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There is no hope for girls like you.
You will become a career genin, cannon fodder, a housewife if you ever get your head out of your ass and finally decide to give up ambitions of becoming a shinobi.
Girls like you are not made for battlefields, they refuse to believe you could be.
(weak-link, sacrificial lamb)
The academy is kind to you, too kind. With teachers who ruffle your ridiculous bubblegum pink hair and with the pretty 100% circled in red. You ace every written exam they give, your form is perfect even as your hits are weak.
They make you believe that you are good.
Even when you are not, even when you are pathetic.
Your classmates all get supervised training at home while the only shinobi-related thing your mother ever taught you is how to make neat stitches.
(you would think skin is harder to sew shut than fabric, it isn't)
You try so hard to pretend it doesn't make a difference, that your good grades and near perfect chakra-control mean something. That it is enough for you to make something out of yourself.
That hope is trampled on when you meet your jounin instructor. When you realize that if teachers are supposed to be chosen to fit their students' needs, that is not the case for you.
(pathetic, boy-obsessed, little Sakura-chan)
You read your file once, when Iruka-sensei left it on his desk along with all the ones of the other graduated kunoichi in the classroom when you were on cleaning duty.
Needless to say, your terrible curiosity got the best of you : genjustsu-type, above-average chakra control, possible affinity for strategy tactics, average ninjutsu, low chakra reserves, below average taijutsu, low stamina -
Your list of weaknesses seems mile-long, you wince.
You brighten up however when you do a bit of light research at the library and find out what possible specialization could be suited for you : medical ninjutsu, puppet technique, infiltration, assassination, seduction (you pull a face at that last one)
They put you in a front-line-worthy, heavy-hitting team.
You don't realize it at first, not when you are busy gloating at having Sasuke-kun in your team and complaining about how Naruto is the class' dead last.
It takes you a week or so after the bell test for you to see it. The boys are sparing, Kakashi-sensei has not told you to do anything and so you just stand there. Like a plant, like you are a decoration.
Naruto is not only able to make solid clones, but an army of them. Sasuke-kun can make fireballs.
There is a horrible, sinking feeling in your stomach, "Sensei, is there something I can do while the boys finish?"
Kakashi-sensei smiles that closed-eye smile of his, ruffling your hair like Iruka-sensei often did, like all of your previous teachers did. That godforsaken almost-affectionate gesture that makes you feel like a silly little girl.
"Maa, you can meditate for today." For today? You blink, you had assumed you would be sparing with one of the boys next while the other took a break. You bite the inside of your cheek so hard you taste blood and go underneath a tree to get some shade and observe the team that is clearly not yours.
(they're perfect for each other you realize, fitting like puzzle pieces)
(who are you to shatter that glossy, picture-perfect team?)
The rest of your afternoon is spent between spinning leaves on your forehead and sending bitter, jealous glares to Naruto and even Sasuke-kun.
You wonder if the other girls in your class are the same, if they are sitting on their pretty asses and waiting for a silver of attention from their teachers.
Something in your chest curls up and shrivels.
Something ugly like you, bitter and ungrateful like you. You should consider yourself lucky, after all, you passed.
(you, the civilian-born girl)
Sasuke-kun you get, with his special eyes that only Kakashi-sensei can help with (you did a bit of research after finding out his name) and his obvious talent, but Naruto?
Naruto who was horrible at everything at the academy and has no respect for authority whatsoever, what makes him more deserving than you at an education?
You are a mean, immature little girl.
(Naruto proves you wrong, over and over again - you hate being wrong)
You end up leaving the training grounds without so much as a goodbye, the boys don't notice and Kakashi-sensei doesn't care. What a good summary of your time on team 7.
You lock yourself in the library and promises to yourself that you will learn something today.
And you do, you dig up some easy genin-level chakra control exercises and easily manages to do them - you search the book from cover to back and don't find an exercise you cannot do on the first try.
Twirling leaves on your foreheads - you stick two additional ones on the palms of your hands, manifesting chakra without hand signs takes you about two seconds - you get the hang of how to shape it even more quickly.
You come to the conclusion that the exercises in the book are not for genin but for Academy students and leave disappointed.
(you are wrong yet again, but this you will never learn)
The next day you don't bother showing up to the training grounds even when you're told to, Kakashi-sensei will be at least three hours late.
Instead you find thick books on poisons to keep you entertained, you inhale the knowledge like you always do.
You remember your last year at the Academy.
Remember that one time a woman with too-sharp teeth was responsible for your kunoichi-lessons replacing Nana-sensei, the soft-looking woman usually responsible for the lessons - there's a bet going on that the too-nice woman was no kunoichi to begin with.
(she wasn't - why waste resources for wasteful girls? Give a woman a book on flower arrangement and seduction, that will do it)
You think that if you had the shark-like woman for a teacher all year instead of Nana-sensei, you might have turned out better as a ninja.
"There's a common misconception that poison is a woman's weapon," there's an unattractive snort as she looks at the girls sitting all around her, wide-eyed and baby-faced, "Poison is not a woman's weapon, it is the weapon of those who are smart."
You remember Ino's awe-struck expression, Hinata's curious one, "Because poison does not discriminate between genders, between the weak and the strong. It kills easier than a kunai or a jutsu does."
Despite your initial investment in the lesson, you soon forget all about it when you manage to snag a seat next to Sasuke-kun. What a pity.
(you are master of the art of wasting potential, the little that you have)
You think about that for the rest of the day, a better ninja.
In a system that destroys geniuses, that condemns talent to a life of misery, why would you want to be better? You are so smart yet so very dumb.
(your skin is so very soft, the blade so sharp)
You are nothing, nothing and surrounded by bright celestial bodies. You will fade and no one will ever notice.
But at least, you know it. Yes, you know that you are pathetic and weak and unlovable, know that you will die a painfully meaningless death.
(they don't) The higher you fly, the harder you fall. You have never even gotten off the ground, what did you expect? (they will die screaming and still believe that they are invincible, they will never expect the blow)
Who would've known? That it is you, the endlessly hopeless girl, that would have the last laugh.