ꕥ 𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕃𝕠𝕥𝕦𝕤 𝔹𝕝𝕠𝕠𝕞𝕤 𝕋𝕨𝕚𝕔𝕖 ꕥ

ℍ𝕒𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝕂𝕒𝕜𝕒𝕤𝕙𝕚

SAKURA KNEW exactly where Kakashi would be.

"Hi, Teuchi-san." pushing aside the fabric and entering the ramen restaurant, she greeted the owner, ordering her usual.

"Coming right up!"

Looking around the booth, she saw a familiar head of gravity defying silver hair, tall and spiky.

"Ah. Kakashi-san. I would like to talk to you."

Startled, said man snorted out the noodle he was eating from his nose, jumping slightly in his seat.

"Ah-ah hello. And what would you like to talk about?" The silver haired anbu captain plastered on a fake smile that Sakura obviously saw through, his eyes forming crescents.

Plopping herself onto the seat next to him, she got right to the point.

"I'd like you to train me. As my teacher. Privately. Starting tomorrow."

there was silence between them for a while, Kakashi only gaping at the pink haired girl in front of him.

Then, he pulled himself together, and turned his expression into stone. "Young lady, I'm afraid your mother will be looking for-"

"I'll buy you the whole limited edition of Icha Icha Paradise."

"Tomorrow at 7. Don't be late." Kakashi put his money on the table, and poofed away.

-

At home, realizing it was going to be night soon and her parents would come back from work, Sakura quickly thought of a plan on how to proceed. It wasn't too hard, because the main purpose was to have fun, so she just wrote it down in a journal and locked it up. She would talk to Shikamaru tomorrow. 

"We're home!" she could hear the front door closing and their footsteps. But something felt wrong. Why? Everything was in place, all the windows were locked, and her parents came home at the right time-and- oh. 

That was the problem. Her parents never came home when they said they would, always five or ten minutes late. Always. So the fact that they came home right on time today...

Sakura took a sharp kunai from her pouch and hid it up her sleeve, slowly walking out of her room and into the hall. Her room was upstairs, so she would have to walk down to meet the two adults. Immediately she hid her chakra presence, if only to make it easier to confirm whether they were her real parents or not. It wouldn't matter if they were her real mother and father.

"Honey? Are you home?" That was her mother's voice. "Yeah, welcome home!" She called back, going down the stairs one by one.

Well, they definitely looked like her parents. But the way they stood-it was graceful, as if their bodies were trained to stand still. 

"Say, mom, can you make my favorite food tonight?" An old way of confirming but it works nevertheless. "Oh sure, sweetie, let me just wash my hands ok?" And the woman who looked like her mother walked into the kitchen, leaving the man. 

"Yo dad, watchu do today?" She never called her father dad, she always called him old man or grandpa. Would he notice? "Oh nothing, just walked around the neighborhood waiting for your mother." 

Ah. This was most certainly an imposter. And an extremely amateur one at that. Perhaps they were chunin. Her father worked as a writer, mostly poems on nature. But he never walked around, and usually came home dirty. This man was spotless.

"Ok, time to eat!" All three of them gathered at the dining table, takoyaki on the table. Takoyaki? "Y'all suck. My favorite food is udon." And before they could react, she slid the kunai into her hand, and stabbed both of their legs twice. 

They screamed in pain, and immediately poofed into their actual bodies, unable to move. "Where are my real parents?" She snarled, pressing their wounds down making it more painful.

"T-They're dead! Dead dead dead! You won't be seeing them anytime soon-" The ninja's head flew off. "Where are their bodies?" Her voice was cold now. The second ninja shivered in fear. "In the forbidden forest. Their blood should tell you-" Sakura knocked him out and put his body into a scroll, for interrogation. Hopefully Anko would be the one interrogating him. 

Sakura felt no particular connection to her parents, perhaps because they weren't her actual parents. Nevertheless, they were innocent, and kind. So anger was what she felt. 

The ninjas' forehead protectors had the symbol for Konoha on it, but they were crossed out. They didn't matter to the plot though. In fact, cutting off what connected her to this village helped Sakura, so that when she wanted to go rogue or create her own village, she would have plenty of freedom. It didn't make it any less painful though.

But for now, sleep.