Sorry it took so long... again…

SAKURA, IN THE MORNING

It was a beautiful early autumn morning in the village of Konoha. The sun was shining with a warm glow, the trees on the sides of the marketplace had just started changing their colors, and a brisk, but not yet cold wind was blowing.

"H- Achoo!"

Also, it was the flu season. Sakura shivered a bit as she stepped out of bed, leaving the warmth and comfort behind. Forcing herself to not linger, she quickly made her way to the bathroom, shivering again as her feet touched the cold, tiled floor. She could feel another sneeze coming soon.

"I hade mobningds", Sakura muttered to herself, and blew her nose.

-exile-

After a warm shower, breakfast, a little make-up and some of her own shop's choicest flu meds, Sakura felt much better. Dressed in her usual red, she ventured downstairs to the first floor of her house, which was the pharmacy. The teen skipped about the shop, running back and forth between the shelves and the storage room, restocking and cleaning. She was in no hurry this morning; it was a Sunday, and the pharmacy was closed.

Sakura had come to own the shop because she had worked there as an intern after her ninja status was removed. In Konoha, where twelve-year-olds were frequently put in mortal danger in the line of duty, the child labor laws were flexible (to say the least), even among civilians. Sakura had been just thirteen, the coup had been freshly over and the village licking its wounds, when she had been asked to work at the pharmacy.

Sakura had agreed without a second thought, because the suggestion had come from Kakashi-sensei.

When the coup had happened, Sakura hadn't been with her team. It was by coincidence that that very day, every genin of team seven had been training separately. Kakashi-sensei had decided to finally give Naruto a much-needed supplementary lesson on chakra control, Sasuke was learning sharingan-tricks with his scary brother, and Sakura had just signed up for some extracurricular healing classes at the Konoha Hospital. When attack had happened, Sakura's teammates had been attacked - but the hospital had been locked down and Sakura and the rest of the students had been rushed to a bomb shelter downstairs. When they finally got out, the village rule had changed.

Her teammates had vanished, and were now called traitors.

The Hokage was dead and the Hyuuga had found evidence that suggested he had funded Orochimaru's human experiments.

The Uchiha family had been wiped out. As it turned out, they had been preparing to overthrow the Hokage and take over Konoha for themselves.

Every corner in the village was now guarded by Hyuuga clan members, as well as other odd-looking ninja, who all wore an even emptier expression than the pupil-less Hyuuga.

Several years' worth of civilian-family genin were removed from duty, even Sakura, the top female graduate of her year.

Sakura had cried until she fainted. Then she had woken up at home, and cried herself unconscious again. For two days, she had refused to eat, get up, or be consoled. That was when Kakashi had appeared.

He had come through her window, disguised and sudden, and scared Sakura so badly she would have screamed if her voice hadn't been so hoarse from all of the crying. All she had managed was a weak croaking noise. Once Sakura had calmed down, her teacher had explained to her what she had already known: the Hyuuga had taken over, and framed the Third Hokage for treason to justify it.

He had also told her that her teammates were alive, and needed her. She was to stay in the village as a spy for the newly formed rebels, and try to aid them from within. Sakura had cried and begged to go with him. Kakashi had pleaded for her to stay. She was their best choice for a spy, he had argued. She had retained her citizenship status in the village, when so many others had been jailed or executed. She was young, innocent, civilian, and female. No one would suspect her.

Four years later, Sakura knew Kakashi hadn't been perfectly honest in saying that. She had been the teammate of three now very notorious rebels, and she was certain that someone had to have doubted her loyalty to the new Konoha, at least somewhere along the way. The teen could only hope those doubts were gone by now. Kakashi had been honest in one regard, though: the rebels did need her. There was a strong, secret anti-Hyuuga movement within the village, but out of those people, the active-duty ninja were now watched so tightly by the Hyuuga that they couldn't aid the rebels much, and out of everyone else, only a handful had any ninja training. Sakura was an excellent choice for a spy. She had the basic training (and then some), she had all of the qualities that Kakashi had mentioned, and was good enough a liar to seem innocent and naive.

Although lying was a skill she had picked up on the way.

So Sakura had allowed Kakashi to convince her to stay in the village, and the man had on a later visit suggested that she should work at the pharmacy, which back then had been owned by an elderly healer - and another secret anti-Hyuuga activist. Sakura had learned a lot from him - about herbs, medicine, diseases, spying, and lying. The man was now retired and had moved over to his son's family's house, leaving the business (both the official and the nightly) in Sakura's hands.

The pinkette was checking her charts to make sure nothing was missing from the storage. Then she checked her other chart, and changed the numbers so that it looked like the items that were missing, which were the supplies Hinata had taken last night, had never been there to begin with.

The teen sometimes wondered if Kakashi and everyone else had wanted to protect her when they had insisted that she stayed in Konoha. She was, of course in great danger even as a spy, but as a rebel she would have been in an even greater one. Sakura did not like the idea of being protected, because it implied that she was weak. But- was she? She hadn't been much use to anyone on her team's first missions and had only begun to grow bolder by the time the coup had happened.

And didn't it seem to prove her weakness further that Kakashi had managed to speak her into staying within the village? Perhaps, deep down, she had not wanted to risk her neck after all, perhaps she had actually wanted to stay warm and comfortable and let someone else do the fighting...

But this, Sakura knew, was not true. If she had the chance, she would join her friends in a heartbeat. Sasuke-kun, that sweet idiot Naruto, Ino-pig, Kakashi-sensei, everyone else too. She did want to go to them. It was duty that bound her to this side of Konoha's walls, where she was alone. It had been duty to her friends and teammates and everyone else that had originally made her stay.

-exile-

Pleased with her checks and the condition of the pharmacy, Sakura put her charts in two folders - one very carefully hidden behind some anti-byakugan traps, the other in her filing cabinet - and smiled. That's all for today. She took a coat from the storage room, dressed, grabbed her purse, and went out.

Clouds had begun to gather overhead, and the sunlight that had woken Sakura in the morning was quickly being snuffed out. Sakura made a mental note to try and hurry. She had some shopping to do, and she did not want to have to run home in the rain. The annoying thing was that she knew a way to stop the rain from touching her skin, but because it involved using her chakra, it was technically considered ninjutsu and therefore she was not allowed to do it.

The rebel community had many theories as to why the Hyuuga had forced some many young genin into a very, very early retirement, but the best theory (in Sakura's opinion) was one that Tenten had come up with. Ino had told Sakura of her theory (sometimes, when Ino was feeling particularly daring, she would possess certain villagers with her mind techniques and come over to Sakura's place to exchange information. Definitely not gossip. Exchange information. Yes. Definitely.)

Tenten believed that the reason was the age ratio amongst the rebels. Among those who were openly rebels, there were many people from the same age group. From Sakura's own graduating class, there were nine people who the Hyuuga had tried to assassinate in the coup, but had survived, and another two who had left without being pursued. From Tenten's class, there were eight rebels. In fact, out of all of those who were openly rebels, almost half had been younger than twenty at the time, and all of the other age groups were less well represented.

So it made sense to ban as many ninja from the young generation as possible, since it was very likely that they knew someone from the rebel community and might sympathize with them. Allowing potentially anti-Hyuuga ninja to train and hone their skills further would have posed a problem for the future. And civilian-family genin had just been such an easy target. Banning genin from ninja families would have caused an uprising immediately, but what could civilian parents do to cause trouble? Not much, it had turned out.

Sakura went to the grocery store, picked up a shopping basket and collected everything she needed in a record time. Snatching the final item on her list (skimmed milk) from a fridge, she felt a little victorious, and certain that she could get back home before it would start raining.

After paying an aging Hyuuga woman at the counter, Sakura left the store. Looking up at the sky, she was disappointed to see the murky clouds overhead. Even though I got everything so fast. She then lowered her gaze, and noticed a man on the roof of another building by the marketplace, wearing anbu getup. He vanished before Sakura could get a proper look at him, but a chill ran through her regardless. Very determined to not look up again, the pinkette started marching towards home.

He was not there for me, Sakura told herself. There were plenty of other people at the marketplace and the shops. You're being paranoid. They don't suspect you. Maybe it was a patrol, maybe he wasn't there for anyone in particular. She really wanted to run, but surely it would be suspicious to break into a run immediately after seeing an anbu officer?

Sakura felt the first raindrops collide against her forehead. Damnit. Well, at least I now have an excuse to run.

-exile-

A/N: Please, for the love of cheesecake, review. I don't care if all you say is "lol i liek it" or "OMG I hate Sakura." Just tell me something. Writing without getting any feedback is like screaming at walls - eventually you will come to the conclusion that you're mad and quit.