woah it's only been a month! enjoy~

10 - never late is better (unless late is your personal philosophy)

Kakashi absentmindedly scratched behinds Guruko's ears as he went over an inventory of his supplies. As an elite jōnin he got the special village discount on the best-quality gear, but that didn't mean he didn't have to constantly maintain it; if anything, his status meant that he was in high demand for missions and had to frequently repair and restock.

He frowned at one kunai, picking it up and testing the edge (Guruko whined at the sudden loss of a good head-scratching). Can I salvage this one? He sighed and threw it into to trash pile. Maybe I should make some more explosive tags. He also needed to pick up some soldier pills and smoke bombs. There was a Hatake clan recipe for soldier pills, but they didn't hold a candle up to the Akimichi versions and really weren't worth the effort of making them. He resolved to pick some up from the shops soon. Maybe he could finagle Sakura into making some more effective ones (as opposed to the custom-made weaker "mud balls" Sakura delivered by the dozens to Naruto).

A bark from his left interrupted Kakashi's musings. "Bull?" He looked at Pakkun, who was resting lackadaisically on Bull's head, for an interpretation.

"Someone's approaching the door. I'm pretty sure it's Naruto," Pakkun responded. He proceeded to delicately lick at his paw.

Naruto? That's a surprise. Wait, she wasn't here to scold him for missing her birthday, right? It wasn't really his fault, he had been out on another mission—the fact that he had chosen a mission which coincidentally also allowed him to miss the end-of-war anniversary festivities had nothing to do with Naruto and more to do with his own anti-social tendencies. While having a chance to talk to his father and seeing Minato-sensei through Edo Tensei did a lot to heal old scars, he still didn't want to be forced to celebrate on the day he'd lost some of the people he'd counted as family. Some of the family—Kakashi felt a flash of painful guilt—that Naruto had never really had the chance to get to know.

Not to mention that Naruto had gotten him a truly excellent birthday present this year. Maybe...he'd think of something. But for now it was time to make an escape. He eyed a window speculatively, opening it and hopping out, taking a moment to turn around with a shushing finger to his lips and winking at his ninken before disappearing.

Pakkun rolled his eyes.

There was a knock at the door. "Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto sounded uncharacteristically tentative. "Kakashi-sensei, I heard a bark, I know you're in." Bull barked again and panted excitedly, tail thumping against the floor. Pakkun sighed, smacked Bull's head from his perch atop it and hopped down, taking pity on the girl and going to open the door.

"Kaka—" Naruto's hand was in mid-knock. "Pakkun?" She looked down at the dog, bemused. "How did you open the door?"

Pakkun snorted and ignored the question. "Kakashi isn't here."

Naruto peered into the room, spotting all the equipment on the table and the ninken lolling around. "Did he just leave…?" She shrugged. "Honestly, it doesn't have to be Kakashi-sensei, I just wanted someone to talk to and last time I tried talking to Sai about this stuff it was terrible."

Pakkun raised a brow skeptically. "And you came to talk to Kakashi? He's emotionally constipated, you know."

Naruto puffed her cheeks in irritation. "Sakura's busy and no way in hell am I talking to Sasuke about this."

Pakkun eyed Naruto. "Well," he drawled, his tail giving a subtle twitch, as if resisting an instinct. "How good are you at belly rubs?"

Naruto grinned widely. "I'm the best!" She declared, and took the question as invitation to bound into the apartment.

"You're telling me Naruto came over to ask for relationship advice?" Kakashi asked Pakkun incredulously.

"Not exactly advice, I'd say, since she already split up with Hinata. Seems like it was amicable enough though." Pakkun rolled over, paws in the air. "You should invite her over more often, she gives excellent belly rubs."

The rest of Kakashi's ninken woofed in agreement, tails wagging happily.

Kakashi shook his head, turned back to his supply inventory, and proceeded to pointedly ignore them.

prompt: climb inside

notes: oops I totally forgot I was basing this on prompts for a while but prompts are so much easier hehe

shout out to InvisibleNinja1234's review for kickstarting me into finishing this chapter (yes guys reviews do motivate me to post faster winkwinknudgenudge)

we're finally moving along in the plot! honestly when is this series gonna finish who knows.

as always let me know if you have any requests ^^