Naruto sighed when he noticed that Sakura was still sobbing when she returned the clothes she'd borrowed from him while she washed her own clothes and the outfit he'd lent her. When he'd come upon her while she was washing her clothes, she had been sobbing inconsolably as she scrubbed her dress on the rocks of the riverbank. Tetsuo-sensei had been a bit too harsh with her it seemed and, unlike himself, Sakura had always been overly sensitive about criticism, and couldn't just shrug such things off and keep going. It looked like he would have to be the one to talk to her in order to explain what was going on since Tetsuo-sensei wouldn't and Sasuke and Kakashi probably didn't know.
Things hadn't always been easy with Tetsuo-sensei and, in the beginning, they hadn't had the relationship they had now. Tetsuo-sensei could be rather harsh, especially if you didn't meet his expectations. Considering the fact that he had been one hell of a mess when he'd gotten out of the Academy...Not meeting the man's expectations was putting it mildly.
There had been a time when he'd thought that Tetsuo-sensei had hated him since, rather than teaching him cool things like he did with Suzume and Satoshi, the man had had him running up and down trees and stuff non-stop for days on end, and would only pay attention to him long enough to point out that he was doing something wrong, or would bark harshly at him if he didn't think he was working hard enough on the Chakra control exercises he'd set him to doing. The man had proven that assumption wrong though the day he had gone out and got Kakashi to give him some special training, and had proven that he actually cared for him even further when he had shown actual concern for him when he'd rather stupidly created far more Kage Bunshin than was safe.
Training became a great deal more fun when Tetsuo-sensei realized that he was taking things seriously, and that he was honestly trying, rather than being that bratty kid who did just about anything and everything for attention. When his sensei saw that he was willing to do what it took to succeed as a ninja, rather than not taking things seriously and constantly demanding to be taught a bunch of Super-Awesome Jutsu, he had eased up on him considerably. That didn't mean that Tetsuo-sensei didn't come down on him like a ton of bricks when he goofed off after the man had eased up on him however.
It had been because of Tetsuo-sensei's often harsh training and occasionally biting criticism that he had brought his teammates and Kurosaki back alive after that disaster during the Chunin Exams, and for that, he was grateful.
Rather than letting Sakura wander off alone and curl up in a corner somewhere and continue to let her resentment fester like she looked like she was about to do, he headed after her to have a bit of a talk with her. The girl clearly needed it because, she didn't seem to understand what Tetsuo-sensei was trying to do for her and thought that the man was just picking on her because he didn't like her for some reason. Sure, sensei had been mean about it, and could have gone about it differently but, the consequences of being thrown into battle when you weren't ready were far far worse than anything sensei would say or do during training.
"Hey Sakura-san." he said when he'd reached a good spot to stop her and have a private chat with her.
"What!" the girl snapped, obviously looking like she'd reached the point where she was willing to risk a broken arm just to chase him off.
"I just wanted to talk with you a bit." he said, signing that he didn't mean her any harm.
Actually what he'd signed was "Chill out dude, I'm not gonna hurt you, so put the weapon down" but, it was close enough to his intentions that it worked as far as he was concerned. He'd gotten a couple of chuckles from his teammates over that little substitution when he'd first used it while breaking up an argument between Suzume and Satoshi that looked like it had been about to turn deadly, and had decided to continue using it since it seemed to break the tension quite nicely. It didn't break the tension with Sakura however, as the girl didn't seem to understand what he was saying.
"Well, I don't want to talk to you!" Sakura yelled as she continued to storm away from where the team was camped. "Today has to be the worst day of my life. Actually, the day I got put on this team was the worst day of my life, and this whole week just hammered the point in. I don't even know what I'm doing here, and if I hadn't signed a five year service agreement, I would've already turned around and gone home! If this is what it's like to be a ninja, I might just do that anyways!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! You do not want to open that can of worms." he said, shocked that the girl had even thought about saying something like that, much less actually doing it.
If Sakura turned around and went home right now, she could expect a black mark on her record that would bar her from ever being promoted beyond Genin at best, and being killed for abandoning her mission and betraying Konoha at worst. What would most likely happen to her though would be that she would be dishonorably discharged, which was practically a death-sentence in Konoha. In Konoha, Ninja who were dishonorably discharged were worse than looked down upon, and compared to how dishonorably discharged ninja were treated in the village until they either left of killed themselves to regain what little honor they could for their families, the way the villagers had treated him was downright neighborly.
Sakura ignored his warning however, and stormed off in a different direction. He turned and followed her, hoping and praying that the girl wasn't about to make a mistake that would destroy the rest of her life. He didn't want to see the girl he'd once had a very massive crush on suffer the fate of a ninja who had turned their back on a mission. Since she was a comrade, he still cared about her, even though he no-longer liked her all that much as a person.
"If you do run off, you'd better be prepared to run as far away from Konoha as fast as you can before dying that distinctive hair of yours, changing your identity, and looking over your shoulder for Hunter-nins for every second of every day for the rest of your undoubtedly short life. Because, running back to Konoha without authorization right now would only get you into some seriously deep shit." he said as he ran alongside the pink haired girl, easily keeping up with her.
That statement caused her to pause in shock.
"The way I see it right now, you've got two choices. You can put up with the situation as it is for the next two months, and prove to Tetsuo-sensei that you are a ninja not a weakling, which will greatly increase your standing in both his eyes and the eyes of the village. Or, you can run, and either be hunted for the rest of your life, or be dishonorably discharged depending on which direction you run in, either way bringing shame upon yourself and your family that neither of you will ever be able to live down." he said, laying all the cards out on the table for the girl who obviously hadn't been ready to be a ninja, much as he hadn't been when he started out and signed a contract that was similar to Sakura's because, he'd thought that he was beyond ready and didn't need a trial period.
His statement gave the girl pause, and she stopped running, which was good in his book. If she had continued to run despite the fact that he'd told her what would happen to her if she did so, he would have been forced to knock her out, drag her back to camp, and leave her for Tetsuo-sensei to deal with.
"Why?" Sakura asked, making him wonder if she was asking why in general, or asking a specific question.
"Why what?" he asked, hoping for further clarification so he could give her an answer if it were at all possible.
"Why is this happening to me?" Sakura asked, fresh tears streaming from her eyes.
"Several reasons, some of them aren't your fault, and some of them are." he replied, getting a little closer to the subject that he'd originally wanted to speak with Sakura about before she nearly went missing-nin. "When Tetsuo-sensei heard that he was getting the Top Kunoichi and the Rookie of the year to fill the gaps left by Suzume and Satoshi's promotions, he had figured that he'd only need to work with us only a little bit in order to prepare us for the Chunin Exams in January, and had signed us up for a bunch of missions in advance so you and Sasuke could have the eight missions that are the required minimum in order to be considered for promotion. Missions which we cannot back out of now that we've accepted them."
Sakura looked like she could understand that at least, and that she would continue to listen to him rather than run again. She'd even stopped crying, which was even better.
"Thanks to the fact that there was a traitor in the Academy who was glossing over things in your and Sasuke's reports so the other Instructors didn't know that there were subjects that they needed to work with you on, and sabotaging your educations in a million other little ways that the other Instructors didn't catch on to, you weren't anything approaching what Tetsuo-sensei expected you to be." he continued, knowing that the girl needed to hear this.
"When it became clear to him that you were not yet ready for life as a ninja, he went into his harsh teacher mode and set out to either toughen you up or break you early before you became a danger to others." he said, getting to the point he'd wanted to make earlier.
"But that's so unfair!" Sakura yelled in indignation.
"I've lived through it, and so can you." he replied as kindly as he could. "When you show him that you're actually taking things seriously, that you're determined to become a better ninja, and that you aren't just going to fall back into old habits the instant he turns around, he'll ease up and become alot nicer. Training's a great deal more fun when he does."
"Really?" Sakura asked in a disbelieving tone.
"Yeah really." he replied, knowing from experience. "If it weren't for Tetsuo-sensei being harsh on me until I stopped being a stupid little kid, and started being a proper Ninja of the Leaf, my team wouldn't have come back from the Chunin Exams."
Sakura seemed to consider this, and that was probably the best he was going to get out of her right now. He'd be happy if she took his advice but, he would settle for her not running off and destroying her life.
"Come on, let's go back." he said offering her his hand. "I've got a pair of scissors in my bag which might help with the hair."
Sakura took his hand, which was hopefully the first step.
While Naruto and Sakura made their way back to camp and the hope of a better haircut for Sakura, Sasuke sat in the bushes where he'd overheard Naruto and Sakura's conversation after he'd witnessed Sakura's little meltdown after he'd followed the pair of them, curious about what the Uzumaki was up to. The only thing that was running through is mind now however was the rather shocking bit of information that the Uzumaki had let slip. Information that, now that he'd thought about it, the Uzumaki had let slip before. Information which he'd ignored because he'd been far more focused on the Uzumaki at the time than he had been on what the other boy had been saying.
Now, he was focused on the information that the Uzumaki had given, information that personally affected him.
There had been a traitor in the Academy. There had been a traitor in the Academy who had sabotaged the students' educations. There had been a traitor in the Academy who had sabotaged the students' educations, his included.
Edited 10-5-12