I finished this up a little early and decided up update sooner than I normally would! Plus, a bunch of you were angry about the cliff-hanger (which I didn't even consider a cliff-hanger). So, here you go.

Omg 10th chapter. I can't believe it's gone this far and I'm going to finish this fic (in such a short time-record for me. Shows how much I adore KakaSaku, I suppose.) Just a warning: the end is in sight! Not totally soon, but after they return to the village, the ending is acomin'. And stormy weather is ahead.

Thank you so much for everyone who reviewed.

One more thing: SHOUT OUT. OMFJS is the greatest thing I've ever heard (Oh My Effin Jashin-Sama). If I can get those reactions from you with this fic, I'll write a billion. love it.

Chapter 10: Reasons to Flinch

It was the swaying rhythm that persuaded her to keep her eyes shut for a period long after she awoke. It was soothing: the air whipping by her ears and the source of some solid, radiating warmth pressed against her. It wasn't until a sharp pain gradually intercepted the medley of sensations that she roused into real consciousness. It was a very sharp and sore pain springing from between her legs.

Sakura instinctively squeezed her legs tighter, but she was only creating a stronger vice against whatever they wrapped around. It was time to open her eyes and stop ignoring the nightmarish reality she left hours earlier.

"… Kaka… Sensei?"

Sakura slowly opened her eyes to found herself flying through the trees at an an ultimate speed. Her body was wrapped around Kakashi in an inverse piggyback—with one arm draped lazily around his shoulder and the other against her thigh, both of which stretched around his sides. What amazed Sakura was that she could sit in this position comfortably with little support from her own body—Kakashi carried her this way.

An audible "hm" of acknowledgment escaped from the man supporting her like a fragile bundle. He looked down. Some emotion flashed across his eyes but it was too quick for her to discern.

"I'm sorry, Sakura. I needed my hands for a moment."

Kakashi referred to the current, complicated position. Sakura inwardly questioned if she restricted his breathing with how tightly her whole body clasped around him. Really only a thin layer of unknown black cotton separated them—she had no clue when this oversized long-sleeve materialized onto her body. That and her black spandex capris were her only covers. Even her binding was missing, she noted painfully as she felt the front of her body and bare chest press against his with every leap.

It was all setting in.

In one fluid maneuver the jounin managed to shift the girl onto his back, unknowingly make her grimace in discomfort. To Sakura's chagrin, all the aches in her body screamed out, especially the one between her legs. She involuntarily clenched them while on his back, and soon enough the lack of oxygen escaping through Kakashi's suffocating middle prompted him to speak up.

"Are you okay?"

"Ah…"

A sudden dip and dodge—Kakashi changed pace in the speed of Chidori's lightening.

"We're under attack by a follower—but as soon as we make it out of the borders they'll stop pursuing. It was Akito."

"Sensei… did you get it?"

"Yes," the Copy Nin confirmed. Her concerns were tucked away with the scroll inside his pack. In a softer tone he added, "I couldn't have done it without you."

Sakura guessed that they had finally crossed the borders when Kakashi slowed his pace. She felt somewhat powerful, freeloading on the back of one of Konoha's most powerful ninja. A rush of affection swept over the girl when she realized that Kakashi was OK, too.

Drained from fatigue and the brutality of their pace, she could do little more than bury her head in his shoulder. "Can we please take a short break?" she whispered.

"I had every intention once we crossed the border. I will find a safe place."

A safe place was a tiny break in the density of the forest. A road was nowhere in sight from the thick trunks of the trees. Kakashi dropped down from the canopy and carried them to the base of a particular large tree with some arboreal fungus twisting around its body. A faint trickling sound indicated there might be a brook nearby.

Once his feet alighted on the ground, Kakashi lowered into a crouch to allow his subordinate freedom from her sloth-like position. Sakura muttered some form of thanks and braced herself. The ground was a hostile force against her feet. Her legs felt incredibly shaky.

"What happened, Sensei?" Kakashi stood up straight and faced his former students.

"The scroll is recovered. When I infiltrated Zo's stash of stolen objects, I found it easily thanks to Jiro. However I ran into Akito on the way out—probably tipped off by Jiro in the first place. He was more formidable than I thought, which is why it took me so long to get back to you. But I need to know… what happened, Sakura? Are you alright?"

For a long moment she was silent, and Kakashi began to take it as a confirmation of his fears. He cursed himself for his lateness. The same tardiness that he inherited from the death of a loved one almost became the cause for the death of another. It was a trait he had always hated for its content and loved for its origin.

"Thank you, for this…" Sakura murmured, tugging at the humorously oversized shirt. He replied with a short "ah", signifying that that was not the answer to his question, although her nakedness was something he hoped she might explain. He hoped that the trust between them was built up enough as to not cause her any embarrassment as well.

"I don't want to talk about it right now," Sakura said. His brow furrowed and Sakura turned her cheek, searching for a place to sit down. Her first step resembled that of a newborn deer—pain shot up her leg and it wobbled. Her body would not let her forget the trauma it endured such a short time ago. Her unsure, amateur movements didn't go unnoticed by Kakashi.

She fumbled and after a blink of surprise Kakashi was before her, reaching out a hand to steady her shoulder. When the touch connected Sakura blanched and recoiled from the contact.

Her reaction furthered his perplexed concern. "What did he do to you, Sakura?"

"…"

"You can trust me. You know I won't think any less-"

There he went again with his words of condolence, as if she were a petulant and scared child. She slapped away his hand.

"Stop, I'm not a kid!" Venom lined her words, even if her real anger wasn't directed towards him.

"Then debrief me on the situation and your injuries, or I'll do a medical examination myself." Sakura flinched at the threat—how dare he threaten to forcibly examine her body after what she just went through! Who was the real medic here?

After a deep exhale, and she reminded herself that Kakashi was only trying to help. He was worried about her, even if it manifested in harsh words. He was scared and he didn't know what happened to her. After all, she forgot to relieve him of the most potent fear.

"He didn't rape me," she told him evenly. Her gaze fixated on a small tear in his flak jacket. "The drug didn't last nearly as long as if was supposed to. He overcame it and immediately guessed that I was behind the drugging. He didn't expect my affiliation with a Hidden Village, though, and he didn't know I was a kunoichi until it was too late. I guess he didn't think women were capable enough."

After the basics, it became harder to speak.

"He still wanted his way and he tried to have it. There was a minor physical assault and I managed to subdue him… only because he was still sluggish from the drug." For a while, Kakashi let her wash in the silence of his serious doubt.

"Sakura, I found you unclothed and covered in blood with Zo incapacitated on the floor next to you. I heard you screaming from the bottom floor..."

"I got him, didn't I?"

"I saw what you did," he replied darkly.

"Great."

"What else happened?"

"You're asking for a lot!" She glared directly into his eyes. Her anger was not matched—nothing but a rare sort of sadness emanated from his expression. "He undressed me, and I couldn't get away. After he violated me using penetration he shoved my hand in his pants. That's when I was able to inflict chakra-induced damage to his groin area. How's that for a mission report?" There was no humor in his unflinching stare.

"I am truly sorry I was late, Sakura."

In all honesty, even through her misdirected anger, the last thing she wanted to do was make her Sensei feel guilty. He had always been there for her in the past—and with this one exception that still led in a narrow escape, he fully prepared to blame himself. Sakura shrugged and waved a hand in dismissal.

"I don't think he'll be taking any more girls to bed," she said with a wry smirk. Gingerly, she lowered herself to the ground with the air of a stiff piece of cardboard. The tissue near her spine swelled and made fluidity nearly impossible.

"What's wrong there?" Kakashi asked, sidling around her. If Sakura had eyes on the back of her head, she would have stared him down. The Copy nin shifted to his knees and prepared to examine her back, as if he were the medic.

Sakura let him humor her. She would always be the queen of medic skills. "The fracture," she told him. The fracture wasn't the only thing nagging her after this whole ordeal. What agitated her underneath these layers was something psychological; a very persistent curiously that she couldn't rub out of her mind.

The black shirt rose above her waist—and the hands that lifted it were not her own. Sakura jerked, inciting more pain up her sides.

"Sorry. I need to talk a look." Kakashi didn't need the Sharingan to notice the way Sakura reacted to every touch with unpleasant surprise. Her experience with Zo probably lingered in her psyche. Every touch could be his touch.

Her cheeks burned as she clung to the front of the oversized shirt, realizing again that it was Kakashi's. The scent she never knew he had was all over it—a masculine musk. A thumb traced her spine.

"Can I ask you something?" Sakura asked. Although he didn't show it, she knew Kakashi was on guard as if she were about to spring an ANBU pop quiz on last time she posed a similar question, it was a request. A request that would never be spoken of again, he hoped. Nonetheless, he voice was gentle when he granted her permission to ask.

"Why didn't you kiss me?" Her reference to the preparation for the genjutsu was clear.

The thumb hit the fracture. In any usual instance, a chill would rake across her body under that touch. In this instance, the chill was electric. It hurt that electricity might.

"Ah, right there…" she heard him mumble when he placed the spot that caused her so much anguish. "Um, well, it wasn't necessary for the illusion. It's not a very unique sensation." The statement fell on Sakura like a pail of water. After hearing it, she felt damp and miserable.

How could he say her kiss would be just the same as any other? What experience did he have, anyway? Not only did she sddter to think… but she didn't want to know. It grossed her out in a different way. She could hardly believe it, but the thought of some other woman claiming Team 7's precious teacher did not seem compatible with her. If he hardly revealed himself to them, how could he give any part of himself to some other woman?

Sakura refused to believe that the man had a girlfriend, or an ex-girlfriend. Or boyfriend. Sakura refused to believe that the dejected feeling inside her was jealousy. She refused to believe she didn't deserve a kiss after all the other "firsts" she went through that night.

"Oh… Well, I guess they're not so different anyways."

If she kept dropping hints like that, Kakashi was going to feel even worse about that incident which he trusted her to not ever bring up. He had no idea how he would fill out this mission report. Whatever she was thinking… She had to say it, didn't she?

"Will you give me that at least, too?"

The second request was blatant, but not as utterly groundbreaking as the first. She dared to ask him because he dared to deny her the one thing that should have accompanied such a lewd act. After everything, Kakashi owed her that kiss. And she wanted it because he was the one to give it.

Her head tipped forward. She felt a slight touch to the back of her head as Kakashi kissed her there—mask up and lips probably sealed shut. It was such a chaste, guarded sign of forced affection.

Unusual, even for him. But she wasn't satisfied.

"How dare you!" She proclaimed before rounding on the confused man. A blank expression protected him from her emotionally charged rage. "You tell me I'm your equal, but you won't treat me—"

"You're hurt and confused. Just stop," he said shortly.

And he was right. What was she thinking? Demanding a kiss from Kakashi like it was natural and he owed it to her? Sakura felt confused and insatiated. She was sure certain that affections from this man would feel right, but where did she pick up on that feeling in the first place? The pinkette was apologetic, and it showed on her scratched face.

"Kakashi—"

He couldn't let her finish with the un-needed suffix. He pressed a kiss to her mouth in a defying moment. Though the thin layer of a mask was between them, Sakura felt his lips as if the barrier melted. In truth—there was no barrier between them to curb the feeling of mingled shock and warmth that she felt. And he had to be wrong-this didn't feel like any other ordinary kiss. As soon as it began it ended, as if the two accidently bumped heads.

Sakura, wide-eyed, fumbled backwards.

"I'm sorry!" she cried, holding up her hands defensively. "Don't worry! I-It didn't count!" She thrust a finger at his mask.

Kakashi marveled at the convenience of her apology; so the girl thought she was the one who clumsily kissed him? She was that convinced that he Copy Nin would never oblige her request? He wasn't ready to correct that assumption.

"Let's move," said Kakashi simply as he withdrew from the devious game he played with her. It was wrong and he knew it, but he wouldn't think about it right now. With Kakashi's help, Sakura pulled to her feet. Her body, swaying under gravity, needed support. "I'll go easy."

It was too easy to be there when she tripped so that she fell onto his back. It was too easy to lift her off the ground and make a quick departure. It was too easy to push and pull her feelings with a simple stare, and "accidental" kiss.

He decided that desire could no longer, should no longer matter in the equation of their relationship. Because Sakura once told him that he was the only man who never hurt her, and meant it. Kakashi was in no way ready to knock himself out of the category with selfishness. That would be the last incident.

On his back he could sense it; glowing blue chakra that leaked from her fingertips was hardly enough to heal even the scratches that spread across her cheek.

"Save your chakra," her ex-sensei told her. "I'm checking you into the hospital as soon as we get back."

"You need a check-up, too," Sakura replied quietly, knowing that the jounin's distaste for hospitals exceeded hers a thousand fold. He willfully ignored her comment. Sakura groaned. "The fracture in my back…! Sensei—don't be clumsy." She seemed to either forget her discomfort from the situation or was looking for ways to chastise him and displace her annoyance.

"Sorry, Sakura."

Kakashi sighed. One moment she was asking him for a kiss and the next she gave him the Naruto treatment? Well, he deserved it in every way. He needed to be punished, somehow.

Home… Now that we're back home, are things just going to go back to the way there were? Granted, "back to the way things were" would never really happen with so much distance between each member of team 7, but that's not what she meant.

Did retuning within the Leaf's borders mean also the restoration of the borders between herself and Kakashi? So many barriers between them melted over the course of the mission. Sakura would give anything to prevent them from built up again. With Sasuke missing and Naruto gone, no more people close to her heart could be ripped away until she was lost completely.

When did I start getting feelings for…

At Sakura's request, they bypassed the hospital and headed straight for the Hokage's office. Familiar thatched red and brown Konoha rooftops passed below them. Even the clouds slipped behind their speed.

Tsunade didn't need a knock on the door to inform her of the visitors coming in—not when she could feel that inflammatory chakra before it even entered the building.

"Let them in," the blonde women ordered hurriedly. Shizune, sensing the urgency and worry, hastened to open the door of the office. Sure enough, two retuning Leaf nins entered. A tall, lean man with white hair, and a shorter pink haired kunoichi who looped an arm around his shoulder for support.

"Welcome back, you too." Her voice hardly betrayed the great sense of relief she felt when Sakura entered the door in one piece; she didn't want to seemed too attached to her budding prodigy. "I take it the mission was a success."

"In some ways," Kakashi answered stiffly. On Tsunade's cue he produced a small scroll from his pack and handed it off to a masked nin that stood dutifully by her desk. After receiving the scroll, the ANBU poofed into thin air for clearance.

"Well done, you two."

At their appearance, Tsunade raised a thin eyebrow. "Nice wardrobe, Sakura." Sakura's gaze shot down to her borrowed, oversized shirt-dress with renewed embarrassment.

"It's Kakashi-Sensei's," she admitted weakly without explaining much. Tsunade just lifted both her eyebrows. Under the intimidating stare Sakura hooked a finger in the raised collar of the shirt and pulled it down. She was sweating.

"Sakura! What the hell happened?" Even Kakashi glanced at the pinkette after the outburst. It took her a moment to understand what they stared at; her revealed neck was nearly fully purple with dark marks. There was a ring of them around her throat and six more lining the back of her neck. It was a gruesome embellishment to her light skin.

"Um-!" Should she tell them about the strangling now or later, Sakura wondered. If only she had enough chakra to healed them before coming!

"T-Those aren't hickeys, are they?" Tsunade's voice boomed threateningly. For some reason, her eyes were transfixed on Kakashi. The two ninja deadpanned at the determinedly unsubtle insinuation.

Shizune sweat-dropped. Lady Tsunade sure loved making Sakura uncomfortable.

"No, M'Lady, they're not," Sakura said hotly. "They're strangulation marks." A small silence passed between them. Tsunade's stare softened as she looked at her pupil.

"Sakura, go to the hospital. Shizune—escort her. I expect a mission report on my desk by tomorrow. Kakashi, stay."

She noticed the way the Copy nin nodded to his former student, and didn't retract his gaze until she had left the room. Did he feel the same pain as her? It was time to get to the bottom of this.

"Kakashi, what happened at there? I need to know but I don't want to ask Sakura in her current state. Did she… follow through with the mission?" The addressed man shoved his hands in his pockets and answered the question with a tested tone.

"No."

Relief washed over Tsunade's features; Kakashi tried not to think of her as selfish. She assigned her pupil the mission and then claimed relief when Sakura avoided the procedure designated to her? If Kakashi still felt the negative consequences, why did she have the right to avoid them?

As if reading his mind, the Hokage said, "You know I feel as much guilt as you do."

Kakashi doubted it.

"I need you to tell me the truth of the matter so I can make Sakura's taken care of properly." With that order, he could comply.

"I don't know the full extent of it myself. You will have the details in the mission report. But when I found her…" it was a haunting image. "She was unconscious, naked and covered in blood."

Tsunade inhaled sharply and closed her eyes. Instead of consensual, although unwanted, sexual relations, her pupil managed to put up a struggle. It was a struggle she ultimately won as her master had sincerely hoped. She was able to protect her body from the enemy.

"I'm proud of her."

"Me, too."

"And you? Are you alright?" Despite fervent nodding, Tsuande commanded him to go to the hospital anyways. That man would avoid the hospital even if his firstborn baby was about to be birthed (not that Kakashi had that coming in the near future, he hoped). Before he turned to leave, Tsuande issued just one more request.

"Kakashi… Please make sure she's alright. I know this is my doing, but I think she looks up to you, too. She hates me right now, and I'm sorry for it. But please—just once, ask her."

"Yes, Hokage-sama."

A small confirmation let her know Kakashi would do his duty—he was a reliable shinobi. But did Tsuande really have to ask if the jounin would follow up on the health of his student and friend? Such formal requests were unnecessary.

Because no matter how hard he tried to ignore it, all he could think about was the bruising on her neck, the pain in her back, the sound of her voice and the feel of her lips.

Sakura swung her legs impatiently while sitting on the end of the hospital bed. She was the only inhabitant in the room, but within a few minutes she managed to scare the nurse away.

"Now, it says her I should give you a pelvic exam due to the nature of your mission," the nurse had said after studying her clipboard.

"I don't need it," Sakura stated.

"Did you have sexual intercourse?"

"No! Just go away, please, I need rest!" The nurse had frowned when she realized she was faced with a patient in denial and a stubborn medic.

"Please—let me just heal your bruises." She managed that at least that before being booted out of the room. Sakura always preferred to heal herself, and to accomplish that she had to rest enough to replenish her chakra.

When the nurse finally left, Sakura felt more alone than anticipated. She should have let her give her a check-up. She leaned back with two hands planted on the bed and stared miserably into the wall.

When the doorknob turned and emitted a soft click, irritation bubbled in her.

"I thought I said-!"

It wasn't the nurse: A silver haired man slipped through the narrow entrance, wincing at her tone. Her words faltered into dumbfounded silence.

"You were saying?" Abashed she quickly looked away. She was only in a flimsy hospital gown—but the man saw her in less anyways. Much less. Now that they were back home and the bent rules of the mission didn't apply, she felt awkward.

"Not you, Sensei. What are you doing here?" He sighed and walked to her side. First he noticed the bruising on her neck had cleared up nicely. He wondered with real concern whether the rest of her was healed as well.

"Checking up on my favorite student," he told her leniently.

"Funny. I thought I wasn't your student anymore." He smiled at her.

"You still call me "Sensei"," Kakashi pointed out. "I'm glad you're recovering." Sakura heard the sincerity in his voice and fought the sudden urge to close the distance between them. He reached out a hand, and for a second Sakura wasn't sure what he would do with it. She realized he was talking about her neck. His hand gravitated towards it until his fingertips rested on a point below her ear.

She tensed under his touch.

"You wouldn't want Naruto to get the wrong idea," he said softly. Her heart beat accelerated to a rapid pace, and butterflies squirmed inhere stomach. The possibility that Kakashi could feel the way her pulse quickenbeneath his fingers sent her into a panic. If she hadn't sorted out her own feelings and reactions towards the jounin, then she certainly did not want him to acquire suspicions of his own!

Sakura brought her own hand up and laid it over his. It rested on top of his gloved hand for a moment before she swiveled from the hospital bed.

"Sensei—did you get a check up? I bet you disobeyed Lady Tsunade's orders! You never get a check-up when you're supposed to!" She had to intercept his touch to regain control over her own reactions. Somehow Sakura managed to shove and bully the unsuspecting Jonin into taking her place on the edge of the bed. Even though it looked like he escaped without a scratch, Sakura insisted on healing his minor wounds.

She always did this after he returned from a mission; even if they hadn't seen each other in weeks, Sakura and his hospital bed formed a committed marriage. Kakashi never complained when she purposely sought him out; it was somewhat endearing that she missed his company. Even if her post-care instructions were super bossy.

"I'm not really hurt," Kakashi lamented at her unwavering insistence. She held up one finger and proved him wrong.

"Your eye was bleeding. I'm taking a look," she said. Kakashi's eye was always a sensitive area, one that normally did not allow medics to examine. The permanently borrowed Sharigan inherited quite the temper and maybe contained twice the amount of pain receptors as a normal eye.

Nothing but a scratched up, soft face and pink hair covered his vision while she leaned over, peering at the open Sharigan with one of her own eyes closed. She ordered him to look to the left while she searched for scratches or some source of the blood.

"Weird… I don't see anything wrong."

Kakashi knew it took more than the naked human eye to discover the injuries behind his own eye. He knew Sakura knew this and she wasting her time. She was avoiding the more serious subject of her own injuries—injures he knew she would never willingly confess to him. Personal, deep injuries he could have prevented.

"Sakura, listen to me." Her green gaze slid from focusing on just one of his eyes to both. The distance between them was slim. "I'm sorry for what happened."

Sakura blinked and shrugged at the sudden apology; it wasn't like him to say sorry twice, or be stuck on a subject they had already discussed.

"It was all my own fault. You did everything you could for me," Sakura said weakly. For once, the expression painted in both of his eyes was clear; she could see that Kakashi felt pain.

"I lost Sasuke—" she flinched at the name—" and even Naruto. You're left, and I failed you. I'm sorry."

The distance between them closed. Through the pain, through his guilt and through Kakashi's mask—Sakura didn't hesitate again. She took one hand to his face and brought her face to his in a kiss. Sakura kissed him.

Those feelings were confusing, but Sakura wanted to wait until they were back in the Leaf to confront them. She hoped it would be more clear—the boundaries, the norms. She hoped these things would shake her into once again denying the long standing feelings that bubbled her chest for years.

Now Sakura knew there was a reason she became so elated during those rare times Kakashi showed graced her with his presence, even when it was only during a mandatory hospital stay, or when she caught him at Ichiraku's.

Now Sakura knew there was a reason she felt resentment when he stopped coming around, and she heard he was to test another genin team.

Now she knew she was relieved when he failed another team because she was still special and unique, with her being a ninja as a testament to his opinion of her and her team. She knew why his compliments nearly brought her to tears.

But Sakura didn't know when she had developed feelings for her sensei beyond that of a simple crush.

Kakashi didn't move to reciprocate the gesture. In fact, he was quite stiff even when Sakura slowly broke the kiss by pulling away. Because they were back in Konoha, the stark strangeness of the action seeped in. Sakura had kissed her Sensei.

Sakura and Kakashi-Sensei.

"You can't keep doing that," Kakashi said, shamelessly lumping in the last incident, which he initiated, into her history. Sakura flinched.

What did she expect?

Kakashi lowered his headband to cover his eyes and moved from the bed. As he moved towards the door, he felt that he couldn't just leave his former student empty without any explanation to his reaction. He felt her eyes glued to his back. She wanted that reaction.

"You're confused and hurt. It's not healthy to use the wrong outlets for those feelings—"

"I'm not!" Her voice cried out behind his back. She saw him pause for just a moment before slipping back out of the door, and closing it behind him. Just another barrier Kakashi Hatake drove between himself the people who loved him.

Sakura crumpled to the ground in an episode of self-hate and self-pity. Because Kakashi was infuriating. If she chased Sasuke to the outskirts of the village and begged him to let her accompany him to his path of destruction, Kakashi shouldn't expect to get away scot-free either.

But she couldn't chase after him now; her back was aching horribly.

So I'm estimating about two chapter left.

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