"Meh..." Kakashi growled as his kunai sharpener slipped from his grasp and almost cut him. Gathering his gear and cleaning his hands he decided it was enough for a while at least.

He tried resting and lay on the mat. He tried closing his eyes. He didn't want to fall asleep. He wouldn't like to embarass himself in front of Anko like last time. He tried thinking of good things; things that made him happy. He tried the old psychological trick: remembering his childhood. He remembered the smell of freshly baked rice cakes and the colours of the leaves on the strees he usually trained by. He tried remembering the chirp of little birds. He squeezed his eyes. No. All he could hear was the shower running next to him. That annoying Anko, he thought. It was almost an hour since she locked herself in there. He'll sure lecture her when she gets out. Just wait. His eyes opened. The water stopped. He got up in a sitting position. He didn't know why, but he was considerably nervous now. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to keep a low profile and pretend to be siblings.

The doors of the bathroom opened. He looked at her. She was in the doorway fixing her hair in chopsticks. She was draped in a silk white sleeping gown with a dragon imprinted on it. It was large around her shoulders. She smelled of freshly cut bamboo. When the steam disappeared she closed the doors and went to sit on the mat in front of his. His eyes fell on the unusual mark on her neck.

"Hey, what's that?" he asked.

"Huh?" she looked confused. "Where?"

"There...on your left side," he said.

She laughed. "That's my ANBU tattoo, silly," she pulled the sleeve of her gown even lower to show him. "Just like yours."

He looked away. "No, I didn't mean that..."

"Then what?"

"That mark on your neck," he curtly said.

"Oh, that," she covered it with her hand. "That's the curse seal mark."

He gulped. "Curse seal..."

"Yeah..." she rested her head on the mat. "Please, blow the candle off."

"Are you sleepy?" he asked her raising his eyebrow.

"Yes, I am," he felt her turn.

"Fine, then," he blew it away. The room was drowned in utter silence and darkness. He placed his hands under his head. "Does it hurt?"

"When it is being taunted with. When they tried removing it..." she gulped. "It never goes away."

"Did it ever...you know...activate?" he asked after hesitating.

"No, never. Why are you so interested?" she asked getting more and more annoyed.

"I must know in order to prevent unwanted events on this mission," he answered.

"You needn't to be worried about that. It won't activate."

"How do you know?"

"It never does. I'm the only person...that has it and I don't know how it works. Orochimaru left me like that. He didn't tell me anything about it. It hurt like hell at the beginning and even more when they tried eliminating it. Nights after...everything, I think it created an illusion of pain."

"You were traumatized..." it wasn't a question.

"Scared. I was scared."

"Are you scared now?"

She didn't reply. Silence braided the room. The atmosphere became heavy. He knew she was still wide awake. He could feel it in her breathing. He shrugged. Why was he even paying attention to her.

"I am," she replied in a hoarse voice. "I'm not scared about what I've become or what I will become. I'm scared that I might hurt my loved ones. I'm scared that they won't understand or accept me anymore..."

He sighed. He could feel her sob. He hated himself whenever he made some girl cry. He always made Rin cry.

"You'll do fine," he tried saying. She stopped. He heavily breathed. It fascinated him that he had the courage to tell her what he couldn't tell Rin. He felt like apologising all over again.

Anko softly watched him in the darkness as he tossed and turned on his mat. "Rin! Rin!" he'd histerically call. She tried poking him, she tried shaking him, but he seemed to be caught up. That was when his hand met her hand fastened around it. "Rin..." he peacefully said. She smiled again and allowed him to hold on to it until he managed to calm down.

It was little after dawn when Kakashi finally woke up. Upon rubbing his eye, he saw that Anko was no longer sleeping in the other end of the room. Her mat was neatly folded as if it had been untouched. Stretching his hands he got up and walked towards the window. There she was, facing the main road on a tree branch while dangling her feet under. He could see was the scruf of her head and her spiky purple hair.

"Ready to go?" he asked her as soon as he reached the treet.

She jumped. "Oh, so Sleeping Beauty finally woke up," she mocked.

He raised an eyebrow.

"Whenever you are."

It was like a race against time. The idea was for them to reach the Northen village as soon as possible. He expected her to stop in her tracks, complain, nag, ask for at least one break, but she didn't. She just kept going on with her eyes narrowed at the view. He wondered if she even breathed; if she even thought. Probably that was her trick. She refused to think. She was turning out to be one heck of a ninja and he didn't know how pleased he was by that. He stopped. She stopped as well. He pulled her by the shoulder down at the shelter of some bushes.

"Hey, I sensed them too," she hissed brushing his hand away.

"Can you tell how many?" he asked.

"Not too many. The chakra energy is low. Three, maximum four."

"Yeah, I think so too," he said.

"You can be sure about that!" she added.

He was taken aback by her knowledge. He felt a bit awkward revealing his Sharingan in front of her. She waited.

"Three," he concluded. "Remember my saying that I will do anything to get to those murderers? Even kill anything?"

"You didn't say that, but you probably implied it," she carelessly said.

"Fine," he said annoyed by her idifference. "Now, when we meet these guys, I want you two show no mercy if they don't come clean."

She stared at him.

"Your answer?"

"I obey your orders," she curtly said.

"Fine. Come on."

They quietly sneaked until they managed to ambush them.

"Well, what do we have here?" one of them men sickly smiled. "Oh, Konoha ninjas. Lovely."

His friends laughed. "How old do you think they are?"

"By the way they look they can't be too old and is that a girl or am I wrong?" he continued mocking them. His face became more serious when he saw that both Anko and Kakashi didn't move from their combat position. "Now, how about you two kids run along and buy some ice-cream and let us real ninjas get on going?"

No reaction. He tried stepping ahead. Kakashi planted himself in front of him. "Real ninjas do not terrorize weaker villages," he coldly said. "Now, are we going to this the hard way?"

"Didn't you mean the easy way?" the older ninja sneered.

"No, I mean do you want to do this the hard way or my way?" he immediately jumped back drawing several kunais ready to dodge the ones sent by his opponent. "I guess not."

Anko stared at him in awe. Her blood was boiling inside and she could barely maintain her cool and not jump into the battle. He looked pretty badass back there but she wasn't going to start admiring him. Kakashi dodged each and every fist sent by his opponent using both his hands and legs. Well, not just yet she smirked engaging in battle.

He was growing tired as his second opponent was pushing him to the ground. He looked to his right where his former opponent was laying lifeless. He clenched his teeth and tried looking after Anko. He saw her, or what was supposed to be her. She reminded him of some sort of feline. She always went for the neck of her opponent if she wasn't using ninjutsu. She seemed wild as if she thirsted for battle. That made him shiver a bit. He turned back to his opponent. He pushed him off him and tried throwing shurikens at him. He tried gaining energy to preform a fire jutsu, but his opponent outran him. They both crushed agains the ground, his back gaining several scratches; his clothes being torn out.

"Guess it didn't turn out to be your way after all," he smirked and he was getting ready to deliver a fatal wound, Anko stepped in pushed him to the ground. "You?!"

"Yeah, me," she yelled thrusting her kunai in his body several times. Blood splashed all over.

Her other opponent was dead. "Anko!" he yelled and pulled her away; his arms tightly wrapping around her shoulders. "He's dead."

After she stopped shaking, she wiped the blood smeared over her face with the back of her sleeve. She was soaked in blood. "Right, let's go. But, firstly," she checked the coat of her first opponent and revealed a map. "This should be of some help," she threw it to him.

He evolved the map and there is was: the trail to the hidden village.

" I saw it while we were fighting," she said.

"Good job. I see that there's a lake somewhere close. We need to go and bathe," he added.

She looked at him. "These men were willing to take or lives today with no regret. I would much rather we reached a village before anything. Who knows how many people they already killed."

"Anko," he called.

She turned. He couldn't say anything and she understood.

Ah, yet another chapter. Probably the longest. Had some issues with the fighting part. I hope you're still there, aren't you?