Sakura Haruno was not an unintelligent woman. No, an unintelligent woman would have tried to protect someone from an attack that was way beyond their level. An unintelligent woman would have jumped in the way.

Unfortunately, Sakura was not an unintelligent woman.

She was a fucking idiot. In fact, those are the exact words that went through her head as she met a chidori meant for her best friend with her chakra-charged fist.

A complete and total. fucking. idiot.

And when she awoke in Training Ground Three as she remembered it from 10 years ago (give or take a few months), she mentally confirmed something that she had silently thought many nights on the battlefield.

Yep, I'm insane.

As she lay on the ground silently regretting her entire life to that point, she realized that her entire body felt like it had been trampled by Kurama himself. Her head, her arms, her legs, and even her bloody mind hurt. Just as she was about to begin the painstaking and draining process of a full internal medical check, the "oh shit" part of her brain registered the soft whoosh of a shunshin and the shape of a hand coming into her peripherals. Instantly, her mind snapped into the ruthless machine it became during battle; thinking quickly, she moved with a speed only a jounin could hope to see as she rolled herself forwards and to her feet, leapt to the side, and began spinning to execute a ruthless roundhouse kick not unlike Gai's. When she saw the familiar flash of gravity-defying silver hair, however, it took all of her battle-hardened years as a killing machine not to literally scream something along the lines of "What the FUCK is going on?!" Unfortunately, she had already made her move, and Kakashi had most likely registered her as a threat. She pulled her kick back, wincing and nearly falling as her body started to pulse in pain and her world started to spin. Briefly, she met Kakashi's eyes, seeing in them the same confusion that was most likely reflected in her own unsteady gaze. Kakashi, taking her momentary pain and confusion as an invitation, was on her in a second, a flurry of blows aimed to incapacitate her.

Sakura's vision was beginning to blur and spin, but her instincts wouldn't let her stop. Through her confusion and slight fear at what was happening- she was fighting her one of her dead best friends - her muscles moved with a mind of their own. Her arms came up, sluggishly blocking Kakashi's blur of blows. The only thing going through Sakura's head was is this even happening right now?! When she looked up and met Kakashi's gaze once more, her mind just couldn't take it anymore.

When Kakashi went to the Memorial stone, he wasn't expecting to fight a random kunoichi who seemed to be battling her own mind more than she was battling him. He also hadn't expected her to clutch her head and scream in pain before passing out, but stranger things have happened, he supposed.

It was certainly something to say at her own skill, as her mind was clearly addled with confusion yet she still blocked his blows without a hitch. His sharingan eye was opened under his mask, reading the confusion on the girl's face. She was clearly not mentally present, but her insane speed and the roundhouse kick (that looked suspiciously like Gai's, his mind supplied) that was laden with enough power to probably knock his head clean off were still replaying in his mind. She had pulled back rather than completing that kick; clearly, she didn't want to harm him. He didn't miss the immediate flash of pain she seemed to have, and he was going to use that opportunity to knock her unconscious and take her straight to Inoichi, but her battle-honed reflexes were getting in the way of his blows. When she looked up at him, well, that led to his current predicament. A passed-out, mysterious kunoichi, who now that he looked closer looked quite a lot like the genin girl he had just been assigned earlier that day. His original plan was to subdue her and take her to Inoichi, but now it looked like Inoichi would have to come to her. Sighing, Kakashi picked her up and body flickered to the Hokage's office, gingerly placing her on a couch near the back. At the Sandaime's raised brow, he explained everything that happened, and immediately summoned one of his ninken to fetch the former head of T&I. Roughly running a hand through his silver hair, the ex-Anbu had only one thought sitting idly in his mind.

For once, can I not be the epicenter of the insane situations in this village?

A/N: Alright, so, super short chapter. Honestly I'm not really happy with it but it's been sitting in my files for damn near a year and I figured it was time to test it out, see how it was received, and if everyone hated it, it was time to put it to bed. So I guess this is that.

Let me know what you think about it, if you want me to continue, what I did wrong (my only request is please don't comment "FUCKING EVERYTHING" but other than that it's fair game).

Also as for the timeline, this is sort of a slight AU I suppose. In case I decide to keep going, I don't want to give away too many spoilers - but this universe is slightly more realistic in some ways and I've taken a few liberties in canon. Namely, Sakura wasn't a whiny little bitch clinging to Sasuke all through Shippuuden and actually got to see some character development. Don't get me wrong, she's one of my favorite characters - but her development was seriously lacking and she made me roll my eyes due to the sheer stupidity of her actions many times. Regardless, in this story, she's actually grown into her potential and is a badass killing machine (she's still Sakura, and deep down she's warm and gentle, but she's no softie and she won't hesitate to take down anything that threatens Konoha or her team. In case you want a solid look abilities-wise, I'd say she and Kakashi could probably go head-to-head and have mixed results/wins (probably mostly favoring Kakashi due to his experience and larger skillset, but Sakura could use her brain and her more specialized skillset to sneak in a few wins).

Anyways, enough about that. I'll leave this for now and see if anyone reads it, and if you do, please review! I want to hear the good AND the bad.

Bye for now!

xAya