A/N
Hey guys! This story was inspired by the 10th Naruto Shippuden ending (beach setting). Thanks for reading and please rate because I love all of your kind or critical little words. :)
words: 3,210
rating: T for language and innuendo
Kakashi knew to be suspicious the instant he had seen Naruto and the boys gathered into a huddle along the beach; Naruto occasionally peeping his head out, looking for any unwanted eavesdroppers.
"Hmm… I wonder what that knuckle-headed ninja is up to…" Kakashi murmured. Iruka stumbled from out of the water to where Kakashi sat. He tumbled onto a towel, landing with a spray of sand by Kakashi. "Oh man, those boys are just looking for trouble," Iruka laughed. "You should hear what they're planning…"
Naruto's blue eyes were littered with mischief as he spoke the next words into the space between the huddle made up of ninjas. Crouched in a circle next to Naruto was Sai, then Neji, Lee, Choji, Shikamaru, Shino, and finally, Kiba (plus one very wet dog).
"Here, my friends, is the single greatest writing utensil you will ever lay your eyes on." Naruto whipped from his pocket a pen-like object, and held it out for the group to admire.
Shikamaru stared at Naruto. "That's why you called us all over here? What a drag-"
"Shh! I haven't even gotten to the good part yet!"
Kiba looked at the pen suspiciously. "Akamaru says that pen smells weird," he commented as the canine barked in agreement.
"That's because it's magical," Naruto continued, the mischievous glint in his eyes growing. "It was developed from some kind of ninjutsu, I don't know exactly..."
Sai glanced at the pen. "It was developed similarly to how my paint was- it has a certain jutsu that is cast upon it. I've never heard of merchants selling them so casually, though. Are you sure you got this from a store, Naruto?"
Naruto dismissed Sai's question with a toss of his hand. "The point is, it has magic ink. Whoever's skin you draw on, the only way they can get it off is if the person who marked their skin releases the jutsu." Naruto's grin doubled.
"Get to the point, Naruto." Shino said, eyes hidden behind dark goggles.
"So, I was thinking we could have a little fun in the sun!" Naruto had raised his voice to a yell, brimming over with excitement. He quickly glanced around, making sure the girls (who were currently sunbathing) hadn't heard him. Naruto dipped his head back into the huddle of boys. "That means," he said, voice hushed in between his sniggers, "I challenge you all to a contest."
Lee's eyes widened at the mention of a challenge. "What a great idea, Naruto! What exactly does this contest entail?"
"Whoever can draw on one of the girls first with the magic marker, wins."
Neji sighed. He could just envision Tenten splicing him with a variety of different kunai. "What's in it for us?"
Naruto looked up at Neji confusedly. "Uh…"
Shikamaru shook his head lightly. Leave it to Naruto to get excited about something and expect everyone to be just as motivated. Shika couldn't help a small smile- Naruto had an infectious way of living that, at times, inspired his own thirst for life. He dipped down to pick up a sand bucket. If Naruto didn't have anything else thought out, there was really only one other person left for the job. Drag city.
"Okay, here are the rules." Shikamaru said. "Every team has to bet something of use and put it into the bucket. Think of it like a game of poker, and this is the pot. Whichever team wins, gets the contents in the bucket. Also- I think it would be a little easier to assign girls to groups. Everyone has to mark the girl that is on their own team. But one more thing, Naruto. How are we going to take turns with the marker?"
Naruto grinned, and his hand dipped into his pockets momentarily before displaying several markers in an array of colors. Sai wondered how in the hell Naruto found the time -or money- to go searching for such odd trinkets.
"Okay, perfect." Shikamaru said. "Now make your bets."
Naruto yanked his prized necklace from his neck. It glinted in the rays of hot summer sun. A hush grew over the huddled ninjas.
"Here," Naruto said gingerly, placing the necklace into the plastic bucket.
Lee gasped. "But, Naruto, that's the necklace that Hokage-sama gave you…"
"I'm not losing this contest!" Naruto expressed passionately. "And that's a promise, 'ttebayo!"
It was Lee and Neji's turn next.
"Don't worry, Neji, I've got us covered!" Lee quickly ran to grab his bag, pulling from it a green jumpsuit.
Lee tossed his outfit into the bucket. "Light and flexible, it is simply perfect. Whoever wins this is a lucky ninja indeed!"
Everyone groaned.
Shikamaru and Choji looked at one another expectedly. "Choji, do you have something? I don't have anything on me…" Shika said with a sheepish grin.
"Uh…" Choji plunged his hands into the pockets of his swim shorts. They resurfaced to reveal a (waterlogged) coupon for 1/2 off BBQ for a whole year. "Well, I was gonna use this for after swimming…" he mumbled, placing the paper inside the bucket.
Shikamaru patted him on the back. "Don't worry, buddy, we've got this in the bag. I have shadow possession jutsu, remember?"
Choji's face brightened.
Shino and Kiba looked at one another, but Kiba just shrugged.
Shino sighed. "Okay, I'll lend whichever team wins one of my female bugs. It'll be very useful on your next mission. You'll thank me later."
Shino held out his hand, kneeling down to the bucket. A small beetle crawled from the tip of his finger into the plastic container. "Just for now, Mei," Shino whispered affectionately, coaxing the beetle into the bucket.
"Okay, perfect. Lee, Neji, here's a pen. You have Tenten. Me and Choji will take this green one and search for Ino. Kiba, Shino, here's red. You've got Hinata." The different groups dispersed. "Okay, Naruto, I guess you and Sai get purple. Just don't try to piss Sakura off too much, will ya? I don't want this beach to be completely demolished."
Naruto cringed with the mental image of Sakura's fist connecting to sand in an earth shattering blow.
The four pairs of boys scattered to make battle plans.
"What are the boys doing?"
The voice had come from a particularly shiny looking blonde. Sakura continued to squirt tanning oil onto Ino's shoulders.
"Ino, quit fidgeting," Sakura chastised.
"They're probably bonding," Hinata said kindly.
"They're probably plotting," Tenten quipped, flicking past another page of her magazine.
The girls sat comfortably on towels, basking in the sunlight provided by the glorious summer day, Tenten blissfully unaware of how true her words really were.
Sai looked at Naruto. "How exactly are we going to win this?" He asked dubiously.
Naruto grinned. "Because, we have a secret weapon," Naruto said, heading in the direction of where Iruka and Kakashi sat, shaded by a pink umbrella.
Kakashi watched warily as his two teammates slid mischievously next to him underneath the canopy of shade.
"So, whatcha readin' there, Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto asked. Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "We were just wondering, you know, if you're not busy or anything…"
Kakashi folded his book onto his knee. "You have a favor to ask?"
"Well, you see…"
And so Naruto told of the contest, and the wager, all the while holding the purple pen up as evidence.
"I see…" Kakashi said finally, smiling in amusement. "And how do you plan to go about winning?"
"We were hoping you could use your sharingan to distract Sakura," Sai explained.
"I don't think that's a good ide-"
"I have something that might change your mind, sensei," Naruto said in a sing song voice.
"Oh?"
Naruto scooted up next to Kakashi, whispering something into his ear. Kakashi raised an eyebrow.
"Really?" Kakashi said, breathlessly, giddily. Very abnormal for Kakashi behavior. He cleared his throat. "Well, I'll have to think about it. I can't imagine when I'd have a chance to even hypnotize Sakura with the sharingan- not while she's with all her friends, anyway."
Naruto looked dejected.
Kakashi did have a point, though. There was no way they would be able to tear Sakura away from the group of girls-
"Look!" Naruto screeched, pointing towards a particularly sunburnt pink-haired kunoichi who was currently making her way to the bathroom.
Kakashi sighed.
"Now's your chance!" Naruto prodded Kakashi, handing him the purple marker.
"We're all rooting for you, Sensei!" Sai said in what he hoped was an 'encouraging' tone.
Kakashi heaved his body out of the chair, lazily making his way to the bathroom hut in what he hoped didn't seem too conspicuous. How did he get caught up in this mess again? Oh, right. Naruto had promised him some of Jiraiya's works. But not just any of his writings- he had promised unedited scripts that Jiraiya had left behind. Detailed scenes that hadn't quite made the cut for his books; scenes that contained material too scandalous even for the adult masses…
Kakashi absentmindedly wet his lips.
"Uh, Kaka-sensei?"
Kakashi snapped out of his thoughts, looking at the girl who stood before him, standing before the entrance of the single unisex bathroom.
"Oh, Sakura, hello." Kakashi's finger traced the pen; the only sign of his anxiousness. "Enjoying your time at the beach?"
"Yes, thank you. I hope you are too?" Sakura asked politely.
Kakashi nodded.
"I'm sorry, were you before me?" Sakura said, a little awkwardly.
"Oh, no, after you," Kakashi said.
"Thanks," Sakura turned to enter the bathroom.
Before Kakashi could even think, his arm acted on its own accord and shot to grab her wrist just as she turned.
"Sakura, wait." The poor girl looked like she was going to jump right out of her (slightly burnt) skin. Kakashi silently prayed to kami that he would be forgiven as he began to use the art of seduction on his ex-student. In order to lull her into a sleep from his sharingan, of course. Not because he got enjoyment from this, or anything.
At least that's what he keeps telling himself.
"Your chest is bright as a cherry," He said, his voice entering a much lower, much huskier register.
He slowly guided Sakura up against a wall, caged by his two arms. Gentle, gentle.
"You should really apply some sunscreen, Sakura, skin cancer is very real."
It wasn't what he said, exactly, but the way Kakashi spoke to her that made her breath catch. She felt herself going fuzzy underneath the heat of his gaze, hoping the scorching sun was responsible for this dizziness she now felt creeping under her skin.
His eyelids hung limply against a pointed gaze, searing directly into her own dazed emeralds. "K-kakashi?"
She could feel his tender grip holding her arm in place, while his other hand reached to touch the burnt area just below her collarbone. His gentle touch stung the sensitive skin, but the sparks that his fingers left long after they were gone were not the aftereffects of a sunburn.
"Sakura, look at me."
Sakura realized her gaze had been intently watching his wandering fingers. They traced the outline of her collarbone, traced the tender dip of her neck, traced just above the swell of her breasts; tracing lower, lower…
His fingers reached for her chin, tilting her face upwards.
"What?" She whispered. The word really was ideal: it could account for so many of the questions that had begun to surface.
"You are having a heat stroke, I believe," Kakashi whispered into her ear, feeling the shiver of her body as he pulled back to once again meet her eyes. They were hazy with something Kakashi couldn't quite place. The whirling of his sharingan was the last thing Sakura saw before crawling into a deep sleep.
Sakura's head slouched near her shoulder, body going limp in Kakashi's arms.
Kakashi promised himself to teach Sakura a new jutsu immediately after all this was over- as well as allowing her to deliver a punch to his face- in order to soothe the guilt he was now feeling. Surely Sakura would have her revenge. Perhaps he should just blame the whole ordeal on Naruto…
Kakashi gingerly guided Sakura to a seated position, back against the wall, where he crouched in sand before her.
Shit, Kakashi thought. It was in that moment that he realized Naruto had failed to mention where and what Kakashi was supposed to mark on Sakura's body.
"Leave it to Naruto…" Kakashi mumbled.
He uncapped the pen and began to survey her body for appropriate markable places. She looked so peaceful in her slumber, mouth slightly ajar. Saliva started to collect there, trailing down to her chin, and Kakashi couldn't help but smile. He brushed the string of liquid away with a thumb. The pad of his finger touched the flesh of her bottom lip, purely accidental.
But when it did, Kakashi froze.
He could feel the heat of her breath dance on his finger with inhales and exhales. The plumpness behind the rosy skin seared beneath his thumbpad. They were so soft… He allowed himself a moment to trace her lip, slowly, itching to feel the tender flesh on his own lips. He told himself this was idle curiosity, nothing more, and retracted his hand a bit too quickly.
Something began to tug at Kakashi's mind as he continued to speculate where to place his marking. He thought back to when he had started to seduce Sakura. Why had she sounded like that? She had reacted so willingly to his advances. Why had she sounded so... winded?
Sakura's body slid sideways, tipping horizontally, jolting Kakashi out of his thoughts. He caught her by the shoulders. He didn't want to mark her where she was sunburnt, that would probably sting. He opted for somewhere on her back.
Suddenly she folded forward, revealing her backside. Strong shoulders met curved spine, trailing down from a tight back to a pert bottom that many ninja had lusted after before.
Kakashi let out a heady sigh, before promptly lecturing his subconscious on the moral duties he had as her sensei and teammate.
"Sakura? Are you there?"
Shit, Kakashi thought at the sound of Ino's voice. He could hear the soft slide of Ino's footsteps as she moved closer to where he sat with Sakura. He had about 10 seconds max before Ino rounded the corner and spotted him with his unconscious student.
Not. Good.
Kakashi let a string of profanities loose as he tore off the pen's cap, decorating the spot right above her butt with his name. He took a small amount of pleasure from his artistic penmanship, right before lifting Sakura's head to his gaze and disappearing completely.
Ino rounded the corner.
"Sakura! What the hell are you doing sitting on the ground?!"
Sakura gazed up at her friend with confused, sleepy eyes. She felt as if she had slept a very long time. Ino helped her to her feet.
"Are you okay?"
Sakura's memory was still very hazy. "I think… I had a heat stroke. Or something…"
Ino shook her head. "Leave it to billboard brow to pass out when no one's around," she said, wrapping Sakura's arm around her shoulder and walking her friend back to the group.
Kakashi appeared back to the spot beneath the pink umbrella, meeting three pairs of curious eyes. Kakashi simply smiled and handed the pen back to Naruto.
"All right, Sensei!" Naruto said, right before him and Sai both rushed to tell their competitors. Iruka just stared amusedly up at him.
"I wonder how long you will be paying for that mistake," he chuckled. "You know as well as I that Sakura has quite the temper. She's not one to be tampered with." And with those words, Iruka left to go take another dip in the cool ocean.
Kakashi just smiled, nestling back into the chair with book in hand.
"Something tells me she won't be quite as mad as she should be."
His mind wandered back to the memory of the look of wonder and excitement that had encompassed Sakura's gaze just before he had led her to unconsciousness.
Kakashi watched the scene from afar as Naruto announced Team 7's victory. He watched as the blonde haired ninja excitedly jumped into a green skin-tight onesie (that was particularly too revealing for Kakashi's tastes) and Sai watched in an interested fashion as a beetle crawled up his arm. Choji had slipped a piece of paper back into his pocket when the other ninjas weren't looking, elbowing Shikamaru hard and winking. Shikamaru, on the other hand, looked a little worse for wear. He was sporting a mighty fine bruise on his cheek, rubbing the sensitive area while receiving a lecture from a pissed off blonde. Kakashi couldn't really decipher Ino's screams, but they sounded an awful lot like "son of a bitch" and "let's see you mark this beautiful skin one more time". The copy-nin averted his gaze back to his book.
Kakashi couldn't help but to smirk from behind the pages of his novel as Sakura passed him, sharing a light wave and a grin, as she continued to stroll the beach. She had felt lightheaded, opting for a stroll along the shoreline to dip her feet into the cool, salty water.
He stole one last glance at his cherry blossom, admiring the sight of her perky butt as well as the clear mark he had left above her rump. An odd sensation overwhelmed him as he flicked his eyes back to the page, a sensation that he hadn't expected to feel.
Kakashi continued to robotically skim the paragraph, unable to focus on the words. All he could think about was how unusually pleasurable it felt to have Sakura branded with his very own name. Yes, he felt guilty, as if he had abused a power that wasn't necessarily his. Surely he would make it up to Sakura.
But he also felt strangely satisfied.
He remembered what Sai had said about the mark. Only the person who applies it can undo the jutsu and take off the marking.
Perhaps when she finally found the mark (how often do women look at their naked backside, anyways?) and came to him, he would agree to release the jutsu. He would take it off, of course, but there might be conditions.
How far would she go to take off that little marking of his, he wondered, a devilish grin spreading across his face.
How far?