Chapter Text
Sakura knew she wasn’t ready.
The chunin exams were notoriously brutal, even within the relative safety of Konoha’s walls. Sakura had been a genin for several months already, but her training thus far had mostly consisted of watching her teammates spar and handing them water bottles at their request. She was the scorekeeper for Sasuke and Naruto’s great rivalry, a referee but with none of the power. Her greatest accomplishments to speak of were climbing up a tree that one time and being an emotional support in times of distress. In the way of ninjutsu, she knew next to nothing.
Normally, this would have been enough to deter Sakura from stepping foot onto the exam grounds. She hated, absolutely hated not knowing things. The slow, creeping realization that she knew next to nothing about being a ninja had been building since the Wave mission, instilling a panic in her that she didn’t quite know what to do with. Sakura had spent hours in the Konoha library trying to research techniques, which proved to be frustratingly fruitless. Everything useful was deeply classified, or not written down at all due to Konoha’s paranoid clan traditions. For a clanless student fresh out of the Academy, even getting her foot through the door seemed nigh impossible.
They had been told it was an individual decision. Naruto and Sasuke had predictably jumped at the chance to become chunin, both eager to prove themselves. But Sakura knew from the way Kakashi’s lone eye had landed on her that this was a lie. Konoha placed great importance on group cooperation, exemplified by both the genin exams and the entire system of teams. It didn’t take a genius to realize Kakashi was testing them. No, not them. Her.
And herein lay Sakura Haruno’s current predicament. Her gut, which had been tensed in fear ever since the Waves mission, was screaming at her not to go. Something bad is going to happen , Inner hissed, and you’re not ready for it . Sakura willed her feet to move. You can’t protect them, so why even try .
She knew that. She knew she was weak and underprepared and feeble. She knew what the smart thing to do was, what the safe thing to do was. But as she was caught between her teammates gazes, eyes filled with hope and determination, she found herself unable to take that step away. Helpless.
“I’ll do it.”
Kakashi smiled at her from behind his mask and gave her a quick nod of approval. She’d passed the first test of many. Naruto whooped in joy and Sasuke went back to playing disinterested. Sakura forced a smile and ducked out of the way of Naruto’s flailing arms, mind racing with terrifying scenarios. She could do this , she assured herself, as long as she had a team . And even the chunin exams weren’t capable of taking that away, right?
The only answer she got was the bitter taste in her mouth.
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Sakura stared at her paper, her mind spiraling. There was no way they were passing this. Of all the terrible scenarios her brain had concocted for this occasion, none of them involved a written exam.
The challenge here was not answering the questions (they were challenging, but Sakura wasn’t the top scoring kunoichi in her grade for nothing), it was figuring out a way to get the answers to Naruto. That’s cheating! Her brain helpfully supplied. It was cheating, and it went against every moral code she had, but she couldn’t think of any other way they were going to make it. Sasuke seemed unbothered so far, although she couldn’t tell if it was his special brand of arrogance or simple calm under pressure. Naruto, on the other hand, seemed to be in the throes of a mental breakdown, and was currently holding his head in his hands and muttering to himself. Sakura felt a little bit like doing the same.
On their way up they had been met with genjutsu, gossip, and a human tornado in a green jumpsuit. Sakura hadn’t known what to expect, but this was not it. And now she had to compromise her standards and her perfect record in order to pass this first phase. She elected to put her head in her hands as well, and stared at the blank where the tenth question should be. But that isn’t really the problem, is it? Inner crooned, You’re still not committed. You’re scared.
Sakura dug her fingers into her hair. Despite her earlier assertion to her teammates, she was not in fact ready to do this. She wanted… well she didn’t know what she wanted. She wanted to be a teammate that others could count on. She wanted to be safe at home eating her mom’s chicken noodle soup. She wanted the image of Sasuke lying still, his body riddled with senbon out of her mind. She wanted Naruto to never have that look in his eyes again. To see his body sag with despair and his eyes filled with red rage.
Sakura recalled earlier, when she had pointed out the genjutsu on the stairwell, and Naruto looked at her in awe.
“I’m proud of you, Sakura.”
She looked up as the proctor gave a five minute warning, running her hands through her hair. To her surprise, Naruto was no longer shaking or muttering, but looking back at her and giving a thumbs up. He winked and she could hear his voice in her head, telling her to “believe it”. Sakura returned the gesture. She could do that, at the very least. She could believe in him.
She smiled and put her pencil down. And when the tenth question was announced, an all or nothing question, she stayed firmly in her seat, hands never once moving up in defeat.