News that Sakura Haruno had defeated Sasori of the Red Sand spread like wildfire. The medic personally made sure to give Chiyo-sama her credits whenever she was asked about said battle. 'It's all because Chiyo-sama and her puppets helped me,' she found herself often saying. Before his final resting moments, Sasori gave her vital information which would help her find and defeat Orochimaru, bringing back Sasuke in the process. Though the information was more important to Konoha than her, she made it her personal goal to end the snake and anything of his.
Today they were going to be introduced to their teammate and captain. "Ne Sakura-chan, do you think they're giving us a replacement because Sasuke won't come back?" Naruto asked, breaking the silence. They were waiting near the training grounds. "I'm not really sure but my guesses are they want to keep an eye on you since you're a jinchuriki, maybe me as an apprentice of the Hokage and we're both former teammates of Sasuke," she replied. 'And because I became an ANBU operative when no one was expecting it,' she added mentally. "I have a question though," he said. She sensed the seriousness in his tone and looked at him quizzically. "When we were kids, did you ever hate me?" he asked, his blue eyes searching her face intently.
"Why do you ask?" she said. "It's because you never talked to me yet we made a lot of contact. You're the only person I smiled at apart from the old man," he explained as he scratched the back of his head with a nervous smile and a slight blush on whiskered cheeks. She walked towards him until she was standing in front of him. "I never hated you. I just found you intriguing, it's just that everyone told me stay away from you because you were a bad kid," she replied. "Did you parents ever tell you that?" he asked again. "No," she said. "Then why didn't you ever approach me?" he queried, trying to mask the hurt look on his face.
"It's because I was a wuss. I was constantly bullied because of my forehead, as such I didn't have any friends. It was because of Ino that I was finally able to get out of the shell I had built around myself," she said as she touched his shoulder. "I'm sorry if you thought that I hated you, I never did," she spoke with an apologetic smile. "What about as we grew older?" the blonde said boldly. "You were annoying Naruto. Girls don't really appreciate confessions from the same guy every day especially if they don't feel the same way," she told him. "Oh," was his only reply as he withdrew from her touch.
An awkward silence settled between the two. Naruto stared at Sakura out of the corner of his eye as she watched the sky with a blank look. He didn't know why he had even brought up the topic, it always ended being up awkward, the silly love triangle in Team 7. His heart thudded in pain as he watched the pinkette before him. His feelings had never changed, in fact they seemed to get stronger especially with how womanly and strong she was. He had vowed to bring Sasuke back to her, at the cost of his own feelings. Perhaps someday, he would find someone who would take away his pain because when it came to Sakura, her feelings for the Uchiha were so strong that what other people said didn't matter.
"Look, there's the new members of Team 7!" He heard Sakura say as he snapped out of his reverie of thoughts.
Obito Uchiha, or as he was more affectionately known as Tobi or Madara, was contemplating his next move. He needed to start gathering DNA for the Edo Tensei that was if Sasuke had not killed the snake. Knowing the boy, he would destroy the snake the first chance he got. He had Madara Uchiha's DNA, the true Madara Uchiha who had saved him from the cave all those years ago. He needed DNA from some of the former Kage and then for some useless ninja he would resurrect for the sake of it.
He stared at the Gedo statue. Only three beasts left until he could bring his ideal world into fruition. But first, he had a few things to do. Pein hadn't yet destroyed Konoha, he hadn't sent Naruto and his pink-haired teammate into an imitation of the Infinite Tsukuyomi. A smile came to his face at the thought of the medic. She was one of those things which drove Sasuke over the edge. She was a failsafe in case Itachi's death didn't work. The boy had three months left to live. With that thought, he got up and headed to the Akatsuki base where he would give the final orders for Konoha's invasion.
Team 7 was crouched in the bushes as they watched Yamato approach the informant. Sai watched the two members from his viewpoint. Sakura had punched him when he had badmouthed Traitor. Well, he was a traitor. It left him curious. He was probably the only person on the team who knew she was an ANBU operative called Midori, and a very good one at that. She had rose among the ranks as a medic and assassin. Soon, she would be team captain. She put a new definition to the word medic in his dictionary. News of towns wiped out by incurable viruses, poisoned water sources with high level poisons, high profile civilians dying of stage 4 cancer with no record of the disease before, dead bodies with no external wounds but internal organs utterly destroyed and other underhanded tactics which were very effective. She was a force to reckon with.
And her alliance was with a traitor to his village. Not to mention, her best friend was a jinchuriki, her master was the Godaime Hokage, her sensei was the famous Copy nin, she was friends with the heirs of the prominent clans in Konoha and so on. She possessed brains and determination that many lacked, she had perfect chakra control. Most importantly, her emotions were as clear as day to him. And so his goal was to find out what went on in her mind. Danzo-sama had given him two assignments; to watch Naruto Uzumaki and Sakura Haruno and to report their activities. The other was also to make Sakura join ROOT. And he was going to do just that.
He also had an offer to make to Orochimaru on this mission and try to find Traitor. If he found him, he would have to assassinate him because he was a threat to Konoha's peace.
"Why don't you tell your team to come out of the shadows? I know they're there," Kabuto's voice sounded in the clearing. Immediately, the three ninjas flashed in front of their captain. "If it isn't Team 7, long time no see ne, Sakura-chan, Naruto-kun?" Kabuto said with a smirk. "I see you have a replacement, finally giving up on dear Sasu-chan huh?" he bantered.
"Don't talk like you know him," Naruto ground out. "Well, I'll have you know that he's doing just fine and he's not coming back anytime soon," the silver-haired medic added nonchalantly. "Shut up you moron," Sakura called out, her eyes staring dead at Kabuto. "Just tell us what we want to know. Where is Orochimaru and most importantly, where is Sasuke-kun? Either you tell us or we do it the hard way," she said as she cracked her knuckles. "You think I'm going to tell you?" Kabuto asked boredly. "Fine. The hard way it is," she said as she raised her fist and slammed it down onto the bridge.
The structure buckled under the force of the blow and fell inwards. With the ninjas suspended in the air as they descended downwards, Sakura hurled several shuriken at the medic. Kabuto took out a kunai and made sure to deflect all the projectiles in case they were poisoned. They landed on the remains of the bridge and Naruto rushed to engage with Kabuto. Yamato turned to Sakura sharply. "What point of wait for my signal to attack didn't you understand?!" he barked out with a frown. "Sorry but he was never going to cooperate, I just took the best way forward," she defended. "Well, Haruno-taichou, sorry but this is my team and orders are coming from me, got that?" he stated with a pointed stare at the medic. "Yes taichou," she said as she clenched her fists.
"Orders are as follows: Sai, Naruto and I will engage with Kabuto. Sakura, you're to remain as backup and assist with your medical abilities. Move out!" The two new members of Team 7 flashed over to Naruto as Sakura remained standing where she was. She cursed Yamato mentally until she could think of no swear words. He was underestimating her, if only he knew of her true abilities.
She felt his chakra before he had even made his appearance physically. Having to manipulate her chakra perfectly made her highly sensitive to foreign chakra, no matter how small. She whirled her head to the side looking for him. 'Where are you snake bastard?' she thought impatiently. Her eyes snapped to the spot just a few metres behind where Naruto was standing as he watched Yamato attack Kabuto. 'There!' She took out a marked kunai and threw it at that spot with precision. As soon as the kunai was at the right place, she substituted with it, pushing Naruto out of the way using her enhanced strength just as a two-headed snake erupted from the ground. One of the heads slammed into her, sending her careening backwards and colliding with Sai. The two crashed into the ground but were standing within a few seconds.
"Are you okay?" Sakura asked, her face marred with concern. "I'm fi-" he didn't finish his sentence as he coughed out blood, dropping to the ground on one knee. "That's what I was asking for," she said as she placed green glowing hands over his chest. "Two dislocated ribs, a slightly punctured lung, kidneys, spleen," she muttered under her breath. "I can't heal all of your injuries now but I'm gonna make sure that you can battle without any restrictions, is that okay?" she asked as she briefly made eye contact with him. He nodded mutely.
"I'm sorry. When I slammed into you, I had covered myself with a layer of chakra to protect myself when the snake slammed into me. I hadn't considered that I'd crash into you. The chakra layer is similar to the chakra I use when punching the ground which is why it probably hurt a lot," she explained as her eyes trained on the battle between Orochimaru and Naruto. "It doesn't hurt," he said monotonously. "I know it does. I had my clone test it on myself," she spoke. She was quiet for a while before adding. "You know, it's not a problem to be in pain or expressing it to your teammates that you're hurting. That's what friends and teammates are for," she said as the green light in her hands died out.
She helped him stand up. "Are you feeling better?" the medic asked. "Yes, it... doesn't hurt as much," Sai replied. "Good, I'll patch you after we defeat Orochimaru," she said with a smile. "I...thank you," he said with a smile. She could tell it was fake but at least he was trying.
A large explosion sounded in the area. The two looked at Naruto who had gone into Kyuubi mode, with five tails growing and skeletons covering his face and chest. His entire body had turned into concentrated dark red chakra, his eyes glowing white. He roared and sped towards the Snake Sannin who wasn't much better to look at but still sporting a wild look. "Shit, this wasn't supposed to happen," Sakura cursed out loud. She turned to look at her newest teammate. "Sai, we have to-" but the boy was already gone. Wasting no time to look for the ROOT ninja, she sped towards where her blonde teammate was.
Much apologies for not updating in a long time, I have a lot going on but hopefully I'll be able to finish my stories. To answer the review of salvatorechick, firstly I want to thank you for such critic review, I really thank you. For the grammatical errors, sorry about that, sometimes I'd write in such a rush plus I have no beta reader so yeah. Then I did think about all those things that you highlighted but I was saving them for the Shippuden period which is what I'm doing now. So stay tuned to read more and send more similar reviews.
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