The Hokage's tower looked much more sinister in the moonlight, Kakashi thought grimly as he approached the building, still a few blocks off from his end destination. As he hopped from rooftop to rooftop, he thought about what Sakura's father had told him earlier that afternoon as the two of them had walked ahead of the younger woman, who had limped along whining about the blisters on her toes. A faint smile tugged at his masked mouth at that memory but it was quickly wiped away when he recalled Hizashi's words.

Jiraiya is back.

Jiraiya the Toad Sage; one of the three legendary Sannin along with the lady Hokage herself. He was legendary and now that he was the successful author of the Icha Icha series, the older man was rarely seen in Konoha, preferring to spend his time in Tanzaku, gambling and spending his nights surrounded by the women who made the distant city famous. He was far from just a talented writer though, Kakashi knew. His skills were the stuff of myth among most shinobi in the village who were old enough to remember Jiraiya.

Kakashi sighed heavily, moving more quickly now. The window was already open when he arrived a few minutes later and the shinobi moved quickly to stand in front of the mahogany desk that was buried beneath several weeks' worth of paperwork. The Hokage was sitting in her chair, fingers threaded together and her chin resting in its usual spot atop them.

"I assume Hizashi told you what he learned in the Land of Waves?"

Kakashi blinked, arching his eyebrow. "No..." He trailed off, voice slightly confused. "He did tell me Jiraiya is back, though." His eye met hers, turning sharp. "I assume he's here about Orochimaru and Sasuke?"

Tsunade huffed, waving him off. "That's not what I summoned you here for."

She stood, turning around to look out the bay of large windows overlooking Konoha. She didn't speak for awhile, both of them listening as the sharp calls of an owl announced its arrival somewhere nearby. Finally she turned to face him, her face heavy and her eyes even heavier. Kakashi frowned as she spoke.

"Hizashi was sent to the Land of Waves to confirm a suspicion I've had for awhile now," she started slowly. "He was able to do so. Do you remember the ANBU operative that died last month?"

Kakashi nodded, furrowing his brow. Karasu had been a friend. He recalled learning of his death; how he'd known without needing to be reminded that there were no remains to bring home for the quiet funeral and even more quiet memorial that his ANBU family had held in the privacy of the forest. ANBU never revealed their secrets - even in death. They never left anything of themselves for the enemy to exploit.

"He hid something outside the village of Tako, where he died," Tsunade continued, pulling a clear bag of bloodstained rocks, all of them with lethally sharp precision edges and all of them the same shade of reddish-brown that didn't exist in the natural geography of the Land of Fire.

"We retrieved these a week and a half ago. Our analysts in the lab determined that they came from the mountains on our border with the Land of Earth. One of Karasu's teammates was able to track them to the Land of Waves, but had to return to Konoha because of an infected wound. Kizashi intercepted them in a small coastal village, where he was posing as a simple traveler. He overheard them discussing the attack on Karasu's team. Kakashi," Tsunade stopped, her eyes hardening. "They need to pay the price. I want you to collect the payment."

Kakashi frowned under the mask, walking to stand next to her. They watched as the owl found its prey, swooping down and gripping a field mouse in its talons. He sighed, turning to face Tsunade.

"In money or in blood?"

Tsunade didn't speak as they both once again turned to the window. The two ninja watched as the bird let out a battle cry before dropping the rodent to its death. Kakashi had his answer, he thought as he accepted the scroll handed to him before he darted out the window.

Sakura was dozing in his darkened bedroom when he hopped back into his apartment, crouching silently as he watched her resting form from his perch. She was in between sleep and wakefulness; not really fully committed to either as she she lay there, her pink hair fanned around her face and shoulders as she snuggled with a snoring Pakkun.

She stirred when Pakkun's restless leg kicked her stomach and opened her eyes, blinking. Kakashi watched as her hand immediately flew for a kunai hidden underneath her pillow. Pakkun woke with a jump, his eyes wandering the room methodically.

"Where are they, Sakura?" the pug asked, his voice all business, posture ready for a fight. Kakashi chuckled, moving a hand to the back of his, his eyes innocently closing as they both finally glared in his direction, realizing who the intruder was.

"Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura snapped at him, whacking his leg with her fist in dramatic fashion. Ever the prankster, Kakashi pretended to fall before peeking his head up with sad eyes.

"Not even a concerned glance my way," he pouted, hopping into the room before he slid the window shut. Sakura rolled her eyes before her gaze dropped to the scroll in his hand, her eyebrow arching. The silver-haired shinobi tried to pretend he didn't see the worry now etched into the younger woman's face.

"She's sending you on a mission?" Sakura asked, a small frown turning down the corners of her mouth. He'd been on a lot of D and C-ranked missions lately; nothing serious, nothing taxing on his body or mind. She knew, though, that the Hokage would not have summoned Kakashi in the middle of the night for such a trivial thing as an escort or a delivery.

Kakashi just shrugged, walking into the kitchen so that he could prepare a pot of coffee. The dark ebony sky outside the window was turning shades of indigo and deep periwinkle now, with brilliant streaks of orange cutting through signalling the arrival of dawn. He didn't answer her question as he pulled a chipped blue mug from the second shelf of the cabinet.

He had decided he was going to lie to Sakura about this mission the second he'd seen the mission objective printed onto the stiff parchment when he'd stopped at the top of a tree as he'd neared the apartment. It was going to be a long mission; a bloody one, too. One that would see him placed within an inch of death. He couldn't worry about the fierce and yet somehow still fragile kunoichi while he was away in the Land of Earth. He needed all of his attention to be put to the task at hand; the words in the middle of the scroll emblazoned in his eyes even as he closed them as Sakura's arms wrapped around him from behind:

Mission objectives: locate, interrogate, and assassinate Karasu's killers.

"Kakashi?" Sakura's soft voice hesitantly broke through the suffocating silence between them.

It pulled him out of the spiral of bloody memories that Kakashi suddenly found himself trapped in, and he just stood there silently still, gathering his emotions and tucking them back into the cage ANBU had carved into his chest before he turned to face Sakura, his eye much lighter than he felt.

"It's nothing serious," he tried to convince her, groaning for added measure before continuing. "You know how she gets all impatient and hyper when she's been drinking sake. She sent Genma over here so serious and all she's having me do is deliver some top secret documents to the Daimyo."

Sakura's chin dug into his shoulder a bit as her arms tightened around him. "I don't believe you," she whispered against his neck, her voice cracking. He turned around when he felt a hot tear splash onto his skin and pulled her to him, kissing the top of her head.

"I promise, Sakura. It's nothing serious."

He felt an ache deep in his chest as he told the lie for the second time in five minutes, though his face gave away no hint of deception. He held her for a few moments longer in the early morning glow of the kitchen. The coffee pot chimed and Kakashi reached to the side of him to turn it off before Sakura spoke again.

"When do you leave?"

"Tonight," he answered her quietly.

She gripped his arms tightly, her lips leaving gentle kisses all along his neck before she looked up at him again. Kakashi met and held her gaze, his expression guarded. She frowned, pulling away from him and walking towards the balcony. The sun was now brightening the sky into vibrant shades of pinks and purples and the baker across the street had just turned on her shop lights.

"And how long will you be gone?"

Kakashi shrugged, pouring the coffee at last into the mug, holding it firmly in his hands as he walked to stand next to her. "I don't know, Sakura."

A heaviness settled around them and Sakura sighed, sliding the balcony door open to let the fresh morning air waft in. Neither of them spoke, but both of them knew he'd been lying to her since the moment he'd come back from the meeting. Only one of them knew why.

Sakura kept her distance from Kakashi for the rest of the morning, excusing herself from the apartment before he had a chance to plate the breakfast he'd cooked for the both of them. As each hour passed by without sign of her - seven, eight, nine o'clock ticked by - and she still wasn't back yet from wherever it was that she'd gone off to.

He had fallen asleep around the eight-thirty mark, his body too tense and his mind too exhausted even with the jolt of caffeine to keep himself awake. He was still asleep when she finally opened the front door just after ten. She stepped quietly over to the door frame, seeing that the click of the door as she'd shut it hadn't woken him up. The pink-haired woman sighed, the stubbornness that had kept her away all morning melting away as she slipped her sandals off before tucking herself in next to him, her hand on his cheek as she rested her arm on his bicep.

She leaned in, pressing her lips gently to his in a silent apology for storming out on him before she pressed their foreheads together, closing her eyes. Kakashi woke up just long enough to see her lying in his arms and then he'd drifted back off, his free arm draped snugly over her waist, holding her close as she drifted between the waking world and the edge of sleep.

When noon rolled around, Sakura forced herself out of the cocoon that was Kakashi's grip and changed into her usual outfit of a pink tunic before she turned to face her sleeping lover. Her stomach did a somersault at the realization that that's what Hatake Kakashi was to her now. For so many years, he'd been her sensei. She sat on the edge of the tatami next to him, kissing his cheek softly. His eye cracked open in acknowledgment of her presence, and the pink-haired kunoichi smiled.

"I'm going to have lunch with chichi-san and haha-san," she told him. "Go back to sleep. I won't be gone all afternoon."

That was all the more encouragement Kakashi needed to sink back into the blankets, already on his way back to his dreams.

He didn't wake up for another hour and a half after that, his alarm clock telling him that it was just after one-thirty. Letting out a loud yawn, the shinobi stretched, feeling every minute of his thirty-one years in the cracks of his elbows and the pops of his knees. Kakashi blinked away the morning blur from his eyes and then stood, making his way towards the bathroom.

He was halfway through shaving a day's worth of stubble when Sakura walked into the apartment. He finished and rinsed his face to find her already in the bedroom, holding a paper bag in her hands.

"I got you some supplies for your mission while I was on my way here," she told him, setting the bag down on the floor next to the tatami. "I even got you the good energy bars you like."

Kakashi tried to pretend again; this time that he didn't see the hurt look on her face as she began pulling things out of the bag and setting them out on the bed for him to take stock. The silver-haired man didn't even glance at them as he reached for Sakura's wrist, pulling her to him.

"Sakura..." He started before he closed his mouth, looking down to the floor. "I'm sorry."

I'm sorry for lying to you, he wanted to tell her. But he knew he couldn't. Telling her would distract him, and distractions could be lethal when on an assassination mission. He sighed, lifting his hand to her cheek, cupping her face gently as he leaned down, brushing his lips over hers.

Sakura was still a mixture of angry and scared, but feeling Kakashi's warm lips against her own melted some of the anger away and she couldn't stop herself from returning the kiss, her lips pulling on his bottom one before she slid her tongue along the crease of them. He allowed her entrance and groaned when he felt her small fingertips tugging the zipper to his uniform down.

"Take this off," she murmured against his lips, sliding her hands along his shoulders, dragging the sleeves down his arms. His eyes never left hers as she tugged each of the cuffs over his wrists before letting the top dangle down from his waist. Her fingers danced around his own for a few moments before she threaded them together, leaning up to kiss him again.

He broke the kiss a few moments later only to pull her to the bed, pushing the supplies off the tatami's surface before he sat down, pulling Sakura so that she was standing between his knees, his rough hands holding her softer ones as he studied her face, willing into his memory the way her eyes looked and the rosy tint to her pale skin; the way her warm breath felt puffing gently against his own face as they took one another in.

"Kakashi-sensei," she whispered his name, squeezing his fingers. He ran his thumb over hers as she spoke again. "Promise me you'll make it home."

Promises, Kakashi thought as his eyes darkened. They were something a shinobi shouldn't do. Not a single second of any given day was promised; survival was never guaranteed. But when he saw the cracked look in her wide green eyes, Kakashi couldn't bear to hurt her again. And so for the third time that day, he lied.

"I told you," he smiled, forcing it to meet his exposed grey eye. "It's just a delivery of some documents. I'll be home before you even realize I'm not here."

Kakashi didn't give Sakura a chance to say another word as he slid back on the mattress and moved over her. His mouth covered hers in a hungry kiss, his hands roaming her body in an effort to distract her from their reality. Sakura allowed it; her body melting against his as her fingers scraped down his back. She knew he was lying; knew he was going to be in danger. She just hoped that he made it back home; back to her.

-x-

A/N: Thank you everyone for all the reviews and support. I really appreciate it and can't wait for you to see what's in store for Kakashi and Sakura!