Peace, order and development. The ninja world had reached a time of tranquility after so many wars until the end. Only one person somehow managed to survive that extinction.
'How can I live with them dead?' Sakura thought in the middle of a crisis.
Her mind was disconnected from her body until for the sake of fate, Sakura came across the whitebeard pirates and her life took a 180° turn and entered a new chapter in her life. The last ninja has entered the great pirate age!
Notes: Hello! I'm back to bring you another translated chapter of my fanfic in Spanish. Remember that this is not my native language so if you see misspellings you would help me a lot by pointing out and explaining those mistakes.
With the new objective in mind, Sakura began to walk more on the ship than stay in her usual place. She got closer to the pirates to listen to their stories, memorized their names, their routines, she began to talk to them, she learned that although they spoke the same language, the writing was somehow different from hers -something she decided to hide for now-, at bath time with the nurses she began to participate in the talks, slowly she began to live with them. She even became genuinely curious about how diverse the crew is, for example, the fishmen. Of course, all with the goal of letting their guard down and showing their true colors.
On the second day of putting her plan into action, the commanders and some of the crew were sitting next to Whitebeard on the deck, eating, drinking, and reminiscing about old fights and anecdotes from their voyages.
When Sakura joined them, some of them caught a glimpse of her even more so when she sat down next to Namur the shark fish-man.
"What?" she asked when everyone's eyes were on her.
Sakura even noticed that the eighth division commander, Namur, sitting next to her was flustered, the object of her curiosity. She was almost tempted to say that she doesn't bite, in any case, he would hurt her more with his pointy teeth. Obviously, that wasn't going to help her plan so she held back.
Luckily, Thatch appeared at her side, leaving a mug of beer, a plate of fruit, and a dessert in front of her.
"Every day you exceed my expectations," Thatch said with a smile, "ordinary people usually don't like Gyojin."
Sakura's gaze flicked from Thatch to Namur's a couple of times before she arched her brow. If she was honest with herself, Namur reminded her a bit of the infamous Kisame, maybe without them knowing Kisame was of the same race, also, Kisame was well known in the ninja world as a feared member of Akatsuki but at the same time recognized by his abilities until he was nicknamed the Tailless Bijuu.
"What's wrong with it? Fighting in and out of the water seems very useful to me."
Without her knowledge, with that answer, Sakura earned the respect and acceptance of the entire Whitebeard crew. As a big family, insults or compliments to their companions were taken very personally.
"That's right, there's nothing wrong with that," Thatch replied, seeing Namur's color flush slightly.
That day Sakura learned a lot about the Gyojin and the different races, she got angry when she discovered that they were discriminated against just because they were different from humans. Her medical side wanted to go and review what anatomical differences there were between the two species but she kept herself from repeating, "I just have to look for evidence to get out of this agreement early." She had already decided, when she leaves this ship She will go to a quiet island with few people to go unnoticed and let time pass before her eyes.
Over the days some pirate ships tried to attack Mobydick with the excuse of taking the head with the white beard. Sakura, Whitebeard and other crew members from the side were watching the enemies, before they could set foot on the Mobydick, the commanders were already on top of them taking turns to fight against the pirates of the opposite side.
Sakura watched them like a hawk recording their every move in case she had to fight them and use their weaknesses to win.
When the fights ended, the pirates looted the treasures and food of the defeated. And as a reward, they ended up celebrating their victory with a huge feast filled with music, food, and beer on the deck of the ship. Thatch and Marco made an effort to get Sakura to eat more than a few bites from her plate, sometimes even Whitebeard and a few of the crew joined the efforts of those two commanders.
There was a day when as a reward for finishing the bowl of soup for the first time, Thatch gave Sakura a dessert she had never seen before, yellow with a shiny coating of dark caramel sauce that just moved the plate and seemed to dance "A creme caramel". She reminded him of the agar cubes that come in the Anmitsu that she likes so much. Sakura watched the curious dessert as she played to squash it with the spoon to see it shake. Encouraged by Whitebeard and Thatch, she scooped a spoonful into her mouth and an explosion of flavor engulfed her. The taste of vanilla and milk was intensified by the taste of caramel that melted in her mouth, those flavors only invited her to continue eating.
It was so delicious, maybe as delicious as anmitsu. She ate everything in silence and no one said anything about it, but for some reason that Sakura didn't understand, since that day at lunchtime they served creme caramel among the different desserts. Sometimes the commanders would come up to him saying that they had eaten so much that they couldn't eat their desserts and they would hand them over to her. Sakura would eat it without complaining or sometimes she would give it to Ace, who she considers to be a bottomless pit.
From what Sakura was learning from Marco and Thath, she learned that the world was divided into four seas that were crossed by a line called the Grand Line and the pirates entered it to find One Piece, a treasure that Gol D. Roger, the previous pirate king, and whoever finds him, will become the next pirate king.
The days passed and before Sakura knew it a month had already passed, by then she had gotten used to her new routine not without great cost. Out of sight of the pirates, on the night when everyone slept, Sakura's nights turned restless, filled with dreams and memories of her friends and family before turning into nightmares of the day the world she knew fell apart.
She had this problem since she was a slave, the nightmares woke her up at night when she managed to fall asleep. The problem is that now that she was associated with the pirates, as her health improved under the care of Marco, Thatch, and the nurses, her sleep hours were shortened to such an extent that for a week she hadn't been able to sleep even five minutes. Sakura felt more tired, her steps were slower and she had a hard time following the conversations. On more than one occasion Marco and the nurses asked her if everything was okay, but she only gave them a half smile and said yes.
Today a storm was raging over the ship that was moving from one side to the other although it was not so sudden as to worry the pirates who had gathered in the dining room to eat. As was her custom, Sakura sat between the commanders and watched Ace fall asleep on her half-eaten plate while she told a story. He no longer scared her like at first, but she just snorted in amusement at how ridiculous she looked.
As Marco finally allowed Sakura to eat solids today, Thatch said that she should wait a little longer for her food than the others because he wanted to give her something special. The crew upon hearing it got excited and complained, it was well known that every time they saw Thatch pass by with the bowl of soup for Sakura, their mouths watered, with each passing day the smell seemed more delicious than the day before.
"I hope we get to the next island, I want to buy a new sword," said a pirate in the distance.
'Ah, yes, they said that soon we will arrive at an island.' Since Sakura arrived on this ship, she had not gone down to any island. She was curious as to what she would find, but she was so tired that she couldn't think much about it or anything else. She didn't want them to find out that she was weak from lack of sleep, so she had to focus all of her energy on maintaining her appearance.
"We're going to one of the best islands with exchange houses and casinos on the Grand Line, although you don't have to let your guard down, many take the opportunity to cheat." Vista, the swordsman commander, turned to see Sakura sitting next to him. "If you want to go exploring, you'd better stay with one of us."
After taking a drink from her water pitcher, Sakura laughed.
"I can defend myself, thank you," Sakura said.
"It's true, when you attacked Pops you didn't move badly at all, where did you learn to fight like that?" Izou asked.
The others paid attention. Although they have gotten closer to the pinkhead, they only talked about them, the world, or her adventures and they had been careful not to ask about her and her past, until now.
"I'm a ninja," Sakura said proudly. If she was in her five senses she wouldn't have said this because it would complicate her plan to go unnoticed, again, she wasn't feeling well.
"Ninja!" the pirates shouted, some excited and others surprised.
"A ninja! Nin, nin! —Ace said excitedly making supposed ninja poses.
A bead of sweat rolled down Sakura's forehead. "We don't say nin, nin …"
"I'm not surprised your skills, even when injured, aren't bad," said Whitebeard, "so you trained since you were a child."
To one side of Whitebeard was the silhouette of Naruto, Sakura saw him out of the corner of her eye before seeing Whitebeard again, since that incident with the sea king the silhouette appeared almost all day and night. "Yes, we trained from the age of six and graduated at twelve," she said with a shrug. Talking about Konoha caused a tight feeling in her chest."
"On my home island, Wano, there are ninjas too," Izou said.
This made Sakura's eyes sparkle with interest. Meeting other ninjas would be interesting, she doubted they had chakra or Izou had already talked about it, but maybe learning or at least exchanging blows with one of them would be interesting.
"It would be interesting to meet them," Sakura said.
"The band you always wear on your head, is it from your village?" —Haruta said bringing his hand closer to the red band that Sakura always wears on her head.
When Haruta's hand was about to touch the metal part with the Konoha symbol on it, Sakura stepped to the side.
"Don't touch it!" Sakura growled in a harsh and suspicious tone.
The laughter and chatter around her disappeared. Realizing her mistake she let out a nervous smile, she put her hand to her ninja band feeling a little comforted to feel the cold metal on her fingertips.
"I'm sorry, this is very precious to me, it's the only thing I have left of my village," he said sadly.
"It is your treasure," said Whitebeard.
"Yeah..." Sakura replied.
At that moment, Sakura felt that she became aware of her surroundings and the people around her again. What was she doing? Was she having fun? She looked as if she had just come out of a genjutsu that until now she hadn't realized she was in.
She nearly slapped herself right then and there as memories of her friends and classmates assailed her, she felt like she was betraying them, she couldn't have fun, she felt worse than trash. Why does he tell you about her past? These pirates are nothing more than a nuisance, more dangerous than she expected.
'No, Sakura, if you talk about your past in a pitiful way, they might let their guard down' she tried to convince herself. 'They aren't friends, my friends are dead'
She looked at Naruto and instantly tensed, for some reason, she felt that his gaze was colder and for the first time, he showed an emotion: hostility. And as if that wasn't enough, he was walking through the pirates to get to her.
"I hope it was worth the wait," Thatch said, appearing with a tray of food. Careful not to spill the food, he placed it in front of Sakura. A bowl of tomato fish salad and a bowl of ramen. "You can eat whatever you want, this is ramen, a food that I learned on an island and was taught by Izo. By doctor's order that the food should not be too heavy, I made one of miso, it will be soft to chew, I think you will like it. Sakura?"
She wasn't listening to him, her eyes trembled as if an earthquake had hit them when she saw the food on the table, her heart was beating at full speed to the point of hearing it beating in her ears and her breathing became agitated.
"You abandoned us, Sakura-chan." Her blood ran cold. Naruto spoke to her.
"No!" Sakura yelled, she swept the table with her arm, throwing the food on the floor and then she looked at Naruto with teary eyes, "Why? They don't... Every day I can't stop thinking about you, about them, even at night…"
She bit her lip so hard that it bled. In a small moment of lucidity she remembered that she was in the dining room with all the pirates who were now looking at her in surprise. Without saying a word, she ran away.
"Sakura," Tato said.
"Wait," Whitebeard stopped her, "Marco, how long has Sakura not slept in?"
Marco, who was still as surprised as the others, regained his composure. "Sleep? No, she didn't say anything about not sleeping..."
"Even though Sakura says she's fine, I've seen her get dizzy even though she hides it, she takes time to answer and for periods of time her legs shake," said Tato.
"And she has dark circles under her eyes, the other day I saw her hide them with makeup," said another of the nurses.
The first division realized what Whitebeard suspected, Sakura just suffered a breakdown.
"If she hasn't slept in days, this must have been a hallucination," Marco said, "the food must have been a trigger."
"Food?" Thatch asked. He and the others saw the food scattered on the ground.
"She must have remembered her family," said Whitebeard.
Nobody said anything.
Once inside her room, Sakura began to throw everything within her reach at Naruto with a mixture of fury and pain. He watched her dispassionately as the objects passed through him.
"All this time- you can talk!" she shouted, throwing a jug of water from the bureau, "I have begged you to answer me and only now do you answer. Forget you? How can I forget all of you? Every damn second I think of you!
She screamed at him and cried until she was gasping for breath, her head spun and by the time she managed to stabilize herself she found herself lying on the floor staring spaced at the wooden ceiling. She felt like an empty shell broken into thousands of pieces, her mind went blank seeing the lamp swaying from side to side from the storm raging outside until hysterical laughter broke out in her.
Naruto was right, she failed the mission and she was starting to have fun with those pirates.
'I don't deserve to have fun' Not with her dead friends and her alive.
A loud explosion took her out of her thoughts as the ship shook harder, this was not the storm.
An attack.
"It seems that there are people who don't care about the storm as long as they take Whitebeard's head, these pirates are really crazy," Sakura said, bursting out laughing again.
She stood up from the ground, leaning against the window, she counted two ships, if they want to kill each other, let them do what they want, Sakura has nothing to do with them. She glanced sideways at Naruto. She approached the small mirror that the nurses gave her that now hung above the desk and looked at herself in the mirror, took a cloth and began to clean the base that she had been wearing for a week to hide her dark circles.
It no longer mattered if she was seen as weak or not, why did she have to follow through on a promise with a pirate? It made no difference to her if the storm carried her into the depths of the ocean, if her life ended in the hands of the attacking pirates, or if right now Whitebeard gets angry for being rude to Thatch and decides to finish her off.
In front of the mirror, Sakura saw a nineteen year old woman with pale skin, puffy eyes with dark shadows under the eyes and her emerald eyes shadowed and lacking in vitality. What happened to that proud female medical kunoichi? That girl who managed to stand up to fight back to back with the rest of team seven, the one she saw every day as a new challenge to give her all and who always carried her heart in her hand.
She felt suffocated inside the room with only Naruto looking down on her.
With staggering steps due to the storm, the cannon fire and the accumulated exhaustion, Sakura left her room. There was no one in the corridor, everyone must have been on the deck fighting the enemy. She aimlessly walked and walked.
On the way, Sakura heard a noise coming from one of the nearby doors, the infirmary. Perhaps some object must have fallen from the room due to the movement of the ship or so she believed until as she passed by she heard the laughter of some men. This was wrong, the pirates were upstairs fighting or else the odd fight would have already happened in front of her. Since she had nothing to do she grabbed the doorknob and opened it as quietly as possible to peek inside.
"Ha, ha, ha, this is a surprise," said a pirate who was missing a tooth, "I had heard rumors of people who thought they saw nurses on the Whitebeard ship but I didn't think it was true.
"We managed to sneak out to steal gold and found something better," his companion said, licking his lips.
Inside the room, in the back part, the nurses were grouped, in front of them was Tato lying on the floor, looking defiantly at the five pirates who were in front of her, looking haughtily and lustfully at her body.
"How about we have a little fun?"
"We better take them with us, we have to share this surprise."
Sakura clenched her fists, she wasn't going to let these pirates do what they want, these girls decided to join Whitebeard's pirate ship not as part of the crew but as a job, they shouldn't be involved but here these guys were doing what they want. This is the anger and hate she wanted running through her veins directed at the pirates.
With steps as silent as a cat's she entered the room, blending in with the darkness, not even the girls had noticed her. From the nearest table, she took a metal box with medical instruments and approached the men. Only when Sakura was behind them did the girls look at her in surprise, the pirates turned but by then Sakura rammed their heads with the metal box, and from the blow, the utensils went flying. One of the pirates was able to dodge the blow in time and tried to hit Sakura, she crouched down took a scalpel and plunged it into the pirate's neck right in the carotid.
With the bloody scalpel, she turned to the girls."Let's go."
The nurses helped Tato up and followed Sakura. Unfortunately for the Pinkhead, the blow she gave them was not strong enough to render them unconscious, in the middle of the corridor they heard a couple of curses followed by footsteps.
Sakura opened a door. "Over here"
Once they were all inside Sakura closed the door, they were in the cupboard, as it is a ship with a large crew the storage is very large. There were numerous shelves of food, sacks filled to the brim with food, smoked hams hanging from the ceiling among other things. They went to the bottom and hid behind some sacks with vegetables that were well hidden between two shelves.
"Don't leave here until the crew finds you," Sakura whispered. She discreetly made a hand sign and unknown to them she held up a genjutsu for safety.
"Don't go, Sakura, there's still a space for you," said one of the nurses, grabbing the bottom of Sakura's shirt so she wouldn't leave.
"Someone has to keep them away, don't worry, I'm a kunoichi, I can defend myself," she assured them, "whatever happens and listen, don't make noise."
Without giving them time to answer, she slipped through the corridors until she hid between some shelves in the middle of the room. Once there she relaxed her breathing and pricked up her hearing. She heard that from the corridor the pirates were slamming one door after another until they reached the one they were hiding. Sakura stuck to the wall as close as she could and held the scalpel tight.
"They must be here," one of the pirates said, turning on the light.
The five pirates walked through the halls looking from side to side looking for the girls. The pirate who approached Sakura identified him as the one who had buried her scalpel in him, he looked very pale from the blood dripping from his wound. Once he had passed her, she came out of hiding, got behind him, covered his mouth with one hand and with the other ran the scalpel across his neck like butter, when the man dropped his full weight on her, Sakura silently put him down. She carefully walked towards the next corridor where another of the pirates was, she crouched down inside a barrel, and when the pirate leaned out to look for Sakura she got up, covered his mouth, and did the same as with the previous one.
'Two to go three' she thought getting out of the barrel.
With the sudden movement of the ship, the sound of jars crashing at the bottom drew attention.
"They must be there!" yelled one of the pirates.
Sakura ranted silently, if Tato and the others moved from the hideout they'll find them. She pushed the shelves towards the aisles where the pirates were and ran off making as much noise as possible.
She ran out into the hallway the way they took earlier, she just had to get far enough away for the girls to be safe and not taken hostage. With another sudden movement of the boat, she leaned against the wall so as not to fall to the ground, she had become dizzy.
'Fuck, I'm tired' Sakura gritted her teeth in a vain attempt to regain control of her body before recovering and running. Turning the corner, a metal bar hit her square in the ear, and she did a couple of spins on her axis before falling to the ground. Because of her exhaustion, she didn't notice that there was another pirate hiding.
In her ear, she began to hear an annoying beeping and the pirate in front of her seemed to have made a couple of clones that intermittently became one, two or three people. She tried to stand up but her body didn't respond, it just made her want to vomit.
"First we will use it and then we can kill it.
The pinkhead heard the four boys laugh, her body trembled and her vision was double, since she didn't have the strength to move, she was dragging herself backward, which only amused the enemy pirates more.
"Whitebeard won't let them out," Sakura said, unable to control the tremor in her voice.
"By the time we're done with you, it'll be too late," said the pirate with the missing tooth, crouching in front of her.
The pirate stretched out his hand towards Sakura's shirt, she had the instinct to close her eyes but no, she did not allow it, she was going to record her faces in her mind, as soon as she can move she will kill them with their own hands. At that, in a matter of seconds, a cannonball went through the wooden wall exploded into a thousand pieces and took the three pirates who were behind the crouched pirate in front of Sakura.
"No!" The pirate yelled with hatred when he saw the place where his companions were before. On one side there was only the violent sea in sight and on the other side the hole in the wooden walls that the cannonball went through to stop at the bottom of the ship. He turned to look at Sakura with hate as she was dragging herself back. Because of that girl, his plan to have fun was ruined—, It's your fault!
He kicked her, Sakura grunted in pain, pulled out the scalpel and tried to attack the man. Her movements were so slow that the other held her hand and punched it twice. The scalpel fell from Sakura's hand as her torso fell to the ground from the impact of the second blow, she tried to reach for the scalpel but the pirate kicked it away falling straight into the sea.
The angry pirate jumped on Sakura and began to attack her, Sakura tried to defend herself but she was tired, dizzy and her ear was ringing. The pirate very easily overpowered her. In one of the punches that the pirate gave her, her ninja's band broke loose and fell next to her.
"You will pay for their lives with yours, you are nothing more than scum," said the pirate. He took her by the neck and began to choke her with both hands.
Sakura stopped her struggling when she saw Naruto's silhouette just to the side of the pirate. Her eyes filled with fear and guilt at the sight of him. Why does she have to fight? Why is she the one who has to live instead of them?
She doesn't deserve to live.
The life and future of her friends ended that day. Maybe it's part of fate that the ninja world ends and she's just a mistake.
She began to cough in an instinctive attempt to breathe.
The pain in her chest will go away and Naruto will never look at her with hate again.
'Naruto, we will finally see each other again. I really didn't forget all of you' she thought to herself sadly.
As the ship listed from the storm's blow, out of the corner of her eye, she saw her ninja band slip into the hole in the wall. She reached out as the ninja gang swept past her to grab her but she couldn't, she slid to the edge. Her tears began to pool in her eyes, it is the only evidence that her life in her village was real. The man above her laughed.
'So here I will die'
We don't want you to die.
Her eyes began to twitch at the sound of Ace's voice.
'Why? Why do they want me to live? ' she thought with anguish.
Don't worry, we don't want to hurt you.
'Since I opened my eyes you were always careful with me, Marco. They were all very good to me'
Only she remains.
You are our guest.
'Thatch, everyone… why?'
What reason does she have to live?
Become my daughter.
'How can I live with them dead?'
She glanced at Naruto before looking back at her headband which with another sudden movement, the headband slipped between the splintered wood toward the sea.
Tears overflowed. There is nothing left of Konoha anymore. The whole world of her, the history of Konoha and the other nations will disappear from the world without anyone remembering them. All the efforts, the wars fought, the tears shed, the sacrifices made, the dreams, the hopes, all will turn to dust.
Sakura-chan, hold on!
'Why?' Sakura wondered.
Just like that? The experiences lived, the efforts made by her friends and her ancestors will slide through her hands like sand. Will the will of fire that they were so proud of be extinguished so easily?
She turned her blurry gaze back to Naruto's silhouette looking at her without emotion.
'You are not Naruto' A small spark inside her blossomed.
The Naruto she knows would not have stood idly by, she has done worse things and still he was always by her side. He was and always will be the brother she never had and she can always count on. Why would he be different now? Naruto wanted her dead?
Never. He would be furious to see her release her life so easily.
Sakura almost wanted to laugh at the ridiculous situation. She felt stupid for believing that this illusion was her Naruto.
Not only she could imagine Naruto looking at her reproachfully, there were also Sasuke, Kakashi, Sai, Yamato and Tsunade. It is as if she turned her back on what her friends and family experienced. Haven't they also suffered from death and loneliness? They suffered, they isolated themselves and still rose up.
No, she can't let her stories and her world take her down.
We want you to live!
If she can't live for her, she will live for her friends and her memory.
Her vision was almost completely black and her lungs burned from the lack of oxygen, yet she lifted her hands over the man's to try to remove them.
"Now you want to fight? Too late."
A blur passed over her, taking the pirate with it. Without her hands obstructing her windpipe she took deep breaths interspersed with an annoying cough. Next to her a person crouched down and helped her sit up.
"Breathe, you're fine now," Marco whispered softly.
Sakura's vision became clear again as she breathed, behind Marco near the edge was Ace on top of the pirate dealing a series of blows to him. She wanted to speak but her throat ached.
"Calm down, breath first," Marco said, taking his hand to Sakura's back and rubbing it making small circles.
They came for her, because they want her to live. Sakura felt so grateful that after everything she did, they still came to save her. Since she couldn't speak, she rested her forehead on Marco's shoulder, who, surprised, stopped her hand for a few seconds before continuing.
When the pirate stopped moving Ace stopped hitting him and moved closer to Sakura and Marco, he sighed in relief to see that Sakura was okay.
"We're on time," Ace said.
Sakura lifted her head and tilted it slightly to the side, silently asking how they knew she was fighting pirates.
"Tato warned us," Marco said.
Tato was worried about Sakura's health so she ventured out of the hideout and went straight to the deck, luckily near the door he ran into Whitebeard, Ace and Marco.
"Pops is furious, so much so that he decided to enter the fight and teach them a lesson for messing with the nurses and with you," Ace said, "Surely the fight must be over by now, no one can beat him."
And there it is again, in a non-explicit way they were showing her that they don't want her to die. These pirates have been determined to help her and for the first time, she felt happy that they did not give up.
"That will be marked," Ace said, pointing with disgust at the mark of the pirate's hands on Sakura's whitish neck.
"May I?" Marco asked, raising his free hand in which a bluish flame appeared.
Marco had previously explained to Sakura about her devil fruit. Not only can he turn into a phoenix, but he can also help heal other people from their injuries, though he had certain limitations. On other occasions, he had offered to help her heal her wounds faster, but she had denied him each time, she didn't want a pirate to touch her again.
How silly she was
She moved her head up and down, careful not to hurt her neck any further. The two are surprised that she is accepting the help. Before she can change her mind Marco stretched out his hand to her and began to heal her. Sakura sighed in relief when her burning began to subside until it became an annoying tingle, the mark turned to the pirate's handprints in pink color and by the way, she noticed that he helped her heal her other injuries. As the days go by, that mark will disappear.
"Thank you," she said hoarsely. Not even thanks she could explain how she felt at that moment.
She was still alive.
Although she felt happy, her spirits lowered a bit as she brought her hand to her head in regret. The two boys noticed that the red headband that she always carried with her was missing.
"What happened?" Ace asked.
They both followed Sakura's gaze to the gap in the hallway that now faced the sea.
"I'm so sorry, that was very important to you," Marco said with a grimace.
"It's better that we take you to your room," Marco said, getting up from the floor, "if father finished off the pirates, we have to check the wounded."
Sakura didn't have enough strength in her legs to get up and she didn't want to ask for help either, she had rejected them so many times that she was embarrassed to start now. To her surprise, an outstretched hand appeared in front of her face. She trailed her arm until she reached Ace's smiling face, seeing his smile felt refreshing. Silently she took his hand, once she lifted it up she leaned on both boys until they placed her on her bed.
Once alone she flopped down on the bed, after having her feelings dulled for a long time, now they were flowing inside her like fireworks. How could she go to them and apologize? She had treated them badly, especially Thatch, Marco, and Ace. Will they forgive her? On several occasions they told her that she is a guest, but even a guest has limits.
Whitebeard was right, she doesn't know much about this world, if she goes out in a small boat she doubts she can survive, and if they leave her on an island she doesn't know how to behave and earn a living. At least with these pirates, no, with these people she has already learned how they live and they have helped her, maybe she can learn a little, ask for help with her writing, learn about currency and other things to survive.
At least she had one thing clear: not all pirates are bad.
By the time she heard someone knock on her door, she realized that at some point she had closed her eyes. She slowly sat up in bed, she winced as she felt her body heavy as an anvil from how tired she was.
" Come in"
Marco peeked out of the door, entered the room and sat next to the chair that had survived Sakura's rage before the pirates' attack. The two of them felt a bit awkward next to each other. Although Sakura knew that Marco must have had a reason for being there, she noticed that Marco's mind was working on how to say what he wanted to say, she was betting that this was because his reactions hadn't been kind at all so far. She knew that she had to be the first to take the plunge.
"I'm sorry."
Marco looked up.
"Why do you apologize?"
She bit her lip before taking a deep breath.
—I have behaved very badly, you only wanted to help me. I was wrong about you guys," saying it made her feel so much better than she expected.
"You don't have to apologize, we all make mistakes and you haven't had it easy," Marco said, patting her pink hair gently.
Sakura's eyes began to sting, she should have expected this, Marco has been respectful of her from the beginning. All worried so that in the end he forgives her so easily. Will it be the same as the others?
"Besides, you should see when one of the commanders gets sick, they're worse than children," he complained, "we have to chase them so they can take their medicines and it's worse if it has to be injections."
Sakura chuckled softly. That is something she can imagine, on more than one occasion the same thing happened to her with the ninjas, how can they bear a kunai buried in their body but not an injection? Don't mention that they stay resting in the hospital, it's as if they had an allergy to the building. Especially Kakashi.
"Are the others okay?" She asked cautiously.
"Yes, Tato and the girls are fine thanks to you. The others only have minor injuries, we're not the Whitebeard pirates for nothing," Marco said proudly pointing to the pirate symbol tattooed on his chest.
Marco was pleasantly surprised when he saw her smile softly. In short, something had changed in that last fight. From Sakura's appearance it seemed that she had taken advantage of the hour to sleep so he got up from her chair so that she could continue resting.
"I just came to check on you, I'll let you continue resting. We finished cleaning up the worst and now the boys want to celebrate."
" Wait." Marco stopped halfway. Sakura bit her lip before speaking again. "I want to go with you."
That was a phrase that Marco did not expect, she looked so determined and nervous at the same time. He wasn't going to be the one to deny her going with the others if she really had a change of heart about them. He let her lean on his arm and they both went to the deck. Marco stopped when Sakura did so a few steps out into the open. From where they were, they heard the laughter of others.
"Are you okay?"
"If... Will they forgive me? "She asked with a little fear.
"Why don't we find out?"
Marco's confident smile reassured her a little, so she resumed her pace until they were out of the hallway. There on the deck they were all laughing, shouting and some singing with a couple of beers in hand as if the fight and the storm had not passed. Some had small bandages but nothing serious as Marco said. So far no one had noticed them. They looked so happy that Sakura felt a little embarrassed. She wanted to slap herself, she is no longer a teenager for her to behave this way.
"Did I miss something?" Ace appeared behind them making Sakura jump, letting go of Marco's arm in the process.
"Ace, where have you been all this time? You hid again so you wouldn't help us clean up the mess" Marco complained annoyed.
At this Ace pouted."I was just busy."
Marco and Sakura noticed their hands full of splinters.
"What the hell have you been doing? An hour ago you weren't like this," Marco said.
"This? It's nothing, look," he set his hands on fire making the splinters disappear, leaving a few small marks where they were before" by the way, what are we doing here?"
Marco sighed. "Sakura wants to talk to the others."
"Why didn't you say it before?" He asked with a big smile before bringing his hands to his mouth. Sensing what he was going to do, Sakura grabbed his arm to stop him but it was too late", Hey, drunks! Before you lose consciousness, listen up!"
Some of them complained to Ace for disrupting the party until they saw Sakura hanging from his arm. Feeling everyone's eyes on her, her cheeks turned red. She slowly let go of Ace's arm.
"Done," Ace said nonchalantly.
In her mind, Sakura beat him up for drawing attention from others without being prepared. With them waiting she had no choice. To the surprise of the crew, Sakura leaned her torso forward in a low bow.
"I'm sorry!"
The silence encouraged her to continue.
"You have been so considerate of me and I have been very rude. I was not in my best moment and losing my home was very painful" if Sakura wanted them to forgive her, she had to be honest with them " I was very resentful because my world disappeared and suddenly some pirates took my life until you saved me I didn't see what was ahead until now, I'll understand if you don't forgive me."
The silence that followed her began to worry her. Until…
"Is anyone upset?" said one of the crew.
" Who was rude to pinky?"
Sakura straightened up to get a good look at them. She was speechless.
"If someone complained about Pinky, let them step up and hit them!"
"Surely it was you Hank!"
" That? Repeat that in front of me!"
The comments came and went in that sense and she even started one or another fight. They weren't blaming her, rather they behaved as if there was nothing to forgive. A nice feeling of relief spread in her chest.
Marco next to her patted her shoulder. "Everything went well, didn't it?"
On the other side of her, Ace put her arm around Sakura's shoulders and grinned at her.
"Was that all? I thought it was something more serious!" He said with a cheerful tone that rubbed off on Sakura, "Come on, this is a party! Let's celebrate that we kicked those pirates' butts! I'm starving!
Ace dragged Sakura along and Marco followed behind them until they reached Whitebeard's table.
Ace dragged Sakura along and Marco followed behind them until they reached Whitebeard's table. As usual, he sat across from Whitebeard. The old pirate looked her up and down.
"I see you're okay.
Sakura remembered that Ace said that Whitebeard got mad when she found out that she was attacked. She couldn't help but smile.
"Yes, all thanks to you who put Ace and Marco as my babysitters."
Marco spat out the beer he was drinking and Ace coughed as a piece of meat caught in his throat.
"Yes, they are the best babysitters," Whitebeard laughed.
"Who are you calling babysitter!" Ace yelled once he had recovered.
The people around laughed cheekily.
"Come on, would you rather be called a stalker?" said Thatch, appearing with a tray of food.
"Stalker," Sakura muttered until she burst out laughing making the others look stunned, "That nickname suits you very well."
At this scene, Ace didn't dare to complain and instead smiled when he saw her laugh. It was the first time Sakura laughed like that, even if she hit his pride right this time he was going to let it go. Sakura and the others laughed and continued with the party.
"Thatch," Sakura said once she stopped laughing and saw that a plate of food was placed in front of her, "I… Your food-"
"What? What I served you before? You did me a big favor! Someone accidentally put sugar instead of salt in the ramen. This time I made sure your food is well done."
They both knew that was a lie but Sakura was grateful. Although this time her food wasn't ramen or salad she decided to eat every last piece as compensation for all the times she was rude to him and his food.
"Child, you look better smiling," said Whitebeard with a smile.
She gave him a light smile.
"My name isn't 'girl', it's Sakura," she said this time with a cheerful tone.
With Sakura joining the party for the first time with the others, the party was more cheerful and noisy than the other times.
The pain for the loss of her home and her family will not disappear but at least for them, she will not let the world she lived in be forgotten. The ship was damaged, luckily the island they were going to was very close, they just have to stay longer than expected to fix the ship.
Finally Sakura will make landfall again.
Notes: In case you have any doubts, I have my MayuraKarin account here at Ao3 in English, and in fanfiction ( / Mayura0Karin) and wattpad (MayuraKarin/ Mayura_Karin) I have them in Spanish and English.
I hope you liked the chapter and for people with doubts I want to say that Sakura's fatalistic attitude is because I believe that a person loses everything from one second to the next, their friends their environment, in other words their entire life, their mind as a defense mechanism is disconnected from the world and had no reason to live.
Without further ado for the moment, I hope to see you soon!
Greetings!