Genre: Hurt/Comfort ; Drama
Ship: Kakashi & Sakura
Triggers(s): Angst, Implied child abuse, Mental health issues, depression
Rating: M
Additional Tags:Sasuke doesn't appear much in this, fuck Sasuke, BAMF!Sakura, Kakashi as a good teacher

The mood in the camp is weird when Kakashi slinks into it late at night.

"Ah, Kakashi. You're here," Genma greeted.

Kakashi cast his eye to where Sakura is sharing the tent with Hisae, taking two quick steps to peer into the tent. "What happened?" he asked after ascertaining that she is all physically sound.

"Did you know? Or at least suspect something?" Hisae says. The campfire flickers, casting shadows across her face. Though the shape of her eyes were mostly from her dad, most of her remaining features reminded Kakashi of his father and a part of him ached. Had it not been for his little genin, Kakashi would have safely remained far away from the rest of the Hatake Clan. The shame at the sight of them seemed to yawn at him.

"Something?" Kakashi asks dumbly.

"She flinched rather violently when Kurenai reached over for her. Not the sort of flinch you get from anticipating an attack." Not the sort she'd get from training goes unsaid. Hisae stares into the fire, her silence thickening into a heavy tension as Kakashi tried to think back on all the training practices he had with her. None of their conditioning training had brought up issues. "Her mother, perhaps?" she finally says. "We need to bring the mother in to see if she's…"

"Or her father," Raidou adds.

"Her father?" Genma repeats. "Have you met him? Kizashi's a good person."

"I know! It's just…" Raidou trails off. "It's just… she said Kizashi called her a talentless, useless kunoichi. It just bugged me."

Takeo scoffs. "Maybe you all are overreacting. I'm sure whatever that flinch was, it might have been a genin's aborted attempt for reflexes. And I'm sure all of us had arguments with our parents that ended up in bitter words."

"Still. We should at least check. Bring them in, check it out. If it clears, then it's good, if not then at least we caught it," Hisae insists.

"She's a genin! A kunoichi of Konohagakure. You mean she couldn't stop her civilian mum?"

"It's not about the physical-" Genma motions angrily to Takeo.

"It doesn't matter," Kakashi interrupts, his quiet voice cutting through their argument. "I didn't know she hadn't told you, but they're dead."

The campfire falls silent at his words and really, Kakashi shouldn't have been surprised that Sakura hadn't told them anything. Apart from that day at the morgue, Sakura hadn't displayed any signs of grief. She carried on her day-to-day slightly subdued but otherwise normal. Kakashi, himself had been through the stages many times of his life. He knew the stages of grieving intimately. His little genin, is like him, in this emotional sense.

Had she been abused? Sakura, like Naruto, has always been upbeat and easy with her smiles. Even if she is useless as a genin. He would like to think that he is perceptive enough to pick it up, but truthfully, he hadn't spent a lot of time with her.

The Chuunin Exams was supposed to make them bond better in adversity, not make it worse. His own Chuunin Exams had helped to bond better with his teammates then. Kakashi firmly stuck the thoughts of Obito and Rin back of his mind, refusing to fiddle with the scabs.

He sinks his hands deeper into his pocket, exhausted from trying to care for three emotional-wrecked genin, almost wishing he could go back to his anbu days. His genin, a part of him bares its teeth to the thought of running away.

Genma rubs the back his neck, his senbon clacking against his teeth loudly in the silence. "I guess… she wouldn't have told us anyway. It's not we were friends before this… invasion."

Raidou mournfully agreed with him. "It's not like we could raise the dead to find out either."

Kakashi chokes. "But I know someone who can," he chuckles lowly, tilting his head slightly to avoid Genma's senbon.

"Too soon Kakashi!"

"Are we going to do anything about Sakura?" Hisae asks. "It doesn't seem right… to just leave it alone."

Genma shrugs. "What can we do? Ask her? If anything had happened, it'd be like putting salt to a freshly closed wound. And none of us is probably close enough to actually get an answer. We met her a week ago and Kakashi here is famous for keeping people at arm's length. I still don't know how his face looks like. And I've known him since he was six."

Slumping his shoulders, Kakashi sighs. "My face has nothing to do with this."

"No, but Gen's right." Raidou shakes his head. "You probably spend the minimum hours on your genin. You probably don't even know that Sakura's a mini-prodigy in the making. She thinks you don't even want her."

"Mini- what? What?"

"Mini-prodigy, Kakashi. She picked up the chakra weight trick in three hours. Even you took half a day." Genma lifts an eyebrow at him. "But you don't know that, do you?"

Kakashi hunched further, unwilling to admit to it. Sakura hadn't shown a shred of interest in being a serious kunoichi, why should he make the effort to train her if she wasn't? Not even training at home, and just barely completing his training regimen. The bare essentials. Naruto and Sasuke were far more interested in being serious shinobi. So what if she had talent? Kakashi knew that talent didn't make a shinobi.

Obito was one such.

His chest throbs painfully at the memory of Obito. Obito was talented enough to be assigned to his team, just not interested enough to maintain being one.

Hisae leans over and touches his arm. "I know you believe that she has to want before you'd train her, but if what we think about her mum is right, then she might need encouragement to grow." Kakashi takes a seat beside her and lets her slump her arm around his shoulders. "Promise me you'll try and be gentle."

He heaves a large sigh, leaning into his cousin. "Ok."

✥.✥.✥

Sensei was already sitting by the tent when Sakura woke up the next morning.

She briefly entertains the idea that Sensei is really keeping her on team seven then scoffs.

He didn't even bother to train you, why would you suddenly matter? Inner says moodily.

Sakura scarfs down the breakfast Sensei had brought for the team and her, trying to bury the hurt. Regardless of what Raidou and Hisae said, Sakura knew better. In the bigger picture, Haruno Sakura is someone that would never amount to anything. Below average taijutsu, below average chakra stores, no kekkai genkai, no clan. So what if she had excelled in knowledge? Nothing else but that stood out. Even with Papa's training, she had never managed to catch up with her peers.

Haruno Sakura didn't matter.

She wasn't going to let optimism blindly raise her hopes. If she had no expectations then she wouldn't need to suffer. Staring blankly at her empty plate, she tries to swallow the fear in her throat.

Don't bother dragging this out. Might as well get over and done with this, Inner nudges her.

Hisae said that Sensei had been asking after her, but really, who wanted her? She stands, dropping the plate into the used dish box. Genma grins at her, slapping a hefty slap on her back. "Remember you can always beat them into the ground until they apologise."

"Genma… Please don't teach my student bad things." Sensei's tone almost sounds like a petulant whine in her ears. Her stoic, lazy teacher whining. Sakura ducks her head, walking quickly towards him, resolutely refusing to react to their bantering.

All Adults lie. Haruno Sakura didn't matter, she reminds herself, squashing the fledgeling hope that maybe, just maybe they wanted her.

"They aren't bad things if she needs them."

Sensei sighs and pushes her towards the exit. "Genma is such a bad influence. I can't believe I let you stay with them for a week," he grumbles.

Sakura fists her dress, trying not to give away the anxiety rolling in her stomach. Real Sakura has no place in the real world. Real Sakura is pathetic and shy. Breathing in deeply, she slowly releases her breath, donning her extroverted Sakura persona. She already has accidently let Sensei and Sasuke see parts of her real self, she can't risk them catching on. After all, no one likes her real self.

Definitely better to pretend to be extroverted, Inner agrees.

She blinks and plasters a large smile on her face, half-bobbing with each step. "Bet Sasuke-kun has grown more handsome since I last saw him," she says, mimicking the adoring look Ino frequently spotted. Faking an infatuation with the Uchiha grates on her even more now, now that she doesn't have the fear of her mother's wrath hanging over her. Sakura didn't care if Sasuke looked at her anymore and there is no one to show her efforts anymore.

"Sakura-chan, what Sasuke said the other day was terrible of him-"

She spins on the ball of her foot to grin at Sensei. "It's okay, Sensei! Sasuke-kun was right after all!"

"No, he wasn't," Sensei says firmly, stilling her with a heavy hand on her shoulder. "It's okay to grieve for your parents. It's okay to cry."

"I'm a shinobi now, Sensei." Sakura didn't get it. Shinobi weren't supposed to show their tears, shouldn't Sensei be frowning on her crying? Or is there some unsaid social etiquette that she is missing?

"Just because you're a shinobi doesn't mean you're not human."

"I am fine, Sensei." She shakes his hand off and runs a few steps forward. "Come on! Just because you are always late, doesn't mean I have to be too." She turns, pretending not to feel Sensei's gaze on her back. Why are people always so contradicting?

✥.✥.✥

Naruto jumps off the handrails, bouncing towards her the moment he sees her. "Sakura-chan! Where did you go? Kaka-sensei said you had things to deal with and you weren't coming for a while! Then I had to do team practices with Teme. Kaka-sensei was really hard on Teme too and Teme was so sulky the whole time you were away. It's so terrible! And all the D rank missions we had to do without you!" He pauses in mid-rant and then does a mini-shriek. "Kaka-sensei! You're here! You're not late! Teme! Kaka-sensei is not late today!"

Sasuke skulks towards them, a deep frown furrowed between his eyes. "You came," he says to her like he's surprised she even showed up.

Now would be a great time to throw yourself at him, Inner prompts.

Sakura twists her fingers together, trying to drag the energy to put on the charade. "Good morning, Sasuke-kun!" she chirps. Her smile plasters oddly on her face and even without Inner telling her, Sakura knows she screwed up the greeting.

"Hn-" He turns from her.

"Sasuke," Sensei says in a half-scolding voice. "Remember our talk?"

Sasuke's lips spasms, stiffly folding his arms across his chest.

"Sasuke…" Sensei's tone is colder now and heavy with warning. "There will be no training for you if you don't apologise."

"It's okay, Sensei!" Sakura quickly interrupts. "Sasuke-kun did nothing wrong!"

Sasuke jerks his chin at Sensei with a self-satisfied air.

"No Sasuke. Just because she will bend backwards for you, doesn't mean you should let her do it. You were in the wrong, you need to admit to it."

"Ne, ne, Kaka-sensei, what did Teme do?" Naruto asks, wedging himself in-between Sensei and Sasuke.

Sensei leans away from Naruto and oddly, still has no orange book in his hand. "He congratulated Sakura on losing her parents."

Naruto gapes at Sensei, his blue eyes flickering between Sasuke and her. "Wow, Teme. You really are a Teme." He whirls around, sticking his face right in front of Sasuke's. "You definitely need to apologise. Even I know that's wrong."

Sasuke harrumphs, turning his face from them. "She did it too. Why should I apologise for repeating her words?"

"Two wrongs don't make a right, Sasuke," Sensei tells him, exasperated.

"It's okay," Sakura repeats. "Sasuke-kun did nothing wrong."

"She doesn't care anyway, I don't see why you care."

"Whatever it is. No apologies, no training."

Sasuke gnashes his teeth angrily, then finally looks at her with a sneer. "I'm… soorrry," Sasuke says. "Happy?" He asks Sensei.

The look that Sasuke gives her is also as frightening as Mama's. Why Sensei and Naruto insisted on Sasuke apologizing to her baffles her. Why was it wrong of Sasuke to congratulate her? She is happier now, is that wrong?

Sensei slumps his shoulders with a sigh. "Fine. Start your laps. It's time for Team Seven's dodge training."

Naruto groans loudly. "Sage of the six paths, not dodge training! This is all your fault, Sasuke!"

Sensei whips out his shurikens and shoots one at Sakura, narrowly missing her flesh by a millimetre. She jerks out of her thoughts, staring wide eyes at him. Is she being included in training? Isn't this their specialized training time?

"What are you waiting for, Sakura-chan? That includes you too."

Sakura quickly hurries after her two teammates, dodging his shurikens.

Includes her? Since when we are still part of Team Seven? Inner asks.

Sakura couldn't help reflecting on Raidou's words. If Sensei came to check on her every night, then he did want her to stay, right?

✥.✥.✥

Sakura stretches. Her back cracks from the long hours of moving through the rubble and debris. Genin missions are unlike the ones she did with Genma's team. Those had been able stabilising buildings, rebuilding the foundation, removing traps. Even Sensei hadn't been spared the brunt of D rank missions. Unlike all those times where he had sat around and watched them work, Sensei had been moving the large pieces of wall and beams that none of them were capable of moving, though Sakura thought that with chakra enhancement, she might have been able to move them. If circulating her chakra in a particular manner could lighten her weight, surely there had to be a pattern for strength and durability.

She tosses the last few pieces of rock into a pile for Naruto the clear, missing the chuunin team's presence and bantering already. After this morning's argument, team seven had fallen into an awkward silence. Before today, Sakura didn't know Naruto was capable of being silent for an hour, let alone the seven long hours and he hadn't even asked her out for ramen or a date.

She stands and rotates her arm, feeling her joints crack loudly as Sensei motions them over.

"Today's mission is over as of now. Tomorrow, I expect to see you at five a.m. at training ground seven."

Naruto makes a loud disgruntled noise and jabs Sasuke in the ribs. "That's like eight Kakashi-time, ne?"

Sasuke grunts, appearing to agree with Naruto. She hears a muffled snort as Sensei ruffles his hair roughly. "Back talks isn't something to be proud of, Naruto."

Naruto swipes Sensei's hand away and ducks away. "No, but forward thinking is!"

She watches Sensei and Naruto rib each other with Sasuke adding on with his grunts, and a sense of isolation envelops her. She shuffles back and team seven doesn't even notices. She dithers. Or perhaps, it's like that time with the Ninja tag. They said she was on their team, but she really wasn't. That made sense. Officially, she is part of Team Seven, but unofficially, she's just a nominal member.

Genma had said that she could go back to them. They probably would be okay with putting her up for one more night, right? She backs up further from them, giving team seven more space for their roughhousing.

"Five in the morning, just as the sun appears on the horizon. Not six, not seven," Sensei says.

Naruto nods solemnly and turns towards where Sakura knew Ichiraku had set up their shop. "See you at eight, Kaka-sensei." With that, Sasuke separates from them, taking off to wherever he goes to after training.

Sensei exhales loudly. "Naruto's been spending too much time with the Nara."

Deciding that her presence is no longer require, Sakura slips into one of the side roads only to be stopped by Sensei.

"Where do you think you're going?" Sensei catches her by the elbow.

Sakura stiffens, fighting the urge to pull it out of his hand. Had she done something wrong? "I was… I was…"

"Come on," Sensei says. His voice is uncharacteristically gentle. "You can sleep in my apartment. But first, why don't we head to your house and find some more clothes for you to rotate in?" He rubs her threadbare sleeve with his fingers. "Your clothes don't look like they can survive any more washings."

"It's okay, Sensei!" Sakura chirps. "I have enough!"

"Well, even if you don't want clothes, let's go back to your house and pick out some things you want to keep."

Sakura's stomach flops when she remembers The Stairs are exposed. "N-no! It's okay." She smiles a little too widely and Sensei frowns.

"Listen. I know you're probably thinking that no one can understand what you're feeling." He steers her down the street, a hand on her back. "But when I was young, my mother died. My father… he killed himself a year later. I hated my father for leaving me behind." His voice is quiet, barely audible over the din of the streets. "In a fit of anger, I burnt all their effects. I was six. Now I'm twenty-two. I wish I kept one or two."

They stop in front of her house. The same broken beams and collapsed walls, the half-burnt garden where Mama's flowers used to be.

She takes a step to the house. Sensei's presence is right behind her. The wind blows. Sakura can see Mama's curtains fluttering in the breeze. The books from Papa's study is strewn across the ground, damp and half mouldy.

Inner is yelling for her to move at the back of her mind, echoing the jitteriness in her muscles. She takes another step. Her hand reaches out for the fence - the half broken fence that is smashed along the neighbour's uprooted tree.

She'll have to get whatever things she has eventually. Sensei is here. She can do it with Sensei watching her. She has to.

She puts one foot after another and stops at the doorway. Her hand shakes as she leans against the frame. She closes her eyes unwilling to see The Stairs. Her foot trembles, Sensei's stare weighs heavily on her back.

Just a thing or two, like Sensei said, Sakura tells herself.

She picks up a random book, it's a book the anatomy of the body. Her stomach lurches. She can taste the bile in the mouth. She remembers Papa using this book to teach her. Turning around, she pulls the edges of her mouth upwards. "Sensei, I got-"

Her foot slips on a damp cupboard door. She jerks back to regain her balance. Her eyes are wide open, scanning the ground for anything else she could trip on and lands on half hidden Stairs.

No, no, no!

Her body convulses, her throat muscles protest as she tries to heave air into her lungs.

No, Papa.

"Sakura-chan," she hears a masculine voice call her. A warm hand is on her bicep and she screams, drawing a kunai.

"NO!"

✥.✥.✥

"I need your help," says Kakashi the moment he lands on the tree branch next to Tenzo.

Tenzo groans, leaning his head back onto the tree branch. "I don't want anything to do with your shenanigans, I will not help you prank-" he pauses at Kakashi's glare. "What happened?" Tenzo asks, quickly gobbling his onigiri down.

Kakashi leaps deeper into the shinobi encampment where Genma and his team had been sleeping. Tenzo is right behind him, and he can practically smell the curiosity wafting off his kohai. Better than his little genin. Kakashi clenches his jaw as he remembers how sharp she had stank of fear.

Kizashi was a good medic, and he was good with children too. In a hospital where bedside manners are barely important, Kizashi connected well with people. Kakashi respected that man, except after that… that… fiasco, he doesn't think he is wrong; he just doesn't want to be right.

"Hi-chan, I need your help. A third person's point of view, if you must know," he says without a preamble.

Genma stands up with Hisae. "Is Sakura okay?"

Kakashi nods his head. Sakura would be as okay she could ever be. Finding out what happened is important now. Would she want anyone to know? He couldn't imagine that she would. His father hadn't even abused him, and even now he still has difficulty thinking let alone talking about him.

"Come," he just says.

The two exchange looks but they don't ask any further questions, immediately following him as he takes off to the direction of the residential district. Kakashi knew they would come willingly and without too many questions. He takes a deep breath, trying to don his stoic anbu persona again and failing. His little genin needs his help and if he's right… then he has failed her for as long as he had been her sensei.

He should have known.

Kakashi hears Genma suck in a breath when they land in front of Sakura's house. There is still the stench of Sakura's fear from this afternoon.

"What the fuck happened?" Hisae demands. Her nose has always been a hundred times better than his. Hisae's nostrils flare as she breathes in deeply, her teeth clenched so tightly that Kakashi thought she might break them. "Is it Kizashi?" she says and shakes her head. "No, Kizashi was a good man." Her words echoing the feelings in him. Her feet picking through the place, uncaring of the debris lying in her wake. Considering how Genma looks distinctively ill, he must have put two and two together.

"What do you want us to do here?" Genma puts away his senbon with an uncomfortably serious look and turns to Kakashi.

"The building, Tenzo." Kakashi says, stubbornly ignoring the question. What did he want them to do? Show the world how Kizashi and his wife might have abused a little kid? Show how he failed as an anbu to pick it up?

Wordlessly, Tenzo throws up wooden pillars to reinforce the building's structure. "Is that all you needed?" He squeezes Kakashi's bicep, the only form of support Tenzo knows how to show.

"Her clothes…" Kakashi starts, rubbing his mouth uneasily. As twenty odd year old men, none of them would feel comfortable picking for her clothes and underwear. He turns to Hisae who is angrily digging through the broken walls and beams.

Sakura could barely make a step this afternoon. There is no way she could stand a trip here to get her things.

"...her books, anything you think she owned… Prioritising her clothes," he adds."Her smell is the strongest at the corner second floor, so you can start from that bedroom."

They nod, leaping onto the beams and through the broken wall. Kakashi sighs. He can't keep avoiding this. Well, he can, but that would mean that he would be a bad sensei. Kakashi has strived for anything less than perfection. He's not a good man, and not a good shinobi, but damn will he try to be one. So despite his yearning to just run away, he grits his proverbial loins and makes his way to Hisae.

"Kashi-" Hisae looks up at him, her hands reaching for his vest. "I thought… I thought, you know, her mother might have beaten her. I saw the way she reacted to Kurenai, I assumed so. Civilians… they can't deal too much damage and now that she's a genin, her physical abilities would start to outstrip her mother's..." Hisae shakes her head and drags him to a set of stairs leading downwards.

"Kizashi was a good man. He was always kind and caring. He never showed an inclination for T&I stuff! How could we miss this!?" She motions furiously at the stairs.

A jag of fear shoots up in him. T&I? Like torture?

He hurries down the stairs only to stagger backwards. It reeked of Sakura's fear along with Kizashi's joy and anger. Had he taken it out on his daughter? Kakashi channels chakra into his eyes and the shadows of the basement illuminate within his eyesight. He can see everything.

"Almost looks like a clinic, doesn't it?" Hisae says.

Except it definitely wasn't.

"Why did no one notice it?"

Hisae shuffles next to him, tugging her traditional Hatake face mask on to dampen the smell. "You know what else doesn't leave scars?" she murmurs. "Medics."

Author's Note: Hello! A bit more insight on Sakura's issues and now the adults know. I made it vague on what The Stairs is, because I didn't want to make it graphical. So in case anyone didn't guess it, Kizashi tortured Sakura.

We're arriving at the crux of this fic and we will be shortly be heading into the recovery part of this fic. Sakura will get better, she will be stronger and she will be happy. This ofc, doesn't include Sasuke in her happy ending or any man for that matter. My Sakura doesn't need a man to be happy.

P.S: Tenzo is definitely guilty of helping Kakashi prank people.

Important note: I also had a fairly good reminder last chp why I don't like posting on ffn. I'd like to remind you all that this is free entertainment and also I'm extremely thankful for the fact that this fic was not posted on FFn originally. I have repeatedly refused to post fics on FFn because of harassment and rude reviewers. And only 3 chps in, I'm reminded of my decision why. I do not appreciate being spoken to like that and I will not tolerate it.

Therefore chp 4 is the last chp being posted on FFn.