Insanity's Slip

Chapter Thirty One

By Boejangles

-/-

Kakashi ran to the blonde's side and flipped him over so he could view the boy's face. The first thing he noticed were the horrible burns covering the boy's entire body. The second thing he noticed was that Naruto's lips had taken on a blue tint. Tilting the boy's head back, he lowered his head so his ear was above the boy's mouth and his eyes were trained on the small chest. He waited longer than he was trained to as he willed the boy's chest to move. When it finally sunk as a reality that his student was in fact not breathing; he gave two quick rescue breaths before checking for a pulse: it was thread, faint, and erratic- but it was there.

The relief Hatake felt at finding the heart beat was push aside when Naruto refused to breathe. With another set of rescue breaths, he screamed. "Don't die on me! Medic, I need a medic!" Frantic eyes whirled around in a frenzy to find anyone that could help. He saw someone running in their direction and could feel relief flooding his system until the person veered and rushed to the fallen Hokage's side.

A bitter laugh fell from his lips. Who was he kidding, why would they help some kid when the leader of their village looked dead. Resisting the urge to shake the blonde, Kakashi's heart clenched as the cyanosis spread from the boy's lips to give his face an eerie blue tint. "No, damnit no!" he cried out before breathing into his youngest student and forcing small lungs to inflate.

Fingers shaking with adrenaline searched for a pulse; not finding one they pushed deeper. There is was. It was growing weaker, harder to find. "I will not lose you to," he breathed out with wavering determination. Taking in a deep breath, he forced air into Naruto's lungs once again. Knowing he had a few second before the boy's body absolutely needed oxygen again; he picked up the boy, barely flinching when the burned skin moved with his grasp, and hugged the youngest Uchiha to his chest.

He was running faster than when he raced Gai, he needed to reach the hospital. He had to keep believing that not everyone would be busy with injured. The mental count down in his head reached three and he halted to set the boy down on a roof. Tilting Naruto's head back, he gave two steady even breaths urging the young boy's body to accept the oxygen he was attempting to provide it. He didn't waste the time to check for a pulse again, he just scooped the boy up.

It was only thanks to his years of training that he was able to dodge to the side and only receive a kunai to the shoulder. "I am not in the mood," you growled out in a menacing tone before moving his arm the was cradled under the blonde's legs to lodge a kunai into the sound nin's forehead. The mishap took away precious time and caused him to lose speed. He had to stop again to give Naruto more air. Flinching as he lifted the boy, Kakashi cursed the wound in his shoulder. He had fought through worse though and nothing was going to stop him.

Bursting through the hospital doors didn't get as surprised of a reaction as he was expecting. His eyes danced around attempting to local the medical nin among the injured. Too caught up in his raging thoughts, he was having trouble locating anyone. He decided to use the next best method: taking in a breath, he screamed, "He's not breathing!"

This caught two medics attention who had been attending to a broken leg and facial laceration respectively. In times of mass causality there was a triage system: walking wounded with minor injuries are green, those likely to live if simple care is given within hours are yellow, those that are critical and are likely to survive if simple life saving measures are applied rapidly are red, and those that are dead or are likely to die soon are black.

Kakashi knew for a fact that the two the medics had left were green; while the boy in his arms was a red if he ever saw one. Setting Naruto down so they could help him, he took a small step back. Anger flared up in him as he grabbed the medical ninja's shoulder and whirled him around. "What the hell!" he demanded pointing at the black band the man had placed on the blonde's wrist.

"I'm sorry sir, he is going to die," the man said as calmly as he could.

"His heart is still beating damnit!" Kakashi cussed and didn't know if he wanted to punch the man in front of him or fall to his knees and cry.

"We don't have enough resources to help him." The matter of fact tone in the man's voice set the silver haired sensei off.

Falling to his knees to give the boy more air, he shook the boy violently and could feel his eyes ready to betray him. No, no he would not lose his student. Looking up at the ninja that had declared his student dead, his eyes became like ice. "Help him or I will kill you."

The medical ninja began to shake since the tone in the Hatake's voice gave no room for sympathy. Looking around frantically, the man began to yell. "All medics working on greens or decently controlled yellows to the trauma room and I need a doctor now." Moving to pick up the boy's body, he wasn't as successful at not flinching when of piece of the boy's skin slipped in his grip. It took all of his training not to puke right there.

Kakashi followed the man as he watched people in white coated moving to a room in the back and getting into gowns. It wasn't until the man carrying Naruto reached the door of the room that he turned around. "You are going to have to wait out here."

"If I find out you let them give up on him-you're dead." Kakashi's threat was expressed in his eyes and there was no doubt in them. If they deemed his student too much of a burden and let him die; he would kill the man it being a crime or not. It wasn't until the door shut off his view of the people racing around the room that he fell to his knees.

Hands reached up to tug at his hair. This couldn't be happening again. First his father, then his best friend, then his last remaining teammate, then his sensei. It wasn't fair. They couldn't take his favorite student and only memento of Minato he had left. The kid was like family to him: the only family he had left.

Kakashi didn't know how long he stayed on the floor before finally pulled himself up and fell onto the bench lining the hallway. Or how much longer after that it was until the sound of running footsteps caused him to break out of his thoughts a look up. A blur of red and pink settled in front of him with panting breaths.

Emerald green eyes looked into his with desperation. "Is it true?" Sakura choked out, "Is Naruto…dead?"

Shaking his head violently, Kakashi pulled his only female student into a reassuring embrace. "No, no, no. He isn't dead. They are working on him right now. You know our Naruto, he can pull through anything. He is going to be fine." Sakura didn't seem the notice the waver in his voice or the fact he was attempting to convince himself as much as he was her. "Who told you Naruto was dead?"

Pulling out of her sensei's embrace, she wiped furiously at her eyes. "Kiba, said that when he brought in an injured civilian, that he saw them put a black band on Naruto."

"That was just a misunderstanding," the silver haired ninja attempted to keep the anger out of his voice as he ruffled pink hair. Kakashi took a closer look at Sakura when he realized she was still panting. "Hey now, deep breaths." He moved the girl and adjusted her so that she was laying down on the bench. Mentally cursing himself, he looked the girl over. The doctor had barely allowed Sakura to leave the hospital with orders to take it easy and here he had given her orders to help usher civilians out of the arena. He was sure that her sprinting to the hospital hadn't helped at all.

"Are you hurt," he asked as he pushed pink hair off of her sweaty forehead as her breathing evened out.

"No," she said while forcing a smile. "I just don't seem to have my strength back yet." Sakura moved to push herself up, when her sensei forced her shoulders back down.

"Rest, the last thing I need is two students to worry about." With that train of thought, Kakashi's mind quickly flashed to Sasuke. He wondered where the boy was. He had been in the arena's rehab area. He hadn't seen that part of the arena destroyed. All of the patients there should have been taken to the hideout. If so, then Sasuke wouldn't be around until the village was officially deemed safe and everyone was allowed to leave the bunker.

They fell into peaceful silence, neither wanting to face that the longer they went without any news the worst it probably was. Both were feigning ignorance and replaying the phrase 'no news is good news.' Well, at least no one had come out with their head bowed asking if they wanted a moment to say goodbye.

Sakura did not like where her thoughts were going one bit. A ghost of a smile crossed her lips as she thought of the blonde- her little brother. A funny little fact, even while most of your mind is shut down, the mind can still hear. Not everything made perfect sense, but she just knew that Naruto had been talking to her even when she wasn't all there. He must have come close to every day for it to have imprinted on her memory so strongly. She simply refused to believe that their positions were about to be reversed or worse.

"He is going to be okay, right?" she choked out as she looked up at Kakashi begging him to have the answer.

Ready to reassure the girl with a dismissive comment about how strong the boy was, Kakashi faltered. Those green eyes staring up at him demanded, no, pleaded for truth. "I don't know," his voice was sad, "I just don't know."

A/N: Whabam! Yeah so I have been attempting to work on this story for months, but I would sit down to type get a few words and then erase everything and close my laptop with a huff. Nothing was quite working the way I wanted it to. Then I am driving in my car and a song comes on my i-pod and boom like a train how this chapter is supposed to play out hits me right in the frontal lobe. So, I present you this chapter. So, I have some more I need to write (like right after I upload this), but this felt like the right ending for this chapter and the next part feels like the right beginning for the next chapter.

So, tell me what you think and all that jazz. I look forward to hearing from you and hope that you have enjoyed!

Thanks and Tata!

Boe