Authors Note: Sorry for no recent updates. Been a bit overloaded with RL. Hope you enjoy this short chapter to whet your appetites for more is to come!
Chapter 11 Time Passes
Konoha was silent except for the chirping of tree frogs as daybreak came to the village.
Far overhead a messenger hawk spied its goal and began it's speed dive to its home. The caretaker on duty spied the new arrival
and retrieved the small cylinder from the hawk's ankle. As the color coding was not critical she tended to the hawks care before taking the cylinder to the Intelligence Ninja on shift in charge of decoding messages. It was only a matter of minutes before the cylinders contents were unloaded, decoded, recorded in report form, and placed in the Hokage's report folder to be picked up by his assistant.
Rin Nohara, assistant to the Hokage retrieved the report folder as part of her morning routine. This had been her responsibility ever since Minato Namikaze had become Hokage and requested her help in maintaining the paperwork. As his former pupil, she was well aware of his proclivities, likes, dislikes, and owed her survival to him and his wife Kushina on more than one occasion.
On this particular morning Rin rifled through the incoming reports for anything from Kakashi Hatake. Usually routine assignment reports were not high priority, but seeing as the Hokage's son was among the Genin on the mission Minato had asked that she keep alert for any incoming news. Not that she wouldn't be looking for her own satisfaction, but there indeed was a report! A smile crossed her lips thinking of her former team-mate and now lover.
Though they had kept their relationship low key, lately it had become more serious. She wondered at Kakashi's composure in public when their private moments were much different. But then he'd always been that way since the loss of their teammate Obito Uchiha. Obito's sacrifice had altered Kakashi's private manner among friends, though in more formal settings he reverted to his aloof mannerisms. It was this duality that drew Rin to him even now. While the Shinobi world saw him as the Copy Ninja, to her he was Kakashi the sensitive man.
The realities of their feelings for one another came crashing upon them when Kakashi was forced to use his Chidori to kill her to remove Isobu, the three tail demon. He thought he had killed her. But her life had been saved by the quick appearance of Kushina Uzumaki whose team had been sent to counter the possible appearance of the tailed beast. Her skills with sealing techniques limited the damage to Rin's body from the extraction of the tailed beast into a nearby lake where a barrier was erected to keep it from harming anyone.
From that point, Rin and Kakashi's relationship to one another changed. The physical pain Rin experienced was mirrored by the emotional pain Kakashi felt for harming her. They found their only solace was honesty with one another and over the years that honesty had blossomed into romance.
So the smile Rin held upon her face was for the man who wrote the report she held in her hand. Rin's mind cleared of the past and focused on the present. That smile faded to concern when she read over the report. This information was time sensitive, it was nearly 2 days old, the Hokage must be informed! He would want to know about these facts immediately!
