Sorry for the wait... Thanks for the reviews though! This is really short and probably not all that great... sorry.
Two
"Obito and Rin? Your teammates, huh?" Ume sulked and sipped at her tea. "Your teammates are better than mine."
"How so?" Kakashi glared into his tea. "You're teamed up with Ebisu and Seiichi Hyuuga."
Ume sniffed. "They're a bunch of jerks, but Obito's pretty cool, I hung out with him on occasion after all of my loser friends up and graduated on me."
Kakashi huffed. "You would hang out with Obito. Two peas in a pod."
"And he's kind of cute to boot!"
Kakashi swiveled towards her, glaring at her. "You think he's cute?" He made a face.
She nodded. "With his dark hair and eyes, he's got the Uchiha good looks!" She nodded matter-of-factly. "But unlike other Uchiha's, he's not too serious or grumpy."
"The perfect man, then." Kakashi huffed and turned back to his tea.
"What's your problem? You sure are grumpy today." Ume popped a sweet dumpling in her mouth and chewing thoughtfully, shrugged. "You're so serious all the time."
"She looks so serious, huh?"
Kakashi looked up from the page he had supposedly reading and looked up at Bull, Jun... he wasn't in uniform. Kakashi huffed lightly and looked back at the still form of Ume. "I honestly cannot think of a single time in the last twenty-something years where I have gone this long without seeing her smile or say something stupid or pull some dumb prank."
"I remember this time when we were still in training and she threw a handful of fire crackers into the camp fire-"
Kakashi smiled under his mask, his eyes tracing Ume's profile. "Ibiki nearly killed her, his reaction was so violent."
Jun laughed. "She got the beating of her life when the old Bird-taichou heard about the incident."
Kakashi nodded and grew serious. "Thank you for bringing her home. Even if she had died... or if she never wakes up... thanks for bringing her home."
Jun nodded. "She's going to wake up."
"Even if she does, she'll be lucky if she is able to return to active duty, let alone Black Ops." Kakashi scoffed. "She's gonna end up on a desk and I don't know if that's going to end well. We both know that she isn't going to take being...useless... well."
"Ume's resilient. She'll find a way to keep herself busy." Asuma leaned into the room, the bag of take-out hanging from his hand.
Jun nodded. "Besides, can't they try the same thing they did for Gai's student?"
"They're going to try but she's twice Lee's age, her body no longer heals as quickly. Lady Tsunade isn't sure it will be as effective." Kakashi swiped a hand over his face. "She isn't sure Ume can survive the procedure."
Her entire body hurt, so that left one of two options: mission gone awry or another binge drinking session with Anko. Ume moaned as she tried to lift an arm to wipe at her very crusty eyes, when her right arm didn't immediately respond, she tried her left only to realize that she couldn't really feel it. Through sheer force of will, she got her extraordinarily heavy left arm to lift out of the traction sling it was-
Sling?
She let her arm fall back down, the slight movement causing a sensation not unlike stitches catching.
Stitches and slings...
She tried to squash a rising sense of panic... Mission gone awry it was then.
That meant she was in the hospital.
Suddenly she could feel everything, the IV plugged into her right arm, the hot scratchy feeling of gauze and plaster casting on her left side, her chapped lips open around a feeding tube and respirator.
Her eyes flipped open wide and she tracked the numerous tubes and wires from her body into the various machines crowded around her. She looked down at her left leg, also in traction, and her arm, trying to force a mind on the verge of full-blown panic to remember what happened to her.
There was a muffled grunt and some shuffling. A smudge of blue and green floated into her vision as Kakashi sprinted to the door. "Get the nurse! She's awake."
There was the sound of scrambling feet and Kakashi floated back in front of her just as she lifted her right hand to claw at the respirator covering her mouth and nose.
He caught her hand and pulled it away from "No, not yet. The nurse is coming, Ume. Just give it a couple minutes."
Ume shook her head and tore her hand from his grasp, trying to disconnect the suffocating respirator.
I can't breathe!
Asuma's face, followed shortly by Gai and Kurenai, floated into the tunnel of her vision. "You sure she's awake? Maybe she's having another episode."
Episode?
Kurenai glared at Asuma over her shoulder. "This is definitely not the same. She's lucid, so watch your mouth."
Suddenly everyone moved out of the way, their faces being replaced by Tsunade and Shizune.
"Hey Ume. If you can hear me nod your head." She nodded and there was an audible sigh in the room. "Good. We're going to take out your respirator and feeding tube, I need you to stay still."
It took thirty minutes, and somewhere between the dull scraping pain of a tube being removed from her throat and suffocating claustrophobia, she felt a gloved hand cover hers.
He was stuck between a rush of relief and a crushing sense of helplessness as he clutched her hand. She was panicked out of her mind, in an immense amount of pain given how she was wincing and groaning, disorientated and probably... hopefully... couldn't remember anything and there was nothing he could do to ease her.
He hadn't been able to stop her from going on a suicide mission, hadn't been able to save her, hadn't been able to ease her pain, hadn't been able to ease her fears.
What the hell was he good for anyway?
"Kashi." Her voice was rough and she sounded like she was in pain.
He looked up and met her eyes smiling softly. "How do you feel?"
Ume let out a little wheezing chuckle and squeezed his hand. "Like I got stuck under a large, somehow-mobile house... apartment complex..."
Kakashi chuckled and watched as Tsunade finished her tests and forced all of their rubbernecking friends from the room.
"I'm glad you're awake."
A weird looked crossed her pale face. "Was there a doubt?"
Kakashi shook his head. "I guess I'm just being dramatic."
"Kashi."
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad you're glad I'm awake."
"Always, Ume. Always."
"I need to leave."
"No."
"Kashi."
"No."
Ume huffed. "I'm going crazy!"
Kakashi kept his eyes on his page and his feet up on the corner of her hospital bed. "I brought you books... read them."
"I'm not reading your porn, Kashi. You read them enough for the both of us."
Kakashi sent her a hot look. "You've never complained before."
Ume sent the look right back. "That's 'cause you're usually doing something with all of that knowledge."
Kakashi hummed. "I could read it to you."
"No." Ume inspected her cuticles. "I have no desire to watch you blush and stutter your way through a sex scene."
Kakashi glowered at her.
Ume smiled at him. "Besides, we both know that you are afraid that you will break me, so you will be gettin' me all hot and bothered with no intention of actually doing anything about it."
Kakashi smiled. It was good to hear her voice.