The copy ninja gives a knowing smile, a mocking one. Of course Tenzou would pick this place.
There really wasn't a choice to begin with.
"Feeling a little nostalgic, are we?" Kakashi says lightly as they cross over the curb and into the boundaries of Training Ground Ten. They keep walking, shoulder to shoulder, no longer seeing eye to eye as they once did. Brother to brother, captain to sensei. With every step they leave another layer of their friendship behind until Yamato feels like a stranger in the presence of the man who taught him to be brave.
It unnerves them both.
They head out into the open field, ignoring the sound of sandaled feet trailing a few meters behind them. Mostly out of curiosity, they followed Kakashi and Yamato out into the open night air, the smack of knuckles on flesh still fresh in their minds. It had happened so fast that no one even knew that there was a scuffle until Kakashi's back hit the floor, all 6 feet of him, laid out flat.
He had met the ground before he even realized he was falling.
Kakashi doesn't try to convince himself that he didn't deserve it. He knew that Yamato would find out eventually, it was just a matter of time and how. It's the fact that Tenzou, once a brat in his uncaring eye, resorted to violence in complete disregard of the fact that Kakashi doesn't like putting his personal business out for the public to see. It angered him that the one man who was a king of subtlety in his own right would do something as rash as sucker punch him in the middle of the Fire Shadow.
He set out their issues, their vices and their hearts on a table to be examined by their peers and their friends. Rage got the best of Yamato and it's stranded them as a spectacle, a source of entertainment when this is one of their deepest aches.
Kakashi doesn't appreciate it one bit.
They trek on into the open space of the grounds. The silver haired jonin tries not to smirk at the sense of poetic justice that his junior is trying to fulfill as they split off into opposite directions.
This is where Yamato first met Kakashi's pupils. He had grown to care for them on this field, trained them and molded them in Kakashi's absence. Sai took his rightful place among them here, in this very spot. Naruto perfected the Rasengan in this dirt. They have all sweat and bled into this land, forming a team in the absence of one and in the gain of two that works so much more seamlessly than others.
And yet, Training Ground Ten is where the roots of betrayal had been set to grow. Here, both jonin found themselves unable to stop watching Sakura for the first time as she danced and flitted about the field, a lethal yet graceful kunoichi in all her pink and jade glory. He must've thought he was the only one who looked at her when her cream skin glistened in midday with a sheen of sweat, her eyes a vibrant, enduring reminder that there is good in such a desolate existence.
How foolish of Yamato to believe that there was only him.
But even as Kakashi seethes, his ego slightly blistered at Tenzou's successful tactic to catch him off guard, the copy ninja can't help but look at his junior and feel the familiar twinge of regret surfacing in his stomach. He sees the Anbu soldier with the long hair standing before him instead of the full fledged jonin that he is right now. Kakashi blinks the boy away, refusing to think about how Tenzou's eyes had once never left the masked face of his senior with nothing short of admiration and respect.
They glare at him now with contempt.
"No weapons," the taichou calls out to Kakashi from a few feet away. Both men discard their weapons pouches and kunai holders in response.
Off to the side, the Konoha 12 and the jonin mill around by the curb, watching. Choji offers Shikamaru his bag of potato chips as if a show is about to start. The gesture makes Sakura grit her teeth.
"I got 30 ryo on Kakashi," Aoba mutters to Kiba. He smirks in agreement, canines showing.
Kurenai's voice echoes in Sakura's memory, haunting her as they continue to place bets amongst themselves. One bet on Kakashi knocking him out in the first five minutes. Double the pot on Yamato's victory.
This is a wager you shouldn't be betting.
Naruto comes up beside her and so does Sai, flanking their sullen teammate.
"I don't understand," the blonde wonders out loud. "Why did Taichou hit Kakashi-sensei?" His light brows pull into each other as they do when he's confused.
"He could quite possibly owe the captain some money," Sai muses seriously. He dissects their body language, the expressions on their faces, and the way that silence permeates the air between his two captains. In training, before a spar between two partners, there is nothing less than banter and heated discussions.
The lack of words between two members of their team as they square off feels wrong. He also doesn't understand and it irks him.
"Kakashi-sensei owes us all money," Naruto mutters. "Captain Yamato wouldn't just hit him for something like that."
Sai's face screws up further into a concentrated expression.
"I cannot comprehend why the taichou would so willingly and publicly challenge Kakashi-sensei even though we have training tomorrow. He could've simply waited if he wanted to spar so badly." Sai begins to speak out loud to himself rather than to anyone in particular, racking his brain for all the social skills he's learned from books to label the intense way that his two captains stare down one another.
Sakura watches their shoulders rise and fall with the slow intakes of their breath. Right now, Kakashi will be clenching and unclenching his jaw, the only overt sign he ever gives when his patience is beginning to run out. And on command, just as she speculated, Yamato's bad right hand tremors with the ghost of an old injury, a tick to a sudden fluctuation in his usual soothing behavior.
"Sakura," the jinchuuriki pleads. Her green eyes swivel to Naruto's concerned azure ones. "Why are they going to fight each other?" His voice nearly rises to a panic and Sakura wants so desperately for Naruto to understand, to side with her and tell her that she did play a hand in this.
But she lost those privileges a long time ago. Yamato knows now and she receives the blunt end of his accusing stares, just as Kakashi does from the opposite end of the field.
He sees her for what she is. And it makes Sakura feel naked.
"I don't know, Naruto," she lies. "I really don't know."
A little distanced from the rest of the crowd, Kurenai crosses her pale arms over her chest, casting furtive glances between Team Kakashi idling nervously to her right. Her crimson gaze hardens as she sees a shock of pink hair from amongst the crowd, the girl's eyes intently watching each man who has yet to move.
"Do something, Guy," the kunoichi hisses. "We can't let those two fight it out right in front of them. This is the Commander of the Armed Shinobi Force of the Leaf squaring off with his own lieutenant. Word will travel fast."
The Beast of Konoha gives a small shake of his head, bowl cut hair sifting lightly over his large dark eyes. The tightness in Guy's prominent cheek bones betray his worry.
"It is bad timing and poor judgement on both their parts but alas, we cannot interfere." His gaze now lingers on Sakura too. "A battle of youthful passion such as this can only be settled with fists now, Kurenai." He puts a hand on his green spandex hip and worriedly watches the hardened face of his rival. "This is a man's fight."
When Yamato refuses to make the first move, Kakashi gives another eye crinkling smile.
"Nervous? I would be too."
The simple, almost undetectable threat jarrs Tenzou.
"That was a good punch you threw back there," the older man taunts casually. "Whoever taught you that right hook must be proud. Street fighting isn't really a style that the elite in Root like to practice, is it?"
Tenzou lets this comment slip past him, unwilling to recognize that Kakashi is making a reference to himself and his superiority. It's all part of the copy nin's end game, the one that Yamato has grown familiar with over the years.
Make everyone believe that the man on the surface is the man beneath the mask.
Make them believe he doesn't care.
But Tenzou isn't buying it. He can see the cold stare in Kakashi's eye, the tenseness of his shoulders as he waits for the first move to be taken, his chakra unsettled beneath his skin.
Yamato straightens his faceguard, a hush following over the bystanders as he rolls back his shoulders. Now or never.
Brother against brother.
He sprints to Kakashi.
The captain's leg goes to sweep the jonin's weight out from under him. The copy nin jumps up to avoid it, placing his hands on Yamato's back to give him the momentum to send his own legs into a scissor kick at Tenzou's face. One sturdy hand catches his ankle and pulls Kakashi towards himself, a fist aimed at his ribs. The other leg comes around and knocks the arm aside. The two of them skid apart, clawing at the ground to stop their speed. But before another breath can be taken, they're off again, moving so fast they're nearly a blur of motion.
Skin smashes against skin, limbs swinging and bodies dodging back like they've been burned. Nobody has landed a hit yet. Kakashi and Yamato dance on the field, their eyes lit like the end of a match that nobody else can see in the storm of their taitjutsu.
Training is one thing. But this is another. Both men strike with the intention to hurt.
Sakura wrings her hands together, her jade eyes flickering across the grounds to try and catch each of their movements. Both jonin are too quick, unable to get in a decent attack because it's blocked before it can even come close.
She knew Yamato was fast. But she didn't know that he was as quick as Kakashi.
Hardly anybody is.
Yamato ducks a swipe at his jugular. His palms flatten to the ground and he spins, twisting his feet in the air to make contact with Kakashi's jaw. He dodges the first strike and then catches Yamato's other foot, throwing it aside as he brings his knee up into Tenzou's chest once he's thrown off balance. The captain slaps it away with the back of his forearm in midair before flipping backwards onto the balls of his feet.
No reprieve again. Kakashi charges first, faking a left punch. When Yamato dodges it, distracted by the foot trying to take out his kneecap as well, Kakashi does a 180 and brings the back of his opposite fist slamming into Yamato's cheek.
Sakura lets out a small yelp as the captain skids across the ground. He doesn't stay down for long. With the momentum of his roll, he spins onto all fours and goes right back into the fray.
"You're slow, Tenzou," the silver haired jonin grunts as he bends backwards to avoid the foot coming at his face.
He's getting angry. His almond eyes glare in fury as he continues to be unable to catch Kakashi who evades his limbs by barely a millisecond. Yamato lets out an aggravated shout and runs at him. He spins on the balls of his feet and brings around his fists in a mock move of what Kakashi hit him with earlier. The copy ninja easily counters this and jumps back to avoid his knuckles.
Yamato juts his foot out and uses Kakashi's knee as a springboard at the end of his spin when he's distracted by Tenzou's hands. Kakashi's recently injured leg almost buckles beneath the weight, not able to react in time to the foot coming right at his face again.
He barely has enough leeway to keep it from fully assaulting his nose, the heel of Yamato's sandal only able to dig into his already bruised jaw when Kakashi swerves to the side. The impact sends the copy ninja's head whipping to the right.
"And you're getting old, senpai."
Kakashi grits his teeth and the fight intensifies. He ducks a vicious jab and swings his leg around to catch Yamato's knees who simply jumps up to avoid it. Neji has to activate the byakugan in order to be able to follow their movements across the field. Every step Yamato makes, Kakashi is one move ahead and vice versa.
The fight seems like it will drag on. Kakashi hits the ground in a hard roll, getting up to his feet quickly. He does a backflip to avoid Tenzou's fist whistling by his ear, using Yamato's flat abdomen as the hard surface to launch off of. It takes the wind out of the wood user and Kakashi swings his foot upward for Yamato to dodge while in mid-air. But when he does, the copy nin's other heel simply connects with his chin on the way out of said flip.
"Yamato!" calls out Sakura when he gets sent a several feet away, hitting the dirt at a velocity that sends him skidding. She takes a step forward to run to him but Sai puts a hand on her shoulder.
"You'll only get in their way."
The words ring truer than he knows.
Kakashi flashes over to Yamato in a blur as he gets up. The man's knee connects with Tenzou's nose before he can counter. Kurenai winces as she hears the bone break at impact.
"You're getting sloppy, Tenzou. Too much brooding, not enough training."
But the captain doesn't even flinch. When the silver haired jonin sends a fist to his left eye, Yamato swerves out of the way. He grips onto Kakashi's wrist whose one visible orb widens, thinking he was too quick to get caught. Tenzou takes his chance and thrusts the heel of his foot into the copy ninja's bad knee. It goes out and Kakashi crumples.
This is Taijutsu 101. Yamato made a mistake. He leaves his right side completely open as he reaches across his body to keep Kakashi's opposite wrist in his hand. The advantage has been handed off to the sensei as he goes to one knee. He's literally staring straight at Yamato's single opening.
And Sakura sees it immediately.
"Stop! Both of you!"
But Kakashi loses his finesse. They both lose the urge to fight like ninja.
Now they just fight like men.
The copy ninja tackles that opening, sending them both flying to the ground with a grunt. They grapple with each other to gain the upper hand, twisting limbs and choke holds that don't seem to work. Yamato grabs Kakashi by the front of his flak jacket and is about to bring his forehead crashing down onto Kakashi's but the copy ninja takes his chance and pops him in the mouth.
Yamato falls over to the side once again and Kakashi is about to flip onto him in order to immobilize Tenzou. But the taichou swings his leg up and catches Kakashi in the neck. They pant and pull at each other, one of them trying to find the grounds to get the other to surrender.
Because this is no longer about what Kakashi did behind Yamato's back.
The quick, uncalled for jab in the Fire Shadow is long forgotten. His betrayal, his secrecy, the unwillingness to come forward like a man means nothing to either of them now. Friend to friend, brother to brother, those are no longer the conditions on which they struggle.
This is about her. It has always been about her.
The two men start to act like it, forgetting that others are watching. They wave off the fact that they're all suddenly yelling for them to stop as the fight turns nothing but ugly, fists, elbows and the heels of feet nothing but a firestorm.
Yamato grabs onto Kakashi's silver head, brings it up, and then slams it back into the ground. The jonin sees stars explode behind his eyes the color of Sakura's hair. In response, Kakashi thrusts the heel of his palm up into Tenzou's already broken nose as a counter and he gives a cry, pain impulses shooting up into the younger man's brain.
Kakashi curls his knees under his chest from beneath Yamato and shoots him off with the soles of his sandals, kicking in a rib as he does so.
Tenzou struggles to his feet but Kakashi tackles him back down.
And just like that, it's over.
The copy ninja, breathing hard, his one charcoal eye ablaze, sits on Yamato's hips, his fist poised to take the hit that will, by ninja standards, claim him the winner.
It will name him the man good enough to keep her.
Or so he thinks.
He looks down at Yamato's almond eyes and he can't do it. His clenched fist hovers by his ear as he grabs Tenzou by the front of his flak jacket, gathering it up in his palm to peel him off the ground. Blood streaks down the man's face from his crooked nose.
He stares up, unblinking, at Kakashi.
"Go on, senpai," growls Tenzou. His free hand reaches for the collar of Kakashi's navy blue fatigue, gripping it tightly. "Hit me."
The silver haired jonin still doesn't move. His breathing slows and the haze of a hot blooded fight finally begins to fade from his one gray eye. Yamato pulls Kakashi down closer to him, all the kindness and the warm rumble of his voice gone, replaced by a desperation that has never been seen in Tenzou before.
Kakashi suddenly wishes he could take back this fight.
"Hit me, you coward!"
He still doesn't and instead looks over his shoulder, tearing his sight away from Yamato and finds her in the crowd.
Her jade eyes watch them, quivering beneath his stare. Naruto has an arm wrapped around her shoulder and even from here, he can see the horror that him and Yamato have just etched into their memories. Sensei on captain, brother upon brother.
What they must look like to the two teammates who have already seen this once before.
The tremble of Naruto's bottom lip, the way he refuses to look Kakashi in the face, makes his insides grow cold. Sakura's mouth moves and even though he can't hear her, he can read her pale pink lips as easily as he can breathe.
Please don't.
Kakashi drops his hand. He hangs his head over Yamato's, pulling him by the front of his shirt until they're nearly nose to nose. The copy nin tries to tell him without words that this fight is over. He searches his sun tanned face and opens his mouth to try and say what his voice cannot.
This is wrong. This is the betrayal, not the the affair.
"You're right, I am coward. But this isn't right."
Tenzou won't stand for such weakness.
He sees red and flips Kakashi over with a knee to the stomach. Sakura screams out for him to stop but Tenzou brings his fist down onto his senior's face as he climbs on top of him.
Then another hit. One more. Two. Three.
Sakura begins to lose count.
"Why won't you hit me back?!" he bellows.
Shikamaru shakes his head and takes Ino's hand, the silence hanging heavy on them all as Sakura flinches into Naruto's chest. Bets forgotten, curiosity long gone, they stare out at Yamato trying to beat the need to apologize right out of Kakashi.
She buries her face in his shoulder, no longer able to watch. Silent sobs assault her and Lee looks like he's about to say something to her but his teammate gives a feather light touch to his arm.
Neji's eyes tell him to leave it alone. This is a team problem. A malfunction within the unit that only they can solve.
What began as a spectator's match, a feud for dignity, turned into a private matter that no one but Team Kakashi should have the right to see. There is something much deeper ripping through the two jonin as one tries to pound the other back into the dirt. A few make a move to stop him but Guy holds his arm out, shaking his head.
This is a man's fight.
The Konoha 12 slowly scatter, feeling like invaders in something too personal to watch any longer. Guy and Kurenai corral them away from the scene that has finally spiraled down to nothing but it's cinders, Tenzou still shuddering life into the last of the coals.
He gives a grunt with every passing slam of his fist, trembling above Kakashi who still looks up at him calmly. The jonin's headband clatters to the ground nearby, forced off by the impact of Yamato's hands.
Within moments, they're all gone, leaving Sai, Naruto and Sakura to flinch at the continuous sound of Yamato's knuckles crashing against Kakashi's face who does nothing to stop it.
He only stares up sadly into Tenzou's distraught features, gazing up at what he has created out of his own cowardice.
Kakashi was never the better man.
"Naruto," says Sai quietly, an unusual strain in his voice. The blonde nods gravely and both boys rush over to their leaders. Pale arms curl around Yamato and haul him off of Kakashi. Tenzou goes willingly, staring down in a daze at the bloodied mess he created out of the copy nin's face.
The captain looks at his split open knuckles and then back over to Naruto who helps his sensei sit up. Silver hair, matted to the right hand side of his face with sweat and blood, falls over his uncovered sharingan. His other eye is swollen shut, black and blue along the edges while there's no doubt that Kakashi's lip is busted beneath his mask.
A split in his cheek opens up, blood spilling over his jaw. Tenzou stares at his hands.
"Yamato," says Sakura with a crack in her voice. The taichou whips his head around to look at her after jerking himself away from Sai's constricting arms, disgust curling up into his palms until they shake.
Rage is foreign. Animosity is a cold lover, he realizes.
Her jade eyes can't look at him directly but she still reaches out to touch him.
"Your nose." Sakura holds her fingers over his face to heal him, summoning the familiar green chakra to the tips. Butafter another lingering look at Kakashi struggling to his feet, arm slung around Naruto's shoulder, Yamato backs away from her.
Reality comes crushing down on him as the adrenaline begins to ebb away. His opened knuckles sting in the night air and it's like he can breathe clearly again without the weight of what felt like the kyuubi sitting painfully on his chest.
He turns away from her, afraid to look into her eyes so that she can see maybe he isn't the better man after all either. Sakura calls out to him again but Yamato is gone in a blink. She watches his dark outline flee to the rooftops, dipping into the shadows of the village while her hand remains outstretched to where his nose should be.
"We should get him home," Naruto says quietly, Kakashi sensei leaning on his student's shoulder. His ungloved hand grips his forehead protector tightly, not willing to let it go.
What else do you have left besides this war, Kakashi?
Sakura can't look at his face but she nods.
The three of them walk in silence back to the village, trying not to dwell on the shambles that Team Kakashi has just become.
"I'm so sorry you had to see that," their silver haired sensei says sadly as his limp from yesterday returns. He tries to look over his shoulder at Sakura who follows behind them. Her eyes take a sudden interest on the ground and a hand flutters to her stomach.
Kakashi fumbles in his pocket to make sure the picture is still there. He smears blood across the grey and black edges but almost sighs when he finds it safe against his palm.
It hurts to move.
"Shut up, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto says with a tight smile, trying to make the foreign feeling between all them flee but to no avail. "Let's go fix your face."
Sai ducks underneath Kakashi's other arm and the two of them match their pace with the copy nin who can't seem to stop dragging his feet as blood begins to stain his silver hair a dull shade of pink.
Naruto paces viciously in the living room of his sensei. A blur of red and cherry blossom suddenly emerges back to where he is and he turns swiftly to face her. Sakura wishes, with a painful stab in her gut, that he would leave.
"What the hell is going on, Sakura? Why did Yamato and Kakashi-sensei fight like that! They looked like they wanted to kill each other!" Naruto demands as Sakura comes out of Kakashi's bedroom, closing the double doors behind her softly.
She looks so exhausted that the jinchuuriki thinks she might fall over as she swerves past him. But he doesn't let up on her as she crosses the room to sink down into the couch. The blonde resumes his pacing in front of the coffee table, hands clenched into fists.
"You know something, I know you do," he growls when she doesn't answer him.
"Naruto, please, keep your voice down. Sensei is resting."
Sakura rubs her temples with the tips of her fingers while Sai curls up in Kakashi's arm chair, a sketchbook in hand. His pencil cuts Yamato's jaw into a hard line as he leans over Kakashi on the paper, fist pulled back to strike.
"Are you even listening to me?!" her best friend demands. His oceanic eyes storm like the waves of a hurricane, forcing her to meet his gaze.
"Yes, I'm listening," she sighs.
"Then why won't you answer my questions?"
"Because I don't know, Naruto!" she snaps back. The kunoichi hates herself for lying but things will only worsen if she tells him the truth. Sakura watches her hands fidget in her lap and her voice softens. "Obviously it's something private between the captain and Kakashi-sensei, I don't know what else you want me to say."
Sai shades in the scar crossing over Kakashi's bare sharingan eye.
The jinchuuriki clenches his fists. His eyes suddenly water and it makes the other boy in the room stop his movements and watch Naruto, pencil spinning absently between his two fingers.
The blonde takes an unsteady breath, curling and unfurling his large hands over and over again.
"How does it not kill you, Sakura?"
The question weighs on the air like a fog. She snaps her gaze up to his.
"Excuse me?" Her voice raises an octave, a signal of a wrath yet to come. But Naruto holds steady, his lower lip trembling as it did earlier. He goes from being the tall, rambunctious yet undenied savior of Konoha to the little blue eyed boy whose only love was ramen before it became being a ninja.
A thought passes between them. Kakashi has a theory that once a set of people work together long enough, at least in the shinobi world, they can speak without words, only glances. And right now is one of those times and Naruto seems to breathe in sync with Sakura who grips the hem of her skirt tightly in her hands. He looks at her like he did when Sasuke betrayed them, sifting through the ashes of Team 7 that the Uchiha burned down in his wake.
Even now, Sai stiffens in his own respectable right as he follows their thoughts.
"Team Kakashi is the only family I have," Naruto says sternly. "I've already watched it fall apart once." He bores his cyan stare into her. "I am not going to do it again."
A pair of bright red sharingan eyes flash menacingly in their memory in unison.
And yet, tonight feels worse than that day without really being so.
The foundations of their team, the first layer being Kakashi, and the sturdy, enduring weight of Yamato crashing against one another feels so wrong that Sasuke's scars feel too healed in comparison.
Shikamaru once told her that the bond binding Team Kakashi together was stronger than most. An ache like the last vengeful Uchiha is something unparalleled until the Great Sannin themselves. Most squads crumble from external forces, distance, illness, and death. But the undoing of their team came from the inside, a weakness between them that will alone could not mend.
A second time burns almost worse than the first.
"Do you think I liked watching that?" she suddenly hisses. "Do you think I enjoyed watching Kakashi sensei give up and let the taichou pummel him? I had to reset the bones in his face, Naruto." She stands up now, unable to sit as guilt stirs in her like a wildfire. "This team is my family too!"
"Then tell me what's going on, Sakura," Naruto whines, almost desperately. His hands go out in front of him like a plea and the anger inside her resettles into nothing but a dimming spark. "Help us fix this for them. Taichou and sensei are friends. And friends don't treat each other like that!"
Sakura isn't sure if she crosses her arms to show her annoyance or to hold herself together. Naruto stands before her, asking for once in his life for her to lend him some strength. To show him how to make things right. That's always been his job, not hers. People will follow Naruto into the dark until the day he takes his last breath because that's just the way he is.
Even then when he was nothing but an annoying brat, he kept Team 7 together. Sakura was only ever dead weight, a bystander while Naruto did the dirty work. While Kakashi shouldered the blame.
Just as insignificant as she is now when for the first time, he asks her to do the right thing, to help him where he really needs it and she can't even open her mouth to give him an answer.
The truth rattles into her spine and she can't find it in her to say anything more. She wants him to understand. She needs him to know so that he will stop looking at her like something that will shatter if he doesn't do anything about the cavern splitting this team apart, once again, from the inside.
The baby growing in Sakura seems to be speaking in volumes for her, calling out to Naruto to learn the truth behind Yamato's unseeing eyes as he mercilessly pounded his fist into Kakashi's face.
It's like a bad dream that they kept having while they're wide awake.
The pink haired kunoichi suddenly hops over the coffee table and pulls the jinchuuriki in her arms. Salvation lies in the heat that radiates off his lean chest and he rests his chin atop her pink head. His strong arms go around her and they stand like that for a long time. In the face of Sasuke's betrayal, in the face of Pain, and in this inner circle violence, they hold onto each other as they always have.
Naruto feels wet spots sink into his orange jacket and he knows that Sakura is crying but doesn't mention it.
It is a secrecy that cuts the tie between them like a knife and yet, she is the only one who can feel it slack beneath the weight of all that she carries on her own shoulders. Naruto is not yet ready to know the identity of the person who caused the disruption in what had previously been their stability. Kakashi and Yamato had been the backs upon which this team found common ground.
She can't tell him the truth.
Sakura's hands tighten against his shoulders and she takes a deep breath of his sunlit summer air with a hint of salty ramen scent.
"You should go see Yamato," she breathes back into his neck. "Make sure he's alright."
Naruto takes her at arm's length and searches her face, confused.
"I thought it would be better if you-"
She touches a soft hand to his whiskered cheek and he calms beneath her fingers. Sakura feels guilty for sending him away. But amongst the ties that she hurriedly tries to sew back together in her own life, she cannot take on the weight of the ones he tries to hand off to her. Not yet.
"Please. It's just-" she lowers her eyes to the floor, "It's too soon for me. I don't think he wants to see me." A single truth in the midst of one big lie.
They stay like that, Naruto sizing her up and trying to do what he always had trouble doing; figure her out. The jinchuuriki pulls her back in for one last hug. Sakura takes as much warmth and strength that she can while her arms are around him before he gently breaks away once again. Her fingers linger on his orange sleeve as him and Sai get ready to leave. She sees them out.
The pale boy gives her shoulder the lightest of touches as he passes by her before he slips out into the night cold night air, waiting on the edge of the staircase for his companion.
"Are you going to stay here with Kaka-sensei?" Naruto asks as he slips back into his sandals slowly. Sakura absently chews on her lip.
"He didn't let me heal all the bruises just yet. I want to make sure he's not in too much pain."
Her best friend gives a short nod and turns to leave, slight disappointment sagging his shoulders.
"Naruto?"
His blue eyes find her once again. Sakura is almost overcome with the need to spill the truth like a water jutsu and let it overflow both of them. This is her brother and yet, she can't bring herself to confide in him.
He wouldn't forgive her.
"I think Kakashi-sensei and taichou will come around," she says slowly. He waits for her to elaborate but she doesn't, leaving her statement open ended but optimistic nonetheless. She tries a smile and Naruto can't help but return it. He rubs the back of his blonde head softly.
"Ah, don't worry, Sakura-chan." Even if it's only for a moment, his whiskered face lights up in it's usual blinding way. She wishes she had a sharingan to implant the image in her memory for when she needs it. "We'll figure it out."
The blonde gives her a wave over his shoulder and the two boys speed off into the village without another word in the direction of the taichou's apartment to the east. She waits until she can no longer hear their sandals against the dirt to shut the door behind them.
"He's upset."
It's more of a question than a statement. Sakura jumps slightly at the unexpected sound of his voice filtering it's way through the dark. She can faintly find the outline of his tall frame against the bedsheets. The girl makes her way over to his desk and turns on the soft light of his lamp.
Kakashi sits up, rather painfully, his left arm resting casually against his knee. He watches her pick up the scrolls and documents of the war plans off the floor and set them on his work space. Ino's file sits open, her pale blue eyes staring smugly at the camera and Sakura has to look away quickly.
"I thought I told you to go to sleep," she says softly, taking it upon herself to organize the papers and rosters in a neat fashion so that he's not scrambling for them in the morning like she knows he will.
"How could I with all his shouting?" He makes an attempt at a chuckle to convey his endearment. But it's dry and doesn't weigh as much as it should. "I didn't mean to scare him."
Sakura smiles wryly. Any sentence implying fear and Naruto at the same time sounds off and foreign. But there's not another word to describe the raw anxiousness that she and her blonde counterpart felt as they watched the two main jonin in their lives try to harm each other.
She remembers a mission in the Land of Iron. Kakashi and Yamato sat huddled close together, talking quietly amongst themselves. The taichou's features turned up in a smile, the flames of the campfire flickering against his tan skin as they watched Naruto tiredly try to climb into his sleeping bag. A bug, as big as Sakura's face, jumped out at him and he screamed like a girl, tripping over himself and landing in Sai's lap who hastily tried to put away his Beast scrolls to hide the evidence.
The two captains burst out laughing, Yamato's voice rumbling the loudest as Kakashi's one mischievous eye found Sakura's amused stare from across the fire
One of the many fond memories she stores away for rainy days. And yet they all feel spoiled.
"How's the pain?" she asks, changing the subject. Kakashi lets her, leaning his silver head against the headboard. He gives an uncommitted shrug.
Sighing, she goes over to his bedside and leans in close to examine the yellowing bruises across his face and the healed but obvious cavern splitting his bottom lip. Her fingers touch his left eye, purple and black along the edges. Sakura didn't have time to give him a full treatment. Naruto was being too noisy and Kakashi waved her off, mumbling something about how some scars deserve to be permanent.
He tries not to breathe too loudly when she stands this close.
"Your jaw still hurt?" She doesn't wait for an answer, knowing that it's more than likely he won't give her one. Sakura presses her palm to the his right jaw line and he flinches. "Stupid man," she grumbles to him, immediately igniting her hand with green chakra. "You set your mandible wrong back there in the bar." Kakashi relaxes under the soothing wave of relief flooding into his joints after his ill attempt at fixing his face resulted in the bones grinding against one another.
"Lousy fool," she adds.
He raises a single silver eyebrow.
"You're starting to sound like Lady Tsunade. I believe her favorite words to address me are both 'stupid man' and 'fool', usually used in the same sentence."
Kakashi tries to give her an eye crinkling smile just to annoy her but he winces, the muscles in his face not responding well to the gesture. Sakura sighs and sits on the edge of the bed. Her thigh presses against his and Kakashi tries to subtly move it away.
The kunoichi pretends not to notice.
Medicinal green floods her palm and she presses it to the bruises and aches along his defined, and now perfect, jawline, his silver brow, and the deep crack in his bottom lip. Her eyes linger a little too long there after she moves her hand to a different spot. Kakashi clears her throat and she jumps her gaze away from his mouth as if it had burned her.
Sakura moves her finger over his right eye and his wrist comes up to stop her. The warmth of his palm holds her in place and she looks at him, an annoyed expression pulling together her dull pink eyebrows.
"Leave it," he mumbles.
"It's going to look rather hideous in a day or two." Sakura tries to shake him off. "Plus it'll be sore."
His grip on her wrist tightens but it is not unwelcoming. His thumb strokes the underside of her arm lightly, only once as his mismatched eyes stare into her confused viridian ones. The sharingan whirls and clicks her face into memory.
"He earned it," is all Kakashi says, leaving her to guess the rest of his explanation.
She realizes that by admitting his defeat publicly, the evidence still on the only visible part of his face, Kakashi will draw the negative attention away from Yamato who had set the fire in the first place.
It makes her finally drop her hand. Kakashi's digits linger in the air, surprised at the sudden absence in his fingers.
Silence lapses over them once again but it isn't awkward. She simply searches his face for all the things that he will not say. Sakura has find herself able to find them etched into the places where he normally hid behind his mask. When his face is bare, she cannot unsee what he hasn't trained to be discreet.
And it unsettles him.
"I should get going," she suddenly says. It jarrs Kakashi out of studying the curve of her long eyelashes and he covers up his frown as a wince of pain when he shifts on the bed.
"It's rather late, Sakura."
She gives another wry smile. The dryness of it doesn't comfort him.
"I don't have a curfew," she retorts back simply. Yet the kunoichi makes no sudden moves to get off the edge of his bed, their eyes still caught in a strange waltz between each other, their hands, and longing in the air between them.
Kakashi gets a sudden urge of bravery.
"Why didn't you go to him?"
"Because of the mess that your face-"
"Don't make me repeat myself."
He doesn't say this rudely, his tone dropping down to a pensive rumble as they sit in the dim light of his room. Her answer was not the one either of them were looking for.
"Why send Naruto?"
The pink haired woman scoffs lightly and then purses her lips. She looks at him seriously.
"Would you have wanted to see me after that?"
Kakashi doesn't miss a beat.
"Then and every minute after."
Jade eyes widen for a second before they recover. They drop down to her fingers fidgeting in her lap and Kakashi takes to watching the shadows that the previously observed eyelashes make against her pale cheeks.
Her silence drags on for too long and Kakashi sighs, knowing he will no longer get an answer from her. A habit that she's picked up from him well over the years.
She gets up to what he thinks will be to leave. But instead of going to the doors, she goes to his dresser and pulls open the second drawer from the top. Delicate fingers tug out a fresh jonin shirt.
The man's cheek redden as she undresses in front of him. He looks away politely and pretends to become interested in the dirt under his fingernails. A few moments later, the bed dips beneath a sudden change in weight and she's settling beside him, back against the headboard, legs stretched out in front of her. The long sleeves of his shirt cover her palms and she grasps them tightly, bringing one up to her lips.
He does nothing to make her change her mind.
"Do you remember Hoshigakure ?" she asks suddenly. Kakashi doesn't respond. "The one where there was a fire set by some genin during their training that destroyed their armory and the Leaf sent supplies and basic ninja tools as relief? We guarded the-
"Cargo from bandits. One of our first assignments."
Sakura nods and continues. Her fingers absently pick at a frayed thread on his navy blue pants.
"I was so mad at you because you said that I was always the first to go to sleep and the last to wake up, not even bothering to take a watch." Her lips turn up in a small smile. Kakashi watches from the corner of his eye as it flickers from being sad to nostalgic.
But then again, maybe there wasn't a line between the two at all.
"So I wanted to prove myself and volunteered to take third watch."
"The boys bet that you wouldn't make it past ten minutes," he adds, chuckling at the same memory now that she guided him into it with her voice. The third was always the toughest to take, fingering the line between late night and early morning when the urge to sleep became too heavy.
They were still so green then, admiring his every word and movement because if they blinked, they would miss something. Even Sasuke-
Kakashi's insides grow cold and he lets her keep talking.
Sakura gives another soft smile and nods, her eyes finding his.
"I didn't even make it past five."
Kakashi laughs and he realizes that her hand had found his against the bed sheets. Their fingers intertwine and the copy ninja wondered what the gesture means in the middle of this story but he did not lean away from it.
His large palm swallows her smaller one easily.
"I woke up with Naruto's stupid grin leering in my face when he came to take over. God, I was so mad."
Kakashi remembers it well. She didn't talk to them for the rest of the trip unless necessary. His small chuckle suddenly falters when he realizes, now older and wiser, what that must've meant for her when the boys joked and put her down because she constantly fell asleep during watch.
They fed her feelings of inadequacy, even him.
The jonin tightens his fingers around hers, as if a younger version of his self wants to hold on to the little girl whose eyes Sakura retells this story through. Call her back and let his genin know that they didn't mean it.
That one day she would be something great.
"I never told you this," she begins, drawing his attention back to the present where the woman Sakura is speaking and the strange, pitted feeling in his gut ebbs away. "But I was awake when you came to sit by me while I slept in order take my watch."
He stiffens but then she starts drawing small circles on the back of his hand with her thumb. A silent gesture to signal for him not to retreat inside himself just yet.
"A twig snapped under your sandal and you froze to make sure that you didn't wake me. I pretended to still be asleep because I was ashamed of letting Naruto and Sasuke win." Her jade gaze meet his and he wants to look away, this conversation steering into a direction a little to hard to face with her. But her thumb doesn't stop drawing against his skin so he lets her go on.
"You took your flak jacket off and draped it over me. Then you sat against the tree trunk where I was supposed to be awake and watching our surroundings and you-" she treads carefully, "you talked to the fourth Hokage out loud. Kind of like a prayer."
He can't look at her now. His eyes drop to their intertwined fingers and he lets himself become distracted by the heat of his skin against the cool touch of her palm. Sakura bites her lip but continues.
"You asked him to help you not screw us up. For him to tell you what to do so that you could be half the sensei that he was to you."
Something hot burns in the back of his throat and a weight sits on his chest, making it hard to breathe as easily as he should. He remembers that night clearly. Sakura, with her long pink hair spread out around her in a halo, seemingly peaceful against his side. And he lifted his eyes to the deep black sky and talked to the Yondaime Hokage because the need to had been burning in him so loudly as he watched his three genin reflect Kakashi's own team so well that it scared him.
"You asked Minato to give you the patience to teach and encourage Naruto like he did with Obito. To give you the wisdom to show Sasuke the way out from the dark with friendship and honor." He knows what comes next and he can't stop his heart from beating too wildly in his chest. She wasn't supposed to know. Not then. Maybe not even now.
"And you asked Lord Fourth to not be so damn cowardly when it came to me because I was so much like Rin. You were afraid to come near me, even if it was just to teach, because you saw too much of her in me that you thought I would break from the simplest of things."
The lump in Kakashi's throat grows. In this moment, in one single story, Sakura has come closer to the man beneath mask than anyone has before. Even Guy.
It terrifies him to death and breathes life into him at the same time.
"For my entire shinobi career, I thought you had looked at me and only saw weakness back then." Sakura gives a bitter smile, more to herself than him. "But it was fear of losing me to a fate so similar to hers, wasn't it?"
Kakashi doesn't know when exactly it happened but she had somehow curled up into his side and his arm is around her now, gluing her there like it's the only place she could possibly ever fit. Her words wash over him in waves and he clings to them like the shore, listening to her ebb and fold away his calluses with her tide.
"You asked me why I didn't follow Yamato. And the only answer I can give is that one day you were my annoying, irresponsible, clueless sensei. Then the next, I'm staring down at you, victorious in something against you for the first time, and I see the reflection of a different woman in your eyes." She touches her palm to his cheek and he leans into it. "While a new man stared back."
His fingers curl in her hair and she traces the scar over his sharingan softly.
"So I guess what they say about falling in love is true." She smiles, just a mere soft upward turn of her lips and yet, it is his favorite one to date.
"You do it slowly. And then all at once."
He cups the back of her neck and tilts her head up to kiss her. Her words ring in his head until he's sure he can feel it in his bones. His lips travel over hers lightly, needingly as his thumb strokes her cheek, fingers still tangled in her pink locks.
But he says nothing and breaks away to stand. For a moment, Sakura remains absolutely still, terrified and on the verge of a heartbreak so severe, she forgets to breathe. She starts to run over all the details of the last thirty minutes to see where she went wrong.
Sakura just confessed that she loves him and he pulled away.
Just as she's about to cry, Kakashi turns off the lamp on his desk and shrouds the room in black. The mattress beside her dips and he settles down on his side, facing her. Sakura is confused but then he opens his arms and in the faint moonlight bleeding in from the blinds, he raises a silver eyebrow.
"Well?" is all he says.
The kunoichi wipes the pooling tears from her eyes and settles down next to him. Expertly, as if in absolute habit, he tangles his legs with hers the way she likes them to be and pulls her into his chest.
Kakashi doesn't have to say it back. And Sakura is sure that he wants to but simply can't. This is as close as she will get but she doesn't mind at all.
The sigh falling from his lips and into her hair as she buries herself deeper into his strong arms is enough for her. And maybe that's why she knows Kakashi loves her too.
Because she doesn't need more than that.
"You know," he mumbles against her ear, "I don't really mind the dresses and the makeup and the glitter." Kakashi's hand rubs swirls over her smooth thigh. "It's the bossy-ness that will drive me crazy."
It takes Sakura awhile to understand what he means. But then his fingers move up to skim underneath his jonin shirt and he begins to trace the same pattern as before over the slightly raised bump of her abdomen.
She finally gets it and she can't help but laugh. Her entire body shakes with amusement and before she realizes she can't stop, Kakashi joins her, chuckling deeply into the crook of her neck.
But while they're too busy whispering to each other in the dark about who her favorite parent will be, they don't notice the slightest of chakra presences at the door. Outside on the the porch, a strong hand leans down and places a box of Konoha's finest cigars on Kakashi's raggedy welcome mat. A white card settles softly against the metal surface, a note scrawled out in a familiar slant.
For when we take our first victory.
Sincerely,
Your Lieutenant.