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Chapter Text

Team Seven has always been a glorified mess, Sakura surmises.

With one member being the sole heir and survivor of the Uchiha clan, another being a potential bomb that constantly threatened the safety of the village should the fuse go off, the last being a civilian girl that didn't quite exhibit admirable traits of a shinobi until much later, and a sensei that was a born and raised war weapon - it didn't take much to be feared, admired, and pitied all at the same time.

A team with a bond so fragile it broke years before it could've developed into something more, yet still withstood the passage of time, all things considered.

Being the only average person in their group of mismatched children (including Kakashi, who never had time to grow up) and the only one that had a penchant for common sense, hadn't been easy. The pure excitement that she'd had when she first found out she'd be in a team with the boy she liked had been snuffed out rather harshly in the wake of their first C-rank mission.

Naruto was dimwitted and impulsive, but he had a determination in his bones that couldn't be taken from him no matter who tried. Sasuke had been brooding and selfish, but he was a genius in his own right, one who never shied away from training until he could no longer stand. The two, with all their flaws, had done far more to help than useless little Sakura who had nothing going for her but her brain. Her brain, which had proved utterly useless in the face of death as her knees buckled and her throat struggled to contain her sobs.

Sakura, growing up, had been more emotionally charged and less objective. It was hilariously easy for her to come to the decision that she could go with her murderous teammate on his homicidal adventure and leave everything else she cared about in the village that raised her. As if that wasn't enough, she also willingly spent years acquiescing to her other teammate's wish to chase after someone who was already long gone, as far as she was concerned. The same fruitless chase that almost cost them the lives of other precious comrades.

Haruno Sakura would've loved to say that, in her final moments, she had finally been able to catch up. Able to stand toe-to-toe with both Naruto and Sasuke and declare to the world that she had successfully gotten her team back after years upon grueling years of hard work and sheer willpower.

Fate, however, seems to always have a grim way with humor.

The choked laughter that escapes her lips the moment Sasuke's chidori connects with her flesh almost surprises her.

"Sakura-" She barely registers the way Naruto says her name, breathless and terrified.

Sakura wonders if his brief moment of hesitation is eating him alive.

Sasuke, to his credit, goes through a multitude of emotions in the span of a second, and Sakura almost chortles at the sheer absurdity of it all.

Years of hard work, she spits in her mind, and it hasn't changed anything. She doesn't know what possessed her to think it would.

She doesn't know what possessed her to even have a sliver of hope that Sasuke would tearfully back away and stutter out apologies that were long overdue - for the years they'd spent running after his shadow, the years they'd spent hoping he'd make good on a promise he never made - or the fact that he just literally tore through her body without the barest hint of remorse.

Naruto hesitated. Sakura wondered if there was ever a time he would've chosen her over his favorite teammate.

Sasuke stood his ground - ever the stoic, a deceitful thirst for vengeance she'd never quite understood roiling under his skin. It burnt so brightly, searing and all-consuming.

His mismatched eyes looked into hers without so much as a hint of the bond they once shared, fragile as it had been.

Sakura mourned - for her team, for Kakashi's desperate attempts to patch things up even when they always inevitably went to shit.

For every part of herself Sakura had decided to bury just to catch up.

All of it - just to catch up.

Naruto was always too early, Sasuke always too angry, Kakashi always too late.

And Sakura, always not enough.

In hindsight, Team Seven was just a clusterfuck of trauma and a bomb bigger than Naruto ever was.

Except it had always been fated to implode.

And always right in front of her face, it seems.

Sasuke wordlessly tears his hand out of her heart, and Sakura manages another laugh.

Shinobi were never meant to live long lives. As a medic, Sakura had been all too familiar with that fact. Her hands would bleed with blood not her own and it wouldn't stop at one - it happened too many times for her to count.

She just hadn't expected her death sentence to be spelled in the names of the two people she wouldn't hesitate to risk her life for.

Sakura never stopped to wonder what dying would feel like, and found out in the harshest way possible that it didn't hold a candle to the burning feeling of betrayal coursing down her throat.

The last thing she saw was Kakashi running towards her, his eyes wide in the most display of emotion she'd ever seen on his face.

The weight of Kakashi's despair and the broken yell he let out would've broken Sakura's heart, if Sasuke hadn't completely ripped it out.

Sakura hadn't let herself grieve in years, but this time, she allowed herself to.

-----

Sakura hadn't expected to open her eyes to a dark ceiling.

The Fourth Great Shinobi War had taken a lot of things from her, including a stable living space. It's been a long time since she last slept anywhere but the faux comfort of her tent.

'Slept' was a fine word to replace 'passing out'.

She finds herself blinking, the expression on her face undoubtedly flat, and she raises her hands from beneath the unusually heavy blanket draped over her body.

Two pale, stubby hands.

Sakura's heartbeat stutters.

She hasn't seen hands like these since her last civilian patient, a child that simply happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Unfortunately, it hadn't been part of Sakura's skillset to reconstruct a skull.

Bile rises in her throat and she haphazardly throws the covers aside, standing on her feet in minutes, and stumbling into a door that had looked to be the closest in this unfamiliar room.

Sakura doesn't pay any heed to the snarky voice in her head that whispers she's adequately familiar with the room because it was hers.

Civilian girl Haruno Sakura's room had been almost frighteningly pink, not like this. Dark, empty, almost without any signs of life aside from a closet and her futon.

The bathroom looks almost just as empty, and the weight in her chest mounts as she notes that her head barely passes the height of the sink.

Haruno Sakura recalls several moments of indignance in her life, amidst an even more staggering amount of close calls with death - of the absolute fury that raged in her veins.

It had never been pretty.

Even less so when she finds herself staring right into the mirror, with mint green eyes replaced with eerie black irises.

She has always regarded herself as someone with an explosive temper, but now, looking straight into the signature pitch black eyes of a certain teammate - she couldn't help but wonder if she'd been overestimating herself.

Because, boy, the Uchiha sure had an interesting way of manifesting the will of fire.

And if it showed in the cracked mirror, her somewhat mangled hands (so, so tiny in comparison to the ones she'd used to save whoever she possibly could in the war), and the distant panicked whispers that couldn't quite pierce through the ringing in her ears - well, that wasn't anyone's business.

At least she still had pink hair.

-----

She's been waking up to darkness for far too long that it almost seems like home, Sakura muses.

The dark ceiling meets her empty gaze once more. Except, this time, she doesn't bother raising her hands to look at them.

"Sakura?"

The voice is familiar, and she struggles to bury the fact that it sounds so much like her teammate's voice, back in their first years in the academy.

Sasuke had never been gentle.

"Are you awake?"

A face - the splitting image of her wayward friend - enters her field of vision. Sakura barely manages to suppress a response.

"I'll go tell mom, okay?" The boy mutters, his eyes wide with concern. Sakura's eyes follow his figure as he stumbles out of her room, but not without giving her a gentle pat on her head.

She wonders if fate simply had a bone to pick with her.

As if her fragile connection with Sasuke hadn't set her death in stone long before she'd become an adult.

Now, she's also become his family.

Fucking fantastic.

Sasuke comes back into the room a few moments later with a woman in tow, and Sakura turns to them silently.

Uchiha Mikoto is beautiful, much more so than how villagers had described her in the past, and she has a gentle look in her eyes that Sasuke had inherited through and through. Though, in her previous life, Uchiha Mikoto's eyes had faded, and Sasuke's had grown sharper like blades swinging at everything with indiscriminate rage.

Sakura takes a moment to breathe.

"Sakura, darling, how are you feeling?" Uchiha Mikoto asks, settling down beside her. She reaches out, and both Sakura's hand and mouth move before she could stop them.

She swats the hand away, retreating warily. "Who are you?"

She barely registers the fear in her voice, and her fists clench.

Haruno Sakura has always been a realist. It was harder to imagine a future and significantly easier to observe things as they are.

It isn't hard to figure out that she'd reincarnated as an Uchiha.

What she couldn't understand is why Sasuke (young, young Sasuke unmarred by the tragedy that was the history of the Hidden Leaf) is so concerned, so touchy with her. Apparently, this also translated to his mom. Sakura doesn't remember the Uchiha being so... friendly with one another.

A part of her wonders if Itachi would just pop up out of nowhere.

Before she could chuckle internally at the thought, she sees a figure crouched by the window slowly coming closer.

"Mom, how's our youngest doing? Shisui told me she had a panic attack."

Sakura had never seen Uchiha Itachi prior to Gaara's rescue, but Sasuke only ever had one sibling, the primary target of his blind thirst for revenge.

Sakura hears the same ringing in her ears that she'd felt in the bathroom, and she vaguely hears Sasuke's whispered, "Sakura, she's our mom."

The notion of family, Sakura muses, sure had a lovely way of introducing itself.

The ringing in her ears grows louder and it barely takes Sakura a second to pass out once again since becoming a member of the Uchiha.

And apparently, Sasuke and Itachi's youngest sibling.

Chapter Text

"Chakra exhaustion," the supervising medic says as she scrawls notes onto her clipboard. "Just make sure she rests for a week or two and she should recover just fine."

Uchiha Mikoto nods, her grip on Sakura's hand tightening.

Sakura had woken up to a more familiar environment this time - white ceiling, the stench of medicine, disinfectant and blood all the same, and the harsh sound of gurneys in the backdrop - but she still couldn't quite make sense of it all.

Uchiha Sakura.

Sakura can't help but think that it sounds wrong, not to mention horrible. It just doesn't fit. None of this reincarnation thing fits her measured analysis of what reality is supposed to be like, and it's throwing her for a loop.

Whilst she had been barely conscious, Sakura could barely hear the hushed voices of her new... family all around her.

"What happened, Mom?" She hears Itachi murmur, worry almost palpable in his tone. "I'm sorry I got home late, but my mission went wrong at some point, so it took me a bit longer."

Sakura, in her haze, remembers the wounds on Itachi's face in the split-second she'd met his eyes.

"I'm not sure either," Uchiha Mikoto says, and Sakura feels soft hands touching her forehead. "Sasuke was the one who found her first. When I got to her, she was already bleeding and hyperventilating." A pause. "I'm hesitant to replace the mirror. Would it be safe?"

Sakura recalls the doctor's words. Chakra exhaustion, he'd said. She would've giggled if she didn't feel like she just got run over.

"The doctor mentioned chakra exhaustion, Mom," Sasuke's voice whispers, hoarse and dry, like he hadn't stopped crying until recently. "What does that mean?"

The silence in the room is almost deafening. Sakura wonders just how old she is, but she can't be more than five. A child, going through chakra exhaustion, at five years old. Oh, Ino would never let her live this down.

Ino, who fought alongside her in the war, with muddled eyes and ragged breaths. The large hole in her torso had been almost impossible to cure, and Sakura remembers the way her heart almost stopped the moment she'd seen Ino - always stubborn, headstrong Ino - fall to her knees.

"Mom, Sakura's crying!" Sasuke's voice gets closer, and he sounds like he's choking on his tears somehow. "Why is she crying?"

Why, indeed.

Another chance at life and without any of the people she'd held close to her barely beating heart.

---

If Sakura had to count the days she'd been stuck with an Uchiha the past weeks with her hands and feet, she wouldn't have enough fingers.

Sasuke is the one that's almost always there. Despite all the worry in Mikoto's eyes, at the very least, she recognizes that Sakura needs some space. Young Sasuke has about as much emotional intelligence as a goldfish, but he has a big heart (Sakura wonders where it had gone the first time around).

Itachi visits the least often, but when he does, he always comes home bearing gifts for both his siblings. Sasuke would get toys in blue, and Sakura in pink, and she snorted at Itachi the first time he handed her a pink plush toy.

Mikoto and Sasuke's faces both lit up at the sound, as if they'd seen an angel descend right before their very eyes. Itachi's smile had gotten softer, and Sakura never even thought Itachi had the capacity to smile.

After that, they kept giving her pink things, as if she loved them.

(She doesn't remember if she did.)

Uchiha Fugaku would occasionally come by, but all he'd do was stare at her, nod, and briskly walk away. Sakura thinks that her new father is like the embers in the wind, bright and fiery, but disappears just as soon as he arrives.

Perhaps he doesn't know how to take care of a daughter, she thinks. Sakura supposes that it could happen when he only ever had to raise Itachi, and then both Sakura and Sasuke came along. One very emotional boy, quick to tears and laughter - and one emotionally detached little girl with an ever-present hazy look in her eyes.

It hasn't been more than a month since she'd come to live in this timespace, but Sakura thinks that living in the midst of war feels easier than being loved. She doesn't know what this aspect of her says about her exactly, but it shouldn't be all that good. Unfortunately, therapy never was an option when every second of your life is spent in the crippling fear of everyone else dying before you.

Her entire family has been fussing over her for this exact reason. Sakura hasn't spoken a word after waking up in the hospital, mainly due to her stubborn streak that - of course - had to carry over to her second shot at life. It was the Uchiha that had caused her to lose so much of the things she'd loved, at some point, even herself. And yet the primary culprit of said trauma turned out to be just like any other kid his age - playful, sweet, and caring. If someone told Sakura that Sasuke had also been capable of something as pure as love in her previous life, she would've laughed herself to death.

Anyhow, the irony isn't lost on her. The former love of her life, later her mortal enemy - now her sweet, sweet brother who barges into her room whenever he could, hands full with dango just as sugary as his smile.

Sakura never had a brother, never had anyone love her as wholeheartedly as her current family.

She doesn't know how to feel, so she doesn't.

"Sakura!" Sasuke yells as he slides the door open. "I helped Mom in the kitchen today!" He bounds over to her with a big smile on his face. "Uh, it looks kinda ugly, but I swear it tastes good. I tried it earlier. Can you try some, too?"

Sakura does a double-take at the pleading look in her brother's eyes.

And she snickers.

This Sasuke's eyes look like constellations.

(Sakura couldn't be sure, but she remembers that Sasuke's eyes looking more like specks of a black hole.)

"Sa..." She begins, hesitantly, and suddenly the boy's face is an inch too close. Sakura scowls and shoves his face away. "Sasuke! Space."

Her brother laughs like the universe is in his hands. "You said my name! We're twins again!"

Itachi walks through the door, taking a moment to poke both Sasuke and Sakura's foreheads. "You've always been twins, little brother."

Twins. Even in this life, her fate is intertwined with Sasuke's. Just in a way she never would've expected.

Sakura denies the warmth rising in her chest.

Family. What a nice fantasy.

---

There are times when Sakura would look into the mirror, and Sasuke's head would magically appear beside hers, also staring at his reflection.

"We look quite different, don't we?" He says, grinning from ear to ear. "I look more like mom, and you look more like dad! But, you know, in a girl way."

Sakura rolls her eyes and pushes at his cheek. "Leave me alone. You look better, I get it."

"No, no," he laughs. "I mean you look pretty, but you also look, um, what's that word? Ser... Sey..."

"Serious?" Sakura supplies.

"Mhm!" Sasuke walks over to Sakura's bed, plopping down on it. The covers Sakura had just cleaned up once again looking like a dog jumped all over them. She frowns, and her mood flies over her brother's head completely. "You look really serious most of the time. Other family members asked me about it, you know? They asked if something bad happened."

Sakura pauses. "And what did you say?"

Her brother sits up with a small groan. "Um, nothing? You've always been like that. You usually don't say anything. It's just..." He hesitates, looking at her. "Mom says you can use chakra really well, but since we're kids, you don't have enough to, um... use? So we're worried you'll use it accidentally and we'd have to go to the hospital again."

In Sakura's silence, Sasuke murmurs, "I don't like seeing you in the hospital."

Sakura blinks. "You won't."

Not this soon, at least.

"But you punched the mirror last time!" Sasuke cries out, squishing his face against her very pink pillow. "I saw you..."

It's at times like this that Sakura's at a loss for words. She's never been too fond of children - much less a child with the same identity as her murderer. She doesn't know what to say to ease his worries, doesn't know how to promise she'd never get hurt or break down.

Sniffling, she resorts to sitting beside him and awkwardly patting his back.

The words escape her before she could even remotely think about them.

"I'll ask Father to train me."

---

Now, chakra usage has always been Sakura's expertise.

Chakra control, at some point, came as easy as cutting onions, though not as torturous. However, at that time, Sakura had to learn how to work around her meager chakra reserves, and it's easier to redirect a river in comparison to attempting to move an ocean. It's not her fault the ocean wouldn't budge. She sighs.

"Sakura, focus," Fugaku says sternly, staring at her.

Sakura purses her lips. She wants to talk back and say that she is, in fact, focusing. It's perfectly reasonable to fumble about when she spent years controlling a puddle and now, all of a sudden, she has to gather enough to form a puddle from a vast pool.

Most days, Sakura doesn't see much of a difference between her current family and her previous one. Today is not one of those days.

Being born as an Uchiha means she has more than a modicum of chakra in her arsenal. It has only been a few minutes since her father started to train her (after many, many attempts at persuasion), but of course, Uchiha Fugaku would be a strict teacher.

In spite of her rising temper, Sakura shakes her head, plants her feet on the gravel, and inhales.

---

Fugaku has never seen fire so pure.

As the father to both Sasuke and Itachi, as well as being the head of the Uchiha, he's seen more than a handful of lauded geniuses. Itachi and Shisui can be counted amongst such, and even Sasuke has shown promise, though he could never tell his son how proud he is of him.

Sakura's flames burnt strong and hot, reaching levels much higher than even Sasuke's. Fugaku blinked, sensing only the smallest amount of change in her chakra.

He turns to her, fighting tooth and nail to keep his face straight. "Are you holding back?"

His cute, dearest, young daughter tilts her head. "How much am I supposed to use, Father?"

Fugaku takes a moment to think, then nods. "However much you think could be utilized in a real fight without losing ground."

"Understood, Father."

In a second, Sakura forms the seals with unusual ease, takes in a deep breath, and breathes fire just the way he taught her.

The flames billow over the lake, stubborn and unwavering, much larger than the first time. Fugaku lets loose a breath as he feels the heat dance over the exposed skin of his arms.

"Good work, Sakura."

He watches the fire burn bright as the sun sets around the image, and fails to notice just how quickly she understood his words.

Sakura pauses, letting her hands fall at her sides.

"Mm."

Chapter Text

"Sakura, come on, now," Mikoto's voice reaches Sakura's ears. "Breakfast is going to get cold if you don't wake up soon. Come on up, dear." She rests her hand on Sakura's shoulder, nudging her gently.

"Just... a few more minutes, Mother," Sakura mumbles, nuzzling into the comfort of her pillow.

The sunlight leaks through the window pane, the rays hot on her face. She grumbles under her breath before turning away, just to feel the heat on her back instead. The discomfort almost drives her crazy, and she flips onto her back, sighing.

Mikoto chuckles when she sees the way her daughter's face scrunches up. "My, your father did not go easy on your training, did he?"

Sakura hums in response, dragging her blanket over her face.

Whoever said fathers were especially gentle to their daughters was lying. She's been training with Fugaku for a week or so, and instead of lightening the load, he seems to think that putting more pressure on her - literally and figuratively - would better set the foundation for her growth as a shinobi. Or, as an Uchiha. Sakura supposes it can go both ways.

Ah yes, she whispers in her head, the principle of overloading to stretch one out to the best of their capabilities - to break, heal, then get stronger.

There's a begrudging sense of amusement that she holds for her father's way of teaching, and Sakura isn't sure if she should feel honored that he thinks her worthy of such attention or if she should be upset that she's not being treated like his precious little treasure.

Then again, the common sense belonging to any Uchiha isn't really all that logical.

Sakura feels the bed dip, and she allows Mikoto to pat her head.

"Mom will try to convince Dad to take it easy on you, hm?"

Sakura makes a hoarse sound of disapproval. "It's okay. Father has good intentions."

She figures that being the daughter of the Uchiha clan head comes with its perks and disadvantages. The relentless training method just so happens to be both.

In any case, Sakura can feel the stronger threads of chakra in her veins, a significant difference from the somewhat hazy image she'd seen weeks ago. Perhaps she should express her gratitude towards her father's (somewhat energetic) tutelage. Sakura isn't blind - while Fugaku tends to adhere to the traditions life had battered into him throughout the years, if she looks carefully, she can see the pride and excitement in his eyes whenever she does something right.

Sakura does most things right.

(She makes sure of it.)

A strange but pleasant feeling blooms in the depths of her chest, but she fails to recognize it after a brief moment of contemplation.

Beside her bed, the overly loud ringing of her alarm clock knocks her right out of her stupor.

"Oh," Mikoto murmurs as Sakura jumps out of her bed with a deep-set frown. The younger Uchiha looks up. While Mikoto looks concerned, the twinkle in her eyes betrays the amusement she feels at Sakura's expense.

It seems like her mother also has a silly bone in her body, despite coming off as gentle and serious.

Sakura sighs, fixing her bed before turning back to Mikoto. "Let's go eat, Mother."

Mikoto smiles and follows Sakura out of the room. She closes the door and walks silently beside Sakura, her presence almost non-existent, like a shinobi in foreign ground.

It's a little strange, Sakura thinks, to feel as if the woman is anxious in her own skin.

Uchiha Mikoto had been an active shinobi for a while before settling down, and despite the world being at peace time, Sakura still sees it in her mother's behavior.

Her past as a shinobi has never been brought up since Sakura got here, though.

The hallway is filled with an almost uncomfortable silence as they walk side by side.

Sakura's mild voice breaks the quiet.

"Mother, what were you like as a shinobi?"

Mikoto looks down at Sakura and blinks. "What do you mean?"

A soft hum slips from Sakura's lips. "Like, what type of weapons did you use? Did you tend to use genjutsu more, taijutsu, ninjutsu?"

Her mother chuckles. "Tend? What a big word, dear."

There's a jolt in Sakura's heart, and her eyes widen as she looks up at Mikoto. "U-Um... I went inside Father's office and read something. I-I got it from there."

Mikoto eyes her with a small smile for a second, then looks straight ahead once more. Sakura discreetly lets out a breath. She's never been good at acting, and especially not as a child. She dearly hopes she would only be labelled as a child genius and not what she actually is, which is essentially a time traveler.

Or a soul who possessed the body of Sasuke's actual twin sister.

Sakura's thoughts grind to a halt, and the looming sense of discomfort in the Uchiha compound weighs heavier on her shoulders.

"I'm sure I did well back then," Mikoto says, forcefully pulling Sakura out of her daze. "I was promoted to jounin at the age of fourteen, which is somewhat early on compared to today's standards. Then again, it was wartime, and the village needed all the help it could get."

Sakura watches her mother exhale as she forces her previous thoughts down her gut.

"You see, Mom was quite fond of blades and shuriken," Mikoto says, looking down at Sakura with that familiar grin. Absently, Sakura wonders if it's deliberately crafted to give people a sense of safety. She has to admit that it was a little effective - just a bit.

"Bukijutsu?" She asks.

Mikoto shakes her head. When they round the corner, she places her hand on Sakura's shoulder to gently steer her body with every tiny step.

"Just swords, kusarigama, and shuriken." She laughs. "I wasn't very keen on using any other weapon."

Swords. When Sakura blinks, a memory of an adult Sasuke slashing at an ally's throat plays behind her eyelids.

Her hand twitches.

"Were you any good at them?"

Her voice trembles slightly as she asks. Whether or not Mikoto noticed, she doesn't point it out, and Sakura whispers a word of thanks in her head.

The air in the Uchiha compound remains still, almost freezing cold.

"I'd say so. That said, while I loved the kusarigama, I stopped using it at some point. Unfortunately, it just isn't as versatile as a sword or a dagger." Mikoto purses her lips, and Sakura smiles a little.

"Shuriken also aren't as versatile as kunai," she points out.

"Oh, getting smart with me, young lady?" The older Uchiha pokes her forehead lightly. "A shuriken has more flexibility and can track an enemy better than a kunai, provided you know how to use it as it's designed. If not, then it holds little to no value."

Sakura grins up at her. "Sure, Mother."

Mikoto rolls her eyes, smiling. "I can teach you if you'd like. It's about time I taught you and little Sasuke shurikenjutsu, anyway."

"Okay!"

The conversation remains a lighthearted banter until they reach the dining room. Sakura's stomach growls the moment she gets a whiff of the pancakes. When she notices the separate bowl of sliced tomatoes on the table, she barely catches the giggle that threatens to leave her mouth. Those things are likely the only things Sasuke would never stop loving.

Pancake with a side dish of tomatoes... A strange combination, but she wouldn't put it past her brother to eat those as parts of the same meal.

Both Sakura and Mikoto slide into their seats across from each other, and the younger Uchiha quickly wolfs down the food on her plate.

"Slow down, dear." Mikoto reaches over to pat Sakura's head. "It's not going anywhere."

Sakura almost chokes on her food when she tries to respond. She takes a moment to pat her chest and take several big gulps of water. "I'm okay! I just like your cooking, Mother."

Home-cooked dishes had been taken away from her a bit too early after all.

Mikoto simply shakes her head, smiling.

Upon swallowing the last bite of her meal, Sakura recalls their previous conversation. "About training, Mother," she starts. "Can you teach me kenjutsu, too?"

Mikoto pauses mid-bite, before nodding. "Sure thing, dear."

A tiny grin lights up Sakura's face for the rest of the day, even when Fugaku tells her off for not focusing enough during training.

Stubbornly, she ignores the voice in her mind that whispers about all the things she couldn't quite catch up to the first time around.

----

At some point, Fugaku started training the twins - Sakura and Sasuke - at the same time. Meanwhile, Mikoto hasn't quite gotten around to teaching them yet. A lesson plan was necessary, she'd said. Lately, Sakura keeps finding her in the compound's backyard, swinging dual blades with striking ease.

Sakura sits on the wooden tiles, not bothering to hide her presence, and watches with rapt attention as her usually gentle mother effortlessly tears the straw dummy to shreds.

Uchiha Mikoto - arguably the biggest enigma amongst the family of four, without counting Sakura.

People in the village only ever said that Sasuke's mother was a beauty who didn't have any flaws. As such, Sakura had a pretty vague, but firm, impression of her. Within the deeper parts of her mind, Sakura had always thought of Mikoto as someone who didn't have much standing in the village - a nameless shinobi who left her duty in order to take care of her children.

The reality comes with the cool breeze that hits Sakura straight in the face.

Mikoto's bladework is both graceful and sharp, and she has never seen a person make the art of killing look like a dance - a soothing yet pointed assertion of power.

Sakura's eyes glimmer in the sunlight as she watches the dance continue past the encore, and her hands slowly curl into fists.

The straw dummy is in pieces by the time their eyes meet.

"Sakura, dear, perfect timing," Mikoto begins with a smile, flicking the tanto towards the ground in a smooth, practiced motion. "I've figured it out. Ready?"

Sakura jumps down the ledge, grinning up at her. "Only if you are, Mother."

Just as Sakura steps onto the ground, Sasuke appears out of nowhere, falling on his butt right beside her.

She looks at him blankly.

"Not fair!" Sasuke cries out in a fit - and covers his mouth immediately. "Ah, I mean, I'm sorry, Father. Please let me try again."

Fugaku walks out from the shadows of the trees surrounding the compound. A corner of his face keeps twitching. Amused, Sakura takes a guess and assumes that this is what her father's face looks like when he's holding back laughter.

"Too slow, Sasuke," he says, narrowing his eyes at his son. "Evasion is part of what you need to learn as a shinobi, especially as an Uchiha. You never know what kind of disaster could be brought down upon the clan." He pauses. "...Did I hit you?"

"Yes, Father," Sasuke says as he stands. "I, um, no, I just... tripped when I stepped backwards." The tinge of red on his face unwittingly supports his words.

Fugaku stays quiet, but the way his left cheek quivers the tiniest amount says more than he'd ever be willing to say outright. Sakura stifles another burst of giggles with a cough.

"Now, now, dear husband," Mikoto interrupts, casually spinning the tanto in her hands. "Since we're both here, we now have two teachers and two students. I'll be teaching our twins kenjutsu for starters. I suggest taking turns between lessons today to keep their memories fresh." She turns to him, a slight quirk on one side of her mouth. "What do you say?"

For the first time, Sakura sees her father smile, and Sasuke's little comparison crosses her mind.

"...And you look more like dad!"

Her left cheek spasms just a little.

"After you," Fugaku says as he meets his wife's eyes, "my lady."

Mikoto smiles, her eyes curving into soft crescents. "Of course."

The next thing Sakura knows, she's holding the other knife Mikoto used and desperately deflecting a flurry of potentially lethal swings.

Alarm bells ring in her mind as she shifts her weight, the blade of her tanto clanging off of her mother's.

"Mother," Sakura sputters, eyes wide. She barely steps back from the range of a swift vertical swing, her breath catching in her throat. "This - this is your lesson plan?!"

Mikoto pauses and plays with the tanto. She does it so naturally that it makes Sakura wonder if she'd somehow assimilated it as an extension of her limbs.

"Well, I know you can handle it." There's that twinkle in her eyes again; the one that Sakura is slowly beginning to dread. Mikoto continues in a soft, leisurely drawl, "Now, show me what you're made of, my child."

Sakura stares at her in disbelief, and the sound of Sasuke's gasp fades into the background.

Then, she lifts her right foot slightly, placing it behind the other in a wider stance. She takes a couple of breaths, flips the tanto in her hand into a backhanded grip, and assumes the only position she knows from all the times Kakashi fought in front of her. Bitterly, Sakura supposes there is indeed benefit to be had from always staring at everyone's backs.

"I'm ready, Mother."

Sakura has never seen such a sincere smile on her mother's face.

"Do your worst, dear."

Whoever said that mothers had a tendency to be gentler to their kids was definitely, absolutely, batshit crazy.

Chapter Text

Uchiha Mikoto, as a mother, is gentle, playful, and considerate.

As a mentor, however...

"Again, Sakura. Don't be so stiff. Quick on your feet, now."

She's ruthless in every sense of the word.

Stiff, she'd said. It isn't Sakura's fault this body's muscles have barely even developed.

Sakura feels the air struggle to crawl down her lungs, shaking her head to get back into focus. It's uncomfortable. Her sweat makes her hair cling to her face and her hold on the tanto somewhat painful. Not even Tsunade had ever been this strict with a five-year-old. She has half a mind to remind her mother that this is her first time training in physical combat, but she bites her tongue when she sees the look on Mikoto's face.

"Just five more minutes, dear. You can do it," she says gently with a small smile. "Now, brace yourself."

Sakura bites her lip in frustration, but she stretches her shoulders before tightening them just enough to prevent strain.

Mikoto moves faster than adult Sasuke.

Sakura had never been able to keep up with Sasuke.

The blade comes down to her right shoulder. Gritting her teeth, Sakura stops it with the edge of her own.

A sharp, metallic noise pierces through her focus, and Sakura lets out a yelp as she stumbles back. The weight of her weapon feels off by a fraction. Sakura lifts it only to see that her attempt at blocking had chipped off a noticeable section of it. She looks at her mother with wide eyes.

Mikoto stands in front of her, adjusting her grip on her tanto. "Lesson number one," she says. "Never use the edge of your blade to block - use the flat of it, like you did earlier. Though I suppose that had been a fluke."

Sakura's eyebrows draw together, and she glares at the teasing grin on her mother's face.

Apparently, Mikoto doesn't simply have a funny bone. Despite her serene demeanor, the woman has a penchant for getting under everyone's skin.

Fair, Sakura thinks as she breathes out, Sasuke had to get that from somewhere.

She puts her arms up, covering her face a little, and shifts her weight to her right foot placed behind her.

Without any warning, Mikoto shoots forward, swinging at her diagonally. Desperately ignoring her frantic heartbeat, Sakura bends her knees and sways her body to the right. She avoids the blade by a few centimeters, and she immediately moves to get to a more secure position.

"Lesson number two," Sakura hears Mikoto's voice the moment she closes her eyes to sneak a blink, and she feels her own body quiver. "Don't allow yourself to think the same way you would in a battle of only taijutsu."

The moment Sakura opens her eyes, the edge of Mikoto's blade is an inch away from her throat.

She looks down at Sakura with a strange smile, and Sakura wonders if that was pride she could see on her mother's face.

She'd failed, and spectacularly so. There's no reason to receive any positive reaction. Sakura stares at Mikoto, all while the tanto is against her throat, and she doesn't know if she's waiting for an answer.

The older Uchiha's response to the question Sakura never voices is a soft pat on the head. "That was great, dear. I knew you could handle it."

Great?

There's nothing great about not being up to standard.

As if Mikoto could read between the lines on Sakura's face alone, her mother's lips curve into a grimace, and Sakura fears that she'd been right.

"Did you know I decided on this way of teaching based off of what I've seen from your training with Dad?" she asks, her hand moving to pinch Sakura's cheek instead.

Sakura frowns at her. "What does that mean, Mother?"

Mikoto squats, bringing herself to eye level with her daughter. "Remember, Sakura," she begins slowly. "People are always watching the Uchiha. Your training with your father has shown that your skills are way above what they should be at your age."

It doesn't take much explanation to understand the underlying meaning in her words.

ROOT, Sakura thinks as she clenches her fists. She doesn't notice when a hint of red flickers in her eyes.

(Mikoto does.)

"So, I've taken it upon myself to watch over you as well," Mikoto says as she softly taps Sakura's cheek, sighing. "And I've seen how smart you are, my child, and how easily you can manipulate your chakra at will. On top of that, you move without a sound. You're not supposed to do that yet."

She messed up. Sakura knows that.

She furiously beats down the thought that it's all she's ever been the best at.

Mikoto eyes her carefully, then hums, bringing her close to press their foreheads together.

"I'm not rushing you, dear." Her whispered words reach the depths of Sakura's bones. "You have Mom and Dad with you. Itachi can help protect you, too. But I want to make sure to teach you everything I can so that you can defend yourself, no matter how young you are."

Age has never kept anyone safe - not in this world, not in the war.

At that moment, when her mother pulls away, Sakura realizes she had forgotten something extremely important in the time she'd spent complacently worrying about her own circumstances.

The Uchiha massacre.

-----

Sakura had never properly interacted with Sasuke's family when they were still alive, and was too busy dealing with the bullying at school to pay attention to younger Sasuke.

It was only in their graduating year that she had developed an obsession over the boy who always stayed quiet in one corner, a dark look perpetually in his eyes. Perhaps that's what had drawn her to him. Or maybe she simply felt inadequate on her own and earning the affection of the most popular yet unfeeling person in the class would make it feel like she had actually been worth something.

Sakura no longer remembers how it had felt like.

Now, watching as her older twin brother spews fire by the lake, she recalls the event that had driven him to lose whatever warmth he had in him.

Every single one of his family members, gone, with their blood dripping from the hands of his own brother.

Sakura hadn't ever had the chance to talk to Itachi before his death, and therefore has no information on how this came to be, aside from that time Naruto had slipped and mentioned that the Uchiha massacre had been orchestrated by the Hidden Leaf leaders at the time.

As Sakura plays with the leaf in her hands, an image passes unbidden by her eyes.

Her father and mother, with presence warm like sunshine—dark clothes stained with red, cold, wet, and only ever real in her memories.

Her heels dig into the dirt, unnoticed.

"Sakura!"

Sakura looks up to see Sasuke skipping towards her with huge smile on his face. "Yes?"

He skids to a stop, and he shakes, as if struggling to contain himself. "Did you see? Dad said I made a fireball as big as Nii-san when he was my age!"

Blinking, Sakura nods. "You did well..." She hesitates, but continues with some difficulty. "Nii-san."

The grin that stretches her brother's lips overlaps with the well-worn smirk of the Sasuke she'd known once upon a time.

"Yeah!"

Sakura struggles to understand the weight of family in her heart.

In her past life, her parents had been entirely absent, and their negligible presence hadn't changed anything after their death.

In this life...

Sakura thinks she'll try to change the course of fate, no matter how unpredictable it is.

She owes them at least this much, for loving her the way they do.

Just this once.

---

"Children, can you guess where we're going today?"

Sasuke jumps in place, his eyes shining. "Where, mom?"

Sakura simply looks at Mikoto, a foreboding feeling in her chest.

Mikoto catches the suspicious look she sends her way and returns it with a nonchalant smile.

"To the playground!"

For the first time in a long time, Sakura wishes the ground would eat her alive.

"That," she starts, wanting to protest, but she finds herself at a loss for words. "That... sounds nice."

Sakura wonders if it's just her or if there's actually triumpant grin etched on her mother's face as they head to the nearby playground.

The memories slowly play out in her mind when she takes in the sight of the children playing. A few of them were using the seesaw, the others laughing as they attempt to chase one another on the monkey bars. She used to go here often, but she'd stopped after one particularly bad day with other kids. It'd been hard to come back after they'd pulled at her hair and called her names.

Sakura doesn't notice that she'd started pursing her lips until Sasuke taps her shoulder. She turns to him and pauses when she saw the worry in his eyes.

"Are you okay, Sakura?" Her twin brother asks, eyebrows furrowed.

Unsure what to say, she simply nods and pats his head. She turns to Mikoto, who continues to watch them fondly. Sakura barely stops herself from making a face. She's still not quite used to having this much attention on her.

"Mother," she calls out. "Can I go to the swing and play alone for a while?"

Mikoto hums. "Go ahead, dear. Your brother and I will be right here."

"Mhm."

Despite Sasuke's silence, Sakura could feel his gaze trailing after her as she walked to the swing.

The sudden urge to be alone and sit there hadn't been because of anything particularly deep. 

She simply missed Naruto a little.

As she walks, Sakura keeps her eyes trained on her feet. For some reason, she can't bring herself to raise her head and look at the other children.

Perhaps it's the fear of seeing ghosts of the people she used to know like the back of her hand.

Sakura lets out a breath and sits on the swing, pushing her weight backwards. 

It's a good day, with the sun shining down on the clean streets of the Hidden Leaf. It's almost always a good day in the village, though. When it rained, parents often told their kids that it was a warning from the gods that something had gone wrong—a bad omen.

Sakura's pulled out of her thoughts when she sees a familiar tuft of pink hair.

Her grip on the chains on the swing tightens enough that it hurts.

Haruno Sakura.

Of course—of course, she still exists, and she's... just not her, anymore.

She's not who she was, not the same person who was on a team with the two biggest troublemakers of their year, not the same girl who'd frozen when something had to count, not the same girl who'd never been able to keep up.

Sakura doesn't know how to process her emotions. She never did, never had the time for it.

Most times, she'd push it down under the rug, and go on with her life.

This time, as the crippling hollowness in her guts threatens to consume her, Sakura takes several deep breaths, and the last one—

"Sakura?"

She looks up and meets lilac eyes filled with recognition they shouldn't have.

"Haruno... Sakura?"

The last one—Sakura keeps close to her chest.

------

Mikoto has three children.

Itachi, who is composed, gentle, and has a heart of gold. Sasuke, who seems to be painted in all the colors of the rainbow. Finally, Sakura, with hair of pastel pink painted with the monochrome shade of gray.

Her eldest expresses his love in silence, with care. Mikoto can't even begin to count the times she'd gone to the kitchen to wash dishes, only to see that it had already been cleaned spotless.

Sasuke is the most vocal when it comes to his feelings. He cries when he's sad, gets red in the face when embarrassed, amd shines brighter than all the stars in the night sky when he's happy. It's very cute that he's an open book and every inch the child that he is, Mikoto thinks. After all, not everyone in this world could grow up with eyes like Sasuke's—acceptably naïve, though not foolish.

Sakura, Mikoto figures, is the strangest one of the bunch. This pink-haired daughter of hers keeps too much to herself, knows too much. She doesn't speak often, and her emotions are kept frozen beneath the steel of her eyes.

Funnily enough, Mikoto finds it the easiest to talk to Sakura, as if they're closer in age than it shows on the surface.

(Mikoto thinks it wouldn't be strange if that is the case.)

As the wife of the clan head, Mikoto has a lot of worries. One of them includes her children, and how they stand out too much to keep under wraps. Itachi, who graduated at the top of his class at seven years old, and became chunin shortly thereafter. Sasuke, whose chakra reserves exceed both of his siblings' and works hard enough to burn himself out every single day.

And then Sakura, her only daughter and the one expected to become a prodigy better than her eldest. The amount of migraines Mikoto's had whenever she heard the clan elders talk about when Sakura would awaken her sharingan can't be counted by her hands.

Although, Mikoto has a premonition that it won't be long now.

Silently, whenever she thinks about how Sakura would be the perfect Uchiha, she shoves the thought in the depths of her heart with the fear the comes alongside it.

Often, Mikoto frets over the sense of isolation seemingly ingrained in Sakura's bones. Sasuke, despite being her twin, has no inkling of the thoughts that go through his sister's brain. Itachi is not present enough to have a grasp of her behavior, and both Mikoto and Fugaku can feel her actively keeping them at arm's length.

It's not hard to figure out when the child insists on calling them "mother" and "father", then acts like a soldier during training. Mikoto still feels proud of the shock on her face when she'd suddenly attacked her and declared it as her lesson plan.

(Mikoto didn't have a lesson plan.)

Now, as she carefully watches her daughter stand up from the swing and embrace the Hyuuga's heir, Mikoto doesn't quite know if she should add this to the list of her worries.

"Sasuke," Mikoto pauses, trying to find words. "Does your sister know that child?"

Sasuke shakes his head. "No, mom, but Sakura says a lot of things in her sleep."

Mikoto looks down at him. He scratches his head. "She mentions... I think, names? There's Ino, Naruto... Hinata... And there are a lot of other ones, too."

When she hears the name Naruto, the lively smile of a long lost friend paints itself well within the confines of her mind.

"I see."

Mikoto doesn't like being proven wrong.

But this once, just this once, she wouldn't have minded if she was.