Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ What it Means To Be Shinobi ❯ Chapter Two - Approaching Hostiles ( Chapter 2 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

WARNINGS: Spoilers for everything before Naruto Episode 135 Chapter 238. Bastardizer of everything after.
 
AUTHOR NOTES: mer. Originally I removed this chapter from the fic, then I realized, dull as it is, it is nessecary. On the plus side, half the next chapter is already written and it earns the fic rating. On the minus side, I've fried my laptop and I'm leaving the states for most of Dec. No pc, means no fic. So, if I haven't posted by month's end, then I'll try and make it extra special for... like, christmas or something. People still celebrate that, right? fcked I know. As usual, tThere are illustrationd for this chapter; ohshushDOTcom/fandom/images/superfluous-fluff/2bsch02DOThtml [<3U for reading!XD]
 
DISCLAIMER: Kishimoto-sensei, Shonen Magazine and all sorts of people at VIZ own Naruto and the premises therein. This is a work of fan-created fiction intended solely for amusement. No infringements intended.
 
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Chapter Two: Approaching Hostiles
 
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“No matter how dangerous the risk, there will be missions you can't decline. . . This is the talent that we most value in a commander--”
Ibiki - Naruto Chapter 44, Volume 5 [VIZ Translations]
 
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“Who calls this child to walk on her own?
Who leads her down this treacherous road?”
- Selena, God's Child
 
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Sakura sat alone in the conference room adjoining the Hokage's office, staring avidly into space. Fair and frail methodically trimmed hair, half circles under her eyes, breathing in calculatedly even measures through her faintly parted lips, and her back maintaining a straight posture like that of a rod, with her legs crossed firmly at the ankles. Her hands were folded securely in her lap, a crumbled bit of paper clenched between the fingers of the right one. These and other subtle signs marked an acutely troubled girl.
 
She assumed, and rightly, that people would be bustling through soon enough, as the office through the other side of the oak double-doors was buzzing with muddled voices in heavy deliberation. She valued the quiet time but was hardly enjoying it. The setting wasn't unbecoming, with high ceilings, plush carpeting, extended sofas and footrests, yet she sat in the narrow space provided by a marble topped coffee table, shared with an ashtray, a number of scrolls and a lamp. Her perch marked the only seat not facing the overhead portraits of Hokages. While she respected her village's history and the patriarchs therein, she never got used to being in their immediate audience. The carved faces in the mountainside were morosely impersonal but the portraits hung captured faded features, shadows and wrinkles of humor and hardship marking the eyes and mouths that seemingly watched everything. While it may have given some confidence and reassurance to stand in their audience, it also gave her the willies.
 
Despite her obvious unease due to the preceding Hokages company it wasn't unusual to find Sakura hauled up in the Hokage Tower. In fact it was commonplace, although certain areas were more comfortable; the clinic library for one, and the testing facility for another. Best yet, the third door along the service floor; a room she'd renovated into makeshift quarters for late night undertakings; a hideaway where she'd likely remain indefinitely if it weren't for obligations of food, family and friends. Early on she committed herself to the opinion that while she might never be an exceptional beauty she would always be an outstanding medical-Nîn.
 
“Sakura!” Tsunade said, sweeping into the room with an air of authority, throwing the double-doors wide apart. Sakura was quick to her feet and smiled tight-lipped as she made a show of bowing slightly. Tsunade gave the girl a vigorous gesture, simultaneously waving her to come nearer and halt the formality. “No one informed me when you arrived,” she said as she came to sit on the couch across from the girl, with an exaggerated sigh waiting to be expelled. Sakura smiled at the forwardness and retook her seat on the table-end. While it was still early in the morning her master was showing all the signs of having been exhausted past her patience.
 
“I was already in administration when your messenger found me,” Sakura explained softly, letting the image play in mind of the Hokages carrier bird soaring indoors to lift the mood.
 
Tsunade smiled sufficiently and stretched her legs out beneath her, finding the soft spot the stiff high-backed couch concealed.
 
“You could have come in,” Tsunade said, audibly amused. Sakura glanced over the couch to the adjoining office and the commotion therein. It wasn't the Chuunin assistants alone that made her reluctant; it was the council members, old and looming, providing such dour company it made her exhausted just looking at them.
 
Sakura shook her head and gave a mild smile, “It looked important... yes, I know all Hokage business is important to someone or else it wouldn't be brought to the Hokage at all. It just seemed a bit more... stiff.”
 
Tsunade snorted in amusement, “Nothing exceptional. I'd have liked it if you could have joined us, give me some sort opinion that wasn't spun with bureaucracy. I expect this to last the rest of the day at most.” She slouched further into the couch, sensing counsel member Homura-san's[1] prying eyes over the distance. Tsunade hardly ever was as tired as she put on but than nothing about the Sannin was ever as it seemed. Most times she smiled brightly, playfully as a schoolgirl and on the turn of a whim had a temper like snapdragon stuck to a pin board.
 
“So, all your paperwork has been squared away?” she asked.
 
“Of course!” Sakura grimaced, an awkward station between a flinch and a grin. She crushed the unnoticed bit of paper into her fist and came away from the end table. She moved across the room leisurely, hands clasped behind her, but without a direction in mind.
 
Tsunade observed her rather narrowly, her knowing honey dark eyes sparkling with mischief. “I imagine you aren't surprised to learn that our favorite loudmouth brat has returned from a successful stint?”
 
Sakura examined the melting calk along a window frame all too intently. She tapped on the glass with her fingernail, importunately. “No. Er, it was successful then?” She went on tapping on the glass, as if trying to find a fault in the structure. Her stance had eased but the obscured right hand mutilated what remained of Naruto's haphazard letter of apology. She knew it wasn't her place to ask the `how' and `why' in relation to their `favorite loudmouth brat'. If she had needed to know mission details then she would know them. His unannounced disappearance three year earlier served as a marker from which she measured herself; it reminded that time consisted of a thing always outside of her control, and regardless of how strongly she cared for people, they were always going to fall outside of her protection because of it. Only slightly less obvious, the ventures of their `favorite loudmouth brat' redefined her idea of `hope'.
 
“Of course,” Tsunade said with confidence, while trying not to be amused. Sakura closed her eyes and sighed. “You seem surprised,” Tsunade continued as she folded her hands onto her lap benignly.
 
“Relieved,” Sakura answered, with her eyes still closed. When she opened them again, her tone was more familiar, her smile less forced and she complied with her master's entreaties to sit beside her. She landed on the armrest and pitched the bit of paper into the garbage bin beneath the coffee table. “It just seems very sudden, don't you think?” she asked indirectly, unable to keep her eyes from darting up to the portraits once more.
 
They remained silent for a beat, reality and the world stilled for a margin and made the breath worth taking and the immediacy of real life that much more relevant.
 
“I'd like to put you back into field work,” Tsunade finished.
 
“Oh,” Sakura replied softly, certain that this ones one of those instances where a reply was necessary even if it was unconvincing. She stared blankly at the portraits for another ten seconds or so, then closed her eyes again.
 
“What? No complaints? No tantrums?”
 
Sakura chuckled weakly and shook her head.
 
“I'm not teaming you up with anyone new if that's what you're worried about.”
 
“I wasn't going to say--" Sakura said, once again not wanting to reply but feeling the need.
 
“I already have an assignment in mind,” Tsunade said, sitting notably forward. The air of authority returned to her voice. “While it isn't really a high rank mission it isn't to be taken lightly either. It's why I sent for you, you know. It demands a certain level of… discretion, if I may. It isn't nearly as diplomatic as I'm making it sound, but it is terribly vital. I trust you to handle it.”
 
“Has it anything to do with why Homura-san glaring daggers at the back of my head?”
 
“Don't mind that,” Tsunade said, an ounce of mischief reappearing in her tone. “I'll let them stew for a bit. I told them I came in here for a document.”
 
“You were going to make a run for it, weren't you?”
 
Tsunade, still looking at the portraits, grinned and shook her head. “You don't know that,” she paused, her long blonde hair making wiry sweeping sounds as it fell forward onto her lapel. She swept them back in an off-handed and juvenile gesture marking that her dark humor hadn't run dormant yet. “So, I'll leave it to you then.”
 
“Of course, Shishou[2],” Sakura said, standing once more, a bit lighter, happy to look away from looming eyes.
 
“Shizune is at the testing facility. She can fill you in on everything you'll need. While you're at it you can have her sign-off on your physical and head out immediately.”
 
“Immediately,” Sakura repeated. She didn't entirely regret having to bail on Ino's plans for that evening, which still seemed entirely too sudden and well timed to have been a coincidence.
 
Tsunade hovered as she stood and made a pretty display of dragging her heels as she returned to the office.
 
“Shizune-san has my assignment? And she's waiting for me in the testing facility?” Sakura asked uncertainly. She shuddered, sensing conspirators in the wing.
 
“Just hurry along, I've got important people to annoy,” Tsunade said evasively and exited with as much grace as she had entered.
 
+
 
“She didn't even say `congratulations',” Sakura marveled, while Shizune fired the inoculation into her forearm.
 
“Sorry,” Shizune said quickly, wiping the puncture wound and readying a bandage. Sakura waved her off, her mild annoyance growing into resentment. She tugged hurriedly on her long gloves, pulling them up to her bicep, yanking them for good measure.
 
“I'm sure she meant to,” Shizune soothed, discarding the syringe and gestured for Sakura to stand once more so that she could get her stats measured.
 
Sakura hopped down from the medical table and sauntered over to the scale. “It wasn't like she hadn't noticed, I mean she asked me about my paperwork. 53kilos” Shizune jotted down the number on her pad, while Sakura retook her seat and strapped her shin guards back on.
 
“Sakura-san, have some consideration. Today, Tsunade-Sama was woken up at first light to deal with these troublesome matters, not to mention the late-night she pulled,” Shizune entreated, while fitting her bicep with a cholesterol monitor. Sakura looked on infuriated that it would take a two-minutes of sitting still for the test result to show, longer if she didn't keep calm. She tried not to glare at Shizune while she worked, tried and failed. “It's not like anything today is going as she intended, but she's making the best of it. Don't tell me you've never had one of those days?”
 
“Those days?”
 
“You know, where everything seems out of your control and you try, in futility, to make things better.”
 
“Sounds familiar,” Sakura frowned and dropped her head slightly. She let her eyes measure the floor tiles and the off colorations of the panel work. She'd committed them all to memory years before, and currently the normalcy they provided was priceless.
 
Certainly she knew what it was like to have one of `those days'. She was living one of `those days', from waking up to have Ino nagging at her, her cherished old uniform beyond repair from yesterdays controversy, and the hastily delivered note that now replayed in her mind's eye. Shizune made a non-committal sound and scratched off her calculations on a medical chart. Whenever she thought about the letter, what it said, what it could mean--Sakura gave a shudder.
 
“Cold?” Shizune asked, concerned and monitoring.
 
“I call those weekdays,” Sakura said, and shook her head briskly and smiled convincingly while she realigned the length of her gloves, obscuring the need to rub her arms. “Briefly interceded by periods of complete moral devastation. See, we call those weekends.”
 
“Come on, come on,” Shizune said, cheerfully placing a thermometer in Sakura's mouth, cutting off any chance at a comeback. “Don't be bitter. Tsunade-sama thinks the world of you. We all do. It isn't all that bad, is it?”
 
Sakura shrugged skeptically and struggled not to bite through the mechanism of metal and plastic, while waiting out the remaining 57 seconds. Shizune drummed her fingers along the edges of the clipboard, thick with Sakura's medical information along with a dossier consisting of mission details. Her features were schooled in a passive-aggressive calm; her lips had very little more color in them than the rest of her face. They were also, very faintly, chapped, likely due to the thoughtful gnawing that was her habit. Sakura's pale eyes narrowed in on the features while trying not to concentrate too intently on the words.
 
“I know it's hardly glamorous work, acting on behalf of the Godaime. It's hardly one of the perks of being her apprentice, tirelessly smoothing over pretentious delegates and feudal lords, ensuring that everyone gets heard and feels valued and blah blah blah. But it's the sort of work so few of us are entrusted to do, and we are because we have good instincts, because we care about others before ourselves, because we can multi-task like freaks. But I've heard that last bit is something of a given to those of the female persuasion.” Sakura broke in with a grunt, whether in agreement or dispute or simply readjusting the thermometer, to which Shizune smirked. “Well, anyway, I'm sure a Kunoichi[3] as clever as you knows that these aren't the only reasons behind your status. Your rank isn't a coincidence and your apprenticeship wasn't entertained because of the people you knew. You are where you are right now because at a time when young girls actively searched for meaning and order in the universe, you dedicated yourself whole-heartedly to the life-saving field of medicine.
 
“The world has need of people like us. We see the details and care enough to fix them. We fight when it counts and mend when it matters. More importantly we're smart enough to know the difference. Knowing all that--more importantly keeping in mind Tsunade-Sama authorizes the status of every Nîn in this village--you don't really need for her to congratulate you?”
 
The mechanical thermometer gave a well-timed chime, the digital face blinked and Sakura withdrew it, shaking it dry for good measure.
 
“37.0°C. Is that my mission?” Sakura asked, and discarded the disposable tip before returning the thermometer to its case. Shizune pale smile was un-phased by Sakura's lack of response, instead she seemed reassured by it.
 
“Not so fast,” Shizune tutted, “first I need another medic to sign off and then--"
 
Sakura looked up and smiled, tipped the weighty clipboard over by clip and flipped it to face her while snatching up a pencil from behind Shizune's ear. She gave it a brief once over, nodded and signed primly under Shizune's signature. She handed off the chart to her sempai and glanced questioningly at the printouts beneath.
 
“What is all this?” Sakura asked, her tone all-business as she handed it back.
 
Shizune separated the medical paperwork from the mission briefs, while creating a third pile between the two, a confusing print-out listing an on-going array of chemical compounds.
 
“It's to make your life a little easier,” Shizune explained. “We've figured out the most effective way to help you track your target. Mind you, it wasn't easy. There were all sorts of possible contaminants to the sample that we were able to locate. And given the unpredictable nature of your mission and how much time has passed, this technique will not last very long and you won't be able to repeat it.”
 
Shizune firmly pressed a seemingly wax seal into the lower right-hand corner of the chart. An unfurled scroll on the countertop just beside filled up with scripted kanji and encoded stats, secreted away for the Sakura's eyes-only, while the printed-page faded into white. “Sakura-san, you'll only have the one opportunity--”
 
“So, what am I waiting around here for?” Sakura interrupted abruptly, from across the room. If the target bothered her, she showed no outward sign and appeared fully prepared to carry out the assignment as directed.
 
Shizune's concern got the better of her. “So,” she started hesitantly, catching the younger medic's attention before she could slip out of the room. “I guess, I should wish you good luck?”
 
Sakura paused and smiled, her expression a bit too rigid to be natural, her stance a bit too taut to be unperturbed. She slipped on a shabby cloak she had earlier left discarded on a seat by the office door. It draped over her shoulders in a careless manner and she looked not entirely well put together because of it. The new uniform was made of a more durable material and the cloak seemed withered and battered with age and misuse. Shizune could guess the many reasons why Sakura had gone out of her way to retrieve such an antiquated piece of finery, fashioned with patchwork and battle-scars. The realization made her worry a bit less and made her smile come easier. She tossed Sakura's the tracking scroll, which she caught without looking and secreted it away into one of many hidden pockets on her person.
 
“There's no such thing as luck. Success relies on having a competent strategy executed with precision.”
 
Shizune allowed herself a weary laugh once she knew Sakura to be to far away to overhear. She noted a neat pile of soot remained where the mission statement previously had been, destroyed after viewing as was protocol. She hadn't even noticed Sakura assess it, just as she hadn't sensed the use of a fire-Jutsu. Sometimes she feared the Godaime expected too much of Sakura, because while two of them were certainly alike it didn't mean they were the same. But then there were times likes these where it seemed Sakura had inherited an abnormal strength from Tsunade-Sama that was not physical at all. She hated to admit it but she was impressed, although it wasn't the reply that surprised her; it was textbook after all.
 
+
 
She stood on the precipice of the road that led to the main gate and let weariness cloud her movement. In her mind however the lanes of thought varied in width and girth, reminding her in distance and terrain where her uncertainty lay. She knew her assignment, wasn't marked as classified, just pressing. She could return to Ino's house to save face, which was likely to be mid-party central. While she felt she owed her friend some sort of explanation she didn't want the confrontation. She'd acquired her favorite, worn-out cloak from her crawl space in the clinic, and she had no reason to go home but no conviction to move forward.
 
Given a life or death situation she knew her judgment to have been tested and stalwart. But working alone, without her team, on something as simple as reconnaissance made her feel a little more lost and a little less grown-up. While she certainly didn't want to be caught up in her past, she feared the future her actions might dictate. She wanted time to plan accordingly but instead felt very numb in mind, bleak, alone and confused. Like a day never passed, like she never learned her lessons, like promises meant nothing...
 
“Sakura-kun.”
 
She started at the call of her name. The voice was familiar and reminded her in its tone that it was `not-to-be-ignored'. She turned to find Iruka; the flicker a smile altered her entire appearance.
 
“Iruka-Sensei!” she greeted.
 
Iruka grinned, eyes nearly closed, all teeth, no inhibitions, awkward at the title still used.
 
Suddenly Sakura could recall nothing from the academy days that he passed on to her that she couldn't have learned from a scroll or field-experience. The pause between salutations expressed as much. Still, he motioned for her to join him on the bench outside the teahouse. Since he didn't really qualify as a friend or a teacher she didn't feel obligated to accept, which made her want to.
 
Iruka drank his tea with a gratuitous sort of appreciation. Sakura smiled at that and stared forward along the vacant road. He wasn't implying that there was a conversation of some terrible significance not going on. They would get to that. She would sit and think and he would drink and simmer. Debates like these could create world peace, she silently mused while closing her eyes.
 
Afterward Iruka observed her with a kind smile that made it obvious he was in teacher-mode, and while she enjoyed his company she was uncertain as to whether she wanted his counsel. She squinted at him through sunlight, lower than it had been moments earlier; it silhouetted him in brown-gold and brought age to his features she hadn't noticed before.
 
“Good tea?” she asked, only partly taking his interest in.
 
“Would you like some?” he replied, by way of not answering.
 
She shook her head and turned her smile toward the ground. If she found him too charming she would be suckered into a lecture she was hardly in the mood for.
 
“I've got a mission already,” she reminded herself, aloud. “Just recon,” she explained and continued to stare at ground, unhurried.
 
“I see.” Iruka's cup was empty but still in hand. He revolved it slowly, like it was a cherished plaything, an item he wasn't ready to part with yet. He looked very contented. “I won't keep you.” With absolute frankness he stated, “It's just that it's been a while, hasn't it?”
 
“Three months,” she agreed with a nod.
 
It felt much longer since she'd seen him in passing in the market, tangled limbs weighed with groceries waving at him through a moderate crowd. He had nodded in greeting as she hurried along. Normalcy. It felt like another lifetime.
 
“Three months," he repeated with a sigh and placed the cup beside him with a delicate thud that trembled along the bench and made her station feel very temporary. It couldn't have been more ominous were it a judge's gavel. She sat further upright, uncrossed her legs and preparing to leave, but attentive.
 
“The new uniform,” Iruka said directly, “it looks good.”
 
“Thank you,” Sakura said quickly, and put a hand to her forehead, wiping at imagined strands. The forehead protector kept her hair, cut short, in place too well for it to have come undone. She hadn't imagined Iruka's amusement at the gesture. She sat up a bit further and tried not to frown.
 
“I don't think it fits me very well,” she reflected and re-crossed her legs in a display of the high hemlines. “Don't you think?” she asked, watching him. She tugged at the hem in absent gestures of example and looked back to Iruka for confirmation.
 
His gazed never left her face while the setting sun matured his features further. She might have altered her position on the bench, if she meant to go on looking at him, but that would have meant lingering. She struggled to keep her eyes from wandering over the recognizable material, fiberglass bonded with resin, layers of basket-weave nylon, weather worn patches and tattered edgings.
 
To her surprise, Sakura discovered herself captured soundly in the thrall of a student enamored. Not romantic in any way, but reminiscent of earlier days, where Iruka out-ranked her by seeming leagues and the borrowed wisdom he supplied was more fulfilling than a physical meal. She fidgeted in earnest, interlacing her gloved clothed fingers over her knee to command her swaying leg to remain still.
 
“You just need to break it in,” he said, turning his gaze to look past her. After a brief reflection he gave his head vigorous nod, somehow pleased with himself.
 
Sakura snapped closed her gaping mouth. Had he advised her, `-she would grow into it-' she might have read it as condescending and regretted his company. She had grown more than enough, more so in the past hour than in the past three months. Had he advised her, `-it looked good enough-` she would have concluded that Iruka-Sensei was a fraud, because flak jacket or mesh-lined skirt, the uniform of a fighter was not a fashionable exploit. It was armor and gear, it was a thicker layer of skin lined with Kevlar, and it was carrying intent like a badge and a club.
 
She shook her head clear of her anxiety she stood to leave. “I'll do that, Sensei.”
 
“You don't have to call me that, you know,” he added, and a sheepish grin, practiced and thin, colored his face.
 
“I know, -Sensei-,” she laughed gently as she imagined he practiced that particular expression in a mirror. He would have to since no one should have been able to articulate so much innocent sincerity while wearing the patches of a Jounin. She grinned down at him and suddenly understood why she remembered the man so fondly.
 
She waved at him quickly as she turned to leave. She'd gotten five feet off the main road before turning back, only to discover the Jounin was already gone. It was the sort of thing to make a civilian doubt whether it had occurred at all, but the discarded teacup and her renewed sense of motivation claimed otherwise.
 
+
 
Her heart nearly came to a standstill when the gate finally appeared before her in the distance. The fan and family crest warning all-points pass reserved for Uchiha. She pulled her cloak tighter, trying in vain to stave off a bone-seeping chill. She centered herself, closed her eyes, squared her stance and drew her hood up. The ends of her lips tugged faintly upward in recognition of the act. This was exactly where she stood less than twenty-four hours ago.
 
She thought about the real reason she shivered, not with fear but with excitement. Three years. She finally allowed herself to think on the many times she had gone out of her way just to stand and stare at this very gate. Not just this gate, but the Ramen stand two-blocks further east than she ever had need to visit, the hospital roof where the laundry was hung out to dry, the three pillars by the practice-field, and the unavoidable turn near the academy that everyone needed to travel to leave Konoha.
 
Sakura opened her eyes slowly, staring resolutely up at the sun. She felt with certainty that the time for standing still had come to an abrupt end. While recon was hardly her strong suit, considering her close-personal relationship with the `target', being Tsunade's choice liaison was hardly surprising. Her features hardened, while, with steady hands, she dredged up Shizune's tracking scroll and broke the seal. She lifted the white mask with the crude red markings on over her face and leapt to the top of the wall, unraveling the scroll through the air behind her.
 
In the endless seconds as she activated the Jutsu a strategy formed in her mind. The complicated artful script was set to locate the `target' with pinpoint accuracy to its present location. A spiraling black smoke poured forth, and carried in the breeze like oil dispersing through water, a slender and dissolving path focused into an unstable line, beginning to fade nearly as soon as it was formed, and she needed to race after its trail faster than the naked eye could see.
 
As she chased after her guide she caught half-glimpses of the Hokage mountainside, playing peek-a-boo with the landscape. Shops, restaurants and citizens, blurred homes, overseen by all-seeing eyes. Whether they were physical, Chakra laden or carved of stone, they watched over all things, including herself. Passersby would catch the marking's, sight her vestments and would smile a bit more earnestly, confident in her presence and abilities, entrusting her to carry on. When she flittered, imperviously, through the main gate, chasing hard after the fading wind, she had every confidence that it wasn't a coincidence that Tsunade entrusted this task to her--that Shizune had taken time to council her -- that this village could forge a kind-hearted protector like Iruka.
 
While the hidden village diminished behind her, all lingering doubts went with it. Konoha made her stronger than her insecurities and the time had come to finally prove it.
 
Impersonal as the mask was apt to be, it provided more for her than the individuality it stole away. When the black chemical remainder of the tracking Jutsu finally began to fade in mid-air it left no trace behind. She took in her surroundings and noted she'd managed to travel what was usually an hour's worth of distance in less than five minutes. Her breaths came in fast and stilted hisses behind her mask. Around her, she discovered, makings of an abandoned temple. She returned the used-scroll to her cloak and soundlessly moved forward along the dirt path amongst the overgrown forestry.
 
Their intelligence network reported that the `target' was likely unaware Konoha was actively searching for him. Sakura reckoned if she was lucky he wasn't covering his tracks and maybe even was somewhere still nearby.
 
She pushed on, examining the temple's withered hangings, rusted over bells and newly lit osenko[4] that simmered in large incense burners. Although it seemed for the most part still and ancient, she couldn't deny the signs of recent use or the residual sense of a significant life force within. Making certain to stay downwind, to keep her breath controlled and her heart-rate at a calm level, she knew even the woodland creatures were unaware of her presence. And yet the very moment she neared the entryway a great spike of energy, like the white center of a small sun, split the air apart, followed quickly by a force of heat so potent and hate-filled it sent her skidding backward.
 
As the ground fell away and the archway of the temple collapsed overhead, Sakura considered, and not for the first time, putting aside her competent strategies, her continued survival rate may well be accredited to dumb-luck.
 
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[1] Homura - He serves on the village council, along with Koharu and the village Kage. First Manga Appearance: Chapter 93. First Anime Appearance: Episode 55
[2] Shishou - Sakura refers to Tsunade as Teacher
[3] Kunoichi - Female Ninja
[4] Osenko - traditional incense