Naruto: A New Perspective

Chapter 34

Sakura woke up the next morning, not with the peak efficiency she had come to expect from years of training, rather it felt like her body was made of lead, and someone was pounding a drumbeat on her head. She groaned and rolled onto her side, opening her eyes... only to let out a small shriek and stumble away as fast as she could. It was a little surprising open her eyes and find out her face was about two inches from an unconscious and snoring Naruto.

"Ow..." Sakura moaned, bringing a trembling hand to her forehead, what had she done last night?

"Aren't hangovers fun?"

She glared at the obnoxiously cheerful voice's source, Jiraiya. The Sannin was sitting on the side of the bed, watching the two genin with an amused expression on his face. Hangover... Sakura groaned, now she remembered. Naruto insisted that they needed to try alcohol, and Tsunade had agreed. Stupid Naruto.

"I hate you..." She muttered; moving to sit up, her body was protesting every movement on principle.

"That's not nice," Jiraiya said, looking hurt, "I was going to give you my guaranteed cure for hangovers... but now I don't think I will!"

Naruto yawned, causing the two to turn to look at the blond. The genin boy sat up, smiling cheerfully at them, "Hey guys! Wow, I had a great night's sleep."

"Aren't you..." Sakura winced, "Hung over?"

"Huh?" Naruto was surprised, "No..."

Jiraiya scowled, "Lucky brat." He muttered, "All of the pleasures of good alcohol and none of the problems..."

"Man, last night was awesome, huh Sakura?" Naruto asked her, a little too loud for Sakura's pounding head.

"Ugh Naruto..." Sakura groaned, "Not so loud... I have a headache."

"Aww," Naruto pouted, "That's too bad, Sakura. What's a headache like, anyways? I never get those."

"You're a headache." Jiraiya grumbled, grabbing the genin boy by the collar as he protested the lifting. "Now," Jiraiya looked him up and down, "Since you're obviously good to go, back to training with you."

"Whatever." Naruto yawned.

"What?"

"Er... I mean yes sir, Pervy Sage."

"...Get out of my sight." Jiraiya scowled, Kakashi had been right, Naruto really did have him pegged for life. Naruto gave him a mock salute and jumped out of the window, leaving a very disoriented Sakura and Jiraiya behind.

"I need some water..." Sakura muttered, her throat felt as dry as a desert, and her stomach roiled ominously... she felt like she was going to throw up soon. "Can you get me some?"

"Here, drink this." Jiraiya handed her a small vile with some kind of strange purple liquid inside.

Sakura eyed it suspiciously, but uncorked the vial. She sniffed it, and as expected, it smelled terrible. However, with a grimace she drank the small amount of liquid, and felt her dry mouth soothed instantly by the cool drink. Sakura was also relieved to feel her stomach calm down as well, even her pounding headache started to lessen.

"Feel better?" Jiraiya asked.

Sakura nodded; apparently even Jiraiya had his uses. She told him as much.

"Hey," Jiraiya pretended to be hurt, "I am a Sannin you know."

"A bad one." Tsunade commented, popping out of her own room, she glanced around, "Where's brat number one?"

"Training." Jiraiya explained, "Apparently he doesn't get hangovers like us normal folk."

Tsunade grimaced, but didn't complain, she had dealt with worse hangovers than the one she had now. She glanced at Sakura who was nursing her own headache with what Tsunade recognized as Jiraiya's hangover cure.