Thank you again to ShipperTrish, the legend, the saviour, for betaing again, and thank you to all those who have been kind enough to review or fav!
Chapter 10: Too Many Mirrors…
When Sakura finally woke up from what felt like the longest, deepest sleep of her life, it was to a strange mix of pleasure and pain. Pain - her body still hurt like hell, her brain seemed to beat like a tin drum against her skull, and the unpleasant tight numbness of her hand made it feel like she'd tied a breeze block around her wrist. The pleasure, however, lay in the fact that she could feel the warm thrum of her chakra coursing around her highway, wrapping her internally in a network of soothing green that diligently worked to heal the bruises and cuts that crisscrossed around her body. She'd got that idea from Naruto. When it became common knowledge that the Kyuubi's chakra regenerated Naruto's body at an alarming rate, Sakura had, in fascination, started working on her first original jutsu.
Being the only medic in her team, her first priority was the health of her teammates. If she was injured, her chakra control was weakened. If her chakra control was weakened, then it took longer to stabilize her teammates, and taking longer to do that could easily lead to complications, especially in enemy territory. So with the help of Tsunade and a rather large pile of medical theory, Sakura had set about learning how to store emergency chakra, formed already into warm, green medical chakra that would set about making essential repairs to her own body so she could simultaneously create new chakra for her patients. Unfortunately, she had only progressed far enough to be able to heal minor cuts and abrasions on herself, but even that could make a difference. At least she wouldn't be left with any superficial scarring. She supposed it wasn't even a jutsu, just something she had trained her body to do as naturally as breathing: collect, convert, store. It was simple, but genius. Despite this self professed genius, she had also always been cripplingly awful at naming things. Her first pet cat was called "Pretty Kitty" or "PK" for short. Her goldfish had been dubbed "Goldie." Yes, she was always an imaginative one…and the technique? "Medical Saving Thingy no Jutsu" much to Tsunade's despair.
Another source of pleasure came from the fact she was lying on possibly the most comfortable bed in existence. It was almost like floating, she thought absentmindedly. Of course, that realization brought up a ton of questions that Sakura found herself not wanting to know the answers to. The last time she had checked, she was losing it in a spectacular fashion, standing in a crater bleeding to death and screaming hysterically over her lost teammates. Just the recollection brought a surge of panic into her chest.
What had happened? Where was she? How exactly did she get here?
Cracking open an eye, she found herself staring up at a very pale and beat up looking young girl, one who, in that moment, looked barely out of the academy, small and frightened. Dirt was plastered over every inch of exposed flesh and her hair looked almost light brunette under the layers of soil and soot. Her eyes were sunken and hollow looking. Her face was drawn with worry. When Sakura reached up towards the ceiling, the girl reached down and she couldn't stop the incredulous bark of laughter that shook the bed with a gentle slosh and then she laughed again, painfully pulling herself into a sitting position.
A water bed and a mirrored ceiling. This had to be hell.
Looking around herself for the first time, she took in the hideous leopard print bedspread, the large glass bowl overflowing with condoms on the bedside table, the fluffy pink pillows which had been dumped on the shag pile carpet, the…was that oils? Ew!
Gingerly, she opened the little wooden drawer in the bedside table already knowing what she would find. Yep, Kama Sutra, the sex bible. And to make it even more cliché and disturbing, the room key lay next to her on the bed, its keyring a felted heart with the number 69 embroidered with sparkling diamante beads.
Rolling her eyes and feeling the need to hit the man responsible for choosing the most inappropriate motel on the continent (A "Love Motel" for Kami's sake!), she scanned the room for the silver haired pervert.
"Kakashi? What the hell is this?" her voice sounded hoarse and broken.
Silence.
"Kakashi?!"
He must be out surveying the area, she thought. Wherever the hell we are…
She turned her attention to the hand that still hung uselessly at her side and the dull bass beat of her head instead.
Focusing her chakra with the well seasoned experience of a medic-nin, she set about probing her body, sending out tendrils of the healing energy to assess the damage. Remarkably, but also as expected, her hand and head seemed to be the worst of her problems. Sure, there was a fractured rib and some muscle damage from several of the aggressive lacerations, but these would be easy to fix afterward. Her legs and thighs were bruised with an almost uniform pattern of ovals, which if she spread her hands wide, matched the marks left by fingertips.
She started with her biggest priority – her broken hand. A ninja was nothing without the use of their hands, a medic-nin more so.
The human hand has twenty seven bones, fourteen of those found in the fingers. Sakura was slightly dismayed to find she had managed to break, fracture, and crush nine of her phalanges, three of her metacarpals, and five of the carpal bones leading to a rather impressive total of seventeen out of twenty seven.
With a deep ragged breath, she quickly stuffed one of the offensively fluffy pillows in her mouth and bit down hard as she painstakingly re-broke each of the bones which had started fusing back at awkward angles. The relief was almost instant as the blood poured back into her fingers, releasing the tight numbness that had set into her joints from lack of oxygenated blood.
Once that was done, she summoned healing chakra and began pushing its energy into her sensitized hand. She let out a contented sigh as the soft green glow soothed the pain and began knitting the fractures and breaks back together, ironing out her collapsed tendons and relaxing knotted muscle.
After ten minutes of repeating this process, she gave her fingers an experimental stretch and flex, wriggling them one by one in front of her face and firing up visible chakra to make sure everything was running smoothly. They were still a little stiff and sore, but thankfully, fully operational. The cuts and grazes to her knuckles were now just pale red marks against her skin.
Placing both hands behind her head, she started a similar process with her skull, quickly closing the hairline fracture that ran from the nape of her neck to her crown and sending more healing energy to try and take down any swelling on her brain.
The hair at the back of her head was matted with clotted blood, hard and sticky to the touch. She looked up at her grubby appearance in the mirror above her and decided there and then that everything else could wait till after a nice, hot shower.
Gingerly stepping off the bed, she walked towards the door that she guessed belonged to the bathroom suite, marveling at how the shag pile fibers rubbed between her toes like furry blades of grass. It was so beyond tacky that she couldn't help but love it a little bit. She already had a complete image of what the bathroom would look like in her head, probably a hideous pink heart-shaped hot tub surrounded by nasty sparkly mosaic tiling and again far too many mirrors.
As she pushed open the door, she would have been pleased to see that her suspicions had been almost spot on if it weren't for the fully dressed man lying neck deep in dark bloody water, paler than she had ever seen him.
Trembling violently, but silently in the water, his exposed eye white where his pupils had rolled back up into his head, Kakashi didn't even notice Sakura's entrance. In fact, he was completely unaware of pretty much everything apart from the heat.
He was burning. What had initially felt like the blazing surface of an iron against his back had since spread to a needling fever all over his body. He remembered staggering to the bathroom and lowering himself into ice cold water. It had seemed like the most sensible thing to do at the time, but there had been no relief to the pain or heat. Instead, there was just a cloudy numbing of his extremities.
He had no concept of time. It felt like forever and felt like a minute all at once and so when small, but fiercely strong arms wrapped under his knees and back, he felt a primal sense of relief flood his system. He was not alone. Someone was here. He was not going to die alone.
It was something not many shinobi of his caliber ever got to experience. He had long ago accepted that he would probably die in a remote corner of the world far away from home, his body left to rot in a ditch or carved up by someone savvy enough to know the priceless nature of his eye.
As he was lowered onto a soft surface, he suddenly knew that whatever the outcome, he was in good hands.
Kakashi's incoherent ramblings continued as Sakura set to work checking his vitals, her forehead contorted with worry.
He was in shock, that much was certain, and then there was the onset of hypothermia judging by his violent shaking and confusion.
Removing his headband gently, she checked first the Sharingan. It spun and flared angrily as names and jumbled words tumbled from Kakashi's masked lips.
"Obito…not alone, stuck inside…" he croaked with agitation.
"Shhh…It's okay, Kakashi. It's me, Sakura. Shhh…" she cooed gently, wiping the perspiration from his brow.
His other pupil was fully dilated against the thin outline of his gray iris.
Once again she summoned her chakra, pushing the green glow into his body, tracing the injuries in her mind, mentally listing them in order of severity. He had several fractures, some were peppered across his ribs. One on his hipbone had become inflamed through walking. His breathing was erratic and shallow from slight smoke inhalation and exhaustion, but what caused her most concern was the nerve damage across his back and shoulders and the signs of infection.
Gently turning him onto his front, she studied his back. The jounin issue jacket was charred a deep and bloody black. The stench of burnt tissue made Sakura want to heave. Experimentally, she pulled gently at the once green fabric, noting dismally how portions of skin seemed fused into the thin weave of the fibers.
Kakashi gave an indignant groan at her actions.
"Only you would try and remedy third degree burns by giving yourself hypothermia," she muttered grimly before coughing and raising her voice loudly. "Kakashi, I'm going to have to take your clothes off and then I'm going to have cut this jacket off you, which will probably hurt a lot, so I'm going to have to knock you out. We don't have any medical supplies left, so I'll have to do it the old fashioned way. Do you understand?" she said this clearly and slowly and without a trace of embarrassment, the professional medic in her overriding her nervousness at the idea of stripping her ex-sensei down to his unmentionables.
"…eyes eat energy. No bloodlines, but the best," he responded with a foggy slur, sounding almost pleased with himself.
"I'll take that as a 'yes'." she said as she placed two fingers against his temple and let out a burst of chakra that rendered him silent and motionless at once.
As soon as he was still, Sakura stood up and started wrestling as gently as possible with her sensei's shoes and trousers. She pulled the sodden and muddied sandals off quickly and gently and eased the jounin pants, along with some absurdly patterned shuriken boxers, over his hips and draped them over the tiny heater by the window to dry. To avoid indulging her wandering eyes, she quickly pulled the duvet over his exposed rear.
Grabbing Kakashi's abandoned kunai pouch in one hand and the large glass bowl of condoms in the other, she strode with quick hurried steps towards the bathroom. She threw the contents of the bowl on the floor, which scattered like plastic wrapped confetti in her wake. Once in the bathroom, she washed her hands thoroughly under the tap that was turned up as hot as she could stand and began soaping them and the sharpest kunai she could find into a thick lather with the motel's complimentary shower gel, which of course smelled like a mint flavored brothel. Once that was done, she rinsed her hands and her makeshift surgical instrument and filled the bowl with warm water and went back into the room. Placing the bowl back on the bedside table and the kunai in the bowl, she wandered over to Kakashi's prone form and knelt on the bed next to his hips.
She took a deep steadying breath as she started what was sure to be the long and tiring process of removing her sensei from his uniform.
The last remnants of sunlight had long since disappeared by the time Sakura eased the last piece of fabric out of her teacher's back. Standing up, the kunoichi cracked her neck, which had been protesting at her awkward, hunched position for the better part of two hours. She took the now claret colored bowl of water and deposited its bloody contents into the sink, again stopping to wash her hands. Finally, she could begin what she was best at: chakra enhanced healing.
The skin on Kakashi's back slowly reformed as one hand worked across its surface fluidly and gracefully while the other worked on monitoring his vitals, slowly raising his body's temperature, pushing out infection, and correcting his blood pressure.
It was an agonizingly slow process, but soon she felt his breathing level out and his heart regain a regular beat that got stronger by the minute. She was starting to feel the unpleasant tug of chakra over-excursion, her eyelids feeling heavy and her breath coming in shorter pants. Once the skin on his back had finally knitted together, she moved both hands awkwardly under the duvet and began fixing the irritated fracture on his hipbone.
That would have to do. Kakashi wasn't anything if not as tough as old boots. He certainly wouldn't complain about the lighter burns that remained untouched or a few cracked ribs.
She studied his sleeping form, too tired to expend any more chakra waking him up. He'd have to get there on his own.
His back still looked red raw and would probably be tight and uncomfortable for a few days, but at least there would be no horrific scarring.
Sakura finally stumbled towards her much needed bath, dragging their pack behind her. Yes, soap and clean clothes. Bliss.
Kakashi watched Sakura emerge from the bathroom feeling more than a little disconcerted. He leveled her with what he knew to be his laziest, most noncommittal stare and spoke with his usual carefully schooled indifference, yet underneath this mask, and the other mask, he was completely flummoxed and possibly a little embarrassed.
"Sakura, where are my clothes?" he gestured up and down at his bare chest and the duvet, which was held in a death grip across his waist. He couldn't miss the way her eyes trailed across his torso before settling on the bunched duvet.
"Oh…erm, sorry about that!" she squeaked, throwing the black rucksack onto the bed and scurrying hurriedly back into the safe confines of the bathroom. "I wont look!" she called, her face flushed as she slammed the door behind her.
The corners of Kakashi's mouth quirked up in amusement as he dug through the bag and retrieved his spare uniform, dismayed that he hadn't packed a spare jounin vest and that the only clean shirt he had was the one he used as pyjamas on missions. It was a little on the small side. He slipped into the uniform quickly, if a little stiffly, and grunted something to let Sakura know she could re-enter. When she finally cracked open the door to make sure the coast was clear of alluring male body parts, Kakashi had already finished two Konoha ration bars and was dusting his mask and shirt down for crumbs. He gestured the other two that sat in shiny green wrappers on one side of the bed.
"For once I am not going to complain about dehydrated fruits, nuts, and bran." Sakura said, greedily snatching up the tasteless offerings. It literally felt like she hadn't eaten in days.
"So…Kakashi. A love motel?" she said with a quirked eyebrow.
"Really?" Kakashi said in a curious tone, taking an exaggerated look at their surroundings. "I hadn't really noticed."
Sakura scoffed disbelievingly as she took a large bite of her high energy snack.
"Sakura, I was a little passed out when I was making accommodations. Besides, the place is called the 'Duck and Dive.' It doesn't exactly sound like a sex den."
Sakura only rolled her eyes at that and shot him another disbelieving look as she unwrapped the second protein bar.
"Whaf fime iss et?" she managed to work around a mouthful of crumbs.
"A little after ten."
Her eyes flickered down to her lap. "Are you feeling well enough to travel? Only I've used up a lot of chakra. I don't think I'll be much use on the way back."
"I'm fine. Good as new, really." he said gently. "But maybe we should rest up tonight and travel back in the morning. We still have some loose ends to tie up here first. I might have a lead."
"A lead?" Sakura asked quizzically.
"One of Sai's ink summons managed to get out. I want to follow up on what he tried to tell us."
"One of Sai's summons made it out?" she looked up at him hopefully. "What did it say? Does that mean there's a chance that they're…" she trailed off dejectedly, tears traitorously pricking at the corners of her eyes.
What could Kakashi say to that? Instead, he plastered what he hoped was a reassuring expression on the visible quarter of his face and put a large hand on her shoulder.
"I hope so, Sakura. I'll send word to Tsunade right away and she'll send the best trackers we have to bring them home." Whatever condition they're in…he added silently.
The way her face transformed made his chest hurt. One minute she looked as if she was sitting under the darkest cloud and the next she was beaming a wide toothy smile at him as if he had just given her the best present she had ever received.
Without thinking, Sakura flung herself at him, her arms wrapping securely around his neck and embracing him as tightly as she could.
"Thank you." she murmured into his shoulder, pressing her face tightly into the crook of his neck.
"Your welcome." Kakashi grumbled back awkwardly, rubbing soothing circles across her back.
He felt safe and warm and comforting. The way his hands traced lazy circles across her back sent delicious tremors through her body as she subconsciously pushed her face and chest further into him, absorbing his warmth and inhaling the smell of him through his clothes. He smelled of the woods and spices, along with the residual odor of blood and smoke. He smelled a little like he needed a proper wash. Altogether he just smelled so masculine, so Kakashi.
Her hands threaded into the hair at the nape of his neck and she closed her eyes, rubbing her check and temple slowly against his jaw. She exhaled heavily, brushing her lips against the soft fabric of his shirt and then there it was…the overwhelming need to turn her head and kiss him. Her heart sped up all at once with the realization that he was the only person that would ever make all this worry and pain go away. He was reliable. He was the only person she had left. Slowly, she pulled herself away until she knew her mouth must be only millimeters from his. She opened her eyes to stare at the dark fabric of his mask and pulled her bottom lip between her teeth dazedly and looked up at him through her lashes. Then, she felt rather than saw him snap rigid.
His eye remained calm and unreadable as his hands took her carefully, but firmly by the shoulders and pushed her back gently away from him. He was up and by the door before Sakura could even work out what had happened. When he spoke his voice seemed lower.
"You should get some rest, Sakura. I'm going to send word to the Hokage."
"Kakashi…" she started in barely a whisper, her own voice cracked with turbulent emotion.
"Get some sleep. You're tired." he stated firmly. An order. Then he added more kindly, "It's all going to be okay. I promise."
Sakura could only nod dumbly as she watched the door close behind him.
I've heard that before, she thought glumly.
Kakashi smoothed the paper in his hands against his knee and gave it one more read through. Satisfied that the message was clear, to-the-point, and contained all the information it needed to, he rolled it up neatly before tucking it inside the bandages of his fastest ninken, Ūhei.
"This is for the Hokage and the Hokage only." he said to the large brown dog, patting it firmly on its haunches.
With a low growl and what could only be construed as a nod, the animal turned on its heel and pelted off down the dirt track at an alarming speed.
"And why am I here?" came the gruff voice at Kakashi's ankles.
"I need you to stay with Sakura. She shouldn't be on her own right now."
"And where are you going while I'm babysitting?"
"I just need some time to think." Kakashi stated simply before turning towards the establishment next door to their motel, a smoky noise filled bar with a large paint peeling sign that said "The Duck and Dive."
Pakkun let out a long exasperated sigh before trotting into the reception room of Kakashi's motel. He wrinkled his sensitive nose in disgust as the smell of sex and sickly sweet body oil hit him.
"Gone to drown his sorrows while I deal with the fallout…Has to take his subordinate to a brothel!…Stupid brat!...No biscuits either…Trust him...'The Strawberry Kunoichi'…Good God, what was he thinking?..." The pug grumbled the whole way up to the room.
Sakura lifted the little dog off the floor and carried him to the bed, ignoring the obscenities that he was currently hurling her way. She plonked him heavily in her lap and began scratching him softly behind the ears. At once his hind leg started beating out a steady rhythm against the bedsheets and all complaints about being so abruptly manhandled died on his lax jowls.
"See? That's not so bad is it?" she cooed.
Pakkun took a while to study her through his heavily lidded eyes. She'd been crying and honestly looked like she needed to curl up and get some sleep. He was about to tell her so when he spotted a folded up piece of paper in her other hand.
"What that?" he inquired.
"This?" Sakura said quietly, unfolding the paper to show him. "It's a drawing Sai did of all of us together."
The pug chuckled, a thick raspy grate, which sounded more like a vacuum cleaner having an asthma attack. "That's really good. Sai's very talented. Not many people could capture Kakashi's lazy ass that accurately."
Sakura smiled back before her face crumpled.
"Sakura…please don't cry." The pug whined, licking her hand with his long pink tongue.
"I-Im s-s-sorry." she sobbed. "I just can't lose any more people. Naruto and Sai are like my family a-and I'm just so s-scared…and then I tried to kiss K-Kakashi. I don't know what I was thinking! …And I think h-he's mad at m-me and I'm justsoworriedandemotional!" she wailed.
Pakkun fixed her with a level look. "You tried to kiss Kakashi?!" he asked incredulously.
Embarrassment flooded her cheeks as she looked away.
"Heh. Well, I can't say I'm impressed with your choice of mate, but it's only natural. In times of crisis the first instinct is to reproduce. It's the body's natural reaction to try and repopulate in times of war."
"PAKKUN!" she shrieked in disbelief.
"What? It's true…Besides, you've stopped crying now." he chuffed in amusement.
Sakura started to giggle and soon waves of raking laughter were jostling both of them, causing the bed to slosh and sway under them.
"What's so funny?"
"Nothing…" Sakura tried to stifle her laughter against her hand. "It's just…that…."
"Spit it out, woman!"
"He…Kakashi…" more giggles. "He…booked us into a sex motel!!" Her eyes were streaming as the pug joined in with her laughter. "And the funny thing is…he's the one running away thinking I was being too forward!"
When she finally got her breath back and stopped laughing, the expression of loss and depression slowly crept back over her features.
"Now, now. None of that." Pakkun grumbled. "You know what will cheer you up?"
She looked up at him through a curtain of hair in time to see him hold a paw out proudly in front of her.
"Press my paw pads. They're really soft and supple."
Kakashi sat at the back of the real Duck and Dive (he really didn't see how it was his fault that he'd gotten the signs mixed up. He had been delirious and on the verge of passing out at the time!) in the darkest, dingiest corner booth, nursing a large tankard of beer. He pulled his mask down and let it pool around his throat while he took his first long sip of the disappointingly warm amber liquid.
Normally, he would never advocate drinking on the job unless a mission required it for some reason, but to be honest, this had been a spectacularly crappy couple of days. He had lost two fellow shinobi. More than that, he had lost someone who was surprisingly important to him. Even Sai had been starting to grow on him. And again, it felt like it was completely his fault. Now they were down to only two original members of Team Seven: himself and Sakura. Sakura who had just attempted to seek comfort in a way that Kakashi would not - no - could not give her.
He could just imagine the fallout of fraternizing with his only remaining female subordinate. He really couldn't afford to lose her, too, and lose her he would have if he'd stayed in that bedroom another minute.
Hatake Kakashi prided himself in many things and often in things that other people thought he had no right to take pride in. He was one of Konoha's most successful and ruthless weapons, he was a master of closer to two thousand jutsus, most of which were unoriginal. This had never bothered him, even though he was known across the continent as "The Copy Nin," a less than complimentary nickname that had become more of a title as his ability and reputation grew.
He often read pornographic literature in public, which had earned him the reputation of a bit of a pervert. This also did not bother him and instead, he took pride in the fact that maybe someone, after seeing him with said pornographic literature, would go out and buy an installment of Icha Icha. If he could convert anyone into a rabid fanboy of the franchise, then brilliant! The more copies sold, the more chance for a third film.
There were two things, however, that Kakashi did not pride himself in:
One, Kakashi did not take pride in his ability to lose the important people in his life before he had really realized that they were just that - important. The idea of seeing another two names carved on the cenotaph made him feel physically sick.
The other was his dire track recorded with the ladies. They all loved him, they all wanted to be "important" to him, but Kakashi was a ninja. Ninjas go on missions and die. This never made for a particularly concrete basis for a relationship. A whore or your hand seemed to be the best kind of relationship for a ninja the way Kakashi saw it. And Sakura? She was too young and too full of life to have to endure his warped view of love. Quite simply, she meant too much to him for that.
He picked up his glass and drained it in one long gulp before setting it down and waving at the waitress for a refill.
She took one look at his unmasked face before trotting off red faced to pour him another.
"Dammit…" Kakashi all but growled.
On her way back over to him, beer bottle balanced precariously on a little silver tray and putting a little too much sway in her hips, her arse was slapped by a burly man sitting with his friends in the booth before Kakashi. The poor waitress, not expecting the wandering hand, pitched forward and landed heavily on her knees. Kakashi's beer smashed, foaming across the garishly carpeted floor.
A rowdy holler of cheers chorused as Kakashi quickly helped the poor waitress to her feet.
"That was a bit unnecessary, don't you think?" Kakashi said, slapping a firm hand on the offender's wide shoulder, a large bald man with a scarred, mean looking face. "I think you owe me a beer and this young lady an apology."
"Sit down, lil boy." The man in question snarled, turning back to his companions and carrying on with his conversation as if Kakashi wasn't even there.
"I said…" Kakashi started patiently.
"An' I says fuck off, ya little shit, 'fore me an' my boys beat the living 'ell out of ya…"
"…erm, Michi…I don't think you should start anything with this guy." One of his companions spoke up, a skinny, greasy looking man with long, mousy hair.
"Eh? Why not?"
"That there is Hatake Kakashi."
"Who?"
"You know, 'The Great Copy Nin Kakashi'."
Kakashi rolled his eye and the other man visibly paled.
"O-oh…right…" Michi stammered, then turned to the waitress. "Sorry, luv. Me 'n the boys is just getting a bit jolly. Didn't mean to scare ya. Get this man anything he wants on us."
The waitress nodded and scurried off, shooting Kakashi a grateful smile.
"Sorry 'bout that, Hatake, sir. I got sacked today. I was jus' letting my 'air down. Didn't mean no offense."
"None taken." Kakashi replied pleasantly, placated by the promise of free drinks.
"Yeah, that bastard Nakamizu fired us without severance pay. If he didn't have so many bloody guards, we'd of scalped the fucker." The smaller man supplemented.
"Nakamizu?" Kakashi asked, his interest suddenly piqued. "Nakamizu Hiroto?"
"Yeah, tha's the bastard."
"Hmm, why don't you boys tell me a little more about this shithead boss of yours?" Kakashi said, neatly slipping into the booth alongside Michi and his crew.
One thing Kakashi was very proud of at that moment was his blind luck.