"Please tell me never to visit your house ever again," Sakura groaned as she held her face in her hands. Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "You asked for it, didn't you?" he replied. The two casually strolling to the training grounds. Sakura had insisted on picking up Shikamaru from his house, in hopes of meeting his family and introducing herself. She had told him that as a future Hokage, she had to be well-acquinted with everyone in the village. She was well-known amongst the civilians so that was no problem. The only problem were the Shinobi. She found the chance to establish a relationship with the Nara clan and had seized the chance. "So you're telling me that you befriended me for the sake of establishing connections?" he had asked. Sakura had looked at him quizzically. He seemed serious as he stared at her intently. "No, I befriended you coz I wanted to, establishing connections comes at a benefit. Besides, if it was really my intentions then I wouldn't have told you in the first place," she had assured him. He had looked at her with blank expression before turning to look at the sky.

"Your mom is..." she was at loss of words. Saying she was talkative was rude but saying she wasn't would be lying. "She's one of a kind," she said finally. "She's troublesome," he drawled. "Yeah, that," she agreed. It felt weird, she felt like she was gossiping about his mom. "We're not gossiping, just stating facts," he told her, as though he had read her mind. "So how far are you in your plans to become Hokage?" the Nara heir asked her. "Well, I'm training with my team everyday but barely train with Kakashi-sensei. I'm mostly by myself," she said. "The scroll that Jiraiya-sama gave me showed the introduction of fuinjutsu but it's limited so I don't know much except how to create my own seal, the basic one of sealing things in a scroll," she continued. "I tried to establish connections with Shino Aburame but he was too quiet, we didn't have a conversation for long. I tried talking to Kiba Inuzuka but he called me Naruto's girlfriend so I punched him in his face-" "You punched the heir apparent of the Inuzuka clan?" he asked her. "Kinda," she said with a nervous smile. "I apologized though," she defended quickly. "Uh huh." She pouted.

"I also tried talking to Hinata of the Hyuga clan but when I mentioned that I was Naruto's teammate, she blushed like crazy and fainted. She has a serious crush on my idiot best friend," she narrated. "Naruto's really your best friend?" he asked. They had arrived at training ground one. "Yeah, we've been friends since we were five years old," she told him as they sat under a large baobab tree. She took out a scroll and released the seal, the shogi board coming into existence with a loud poof. "You kinda don't seem like it," the Nara said as he watched her set up the board. "Really?" she asked as she stared at the shogi board, making sure that every piece was in place. "You're always hitting him, you reject him on dates countless times, you act like he's a pest to you," he told her truthfully. The pinkette stared at him. "Hmm. Well, we've always been like that," she replied as she moved her first piece. "How so?" he asked as he moved his. "In our generation, our parents told us to stay from him because he's cursed, especially civilians. But whenever I saw Naruto around town, I didn't see any of that. I saw a lost kid looking for attention. Plus the only time I saw him smile was when he either pulled a prank or looked at me," she narrated. Shikamaru raised an eyebrow in question. "Ino's the one who told me that. She said that the only person Naruto ever smiled to was me. I felt bad for not befriending him seeing how he wanted to befriend me. I don't know what the adults know about him but it's not his fault," she said. "You can't blame a five year old orphan for something they didn't choose," she growled out. "Uh huh, keep your temper in check otherwise you might break the shogi board," he said with a yawn. Sakura looked down at her hands, she was gripping the shogi board. She chuckled in embarrassment. "Sorry," she apologized.

"Eventually, I decided to approach Naruto and we hit off immediately. Ino didn't like him as she felt he was stealing her best friend so I played with them separately. I tried to have them play together but it ended up in a disaster. So Naruto was my guy best friend and Ino my girl best friend," she went on. "But when I told Ino that I had a crush on Sasuke, she was mad that I wanted to steal him. And so I broke off our friendship. I was always hiding in her shadow but I wanted to be me. I feel bad though, she was a great friend. I miss her," the pinkette said with a faraway look in her eyes. "I messed up pretty bad," she said more to herself than him. "Then go and apologize to her," the lazy genius said with an eye roll. "It's not that easy. She's gonna be smug about it. I'll wait a few years until she's mature," she retorted. "I'm training with you in strategizing -" she felt his intense gaze that she stopped talking. "What?" she asked cluelessly. "You trusting me to handle your strategizing training?" he drawled out. "Of course, why not?" she replied. "I'm the laziest person in our generation, if not the village. You should be training with someone who's hardworking, not me," he told her with a slight frown. Oh, that. He felt uncertain, she thought. "I would feel that way considering I knew how lazy I was," Inner commented in her head. "I guess you're right. You're not cut out for this at all," she said as she began to gather the shogi pieces together. She watched his eyes widen out of the corner of her eye. Uncertainty and fear were in his eyes. "I guess I should look for someone else," she spoke as she sealed it in her scroll. She looked at him, waiting for him to speak.

But he was stubborn, refusing to meet her eyes. She stood up to leave. Shikamaru opened his mouth to speak but then closed it, as if reconsidering his words. 'I was hoping he could tell me a stupid excuse for us to keep playing,' she thought in disappoinment. "Farewell," she said as she walked away. The Nara watched her leave, mentally cursing himself for even bringing it up in the first place.

"Geez, what's gotten you in a sour mood?" Naruto asked as Team 7 made their way to the Hokage Tower to get their mission. He received silence in return. "Sakura, what's wrong?" he asked again but received a long-drawn sigh. "Saku-" "If she doesn't want to speak about it then let her be," Sasuke snapped as he glared at the blonde. Naruto stick his tongue out at him but otherwise didn't speak anymore. "It's been two weeks already. He hasn't made a move to talk to me," she muttered to herself but her teammates heard it. "Well, you haven't made a move to talk to him either," Inner replied. "I guess, but it's the guy who always makes the first move in the novels," she replied, not catching her teammates who were giving her weird expressions. "But you're not in a novel and you're not romantically involved with each other," Inner spoke. "Yes but I thought maybe..." "You are aware that we can hear what you're telling yourself, right?" Sasuke told her. Sakura looked sheepish and her face was tinged pink. She muttered a quick apology. She remained quiet throughout the rest of the journey.

"We want a real mission old man!" Naruto exclaimed as he pointed a finger at the Third Hokage. "Have respect for Lord Third baka!" Sakura seethed as she sent him a death glare but Naruto remained unshaken. "I don't approve of the dobe's approach but we are now fit for taking C-rank missions, not chasing around cats and removing weeds," Sasuke spoke. Hiruzen watched the genins stare at him with determination in their postures, though Sakura was absent-minded. "What about you Sakura?" he asked her. She looked at him surprised. "What do you think?" he asked. Kakashi had informed him of her dream, to become Hokage. He had been surprised. She was a civilian and there had never been any ninja in her family, with the exception of Kizashi Haruno who didn't go beyond genin. She hadn't received any ninja training prior to starting at the Academy and her chakra levels were low, as expected of a civilian. All in all, the odds were against her and knowing she was smart, Hiruzen knew there must've been a reason why she wanted to become the leader of the Hidden Leaf Village. Plus there had never been a female Hokage before, it was a first.

"Well, keeping us locked in the village will not protect us from the harsh life of a shinobi. In the Third Shinobi War, children as young as seven years old were sent to the war. They were promoted early to chunin and jounin, some even made ANBU by the time they were ten years old-" Sasuke stiffened at that. "-mostly because we were in need of manpower. Now, we are not in a war but there has always been tension between the Hidden Villages that we cannot be sure what will happen. One of the villages might attack us. As such we must always be prepared for any situation. Going on missions outside the village despite being D-rank means we are bound to encounter enemies. This will train and equip us with the mentality that is required for a ninja to have in order to protect their lives and their village. One way or another, there will always be a threat lurking in the shadows. We have people like Orochimaru, one of the Legendary Sannin, who became a rogue ninja. Who knows what he's plotting against the village? So I think it's wise if we were to start taking high rank missions," she finished. Hiruzen nodded. "What if you encounter ninja who will overpower you? Perhaps you will escape at the cost of one of your teammate's lives or even yours, what will you do then?" he asked. Sakura remained quiet for a while.

"Then we'll have to make sure it doesn't happen."

Hope you enjoy this chapter! Thank you for your reviews. Read and review.

Tozoonana

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