Between a Rock and a Hard Place.
...
A rustle.
A flash of red above him somewhere... then a pair of green, green eyes.
There was little more that Kakashi could do now other than groan. Sharingan exhaustion, coupled with the regular kind, and augmented with a sucking chest wound made for a battering combination. Fluttering between consciousness and unconsciousness, he could hear the air hiss through the wound in his chest - constantly feeling winded because of what was sure to be a collapsed lung.
"I owed you one," muttered the bell-like voice above him, stressing syllables in a way a Leaf would not.
Kakashi felt his fingers twitch as he tried to reach for a kunai - reduced to groping for where he had remembered dropping it as his eyesight dimmed to blurred shapes in the wake of extreme Sharingan overuse. The crisp, bitter odour of crushed grass reached his sensitive nostrils - heightened with the deprivation of one other sense - along with the musky sweat and the bitter tang of blood.
A hand touched his face lightly, the silver chime of a female voice sounding again, and Kakashi practically hissed at his own helplessness - teeth gritting behind his mask, tendons on his neck standing in sharp relief, and every muscle tensed in a way that made a spasm of pain wash over his body a moment later. To die lying amongst the fluttering grass of Kusa like a helpless infant wasn't exactly what he had had in mind. A heroic death, maybe. One for the sake of Konoha, definitely. One that involved an avalanche of voluptuous women, in his dreams.
When he managed to open his eyes and make out the blurred image of a heart-shaped face with spectacular spring colouring - vibrant pink hair and green eyes that matched the swaying grass at the edges of his vision. The unmistakeable deadly sheen of a kunai in her delicate hand and the soft chinking noise of her armour moving with her. I owed you one. He wondered who of hers he had killed, but as the darkness began to creep over his sight Kakashi dropped that line of thought.
Mission complete, teammates escaping from the area, and a pink haired valkyrie to see him off.
Maybe not such a bad way to go after all.
...
The blurred shape of a hand poised above his face.
A soft exhalation of anticipation.
In a heartbeat, Kakashi grabbed the hand, dragged himself into a sitting pfosition despite the burning pain in his lungs, and slammed the smaller body down before moving to grab fruitlessly try to find a kunai. It took a second for his eyesight to catch up with his body - vision returning just in time to see an armoured fist making contact with his jaw with enough force to crack the bone.
"I'm healing you, you brain dead Leaf!" snarled the Iwa girl glaring at him from where she was sprawled on the ground.
The feeling of foreign, definitely healing chakra in the vicinity of his torso confirmed her statement enough for him to let go of her delicate wrist. She massaged it lightly - still staring at him intently with the greenest eyes he had ever seen. Her furious expression was one of the most downright attractive things he had seen in a while.
"Hmm, there are no injuries on my face that I knew of," Kakashi said, mildly, knowing that she wouldn't be able to identify his teasing expression.
Just as she had predicted, she blushed a deep scarlet that matched her armoured dress, before looking away hautily,"I thought that mask might be restricting your breathing."
"Sure, Iwa-chan."
She looked at him strangely when he said that - all signs of anger evaporated like a puddle of water on a hot day. The change was so instantaneous he was almost surprised. For a shinobi, it was far too easy to read her emotions. She shook her head slightly before speaking in that voice that he didn't think he would ever forget - like light and sweet like wind chimes in a summer breeze.
"You probably don't even remember me," she said, a wry smirk forming," but I remember you – mostly because of this hair."
Putting her hand in the thick silver locks, she tugged gently. Some part of him, the shinobi part, raised its hackles at her touch – expecting attack, but she had been the one to save him, and it wasn't like he had the bodily strength or chakra at the moment to fend her off. He knew she was leaving out his reputation, the fact that he was probably plastered all over the Iwa most wanted section, but didn't call her bluff. She was probably ignoring that fact to lessen the guilt of helping an enemy.
"Hey, be gentle with me, honey," he groaned suggestively, causing her to release him as though she had been burned.
She grumbled what was probably a scandalous curse in one of the languages still indigenous to isolated areas of Iwa before adding, purely for his benefit it would seem, "Stupid Leaf."
In the light, with his vision returned to normal - normal enough, anyway - she looked very young. Younger than he might first have guessed. His fingers paused in mid air, hovering just inches above the smooth, lightly tanned skin of her exposed thigh. In his mind, he considered pinching, or squeezing, the soft feminine skin just to get a rise out of his pretty, little saviour. From what he had seen earlier she was quite a sight when angry. It had been some time since he had met a new young woman (or, really, since he had seen any woman other than that viper Anko - he wasn't foolish enough to get entangled with that one for more than a night). But, one look at her sweet, devastatingly young face and he was miraculously thinking again.
"How old are you?"
She almost seemed surprised, petal coloured eyebrow raising in a way that was both quizzical and challenging, "Fifteen, does that matter?" The tone of her voice suggested that the consequences would be severe if he said it did.
"Just curious," he muttered, smiling cheekily up at her and retracting his hand as silently as he had moved it there.
Her delicate facial features and colouring was familiar to him, but for the life of him he could not place her. Surely remembering such a pretty girl with such strange hair would be not great challenge, but his mind chose that moment to fail him. She was rustling through her bags and setting out a series of pots that presumably held ointments. Adrenalin gone now that the 'threat' had been nullified Kakashi began to feel a burning ache across his torso and up his throat.
When he moved he felt the resistance of a sticky medical plaster that she had obviously put on him as a temporary battlefield solution to his sucking chest would. It meant that the puncture in his lungs was somewhat sealed, for the time being, and his lungs could fill to at least half of their capacity. She gestured for him to lie back with a single, dismissive hand gesture. Her dainty little fingernails were painted a fetching shade of apple green that reminded him of the ripe, fruit filled orchards on the West side of Konoha in late summer. It had been seven months since he had been back there for more than a week and the low, sloping trees would be heavy with fruit by now.
"Odd choice of colour for an Iwa girl." He said, gesturing to her hand, she flinched ever so slightly - almost imperceptibly, before he added, "but I like it."
"Well," she said, smiling, her sudden amusement like a beam of warm, golden sunlight, "at least somebody does."
Then, the shutters came down behind her previously sparkling eyes and he was met with cool, medic mode -"Since you're awake... Shirt off, please."
It took more effort than Kakashi would ever let on to pull his shirt over his head in an effortless manner and lie back with his legs parted and bent in a way that could almost, almost be constituted as a welcoming gesture. Though she was probably too young to get that, he still noted the faint rose blush that spread across her cheeks when she looked up at him.
Very defined. Sakura tried not to stare at the curling tattoo on his bicep that she knew was a mark of ANBU, or at his sleek, muscular chest - marred only by the odd streak of scar tissue, a few bruises and her bandaging. He flexed suddenly and to her utter mortification she realised she had both blushed furiously and flinched back - like some kind of skittish schoolgirl. Letting him bleed out instantly became a more appealing option than using up most of her left-over chakra reserves to patch him up.
"Stop that," she hissed, when he did it again as she hovered her small hands over his wound, preparing to rip the bandage on.
Her only reply was an eye-crinkle that she assumed meant he was smiling at her. Somehow he managed to look supremely smug with about only a fifth of his face visible. "You obviously liked it."
Sadistically, she took a certain amount of pleasure in the muscle that jumped in his jaw when she ripped the bandage from his skin with a satisfying noise. She quickly smeared some of the special healing paste she had for such an occasion and, with a little bit of difficulty - like persuading a slightly rusty piece of machinery to start - her hands began to glow with the pale green of healing chakra. Tatsuo used to always complained about the colour whenever she had to heal him - couldn't you do Iwa red, bitch?
Secretly, she quite liked the colour green. Glancing down at her pale hands on his torso, with their painstakingly painted fingernails, she frowned slightly - or maybe not so secretly. She moved her hands carefully over his skin - only brushing against it feather-light. This took all of her concentration, but after a few minutes of feeling sweat trickling down the line of her spine he was healed enough for her to sit back on her heels and breathe a sigh of relief.
"Mm, done, I think. How does it feel?" She tried not to let the nerves show in her voice. She had never healed anyone outside of her team before.
"Feels as good as new to me," he said, nonchalantly," you're not a half bad medic."
For an Iwa - was left unspoken between them. They were renowned as fighters that did not back down, and had a bit of an infamous reputation for having the worst, most underfunded, medical facilities in all of the major countries.
"I'm not as good as I'd like to be," she said, before grudgingly adding, "there's not much in the way of medical training, or facilities, in Iwa."
"Aa, I know," he closed his one visible eye.
"I'd like to check your breathing and heart rate," she said, smoothing down the scales that made up her armour. It wouldn't do to be anything less than thorough.
He only nodded - cool and irritatingly collected as possible. Sakura held her breath so long that she was sure she was turning purple when she finally brought herself to shuffle over and lay her head against his chest - half of her face pressed against the wall of muscle and smooth skin that masqueraded as his chest. She was forced to close her eyes when her line of sight lead directly to a pale trail of silver hair leading beneath the waistband of his trousers that almost made her start hyperventilating.
She must have lingered a little too long because suddenly he was speaking, the rumble from his chest tickling her skin," When a person is alive their heart usually beats."
"Thanks for the life-lesson, Kakashi-sensei," she spat, jerking back, "And you seem fine."
The long, hard, predatory look he sent her when she attached the honorific to his name made a completely and totally unrelated shiver crawl down her spine and settle in scalding fingers of warmth in her stomach.
It wasn't until later that she understood. When he had drifted into a restless sleep beside the fire she had set up and she was left to keep watch Sakura noticed a vivid, orange book poking out of his pouch. Curiosity got the better of her so she crept over and slid the book out, while trying to touch it as little as possible in case he could smell her scent on it later. Glancing at the cover, she frowned slightly.
Icha Icha Sensei?
This must be a Leaf thing - she had never heard of it. Gingerly, she held the corners of the book and flipped it open to a random page. One that so happened to have the most vivid picture of two people entwined she had ever seen, plus a beyond lewd
description. Sakura blushed so hard she was quite sure that her organs would have shrivelled up from the lack of blood flow getting to them.
She half-flung the book into his pouch as though it had mortally offended her (And, really, it had) before shuffling over to the complete opposite side of cave as quickly as was humanly possible.
So, her saviour that she had near idolised for years turned out to be a very perverted old man... who happened to be attractive. That thought made her splutter as soon as it reared its head.
Obviously he was rubbing off on her.
...
Hours later, they were still in the cave and night had fallen. The rivers of Kusa in this area would have swollen to a treacherous size by now - the marshes becoming deadly for all but the most familiar - meaning that it was safe for them both to sleep as no one in their right mind would be moving about anymore.
Glancing at the stone ground, with its very light covering of loose dirt and small stones, Sakura felt her shoulders sag slightly. Though, it wasn't like she had done this plenty of times before. Her thoughts turned wistfully back to her full, cushy bedroll, and then to the image of it lying in a puddle of mud slashed beyond repair where she had left it a few days ago. She crouched down to brush away some of the debris from where she would be sleeping - back to the fire, and - the newly anointed pervert - Kakashi.
She glanced over her shoulder to see him propped up against the opposite wall with his eye closed, but a deep, innate, woman's awareness told her he had been staring intently at her rear seconds before. Huffing slightly, annoyed but secretly a little pleased, Sakura lowered herself onto the ground and curled up. Almost instantly the chill of the ground crept through to her skin, despite the heat of the fire behind her, something was digging into her head and thigh, and every ridge of her armoured tunic was pressing uncomfortably into her side.
"Are you planning to sleep like that?" Kakashi said, from the other side of the cave.
Sakura made a - distinctly irritated - affirmative and mentally dared him to make a lewd comment. He said nothing, much to her surprise.
It was probably a combination of bone-weariness, an uncomfortable position and a lack of chakra from the earlier healing that made one of her usual recurring nightmares flare up like an old injury. It wasn't so much a nightmare as it was a memory, but it held the qualities of both. Later, she would be glad that she didn't scream, or cry out in the night. Or, if she did... Sakura was grateful that the silver-haired nin didn't mention it.
Closing her eyes, she slid unwillingly into the womb-like blackness of slumber before that old dream started up again. His voice always came before any sight.
...
"Dirty Kusa - who needs 'em anyway."
The heavily accented male voice could barely be heard before the wind snatched it away. High on a mountain ledge, concealed with genjutsu, two young shinobi sat sill - stiff and bored on their sentry duty. The young man was smoking - nonchalantly ignoring the clouds that billowed back in his face faster than he could exhale him. Had it not been for the genjutsu, the pink-haired girl would have been seen for miles around with the beacon that was her hair.
"Hmm, I don't know, Tatsuo-kun... Maybe because of the prime tactical location and rich natural resources," she said, shuffling closer to him discreetly to be heard better, "besides this part hasn't defected yet."
"They're all filthy, Sakura, and you know it."
"Even Kazu?" she said, quietly, in the deadly sweet voice that had become a prelude to violence of late.
He just snorted and took another drag on his cigarette. She knew that meant Tatsuo missed their teammate more than he would ever let on. It wasn't like it mattered anyway. Sakura turned to watch the teams of Leaf arriving to fortify their newly won area of land just over the river. They were just dots on the horizon - shadowed by trees, and as insignificant as ants in comparison to the landscape and from the perspective she was at. Drawing up her knees against the chill wind, she looked at him.
"Don't do anything stupid," Sakura muttered, into her knees.
"Don't get your panties in a twist," he replied, flicking the cigarette over the edge where it tumbled down out of sight, "I won't."
Sakura would later look back on that statement with a scalding mixture of regret and scorn.
...
Tatsuo looked frantic - waving his arms, lit torch bobbing with the movements and leaving coloured streaks flickering across her eyes. The darkness was not enough to conceal the look of fury and defiance on his fire-lit features.
"We can't give up this ground!" he bellowed.
Sakura put one hand on her hip and waved her own fiery torch at him.
"Come on! This area ...has defected to Konoha, and we have to leave it! It isn't safe anymore, and we have orders!" she hissed.
"I'll die for this, Sakura!" - he pointed to the Iwa sign on his headband.
"This isn't Iwa, you idiot!" she spat back.
His eyes reflected the fire he held in his hands, but it was just that - a reflection - but despite his outburst none of the flames of fanaticism burned in those dark orbs anymore. Sakura felt a chill, a warning bell deeper than the five senses ringing in her head. He looked up at her and his eyes held her whole.
"If we burn the village Konoha will have nothing to use. There are no resources around here! If they stay they would die!"
Despite the heat of the torch in her hand, Sakura felt chilled to her very bone marrow. "But, the people...
"It's a sacrifice worthy of Iwa," he replied, mind obviously made up.
Sakura had never been one to let the civilian cost of the war lie easily on her conscience. Tired, beaten, angry, and going into the black tunnel of battle-fatigue - the pure primal instinct to protect her people won over the logical one that said she should remain with the person that was all that was left of her team. She killed him when he set one of the little houses alight later in the night - the screams of one of the children inside driving her to wrap her hands around his windpipe and squeeze until her hands locked in that position even after she had let him go.
His bulging eyes with their burst blood vessels - like tiny red streams seen from high above - and the almost comical size of them as they swelled out of his eye sockets like overinflated balloons were a regular feature of her nightmares. That, and the wet, rasping wheeze of his last breath.
A worthy sacrifice? - she didn't know.
...
When she woke up in the morning, Sakura knew without looking that she had bruises on the side of her knee, her hip and her shoulder from the hard ground beneath her. She was still sweating from the aftermath of the dream and spent the next few moments with her eyes tightly squeezed shut, breathing heavily through her nose. The next thing she noticed when she managed to loosen the coil of dread and tension in her muscles was the warm, weight that was draped over her torso, and the lumpy, soft object that was now cushioning her head from the floor. Groggily, she opened her eyes to see the muted green of the Konoha flak jacket that was now providing some measure of warmth.
Propping herself up, she looked down at the bandages, that were probably used to secure his shurikan holder, rolled into a loose ball that had supported her head. Frowning down at it, she looked back over at the supposedly recovering man lying not that far from her. Some part of her was pleased, flattered, by his display of thoughtfulness, but in the other very loud warning bells that reminded her of the ones that sounded in Iwa every time a fire broke out were sounding.
Sakura folded his things up neatly beside him and went out to find fresh water with her mind still buzzing. The only conclusion she could come to was that it would not do to let her guard down like that again.
He was, after all, a Leaf. An enemy. And it shook her to the core - sending tiny, rippling tremors, like the aftershocks of a vicious earthquake, throughout her mind - that she had to remind herself of that fact.
When she returned he was still asleep - only lightly - despite recovering from serious chakra depletion, a bad wound and exhaustion she was fairly sure he would be up like a shot the moment she made any unnecessary noise. Her debt, the one that had lain in her back mind surfacing from time to time like a buoy bobbing up and down on a turbulent ocean, was finally repaid.
Walking out into the fresh, still dark, morning, Sakura tried to reassure herself that she didn't feel slightly upset about the fact that she would never see him again.
Or so she thought.
Second chapter! Man, I really need to sleep now. So. very. tired.
Thanks of reading,
Silver ~