Naruto Shippūden: The Legendary Team 「伝説のチーム」

Chapter 2.1

VOLUME 02: GRADUALLY

"Thanks for walking me home, Ino-chan."

Ino gave her a wry smile. "No problem, Sakura. Just remember: we're rivals starting tomorrow for Sasuke-kun's love!"

Sakura watched Ino's retreating back, suddenly feeling very uncertain.

Is it really necessary...? Can't we just become friends...?

But maybe Ino-chan just doesn't want to be friends with me...

With that thought in mind, Sakura hung her head low and went inside her house.

After greeting her parents, ("Oh, Sakura! Why did you come home by yourself? I was just about to go pick you up! I know you're starting the Academy now, but you're still five, you know.") she went to her room and laid on her head, staring at the ceiling.

She remembered the way she acted towards Naruto earlier and almost burst out crying again. Naruto didn't deserve her ignorance; he didn't do anything wrong, after all. But she had been scared; so scared that Ami and the others would pick on her even more if she talked to him. She couldn't even glance over towards Sasuke in class because she felt like Ami had eyes everywhere. Deep paranoia was rooted in her system and she couldn't let it go.

Of course, deep inside her, she didn't like being afraid all the time. She wanted to be able to stand up for herself, but she didn't know how. What was she supposed to do, anyway? Her parents brought her up to be polite, mild-mannered, delicate... They did not bring her up as a brute or some sort of war-freak individual. Kizashi always told her that the best way to handle conflicts was to ignore them while Mebuki opposed slightly, saying that the most preferable solution was to go to the one which provided the most peaceful result.

Sakura had to choose to stay quiet so as to not cause any more trouble.

But if it had already gone this far, was it still really worth it?

• • •

"You mean you don't know what's going on, either?"

Sasuke's statement was left hanging in the air for the briefest of moments before Kyūbi-Naruto shook his head.

"Like you, my memory is blank of what exactly happened in that climactic fight against Kaguya." The Kyūbi's voice, a little gruff and lower than its vessel's, now sounded considerably subdued. "I suspect that time went back to the attack on Konoha just before Uchiha Obito could extract me from Uzumaki Kushina, because there was a momentary blackout experience before my memories eventually came flowing in. I also suspect that the reason why I can remember is because we Bijū are not bound by the laws of time; we are a large part of chakra itself, thus the intended effect of time travel cannot do anything to us, like alter or erase the memories in our minds. However, this is only a speculation for now since I cannot contact them in any way to confirm."

Sasuke still looked as puzzled as he could be. "...Then why do I remember? And why now?"

Kurama shook his head once more. "I do not know. I have no awareness of what's going on. What I can hypothesize, however, is that if I remember, then it is a big possibility that the four of you — or maybe even just one of you — turned back time, even though that's a huge stretch in itself. The performed time travel technique has already made its first ripples in the pond, not to mention that I willingly saved Naruto's parents from their destined deaths, so the future is not simply something we can predict now." Kurama's expression turned into that of deep contemplation. "I do wonder about one thing, though..."