What a long morning it had been for Tsunade. Shizune burst into her office yelling that there was a fire the night before. No big deal, Tsunade just ordered that the mess be cleaned as to not cause a disturbance. Her apprentice then mentioned that it was Kakashi's home that had burned down! This put a different perspective on things.

She had spent all morning directing the Night Watch nin to search Konoha for the missing body of Kakashi which had not been found at the burn site. Shizune had led a group towards the north and Shikamaru led a group south. No one reported seeing Kakashi at all since the fire, and due to Shikamaru's testimony that Kakashi was walking on broken ribs, it was not considered that he may have left the village.

Tsunade sat in a folding chair set under a tree near the burn site, she poured some sake into a cup and gulped it down. "Ah! Where is he? He could've left word if he left, and we haven't found anything from the rubble…"

Shikamaru walked up lazily with his usual sway, "Nowhere. We can't find him. I sent the group out to look some more, but I think they are wasting their time."

The Hokage's eyes roamed towards him then looked to the ground, "He could have left the village."

Shikamaru shrugged his shoulders, "Like I said, with the way he was moving last night, I doubt he could walk without being in pain."

"Do we know anyone specific who may know where he is?" Tsunade asked.

The boy's eyes looked away, "Yeah… one."

Tsunade turned to his, "Whooo?" She rotated her hand in a windmill fashion, urging him to continue.

"Mitarashi san." He said with a dramatic leer.

Tsunade blinked, "Mitarashi…" She thought for about a second and came back, "From what Shizune told me, Mitarashi san has been through a lot these past few hours. She went home in a fit last night mourning over the loss of one of her closest comrades. Kakashi was at the scene with her, but that is the time he is reported to have disappeared."

Shikamaru inquired her with a blank stare, "Are you sure that's it?"

There was a pause between them before he continued, "Kakashi's not much of a lady's man, that much I know. Last night Anko slapped him upside the face before she stormed out the door. I advised him to go after her before she got away."

"You gave Kakashi 'guy' advice? From what I hear your advice is pretty hard to obtain since you seem to know how to wrap a woman around your fingers so easily." She coughed with this remark, saying a name under her breath. Shikamaru flushed red and retaliated.

"Not the point here!" Shikamaru shifted his view away from his superior and shoved his hands in his pockets.

Tsunade smirked, "Well, Anko is not here at the moment. So I'll send Shizune to go collect her." She went into her pocket and found a small radio transmitter.

The languid ninja finally spoke up, "You don't need to do that. Just ask her yourself." His eyes glanced up, "She's right here."

Tsunade snapped her head in Shikamaru's direction, "What?!"

Anko leapt from one tree to the next, making sure to balance herself on the branches she managed to land on. She struggled to pick her leg up; the one that she found was mysteriously cut. She finally launched down and grabbed a branch as she landed at Tsunade's side, "Hokage sama, I--!"

Anko buckled under her aching shin and knelt in pain, Shikamaru quickly flashed over to her and held her shoulders up before she collapse to the ground. Tsunade crouched down next to the Special Jounin and examined her symptoms. Her cheeks were still flushed from running, her fever was running a close 101.5 degrees, her eyes were unfocused and her bandaged shin was already bleeding open.

"Anko you fool! You are in no condition to be moving about! Oy." The medical expert charged chakra into her hand and healed Anko's leg. She then continued to aid the healing process of Anko's fever and whatever was left of her hangover.

Anko slowly opened her eyes, the bloodshot veins had receded and her vision was much clearer. "Hokage sama!" She attempted to sit up but Shikamaru and Tsunade let her lay down and rest her body on the soft grass.

"Anko, calm down for a moment, I have to make sure your health is secure." Tsunade waved her finger in front of Anko's eyes to see their reflexes. She pulled a dango stick out of her jacket and led it to Anko's lips, "Say 'Aah.'" Anko complied and Tsunade checked her throat. She pondered for a minute and then dismissed her initial thoughts, "Alright sit up, then."

Anko propped herself on her elbows and sat up, Shikamaru gave her a helping hand and guided her into a seated position. She shook her head, noticing that she didn't have a headache anymore, "Arig--."

"Thank you's can be saved for later. Right now, Shikamaru and I need to know what you were doing last night after you left the Sake Ken Joshi." Tsunade sat down and crossed her legs as she spoke to Anko seriously.

Anko's eyes widened, she knew she could barely remember anything that happened after she left. "W-Wait, what's going on? What happened? Chiisai and Kinomi said that there was a fire, an apartment burned down…and that Kakashi was nowhere to be found!"

"All in due time, Mitarashi san, but first we need you to remember what happened last night." Shikamaru insisted.

Anko ran her hand through her hair, "I- I- I don't know. I left the Sake Ken Joshi and I somehow got home. That's all I've got."

Shikamaru stood up and loomed over her, forcing her to lean her head back to look up, "Are you sure? Kakashi didn't chase after you or something?" He was sure that Kakashi would have gone after her, it was something… Kakashi-like. He wouldn't want his own partner to hold a grudge against him.

"Anko, you leave me no choice. I insist that you hold still." Tsunade slowly raised her hand.

Anko looked back down and met Tsunade's fingers as they tapped her on the head. Instantaneously Anko felt light headed and finally out of breath, she shut her eyes as her body went into a deep trance. Tsunade went into a meditative pose and concentrated for a while.

Shikamaru looked on as he finally realized what she had done. Tankyuu Sangai No Jutsu, an advanced mind probing technique used to search a person's past within their unconscious mind. There were few risks to this jutsu, but you had to be careful not to lose yourself inside the opposite's mind. Doing so would lead to terrible consequences. For example death, your mind would never return back to the body so your body is useless. The Yamanaka clan sees this jutsu as their specialty, but it can be useful in others' cases if they learn how to control it.

Of course the jutsu would only last for so long, so you had to make it out and to your original body before you ran out of chakra. So far it had been three minutes, the maximum known to be seven minutes. Anko was silent throughout the procedure, she occasionally winced and twitched a bit but that was normal.

Five minutes had passed and Tsunade was still searching, Shikamaru began to pace looking back and forth between the burn site and Tsunade's status. Suddenly Tsunade tensed up and her expression ran from calm to enraged, her eyes shutting harder as she experienced some sort of difficulty. This could simply be a mind barrier that she was trying to break, but mind barriers wouldn't normally cause the user of the jutsu to have spastic muscle attacks during their meditation!

Shikamaru ran to his boss's side and made a hand seal trying to release the jutsu. Tsunade bit her lip, causing it to bleed out, her hands had formed into fists and her shaking was out of control. The jutsu would not cease! Shikamaru tried to wake Anko up, but she wasn't responding either. "Come on! Come on! Wake up! Come back to life! Do something!"

Tsunade kneeled over and coughed blood to the ground. Shikamaru leapt back, "Not that!" He took out a handkerchief from his vest pocket and cleaned up the blood around her mouth. With a final gasp, Tsunade's eyes burst open and her voice returned, "Aaah! Fuck!"

Her forearm flew up and she unintentionally hit Shikamaru in the face, he rolled on the ground and into the tree landing upside down, "Ow… how troublesome…"

Anko finally began to breathe as well, her breathes not as sharp as Tsunade's though. She began gliding her hand over her throat, repairing the damaged tissue that had caused her to cough blood. Her eyes flew and stared insanely at Anko, "YOU have a freakishly twisted mind! I never want to go in there again! EVER!"

Anko shook the dizzy spell on her, "I don't even know what you're talking about, so I'm just gonna call you a bitch for saying that!" Her eyes glared with a fury.

Tsunade growled under her breath and looked into Anko's fearless eyes, locking with her psychotically and realizing that her opponent was too determined to be psyched mentally. She cleaned the area around her mouth and sat up straight again looking around, "Where's Shikamaru?"

The Chunin crawled forward, "Right here." He had the handkerchief help up to his nose. Anko gazed curiously at his face, he simply waved his hand, "Don't ask, either of you."

Anko nodded slightly, "Okay… so what did you find out?"

"You don't know where he is that's for sure. He found you and he walked you home. Once he left, you went to sleep." Tsunade informed. "Obviously you can't help us."

"What exactly happened? Why is Kakashi missing? What's the deal with the fire?"

In a muffled voice Shikamaru said, "My team has been searching through the ruble and haven't found anything yet. Although, there is less than three hundred square feet to check, so we may find something soon."

"Find something? What do you mean? What's he talking about Tsunade?" Tsunade was silent. "What do you expect to find in the rubble?!"

"Kakashi has not been sited since late last night, when his final witness was you. Then the fire occurred and burned down his home." Tsunade paused again and looked into Anko's eyes, "We now have reason to believe that Kakashi was incinerated in his sleep or before he could escape the flames."

"No… He can't be…" Anko's bewildered expression fell to the ground and her eyes filmed over in a gleam of tears.

Shikamaru patted her on the shoulder, "Don't worry, Anko. I'm sure he's fine."

"No he's not. His ribs are broken. He won't survive without rest. I have to find him myself." Anko stood up and walked past Tsunade, who caught her by the wrist.

"Anko Mitarashi!" Tsunade called out furiously. Anko stopped in her tracks and froze within the 5th Hokage's Herculean grasp. "You are hereby under strict orders to find Kakashi Hatake, no matter what the cost may be. You shall complete this mission before continuing with your previous investigation."

Anko glanced over her shoulder and nodded in confirmation. Tsunade's sinister glare looked away and her vice grip released Anko's wrist. Anko bolted away into the trees, maneuvering efficiently around trees and branches without losing her balance.

Back under the tree, Shikamaru looked on lazily after Anko and turned to Tsunade. "So… we continue looking?"

"No… She knows he is alive. And I believe her." Tsunade said calmly looking up at the sky.

Shikamaru scoffed and found a cloud to stare at, "What makes you so sure?"

"Her heart told me so." Tsunade smiled briefly at the thought. Shikamaru looked down at her, for the first time perplexed by Tsunade's remark.

"O---kay…" Shikamaru turned towards the rubble and suddenly a sensation hit him. He popped out a cigarette and lit it. He inhaled it deeply, causing himself to cough and blow out a cloud of smoke.

Tsunade noticed his new habit and gazed at him curiously, "What made you do that all of a sudden?"

Shikamaru stared at the burn site and smoke his cigarette, "This place reeks of death…"

Tsunade realized what he meant… Anko… I hope you can find him, before we have to assume the worst. After a week of absence… we will have to proclaim him MIA…

To be continued...

Kiraichi's Author Notes: For those of you who are keeping up with the fan fic: Hey thanks! I'm glad you're enjoying it. For those who are new to it, I hope you like it so far and know that there is still more to come. Sorry for the big gap of time before the updating thing happened. Had a sort of writer's block, thingy. Anywho, thanks for reading it till now and I look forward to continuing soon. See ya.

PS: MIA Missing In Action