[OOC: APPLICATION]
CHARACTER INFO
CHARACTER NAME: Sakura Haruno
SERIES: Naruto (manga)
PERSONALITY:
Sakura is an intelligent, sometimes preachy (to those she knows and/or finds clueless about a given subject she is knowledgeable about), caring young woman. She takes her job as a medical shinobi (ninja) seriously, and this seriousness is displayed in how she handles any work assigned to her. Sakura likes to be thorough, complete, and as close to perfect as possible. She's also neat and tidy, perhaps even fastidious, from the few glimpses into her personal living space that we've gleaned. (Part of this might indicate that she spends little time at home.)
Her tendency to follow the rules also lends itself to her having little patience for people acting perverted, despite the fact Sakura herself is a closet "pervert." She's not as sensitive about her appearance as she once was, but making an issue of it with her is asking for retribution. (Usually immediate and physical.)
Sakura is determined to achieve her goals, and achieve them well. She has a good grasp of tactics and a good mind for cryptology and research. Her memory is very good, and her detail recall is high, but not infallible. Sakura is also tenacious in her resolve. She is far less judgmental than she was as a pre-teen, and is far more likely to forgive (if not forget) people's minor indiscretions. She holds teamwork as incredibly important, and still respects the opinions of her elders enough to listen to them when they give advice.
Sakura tends to be honest. She's been known to overreact to people's words or actions in non-combat situations. Sakura hates losing, and due to stubbornness, really hates giving up. She's the sort of person who could be talked into a challenge, even if she wouldn't blindly accept one.
She is confident in her skills and abilities, if not to a point of unchangeable faith. Her resolve to improve makes her a harsh taskmistress on herself, in order to make sure that she's able to stand equal with Naruto, Sasuke, Sai, and Kakashi. Perhaps her greatest fears and failures come from feeling inadequate in the face of her important people; being unable to help them drives her up a wall (and sometimes into the pits of despair).
Sakura is not above gossiping, though she keeps it to a minimum until she's comfortable with whomever she's speaking. Part of this may be due to the fact the personal lives of most shinobi seem to be seriously lacking; her gossiping is done with Ino, and in only the most brief ways. She doesn't appear to talk about herself or her feelings often, presumably because she doesn't want to burden others and prefers to deal with them on her own. Then again, most the time she reads like an open book (Sakura has the mistaken impression that she's far harder to read than she is).
tl;dr version: she's a teenager with emotional hangups over her teammates, who wants to help her closest people out, often fails, and keeps her belief in her best friend ever -- or at least best used punching bag -- because it's what she has so annoyingly decided she simply must do.
I feel like I should address Sakura and xenophobia, since we have some idea of this in series: as an 11/12 year old, Sakura is quiet, intimidated, and then self-righteous when confronted with people from outside the village. On the whole, she's not comfortable with strangers, let alone outside of combat situations. She is a friendly person by nature, curious as to what people do and why and what drives them in those doings, but she's generally polite enough to not be pushy -- unless she's really, really interested, or it's relevant to someones health, sanity, or safety. As a consequence, she can appear far more reserved, calm, or collected to people she doesn't know, as she falls back into habits of emotional repression pretty common for all shinobi, and pretty common for her earlier life. This breaks apart during times of stress; not so much because she falls apart (though she can and will show dismay and distress outwardly), but because she becomes proactive and reactive based on an inability to sit back and watch when she can actually do something. She'll focus those energies in directions that she knows she's capable in, not finding it as tempting to charge head-on into the kinds of fights she expects or know she'll lose when instead, say, there are people who need tending and an emergency hospital to keep running and tabs on the injured and where we're taking them to be... filed. The point is she'll start off as more emotionally reserved as a mechanism to dealing with a new environment and new people, and that as she gets closer to people, the less reserved she'll be. Anger will show through when she feels genuinely outraged, no matter how much she wants to hold it back, and her deep angers at slights aimed at her teammates would still surface, if adapted toward the people she grows close to in the tree. (And kneejerk, when people talk down on traitors and the like. "Do you know why they did what they did? No? Then shut up." If not necessarily so harsh, and conditional based on circumstances.)
And when I say emotionally reserved, it's more about investment. Her world as a whole isn't big on discussing the past; she'll be open to making friends, if distrustful of the location and technology, simply because she has to be.
Played out in Edensphere, this becomes an outward wariness that she has to shove aside again and again simply because there are few if any people she can identify as being part of her past. Thus she can move beyond something she's had to set aside for the sake of the unity of shinobi in the face of Madara's 4th Ninja War, by merit of what she cannot remember.
TIMELINE: Chapter 470!
- Show quoted text -
BACKGROUND:
Sakura started out in life as most people do: bits of genetic information that was birthed, and at roughly 6-8, was a rather shy, self-conscious little girl. While not much about her youth is shown, Sakura was seen as a somewhat friendless and sad child, teased for having a "big" forehead by her peers at the Shinobi Academy. This changed when Yamanaka Ino, a self-assured fellow student, approached Sakura and made friends. Sakura appeared to treasure this relationship, and started to become a more open person through their friendship.
This new found self-confidence eventually propelled Sakura into feeling good enough about herself to develop a crush on a fellow classmate. While it's not known exactly why or how she so proudly discovered Uchiha Sasuke on her own (for quite clearly, based on the reactions Sakura had to her fellow classmates and Ino when she announced her crush, she had no clue Sasuke was himself already popular among the other girls) only to find everyone else already knew about him. This led to the first stance Sakura definitely took in her friendship with Ino, at some point afterward returning the ribbon Ino had given her as a sign of their becoming rivals. Sakura chose this route, and Ino allowed her to. The two bickered back and forth, though they never really forgot that they had been friends.
Sakura was intelligent and hard-working, doing well at the Academy and striving to be close to her crush (Sasuke) and to keep the boy crushing on her (Naruto) away. She didn't understand Naruto (or Sasuke, really) when she found herself suddenly on the same team as her crush and her would-be boyfriend. She insults and shuts Naruto down, while trying to engage Sasuke - a tactic which combined with the personalities of her teammates almost got them all to fail their test with Kakashi.
Sakura's weakness for believing what she thought she saw when right out of the academy contrasted with her actual strengths of seeing through what was presented. Coming to understand Sasuke's point in offering food to Naruto during Kakashi's test was the first of many small turning points for Sakura. Tolerance was a hard lesson. Learning to "see beneath the beneath" was equally difficult.
The first direct confrontation Sakura had with Sasuke over Naruto proved another turning point. Having her crush tell her, point blank, that he couldn't stand people like her, people who had no idea of what it was like to lose bonds, or never have them, and yet passed judgment on others. (Liberal rewording taken.) Sakura had to look at how she treated Naruto, and while she never fully prevents herself from knocking Naruto for some of his habits (over-enthusiasm, perversity, and the like), she starts to grow closer to both her teammates.
What was meant to be a simple escort mission to the Wave Country proved to be anything but when not far out of Konoha, Team Seven and the man they were escorting were attacked. Sakura defended Tazuna, though she would have been killed if Sasuke hadn't stepped in. (Or Kakashi, for that matter.) Her instinct to stick to the mission was admirable, yet her ability to perform was lackluster. When the threat to their team and Tazuna's life brought out even more powerful shinobi, Sakura found herself on the sidelines and close to useless. She strove to continue to protect Tazuna, but it was Kakashi, Sasuke, and Naruto who were able to fight and defeat Haku and Zabuza. At this point she still has an obvious bias toward Sasuke - emotionally, at least - as she recites out the 25th Shinobi (never show your emotions) rule while racing past Naruto to Sasuke's still and seemingly dead-form, weeping. Sakura probably started resolving to be useful to the team and not to just be protected because of this incident. This was also her first real contact with Naruto breaking down his seal due to emotional distress - and some insight into what her blonde teammate was capable of in full.
Sakura excelled before both the boys in chakra control. This came to the forefront first with the tree walking exercises, which she mastered in much less time than either of her teammates. Still, control itself wasn't enough to make her shine between the two boys, let alone on their first mission. She loses confidence before the first chuunin exam, a contrast to the assurance of Sasuke, and the enthusiasm of Naruto. She was close to not wanting to participate at all, though she didn't know her choosing not to go would stall her team as a whole.
The first encounter Team Seven, and Sakura, had with the Sand Nin competing in the Chuunin Exams was in their village, when Kankurou was bullying some of the kids. Sasuke and Gaara immediately struck a tense note with each other. Other than verbal exchanges, and some physical, not much was exchanged at that point. It was time for the Exams.
Naruto had more blind belief in Sakura's will to compete and complete the exam, while Sasuke was the one to give her the confidence to feel useful to the team. When they were confronted by exam officials in disguise at "Level 3" and Sasuke prompts Sakura into saying she had already figured out this wasn't the real level 3. She pauses for a moment before smiling, and saying, "Of course. It's level two." (Of course, this may have been "door two" but I admit I don't remember this specific detail at the moment.)
The Chuunin exam is where Sakura first met Rock Lee. His impromptu attack of Sasuke and their brief conflict left Sakura catching Sasuke to break his fall as well as dodging Lee's blown kisses and expressions of endearment. She also met Maito Guy in all his spandex-clad, youthful glory, and was left subtly disturbed by the event. Her then particularly shallow nature showed through again, with her largest complaints being that both weren't particularly "attractive." Her depth was echoed by the other two, and they wore identical expressions of disbelief at the closeness of the student-teacher bond Gai and Lee displayed. (That may have had something to do with both men crying tears of joy while hugging each other, however.)
Stage one of the exam pitted Sakura against her natural element: the written test. She passed without trouble, or shall I say she filled out the exam without trouble. Very likely, she was one of the few persons in the room to have passed without cheating, even if cheating was the point (to an extent). We also finally see Sakura thinks about, and cares for, Naruto as she thinks about standing up and asking for their team to be disqualified, so that Naruto wouldn't have to bear the shame of doing so.
He, of course, stands up and manages to shoot down all her concerns in one go, while showing just how strong he is at heart. Sakura was learning in bits and pieces who Naruto really was, and what kind of respect he deserved. She held her tongue.
The second part of the chuunin exam is where Sakura finally was forced to find herself. Survivng the other participants wasn't their first worry - no, once Orochimaru located Sasuke and Sakura, the difficult became surviving the former sannin. Sakura wasn't able to combat Orochimaru's sheer malevolent presence, and Sasuke was forced to carry her out of the immediate danger zone after shoving a kunai through his leg.
I mean, seriously. Since Sasuke was Orochimaru's target, however, the pre-teen couldn't escape forever. Naruto ended up making his way back toward them after the separation which had allowed Orochimaru to close in on Sasuke. Sakura was again left unable to do anything directly while Naruto and Sasuke fought, even at the point where she had to again run to Sasuke when he collapsed from the pain of the curse seal. Naruto then collapsed in turn, and Orochimaru left the scene.
Sakura took up an all night vigilance over her two teammates, doing as much first aid as she could while setting up a perimeter guard to help protect them all. Unfortunately, Sakura has a soft heart, and when a squirrel was going to set off one of the traps, she purposely stopped him from entering.
Of course, elsewhere, Lee had to save squirrels with exploding tags on their back, but that's a little digression.
Sakura found herself facing the chuunin team from Sound on her own. She didn't back down, and was prepared to fight them (though certain to lose) when Lee appeared to help assist her. This was a slap in the face to Sakura's judgmental nature, so in a way another sort of turning point since Naruto wasn't the only person she'd slighted.
Lee was ultimately defeated, and Sakura now took front and center to protect him in addition to Sasuke and Naruto. For now, she was on her own - though from the shadows Ino and her team watched and waited.
Sakura was losing, but she wasn't giving up. Kin, the female from the other team, got ahold of Sakura's long hair and kept her on her knees, cutting Sakura down for being too concerned with her looks to concentrate on her skills as a shinobi/kunoichi. In pain, Sakura dug at the ground and then lashed out with her kunai - missing Kin entirely. The other female was going to belittle her yet again, only Sakura had managed to cut through her hair, and thus break free.
The battle with the Sound Nin continued, degenerating to a point where Sakura even bit down on the arm of one of her aggressors in her staunch effort to not roll over and take it like a dog. It was the sheer determination behind Sakura's actions that ping'd Ino, and caused her to drag her teammates out with her in order to face down the Sound Nin and save Sakura.
During this transition, Sasuke finally came back to consciousness. After seeing Sakura's beaten up body, he asked her who had done this, and proceeded to draw upon the curse seal to entirely lose his cool. The sadistic, brutal way he dealt with the Sound Nin frightened the rest of the conscious Konoha Nin, to the point where Sakura found herself bursting into tears (a habit she didn't have as often as one might expect) and running out to stop Sasuke. He wasn't being who she knew him to be, and latching onto him from behind, Sakura managed to make Sasuke stop. For now, his curse seal receeded, though it hardly left him in a better state than before.
Team Seven finished the second part of the exam, and was allowed to rest. Sakura worried for Sasuke and Naruto, though particularly Sasuke. The preliminary matches didn't leave her feeling any better. Sasuke won his match, and so did Naruto. Hell, for the first time, Sakura was rooting for them both. (Biased little wench that she usually was disappearing for a moment.)
Her own match paired her up against Ino. This battle came down to one of wills, which surprisingly, Ino lost - though not as surprisingly, Ino herself started to move beyond where she'd been capped and become a better, stronger person herself. Sakura finally was able to do for Ino what Ino had done for her years prior. The two of them came to a sort of respect for each other, even as Inner!Sakura (a testy little "second" personality Sakura kept locked in her head) pushed Ino back out of Sakura's mind. The two ended up knocking each other out simultaneously, leading to a draw. Neither would qualify for the matches in the exam proper.
Sakura didn't see Sasuke for the days after the preliminaries. She came to the Chuunin matches with concern heavy in her heart, especially for Sasuke. Kakashi sensed some of this concern, and attempted to alleviate her concerns without specifically addressing them. Being a smart lass, Sakura found herself comforted a bit by her sensei's words... just not entirely.
Watching Naruto's fight had her supporting him yet again, if it didn't diminish her opinion of his idiocy overly much. Sasuke's match, which was one almost all of Konoha looked forward to (both because, hey, an Uchiha! and also, "Sand Demon" Gaara), was tying her stomach into knots.
Her premonitions, if they could be called that, were met with Orochimaru's second move. When the genjutsu that put most the village to sleep was put in place, Sakura, along with Shikamaru, Kakashi, and a handful of others, was able to dispel the technique and maintain consciousness. One of her natural strengths was shining through, and Kakashi asked her to wake Naruto in order to pursue Sasuke, who had in turn pursued the sand siblings in a one-track mind way.
Sakura and Naruto managed to catch up to Sasuke, who was (not terribly successfully) battling Gaara still. Unable to, you know, let anything go ever, Sasuke had to be saved by Naruto, and then Naruto had to keep on fighting after Gaara trapped Sakura up against a tree with a giant hand of sand.
Understandably, she doesn't remember a whole lot of what happened right around then.
Sakura did, however, start seeing the problems between Sasuke and Naruto, as well as with Sasuke himself. Sasuke was never a good patient, but he became even less of a good patient facing the difference in power between himself and Naruto. The fight he and Naruto broke out into on the hospital roof was interrupted by Sakura and Kakashi, though Sakura wouldn't have fared too well if Kakashi hadn't taken the active role in breaking the boys up. She couldn't understand the anger driving Sasuke, because this wasn't how it was supposed to be. They were a team - they all worked together, they all improved together.
But with Orochimaru's curse seal, suddenly, it wasn't enough. While Sakura wasn't around when Naruto was starting to train with Jiraiya (far before they all went separate ways, and right after the death of the 3rd Hokage because of the chuunin-exam mess), and she wasn't around for when Itachi screwed Sasuke over mentally (again) and sent him back to the hospital, saying he wasn't strong enough, and that Naruto was his aim (which I suppose implied Sasuke wasn't special enough for his brother to care about at the moment), it really wasn't enough. Sakura could sense the undertones, even perhaps the reasons behind them, and she didn't know what to do.
The fact that this cumulated in Sasuke willingly leaving Konoha says something about how deeply it affected Sasuke. The fact that Sakura was waiting on the path out of town for him says something about how well she knew him - even if her speech, both admitting to what she hadn't been, and what she wanted to be, showed how far apart they were. Sakura was earnest in her desire to stay with Sasuke, just as Sasuke was likely earnest in saying thank you before he knocked her out.
For reasons citing the fact that females weren't often doing important things and Sakura was (apparently) far more likely to break down, Sakura was not part of the initial Sasuke retrieval arc. All she learned about it came from others, and what Kakashi and Naruto would say.
Naruto's apology to Sakura for not bringing Sasuke back (a promise he had made to her before setting out) on his hospital bed cemented her direction for the next two to three years. She would never ask Naruto to tackle this alone again, and she tells him that next time, they'll bring Sasuke back together. She then approaches Tsunade about becoming her apprentice, and is summarily accepted. The Triad was complete in it's mirroring of the Sanin, as each of the new students out of team seven fell to working with the former masters.
Timeskip happened, and Sakura grew a few inches. Her abilities also grew, but Naruto didn't notice until he got decked for saying she looked the exact same as when he left. Sakura was more expressive and less repressive when Naruto came back, a likely side-effect of working with Tsunade.
As a "Welcome back!" party, Naruto and Sakura were challenged to a replication of the Bell Challenge Kakashi put them through two-three years past. Sakura's abilities manage to surprise both Naruto and Kakashi, even if it's an underhanded ploy by Naruto that allows the two to capture the bells. Thus began an era where Sakura kicked much ass!
Sort of. Called into helping find the kidnapped Gaara, now kaze-kage of Suna, Sakura gets to show off her medical ninjutsu as she save's Kankurou's life in removing the poison Sasori injected into his system. A short while afterward, when paired up with Chiyo of Suna, Sakura and Chiyo face down Sasori, who turns out to be a former shinobi of Suna. The antidote she and Chiyo had developed to save Kankurou is "used" by both women as they fight Sasori - only Chiyo is a crafty old woman and double-injects Sakura when the former's time limit of effectiveness runs out. Between using Sakura's natural strength and chakra manipulation skills, and Chiyo's masterful puppetry skills, the women manage to defeat Sasori.
And now they had a dead Gaara. Chiyo does the last crafty thing of her life, and gives her life's energy to Gaara - which brings his soul back to his body, even if it sort of misses the part that Shukkaku had gotten friendly with. Naruto rejoices, Sakura smiles, and then she remembers that Sasori gave her some interesting information about a spy in Orochimaru's ranks, and a meeting place to where he was supposed to go.
The plot moves forward. Kakashi was so severely messed up from the Suna trip (he was screwing around with Deidara while Sakura was off being effective for once) that he remains hospital ridden as two new members are added to Team Seven. Yamato is a fairly straight-faced, straight-laced jounin who gets stuck with the mostly reasonable Sakura - until Sai or Naruto piss her off, and she decks them in the face. Sai is an enigma - she understand that he has absolutely no social skills, but doesn't like being on the butt end of all his social faux pas. Or, as it turns out, the butt end of the writing scale, as her prior strength is essentially neutralized when she manages to get herself knocked out and falling through space during the pursuit of the "spy" meeting. (Orochimaru and Kabuto, as it were.)
Still, the new team meets up with this "spy," which ends up turning into a trap that severely injures Naruto and makes Sakura aware of just how fragile Naruto's control can be. She tried to approach him in four-tails form and was injured in the attempt - Kabuto, of all people, healed her while Yamato took control of Naruto with his specialized binding jutsus. (Yamato, who was an Orochimaru experiment, it turns out, but hey, no one needs to know that for long.) Sakura was able to heal Naruto after he had reverted to his true form, and yet again resolves to help Naruto in every way she can. Yamato gives her some advice on this count, saying it is the strength of her feelings that also matters.
Their conversation is interrupted as Naruto regains consciousness, and they continue on to Orochimaru's hideout. Searching the hideout thoroughly, they located Sasuke, who wasn't particularly wanting to see them. The first meeting after years of separation brought Naruto to stumbling shock, even if it set Sakura a bit on edge. The confrontation they had was brutal and too quickly over. Sakura had chased Sai down and was throttling him to figure out what he was after when Sasuke said her name, and she turned to look up at him. The dramatics were ones Sakura followed fairly well - and has Naruto sort of trump his reasons by pointing out that Sasuke actually sucks at cutting bonds, despite Sasuke saying that was what he had done.
Sakura tells Sasuke she's going to stop him with her own power, and gets cock-blocked by Yamato, who notices that Sasuke's eyes look dangerous. (Seriously, that's what he says.)
Sasuke does some more schnazzy sharingan stuff, and is about to pull out some move before Orochimaru stops him cold.
Orochimaru, Kabuto, and Sasuke leave. Naruto breaks down a bit, crying, and Sakura says, "You know, crying isn't going to bring Sasuke-kun back! I'm here too! We'll both get stronger, together!" While she is also crying. Sai tosses in his hand to the friendship pool, and Naruto stands and says thanks.
We next see Sakura with Sai, acting as back-up to Shikamaru in the second confrontation for Team Ten with Kakuzu and Hidan. (The first killed Team Ten's sensei, Asuma.) She doesn't end up fighting, because Shikamaru was too ninja and already had defeated Hidan by blowing him into a hole, so her usefulness was saved for healing Naruto's screwed-up arm after the use of his new technique in fighting against Kakuzu. While Naruto is healing, Sakura feels more drawn to her new team as a whole, and as a sort of payment for Naruto's kind words at an earlier point, offers to feed him. Sai, too, makes an offer, which ah... doesn't fly as well. Sakura seems largely unaffected by the fact Naruto still does display crush-like feelings toward her - in at least the sense that they remain nonreciprocated as romantic. (Yamato believes differently, and was about to say so prior to finding Sasuke the first time.)
The in-town encounters that Sakura, Sai, and Naruto have with others are almost like side-line jokes; first, Sai screws up nick-names and calls Sakura "Hag," while due to her physical correction on the subject, he then defaults to calling Ino "Ms. Beautiful." The fact that he's going for the opposite of what he thinks doesn't translate, so he's decked again.
A seperate encounter with Konohomaru has Sakura lecturing him and Naruto on their sexy no jutsus of two women feeling each other up - and her credibility drops when Kohonamaru switches the genders (so Sasuke and Sai are shown in a similar embrace) and Sakura reacts like Ebisu had, only with a "HELL YES!"
All's fair, but in the end this was a comical way to point out Sakura's own double standard (and all the men's, too, but that's not really addressed).
News of Sasuke killing Orochimaru reaches Konoha, and Sakura's back on the road with Kakashi's 8-man squad to find him. She passes within touching distance of Karin, one of Sasuke's new teammates, but the never find Sasuke himself.
Back in Konoha, after that venture ending in visiting Tobi, Sakura finds herself present when Naruto is told about Jiraiya going off and getting killed. She's surprised by Naruto's vhemnent reaction, and subsequent lash of anger in blaming Tsunade for Jiraiya's death. Sakura appeals to Shikamaru in attempting to figure out Jiraiya's dying code. She ultimately is assigned to figure out the code and it's meaning and how to defeat Pain.
Pain comes to town, and shit gets serious. An explosion at the Code Breaking Facility draws Shikamaru and Sakura close, and she kills Pain's centipede summon-creature, in one blown that the little tailor would have been proud of, and begins her healing escapades. Kakashi is killed in the initial attacks, along with many other shinobi. The intense healing lasts, at high volume, until Pain blows up Konoha.
At this point, Naruto was off in Sage Training, and as she wonders where the hell he is (my lifeline! my teammate! my crazy ass friend with way too much power!) while coming to reluctant terms with the people who've been dying trying to prevent Pain from killing everything. She's told when Naruto arrives, witnessing a fight between Naruto and Pain that looks like it will end up being one-sided until Hinata jumps in and causes Naruto to go into a tailed form. Naruto and Pain move out of town, Naruto almost hits nine-tails form -- and then she feels the chakra change, and is told he's under control.
She heals Hinata, and when everyone is revived by Naruto's ability to talk to Nagoto, she's among the masses waiting for his return. The whole village turns out to recognize him, and she hits him over the head and gives him a bear hug. She doesn't want him making her worry that much again.
Unfortunately, she then learns Tsunade is in a coma, but instead of being comforted by anyone, she ends up comforting Naruto over the same fact. She's proud of him again as he handles the topic of Sasuke's being out of Konoha with old acquaintances, and then is confronted with information that no one ever wanted to hear: Danzo was the new Hokage. She's outraged (for a variety of reasons, including "Danzo has done many shady things and that's my mentor you're talking about"), but Kakashi manages to forestall her doing anything blatantly stupid (along with Naruto), and instead she takes a walk with Sai and Naruto to calm down. Only the contingent sent out by the Raikage appears and decides to present them with even more information: Uchiha Sasuke had joined the Akatsuki, and had killed the 8-Tails. (Naruto lets them know the 8-tails may actually be alive, because extraction requires them to be.) They demand information from Naruto and Sakura, who both resist, and Sakura breaks down in tears because it's just too damn much, too damn fast, and she can't do a damn thing about any of it. (She can't seem to answer the foreign shinobi's question on what exactly Uchiha Sasuke is to her.)
ANYHOW she magically is whisked away to Tsunade's comatose side, while Naruto gets himself beaten up and makes Sai feel anger which makes him angryto the point that he confronts Sakura over her amazing guilt-tripping ways that are destroying Naruto even more than Sasuke alone is destroying Naruto and she starts weeping quietly again. Then Shikamaru walks in, says the Rookie 9 are signing Sasuke's death warrant, and that she needs to suck it up and deal -- and she tells him she'll tell Naruto, because "the idiot's in love with me." No one is surprised -- at that fact, not her decision to go after Naruto -- and soon she's on her way to the land of Iron with Lee, Kiba, and Sai. Team Awesomepants.
They find Naruto, and Sakura... confesses... her.......... love. By basically insulting everything Naruto was before and saying she's more or less seen the light since he's become a hero in the eyes of the village. Naruto tells her he hates liars, and Sakura says she isn't lying, but fine! He can have it his way. Stomping on Kiba's foot to keep him quiet on what motivated the trip in the first place, Sakura storms off -- back to Konoha! Only she tells Kiba to get tracking because she's taking down Sasuke on her own.
- Hide quoted text -
Now in brief summary of her last time in Edensphere: it was my own failing in not being around for long, but Seven did learn the basics of the area and start working and exploring (if not the wilderness) various parts of her new home. She was greeted by Cara and Dash at the time, being born with a four legged sister known as Furball. Furball ended up being... Furball didn't end up staying very long, which was saddening to Seven, but a fact of life. She met Bell and Youth, went out and helped Youth pick up a few glorious colored inks for his adventures in journaling, and tried to figure out what it was that niggled at her consciousness as important about the people around here. She had tea with Crow (if I remember correctly, I believe it was her second time around) which was disquieting in it's own way; he seemed familiar, yet... not. Then again, that seemed to be a problem inherent to their general condition.
Her first journal entry informed her of the fact she'd been there before, with the name Seven, and that people remembered her from that time. It was disquieting, and yet relieving, to know that she was someone and something worth recognizing, and it left an impression as to how prized current memory was given the possibility for memory to be taken yet again while living on the tree. Rebirths, not that they were... really births, could leave people stripped of their memories from before. She was an example of that, and it wasn't something she wanted to repeat again. (Whoops.)
Youth started her questioning and feeling concern from that first entry. What, with his talk of apples and the like -- but she came to the fast conclusion that whatever was going on to bring these people together, and to take away their memories of their lives beforehand, didn't really enjoy people digging at finding out who, or what, it was.
Not that she spent long thinking this over, more keeping it internalized for her short stint awake again on the tree.
It was interesting to her to see people live, and not just survive, considering what kinds of difficulties they faced. From seeing people engaging in doodling competitions on journal to just about everything else, Edensphere was a place filled with all sorts of personalities... and it was something to appreciate, even as she picked away at what felt right to her.
ABILITIES:
Sakura is a medical shinobi, chuunin rank, on her world. This is all gobblygook up until I start breaking down what those mean individually, so I'll get to the parts that rely on this magical thing called "chakra," which was argued by Kishimoto (the series author) as making things sound natural and not contrived, though he later danced another dance in an interview that stated "chakra" is basically equivalent to "the Force."
... because it's always with you?
CHAKRA:
In the Naruto universe, chakra is something every living being has, and (as we learn later) a kind of chakra is present in everything that exists. Individuals chakra can be broken down into two parts: the chakra known as "life chakra," also a "life force" or the binding energy that keeps the soul/consciousness in a physical body, and the chakra known simply as "chakra."
Furthermore, chakra, even if it exists in everyone, is not accessible by everyone. Even with extensive training, some people are simply incapable of accessing their chakra reserves, or alternately incapable of creating chakra reserves past their "life chakra." I mention chakra reserves -- in series, there is a theoretical natural limitation to an individuals ability to produce chakra. Sakura is known to have a smaller chakra reserve (if this is in comparison to anyone other than her teammates and sensei, who all have much larger chakra reserves, I currently don't recall), which she has improved on since 12. Her biggest limitations come out in the form of things such as "summons;" Sakura is literally (or was literally) unable to form a summoning contract because she doesn't have the chakra reserves to support one.
Thus she's the only member of Team Seven who does not, and will not (if Kishimoto doesn't retcon it) have a summoning contract with any of the sentient animals of her universe.
Back to chakra: the chakra used by shinobi in order to do the crazy antics they do is formed by a combination of two energies. The first is physical energy; energy of the body. Training this half of the chakra equation is literally a matter of training. Build endurance, work on the body, keep in shape, push yourself to new limits... all of these are important. Endurance is the most important, but it effects chakra output in several ways (which I'll discuss in a moment). The second is mental energy, and this part can feel/seem a bit more spiritual. To increase chakra output from mental energies, things such as meditation are suggested.
Combining these chakras allow the ninja of the Naruto universe to do all sorts of techniques, known as ninjutsu and genjutsu. Taijutsu, the third branch of ninja techniques, is quite honestly martial arts. It's not supernatural (though it can be enhanced using chakra, hence I'll discuss it both here and in the category following) or metahuman or even difficult to train others in. It's... martial arts, of no specifically labeled style.
Sakura is stated to have an aptitude for genjutsu, i.e. illusion based techniques, though this is never expanded upon. The only further canon statements on this ability tie in to her ability to fend off and break out of illusion techniques, as well as recognize, dispell, and respond to such techniques when used on herself or others. She's fairly to very sensitive about mental manipulation, which is basically how genjutsu works on her world. (Manipulating the chakras of the head in order to create an illusion or make a suggestion, such as sending a large group of people to sleep simultaneously.) In theory she can develop this skill; there's little reason for her not to, outside of choosing to spend time perfecting medical ninjutsu along with increasing her taijutsu aptitude.
NINJUTSU AND SAKURA:
First, a link to a wikia entry on jutsu: http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Jutsu.
Sakura is adept in all E-level ninjutsu. In short, she's capable of creating illusionary clones of herself, henging herself (making herself appear to be another person/sound like another person/creature/object), escaping from rope bindings, replace herself with an object in line of sight (presumably) in what's known as "replacement [no jutsu] technique," and technically "sexy no jutsu," though Sakura herself likely wouldn't think, "THIS IS A GREAT IDEA, I'll henge (transform) myself into an overly sexualized version of femininity to pose mostly nude and blow kisses as enemies in order to distract them and win, ohohohoho!"
She's also able to preform at chakra enhanced speeds, which... don't have a really great way of being measured, if it's good to note she's got to be the slowest member of her team. (Slower than Kakashi; Naruto and Sasuke are ridiculously fast.) She can keep up on a three day long run, covering a distance equivalent to five hundred miles(?)* in three days. This is said to take... was it weeks? By foot otherwise, or by oxen-train, because they probably get lost trying to find Oregon along the way.
* I don't actually know the exact distance between these fictitious countries; trying to remember an exact canon quote only made me think that they can more or less cut weeks of travel down into days, if I'm pretty sure it's also suggested that Sakura has trouble doing this, and thus might rely on things such as Soldier Pills to keep up. ex: http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Soldier_Pill
Sakura is also capable of walking up/on/across any surface she can hold herself to with chakra (on a related note, cling to any surface with chakra as long as that surface isn't incredibly disruptive and/or nullifies one's ability to use chakra). Canon examples include water, both still and disrupted; walls, trees, roofs, ceilings, etc.
Kishimoto revealed in the second half of the series that ninja all have a certain inimical affiliation for one of five elements: air, earth, water, fire, lightning. Sakura's element has never been stated, and not really implied. She shows no elemental affiliation in her skills shown in series, but presumably she has one. Also, it's presumably not air, or else she might have been asked to help Naruto focus with his air-element chakra... maybe. Depending on if it would be useful as a plot device.
MEDICAL NINJUTSU AND SAKURA:
Sakura's particular specialization as a ninja comes in the form of her medical training. Canon is not, however, very coherent with explaining this training or its limitations, so I will do what I can to build a cohesive explanation for you.
We'll start with what's explicitly unable to be done (by Sakura) in the manga. Sakura cannot raise the dead (though it is possible to do, by more than one technique, though the only one she is aware of that can be replicated takes the user's life in exchange when being preformed). She cannot heal grievous wounds quickly enough to prevent a patient from bleeding out, if they aren't also self-regenerating. She cannot repair individual cell walls, though she can, apparently, detect if cell walls are ruptured.
I tend to think of Sakura's healing chakra as a sort of lending/encouraging system. She's able to guide a body's efforts in healing to specific locations, and then supplements the body's healing with her own energy. Likewise, while this allows the body to heal at a much increased rate, and heal smoothly (i.e. without scars or impaired motion) if that's within Sakura's capacity at the time, it doesn't land the injured person back on their feet at 100%.
Thus I tend to play this out as requiring both Sakura (less often, however) and the injured party to seek out adequate water and nutrition in the aftermath if the healing is significant enough, as it's taken the body to a level of energy burn usually seen in exercise (or maybe in some way fasting?). Sakura's actual physical resources aren't being used in the same way, but it's worth noting that on someone she's healed, while the injury may be healed, perhaps even fully healed, they still need down time to recover from their injuries. Most of her ability to get them back on their feet seems to be running on the adrenaline of the moment -- i.e. getting a teammate through battle/making sure they survive. When the battle ends, and the adrenaline cuts out, they may be healed, but they're sure as heck feeling the equivalent burn of whatever injury got patched up.
But ninjas are ridiculous, since Sakura's been in the process of dying, had half of another woman's life chakra put into her to forestall the dying process, then been up on her feet running around supporting the life-chakra donor while not appearing to be too worse for the wear. (Hence, again, my theory on Sakura's likely over-use of Soldier's Pills and a youthful appreciation for things like adrenaline highs because this is just not normal, let alone for someone repeatedly mentioned as having a lesser reserve than the behemoths she walks around teamed up with.)
Now, what we've explicitly seen Sakura do! Sakura has tracked poison in another's body, rounded it up with chakra, and extracted it from the body using chakra. It's like the world's most cheating version of the board game Operation. Her ability to follow things within the human body is likely similar to a kind of echolocation via chakra -- getting a sounding and response and feeling from her chakra as it moves through the body of her patient at her direction.
Sakura can heal a variety of traumatic wounds; I theorize she can't do anything with genetic defects, and she can't reverse damage as much as encourage healthy regrowth (or slowly working out scar tissue for old wounds). She's able to manage dozens on dozens of injuries of different severities over the course of battle; when her village is attacked one of the healings she preforms is fairly massive, bringing Hinata back from what otherwise would have killed her (post Hinata standing between the major aggressor on Konoha and Naruto).
It's likely Sakura can use Chakra Scalpels as well; forming her chakra into a sharp enough point as to be able to cut through ligaments, tendons, flesh, etc., at her own direction. In a less focused way, she can also use this as a general attack against others (we've only seen Kabuto do it in series, but there's very little reason Sakura shouldn't be able to do the same if she had/saw the need) without leaving external marks, but also with a sort of shot-gun effect on aim/accuracy. These scalpels have less martial uses, being good for, you know, actual surgery if you need to get something done non-invasively, or just... because she can.
A side effect that's more apparent in the anime than anything else is that when Sakura uses medical ninjutsu (aka uses her chakra in this way) it glows green. How much light this actually generates is unknown, but if she needed to show up in a dark place with something to attest to the fact she's there... she can at least be ready for a hand rave.
As to under what duress can Sakura heal... she can and has healed herself continuously while a sword was shoved through her midsection, a moving sword. Sakura's tenacity and stubbornness often overrides her pain response just enough that she absorbs it in order to continue to pursue or defend whatever it is she finds most important. She feels every hit that lands, she knows every ache and bruise and cut, but she won't let them incapacitate her until she's quite literally unable to stand under any amount of willpower.
SAKURA AND CHAKRA CONTROL:
It's stated multiple times that Sakura has perfect chakra control. Most often this is like having a nice little framed piece of paper up on an office wall; it sounds more impressive than it might be in practice. However, for Sakura at least, this perfect control is how she manages to keep up with her team members, and also how she manages to achieve the "super strength" that her master, Tsunade, also trained her to use.
Sakura doesn't waste her chakra. Whatever she uses, she uses exactly as much is needed to accomplish something, and nothing more. Due to the exactness of her useage, Sakura can make a relatively small chakra reserve stretch and last for really long periods of time, under really high stress and usage. It helps that chakra is a replenishing thing by nature, but even so, without her control of its release, Sakura would not be capable of doing what she can in either healing, keeping up with her team, or in practice chakra-enhanced hand-to-hand combat.
What is chakra-enhanced hand-to-hand combat? It's where Sakura is able to "knead" chakra in her body, direct it to one portion of her body (usually her hands, though if she's being extremely fine with her control, then even just a fingertip will work), and then release it with exact timing in order to magnify the strength of a given motion. For example, with the use of chakra enhanced strength, Sakura has been able to cause fifty-foot long fissures in the ground simply by hitting it, extending over six feet down into the earth itself. Another application can be seen when, using a paper seal to help further direct the outward bound fissures caused by her fist's impact on a three-story tall boulder, Sakura caused the entire stone to break apart. It's important to note this is not inherent strength; Sakura is strong for both her size, weight, and age (also sex, really), but she is not able to cause damage like this without access and use of her chakra. She can still knock you flat, depending (she is very well trained in hand to hand martial arts, unrelated to any extra whallop she can pack with chakra enhancements), but she can't send you soaring several hundred yards away with one landed punch.
And while a perfectly normal human being's punch can kill you, if all the factors are going either extremely right (or wrong), Sakura's chakra-enhanced strength is meant to be capable of one hit kills/one hit incapacitations. That she doesn't do this, in spite of possessing the ability, is part of her personality. Sakura is still a healer and protector of life even when defending; the most all out she's gone in a fight in canon has been against a man who was mostly dead already, and who ultimately killed himself. (Had Sakura been fighting a regular human being, or rather a ninja with a regular body, that body would have been utterly destroyed multiple times over, to the point of death. Since it was a puppet body, all it did was fly apart and fracture and break, depending on which hit we're talking about.)
Sakura's also known for punching giant metal iron blocks back when they've been thrown at her. I make the supposition that any of this is possible by saying that when using chakra-enhanced strength, Sakura is simultaneously creating a sort of shock absorbing chakra-field at the point of contact, so that her own body isn't shattering under the stress of her actions.
NON-MAGICAL:
Medical knowledge! It's not going to be as current or deep or broad as anyone from modern day earth. For one, new diseases for us simply aren't back in her world; for another, her specialties seem more focused on trauma and poison than anything else. However, Sakura has only two hobbies, and one of the two is learning medical techniques from other cultures. (The other is learning random trivia. No really.) Paired together, she has an active itch to learn more about medicine all the time. Her world's tech is bizarre and not really internally coherent, but it's safe to say anything even in a modern hospital would be beyond her general experience. On the ship, she'll have to deal with the culture shock of not knowing what anything is, what it does, or how to use it -- if it couldn't be found in like... a slightly elevated WWII era med bay.
Martial arts! They call it taijutsu on her world, and individual styles don't usually get named, but while Sakura's mind was being taught, so was her body! She's very good at hand-to-hand combat, has been specifically trained to do the most damage in one hit as she can, while dodging, deflecting, or otherwise minimizing damage she cannot escape. Her master's general feeling on the subject was that a medical ninja absolutely could not get hit, because then who was around to heal? But that same medical ninja was critical on the front lines of any battle.
Book smart! Street illiterate... Sakura has consistently shown she's a good reader and researcher through the series. She is not, however, gifted at adapting what she's learned to practical use, though she's far better at doing so now than she was at 12. She can learn most anything she needs to... just don't ask her to apply that knowledge without expecting a trial and error period, along with a potentially extensive period of "no, please demonstrate this again, and this time, in a different way."
Poison knowledge! While it's a bit odd in her universe, Sakura has extensive knowledge of poisons and other herbal remedies/creations. She's able to follow complicated directions in order to make a complicated antidote in record time; she's meticulous when it comes to these things, as she's been trained to be (and by nature with her striving for perfection). An example of her using knowledge of chemicals/herbs/what have you in series would be her sleeping gas bombs, which she designed and then used on her temporary teammates when she wanted to keep them out of danger. Presumably she's somewhat handy with the design of such containers and their releases; also presumably she can design different types of syringes and release mechanisms, or at least figure out how to use them. (There's a few odd ones that crop up in series, around the time she herds poison out of Kankurou's body, and develops the three short term 'antidotes' for facing off against Sasori [a preventative measure for whoever would, rather than knowing she would].)
THE BREAKDOWN FOR WHAT SHE'D BE LIKELY TO KNOW/LEARN/UNLOCK:
Chakra is an unlock, learning the techniques behind it, definitely. Her taijutsu skills will come back faster once she either picks up training or starts training, and she'll definitely find she has excellent reflexes, and a good deal of hand/eye foot/eye coordination. It's likely she can even be taught again how to access chakra and be a quick study at using it for speed enhancement/wall walking/water walking/tree walking, or perhaps the most basic techniques (henging, clones, shadow clones, replacement no jutsu, things of that nature), but without memory crystal aid she's not getting back her medical jutsu knowledge, if she will find herself a quick study of the books -- but with a focus probably more appropriate for her general world. In other words, modern medicine and modern medical practices and/or machines won't be easy or near as easy for her to learn about as would be technology appropriate to the levels seen in hospitals on her world, nor diseases we know about these days that aren't seen or probably talked about in series. (Think also of her being a medic, and not a doctor -- she's not a geneticist, and while she specialized in things like poisons, the way she navigated and healed the human body back home was a hands on direct exploration and guidance of the body, in addition to first aid and traumatic injury care. She'll feel more of a tug toward that idea of healing than the ones of properly assigned dosages of medicines, and probably find she favors herbal remedies without knowing precisely why.)
... I'm not sure I've said anything coherent in this, outside of the fact she needs memory crystals to learn anything past a basic jutsu, and she can only learn chakra based things at all either through being taught or a certain level of trial and error or, perhaps, praying to the giant spaghetti monster in the sky. (...I jest.)
CHARACTER NAME: Sakura Haruno
SERIES: Naruto (manga)
PERSONALITY:
Sakura is an intelligent, sometimes preachy (to those she knows and/or finds clueless about a given subject she is knowledgeable about), caring young woman. She takes her job as a medical shinobi (ninja) seriously, and this seriousness is displayed in how she handles any work assigned to her. Sakura likes to be thorough, complete, and as close to perfect as possible. She's also neat and tidy, perhaps even fastidious, from the few glimpses into her personal living space that we've gleaned. (Part of this might indicate that she spends little time at home.)
Her tendency to follow the rules also lends itself to her having little patience for people acting perverted, despite the fact Sakura herself is a closet "pervert." She's not as sensitive about her appearance as she once was, but making an issue of it with her is asking for retribution. (Usually immediate and physical.)
Sakura is determined to achieve her goals, and achieve them well. She has a good grasp of tactics and a good mind for cryptology and research. Her memory is very good, and her detail recall is high, but not infallible. Sakura is also tenacious in her resolve. She is far less judgmental than she was as a pre-teen, and is far more likely to forgive (if not forget) people's minor indiscretions. She holds teamwork as incredibly important, and still respects the opinions of her elders enough to listen to them when they give advice.
Sakura tends to be honest. She's been known to overreact to people's words or actions in non-combat situations. Sakura hates losing, and due to stubbornness, really hates giving up. She's the sort of person who could be talked into a challenge, even if she wouldn't blindly accept one.
She is confident in her skills and abilities, if not to a point of unchangeable faith. Her resolve to improve makes her a harsh taskmistress on herself, in order to make sure that she's able to stand equal with Naruto, Sasuke, Sai, and Kakashi. Perhaps her greatest fears and failures come from feeling inadequate in the face of her important people; being unable to help them drives her up a wall (and sometimes into the pits of despair).
Sakura is not above gossiping, though she keeps it to a minimum until she's comfortable with whomever she's speaking. Part of this may be due to the fact the personal lives of most shinobi seem to be seriously lacking; her gossiping is done with Ino, and in only the most brief ways. She doesn't appear to talk about herself or her feelings often, presumably because she doesn't want to burden others and prefers to deal with them on her own. Then again, most the time she reads like an open book (Sakura has the mistaken impression that she's far harder to read than she is).
tl;dr version: she's a teenager with emotional hangups over her teammates, who wants to help her closest people out, often fails, and keeps her belief in her best friend ever -- or at least best used punching bag -- because it's what she has so annoyingly decided she simply must do.
I feel like I should address Sakura and xenophobia, since we have some idea of this in series: as an 11/12 year old, Sakura is quiet, intimidated, and then self-righteous when confronted with people from outside the village. On the whole, she's not comfortable with strangers, let alone outside of combat situations. She is a friendly person by nature, curious as to what people do and why and what drives them in those doings, but she's generally polite enough to not be pushy -- unless she's really, really interested, or it's relevant to someones health, sanity, or safety. As a consequence, she can appear far more reserved, calm, or collected to people she doesn't know, as she falls back into habits of emotional repression pretty common for all shinobi, and pretty common for her earlier life. This breaks apart during times of stress; not so much because she falls apart (though she can and will show dismay and distress outwardly), but because she becomes proactive and reactive based on an inability to sit back and watch when she can actually do something. She'll focus those energies in directions that she knows she's capable in, not finding it as tempting to charge head-on into the kinds of fights she expects or know she'll lose when instead, say, there are people who need tending and an emergency hospital to keep running and tabs on the injured and where we're taking them to be... filed. The point is she'll start off as more emotionally reserved as a mechanism to dealing with a new environment and new people, and that as she gets closer to people, the less reserved she'll be. Anger will show through when she feels genuinely outraged, no matter how much she wants to hold it back, and her deep angers at slights aimed at her teammates would still surface, if adapted toward the people she grows close to in the tree. (And kneejerk, when people talk down on traitors and the like. "Do you know why they did what they did? No? Then shut up." If not necessarily so harsh, and conditional based on circumstances.)
And when I say emotionally reserved, it's more about investment. Her world as a whole isn't big on discussing the past; she'll be open to making friends, if distrustful of the location and technology, simply because she has to be.
Played out in Edensphere, this becomes an outward wariness that she has to shove aside again and again simply because there are few if any people she can identify as being part of her past. Thus she can move beyond something she's had to set aside for the sake of the unity of shinobi in the face of Madara's 4th Ninja War, by merit of what she cannot remember.
TIMELINE: Chapter 470!
- Show quoted text -
BACKGROUND:
Sakura started out in life as most people do: bits of genetic information that was birthed, and at roughly 6-8, was a rather shy, self-conscious little girl. While not much about her youth is shown, Sakura was seen as a somewhat friendless and sad child, teased for having a "big" forehead by her peers at the Shinobi Academy. This changed when Yamanaka Ino, a self-assured fellow student, approached Sakura and made friends. Sakura appeared to treasure this relationship, and started to become a more open person through their friendship.
This new found self-confidence eventually propelled Sakura into feeling good enough about herself to develop a crush on a fellow classmate. While it's not known exactly why or how she so proudly discovered Uchiha Sasuke on her own (for quite clearly, based on the reactions Sakura had to her fellow classmates and Ino when she announced her crush, she had no clue Sasuke was himself already popular among the other girls) only to find everyone else already knew about him. This led to the first stance Sakura definitely took in her friendship with Ino, at some point afterward returning the ribbon Ino had given her as a sign of their becoming rivals. Sakura chose this route, and Ino allowed her to. The two bickered back and forth, though they never really forgot that they had been friends.
Sakura was intelligent and hard-working, doing well at the Academy and striving to be close to her crush (Sasuke) and to keep the boy crushing on her (Naruto) away. She didn't understand Naruto (or Sasuke, really) when she found herself suddenly on the same team as her crush and her would-be boyfriend. She insults and shuts Naruto down, while trying to engage Sasuke - a tactic which combined with the personalities of her teammates almost got them all to fail their test with Kakashi.
Sakura's weakness for believing what she thought she saw when right out of the academy contrasted with her actual strengths of seeing through what was presented. Coming to understand Sasuke's point in offering food to Naruto during Kakashi's test was the first of many small turning points for Sakura. Tolerance was a hard lesson. Learning to "see beneath the beneath" was equally difficult.
The first direct confrontation Sakura had with Sasuke over Naruto proved another turning point. Having her crush tell her, point blank, that he couldn't stand people like her, people who had no idea of what it was like to lose bonds, or never have them, and yet passed judgment on others. (Liberal rewording taken.) Sakura had to look at how she treated Naruto, and while she never fully prevents herself from knocking Naruto for some of his habits (over-enthusiasm, perversity, and the like), she starts to grow closer to both her teammates.
What was meant to be a simple escort mission to the Wave Country proved to be anything but when not far out of Konoha, Team Seven and the man they were escorting were attacked. Sakura defended Tazuna, though she would have been killed if Sasuke hadn't stepped in. (Or Kakashi, for that matter.) Her instinct to stick to the mission was admirable, yet her ability to perform was lackluster. When the threat to their team and Tazuna's life brought out even more powerful shinobi, Sakura found herself on the sidelines and close to useless. She strove to continue to protect Tazuna, but it was Kakashi, Sasuke, and Naruto who were able to fight and defeat Haku and Zabuza. At this point she still has an obvious bias toward Sasuke - emotionally, at least - as she recites out the 25th Shinobi (never show your emotions) rule while racing past Naruto to Sasuke's still and seemingly dead-form, weeping. Sakura probably started resolving to be useful to the team and not to just be protected because of this incident. This was also her first real contact with Naruto breaking down his seal due to emotional distress - and some insight into what her blonde teammate was capable of in full.
Sakura excelled before both the boys in chakra control. This came to the forefront first with the tree walking exercises, which she mastered in much less time than either of her teammates. Still, control itself wasn't enough to make her shine between the two boys, let alone on their first mission. She loses confidence before the first chuunin exam, a contrast to the assurance of Sasuke, and the enthusiasm of Naruto. She was close to not wanting to participate at all, though she didn't know her choosing not to go would stall her team as a whole.
The first encounter Team Seven, and Sakura, had with the Sand Nin competing in the Chuunin Exams was in their village, when Kankurou was bullying some of the kids. Sasuke and Gaara immediately struck a tense note with each other. Other than verbal exchanges, and some physical, not much was exchanged at that point. It was time for the Exams.
Naruto had more blind belief in Sakura's will to compete and complete the exam, while Sasuke was the one to give her the confidence to feel useful to the team. When they were confronted by exam officials in disguise at "Level 3" and Sasuke prompts Sakura into saying she had already figured out this wasn't the real level 3. She pauses for a moment before smiling, and saying, "Of course. It's level two." (Of course, this may have been "door two" but I admit I don't remember this specific detail at the moment.)
The Chuunin exam is where Sakura first met Rock Lee. His impromptu attack of Sasuke and their brief conflict left Sakura catching Sasuke to break his fall as well as dodging Lee's blown kisses and expressions of endearment. She also met Maito Guy in all his spandex-clad, youthful glory, and was left subtly disturbed by the event. Her then particularly shallow nature showed through again, with her largest complaints being that both weren't particularly "attractive." Her depth was echoed by the other two, and they wore identical expressions of disbelief at the closeness of the student-teacher bond Gai and Lee displayed. (That may have had something to do with both men crying tears of joy while hugging each other, however.)
Stage one of the exam pitted Sakura against her natural element: the written test. She passed without trouble, or shall I say she filled out the exam without trouble. Very likely, she was one of the few persons in the room to have passed without cheating, even if cheating was the point (to an extent). We also finally see Sakura thinks about, and cares for, Naruto as she thinks about standing up and asking for their team to be disqualified, so that Naruto wouldn't have to bear the shame of doing so.
He, of course, stands up and manages to shoot down all her concerns in one go, while showing just how strong he is at heart. Sakura was learning in bits and pieces who Naruto really was, and what kind of respect he deserved. She held her tongue.
The second part of the chuunin exam is where Sakura finally was forced to find herself. Survivng the other participants wasn't their first worry - no, once Orochimaru located Sasuke and Sakura, the difficult became surviving the former sannin. Sakura wasn't able to combat Orochimaru's sheer malevolent presence, and Sasuke was forced to carry her out of the immediate danger zone after shoving a kunai through his leg.
I mean, seriously. Since Sasuke was Orochimaru's target, however, the pre-teen couldn't escape forever. Naruto ended up making his way back toward them after the separation which had allowed Orochimaru to close in on Sasuke. Sakura was again left unable to do anything directly while Naruto and Sasuke fought, even at the point where she had to again run to Sasuke when he collapsed from the pain of the curse seal. Naruto then collapsed in turn, and Orochimaru left the scene.
Sakura took up an all night vigilance over her two teammates, doing as much first aid as she could while setting up a perimeter guard to help protect them all. Unfortunately, Sakura has a soft heart, and when a squirrel was going to set off one of the traps, she purposely stopped him from entering.
Of course, elsewhere, Lee had to save squirrels with exploding tags on their back, but that's a little digression.
Sakura found herself facing the chuunin team from Sound on her own. She didn't back down, and was prepared to fight them (though certain to lose) when Lee appeared to help assist her. This was a slap in the face to Sakura's judgmental nature, so in a way another sort of turning point since Naruto wasn't the only person she'd slighted.
Lee was ultimately defeated, and Sakura now took front and center to protect him in addition to Sasuke and Naruto. For now, she was on her own - though from the shadows Ino and her team watched and waited.
Sakura was losing, but she wasn't giving up. Kin, the female from the other team, got ahold of Sakura's long hair and kept her on her knees, cutting Sakura down for being too concerned with her looks to concentrate on her skills as a shinobi/kunoichi. In pain, Sakura dug at the ground and then lashed out with her kunai - missing Kin entirely. The other female was going to belittle her yet again, only Sakura had managed to cut through her hair, and thus break free.
The battle with the Sound Nin continued, degenerating to a point where Sakura even bit down on the arm of one of her aggressors in her staunch effort to not roll over and take it like a dog. It was the sheer determination behind Sakura's actions that ping'd Ino, and caused her to drag her teammates out with her in order to face down the Sound Nin and save Sakura.
During this transition, Sasuke finally came back to consciousness. After seeing Sakura's beaten up body, he asked her who had done this, and proceeded to draw upon the curse seal to entirely lose his cool. The sadistic, brutal way he dealt with the Sound Nin frightened the rest of the conscious Konoha Nin, to the point where Sakura found herself bursting into tears (a habit she didn't have as often as one might expect) and running out to stop Sasuke. He wasn't being who she knew him to be, and latching onto him from behind, Sakura managed to make Sasuke stop. For now, his curse seal receeded, though it hardly left him in a better state than before.
Team Seven finished the second part of the exam, and was allowed to rest. Sakura worried for Sasuke and Naruto, though particularly Sasuke. The preliminary matches didn't leave her feeling any better. Sasuke won his match, and so did Naruto. Hell, for the first time, Sakura was rooting for them both. (Biased little wench that she usually was disappearing for a moment.)
Her own match paired her up against Ino. This battle came down to one of wills, which surprisingly, Ino lost - though not as surprisingly, Ino herself started to move beyond where she'd been capped and become a better, stronger person herself. Sakura finally was able to do for Ino what Ino had done for her years prior. The two of them came to a sort of respect for each other, even as Inner!Sakura (a testy little "second" personality Sakura kept locked in her head) pushed Ino back out of Sakura's mind. The two ended up knocking each other out simultaneously, leading to a draw. Neither would qualify for the matches in the exam proper.
Sakura didn't see Sasuke for the days after the preliminaries. She came to the Chuunin matches with concern heavy in her heart, especially for Sasuke. Kakashi sensed some of this concern, and attempted to alleviate her concerns without specifically addressing them. Being a smart lass, Sakura found herself comforted a bit by her sensei's words... just not entirely.
Watching Naruto's fight had her supporting him yet again, if it didn't diminish her opinion of his idiocy overly much. Sasuke's match, which was one almost all of Konoha looked forward to (both because, hey, an Uchiha! and also, "Sand Demon" Gaara), was tying her stomach into knots.
Her premonitions, if they could be called that, were met with Orochimaru's second move. When the genjutsu that put most the village to sleep was put in place, Sakura, along with Shikamaru, Kakashi, and a handful of others, was able to dispel the technique and maintain consciousness. One of her natural strengths was shining through, and Kakashi asked her to wake Naruto in order to pursue Sasuke, who had in turn pursued the sand siblings in a one-track mind way.
Sakura and Naruto managed to catch up to Sasuke, who was (not terribly successfully) battling Gaara still. Unable to, you know, let anything go ever, Sasuke had to be saved by Naruto, and then Naruto had to keep on fighting after Gaara trapped Sakura up against a tree with a giant hand of sand.
Understandably, she doesn't remember a whole lot of what happened right around then.
Sakura did, however, start seeing the problems between Sasuke and Naruto, as well as with Sasuke himself. Sasuke was never a good patient, but he became even less of a good patient facing the difference in power between himself and Naruto. The fight he and Naruto broke out into on the hospital roof was interrupted by Sakura and Kakashi, though Sakura wouldn't have fared too well if Kakashi hadn't taken the active role in breaking the boys up. She couldn't understand the anger driving Sasuke, because this wasn't how it was supposed to be. They were a team - they all worked together, they all improved together.
But with Orochimaru's curse seal, suddenly, it wasn't enough. While Sakura wasn't around when Naruto was starting to train with Jiraiya (far before they all went separate ways, and right after the death of the 3rd Hokage because of the chuunin-exam mess), and she wasn't around for when Itachi screwed Sasuke over mentally (again) and sent him back to the hospital, saying he wasn't strong enough, and that Naruto was his aim (which I suppose implied Sasuke wasn't special enough for his brother to care about at the moment), it really wasn't enough. Sakura could sense the undertones, even perhaps the reasons behind them, and she didn't know what to do.
The fact that this cumulated in Sasuke willingly leaving Konoha says something about how deeply it affected Sasuke. The fact that Sakura was waiting on the path out of town for him says something about how well she knew him - even if her speech, both admitting to what she hadn't been, and what she wanted to be, showed how far apart they were. Sakura was earnest in her desire to stay with Sasuke, just as Sasuke was likely earnest in saying thank you before he knocked her out.
For reasons citing the fact that females weren't often doing important things and Sakura was (apparently) far more likely to break down, Sakura was not part of the initial Sasuke retrieval arc. All she learned about it came from others, and what Kakashi and Naruto would say.
Naruto's apology to Sakura for not bringing Sasuke back (a promise he had made to her before setting out) on his hospital bed cemented her direction for the next two to three years. She would never ask Naruto to tackle this alone again, and she tells him that next time, they'll bring Sasuke back together. She then approaches Tsunade about becoming her apprentice, and is summarily accepted. The Triad was complete in it's mirroring of the Sanin, as each of the new students out of team seven fell to working with the former masters.
Timeskip happened, and Sakura grew a few inches. Her abilities also grew, but Naruto didn't notice until he got decked for saying she looked the exact same as when he left. Sakura was more expressive and less repressive when Naruto came back, a likely side-effect of working with Tsunade.
As a "Welcome back!" party, Naruto and Sakura were challenged to a replication of the Bell Challenge Kakashi put them through two-three years past. Sakura's abilities manage to surprise both Naruto and Kakashi, even if it's an underhanded ploy by Naruto that allows the two to capture the bells. Thus began an era where Sakura kicked much ass!
Sort of. Called into helping find the kidnapped Gaara, now kaze-kage of Suna, Sakura gets to show off her medical ninjutsu as she save's Kankurou's life in removing the poison Sasori injected into his system. A short while afterward, when paired up with Chiyo of Suna, Sakura and Chiyo face down Sasori, who turns out to be a former shinobi of Suna. The antidote she and Chiyo had developed to save Kankurou is "used" by both women as they fight Sasori - only Chiyo is a crafty old woman and double-injects Sakura when the former's time limit of effectiveness runs out. Between using Sakura's natural strength and chakra manipulation skills, and Chiyo's masterful puppetry skills, the women manage to defeat Sasori.
And now they had a dead Gaara. Chiyo does the last crafty thing of her life, and gives her life's energy to Gaara - which brings his soul back to his body, even if it sort of misses the part that Shukkaku had gotten friendly with. Naruto rejoices, Sakura smiles, and then she remembers that Sasori gave her some interesting information about a spy in Orochimaru's ranks, and a meeting place to where he was supposed to go.
The plot moves forward. Kakashi was so severely messed up from the Suna trip (he was screwing around with Deidara while Sakura was off being effective for once) that he remains hospital ridden as two new members are added to Team Seven. Yamato is a fairly straight-faced, straight-laced jounin who gets stuck with the mostly reasonable Sakura - until Sai or Naruto piss her off, and she decks them in the face. Sai is an enigma - she understand that he has absolutely no social skills, but doesn't like being on the butt end of all his social faux pas. Or, as it turns out, the butt end of the writing scale, as her prior strength is essentially neutralized when she manages to get herself knocked out and falling through space during the pursuit of the "spy" meeting. (Orochimaru and Kabuto, as it were.)
Still, the new team meets up with this "spy," which ends up turning into a trap that severely injures Naruto and makes Sakura aware of just how fragile Naruto's control can be. She tried to approach him in four-tails form and was injured in the attempt - Kabuto, of all people, healed her while Yamato took control of Naruto with his specialized binding jutsus. (Yamato, who was an Orochimaru experiment, it turns out, but hey, no one needs to know that for long.) Sakura was able to heal Naruto after he had reverted to his true form, and yet again resolves to help Naruto in every way she can. Yamato gives her some advice on this count, saying it is the strength of her feelings that also matters.
Their conversation is interrupted as Naruto regains consciousness, and they continue on to Orochimaru's hideout. Searching the hideout thoroughly, they located Sasuke, who wasn't particularly wanting to see them. The first meeting after years of separation brought Naruto to stumbling shock, even if it set Sakura a bit on edge. The confrontation they had was brutal and too quickly over. Sakura had chased Sai down and was throttling him to figure out what he was after when Sasuke said her name, and she turned to look up at him. The dramatics were ones Sakura followed fairly well - and has Naruto sort of trump his reasons by pointing out that Sasuke actually sucks at cutting bonds, despite Sasuke saying that was what he had done.
Sakura tells Sasuke she's going to stop him with her own power, and gets cock-blocked by Yamato, who notices that Sasuke's eyes look dangerous. (Seriously, that's what he says.)
Sasuke does some more schnazzy sharingan stuff, and is about to pull out some move before Orochimaru stops him cold.
Orochimaru, Kabuto, and Sasuke leave. Naruto breaks down a bit, crying, and Sakura says, "You know, crying isn't going to bring Sasuke-kun back! I'm here too! We'll both get stronger, together!" While she is also crying. Sai tosses in his hand to the friendship pool, and Naruto stands and says thanks.
We next see Sakura with Sai, acting as back-up to Shikamaru in the second confrontation for Team Ten with Kakuzu and Hidan. (The first killed Team Ten's sensei, Asuma.) She doesn't end up fighting, because Shikamaru was too ninja and already had defeated Hidan by blowing him into a hole, so her usefulness was saved for healing Naruto's screwed-up arm after the use of his new technique in fighting against Kakuzu. While Naruto is healing, Sakura feels more drawn to her new team as a whole, and as a sort of payment for Naruto's kind words at an earlier point, offers to feed him. Sai, too, makes an offer, which ah... doesn't fly as well. Sakura seems largely unaffected by the fact Naruto still does display crush-like feelings toward her - in at least the sense that they remain nonreciprocated as romantic. (Yamato believes differently, and was about to say so prior to finding Sasuke the first time.)
The in-town encounters that Sakura, Sai, and Naruto have with others are almost like side-line jokes; first, Sai screws up nick-names and calls Sakura "Hag," while due to her physical correction on the subject, he then defaults to calling Ino "Ms. Beautiful." The fact that he's going for the opposite of what he thinks doesn't translate, so he's decked again.
A seperate encounter with Konohomaru has Sakura lecturing him and Naruto on their sexy no jutsus of two women feeling each other up - and her credibility drops when Kohonamaru switches the genders (so Sasuke and Sai are shown in a similar embrace) and Sakura reacts like Ebisu had, only with a "HELL YES!"
All's fair, but in the end this was a comical way to point out Sakura's own double standard (and all the men's, too, but that's not really addressed).
News of Sasuke killing Orochimaru reaches Konoha, and Sakura's back on the road with Kakashi's 8-man squad to find him. She passes within touching distance of Karin, one of Sasuke's new teammates, but the never find Sasuke himself.
Back in Konoha, after that venture ending in visiting Tobi, Sakura finds herself present when Naruto is told about Jiraiya going off and getting killed. She's surprised by Naruto's vhemnent reaction, and subsequent lash of anger in blaming Tsunade for Jiraiya's death. Sakura appeals to Shikamaru in attempting to figure out Jiraiya's dying code. She ultimately is assigned to figure out the code and it's meaning and how to defeat Pain.
Pain comes to town, and shit gets serious. An explosion at the Code Breaking Facility draws Shikamaru and Sakura close, and she kills Pain's centipede summon-creature, in one blown that the little tailor would have been proud of, and begins her healing escapades. Kakashi is killed in the initial attacks, along with many other shinobi. The intense healing lasts, at high volume, until Pain blows up Konoha.
At this point, Naruto was off in Sage Training, and as she wonders where the hell he is (my lifeline! my teammate! my crazy ass friend with way too much power!) while coming to reluctant terms with the people who've been dying trying to prevent Pain from killing everything. She's told when Naruto arrives, witnessing a fight between Naruto and Pain that looks like it will end up being one-sided until Hinata jumps in and causes Naruto to go into a tailed form. Naruto and Pain move out of town, Naruto almost hits nine-tails form -- and then she feels the chakra change, and is told he's under control.
She heals Hinata, and when everyone is revived by Naruto's ability to talk to Nagoto, she's among the masses waiting for his return. The whole village turns out to recognize him, and she hits him over the head and gives him a bear hug. She doesn't want him making her worry that much again.
Unfortunately, she then learns Tsunade is in a coma, but instead of being comforted by anyone, she ends up comforting Naruto over the same fact. She's proud of him again as he handles the topic of Sasuke's being out of Konoha with old acquaintances, and then is confronted with information that no one ever wanted to hear: Danzo was the new Hokage. She's outraged (for a variety of reasons, including "Danzo has done many shady things and that's my mentor you're talking about"), but Kakashi manages to forestall her doing anything blatantly stupid (along with Naruto), and instead she takes a walk with Sai and Naruto to calm down. Only the contingent sent out by the Raikage appears and decides to present them with even more information: Uchiha Sasuke had joined the Akatsuki, and had killed the 8-Tails. (Naruto lets them know the 8-tails may actually be alive, because extraction requires them to be.) They demand information from Naruto and Sakura, who both resist, and Sakura breaks down in tears because it's just too damn much, too damn fast, and she can't do a damn thing about any of it. (She can't seem to answer the foreign shinobi's question on what exactly Uchiha Sasuke is to her.)
ANYHOW she magically is whisked away to Tsunade's comatose side, while Naruto gets himself beaten up and makes Sai feel anger which makes him angryto the point that he confronts Sakura over her amazing guilt-tripping ways that are destroying Naruto even more than Sasuke alone is destroying Naruto and she starts weeping quietly again. Then Shikamaru walks in, says the Rookie 9 are signing Sasuke's death warrant, and that she needs to suck it up and deal -- and she tells him she'll tell Naruto, because "the idiot's in love with me." No one is surprised -- at that fact, not her decision to go after Naruto -- and soon she's on her way to the land of Iron with Lee, Kiba, and Sai. Team Awesomepants.
They find Naruto, and Sakura... confesses... her.......... love. By basically insulting everything Naruto was before and saying she's more or less seen the light since he's become a hero in the eyes of the village. Naruto tells her he hates liars, and Sakura says she isn't lying, but fine! He can have it his way. Stomping on Kiba's foot to keep him quiet on what motivated the trip in the first place, Sakura storms off -- back to Konoha! Only she tells Kiba to get tracking because she's taking down Sasuke on her own.
- Hide quoted text -
Now in brief summary of her last time in Edensphere: it was my own failing in not being around for long, but Seven did learn the basics of the area and start working and exploring (if not the wilderness) various parts of her new home. She was greeted by Cara and Dash at the time, being born with a four legged sister known as Furball. Furball ended up being... Furball didn't end up staying very long, which was saddening to Seven, but a fact of life. She met Bell and Youth, went out and helped Youth pick up a few glorious colored inks for his adventures in journaling, and tried to figure out what it was that niggled at her consciousness as important about the people around here. She had tea with Crow (if I remember correctly, I believe it was her second time around) which was disquieting in it's own way; he seemed familiar, yet... not. Then again, that seemed to be a problem inherent to their general condition.
Her first journal entry informed her of the fact she'd been there before, with the name Seven, and that people remembered her from that time. It was disquieting, and yet relieving, to know that she was someone and something worth recognizing, and it left an impression as to how prized current memory was given the possibility for memory to be taken yet again while living on the tree. Rebirths, not that they were... really births, could leave people stripped of their memories from before. She was an example of that, and it wasn't something she wanted to repeat again. (Whoops.)
Youth started her questioning and feeling concern from that first entry. What, with his talk of apples and the like -- but she came to the fast conclusion that whatever was going on to bring these people together, and to take away their memories of their lives beforehand, didn't really enjoy people digging at finding out who, or what, it was.
Not that she spent long thinking this over, more keeping it internalized for her short stint awake again on the tree.
It was interesting to her to see people live, and not just survive, considering what kinds of difficulties they faced. From seeing people engaging in doodling competitions on journal to just about everything else, Edensphere was a place filled with all sorts of personalities... and it was something to appreciate, even as she picked away at what felt right to her.
ABILITIES:
Sakura is a medical shinobi, chuunin rank, on her world. This is all gobblygook up until I start breaking down what those mean individually, so I'll get to the parts that rely on this magical thing called "chakra," which was argued by Kishimoto (the series author) as making things sound natural and not contrived, though he later danced another dance in an interview that stated "chakra" is basically equivalent to "the Force."
... because it's always with you?
CHAKRA:
In the Naruto universe, chakra is something every living being has, and (as we learn later) a kind of chakra is present in everything that exists. Individuals chakra can be broken down into two parts: the chakra known as "life chakra," also a "life force" or the binding energy that keeps the soul/consciousness in a physical body, and the chakra known simply as "chakra."
Furthermore, chakra, even if it exists in everyone, is not accessible by everyone. Even with extensive training, some people are simply incapable of accessing their chakra reserves, or alternately incapable of creating chakra reserves past their "life chakra." I mention chakra reserves -- in series, there is a theoretical natural limitation to an individuals ability to produce chakra. Sakura is known to have a smaller chakra reserve (if this is in comparison to anyone other than her teammates and sensei, who all have much larger chakra reserves, I currently don't recall), which she has improved on since 12. Her biggest limitations come out in the form of things such as "summons;" Sakura is literally (or was literally) unable to form a summoning contract because she doesn't have the chakra reserves to support one.
Thus she's the only member of Team Seven who does not, and will not (if Kishimoto doesn't retcon it) have a summoning contract with any of the sentient animals of her universe.
Back to chakra: the chakra used by shinobi in order to do the crazy antics they do is formed by a combination of two energies. The first is physical energy; energy of the body. Training this half of the chakra equation is literally a matter of training. Build endurance, work on the body, keep in shape, push yourself to new limits... all of these are important. Endurance is the most important, but it effects chakra output in several ways (which I'll discuss in a moment). The second is mental energy, and this part can feel/seem a bit more spiritual. To increase chakra output from mental energies, things such as meditation are suggested.
Combining these chakras allow the ninja of the Naruto universe to do all sorts of techniques, known as ninjutsu and genjutsu. Taijutsu, the third branch of ninja techniques, is quite honestly martial arts. It's not supernatural (though it can be enhanced using chakra, hence I'll discuss it both here and in the category following) or metahuman or even difficult to train others in. It's... martial arts, of no specifically labeled style.
Sakura is stated to have an aptitude for genjutsu, i.e. illusion based techniques, though this is never expanded upon. The only further canon statements on this ability tie in to her ability to fend off and break out of illusion techniques, as well as recognize, dispell, and respond to such techniques when used on herself or others. She's fairly to very sensitive about mental manipulation, which is basically how genjutsu works on her world. (Manipulating the chakras of the head in order to create an illusion or make a suggestion, such as sending a large group of people to sleep simultaneously.) In theory she can develop this skill; there's little reason for her not to, outside of choosing to spend time perfecting medical ninjutsu along with increasing her taijutsu aptitude.
NINJUTSU AND SAKURA:
First, a link to a wikia entry on jutsu: http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Jutsu.
Sakura is adept in all E-level ninjutsu. In short, she's capable of creating illusionary clones of herself, henging herself (making herself appear to be another person/sound like another person/creature/object), escaping from rope bindings, replace herself with an object in line of sight (presumably) in what's known as "replacement [no jutsu] technique," and technically "sexy no jutsu," though Sakura herself likely wouldn't think, "THIS IS A GREAT IDEA, I'll henge (transform) myself into an overly sexualized version of femininity to pose mostly nude and blow kisses as enemies in order to distract them and win, ohohohoho!"
She's also able to preform at chakra enhanced speeds, which... don't have a really great way of being measured, if it's good to note she's got to be the slowest member of her team. (Slower than Kakashi; Naruto and Sasuke are ridiculously fast.) She can keep up on a three day long run, covering a distance equivalent to five hundred miles(?)* in three days. This is said to take... was it weeks? By foot otherwise, or by oxen-train, because they probably get lost trying to find Oregon along the way.
* I don't actually know the exact distance between these fictitious countries; trying to remember an exact canon quote only made me think that they can more or less cut weeks of travel down into days, if I'm pretty sure it's also suggested that Sakura has trouble doing this, and thus might rely on things such as Soldier Pills to keep up. ex: http://naruto.wikia.com/wiki/Soldier_Pill
Sakura is also capable of walking up/on/across any surface she can hold herself to with chakra (on a related note, cling to any surface with chakra as long as that surface isn't incredibly disruptive and/or nullifies one's ability to use chakra). Canon examples include water, both still and disrupted; walls, trees, roofs, ceilings, etc.
Kishimoto revealed in the second half of the series that ninja all have a certain inimical affiliation for one of five elements: air, earth, water, fire, lightning. Sakura's element has never been stated, and not really implied. She shows no elemental affiliation in her skills shown in series, but presumably she has one. Also, it's presumably not air, or else she might have been asked to help Naruto focus with his air-element chakra... maybe. Depending on if it would be useful as a plot device.
MEDICAL NINJUTSU AND SAKURA:
Sakura's particular specialization as a ninja comes in the form of her medical training. Canon is not, however, very coherent with explaining this training or its limitations, so I will do what I can to build a cohesive explanation for you.
We'll start with what's explicitly unable to be done (by Sakura) in the manga. Sakura cannot raise the dead (though it is possible to do, by more than one technique, though the only one she is aware of that can be replicated takes the user's life in exchange when being preformed). She cannot heal grievous wounds quickly enough to prevent a patient from bleeding out, if they aren't also self-regenerating. She cannot repair individual cell walls, though she can, apparently, detect if cell walls are ruptured.
I tend to think of Sakura's healing chakra as a sort of lending/encouraging system. She's able to guide a body's efforts in healing to specific locations, and then supplements the body's healing with her own energy. Likewise, while this allows the body to heal at a much increased rate, and heal smoothly (i.e. without scars or impaired motion) if that's within Sakura's capacity at the time, it doesn't land the injured person back on their feet at 100%.
Thus I tend to play this out as requiring both Sakura (less often, however) and the injured party to seek out adequate water and nutrition in the aftermath if the healing is significant enough, as it's taken the body to a level of energy burn usually seen in exercise (or maybe in some way fasting?). Sakura's actual physical resources aren't being used in the same way, but it's worth noting that on someone she's healed, while the injury may be healed, perhaps even fully healed, they still need down time to recover from their injuries. Most of her ability to get them back on their feet seems to be running on the adrenaline of the moment -- i.e. getting a teammate through battle/making sure they survive. When the battle ends, and the adrenaline cuts out, they may be healed, but they're sure as heck feeling the equivalent burn of whatever injury got patched up.
But ninjas are ridiculous, since Sakura's been in the process of dying, had half of another woman's life chakra put into her to forestall the dying process, then been up on her feet running around supporting the life-chakra donor while not appearing to be too worse for the wear. (Hence, again, my theory on Sakura's likely over-use of Soldier's Pills and a youthful appreciation for things like adrenaline highs because this is just not normal, let alone for someone repeatedly mentioned as having a lesser reserve than the behemoths she walks around teamed up with.)
Now, what we've explicitly seen Sakura do! Sakura has tracked poison in another's body, rounded it up with chakra, and extracted it from the body using chakra. It's like the world's most cheating version of the board game Operation. Her ability to follow things within the human body is likely similar to a kind of echolocation via chakra -- getting a sounding and response and feeling from her chakra as it moves through the body of her patient at her direction.
Sakura can heal a variety of traumatic wounds; I theorize she can't do anything with genetic defects, and she can't reverse damage as much as encourage healthy regrowth (or slowly working out scar tissue for old wounds). She's able to manage dozens on dozens of injuries of different severities over the course of battle; when her village is attacked one of the healings she preforms is fairly massive, bringing Hinata back from what otherwise would have killed her (post Hinata standing between the major aggressor on Konoha and Naruto).
It's likely Sakura can use Chakra Scalpels as well; forming her chakra into a sharp enough point as to be able to cut through ligaments, tendons, flesh, etc., at her own direction. In a less focused way, she can also use this as a general attack against others (we've only seen Kabuto do it in series, but there's very little reason Sakura shouldn't be able to do the same if she had/saw the need) without leaving external marks, but also with a sort of shot-gun effect on aim/accuracy. These scalpels have less martial uses, being good for, you know, actual surgery if you need to get something done non-invasively, or just... because she can.
A side effect that's more apparent in the anime than anything else is that when Sakura uses medical ninjutsu (aka uses her chakra in this way) it glows green. How much light this actually generates is unknown, but if she needed to show up in a dark place with something to attest to the fact she's there... she can at least be ready for a hand rave.
As to under what duress can Sakura heal... she can and has healed herself continuously while a sword was shoved through her midsection, a moving sword. Sakura's tenacity and stubbornness often overrides her pain response just enough that she absorbs it in order to continue to pursue or defend whatever it is she finds most important. She feels every hit that lands, she knows every ache and bruise and cut, but she won't let them incapacitate her until she's quite literally unable to stand under any amount of willpower.
SAKURA AND CHAKRA CONTROL:
It's stated multiple times that Sakura has perfect chakra control. Most often this is like having a nice little framed piece of paper up on an office wall; it sounds more impressive than it might be in practice. However, for Sakura at least, this perfect control is how she manages to keep up with her team members, and also how she manages to achieve the "super strength" that her master, Tsunade, also trained her to use.
Sakura doesn't waste her chakra. Whatever she uses, she uses exactly as much is needed to accomplish something, and nothing more. Due to the exactness of her useage, Sakura can make a relatively small chakra reserve stretch and last for really long periods of time, under really high stress and usage. It helps that chakra is a replenishing thing by nature, but even so, without her control of its release, Sakura would not be capable of doing what she can in either healing, keeping up with her team, or in practice chakra-enhanced hand-to-hand combat.
What is chakra-enhanced hand-to-hand combat? It's where Sakura is able to "knead" chakra in her body, direct it to one portion of her body (usually her hands, though if she's being extremely fine with her control, then even just a fingertip will work), and then release it with exact timing in order to magnify the strength of a given motion. For example, with the use of chakra enhanced strength, Sakura has been able to cause fifty-foot long fissures in the ground simply by hitting it, extending over six feet down into the earth itself. Another application can be seen when, using a paper seal to help further direct the outward bound fissures caused by her fist's impact on a three-story tall boulder, Sakura caused the entire stone to break apart. It's important to note this is not inherent strength; Sakura is strong for both her size, weight, and age (also sex, really), but she is not able to cause damage like this without access and use of her chakra. She can still knock you flat, depending (she is very well trained in hand to hand martial arts, unrelated to any extra whallop she can pack with chakra enhancements), but she can't send you soaring several hundred yards away with one landed punch.
And while a perfectly normal human being's punch can kill you, if all the factors are going either extremely right (or wrong), Sakura's chakra-enhanced strength is meant to be capable of one hit kills/one hit incapacitations. That she doesn't do this, in spite of possessing the ability, is part of her personality. Sakura is still a healer and protector of life even when defending; the most all out she's gone in a fight in canon has been against a man who was mostly dead already, and who ultimately killed himself. (Had Sakura been fighting a regular human being, or rather a ninja with a regular body, that body would have been utterly destroyed multiple times over, to the point of death. Since it was a puppet body, all it did was fly apart and fracture and break, depending on which hit we're talking about.)
Sakura's also known for punching giant metal iron blocks back when they've been thrown at her. I make the supposition that any of this is possible by saying that when using chakra-enhanced strength, Sakura is simultaneously creating a sort of shock absorbing chakra-field at the point of contact, so that her own body isn't shattering under the stress of her actions.
NON-MAGICAL:
Medical knowledge! It's not going to be as current or deep or broad as anyone from modern day earth. For one, new diseases for us simply aren't back in her world; for another, her specialties seem more focused on trauma and poison than anything else. However, Sakura has only two hobbies, and one of the two is learning medical techniques from other cultures. (The other is learning random trivia. No really.) Paired together, she has an active itch to learn more about medicine all the time. Her world's tech is bizarre and not really internally coherent, but it's safe to say anything even in a modern hospital would be beyond her general experience. On the ship, she'll have to deal with the culture shock of not knowing what anything is, what it does, or how to use it -- if it couldn't be found in like... a slightly elevated WWII era med bay.
Martial arts! They call it taijutsu on her world, and individual styles don't usually get named, but while Sakura's mind was being taught, so was her body! She's very good at hand-to-hand combat, has been specifically trained to do the most damage in one hit as she can, while dodging, deflecting, or otherwise minimizing damage she cannot escape. Her master's general feeling on the subject was that a medical ninja absolutely could not get hit, because then who was around to heal? But that same medical ninja was critical on the front lines of any battle.
Book smart! Street illiterate... Sakura has consistently shown she's a good reader and researcher through the series. She is not, however, gifted at adapting what she's learned to practical use, though she's far better at doing so now than she was at 12. She can learn most anything she needs to... just don't ask her to apply that knowledge without expecting a trial and error period, along with a potentially extensive period of "no, please demonstrate this again, and this time, in a different way."
Poison knowledge! While it's a bit odd in her universe, Sakura has extensive knowledge of poisons and other herbal remedies/creations. She's able to follow complicated directions in order to make a complicated antidote in record time; she's meticulous when it comes to these things, as she's been trained to be (and by nature with her striving for perfection). An example of her using knowledge of chemicals/herbs/what have you in series would be her sleeping gas bombs, which she designed and then used on her temporary teammates when she wanted to keep them out of danger. Presumably she's somewhat handy with the design of such containers and their releases; also presumably she can design different types of syringes and release mechanisms, or at least figure out how to use them. (There's a few odd ones that crop up in series, around the time she herds poison out of Kankurou's body, and develops the three short term 'antidotes' for facing off against Sasori [a preventative measure for whoever would, rather than knowing she would].)
THE BREAKDOWN FOR WHAT SHE'D BE LIKELY TO KNOW/LEARN/UNLOCK:
Chakra is an unlock, learning the techniques behind it, definitely. Her taijutsu skills will come back faster once she either picks up training or starts training, and she'll definitely find she has excellent reflexes, and a good deal of hand/eye foot/eye coordination. It's likely she can even be taught again how to access chakra and be a quick study at using it for speed enhancement/wall walking/water walking/tree walking, or perhaps the most basic techniques (henging, clones, shadow clones, replacement no jutsu, things of that nature), but without memory crystal aid she's not getting back her medical jutsu knowledge, if she will find herself a quick study of the books -- but with a focus probably more appropriate for her general world. In other words, modern medicine and modern medical practices and/or machines won't be easy or near as easy for her to learn about as would be technology appropriate to the levels seen in hospitals on her world, nor diseases we know about these days that aren't seen or probably talked about in series. (Think also of her being a medic, and not a doctor -- she's not a geneticist, and while she specialized in things like poisons, the way she navigated and healed the human body back home was a hands on direct exploration and guidance of the body, in addition to first aid and traumatic injury care. She'll feel more of a tug toward that idea of healing than the ones of properly assigned dosages of medicines, and probably find she favors herbal remedies without knowing precisely why.)
... I'm not sure I've said anything coherent in this, outside of the fact she needs memory crystals to learn anything past a basic jutsu, and she can only learn chakra based things at all either through being taught or a certain level of trial and error or, perhaps, praying to the giant spaghetti monster in the sky. (...I jest.)