Disclaimer: All characters and places belong to Masashi Kishimoto. "Hoshizora no Yoru ni" belongs to Murai Kazusa from the Tokimeki Memorial 2 Substories Vol.1: Dancing Summer Vacation video game.

HARU no SAKURA

(or "The Messenger")

It was the start of a new Age.

She could feel it, coursing in her veins, rattling in her bones, creeping on her skin. The wind breathed through coral tresses; soft, whispering. The grass bowed, tickling bare, tanned legs. A stray leaf fell from its perch and caressed the fabric of her crimson dress.

Jade irises stared out at the plain. It was wide and empty, but most of all it was quiet. Peaceful. Moving. Narcotic. It was a drug she couldn't hope to withdraw from any time soon.

This was a girl who was born and raised far away from the ever growing conflicts between Bloodline Clans and their rivals and purist organizations that intended to extinguish all existing Kekkei Genkai. This was a girl who, along with many of her generation, was spared the death and bloodshed and bigotry beyond the expansive grassland and tree-infested rolling hills. Here it was simple, where the soil was tilled, the livestock fed, and the community understood and united as one. There was no smoke, no fire, no destruction, and no pain.

But that was all going to change.

She could make out their silhouettes, of man and beast and creation and devastation. She could see their weapons cut through the air, diluting its cleanliness with rusted, notched steel and blood-stained heirlooms. She could hear their faint battle cries, men's voices and women's voices and animal voices ringing with determination, frustration, and bloodlust. She could feel the rush of heat and spiked energy signatures – chakra, she heard the Village Elder call it -- kicking up her long pink hair.

The shapes of people, of fighting Shinobi and Kunoichi, took form on the vague, misty horizon. And somewhere on that plain, its ground painted in gore and body parts and scattered shuriken, a plume of fire and a limb of wood collided; a mushroom cloud of smoke bloomed like the first flower on earth; magnificent, gorgeous, sudden … and utterly tragic.

The wind howled harshly in her ears.

She smiled.

When Hashirama Senju awoke the next day, the town was still burning. Its citizens dotted the landscape with horrified, ill-prepared macabre. The huts continued to spew charcoal-grey apathy into the endless blue brightening above. Upon stepping out and staring at the widespread carnage they had committed, that he committed, he withheld the temptation to vomit.

Cold steel nicked his bare neck. "There's nowhere else to run," Madara Uchiha murmured succinctly in his ear. He stood in the shadows of the tent, unseen and unheard from the ninja tending to their wounds. Deep, deep red eyes – eyes that had evolved beyond the norm, transcended those set standards that would become the Mangekyou Sharingan – jumped forth from jagged obsidian curtains. "Your life as a Shinobi, as a man, is now forfeit."

"I don't want to fight anymore, Madara," said Hashirama softly. He did not turn to look at the man he called his enemy. "These people have died because of us. Our war has driven us to destroy their land and very birthright from continuing on. Let's end this with a truce."

Madara barked laughter and smirked. "A truce, you say? O' mighty Senju, when have you grown so weak? You know how the world works: only the strongest and the fittest can survive! Once you start something there's no turning back. One of us has to finish this… and only one of us has to fall."

"Madara…."

"One of us, Senju," the Uchiha hissed venomously. He pressed the blade down forcefully and drew a beaded line of blood. "And it won't be me." He vanished in a burst of flame, parting with a burning sensation on the back of Hashirama's neck.

And burn it did. Seven years after the fighting ended and Konohagakure no Sato, the Hidden Village of the Leaf, was built, Madara attacked.

The Kyuubi no Kitsune roared and thrashed its signature nine tails upon the canyon walls, raining earthen debris every which way. The pristine waters of the valley blazed a sunset orange as Katon Jutsu and the demon's chakra glow dominated all, living and inanimate.

Quite literally, it was hell on earth.

And he could feel it, that Hashirama Senju did. Sweat glistened on his brow and face, and those salty drops coating his squat, bullish neck lapped the cut the Uchiha's blade had made on that day so long ago. That horrible, horrible day….

He would never forget that day until his dying breath. Haunt him it would: in his dreams, in his thoughts, in his memories, in the dirtied, frightened faces of children left orphaned by their narrow battles and untimely destruction of any and all they held dear, in the power surging through his veins….

Hashirama screamed, sorrow and anger at those damned purists, at the warring clans, at the Uchiha, at Madara, at the Senju, at himself, passed his lips like an open sluice gate. He charged headlong into deadly peril, feet slapping shamelessly against the earth. Huge hands gnarled as tree trunks flashed through sacred seals.

Madara smirked and unsheathed his insidious blade from the scabbard strapped across his shoulders.

They fought, oblivious to the girl watching from above.

--and he remembered, so writ Tobirama Senju, Nidaime Hokage of Konoha, she was sitting there, by his side, watching him, looking at him. There was… such great sorrow… a sort of pain one experiences when the weight of the world is borne upon one's back… but, at the same time, it was unlike any sadness he has ever seen; not in all the years he has lived waging war and waging peace. He professed he could not fully meet her eyes, for he could not bear to lose strength before this fair child – this girl he thought perished in the fires that consumed her village or by Shinobi blade. He could not, but he did, though his resolve was wavering. He asked her for her reason being in his room, if she was going to haunt him ere and after life – like the old ghost tales our mother used to tell us around the campfire.

She had stared at him for a stretching, long while, a myriad of emotions flickering like wells of light upon rippling water. Then, when she was much composed, she said to him: "I will not, for I am above that. I am here on this day to relate to you I have been tasked by the Gods to oversee the fruition of your dream."

"My dream?" he asked. "What dream may that be?"

"To see no person – man, woman, and child – has to ever fight again. It is a wish all good peoples of the earth want to come true, in this lifetime or the next. I cannot tell you how many innocents yearn for the day when there will be no more bloodshed, no more broken steel, no more unidentified corpses, no more ruined homes, no more pain. I know it so, for I was there when first you offered truce to your most bitter enemy."

"But how? I did not feel that strange energy you and your kin possessed, nor did I see that mane of rosy dawn nor those gems so pure as the healing energy peaking shyly from our fingertips."

"Indeed I was not there; the man called Madara cut this fair tree from her roots whilst defending the Village Elder, Gods bless his soul. The Creator was delivering me home when then I heard you speak. Your words troubled this humble ghost even in those impenetrable walls Paradise holds in more ways than one. I could not find rest, so said the Holy Man, as He Himself is wont to wistful thinking, until that peace is attained; in a world where one can understand another and never be afraid. Thus is the reason of my visit to the mortal plane, to grant you knowledge I shall be witness to this achievement in due time, when this world of war is at war with itself."

And it was this note my brother asked, tremblingly, "Does… does this mean the end of the world, as we know it, is at hand? Will I not see the flourish of this city, the little sapling that soon shall raise its head not a single but many crowns of leaves?"

"The world as you know it, the realm of ninja and magic you are intimately familiar with, is the world that waits its pending fall. But you, O' Lord of Trees, Prince of Nature, you shall not bear sight to chaos incarnate; this I am sure as the stars in heavens. The fate of humanity on this side of Gaia will be decided by the messenger destined to embody the teachings instilled by Rokudo-sennin, be it salvation… or destruction." With a weary sigh she added, "There is naught I can do save guide the chosen one to the appointed hour, nothing more."

"When will this moment arrive?"

"I cannot say, but I will say it shall be soon. The future is vague and beyond my calling—"

The script trailed off, ending abruptly due to a case to undaunted time. The parchment was grossly yellowed and the ink faded to the point where it proved ineligible to continue. Hashirama's granddaughter the Godaime Hokage flipped to the second to last page where, at the bottom, the note picks up suddenly with this passage:

"Wait!" he cried, reaching forth a hand to stop the girl (though both knew it would be impossible to touch such a spirit), "I… I must know… your name. I… I want to be… the first…to thank you, should our dream ever be realized."

She turned – half inside the room, half outside where entrance and hall met – and bowed her head in grace to Hashirama-nii-san. "Haru no Sakura," she said; and then parted.

He has not seen her since that day.

Tsunade Senju stopped there too stunned to continue. Instead, she lowered the letter and reread the three words inscribed at the bottom. Haru no Sakura. The Spring of the Cherry Blossom Tree.

The name of her student. Her apprentice. Her successor's teammate.

…A dead girl from before the foundation of Hidden Villages.

…Was this some sort of sick, twisted joke Sarutobi-sensei was trying to pull on her? What was the meaning behind this debacle? It couldn't be true, it just couldn't. Haruno Sakura was a sixteen-year-old Chuunin born and raised in Konohagakure, a member of Team Seven and medic-in-training. There was no way the Sakura she knew was the same Sakura in Tobirama's missive.

'Then again,' Tsunade thought, 'Sarutobi did mention there were no actual records of a person named Sakura Haruno… except… an event called Haru no Sakura.' Her brow furrowed as deeply as her frown. 'What are you trying to tell me, Sensei? That my student is a messenger of God sent to be Naruto's guardian angel and play a part in a future revolution?' The Hokage huffed irritably and massaged her temple. "This is so confusing…."

I can't believe it.

When Konohagakure was razed to the ground by Pein's Shinra Tensei no Jutsu and she confronted the madman himself – her ANBU entourage lying dead at her feet and with nary Naruto or Sakura at her side – Tsunade Senju had no choice but to accept the truth.

The appointed hour was nigh, and she wasn't sure how she knew that.

Then darkness conquered her, and she remembered no more.

When Sakura and Naruto learned from their fellow ninja Kiba Inuzuka that Danzo had been named Rokudaime Hokage by the Fire Daimyo – and met with hardly any complaint – Sakura had the gut feeling she should stay by Naruto's back at all times. She had always suspected the elder of ill intentions, even before word first reached the public of the Uchiha Massacre many years ago. It was his treatment of that once great clan she grew wary of the masked, cloaked agents lurking in the shadows.

So when it was apparent Naruto, Sai, Kakashi-sensei, and Yamato-sama (the man had rescued her from falling to her death in the deep canyons with a branch securely wrapped about her; and it was after the fight on the Heaven and Earth Bridge in Kusa she placed an unwavering trust in him for reasons she could not clearly explain) were to leave Konoha for the Five Kage Summit in Iron Country, she pleaded them to take her. They insisted she should stay at the medical tents where she was most needed, but she refused, adamantly, that she was not. She had pressing matters to deal with and it was not a lie (for she could not bring herself to say it was so). Unable to turn her away the men welcomed her to their fold and the quintet then ventured west to the anticipated location.

Throughout that week-long they were tailed by Root operatives. While Yamato-sama and Sai tended to the road ahead of them, Kakashi and Sakura and a pair of their Bunshin maintained their positions around Naruto, front and back. Few weapons were wasted on those black agents, here and there a Genjutsu or clever Ninjutsu (like Yamato's unique ability to utilize earthly nature at will, for example). Sakura had half a mind to run her honed kunai, or shuriken, into the blighters. It was…a peculiar sensation, one she had not felt in what felt like an eternity, and it was the thought of Naruto's safety, and of Yamato-sama's, that stayed her hand and thirst.

Sometimes the need for violence was unprecedented. This she recalled, vague as it was, like the first memory on the precipice of recognition, and this she followed to this present moment.

…Except there was one major factor she did not count on, a variable in the grand scheme of all things good and evil and in between that would pull imminent war to their very doorstep. It was an intense half-hour into the Summit, the world leaders unloading fire at the Hokage for his village's inactions to properly do away with nukenin Sasuke Uchiha, when the office was suddenly rocked by a fierce explosion. The reinforced walls had crumbled and smoke hissed from its crevices. Each of the Five Kage ninja, ranging from Chuunin to ANBU rank, unsheathed their weapons and intercepted the threat.

In spite of their size and strength, none were prepared to expect the black inferno searing through the barriers wood and corrugated steel.

"AMATERASU!"

In the midst of chaos and confusion, four shadows charged from the crackling husk of the administrative office. Through blood flying on walls, dying Shinobi, and the roar of Jutsu, Sakura caught glimpse of bleeding crimson irises and a shock of screeching, electric chakra.

Naruto's cry repeated the name springing to her mind: "Sasuke!"

Yes.

Sasuke Uchiha, the leader of Team Hawk. The bane and ire of Cloud Country.

Her friend.

…He did not start the war. No, it was far from it.

They never saw Danzo unfurl his bandages and open his right eye. They never saw the black chakra needles dart from spinning pinwheels like phantom wraiths unleashed from the gates of hell.

By then it was too late.

Danzo – Madara Uchiha – had let loose the hounds of war.

And there was no turning back.

Days… weeks… Sakura could not exactly remember, after the Summit ambush, the entire Leaf Village was placed under military lockdown. An emergency draft was declared by the Rokudaime, and young men and women and children, all of whom were citizens, were unwilling dragged to fight for a cause they did not want to be involved in. Those whom resisted were either jailed by Root or publically executed by the Hokage himself.

Root was everywhere. They patrolled the streets with ninjato that would poison or cripple a being to death. The animal masks they wore to hide their faces were now blank slates of white casing the whole head as to eliminate individual identity. Deep dark cloaks swathed their bodies and heads, and they became one with the shadows. The only color on them was a blazing eclipse stitched to their backs which glowed bright and orange in the witching hour as they hopped from roof to roof, and they were bestowed the name Ten no Akuma, or Heaven's Demons, by the bold and fearful.

Sakura watched it unfold with a mixture of trepidation, anger, and great sadness. She feared what the future would hold with Danzou as ruler of the village. Her spirits quavered and crumbled upon hearing the agonized death knells of innocents wronged for 'conspiratorial' agendas (as those bastard Devils were wont to call it). Her ire rose at the blatant abuse of authority and justice in the name of 'Our Lord Hokage' and 'Kami-sama'.

And yet, she hadn't the faintest idea why or how she knew Danzou – no, Madara Uchiha – was behind this disjointed Utopia: he wanted revenge against the Uchiha, against Konoha, against the government's docile decisions. They had betrayed him because they did not share the same thoughts that he thought, nor did they believe in his view of Konoha as a police state, or, as rumor dictates, a republic of 'enlightened absolutism'. Even more confusing was how she came to the conclusion that Danzou, the elderly scarred man who fought in two Great Shinobi Wars, was a façade to the infamous Uchiha Clan leader of generations past. Perhaps it was those details conjured that made him stand out like a weed among flowers. Maybe it was the cropped black hair, the deep-set wrinkles of his face, or the Sharingan he was now in possession of. Sakura wasn't sure.

However, there was one thought that kept disrupting the forefront of her concerns, still persisted her waking moments. As absurd and ridiculous as it was, Sakura was determined to overthrow Madara and restore proper order to Konohagakure. But how was she to go about it? The Village's numbers, excluding Root and Heaven's Demons, were spread thin, most of which were still recovering from Akatsuki's attack. Naruto had reopened his more serious wounds and Yamato-sama – oh Gods, Yamato-sama – had been so severely hurt in the Summit ambush that he fell into a morphine-induced coma. Team Eight was overseeing Hinata's recovery and what was left of the late Asuma Sarutobi's team were with Might Gai's squad and a contingent of Chuunin, Jounin, and ANBU defending the frontlines from invading Cloud- and Rock-nin.

That left only Sai and Kakashi-sensei. It would be easy to recruit them to the cause, as with Naruto and Yamato-sama and the former Rookie Eleven. The citizens, however, would need convincing – and maybe a little bribing on some of the difficult types. Subtlety and reality was the key to draw the monster out of his fake hide and lured away from Konoha to be exterminated once and for all.

Sakura wasn't too worried about what was going on outside. There were whispers circulating the tent zones that the fights breaking out across the continent were a prelude to a Fourth Great Shinobi War – a War to End All Wars. Others like veterans from the Leaf-Rock war or Danzou and his three factions (Root and Heaven's Demons and The Foundation, a name Sakura only heard once from Sai prior to their trek to Iron) had already confirmed there was a Fourth Great Shinobi War, and that Danzou was going to do everything and anything to put an end to the violence. It was a lie, and everyone from the youngest child to the oldest Shinobi knew it, but they were too afraid to oppose it, let alone those who had started the War.

But the troubles didn't stop there; there was still the matter of finding Killer Bee the Eight-Tailed Jinchuuriki. His brother the Raikage was furious and was the first nation to declare war on Konoha (the second was Earth), pledging to destroy any and all ninja loyal to Sasuke Uchiha. The nukenin, as a matter of fact, had retreated with Team Hawk after suffering a humiliating defeat at Danzou's hands, and since that day they had not been sighted since.

Sakura mused over these events in the time it took Root and Heaven's Demons to establish defensive perimeters, which was not very long. It troubled her to think of all that was occurring in the short span of time since the Summit ambush, and she sighed to release the dull ache permeating her being. She turned in her bedroll and stared at Tsunade's frail, bony form. She had not woken, not after exerting every ounce of strength in her diamond seal to fight Pein. Danzou's lapdogs said she would never rise again, said she would die from injuries internal and external, physical and mental.

Sakura scowled. Something had to be done, and fast: about the War, about Sasuke, about Team Hawk… and Madara. Yes, something most definitely had to be done about that abominable serpent. She couldn't afford to wait for Yamato-sama and Tsunade-shishou to wake up or for any one innocent be killed by the Rokudaime and his eclipsed suns.

Come next morning, she was going to have a talk with Naruto and set things straight. The right way.

And she told him what she wanted to be done, what she believed was the best possible course of action to close the door on the Fourth Great Shinobi War. The Nine-Tailed Jinchuuriki tried to get a word in, but Sakura did not let him and told him to listen, and he did and hung on every word that passed from her lips.

A half-hour later, when Sakura had said her piece, Naruto stared at her wide-eyed and astonished. With all those bandages wrapped around his lithe frame, the young man could have been taken for a mummy just returned to the land of the living.

His blue eyes made her uncomfortable, and she showed this by fidgeting. "What?" she asked.

"When do we start?" Naruto answered, grinning one of his vulpine grins. Sakura slapped him upside the head. "Idiot," she grumbled, and Naruto laughed.

It took them almost a year to get this far, but they had finally done it at the cost of many necessary and unnecessary lives.

…Naruto was unprepared for the death that would hurt him the most.

It was at the Valley of the End the War came to a dramatic close. Through many trials, errors, hardships, and revelations, the Five Great Shinobi Nations united as one giant fighting force; even Akatsuki had joined the cause (for their own reasons save Konan, who wished to see Nagato and Yahiko's dream of a peaceful world be fulfilled by the Fourth's Legacy) after witnessing an epic clash between Sasuke and the newly-formed Team Seven. It took an incredible amount of chakra-intensive Jutsu and several fists to the face courtesy of Naruto to convince Sasuke and his ragtag group that their master Madara was the enemy and that he was using them to regain his power and Mangekyou Sharingan. By then Sasuke was beyond caring for his own well-being, compounded with memories of his clan's massacre and the truth behind it, Itachi's death, and Madara's ill manipulation. But when he was reminded by Sakura (and Naruto) about the purpose of his existence, the purpose to revive the Uchiha clan and restore its name to its rightful glory, he was more than willing to shove his sword through his patron's wicked heart. Suigetsu, Karin, and Juugo accompanied them, for they were loyal to Sasuke and had nowhere else to go or call home.

It was on that day, March twenty-eighth, that Madara Uchiha was felled by Naruto Uzumaki, the ascertained Child of Prophecy. It was the day that fighting in the Fourth Great Shinobi War immediately ceased.

…It was also the day of Sakura's seventeenth birthday.

They were throwing all their weight and strength against the might of Madara and his super soldiers –experiments cloned and created left abandoned by Orochimaru and Kabuto in Rice Field Country prior to their death. Konoha led the alliance with Naruto Uzumaki, Killerbee, the Raikage and his entourage (consisting of Omoi, Karui, and Samui), Team Seven, and Akatsuki at the front. Fire and frost and water and earth and wind and thunder were conjured from the very atoms that composed the ether they breathed. Kunai and shuriken and caltrops and needles and darts struck the enemy true and sent their souls to the chained darkness of oblivion, the Place With No Name and No Chance for Rebirth or Redemption. Shinobi and Kunoichi left and right fell to their doom, limbs blown from their bodies or blood painting the pockmarked floor and a damning, glaring red. Against this man it was like going through a wall that refused to be penetrated, but the good peoples of the Continental Alliance pushed; and they pushed and pushed and pushed until that wall gave in and they flooded the battle zone as a plague sent from the heavens.

It was from there all hell broke loose, so the saying goes. Sasuke wanted as much as Naruto and Sakura to kill Madara for his schemes, but it was with their combined efforts that they brought him down.

The eldest Uchiha almost foiled it, almost destroyed everything they had planned up to this point. Much earlier, before the anticipated final assault, the Konoha Cryptology Network, in adjunction with the Fire Country National Archives and the Konoha Emporium of Mysticism and Ritual (which, as it turned out, was founded by Minato Namikaze to research the properties of Fuuinjutsu and Lost Arts during the first few years as Hokage), cracked the secret to Madara's transparency. It was through Sasuke's unbreakable determination he shattered that guard, and it was here he had clashed his steel fang against Madara's open palm. Dark chakra had flared from the madman's pores, and with a widening of his Sharingan eyes he knocked the Avenger away with an invisible, forceful shove. Immediately he sifted furiously through a complex array of hand seals, and the Bijuu Statue behind him opened its splintered jaws and moaned. A mass of energy began to culminate in its mouth, its dreadful humming intensifying with each passing second. Naruto swore and, with his two clones, worked faster to complete the Rasen Fuuton Shuriken; Sasuke had just started charging up the Chidori when Madara started to laugh and proclaim victory over these foolish ninja—

--only to stop haltingly when he felt his chest seize.

Glancing over his shoulder, his bloodshot eyes caught sight of a familiar face. "Y-You!" he wheezed. "You're supposed to be dead!"

Sakura promptly ignored him, holding the struggling Uchiha in his place. "Naruto, take him out! Sasuke, when Naruto attacks, aim your Chidori at Rasen Fuuton Shuriken! I got the bastard right where I want him!"

"Sakura, no!" Naruto yelled over the screech of the Rasengan. "If I do that, you'll—"

"We don't have time for this, Naruto!" Sakura snapped brusquely. "Don't worry about me!"

"But…!"

"DO IT!"

And Naruto didn't hesitate. He reared back his arm and not a second later hurled the spiraling orb at the locked pair. Not far behind him, Sasuke unleashed the fury of Chidori Eisou with a vengeful scream, and the bolt rocketed across the field like a fiery comet.

Sakura smiled--

--Madara roared.

It cut through them instantly.

--and both bodies hit them in a burst of pink cherry blossoms.

That was when Naruto realized what he'd done; he shouted her name, dropped out of Sage Mode, and ran toward where she lay. Sasuke was right behind but he didn't care. He hurt Sakura, harmed her, probably struck her where the Rasen Shuriken would kill her without ever feeling it. He made to be sure the kill was at least clean, that her blood wasn't mingling with Madara's, that her entrails weren't spilled all over the place OH DEAR GODS IN HEAVEN THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING. But it didn't happen when he dropped to his knees and stared REALLY STARED at her because he couldn't believe what he was seeing and he was positive Sasuke didn't know what he was seeing either but they saw it for their eyes that it was real. Sakura was still with them, still there, but the lower half of her body was gone, a spray of petals coloring the dreary landscape, and the rest of her was disappearing rapidly in this bizarre metamorphosis. Naruto tried to pick her up, but when his fingers grazed her skin it would peel and fly away into the sky where the sun was fighting fervently to break through the clouds. She was pale as magnolias and the jade of her irises was faded but her hair was so vibrant, so rich in color it was as if spring decided to be sprung again. Sasuke touched Sakura, but it burned and it stung him and he withdrew his bleeding hand from the unfolding flower. Tears wet Naruto's cheeks and he blubbered apologies in between choked sobs and grinding teeth, and Sasuke could only look on and wonder how and when and why this was so. But Sakura's cracked lips stretched into a tired smile and she laughed and it was such a forced, delicate sound; and when Naruto asked her what the cause was in laughing she said, "It was gonna happen sooner or later. I don't know why I did what I did… but… it had to be done. Wouldn't want… all that hard work… go to waste… right? I didn't… want to let them down…." And Naruto and Sasuke agreed that, yes, without Sakura's initiative to protest Madara's machinations and the right to uphold the ideals of the peoples of the ninja world, all that they held dear and loved would have been stamped out and desecrated by the darkness inside that one man's heart. However they could not help but feel confused at how she said those words, the tone that permeated softly as her neck billowed free on heavenly gusts, the way her eyes glazed over as if recalling a memory much too distant to be her own. Before they could say anymore the Haruno closed her eyes and whispered: "Leave me. I'm going home now, to a place where everybody knows my name…." And then the last wisps of her hair were gone, and Haruno Sakura was no more.

"…I just couldn't believe it," said Shichidaime Hokage Naruto Uzumaki-Namikaze, Together with his rightful predecessor the Lady Tsunade Senju, the pair stare out the panoramic window where a reconstructed Konoha sits in unending sunshine. "She put her life on the line, and yet… when I saw her… pure and severed and disappearing to nothingness… I thought I was dreaming. I told myself it wasn't real, I was seeing things. I mean, grief does to you when someone close to you dies, right? It was probably so great my mind couldn't accept losing her."

"That's what I thought, too," replied Tsunade, shuffling her feet, "when I read Sarutobi's will and testament. If you look at this from a Revivalist point-of-view, it would be impossible to reinstate a soul into a new vessel without erasing memories from his or her former life. Also, the Second Passage describes a soul cannot be placed into a similar body, as it would corrupt the creation process and the former memory that is to be cleansed. Think of it this way: no two snowflakes share the same pattern; therefore, all snowflakes each have a unique pattern different from other snowflakes. There cannot be two similar bodies of the same mind on the same earth. The Gods would have to either erase the soul's memory or place the soul in a body that would hold no similarity to the original vessel."

"Did Sakura ever know who, or what, she was?" asked the Hokage, running a hand through his hair. "That she was once a common villager who foresaw the beginning and the end of Madara's campaign?"

"Sarutobi made no mention of that, nor did he relay any proof she was capable of doing so in the missive. She may or may not have learned through her records, but those are merely fake, and wouldn't offer any exclusive details. There was never a Haruno Sakura, only vague inscriptions of a cosmic event called Haru no Sakura, in which all seven planets asymmetrically line up with the Sun and release large doses of radiation into the atmosphere. Now I don't what properties this radiation has, nor do I want to start thinking of how this radiation is similar to chakra (you should've been more specific, Shizune!), but… it's likely, and unlikely, mind you, Sakura could have been born on a night when the cosmic event occurred... and from it was bestowed the prophetic power to see into the future. However, you have to remember chakra had just established itself as a driving force of nature, so at that time paper was very flammable and not insulated with anti-elemental seals as it is done so today. The Haruno records were destroyed as a result of the Uchiha-Senju war, so there's no telling if this actually happened. It's all false-truths and speculation."

"As complicated as it is," said Naruto, "can't I accept Sakura for who she was as a human being and not a resurrected apparition? I mean, I don't think she'd want to be remembered as such a complexity…."

Tsunade shrugged. "…Well, there is that. I suppose it wouldn't hurt if we had the Emporium close shop on the case. Sakura does deserve a well-needed rest after all that's happened in the last twenty-five years."

The Hokage nodded and turned his seat away from the viewing pane. "Yeah, I think so, too. All work and no play make the Messenger a dull girl." He chuckled lightly, and then reached out and slid the scratched music box toward him. He opened the lid, and from it a dreamy lullaby tinkled into the quiet office.

The eternally young woman smiled down at her successor. "That's a pretty melody. You said Sasuke was given this by Yamato?"

"He did, though he couldn't get Yamato to say how he got it. Maybe Old Man Sarutobi gave it to him as a gift, like a parent would to a child after receiving a birthday present, I don't know. Sasuke said Yamato wanted me to have it, to keep your spirits high when you're alone as he put it, because he felt ready to move on and live as life should be lived."

"There's still a ways to go before the dream is truly realized, yes?"

"Indeed, but let's not worry about uncertainties. Golden Week's coming up, and I hear tell there's gonna be a lot of people coming in to see the cherry blossoms."

"Oh yes, I've been offered many requests from nearby counties to perform a number of concerts all across Fire Country. Did you have something in mind?"

"Sort of. I mean, I'm not much a singer (don't make that face at me, Grandma; it's embarrassing!), but I'd like to try my hand at a last-day piece before the fireworks are set to go off."

"You mean this piece?" Tsunade gestured to the music box. Naruto blushed and offered a small nod. "I'll propose it to them, but I'd like to hear it first before I do so."

It was the Hokage's turn to make a face, or rather more of a grimace. "Hey, just because I brought it up doesn't mean I'm going to give the folk something to gossip about."

"It's only you and me, brat. If anyone's going to hear you fudge it up, it's going to be me. So suck it up and loosen those vocal chords of yours. I'm not leaving 'til that last note is sung."

"I can't say no to that, then," said Naruto, acquiescingly, "but not a word of this to anyone, understand? I do want to put in some sort of practice." Tsunade smirked at this, but the Shichidaime ignored it. He cleared his throat and, once the music box replayed the sleepy tune, sang:

"Hoshizora no yoru ni ha omoi desu
Koi ga oshiete kureta koto
Haru natsu aki fuyu kisetsu ha meguri meguru kedo.
Donna namida demo toki ga itsuka
Yasashiku kokoro tsutsumu deshou
Anata no senaka ga sayonara wo tsugeta hisae mo.
Soto omoideheto kaeteyuku.

"Kyou no watashi suki de iru tame ni
Wasureta kunai kotomo aru
Ano hi no hohoemi ima demo yuuki kureru kara.
Donna tameiki mo kaze no you ni
Tooku de kokoro yurasu deshou
Mirai mo miezuni tashika ni aruita futari ga
Ima omoideheto kawateku.

"Hoshizora no yoru ni ha omoi desu
Koi ga oshiete kureta koto
Ano hi no chikai wa ima demo dakishimeteru kara.
Nando koi wo kasaneta toshite mo
Itsudemo kokoro domosu deshou
Ima goro anata ha douna yume o mitei masuka.
Soto omoideheto kaeteyuku."

At the Hokage Memorial, one of the many sakura trees planted around the stone began to bloom, and its lively ochre petals were most beautiful.