Sakura sat on a wooden bench, a half eaten stick of dango in her mouth and the transparency jutsu activated.
The raven haired boy didn't notice her as he walked past. The jutsu dropped.
"Sasuke-kun." She crooned and he froze, whipping to look over his shoulder at her.
"Why are you here in the middle of the night?" He asked, glaring poisonously.
"I knew that you'd come this way, if you were going to leave." She smiled slyly. "You're really, very predictable."
"So what, are you here to stop me?" He said as his eyes bled red. "You?!" His voice was anger and false incredulity. A thick layer of sloppy bravado plastered on in an attempt to maintain his deluded worldview as sitting at the top of the food chain.
But there was the barest of a tremor in his knees and his hands hung unconsciously close to his weapons pouches. She registered as a threat to him, then.
Good.
"Nope." She popped the sound. "That would be hypocritical of me." She stood in a fluid movement, waving the stick of dango at him and causing his expression to twist sourly. The black tomoe of his Sharingan spun in dizzying circles. Her smile was entirely unkind.
She'd already given one of her teammates a kick up the ass. It only seemed fair she'd share the cold shock of reality equally.
"Then what?!"
"I just want to say something." She said. "Because hypocrisy pisses me off, and you. Are a hypocrite."
"What the-"
"Getting into a fight, trying to kill your comrade." She started and he scowled. "To what? Prove your strength? Use Naruto to measure your worth?" She pretended to not notice the way the Uchiha flinched. She knew exactly what kind of effect that phrasing would have after months of researching the massacre. "And now you're abandoning the village." She narrowed her eyes, her voice went flat. Her face unimpressed. "You're just as bad as Itachi."
The Uchiha snarled and threw himself at her, but she just kawarimied with a kunai on top of a nearby tree branch. The boy's Sharingan eyes flitted wildly around before locking on to her, his face twisted with pure rage.
"You have until I make it to the Hokage's office. At this time of night it might take me an hour, maybe even two. Then, I'm a Konoha chūnin and you're just a traitor."
She disappeared.
Sasuke's cry of frustration followed her into the dark.
"You have thirty minutes." The Senju said. "Gather as many worthy genin as you see fit, and leave immediately."
"It's going to be troublesome, but it's someone I know so I can't just let it be. I'll do what I can." The Nara replied.
"I would like to recommend to you Uzumaki Naruto."
The Nara nodded and left, a determined look on his face as he went. Once the door closed Sakura let go of the transparency jutsu, rippling into existence against the wall.
"And I'm here, because?"
"Insurance. I want you to follow team Shikamaru until they come into contact with Sasuke and Orochimaru's men, at which point you will follow any survivors to the traitor's hideout." The Hokage said, her face severe. She pulled an ANBU level scent masking uniform from under her desk and threw it at her. Sakura caught the bundle instinctively. "Under no circumstances are you to reveal yourself or become involved in the fight."
"You're suggesting Shikamaru's squad won't be successful." Sakura's voice was flat, her face expressionless.
"I hope they will be, but it's highly unlikely." The Hokage replied, grimacing.
Sakura walked forward a few paces, slammed her hands into the Hokage's desk and pulsed as much killing intent as possible into the air. Her glare was poisonous, her face scrunched up in distaste. A tantō was at her neck, a kunai against her stomach, the two ANBU having reacted almost instantly. Threatening but not killing. Sakura ignored them.
"You're suggesting," Her voice was a whisper, low and furious. "That I abandon my comrades and refuse to help them even if their lives are at risk."
"Yes." The Hokage replied, not backing down despite the sheen of sweat building on her forehead.
Sakura could produce a lot of killing intent.
"If I do this, you will teach me how to punch through mountains." Sakura snarled and the Hokage nodded.
"Fine, but only if you're successful."
Sakura stopped the killing intent as suddenly as she started it, shifting her face into a bright smile. "Thank you, Hokage-sama!" Her voice was cheerful and the Senju looked thrown. The ANBU disappeared, but it was slower than they should have.
"Brat." The Hokage growled. "Hatake was right about you. You're a manipulative little shit."
Sakura laughed, bright and musical. "I'm flattered."
"Get going, we both have work to do."
Sakura activated her transparency jutsu again and disappeared out the window.
"Wait!" Sakura called.
"Sakura-chan!" Uzumaki cried. Sakura eyed the group of genin solemnly.
"Good luck." She said to the blonde, then turned to the Nara. "Bring them home safe."
"You're not coming?" He asked, an eyebrow raised. She smiled sadly in response.
"I have a mission." She replied. "To be honest I should have already left, but I wanted to see you all off." She also wanted to check the team members and ensure that, on the small chance her uniform failed to block her scent, Kiba would pass it off as simply something on their clothes.
The Hyuuga would be harder to trick, but keeping her signature locked down and avoiding where he was ordered to focus should work. Hopefully.
"We'll be fine, Sakura-chan!" The Uzumaki cried, throwing her a thumbs up. "That's a promise!"
"Thank you, Naruto." She smiled and pulled the blonde into a hug, rubbing her scent well and truly all over him, before pulling away, using chakra to look teary eyed.
"Alright!" He yelled "Lets go!"
"Well, we've wasted enough time. Let's hurry." The Nara said, though he threw her a suspicious look, and the group headed off.
Sakura watched them for a moment before heading back into the village, finding a dark corner, performing a quick change, and sprinting back towards the woods. The glassy feeling of the transparency jutsu shuddered down her spine and she set off at a gruelling pace.
She caught up to the team just as they were shifting into the trees. She moved up to the thinner branches, only possible to move silently through due to her small size, and followed them unnoticed.
She turned off the small, sentimental portion of her brain that viewed these people as familiar and to be protected. They were a stepping stone to the target. Nothing more.
(She watched the Uzumaki visibly hesitate, one hand wrapped around his clone's and the other holding a ball of death, but it didn't last in the face of the Uchiha's Chidori laden charge.
Uzumaki didn't falter again.
The Uchiha turned out not to be a hypocrite.)
Sakura was tired.
The Sound four had been far more trouble than she had expected. In the end, it was only her training with Morino and a reasonable amount of luck that led to her being able to avoid their traps.
Her muscles were cramping. She was soaked through her clothes. Her bones were aching.
And yet she continued to watch the small building set into the dirt, almost invisible but from the right angle. The Uchiha had disappeared into it a little over four hours ago. As was protocol, she would watch the entrance for five, thus reducing the possibility that it was simply a pit stop before the boy was taken somewhere else.
It didn't eliminate it, especially considering that the building could have any number of back entrances, but it did reduce it. Just a little. Anything else was beyond her role in the mission.
Minutes passed. No one went in or out. It had been five hours.
Sakura stared a minute more at the building and turned to leave. She would need to hurry, she could only maintain the transparency jutsu for another hour or two, and she wanted to be well within Fire country before she had to drop it. Then there was a sound, just the tiniest rustle of leaves, and she paused. Looked back at the building to see a tiny, green snake sliding through the undergrowth. Internally she swore. It wasn't likely it could tell she was there, or that it was even a summons, but if it was and it did know and it got back to Orochimaru that a Konoha shinobi knew where the base was, it would be evacuated and burnt to the ground. Any intel she could give would be worthless.
She headed south east, intending to cut through the Land of Hot Water to throw off any pursuers. Her Konoha Hitai-ate sealed inside a blood and signature scroll.
Her feet flew.
Her breaths were gasping. Her heart pounded in her ears.
Three Yuga shinobi were chasing her, two trying to flank her left as one on her right herded her into a trap. Her transparency jutsu had failed two thirds of the way to the border to the Land of Fire and she was running on fifteen percent chakra reserves. Her jaw clenched even as her cheeks were hurting from her feral smile.
A trio of shuriken launched at her from her left side and she was forced to turn to deflect them, losing a touch of her momentum and allowing the shinobi to her right to gain ground. They swiped at her with a kunai and she ducked, sliding under their arm and drawing her chokutō to slash at their stomach. The Yuga shinobi wasn't fast enough to dodge completely, clearly expecting her to dodge rather than risk injury, and took a shallow gash to the vulnerable flesh but she was prevented by following up on the attack by a second appearing to take a swing at her with a giant, spiked club.
She rolled and threw herself back into a sprint, hoping to gain even the slightest bit of ground and hopefully an advantage. No such luck. The third was waiting for her with a doton jutsu that smashed into her left forearm, definitely breaking it and causing her vision to white out with pain. She forced herself to push through it, launching directly at the surprised looking third shinobi and burying her blade through their eye.
She didn't stop to watch the man die, instead vaulting over him and drawing her blade out with a satisfying squelch, launching herself into movement to stay ahead of the two. They were faster than before. Angry that she'd killed their comrade. She wouldn't get away from this without their deaths.
Sakura had changed direction to head towards Kiri the moment she knew she would be detected, in the hopes the attackers would assume she was a shinobi from the land of Water. She had the reserves for one jutsu and maybe thirty seconds of a henge before she needed to stop using chakra entirely.
She turned, a manic glint in her eyes, and threw one hand in a seal above her head as the other formed a clumsy seal over her heart. The pain in her arm threatened to stop her higher mental faculties completely but this jutsu was instinct. She didn't need to think to bend the water. The rain abruptly paused midair and coalesced into an opaque white mist. She heard her followers pause nervously, shifting quietly through the grass. She flickered a white henge on and launched herself towards their general positions. She wasn't experienced enough to track them exactly through the mist yet, but she sliced through the neck of one and got the other clumsily in the thigh before her thirty seconds were up and she had to run. The mist dissipating around them.
The third shinobi did not follow her as she sprinted towards Kiri, but they would live. It didn't matter. Any report they gave would mention the Kiri-headed shinobi using Kiri techniques. Finally far enough away, she changed course to duck directly back into Fire.
In a massive stroke of luck, she met no further resistance.
Sakura walked into Konoha drenched, covered in mud, and shivering with cold. Her only consolation was that the hypothermia had numbed the pain in her arm completely. She'd been forced to run on the ground for most of the journey through Fire, having not enough chakra to even tree hop.
She paused at the gate stand- not Kamizuki and Hagane, the guards actually forced her to dig through her pockets and locate the scroll with her hitai-ate before they let her sign in and enter the village- before making her way straight to Hokage tower.
She was stopped by a harried looking secretary before she could make it to the door, an ANBU appearing to back the kunoichi up.
"I need to speak with Hokage-sama." She said, frustration growing along with the return of pain in her arm as the warmth of the building seeped into her still shivering skin.
"You can't just walk in, you have to make an appointment!" The secretary insisted. Sakura smashed a fist against the wall, the secretary jumped and cowered back but she ignored it, instead turning poisonous green eyes to the ANBU.
"Haruno Sakura. I promise Tsunade-sama will want to talk to me." She said. The ANBU hesitated for a second before disappearing into the Hokage's office.
"OF COURSE YOU SHOULD LET HER IN, WHAT KIND OF IDIOT ARE YOU?!" Came a muffled scream followed by a series of thuds and smashes before the Senju's blonde head appeared in the doorway. "Well?! What are you doing, brat?! You should have been back hours ago! Get in or I'll punch you in!"
Sakura blinked before walking around the pale-faced secretary and heading into the office, taking a seat that a worried looking Senju pulled out for her. Green light appeared from the woman's hands and Sakura let out a sigh of relief as her limbs flooded with warmth and the pain in her arm faded away.
"Geez brat, what happened to you?" The Senju snapped, grimacing towards her forearm.
"I followed Uchiha Sasuke to Orochimaru's base as instructed, spent the protocol five hours watching the building to confirm the location." She dug with her good hand through the pockets of her jacket, pulling out the scroll with the mapped point of entry. The Hokage took it with a nod. "As I was about to leave, I spotted a small snake appearing from the entrance. I did not think it knew I was there, but just in case I moved to pass through the Land of Hot Water to throw off the track. At the time I thought I had enough chakra to maintain my jutsu into the Land of Fire and escape detection." The bones of her arm abruptly clicked into place and Sakura hissed, blinking back tears. "I did not take into account the amount I would need to cycle to prevent hypothermia. I was discovered twenty minutes from the border."
"I can't say you were wrong to choose to cut through the Land of Hot Water but the risk to your life was too much. All of that effort would have been for naught if you'd died and we'd never gotten the information anyway." The Hokage rebuked, poking a green finger into Sakura's palm and observing the twitches of her fingers.
"Mhm. I managed to change directions before being discovered, making it seem as though I was headed towards Kiri. I fatally injured two of the three man squad and seriously wounded the other using techniques Kakashi-sensei copied from Momochi Zabuza, so at least Yugakure will be looking for a Kirigakure shinobi rather than one from Konoha."
The Hokage sighed and dropped her- slightly tender but fully functional- arm. "You did good kid. Get some rest and refrain from heavy chakra usage for three da-"
The sound of a gentle thud on the window made her pause, both of them turning to look at the scarecrow that had casually broken into the room.
"Hatake. At least knock before you waltz into my office." The Hokage deadpanned. Hatake gave his best no fucks eye smile back at her.
"Maa, just making sure my cute little student is alright." He turned an admonishing look on Sakura. "She was meant to be back hours ago, of course."
"I got a little banged up, but Tsunade-sama was kind enough to heal me." Sakura smiled and held up her arms, putting the full force of her best puppy dog eyes on the ninken owner. "Carry me, sensei?"
"If you insist." Hatake sighed, crouching in front of her chair so she could easily climb onto his back. He stood, hefting her a little higher on his back and turning to the Hokage. The Senju's face was a mix of annoyance and fondness. "Thank you for allowing us the use of your office, Hokage-sama."
"Don't test me, brat." She growled and Hatake made for the window. "She's on no heavy chakra use for three days."
Hatake nodded and threw them into the night, smoothly making his way over the rooftops and towards Sakura's house.
"The others?" She asked, voice almost a whisper.
"They'll be fine." He replied and she relaxed completely, melting into the man's back and happily burying her face into the back of his jacket.
Sakura was poked awake. A finger tapping her forehead incessantly and she frowned, sleepily trying to bat the offending appendage away.
"Come on, Sakura-chan. I don't think you'll enjoy it if I leave you in bed without a shower." Hatake drawled and she blinked her eyes open. She registered that she was still on the man's back, on the windowsill of her bedroom, and groaned.
"Asshole." She grumbled, clumsily dropping off him to sway her way towards the attached bathroom, grabbing her previous night's pyjamas from a pile on the floor as she went.
Freshly showered, mud free, and clad in a hoodie and sweatpants that were far too big for her but were very, very soft; she stumbled back into her room to see Hatake leaned against the wall to the bathroom door's left, Icha Icha in hand. She looked up at him with a confused frown on her face, blinking sleepily.
"Just making sure you made it out of there, Pinky." He closed the book with a clap and eye-smiled down at her. "Wouldn't want you falling asleep in the shower and drowning."
"That would be an embarrassing way to die." She mumbled, rubbing an eye and yawning. "Thanks, 'Kashi."
Quick as a flash, a hand tilted her head forward till she was staring at their feet and an unmasked nose pressed against her hair, breathing in. Then Hatake was gone, only the open window giving any indication he'd been there at all.
She blinked out at the darkness.
She knew he had enhanced senses from his ninken contract, but she hadn't realised he used them that much during their day to day life. Had her lack of smell been bothering him? She figured that either way the man deserved it after the day he'd had; with one of his students going traitor, beating another to near death and the last appearing injured and exhausted hours after they'd been meant to show up.
Carrying her home when asked and sniffing her was, frankly, quite reserved compared to what a jōnin-sensei like Maito would do.
Sakura climbed into bed, only taking the time to cocoon herself in blankets before she'd drifted off to sleep.