A/N: Um, sorry! I'll be trying to update faster, but with the way the site is changing...that might be a little hard. I still hope you enjoy the read though!

Send Me An Angel

Chapter 3: Moving

Sakura raced down the streets of Konoha even faster than the Anbu Captain escorting her. Her nerves were getting fried off one by one as her heart pounded against her chest. This couldn't be happening. And if it this wasn't a prank to drive her crazy, then how did it happen so fast? It was unimaginable and so chilling.

She expertly adjusted her feet to push her to the side, following that sharp turn, and the poor ant that happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. She was a woman on a mission. The dreadful sight she knew was coming only made things that much more real.

Someone was in trouble.

Someone was hurt, and Tsunade couldn't handle it by herself. This almost never happened, and it struck fear in her that she might not be able to help at all. That Kakashi might die. Why did he always have to get himself hurt? He was far too stubborn for his own good, and it drove her crazy with worry. He would come back half dead and losing life, but it had never been this bad. It was so frightening.

He was a tool of Konoha first and for most, a scrape or two wouldn't slow him down.

That's what he would say but a whole straight through his gut was not a scrape. And to make it worse this Anbu couldn't give her all the details she needed. How far was his healing process done? What organs had been destroyed? What method was Tsunade using to fix it, because she just knew Tsunade was fixing it?

That was the bad part about Anbu. Sure, they were powerful and elite but most of them would be at a complete loss in explaining an advanced medical technique, advance meaning those that only extremely skilled medics even know of.

The door was rather lucky it wasn't busted off its hinges when she ran through the entrance at top speed. Not many people were there, thankfully, so she grabbed the clipboard from the kind faced nurse trying to talk to her and flipped through it, reading what was necessary and important. She found the room number quickly and darted for the stairs.

She felt her anxiety rising as she watched with raw frustration the blood stains across the walls become ever more visible. It turned into a puddle in front of Tsunade's hospital office, but it stopped there, along with her heart. Sakura jerked her head back to the other side of the hall; they had used the closest operation room. Sakura could only guess that Kakashi had dragged himself to Tsunade to report the mission a success.

As soon as he was healed she was going to personally beat the living hell out of him. What nerve, doesn't he have the slightest idea that he could die? Kakashi had never cared much about whether or not he lived as long as he did what he was aiming for, but this was ridiculous.

Sakura shoved the door open, taking one last glance at the files neatly held in place by the clip before pushing herself into the room.

She saw Tsunade leaning over a bloodied body. Her breath was labored and Sakura could clearly make out the perspiration across her face. Her hands were covered in a brilliant green glow and her eyes were set in a fixed glare of determination. Sakura could make out the harsh curses being muttered under her teacher's breath. Her eyes went further down, to the unmistakable form lying on the bed.

It was Kakashi.

Kakashi's light silver hair was matted down in dark blood. He was dressed in his Anbu uniform. His sword was laying half way across the floor, but the rest of his outfit was still in perfect order, save for his vest and his shirt.

They lay ripped opened as Tsunade pushed harder in her struggle to mold his flesh back into their rightful positions. She had stopped the bleeding and was recreating the organs that had been lost, that was the most difficult thing to accomplish. The recreation of a vital organ required perfect chakra control and no distractions. Losing someone you cared about when they sat at your finger tips was one hell of a distraction.

Sakura continued to walk forward with shaky steps, finally taking notice of Shizune who was dealing with the more minor wounds. At the moment she was busy mending a broken bone in Kakashi's left leg.

"What happened?" Sakura asked, though her voice was quivering.

Tsunade's eyes snapped up for a fraction of a second before immediately rushing back down. Sakura could see the sweat coming off of her face in large drops. She could also see that Tsunade's hands looked burnt, probably from over use of chakra. It might as well have been peeling her flesh off with the intensity she was forcing.

"The mission," answered her mentor shortly. "He was attacked. Akatsuki." She must've felt that she didn't need to say any more. Sakura realized that she would have to get the details later, but right now all thoughts of beating Kakashi for this had flown out the window.

"Sakura get over here," Tsunade demanded as she visibly stumbled. "I'll try to finish what I can."

Sakura drew chakra to her hands and rushed in, trying to save the life of the man who had saved her countless times. Kakashi couldn't die, he couldn't. He was Kakashi. He was the Copy nin. He was invincible and strong, so strong, so fierce. He can't die!

Sakura increased the chakra she was using with an unconscious thrust. It wasn't going to happen like this, it wasn't going to end this way. Not now, she prayed, not now.

She saw Tsunade's body slouch more than what could be considered usual. Her master went limp and slid to the floor before she had the chance to cry out.

Shizune was there in a moment, catching the woman who had played as a mother to both of them. Her dark eyes flew up in a whirl of hurry. Everything was happening so fast.

"I'll take care of her, you keep going on him. I promise I'll be right back," Shizune said quickly as she pulled herself to her feet, supporting Tsunade's weight as well. "Don't stop," she warned running out of the room just as fast as Sakura had run in.

Sakura didn't say anything but went back to her current work. She was alone now, her and Kakashi. He was dying and she was the only thing preventing it.

The adrenaline and fear pushed her on. Her focus and strength meant nothing if she couldn't save him, the one person who still stood tall in her broken world.

She finished what she was working on quickly, rushing in to see what was next. She noticed that he had started bleeding again, without Tsunade's chakra to hold the blood in. Sakura could see, without anything there to cloud her vision, just how easily Kakashi could die.

She changed the course of her chakra rapidly, with a desperation that fueled a desire to save him even more. She took over the work Tsunade hadn't been able to complete and switched to her more formal medic ninja mode, but not still not being able to get rid of that fear that prickled down her spine.

Another medic came running in. Sakura risked a glance and saw that it was Ino, worry deep in her eyes. She must have seen Tsunade, but an open hole in Kakashi might have had some credit to take in that expression.

Her blond friend rushed over and began flexing her chakra to match Sakura's speed. There was still a lot of work to do, but hopefully between the two of them they would have enough energy to do it.

--

Sakura's gaze drifted lazily over to Ino as she watched yet another healer fall to the ground from exhaustion. How long had Tsunade gone? How long had she healed him?

Sakura dared not think of these questions because to do so would be to take a portion of her concentration away and to give way to the icy death that clutched Kakashi's soul so fiercely.

Sakura's head began to sag, her chakra waning and her legs nearly buckling. She shook her head, trying to gain back the energy she had lost, but it only made her dizzy. If she quit now Kakashi would die and then everything that they had done would mean nothing. It wouldn't just seem like it meant nothing, like how she had felt in that crowded street.

She began to close the gap, his skin finally stretching back together. She could faintly hear a yelling somewhere outside. It sounded an awful lot like Naruto, another teammate she had to protect with an unmatchable passion.

She dragged her hands up Kakashi's chest, though her arms felt as though they would fall off, closing the rest of his incredible wound. Her legs gave out from under her and she fell to her knees, her head still above the side of the bed and her hand still glowing as her droopy eyes examined the flesh she had just finished healing.

One week back from her first Jounin mission and her first Jounin teacher nearly gets killed on an entirely Jounin assignment. Jounin life pretty much sucked.

Her hand fell to her side satisfied with its work. There was no indication that Kakashi had ever been hurt, not even a scar. Her eyes trailed up his body to his face. It was dirty and peaceful, still covered by a thin strip of cloth that Fate had decided to call a mask.

"Bastard," she sighed more in content than in anger as her final threads of consciousness left her and she dropped down to the cool tiles of the floor.

Even after all that she still hadn't seen his face.

--

Sakura sat up with a jolt, a cold sweat running down the sides of her faces and her eyes wide in fear. She could feel her body shaking and she knew that she couldn't stop it immediately. She would have to wait for it to fade. It happened every time she had a nightmare and it never failed to shake her to her core when that nightmare involved her loved ones dying.

And this time she didn't have Kakashi's shirt to keep the bad dreams away, like she had been doing for the past few nights, to keep from hearing the screams of those men in that field as she helped slaughter them.

"Sakura are you alright?" asked a concerned voice somewhere in the room. Sakura looked up to see that she was in the hospital, in a bed with thin white sheets covering her. The voice had come from her favorite blond hyperactive Hokage-to-be.

She held her head with both hands. "Yeah, just a little shook up."

She realized he was sitting in a chair at the end of another bed. A quick flicker of her tired eyes to the top of that bed revealed its occupant to be her team leader and former teacher, Hatake Kakashi, mask still in place.

"Well that's understandable," he said with a light tone of relief. "After everything that happened it'd be weird if you weren't."

She bent her head back, trying to control the shaking that was steadily decreasing. "At least he's all right."

Naruto was silent, causing her to look back up in curiosity. His eyes were dark and worried, troubled in a way that was almost as bad as their first massacre a few days ago.

"He is all right isn't he?"

Naruto shook his head, "I don't know. I tried asking around and everybody said he was ok for now, but after Granny Tsunade woke back up she came to check on him."

"And?"

Naruto's shoulders slumped and Sakura noticed just how much her teammate had grown, his defined muscles straining under his orange jacket.

"I don't really understand it," he admitted quietly. "They said something about chakra and life force, and then something about his wound and body. I couldn't really get all of it, even if I hadn't been running in circles when they told me."

Sakura held one hand in the other, looking down at her wrist as the last of her shaking subsided. That dream had forced her to endure the possibility of losing Kakashi, and now she was faced with that possibility again.

"Something about chakra…?" slipped out of her mouth as she barely moved her lips to the words, her eyes staying focused on the lines of her hand.

He nodded, though he doubted she saw it. "Something about the sharingan too. I think they said that the sharingan was eating his chakra."

Her eyes snapped up, "But it's always eating his chakra right?"

He nodded again.

"So then why…?"

"I don't know Sakura," he admitted again. His lack of knowledge was frustrating her, she couldn't deal with this.

"Where's Tsunade-sama?"

He looked surprised. "Resting, duh. But I think she's working something out, she ran back into her office so fast I couldn't really ask her. Shizune was the one who tried explaining everything to me."

She looked back to Kakashi and took a feeling of utter relief at the steady rise and fall of his chest. He was breathing. He was hooked up to wires and cables and monitors, but he was breathing. He was alive and that's all she needed right now.

A sudden thought occurred to her.

"Naruto what time is it?"

He raised his eyebrows in question but glanced at the clock hung across the wall behind her. "Uh, 9:47, why?"

"It's still early," she noted. "Why are you here?"

She saw the dawning realization in his eyes and listened to his answer intently. "I was hunting down Granny Tsunade to see when our next mission was, but then I found out that she was completely out of it and you were healing Kakashi-sensei, who happened to be seriously hurt. I really didn't expect any of it so I guess you heard my reaction."

"Yes I did," she answered remembering that background voice just before she passed out. "I thought that was you."

He scratched the back of his head in a way that reminded her so much of the man lying in the bed next to her and in front of him. "Yeah well it's not every morning something like this happens."

"Thank goodness not," she sighed. "So when is he going to wake up?"

"No one told me. I guess he'll just come around eventually, he always does."

"Right." She laid back down letting the comfort of that fact consume her. He always came back, he always got better, and he never stayed down. That's just who he was.

"Hey Naruto?"

"Yeah?"

"Could you go get Shizune?"

If he had any surprise he didn't let it into his voice. "Sure."

And with that Sakura heard a soft click as the door shut behind him.

--

"Oh Sakura you're awake," was Shizune's greeting. She always had a was of speaking like she was talking to a queen and it was so different than anything Sakura was used to that the pink haired medic took it as a sign of unique individuality.

"Yes, could you tell me what's going on? Naruto wasn't much help." She sat up with a smile, it was always easy to talk to Shizune about business, or problems, or just girl talk.

"Er, right," Shizune sat down to gather her bearings before continuing. "Well you see we came to a minor…problem, or more like obstacle, in Kakashi-san's recuperation."

"What kind of problem?" Sakura asked with narrowed eyes.

"To be honest it's not clear if he'll even make it far enough to get to the recovery schedule."

"Why not?" Sakura was aware of the harshness of her voice but she didn't care. Kakashi was still in trouble, even after all that, and she refused to stop until he was safe.

"Sakura," Shizune spoke softly, "his sharingan is eating what little chakra he has left. At this rate he won't have enough to make it."

"So you're telling me that he doesn't have enough chakra to live and his sharingan is eating all that's still there?"

"In a way, yes."

"Then transfer him chakra!" She slammed her hands into the mattress, careful not to use any of her enhanced strength.

Shizune almost looked defeated. "That's the problem, we can't."

"Why not?!" Sakura's anger was rising as her fear gripped her heart. No chakra meant no life, no life meant death, and death meant no Kakashi. No teacher and no guidance, no idiotic excuses and super cool jutsu, she could feel the tears stinging her eyes at the thought.

Shizune's dark eyes were impossibly tender. "His chakra is what you might call…special. There's nothing we can do to recreate it perfectly, but you can trust that Tsunade-sama is working her subordinates to death to find a way."

Sakura felt her shaking slowly clawing its way back into reality. "What do you mean by special chakra?"

Shizune's gaze held her own, "White chakra Sakura, it's the Hatake bloodline, and unfortunately there aren't any other Hatake. Maybe if Sasuke was still here he could turn off the sharingan, but we shouldn't deal with 'ifs' right now. It's best to think of what's true and what's real, and not mislead ourselves with idle hopes."

Shizune's way of comfort wasn't exactly the kind that Sakura craved. At times like this very few people knew how to make her feel better. Some of them didn't really know how but could naturally do it, like Kakashi. He comforted her when Sasuke and Naruto had fought on that hospital roof all those years ago, and at that time she knew that no one else would have been able to. She craved Kakashi's hand ruffling her hair and his smile reassuring her that everything was going to be alright.

"What…How…What's the idea?" She knew Shizune would understand her way of short speak at least, if nothing else.

"Well the concept is that if we concentrate enough chakra then we'll be able to recreate something close to the Hatake chakra, but all the trials have failed. It turns out that it takes more than intellect to make something that comes from something so…different."

"Did you just call him a 'something'?"

Even Naruto was surprised by the pure growl that was her voice. She didn't like yelling at Shizune, but growling felt even worse right now. Even so, she would stop at no lengths to protect him, be his name or his life.

"Of course not Sakura, I was talking about his chakra source. It uses something in his blood, which is extremely rare," Shizune hurried to explain. "It's like blood chakra and I'm afraid we don't have the genes that fit."

Sakura looked at Shizune like she was an idiot.

"Then use his blood to help make extra chakra."

Shizune sigh as she stood up, straightening her clothes. "Sakura you know we can't do that. He's already lost too much blood. And even if we did, we would have no idea how to make it."

Sakura watched her back as Shizune walked to the door, opening it in a quick motion before turning back around with a worried yet somehow frustrated look. "If it makes you feel any better, Lady Tsunade has already sent out Anbu troops to get Asuma and Genma. If anyone knows how to fix this then I bet it's them."

For the second time since she woke up Sakura heard the click of the door shutting as someone left, and her shaking returned at the end of the sound. She brought her knees up and buried her head in them as a sob racked her body. She felt so weak, so vulnerable.

She was going to lose him. That feeling had already settled in her gut and only him waking and telling her that he was ok, he was going to live, would calm that storm that was pushing over the edge at this moment.

Naruto came to sit on the side of her bed, wrapping his arms around her. She knew his eyes were on Kakashi, she knew he was holding back his own pain so he could be there for her in her misery, but she forced silence of herself even as the tears continued falling. She would not cry out and she would not scream. She would pray, and at least try to do something that made this a little easier for Naruto, no matter how small that act may be.

"Sakura," Naruto's voice was barely a whisper, "he's gonna be all right. We know that. He won't die."

She shook her head, no reasoning of why her body chose that motion, to give some sort of reaction. He was forcibly loosening his muscles, though it was clear his body wanted to be tense in his always futile attempt to retrain his emotions.

A smile graced his lips, "He's too stubborn to die, remember?"

She turned her head towards the immobile figure on the bed next to them, to the man who was causing them this pain, and nodded slowly, pushing down the knot in her throat to steady her voice. "Yeah you're right," she answered though her words were shaky and weak.

"Now get some sleep," he concluded releasing her. "You need it. I'll wake you up as soon as they get here."

'They' meant Asuma and Genma, and that just reinforced the honest desperation that her village's leader was taking to save Kakashi. It wasn't often that Tsunade was met with a dead end, and it was even less often that she called on a person's old friends to come help out when they hardly knew anything about medical treatment.

"I won't be able to sleep Naruto, not now."

"Please try."

She looked back up to him with glistening eyes, the green beauty of them magnified by the shine, and smiled slightly with a sadness that shone through. "I'll stay up until they get here. I can't sleep until I know he's ok."

Naruto leaned back, still sitting on the side of the bed, "Alright then, at least lay down."

She sighed but complied as he stood up and walked silently back to the chair he had been sitting in not too long ago.

She felt exhausted. She must have put more into healing Kakashi than she had originally thought, the fatigue was still there. She pulled the sheets around her, wishing that they were Kakashi's shirt, and closed her eyes.

--

The rush of voices and loud running woke her and her eyes snapped open to see Naruto jumping out of his seat in natural response as two Jounin, Shizune and Tsunade filed into the room with a haste that hadn't yet registered in Sakura's foggy mind.

Things began to fall into place as she sat up and noticed that the two Jounin were Genma and Asuma. They had finally arrived, but the expressions on their faces frightened her. The worry and doubt they felt was clearly written, and it froze her in place.

"What's going on?" she choked out.

Quick glances were given to her but no one answered, instead continuing what they had been doing before.

"You damn idiot," Genma cursed, staring at Kakashi with the worried look of a brother or best friend. "What did you do this time?"

"Akatsuki attacked him," she heard Tsunade explain, obviously rested and using more words than she had when Sakura had first arrived. "They didn't kill him, but they came close."

Asuma looked like he did before he went into a fight, fierce and ready, a far cry from his usual stance. He wasn't slouching and he wasn't smoking, things seemed so odd. "What do you need?" he asked. Apparently they hadn't gone over much before rushing in here.

"Chakra," Tsunade answered. "That Hatake chakra is causing some trouble. Do either of you know any way to transfer any?"

Genma shook his head, "It has to already be created."

"We know that," Tsunade glared, "that's the problem."

Sakura felt her chest tighten and suddenly it was hard to breathe. She knew that was a big reason as to why Kakashi was still in danger, but she didn't want to hear it again. With everything going downhill Sakura could barely think. Kakashi was supposed to think for her anyway, but unfortunately in was lying in a bed only breaths away from death right about now.

Asuma's eyes brightened, "What about a simple transfer?"

"What do you mean?" Tsunade demanded but Sakura could hear the hope in her voice.

"Remember when Kakashi transferred for us a few weeks ago?" he asked turning to Genma. "If there's any left in our system then his body will absorb that, even if it's impure."

Sakura felt some of her panic ebb away so it wasn't quite as sharp, but it still consumed her. How could anyone expect her to be able to lose another teammate? And Kakashi was supposed to be their protector, damn it, he shouldn't be this hurt in the first place.

"You're right," Tsunade said stunned. "Don't waste any time, if there's even the slightest chance then we have to take it now. He's not going to make it if we wait any longer."

"Right," they chorused circling his body, Genma on his left and Asuma on his right.

The chakra that glowed at their hands was blue, but a lighter shade of blue than Sakura normally saw when testing shinobi patients. It poured into Kakashi's body as they pressed their hands to his chest, pushing the energy into his chakra network.

Kakashi stirred and shifted beneath them, his face contorted like he was in pain. He grunted and Sakura's hand came to ball up at her chest, trying to calm her racing heart. She sat up.

"Keep going," Tsunade urged. She was watching the monitors and seemed pleased, but the relief was still held down by the pressure of possible failure. "It's working."

The glowing lessened as both men lost power. Most of that power was being wasted as only a small part was the white energy that his body accepted.

He gasped and arched, he was in pain, agony.

"Hold on buddy," Asuma whispered. "Almost there."

Kakashi's movements became tamer but didn't stop completely. His expression was still the same as before and Sakura looked on with a knot in her throat and hope in her heart.

Everything seemed to stop. Kakashi fell back to the bed, breathing hard and Asuma and Genma stumbled back, their hands limp at their sides like it would take far too much energy to lift them. Tsunade remained at the monitors but didn't move. Shizune and the Jounin didn't move as they awaited the results, as did Sakura and Naruto.

Tsunade released a breath that seemed to carry all the tension in her with it. "He's gonna be okay," she finally said in a light but quiet tone.

The room relaxed and Naruto cheered. Sakura sighed in relief, a gentle smile and teary eyes proving her joy. She jumped out of bed and stood beside his, studying him. His breathing had returned to normal and his face has smoothed out.

"You're okay," she breathed with emotion filling her every word. The pain had dissolved for the time being and she fell into the moment, enjoying the relief and joy that filled her so greatly.

His eyebrows twitched slightly and his eyes fluttered open slowly, both sharingan and other. She stared into them as they crossed the room, thoroughly appreciating the fact that they were open. The crimson eye had never looked so beautiful.

"Hey," he strained, his voice was ruff and groggy. He looked tired, worn out, and oddly happy. "What's…going on?"

Genma shrugged with a grin on his face, "Ah you know, the everyday thing. Just saving your ass all over again."

"That so?" He tried to sit up, but tensed and fell at a sudden pain. He tried again but Sakura gently pushed him back down.

"Rest," she commanded in the perfect fashion of a family member who just so happened to be a nurse. "You're not going anywhere for a while."

"I figured that." His voice sounded like it was returning. It was regaining that smooth but deep texture that Sakura couldn't stop thinking of only a few moments ago. How amazing it felt to know that it wasn't gone, but here with her.

Tsunade walked around to stand at the end of the bed. "You fool, why did you take them on?" She wasn't happy; she made no attempt to hide that. She wanted answers as to why one of her best ninja just barely escaped death because of a fight that shouldn't have happened.

"I didn't have a choice," he explained in the calm tone that he always used, though slightly different, but Sakura couldn't figure out how. "They ambushed me on my way back to the village, I had to fight."

Tsunade bent her head back, her hand on her hip, "Who?" There was no other question to ask in her eyes.

"Kisame and Zetsu I think," he admitted. "It happened so fast. I'm only sure of Kisame, the other one I didn't see very well."

"And?"

"Well, the second one was killed but Kisame got away."

Tsunade groaned at his annoying vagueness, "I'll debrief you later."

"Alright."

Tsunade turned to face everyone else, "Good, now let's clear the room so Kakashi can get some sleep."

As the Jounin and Shizune walked out Tsunade stopped in the doorway at the sound of Kakashi's request, "Wait."

She tilted her head towards him, "What is it?"

Kakashi shut his eyes and Sakura could see dread hidden in his features as she looked at him over Tsunade's shoulder. "They're coming Tsunade. They're going to come after Naruto very soon. I don't think we can stop them right now."

Tsunade looked surprised but steadied her response, "I'll look into it."

"Thanks."

--

"Aw man, Sakura how come we had to leave too?" Naruto complained as they walked down the streets of Konoha, the people already bustling around them.

"Because Kakashi-sensei needs his rest Naruto," she reworded her former response of 'Because we can't.' "How do you think he'll be able to sleep with you in there?"

Naruto didn't let up, "But Sakura…"

"I don't want to hear it," she snapped. "Go get some breakfast and meet me at the training grounds."

Naruto nodded in defeat. He knew the plan, they had already discussed it. Sakura was practically ordering him to do exactly what she told him, no questions asked, no objects, and no complaining. It looks like he's already failed.

She was going home, to rest for a couple of hours he guessed, and he was to go eat and then train until she came to get him. She knew he would have been training anyway. That's why she set the plan the way she did. He had no idea what she was going to do, and he could say in all honesty that he didn't really care.

Watching Naruto run off in the opposite direction of where she was about to go left her with a sense of wholeness that was beginning to be stabbed at by an emptiness so vast that it threatened to take away all the relief and joy her tired soul had managed to conjure up. It seemed unfair, how life could be so cruel. With threat after threat always there to scare her away, ever since the beginning of this week, she was almost ready to give up and do the weak thing.

But she knew that neither Tsunade nor Kakashi would have any of that as she turned to tread softly back to her home. They were both fierce, strong fighters who had been born with a confidence that Sakura hadn't acquired until long after her heart had been broken. Confidence had never been side by side with her, and that fact only gave her another reason to admire her teachers, former and current alike.

She remembered the first time she got to see Kakashi fight against a Jounin opponent. It was scary and left even Sasuke trembling in terror. But she had a different reaction than her love interest had had during that battle. She had felt her first real trimmer of comfort and safety when Kakashi had stepped forward and promised to protect them. It had felt so different than anything else. Sure, her parents had told her the same thing, and Iruka-sensei too, but no one else, at that time mind you, had ever gotten up to prove it.

They had only known him for a month then, but he was more than willing, and that bond only grew over time. Like today, she would gladly put herself in danger to protect him, the same as he would do for her.

She dug out her small golden key and unlocked her door, stepping inside sluggishly. The exhaustion of overusing her chakra was still there, despite the few hours of rest she had gotten.

She shut the door behind her with the heel of her shoe, continuing to walk straight to her room and fall on her bed. She took notice of the sweet aroma that it had. It smelled like she did after she took a shower, but that should make sense. She always took a shower before going to bed.

She rolled over and pulled her fluffy pillow under her head to better her comfort. Staring at her room she realized just how much pink and red was actually present. Her curtains were a light shade of pink, matching her sheets. A pile of spare blankets that were a deep shade of blood red sat next to a valentine's day teddy bear that Naruto had given her last year. He really was sweet, no matter how much of an idiot he was.

She continued to let her eyes roam over her room, lingering on her desk. On the back of the chair sat the one of the only dark colored objects in the room; Kakashi's shirt.

She pushed herself up and grabbed it, falling back down. She held it, turning it and flipping it to observe the fabric more clearly. There were blood stains on the sleeves, as Kakashi had predicted, but the chest of the shirt was the pure color it always was. It had no stains or rips and, more than anything else to her in the room at that moment, was wonderfully perfect.

She pulled it to her chest, hugging it like she would a stuffed animal or pillow. His smell was fading, she noted with disappointment. These past few nights she had kept it close to her when she slept. To anyone else it would sound like nonsense, but somehow it chased away her nightmares; well, most of them.

Her eyelids closed and her mind fogged as sleep once again claimed victory over her consciousness. Naruto could wait until later anyway.

--

"Are you up?"

Kakashi wanted to groan. Tsunade really was as impatient as always. She had only given him a few hours to rest, and she's the one who ordered it, she should know how tired he was. "Yeah, I'm awake."

"Good," he heard her say in her 'always satisfied when she gets her way' voice. If he had been sleeping then she would have woken him up anyway, why not humor her a little?

"I still need to debrief you."

"I know." He finally opened his eyes, not bother to sit up least another wave of dizziness wash over him like before. "Let's get it over with."

"Alright then," she sat down in the chair Naruto had occupied earlier that morning, it seemed to be the only chair anyone took notice of in the room. "The mission itself doesn't matter, even if it had been the only thing that had happened, you wouldn't sit through a report on it."

She watched his eyes his masked face and droopy eyes for any sign of indifference or annoyance; anything that might help her decode him faster. She was met with only the look of acceptance to her statement, he knew it was true.

"So where were you attacked?"

"About three miles outside the gate," he answered quietly, and she was surprised at the dead tone he used. It was like this meant nothing to him. Her face straightened out as she remembered the type of person Kakashi was, completely different from almost everyone else. He shut out emotions to take in information in the most effective of ways. The pain could come later.

"Then explain," she commanded. It shouldn't take more than that to get him talking, especially not about something this important.

He shook his head, but he doubted that she knew what the jester meant. "First Kisame attacked me. He was as loud as he always is. My right arm got injured then, as I'm sure you know since you're the first one who healed me. It dragged on for a bit, the whole time he kept saying that they were going to get Naruto soon, that they were going to destroy us soon."

He smiled sheepishly, "I guess he managed to set a spark in that old temper. For a time, I stopped fighting with my head. I started fighting like he would, just brute. It wasn't a very smart move. Then the other guy, Zetsu, came around and charged too. I couldn't take both of them Tsunade, I could barely handle Kisame."

She nodded. He was as honest as he could be. Frankly she was surprised that he remembered so much, what with all the wounds he had. "So tell me how you got your gut blown out."

His voice went dead again. "That was their last attack. Kisame sent a burst of chakra out of his sword, and his idiot partner got in the way, or at least the way I saw it. I spread the chidori, and changed the direction of the attack and the size. It did more than you think."

"So putting a hole in you wasn't their goal?"

He shook his head, "No, they had been aiming for the village. It was meant to be a warning, to get us scared. They want us to know that they are coming. They want a fight, and trust me, with those guys…they'll have the time of their lives. They want to enjoy this."

His face was blank, devoid of any sign of emotion or even regret, but her face was set in a grave expression.

"So you practically killed yourself so that there wouldn't be a whole in our gate," she said in a whisper. "You really are a moron."

"What else could I have done? Let that blast hit?"

She could hear hidden venom in his voice, an anger that had long been suppressed. It rarely surfaced. She could never forget how glad she was when he had cooled down after those teenage years.

"No," his voice was a promise, "never again."

She watched him with tender eyes. She knew what he meant better than anyone else; well anyone else still alive that is. He couldn't lose someone important again; he wouldn't be able to take it.

Last week she would have laughed at his promise, with respect and confidence. She still would have laughed, and now she felt a tinge of pride building in her chest. That little masked kid that used to trick her into buying ice cream everyday had grown up. And he grew up so well, even with all the unfair hardships that life had hit him with.

"No, not ever," she agreed with a gentle smile. "You're too strong for that."

He looked back up at her, surprise written on his face. She knew for a fact that she didn't display affection very often, and she never gave compliments away for free. She could vividly remember Kakashi's grin when he had been but a gennin. A stupid little kid too cute to be a ninja, that cuteness served him well in his young life.

He leaned back and she knew that she couldn't avoid bringing this up any longer. "They weren't lying, Kakashi. Akatsuki have been repeatedly spotted closer and closer to the village."

He almost glared, she knew, but refrained from doing so. He was trying to hold on to the last pieces of self control he had left, but that was weakening. The medicine they had been giving him was for him to relax, release all his pent up stress so that his body could finish healing naturally. Unfortunately that also broke the restraints he spent so many years building.

"What are we going to do?"

She almost flinched at his growl, not a voice and not a tone, but a pure growl. She hated that thing. Sakumo had always used it when he got pissed and Kakashi always used it when he got frustrated and couldn't do anything.

"I'm working that out now Kakashi," she told him calmly. "There are a few plans going up and I'm going to pick the best one. We'll have to work with what we've got."

"And so far?" he dared to ask.

"Do you really want to know?"

He did glare, her innocent tone left something that pressed down on him. "If any of you are thinking about handing Naruto over…"he warned.

She cracked a smile, "I'd let you beat the hell out of those elders if that were the case."

The relief that he felt was unparalleled. "Thanks."

"But that doesn't mean that this isn't bad too ya know."

"Are you going to tell me or not?"

"I'm debating whether I should," she admitted. "But seeing how there's no way around it, and the fact that it directly involves you, I think maybe I should."

He waited, and she was fully aware of the fact that he was holding himself back from ordering her to spit it out. That was another thing about him that she couldn't stand. He had so much authority that he was used to bossing people around, and no one ever objected unless they were a higher rank than him, and even then that was rare.

"The best option right now would be to send you back to your childhood home,*she answered cautiously. "I'm trying to get an alternative."

His glare didn't let up, but his voice lost most of its fire. "No, that's a good plan."

Now she was honestly, beyond a doubt, shocked. "But Kakashi, you hate that place. Are you sure you want to stay there?"

His eyes flickered away from her for a moment, and she could see the doubt. "Tell me how this directly involves me."

"Well," she started but didn't know how to say it. It reminded her of those times when she had to confess something to her parents, but she didn't know how to word it right. In those crucial moments, not really but still, she found that the best way was to just say it, no matter how it sounded.

"The plan is for Naruto, Sakura, and you to go and stay there for a few months under the guise that all of you went on a long term mission. It's supposed to act as a decoy so they believe all of you are running in fear to another country, which is believable, especially after what happened to you."

His voice went even more dead than before. "Do you think it will work?"

"There's a definite possibility."

"Then that's what we'll do."

And it was settled. No matter how much Kakashi was going to hate it, it was settled.

--

Sakura stirred in her sleep, twisting to block out the tapping sound disturbing her. She groaned in annoyance. Forcing her eyes open and jumping up so fast it made her dizzy. She felt stupid when she realized the sound was only someone knocking at the door.

Stretching a little on her way to the door she sighed in a bliss of unawareness. Whatever this was it should have wait until she had about five hours more sleep.

The knocking continued, but with a little more force this time.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm coming," she grumbled as she unlocked the door. Honestly, people these days had no manners. You just don't come knocking on a woman's door like that, it was rude.

"Hurry up Sakura!"

She blinked in surprise. She knew that voice. She knew that voice very well.

"Naruto?" she asked in wonder as she pulled the door open. He stood there grinning down at her, his eyes sparkling. "Weren't you supposed to be training?"

"Yeah but something came up," he answered quickly. He sounded excited and eager and Sakura couldn't dare to think what had happened to make him like that. With Kakashi in the hospital and her worn to the bone she hadn't expected him to be delivering news to her on her welcome mat.

"So what's up?"

His grin seemed to grow in ways she thought impossible. "We're moving!"

"Moving?" she repeated slowly. "Naruto are you sure you didn't hit your head?"

"Yes silly, I'm sure," he answered pulling her in for a hug.

She was definitely surprised but that didn't stop the anger from pouring into her gut. "Naruto..." she warned.

His voice was suddenly serious and deep, "Sakura, we have to leave. We have to get out of the village."

"What?" What was he talking about? Leave the village? She knew that was the last thing Naruto would ever want to do. And what was with him hugging her like this? What was going on?

He sighed into her hair, holding her close. "Listen, an Anbu stopped by during my training. Turns out Tsunade's done with her report from Kakashi-sensei. We'll be leaving tomorrow."

She pulled back, her gaze intense.

"Explain that a little better. Why are we leaving?" Even as she asked the question, she knew the answer. What Kakashi had told Tsunade before they left...it was true.

His bright blue eyes dulled, "The akatsuki want me pretty badly."

"Right," she sighed pulling him by his hand to guide him into apartment. "Those gay freaks really need to get it together. What would they do with a nine tailed rodent anyway?"

Despite her light joking he was still completely serious, and she hated seeing him that way. "I don't think a fox is a rodent Sakura. And they could use it to destroy the village."

She stopped walking to sit down on the couch, dragging him with her.

"Then we'll just have to make sure they don't get it," she smiled.

He grinned back, "Duh."

She was happy he wasn't serious anymore, that mood just didn't sit well with Naruto. And she was also joyful that this whole Kakashi-near-death-experince thing had knocked him out of his depression.

"So where are we moving?" she asked playfully.

He looked confused for a moment, but then his expression changed like a light bulb had lit up. "Kakashi-sensei's going to take us tomorrow."

"But Sensei's hurt Naruto," she pointed out to him. "He's not going anywhere."

Naruto shook his head, "Didn't you listen to anything I said?"

She glared at him, "Of course, but you never said anything about Kakashi-sensei. He's not healthy right now Naruto and Tsunade-shishou would never let him-"

"It's Granny's orders," Naruto cut her off. "She wants us to leave."

She stared at him.

He chuckled, "The Anbu was Shikamaru so he explained it so I would understand."

Well that cleared up a lot. Shikamaru and Naruto were good buddies, even though Naruto was still a little on the slow side. Sakura really hadn't noticed what Naruto meant by that Anbu remark until it came back to her that Shikamaru had been accepted into the interrogation section or whatever just last month.

"So where are we going?" she tried to ask to continue the conversation, even if it was one that she didn't enjoy having.

"Um, some abandoned house outside the village. It shouldn't be too far away. If anything happens to the village then we could get back in time to at least help out a little. All I really know is that Kakashi-sensei knows the place, so it can't be too bad."

She could say with all honesty that she knew exactly why Sasuke had never stopped looking at Naruto like he was an idiot, which he was at this point. She felt her stomach twist uncomfortably as her mind ran through the possibilities of exactly what type of 'not so bad' places Kakashi could be completely at ease in.

She coughed into her hand, "Naruto you do realize that Kakashi-sensei has probably lived in a sewer for months at a time right?"

"Why would you think that?"

"Oh, I dunno, just the fact that he is personally asked for nearly everyday for every mission because of his ability to stomach places like that."

He laughed again, and this time she didn't want to look at him like he was an idiot or a crazy blond, she wanted to smack in the back of his head so that his face would make a nice thudding sound when it hit her wooden floorboard.

"Oh c'mon Sakura, I bet he had fun."

"You need help," she said finally giving in to her earlier impulse to look at him like he was mental. "You need some serious help."

"Well pack up," he cheered patting her knee as he stood. "We are leaving in the morning after all."

"Right," she answered getting up after him.

He turned to face her as he walked outside the door. His eyes were so warm that Sakura just stared at him for a moment. Naruto truly had grown into a handsome young man. His hair was longer and glowed in the sun. His skin was tan and smooth, and his eyes looked like they melted into a pure blue ocean when he looked at her like that.

Then he smiled with the smallest up turn of his lips. He probably thought it would look cool, but Sakura would never admit to how right he was. If only he could see the way Hinata looks at him...

"Four-thirty," he mumbled with a light tone. "Bye Sakura."

"Like I could ever forget," she smiled, even though she knew that training with him for three hours was going to be a major pain, "Good bye Naruto."

--

After her round of training with Naruto she could say with all certainty that she was dead beat exhausted, again. But at least now she could argue her way in to not having to do that again for at least a month, or two. In any case, she was glad she had endured it.

Every time she trained with Naruto she knew for a fact that she became stronger, and that's all that mattered. Her strength. If she wasn't strong enough then those precious to her could be lost. Like earlier today, with Kakashi. Her perseverance won out, and she knew that she would never be able to express the gratitude she felt for it. Some how, some way, fate had smiled on her.

Even after deciding to break her.

She nearly jumped in to the steaming water of her bath. A woman's dream paradise. She was going to relax tonight, because all that stress she had gone through today couldn't be healthy. With low music playing as her background she sighed in satisfaction. Maybe, if the place she was going had a tub and really hot water, she could live through it.

She tilted her head back, listening to the music for one long moment of peace.

What was playing anyway?

"-Baby I want you like the roses want the rain,
You know I need you like the poet needs the pain.
And I would give anything. My love, my life.
If you were in these arms tonight."

It took her a moment to decide that it was a half way decent song, so she leaned back and waited for it to end, like she did any other song that she didn't know or didn't imediately take a liking to.

She sighed, a little annoyed with it. It sounded like something her mom would listen to, and that was insulting. She had picked up most of her parents' taste in music, but she still could understand some of her mother's enjoy from something so...rock. Not that she was classifying this as rock, she was just throwing it in to a catagory of examples. Some of them were just screaming in to the microphone. She would bet that, if forced to listen to it for more than an hour at the very most, her ears would bleed. But then, some of them were lighter and more joyful. Those ones she liked.

"We stared at the sun and we made a promise
A promise this world would never blind us."

Well that was interesting? The thought was only a dull remark somewhere in the back of her mind.

"And these were our words.
Our words were our songs.
Our songs are our prayers.
These prayers keep me strong and I still believe.
If you were in these arms tonight."

All right, so maybe this song wasn't so bad, she decided. It was enough to distract her from most of her problems, even if only for a few more minutes.

Those minutes seemed to go by so fast, and when the song was finished she found that she couldn't listen to the next one. As much as she hated it, she knew she had to get around to thinking about what was going to happen tomorrow eventually.

Ok, so they would be leaving. That sounded all right, in the long run it would probably be for the better. They were leaving so Akatsuki couldn't get to Naruto, that made a lot of sense. They were going to a place that Kakashi knew, that put her on edge. It made her anxious because, not only could Kakashi bare extremely disgusting places, but also because that would mean there was a big chance that she hadn't even known that the place existed, which sounded like a much more likely an outcome than it should.

She took a deep breath to calm herself. Tsunade would never send them to a place that was too bad. And if she did, Sakura gulped, then she would have to be a good girl and endure every woman's personal hell. No bathroom.

Oh boy, wouldn't that suck?

I don't know all that much about medical stuff, or the human body at all really, so Kakashi's injury was hard for me to write about. If you do review, don't be too mean, okay? Oh, and can anyone tell me the names of Kakashi's dogs? That would be really helpful. Thank you, and as always, I hope you enjoyed it.

And I do Not own the song.I just like it. And for those who don't know, it's Bon Jovi's "In These Arms."