Capítulo 11: Departure
The Chunin exams were over. For Y/N and a few others. She didn't make it through the preliminaries. Fighting with Neji was a new experience for her. It made her feel like a loser.
Sure, she put up a fight. She used various moves and he was injured too. But he really did in a sense, destroy her completely. One thing she came to understand is that she needs to train repeatedly with the Hyuga clan. Although it felt uncomfortable, she realized it was time to finally talk to Hinata.
Maybe she'll refuse considering how close Y/N was with Naruto but she really hoped the girl would agree. It was amusing how they finally had a common ground to relate on now.
Losing against Neji.
Although, she can only imagine how bad it was for Hinata since her own brother was ruthless to her. Some kind of tension in the clan. She would definitely prefer to avoid the topic.
Other than that. There was something that worried her more than she could admit. A lot of events took place at the end of the Chunin exams. But to sum it all up, the Leaf Village was attacked and Orochimaru killed the Hokage.
Y/N would prefer to say the Hokage sacrificed himself for the village.
And she made new acquaintances. It probably wouldn't be the case if it wasn't for Naruto. Somehow, his fight with Gaara brought him closer to the shinobis of the Sand Village. It was a guess, but she could understand how all those who had the beasts inside of them were treated like monsters.
Thankfully, Naruto handled it well. She was quite proud to be his friend. He...made a lot of improvement. Which finally brought her back to the main issue.
The question of how she was still alive.
She remembered very well how she was trying to stall time and let Shikamaru, Naruto, and Sakura chase after Sasuke when the ninjas surrounded her. Ofcourse, she wanted to go and check on him. But without Shikamaru's brain? It was impossible for them to come up with decent plans.
She remembered her body getting stabbed in multiple regions, causing excessive blood loss. At least that would've been the cause of her death. She knew fighting near the water body was definitely an advantage to her but despite all of her moves and powers - in front of ninjas with years of practice and experience, she was nothing.
When she woke up, she found the ninjas floating face-down on the water. The strangest part of it all though was after the post-mortem when the shinobis started discussing their cause of death. Y/N couldn't tell anyone that she was the last person who saw them alive. The fact that their cause of death was dehydration. Their life force and chakra were drained out of them. Ofcourse, there's no way they could survive after that.
She immediately left afterward when she felt the ground trembling. Sakura was unconscious and Sasuke was once again, covered with the weird marks all over his body. The marks left by Orochimaru. But, she couldn't dwell on that. Naruto was dragging himself towards Gaara, talking to him.
And that was it.
No one knew the person behind the death of five shinobis except for Sakura, Naruto, Shikamaru, and Kakashi. Ofcourse, Kakashi guessed it right immediately. At first, he was quiet and observed her quietly. But then, when he asked "You really came out unscathed?", she couldn't help but tell him everything.
This was the first time she felt scared.
The protection she was under - the Hokage - was gone. Most of the shinobis of Leaf Village were always keeping an eye on her. The village was suddenly attacked. There was no doubt in it that people were starting to look at her like she was some kind of spy of Orochimaru. After the actions pulled by Orochimaru, it wouldn't be much of a surprise if he used dirty tactics to make a child grow strong enough to make things easy for him.
Maybe she should've tried to understand Sasuke a bit better, then she wouldn't have to see the future events. She should've understood that meeting with Orochimaru was just the beginning of everything going downhill. She should've known it wouldn't end so easily.
The comfort that she expected to find from her team was gone too. Sakura has been quieter than usual around her. Sasuke was barely with them as he was busy training by himself. The only person that she did talk with was Naruto.
And somehow she started spending more time with him. He was her safe zone now.
[ TIME SKIP ]
"Hey can you help me a bit," Y/N said, "I mean...since you're done."
"Yeah sure. Let me see," Sakura said, leaning in to check her fish.
A lot of things went down. But if described in short, Tsunade was the Hokage now, Sakura and Y/N trained under her, and Sasuke...left the village. She knew he was ambitious and wanted revenge but she didn't know how strong his ambition was. Sasuke never talked much but since he left, their team surely felt incomplete. Even without much words exchanged, Y/N could feel how much he meant for the team.
Ofcourse, Naruto and Sakura were devastated and were pretending to be strong but she knew how much more it hurt them than her. She couldn't find words of comfort to begin with. In the first place, she pretended like he didn't matter. She didn't know how to bring the topic up without looking pretentious.
All she knew was that Sasuke meant something for them, and she was willing to put her difference in opinion about him for them. If anything, she knew out of everyone in the team, she was the one least affected. And she didn't mind if they wanted to use her to get him back.
The missions they went into brought them closer. And she understood one thing that she didn't think of before. She couldn't bear to see any of her friends leave the village and give up on being their true selves.
"You're doing great," Sakura muttered, "Just focus on your chakra a bit more."
Y/N tried but in vain and gave up. Sighing she stepped away from the table and looked down her hands.
"You're distracted," Sakura said.
Y/N closed her eyes and muttered, "I'm sorry."
"...it's not your fault."
"No, I'm sorry for being so insensitive all these times. I just-"
"It's okay," Sakura smiled, "You're guilty not because you don't feel anything for him. It's because somehow, you...think he wouldn't have left if you behaved better with him."
"I thought I didn't care. But...I guess I do," she sighed.
"I know. But, he would've left eitherway. No one could really stop him..." Sakura's words trailed off.
"And I'm sorry for being...so insensitive towards you. I didn't realize-"
"No, you were right to feel like that about me. I was...useless in most missions," Sakura said.
"So was I. But, in order to take the heat off, I was just directing all my anger to you. I didn't even bother to think how you must be feeling."
"Well, if it makes you feel better, I'm happy that you apologized. It wasn't necessary though."
Y/N smiled and said, "You know...he's leaving today right?"
"Yeah, he is."
Y/N didn't know what else to say. She wanted to know if Sakura wanted to come along her to bid him goodbye. But...somehow it felt weird. No doubt in it, that she was going to miss him but why was she...embarrassed? Why was she feeling shy?
"Oh, you're turning into Hinata too," Sakura mumbled, "Didn't think anyone would be interested in that idiot other than Hinata."
"W-What?" Y/N stuttered, her face turning red.
"Oh my god, you didn't even realize?" Sakura sighed, "Why do you think you are feeling so restless when he's leaving just for training? Do you really think the rest of us think like you?"
"Cause I spend most of my time with him."
"No, come on. You really don't believe that's the case, right?" Sakura looked at her, "You're protective when it comes to him. And maybe you don't realize this cause you don't see any girl flirting with him but just imagine, he's gonna grow up. And he might have a few...love interests."
Oh.
Y/N was slowly starting to understand Sakura and Hinata a little bit better than before. Her mood suddenly went sour. A frown visibly took over her face. "You can't be serious," she said. She wouldn't have ever imagined the possibility of developing feelings for someone. And for an idiot like Naruto? Well, that's not just it.
For someone who cared deeply about his friends. For someone who made her feel better when she felt down. For someone who was ambitious.
She felt so dumb. She should've seen this coming. She barely spent as much time with any boy other than him.
"Well, aren't you gonna go?" Sakura asked.
Smiling, Y/N ran out of the building near the gates where she saw Naruto walking along with Jiraya. "Naruto!" she shouted. She watched him snap back his head with a grin on his face. Immediately, Y/N waved her hand at him. Naruto waved back.
Ofcourse, she couldn't say it. How could she? He's so innocent, he probably has no idea. Worst case scenario, he might even feel disgusted, right?
She knew she couldn't have everything. But still, maybe hanging onto the hope of someday wasn't that bad right? And it's just a silly crush. It would go away by the time he came back.
She turned and started walking back, ignoring the hammering in her chest.
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