[Adventure] Look At Me Now VI - Don't Pity the Dead, Only the Living

[Hinageshi]

Spoiler

You must be registered for see links

Summary: Strange old people in caves are generally to be avoided in the fairy-tales Sakura has grown up reading. But the offer of training from one old lady in a cave in the Land of the Waves not only makes Sakura throw caution to the wind, but teaches her that power comes to those who seize it. Strong!Sakura

Recap: Sakura has met an elderly woman named Takehana in the Land of the Waves who offers her training. But this woman is more than she seemed at first and has given Sakura a mission in exchange for training: to kill Gato. Sakura has secretly poisoned Gato, causing the battle on the bridge to conclude with the deaths of Haku and Gato. But now that Sakura has finished the task, what will she learn from her strange mentor? Why is Takehana interested in Sakura and what did she gain from the death of Gato? And will Kakashi learn of his student's secret teacher before they leave Wave?

________________________________

Look at Me Now

Chapter VI: Don't Pity the Dead, Only the Living
________________________________
"What a terrible world. And it all gets more peculiar every single day. We don't know who we are. We don't know where we are."
________________________________​

Most shinobi had no funeral. On a battlefield a dead shinobi was a boon to a victor as the source for extra resources, or maybe even a shield. If they had a kekkai genkai, then someone would most likely take the corpse, either to protect its secrets or steal them. High-level shinobis' bodies, if teammates could get to them, were generally disposed of quickly. Fire, carrion summons, or just a good old fashioned kunai to slice the bodies into such small particles that could be hidden easily were used. Units like the Hunter-nin of Kirigakure were rare and expensive to train, so most "elite" corps in ninja villages had body disposal training, with some basic instruction provided to those who reach chuunin. Of course that was provided that the enemy didn't get to the body first. And if the enemy happened to be a missing-nin? Well, if you were someone, and that "someone" means someone with a bounty you could expect your head to be separated from your body. Permanently. Shinobi who got this treatment generally found their heads cremated after the bounty was collected. Or sometimes they had their organs used after the shinobi was finished stripping the body of its value, both monetary and genetic. After all, organs were very useful in the absolutely flourishing black market.

As you can imagine, it is the rare ninja who gets a "normal" funeral according to civilian terms. Of course, the absolute messiness of the shinobi lifestyle made faking a death a popular choice among those hoping to go rogue. However, if the remains were able to be identified on the battlefield or in the morgue, a missive would be sent out to any remaining loved ones. If not well, there was no MIA statue in most villages. It was a disordered system, to be honest, but that was life. Shinobi could be very efficient when it came to protecting village secrets, but notifying loved ones of deaths? Nowhere near as important.

Shinobi funerals weren't exactly on Sakura's mind as she sat on the dock looking at the spot she'd rolled the body of the man she'd killed yesterday into the water. Sasuke was recuperating back at the house with Kakashi and childish laughter told her that Naruto was currently entertaining Inari. Now that Inari had gotten over his misgivings about them, he and the blond were as thick as thieves. She honestly felt like the only capable adult in the situation. The island of Wave seemed to be giddy as well. The islanders had stormed some of the ships causing the blockade, freeing up the waterways. The only one they hadn't gotten to was Gato's ship, the same one she'd climbed, because of the mercenaries protecting it. With the bridge being near completion, it was likely that in a week or two she'd finally be able to go home with their mission mostly completed. Tazuna was personally taking the day off.

She eyed the water longingly. The water here was so…swimmable. Very different from the Naka River back home in Konoha.

"Water's great isn't it?" The sound of the unfortunately familiar gruff voice behind her startled her so much that she almost fell in the water, only holding herself up by using the chakra to stick back to the dock as she turned back to glare at Zabuza.

"What are you doing here?"

Zabuza wasn't dressed in his regular clothes but in formal looking trousers and a plain black shirt with bandages wrapped around his many injuries. He looked more tired than he did on the bridge, like he hadn't slept the entire night, and his sword was securely strapped against his back. He lifted bandaged arms and flattened his palms to show his lack of harmful intent.

"Easy there, brat. I'm not here to attack you."

Sakura narrowed her eyes. She'd expected him to flee Wave, but it looks like he was paying someone to help him recover. Sakura had half a mind to go ask Kakashi if they should call the Mist authorities. The young kunoichi got up to face him, body posturing still tense as she attached her hands to her hips, obviously wanting an explanation. Zabuza sighed at her actions and ran a hand through his short hair. Sakura noticed that his teeth were jagged and sharp-looking, like they had been filed on purpose. The expression on his face, though with lack of eyebrows it was hard to tell, was….sheepish?

"I'm burying Haku tonight and that kid… the blond… He seemed to care about Haku enough to defend him to me so I thought you brats might want to come…"

Sakura's mouth opened into an 'O' shape as she realized that Zabuza was inviting them to Haku's funeral. Her posture relaxed for a second and she looked down, feeling awkward. She hadn't interacted with the young shinobi at all, but he spared Sasuke-kun's life and made enough of an impression on Naruto that he loudly defended him to Zabuza. Obviously Naruto would want to say goodbye, but engaging in such a friendly manner with a missing-nin was generally frowned upon in ninja society, if it wasn't forbidden. Iruka's only explanation for this, besides the fact that they were generally treasonous scum and immoral criminals, was that the existence of nukenin, or missing-nin, was basically a way of spitting on the decision of previous generations to form villages and put an end to the era of feuding clan warfare. If Iruka-sensei could see her now he'd tell her immediately to run to Kakashi. And that was what she would do.

"I see…I'll go get my teammates." And before Zabuza could say anymore she fled into the house, looking alarmed as she entered the living room full of rather cheerful people. Naruto and Inari were playing some sort of card game, Kakashi was lying on a sofa reading his porn, and a bandaged-covered Sasuke was trying to look completely uninterested in Naruto's card game. They all looked up in unease when she burst in.

"Zabuza's outside."

Kakashi was up immediately, even before Naruto could yell out. He limped over to Sakura, worry on his face as he placed a hand on her shoulder.

"What does he want?"

"He's not here to fight," said Sakura, even if she didn't fully believe this. "He said something about burying Haku tonight and with Naruto defending him, he thought that perhaps we could come." It sounded awkward to her ears with her trying to reconcile the idea of going to a funeral of someone who tried to at least severely hurt her team and was in fact killed by the man in front of her.

"Of course we should go!" Naruto was up and almost out of the room when Kakashi's surprisingly fast hand stopped him, much like it did yesterday. The look in Kakashi's eye was indiscernible but Sakura could tell that he at least was mulling it over in his head. Naruto didn't look too happy about being stopped and frowned at Kakashi.

"Kakashi-sensei, I know about the rules of engaging with enemy shinobi and all that crap, but Haku – you gotta understand! Haku could have killed me before the fight, and he didn't kill Sasuke, and he didn't even want to fight us. Zabuza was just making him. He even trusted me to kill him once he failed!"

"What?" Sasuke finally spoke, unsure of what he just heard. Sakura wanted it repeated as well; did Haku actually ask Naruto to kill him?

"Yeah, yeah, Haku was real sad about failing Zabuza so he was like, 'I'm a failure, please kill me, I know you can Naruto-kun' and he looked so sad, so I told him we should have been friends in a different world and tried to but then he went and saved Zabuza. But that's not the issue here! I know this sounds crazy but Haku, he was a good person and I swear sensei that he taught me about being really strong and protecting people, yanno? So you gotta let us go! He deserves it."

No one spoke after that monologue. Sakura herself wasn't sure what to even think of it. Naruto, as she was coming to learn, was weird in the way that he immediately either took a shining to people or outright disliked them but even then he tried to get people to like him or try to see things from his point of view. It was admirable but also freaking crazy. And sometimes it worked.

"Kakashi, I agree with the idiot. Haku kept trying to get me to stand down so we didn't have to fight. He could have killed me." The mass of bandages sitting next to where Naruto had been voiced his opinion, black eyes looking faintly challenging. Sakura inwardly sighed as Sasuke threw his lot in with Naruto. Naruto didn't even react to the insult; just puffed out his eyes and stuck out his bottom lip at Kakashi, remaining cute baby fat being put into good use.

'We should probably agree as well. Can't let either of them be alone in this.'

The surprising rational thought from her Inner surprised Sakura and she nodded at Naruto before widening her green eyes at her sensei as well.

"Kakashi-sensei, Haku could have killed Sasuke-kun but he chose not to. I know he was our enemy but he chose to spare Sasuke's life, so I'd want to thank him. Please, sensei."

Kakashi's eye wandered over his students' mostly pleading faces (except Sasuke because he was sure he never pleaded) and closed for a second.

"Maa, maa, I get it. Let me talk to Zabuza for a few minutes. Alone. Stay here and focus on our mission." The three shinobi nodded as Kakashi walked out of the room, somehow nimbler than he had been a few minutes earlier.

"Naruto-nii-chan?" Naruto looked back at Inari, who had taken to calling him that, and grinned.

"Sup?"

Inari looked a little spooked as he set down his hand.

"We're not going to have to deal with people trying to kill us again, right?" Naruto's face came out of the grin and softened as he turned his bright blue eyes down at the small boy.

"Nah. Everything's going to be fine, yanno? Now come on, let's finish up before Kakashi-sensei comes back."

________________________________​

It really was a hot and humid afternoon. Sakura knew this because there was sweat running down her scalp and, when she stilled her movement, down her expansive forehead. The rest of her head had hair sticking down to her face as she jumped from tree to tree on her way down to Takehana's cave. She hadn't had the opportunity to visit the woman yet and so she saw a small avenue of time in the hours they had before Haku's funeral.

Kakashi had come back with a smiling eye, one that didn't feel all that natural, and told them they'd have the funeral late that night so no one would disturb them. And as her teammates went back to resting, Sakura slipped out after leaving a note promising her return. She felt rather at ease with this visit to Takehana's, as her task would be accomplished and that scroll would be hers.

It was hard to explain why or when Sakura hard started really desiring the summoning scroll, but the mere thought of it and the promise it held for her potentially made her brain light up in a similar way as the prospect of receiving praise. It was a trophy after all. Even if she didn't have the chakra necessary for lots of summons, she was sure that eventually she would work whatever it was into something to knock the competition out with.

As her feet touched ground, a familiar figure came into view, sitting by the shore. Takehana didn't look at her, just waving her closer and Sakura went over to sit by her. As usual, an elegant kimono was wrapped around her, obscuring her figure while her hair lay limply around her.

"Takehana-san, I achieved what you asked of me." The waves pulled in several times before Takehana spoke in answer.

"I know. I saw." Sakura blinked in surprise.

"But I didn-."

Takehana cuts her off with a laugh. "I know many things, child, and of course I'd be there to watch you work."

There is a brief moment where Sakura, mulling over everything, looks down to the damp sand she is resting on, memorizing the shape and color of dozens of individual grains as she tries to formulate a response. Takehana, for all intents and purposes, was Sakura's client. Somehow Sakura had managed to be roped into working for her, in return for some attention, training, and now a couple of special scrolls. Had Gato's life, repugnant as the man was, been worth it? Had potentially betraying her country and team? It was hard to focus. The most pressing question in Sakura's mind, the one that rose above the more incoherent paranoid thoughts that expressed danger, was "why?".

"Why did you have me kill him? You could have done it yourself." Sakura's voice was firm on this. She knew Takehana was capable, even more than Sakura was. Her bearing didn't scream shinobi but Sakura had known from the first time she had felt her chakra that the women sitting next to her was uniquely powerful. Then what was the purpose of convincing an inexperienced twelve-year old into killing some big shot civilian who had little sense to hire actual professionals to guard him?

The wind whipped Takehana's hair, long and wispy towards the ends, and Sakura could feel a few stray hairs hit her face accidentally. The waves gently pulled back and forth, staining the sand a deep brown each cycle. All traces of snow had been long melted by the strong sunlight and Sakura wondered briefly if Takehana wasn't hot constantly wearing her layered kimonos. As usual with her temporary mentor, questions were answered by long silences and more questions developed.

Sakura just wanted the truth.

It was different in Konoha. Of course the idea to look underneath the underneath had been put into her head by Kakashi, but she couldn't exactly recall when he actively lied to them. They were his genin, but also his comrades. She could see him omitting information they weren't supposed to know, but manipulating them? Orders were given and as subordinates it wasn't the duty of a shinobi to question the mission or its purpose, even with the directive of looking underneath the underneath. The one time she had to directly disobey her sensei, not counting this mission was when-

"You're testing me. That's why you don't answer me directly, that's why you wanted to me to kill Gato. You merely wanted to see what I would do." The words sounded strange even to Sakura, whose was more surprised by her sudden analysis than what it contained.

Takehana hummed in acknowledgment, still not meeting Sakura's eyes or opening her mouth. Sakura's fingers dug into the wet sand, enjoying the cool feeling as she tried to think of what to add next. She could understand what Takehana's actions were, but her motivations were still a mystery. There was no deduction to be made so Sakura gave up for the time being.

"Alright," she said with a sense of finality. "That's as much as I can guess currently so either you tell me what for or I leave it. I've done what you've asked of me, so I might as well demand my reward."

Takehana finally turned her head to look at Sakura and there was mirth in those pupil-less golden eyes.

"Come along then. I suppose you and I have some time to do a quick dissection before sunset. I hope you are used to the smell of rotting flesh, Sakura-san."

________________________________​

Sakura's arms stung with how furiously she cleaned them before rejoining her teammates. Rotting flesh indeed! Takehana had a two corpses in that cave of hers and they were fresh. Sakura knew this because the last time she had seen one of the corpses, she had rolled it off the side of the dock. There was a bit of a knowing smile on Takehana's face as she observed Sakura taking notes about the bodies and how they were killed. It was an interesting anatomy course, considering how Takehana would swivel around Sakura especially when the young girl would pay attention to the corpse of the man she killed. This extra attention made Sakura nervous – what did she expect? – and so the next few hours were filled with silent tension and the occasional instruction from Takehana.

Not that Sakura didn't learn. Her temporary instructor, while a dangerous enigma Sakura would probably like to see the back of, was a good one and unlike with Kakashi, Sakura didn't have to fight for her sole attention. But Sakura would be relieved when she headed home and could put her encounters with the old woman behind her. It was surprising her that her sensei hadn't even followed her on her rounds. It was only due to the fact he was exhausted from chakra overuse and lightly injured that her lessons had escaped notice.

'That and Naruto and Sasuke probably don't care enough to follow us.'

Inner's words would have stung but Sakura's confidence in her team had gone up significantly after yesterday's battle. At least she could make a good pair with Naruto and keep his head on his shoulders. Sasuke however…. Sakura shook her head of the memory of Sasuke's "dead" body as she slipped back into the living room.

"Yo, Sakura!"

Kakashi was sitting on the couch, arm limply resting on the crutch he was using to support his own weight why his chakra came back. His wrist flexed in a greeting as she joined the rest of the team. Each member of Team Kakashi was dressed in their regular gear but everyone looked a little neater. Naruto's blond haystack looked tidier, something Sakura thought would break the universe.

'So is Kakashi sensei's!'

Sasuke, of course, looked as perfect as ever, even though most of him was covered in bandages and the rest was bruised so Sakura couldn't tell visually how good he looked. She just knew from prior experience staring at him for long periods of time.

Luckily no one caught her flushed face because Tsunami called them all for dinner, and so the team ate quickly before setting out in the dark to the place where Zabuza invited them to.

On long missions that are far from home, burials are generally quick if one was afforded the opportunity to bury a comrade. With such circumstances there wasn't exactly a dress code. You either showed up in shinobi gear or civilian clothes. Formal clothing was worn for "important" funerals.

That did little to quell the feeling of being underdressed that Sakura had as they stood watching Zabuza push a shovel into the dirt. Haku's body, arranged in a reposing state, had been washed since yesterday and smelled much better than a day old corpse was supposed to smell. The hole in his chest had been disguised by a very elegant looking pink kimono. Stiff white hands clasped the mask that they had first met him with and the hair was done up. Naruto crouched down to his knees get a closer look at the corpse while Sasuke briefly noted it and looked away.

Zabuza had chosen a very lovely grove to bury his protégé. Overlooking the sea, the grove rested on a cliff and attracted a large amount of fireflies that flew like floating spirits over and under branches. It gave the area a bit of a magical quality, and it fit the corpse of the gentle young man well. It took a minute of watching Zabuza work before Naruto's lip quivered and he yelled out that he wanted to help bury Haku too. The broad-shoulder nukenin stopped digging a pointed to a couple of extra shovels several feet away, mostly disguised by a bush. Naruto made a start for them, and after making sure Sasuke and Kakashi found a spot to sit on, she joined him.

It occurred to her, around fifteen minutes after they had started to dig, that surely someone as strong as Zabuza would know one or two earth jutsu to make this easier on himself. But Zabuza was lost in his digging, bandaged muscles bulging with every load of dirt. Naruto himself looked solemn but determined. So the pink-haired kunoichi put away her questions and focused on digging.

Sakura gave a sigh as she jumped out from the just finished pit, wiping her brow with slightly dirty fingers. They'd had digging D-rank missions before, though Sakura usually felt too tired from skipping breakfast to help with more extreme physical labor. Not here, however. Her appetite had doubled since leaving Konoha and with the amount of training and stress she'd been undergoing, Sakura was sure she'd gained weight and muscle mass. At least she didn't feel so light-headed after exerting herself, even though her biceps were sore.

They climbed out of the grave, sticking the shovels in the unturned dirt pile. Zabuza took out some sort of silk wrap, emblazoned with the Kirigakure symbol, and wrapped it around Haku's shoulders.

"If this was a normal funeral, I'd be cremating him so those bastards don't get him." He said gently. Sakura frowned in thought.

"Who the heck are you talking about?" Naruto spoke up with half his usual volume. It occurred to Sakura that he was trying not to cry and doing a good job of it.

"Kiri." Zabuza spoke the name of his former village with none of the disgust he had previously, just a small wistfulness and yearning. Lifting up Haku's body, he let it down gently into its final resting place and then turned to look back at them. Unlike Naruto, the older man wasn't trying to conceal his tears.

"I'll tell you my story, I guess, brats, if you really want to hear it."

Naruto was the only one who nodded, but Sakura could see Kakashi's stretch as her teacher made himself more comfortable.

"I was born twenty years ago in Kirigakure. My family wasn't civilian but we weren't from a bloodline clan either, and there was little pressure for me to be a ninja. You see, Kiri had been named the Bloody Mist once, but it wasn't until twelve years ago that name was brought back by that bastard."

Sakura blinked at the age he gave for himself. Zabuza looked like he'd be Kakashi's age, but to know he was around seven years older than them gave her shivers up the spine. To be that strong and so young?

"Bastard?"

"Yagura. The Yondaime Mizukage. A pint-sized nightmare and a tyrant." Zabuza clenched his fists and Sakura felt a tiny bit of killing intent spike out of him.

"He'd been a good ninja beforehand, but then he was given the Sanbi."

"What?" Kakashi called out. All of them turned to look back at her sensei, who looked more alarmed than she'd ever seen him. Sakura frowned at the implications. Whatever this three-tails was, it obviously spooked her sensei.

"You encounter it before, Hatake?" Zabuza seemed a little disturbed. Kakashi looked a little green, as if he didn't want to remember it.

"Last days of the war. It got loose and I was…I was in front of it."

Zabuza seemed to understand.

"That must have been the bloodbath? Before Yagura took it, something happened and wiped out a platoon of ours. I only heard about it through the folks who got to the scene days later. Nor survivors, except you I guess." Kakashi didn't answer him so Zabuza went on.

"It, Sanbi, what the heck is a three-tails?" Naruto's volume was back to normal but he seemed to have paled.

Zabuza frowned at Naruto.

"What, did Konoha not teach you anything? Didn't the Kyuubi attack you guys twelve years ago? Demons, brat, demons. Sanbi is one of the ones my village has."

"You mean there are…more of them?" Naruto looked as sick as Kakashi.

'Naruto's a Kyuubi orphan, right? No wonder this story is affecting him.'

"What do you mean "took". How can one take a demon?" Sasuke spoke up from the log he was sitting on, sounding annoyed.

Zabuza shot Kakashi a bewildered look.

"Is Konoha suicidal? You sent out genin not knowing what a jinchuuriki is?" Zabuza's head shook in disbelief.

"Okay brats, I'm telling you this so perhaps you know when to get off a battlefield, unlike the shit you pulled with me. Demons can't be killed; only sealed, and usually into human beings. Those human beings are called living sacrifices. Jinchuuriki contain one of the nine tailed beasts and are known as tools of war. Of course having a living demon in you is a quick way to get ****ed in the head."

"B-but…The Yondaime Hokage killed the Kyuubi?" Sakura's lips trembled. If he only sealed it that means…

She sent a frightened glance at Kakashi for confirmation, who looked alarmed but quickly slipped into a blank expression once he noticed his students' searching looks.

'He knows something.'

'But it doesn't look like he's gonna tell us anything.'

Zabuza continued on with his story after no one spoke up to assure Sakura that the young kage had indeed killed the Kyuubi.

________________________________​

"No. That fox demon that attacked you is probably still in the village, either in some sort of container or in a person. Yagura went off the deep end after getting the Sanbi sealed into him. Now, because there's only one seal between people and a massively destructive demon, Jinchuuriki are usually given a wide berth. They're generally the avoided pariahs of a village. Unless there's no way to control them, there's no reason to attack them. But when Yagura became Mizukage, people weren't happy. No one wants a demon-possessed leader. So someone hires an assassin with a bloodline and Yagura survives but his sanity doesn't. He goes on a campaign to round up all people with kekkai genkai and have them tagged and watched.

It works easily. The civil wars we've been fighting amongst each other are fresh in people's minds and hearts. Mizu's bloodline clans aren't seen as a boon as they are in Hi; no, in our bedtime stories they've always been cursed. Rehash some old rumors of some clan users raping a defenseless peasant girl, of them trying to spread their 'cursed seed', of how they're all descended from demon trees and well, you got your angry populace.

No one lifted a kunai against kekkai genkai users at first, but there was enough propaganda that the rabble did the work for Yagura. Within a year, you hear of whole clans being lynched all over Mizu. I remember watching Terumi Kenchou being executed publically in the square in front of my house for not wearing a patch as a kekkai genkai user. People were clapping. Amazing, isn't it? People born with quirks were despised more than a despot possessed by a demon.

Yagura didn't trust anyone, even shinobi who'd proven themselves loyal twice over. So you have some of strongest shinobi killed for being too strong, too powerful. Clans went into hiding. No one was safe from the purge; even clanless shinobi feared being taken in the midst of the night for 'questioning'. And then he decided that the reason there were so many traitors in modern Mist was because of lax standards. Children with weak constitutions were being promoted. So why not have them kill each other to see who exactly had what it took to be a loyal soldier?

And that's what I grew up watching from my window. I was a sickly child. I don't know whether I was really sick or my mother had been poisoning me to keep me safe, but that's why my folks kept me inside. Oh, my pops would train me, he didn't want me to die, but they were insistent on keeping me away from the Academy. It worked till I was ten. Around 3 years after the graduation ceremony had been changed back, I was watching the festivities from my window. I saw a girl my age hug her best friend before she tore that ***** apart with a knife, and later her hands. The week before I saw them skipping rope down the street. And that's when I realized that it wasn't fair. If this was the world, if this was life, then why was I stuck here instead of there?

My father trained me well. I killed every single one of those kids; kids that would have never played with me. Kids that were going to die anyway. I remember looking at the girl and all I could ask was, 'Where's the jump rope?' as I stabbed her.

Next thing I knew, I was given a headband and kunai. And so they let me loose on whoever with similar results to my graduation day. I was a good butcher. I did what was asked of me.

But Yagura was running out of people. Most of the Seven Swordsmen had been killed, replaced with those who he thought would be loyal, those who killed their masters for power and friends for the village. But the thing about countries at war with themselves is that you get deserters. I worked the Ops for as long as I could, until the jinchuuriki of the Rokubi told me and few others that whatever was wrong with Yagura, it wasn't the demon.

And what do you know, he was right. Some orange-masked bastard was manipulating him, don't ask me how. Slippery ass that one. Yagura, of course, wouldn't listen to reason. He was "not being manipulated, we were all traitors who deserved to die". Paranoid little runt. I laid low and put together a coup, but some key-players went missing and I was left with a half-finished coup on my hands.

I suppose you want to know why I'm telling you this. You're looking pretty sick there, blondie. I want you to understand Haku and how he grew up. Where he grew up. His ma was from the Yuki clan. I could never find an actual real name for her, she seemed to hide her tracks well. I wouldn't be surprised if she was a ninja. Still, she married a real ****ing bigot who killed her and tried to do the same to Haku because they could freeze things. Haku of course survived.

Do you know that he'd wake up to this day crying out for his parents, asking his dad to forgive him? How he would pray at every temple we passed for the gods to forgive him for every villager he killed? Anyone he ever killed? He kept a list of people he killed so he could pray for them. I saw that it hurt him to be my tool, but I knew it would hurt him more not to use him. You don't waste potential in this world. You don't neglect tools, brats. I knew this as a shinobi in Kiri but it became life and death once I left Kirigakure.

I tried to make sure Haku had it better than being homeless in Kiri. And with looks like his, if I hadn't taken him, he'd been in some child brothel. Is ordering someone to kill as bad as leaving them to suffer?

I can't answer that. I can't even answer why I went outside that day and killed those kids. I don't know whether it felt good or terrible. I just know when I met Haku, both of us were hungry for a world that didn't exist, not anymore.

In the end, Haku's better than me. I always thought he'd crack eventually; stop going to temples to pray for people who he killed, stop crying in his sleep, stop faking people's deaths. But he died a whole person with morals while I broke a long time ago. And it took him saving my life before I could finally see him as a person and not another kunai to use. Thanks to you and your runts, Kakashi, I lost the one person I had in this world, but I feel as if something has been cleared from my mind anyway.

So take a good look at Haku, kids, and take a good look at me. You might end up like this, talking about every screwed up thing you did to your enemies and wondering if you'll see your friend after you die."

________________________________​

Sakura slept badly that night. The funeral had went by without incident after Zabuza finished his story but it shook up all of them, even Kakashi. Naruto had broken right as they began filling the grave up. All of them looked away as he finally succumbed to his feelings and starting sobbing right into the grave. Sakura hadn't even put her hand on his shoulder until he started wiping the snot from his face with his sleeve.

After a couple of prayers and flower wreaths were placed on Haku's finished grave, they bid Zabuza goodbye and left the grove. Sakura could tell they wouldn't see the last of him; Kakashi traded a few hushed words with him before they left. Mostly what Sakura paid attention to was the way the man who had frightened her a week ago now looked so broken. Bulging muscles looked limp and even those teeth (Kakashi mentioned that all the Swordsmen of the Mist sharpened them) looked unthreatening.

Suddenly she could see why Tazuna, a complete stranger to their world, told her that their world was too tough. The proof was in those like Zabuza.

Sakura rolled over to the other side of her bed, sighing as she ran her hands through damp hair. It was bad enough it was humid, she was trying to process the carnage that Zabuza's story contained. So much death, so much needless death. Why would anyone despise someone for something they were born with? Even worse, the idea that people sealed demons into others and used to them… The thought made her sick.

"I am not here to reassure you that killing will be easy or that it will be hard. But sometimes lives need to be taken."

She couldn't argue with Takehana's statement. She didn't regret the deaths she had caused two days before. Otherwise Naruto would have been hurt and she didn't want to think about what would have happened if Gato had lived. Nothing good. But as loud as the recollection of Takehana was, there were only two things louder. One was the memory of Ino and herself playing with jump rope. She could almost imagine a forlorn sick boy looking out at her through a window. But she could never imagine killing her friends.

The other distracting thing was that someone had left the sink in the bathroom running for ten minutes and hadn't bothered to shut it off. Groaning, Sakura pushed herself up and straightened her hair. Everything about her, even her pyjamas, was screaming that she'd been tossing and turning instead of sleeping like she should have. She was probably going to be lethargic the whole day. Silently, she crept out of her room to shut it off.

The door to the bathroom wasn't closed and the sink hadn't been left on. Through half an inch of open door, she could see her sensei standing, a hand of his under the pouring water. He didn't seem to notice her, both eyes of his trained on his wrist as he let the water pour over his hand. Half a minute of this and Sakura retreated back to her room, unsure of what to think about her sensei standing there as if in a trance. She crawled back into bed, shutting her eyes and falling into uneasy dreams filled with girls playing jump rope with each other's intestines.