Chapter VII: Feint Operation
Pink tresses cascaded down Sakura's back as she lifted her arms to grasp two senbon in each hand. Swiftly slitting her skirt for better mobility, she dashed behind a balustrade by the stairs leading up to the main entrance and quickly sized up her opponents and her situation.
Four men stood at the door holding a long, oddly shaped concoction of metal and wood. There were several holes punched into the fresco above, about the size of the cylinder connected to the strange invention the men held under their arms. Sakura deduced that some kind of projectile had been emitted from that...thing at an insanely high speed. Making a mental note to avoid crossing paths with the barrel, she shifted her attention to her new set of guests.
All except for one man looked alien to the country. The lone man that did not sport any Thompson-sama-esque features. Armed with the largest supposed projectile-emitting instrument, he seemed to be making some demands which Sakura could hear clearly from her station.
"Ladies and gentlemen! We have not come here to steal anything, so please be somewhat at ease." At least he's straight-forward, Sakura thought, unlike a certain thickheaded senpai I know...
"I would like to know the whereabouts of a certain man by the name of Uchiha Sasuke or Hatake Kakashi."
Sakura nearly dropped her senbon. How did they know that the team was here in the first place? They were supposed to be undercover... Did Kakashi lie to them?
Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Sakura gripped her weapons tightly. She would extract information later. Four senbon, four men. Running her tongue over her arsenal, she contemplated her options. Should she just paralyze them all, or leave one standing? Choices choices.
A man looked about nervously, index finger rubbing the edge of the trigger. Though his premonition was accurate, his senses were not as defined and his muddied instincts failed to notice the needle that punctured his lungs a second later. He cried out in warning, but his shrieks were silent and went ultimately unnoticed as he slumped to the ground.
Only the speaker noted an inferior presence and turned in time to see the gunman collapse before he rolled down the stairs. A woman shrieked as two more senbon pierced through the throats of the other two men.
The last needle stuck between the fingers of the leader.
The survivor turned and pulled something on his weapon that made a loud 'ka- chunk!' and to Sakura's shock, he pointed the barrel of his weapon toward the pillar that served as her blockade.
"I see you."
As she scurried away, an ear-splitting boom shook the mansion to its foundation. Sakura surveyed the damage of her previous barricade from the other side of the room. Her eyes widened as she saw that the projectile had not only ripped away the unfortunate piece of architecture, but had bulldozed a balcony as well as leaving a sizable ditch in the garden below.
"Ah, crap. Where's back-up when you need it?" the lone gunman complained as he fiddled with his radio. An object whizzed by the technologically challenged young man and he turned to see a silk fan embedded into the double doors behind him. Using the man's inattention, Sakura rushed in. Her fist collided with a hand, which she pushed away by quickly redirecting the flow and direction of her punch. Another strike toward a critical pressure point was also trapped by the opponent.
The gunman looked back at the kunoichi and blinked at his lovely challenger. Sure, at first he was hesitant when he was told that his life would be in danger due to hired ninjas, especially with his over reactive imagination. But if he could fight ninjas like this, he would gladly sink six feet under without any regrets.
Sakura smirked into the man's face and shifted her hands to form a seal using her captive's hand.
"I'm borrowing your other hand for awhile," she crooned softly. She was only able to perform the fourth seal when the man's body convulsed as an object collided with his body and her routine was interrupted. His eyes went wide before drooping closed. Sakura caught his limp figure to see a kunai protruding from the man's back.
"Thanks for giving me a clear shot." Sasuke stood balanced meticulously on the handrail as he indicated the unconscious man. Understanding and disappointment flooded the kunoichi's face.
"I've sedated him," he stated bluntly, mistaking her expression as one of worry.
"Oh..."
Sasuke looked at her oddly. Noting that she still wore that expression, he wondered if Sakura wanted a hand at interrogation. After all, long pointy things were not exactly objects to sneeze at.
"Oi, Sasuke! Sakura-chan! I got rid of all the other guys around the area!" Naruto leaped easily from ground level to where his two teammates stood and took a deep breath to make an announcement.
"It's alright! We've gotten the situation under control!" he shouted, waving his arms about frantically in good aristocratic taste.
"Sakura-chan?" Naruto was not the only one who noted Sakura's lack of interest in reality. Sasuke wondered why Sakura seemed so spacey as of late. As she snapped out of her reverie, she smiled at the two and handed the unconscious man to the Uchiha. Walking over to one of her previous kills, she yanked out a senbon and wiped the pin on the corpse's shirt. She piled her hair on top of her head and stabbed the pink mass, securing the makeshift bun. It has been a while since she let her hair down. She needed a haircut.
"I'll be right back. I have to talk with senpai." With that, she poofed away. Naruto blinked several times.
"Talk with... who?" Naruto was dumbfounded and Sasuke sighed. So he did come.
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The party had to be called off that night and people slowly dispersed into the rain. There were some people left; that Sakura kept in mind as she sat at the far edge of the balcony, out of the rain but not out of sight for some stragglers. Namely, Gama-Ono...sama. Also, the last time she peeked inside, Naruto and Sasuke were currently deciding who got first dibs on interrogation with a significantly drawn-out janken match. What was originally winner out of five grew to twenty-three.
Despite the two's odd, un-ninja-like quirks, their strength had grown immeasurably combined with their friendship. Both had each other to seek comfort, rivalry, and who-knows-what-else. For some reason, boys became best friends after beating each other into the dirt; the more damage, the deeper the friendship. Basically, a masochistic camaraderie.
And she was jealous.
Sakura bit her lip and swallowed the bitter lump that formed in her throat. What was wrong with her lately? For some reason reuniting herself with her old gennin teammates had become much more bitter than sweet and served to deepen an old wound known as Inferiority. Worst yet, she found that tears were sliding down her face.
Sighing, Sakura stood up and walked into the rain. The beach was visible from where she stood, and the breeze blowing from the ocean was cool. She could cry here and hopefully escape Kakashi's unusually receptive senses.
"Sakura." Speak of the devil.
"Yes?" Though the rain obscured her tears, Sakura did not dare to turn around. It was a strange situation; here she was with tears streaming down her face and acting like there was absolutely no internal turmoil on her behalf.
"Are you alright?"
Sakura 'hmmed' softly and smiled wryly to the sea.
"Yes."
"Hmm." The raindrops grew fatter during the pause and soon Sakura could not discern her tears from the precipitation.
"No," Sakura admitted. Kakashi remained silent. Both were drenched, but neither acted upon their unhealthy choice of location. Sakura appeared to have nothing further to say, so Kakashi decided to speak.
"Why were you crying?"
"I wasn't." Another moment of silence.
"I don't know," she finally muttered, crossing her arms tightly in defense while feeling a bit embarrassed with her constantly mutating answers.
In all honesty, Kakashi wanted to discuss the kunoichi's apparent reluctance in cooperating as a team. Yet a lecture at this time would only serve as a catalyst to the other's anger and there was always the promise of a better time. Unless she was suffering from PMS. Whichever defect that currently plagued Sakura's mind, he hoped it would not resort to emotional hysteria. Besides, there were more pressing matters that needed attention.
Footsteps softly splashed toward where Sakura stood. Sakura counted three splashes before she decided to retreat back indoors.
When she turned, a hand intercepted her face and held her jaw captive.
Kakashi held her chin, disregarding the blank stare of naivety. A few seconds passed and Sakura decided to change pace and glared at the jounin. The latter only tilted his head to the side and moved his head closer to hers. She could feel his breath warming her skin and the prospect of a kiss swamped her mind. Though she continued to glare, Sakura felt her chest tighten as rather sensual images flashed into the theatre of her adolescent mind.
Then he licked her face.
Did he just…? Sakura just stared. Staring seemed to be the most appropriate action since the sheer spontaneity of his actions had left her speechless. In rather recent past events, Ino had given a number of hints and tips on why guys behaved in certain ways at certain times, but… How was she supposed to react to that and what the hell was that for!
Kakashi smiled and simply stated, "Your face is salty." There was no doubt about it. Kakashi-senpai was a docile psycho. Sakura realized that there seemed to be only one kind of smile he displayed, and even without his mask, his face was unreadable.
After successfully rendering his case immobile, Kakashi wrapped his arms around Sakura's waist and pulled her into a tight embrace. Removing the senbon supporting her damp hair, he weaved his fingers into her hair and gently tilted her head to murmur into her ear.
"We'll have to move out tonight. Our cover's been blown and it's apparent that someone's trying to hunt us down." A wild goose chase. How romantic.
"Where are we going?"
"Thompson-sama has invited us to stay at his place for several days." Sakura froze.
"Where!" she squeaked incredulously. I am not sleeping in a house of the extended weirdo family. I already have two on my team, she thought, eyes rolling toward Kakashi and thinking of Naruto.
"If we're invited to someone with his status—"
"No, no. Status or not, I'm not staying that freak's house," she declared, bent on keeping herself out of any pervert's quarters by at least a kilometer. Sleeping in the rain with hypothermia looming in every droplet sounded much more inviting.
"Ha ha, don't worry." Kakashi slightly pulled away and rested his forehead against Sakura's, bringing back ghosts of her childhood forehead complex as well as previous clips from before Kakashi confirmed her shed tears. "The only reason he was interested in your marital status was because he was interested in you."
"I thought he was married," she faltered. His face was a bit too close for comfort.
"The more money you have, the more wives you can hoard. Basically, he has a personalized harem, but don't worry about that," Kakashi replied without missing a beat. Sakura's eye twitched in disgust. 'Don't worry'? What kind of comfort was that after explaining the man's fetish for legal bed-jumping? Sakura felt a bit better about this simulated—read fake—marriage to Kakashi-senpai than she had previously had conceived.
"Are you feeling better?" Kakashi asked, noting that Sakura's face had melted into a serene expression.
"Are we still married?"
"Yep." The kunoichi grimaced, making her 'husband' smile.
"Then no."
Kakashi chuckled and broke off all contact. There was a moment where the two just looked at each other. Sakura felt awkward again and dropped her eyes to the ground quite suddenly and began to pick at her gloves again. He's your husband you idiot, she drilled adamantly into her brain, so stop being so tense!
"Ah..." Before she could string a group of meaningless syllables together, something heavy was draped over her shoulders. Sakura looked up to see Kakashi pulling a cloak on top of the jacket she now wore. Finishing his task, he raised a hand.
"Later."
Sakura watched the man disappear in a cloud of smoke and clutched his cloak tightly about her chest. She hadn't realized how cold her underdressed arms or legs had become until she felt the warmth of Kakashi's jacket.
In an effort to assess the previous event, images of what had happened on the balcony were conjured from Sakura's memory. She was proud of the fact that there was absolutely no exchange of romantic mush or fluff other than their little charade. She had not fallen into any kind of infatuated inattention and...and she was just nervous.
"Sakura-chan! Let's go!" Naruto was grinning madly and Sakura assumed that he had won the janken marathon. Sakura turned her head and smiled in response but was caught unaware by the sudden weight she dragged with her head.
Kakashi had taken her senbon.
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Gama: frog
Janken: Paper, Scissor, Rock (game)
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Author's Notes:
FYI: I'm going out of the country on July 7th and returning on August 10th.
Action was cut short because I'm out of practice, if that's the phrase.
Eh... I feel like I have no control over this fic .;
"Fanartist"