Recognition

by scarletglare

An old acquaintance from many years ago reenters Sakura's life during a tumultuous time, and her determination to find out who he is brings her through a wild adventure - and brings her a new perspective.

Recognition

one: blooms

Sakura rubbed her fingers over her temples as she passed under the leaning cherry trees along the sidewalk, letting the circular motion take her focus away from the day she had had and distract her for a moment. She took in a deep breath of the cool afternoon air, her nose filling with scents of the fragrant pink blooms all around her and the deeper smells of the damp earth thawing and pushing unfurling spring blooms to the surface. She took in the sounds of the swaying branches around her, the pattering sounds of people's footsteps on the road and distant clatter of restaurants and voices, the shh of her long hair brushing along her face in its attempt to draw away with the breeze.

She tucked the stray strands in her ear as she consciously un-hunched her shoulders, working to untense each tight, knotted muscle in her upper body. She swore that for each new stress in her life there was another knot in her neck and it was sore enough sometimes to feel like that were true.

She resisted the desire to close her eyes and sink in defeat against the stone wall to her right. No. I won't let today weigh me down. I should feel free now, not more heavily burdened. Her heart clenched, contracting in her ribcage like it was getting smaller. I do feel freed. But I just feel so alone.

The urge pulled her again, a pressing need to just curl up and press her face into her knees and let her tightly controlled daily facade of stern calm fall. Sakura wanted to let herself cry, let herself shake with the sobs like a little girl again. It had been so many years since she had remembered how to cry, and even in the absence of her tears, she had decided for herself recently that she would never again cry for Sasuke Uchiha.

She straightened her back as she walked then, remembering her resolve and etching it once more into her mind. Sakura did not have any regrets about filing her divorce from Sasuke earlier today. She had felt a strange sense of being broken free from an invisible chain as she had signed and handed in the papers, a feeling like her body were momentarily weightless and cut free from the earth. She knew to the very marrow of her bones that it had to be done for her own sake.

That feeling returned as she took in a cherry-scented breath, and her stress melted some as her thoughts moved from her recent past and towards the future. As she began to relax, she sensed a familiar chakra signature nearby, and was not surprised to hear Naruto shouting her name from somewhere behind her as she was already slowing her step to turn around. She felt a little relief climbing up her throat and cooling her thoughts at the sight of her still-obnoxious, still-rambunctious friend.

"Sakura-chan!" He was enthusiastically waving with his entire arm at her from a stone's throw back down the road Sakura had come from. Sakura's slim pink brows raised in interest at the unfamiliar man in a long coat and dark scarf walking beside her friend, and she stood where she was as they approached. As if hearing her thoughts Naruto then shoved both arms in a gesture at the man walking beside him. "It's Sukea-san!" Sukea gave Sakura a polite, small wave and a brief wide-lipped smile.

Sakura gave him a brief nod in return, running a tired hand through her long pastel hair and found that Naruto was making the clear assumption that she remembered who Sukea was. Her tired mind made it clear to her that she did not. She debated asking him to remind her, falling into step next to Sukea as the three of them continued on their way down the cobbled road. Has my mind gotten dull in my old age? I feel like I should remember who he is. She was almost too tired to care.

Sakura opened her mouth to ask Sukea where she had met him before, but fell quiet as Naruto took his attention and launched into a battery of questioning about his photography ventures. Sukea dipped his hands into his large tan overcoat pockets, raising a lazy brow into his brown wavy mop of hair as he listened and attempted to answer the barrage of questions with an amused quirk of a smile. His gray digital camera that was slung around his neck bounced against his faded dark purple scarf as he walked.

Sukea. Sakura wracked her mind for him, searching the threads of her memory. We've met before, right?

She narrowed her eyes as she scrutinized him from the side. He was oddly familiar; very familiar, and she couldn't pinpoint exactly why. Nothing about his appearance jogged her memory, though she didn't feel particularly sharp in the mind after using up most of her focus and energy on her hospital patients for the day. The fact that he had a fairly unique appearance - the neat purple paint over both of his eyes and a small beauty mark next to his mouth definitely made him stand out - only served to further frustrate her for not remembering who he was sooner. Maybe he's a patient I worked with a long time ago. She nodded to herself. That could be it. Her core stirred a little, and it felt like disagreement and agreement at the same time.

It really was a long day today, she admitted to herself, running a hand through the hair on the back of her neck as the trio walked. She half-wondered where they were heading; probably to Ichiraku for Naruto's favourite ramen. Her stomach rumbled with agreement as this likely occurrence. I can spare some time to dine at Ichiraku's. Sarada will be at Ino's all night anyway. She's been spending a lot of time with them, and I know Ino likes having her over. She hid a smile, shaking her head a little. I daresay she has a crush on Inojin. Sarada's taken up a great interest in learning to draw from him all of the sudden as of late.

Her ears had been picking up Sukea and Naruto's conversation, but only just then did one of Naruto's remarks come all the way through from her ears to make the connection with her thoughts. "So, Sukea-san." He laughed as he spoke with nostalgia in his voice, "I never did thank you for your help trying to find a picture of Kakashi-sensei's face back then, did I?"

Oh! The answer came to her then, just as she had been about to give up trying to remember. Of course. We rendezvoused with Sukea once on a stupid impromtu mission to find out what's under Kakashi's mask. She shook her head with embarrassment at the memory, though it didn't sour her mood to think of their failed project. She had long since then resigned herself to the fact that no one was ever going to see beneath the Copy Nin's mysterious mask, and even Naruto had given up trying to trick it off of their wily comrade. She knew they had matured enough to respect that he simply didn't want to show his whole face to them, for whatever reasons. She had not seen Sukea make an appearance since that silly mission of theirs. That settles it. Finally my memory serves me properly.

Sakura took a moment to appreciate how things had changed as she walked with her unexpected company. The years passed had remarkably seasoned all of them at least to a point, even boisterous Naruto. She knew that the reprieve of dinner with her and Sukea, however brief it might be, would be a welcome break from parenting his children with Hinata at home. She wouldn't be surprised if he had taken Sukea's reappearance as a welcome excuse to escape the Hokage tower and escape his life to reminisce with an old acquaintance.

But something still twisted in her gut when she looked at Sukea again. His attention was still on Naruto, his gray eyes hiding subtle amusement, and she studied the side of his face that she could see for a moment while he was distracted. There was a slight crinkle to the way Sukea smiled with his eyes that made him look both younger and older at the same time, though from how he appeared he looked barely older than she was. The afternoon light lit the fibers of his wavy brown hair, giving it a dull sheen that looked off for some reason - perhaps he just didn't use conditioner. Sakura pressed a hand to her chest to prevent the laugh that pressed back in reaction to her own observation.

She returned her hands to the pockets of her long white coat and played with the linty crease in her pocket as she allowed her mind to keep debating what was off about Sukea. She couldn't place the feeling, but she knew to trust her instincts. She found herself surprised at the strange twisting in her gut that remained even after she had successfully identified the photographer in her mind (which eased most of her worries about going senile already at twenty-nine).

Sakura returned her eyes casually to the road as she felt his eyes slide to her; he had felt the brief touch of her eyes on him again, and she hoped that even her (what she hoped was) subtle scrutiny had not made him think she was staring. She was surprised at how he had sensed her gaze on him when she had been looking at him for only a slightly lingering moment. His senses were a little too sharp for a simple photographer, and the thought made her gut twist again. Something is not right.

Come on, she told herself as her fingers worried at the creases in her pockets with more fervor and cool sweat began to form on the back of her neck. She could still feel Sukea's curious gaze on her. It's not unusual for someone to feel it when another person is staring at them. You're being paranoid.

She could not help but smile then at how well she knew Naruto when they took the familiar street down toward Ichiraku. Her guess was spot-on and she didn't doubt that her assumption about him taking Sukea as an excuse to disappear from his duties was correct as well. Sakura shrugged to herself as she followed them into the glowing crowded restaurant's lobby. I'm using this as an excuse to escape my life for a moment too.

The three of them huddled by the host stand. Naruto waved to get the host's attention, a cheery knowing grin on his face, and the trio was quickly given a table regardless of the crowds and their definite lack of a reservation (Naruto being Hokage, even if he wasn't wearing his traditional hat and robe, had its benefits). Sakura decidedly didn't mind being pulled into this hangout, another touch of relief for the distraction cooling her sweaty skin as she sat down next to Naruto across from Sukea. They had been given their own little booth with paper screens around them for privacy, lessening the din of other customers outside in the main area.

They shifted naturally into their preferred sitting positions, Naruto leaning back on his elbows, Sakura sitting up straight and cross-legged and Sukea slouching across from them with hands splayed casually to the sides. So familiar somehow, she thought, trying not to stare. She noticed that he didn't take his coat and scarf off, even though the restaurant was very warm. Isn't he dying of heat stroke? It's so hot in here. The coat was oversized, shaggy over the man's frame that looked lean and even muscular from the little skin she saw. He had a wiry look around his wrists and neck that suggested he was hiding a fit body beneath the unnecessarily baggy coat. As a practiced medic who had seen many, many different people naked on a regular basis, she didn't need to see much to get a general and usually accurate idea of what someone's physique was like.

Sakura shook her head of her thoughts as she picked up a menu and tried to focus on what she wanted to eat. Why am I thinking about Sukea's body? Have I lost my mind? Surely getting divorced hasn't gotten to me that bad. She quickly shoved the thought back into her subconscious as a faint blush stained her cheeks, scanning repeatedly through the different ramen dishes that were listed. She silently hoped that Sukea was still listening to Naruto (who was still talking) and not noticing the way Sakura was still trying to figure him out. She didn't dare look up from her menu at him, trying instead again to pay attention to Naruto.

"You have got to get this one, Sukea-san. It's the best one they have here. Oh! And this one - and that one - one time, me and Lee had a contest on who could eat the most ramen, and oh boy you should have seen his face when -"

Sakura's eyes lifted from the menu back to Sukea, her suspicions creeping back into her mind like the tide rising. Without thinking about it Sakura gave him a slow onceover while he was nodding at Naruto. She noticed this time just how tall and lean he was - even having the opposite side of the table to himself, his legs were long and slim, his knees touching against the table; even though he was slouched, he was almost too long of frame and limb to fit where he sat. The baggy coat was shifted to the sides where his legs splayed as he sat cross legged, showing his dark and loose joggers and sandals. Sakura's attention moved back upward, her mind nearly audible as it clicked with tired but increasing curiosity. Why hide that physique? Why is a casual wandering photographer so apparently well-toned and in good shape so obvious that even baggy clothes can't hide it?

Sukea's eyes shifted, catching Sakura staring at his slouching form, and she shot her glance out the window. She cursed herself silently as a faint blush tinged her cheeks. She pretended to be engrossed in the gently shifting branches just outside the glass, and didn't shift her gaze until she felt his eyes move from her back to Naruto. She dragged her eyes down along the floor to the center of the table, keeping her eyes off of Sukea. Gods, she was making it look like she was molesting him with her eyes and that really wasn't the impression she wanted to make. She was grateful that Naruto was as unobservant as ever - if he had caught that brief exchange, he would have openly teased her for it. Fuck, and Sukea is smiling. She bit back a scowl as her blush deepened, knowing somehow that he was smiling at her and not Naruto.

Naruto answered before the waitress could get a word in as she walked up to the table with a notepad, ordering what sounded like half the menu for their table. The poor girl scribbled something down and scurried off; Sakura was surprised Ichiraku didn't have a separate menu just for Naruto as he was one of their most frequent and voracious patrons. She set her unused menu back down on the table, no longer having the excuse to stare at it, and made sure that her eyes did not automatically return to scanning Sukea - she picked up a glass of water on the table and focused on that instead as she felt Sukea's eyes shift between her and Naruto beside her. Naruto was onto stories from their genin days now, describing to Sukea the day that they had been tasked with stealing bells from Kakashi, and Sakura blinked at the old memory.

What she wouldn't give sometimes to go back in time and redo her life - it had taken her years to get over her feelings of being abandoned and left behind by her teammates and old sensei, made up for by her hard work training under Tsunade and training until she was just as strong as them. The old bitterness had gone away for the most part until Sakura had begun to realize that she was unhappily married - until she had signed those divorce papers. Now it was back in full, and it soured and pinched her stomach. She took a swig of cool water from her glass, letting out a soft sigh that was drowned out by Naruto's eager storytelling and the noisy din of the surrounding busy restaurant.

She had thought her life would only get better after she accepted Sasuke's unexpected marriage proposal and had Sarada. She wished that that had been the case.

Wanting to pull her mind away from the track she knew it was going down again, Sakura watched Sukea's face openly once more. His gray eyes nonchalantly flicked to hers semi-frequently, though he kept his gaze mostly fixed on Naruto as the blonde Hokage kept on talking with animated gestures. She half-wondered if Sukea was also tuning out Naruto and had a moment of begrudging respect that he could retain enough of the boisterous rambling to give the appropriate attentive mhms and is that so's once in a while.

"And you said you visited Water country! And the temple! I bet you got some cool shots there. What other places did you see? Not like I haven't seen them myself, but I wanna hear about the stories you heard, and I want to see more of those photos -"

The food arrived, plate after plate of ramen and egg rolls and miso soup. The three of them were instantly reminded how hungry they were, and Naruto's rambling became the happy smacking sounds of eating as each of them tucked into the steaming hot food. Sakura continued to avoid looking directly at Sukea, still embarrassed from him catching her staring at his form earlier. The steaming hot ramen burnt her mouth as she ate but she ignored the numbness of her tongue as she shoveled down the delicious noodles and broth.

Then her mind turned again, and a random thought spiked into her head as her eyes flicked back to Sukea's face against her will. Maybe he's an enemy shinobi in disguise.

Sakura swallowed the ramen in her mouth and sat back a moment, one hand over her bloated stomach. Ridiculous. What a ridiculous idea. He had helped us back when we met him, and has shown no signs of being hostile at any point. She allowed herself to look at him now fully, keeping her face neutral. Sukea was speaking to Naruto, but his eyes held hers as he gave his delayed answer to Naruto's earlier questions. "I did visit those places. I'll have to bring my photo album with me next time we speak so I can show you. I think I still have some pictures of you guys back when we met." His eyes squinted in a catlike, amused expression that shot a strange jolt down Sakura's chest. "You were quite the rambunctious crew."

Her thoughts wandered back over to that mission Sukea had joined them on, back in the day. She found that her initial cringe at the memory from earlier was slipping into a warm nostalgia. Those were the days… sneaking around in top-secret files where they shouldn't have been, picking locks (though Sukea had been the one to actually succeed in picking the locks), and nearly seeing Kakashi's face on a page before they were caught by ANBU. She chuckled to herself. She did admit, she still wondered what Kakashi's full face looked like after all these years. She had just lost the obnoxious determination to pull it off his face. Perhaps just lost her obnoxiousness altogether, as becoming a parent tends to do to adults.

Sakura's thoughts turned then to her of sitting in the kitchen the night before at midnight, signing all the places she needed to in the rather thick packet of divorce papers. She remembered how her hand shook slightly as she forged her now ex-husband's signature beneath hers with finality. She had tried to tell him to speak with her about fixing their relationship before, but the few times that he was home a year, he refused to talk about it, remaining as cold as he had always been like when they were younger. Freezing anger in her heart made her shiver as she remembered her countless nights alone, wondering where he was out there, wondering if he was thinking about her at all, if he was even alive.

Sakura lifted her head, feeling eyes on her, and realized that both Sukea and Naruto were staring at her with some concern. She also realized that one of them had probably asked her a direct question and she hadn't heard, lost in her unfortunate thoughts. She made a small cough in her throat, shaking herself of her recent train of thought, and made an uneasy smile at them. "I'm fine," she said, hearing her voice come out as a squeak.

Naruto reached over and took Sakura's hand, squeezing it lightly. "That wasn't the question, Sakura-chan. But you do have me wondering if you're okay." Across from her, Sukea was nodding. Though he kept his face neutral, Sakura could see concern on the same depth of Naruto's in his eyes.

She swallowed and took back her hand, sitting back on her elbows. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to zone out. I've just had a hell of a day."

Naruto folded his arms. "You had better tell me about it or I'm gonna shake it out of you."

Sakura smiled. "The years haven't changed you, Naruto-kun."

The bill arrived, taking the group's attention off of Sakura. As a group, they got up to leave; Naruto insisting on footing the bill and waving off Sukea and Sakura when both of them tried to pay for their meals. They walked together out into the cool late afternoon that was dipping into early evening, Naruto squeezing Sakura's arm as he turned to face them. "Well, I had better get home before Hinata strangles me. Sukea-san, I would love to buy you ramen again sometime and speak more of your adventures. Sakura-chan, when you're feeling up to it, I'm here for you, whatever's happening." His eyes were warm, and then he disappeared into the crowd as he hurried home.

Sukea turned to Sakura, hands in his pockets and eyes kindly, holding out an arm. The sight made Sakura pause where she stood, watching him with wide eyes at the stranger's gesture. When was the last time someone did that for me? "I know we do not know each other well, but the hour is late and I am old-fashioned. May I walk you home?" His smile was wide, genuine, and she found herself smiling back as her gut twisted again. That same feeling.

Sakura made a small laugh as she slipped her arm into his, feeling glad that she wasn't going to be alone with her thoughts for at least a little while longer. Her staring and probably unfriendly manner earlier surprisingly didn't scare him off. And perhaps a little more time with this strange photographer would help her to figure out what her gut was trying to tell her. Walking with a good-looking man on my arm doesn't hurt either, she thought, and nearly kicked herself for the thought as soon as it came.

two: tea

"Hmm, you know I can't go into that," Sukea was saying with a small smile and shake of his head after Sakura had asked him with a teasing grin about his ANBU days. She had recalled that particular detail as they walked together, and it had made another pang of suspicion about what he was hiding from her twist like a blade in her guts. "I'm surprised you remember that I even mentioned it." He was giving her an askew glance that was halfway playful.

She gave a sigh. "Usually I have a good memory. Though it took me a bit to remember you, honestly. It's been years."

Sukea kept his eyes forward as she spoke, his hold on her arm light. "It has been a while."

"Where did you go for all that time? And what brings you back here?"

He squinted, pausing in his reply as they passed from under the shadow of a blooming cherry tree, the pink blossoms looking like they were caught afire in the golden sunrays that fell upon them both as they walked. Shading his eyes with his other hand, Sukea cast a curious glance at Sakura. "I was wandering. Visited a lot of different terrain, different villages and cities. There is so much in the world to photograph."

Sakura hid her suspicion at the likely lie as well as she could, ignoring his curious glance so she could hide the questioning look in her own eyes. It seemed too easy an explanation to her; not detailed, too vague.

"You'd have known that and more about me if you were listening to my conversation with Naruto-sama."

Sakura breathed in sharply, and then couldn't help but laugh, her free hand pressing to her stomach. She heard Sukea's responding chuckle and she shook her head, ignoring her suspicions for a moment to let the glow of amusement warm her. It was something about the faux-serious tone he had adopted with the teasing at its edges, along with hearing Naruto-sama - it struck her funny, and she had to make an effort to fight back more laughter as she righted herself.

Sukea's smile was small, though genuine. She appreciated his lack of comment on her laughter outburst as they continued their leisurely walk. "As for why I came back, well." Sukea squeezed her arm lightly. "This village seemed the most interesting. Memorable people," he added with a wide smile.

Familiar, she realized again as she finally met his eyes that bored into her face from the side. Her blood pulsed as Sukea's eyes widened at something he'd seen in her expression, and she quickly looked away. Familiar because he's also a shinobi? Familiar because perhaps he's an enemy I've clashed with before?

Regardless of her suspicions, Sakura found that she was enjoying his company on this walk so far. They fell into silence for a while, and she gathered her thoughts while keeping an eye on him. The feeling of familiarity was stronger now, and it made her feel oddly relaxed even though her thoughts and instincts were as tense as a compressed spring. Maybe… Sakura looked down at their loosely linked arms. Maybe I'm just overthinking it all.

Her eyes traced over his pale hand that had faded scars and rough pads on his fingertips. They were the hands of someone who knew battle, not art, and she flicked her eyes away in unease. I'm overthinking it. Stop it, Sakura, she told herself. taking in a breath. You're taking out your long day on this unfortunate man. Stop it.

"Are you alright?"
Sakura glanced at Sukea. "I'm fine." Her answer came out more curt than she intended, and she quickly looked away. "Sorry. I've… it's been a long day." She let out a long, withered sigh. "I'm sorry if I've seemed… off, or rude."

His only response was a gentle squeeze of his large, rough hand on her arm. Sakura could feel how tense Sukea had become, and worried that she had offended him. Probably. I've been acting like a weirdo all night. She covered her forehead with a hand, bowing her head in shame. I'm just going to go to bed when I get home.

Sakura spotted her home, a small house at the end of the road surrounded by trees. The branches stretched and curved around the little structure, and flowers covered the walkway and flourished in the yard. The dying sunset painted the road, house, and branches all with a light sheen of red. As soon as it came into sight and the spark of recognition lit her eyes upon seeing her home, Sukea let go of her arm, stopping where he was. She paused as well, looking back at him.

"I best get going," he said, eyes shifting back toward the road, and Sakura felt another pang of guilt for her behavior this evening. Sukea seemed eager to get going and leave her to her home. Eager to get away from me because I'm seeing through who he is? She didn't shove the thought away, so it continued. He'll slip away and do what he's here to do and you'll have completely missed your chance to prevent him from doing it. If your instincts are right, and they usually are - if he's truly an enemy shinobi and you don't stop him, someone could die tonight.

"Wait," Sakura blurted. She reached out and pinched his long coat sleeve between her fingers.

Sukea stared back at her with wide eyes for a split second before regaining a more neutral expression, one dark eyebrow disappearing into his dark mop of brown hair. "Why? Did you need something?"

Something in the back of Sakura's eyes registered how his eyes darkened slightly after his question, making her wonder if he was suggesting something else. This made her blink, halting her thoughts for a moment, and she moved on then before her thoughts derailed from her original train of thought. She quickly formulated a plan, her heart rate increasing as her thoughts raced. Better to risk weirding out an acquaintance a little and possibly prevent a crime against the village than never know and risk someone dying.

"Come in for tea," she insisted, tugging at his sleeve. Sukea looked around them at the dark night with wide pupils, and Sakura realized it had gotten rather late into the evening for tea. No wonder he had questions written all over her face at her invite. No matter. I can't let him leave just yet without knowing for sure. She gave him a forced smile, hoping he'd say yes, redness staining her cheeks knowing that her late evening tea invite was, intentionally or not, somewhat suggestive.

Sukea coughed into his other hand, looking away from her at the ground. She swore there was a dusting of pink on his cheeks but it was hard to tell from the shadows cast on his face by the streetlights.

"I… I'm flattered by your offer," Sukea began, his voice faltering in a strange way, "but it is late, and perhaps…"

Sakura tugged him closer, toward her home. She gave a nonchalant laugh. "Nonsense. It's just tea. I don't have company at home at the moment, and you're probably not coming back to Konoha for a long time again once we part ways. Why don't you stay for a while and talk for a bit?"

Reluctantly, Sukea let Sakura pull him toward her home. They paused at her front door while she took out her keys and jangled it in the door. He stood awkwardly behind her, looking around as she opened the lock. The door fell open to a dark house, and she flinched away the seeping bitterness in her mouth as she reached into the doorway and flicked on a lightswitch. Maybe flattery is the right answer here, she was thinking to herself as she tightened her grip on his sleeve to make sure he didn't slip away while she wasn't looking at him. A little harmless flirting would work on getting him to stick around until I figure out his angle. I'm not dressed up but surely I'm still pretty enough in my thirties as I was in my twenties - enough to tempt him to stick around.

Taking another breath, Sakura turned around to face Sukea, who stood uncertainly at the threshold of her home. She narrowed her eyes at his flighty expression - he looked shifty, definitely pink in the cheeks, and like he had lost control of the situation. She decided to take advantage of his hesitation and reached out with a half-tentative hand to tug on his scarf. "Stop being so shy," she said, her voice dropping to a lower register and taking on a slightly more alluring tone. Sukea's eyes snapped to hers with alarm as he found himself pulled within a foot of Sakura, who had a catlike smile on her face. "And take the coat off. It's not winter, I don't know why you have all these clothes on anyway."

One of his eyebrows bolted up into his hair as Sakura shut the door behind him and sauntered into the kitchen. She made sure to put a little extra sway in her step, and felt him looking. She felt dirty, keeping him here with flirtatious tactics, but as a practiced kunoichi, it was not something she was unfamiliar with. She swept the kettle into her sink and filled it with water, turning on the stove. Sukea was still standing where she had left him in the front entryway, shifting from foot to foot like he was going to break into a run. She had to turn up the charm.

Turning toward him after setting the kettle on the stove, Sakura shook off her white doctor's coat she had been wearing and tossed it aside onto the stair banister next to the kitchen that led upstairs. She was wearing her red vest and tight spandex shorts today, and she knew it showed off her long arms and toned legs; she walked confidently up to Sukea, ignoring the pounding in her chest, and pulled on his scarf again. This time it slid from his shoulders and easily into her hands. She tossed that too, hearing it softly float down near the couch in the nearby living room, and then her small hands descended onto his coat buttons.

Sukea's hands enveloped hers, making her pause. She looked up at him, moulding her expression into one of innocence, expecting him to look gently bewildered and flattered. But his eyes had darkened, the color of his cheeks having gone a deeper shade as well, and there was a look there of an intensity she did not expect. "Sakura," he said then, and his voice was different, deeper, huskier, causing her blood to throb in her veins. She did not miss how he completely dropped the honorific. "Stop." His hands on hers tightened, and she could feel the sweat in his palms. "I…." She tightened her grip on his coat where her hands rested at the top button, knowing he was going to try and leave. She was determined now not to let him slip from her grasp even if just to validate her pride. "Stay," she hissed from between her teeth, keeping a friendly enough face on but letting her tone slip slightly into a threatening one. Sakura pressed closer to him, almost against him, letting her face melt into a sweet smile. "What, you don't have anything to hide, do you?"

Sukea blinked at her, and then his frame shook as he began to laugh. Sakura maintained her expression just barely as his hearty laughter filled her kitchen and entryway, ringing in her ears and settling in her stomach. Familiar, her gut told her.

"Well?" Sakura couldn't help but let a little of her annoyance slip as she let her hands slip from his coat's front. "Do you?"

Sukea shook his head, his laughter turning into a chuckle. His tone kept slipping slightly into a lower register in an abnormal way, making her suspicions rise in her like the hairs on the back of her neck - there was still something off about Sukea, something decidedly fake, and she was determined to find out what the hell it was.

"If you have nothing to hide," she said then, putting her hands on her hips, "then take off your coat and come sit with me, Sukea-san."

Sukea eyed her then, growing still. He seemed to make a decision that she could not see behind his dark eyes, and then he shrugged, his large hands moving up and beginning to unbutton his coat. He still looked somewhat nervous, Sakura noticed, as there was a bead of sweat on his brow - barely perceptible, but there. She could not help but to stand and watch as he shrugged off the coat after making quick work of the buttons, his dark eyes pinned to hers as he threw it to the side. He seemed to be daring her to look away, and she wouldn't have, but behind her the kettle in the kitchen began to whistle a high, ear-splitting pitch.

With a huff she turned and lifted the kettle from the stove, setting it aside and turning around in a fast movement back to Sukea.

He wore a simple black sweater that looked like a turtleneck that clung to his lean form. He was moving now, walking over to the couch in a familiar hunched way; he sprawled across it, leaning his head back on the cushions. His uneasiness was still apparent by the way his fingers tapped on the cushions, how his eyes roved around the room and back to Sakura.

She prepared two green teas and walked over to him, making an ahem in her throat; he moved one long leg to allow her to sit beside him as she set the two teas down on the coffee table. She sat with her back straight and looked over at him curiously. "So… why are you so uncomfortable, Sukea? Am I so terrible a host?"

He gave her a startled blink and reached out to pick up the tea. "Of course not," he assured her as he took a long sip. "I'm just… Not used to much company." Sakura leaned back, reminding herself to not act too suspicious, to loosen up; she set a hand on the cushion near his leg. It was an inconspicuous action, but Sukea eyed the hand as he drank his tea. "Why are you in Konoha?" Sakura asked as casually as she could manage.

Sukea's gray-brown eyes returned to hers, looking slightly droopy like he was about to fall asleep. Sakura gave a prim smile in return. "I'm here to see some old friends, see how they're doing from a different perspective," he told her, and she knew he was suspicious then when he set the unfinished tea back down on the table next to her cup, which she hadn't touched. "I've learned a lot while I was away about the world and thought I might make a recent visit and…"
He sniffed the air, and then looked at Sakura with wide eyes. "That's not green tea."

Her smile only grew bigger, showing her white teeth. Sukea began to waggle his open palms at her wildly, shaking his head. "No no no. Sakura, you don't understand - What have you -?!"

Sukea's head plopped backwards onto the couch cushions, eyes closing as he slumped, fast asleep.

three: orange

Cold adrenaline slivered Sakura's veins as she took in a slow, deep breath to ease her pulse. She held the breath in her lungs, feeling it stretch her, and waited ten seconds before she exhaled it through her nose. She consciously listened to the pleasant quiet of her house around her, and picked up the sound of Sukea's slow and easy breathing.

Her thoughts had been buzzing around her head in wild, looping circles and after she exhaled they slowed, settled, and melted into neat lines.

Sakura first reached out and took the tea cups from the end table, comfortable leaving him sprawled on the couch for the moment. She rinsed out the cups and set them in the sink. She then walked over to his coat that he had tossed on the stairs, picking it up gingerly and sticking her hands into the pockets to search for anything amiss. As she checked the pockets, finding nothing in the right side so far, her mind replayed how his eyes had darkened when she had pressed up closer to him. That look in his eyes was going to haunt her for a while. She was beginning to think perhaps she was going crazy, but that hungry, conflicted, dark look made her limbs tingle and her core burn. I know this man. I don't know how, but I do.

She began to check the left pockets, noting how the coat seemed almost new with no signs of wear, as if he wore it once a year. It was suspicious to her for sure - someone like a wandering photographer probably wouldn't carry many spare clothes, especially bulky coats, and there's no way he'd be able to keep it this immaculate if he wore it all the time.

Sakura found little in Sukea's coat pockets either but a wallet with only a few Ryo, which could buy just about nothing but a wish in the wishing well. No enemy missives, no weapons, nothing interesting but a bit of dust and a very slight papery smell. She found a few crumbs that she could smell was from a dog biscuit.

Sakura was less than amused at the complete lack of money on Sukea because it meant he was definitely not intending on paying for his ramen earlier at Ichiraku. He had had two ramen orderstoo, being nothing less than greedy with the food he ate. How could he have been so confident that Naruto would foot the bill? He certainly couldn't have thought Sakura would pay for him either. She shook her head with disapproval. What a mooch. She had half a mind to deck him just for taking advantage of Naruto's generosity, but it was no fun when he wasn't awake to fully appreciate the punch to his face.

She put the wallet and coat back where it was and walked back over to Sukea. He was limp on the couch, head tipped back on the cushion and brown hair splayed around his head and over his face. His face was much paler than earlier, and one hand was still over his stomach from when he'd realized she'd tainted his tea. His terse expression had relaxed, and Sakura felt a stab of annoyance at seeing him taking a peaceful nap on her couch.

But then she took a moment of self-awareness. She had all but lured an acquaintance to her home and drugged him based on unfounded suspicions and gut instinct, and now she had searched the man's wallet, and was about to give him a pat-down.

She shook her head. He could be an enemy, and he has had plenty of red flags to justify my actions. She cracked her knuckles. I trust my instincts.

Sakura began to pat down his person, searching for weapons, scrolls, or anything else like it. Her hands moved around his arms, around his sleeves; she brought her hands down his chest and patted around his sides, trying to ignore the thoughts that came up as she did so. He's in perfect shape. He's so lean and tall and muscled, but he's scarred - I can tell even with his clothes on. She cut off the last thought as she curled her fingers into his pants pockets, searching for something, anything.

Nothing. His jogger's loose pockets left black lint under her fingernails.

Sakura let out a vivid curse and plopped back down onto the couch next to Sukea with a frustrated sigh, covering her face with her hands. There was more of him still to pat down, but all the most common places for things to be hidden were lacking anything suspicious - and she was beginning to become more and more worried that she had been entirely wrong the whole time and was just a fool. How would she explain this should he report her? She could imagine herself now, standing in front of Naruto in the Hokage Tower, sheepish and guilty as she was asked to explain her aggravated kidnapping and drugging of an innocent man just trying to be a gentleman. Her face burned with shame already. She could lose her job at the hospital, lose her jonin status. Had her instincts about something being off with Sukea really been wrong the whole time?

Beside her, Sukea stirred, his face pinching a little in a terse expression before reverting to a peaceful expression of sleep. Sakura's brows quirked. That's a potent sleeping tea poultice I made. He shouldn't be able to fight it off for a while longer - he should be totally unconscious. Even stirring is a bit unusual. Does it have to do with how he's ex-Anbu?

Her gut sunk further into herself then. Fuck. If that's true… he'll have some remaining high reputation, and if he complained to the right people, he could ruin my life. Not to mention that Anbu are highly-trained individuals with a variety of resistances to things like my poultice.

Sakura buried her head in her hands. What do I do now?
She remembered Sarada suddenly. She was out late tonight with Ino and Sai's family. She pulled out her phone, texting Ino. She knew her friend wouldn't mind hosting her daughter for the weekend, and was probably already planning on letting her stay the night. Sarada had been spending a lot of time with them lately as she had become best friends with their son.

So she had the house to herself for the weekend. Sakura rubbed her temples to ease the headache that was coming on. But what to do with Sukea? He wasn't going to stay asleep long by the looks of it, and she needed to at least talk to him and explain herself before he woke up and reported her.

She eyed him as he slept, his chest rising and falling slowly. She still hadn't finished searching him over either.

The sound of her clock ticking up on the wall clicked through her thoughts, making them vanish. She nearly jumped through the roof when Sukea stirred again, turning his face into the couch cushion and hmming in his sleep. She ran her hands through her hair and decided she had to move him out of here, and now.

She angled herself as she leaned forward so she could tuck her arms underneath his lower back and beneath his knees, hooking her grip and picking him up with a grunt. Just as she was adjusting so he was more comfortable to carry, her phone began to ring in her pocket.

Fuck! She cursed at the loud ringtone splitting the quiet of the house, a beat with percussion and guitars clashing noisily with the little calm she had managed. It was buzzing and ringing in her coat pocket, which was now impossible to reach with her captive in her arms, and she tipped her head back with a curse. Pig, if that's you, I swear to God. And if he wakes up… She couldn't help but glance down at Sukea's now very near face that leaned into the crook of her neck and shoulder as he slept, and her cheeks colored red. That would be an interesting conversation.

Sakura managed to ignore the ringing phone until it quieted as she opened her back patio door with Sukea in her grip, kicking it shut behind her and hearing it automatically lock. She stood still a moment, making sure her burden had not somehow awoken. His head was lolled against her shoulder, eyes closed, his breathing regular. She could not help but notice that he smelled like steel and leaves, the warm scent filling her nose. She squinted at the additional scents of ramen, green tea, paper, and a slight plastic tang that she couldn't quite place. And was that a floral soap she could also detect? She held back a snort at that one. All so familiar somehow.

Sakura looked back into her quiet dark house, exhaling Sukea's odd bouquet of scents, and noticed hers and Sukea's discarded coats and scarf by the stairs and couch. She made a mental note to get rid of those before Sarada returned and asked questions about them, and then turned back to the door. As Sakura made a determined twist of her lips, jumping away into the forest beyond her patio, she thought she saw the tiniest glimpse of orange under her couch in the living room.

four: ino

Ino leaned against the wall of the kitchen as Sarada shuffled through her things upstairs, packing herself a bag of clothes for the weekend she was about to spend at Ino and Sai's home. Sakura's message was unexpected, but she felt unworried - she might have gotten a last-minute mission, and was probably excited to escape her life for a while to go on it. Ino had made the last-minute decision to just head over to Sakura's place to pick up Sarada's things with her before bedtime, figuring that the trip would be a five-minute one.

The house around Ino was well-decorated, covered in flowers from Ino's shop, carefully put together by someone who shouldn't have much free time to do so. Ino gave a sigh, shaking her head at her lonely friend.

Sarada seemed excited - Ino smiled knowingly, and an image of Sarada walking down the aisle with her son Inojin flashed in her head. She snorted. The girl's twelve, she doesn't know what she wants yet - but the image pleased her nonetheless.

She cast a glance at the teapot sitting on the counter. Had neat-freak Sakura left that out instead of washing it and putting it away? That was unlike her. Ino stepped over and poured out its contents into the sink, and her eyes widened at the pair of teacups in the sink. Ah… she had had company. That explains her being distracted from her usual neatness.

Company? When was the last time she had seen Sakura have company? Her mind immediately debated if the second teacup had belonged to a lover or not, and Ino steamed at not being let in on this juicy piece of knowledge. Sarada was taking her time upstairs; Ino decided to investigate.

She knew Sakura. She made green tea for new guests whose tastes she was unsure of and ginger-peach for regular company, one of her probably subconscious quirks as a host. And this was unmistakably green tea. Who could be the new stranger in Sakura's life? Ino thrilled to think.

Ino turned her attention to the couch in the adjacent living room, and when her eyes fell upon the large purple scarf thrown along the carpet, her jaw dropped. That's no scarf of Sakura's. That had to belong to whomever she had tea with.

She sprang across the room and knelt to the carpet by the couch to pick up the scarf. This belonged to a man, she could tell, seeing how it was large and wooly and hardly feminine. It smelled like a man. She wrinkled her nose at the familiar shinobi smells of steel and fresh air that clung to the scarf, as well as the definite male pheromones. It was a familiar scent, and she found herself slowly recognizing it even through the added scents of Sakura and green tea on it. It's not unusual for a guest to remove their scarf, but it's normally shed near the door, not cast aside by the couch… Ino narrowed her eyes thinking about what possible risqué things this could imply.

Ino thought her jaw was going to unhinge and fall off when she saw the little orange book shoved under the couch. As she stared at it, the scent registered in her mind, the connection fully made with the sight of the book.

Sakura was taking the weekend off to be with Kakashi? Her late-night last-minute guest whose scarf she ripped off (and heaven knows what else) was Kakashi?

No. It couldn't be.

She giggled, a hand coming up over her lips. She tried to make sense of it in her mind, repeating it to herself. So Sakura has run off somewhere with Kakashi. The thought tickled Ino and it was delicious gossip. Though, she had to admit that it was odd that Sakura had made him green tea instead of the usual ginger peach - and it was unlike Kakashi to be wearing a scarf. She wondered if she were perhaps just assuming who the man was incorrectly. But the book… The worn makeout tactics book hiding under the couch was just too like him. Nobody really read those anymore, even with some new sequels being released under Naruto's authorization, but Kakashi was as perverted as ever and was rarely seen without one. She reached out and took the book, flipping through the dog-eared pages with a shake of her head. Had he shoved this under here so Forehead wouldn't see it? That was even more odd. We've all seen him read it while we're trying to talk to him and it's still as annoying as ever when he does it. Maybe the reclusive former sensei is getting to be more of a gentleman with age.

And it was also odd that Sakura hadn't answered her phone. She answered calls within the first ring on a regular basis. Ino snorted and shook her head, and then her eyes widened as she froze with a new realization. Oh- maybe Sakura and her "guest" are upstairs together right now. That would explain her not answering the phone - Shit.

Ino turned and ran up the stairs, nearly tripping on Sakura's discarded coats that half-obscured the lower steps, hoping Sarada hadn't already peered into her mother's bedroom. Dread filled her stomach. She should have known to wait until tomorrow to bring Sarada by for her things - she just hadn't thought that Sakura would want the weekend off for that reason.

Ino found Sarada still shoving clothes into her pack in her own bedroom, and she passed by the doorway silently before the girl noticed her. She ducked her head into the bedroom at the end of the hall with delighted apprehension at what she might discover.

Darkness, silence, emptiness. The queen bed was neatly made and clearly unruffled. Ino let out a sigh of relief that she didn't know she had been holding in. Thank the gods that Sakura wasn't in here doing the deed with Kakashi.

As she leaned against the door to the empty bedroom in her relief, Ino was also interested to find that the image of Kakashi and Sakura as a couple in her mind wasn't particularly surprising to her. After all, those two had been spending a lot more time together over the past decade, and had become closer through the hellish experiences of the war. It was no surprise to anyone when they would be out sharing ramen or tea somewhere, swapping jokes and catching up as comrades, the old titles of sensei and student long shed in favor of the word friends. She was still the only medic he allowed to touch him after getting injured on missions, and he was her preferred partner on the few missions she took nowadays what with Sasuke ever-absent and Naruto busy with his duties as Hokage. There was no doubting that Kakashi and Sakura were birds of a feather.

Kakashi spent more time with Sakura than Sasuke ever had and Ino wouldn't be shocked if Sarada had started to see him as a father. The man was part of her daily life with how often he and Sakura spent time in each other's company, and Sakura was the only woman that Kakashi ever seemed to hang around. Now when Ino really thought about it, those two getting together made just simple sense.

She grinned. She would be sure to enlighten Forehead with this epiphany if it turned out that whomever she was with wasn't actually Kakashi. If anything, she would just like to see her friend's embarrassed, indignant, and telling reaction. It was about time she got over her absent husband and shared her heart as well as life with someone that actually cared about her.

As Sarada emerged from her room, Ino took a moment to take in her appearance. Sarada was Sasuke's kid, right?

Sarada blinked back at Ino with wide and innocent dark eyes. Ino shook the question from her head as she observed Sarada's long black hair glinting in the moonlight from a nearby window. Of course she is. Ino smiled at the girl and led her back downstairs, but the question making its presence known in her mind at all made her wonder. That girl needs a real father.

five: dark

Branches hissed and shook with the windstream funneling behind Sakura as she dashed through the woods with Sukea passed out in her grip. The sky was fully dark and speckled with a dusting of stars above them, and it was much colder this night than it had been for weeks. She leapt in a blur from branch to branch with feline grace and skill, her hair fluttering out behind her head in a long streak. Around them, a fog obscured the floor of the forest. Each time she leapt onto branches that stretched high enough, she could see the huge tree canopy that stretched in every direction into the horizon. It looked like she had gone so far into the sky that she was dashing over a sea of green clouds. The moon shone down like a silver eye, and she felt like she was being watched as she ran.

She could feel her lungs beginning to sear at the edges, her pulsing blood heating her enough to send sweat dripping and flittering off her in droplets. She was starting to slow her pace involuntarily. I need to rest, but it's still so far to go.

With a soft curse, Sakura leapt down and landed on a soft leaf-covered clearing where a few trees bent far enough away from each other to allow the tiniest patch of sky above them to shine down. She set Sukea down on the forest floor as she looked around them with tense shoulders. The fog obscured anything beyond the initial trunks of the trees around her, and she still had the feeling that she was being watched. Not good. I cannot stop here, but I cannot go forward any longer. The emotional and physical strain of today and Sukea's added weight to carry... my body must rest, or I'll pass out right alongside him.

Perhaps just a ten-minute rest, then, would help her enough to give her that last kick she needed to take the both of them there. It couldn't be too far now. She had run for hours, and reasoned that it was around midnight now.

Sakura glared down at his peacefully asleep form, laying on his side before her where she had set him down. She wondered how her day could possibly have turned a stranger direction. Sitting back in a squat next to him, she let the cool air soothe her sweating bare arms and legs. She wasn't looking forward to explaining everything to Sukea when he woke up - though her suspicions about him still insistently remained, tugging mercilessly at her gut. Her skin prickled at the feeling of being watched that made her stay alert and aware.

A breeze sighed through the clearing, ruffling her hair and cooling her sweaty skin. She tasted the delicious scents of the forest, the musk of the leaves, the flavors of pure cool night air. It felt so good to be out like this again, on the run for a mission, albeit self-assigned. She had missed this feeling of freedom and she savored every moment that it coursed through her like a wind that surged in her veins.

The hut has supplies. Weapons. Food and water and spare clothes. Sakura delighted in the idea of being able to sleep in the little cot in the small hut that served as her own personal getaway, and again fought her eyelids from falling as sleep moved to claim her. And it's secluded… I'll be able to stop him from running off and get some answers. Maybe he's not enemy shinobi, but he's still absolutely lying about something. His battlescarred hands, his strangely new coat, the inconsistencies in his voice and mannerisms… He's hiding something, and it's big.

Sakura coughed as redness colored her cheeks and she let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding, scattering the fresh rise of unclean thoughts that had popped into her head. I didn't know I'd gotten so perverted over time, she scolded herself. I swear, I'm getting to Kakashi's level of shameless perversion sometimes.

Remembering Kakashi had her pressing a palm to her forehead in frustration. He had slipped her mind when she was thinking of who she could come to in the middle of the night with a problem like this. She ran her hand through her hair and let out a huffed sigh. She had been on her way to see him for the usual ramen-and-chill they would have most nights after her shifts before she had been sidetracked today, and knew that he would have understood her suspicions about Sukea. She settled down from a squat onto a full sit next to Sukea on the forest floor, letting out a sigh; she could see her breath puff out as a white cloud in the chilled air as her mind cranked and turned.

Kakashi would have helped her come up with a plan that wasn't as harebrained as hers was turning out to be so far. She had also been ready to vent about her rough morning turning in those papers. He had helped her through the process, after all; he was the one who had helped keep her head up in the last few years, and he understood what she was going through better even than her best friend Ino.

Sakura hid a smile. He would still tease me for the way I went about things tonight. I'm sure he's not pleased I ditched him today… I should call him.

She pulled out her phone from her pocket. Even though it was too late to turn back with her captive - she was far too exhausted to make the trek back now - Kakashi's advice would be useful to her as it had been for nearly two decades.

The lit-up screen stayed that way for several minutes, continuously ringing until his automatic voicemail came up and the screen darkened. She stared down at the phone as it went into recording a voicemail, a slightly static silence waiting after a soft beep. She had never heard it go beyond two rings on his end, never had even an opportunity to leave a voicemail to him before.

He didn't answer?

Since when did Hatake Kakashi not answer her calls? Sakura resisted chucking the phone at the nearest tree, her sweaty fingers clutching hard enough around the device that it trembled like the case was about to crack. Dammit! Nothing is going right! First, all of this with Sukea, then I get too tired before I get us safely to the hut, THEN Kakashi doesn't answer my phone call for the first time in years! She knew it wasn't because of the late hour either - she had called him at stranger times for stranger things, and he always answered her within the first ring.

Sakura stared unseeingly at the phone clutched in her hand. She let out a few streams of incoherent curses, exhausting her vocabulary of swearwords, and it took another beep from the phone with a computer voice saying she had reached the limit for how long voicemails can be to snap her out of it. Sakura flushed with embarrassment as she hit end call and turned off the screen.

Well, that will be an interesting voicemail to explain to him later.

Sakura heaved a sigh and then her phone buzzed in her hand - she clumsily thumbed open the lock screen with a racing heartbeat to see what he'd said, dreading to read it, but saw that it was not Kakashi who had contacted her. It was Ino. Sakura's face bloomed a deep, tomato read as she read the text.

Having fun fooling around tonight, Forehead? I didn't know you were being so specific when you said that 'something came up' - I'm sure something did. ;) Tell Kakashi I say hi!

What?

Sakura furiously typed back a message calling her an idiot and that she wasn't out "fooling around" with Kakashi. What would make her think that? Ridiculous. Sakura swallowed a dryness that had suddenly parched her throat and fought back a weird urge to laugh and bury her head in her hands at the same time. There was a host of explicit images of Kakashi spawned by the teasing text running around her head, and though she tried to cripple them, they only intensified as if to mock her efforts. Sakura shoved the phone in her pocket, the lock screen flashing to warn her that its battery was low. I'm going to kill you, Pig, when this mess is over with…

She tried to cool off her suddenly hot skin as she looked around herself again. The fog was beginning to thicken around them, and she didn't feel any less tired than she had when she first settled down in the clearing. She eyed Sukea with a disgruntled expression. I can do this. I can carry this idiot and myself to the hut without passing out from exhaustion. I might not be in the best shape right now, but I can do this.

Getting wearily to her feet, Sakura scooped the captive back into her arms, shaking her head of drowsiness once more. Soon, soon I can slip into my cot and sleep. She began to run again, picking up the pace as her thoughts spun her head full of fuzzy images and memories. Her gut twisted as she worried about Kakashi, an added stress to her plate for the evening. I've heard others complain about him being quiet but he's never ignored me like that before - and it's not like he sleeps through ringtones. I hope he's all right.

Sakura was nearly sent spiralling off a branch as something whistled past her ear. She gasped, ducking and then dashing to the side - her eyes searched the dark forest around her, but she could see no one, hear no one. She cursed as this time her eyes caught on the next projectile coming her way, and she hissed as she dodged it - a kunai.

She didn't have time to process this as a spray of the spinning blades came at her from a different direction, which she narrowly avoided as she leapt higher and kicked up her speed. Sleep continued to threaten her as she ran, pulling at her eyes, and she clutched her captive tightly to her as she went, afraid of dropping him while dodging the kunai.

Crimson in her eyes and she felt a sear of pain as a blade lodged in her thigh and another sliced past her cheek, leaving a gash. Sakura pushed on, legs pumping as she ran, head down and blood pulsing. It's not far now. Not far. You can do it Sakura. Go.

There was another spatter of red as she felt the man in her arms jerk. She noticed with horror that there was a kunai now lodged in his shoulder. He remained asleep, but she saw that he was grimacing, his mouth and brows tensing with the pain. Her guts twisted with intense guilt, and her hands tightened their grip on him as she fought to keep calm.

Sakura emerged from the forest past the treeline into an area that opened up into a canyon. Great shaggy crags of stone twice the size of Konoha stretched before her, and she happened to see a crevasse at the far end of the canyon - she kept running, a warm stinging wetness on her cheek that she didn't doubt was blood, and she knew that her attackers weren't far behind her. Her hand where she held Sukea around his arm and shoulder tingled at the seeping of his blood through the coat - this is bad, the kunai is in deep, gods is it poisoned? Who are these attackers? If they're with Sukea, why would they injure their own teammate?

She thundered into the crevasse and immediately swerved to support Sukea with one arm against her as she slammed her free fist into the ground behind her. She leapt back a half-second after the impact. The ground beneath them shuddered and split, opening and cracking to reveal a seemingly bottomless abyss in the widening cracks between the split earth. She dashed from rock pillar to rock pillar, bringing herself and her captive further away from the crevasse entrance and deeper into the cave. She finally crash-landed onto a rocky edge that overlooked the black abyss, and her breath shuddered as she curled around the bleeding captive and tried to keep conscious from the overexertion.

Please let that hold them off. Please let this work. I can't… I can't do this any more.

She collapsed beside Sukea, raking in breaths as she tried to slow her heartbeat. She reached a tendril of thought through her body, testing to see how much chakra she had left as she looked over at him with a groan. His sleep was pained now, his features drawn together in agony, and his shoulder was a deep red hue that dripped from the black sweater and the tear where the kunai was firmly lodged in his skin. She reached out, a meaty shkk sound making her cringe as she pulled the blade from his shoulder. He cried out in pain and Sakura held back a curse as she leaned over and tugged the torn sleeve fully off of his arm. She placed her hands over his open wound and concentrated. Every last ounce of chakra… Have to heal…

Sakura felt the hot bleeding flesh under her hands twitch and move like it was its own living thing, responding to her cool green chakra, mending. Relief tinged her fingers upon sensing no poison in the wound, and the wide gash was starting to close up. But the longer she held her hands there, the more that darkness encroached on her mind, waiting for the opportunity to pull her into unconsciousness. She was forced to pull her hands away, propping herself up on her elbow, her mind spinning. She ran a hand over her face in shame, leaving red streaks of his and her blood along her face, but she didn't care - fool, fool, fool, she was telling herself, in way too deep for me to handle alone.

She tugged the phone out of her pocket and choked back a sob when it was unresponsive to her pokes and prods. The screen was black; it was dead.

Her cheek stabbed with pain, and she raised a hand to her face as she felt her wound. Her thigh was throbbing where another blade was stuck in her flesh. She didn't have much chakra left - maybe if she tapped into her stores… She focused, taking in a slow breath, easing her stress and forcing her cycling mind to slow, slow down. She felt her pulse beginning to go from a frenzied jaunt to a casual jog, and then to the pace of a thoughtful stroll through her veins. That's right. Slow down. Block out the pain. She felt the small diamond on her forehead with her fingers, keeping her breathing steady.

Though her emotions had settled like sediment in the depths her thoughts, plinks of guilt continued to rain down and disturb the glassy cool surface of her mind. The ripples of it lapped into her subconscious and she knew she would be feeling its aftereffects for a long time.

While she tried not to drown in her guilt, her chakra was doing its work; her cheek wound slowly mended shut, and her thigh was beginning to heal as well.

Sakura opened her eyes, not realizing that she had closed them.

Sukea watched her with wide gray eyes, sitting up with a hand over his half-healed shoulder wound. He coughed before he spoke, his voice hoarse and much much too familiar. "Sakura?"

She launched herself at him without thinking, pinning him to the ground. She started signing with her hands, being as quick as she could with how sluggish and tired her mind was - but Sukea caught one of her wrists with his other hand, his teeth clenched in pain from his still-bleeding shoulder. "Sakura. Stop."

She struggled for a moment, determined, and he was grimacing with frustration as he fought to hold her still. "This has gotten wildly out of hand. How long have I been out? Who is attacking us?" Sukea successfully gripped both of her wrists, holding her forcefully still above him. He moved to sit up, making her sit back on the ground in front of him, legs splayed. Sakura's struggles were growing weaker, though the gleam of determination and mistrust was bright in her eye. "You tell me," she hissed as she kept shifting, trying to break free from his grasp.

He glanced out at the distant cave opening, his quick eyes taking in every detail in a single moment before returning his attention to Sakura with his mouth open to ask something else - but she had sunk, limp in his grip, and she promptly fell forward and slumped across Sukea as she passed out.

six: run

When Sakura came to, she found herself washed in a dim gray light, her head nestled on warmth. She wanted to return to the soft lull of sleep, her few moments of renewed consciousness already beginning to remind her of how much her body ached. As she slowly came to, she began to hear the wind rushing past her ears, how her hair was whipping around in the air and tugging at her scalp; she realized she was leaning against that warmth that had woken her, and she was being carried.

Her eyes fluttered open as a flurry of shuriken seared past, just beyond Sukea's head, as he ran with her in his arms. He was dashing through the cave, gripping her tightly as he expertly dodged each wave of spinning blades. Sakura found she had little choice but to hunch against his body as they were flung through the air, holding on for dear life - her ears rang with the metallic shnng sound of blades barely missing her and Sukea. As he leapt from rocky cave ledge to ledge, he did a graceful twist and flip in the air to avoid yet another wave of spinning shuriken.

Sukea darted with the dizzy and still barely-conscious Sakura toward the crevasse that served as the entrance to the cavernous cave. The black-clad shinobi who were positioned there retreated as he somersaulted through and landed on his feet, supporting her against his chest with one arm. In his other hand he had a shuriken that he had caught from one of the thrown waves, and he held a grin almost like a grimace on his face with white, clenched teeth. With one fling of his arm and a leap, the pair of them were launched upwards; she heard the screams of several of the men below as his perfectly-thrown blade sliced through them.

Sukea landed with minimal impact and practiced grace on the clifftop, glancing down at Sakura cursorily to make sure she was unharmed - then he looked west and kicked off toward that direction, the night air coursing in windy waves around them.

"Where are you going?" Sakura gasped, her hands clutching at the pooled fabric of his collar for something - anything - to hang on to. She hissed into his shoulder, wriggling in her wrist restraints. He was leaping across canyon tops, giving Sakura a terrible lurching feeling in her stomach, and felt like a helpless girl again as she was carried in a streak across the terrain.

She squinted against the rushing streams of air that blinded her vision, moving to press her hands near her face to protect her eyes from the wind. It was then that she finally realized with numb shock that her wrists were bound. She wriggled her hands automatically, but the bindings - looking to be simple bandages - held firm. She knew they had to be laced with chakra in order for her to not tear them easily, but she fought them anyway. "Damn you," she added as she wriggled, and Sukea's mouth turned up in a smirk as he dashed over the forest floor between the trees. Through the hissing winds, she barely heard his reply. "That's no way to talk to someone who just saved your life while you napped."

Sakura was about to spit a retort when her stomach lurched. Sukea had slowed to a stop, and she found as she blinked away the dryness of her eyes that they were standing in front of her hut - the very one that she had been trying to get to before. While she stared at it in disbelief, Sukea reached over with his other hand and untied her wrists. She found her footing on the ground and he let go of her; she rubbed her sore wrists, getting to her feet.

Sakura swerved to look at him, eyebrows twitching with her abundance of confusion. "Wh-how-how did you know about this place?"

Sukea folded his arms and let out a huge sigh. His voice was deep again, and she knew now for sure that his different voice timbre from before was a false one, covering up the normal voice that he had and was using now. "Sakura."

"Sukea-san." She matched his posture, eyeing him. She still didn't like his lack of honorifics.

"This is a very large misunderstanding."

She swallowed, her gut wrenching as she knew he was right. "Yeah?"

Sukea gave her a small smile, shaking his head slightly. "Drugging my tea was certainly not where I thought yesterday evening was going. Was it the valerian root concentrate you carry around sometimes?"

"Who are you?" She didn't want to waste time with small talk. She had to know.

He gave her a wicked grin. "You're not going to like the answer to that question." He rubbed at his half-healed injury with a hand, wincing a little. Her eyes followed his hand, and she saw the red gleam of the ANBU tattoo on his shoulder. Returning her gaze to his, Sakura stepped forward, raising a fist threateningly. "Tell me who you are."

"Sakura," Sukea said, his tone lowering dangerously, "It might be better if you just don't find out. You'll never be able to go back once you know." His eyes flicked to the side and back to her as if there were others nearby overhearing their conversation. "And… I never meant… never expected this to go this way." She could hear the truth in his words, and it made her more uneasy; she lowered the fist, only to raise it near face when he took a step backwards. There was a promising gleam in her eye she knew he could recognize. Sukea caught her fist in a tight grip, and his gray-brown eyes narrowed. His fingers tightened. "Let's do it this way. You tell me your theories, and if you're right, I'll tell you."

Sakura wrenched her wrist free and glared at him. "No. I'm not playing games with you."

"Then you'll never know." And with that, Sukea vanished in a whoosh of air and a puff of smoke, and she was left standing alone in front of her hut.

What? I… failed?

Sakura stepped back, a stagger in her step like she had been punched in the gut. After all that I just endured, he just… vanished?

She slumped against the outer wall of the small wooden hut, placing a hand over her pulsing heart as unbearable disappointment and shame crunched her slim remaining hopes into dust. I have utterly and completely failed. Not only did I make things worse, but I didn't even succeed in learning who he really was. Now, Sukea will return to Konoha, report me for what I did, and utterly ruin my life.

Failure.

The realization was enough to crush her, enough to make her so lost in herself that she couldn't even be angry at Sukea for turning tail and disappearing.

It took her another half hour before she could muster any interest in moving from where she was curled up, and when she did get to her feet she found herself turning into the little hut and collapsing into the cot by the door. Screw it all, she decided, and shoved her face into the small white pillow that awaited her.

A small, hateful inner voice whispered into her ears and made her shake with sobs. Tsunade would be disappointed in you.

She found herself falling into darkness once again then, her eyes stinging with her shame.

seven: rock

When Sakura came to, face groggily turning toward the strange noise of steel grating against steel, she realized that her former captive was busy sharpening his kunai while crouched in front of the shut door. He regarded her with unreadable eyes beneath his dark bedhead hair. "Good, you're finally awake. We have company." He inclined his head towards the door where they could both hear the slight sounds of shuffling feet and weapons being unsheathed outside.

"They're back?" Sakura sat up slowly, running a hand through her hair and blinking. "Wh…"

"Yeah, I fought off some of them while you were asleep. Seems they sent some backup."
"Who?"

"I'm not sure where they're from yet. They seem particularly interested in you. I've kept them at bay, but you're welcome to join me in finishing them off."

"You came back."

"Yeah?" Sukea regarded Sakura with raised eyebrows, as if his return had never been in question. She rubbed at her cheeks, hoping that her tearstains had faded. He didn't miss this small movement and narrowed his eyes - is that guilt I see in his face?

"Why?" She swung her legs over the bed and let out a slow sigh. "You had no reason to."

There was the slightest sound of a footstep somewhere outside of the hut and both Sukea and Sakura instinctively moved back away from the door.

"Honestly, Sakura." Sukea gave a short bark of a laugh and shook his head as he adjusted his grip on his blades, spreading his feet in a ready stance. She caught the kunai that he tossed her, and she adjusted her grip on the warm handle with practiced ease. His eyes were trained on the door as he spoke. "Let's just deal with these unwelcome guests first."

She nodded, still not confident that he wouldn't disappear again and leave her to deal with it. She was too exhausted to try and ponder his identity anymore; she still wanted to fall back asleep and escape the mess the last day and a half had been. Sakura steeled herself as they turned together to face the door as Sukea kicked it open and enemy shinobi flooded her small hut.

The shinobi had been weak enough; neither of the pair had needed to use their chakra, and the battle was over in minutes. Not long after one enemy had been killed and several more badly injured, the dark-clad men scooped up their fallen one and retreated back into the woods.

Too easy, Sakura thought as she stared with a frown at the mess her hut had become - there were blades stuck in the walls, blood spatters across the earthen floor, and the hut door was hanging off its hinges. She was reminded of Sukea's unnaturally graceful tai-jutsu and lightning speed as he had cut them down, and she found herself glad that she wasn't battling himinstead.

Sukea brushed himself off, looking bored and barely ruffled from their short but bloody battle. "I'm sure they were trying to get one of the bounties on your head, Sakura. I've seen your face in the bingo books."

She put a hand to her mouth with mild surprise. "Well. Should I be flattered they had to send this many men after one woman?"

Sukea gave her a pointed look. "Your reputation demands it."

Sakura hmm'd at the observation. She was both annoyed and in a strange way pleased that she was so widely known and apparently feared that there would be assassins sent after her, and regardless of her exhaustion that was barely dented by her stint sleeping in the cot, she wanted to dive after them into the woods and hunt them down. But she remained where she was, not missing how Sukea was looking shifty again, eyeing the partially open door.

"So," Sakura began, looking at Sukea from the corner of the eye. He echoed her as a smile ghosted his lips. "So." He was sheathing his weapons now, his fingers white as they gripped them more tightly than needed. She saw the sweat glistening under his dark brown hair that certainly wasn't from the fighting. Don't run, she silently pleaded. She sat down on the cot with a tired huff, and Sukea sat down next to her at a safe distance.

Sakura reached over and jabbed him in the side. He jumped a little, shooting her a glare. "Tell me who the fuck you are before I knock you out again," she commanded, her tone stern. She knew by his wide-eyed return stare that he knew she was being serious.

"I still want to know your theories first. Sakura -"

She had a fist raised, and something in her eyes gave him pause. Sukea reached out and slowly lowered her fist with his palm like earlier. "Humor me. I won't run - you're too tired right now to fight off those shinobi if they come back with more of them. Just... humor me."

Sakura shook her head, losing her patience. "Fine. I thought you were an enemy spy at first, someone lying about who they were to infiltrate the village. I didn't realize our attackers weren't with you until they injured both of us."

"Well, that I know," he laughed, and she raised the fist again. His laughter halted quickly. "I meant names."

"Names?"

"Names."

Sakura rubbed a hand through her hair, suddenly lacking confidence and noticing her pulse racing. She knew her investigative skills should be sharper right now, but she was frazzled and exhausted, and the way he was giving her an incredulous expression was throwing her off.

Sukea's hands were raised to clasp behind his neck as he gave her a lazily weary look. Yet again he struck her as familiar, and she became only more annoyed as her head began to ache with her frustration. Sakura rubbed at her temples, warding off the coming headache, and she was just too tired to try and think this through. His heightening amusement was doing nothing to help, either.

"What, you really have no idea? After this entire day and a half with me now you have no idea? Sakura… I thought you saw through me better than that."

She was scrutinizing him now, murder in her eyes, and he squirmed a little where he sat.

"Hint," he said, folding his arms and leaning back against the wall. She was struck suddenly by just how tall he really was, his head near to the hut's ceiling even when sitting. "We've known each other for over half your life."

Sakura prodded his chest with an accusatory finger and a scowl. "I've known most of the village for over half my life. Is that why you're so nervous to tell me who you are? Because you know I won't hesitate to beat your ass for trying to fool me?"

"Trying? You mean succeeding."

She slapped at him, and he deflected the blows with a laugh. "I meant it, you might not want to know."

Sakura folded her arms then, scrutinizing Sukea as she gave his appearance some thought. "Well, you're very tall, so that gets rid of a bunch of names. You're at least somewhat clever or devious, so that means you're most definitelynot Gai-sensei or most of the other jonin…" She leaned in and Sukea bumped his head on the wall as he cringed backward. She suppressed a smile upon seeing how he was starting to avoid meeting her gaze. "Oh - and you're Anbu,' Sakura remembered, her eyes touching on the swirl of red on his shoulder. "I think I know."

Sukea couldn't press backward any further while she leaned closer, eyes sparkling with mischief she didn't know she had. "Kakashi."

His eyes widened as he grew very still. Sakura laughed, clutching her stomach as she wiped her brow with the back of one hand. "No, no, I'm kidding. You can't be Kakashi. He wouldn't be able to pull this off so well. Perhaps…" She raised a finger to her chin and let herself think for a moment. Sukea seemed to relax slightly, but he had gone ghostly white. "Perhaps…" Sakura sat back on the bed then, feeling her stomach clench unpleasantly. "Captain Yamato-san…?" His voice isn't quite right to be Yamato, but he could be changing how he sounds again.

"Really?!" Sukea rubbed his face in his hands with despair, some of the purple paint over his eyes coming off on his palms. "You think Tenzou could pull this off but not Kakashi?"

She shrugged, feeling only more confident as she thought about her theory and unbothered by Sukea's use of the captain's other name. "I know Kakashi too well. I'd recognize him anywhere, so he's disqualified. Anyway, Yamato-san's kind of a weirdo, and he was in ANBU. Only someone like him could pull off fighting like that earlier and be at least kind of clever."

Sakura caught how Sukea had been gaping at her openly before he forced his expression back into neutrality. "Kakashi is like that too, you know. I think you are too confident in your powers of recognition." He looked greatly annoyed now, tapping his fingers on the cot and pouting.

"That's really bothering you," she commented, eyes narrowing at him.

He gestured widely, red dusting his face. "Well of course it bothers me! You think he could be a subtle master of disguise but not-"

Sukea stopped himself, and his eyes slid back to Sakura as she bit back a grin at his all-too-obvious giveaway.

"Ahh." She sat back, looking smug. "There it is."

He managed to get a little paler, and she laughed as she shuffled back to put appropriate distance between them on the cot. "Confirmed. I knew it. Well, I didn't know until now, but only you would try so hard to cover up that you're him. Ha ha, you fooled me good. You can take the disguise off now, Yamato-san. Damn… I didn't think you could be so tenacious with a disguise, even though it had clear inconsistencies. Why were you so hellbent on waiting to tell me who you are?"

He was eyeing her cautiously. "You're not serious."

"No, I'm proud of you! You got me good." Sakura was shaking her head in disbelief, trying to reconcile her mental image of the eccentric dark-eyed captain with Sukea and failing. "Your disguise is honestly brilliant. I even thought you were attractive at one point." She blushed at her own unexpected admission, but it was out of her mouth before she could stop herself. "Only in disguise could I think that about you - no offense, Captain - And!" She ran her fingers over her scalp, remembering with a flush of heat how she had passed out in Sukea's lap. Her body tingled with a warm flush of embarrassment. Her mind replayed the memory but with Sukea replaced by Yamato, the captain staring blankly down at her as he picked her up and held her to his chest. Chills made her shudder violently - nope, nope, nope. Sakura found herself wishing it had been Kakashi instead. She wouldn't be nearly as nauseous as she was starting to get if Sukea had turned out to be him instead of Yamato -

Sukea leaned forward with a frustrated grunt and he pulled off the mop of brown hair from his head, dashing it to the dirt floor. "Dammit. I wanted to wait a little longer or even better just never show you, but you thinking I'm Tenzou is just toomuch of an insult."

Sakura stopped breathing at the shock of silver hair that sprang from beneath the wig. He was still talking, removing things, and she could only stare as he next pulled out gray contacts that plopped to the dirt; then he removed the sticker from his scarred left cheek. "Honestly. Tenzou? That wood-wielding idiot pulling off a brilliant disguise? Did you see him chasing after Orochimaru in the streets before Naruto and Hinata's wedding?" He shook his head of silver hair and rubbed off the rest of the paint from his cheeks as he continued, his tone half-annoyed and half-affectionate. "At one point he was running around wearing a barrel as a disguise. A barrel! And you think he could fool you like this instead of me..."

'Sukea' stopped when he noticed Sakura's expression, swallowing the rest of his sentence. He gave her an uneasy smile, reaching out to gently touch her shoulder. "Sakura. Sakura -"

"KAKASHI!"

Sakura threw herself at her companion, fists thrown at him in quick succession as he blocked them just as quickly. Her teeth were clenched in her blotchy tomato-red face and he was squinting back at her with an equally vividly-colored face. "You - damn - fool - Kakashi!" She shoved him and he nearly fell off the cot. He caught her wrists so she couldn't punch him anymore, and she wiggled to fight out of his restraining grasp. She only got angrier at the gleam in his eye, and then fought him harder. "How could you-! This whole fucking time I thought -"

Kakashi was struggling to keep her caught, and then he suddenly let her go as he flashed to the other end of the tiny hut. She slammed her fists down on the cot, which bent the frame nearly in half and sent her bouncing clumsily off it onto the dirt floor. She shot the cot a guilty glance and then an acidic glare at Kakashi. He gave her a little shrug, pulling his mask up from his pooled turtleneck collar to cover the lower half of his face; there was a quiet thwap of the black nylon as it snapped and melded into place.

That gave her pause, and her fists unclenched as she sat up. "Wait… That whole time… I was seeing your entire face?"

Kakashi blinked at her with a slightly tilted head, and the way he squinted slightly at her told her that he thought it was idiotic question.

I've been looking at his entire face for well over a day and didn't even know it. She sat back with a stupid look, half-dazed as it all rushed into her head now, the pieces falling into place. Genius. We'd never seen the lower half of his face, so why would we recognize him in disguise without his mask? And he changed the color of his eyes, changed his hair - the two things we recognize the most easily. He even changed the timbre of his voice for most of the time so he's virtually unrecognizable. It also explains why he was slow to reveal that he is who he is… he's spent his entire life hiding his whole face from us, and from everyone else too. She blinked at Kakashi. But… how? How, even with the thoroughness of his disguise, did I still not see him for who he is right away? I spend part of every single day with him; I know him better than anyone else in Konoha.

It took Sakura a moment to process that, too. Trying to deny it was pointless. She knew that it was true - no one knew Kakashi better than her except maybe his ninken, and no one in Konoha knew her better than he did.

"Epiphany?" Kakashi looked around the hut boredly, eyes touching on anything but her. If it weren't for the faint pink in his cheeks Sakura would wonder if he was embarrassed at all. "When you're finished gaping at me like a fish, can you show me where you have something to eat around here? I haven't eaten since yesterday."

Sakura shook her head of her oncoming dizziness and pointed at the small cupboard he was leaning on. Kakashi's gaze traced along her finger and then looked down at himself; his eyes flicked to hers with raised eyebrows. "Ummm…"

"No, no! The cupboard, you idiot." Sakura snorted and rubbed her temples as she tried to block out the heat in her cheeks and ground her spinning mind. She heard her companion chuckle as he got up and started digging through the cabinet's contents.

She heard him humming with interest on what he was finding and tried to remember if there was anything embarrassing in there as she bent the cot's metal frame carefully back into place. Last I left here, I had some dried fruit and herbs, some fishing hooks, medical supplies, books, blank scrolls and ink, sketchbooks, spare clothes, a backup charger, some miscellaneous things… Nothing bad, right?

"Oh?" Kakashi paused from rifling through her things, and she heard the delight in his voice as she turned to face him. Horror made her guts writhe at the sight: Kakashi, dangling her worn, forgotten copy of Icha Icha Violence with a cheeky look in his uncovered eye. "What's this, Sakura?"

"No no no no no! Put that back!" Sakura rushed over to him and tried to grab the book from his hands, hissing with embarrassment as she scrabbled at it. He kept it just out of her reach, standing up to his full height, and she jumped up to try and get it with fruitless efforts. Kakashi was greatly enjoying himself, keeping it from her reaching hands with ease and watching her with amusement. "I didn't know you shared my tastes in literature. I must have rubbed off on you more than I thought." His slim silver eyebrow waggled, and she didn't think it was possible to turn a brighter shade of red.

"Dirty pervert - Give it back!" She lunged at the book again. He tossed it to his other hand, outstretching a long arm over her head with glee. "Oh, I'm not the dirty pervert here, Sakura. This is your book in your little hideaway hut. Tell me, what was your favourite part?"

"Bastard!" She leapt up at the dangling book and her fingers brushed along its bright orange cover. Kakashi had it back in his other hand in a flash, holding it behind his back. "If you tell me, I'll give it back." She could see his shit-eating grin beneath the mask. She stomped her foot with huff and gave him her best death-glare. "Kakashi, I will end you," Sakura growled. "Give me the damn book and let's forget this ever happened."

Kakashi made a small cough, and she realized with a jolt that she had wrapped herself around him in her quest to snatch away the book. Sakura looked up into his now very-close face; he was as red as she was. For a moment neither of them spoke, and he shifted a little; she could feel how tense he was. His scent filled her nose, making her dizzy again, and she squinted up at him as she tried to keep her mind on track.

"Um… Sakura?"
She flashed him a grin, and then her hands behind him closed upon the book and she wrenched it out of his grip. Dancing backward, Sakura panted, suddenly out of breath. She was gripping the book tightly, and eased her fingers enough so she wouldn't damage it. She found that she was unable to meet Kakashi's dark eyes burning into her face and she returned her attention to the cot; she started tapping the metal frame in places, making sure it was perfectly straight.

She heard him shift and start digging through the cupboard again, and her face cooled as if the sun itself had just been burning off her features. Letting out a breath, she set the book down on the ruffled covers and then patted her pockets unconsciously. Things are suddenly awkward, she realized as the silence in the hut continued. Is it my fault? I shouldn't have done that. But he was teasing me, he invited it. Right? Sakura peeked at Kakashi from the corner of her eye; her view of his face was blocked by the open door of the cabinet. She took advantage of this for a moment to keep staring, and her gaze travelled down his side only to halt on something just over his left hip. It was a deep stain in his clothes, harder to spot because of the dark colors he always wore, but her expert eye detected it as blood from something that must be a fairly large and definitely painful wound.

"Kakashi!" she spat, "why didn't you tell me you're hurt?" She wasted no time coming over to him and pulling him away from the cabinet, pushing him so he sat down. He was munching on a dried apricot from her stores; her hand flashed into the cabinet and she cut away his shirt where it stuck to the bloody patch on his hip, the kunai glinting ebony-black in her hand. "It's not so bad," he murmured while she shifted his leg aside and cut away part of his waistband to reveal the full length of the gash. It ran from above his hip to mid-thigh, she realized, and cursed softly as she parted more cut fabric to reveal it. She felt him wince as she gently prodded around the open cut and she shot him a dirty look. "You have got to stop saying that every time I heal your festering wounds, Kakashi," she scolded as she took out a bottle of water from the cupboard and poured it along his gash. "You know you can't hide this stuff from me." She felt a little better as the warm water washed away the dirt and blood from his leg.

"Thank you," he sighed, tipping his head back against the hut wall; she shifted his leg aside, scooting in closer as she positioned her hands over the open wound. Her hands moved along the gash with the lightest of touches; she closed her eyes and focused. She could feel him relax as her cool green chakra flowed into the wound and helped it mend and close.

She sat back, brushing her hands together with satisfaction as she looked down at her work. His gash was fully closed, leaving behind a long and thin scar, and the skin was only a tinge of pink as opposed to the angry red it was before. The leg arched as he pulled his knee up and she turned her head with wide eyes to realize that she was just about sitting in Kakashi's lap again. His amused expression had returned as he regarded her. "Tell me, why do you have an Icha Icha book here?"
Sakura rearranged herself so that she was sitting near but not that near Kakashi, folding her arms and regarding him with a half-playful glare. She mocked his tone with her response. "Why did you show up disguised as Sukea? And - how did you know where to find my hut?"

They watched each other with narrowed eyes. "I'll tell you if you tell me," Kakashi offered, and they both knew what was next.

"Rock paper scissors," they said in unison. "Best out of three," she added.

Sakura leaned in unconsciously, hands in position to play the game as they tried to read each other for who would do what choice first. He'll go with scissors first, Sakura thought, so I'll go with rock.

"Rock, paper, scissors, shoot -" Kakashi chose paper, and she chose rock. Sakura let out a curse as he chuckled. "So easy to predict, Sakura," he teased, and she threw her "rock" fist at him, landing a blow on his shoulder. He rubbed the spot with a fake expression of pain as they readied their hands for round two. "Rock, paper, scissors, shoot!"

His scissors beat her paper, and she let another curse. His eyes crinkled in a smile. "One more, but it looks like you're going to be telling me about your secret penchant for porn, Sakura."

She trembled a little, and her mind was frazzled enough that she couldn't identify every reason why her fist shook slightly over her flat open palm. No way. No way I'm telling Kakashi why I read his favourite dirty book series or what my favourite part is. She felt him watching her with interest, and she met his curious gaze with a determined glare. "One more round." They readied their hands, and she tried to read his mirthful dark eye as they went for round three. I'll do rock again. He won't think I'll be dumb enough to do it again so I'll do it again.

"Dammit! Dammit, dammit." Sakura gazed down with vast disappointment and growing embarrassment at his flat palm indicating paper and her fist indicating rock. He was holding back a chuckle, and she shoved him. She didn't need to look up at Kakashi to see and feel his delighted expression of victory. He does know me too well.

eight: lines

"Rematch," Sakura growled, unwilling to give in. "You - you cheated, somehow." She found herself wishing she still had the convenient excuse of Kakashi's Sharingan to blame for occasions like this.

Leaning back with folded arms, Kakashi gave her a wide smile that confirmed he wasn't going to do a rematch. She looked away from him, pushing the hair back from her face and actively trying to get her face to cool down. "Let me… let me just…" She got to her feet, rubbing at her hot cheeks and picking up the shards of her pride.

"Take your time," she heard him say, his smirk audible. She caught a glimpse of his long arm reaching over and picking up her Icha Icha Violence book, sticking it up near his nose and beginning to read while he waited. Sakura shook her head with amusement at this familiar habit of his. "Shameless pervert," she muttered, and felt him kick her shoe as she passed him to kneel by the cabinet.

As she knelt, she remembered a lump in her pocket - her phone. It had been dead since last night, or whatever time it was now - Sakura glanced toward the hut door where light shone dimly through tiny gaps in the doorframe. Must be midday. She took the phone out of her pocket and pulled out a long cord from the recesses of the cabinet where it was attached to a small mobile generator. I'll charge it up and check with Ino to make sure all is well with Sarada. The phone blinked to life as she inserted the charger into its port.

She heard Kakashi say something, and she turned, eyeing him suspiciously as she set the phone down on top of the cabinet. He was standing and patting himself down with a bemused look on his face. Sakura raised her eyebrows at him quizzically, resisting laughing at his comical expression like that of a kid who dropped his ice cream. "My own Icha Icha," he was saying, "where is it?"

Sakura blinked. "What, you brought it?"

The look Kakashi shot her made her roll her eyes and she took on a mildly patronizing tone. "Where did you last see it?"

He pressed a thoughtful finger to his masked lips. "Hmm. At your place, I think." Then his eyes narrowed back at her. "That's right. That tea… dammit, Sakura, is that how you treat all of your guests?"

Sakura's ears turned a shade that matched her hair. "Well, you shouldn't be reading porn at a casual chat over tea," she blurted, and he raised a single eyebrow. "Is that what it was?"

"What!" Sakura got clumsily to her feet and curled her hands into fists, the phone forgotten. Kakashi's tone was still lightly teasing, but there was something just beyond the playful look in his eyes that she couldn't quite read. He had pressed the right buttons to make her indignant - he knew the ones that riled her up, and he knew she was embarrassed at the reminder of last night's events. She folded her arms tightly, resisting punching him just yet. "What are you trying to imply?"

"Hmm." Kakashi fell into his usual relaxed slouch with his hands hooked in his jogger pants' pockets. "You know, I wasn't exactly sure what you were implying yesterday evening either."

Sakura remembered his initial hesitation at her door, how she had had to hike up her charms in order to coax him into her home. Her cheeks burned with heat now as she refinished her memories with Kakashi's face and likeness instead of Sukea's, and the more she remembered, the more she found that she couldn't meet his eyes. She knew she had not been subtle in her implications last night, regardless of having no intention to actually see them through, and it shocked her that he hadn't just poofedinto smoke at her first suggestive implication.

The memories flooded to her regardless of her wishes. Sukea's eyes darkening as her hands rested on his chest, the scarf she had ripped from him fluttering down to the side. Sakura looking up into his face daringly, standing close enough to smell the hints of ramen in his breath. The undeniable blush in his high cheekbones that matched her hair. The way she had searched his face with a knowing, flirtatious smile, and the way he had been receptive to her charms - how he had never broken eye contact with her as he tossed away his coat. Pure adrenaline, shared between them both.

Rarely, if ever, had Sakura ever had chemistry with someone she viewed as a target or enemy that she was using her kunoichi charm on. If she had, it had been based purely on lust from appearances, and she knew to her bones that that wasn't the case with "Sukea."
Kakashi was patiently watching her with a neutral expression while she dealt with their conversation - she didn't doubt that her face, morphing from expression to expression, was an open book to him. The way he was relaxed still, seemingly unbothered, told her that he was in the very least not upset by the way they had interacted at her home. Though that served as a sort of comfort to Sakura - who no matter what, did not want either of them to be uncomfortable or genuinely angry with the other - there was another question nagging at her mind that she had to at least entertain.

Why didn't he disappear much earlier?

Sakura was certain that he could have easily seen from her terse and strange reactions to him early on that his disguise was either not working well or something was going wrong. It would have been little chore or consequence to Kakashi had he simply recognized that the joke was done with and left; she would have been none the wiser about who Sukea truly was, and because of this, he could have continued on life with her without issue. She knew she herself would have gotten over the stranger and his suspicious actions eventually anyway.

But he had made a silent decision during his clear conflictions over taking her invite. "Sukea" had let her pull him into her home, the events of the night unfolding from there - and she remembered again their chemistry.

"You know now, and knew then, what I was implying." Sakura fixed Kakashi once again with her scrutiny, and he lowered her Icha Icha book from his face to allow his attention to be caught. He blinked innocently, making no attempt to deny what she stated - but when she folded her arms disapprovingly, he shifted his feet and set the book aside quietly. "So, knowing that... Why did you still come into my home?"

In the instant before he regained his neutral expression, Kakashi's eyes darkened, and she recognized the look he gave her immediately. It was akin to the one he had given her when she had flirted with him the night before - the one that sent a spike of adrenaline through Sakura like unadulterated, pure caffeine.

Oh.

It was the only answer that she needed. She had guessed it in the back of her mind but had not dared entertain it as a possibility.

Sakura coughed, breaking eye contact with Kakashi and changing the subject while she could still think coherently. She was not going to try and dissect this new and shocking information right now, nor how he hadn't even tried to deny it. Her mind raced to come up with a distraction while the looming thoughts piled up. "Ahem. Um, I should get going to that answer I was supposed to give you! Right. The book-"

She glanced over at her bright orange Icha Icha book he had set aside next to them near the charging phone. Her face burned as hotly as before in her returned embarrassment. The book? What a terrible transition! From learning that Kakashi actually considered me recently in a very-not-platonic way to answering his question about my private erotica collection? What is wrong with me?

"Right," Kakashi murmured. "You owe me that too."

Sakura's attention snapped back to him as she stood up stick-straight. "What?"

"Well, you did drug me and then drag me out into the middle of nowhere." The playful gleam was back in Kakashi's eyes, dancing merrily over his ebony-black pupils. "Not to mention I got injured while saving your life from enemy shinobi and assisted you in fighting them off. I would think that experience deserves some sort of compensation." He raised a silver brow at her, and Sakura's blood pulsed in her ears. He was making fewer efforts to keep a neutral expression now, and his eyes were easier for her to read. His was technically an innocent request, but she could not help but to interpret his slightly lower tone differently than she normally would have. She found that she did not want to punch him for it, either, but ask what exactlyKakashi had in mind.

Sakura wondered just when the dynamic between them had changed so much and tentatively formed her hand as a fist, raising it to threaten him with it for taking that tone with her - he was already smirking at her half-hearted protest. She heard her phone buzz next to them, and they both paused to look down at it. With quiet exasperation Sakura picked it up, letting out a sigh before reading whatever messages awaited her.

Hello? Forehead? Did you think I wouldn't see your clothes strewn everywhere when I stopped for Sarada's stuff? He must be really into you, he even left behind his porn. Attached was a slightly blurred picture of a familiar worn Icha Icha Tactics book, pinched in Ino's painted purple fingernails.

Sakura clutched the phone to her chest. Oh no.

Kakashi's hand was on her arm then, standing next to her and leaning to try and see the screen that she hid from him. Upon seeing where she was currently holding it he coughed into his hand and took on a concerned tone instead, looking away politely. "Everything okay?"

Sakura looked up at him with amusement. "Well, I know where your dirty book is."

"Really?" He was comically relieved, eyes alight. "Where?" His eyes flicked again to the phone against her chest and then to her face, and she nearly laughed at his attempt to look innocent. She kneed him in the side as she set the phone back on the cupboard. "Tell me!" He was nearly hopping with frustration as she walked over and sat on the cot. "Who has their hands on it? Ino?"

She nodded, one hand covering her face though she still watched him with an eye peeking between her fingers and strands of pink hair. She was mildly impressed at his accurate guess, but she wasn't surprised.

"What does she know, exactly, about the events of last evening?"

Sakura shrugged. "I don't know, I never told her anything about it. We left our coats there, and your scarf. And apparently your book. I…" She blushed. "She's assuming some… things."

Kakashi folded his arms, watching her with a stern look on her face that reminded her of her genin days. She dashed her eyes to the dirt, suddenly unable to look at him. "Well, you wouldn't exactly let me keep those on, Sakura."
She wanted to shoot him a withering look but still couldn't meet his eyes, the flush on her face spreading to the rest of her body. He was right - she had insisted he take them off, and his continued reminders of her flirtations only made her want to sink deep into the earth where she stood. What horrified her most was that she was finding didn't regret it - any of it - and that she was enjoying the new dynamics between them now.

There was a pause, and Sakura became suspicious of him again, looking up. "No worries," Kakashi was saying with his back turned as he fiddled with something, "I'll just look myself!"

Sakura opened her mouth in shock to protest, but the phone was in his hand and he was reading her texts with Ino already. She wanted to disintegrate as she heard his eyebrows skyrocketing into his silver hair. "Wow, Sakura," she heard him say, the wow drawn out mockingly.

She buried her face in her hands as she recalled Ino's other texts. Right… Ino's joke about 'something coming up'... Gods, Kakashi is never going to want to talk to me again at this rate. I"ll be too embarrassed to face him ever again after this anyway.

Realizing that that was the last thing in the world she wanted, Sakura looked quickly back up at Kakashi. He was turned to the side enough now that she could see what exactly he was doing with her phone and he was texting - on her phone.

"What the hell are you doing!" She leapt to her feet, darting forward to take the phone from his hands. Kakashi kept it easily out of her reach and with a huff she backed him against the wall. She had already done this dance with him earlier and had every intention of getting her phone out of his hands before he sent what ever he was typing. Kakashi allowed himself to be cornered in the hut, his long arms holding the phone up out of Sakura's reach and moving it side to side each time she tried to hop and grab it. He pulled it behind his back like he had done earlier with the Icha Icha book, and this time Sakura hesitated.

She looked up at Kakashi, keeping eye contact with him as she slid one arm around his side. Her eyes danced with mischief as she moved slowly and deliberately with her other arm snaking around his back. The heat in the air between them increased as she pressed close, holding his gaze with her own.

He didn't move quickly enough to stop her as she triumphantly snatched the phone from his loosened fingers, gaping at her with wide eyes. Sakura slunk backwards with a shameless grin, her arms dropping away from his waist. After blinking a couple of times Kakashi glared at her. "That's a dirty move."

"I still won, didn't I? Besides, I learned my 'dirty moves' from you, sensei." Sakura was already looking down at her phone as she spoke, and she missed the way Kakashi's eyes flashed dangerously at her over his reddening cheeks.

What she was seeing with horror was that he had already sent his reply to Ino.

Be nice to my book. A photo was attached to the single line of text he had written, and Sakura opened the picture timestamped from three minutes ago with some trepidation. It was of her, sitting on the cot looking beet-red and disheveled. It was during when she was looking away from Kakashi, gathering her thoughts, a light sheen of sweat on her bare arms and legs. The sheets of the cot were mussed and crumpled, looking slept-in; Sakura's hair was messy like she had slept a day and never had time to tame the tangles. Completing the image was the hint of a smile on Sakura's blushing face as she had contemplated her thoughts.

Though she knew the actual moment to be innocent, the photo by itself with no given context paired with a message clearly written by Kakashi suggested far more than that. She could hear Ino's ear-splitting squeal already. By the end of the next hour Ino no doubt would have announced every dirty detail (and then some added ones) to the entirety of Konoha.

Sakura looked slowly over at Kakashi, who was grinning so hard she could see it crinkling his eyes over the mask.

He barely managed to dodge in time to avoid the phone that flew across the hut and burst straight through the hut wall, clattering somewhere out on the forested clifftop. There was a laugh in his voice as he dodged the pillow next, dashing to the side. "Oh, Sakura - calm down -"
"CALM DOWN?!" She was on her feet, stomping hard enough toward him to make the earth beneath them tremble. Kakashi dodged a thrown piece of rock and then ducked as the Icha Icha Violence book clattered against the wall behind him. "Right, Sakura, don't forget you still have to tell me about your favourite part of-"

"DON'T YOU 'SAKURA' ME!" She threw herself at Kakashi and tackled him to the ground. They wrestled on the earthy floor as he dodged her punches at lightning speed. Grappling to hold the other still, they rolled across the hut floor until Kakashi's head bumped up against the cupboard. He winced dramatically while lifting a hand to rub where it had hit his skull. Sakura immediately halted her beatdown, sitting back on his lap where she straddled him against the ground and running a hand over the back of his head to check his injury. She inevitably found that there was nothing there but the slightest bruise, and when she looked down at Kakashi, there was an impish grin stretched across his face.

Sakura's face pinched with rage, and Kakashi laughed; her rage muted as his chuckling distracted her. She gave a distinctly un-ladylike snort, making Kakashi beneath her laugh again; together they began to laugh, and Sakura was jostled up and down, further making her realize how she straddled him against the ground. The full-body flush heated through her again and she stared dumbly down at him for a moment. His amusement halted and he was left smiling up at her, his hands resting on her legs.

Kakashi propped himself up on his elbows as she stared. She did not lean away from him as their faces grew just a few inches apart. His long silver hair brushed against her forehead, and she reached up to run her fingers through it. "How did you ever get this to hide under a wig?" Sakura asked softly. She ran her hand through his coarse strands, distracted, breathing in as he breathed out. She could taste the slightest hint of green tea and apricot on his breath that washed lightly across her face.

Sakura felt her heart beating raggedly as she managed to bring her eyes down from his glinting hair back to his face. His dark gray eye had lost its mirthfulness, deepening into an intensity that she could not look away from. She brought her hands slowly up to his face, her rage completely forgotten; she cupped his cheeks, trying to reconcile the image of Sukea's bare face with Kakashi's masked one. Her fingers moved slowly, and she kept her eyes on his. He made no move to stop her, his wide black pupils fixed on hers. She traced along his high cheekbones, drawing her touch down his sharp jaw and around his chin. She admired his straight nose and full lips with a gentle and slightly shaking finger over his mask. Her thumb rubbed thoughtfully near his mouth where she remembered the beauty mark being, memorizing the moment as she intimately rediscovered his features.

Her hands tingled as Kakashi's hands covered hers. Fingers entwining, he brought their hands to the uppermost edge of the mask and together they pulled it down and off of his face. She found herself already leaning in, following the way that her heart beat faster and how she was losing herself in his dark eyes; her gaze flicked from his pale lips back to his smoldering eyes. His hands slid up her legs where she straddled him, and it seemed the whole of her was burning. He had been securing her with his hands while he sat up and they remained splayed on her thighs. She was inches from his face again, her hands sliding down to rest softly on his chest, and her heart thudded loudly enough that she knew he could hear it. Her calves slid forward so her legs were bent around his sides. Gods have mercy, Sakura thought as he leaned in, eyes just as intense and dark as before - his handsome face in its full, unhidden glory a sight she would never cease to be stunned by.

Wait, Sakura's worried conscience butted in as their noses brushed together. She was beginning to close her eyes and fully let go, about to give in - Kakashi was holding still, waiting for her to decide if she wanted to close the distance between their faces, his warm breath making the sensitive skin of her features tingle. Her heartbeat had leapt up into her throat and her mind was spinning off course. But the worry persisted, fighting against her heart. She hesitated, her eyes flicking between Kakashi's slightly parted lips and questioning eyes.

Sakura dipped her face into the crook of Kakashi's neck then, ashamed of her hesitation and hiding her face from him. I've ruined the moment. She listened to their synchronized breathing, calming her thrumming pulse. His fingers gently rubbed along her back, and though the guilt she felt made her feel nauseous, he quietly gave her a moment to gather herself.

How did we end up like this?

Taking a deep breath, her nostrils filled again with Kakashi's scent - he smelled of fresh air, of fallen leaves, and a hint of steel. There was a spice she couldn't identify, surrounded by warmth; she wanted to breathe it in forever, and she didn't know why his smell drew her in closer and muddled her focus. I'm embarrassing myself further, she told herself as she let out the long sigh through her nose.

She felt more than heard him speak then, his rumbling voice making his throat against her nose vibrate. "Sakura… are you okay?" Her legs squeezed against his waist unconsciously, and he tensed under her.

It's not that I don't want this, Sakura thought, and she watched her hand move up his chest and curl around the side of his face gently. It was that very thought that made her hesitate.

When did I develop such feelings for Kakashi?

"'Kashi," she murmured against his neck, and she felt his skin heat up slightly. He was very tense. She sat up just enough to see his expression. His eyes were averted from hers, and his expression was terse. His lips were pulled into a frown.

"Yes, I'm okay. Whatever you're assuming, stop it," Sakura said immediately. She knew that worried look of his - she knew his thoughts were churning like hers were now, and she didn't want him to entertain any more thoughts of disappearing. Damn my hesitation. Does he think I don't want him? Do I want him?

"I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable," he said, the huskiness fading from his voice as he shifted; she was forced to move aside and off of him. He sat up in a cross-legged position and pulled the mask back up over his face. She reached out to stop him and he shrugged her off as he got to his feet. He moved toward the door and Sakura let out a curse as she scooted just quick enough to grab his ankle.

Kakashi looked down at her with an unamused expression, impossibly tall. She was cast in his shadow and glared up at him with fiercely bright eyes. "If you try to leave right now, Kakashi, I will personally make sure that I break every bone in this foot first."

"I'm not leaving. I'm going to sit outside and keep watch."

"Bullshit." Her fingers wrenched ever tighter around his ankle.

"Do you really think I would lie to you?" His dark eyes flashed dangerously, and she swallowed some of her confidence at the edge in his stare.

Then she remembered Sukea, and her eyes narrowed. "It's all you've been doing for the past day and a half."

With a derisive snort, Kakashi pulled his foot from her grasp and left the hut. Sakura was left with her hand still half-outstretched, frowning after him.

nine: fire

Her heart had contracted into a painfully tight ball in her chest as she got to her feet. She wasn't sure what to do now. She also wasn't certain why Kakashi had grown so icy toward her in such a brief time. There were so many questions buzzing around in her head that she wanted to dunk her head in a stream and clear it completely. What is happening to me? How can everything I know and feel change in the course of a single day?

Sakura turned, one hand rubbing over her aching stomach. She pulled a small tightly-packed package of brown paper from the little cupboard, ignoring the fresh memory of where Kakashi's head had just been against it. She focused on the string that held the paper package together, pulling at the bow and loosening its hold. She removed the dried fish from the package as it fell open, and she took out the flint and stone she kept in one of the drawers of the cupboard.

It took her less than a minute to set up a small fire in the center of her hut. Soon she was cooking the dried fish in a small pot with lemon juice and a small variety of spices that she had scrounged from the hut's supplies. She kept glancing over at the door, hoping the enticing smell of cooking food would lure her estranged companion back indoors, but if he was out there like he'd said he would be, he was ignoring the unspoken invitation.

I'm sorry. Sakura's heart ached with the words.

As she sat cross-legged by the fire, she stared into the flames, taking a bite of fish from her chopsticks. She had so many things to think about and didn't know where to start. The licking orange flames soothed her somewhat, their endless heated dancing over the white-blue embers giving her mind a visual reprieve. Being lulled into the easy repetition of the flickering flames, she was reminded of just how tired she was.

Closing her eyes to the fire, she raised a hand to her heart and felt its slow rhythm. It was her left hand, and her fingers brushed together, the feeling of her fingers lacking a ring still alien to her. Sakura looked down at her bare ring finger and remembered her recent divorce for the first time since yesterday. She wasn't sure how she had forgotten it for so long. Her other hand moved over and thoughtfully rubbed at the spot where the ring had been. She wondered if it would ever bear one again.

Sakura blinked away the thought, hearing the hissing as her fish began to overcook. She reached out and pulled the pot off the makeshift fire, setting it aside and quickly forgetting it again as she leaned back on her elbows and returned her eyes to the fire. The flickering flames were still burning slow and steady. Her ears prickled as she listened to its crackling; her attention moved outward around her to the sounds of crickets outside the hut and beyond. Somewhere in the distance she could hear frogs croaking and the wind sighing between the trees. She could just barely hear the murmuring of a river in the canyon far beyond.

She focused harder, and unless Kakashi was using his chakra to hide his presence, there was not a soul around for miles.

I'm sorry, she felt her heart repeat with sore beats. Her hand returned to her chest and she felt a sudden wave of pain wash over her. What have I done? Why did I hesitate?

Her conflicted thoughts began to fight in her head, and she hunched forward as her hands wrung frustratedly through her hair. Of course I hesitated, he's Kakashi! We're friends, like we have been for years - not to mention he used to be my sensei. She nearly ripped out her hair as she clenched her teeth. Close friends, who have been through hell and back. Mission partners who have saved each other's lives too many times to count. His dark eyes emerged from her mind and she put her hands over her eyes. How did that change?
Beneath the eyes a wide-lipped smile with a beauty mark to the side caught her thoughts and tangled them. The image of Kakashi as Sukea completed the face in her head, the smile falling into a frown. She tried and failed to resist remembering her tentative hands gently exploring his face, the feel of his skin under her fingertips.

Why would he come to us in disguise like that? Was it all some sort of trick that went wrong?

Her fists slammed down on the ground beside her. This is not how it was all supposed to be. She wanted to take it all back, turn time around and restart the day before. She wanted to erase all the strange twistings of emotion in her core and rewind until she was back where she should be, before she had seen Kakashi so differently and then promptly snapped the bond that they had grown and strengthened over the years.

Is that what I have done?

Her hand clutched over her chest; her nails dug into the smooth red fabric. She hunched forward and with a sweep of her other hand cast dirt into the fire, smothering the orange flames. Beneath the scattered earth that covered the blackened sticks, white embers flickered and hissed.

She needed to train. Her body ached and her heart ached more, but she needed some sort of physical release. It had been far too long since Sakura had practiced in a training field on her own; she knew from how she had struggled to carry Sukea across the landscape last night that she needed to get herself fitter. She flinched hard at the false name, and more recent memories of Kakashi sifted invasively though her thoughts and made her head throb painfully. I can't bear to be in here anymore.

Turning from the fire as she got to her feet, Sakura remembered something else she kept in her cupboard. She bent and with a quick movement of her knowing hands snatched the tiny black box from one of its back corners. Cracking it open and moving the lid aside, she removed one of the small round soldier pills and popped it into her mouth.

Now I won't have to deal with my nightmares for a while; just the waking ones. She slipped the remaining pill into her pocket. She removed several more supplies, packing them into her side-pouch; after brushing herself off and running her fingers through her tangled hair, tying it back, she looked toward the hut door.

Her pause was not from being unsure if she should leave. Her pause was caused by her conflicted guesses about whether or not Kakashi was keeping his word and standing guard at her door. Sakura snorted. As if I need a guard. She ignored the increasingly sore feeling in her chest and kept her chin up as she strode over and pushed open the damaged door.

Sakura could not help but to pause where she stood, looking left and then to her right; when she saw nothing but the way the tall meadow grass stirred in the dying sunlight around her hut, she gave a dejected sigh and pushed off north.

Ebony eyes watched her from atop the hut's thatched roof, following her figure as it streaked across the cliffside.

Sakura's fist shattered the trunk of an enormous tree. The fine shards of it imploded, bursting outward in a violent shower of projectile slivers. Flipping backward just out of range Sakura slammed her other fist into the hard rock of the cliff beneath her, and there was a deep grumble as her knuckles impacted the ground. Springing back into the air, she watched with burning eyes as the earth gave a great tremble and then as sudden as glass breaking became a huge network of black cracks. Every crack gaped and opened into huge maws leading down into hundreds of new crevasses. She flung her weight to the side as she began to fall down one of the splits in the ground that she had created; angling herself, she redirected her fall and then leapt from side to side of the crevasse down into the earth. The moon shone down on her as she descended into the darkness, and she looked up as one of the hundred-foot splits tore open. Water gushed forth and enveloped her completely.

Her long legs kicked viciously and Sakura emerged from the torrential water, one arm flinging out and gripping the crumbling wall of rock and earth that jutted high above her; giving it a savage pull, she pulled herself out of the makeshift whitewater river she had created and climbed upward with clenched teeth. Her pull against the wall of rock had done damage as well, and she sped up her climbing as it began to buckle beneath her, collapsing into the racing water. Sakura managed to throw herself back up onto the clifftop and away from the edge in time before the rest of it fell deep into the angry black waters.

Chest heaving, she backed away into the treeline, kicking away the fine wood shards beneath her feet. She watched as the ocean line leaked and pushed into the broken canyon, creating a roiling and hissing lake. Rage seethed in her veins and she swung her leg at the nearest tree; it uprooted at the force of her hit, sending it violently backward and felling several more fully-grown trees in its path of destruction. Sakura leapt upward above the treetops, looking outward over the sea of green, her figure gleaming in the silver-gray moonlight as she soared upward. She almost felt lighter, and a voice deep within her whispered. Failure.

With a roar she plummeted downward and sunk her fist through a massive, centuries-old boulder. It burst apart, shooting large chunks in several directions while the rest of it crumbled into dust. "I am not a failure!" She razored her arms through the air and caught one of the flying chunks of rock, swinging around once in a circle and then hurling it. It careened outward and exploded against the jutting crag of a nearby rocky outcrop.

Her chest was heaving as she watched its pieces crumble and skitter down the rock face, and she watched the bits of shattered rock tumble downward in an unstoppable path toward the sunken lake she had created. The sounds of her destruction surrounded her. The cracked and broken trees creaked and groaned in the wind, and the rock face groaned as it began to lean sideways; the sunken lake was hissing and swirling still as it formed. "I'm not," she whispered, the tears that wanted to fall pressuring the corners of her eyes.

As she raised her head to look up at the sky, she saw a raven flutter and float tentatively over the broken landscape, searching for its favourite perch. It circled several times and then flew off.

She felt her anger beginning to dissipate, dissolving into her chest and becoming a heavy weight beneath her stomach. Turning aside, Sakura pulled off her dripping red top so she was in her sports bra and twisted the fabric between her hands, wringing it of the cold water. She kicked off her sandals and let her wet hair loose around her shoulders. The cool water soothed her skin and cleansed the ache in her bones; the night air brushed across her shoulders and curled through her hair. The hissing of the lake and of the wind between the trees made an ambient melody that she found a shred of peace in as she eased herself back and laid against the forest floor. Though the weight remained in her core, she found that she was able to sink into the moment of peace.

She did not track the time as she watched the clouds drift as ghostly wisps across the moon, letting her mind become one with the world around her. Her heart beat steady and strong; her body tingled in its comedown from her exertions.

I'm sorry, her heart repeated, recalled. Sakura's expression of peace twisted into a frown, and she opened her eyes, not realizing they were closed. I'm sorry.

Her hands drew up to her face as she pressed her palms to her temples. She breathed in the scents of the night air, the leaves, the strands of grass; she could smell the salt of the ocean, could taste the wild mint that grew near where she lay; she could feel the tickling of the breeze on her bare skin. The fresh air brought her a temporary comfort when her nose remembered the added scents of steel and spice, of apricot on warm breath.

Sakura stopped, letting out the breath she had drawn in. Her palms pressed against her head and she squinted into her hands. Let me enjoy this moment… please let me escape in peace.

The way her heart seized against her ribs made her roll to the side and bury her face in the grass. This was not a pain that she could soothe with a stint in nature, not a point of contention that she could ignore for long. Her memories, etched deeply, would not let her forget. Sakura resisted the dangerous prickling at the corners of her eyes and hissed into the grass. Don't you dare cry, Sakura. Don't you dare. You're not a little girl anymore, and crying has never solved a thing.

But as she clenched her voice back from releasing a sob, it tightened into a cry of pain. Its pitiful sound broke down the walls she had built to protect herself from her own mind and all of the thoughts that were building up flooded forth to drown her. Failure. Failure, you've always been a failure. You're blind to what's right while chasing what's wrong. You've ruined another thing that you love. Failure, what have you done?

Sakura's hand drew back and then slapped at her forehead. Stop it. Her tears were falling freely, and she sat up in the grass, drawing her shirt over her head and back onto herself. Why am I sorry? her thoughts returned, less sharp, but just as painful. She cast her eyes out over the shattered lake she had created, her gaze sinking into the silver moonlit rivulets streaming down from a broken shore. She heard her own voice as she spoke her thoughts aloud. "Because… because I wasn't ready. I wasn't…" She scrunched her brow and folded her hands against her lips as she whispered. "I didn't know."

Didn't know that the events of the last day and a half could happen. Didn't know that such chemistry could rise to life between herself and Kakashi, didn't realize that the spark between them could keep returning, igniting the air between them and drawing them like magnets. The look in his eyes as she beheld his unmasked face burned eternally in her memory, a look she could not remember seeing on anyone's face toward her before. Not even Sasuke; especially not Sasuke.

The lakewater was beginning to settle, the torn earth sinking to its depths and beginning to mould with the landscape. Its connection to the ocean was levelling out and would eventually become a bay once the connection calmed completely. Sakura wished with wistful eyes that she was able to adapt so easily to change, her fingers moving to feel the blankness of her left ring finger.

She found then that she simply wanted to lean her head into Kakashi's shoulder and forget everything that had happened. It's what she was used to doing, her coping mechanism that she had grown dependent on over time for her sanity to remain intact. What started as catching up over ramen became venting at the bar, and that became quiet confiding over her coffee table at home. Eventually she had crossed over the gap between them to sit beside him, and on her hardest days, she would find solace in his shoulder and his comforting hand in her hair. The escape he had become for her had grown into a basic necessity.

Sakura felt twice as lost now that the very way she needed to find comfort was what was causing her stress. She rolled onto her side, watching the tall grass sway around her, trying to find some sort of relief for the pressure building back up within. Nearby, a tree that she had half-severed gave a final groan and fell, crunching against the forest floor; its leaves gave a sigh as it settled against the earth. Sakura's eyes shifted over to it and her face tightened. I'll have to have Yamato come here and help me fix this.

Remembering the captain made her groan again, hands returning to cover her face. He and everyone else I know are hearing about Kakashi's text on my phone right now, she knew. She dreaded to think what Ino was telling everyone, her ears turning red at what was certainly a wild story that would be told with the text waved about in her hand. She could already see their friend circles all gathered around the phone and Kakashi's book at the bar. Was this their unexpected debut as a couple? Her hands curled into fists as her face reddened to a shade akin to earlier in the hut. How would they all react? Disgust? Horror? Shock? God forbid Sasuke ever hears about this. The worst way to break the news that we are divorced now...

Sakura couldn't fight back a smile, though, imagining Naruto's exaggerated expression as he heard the news. He'd probably try to strangle Kakashi as soon as he had a chance and then make fun of Sakura for the rest of her life. And Ino, undoubtedly, would demand to know every dirty detail of the last two days, which Sakura would continually refuse to divulge other than that she got to see his whole face as none of the rest of them ever had.

Every dirty detail. Sakura flushed at the memory of the way they had entangled and drawn ever closer to the flame between them. Can I not purge Kakashi from my head for any stretch of time?

"Bastard," she muttered as she got to her feet and brushed the dirt from her clothes. She knew that she should go back, find him, face him, talk to him - but he had been the one to walk away. Sakura tossed her wet hair and tied it back up, lines creasing in her face with worry. She knew that the way she saw Kakashi had forever changed, regardless of what she wanted, and that this was true for him as well.

What do I want?
She heard something far into the distance, an echo of an echo. She was instantly on alert, opening her senses and watching her surroundings for the tiniest of movements. Sakura's hand moved silently into her side-pouch, her fingers drifting across the handle of one of her kunai. She moved instinctively into a defensive posture, her lithe muscles tensing as she poised to move at a moment's notice.

She heard it again. It was faint, but she knew what it was now, and she pushed off from the ground and soared into the woods. The horizon flickered with lightning that did not originate from the sky. Branches whipped past her face and left scratches on her arms and along her legs; she ignored the stinging pain, using the extra energy she still had from the soldier pill to push herself forward faster. They're back.

ten: lost

A blade sunk into Sakura's leg and she screamed as she stumbled to the side, clutching at the bloody kunai. With a fierce grimace she pulled it out and kept running, swerving so that she was more difficult to target. She could not, she would not be slowed down. She could hear the active fighting now, not far ahead - she heard the mingling screams, and her blood boiled as she felt more lightning crackle in the air. Kakashi, I'm almost there.

Yet another thrown blade seared through the air toward her and Sakura leapt upwards, managing to dodge it this time. She glanced in the direction it was thrown and thought she could see burning eyes in the darkness.

She nearly slammed into one of the enemies that swarmed the forest clearing, and she swerved aside as she skidded to a halt at the clearing edge. Sakura launched into the fray of black-clad fighting shinobi with a roar, dodging a thrown kunai and bodily ripping a man away from Kakashi, who was fighting off two more of the attackers with bloodied blades that crackled with sparks. The thrown enemy crunched through a nearby tree and spun off into the forest. She stabbed viciously with her kunai into another man's leg as he moved toward Kakashi; the injured enemy swerved to her with a yell. Sakura gave him a flinty smile as she tore the blade back out, ripping a spray of blood into the air. The attacker screamed and she moved onto the next one, slamming her weight into him as he leapt through the air at her. She pinned him to the ground and heard Kakashi hiss behind her as several more shinobi dove into the fight with gleaming eyes and weapons. She cracked her captive's head against the ground and spun to join Kakashi in facing the new wave of attackers.

"Sakura," he managed to greet while they dodged a wave of thrown shuriken, the blades making a shnnk shnnk shnnk sound as they sliced into a treetrunk, She threw herself into his side and pulled them both to the ground as two more waves of blades sliced through the air and narrowly missed their heads. "Who are they?" she spat as they rolled to the side, several kunai sinking into the earth where they had been a breath ago. "Don't know," Kakashi grunted as he pulled out the sunken kunai and began to clash blades with an oncoming shinobi. Sakura got to her feet, her back against Kakashi's as they faced off against more enemies. Her eyes widened with horror as she saw another wave of dark-clad men and women approaching with the promise of death glinting in their gazes. "We have to go!" Sakura turned, pulling at Kakashi, and they broke away from the fight, running toward the sea. Though he kept up with her, she noticed the pain that twisted his face, and she dreaded to think of what injuries he had.

They veered along the sea, feet pounding in the sand, blood dripping down their faces and sweat drenching their backs. Not far behind them followed the many running feet of their attackers. Sakura glanced over at Kakashi as they ran, worry in her eyes while he kept his eyes focused on what was ahead. She was on an intense adrenaline rush brought on artificially by the pills, but he was not - she worried for his physical condition and how much more of this he could take before complete exhaustion. "Don't worry about me," he said in answer to her look, grimacing, and she flicked her eyes forward with increased concern as they kept up their attempted escape from their pursuers.

She tried to figure out where exactly they were right now while her lungs began to burn from running too long. We were formerly in the Land of Earth. Where are we headed? Is this still east? She glanced at Kakashi. He might know, but his haggard face was making her throat tight and she knew she didn't have time to ask. They had to stop soon and heal, rest, recover - but how could they do that while being chased down?

They darted together back into the treeline and away from the sea, managing to keep ahead of the pursuing shinobi. She was amazed there were still this many after how many the two of them had cut down and tried to keep herself focused as they ran. One slip and we could both die.

Sakura's eyes widened as the forest they were in suddenly thinned and cut off into a canyon, and she screamed, reaching out to grab at Kakashi to stop them both - but she had realized the reason for the landscape change too late.

For a moment, they were suspended in midair, eyes turning to the other's and then downward as they began to fall. As the top of the cliffline fell from her sight above them, she saw a single dark figure with drifting midnight hair step forward and watch them plummet.

The air around them screeched upward, their hair whipping in the currents of darkness: Sakura looked desperately around them at the gigantic waterfall that they were descending over, but there were no nearby handholds, nothing but a rocky pool far below that meant certain death. She looked back at Kakashi, her entire being feeling heavy, and his eyes on hers were vivid with emotion as they hurtled through the night air.

Then, with a bone-crunching splitch and an enormous wall of water that rose around them, they hit the water's surface and plunged into the murky depths.

She didn't know how long she was unconscious as she floated, drifting down a river in the darkness, her body suffering. Her thoughts were broken and incoherent as her eyes blinked up at the cloudy sky.

Am I alive?

Sakura's head turned in the water, her neck searing with pain from her movement, and she thought she saw something silver floating alongside her further downstream.

Her mind clicked, whirred, stopped; she twitched, her fingers numb and her lungs burning as she took in a breath of freezing air. She blinked again as she began to waken and her bones screamed in protest as she tried to move her flipped over in the freezing black water and sputtered out the mouthful of river water. Gasping for air, Sakura forced her burning limbs to move, and she was able to look again at what was floating near her.

Kakashi, face-down in the water. His body bobbed gently in the slowing river.

With a cry, Sakura pushed her arms through the water, swimming nearer to him and reaching out to flip him onto his back with no regard to the excruciation it caused her body. "No, no -"

The currents didn't fight her anymore as she pushed their floating forms to the rocky shore, sparing a single look behind her. They were alone in the rocky, unforgiving landscape, lying on the shore in a valley surrounded by waterfalls. Sakura searched Kakashi's white face, brushing away the silver hair that stuck to his face and pulling down the torn mask. She made no hesitation this time to meld her lips to his, pushing hot air into his lungs as she did compressions with her palms on his chest. He laid there unresponsive as she pulled back and watched his face. Her hand moved up to the side of his neck and felt for a pulse as she moved in and gave him another breath.

"Kashi, no," she whispered hoarsely, blaming her numb fingers and pounding, unfocused head for the lack of pulse she felt by his throat. She sucked in a painful breath and placed her mouth over his once again, closing her eyes as she pushed air into him. She tried not to taste the blood on his lips, tried not to think about how cold his face felt against hers, tried to avoid the dreaded words he's dead-

Kakashi's chest gently fell as she pulled her lips away, and his eyes remained closed.

As her heart pounded against her chest, her hands growing limp over his heart, she realized with a terrible finality that again, she had failed.

Sakura bowed her head against his side, sobs wracking her body, choking her lungs. She felt her chakra enveloping her like a cool cloud; it followed her tears, billowed outward as she wept into his soaked and bloodstained shirt. A thousand memories of him alive thundered through her body and soul, tormenting and guilting her, followed by a thousand more that burned and reduced down into the lifeless body laying before her now.

I did this, came the voice of her mind, broken and lost.

Above them, the clouds condensed and darkened; she turned her face into his chest as rain began to fall.

Sakura's hand slipped to his side, and using her chakra she reached into his very ribcage and held his heart in her palm. She felt her chakra diffuse around her and then intensify within her hand, and she massaged Kakashi's still heart. She was having difficulty controlling her energy, her chakra pouring out in waves as she massaged his heart, her tears falling with the rain. Come back to me.

She moved to lean over him and continued pouring her chakra into his body, her forehead touching against his as she searched his face for life. She bent and melded their lips once more. Another breath. Her fingers squeezed, moved, imitated the movements of a heartbeat, and she surged her chakra forth as she imagined him sputtering to life. All she wanted was for him to waken, to lose the look of death that paled his features, to have any sort of response to her ministrations.

Another surge. The canyon around them lit green as she pulsed her energy into Kakashi's body beneath her. Sakura kept trying, pushing breath after breath into him, and both of their bodies were afire with her viridian-green chakra as she burned through her vast stores of life force. The canyon was trembling from the waves of pure energy, the rain sizzling as it hit heated ground. It streaked down his face where her tears were falling, drawing diluted blood along the ground where they lay.

Her body was weakening, and she was burning dangerously low on chakra - but her shaking hand insisted, continuing to try and revive his heart, and she pressed her trembling mouth again to his. I'd rather use it all than let you die.

Sakura's other hand rose to his cheek as she took in one more breath to give, the black ribbons of her last stores of chakra drawing out from her head and around them, her dulling eyes still holding a fierce shine as she clenched her will and seared forth what energy she still had into Kakashi.

The canyon around them burned with light, tinting the sky green and creating a wind that swirled and coursed against everything within miles. The ground shook and the waterfalls trembled; the rain in the air spun as it fell. The clouds pulled apart from the force of the wave and the stars gazed coldly down upon the heart of the canyon.

Sakura was slumped across Kakashi, and she was no longer moving. Her hand that had been around his heart had slipped from him, limp on the ground; the other had fallen beside his face. Pink strands of hair spread like a damp silken curtain that framed Kakashi's pale face.

Dark eyes slowly opened, chest rising as he took in a ragged breath. His hand rose unsteadily, resting on her face against his neck. "Sakura," he managed, her name barely making it past his lips. He waited for her reply, his lungs burning every time he took a breath, and his hand curled around her cold cheek.
She did not stir.

Silence cut across the Konohagakure gate. Its symmetrical visage was sliced by jagged black shadows and dull gray light that criss-crossed, shifting slightly in the breeze. Two anbu operatives serving as guards leaned against the twin pillars, their watchful eyes flicking through the slightly shifting leaves and branches of the soundless forest around them. Color was leached from the grass, the leaning trees, and from the sky above; the operatives matched their seemingly lifeless surroundings as they waited for anything to stir.

Their eyes drew together to the same point just beyond their view into the darkness.

First they heard the barely audible sound of footsteps that dragged against the coarse earth. The slight and distant sound gradually drew nearer. As the anbu slowly unsheathed their weapons, their blades glinting in the dimming moonlight, the figure stepped into a slice of light through the trees.

Their calculating eyes blinked in unison. Kakashi, his head of silver dripping over his shadowed face, his tall frame hunched as he shifted slowly forward. In his arms he held a crumpled body that swayed slightly as he walked. Audible to the anbu's ears now was the dripping.

Crimson fell slowly in descending lines from every aspect of Kakashi and his burden's form, leaving a trail that led behind him and into the fading darkness. Blood darkened his face and stained the tears in his black mask and clothes, and it dripped from the tangled strands of hair that streamed down from the person he held. The tainted strands waved and shifted, drawing from a pinkish hue to a deep magenta and ending in that vivid crimson as they dripped in the sighing breeze.

In a movement as slow as his pained gait, he looked up at them with a single visible eye.

The anbu stepped forward, tentatively sheathing their weapons. Kakashi continued toward them, ignoring their questioning eyes as he pushed past them and toward the gate. One bloody hand extracted from where he held Sakura's body against him, wrapping around the iron bars that gave way as he entered the village. Behind him the operatives watched his slow but sure path down the road, and after a pause, one of them darted into the darkness.

Whispers rose from the shadows as Kakashi made his way deeper into the village, blood following his feet. He did not look away from where he walked, deaf to the sounds of windows cracking open, blind to the waving hands of people who called his name and asked who, what, how. He shambled forward, his hands ever tighter around Sakura's limp form.

His feet moved faster as the hospital came into view. Muscles strained with coursing pain as he pushed forward, resisting outstretched hands and jerking away from anyone who tried to relieve him of his burden. It was only when someone showed the way into an empty hospital room did he slowly set Sakura's bloodied form onto the white cot, her face falling to the side of the pillow, lips bloodless and pale.

He rested, then, slumping into the chair by the bed and refusing to move or answer anyone who approached him. The medics who swarmed the room soon gave up trying to expel or examine him, shifting their attention fully to Sakura as they began their work. They cut away her scarlet-soaked clothes and washed her skin, tending to every gash and broken bone they found, sealing the cuts and rinsing away the dark hues of blood in her hair. Kakashi watched, his eyes on her face, but she remained unresponsive and still.

Hours passed; the dawn rose outside as a runny red-pink sun that crept above the buildings. The silence stretched across the room and filled the spaces between them. Sakura was breathing, her heart slowly pulsing, but her face was lost in a deep expression of peace as she slept. Coma, a medic had told him while he stared at Sakura's ever-still body. She's alive, but we don't know when she'll wake up. By the grim twist of her lips he knew that the medic was withholding the words if she does.

Kakashi reached forward, wincing at the pain as he curled his cold fingers into her open hand. He bowed his head and began his vigil by her side.

eleven: stitches

He vaguely sensed the many visitors that came through Sakura's hospital room, acknowledging some of them with a slow blink of his eyes that remained fixed on her sleeping form. The only ones that got any more of Kakashi's attention than that were very few regardless of what attempts they made to draw answers from him. Their demands and pleas fell deaf on his ears, and it was only when Naruto entered the room with a bang of the door that Kakashi's hooded eyes blinked and looked up at him from his place at Sakura's side.

The young Hokage had stared at her limp form lying in the hospital bed, his eyes drawing from the IV drip and softly beeping machines to the bandages along her arms and then to the pale expression of sleep on her face. His face twisted with pain and then he surged forward with a wail. "Sakura, no!" Naruto threw his arms around her and wept into the clean white blanket that covered her body. "How did this happen?" he sobbed, tears streaking down his face, making him look both younger and older at the same time. Teary blue eyes moved then to Kakashi, who stared with empty eyes at Sakura's hand that he held. His gloved fingers squeezed softly and he bowed his head. He did not look at Naruto.

"Please," Naruto whispered, his voice jagged at the edges from his grief. "Please tell me."

"She gave her life to save mine," Kakashi answered, his voice hoarse from disuse, and he closed his eyes, tipping his head against Sakura's side. There was a pause as Naruto processed this with wide eyes, and then Kakashi spoke once more. "It should be me, instead of her…"

Naruto took Sakura's other hand in his and sat up with a tear-stained but resolute face. "Don't say that."

Black eyes opened and lifted to glare at Naruto. "It should be me, Naruto. Sakura sacrificing her life for mine is a waste."

Naruto held the glare a moment, his brows furrowing, and he looked again to their unconscious teammate. "You're wrong, Kakashi-sensei." His hand moved up and brushed the lank hair from Sakura's face. "You're wrong, and she isn't gone."

"You don't know that," came Kakashi's wretched whisper, and he looked away from Naruto's sharp returning stare. Though shadows obscured his full expression, Naruto could see the agony that aged his features. His teeth clenched and his voice rose at Kakashi as his anger burned. "How can you say that? We don't know she's gone, but you can't act like she is! You have to keep hope." He gripped the hospital blanket and got to his feet. "Sakura would - she will kick you into space if you don't get yourself looked at and healed, Kakashi-sensei. If she gave everything she had to save your life you had better take care of yourself." Naruto's eyes touched worriedly on the reddish stain that Kakashi's head had left on the crisp white blanket. "Look at you... you need help."

"I won't leave."

"You need rest! And healing! And food, and probably-"

Gloved hands with dried blood gripped the pale hand on the bed, and Kakashi looked up at Naruto. Cutting himself short, Naruto stared, taken aback by the fierce glint in his former sensei's eyes. He had seen it before during the war and seen shades of it since then but never had he seen the way the dark depths of his eyes raged and churned, tinged with pure agony and guilt. He blinked, and Kakashi bowed his head once more.

"You love her."

Kakashi's hunched and shadowed figure tensed, but he did not answer. Something warmed within Naruto and he reached out, placing a hand on Kakashi's shoulder. Understanding, Naruto turned to leave him to his vigil at Sakura's side. "Please at least consider getting those wounds looked at," he said quietly as he left the room, "You'll want to be at least alive when she wakes up." He closed the door behind him and looked to his side, where Sarada stood, her dark eyes brimming over with tears. She had had her ear pressed to the door.

He placed a comforting hand on her head, trying not to let the sadness show too much on his face as she opened the door to the room and stepped inside.

Sarada walked slowly to her mother's side, her face as white as the sheets. Her gaze flicked to Kakashi, who kept his head bowed against the figure in the covers. Silently she took a seat at Sakura's side. Her tears fell like hot rain where Naruto's had not long before. She matched Kakashi in the way that she tipped her face into Sakura's side and gripped her limp hand with both of hers, grieving in the silent room. Neither said anything; the only sounds in the room were Sarada's shaking breaths as she cried, accompanied by the beeping medical instruments that surrounded them.

"I'm sorry." Sarada jumped in her chair at the raspy sound of Kakashi's voice. She fixed her red-rimmed eyes on him; he kept his stained and matted head down, rising and falling softly with Sakura's even breaths. She was beginning to think she had imagined him saying that when he spoke again. "Sarada, I'm so sorry."

Her tears began to fall again. It took her a moment to untense her constricting throat enough again to speak. "Why?"

"This is my fault." His voice was barely above a whisper.

Sarada studied her hands around her mother's for a long moment. Her fingers traced along the unpainted nails, along the creases between the joints of her fingers, along her palm.

"I heard what you told Naruto-sama," she answered then. Her fingers interlaced with the hand she held.

Kakashi lifted his head and looked at her with his dark red-rimmed eyes. Sarada lowered her gaze, keeping it fixed on her tensed hands around her mother's that slowly relaxed as she spoke. "I might be young, and I don't know a lot. I don't know what happened out there to make things end up like this." Her eyes closed. "But… she cared about you. You were there for her a lot, and for me." She looked at him then, pointing with a shaking finger to her irises. "You helped me almost every day with my Sharingan when it awakened. Remember? I can control it a lot better now." Sarada's eyes flashed red for the briefest moment, and she made a watery smile that fell as she quickly returned her gaze to her mother's side. "You've been around a lot, and I think it made her happy." Her hands curled around the hand and she bowed her head until her forehead touched against the cool fingers. "If you love her like Naruto-sama said, and she gave her life for you, then… I will trust her, trust what she fought to save." Sarada's shaded eyes burned as she choked back a sob, teardrops dripping down her and her mother's entwined hands.

Kakashi stared at her for a long moment, eyes wide as he took in what she had said.

There was a soft knock at the door, and both of them turned to look as a medic came in with a clipboard. "I'm so sorry to interrupt, but I need to check her vitals and her wounds." Silently Sarada crossed over to sit near Kakashi as the medic approached. She shot them an uncomfortable glance as she peeled the covers back and began to change out bandages and check the tubes that hooked up through needles into Sakura's arms. As soon as her work was done she made some notes on her checklist and slipped back out of the room.

Sarada turned to look at Kakashi with wide eyes. She had not seen from the other side of her mother's bed the extent of how terrible his condition was. Dried blood caked his face and neck, spattered along his arm and painted around the rips and stains in his dark shirt and pants. There was the distinct rusty smell of fresh blood that told her he was still actively wounded.

Getting to her feet, she reached to the side and took out several supplies from the nurse's station. Kakashi looked at her from the corner of his eye. "What are you doing?"

"I know you only let my mother heal you," Sarada said after a pause, "but while she's away, please let me help you." She blinked dispassionately. "You know it's what she wants."

He let out a long sigh, and then with a resigned shifting of his legs, turned to face Sarada. She handed him a damp towel. "You can wash yourself, and I can do any stitches and basic healing you need. Mom started teaching me healing techniques recently." She took out a needle and clear bio-plastic stitching thread from the nurse's station. "I'm not great at it but I can at least help."

After scrubbing away the dried blood from his arms, he extended his forearm toward Sarada with a hint of trepidation in his eyes. She took it gingerly, eyeing the wide gash that split down his skin, and lifted the glinting needle in the air. After a short breath, she gathered enough courage, and the needle delved downward and into Kakashi's arm.

He managed to flinch only slightly as Sarada pulled the thread through his skin and then began to stitch the freshly-bleeding skin back together. It took her several focused minutes to finish the job, and by the time she tied a bow at its end and placed the bloody needle back on the nurse's station, he was pulling his arm back into his shadowy form and wincing repeatedly at the stinging pain.

"Any other injuries?" Sarada asked, and he glanced at her, answering quickly. "No."

Her eyes narrowed, and he recognized the very Sakura-like way that she raised a fist and shook it at him. "You lying?" Then she blinked, remembering that he was a senior respected nin and former Hokage, and she sputtered as she lowered the fist and looked away. "Sorry, Rokudaime-sama."

He shuddered at the title. "Don't call me that." But the hint of a smile that crinkled his eye told her she was forgiven.
Sarada made a small smile of her own as she returned to her place at Sakura's other side, settling and taking her mother's hand back into her own. "She won't be gone long," she promised as she looked to her mother's peaceful face.
Kakashi's eyes were wistful as he also watched Sakura's serene features. His gloved fingers interlocked again with her unclaimed hand, a sigh falling from his nose. He resumed his vigil, knowing he would wait until he faded away for the day Sakura woke up; but this time, he wasn't alone.

twelve: anchor

Never had Sakura felt so weightless, floating and drifting across a groundless sky like an unfolded bloom cut loose into the air. Without the burden of form she was free to immerse with the wide white void that surrounded the entirety of her being. Though she did not have senses beyond vision and the feel of her soul, she had never felt freedom be so tangible.

She drifted further, no instincts for direction pushing or pulling her as she went in what she assumed was forward; she had no thoughts of who she was or where she was going. Her consciousness was one with the endlessness. Whispers shimmied down her thoughts, whispers of what she once was, whispers of what could be, following her as she floated. am i alive? Her consciousness made the words and watched them dissipate into the shifting, breathing void.

what is

alive?

The lull of the void slowly darkened; she spiralled in slow motion, completely cut loose from the tethers she had once known.

alive?

The word repeated, circled, drifted alongside Sakura invisibly, persistent, tugging. Its pulling at her soul was the only direction she knew and she allowed herself to be willed into its path. She felt a sensation like warmth, and then the word jarred and stabbed into her. you are ALIVE.

Alive. She shifted and twisted, feeling a semblance of shape come to her consciousness. She almost shied away from it, wanting to chase that pure essence of freedom she had tasted. It was a shape almost like a line, suddenly cold with temperature, a sense she had almost forgotten. She watched as it drew downward colorlessly through the void, extending out forever.

Her void shifted as a whole, swayed impossibly far and then slowly back, becoming a pendulum of rhythm that lulled her along with it. alive…

Crashing through the whiteness came color and sound, crisp and harsh against the endlessness: cascading green and sinking crimson, the coldness of ethereal white and dripping silver. Slowly the void around her shifted back, taking her along with it.

Sakura reached formlessly outward. She tried to focus on the colors, to make the blurred lines tighten and draw out, to show her the way. Around her the word that had drawn her into direction echoed winding circles through her soul. alive, alive, alive…

The circles began to spin. She spun with it, out of control, and the void again began to darken. Panic clawed up and bit through her, a visible scribbled mass of vivid white that gave her a form to cling to - the lines contracted and expanded outward and into the spinning tornado that the endless space had become. Bursts of color and sensation punched through the expanding funnel of darkness that pushed infinitely out beyond and beneath her. Sakura screamed voicelessly. The vast expanse of swirling lines grew ever further out, and she felt herself being drawn downwards into an impossibly dark mass at the center of the funnel. She fought against it, her will of fire the only tool she had to resist. With fury she roared against the void and raged against the black horizon that swirled beneath her. I AM ALIVE.

In response the funnel violently plunged down and then exploded upwards, enveloping every burst of color, every shard of sound and shape that swirled around her being. Sakura fought through every clinging moment she had until she was drowned by the impossible dark, shunting her consciousness back into the emptiness of the drifting void once more.

Without the sense of time to guide her, Sakura found no peace now in her drifting. Ever formless she floated over a grayness that was murky and thick like a liquid she could breathe. Something ached in the core of her spirit, an ache that strung that remaining panic from before through her and tied it into her thoughts that had begun to blot her being.

where am i?

Sakura remembered warmth and could almost feel it at the edges of her mind. She willed herself toward it, the aching growing sharp, but she did not stop herself as she sought it out. It was just out of her reach, but it brought a trace of red-orange color to her, and she would chase it forever if it would eventually relent and give her direction. Come back to me.

The pain in her consciousness intensified and magnified tenfold, and she flinched from the words that had seared into her soul. The warmth began to retract and disappear; she outstretched herself and reached back. i'm sorry.

i'm sorry. Heartbeats in her head and she wanted to slam herself down to some kind of gravity as she continued to drift. The thoughts that had come to her entwined and laced out into the gray cloud around her. She wanted to give up; she wanted to give in, to let go of the throbbing hurt in her soul's center. i need an anchor… i need…

Sakura focused, concentrating on becoming a form. She imagined feeling the pull of the earth beneath her feet, the pulsing of a heart in the chest, the sinking of her blood and bones that she now desperately missed. She seethed as she focused. Around her the grayness began to drift away from her in all directions, and with a slight lifting of her soul, found that she had fallen into her form. Getting slowly to her weightless but existent feet she brought her gaze upward. A formed thought unbraided itself from the shapeless ground beneath her feet and strung again beyond her vision. where am i?

She closed her thin form's eyes and remembered. She flicked back through the endlessness and searched for a foothold. Seeing a touch of red, she reached out with her consciousness's invisible hand and took it.

With a blink, she was floating above a sunlit tatami mat and breathing in the savory fumes of fresh green tea. She quickly adjusted to the memory, inner eyes opening wide to watch. As a cloud that hung against the ceiling, Sakura watched herself as a young girl pick up the cup of tea and smile at the woman sitting on her knees in front of her. Mother, Sakura thought, leaning her consciousness forward and peering at the familiar petite figure that gently lectured her younger self with a raised finger. She listened to the gentle lilting timbre of her voice, watched the way the sun caught and gleamed in her long hair that exactly resembled Sakura's. Her heart called out to her mother. Sakura willed herself closer, her attention shifting to her younger self.

Young Sakura sat up straight in her red and white qipao, large green eyes sparkling. She was clearly unabashed by the lecture, and she set down her drained cup of tea as she got clumsily to her feet and ran down the hall of her family home. Sakura's drifting consciousness followed her until she swerved into a room.

More sensations tingled her mind as she watched her younger self toss herself onto her bed and lean on skinny elbows, feet kicking in the air behind her. Sakura's invisible eyes looked around her old childhood bedroom, touching along the cast-aside dirty laundry and bright pink hair brushes, along her toys and vividly-painted child-sized furniture and floor mirror.

Child-Sakura made a squeal, and the consciousness that drifted above her drew in for a look at what was clutched in her fingers.

A photo, framed with simple wood and plastic over its surface. Sakura drifted closer to make out the faces on the photo. Her child self was giggling and staring at the raven-haired Sasuke next to her in the photo; to the right of the photo grinned Naruto, and smiling quietly above them, Kakashi.

Sakura reviled from the memory, spinning outwards as the bedroom disintegrated. For a moment she was formless again until she grounded herself into the semblance of her body once again. Kakashi. She curled into the name, refusing to let go, letting it be her anchor.

Just beyond her grasp, the thought returned again, and she pushed it away as it formed - where am i?

This time, a memory reached for her through the grey-dark of her memory, and she kept the name against her consciousness as she sunk back into it.

Where she found herself this time was behind the gray-shirted back of Sasuke, standing on the dark greenish crater after they defeated the goddess Kaguya. She floated past Sasuke and toward her memory-self, a young woman now, standing and shouting passionately after Sasuke beside Kakashi on the ground.

Sakura didn't listen to her old self as she wailed out toward Sasuke. She watched Kakashi instead, noticing the way his face twisted with frustration as her younger self called out to their estranged black-haired teammate. She caught the end of her younger self's cry, and shifted her consciousness's attention to her. "-if we all just stick together-"

Sakura watched with Kakashi as her younger self was then punctured by Sasuke's cruel stab of genjutsu, her body collapsing to the ground. To her surprise the memory continued, and she drifted over her memory-self's body as Kakashi's hand curled around shoulder, calling her name as he did so. Sorrow filled her as she felt regret filling her body, a familiar bitterness tainting the cloud of her consciousness.

"Sakura…" His eyes touched with worry to her face, then lifted in anger to Sasuke. "Sakura just wanted to help you, all this time!" Kakashi's features twisted, his brows drawn together harshly over burning dark eyes. Sakura's consciousness watched him intensely, just hearing the end of Sasuke's cold reply. "You're suggesting I enjoy a romance. Too bad I have no reason to love her, or to be loved by her."

"The only time that you need a reason like that is when you want to hate someone. Don't you understand? Sakura isn't even trying to make you hers." The hand on her shoulder clenched as Kakashi's anger rose. "She almost died by your hand, but she still spills tears for you. She suffers from loving you."

As a crimson wave of anger that matched Kakashi's rose within her, Sakura felt the edges of the memory beginning to give way again to the void. With a soundless cry she held on to it, feeling it ripple around her; she did not want to leave yet, did not want to disappear before she fully processed what she had just seen and heard.

Her bodiless heart ached as she looked back at Kakashi and her younger self's unconscious form. He was looking back down at her now, the anger subsiding to the back of his eyes as his gloved hand lifted and curled gently around the side of her face. Sakura watched as his rough-padded thumb stroked gently across her cheek; empathy, understanding, and frustration clear in his face.

She wanted to pause the memory, to stare into that expression he held that no one but her could see. Her soul was aching, aching at the cold hatred and cruelty she had been shown by Sasuke, aching from the look on Kakashi's face that she had never seen before now. How could I have been so blind? she thought as she searched the depths of his eyes, how have I been so ignorant for so many years?

Sakura followed Kakashi's intense gaze back to her memory-self's unconscious body, and her attention caught again on the way his thumb stroked her cheek as her hair flickered in the breeze. It's unmistakable, came her realization.

She sunk to Kakashi's side, watching him begin to slowly fade away as unspoken love burned in his eyes. The memory around them started to crumble into dust, and Sakura was cut loose, floating back into the void; she called his name once, ever-voiceless, and he looked up in her direction as the memory dissipated completely.

thirteen: eye

In her sleep, Sakura's hand squeezed Kakashi's.

He jolted, getting to his feet and squeezing her hand in return, his wide eyes full of hope as he leaned over her face and searched her features. "Wake up, Sakura," he said. His other hand cupped her jaw, his rough fingertips brushing gently along her cheek, his thumb tracing along her lower lip.

Somewhere in the void… Sakura felt it like she were vivacious and alive again, and this time fully conscious - the thumb on her face, drawing tingles across her skin. It felt so real she did not know if she were reliving her memories or somehow experiencing the present. She drew toward the feeling, propelling all of her soul toward it, inviting and inciting it to pull her from the endlessness. Come back to me, she called, and felt the words bounce back to her.

Sakura's face moved, brows drawing together and lips twitching for the briefest moment before she lapsed back into a slack expression. Both of Kakashi's hands on her face gripped her. "Come back to me." His dark eyes burned into her face, his tense body drawn across hers as he leaned in. He ignored the stares of the others in the room and touched his nose to Sakura's as his voice softened, his breath passing across her face. "Please."

A wind drew across the canyon that the void had become, and Sakura found herself standing alone in a vast endless plane of silver. She watched the skies draw back and shift, moving across the world though it were a living thing on its own. As it moved aside, it revealed a starless void beyond with no sun or moon. She sat back, drawing her arms around her knees. She closed her eyes and felt the wind push, sigh, heave around her. She moved a hand to her stomach, a pang stinging through her core as she missed her daughter.

Though he tensed when he heard the door to the hospital room open, Kakashi stayed where he was, his fingers tightening against Sakura's warm cheek as he easily recognized the chakra signature. He heard a shifting behind him as Sakura's other visitors responded to the new presence, and Kakashi's blood began to smolder. "Dad?" Sarada's voice was timid, and there was a shuffling sound; Naruto's chakra flared in anger as he shouted what everyone was thinking - "Damn it all, where have you been, Sasuke? She's been out for three months-"

Kakashi did not move or shift away from Sakura as Sasuke stood behind him. "What are you doing?" he heard the cold voice ask, and Kakashi turned his face just enough toward Sasuke to allow him to see the deadly gleam of his eye.

Sakura looked up at the black void of the sky and watched it for a sign. She didn't know if she would ever be able to leave this place. The edges of the plane were beginning to condense toward her slowly, like she was being squeezed from the outside in; there was warmth rising up from both no direction and every direction at once. She thought she could hear a distorted sound like a rhythmic, repeated tone, so faint she thought she had fabricated it out of her listlessness and need for her life to return to her. She had grown too tired to try and reopen her past; what lay before her now was the textureless darkness that called to her silently just beyond the plane.

Sasuke reached out with a white hand toward Sakura, and Kakashi turned his face to look at him fully, his arm shielding her from the hand. "Do not touch her."

Sasuke sneered. "What, do you own her now that you've fucked her?"

Kakashi bodily flinched, and Sasuke's waiting hand was on Sakura's face in that moment, one poking finger lifting her eyelid forcefully open in a flash of movement; Sasuke's eyes flashed scarlet. Quickly regaining himself, Kakashi shoved Sasuke hard enough away from Sakura that he was hurled backwards through a medical machine, colliding roughly against the hospital room wall and making the foundations of the room shudder at the force of the impact. "I said don't touch her."

As Naruto and the others got to their feet and rushed over to Sasuke, their eyes blazing, Kakashi returned his attention to Sakura. She was shifting in her sleep with a fierce expression of agony. She writhed in the bed, forcing Kakashi to shift aside - he reached out to catch her arm that flailed upwards, preventing it from snapping the IV tubes. Sweat pearled on her forehead and she arched in the sheets, her teeth clenched. Her head wrenched from side to side and her lungs strained as she made voiceless screams that could not make it past her lips. "Medic!" Kakashi shouted, pinning down Sakura's arms as she flailed violently, chakra flaring in her hands and around her form. He struggled to keep her pinned as a medic ran up with a damp rag - he took the rag, using one hand to pry her mouth open and put the rag in her mouth. She bit down on the rag and he jerked his hand back before her teeth came back together - the rag prevented her from biting her tongue and breaking her teeth. The pain that wracked Sakura's face tore through Kakashi, and with a hisshe turned to look at Sasuke across the room while he held Sakura down. "Sasuke, what have you done?"

Then Sakura gasped, her unfocused eyes blinking harshly in the lights of the room. She collapsed against the bed, breathing hard, and she closed her eyes again. Her heart thudded slow and sure in her chest.

"I woke her up," came Sasuke's tired voice behind the figures that crowded him. Every eye in the room turned to Sakura.

fourteen: vitality

Floating turned to falling, and falling turned to the feeling of light flooding her mind as heat and sound and sensations began to overwhelm Sakura's mind. With a suddenness that thundered through her being, Sakura became weighted, her limbs and her body feeling heavy, present, and very much alive.

With a gasp she surged upward, her muscles screaming as she opened her eyes and heaved for breath in the hospital bed. Her irises contracted and expanded as she focused them, and her heart shuddered in her chest as her blood pulsed. Her toes curled, her fingers stretched out and lifted to her face, her breath tore through her throat, and she felt like she had been completely reborn.

As her hands fell from her face and to her lap, she felt them be gently covered by another set of hands, larger and rougher. She looked to her right, then, and directly into the intense, exhausted, alive eyes of Kakashi. Her mouth parting, Sakura stared, slack-jawed for a moment as she began to truly realize that she was no longer adrift in her seemingly endless sleep. One of his hands on her lap rose and lifted to her face, and the tears came to her then as she remembered what she had lived while asleep.

Then she pulled forward, her fingers threading around the mask and through his hair, tugging him down to her. He pulled down the mask as her hair cascaded in a cherry-blossom curtain around them as their lips met.

In response, Kakashi pulled her closer, his hands around her back and behind her neck tight in their grip like she might disappear at any moment. She allowed her long hair to shield their faces and give them a private moment. Slowly opening her eyes to search his, Sakura smiled at the same fierce depth of passion in his eyes that she had discovered in her past. She reveled in the warmth of his skin, the distinct shine of life in his face, the thrumming of her heart in her throat. She felt the word repeat itself one last time as it sunk with finality through her body. Alive.

Then she blinked at him as she heard many different sets of clothes shifting and the faintest of giggles in the room with them - feet shuffling, mouths whispering. Kakashi pulled the mask back up with a grin, nimble fingers quick enough that his face was masked once more before her hair slid away from around them. Settling back on the pillows that propped her up, Sakura turned with a blooming red face to see who had witnessed their blissful reunion; at her side, Kakashi looked with her.

The hue smoldered into a decidedly tomato-red as her eyes flicked across the people she loved sitting around her hospital bed. Naruto and Sarada were across the bed from Kakashi at her left side, and next to them just about everyone else she knew - Ino, Sai, Shikamaru, Tenten, Hinata, Chouji, Kiba, even Shizune and Tsunade; more figures stood behind them, more faces that she knew. Yamato, Gai, Genma, Lee, Iruka… She couldn't count them all as they crowded the little hospital room and out into the hall just beyond it. Sakura's hand slid over and took Kakashi's back, giving it a self-conscious squeeze. She unconsciously leaned toward him, her eyes wide - then her eyes met Naruto's, and her cheeks burned hard enough to fall off as he gave her a huge (and teary) grin. "YOU'RE AWAKE SAKURA-CHAN!" Even as he launched toward her, Sarada and Kakashi both reached out to restrain him - "Naruto, be careful!" - but he still managed to hug her with enough force that she almost fell off the bed. The IV tubes tore from her arms and she winced as her muscles ached with the hug but she laughed anyway, hugging her teammate and friend in return and feeling the tears beginning to fall again. Her voice was hoarse with disuse. "How… how did you get the entire village into this little hospital?" Naruto moved back as suddenly as he had crashed forward and gestured with shining eyes outside. "You were finally coming to. I knew you weren't far out anymore, Sakura-chan. And there is going to be the biggest celebration ever in celebration." Happiness shone in his blue eyes, and Sakura felt Kakashi squeeze her hand. "I knew you would come back."

She laughed. "That still doesn't answer my question!" She reached out to smack playfully at him, but her arm flailed limply, and she shot a stare at it like it had grown a voice and called her a name. She tried to flex her muscles and saw with horror that her muscles responded weakly.

"Yeah, you've atrophied a bit." Naruto's smile fell for a moment. "You were gone a long time, Sakura-chan."

Blinking, remembering her long sleep, Sakura looked to her right. She heard Naruto chuckle at the way that she and Kakashi stared at each other. Cheeks flushing, she glared over at Naruto, and he instinctively backed away from the bed to avoid being punched as he made a cheeky grin. "Saaakura loves senseeeei, Sakura loves senssseiii-"

Sakura hissed, steam shooting from her scarlet ears, clawing outwards as Kakashi gently held her back. "Naruto, I swear to any gods there are I will end you-"

Both of them reddened as Naruto winked back, walking into the crowd with a wave. "I'm looking forward to being the best man!"

Looking at each other with wide eyes, Sakura and Kakashi composed themselves as her many visitors began to flood forth with questions, tears, hugs, and laughter. Her face hurt from smiling, and her heart hurt more; but her stomach dropped as a familiar figure stood at the end of the bed, black cloak drifting.

Sasuke stared her down coldly. "What the fuck, Sakura?"

"Now, I won't say I haven't thought about it," Kakashi was saying as he and Sakura walked together down one of the side Konoha streets toward her home, one arm slung around her shoulders to prevent her weakened legs from stumbling. The setting sun dipped their figures in golden-orange; their respective silver and pink hair shifted softly in the light. "Actually... I've been thinking about it all of the time." He stopped them in the middle of the street and turned to her. Sakura watched with blooming cheeks and parted lips as Kakashi got down on one knee, and she thought her heart was about to burst as one of his hands reached into his back pocket, smoldering dark gaze never leaving her face as he soaked in her intense expression. Her hands lifted to her gaping mouth in her growing epiphany, a hundred thoughts and images of the future coming to life around the image of him kneeling before her. His hand in his pocket out of her view found what he had in store for her...

...And pulled out the Icha Icha book that had been in her hut, presenting it in his hands. "Sakura… will you tell me your favourite part?" His eyes gleamed as he offered the bright-colored book of erotica up towards her.

Her roar was heard all throughout Konoha, and the famous Copy Nin Rokudaime was seen jogging cheerily through the streets, chased by a purple-faced and clumsy Sakura.

She caught up to him when they were nearing her house, and he caught her as she stumbled again. Helping her back to her feet, Kakashi's arm returned to her shoulders. Though she had to keep her eyes ahead and occasionally toward her feet to avoid stumbling again, she could see the way he was smiling slightly beside her, thoughtful eyes reflecting the rising night sky. Sakura was grateful to not be carried, grateful that he already knew she wanted to walk home on her own two legs regardless of her weakened and half-atrophied muscles. His hand curled gently around her shoulder, and she felt her memories stir at the touch. She glanced at him as they stopped at her home's front door.

She was fumbling, looking automatically for her house key, and Kakashi shook his head with a smile as he took out a key from his pocket and unlocked the door in an easy blur of movement. Sakura rolled her eyes mostly at him and partly at herself as she stepped back into her home for the first time in a very long time.

Standing out at her open door, Sakura's knees nearly gave way beneath her, and Kakashi's hands caught her from falling as they snaked around her waist. She stared out into her home.

Roses, asters, baby's breath splashed along the walls in hanging baskets; vines on trellises, spilling out trumpet flowers and clematis, standing over vases and pots of lavender and chrysanthemums that bloomed vivaciously. Every color covered the surfaces of the walls, the floors, the counters and tables; they hung from the ceilings and dripped down the stair banister. The air was alive with scents. She breathed in the smells of honeysuckle and lavender, of eucalyptus and mint; closing her eyes a moment to appreciate the way the air made her lungs glow, Sakura took her time before letting out a slow sigh.

"Compliments of Ino and Sai," Kakashi said behind her, guiding her through the path that the gaps between potted plants and flowers left over to the stairs. She couldn't look away from the green life that had turned her home into an indoor forest, and she nearly stumbled over several different pots as they made their way upstairs. "And Naruto, and myself. And many others."

They entered the room at the end of the second-floor hall, and with a loud exhale Sakura collapsed onto her bed. She laid back, her blush-colored hair spilling across the neatly-made covers. Her hand patted the comforter beside her in an open invite. After she did not feel a weight joining her on the mattress, she cracked open an annoyed eye to see Kakashi standing at the end of her bed with a raised eyebrow.

"What?" Sakura huffed. "Come rest a minute with me."

Kakashi held up a gloved hand, fingers extended, and pressed one finger back down into his palm. "One. I am exhausted, and if I lay there with you, I'll fall asleep and probably not wake up for a couple days. And as much as I want that, I need to be awake to help you around and keep an eye out for trouble." He narrowed his eyes at her, pressing down another finger. "Two. I'm making it clear right now that we aren't going to…" His dark eyes flicked around the room as if the right way to phrase his sentence was scrawled on the walls somewhere, then pinned back to Sakura. "...to finish what we started over tea all those weeks ago until you are feeling completely better, and three-"

"To finish what we started?" Sakura ran a hand through her hair with a snort.

Kakashi glared at her, his middle finger waggling as his index finger lowered a moment, flipping her a bird. Sakura's laugh turned to a chortle, and she clutched her stomach as she ached with her amusement. "Oh, oh please continue," she managed as she attempted to ease her laughter. With a straight and carefully unamused expression Kakashi continued, eyeing the way she sprawled back on the covers. "Anyway… and thirdly, Sarada will be home soon. So that further negates any ideas you were entertaining about number two."

"Who said I was doing that?" Sakura blinked up at him innocently. She stretched, her arms relaxing behind her head, and she adjusted herself so she was lying up against the pillows. She didn't miss how his eyes traced her reclining form, and she took the opportunity to tease him further. "Dirty pervert."

Kakashi folded his arms, narrowed ebony eyes watching her dangerously. "You had better stop calling me that or I'll show you what a 'dirty pervert' I am."

"Please do." Sakura's eyes glittered.

Downstairs the front door handle jangled as keys were inserted into it; their eyes flicked synchronously beyond the open bedroom door. Mustering her remaining energy, Sakura sat up and tied back her hair, getting to her feet; as she passed Kakashi, she shot him a dark look, one hand tracing lightly along his vest. "If you think I'm going to let you make me wait until you say so," she murmured as she brushed past him, "you have another thing coming." Then she left the room, hips swaying as she went.

The hug that Sakura squeezed Sarada into made her daughter squeak as she curled her arms tight around her. "I'm sorry we didn't get to talk much at the hospital," she was saying as she ignored her complaining muscles and turned them around in a circled embrace. "I missed you so much." She buried her face in her daughter's long black hair. "I'm so sorry I was gone for so long."

Sarada's eyes were glistening with tears as she gently broke the embrace and smiled up at her mother. "It's okay. I watched over you with Rokudaime-sama while you were sleeping." She planted a kiss on Sakura's cheek and sniffed. "I even got to practice my healing skills while you were away."

Sakura's eyes widened a moment, and she tilted her head questioningly. "You what?"

Sarada pointed behind Sakura, and she turned. Kakashi sheepishly held out his arm, and Sakura stepped over and took it, staring at the long scar along his forearm. Her practiced fingers moved over the whitish-pink jagged mark with interest, and she shot Kakashi a quick look of mixed pity and gratefulness as she shifted to show the mostly-healed gash to her daughter. "See here how you could have stitched a little tighter in this spot, and more evenly along here?" She indicated with a trailing finger the parts that she meant, and Sarada nodded, focused on the impromptu lesson. "You want to aim for a ninety-degree angle when you curl in the needle, clockwise. See here in this part midway up you went a little too deep…"

Sarada's expression pinched and Sakura gave Kakashi's arm a pat as she released it, her hand ruffling in her daughter's hair. "Don't worry. I'm still proud of you and it was an excellent effort. He still healed, and you sterilized it properly or he would be suffering from infection." She glanced at Kakashi again and this time with surprise. "You're the first medic he's let touch him other than me in…. well, as long as I can remember."

Kakashi shrugged. "It's the Sakura in her. That shaking fist reminded me of past bodily threats you made at my expense. I was moved."

"She what?!" Sakura stomped her foot and loomed over Sarada. "You don't threaten patients! Especially ones that are your elders!"

Kakashi coughed. "Elders? Who are you talking about exactly?"

Sarada bowed her head quickly. "Sorry, sorry…"

"You only threaten them if they deserve it and are refusing help." She folded her arms as she concluded her lecture. "So don't do it again unless that's the situation."

Head still inclined respectfully, Sarada's mumble came out with her pout audible. "That was the situation. He was refusing to get healed, and he was bleeding everywhere…"

Sakura turned her scrutiny slowly to Kakashi, and his palms were already facing outward toward her in a placating gesture as he backed up a step. "Sure, I was pretty injured. But you were unconscious, and I was -"

"Kakashi!" She stomped in his direction, and freed from the lecture, Sarada moved out of the way and into the kitchen. Sakura chased Kakashi up the stairs, hands tightly gripping the railing. "Get back here! I'm making good of those 'bodily threats'!"

As soon as they made it past the top of the stairs, Sakura found herself suddenly pinned against the wall of the dark hallway, her arms beneath Kakashi's wrists and her face shadowed beneath his as he loomed over her. "Are you?" came his teasing whisper, and she had to bite back the shuddering sigh of delight that pushed through her as his masked lips descended. He traced his mouth over her brow, then her cheek, and along her jaw; his head lowered as he began to kiss her neck. "Fuck," she whispered, her hands running up his back. She could feel how tense his body was and she laughed softly into his hair. "Are you all right there, Sukea? I thought you were putting an embargo on…" She groaned as his warm breath ghosted over her throat and ascended as he placed a kiss on the corner of her mouth. Then Kakashi pulled away, a grin on his slightly reddened face.

Sakura quickly realized that he wasn't going to continue, and the thunder returned to her expression. "Don't you dare," she hissed, her hand darting toward him - her other hand flicked behind her, and her guess at where he would flash to was correct as her other hand hit against the back of his vest. She caught its edge and pulled as hard as her muscles could manage, successfully tugging Kakashi bodily back into her and preventing him from escaping down the stairs. She turned him around and yanked down the mask as she slanted her mouth across his.

Kakashi responded easily and with warmth, allowing a lingering, edged kiss before they parted. "So impatient," he commented, and she carefully pulled the abused black nylon of his mask back up over his face. It was loose around the edges where she had torn it off of him and Sakura squinted up at him in apology. "I may have damaged it."

He raised his fingers in response, wiggling his pinky with a grin that touched his eyes. "Four… you owe me a new mask." Sakura raised her fist with a smile, and then they turned from each other wordlessly, Kakashi heading back downstairs to help Sarada and Sakura walking into her bedroom with thoughts of rest. As she paused at the master bedroom's door, looking back and hearing the clanking of dishes and Sarada's laugh at a joke Kakashi made, she lifted a hand to cover her heart. She listened to its steady rhythm that was slowing from its erratic thumping from their moments against the wall, and she felt the quiet sounds of the house around her easing her aching body. It all felt so thrillingly domestic in a way she had not quite experienced before.