[open]

[nobrassknuckles]

Who: Sakura and YOU.
Where: Parlor, library, possibly up to the second floor -- wherever, basically.
When: Night 004.
What: New ninja + paranoia + exploring.
Warnings: Sakura's temper...?

Comments

[forwantofpeace]

She seemed to have things under control, and he wouldn't have bothered the girl until he saw a flash of her headband. Konoha ninja, but he didn't recognize her.

That wasn't exactly a problem, but he knew most active duty ninja around his age and pink hair was fairly memorable. In fact, the only one he remember was one of Sasuke's little classmates and this girl looked far too old.

Which might be a result of slipping time-lines, but he wasn't sure. "Excuse me, are you from Konoha?" He smiled, hoping she would turn so he could get a better look at her forehead. But the symbol was one he had been surrounded by his entire life, as close as the Uchiha fan sewn onto his back.

[nobrassknuckles]

Sakura started, halfway through a stanza in a thoroughly useless book of poetry (not a kind she recognized), and could have kicked herself a moment later. Some ninja you are.

A name she recognized, finally. Konoha. And when she turned to look at him, she recognized the symbol on his forehead protector too. Any other time, it might have put her at ease.

"I am." She took a moment to take him in, cataloging observations, not the least bit ashamed of looking because it's what any shinobi would do, what he'd probably do in return. Weapons, stature, his bandaged eye. Maybe lost, maybe not; she'd been trained by the Copy Ninja, she wasn't going to make assumptions.

"So are you," she commented, and it wasn't exactly a question. She didn't recognize him, but there was something unsettlingly familiar about him just the same.

[forwantofpeace]

He studied her for a moment, observing her weapons, equipment bags, and complete lack of clan markings. Watching her general nervousness for a moment before offering her a shallow bow that never broke eye contact. "Uchiha Shisui, Jounin of Konoha, and you are?" He smiled politely, relaxed as he possibly could be.

She seemed guarded, but he couldn't imagine very many ninja being comfortable with being moved to who knew where all by themselves.

[nobrassknuckles]

"Uchiha...?"

For a second, her shock registered quite nakedly across her face. Granted, she wasn't always the best at schooling her expressions, but that name was all it took to lose control of it completely.

It wasn't every day you ran into a dead man, after all.

(Genjutsu, she reminded herself.)

Sakura managed to pull her composure back in, at least enough to reply: "Haruno Sakura, Chuunin." She returned the bow, because she wasn't always this rude, but her eyes never left him either.

[forwantofpeace]

She must be from the future then, with that reaction. The name brushed against something in the back of his brain, and he chased it for a moment until he figured it out. "Ah! You're one of Sasuke-kun's classmates. Aren't you?" He smiled, bowing again. "But from somewhere past my death, I think. It's very nice to meet you, Haruno-san."

After all, every person from home he had met so far except for Sasuke had declared him a dead man. It really wasn't a shock anymore. For her, yes, for him, no.

[nobrassknuckles]

"He was my teammate."

She almost didn't realize the way she phrased that. Was. Naruto would have said is, a week ago she would have said the same thing, but that was before she found out he was Akatsuki. That he'd attacked a Jinchuuriki. Betrayal was still fresh and painful, like a wound that hadn't scabbed over yet.

Sakura wasn't going to think about that.

Shisui seemed pretty calm about being dead, all things considered. It was a little eerie. "You know about that, then?" But then, of course he would.

[forwantofpeace]

"Was, Haruno-san?" The cautious interest was disguised as naked curiosity, leaving little room to read into it further. "Did something happen to him?"

He nodded. "Mikoto-sama threw a plate at me and Itachi gawped at me like a fish, even Hatake-san seemed shocked to see me. I think he may have used up his expressions for a year though." He smiled, utterly relaxed. "We all die, eventually. My own death is something I made peace with the first time I tied this on." He made a gesture to the headband, still smiling. "It's a comforting thing, in its own way, to know how the end will come. It takes a bit of the uncertainty out of it, don't you think?"

[nobrassknuckles]

Distracted from his first question -- not like she was going to answer it anyway -- by another dull shock, Sakura gaped. "Hatake -- Kakashi-sensei's here? That doesn't make any --"

Sense. It didn't have to.

"And Itachi." The other name wasn't immediately familiar to her, not like those two, and Sakura couldn't keep the sharp edge of anger out of her tone completely. One dead man is as likely as another, she supposed, but damned if she didn't want to take a swing at him. She might have, given the opportunity, if it wasn't suicidal.

[forwantofpeace]

"Yes, he is." Sensei, huh? Sasuke and Sakura and who? "I can direct you to him if you like, Haruno-san. But you'll find that much of this place doesn't come close to making sense, it's best to check that impulse at the door. It plays by it's own rules."

His smile didn't slip, catching her tone and studying her briefly. He knew what had happened, at least in a limited scope without details. Itachi had allowed himself to become the villain. "Ah, Haruno-san, please believe me when I say that Itachi is on our side and working towards the same goals as the rest of us. Sasuke-kun would be incredibly upset if you attacked his brother in front of him, he is rather fond of him. It might start you out on the wrong foot with him."

[nobrassknuckles]

Sakura snorted, perhaps rudely, definitely inelegantly. "I'm not going to attack him unprovoked. I'm not stupid. But my goals have nothing to hunting down and murdering jinchuuriki, Uchiha-san, so maybe you should speak for yourself."

The words were blunt, but Sakura herself was a blunt object when she wanted to be, when she was at her most stubborn and burned with a fire she alone owned. She couldn't think of another person who'd done as much harm, and would have done more harm, to the people she loved most

[forwantofpeace]

No, he didn't think she was stupid, she seemed far too guarded to lump her into any sort of category. So was that what Itachi had been up to? Well. "Our goals at the moment are simply survival, and protecting Sasuke-kun. Though I do wonder, Itachi killed a clan full of ninja at thirteen, experienced ninja who survived through the war. If he really wanted to take Naruto-kun, I wonder why he didn't simply do so?" He let his smile slip, calm and attentive and studying her with his single eye. She knew a lot, and that information was a valuable thing. But she didn't know who he was, which made his pride sting a little

[nobrassknuckles]

Not forgotten -- at least, not by this girl. Sakura turned more fully toward him, her feet spread apart, every muscle in her body taught with a challenge, an indictment. "If you know how you died, you probably know most people think Itachi killed you and forged your suicide note, Shisui-san. I've been over that file. Now you tell me you know about the massacre. Did you know that Itachi tortured Sasuke-kun with the sharingan when he was thirteen? Did you know he was unconscious until Tsunade-sama returned to Konoha and healed him? And now you expect me to believe that Itachi has his best interests at heart." She scoffed, crossing her arms over her chest. "I don't pretend to know his reasons. I just know that he's a threat to the people who matter to me most, and I don't trust him

[forwantofpeace]

He paused, filing away the information she had offered, fitting it in with the pieces he already knew and the pieces she was giving him. He smiled faintly, tiredly. "I have very many doubts that he forged anything at all, Haruno-san. I know my state of mind when I lost this right eye, I arrived here in that state. If I died, if Itachi killed me, it is because I told him in order to fulfill certain conditions. And there is really only one reason I would do that, Haruno-san, and that is because I didn't want him to die."

His smile tightened, head bowing and finally breaking eye contact. Danzo's words had not been kind, or in any way softened to spare his feelings. "I know some of that. Not all of it, but Itachi threw much the same details at me. I-I understand his choices, even if I do not condone some of them. He was always horribly reactive. I did not know that Tsunade-sama had returned, actually. So that I didn't know. But, Haruno-san, you are from a civilian family, are you not? In clans, many times it is not the well-being of our

[nobrassknuckles]

Sakura was silent for a long while, her jaw tight. Shisui's speech about gave her a lot to think about. A lot to ponder, a lot to reject - she's seen the kind of damage that a clan can do to their own by focusing only on their lives, and not their well-being - and a fair amount of insight into the kind of relationship Shisui and Itachi might have once had. Obviously, he trusted him. It made her wary again. But he still wore his hitai-ate intact, she wouldn't ignore that

[forwantofpeace]

"Of course, Haruno-san." His polite smile returned, voice soft with respect. "It's an honor to meet the apprenticeof Godaime Hokage-sama, I am sure you are a credit to your teacher

[nobrassknuckles]

"It's good to meet you too." She hadn't said that yet, she realized. Mostly because she'd been too suspicious of him, and it might not ultimately turn out to be true. But he seemed pleasant and polite enough, so Sakura figured it was probably time to return the favor and demonstrate that she was, in fact, capable of being respectful.

Pleasant, polite, and with a sense of humor, too. She couldn't help but smile. "I'm sure." No, she didn't believe that for an instant. Shinobi sweat and bleed to become good at something because they have some reason to - family, war, broken teams. She wouldn't call Shisui on it. "I won't tell anyone else.

"It's a house, as far as I can tell." Not that she'd had the chance to explore it as much as she'd like. "There are a lot of others who are in our situation, I've heard."