Chapter no.15 Team 7's Introspection part 2

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"Oh dear... I was afraid this day would come." Mebuki said, putting a hand to her face and shaking her head. "Sakura... you're becoming a teenager." Her daughter just scoffed. The woman looked to the ceiling sadly. "Whatever happened to the little girl who would tell me everything when she got home? It seems like just yesterday I was holding you while you were crying about the other kids poking fun at that cute forehead of yours. Or you told me about how happy you were that you finally made a friend, or..."

"I get it, mom!"

"Ah see, that's more like it." Mebuki smiled at needling a reaction from her daughter. She placed a hand on her arm. "Now look, I was a child once too. And I may not have gone very far but I am a kunoichi. I know how hard the shinobi life can hit you when you're just starting out. So tell me what happened."

A few moments of silence passed as Sakura thought about whether or not to say anything. Finally, she responded, "It just... some things that got me thinking is all. Like... have I been wasting my time and..." She trailed off.

"Oh boy... I know that feeling." Mebuki shook her head and then called out. "Kizashi! I think our daughter's taken one of those long hard looks at herself."

"Oh? Looked into the mirror, has she?" Her father's good-natured voice called back. In a few moments, he joined them. "Well, that's no reflection on her; I do it all the time!"

"Dad..." Sakura groaned in exasperation. Soon, Kizashi joined them.

Her father was a man who stood just over six feet with blue eyes and dull pink hair, which he styled into her namesake cherry blossoms. He had a bit of stubble and sideburns that flowed into an angular mustache. He wore a simple green obi, burgundy-colored pants, and a silver necklace with a pink cherry blossom design.

He gave his daughter a kind smile as he sat down on the opposite end of the bed as her mother. "So, what did you see that's got you so down?"

"And what brought it on in the first place?" Her mother added.

She sighed, knowing they weren't going to leave her alone, and so she caved. She told them everything. Of how she'd secretly agreed with Naruto about being fed up with the tediousness of D-rank missions. How glad she'd been to receive their first C-rank. The attack of those two chunin and the revelation that it was far more dangerous than advertised. Their decision to press on and their first encounter with Zabuza, revealing to them just how deep in it they were. The masked boy. Life in Wave. And finally, the events on the bridge.

Her parents had mostly stayed quiet. Although, they'd expressed anger at Kakashi-sensei deciding not to cancel the mission and come back. She didn't hold it against him. Everything had turned out alright for the most part, and who knows how things in Wave would have gone down if they'd assumed it was only a B-rank job and sent a bunch of chunin?

They had been surprised that Naruto had been the hero of the day. His plan to free their sensei, once again all Naruto and Sasuke she'd just stood there and watched. How determined he'd been after hearing Inari's story. How he'd inspired the people of Wave and brought them out of despair. The apparent death of Sasuke, the real death of the masked boy, and how he'd reacted to it all. She'd seen them exchanging looks she couldn't read a few times.

"Well, first let me say good riddance to this Gatō," Mebuki said, her face wrinkled in disgust at what the man had done.

"Here, here!" Her father wholeheartedly agreed. He then smiled at her as he placed a hand on her shoulder. "Now, why does all this have you looking so glum? You helped save a nation! On your first real mission, no less! You should be celebrating!"

"No, I didn't," Sakura said dully. "I didn't do anything. I just stood guard of Tazuna; it was all Sasuke, Naruto and Kakashi-sensei."

"You don't think guarding the client's an important job?" Mebuki asked in a deadpan as if she thought she was being stupid.

"Not when I couldn't have protected him if my life depended on it." She said before grimacing slightly. "Which it would have." She added before looking away. "If the masked kid or even those two chunin we fought on the road had gotten past everyone else... I wouldn't have lasted two seconds. And the only time Tazuna was attacked it was Zabuza; we'd be dead if Kakashi-sensei hadn't saved us. What good's a guard who can't even protect herself?"

She sighed deeply as all the fights ran through her mind again. "Naruto and Sasuke saved Kakashi-sensei when Zabuza had him trapped. They fought the masked kid, Kakashi-sensei protected Tazuna the one time he needed it, Naruto inspired the people of Wave to stand up... I didn't... couldn't do anything. I can't even say I've ever helped them. All I've ever done is put Naruto down and fawn over Sasuke... and I can't even do that right. I mouthed off about Naruto being an orphan. In front of Sasuke."

Her mother's grimace told her she agreed with how bad that was.

"... Am I... I'm not a good ninja... or a good person, am I?"

"Sakura..." Kizashi began, but her mother cut him off.

"Well, if we're being honest... it was pretty low of you to break off your friendship with that Ino girl after she stood up for you." Mebuki began with a hand on her chin, earning a light glare from her husband.

Sakura sat up and frowned at her mother. "Are you going to tell me Sasuke isn't worth it?" She dared her mother to tell her that true love wasn't something worth fighting over.

Instead, her mother just made a single quiet laugh and gave her a lopsided grin. "So she's a rival for the boy you like. Friendly rivalries are a thing, you know?"

Oh... yeah, that's true, wasn't it? She'd seen them in some of the stories she'd read and on TV shows. So, she'd broken the only real friendship she'd had, with a girl who defended her from bullies when they first met, for nothing. Yep, another mark on the tally of 'Proof Sakura Haruno is a terrible person'.

"But, you're missing something very important here." Mebuki continued looking at her seriously before smiling and placing a hand on her head. "Sakura, you're a child."

"Exactly. You're barely in your teens." Kizashi agreed. "Children make stupid mistakes. It's what you do. What we did when we were that age. The important thing is that you recognize them, learn from them and do what you can to make up for them." He smiled at her. "None of that is anything you can't fix or make up for, right?"

"... I guess not."

"Then try to figure out what you need to work on."

What she needed to work on? The things she'd need to fix or make up for...

.....

She had some thinking to do.

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Kakashi sat at a table in his home, his head resting on his hand. He hummed quietly in thought as he closed his eye.

He hadn't done a good job of leading those kids, had he? They hadn't been ready for that. Well, that was pretty obvious; he'd had to teach them the tree-climbing exercise mid-mission. He was proud of them for having made it through but was under no delusions that it wasn't a close call. Everything Lord Third had said to him was something he'd realized when they'd thought Sasuke was dead on the bridge.

This was the first time he'd led a team of apprentices. He hadn't been on a team like this since he was under a jonin sensei himself. Perhaps he'd been too hands-off when it came to training them? Had he been expecting too much when he decided to push on?

Well, hindsight was 20-20, as they say. The more important part was what was he going to do about it now?