"Do you find this place very familiar?" Chocho asked.

Sarada took in the place around her. It's dark, late at night with a cresent moon hanging high above their head. Her mother sitting on a bench dejectedly. What is she doing here alone at such a time?

"This place... isn't this near the entrance of the village?" Sarada noted. "What is Mama doing..." Her words trailed off as she saw her father walking down the road with a backpack in tow.

"They're setting out for mission at this time of the night?" Chocho asked.

"Why are you around here in the middle of the night?" Her father asked.

"I knew you'd come this way if you were to leave..."

Leave? Sarada widened her eyes. Her mother had always been evasive about part of their past. She had sensed her mother trying to blur out certain things, telling her Papa had been away from the village for awhile, but never stating the reason nor the way he left the village. She had thought maybe his tutor took him out for training for a few years, she knew it didn't sit right deep in her heart, but it had been done, hadn't it? Now realization dawned on her, maybe her father had ran away from the village. Maybe her father was a defected shinobi.

While Sarada was deep in thoughts, the scene she had never once dreamed of unfolded in front of her. Her mother begging her father to stay, tears streaming down her eyes, but Papa was determined to leave, she could see it in his eyes.

"I love you with all my heart..." Sakura cried, Sarada could sense the desperation and sadness in her mother's voice.

That was then her father turned around and said with a sarcastic smile, "You really are annoying."

"Don't leave!"

With just a blink of eye, Papa was standing behind Mama.

"Thank you," Sasuke said and then he knocked her out.

Sarada watched with aching heart as Papa carried the collapsed Mama and placed her on a bench. Even though she did not want what's happening in front of her to unfold, she knew deep down that her father would turn around without a pause and walk out of the village without any hesitation. And he really did that, with the crescent moon shining behind him.

"That's... Sarada..." Chocho muttered.

"I know, I am shocked too." She brushed away the drop of tear she had no idea was hanging on her eyelashes until now.

"Don't worry Sarada, you're proof that everything turns out alright in the end!" Chocho tried to cheer her up.

"I know right?" Sarada tried to smile.

"It's like those melodramas Mama love to watch, before the couple get together they have to undergo hate, love, misunderstanding, miscarriages, memory loss and whatnots."

"..." Sarada slapped Chocho on her arm. "Just what kind of dramas are you guys watching! I don't want my parents to undergo those!"

But why did Papa have to go? Why did he defect Konoha? Sarada thought. And he told Mama she's annoying, she must be deeply hurt.

White light again enveloped them.

Author's note

Hope you had fun reading this! Do leave some comments or follow the story!