Okay so it's 11:29pm and I just typed this out really fast for you guys. (You BETTER be happy. That's right. BE happy.) So here is the fresh, un-beta-ed version of chapter 14. You BETTER be happy. I only have 24 more pages of story left! D: I told my friend this today and she sarcastically replied, "You poor baby!" She just doesn't get me ;) Anywho, without a long winded A/N that makes most of you want to kill me, here's the good stuff.

~ Belle

…

It was late night or early morning, judging by the darkness in the forest. I would say probably one a.m. That means I had been running 7 hours straight, and I needed a rest.

I stopped jumping ahead and jumped branch to branch down, until I was standing on the forest floor. I undid the harness and let Sakura gently down to the ground, leaning her against a tree and carefully sitting beside her. I sighed and leaned my head back against the trunk, staying like that until I heard a noise.

I jumped up and positioned myself in front of Sakura, glancing around the clearing until I heard the noise again, this time from behind me.

I quickly turned around and then relaxed as I noticed it was Sakura moving. I looked at her closely and she had just moved a little unconsciously. I smiled lightly and returned to sitting by her side against the tree trunk.

Another half an hour passed maybe, and then I heard a muffled noise. I moved again and just turned my head so I was looking at her. The muffled noise came again. It almost sounded like a whimper.

"No…" she whispered, her voice full of dread.

I stayed quiet.

"No…" she whimpered, a little louder this time. "Don't leave me… please!"

I sat up straight and checked her over. No, she was most definitely not awake. But she was talking…?

I then got an idea. I gently took her hand.

"Sakura…" I said quietly. "Who's leaving you?"

"Ka… Ka… Kakashi." She whispered, a little louder this time. "Don't leave me!" She let out a scream.

"Whoa, whoa!" I panicked, not knowing what to do. She was having a nightmare, and I couldn't help her. I jumped to my feet.

"Don't go…" A tear rolled down her cheek. "I know… I'm not… good enough…" Her arms twitched, then wrapped around her midsection. I was watching her with increasing horror.

I was the reason for her nightmares.

This had to be horrible for her… this wasn't the first time someone had done this to her.

I was no better than Sasuke.

I was becoming more and more desperate, feeling helpless as I watched her endure her own personal form of torture.

I had another idea. If my voice could reach her, maybe my presence could too.

Looking around, as if to check and see if there was anybody around watching, I carefully went to Sakura's side again and sat down. After hesitating a moment, I slowly reached my arms around her and pulled her against my chest, gently hugging her to me. She sniffled and a couple more tears rolled down her cheeks. I rubbed her back and held her tight for a moment, silently praying this would work.

"I'm not leaving you." I said quietly.

"But…" she whimpered. "You're walking away…"

I pulled her so she was now in my lap and I held her against my chest, softly pressing my lips to her hair and inhaling the sweet scent of her hair.

She flinched. "Who… who's there?"

"I am." I breathed. "I won't ever leave you again."

It was silent for a minute, and then a word tumbled out of her mouth in a whisper that I really had to work to catch.

"…Promise?"

I chuckled quietly. Of course she would ask for my word, otherwise she wouldn't believe me.

"Promise."

"Okay…" She unconsciously curled a little closer to me, her fingers grasping my shirt and tangling themselves in it as if to assure herself that I wouldn't leave. I chuckled again and gently ruffled her hair and drifted to sleep slowly with her in my arms.

…

I was up at down the next morning, and seeing as Sakura was still unmoving, I did up the harness again and then, seeing as she was safely on my back, I took off, leaping from tree to tree as fast as I could with renewed strength.

Due to the speed I was travelling at, I knew it would only be a short time before I could see Konoha. I turned my head to look at Sakura on my back.

"Almost there, Sakura." I assured her. And as if to back up my claim, the forest started to thin as Konoha became visible.

I paused at the edge of the city and taking a look at it I decided not to walk through it, instead performing a few hand signs and disappearing us into a cloud of leaves and smoke.

I appeared in front of a door, and I stepped forward and knocked on it.

I managed to count to 3 before Tsunade opened the door. Her eyes went from my feet, to my face, to Sakura on my back. He eyes narrowed and went back to mine.

"Well Hatake, what'd you do?"

"Don't worry," My eye curved up and I laughed nervously. "It's only chakra exhaustion."

"Chakra exhaustion eh? Now how in the world did she manage to get that?" Her voice sounded full of sarcasm.

"Helping me…" I changed the topic at the look on her face. "I killed Orochimaru, though."

"Oh yes, I'm quite aware of that." She said. "That news went around rather quickly after the body was found. The body, might I add that you LEFT in the forest, by the way."

"Well, I woke up and Sakura was unconscious and feverish so I thought I should take her to Suna first—"

"Well that shows you have at least an OUNCE of common sense. So she was in Suna…?"

"Umm, can we finish this conversation later?" I nodded towards the young kunoichi on my back.

She exhaled annoyedly and glared at me as she made some hand signs, causing us all to disappear and appear again in a hospital room. Tsunade immediately walked to the door of the room and exited.

"You can put her on that bed there," she called. "I'm going to go get the paperwork."

I looked at the bed in front of me and carefully glanced around the room.

"Well, I guess we're here, Sakura." I carefully let her down and gently laid her on the bed and went and sat on one of the chairs in the farthest corner of the room by the window and waited for Tsunade to get back.

She entered the room with a chart and clipboard and sat down beside Sakura and checked her pulse.

"Temari said a couple days ago she would be out for a week, so I'm guessing that's less now, is it not?" I asked.

She nodded, letting go of Sakura's wrist and writing down a number.

"Yes," she began. "She's got about 4 more days."

I stayed silent and took to looking out the window.

"You know? There's one thing I'll never get about you, Kakashi."

I looked at her with my lone eye and raised my eyebrow slightly, prompting her to continue.

"It's how you can remain so cold, so indifferent, so apathetic, when the girl who probably ended up like this because of you is laying here unconscious."

I returned to looking out the window. How little she knew.

"And it breaks my heart to know how much this girl cares about you while all you seem intent on doing is breaking her from the inside…"

I stayed quiet.

"When she wakes up she's going to leave again; you know that."

"Hmm yes, about that actually…" I turned to look at her. "I need to talk to you for a minute Tsunade… explain some things."

She stared me down. "This'll take longer than a minute. You have a LOT of things to explain."

I stood up and resignedly follow her to her office after speaking with one of the nurses about Sakura's condition, knowing she would only be satisfied if I explained it from the beginning…

OMG! It ends in stars! (or at least it was SUPPOSED to, but I didn't bother fxxking around with the editing, it wouldn't let me put them, stupid word processor ) You know what that means?! Yeah I know, it's not that exciting. I'll stop now :x