No one is telling me what they think again; I'm getting a little antsy! Please Review! (Preferably after reading)

First in case anyone is wondering, yes the summary of the story is correct I am leading my way slowly but surely to the whole deal with Sasuke and Itachi etc and that's all I'm saying for now about that because I really don't want to give you the whole plot, I want you to experience it as you read. Just wanted to let you all know that I haven't forgotten about my summary.

Our story continues on with:

Chapter 8: Coming Home to You

Sakura ran down the street on pure adrenaline, having almost completely exhausted her chakra during the course of this long and trying day from getting up at 5:30 in the morning she had fallen from a 2 story building, healed a wounded Jounin, used her new technique, trained all day, danced all night, gotten drunk, performed an incredibly difficult poison extraction technique while intoxicated and shoved off a rather strong shinobi while he was busy plowing her. Blindly, not even caring where she was going or the fact that she was in pain and she had no shoes she turned a corner and suddenly screamed when someone's strong hands grabbed her shoulders.

"Don't touch me! Let go! LET GO, LET GO!" Sakura shrieked at she didn't know whom, the feeling of someone touching her after what had just happened was too much and she closed her eyes and feeling hot tears finally escape. Suddenly through the hysteria she heard a familiar voice saying her name.

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"Sakura? SAKURA!" Kakashi said frantically keeping firm grip on her shoulders and urging her to open her eyes and see it was him.

"What happened? What's wrong?" he pleaded letting go of one shoulder and grabbing her chin to tilt her head up to face him which must have been just the wrong move because with her arm free she belted him a good one right in the gut. Fortunately, there were advantages to being an infamous Jounin copy-nin and the little amount of chakra that he could sense that she had left wasn't enough to gather that monstrous strength that she was usually able to summon so it was just an ordinary shinobi-strengthed punch, which he could easily handle.

"Sakura open your eyes, it's me Kakashi," Kakashi said feeling he probably should have said this to begin with.

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"Kakashi?" Sakura said hopefully daring to open her eyes, and saw the most beautiful masked man in the world, feeling instantly relieved and safe she promptly collapsed exhausted into his arms and blacked out.

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Standing in the middle of the sidewalk holding a passed out Kunochi who was barefoot and bleeding and had just screamed rather loudly to make him let go of her Kakashi felt rather awkward and decided maybe there was a need for a little more privacy. Quickly, hoping he didn't look too much like a kidnapper (and the mask couldn't be helping) Kakashi picked Sakura completely up bridal style and performed the transportation Jitsu to carry them both to his apartment.

Carefully cradling Sakura in his arms Kakashi took her over to his couch and lay her down beginning a careful examination of his former student. Her face was flushed from crying and her mascara had run, running his eyes down her body he noticed several bite marks and a rather large hicky on the side of her neck. Her dress looked disheveled and as he got to her legs he again saw what he was hoping he hadn't earlier. There was blood, already beginning to dry down the sides of her thighs and it didn't take a genius shinobi to tell where the blood originated from. Looking down at her feet he saw that they were bruised and bleeding as well from her barefoot run down the street. Going over to sit on a chair by the couch that the young girl in front of him had dozed off in that very morning Kakashi placed his head between his hands trying to figure out what to do.

"I need to know what happened, I mean I know what happened but I need to know WHO so I can kill them and rip their balls off," Kakashi thought angrily, "Should I wake her up or let her rest? No. I have to wake her up, this guy could be getting away and I don't know how injured she is, I might have to bring her to the hospital."

Walking back over to the couch Kakashi sat on the coffee table and feeling it best not to get into the whole "don't touch me" mode again instead decided to gently call her name. If he had to he would dump some cold water on her.

"Sakura, Sakura" he said softly and to his great relief he saw her eyelashes flutter open.

"Kakashi" Sakura said in the most pitiful tone he ever heard as fresh tears began to well up in her eyes.

"Sakura, yeah it's me," Kakashi said quietly. "Sakura I need you to wake up and tell me exactly what happened ok? We may need to take you to the hospital. . . Have you been raped?"

"Yes. No, I mean yes but no," said Sakura beginning to sob, "No it's all my fault. I shouldn't have gone to the hotel room and I never said no and I guess I was too drunk but I thought I only had two beers besides the cup of wine Ryu gave me in his room, and- RYU! Kakashi you have to help me I may have killed him you have to go check!"

Confused by the quick run-on sentences and unable to make everything out over the sobs that were coming every few seconds all Kakashi really understood was "Yes", "no" ,"my fault" ,"drunk" and "Ryu . . . killed". If it was this Ryu who had done this to his little Kunochi he very much hoped he was already dead because he was about to find new levels of pain if he wasn't.

"Sakura, calm down. You're safe now ok. Just take some deep breaths and tell me exactly what happened," Kakashi tried again.

"Ok, ok," said Sakura sucking in air and trying to get a hold on herself. " I went out to meet Ino like I said and she was with a guy already so we decided to split up and then Ryu came into the bar-"

"Who is Ryu," Kakashi growled sure that this was the dead man that had hurt his Sakura.

"He's my old ex-boyfriend from sand country, I mentioned him to you once after I got back from my training over there with Tsunde, well he just finished a mission and he found me in the club and so we hung out together and he invited me to his hotel room and I stupidly said yes because I was so desperate for a boyfriend after all the thoughts I was having this morning so I went with him and we kissed and I told him we were going too fast so he stopped and we had a drink and then…then I can't remember much, I guess I can't handle my liquor but I only had two beers and that glass of wine, but next thing I know we were in the bedroom and I thought something felt wrong because I couldn't think clearly so I started to do the poison extraction technique on myself to clear out the alcohol but I couldn't talk while I was doing that because its really hard and I was already having a hard time thinking and then. . . and then. . .he-" Sakura said quickly at first and then at the end unable to continue.

"I know Sakura, you don't have to tell me that part," Kakashi said quietly.

Taking a deep shuddering breath Sakura looked into Kakashi's eyes as he still had the Sharingen uncovered and continued, "When I cleared my system enough I used my new technique and shoved him off, that's why I need you to go make sure he's ok, I don't know how much damage I may have caused him."

"He deserves anything you gave him," Kakashi said adamantly looking into the moist green eyes of his treasured friend and trying to pour out any support he could.

"No, Kakashi, it's my fault," Sakura said looking away, " I got myself into the situation by drinking too much and not saying no."

"Sakura you're not thinking clearly, maybe you made a mistake by going alone to a hotel room with a guy you had no intention of sleeping with, but it sounds to me like you tried to tell him he was going to fast. And it also sounds like he probably did something to that glass of wine you had. If he did and even if he didn't I don't know what kind of trash takes a girl to bed when she's obviously too intoxicated to think straight. It wasn't your fault if you didn't want it, he should have respected that," Kakashi said speaking carefully. He wanted make sure she understood that this wasn't her fault. He had so many experiences over the years of being a top class shinobi dealing with girls who had been raped and he often found surprisingly that many of the girls found ways to blame themselves. He didn't want his Sakura fall into that mind trap.

"Maybe," answered Sakura turning even farther away, and then suddenly turning back to him, she reached out and gripped his gloved hand, "Either way, Kakashi can you please go see if he's ok? And don't hurt him! I just want this to end, I need to know if he's ok I couldn't bare it if I killed him. Even if it wasn't my entire fault, it wasn't his either. There were two people in that room tonight . . ."

Sakura broke off beginning to cry again and Kakashi moved to sit next to her on the couch and lift her body so that he could cradle her and hug her, letting her sobs rack into his green vest as she lifted her arms to hug him back tightly.

"Please Kakashi, please go see if he's ok," Sakura cried, "I guess I'm not going to be a good ninja after all, I can never seem to stop what I'm feeling. I just can't stop crying."

"You're completely drained Sakura, losing your virginity like this is traumatic. And the way of the ninja just says you don't show your emotions during the mission, it doesn't say that you won't have any, and it defiantly doesn't say that you can't share them with people you trust when you need to. Otherwise we'd all go insane. I'm here for you Sakura. Besides it sounds like you did pretty well, you were able to think with a hazy head and heal yourself and stop the situation. That's better then a lot of people could have done." Kakashi said hugging her tightly and talking softly into her hair. It smelled of roses and lavender.

"Really?" asked Sakura leaning back a bit to look into Kakashi's eyes, their faces close together.

"Really," said Kakashi quietly unable to break eye contact.

Silent, Sakura and Kakashi held each other in the darkness of his apartment unmoving looking intently into each other's eyes as if searching for something.

Clearing his throat Kakashi laid Sakura back on the couch and said, "If I'm going to go check on this bastard I'll need to know where he is."

"At the hotel just down the street from where I ran into you," Sakura said averting her eyes, "I think it was room 1503."

"Right," said Kakashi striding towards the door.

"Kakashi," Sakura called, "Promise me you won't hurt him."

Pausing for a moment by the door Kakashi finally answered quietly " I promise. If you want you can take a shower, you can wear some of my clothes, I have everything in the closet in my room, and you're welcome to anything in my house Sakura. Whatever you want is yours. I'll be back soon."

Opening the door to leave Kakashi heard Sakura say "Thank you Kakashi-kun."

"Hn," was all he was able to get out as he closed the door, his mind already set on how he could get this Ryu without breaking his promise to Sakura.

Yay! Kakashi protects Sakura! Let me know what you think ok? I'll get the next chapter out as soon as possible but I will be more encouraged to do so if I get reviews ::dangles cookie::