Chapter 106: The Uchiha Comes Home
Hiruzen gave Sakura one day.
The morning after, she and Kakashi would depart for the Frost Country front. The unit would include Sasuke and Team Eight under Yūhi Kurenai — worth noting that Hinata was not among them. Sakura had no particular comment on that. Hinata on a battlefield, given her temperament, would be—
She said goodbye to Kakashi and went home first to let her family know she was alive. Then she set out for the Senju clan district to visit Tsunade.
Tobirama had promised her open access to the Senju archives. She'd been trying to get there since the invasion and kept getting interrupted. Today she was going.
"Sakura's leaving for the front tomorrow..."
Karin walked beside her, voice a little flat.
"I'll be fine. I'm quite good at what I do."
"Don't worry. If you want to stand next to me, get your Konoha forehead protector sorted out."
Karin had the ability, easily. The obstacle was a required coursework module called The Will of Fire, which was apparently giving her considerably more trouble than anything involving chakra or combat.
Sakura didn't have a solution for that one. Karin would have to work through it herself.
"Anyway — where are we going?"
Karin looked at her, puzzled.
"Karin's an Uzumaki, right?"
"I know someone who also has Uzumaki blood. She might find you interesting."
Karin considered this.
Naruto?
He was blond, and his surname was Uzumaki, and his chakra reserves were genuinely enormous. But in Karin's estimation, his actual connection to the Uzumaki clan ended there. The clan was known for sealing jutsu — techniques requiring extremely precise chakra control. Naruto's chakra was warm and vast in a way that had struck her immediately, but precision wasn't the first word she'd use.
She didn't say any of this.
"Who is it?"
"That's a secret for now."
Sakura smiled and kept walking. No matter how many times Karin asked on the way, she got the same answer.
Karin's curiosity intensified in direct proportion to the stonewalling.
Sweet. Soft. Faintly fragrant.
A taste familiar and strange at once, filling the mouth — something he hadn't had in years. The man sat quietly with it, paying attention to each bite.
The same dango existed in other places. He'd had it elsewhere.
But this was different. This was the original.
Perhaps the biggest thing he would take from returning to this village — Uchiha Itachi — was a plate of dango, eaten properly, in the place where he'd first learned what it tasted like.
He finished the last piece, set down the money, and walked out.
His companion, Kisame Hoshigaki, followed at an unhurried pace.
"So this is where you grew up, Itachi-san."
The large man shifted the bandage-wrapped blade on his back and spoke to the figure ahead of him.
"Peaceful place. Surprising, given that a war just started."
"It is. Quite peaceful."
Black cloak, red clouds, a traveling hat that kept his face in shadow. Whatever Itachi's expression was doing, it wasn't visible.
They drifted through the streets without particular purpose, talking in fragments.
"Incidentally — once this assignment wraps up, we'll be going our separate ways for a while."
"A little sad, isn't it."
Kisame's face had the quality of a shark's — the sentiment in his words was impossible to verify against any visible emotion.
"Yes. That's how it is."
Itachi's response was mild.
The assignment: Pain had dispatched Kisame and Kakuzu as mercenaries into the Wind Country theater, specifically to prevent Sand from collapsing too quickly under the Fire-Earth alliance. Itachi had wanted to go. Pain hadn't agreed. Deidara had been loudly insisting for days that he should be the one going — Pain had declined him too. Sasori was out of the question; Sand would have targeted him immediately. Hidan had only one person in the organization willing to partner with him, and Kakuzu was already assigned.
So it was Kisame and Kakuzu. Itachi stayed.
"What's the assignment, exactly?"
"Mind if I hear it?"
The voice came from ahead of them.
They'd drifted to a stretch near a river without noticing. A girl in a green flak jacket stood in their path, pink-haired, watching them.
Sakura looked at the two figures in front of her and felt a headache form.
She'd been on her way to the Senju district with Karin. They'd passed a dango shop. And there they were — exactly as they'd appeared in canon, walking through Konoha like a bad joke.
Except nothing was canon anymore.
The war was already different. Hiruzen was alive. Orochimaru still had his hands. Rasa was alive. Tsunade had been back for weeks. The plotline she'd memorized was increasingly decorative.
But right now: she and Kakashi were shipping out tomorrow. Kakashi could not go down today in a street encounter with these two. The Frost Country front needed him.
Sakura ran a quick internal assessment.
Inner Sakura as genjutsu resistance layer. Yin Seal active. The slug she'd tucked into her collar before leaving the house — present. Could she take a Tsukuyomi and survive it?
She'd sent Karin to get backup.
"Sakura."
Itachi raised his head. Three-tomoe Sharingan, calm as still water, resting on the girl in front of him.
"It's been a while."
In his memory she was the girl who had outgrown his brother in ways that mattered. The intelligence network had been clear enough — her name appeared in reports with increasing frequency. The Akatsuki leadership had a file on her.
The Forest of Death, where she'd engaged Orochimaru alone. The joint effort with Hiruzen to hold off Orochimaru and Rasa simultaneously.
The Grass Country operation, where by all accounts she'd been the most visible combat presence on the Konoha side.
A remarkably capable and dangerous asset had appeared in Konoha, and people kept underestimating her because she was twelve and pink.
Medical ninjutsu. Taijutsu. Summon contracts with both monkey and slug clans. In certain areas, already past Tsunade.
(End of Chapter)