn't ever said a word to him. And the other boy was asleep.
She did a double take. It was him! That boy had been speaking to Naruto this morning about her forehead!
Choji finally glanced upwards from his lunch. "What is it now, In— oh! Hello," he said to her, his shoulders hunching inward.
Ino gestured vigorously beside her, as though prodding him on.
"I'm Choji, the heir to the Akimichi clan. It's very nice to meet you." He said it stiffly, as though in recitation.
"Is everyone in this class a clan heir?" Sakura blurted out without preamble, then went pink.
Smooth.
Ino, Choji, and the other boy (who had lifted his head off the table slowly) all exchanged glances.
"Mostly," Ino admitted after an insufferable silence. "This is the first generation where there's been an agreement for all shinobi clan heirs to be born in the same year. There are two clan heirs in the year above us, though, and one who'll start in the Academy next year. Issues with the pregnancies, I think."
"And there's the Uchiha clan," Choji added.
Ino frowned. "Oh, yeah. Them too. But why do you think their heir isn't…"
She didn't finish the question, but Choji and the other boy seemed to know what she was thinking anyway. Sakura felt a little out of the loop.
"The Sarutobi clan, too," the ponytailed boy added, his voice a lazy drawl.
"Lord Third's clan?" Sakura questioned, eager to participate somehow.
Ino looked at her sadly. "Hokage-sama's eldest son and grandson… they were on their way back to Konoha from a diplomatic mission when they were killed by enemy-nin."
"He would have been in our year," Choji said, looking down despondently.
"Oh, I did hear about that," Sakura recalled. It was before she'd joined the Academy, and her parents had attended the state funeral. Her mom had ordered Sakura to stay home, insisting she was just too young for such things.
"There's only the younger son now. He's two years old, I think," Ino told her.
"Konohamaru," Choji supplied. "His kaasan died right after they heard, did you know? Tousan said it was from grief."
"People don't die from grief, Choji," Ino snapped. The look on Choji's face made it clear that he didn't agree. "She died from childbirth complications."
"How come the clans do that?" Sakura interrupted their argument, curiosity piqued. She'd learned about some practices unique to shinobi clans back in her civilian school, but she'd never heard about this.
"It makes it easier for everyone to get along," Ino explained. "They're the same age, so they understand each other better than, like, a really old and really young person. And they attend school together, so they'll become friends early on."
"I guess that makes sense," Sakura said, thinking aloud. "The clans haven't lived together very long." They'd been isolated, actually, before the formation of the Village Hidden in the Leaves. "It's smart to try for unity, right?"
It wasn't a particularly difficult conclusion to reach, but Ino smiled at her in approval, then looked to the boys as if to say 'See?'
She might as well present you in gift wrap, Inner said. Had her alter-ego just snorted?
"Don't be rude!" Ino hissed to the other boy, pulling Sakura out of her musing.
"What a drag," he said under his breath, loud enough for Sakura to hear. "Shikamaru," he offered. His name and nothing more.
"Are you a clan heir too?" she couldn't help but ask.
Shikamaru looked heavenward, as though she was inconveniencing him terribly. Shortly, he said, "Yes. I'm a Nara."
"We've known each other since we were babies," Ino said brightly. "People from our clans always get put in the same team. We're going to be in a team one day as well. And that's why we're all best friends! Right, guys?"
Shikamaru rolled his eyes very obviously. Choji looked warily from him to Ino.
"Fine. Choji and I are best friends," Ino corrected breezily, though Sakura didn't miss the flash of hurt that had passed over her face. She clenched her fists. Who did this Shikamaru guy think he was, anyway? Ino had granted him the title of her best friend so freely, and he'd just rejected it!
Choji nodded weakly to Ino's declaration. It wasn't the most enthusiastic response, but Sakura decided it was enough to definitively label him the better of the two boys.
"And Sakura is my best friend," Ino added. Sakura's mom had already told her people could have multiple best friends, so it only bothered her a little bit that she had to share the spot with Choji. "She's much nicer than you two. And I bet she's as smart as you, Shika."
Sakura didn't know what to make of this. Judging by his behaviour, Shikamaru was the furthest thing from intelligent, so she was leaning towards feeling insulted more than anything else.
Shikamaru appraised Sakura skeptically.
This was it, she realized, stomach clenching. He was going to mention her forehead.
Then he shrugged, and promptly went back to sleep. Choji snickered, but it seemed directed at Shikamaru's antics, rather than at her expense.
Sakura realized right then that she probably shouldn't have been surprised by any of this. Shikamaru didn't seem like he cared much about anything, and thankfully, her forehead had also escaped his notice.
"Boys," Ino said (somewhat fondly, Sakura thought), while shaking her head.
Once they'd returned to their seats, Ino filled Sakura in on some of the other students. Sakura tried to listen, though she was mostly thinking about how Ino's lunch was smaller than hers.
There were some civilian kids who Ino said were nice, but she hadn't had the chance to befriend yet.
"There's also Hinata. She's the Hyuuga heiress. And she's very quiet. I want to be her friend, you know, but she's only said ten words since she got here. And it's even worse outside of the Academy. I see her all the time at clan gatherings, and she always looks like she wants to disappear."
"She's nice," Sakura said, thinking about her very first taijutsu spar, with the pale lilac-eyed girl as her opponent. Then another memory came, unbidden — Sakura praying she could blend into the bushes whenever her bullies came by. Maybe the sentiment of wanting to disappear wasn't as unreasonable as Ino believed.
"I guess. Then there's the clan boys. They always talk during lessons, and some of them pull on my hair during recess. Honestly." Ino huffed. "Shino, and, um, Sasuke, are the only ones who stick to themselves. But Shino…" she pointed the boy out to Sakura. "He's got bugs everywhere."
"Bugs?"
Ino's face was grave. "He's the heir to the Aburame clan. Bugs are their thing. You'll want to stay away."
Privately, Sakura reflected that she didn't mind bugs at all. There had been plenty of them when she'd played alone in the forest, and they'd always been nice.
"And you already know Naruto," Ino said with disdain. A few rows ahead, Naruto was sipping loudly on his ramen broth. Sakura felt a pinch in her chest.
"Is Naruto also part of a clan?" she asked, mostly to distract herself.
"The Uzumakis. There aren't many of them left anymore," Ino answered. "I think that could be why his folks died, but my parents wouldn't say anything more about it."
"Maybe a library book would," Sakura said mischievously.
Ino giggled. "Maybe."
Looking into beautiful blue eyes, Sakura felt like she was obligated to say it, to reassure Ino the way her friend had done for her. "Thanks for being my friend, Ino. Anyone who doesn't appreciate you is really, really stupid."
Ino's mouth fell open momentarily. Then she threw her arms around Sakura. Sakura hugged her back tightly, feeling her face burn. She was a bit overwhelmed by the gesture, but also so, so happy.
"We're best friends, remember?" Ino said, voice a little muffled. She smelled like flowers.
Much to Sakura's delight, she did make another friend.
Masami was a civilian, with beautiful long black hair and warm amber eyes. She had a sharp sense of humour and didn't mind her manners like girls should.
Sakura had stayed clear, of course, until one class, where her shuriken just kept missing, and Inner's reprimands in her head made her burst into quiet tears.
"Hey," Masami said quietly, putting a hand on her shoulder. She was looking straight ahead, standing next to her casually, so as to not draw any attention to them. "You want some tips?"
Masami could throw a shuriken better than anyone in their class, even Sasuke. Sakura, on the other hand, nearly hadn't been permitted to move into second year because of her abysmal performance in weapons work on the Year 1 Final Exam. At this rate, she wouldn't make it to third year.
It was a no-brainer. Sakura nodded, wiping her snot away on her sleeve.
After that day, Sakura went to Masami's house at least once a week. Her friend's apartment was cramped and dingy and located next to a sewage plant, so it was the smelliest place in the village. Sakura hated it. But she visited to tutor Masami in any subjects that involved theory and writing, and afterwards they'd find an open training ground to brush up Sakura's physical skills.
"Naruto lives here too, you know?" Masami said.
"In here?" Sakura asked, horrified, because, seriously, she didn't get how one person could live here, much less two.
Masami chuckled, though it lacked her usual humour. "No, Sakura. In this apartment building. His place is much nicer. It's a few floors above mine. I don't know how he pays for it. I never see him work."
"Do you work?" Sakura asked.
"It's not much. Gardening, cleaning fences, just me-null tasks around the village."
Sakura's first instinct was to correct Masami (it was 'menial,' of course!) like she typically did. She quashed the urge, or maybe she was just too baffled by the prospect of one of her classmates working and earning their own wages.
"Me and Naruto stayed in the same room at the orphanage. He was always more trouble than me. But we didn't ever get adopted, and now he's got a big apartment, and I'm still…"
Sakura stared at the ground awkwardly. She didn't know what she was supposed to do about that.
"All right, come on," Masami said, a new resolve to her voice. "We have to practice if we're going to be good shinobi, right?"
Sakura liked Masami. The girl couldn't sit through a book to save her life, and she got into fights all the damn time, but her eyes looked like pools of honey, and she was funny and sweet when they played together outside of school. Besides, Sakura's other friends were all Ino's, in truth. She may have liked Choji and Shino (and Akamaru) quite a lot, but Ino had gotten to them first, and Sakura never forgot it.
This only made it all the more upsetting for Sakura when, several months into their second year at the Academy, Iruka-sensei announced to the class during homeroom that Masami had moved away.
The class broke into questions at once. Sasuke had already been missing for four days, a blotch on his enviably perfect attendance record, and now this?
"It's a letter from Hokage-sama," Iruka-sensei said, though his tone was as bewildered as their faces. "He said she finally got adopted. A couple from a small village on the outskirts of Konoha looking for an older daughter… oh, that's wonderful! I'm glad to hear some good news."
Cheers ensued from their classmates. Ino shuffled closer to her.
"You okay?"
Ino had never seen Sakura and Masami talk very much, because Sakura made it a rule to avoid the girl when surrounded by the four walls of the Academy (Masami was a troubled child, and Sakura didn't want to be labelled as such by association). Of course Ino had picked up on their friendship anyway.
"She didn't say goodbye," Sakura said, dejectedly.
Why would she? Like she's going to be missing anything special.
She should be happy Masami had finally found parents, happy that she could finally move out of that pitiful apartment. Instead, she wanted to cry.
Ino held her hand as Iruka-sensei read out a letter from Masami.
"I'm very sorry I couldn't say goodbye to you all in-person. I am just so excited to start my new life with my parents! I wanted to thank you all for being my friends. I'll miss you guys so much! I hope we can meet again one day. I know you're all going to be amazing shinobi! With love, Masami."
Sakura asked to see the letter as her peers filtered out of the room for their next class.
"All right," Iruka-sensei said, his eyes filled with understanding.
Sakura held it in her hands, frowning. It was Masami's handwriting, there was no doubt about it, but Sakura had never known Masami to write anything so long (and with good spelling, too). It didn't even sound like her! And there was nothing written for Iruka-sensei, even though Sakura knew Masami liked him more than most of their classmates.
There was no mention of Sakura, either.
Sakura realized she was crying when Iruka-sensei patted her shoulder in consolation. "It's okay. It can be hard, losing a friend, but at least she's in a better place now, right?"
Sakura had heard her parents say that about her grandpas and grandmas, and they were all dead. But she choked out that she understood, anyway.
Looking back down at the letter as her vision cleared, she couldn't help but focus on one line.
'I know you're all going to be amazing shinobi!'
She couldn't shake the fundamental wrongness of it. But even as she read it over five times, she couldn't quite grasp why.
Her parents wouldn't let her visit Masami's apartment.
"Maybe she left something there for me!" she complained, trailing after her mother.
"Sakura, please. It's not Masami's apartment anymore, they'll clean it out soon. And nobody is going out right now," she said curtly, taking a seat on the sofa.
"Maybe I could go with her," her dad suggested.
"Are you insane?" her mom said to him. Both she and her father were taken aback; Mom never took that tone.
"Sorry," she said quickly. "It's not safe for anyone out there right now, Kizashi. You know that."
"But why?" Sakura was growing frustrated at the lack of explanation. "What changed all of a sudden? I haven't even been allowed to play with Ino for a week! Her parents aren't letting her go anywhere outside of school, either!"
"Your mother's right. Sorry, kiddo," her father said, staring out their living room window with dread, as though a monster was about to pop up right around the corner.
Sakura's attempts to convince them were futile. As she lay in bed that night, she wondered how successful she might be if she tried again tomorrow.
Not very, she concluded.
She turned her head to stare out the window, fighting a yawn. It was pitch black outside, with only the moon overhead. They'd been practicing their moon phases at the Academy lately, so she knew what tonight's was called — a waning gibbous.
Sakura sat up in bed to open her window (which was simple, given that her bed was pushed up against it), some of the chilly autumn breeze drifting in.
An idea suddenly came to her. Her parents didn't want her to visit Masami's apartment, but, as she'd heard her dad remark in jest once, what they didn't know wouldn't hurt them.
Her bedroom window directly faced that of her neighbour's, Kenji, next door, but the lights were out, so that was fine. Tiptoeing around her room as silently as possible, she grabbed some pillows from the couch in her room and placed them strategically underneath her blanket, just in case her parents decided to take a peek. That was fine too. Hurriedly, she shrugged on a sweater, then popped her head out the window.
Sakura's bedroom was on the second floor, and she'd break something if she jumped from up here. That was not fine.
Ideally, she'd tie a rope around her waist and secure it to something sturdy, letting herself down bit by bit. But Sakura didn't have a rope, and she needed to do this as quickly as possible.
There was nothing for it. She let herself out the window, feet first. Her hands were clammy and clutching the outer windowsill upon which she was perched, balancing precariously on her knees.
Taking a deep breath, she let herself down.
Sakura didn't scream, for which she was grateful. But she was even more grateful that she hadn't fallen.
Her teeth were chattering uncontrollably, her feet were dangling mid air, and her fingers were burning with the effort not to let go.
This was a great idea, Inner remarked dryly. But she didn't care. She'd done it!
She knew there was a living room window directly below her bedroom window. She looked down, cement wall raking her forehead painfully, to check how far down the next windowsill was. It wasn't too bad, she thought. If she could make sure she landed there on her feet, then—
She did cry out this time as her hands slipped above her. Her knees bumped against the living room windowsill, but she slipped off after a few seconds of attempting to regain her bearings, and then she landed on the ground, flat on her butt, with a muted "oomph!"
"Oww!" She'd scraped her palms nastily, trying to soften her fall.
She tried wiggling her fingers and toes, but she wasn't sure why. She'd just read it in a book somewhere. To her relief, it seemed like her hands had incurred the worst of the damage.
With wobbly legs, Sakura stood up, wiping her hands against her sweater. Then she ran.
It was a rush, knowing she was breaking the rules. She'd never done anything like this before, and she vowed to herself she never would again, but something was off about this whole Masami situation, and she needed to know what it was. If only for her friend.
As Sakura ran through the streets, she noticed just how empty they were, with all the shops closed, and vendors' stands abandoned, and the town square devoid of life. At first she dismissed it — the hour was late, after all — but she'd been out on a few late-night walks with her father before. It always seemed like the village never slept.
Until tonight.
She never thought she'd be so relieved to catch a whiff of sewage when she finally ran through the doors of the drab apartment building. Travelling through the halls, she felt eerily like she was being watched, but she told herself she was probably just spooked from her first (and last, she promised herself again) solo nightly excursion.
Masami's door was unlocked. Sakura went immediately to the bathroom, running her injured hands under a steady stream of water. She searched the cabinet for antiseptic to apply, but Masami had none. The bathroom contained shockingly little — only a dried up bar of soap, a worn toothbrush, a dusty comb, and a towel that looked like it hadn't been cleaned since who-knows-when. Sakura didn't even want to comment on the state of Masami's bathtub and toilet.
She thought of her many hairbrushes, her creams and moisturizers, her shampoos and perfumes. For the first time, she wondered if she could have done more for Masami. After all, her parents had asked if Masami needed anything after Sakura told them her friend was an orphan, and Sakura had always said the girl was doing fine.
It dawned on Sakura that Masami had never even seen her room . The rosette had wanted to avoid the awkwardness of inviting Masami over, knowing her home was so much nicer. She reckoned she'd get around to it eventually, though, maybe after Masami bought a bigger apartment.
Now, though? That seemed like a thoroughly moronic thing to have ever concerned herself with.
The usual for you, then.
She shook her head and decided to perform her inspection of Masami's apartment. Nothing was amiss — in fact, it was like Masami had never left. There were plates in the sink, still in need of a wash, and her bed was unmade, and there were even some papers sprawled over the tiny kitchen table. When she chanced a look into the closet, all of Masami's clothes were still there.
What really made Sakura pause, though, was the glint of metal she spotted on the kitchenette counter.
'We're going to be good shinobi,' Masami's voice echoed in her mind. She'd said it often.
Masami's shuriken and kunai pouches lay there, abandoned.
If Sakura had grabbed her friend's weaponry and bolted, then, well, at least it wasn't stealing. That apartment technically didn't belong to Masami anymore.
She was in such a hurry to return to the safety of her bedroom that she bumped straight into someone as she descended the last flight of stairs, sending them both tumbling down.
The boy was swearing profusely. Sakura's limbs hurt. "What'd you do that for, you— Sakura-chan?"
"Naruto?"
They'd barely exchanged five words with each other since their fight, which had practically been a whole year ago.
The scowl disappeared from his face, only to be replaced by confusion. "What are you doing here?"
"I was visiting Masami's apartment. What were you doing out so late?" she asked strictly. She felt an urge to whack him. Didn't he know it wasn't safe?
"I was just taking a walk!" he exclaimed, his tone defensive. "I couldn't sleep. I kept…" he trailed off, then sighed. "Don't you know how many kids from here got adopted this past week? Half their apartments are empty now."
"Are there a lot of orphans here?"
"Yeah, this building is the cheapest in the village. Smell anything funky?" asked Naruto with a goofy grin.
She was actively trying not to. "So… where did the kids go?" she asked suspiciously.
He shrugged. "I don't know. Nobody told me about it! If they had, maybe I could have talked to the parents too." His voice indignant, he added, "They would have loved me, dattebayo!"
She'd bet all her savings that none of them would have been interested in adopting Naruto. "Whatever. You need to stay home after dark, Naruto. It's dangerous to go out alone. Haven't you noticed how empty the streets are?"
Naruto's eyebrows waggled. "You worried about me, Sakura-chan?"
"Ugh, as if! Just be serious. I mean it."
Naruto seemed to absorb her words, then said quietly, "You… you don't think something happened to that loser, do you? You just said it was dangerous outside and all."
Sakura hadn't considered that, but she felt her heart drop.
"I mean, he's probably fine," Naruto continued, though she could hear the uncertainty in his voice. "Isn't his dad head of the Police Force?"
Sakura nodded, trying to believe him. Sasuke had the strongest clan in the village looking out for him. Masami didn't have anyone. "You're right. The Uchihas would keep him safe. And besides," she added, trying very hard not to blush, "Sasuke-kun is strong."
Naruto groaned loudly. "Sakura-chan, not you too! He just shows off."
She rolled her eyes. Ignoring him, she reached for the weapons pouches clattered on the floor around them, gathering them in her hands.
"Are those…?"
"They're Masami's," she said. She pulled a kunai out of the pouch to show him. "She sharpened them every—"
What happened next came so fast that Sakura could barely process it. A man with a white face appeared in front of her, seemingly from nowhere.
She screamed. She wouldn't let go of Masami's kunai, no matter what!
The man yanked it out of her hands in one smooth motion. She could feel the scrapes on her palms reopen from the sheer force, blood pouring out.
His face wasn't white, she registered dimly. It was a mask, decorated with red markings. It looked like it was covered in blood.
In her periphery, she could see another masked man materialize. Naruto simply groaned, as though this was all perfectly normal. "No, no, she was just— hey, bastard! Give that back to her!"
"Hound, she's a kid, come on," said the newest arrival to the scene. His mask was painted in various shades of cool blue. Unlike Hound, whose hair was spiked grey, the man had rather mundane dark brown hair that fell to his shoulders.
Hound was staring at her. She caught a gleam of red under his eye slits, and shrunk. With all his focus directed squarely on her, she felt like she couldn't breathe.
"Hound," the other man said, sharply now. "Take him and go."
She had only to endure his intense scrutiny a second longer. Then, wordlessly, Hound dropped the kunai and picked up Naruto with one arm. Naruto waved goodbye over Hound's shoulder, shouting, "See you on Monday, Sakura-chan!"
They disappeared from sight.
Sakura collapsed to the floor in tears.
"Oh, good sage," the other man said. "Hey, don't cry, Pinkie, come on now."
She flinched as he lay a hand on her head. She waited for him to ruffle it the way her dad did, but apparently he had no idea what to do from there.
"My friend is a little paranoid right now. He's gone a week without sleep. I'm sorry he scared you, okay? I'll talk to him."
Sakura nodded, rubbing her eyes to wipe away the tears, detecting a scent of copper.
"How do you know Naruto?" she asked.
She couldn't tell what expression the man was making under the mask, which was unnerving. "Well, me and my friend watch over him sometimes."
"Because he's an orphan?" she guessed.
"Yeah, exactly," he answered halfheartedly, stuffing the kunai back into its pouch, and then handing her Masami's things.
"Thank you. What's your name?"
"Heron," he supplied.
Obviously this wasn't his real name, nor was that other scary man named Hound. She wasn't stupid.
"Heron-san," she started, "If you watch over orphans, do you know about a girl named Masami? She lived in this apartment complex, a few floors below Naruto. Sandaime-sama sent a letter to our class today saying she'd been adopted, but I don't… I'm worried about her. She didn't even say goodbye. Did you see her new parents?"
Heron was silent for a few moments. Then he shook his head. "Sorry, kid, I don't know anything about that."
"Naruto said a bunch of kids from here got adopted this week. Do you know about any of them?"
Heron raised a hand to his forehead in exasperation. It looked absurd with his mask still on. "Pinkie, I'm saying this for your own good. Forget about it, all right? Don't go asking around about this."
Before Sakura could vehemently protest, he added, "What are you thinking, roaming around alone in the middle of the night, anyway? Aren't your parents home?"
"They are," she said, feeling inclined to defend them. "They told me not to go." She crossed her arms. " I snuck out!"
She could feel her eyes welling up with tears again. They were going to be so, so mad at her.
"That wasn't very smart of you," he said, and she bowed her head in shame. He leaned down in front of her, then tutted. "You got blood on your face, Pinkie." She scrunched up her nose in disgust. It must have been from when she tried to wipe her tears away.
"It's Sakura," she corrected.
"Sakura. Sorry about my friend," he said again. She didn't know why he kept apologizing for him. "He was out of line. He shouldn't have hurt you."
"I fell on my hands earlier, so it wasn't all his fault," Sakura said with a shrug. "Besides, he was worried about Naruto, right?" She remembered how he'd appeared the moment she'd pulled out Masami's kunai. She hoped Masami had also had someone like Hound watching over her. Then, as an afterthought, she said, "But don't tell him any of that. He should feel bad."
"Okay," Heron said. He sounded like he was smiling.
"Are you an ANBU fighter?" she asked, because she'd put it together now, with their masks and jobs. She'd seen them a few times. Her last sighting of the ANBU fighters had been a month ago, during a nasty fight that had broken out when a shop had been robbed. The Police Force took care of most physical altercations in the village, but she'd seen the ANBU around more and more often as of late.
Her mother didn't like ANBU. She always turned Sakura away when they encountered them, saying something about how they weren't only unnecessary, but also too violent for simple villagers. (Sakura's run-in with Hound didn't do much to dispel that notion.) Before that, though, her mother had complained incessantly about the Police Force, so Sakura wasn't sure what to think.
"Yes," Heron said, actually chuckling this time, though she wasn't sure why. "I am an ANBU fighter. Let's get you home, Pinkie. Can I pick you up?"
She nodded. "I can tell you the way."
When Sakura finally landed on her neighbour's roof, she couldn't help but feel angry. Jumping over the city with Heron at a breathtaking pace had been a surreal experience, one she was unlikely to forget. She wondered if this was what shinobi always felt like — floating above everything.
Unfortunately, it also meant that she'd been duped into forgetting about her mission.
"Let me down," she grumbled. When he did, she glared up at him with her hands on her hips. "Why did you say that I should stop asking about Masami?"
Heron whispered a curse (not quietly enough), then said, "Pinkie, you want me to tell your parents that you snuck out tonight?"
"No!"
"Okay, then listen carefully. For one, you never, ever, sneak out in the middle of the night again. Not until…" he looked at her again, then said, "Just. Never. If you do, I'll tell your mother and father everything, and I'll go to your Academy teachers, and the Hokage, too. Then they'll have to decide if you're fit to be a shinobi."
She glared at him, lower lip trembling at the thought. She wouldn't cry in front of him again. She'd been wrong to think Heron was nice.
"Second, you stop poking around about Masami. It won't do anyone any good. This is for your own safety, okay? You don't want to draw attention to yourself."
She opened her mouth, then closed it, not trusting herself to speak. Then she took a few deep breaths, and said, "Is Masami okay?"
He hesitated.
"If you know something is wrong," she asked furiously, "Why aren't you helping her? Aren't you supposed to protect the village?"
Heron sighed audibly. "Okay, Sakura, I didn't want to tell you this, but Masami… I was watching her, like I watch Naruto. She was mad at you. That's why she didn't say goodbye."
Sakura's breathing was still heavy from her outburst. "Really?"
"Mhm. Her new parents asked if she wanted to say goodbye to any of her friends. She mentioned you, and then said she never wanted to see you again."
Sakura gaped, thinking about the last time she'd talked to Masami. Things had been fine between them, and yet…
"Did she say why?"
"Are you sure you want to hear this?"
Sakura nodded. "Please, Heron-san."
"Fine. She said you're always such a know-it-all. You act like you're better than her, just because you have fancier things. And some other mean things. I can tell you're sad, so I won't repeat them."
Sakura's mind was a whirlwind, taking it in. Masami had said all of that?
Obviously. I won't say I called it, but I did.
"What other mean things did she say? Did she talk about my forehead?"
"Er, yes. That too."
She was a fool , thinking Masami was in trouble. The truth was so much simpler. Masami hated Sakura. Now that she had new parents, she didn't need her anymore.
"This is why I didn't want to say anything. For the record, I think you're all right, Pinkie."
She gave Heron a brittle smile. She could cry when she was back in bed. Instead, she held out Masami's shuriken and kunai pouches.
"You can take these. Do you know why she left them behind?"
"Her parents promised they'd buy her better ones," he answered easily.
"That must be why she left all her other stuff, too," Sakura realized with a nod. It made sense. "I can't believe she hates me. It's not my fault I have nice things! And she was obviously so excited to get out of her old apartment and live like me. She didn't even clean up before she went! That's so rude!"
"Definitely," Heron agreed. "But why don't you keep the weapons? Be careful with them, though. They're wicked sharp."
She considered it, then mumbled "Okay." Masami's weapons were much better-tended than her own.
"You need to remember what I said. No sneaking out anymore. And don't worry about Masami. She obviously wasn't a real friend. If I were you, I'd forget about her."
Sakura accepted those terms miserably.
"Good. Now, how were you planning on making it back to your bedroom?"
Sakura opened her mouth to answer him, then faltered. She was pretty sure her plan had stopped at the stage of investigating Masami's apartment.
"Well, I could go in through the front door," she tried.
"Did you bring your house key?"
The question was met with silence. Slowly, she shook her head.
Heron-san picked her up again, and in a flash, she was being deposited on her bed. She saw his silhouette crouched in her open window.
"Don't mention any of this to your friends, all right?"
She froze, because she'd been contemplating how to tell Ino right then.
"Well, if you really want to share, your parents should be the first to know," he said casually.
"That was cruel, Heron-san."
Strangely, he didn't reply for several seconds.
She wondered if he'd taken it seriously, but before she could clarify that she'd only been kidding, he said, "Yeah, yeah." His words were humorous, but his tone was solemn. "Sleep well, Pinkie."
"Good night."
She watched as he leaped away into the darkness.
Author's note
please leave a review with your thoughts! thanks for reading 3