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Iruka is nine years old, almost ten, when a Chunin drags him off the battlefield that will kill his parents.
He’s still an Academy student, not yet a Genin, though he could be. He’d had a bitter fight with his mother over graduating last year. But the Sandaime had ordered all the children off the battlefield, regardless of rank.
Iruka is nine years old and he’s been evacuated to the shelters under the mountain like a civilian, not even allowed to help with the evacuations. He’s alone and numb and alone and he can hear them dying.
Eventually, it’s over. Iruka returns to a destroyed house. His parents never come home.
His family house is unlivable, so he’s assigned to live out of a tent with a few other families who have been displaced. Everyone gives him looks of pity, and they all treat him like a civilian child, like he’s incapable of taking care of himself.
Iruka is not sure what makes him worthy, but eventually, Danzo-sama comes and takes his hand and gives him the name Mizunoto.
*
Iruka stood at the village gates for several minutes after Naruto and Jiraiya were out of sight. Sakura was the only one who was still there with him.
“Sakura-chan,” Iruka said eventually. “Let me buy you lunch.”
“Sure, Iruka-sensei,” Sakura replied, though she, like Iruka, was still looking out the gates in the direction Naruto had gone. She sounded tired. “Not Ramen though, please.”
The teahouse Iruka selected was homey, with soft lighting, overstuffed furniture, and colorful drapes. It reminded him of his parents, and so he felt it might remind Sakura of hers. At the very least, it should remind her of Uzuku.
Sakura sat across from him, head bent forward and looking down at her hands fisted in her lap. Iruka let the silence sit until the food and tea arrived.
“I recommended you for a field promotion to Chunin,” Iruka told her as soon as the server was out of casual earshot.
Sakura whipped her head up to stare at him, eyes wide. “What?”
“That Genjutsu you broke during the invasion showed a prodigious amount of talent. That, coupled with your extremely advanced chakra control and quick thinking in the field– I think it’s clear you should be a Chunin. I’ve heard a few of the Chunin you woke in the stands have submitted similar recommendations.”
“But… Naruto and Sasuke-kun aren’t Chunin,” she told him blankly.
“That’s because Naruto and Sasuke aren’t qualified to be Chunin,” Iruka said plainly.
“But… they’re stronger than I am.”
“There are lots of different kinds of strength. The type of strength you’re talking about isn’t the only qualification for Chunin. It’s not even the main one. If it was, do you really think Shikamaru would have been made Chunin while Neji wasn’t?”
Sakura was silent in response. Iruka started eating his food, but after a few minutes of Sakura’s silence, he looked back up at her, concerned. She still looked a little shellshocked, but also now a little upset.
Had he misread her? He didn’t think so. He rarely made mistakes like that anymore. In the chaos following the invasion, Iruka had spent night and day running the administration building in Sarutobi’s absence. He’d looked at every report and piece of paper filed in the weeks afterward, and he’d used that information to carefully select nine people that he felt would be good fits for the program.
Sakura was the last of the nine to be approached, but the time should have only done him favors here, with the Godaime casting her aside for the mission to retrieve Sasuke, and now Naruto leaving her behind.
Still…
“I’m sorry, Sakura-chan, I guess I assumed. Do you not want to be a career shinobi?”
That startled her out of her thoughts. “What? No! I mean, no, that’s not why I’m-” She bit her lip. “Did… Iruka-sensei, did Kakashi-sensei also recommend me for Chunin?”
Iruka breathed very slowly. Sage, he really hated that man. He’d avoided Sarutobi’s other favored shinobi as much as humanly possible, for various reasons, but there was no avoiding Naruto getting assigned to the man’s Genin team. If anything, Hatake’s lackluster performance as a Jounin-sensei only cemented Iruka’s ill-will.
But he understood Sakura’s loyalty. In fact, it was one of the reasons he’d chosen her.
“Not that I’m aware of,” Iruka told her.
Sakura’s face crumpled a little, but she didn’t look surprised. “And Godaime-sama decided against promoting me.”
It wasn’t a question.
“If she was going to, I imagine she would have when she promoted Shikamaru.”
“Right,” Sakura agreed. She picked up her chopsticks and started to eat, eyes lowered to her plate. Iruka followed suit, letting the silence sit.
“What should I do, Iruka-sensei?” Sakura asked eventually. “Sasuke left the village to join Orochimaru. Naruto is getting training from Jiraiya of the Sannin. Kakashi-sensei- he doesn’t train me anyway. Team Seven was all I had left, and now I don’t even have that.”
“You have me, Sakura,” Iruka said quietly. “Uzu-jin stick together.”
Sakura’s face scrunched up and turned blotchy. She reached up quickly and scrubbed at her eyes with her forearm. “Thanks, Iruka-sensei.” Iruka stayed silent for a few moments to let Sakura regain her composure. She breathed deeply and then settled. “I want to be a shinobi,” she told him. “But I don’t- I don’t know how to go forward. How to get stronger.”
Iruka watched her for several moments, shifted his body language to considering and Sakura straightened her spine almost immediately, recognizing it.
“I know someone who might be able to help you with that,” Iruka finally admitted. Sakura’s face flashed through a brief expression of surprise and hope before she locked it down into something more professional, posture attentive. “But it won’t be easy.”
“I can do it,” she said immediately, eager.
“I’m talking the hardest work you can imagine, increased by a factor of ten. If you can’t do it, you’ll die trying,” Iruka told her seriously. Sakura sobered, thoughtful.
“What is it?” She asked, because she was the smartest Genin of her generation, and if Iruka did this right she would be theirs.
The server returned with another pot of tea and took away their dishes. Iruka waited until they were out of earshot to continue.
“There are a lot of us, who fall through the cracks,” Iruka told her, quiet. “Konoha is a big village, the biggest and the most prominent. We’re the Damiyo on the hill everyone is trying to usurp. We have to be the strongest, the steadiest, the most unyielding, just to maintain our position. Konoha has to be the best.” Sakura leaned forward slightly, hanging on Iruka’s words. “But we are too big for our own good, sometimes. There are a lot of orphans here, without the resources needed for them to meet their potential. That’s something you and I have in common, now.”
Sakura flinched, eyes wide, but didn’t pull away.
“So, this person I know decided to create a program,” Careful, Iruka told himself, feeling his mouth start to tingle, “that would help those who fall through the cracks and Konoha at the same time. But because Konoha has to be the best, so do the graduates of this program. They must, to keep Konoha safe. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sensei,” Sakura said, completely serious. “Is this-?” She pressed her lips together on the question, clearly recognizing it was something he wouldn’t be able to answer. “If I could do it, would I be as strong as Naruto when he comes back? As strong as Sasuke?”
“Yes,” Iruka told her, completely confident. She smiled, just a little, then returned to serious.
“And in a couple of years when Naruto comes back, will I still be… Sakura?”
Clever girl, Iruka thought fondly. “In what sense? Are you the same Sakura you were a year ago?”
Sakura gave a little huff, clearly having trouble phrasing her question in a way that wasn’t too ambiguous but was also something he could answer. “Will I… keep my name? My identity?”
“If that’s what you want,” Iruka told her, though she would be a much less essential operative if she chose to give it up. Her connections to Naruto, Sasuke, and Hatake were at least a small part of what made her valuable.
She seemed relieved by his answer, though. Excellent.
“And you think I can do it?”
Iruka reached over the table for her hands. She brought them up and slid them into his willingly. He squeezed her hands slightly. “You are one of the forgotten ones, Sakura. I was your teacher for years, so believe me when I say that your placement on a team with Naruto and Sasuke was not an accident. You were not put there to be ignored by your Jounin-sensei and left behind by your peers – you were put on that team because you have the same potential they do. You’ve slipped through the cracks and you have the potential to be the best, and that means you will make it. I know it. The program was made for you.”
Sakura squeezed his hands back, expression fierce. “Then I’ll do it.”
Iruka introduced her to Danzo Shimura the next day.