Chapter Four: Kashi

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. . . The Fourth Great Ninja War

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Legs trembled with exhaustion. Their home planet was terrifyingly silent. The Rabbit goddess had been sealed away. Sakura's chakra levels were dangerously low, but she and Obito had managed to save both Sasuke and Naruto from the dimension hopping psychotic goddess. Kakashi had tried to sacrifice himself one too many times and his stormy grey eyes were more haunted than usual. His best friend's dying miracle had temporarily gifted him with the double Mangekyou Sharingan and being the talented, genius he was- a fully formed magnificent electric blue Susanoo had emerged once again — he saved Sakura's life.

With increasing horror, Sakura listened to Sasuke rant in his madness. He intended to continue his murderous spree— taking out all the kage and planning to rule over Konoha after he remade it in his image. She knew that he'd looked at her with love and affection when she'd saved him from that desert planet and he'd caught her fainting form. But now, those eyes of his caught her gaze before she could reason with him and she knew it was a powerful genjutsu that trapped her in some simile of a perfect world.

In this perfect life, trapped within her mind, she and Sasuke were of course married. He spoke in quiet, soft terms. They lived in the newly rebuilt Uchiha district and Naruto and Ino were their neighbors. She never realized in her perfect version of reality that her two blond best friends would somehow be together — but it made sense. Sakura went on daily runs in the morning, always crossing paths with her Kaka-sensei as he ran with his pack of ninja hounds. They would talk about anything and everything - he was so open to her!

She'd work a steady eight hours at the hospital, performing impressive surgeries and making Master Tsunade and Shizune-senpai so proud. Her parents would drop by the house at least twice a week bringing a delicious home cooked meal for her and Sasuke and their three kids. Sasuke was an impeccable husband— their home was spotless, a beautiful garden in the backyard with tomatoes and various vegetables along with several plum trees that bloomed beautifully around the time of her birthday. There was no need to take outside missions, he did occasional patrols within the village as the new chief of Police.

And it was a lie. Sakura knew it was a lie. She didn't have the chakra to dispel it. So, she lived it — she wasn't sure how long. She tried to talk to her dream companions. They weren't particularly helpful and often told her she was working too hard. Except, her dream Kaka-sensei. He'd listened and after a while, she could hear his true desperately pleading voice with her hearing in the outside world, calling her, willing her to return back home.

It was a powerful genjutsu and even he couldn't bring her out of it.

Then, her physical body had recovered enough and Sakura came to.

She and Kakashi were all alone. The land was still terrifyingly quiet. The accursed godtree continue to suck out the chakra of everyone they ever knew and loved, killing them and killing the planet. But, Sakura was safe held within the embrace of the man she trusted most in the world.

Kakashi had gathered Sakura against him, held her on his lap, knees raised up and arms banded around her upper body, pressing her face against his upper chest and throat. He was quietly murmuring her name, voice cracked and broken.

"Kakashi," Sakura muttered, her throat dry and voice weak with disuse. She lifted her hand to the side of his face and looked up at him. His mask was loose about his throat, his face was wet between the blood and the tears that had streamed down his cheeks. His lips were swollen and bloodied from his chewing on them in his nervous state. And the haunted look in those beautiful stormy grey eyes shifted from empty into a glimmer of hope. "Kashi," she whispered. "I'm okay. You're okay. We're okay."

By all that was good in the world, Sakura was amazed to see her team captain's mesmerizing, beautiful, concerned face. "I thought I lost you," Kakashi said so quietly, she couldn't have heard him if the world hadn't turned into an eerie graveyard.

"I would never leave you willingly, Kashi," Sakura vowed. "It's you three boys that are always the ones leaving me." Her hand was still caressing the side of his face and she brushed away the tears with her thumb over his bisecting scar on the left. He didn't have the magical Sharingan anymore.

He cradled the hand on his face with his hand, pulled it gently away from him and pressed a kiss to her open palm. "We have to find Naruto and Sasuke. They're the only ones that can stop the life-sucking tree and release everyone."

He was trying to complete the mission. He'd seen his beloved sensei Minato Namikaze. He'd fought alongside his childhood best friend and rival. He'd been magnificent with magical Sharingan eyes. He'd saved her several times over.

"Okay," Sakura agreed. "I tried this new technique where I can map out the area with my chakra. But I don't have a great range."

He smiled at her softly, his teeth were straight, a pearly white with canines extra sharp like an Inuzuka. She stopped breathing for a moment at the sight. "My hounds found them. It's a hike." He stood and helped her to her feet, arm around her shoulders and she held an arm around his waist. Supporting each other's weight they began the journey to stop the final battle between Indra and Ashura's reincarnations and to hopefully, save the world.

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There was a neatly packed bento box on his desk. Two boxes in fact — one for Kakashi and one for Genma. They both had notes. Kakashi's had a reminder that he was due for his annual physical and he could either schedule with Sakura or Shizune sometime that week. Kakashi was more interested in the note attached to Genma's lunch box.

"What does it say?" Kakashi asked, in between bites as he shoveled the food into his mouth. His mask loose about his neck, because it was only Genma after all.

Genma shot him a dirty look and spit out his senbon, landing with an angry thud onto the wooden floor of the Hokage's office. "Apparently, my cousin Sukea asked Sakura out on a date to the upcoming carnival. She accepts his invitation."

Kakashi relaxed. He didn't know why his friend was so upset about that. "Good."

"Not good. You've drawn me into this deception of yours and when it inevitably snowballs I'm going to be suffering too." Genma waved the paper with the neat, familiar script of Sakura in Kakashi's face. "She asked if I would please considering joining the two of you because she would really like to invite her dear friend Shizune."

"Oh." Kakashi snatched the paper from Genma's hand. He carefully slid his mask back into its usual place so he could hide his satisfied smile from the bodyguard. "Double-dates are less stressful." He looked up into his friend's scowling face. "So, cousin, will you join us?"

"You're still the fucking Hokage. I can't let you wander around without protection," Genma growled. "And — you know how I feel about Shizune. It's complicated. I can't imagine this little double-date doing anything but disturbing the careful peace that she and I have managed to cultivate over the years."

Kakashi observed his friend silently. Genma and Shizune had worked closely together for years, starting under the Fifth Hokage. There had been palpable chemistry between the two, but she was too shy and Genma was too busy sowing his wild oats. Kakashi had seen how the two would be good for each other when he'd first taken over the mantle and kept Genma as his chief of security and Shizune had helped with his transition into power. Now she mostly spent her time at the hospital and interacted with Genma as little as possible.

"Careful peace," Kakashi repeated. "Genma, none of us are getting any younger. Maybe it's time that you actually pursued the woman you so obviously love."

Genma stared at him slack-jawed. "Obviously love?"

With a shrug, Kakashi gently folded the letter back up and handed it to Genma. "Obvious to me at least. I'm sure she is clueless, as you've intended her to be. I appreciate you helping me in this cover. I promise, I won't drag out this Sukea idea for ever. I just, need a few weeks for this experiment. Sakura and I have so much history."

"You know, during that battle, when I was stuck in that miserable cocoon— I knew it wasn't real. But, I'd dreamed of Shizune. I'd not really allowed myself to think about what it would be like to be with her — outside of a casual hook up of course. But in that enchanted sleep, I could see it, Kakashi." Genma sucked in a shuddering breath. "It had been very easy to accept that dream as reality."

Kakashi didn't quite understand what everyone went through in those alien egg cocoons. He'd been spared the experience. Instead, he knew what it was like to be powerless, alone in a dying world, with the woman he'd come to love trapped within a powerful genjutsu by their wayward teammate. If she'd not woken up when she did, she would have easily died in that genjutsu of dehydration. His name had never sounded more beautiful than when it came from her parched lips. When she had called him Kashi.

In the nightmare their world had become, Sakura — battle weary and brave — supporting each other's weight as they hobbled to find their other teammates, had been Kakashi's only reason for living. He'd been so tired — physically and emotionally. He'd lost everything again —- Master Minato, Obito, the power of the Sharingan. He could not lose Sakura too.

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It was growing late in the evening when there was a knock at her office door. Sakura called out permission for the person to enter and had been astonished when the Rokudaime entered. He looked a bit sheepish in his official robes as he looked over at her.

"Lord Sixth!" Sakura cried out in surprise.

He gave her such a look of disquiet that she corrected herself.

"Kashi. I'm just wrapping things up. Can I help you?" Sakura looked back at the file and finished documenting her notes on the last surgery she performed that afternoon.

"I received the summons that I was due for my Physical," Kakashi explained. He rolled his shoulders back and his Hokage robes began to fall and he caught it, placing it over the hook on the back of her door, right next to her white coat.

He wore simple blue tactical pants, standard Jonin issue and a simple long-sleeved navy blue shirt with a face mask.

"You're Hokage. I don't understand why you can't upgrade your wardrobe," Sakura murmured, glancing up, appreciating his broad shoulders and then focusing her attention on the report. "Why don't you have a seat? I'll be able to check you over in a minute. Though, it would be better to use an exam room —like a normal patient."

"I'm not a normal patient," Kakashi pointed out. "I'm the Hokage."

Sakura rolled her eyes. He only called out the Hokage card when it suited him.

He didn't sit. Instead he tucked his hands into the front pockets of his pants and wandered around her office. He spent a lot of time scanning her bookcase, seeming intrigued by some of the titles. He leaned over and sniffed the houseplant Ino had given her. Then he ambled over to her desk. He picked up the framed photograph that Sukea had sent her.

"Nice flowers," Kakashi mentioned, standing in front of her desk, holding the photograph close to his eyes. "Who's the guy?" He set the elegant, silver frame back on her desk with a disgruntled thud.

"An old friend," Sakura explained. "We recently reconnected. He's a photographer named Sukea — a relative of Genma's. I would assume you might know him — he used to be in Anbu."

"Hm," Kakashi said, pulling the chair out in front of her desk and sitting. His elbows were propped on the arms of the chair and he steepled his hands together to rest his chin on them. "Can't say that I remember him. We wore masks and went by pseudonyms."

Sakura finished her report, set down her pen and closed the folder. "I thought about having you look through his file. Make sure he's decent." She looked across at him, once more stunned by seeing both of his stormy grey eyes staring back. "But that wouldn't be fair and I don't want to take advantage of your position to research the backgrounds of a potential boyfriend."

"Sounds serious," Kakashi mused.

She shrugged. "He's a nice guy."

"He seems a little old for you."

"I'm not sure that matters too much. You've seen Lady Tsunade when her jutsu isn't activated." Sakura tapped her forehead. "When I unleash this seal I lose years off my life. It would be cruel to date someone my own age and die so much sooner than them."

Something unreadable passed over Kakashi's exposed face. "I would forbid you to use it, if I thought you'd listen," he said.

"Keep us out of a future war and I shouldn't have to use it," Sakura answered back with a saccharine smile. She felt a ball of satisfaction when her old team captain shifted his weight under her response.

Kakashi reached for the hem of his shirt and yanked it up, leaving the mask in place, but now naked from the waist up. As usual, Sakura found her gaze roving his chest.

She saw a lot of half-naked men, they didn't stir anything beyond a professional concern. However, whenever she saw Kakashi it was harder to separate the patient from the man. It didn't help that he often came into her office or her apartment for his physicals, rather than a clinical room setting. It was like he enjoyed messing with her equilibrium.

She came around to his side and resting her hip against the edge of her desk, laid chakra infused hands over his shoulders to do a preliminary scan. He watched her intently while she tried to avoid his gaze. Her attention focused on those pale scars on his left pectoral — where Kakuzu had tried to rip out his heart those years ago. "Your cholesterol levels seem improved," Sakura murmured. "Your serotonin and dopamine are improved too." She met his gaze and smiled. "Are you sleeping better?"

He shrugged. "I'm not having nightmares lately. So, that helps."

"Are you socializing? Spending time with your friends and unwinding?" Sakura drew her hands away from him. He was perfectly healthy. And she was relieved. Perhaps making sure he had at least one hardy meal a day was helping him. "What are you eating for breakfast?"

"I don't need to socialize. I have my dogs — and you," Kakashi said with one of his eye-smiles. "And to unwind, I have my books. And I'm making protein smoothies for breakfast."

Sakura rolled her eyes. Those books of his drove her crazy! "Would you be interested in taking a break this weekend? You can come with us to the carnival!"

"Who is us?" Kakashi asked, his eyes narrowed.

"Me, Shizune, Genma, and Sukea," Sakura said. "I'm sure countless other citizens of the Leaf. It will be fun! There's a ferris wheel, tons of games, all sorts of sweets, and fireworks!"

"No thanks," Kakashi murmured. His gaze pointedly landed on the framed picture on her desk. "Sounds like a double-date."

"We could make it a triple date! Surely, there is someone you're interested in, Kashi," Sakura said, smiling at him, her heart breaking a little even as she suggested it.

Seeming to realize he was still shirtless, Kakashi dressed again. "I'll see you around, Sakura. Don't work too hard." He reached for her and ruffled her hair like when she was a kid. Then turned his back on her and strode out of her office, grabbing his robes on the way out.

Sakura stared after his retreating figure, her hands fisting against her side. The man was infuriating! For weeks, no months, he didn't talk to her outside of official meetings. Now, he's requesting her help on the weekends and coming to her office after hours. She didn't understand him at all! For a moment, she thought maybe he was interested in her — like interested.

With a huff of annoyance, she picked up the photo of her and Sukea. "At least you're easier to understand." She kissed the tip of her index finger and then placed it over his face in the image before placing the frame back on her desk.