Chapter Text
One way or another, mostly through Naruto’s cajoling, they finally got their first C-rank mission. Sakura doubted the Third Hokage would have given them the task, no matter how indulgent he was to Naruto, unless he felt they were ready to take the bridge builder to his village. Or at least Kakashi-sensei was.
Tazuna wasn’t a princess by any means but Naruto would finally be getting the escort mission he wanted. Sakura herself couldn’t help but be a little excited about the prospect of travel.
They would be going outside the village together for the first time. To be fair, this was Sakura’s first time going outside the Konoha borders. She had wandered around the forests surrounding the village proper, had even gone over the intimidating walls when no one was looking but she hadn’t ever strayed too far. And Fire Country was big and sprawling, even beyond Konoha’s borders.
There was a calling in her. To see what was beyond these borders, beyond any borders. Sakura knew their family had been nomads, before the shinobi nations had even formed, and some time after that. At some point the Harunos had somewhat settled in Iron Country, though a lot of them still traveled. Life, and Death, called across the continent.
Sakura’s father too had been a monk of the Fire Temple, outside Konoha. Sakura had never actually met him, but from Mama’s stories knew he was a joyful man named Kizashi. Mama had met Papa while on her own pilgrimage away from the Haruno lands. She used to say she had fallen in love with the way he connected to nature around him. Sakura looked nothing like her father she was told, she was Haruno from the marrow of her bones to the tips of her hair, but they had that in common.
Haruno’s didn’t marry if they didn’t want to, and Mama had not, not that the monks’ vows would have allowed them. So a pregnant Mebuki had bid Kizashi a loving and cheerful goodbye, and had carried on her journey. Ultimately, she had enjoyed the climate of Fire Country too much to leave. She had settled at a local empty temple as its new caretaker.
Sakura was born, right here, in Konoha. One day, she hoped to die outside it.
“Alright, my precious students,” Kakashi said with a clap as they walked out of the tower, “Since this is your very first long mission outside Konoha, we will go to each of your houses today and I will supervise your packing.”
They would be leaving bright and early tomorrow morning. Sakura couldn’t wait.
They followed Sasuke to his house first. The young Uchiha himself looked the opposite of pleased. Shisui for his part had disappeared as soon as Kakashi-sensei had announced their route. Despite that, Sakura was kind of eager to see the inside of Uchiha District. When she was younger, when the massacre had resewn the fabric of her reality, she would walk as close as she dared to the district’s outer walls. Neither Mama nor Sakura knew what was done with the ashes after the Hokage and the council had decided to burn all the bodies, but she had never seen a single Uchiha ghost, other than Shisui, in the village. Not even around the edges of the district.
Sakura wondered if they were trapped in the district somewhere, tragedy alone streaking their souls onto what used to be clean tatami and wellkept cobblestone paths. She wanted to see how Sasuke lived with those ghosts, if there were any.
Sasuke had always been the elephant in the room since Sakura’s own awakening. She was desperately curious, but had been unwilling to actually try and get close to the other Uchiha boy in class when Shisui became uncharacteristically reticent whenever he was around.
They both awkwardly hovered around the truth, of what it would mean to talk to the other Uchiha. To learn what had really happened that night.
She didn’t know what she was expecting, but as Sasuke led them with a clipped pace to the heart of the district where the main house was located, all she noticed was how desolate the place was. No physical evidence remained of that night of course, but despite the lack of ghosts she could see, there was just an emptiness in the air. Like no one living had bothered to even come check in on the sole Uchiha, had opened any windows, sweeped the roads, in years.
The main house itself, a big and lonely, perhaps once lovely, structure, smelled like a bakery. Vanilla, soft and hazy in the air. Sakura knew it wouldn’t smell like that to anyone else. Maybe to them it smelled dusty, old. More likely, it smelled like fresh anger, aged grief.
She was about to follow Naruto and Kakashi-sensei to Sasuke’s room, when a voice stopped her cold in the hallway.
“Oh, dear.”
There was a woman, standing in the darkness where the daylight didn’t quite reach, in front of another imposing shogi door. First thing that struck Sakura was just how beautiful the woman was. Ethereal in a way, even beyond her faded form. Long sleek hair, Uchiha black even in death. High cheekbones, delicately arched brows.
Once you started looking for it the resemblance was unmistakable. Sakura was standing frozen across from Sasuke’s mother.
Rather unkindly, she wondered if Sasuke’s resentment alone could have shackled her to this place.
When the rest of the team reappeared, packing finished efficiently in a matter of minutes as expected from Sasuke, the woman had already disappeared between the shogi doors. What happened here?
She took her little cat skull out of her pocket by habit as she joined the boys, the bone was warm from the heat of her body, surface smooth to the touch as always. It was a brittle little thing, light enough to carry around if she was careful, yet something incredibly heavy and ancient in the empty grooves of the eye sockets. The cat offered no answers.
Naruto was next. Her confusion grew as they walked further and further into the civilian sector of the village. Sakura herself lived close by, though more on the outskirts closer to the forest, but she hadn’t known he lived around here, passing the border between the actual civilian sector and what the locals called the Uzushio Quarter, as scattered as it was.
Sakura had never been close to Naruto while they were in the academy. He was loud, which Sakura didn’t really mind after becoming friends with the other particularly loud blonde in their year, but he could be obnoxious. Then again what child hadn’t been annoying one way or another. The other children very pointedly ignored him, though Iruka-sensei had always been nice, so Sakura had assumed it was a ninja thing she didn’t understand and had let it go.
She hadn’t thought further about the ostracization until it was staring her right in the face when they were out in the town together doing missions. It wasn’t just the children, and it wasn’t dumb schoolyard bullying. It had been jarring at first to see other adults respond to Naruto with sneers, even the ghost so beloved to her scoffing when he walked by. It still baffled her.
At least, as they walked further into the older neighborhoods, less and less people glanced up. Older civilians simply did not care who they were and what ninja did.
Another thing that became clearer as they reached the apartment Naruto was staying in, right in the middle of Uzuhio Quarter, was a ghost.
Naruto, had a ghost and a half.
No, that wasn’t entirely right.
At this point Sakura was familiar with ghosts of all kinds, all ages, all deaths. Some echoes, some impressions. Naruto’s, if it was a ghost, was something she hadn’t ever seen before. It didn’t always appear, though there were sections of Konoha the apparition grew stronger with no rhyme or reason. Sometimes around training fields, sometimes in the market. Around the Hokage Tower, especially. Here, as they stood in the barebones apartment, Sakura could almost make out the shape of a woman, standing over Naruto. It felt hot. She breathed in, and her tongue burned.
But, there was another one too, half an impression.
It didn’t have a shape, but it made Sakura imagine pretty swirls carved into skin, into walls, when she closed her eyes. It didn’t have a sound, but she knew there was a voice, just trapped somewhere it couldn’t reach her ears as if she was submerged in water. Trapped, in a 12 year old boy who more than made up for the volume.
Kakashi-sensei seemed surprised but pleased that Naruto had everything necessary to go on a long term mission outside Konoha. Frankly, his kunai were more numerous and in better condition than the few ones Sakura had gotten with her first D-rank paycheck. Naruto bragged about how they have been a gift from the Third. Though it was Iruka-sensei who drilled into his head how to take care of his weapons.
“It was hard to get used to it at first but now the routine helps me focus,” he said, prompting a hair ruffle in praise from Kakashi-sensei.
“A basic well-maintained weapon kit is essential, and perhaps one day you will have your signature weapons to take care of as well,” sensei smiled.
A signature weapon. Huh, now that was an idea.
“Do you have parents, Sakura-chan?” Kakashi asked, gentle as he could. As far as he knew his remaining student was a civilian, had a loving home with well-adjusted parents, but they lived in a harsh harsh world he knew better than most. Hell, his other students knew that. He didn’t want to assume anything about Sakura, and put his foot in his mouth.
“Yes, Mama should be home at this hour.”
“And your father?”
“Never met him,” she shrugged with ease. Okay, so maybe his little civilian also had her own baggage. It would only be fitting, for someone on Team 7.
“You live in a shrine?” Naruto gasped excitedly, as soon as the building came into sight over the narrow stone stairs they were climbing.
“Mama is the shrine maiden,” Sakura grinned back at him, “I wanted to be one too when I grew up.”
An attainable dream, rather peaceful one. He couldn’t help but ask, “What made you decide to become a ninja then, Sakura-chan?”
“There are questions in this world, Kakashi-sensei,” she replied, still smiling, “That I can only answer through steel and blood, not prayer.”
This kid.
Sakura bowed once when they reached the gates, the team following after her. When he raised from his bow Kakashi noticed a short woman sweeping further up the walkway.
Now he could see Sakura’s outfit was a miniature version of her mother’s, color scheme the same as miko's, brilliant red and pure white, though cut differently in a way it wouldn’t hinder shinobi movement. The woman’s strawberry blonde hair was tightly tied behind her in strings, unlike her daughter’s loose pink braid.
Kakashi was terrible at talking to other human beings on a good day, but Haruno Mebuki as she introduced herself, was not a ninja, which made this even a trickier conversation to have. As if the woman could divine Kakashi’s inner dilemma she smiled at the kids and said, “Why don’t you boys let Sacchan show you the grounds, while I talk to you teacher?”
Kakashi nodded, relieved, “We will do the packing after.”
He watched the kids immediately run off as he recalled the bell test. He hadn’t been expecting much, but had had a vague idea what to challenge them on. Admittedly he hadn’t kept up with Naruto, too scared to even think about Minato-sensei, but it was hard not to hear about the boy in the jounin grapevine. Genma could be annoying that way. It had been easy, too easy, to use his rashness against him. A warning that guts alone couldn’t win fights. Sasuke, he knew, would have solid Uchiha taijutsu and ninjutsu foundations at least, but too much pride, and would need humbling.
He had the least idea of his civilian student. There had been a blurb about her potentially being adept at genjutsu in her academy file. But he could have never expected what he got when he actually put Sakura under a genjutsu. He knew she was under it, he could feel the technique latch onto her chakra. And yet.
“Oh,” she had said, calm as you please, walking towards the genjutsu construct Sasuke bleeding on the ground. Kakashi was ready to consider her a failure, when she had looked up and murmured, “All these different wounds, Hatake-san, they are not supposed to bleed the same.”
If she was aware this was in fact a genjutsu she didn’t bother dispelling it. Kakashi watched stunned, as the girl turned her back on a teammate and walked away back into the clearing. Her willingness to work with the team had put him at ease later on, she was friendly, she seemed to like Sasuke and Naruto, but Kakashi couldn't entirely forget the way she had given him the chills.
He didn’t know how to articulate his confusion, or worry, to the girl’s non-ninja mother. At the end he mumbled something about Sakura saying strange things sometimes, and asked if she had any ninja ancestry, or someone around previously who might have shown her things she wouldn’t have otherwise seen.
“Oh, don’t worry,” the woman reassured him, green eyes the exact shade of her daughter’s alight with humor, “Sacchan just has a very active imagination.”
Kakashi couldn’t help but feel like he was the one being laughed at.
While Kakashi-sensei was busy talking to Mama, Sakura tugged on the boys' wrists as she ran towards the dark forest behind the shrine, through a path laden with sakaki trees. Sasuke was quick to shake her off when she slowed down, but Naruto shyly slipped his hands into hers.
She squeezed his hand once to let him know it was okay, and Naruto squeezed back, a blinding grin taking over his face. His hand was warm, she could feel his heartbeat steady and strong through the contact. Ba-bump ba-bump ba-bump. Alive. Sakura liked holding onto him.
Sakura finally let go of Naruto’s hand to wash her arms at the natural stone basin with the wooden ladle resting against it. Naruto, eagerly but awkwardly mimicked her motions. Sasuke didn’t seem inclined until both of them staring at him expectantly made him huff and wash his own.
They stood in front of a statue, in between two trees bowed over it, thick trunks strung with shimenawa. Though the stone was so weathered by age you couldn’t tell which god it had once belonged to. It didn’t matter.
Sakura believed in no gods as she believed in all.
She bowed twice, clapped twice, before bringing her hands together in silent prayer. Naruto once again followed her without question. He was murmuring something in prayer though it was low enough that Sakura couldn’t make out what he was saying. This time, Sasuke refused to follow their actions and stood to the side with a scoff.
“Do not be rude, Sasuke-kun,” she tutted, “If you ever need to ask for grace one day, you want someone to answer.”