The end of the winter holidays for the shinobi of the Hidden Leaf was drawing near, and, as was her custom, Sakura had procrastinated on everything she had promised herself she would do over the past few days, leaving her to cram it all into her last day of freedom.
As Sakura was devastated to learn, getting stuck in shinobi jail did not entitle her to the paid time off she would normally have received during that period, and thus, she still had to go back to work tomorrow. She had already been generously reimbursed for her troubles, after all.
And so, the Tuesday following the new year found Sakura in Karin's apartment, facing her first, and probably most painful, chore of the day.
"Ouch!" Sakura hissed, as Karin firmly grasped her wrist. "That stings!"
"Please hold still, onee-sama," Karin chided her. "If I make a mistake, I'll have to start all over again, you know?"
Lately, Karin had begun learning Fūinjutsu on top of Iryō Ninjutsu under Lady Tsunade's tutelage. As an Uzumaki in all but name and hair colour, Tsunade felt as though it was her duty to pass on the ancestral teachings she had received from her grandmother Mito to the last of the Uzumaki.
That being said, she had not even entertained the idea of teaching the Art of Sealing to a young Naruto, for various reasons. If asked, she would claim that it would not be right for her to interfere in the master-disciple bond Naruto shared with Jiraiya, but in reality, she simply couldn't be bothered teaching such a slow-witted and untalented student.
"His parents were both so brilliant and talented, so how in the world did they produce such a dunce?" Tsunade would sigh to Shizune. "Honestly, the very idea of trying to teach that boy anything drives me to alcoholism."
And Shizune would inevitably reply:
"But Milady, you're already an alcoholic."
And Shizune would snatch the bottle of wine out of Tsunade's hands and hide it away, leaving the resentful Hokage to do her job properly.
However, Karin was another story altogether. Unlike Naruto, she was a pure-blooded, red-headed and red-blooded Uzumaki, through and through; she was talented, smart, and willing to learn. Disregarding her strange obsession of wanting to learn the secret behind her teacher's large bust, Tsunade thought Karin was a fine disciple— much less problematic than her star pupil, Sakura.
In conclusion, Karin had grown much better than her at sealing stuff into other stuff, which was why Sakura had sought her out today. Sakura supposed she could have asked Tenten instead, since she was far more experienced, but honestly, she didn't trust her to not seal weird things inside her.
"By the way, onee-sama," Karin said. "Have you given your sword a name?"
That's right: Sakura was getting Karin to brand her wrist with a reusable seal in which she could store her sword. She was tired of getting caught without her main weapon, and honestly, it was a drag having to run ten metres away to drop it and then come back, just to avoid firing it accidentally whenever she used the Lorentz Gun Jutsu.
"I called the old one the Manyū blade, but I guess that's kind of boring," Sakura said, chewing her bottom lip in thought. "I suppose… hmm… how about… Makoto?"
"Makoto, as in sincerity?" Karin said dubiously. "You're going to swing sincerity at your foes, onee-sama?"
"Actually, truth!" Sakura replied smugly. "But instead of spelling it the normal way, it'll be written with the character Ma (魔) for magic, like in Manyū, and Koto (言) as in word, like kotoba!"
Karin still looked doubtful.
"Because I'm so good at Genjutsu I can make illusions come true?" Sakura said helplessly. "Like I can make magic happen just by saying it?"
"But why word? Aren't most of your illusions vision-based, onee-sama? I mean, if you mostly used auditory illusions, I could understand!" Karin giggled. "Well, as expected of onee-sama's unique naming sense; who else could have named their pet fish Tenpuramaru…"
Sakura's face turned bright red.
"All right, I get it, stop nitpicking," Sakura groaned, before adding a few seconds later, "Wait, how come you know what I named my goldfish?"
Karin whistled nonchalantly as she worked, pretending she could not hear. Sakura bit her lip as Karin continued laying down the sealing matrix on her wrist, which felt as if it was crawling with a hundred ants.
"So, er…" Sakura asked after a while. "Why did you want to know what I call my sword, Karin?"
"For that," said Karin, giving Sakura a slap on the wrist. "All done!"
Karin withdrew her hand, revealing the characters 魔言 branded in black on Sakura's inner wrist.
Sakura gaped at her. "I thought we agreed Makoto was a stupid name for a sword?"
Karin nodded. "It really is."
Sakura peered suspiciously at Karin, her female intuition working in overdrive.
"Why do I get the feeling you're mad at me?" she said slowly.
Karin rolled her eyes, and Sakura's wavering suspicion that Karin was mad at her promptly solidified. Yes, she was definitely mad about something, but what?
"I wonder," Karin harrumphed. "Why don't you tell me, onee-sama?"
"I, er… I forgot your birthday…? Maybe?"
Sakura was stumped.
Why couldn't women just be upfront and say what they wanted and be done with it? Why all this song and dance, she thought to herself, completely oblivious to the fact that she was always doing the exact same thing to poor Naruto and Sasuke.
"I'm angry because you only ever call on me when you need something from me, onee-sama!" Karin cried out. "Why can't we ever go on dates and do fun stuff together?"
Since Karin tended to hang around (read: stalk) Sakura whenever they were both in the village at the same time, Sakura had come to assume that Karin would drop by uninvited anyway, so she rarely bothered inviting her to any fun activities.
Sakura sighed. "Okay, okay, I get it. Where do you want to go first?"
Karin beamed at her.
Sakura still had a few things to cross off her to-do list, but oh well, they could wait. Hinata's eyeball could probably endure waiting around in her fridge for a few more hours (since taking Karin to another girl's place on a date was a recipe for disaster), and posting the warning letter she was meant to mail to Orochimaru via one of Root's dead drops could be discreetly done during the date itself.