Sakura located a nearby inn and entered the traditionally (perhaps not so traditional during this time) built establishment. She slid the door shut behind her and made eye contact with the man sitting behind the front desk.
When the innkeeper gave her the same horrified stare she had been receiving from every stranger she passed since she arrived in the city, his gaze clinging to the blood staining her hands and the skirt of her yukata, she quickly explained, "I'm a doctor."
The man sagged in relief, a smile coming to his face as he laughed, "Ah, of course. And here I was thinking you were the victim of some terrible accident."
Sakura smiled with the man and stepped forward to pay for a few nights in his inn. Over the next few days, as she mapped out the sprawling trade city, she would search for another, possibly better priced establishment. For now, considering she was covered in dried, flaking blood, she would stay there to clean up. The man handed her her key, actively avoiding touching her blood stained hands, and she found her room.
Her first order of business was to take a bath. She removed her soap and brushes from her storage scroll as she began to fill the wooden bathtub in her bathroom with hot water (thank the gods!). As she waited for her bath to fill, she used the sunken shower to clean herself, using her soaps to scrub away the dirt and blood from her skin and hair. Her shower was a far cry from the hellish, frigid ice shower from the last village and she found herself enjoying the rinse as she picked the blood from underneath her fingernails.
When she finally stepped out of the shower and submerged herself into the steaming hot bath, a shiver of bliss ran up her spine. She settled into the small tub contentedly, finally finding a moment of peace after a week of nothing but stress.
When Sakura emerged, her hair and teeth brushed and her body free of the filth of the trek, she changed into the only other clean yukata she owned, colored a shade of red that reminded her of her old clothes and paired with a white obi. She loaded up her supplies into her obi before beginning her search for new clothes and lunch.
Weighted down by the bag of new clothes in her hand and a good meal in her stomach, Sakura entered the bookstore she had heard of from the shopkeeper of the restaurant she had gone to.
She relished the smell of books and the calm atmosphere of the shop as she approached an older woman sitting at the checkout counter. The gray-haired woman peered at her from over her glasses before giving her a warm smile and setting down the book she had been reading.
"Good afternoon. How may I help you?" she asked in a kind voice, drawing a smile from the medic.
"Good afternoon, ma'am. I'm hoping that you might have some scrolls on ninjutsu?" she queried, noting how the woman's expression immediately morphed into one of confusion.
"I'm sorry for asking but are you not from around here?"
"I… No. I'm from a distant village. I just arrived in this land," Sakura replied, immediately making note of the fact that she needed to come up with a decent cover story for herself should the need arise.
The elder woman nodded thoughtfully. "Ah, that explains it then. We're a civilian city, my dear. You won't find anything like that here. That's ninja clan business."
Sakura sagged at the information, her quest to return home having just gotten that much more arduous. She had vowed to avoid the clans as much as possible, especially the larger ones which would no doubt house the information she needed.
"I see… Would you happen to have any history books available, then?"
"Of course. You'll find them in aisle three, right after the books on geography," the woman responded, her kind smile returning, "I'm sorry for the trouble, dear. I hope you find what you're looking for."
Sakura soon left the store with a book on geography (something that would be infinitely helpful as she tried to navigate her familiar yet infinitely unfamiliar homeland) and a couple books on history, one specifically detailing the uprising of the clans in the area and one that would hopefully tell her whether or not her last name had a reputation during this time.
Sakura spent a couple days buried in her texts and was relieved to find that, in the history books she read, that her family had yet to make a name for themselves in the shinobi world. She suspected the Haruno family had yet to even form, her father's ancestors instead still inhabiting the still standing Land of Whirlpools. Not having to decide upon a new last name made it much easier to come up with a believable backstory for herself.
On the second day, as she continued to recharge her seal more effectively through meditation, Sakura had a sudden and brilliant idea. The simplicity of it nearly had her slapping herself for not coming up with it sooner.
If she summoned Lady Katsuyu, the slug could give a message to Lady Tsunade in the future! Even if the Slug Sannin was in a coma during their time, her mentor could create a plan before she fell into her coma that could be enacted even while she was unconscious!
Even though Sakura was confident in her new plan, she struggled to come up with a message that wouldn't interfere with the timeline. After much thought and writing out a dozen different ideas, she decided that telling her the date that she would fall prey to the space time jutsu and the fact she had been sent to the past would suffice. Then, hopefully, she could be convinced to not leave the village in search of Sasuke. While she knew that her past (future?) self would be averse to the idea of being prevented from leaving the village, at least she wouldn't be shot backwards in time.
As much as she wanted to take advantage of her being in the past to tell Lady Tsunade of Pain's attack or of the Uchiha Massacre, she knew that she couldn't interfere with the future so drastically. She desperately wanted to be able to put a stop to the event that would damage Sasuke beyond repair, but knew that her influence could spell an even worse fate for the man she once called a friend. The man she once thought she knew. The man she once thought she loved...
Sakura settled down in the center of her rented room, giving herself enough space to summon just a small portion of the slug summons. Her hands ran through the familiar seals before she bit her thumb, drawing a droplet of blood, and placed her palm on the ground.
"Summoning jutsu!"
Instead of Lady Katsuyu puffing into existence before her, Sakura felt a bizarre tugging sensation in the back of her head. There was a moment of senseless darkness, similar to the one she experienced when she was shot backwards in time, before she became acutely aware of the fact she was falling.
The kunoichi righted herself midair immediately, orienting herself towards the ground. She looked down just in time to catch the sight of numerous, bizarre looking trees beneath her before she fell through the unusually thick canopy, getting whipped by branches and vines as she descended.
As she fell, a thick vine wrapped around her leg, jerking her to the side as she came to an abrupt stop midair. She swung ten feet above the ground for a few moments, her ankle caught in the vine, completely disoriented.
Sakura formed a chakra scalpel in her hand and cut the thick vine caught around her ankle. She righted her fall as she came loose, landing gracefully on her feet on the spongy surface of the moss covering the ground.
Standing to her full height, she took in the sights around her with a confused expression. The canopy above her was so thick that it blocked out most of the light from above. Everything was shaded and the only light source was thin streams of sunlight coming in through holes in the treetops. Even in the darkness, the various shrubs and flowers around her remained painted in bizarre, vibrant colors. Some had wicked looking thorns and fang-like projections, an intimidating sight on plant life. Bright green moss coated almost all the surfaces around her, small flowers randomly emerging from the fluorescent coating.
The air was humid and warm and beads of sweat immediately formed on the back of her neck. She could hear what she thought was birds flitting around through the trees although she had never heard such outlandish bird calls before.
Never in her life had Sakura seen such a bizarre forest.
She wracked her brain for a reason why she had suddenly appeared in this place. She was beginning to become frustrated with her being transported to random, strange places and hoped that she hadn't just been shot even farther back in time...
As her mind raced, searching for an answer, she remembered a story that Naruto had told her about his perverted, cheapskate mentor, Jiraiya: When the Sannin was a young boy, he had learned how to use the summoning jutsu and had used it before signing a contract with a summoned animal. Instead of the summoning jutsu failing, he had instead transported himself to the land of toads, the summoned animal which he aligned with. It was there that he signed the contract with the toads and eventually learned to use sage mode.
It was then that she belated realized something that immediately made her drop her face into her palm.
The contract she had signed with the slug didn't exist during the time she was in. Or at least her signature wasn't on it yet.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid…" Sakura muttered, berating herself for having made such a decision without thinking it through. She had been so excited at the prospect of having a solution for getting home that she hadn't even thought of whether or not the contract she had signed was still valid.
She dragged her hand down her face to stare out at the unusual jungle around her and wondered why she hadn't appeared in the Shikkotsu Forest, the land that Lady Katsuyu called home. Where was she and what summoned animal lived in this unusual place?
Almost as if on cue, a deep voice drawled from above her. "Who… are you?"
Sakura's gaze shot upwards towards the sound and it took a long moment for her to locate a pair of golden eyes looking down on her from high in the shaded canopy above her. She couldn't make out the being who spoke to her, their form shrouded in darkness.
"My name is Sakura. Who are you? And where am I?" she answered, her eyes narrowing as she tried to make out the individual speaking to her.
"My name is Kuro and you are in my jungle. You certainly haven't signed a contract with us. How did you get here?" the baritone voice responded with a lazy blink.
"I… I was trying to summon someone but I think the summoning contract I signed was destroyed," she lied.
The pupils of the eyes above her dilated widely in response before the being in the canopy leapt out, revealing themselves. When he landed on the ground with nary a wince after falling so far, Sakura was finally able to see who she had been speaking to.
The panther that stood before her was larger than any cat she had ever seen, aside from Nekomata, the feline Sasuke had taken a pawprint from during a mission when they were genin. The sleek black creature was longer than she was tall with large golden eyes that bored into her. His ears were pulled back against his head and his tail swished back and forth behind him in agitation. The big cat paced around her on silent feet, his wide, golden eyes never leaving Sakura's. The lean muscle he was covered with was tightly coiled in anticipation, even as he smoothly stalked her.
"You're lying. Tell your truth or die here, stranger," Kuro threatened calmly, pacing around Sakura dangerously.
Sakura considered her options as she spun a slow circle, not letting the feline get behind her. She could fight the panther, but knew that if she did that there would be more conflicts with the other cats that without a doubt inhabited this place. Considering how well Kuro blended into the trees, she could very well be surrounded at that moment.
She could lie again, but Kuro seemed to have a knack for picking out lies. There was a good chance that he would simply attack her should she try again.
Or she could tell the truth... While she was concerned that admitting such a thing could alter the timeline, she didn't see her having much of a choice in the matter. Or even how telling the truth to this summon could affect the future at all.
More than anything, she needed to return to the human world alive and preferably in one piece.
Sakura's decision being made, although she still felt conflicted, she explained, "I was caught in a space-time jutsu and I find myself in the past. I tried to summon Lady Katsuyu, the slug, but I believe it failed because my contract with her isn't signed in this time."
Kuro stopped in his steps, his ears flicking forward as his pupils constricted to their normal size in a way that seemed non-threatening. He sat down on the mossy ground smoothly, blinking slowly as he stared into Sakura's eyes for a long moment.
"Well, if that isn't fascinating. And how did you come into contact with such a jutsu?" he asked curiously, his threatening demeanor gone as he apparently believed her.
"I was battling someone who betrayed me and my village and protecting my leader. I think that my leader or my opponent's ally may have used the jutsu during the fight and I was either caught in it or the focus of it."
Kuro continued to watch her for a long moment, dissecting her body language and attempting to discern a lie. He soon licked his large paw before bringing it up to groom the side of his face.
"Interesting…" the panther drawled, continuing with his grooming silently for a long, tense minute.
Sakura stared at him, unsure of what to say or do. Kuro soon stood once again, stretching out his long, powerful body before slowly pacing away.
He took a dozen steps, leaving behind a confused Sakura, before calling out over his shoulder, "Come with me."
The kunoichi quickly caught up, avoiding the colorful shrubs and hanging vines, and walked along side him. After a few moments, she looked down at the sleek panther next to her and questioned, "Where are we going?"
"To visit my leader. She will want to know more about this... situation," Kumo responded simply, not faltering in his slow, relaxed pace.
Sakura nodded in response even as nervousness began to creep in. She worried about who the leader of the cats was and how she would react to her presence.
As they walked in silence, Sakura became aware of the fact she was being watched by numerous pairs of eyes high in the darkened canopy. She looked up, observing the eyes and the shadows silently leaping along the tree branches.
So she had been surrounded…
The owner of one of the pairs of eyes, smaller than the others, leapt from the tree branches to the ground. She watched as a small cat, one nearly the size and appearance of a normal housecat, tried to approach them. It's dark fur was lit up by one of the rays of sunlight and it's bright ivy eyes were wide with curiosity.
Before the cat could approach the pair, Kuro gave it a harsh glare. The cat quickly skirted back into the jungle, disappearing behind the hanging vines and joining the other eyes in the trees once again.
Kumo led her through the humid jungle expertly and silently. They traveled through secret pathways hidden behind concealing curtains of vines. They ducked under the gargantuan roots of otherworldly trees and passed through underground caverns.
They walked across a lake coated with a layer of moss and flowers which resembled lilies, something which surprised Sakura due to the saying that cats were frightened of water. With the jungle opened up around her, she was able to fully take in her mythical looking surroundings.
Sakura spied great spires of stone which towered above the giant, otherworldly trees dominating the area. She spotted and heard a rushing waterfall in the distance, water pouring out of a mountainside with incredible force. She saw flocks of bizarrely colored birds flitting along the misty sky, filling the air with their strange calls.
They soon disappeared into the darkened jungles once more, traveling along hidden paths until they reached a clearing in the jungle. In front of her stood a stone temple, the dark gray stone overgrown with vines and moss and bursting with flowers of every color. She spied the waterfall she had seen earlier feeding a lake of pristine water that surrounded the temple.
Her and Kuro leapt along stepping stones which jutted out from the clear water. Once they reached the temple itself, she was greeted by two intricately carved stone tigers with open maws and dangerous looking teeth. The walls of the temple itself were carved in an unfamiliar, sprawling text and depicted numerous carvings of felines of all kinds.
"Come along now," Kumo called out from halfway up a stone staircase after he noticed Sakura slowing down to observe the carvings around her.
Sakura nodded before bounding up the mossy stairs which led to an entrance wide enough for even Lady Katsuyu's largest form to enter easily. They walked through the opening and into the temple itself which was damp and dark but lit in much the same way as the jungle, streams of light entering through holes in the ceiling and walls.
The kunoichi would have been far more interested in the numerous paintings which decorated the walls of the temple and depicted battles between big cats and various monsters, but the entirety of her attention was drawn to the incredibly massive lioness which laid before her.
The creature was larger than even Lady Katsuyu, her graceful and tightly muscled body dominating the space in the temple. Her tail flicked idly even as her glowing golden eyes bored into Sakura. Two other incredibly massive cats, one a tiger and the other a leopard, were curled up on either side of the lioness, eyeing her warily.
"Kuro. Why do you bring a human before me?" the lionesses demanded in a velvety but authoritative voice, her eyes never leaving Sakura's.
"Lady Miyabi," Kuro began with a deep bow, "I apologize for the intrusion. While on my hunt, I witnessed this woman appear in the sky and fall into our jungle. She says that she was caught in a space-time jutsu and that she mistakenly appeared her while trying to summon another animal."
"A space-time jutsu, you say? Curious. Human. What is your name?" the lioness questioned, leaning forward to investigate Sakura more thoroughly.
Sakura bowed deeply in respect, not wanting to offend the intimidating leader of these big cats. "My name is Sakura Haruno, my lady."
"Ah, such respect. But I would expect nothing less from one attuned to exemplary animals such as ourselves," Miyabi laughed before relaxing once again, her tail flicking idly.
"Sakura. Tell me how you found yourself here and spare no detail. I will know if you lie and will strike you down should you disrespect me by doing so. Now… Tell me your tale," the lioness warned, folding her gigantic paws as she waited patiently for Sakura to begin her story.
Knowing that she would have to tell the truth if she wanted to live, and if she wanted their help to return back to the human world, she did. She told her entire story and all the details as well. She explained who she was briefly and her skills as a medical ninja. She told her about how she had been trying to kill her traitorous teammate for abandoning her village, assisting their greatest enemy, and attacking her leader. She told her how she was caught in a space time jutsu and found herself nearly a century in the past. She even told her of the two times she had worked as a guard and a healer to gain information and to earn money.
At the end of her story, when she told Miyabi of how she had tried to summon Lady Katsuyu to deliver a message to her future mentor but had wound up here instead, the lioness had chuckled.
"And you didn't stop to think if the summoning contract you had with the slug even had your name on it during this time?" the lioness teased with a fanged smile.
Sakura flushed with embarrassment and glared up at the massive cat before biting out, "I was too excited at the prospect of finding a way home. I hadn't considered it."
"And she has some fire to her as well. Hmm…" Miyabi chuckled before leaning in close once more to observe her with a glinting, golden eye as wide as Sakura was tall.
The massive lioness observed her closely for a long moment, to the point where Sakura became uncomfortable under her scrutiny, but she maintained eye contact bravely. Miyabi smirked in a way that looked like a baring of fangs before returning to her spot lounging across the stone floor.
"We will help you," the lioness stated simply before she began to groom her paw, "Kuro. Fetch the contract for me."
Sakura nearly sputtered, shocked by the lioness asking for their contract. She hadn't even asked for her assistance. She had just wanted to leave with her life.
Kuro nodded simply before padding off farther into the darkness of the temple and down a corridor far too small for any of the massive summons before her to enter.
"Are you certain, my lady? She is but a stranger who made her way here by mistake," the gigantic leopard from the other side of Miyabi finally spoke, voicing his concerns.
"Are you questioning me, Hyo?" the lioness returned in an almost sweet tone which conflicted with how Hyo suddenly bowed his massive head.
"Of course not, I would never question your decisions. I am simply concerned about this… oddly colored stranger," the leopard amended quickly, avoiding Miyabi's gaze but glancing at Sakura.
"I expect nothing less than your complete loyalty and trust. This woman may have arrived here by accident but she is attuned to us. That is why she found herself here when she tried a summoning jutsu with no contract. I will not abandon a kindred spirit to her bizarre fate," the boss summon explained, filling Sakura with hope.
"What of you, Tora? Do you have any objections or…" the lioness looked at Hyo pointedly. "Concerns about my decision?"
The tiger, just as large as Lady Katsuyu, who had remained silent thus far shook it's massive head before speaking in a distinctly feminine voice. "Never, my lady. You have led us well after Raion's tyranny. I trust you with my life."
Miyabi nodded in satisfaction and, as she did, Kuro reappeared from the bowels of the temple carrying a scroll in his maw. He released the scroll on the floor between Sakura and Miyabi and used his paw to unfurl it to an open space.
"Why would you allow me to sign a contract with your family?" Sakura questioned, her confused gaze returning to the massive lioness before her.
"Were you not listening? You are attuned to us, not that slug you tried to summon. Your chakra and your soul is as ours is. That makes you a member of our pride, a part of our family. And us cats have never abandoned a member of our pride in their darkest time," Miyabi explained simply, filling Sakura with a kind of happiness she hadn't experienced before.
To be accepted so quickly into a family, a pride, when she had struggled to fit in with her old team, her own village, for so many years… It was elating.
"Go on, cub. Sign your name and leave your pawprint," Miyabi urged, "Us cats are as clever as we are powerful. We will help you return home."
Sakura pulled out a kunai from her obi and cut a gash in her palm. She guided the stream of blood down onto her index finger and signed her name in a careful script. Afterwards, she made a fist, coating her entire hand in blood. She pressed her hand onto the scroll, right next to the dusty brown handprint of an unknown person, and left behind her bloody signature.
While she felt nothing special, she noticed that the cats in the room shivered.
"Alright, all of you. You may enter and greet the newest member of our pride," the boss summons declared.
Sakura glanced around her, shocked when numerous sets of eyes opened and dozens of cats, big and small, prowled forward from the darkness to greet her.
The small dark colored cat who had tried to approach Sakura when she was first being led through the jungle by Kuro bounded forward. With the kit being lit up in the shafts of light drifting down from the roof of the temple, she noticed the feline's coat was a deep brown decorated in black spots and stripes with splashes of white on their chin and chest.
"Hi!" the young cat greeted in a girlish voice as she rubbed her face against Sakura's legs.
The young cat leapt up onto Sakura's leg, digging her claws into the medic's yukata so she could climb up onto her shoulder. Sakura winced as the feline did so, her claws digging into her flesh as she scaled up her side. When the ivy eyed kit was perched on her shoulder, she rubbed her cheek against her cheek affectionately.
"I marked you so we're friend's now! My name's Kurumi. It's nice to meet you, Sakura," Kurumi greeted enthusiastically, drawing a concerned look from the kunoichi at the mention of being marked.
"Hi, Kurumi... It's, uh, nice to meet you too," she replied with a slow smile as numerous other cats approached her curiously.
Sakura shared introductions with the many cats around her, noting that the summons ranged from housecat sized cats like Kurumi to larger cats like Kuro and then to massive summons like Tora the tigress, Hyo the leopard, and the great lioness Miyabi.
"I apologize for my earlier wariness," the massive leopard piped up after watching Sakura interact with his family, "My name is Hyo and I hope you will one day summon me to the battlefield so I may fight at your side."
"I accept your apology. It's nice to meet you to. And, while I'm not trying to get involved in any… more major battles during this time, I'm happy that I can rely on you," Sakura responded with a smile before a loud scoff caught her attention.
"Don't listen to that Hyo. If you find yourself in battle, call upon me, Tora, instead! I have fought in many battles and have grown quite skilled because of it. I can guarantee your safety as well as your victory," the gigantic tiger piped up, apparently quite vain but from experience rather than overconfidence.
Sakura smiled in response, even though she was beginning to feel embarrassed by the sudden attention from these numerous cat summons. "Thank you for your offer. Although I'm not sure how I can pick between either of you if I come across a big enough battle."
"Tora is really strong and Hyo is really fast and can jump really good!" the childish Kurumi explained from atop her shoulder, a wide smile spread across her feline face.
Before Sakura could respond, Miyabi waved her giant paw in dismissal.
"Enough greetings. I will speak with Sakura myself before we send her home. All of you: I expect you to treat her with the respect you would any other cat. Be ready for her summoning, should she require our help."
All of the cats, besides Tora, Hyo, and Kurumi, immediately turned to leave. Kuro paused for a moment next to Sakura, nodding at her approvingly. She returned his nod with a smile as the panther made his departure as well.
"Kurumi. Do as I say," Miyabi ordered, the young cat rubbing her cheek against Sakura's once more before uttering a quick farewell and joining the rest of the felines.
"Now, let us speak of your predicament. While we have no knowledge of the space-time jutsu you speak of, there are other ways in which we can assist you."
A/N: Kuro means "black". Miyabi means "graceful". Hyo supposedly means "leopard". Tora means "tiger". Kurumi means "walnut", because she's a mixed brown color (I imagine her looking sort of like an Egytian Mau or a Dragon Li). Raion means "lion".
I'm picturing Kuro as being about the size of a normal panther, Tora and Hyo being about the size, perhaps a bit smaller, that Gamabunta, and Miyabi being even larger than Gamabunta.
I hinted at the backstory of the cat summons with mention of a big cat named Raion, a story which will be revealed in depth much later on.