The first battle was one-sided.
So was the second.
And the third.
Over the course of the first four months of combat, Konoha and Suna forces pushed Iwa forces back, and back, and back again. Every few days, the frontline would move—a bit inward, then a bit more, then a bit more.
They made it to the border by the end of the first month.
By the end of the third, the Land of Mushrooms was almost a full five hours' travel away.
It was in the middle of the fourth month that they were ordered to hold positions—they were too far from any major targets for their continuous push to be worth the supply and manpower losses of continuing the push. Instead, they were to hold position for the foreseeable future, slowly chipping away at the Iwa forces and forcing them to fight on multiple fronts.
So life settled a bit, became somewhat routine.
Sakura would watch Headquarters for eight hours a day, then sleep twelve hours. The additional four—two before, two after her shift—were spent eating, resting, and editing her research proposals (while most personal mail was cut off during the war, the same could not be said for military mail.)
The job was exhausting.
It wasn't physically tiring, to be fair, but.
Well.
It felt a bit, Sakura thought, like standing in knee-deep ocean water during a storm and trying desperately to figure out what animals were near you.
The water—the chakra—bashed against you every time you tried to catch your breath, and while larger chakra signatures were easy to catch, the smaller ones could, unless you stayed constantly alert, constantly on guard, go unnoticed.
So it wasn't physically exhausting, but she used nearly all of her chakra and even more of her mental capacity every day.
The task of combing through Arden's memories was completely dismissed in favor of a few more minutes of sleep.
Sometimes, though, Sakura had to do other things. Today she was going to the market that had sprung up immediately behind camp. She needed a change of pace from the ration food every ninja was meted out, and the market had options to spare. It was also a far different atmosphere than in camp—in camp, while they were doing well, there was the constant energy of people at work, of treating battle wounds and sleeping in shifts and trying to forget what was going on just beyond the camp's front borders.
At the market, there was no trying—instead there were baths, and carts full of delicious food, and musicians, and while everyone may have been trying to ply money out of the Konoha and Suna soldiers who frequented the streets it was still far more obviously carefree.
Sakura bought some ramen from a vendor, found a place to sit, and watched as everyone around her took full advantage of the different atmosphere.
To her right, a man was singing a bawdy song she rather wished she didn't understand the lyrics to; in front, of her several couples (or strangers) danced to the tune, often mimicking what was being described in the melody. To her left stood one of the only full structures—a bathhouse with two bodyguards on either side of the entrance. Sakura preferred the one some ways to the south of Konoha's camp, near the back entrance of Suna's—that one was women's only and provided a nice selection of teas.
She'd only just begun digging into her meal when she stiffened, reacting against a blast of intent, cruel and conniving, that came from some ways off.
She dropped the meal.
Anything that felt like that—
She rushed to the chakra.
Anything that projected that far—
It was coming from an alley.
Couldn't be good.
It was coming from a man.
A Konoha nin.
A Konoha nin holding a kunai over a civilian.
His mouth was shaped into a sneer, looming over the man with all the energy of someone who was enjoying what he was doing.
"What are you doing?"
"This… man tried to rob me," The nin said, he turned back to the civilian, not dropping the knife. "Didn't you?"
The civilian shook his head rapidly, whipping it back and forth without letting the kunai out of his sight.
"No—no—no—I didn't. I didn't—I just, I just—I didn't."
"Oh, you didn't, did you?" The nin (Sakura didn't recognize him, but his body spoke plainly of being frontline) grinned his shark grin.
"What did you do then?" Sakura said, peering over her larger comrade to stare at the civilian directly.
"I'm—I just—I tapped him, on the shoulder. I have no money, no money, and I thought—maybe—maybe he had some he could give me. But I didn't try to rob him! I don't even have a knife!"
Sakura glanced around—no weapons.
The other nin shifted uncomfortably but still didn't drop the knife. "Don't listen to him. He didn't tap me, he jabbed his gods-damned fingers into my back—he might not have had a knife, but he was faking it!"
And then, from behind the three of them, a fourth voice arrived.
.
Shimura Ryota rubbed at his ribs as he walked down the street. Bruised ribs—bruised ribs, and he was out of commission for the rest of the week!
He'd barely made chuunin in time for the war, barely been able to keep up with his team for the first few months and now—now that he'd finally adjusted, finally begun pulling his weight—
Bruised ribs.
He grunted, considering whether to turn around and head back to the baths (not much point waiting in the barracks to do nothing) when he heard voices.
He turned, bent around the cart that half-blocked the alley, and found three faces staring back at him.
"Shimura!" Said Yamanaka Sakura, a fellow nin he hadn't seen since the Academy.
"Ryota!" Said Shimura Toru.
The civilian, kneeling in the dirt and staring up, terrified, at the kunai held by Ryota's second cousin, only whimpered.
"What's going on?"
All three tried to talk at once. He slashed his hand up, once. "Enough. I've got the gist."
Unfortunately, he had.
And that left him with a choice, and not one he necessarily wanted to make.
Attempting to rob a soldier was not a crime with a light punishment.
Accusing Toru—Toru, the nephew of the Shimura Head—of lying… well, he certainly wouldn't have to worry about how to climb his way to prominence anymore.
The problem was that he didn't think Toru was telling the truth.
Yamanaka Sakura would never be Ryota's favorite person. She was judgmental—more judgmental, he thought, than she was aware—and good in a way he couldn't mimic. Not morally, really, just that she'd always remember everything in class, always be able to do the math problems and then sit back as if it wasn't so very noticeable that she was the first one done.
What he most hated, however, was fighting her.
It wasn't that she would win. That would've been one thing.
It was that—it was that she always knew what you were going to do before you did it. There was no feinting, no fancy tricks, no fast thinking. Instead, you were all but forced to use brute strength and defend, as much as possible, against her feints and tricks and intelligence.
Winning against Sakura never felt good. She was small—a full two years younger than him—and had no interest in physical combat anyway. Winning against Sakura left one feeling as if every second should have been easier. Ryota preferred the battles against other frontline students. He didn't mind the battles against backline students either, or paperwork students.
He hated fighting against geniuses.
So, Sakura… Sakura and her 'better-than-thou' attitude, and her super-intelligent brain, and her losing with dignity… she would never be his favorite.
But she wasn't one to lie.
And she was right—there was no visible weapon, no sign that the kneeling man was anything but a down-on-his-luck beggar.
But Toru.
Toru was a good decade older than him. He was frontline, too, a Tokubetsu jounin who led a team of three chuunin into combat. He was Ryota's second cousin.
And the nephew of the Head.
If he—if he denied Toru's story… well, that would be the end of it.
And for what?
For a no-name no one?
For Yamanaka Sakura—who had never liked him, would never like him, just the same as he'd never like her—to respect him?
Or he could agree with Toru, doom the civilian to a life not worth living.
That would catapult his career, certainly.
"This didn't happen," Ryota said. He gestured around the cart. "We're all going to leave. We're all going to go about our days like none of this happened, because none of this happened."
Yamanaka blinked at him.
Toru blinked at him.
The civilian didn't waste his chance—he turned tail and fled.
And then Yamanaka nodded. She slipped past him, glancing at him as she did, and was gone. Toru grunted. He shifted his grip on the kunai, then finally let his arm fall to his side.
"Fine."
.
Sakura did not see Shimura Ryota in the coming days. She'd known he was there—had seen him in passing a few times—but now he seemed to fastidiously avoid her.
She didn't necessarily mind that.
Still, life went on.
During war, most personal mail was cut off—some combination of too many people and too much risk to let it continue. There were some exceptions, though; each clan was allowed to send one letter to each battalion on a biweekly basis, where one nominated leader at each battalion would then be in charge of disseminating its contents to everyone else in the clan.
In the Second Brigade's Second Battalion, that was Yamanaka Douri. Douri was the only non-Uchiha in the Battalion's military police. He'd originally been a tracker, actually, but had switched fields several years ago to spend more time with his children. They were six and seven now. He'd already missed both of their most recent birthdays.
Whenever the latest letter arrived, Douri would call them all to his tent—a large one he shared with three of the other MPs.
Sakura was always the first to arrive.
It was a most inconvenient time for her, actually, because Douri's schedule meant they always came together when she should still have been asleep for another four hours.
Douri grunted at her as she entered, handing her a cup of tea and the letter. The other Yamanaka—a genin corps, two chuunin corps, two trackers, and a medic—would only hear his summary, but Sakura was practiced enough in the art of analysis that she was allowed to double-check the letter for any hidden messages. Her eyes glided down the page, noting the copious cultural references (the most common defense against spies) and doublespeak. She reread the second paragraph again—something about the final sentence read wrong—then glanced up as all three of the corpsmen ducked into the tent.
Among those to enter was Yamanaka Aisha, a decent kunoichi who had only ended up in the corps due to her genuine aversion to paying attention to 'boring things.' She was a courier now, mainly, but still a Yamanaka, and her eyes narrowed sharply as they landed on Sakura—Aisha may have been far lower in rank, but she outpaced Sakura significantly in her ability to read people, and so she had no trouble putting together what Sakura still holding the letter—usually she'd have put it down by the time any others entered—might mean.
Sakura reread the paragraph once more just to be sure, then looked up fully as the last of the Yamanaka entered.
The final body through the door is that of Yamanaka Kimi. The oldest of all of them, the body less walked in and more floped, in as few steps as possible, onto Douri's cot, depositing itself like a sack of potatoes with nary a word spoken. Yamanaka Kimi was a medic, a position even more exhausting than being a sensor, and therefore acting her age was just about Kimi's last concern.
The rest of the Yamanaka still waited until she grunted to prove her awakeness, then all eyes turned to Douri.
He starts with family news. Two deaths, one wedding, and four births.
Then Konoha news.
Not much of that, but apparently, the newest Academy graduates were 'of good quality.'
Finally, the war.
It was still going well.
The only important nots for the clan, the Yamanaka, was that a new use of the kekkei genkai had been developed. It wasn't elaborated upon, but that in itself was a clue—at the very least, the new tool was unlikely to be usable on the frontline (if it were, the Yamanaka might go through the effort of sending a tutor to each battalion.)
With the information appropriately broadcast, the Yamanaka began to trickle out of the tent.
Kimi went to join in the rush to leave—her own bed was of far better quality than a cot, as was typical for medics—but Douri's hand on her shoulder made her pause. Her eyes flashed to Sakura, who stayed seated as well.
Then Douri looked at the door.
Yamanaka Aisha hovered there, trying desperately to look as if she was just lagging behind while leaving, and not deliberately attempting to eavesdrop.
"Is there a problem, Aisha?"
"No, no. Um, see you later." She let the tent flap drop behind her.
Douri's eyes jerked to Sakura.
Rather than bothering to actually use her sense, however, Sakura went with the slightly less tiring route: "You know what would be really silly?" She said, projecting her voice just above what could comfortably be considered a speaking level. "Trying to spy on a sensor."
A pause, silence within the tent, and then the sound of quiet footsteps racing away from the entrance.
Douri sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose, then looked at Sakura again. "Double check, please."
She did.
"We're good."
"Alright." Then he turned to Kimi. "They haven't given us much, but… there's a new bloodline."
"I'm guessing we're not lucky enough that it's on our side?"
"No. Sakura, what do you think?"
Sakura frowned. "From the way its worded… definitely a bloodline that effects the mind, and we definitely don't have a way to deal with it currently. Beyond that… 'lack of', I'm guessing? Like—you lose your mind, or your knowledge, or something. It's very vague."
"Why didn't this come officially?" Kimi was sitting up now, giving them both her full attention.
"Konoha's trying to hide it—" his eyes slipped to Sakura, double checking, "or at least downplay it. I think, officially, that we're not supposed to know even what we do."
"A new bloodline, especially for one we have no effective countermeasure, can affect morale a lot." Sakura said. "We're doing well, so far, but the new bloodline… depending on how bad it is, Konoha either doesn't want the risk blown out of proportion or they want to make as many inroads as possible before being pushed back by the size of the problem."
"Best guess?" Douri said.
Sakura hummed. She read the letter again, and thought about how assured the Iwa nin had acted in Fire's Capital, about how they'd been able to completely eradicate Uzu despite Uzu's strength and advantageous geographic position.
"The latter."