Title: Are You Ready?
Chapter: 25 – and that would be okay for me to do
Author: Killaurey
Rating: T
Word Count: 5,580
Summary: AU. Sakura gives up on Kakashi as a teacher after Team 7 falls apart. Too bad fate, enemy ninja, and sheer bad luck have other plans.
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. Part 25 of ? Unbeta'd.

"Dad," Chouji says, "do you think I'm a bad friend?"

It's after hours at one of the family's restaurants helping to prep for the next day as a favour for Aiya, the cousin who usually runs the place, as she's busy tonight. He doesn't know what she's busy with, but Chouji knows it was important because his dad offered their services rather than letting her ask first.

They're working together in the kitchen. Chouji likes this restaurant, though it's not one of their fancier ones. They won't be doing much actual cooking, but cleaning and prepping for tomorrow's open is something he enjoys.

It's too bad he's not cooking, though, as he's rather good at that. Better than he is at baking.

He finds baking to be much less forgiving of any flaws. He can't eyeball things and decide they're close enough. That way leads to lumps and things not turning out quite right. He has to measure and weigh and make sure he's following the recipe exactly the same way, every time.

He'd rather cook.

Right now, though, he's doing dishes. Up to his elbows in hot, soapy water and cleaning the things the customers won't ever see. It makes it easier to avoid looking at his father once he's finally asked the question he's been struggling with.

His dad doesn't look up from the racks he's cleaning as he hums thoughtfully.

"Do you think you're a bad friend?" Dad asks, sounding curious.

Chouji grimaces.

He likes to think he's a good friend. He tries to be. It's usually pretty easy.

At least, it had been.

"Kiba-Inuzuka Kiba, that is-says we haven't been," he says. "Or, well, he said friends help friends and then asked when the last time we'd helped Ino was."

Chouji hesitates, then finishes with, "I couldn't remember the last time I had."

"Helped Ino-chan, you mean?"

He doesn't mention that Shikamaru hadn't been able to remember either. He's not asking about Shikamaru, he's asking about him.

"She's usually the one that helps us," he admits, feeling guilty in retrospect as he thinks about it. Ino had never seemed to mind being the one to help. She… "She doesn't usually need help."

They're quiet for a bit, just working, while that sinks into the silence.

"Ino-chan's a very prideful, touchy girl," Chouza says eventually, his voice thoughtful. "Even when she could barely walk, she wanted to do things herself. I don't know that I've ever seen or heard her ask for help from someone outside of her Clan."

Which Chouji knew was different. Asking family for help, to teach, to reach, to show… that was what family was supposed to do for each other and he knew the Yamanaka Clan was small and tight-knit.

Their abilities mean they're all up in each others business anyway. They couldn't be anything but close.

Chouji grimaces. He doesn't remember Ino ever asking for help at the Academy either. Not that she would have, from him, when her grades were so much better than his. Rather, she'd patiently tutored him all through history and helped him memorize the math formulas he'd need in the field, to be able to calculate things as they happened.

But…

He sees what his father is saying. He does. Which means that he's found a lump in him that needs to be worked out.

"You're saying that just because she didn't ask for help, doesn't mean she didn't need any," Chouji says, feeling very down and very small.

"That's part of it," Chouza says. "And that's the part of things that you can change."

"But… why can't she ask for help?" Chouji asks. "We're—I mean, we were her team and we were her friends long before that. Shouldn't that… count for something? We'd have helped, if asked."

His father is quiet for a long, long few moments before he sighs. It's very tired. "Ino-chan's situation is… a lot more complicated than that and despite her father's attempts to shield her, she's well aware of it."

"I don't understand," Chouji admits. "What's more complicated?"

What had he missed?

"I want you to think back to the Academy," Chouza says in a slow, thoughtful voice. "And not just about Ino-chan. Tell me, how often did shinobi-born girls ask for help from any of their male peers?"

It's a strange enough question that Chouji nearly drops a corer as he looks over at his father, who just meets his gaze steadily, until flushing a little, Chouji goes back to his chore. The hot water is soothing. Making things clean.

How often had the girls asked the boys for help?

No, that was wrong. His father had specified the shinobi-born girls, not all of them. There weren't that many of them in his class at the Academy. Ten girls to start with, then four of them had been civilian-born, including Sakura. Two had been second generation. Then there had been Hinata-san and Ino and two small Clan girls.

The civilian girls hadn't been shy at asking for help. Sometimes they were flustered, especially if they were talking to Sasuke, who was never very helpful anyway.

But, then… he frowns.

The shinobi-born girls had flirted with some of the boys (okay, mostly Sasuke, though he was never going to understand that fascination) and sometimes those flirts had come with offers to train with or study with.

But that… that wasn't the same as needing help. Even the second-gen girls didn't ask for help from the boys, though he had the impression that they asked for help amongst themselves. Hinata had been too quiet to really talk to anyone about anything but Ino…

He couldn't actually remember Ino asking for help from their sensei either. She asked questions or asked for clarification on a point but…

"I don't think they ever did," he says, increasingly bewildered. "Unless they were trying to get close to a boy."

And, in retrospect, was that really asking for help or was it just asking for a date?

"That's about what I expected," his father says, though he sounds a little… not sad, not quite, but… something like it.

Chouji left off his work to look at his father. "But why, Dad?"

He knows girls are weird and he is, frankly, rather terrified of the ones his age that he isn't related to because he never knows where they are coming from or where they were going, but if anyone had asked him for help… he'd have helped them.

It would have been nice to be asked to help, actually, instead of just lingering barely in the mid-range of the class and over-looked. Shikamaru's grades had been terrible, but he'd known all the material. Ino's grades had been impeccable.

"Did you know that Ino-chan's grade average was the highest in your year?" Chouza asks. "Higher than Uchiha Sasuke's."

He frowns. "But Uchiha Sasuke was our Number One. That doesn't make any sense."

"It was a very close contest regarding most of their marks, but Ino-chan aced the teamwork modules while Uchiha Sasuke's greatest weakness was there. And yet, he is the one that was named Number One Rookie. Tell me why."

Chouji doesn't know why, though he has a weird sinking feeling in his stomach. He'd known that Ino was good but he hadn't known she was that good. "Was… was it because she's a girl?"

"In part, yes," his father says. "There were other reasons. Some of the council thought it would look better if Uchiha Sasuke, the last Uchiha, was shown to be the strongest in his class. Some hoped that it would help bind him here more closely. But a lot of it was that people were more comfortable having a boy be the strongest in the class. The argument goes a lot like 'well, boys are physically stronger than girls are anyway, so where's the lie', leaving out that the Academy isn't testing on pure strength of body.

"And, too, it's very unusual for a girl to be Number One in a year because every girl has to take the kunoichi-only classes, which means they get less time to learn and practice the basic taijutsu and weapons that their male counterparts do. It automatically sets them back compared to their male peers unless they make a concerted effort to counter that because they're forced to spend their time learning to sew, cook, ikebana, tea ceremony, fine manners… amongst other things."

Chouji thinks of everything Shikamaru has ever said about girls and how angry Ino had gotten at him for doing so. He'd always thought she was over-reacting. Shikamaru was her friend, it was just a joke.

He's pretty sure that Shikamaru had always meant it as a joke.

But when he got the chance to pick a team, he didn't pick any girls, and, oh, that's an insidious whisper because it's not really fair. Hinata had been out with an injury to her heart. Sakura had already failed once. Ino…

He… doesn't know why Shikamaru didn't pick Ino, except that the guys he'd picked, including Chouji himself, had been physically stronger. (Chouji doesn't kid himself; he's also much physically stronger than Shikamaru himself.)

But would Ino have been able to do a better job than he had against Jirobo? He doesn't know. They'll never know.

"That… that's…" he trails off, not sure how to express that none of it seems fair but also what does that have to do with what they're talking about?

"Ino-chan knows good and well why she wasn't chosen," Chouza says. "She's also grown up very well aware that there are those even in her own Clan, her own family, that think that leadership of the Yamanaka Clan, when it passes from Inoichi, should go to one of her male cousins. It pains me to say that same sentiment is echoed in both the Nara and the Akimichi Clans."

"She's her father's heir," Chouji protests. "And she'll be good at it—"

"But she's a girl and, in time, she'll be a woman, and that counts against her. Most kunoichi never make Jounin, you know, and a lot of that is due to having children. Men can marry and have children and still keep their rank and their status. It's harder for women since their bodies change after birth and, too, someone does have to stay home and raise the children."

"Mom and Yoshino-san are both Chuunin," Chouji says blankly. "Did… did they give that up for…"

"Yes," his father says quietly. "Of course, it's not the only choice a woman can make, but staying an active shinobi after childbirth is much harder. Most women who become Jounin are unattached and childless. Of your friends, only Inuzuka Kiba's mother remains an active shinobi. Inuzuka Tsume is an active Jounin and leader of her Clan. Think about what they say about Inuzuka Tsume behind her back, how they talk about her, what they think about her, how they pick apart her choices. Ino-chan has been facing all of that from the time she was born. It will only get worse for her."

Chouji is quiet then, just thinking, as he goes back to his work.

He knows what kind of talk his father means. He's never met Inuzuka Tsume but he knows what people say. The nicest talk is about how she's wild, reckless, and unable to keep a man. Her ability as a ninja is not mentioned.

The talk only gets worse, and more bountiful, from there. Even in his own mind he flushes a little when he remembers the things he's overheard—and that's just the things people say in front of children, for he'd heard a lot of it before he'd ever graduated.

The idea of people saying the same things about Ino makes him angry. No one has ever said anything like that to him about her… except Shikamaru's jokes, which he'd never taken seriously.

"That's why she doesn't ask for help, isn't it?" he says. "That's why the shinobi-born girls don't ask for help. If they do, there's no going back, is there? They're thought of as weak for forever."

"Yes," his father says. "And it's wrong and it's not fair and yet that is exactly what will happen if any of them ask for help. The shinobi-born women and girls who succeed do so against the weight of a lot of expectations their male counterparts do not have."

Chouji feels… he doesn't really know how he feels, except that he kind of wants to cry, because Ino has shouldered that for her whole life and he never knew and never noticed. Instead, he'd also leaned on her.

"That's why she left Team Ten," he realizes. "Asuma-sensei wasn't giving her the tools she needed to succeed and Ino would never let someone hold her back. She complained all the time but… but you're saying she couldn't out-right ask for more training. That's why she nagged and complained and…"

Honestly, she'd made more than one day absolutely miserable as she'd mouthed off through everything.

But… but… he thinks maybe he gets it a little better now. Ino hadn't been able to afford all those days spent eating barbeque and watching Shikamaru play board games. Money hadn't been a problem but rather the time lost that she could have spent better.

"It wasn't about me and Shikamaru at all," he says. They'd thought maybe it hadn't been but they hadn't known. If he'd wanted more training, he'd have asked Asuma-sensei and not thought twice about it. Chouji had been operating under the assumption that Ino would have done the same, could have done the same, without it meaning anything. "It wasn't even about Asuma-sensei. It was—"

He trails off there, not sure how to encapsulate everything his father has said to him.

"It was about her and what she needs to do to be taken seriously," he settles on. And it still sucks and he still misses her but he also now has the urge to go and hit anyone who says anything bad about her. "To… not be left behind and frozen in place.

"Though… though I don't know why she picked Team Seven, if she wants to improve," Chouji admits. "She's had a lot of opinions on Haruno's team in the past."

"Team Seven's management has shifted to a new style," Chouza says.

"What?"

"That's all I can tell you about it," his father says. "The rest isn't for me to share, no matter who asks me about it."

Chouji nods slowly, though he doesn't understand. That means his father is under orders not to speak about it. He tries to figure out what could be so important that orders kept answers about another Genin team out of reach and fails.

Maybe Shikamaru will make something of it.

Maybe that's why Hinata-san and Tenten-san had been so very leery of telling them anything. Then he feels stupid because—right. Hinata-san and Tenten-san are both girls. If Ino has asked them for help, there's no way they'd say anything to him.

"Is there anything I can do to help?" he asks plaintively. He misses Ino. She's one of his oldest friends. "Dad, I… I want to be a better friend."

He can't change the past but maybe he can make up for it, at least a little.

Chouza is quiet for a long time as they work. "There's no easy way to help this situation. Changing other peoples' attitudes has to come slowly or it won't come at all. But there are two things you can do."

"What are they?" Chouji asks. He doesn't ask if they'll make Ino talk to him again. He thinks… he knows… that's going to be something for him to figure out.

"Don't wait for a kunoichi to ask for help," his father says. "Just help. Treat them the way you'd treat any shinobi of Konoha. You wouldn't wait for Shikamaru to ask for help. So don't wait for Ino to do so."

Chouji wants to argue with this point but… he really can't. He does help Shikamaru without thinking about it.

Chouza continues with, "You do have to be careful with this as some kunoichi will be furious if you help them. Ino-chan is likely to accept your help. You're basically family, even though she can't ask for it. If a kunoichi does get mad, though, remember that it's not about you. Treat them the way you'd treat any shinobi and, if they ask, tell them that's all you're doing, no more, no less. Some of them will think you're being patronizing. Others will think you're flirting with them, looking for favours. You can't help what they think, but you can control how you act."

That's… that's a lot to think about, right there, and though he's thirteen, he feels very young when staring at the face of all of it.

But Ino's known this all along…

"What's the second thing?" he asks, because if Ino can face everything everyone throws at her, then he can do this much.

"Speak out about it, when you hear your male peers put down a kunoichi. I won't lie to you, son, if you do this, you will be insulted. You'll be called names. You might even have some shinobi lose their tempers and try to hit you. But it's important that you do this, and do it consistently, because the kunoichi aren't listened to. They can scream the same thing from atop the Hokage Monument and most shinobi will never listen to them as much as they will listen to a comment from you."

Chouji swallows hard. He…

"Shikamaru says things sometimes," he says, very quietly, like he's betraying his best friend just by mentioning it. "You mean… even… even him?"

"Even him," Chouza says. "If he's really your best friend, he'll understand what you're doing. As a guy, this is something you can do that the girls you'll be in the field alongside can't do. Not because they're too shy, but because their voices aren't heard. Give them that chance."

After that, there's really nothing much Chouji can think to say. He retreats into a troubled silence.

Just… thinking.

She finishes speaking and waits for Hatake-sensei's verdict to fall upon her.

Sakura appreciates the way that he likes to think before he speaks but, at the same time, it just about kills her. She's not a patient person.

But she resists the urge to fidget or get up and pace or ask, again, what he thinks, because doing all of those things both seems too silly and too much. It's better just to wait, so she does, counting down from a thousand by fives.

"Very good, Sakura," Hatake-sensei says. "I'm impressed at the amount of thought you've put into this. Great work."

She flushes, a little light-headed from relief.

"You do know that you don't have to quit medical training if you don't want to, though, right?" he asks.

"I know," she says, because that had been the hardest part of the decision. "But that's… I don't want to be a medical ninja, Hatake-sensei. I never really wanted to be one. I just wanted someone who paid attention and who taught me things that worked with my strengths. Unless, unless you don't think I can be strong this way?"

And, oh, but that would be a blow, wouldn't it—

But Hatake-sensei is shaking his head.

"You can be strong this way," he says firmly. "It will take time and you'll be at a disadvantage compared to your male peers because they're generally going to be larger and, right at first, that's going to directly translate into them being stronger than you. Even once you've reached your full growth, you're likely going to have a slenderer build than your male peers and they'll have the weight advantage against you. You'll never be able to forget that. In combat you'll always have to remember that biology is working against you, if only in leverage. But that doesn't mean you can't do this. It just means it's going to be harder for you than it would be if you'd been born a man.

"So, the question is only: are you willing to put in the work?"

Because he looks very, very serious, Sakura makes sure to think about it before answering. Her answer is still the same but—she wants him to know that she's taking this as seriously as he is.

"Yes, Hatake-sensei," she says, with a resolute nod.

He leans back in his seat. "Then that's what you'll do, and I'll help you get there."

Sakura heaves a sigh of relief.

Hatake-sensei smiles, his eye curving. "Have you considered what kind of combat ninja you'd like to become?"

She shakes her head. "Not really," Sakura admits. "I don't really have any obvious skill to build on, aside from my chakra control. Is that a bad thing?"

"No, it's not," he says. "Especially not this early into your career. Being a Genin is partially about trying everything and seeing what you're good at. A lot of people don't really start to develop into specialists until they're Chuunin. And your chakra control means you'll have many options."

"I was kind of hoping you'd be able to suggest which options I should look at," Sakura says, feeling a little embarrassed but she really doesn't know a lot about the different kinds of combat ninja she could really be. Not on a specialist level.

He tilts his head slightly, considering her.

"We're already remedying your taijutsu," he muses. "And we'll have to talk to Ino about her needs in order to specifically train you to protect her, which will likely wind up being an adjacent but complimentary skillset—there's not many scenarios in an actual battle where you'll wind up covering for someone completely unable to move on their own who aren't injured."

He lapses back into silence.

When she goes to speak, he holds up one hand, so she doesn't say anything and just waits. It almost feels like she's back in the classroom while Iruka-sensei works through a problem on the board that someone else has posed.

"Your Academy profile noted that you were above-average in traps," he says.

Sakura blinks, not having expected that. "Yes, Hatake-sensei."

With a nod, he says, "We'll come back to that then. Do you know your elemental affinities?"

She shakes her head, a bit bewildered at the question. Elemental affinities? Is she supposed to know that?

"Alright," he says. "Let me think about this. Do what you want for tonight and I'll have something figured out by tomorrow's training. If Ino's busy, don't bother her. If she's not, you may tell her as much or as little of this as you want. I'll follow your lead here."

"Yes, Hatake-sensei," she says, a bit bemused by the dismissal but not upset because he isn't being dismissive of her, he just wants her to go away for a bit so he can think. Sakura does.

Sakura, feeling a little aimless, wanders back to their room. Ino is in the one next to it, but when Sakura pokes her head in, Ino is industriously working on something (weird brain math, probably) so she just leaves her be.

In their room she finds her cut pouches and, after some examining of them, decides that she can fix it with a needle and thread. She'll need to buy new ones after this mission but—

I deserve that, she thinks soberly, each of the precise, sliced lines is a spray of cold reality.

Bending her head, fingers, and attention to the chore. Once she gets into the rhythm of it, it doesn't take her long to get it done.

Sakura stretches out her cramping fingers and rubs the back of her neck as she surveys the neat, even stitches of her handiwork.

Suzume-sensei would be proud, she thinks wryly. Though come to think of it, it does feel good to have been able to fix this myself and know that my work will hold.

Putting the thread and her needles away, Sakura organizes her weapons, fingering each one and promising herself that she'll never misuse them the way she'd almost done this afternoon.

Once everything is tidy, Sakura wanders down to the kitchen, which is empty, and gets a drink of water.

I wonder where Hatake-sensei is?

She thinks about looking for him but, after a moment, decides she doesn't really need to. There's nothing she wants to talk to him about that they haven't already talked about... she's just curious.

Feeling a little lonely, she heads back to see if Ino is done with her drawings yet.

She finds Ino rubbing her temples.

"You okay?" Sakura asks, pausing in the doorway. She's careful to keep her gaze away from the low table that Ino's been working on, in case even looking from the door is enough to violate Ino's Clan's privacy.

"I'm fine," Ino says, and there's a flurry of rustling papers, before she continues with, "you can come in, if you want. I'm done for the night."

Sakura leaves the door open behind her, careful to remember Hatake-sensei telling Ino she had to, and assuming that applies even still. She takes a seat next to Ino, their shoulders bumping companionably.

"Did you figure out what you were trying to?" she asks curiously.

Ino shrugs a little. "It's hard to tell when it's all just on paper," she says. "I'll know better if I worked it out when I move it into action tomorrow. Shikamaru was always really good at planning ahead. I'm better at making decisions on the fly. Daddy says it's the difference between a strategist and a tactician. Both are useful, because they cover for the other's weaknesses."

Sakura nods thoughtfully. "Would he have been able to help you with this?"

She's proud of herself for asking without feeling jealous or petty. It's just a question.

"I wouldn't have asked him anyway," Ino says, twirling a pen idly through her fingers. "If he'd been around while I was working on it, then, maybe. Hard to tell with him, when it comes to things that don't need to be done. If it intrigues him, he's in. If not..."

Ino shrugs again.

"I don't need him to come to my rescue."

She doesn't seem bothered by this, though Sakura isn't sure how she feels about it. It's friendship in a way she doesn't understand and she knows Ino misses it.

"It doesn't matter anyway," Ino says. "What's up with you? You and Hatake-sensei have been weird as anything around each other all evening."

Sakura hesitates.

Somehow, she hadn't expected Ino to just ask.

"I mean, you don't need to tell me if you don't want to," Ino says, as the silence stretches. She doesn't sound particularly bothered by that either. "I don't tell you everything either."

Even though that's true, it's also the simple acceptance of that fact Sakura could choose to keep this a secret, that makes Sakura feel weirdly, obscurely guilty. Sakura shakes her head, trying to figure out how to put it. She wants to tell Ino. She almost has to tell Ino, especially if she really wants to progress with her new training regime.

"No, it's just…," she sighs. "I don't know where to start."

"The beginning is usually a pretty good place," Ino observes.

"The beginning is awful," Sakura complains.

Ino laughs. "So, face it head on and get it over with. Be fierce like a tiger—you're a kunoichi of Konoha!"

"If it hadn't be for Hatake-sensei, you'd be dead," Sakura blurts out. "And it would have been all my fault."

In the shocked silence that follows her audacity at just saying something so terrible, Sakura does her very best to not look at Ino. Ino has gone still in a way that back in the Academy Sakura had associated with the absolute (social) death of whomever had offended her. Ino has never been very forgiving.

Ino has never had to be. Everything she fights for, she wins, in the long run.

I bet Chouji and Shikamaru never almost killed her, Sakura thinks desperately. I bet she's regretting every single choice she's made to wind up here.

"Tell me what happened," Ino says. It's an order, really.

Sakura does, tripping over her words in her haste to get the whole sorry story over with for, hopefully, the very first and the very last time. It's worse than having to talk to Hatake-sensei because, in a weird way, he was far more encouraging as they'd talked it out.

Ino is like a wall.

She gives absolutely nothing away as Sakura rambles, trying to fill the silence with—not with excuses, those have never worked with Ino, ever, but with an explanation. She explains how she hadn't known and hadn't realized and that if Hatake-sensei hadn't taken her pouches… well, she doesn't know what they'd be doing because they wouldn't be here right now, like this.

Her apologies are interlaced with the rest of her story, even as she tells Ino about everything, absolutely everything, that she and Hatake-sensei had talked about and how he'd made her pick her own punishment for what she could have done. Ino gets a rambling treatise on how Sakura's been a terrible teammate in so, so many ways and how, as she winds down, Sakura tells her what she decided upon as her punishment, how she's going to be Ino's protector, her guardian from now on, and how that's what she and Hatake-sensei had just been talking about and how he'd told her that she could tell however much or little as she wanted to Ino.

Then, because she's run out of words that aren't apologies, Sakura falls silent. Everything else she can think of to say all boils down to begging Ino to talk to her, to say something, and Ino can't stand when people beg.

I guess I'll be finding out if Ino can stand people who almost, could have, gotten her killed, Sakura thinks. Is it a curse on Team Seven? Naruto got a hole punched through him, thanks to Sasuke. Kakashi-sensei and Sasuke were going to try and put holes in each other up on the hospital roof until I got between them and now…

Now she's the one that could have put a hole through her teammate. The only thing Sakura really has going for her is that it wasn't a deliberate decision on any level and that she never even got so far as drawing a weapon.

The other members of Team Seven can't claim that.

Thank goodness for that, she thinks, grateful again that Ino is just fine. Even if she never, ever forgives me, she'll be around to be angry and that's…

A precious gift.

"Let me get this straight," Ino says finally. "You could have accidentally killed or injured me but didn't because Hatake-sensei thought ahead and neutralized a potential threat before it ever materialized and then, as your punishment, you've decided to make yourself my protector. Specifically, my protector while I'm helpless or incapacitated."

Er.

Put that way, it really does sound—

"I thought it made sense?" Sakura says a bit meekly.

She is the worst tiger ever.

Ino starts laughing.

For a horrible, panicked moment, Sakura thinks that Ino is laughing because she's so not okay with everything that the only thing to do is laugh. Then, as Ino keeps laughing, Sakura realizes that she knows this laughter.

And her heart sinks all over again because—because Sakura doesn't know what this laughter means for her. Ino is laughing because she is genuinely, completely, thoroughly amused. That very purity is the reason for its scarcity. Ino is rarely pure anything, Sakura has come to know.

I can't tell if that's good for me or not. I don't know what to do or how to fix sheer, unadulterated mirth.

Sakura doesn't laugh, just waits it out no more patiently than she's waited out all of Hatake-sensei's silences. She hates waiting.

Perversely, when the laughter does die, Sakura misses it. While it had been on-going, at least, she didn't have to—

No. No, I want to be stronger, that means I have to face this, whatever Ino decides to do. I just wish I knew why she was laughing.

"If you'd killed me, my dad would never have forgiven you or Hatake-sensei," Ino says conversationally, into the silence Sakura had been too scared to break. As Ino talks, she gathers up the papers and pens she'd been using for her weird brain math. "My Clan would probably have never forgiven you. Probably not the Nara or Akimichi ones either.

"But since that didn't happen…"

Ino shrugs and stands.

Sakura stands too, a little desperate, because Ino is leaving and—

Ino studies her with blue eyes that Sakura can't read the thoughts behind. "My knight in shining armour, huh?" she says, in a tone of voice Sakura doesn't understand, once she's looked her fill.

It's a slight difference but, right now, Sakura is acutely aware of the fact that Ino is that ever so small bit taller than she is.

Then, Ino flicks her on the forehead. "I'm going to go talk to Hatake-sensei," she says, turning away. "Don't wait up for me."

Then she's gone and Sakura… Sakura doesn't know what to make of that.