Art of the Heart

moldycookies

A Special Thanks to Kat for helping me get this.

You can only imagine how.

.

Sakura closed her eyes tight, and tried to pull her gaze away from the heart on the slab. It started to pulse by itself.

Thump.

Tsunade's mouth was set into a firm frown, and it certainly showed no mercy when yet another chuunin came in and told her that Sakura hadn't arrived yet. Just what was that girl doing? Planting trees? Well, Konoha had enough of them! She didn't need to plant trees! She needed to be here, filling out her paperwork and getting her sake.

That girl was hopeless.

Finally, after twelve agonizing seconds, Sakura bustled into the room. "Sorry I'm late – it's all Kakashi's fault."

The blonde bristled at the mention of the Copy Nin. A fine ninja that man was, but also a really bad influence, and it seemed like he was already rubbing off on her! Well, granted, he could have rubbed off on her a lot sooner when they were genin – anyways, Kakashi was not someone Sakura should be hanging around with.

"Ah," Tsunade said smartly, "Well, what was so important that he had to keep you long enough for you to be late?"

Thump-thump.

At the mention of his name, she remembered the beating heart on the slab of metal. It was beating, almost mocking her as she began to autopsy the rest of the body. When she tore her gaze away from the moving heart, the person she was examining had their eyes open. Sakura moved her hands over their eyelids to shut them, but they grabbed her wrist and bit her hand. No one heard her silent screams.

Thump.

Sakura, who was already at her tiny excuse for a desk, looked up from the mountains of paperwork, slightly bewildered that Tsunade was actually talking to her. "Huh? Oh," she shrugged, "he said he was pursuing me or something."

Sakura tried to push away the vision that she just had. She had been having them for weeks now, and according to Tsunade, they weren't going to stop anytime soon. She just had to wait it out until they figured out what to do with it. Shizune was convinced that it was going to wear off soon.

Sakura wasn't so convinced.

The scrapping of the Hokage chair against the floor could be heard as Sakura frantically began to file budgets and old mission reports. Behind her, Shizune tripped over her feet, knocked over a vase, causing the annual budget project to topple onto the floor and Tonton to run over it with her dirty hooves. "Pursuing you?" Shizune asked incredulously. "He's doing what?" Shizune scrambled to pick up the papers, "He's pursuing you?" she asked, her voice reaching a higher octave each time she asked or repeated it. And she repeated it a lot.

The pinkette nodded and shrugged. "What?" Sakura asked, totally not getting it. It wasn't that big of a deal.

Oh, it was a huge deal. Especially to Tsunade, the woman who made Sakura blossom into a beautiful and strong woman. Shizune balefully noticed that four pencils were now protruding from half of those mission reports and last year's village budget. Tsunade, who was oddly silent, stood up from her chair and looked Sakura straight in the eye. "That man is pursuing you?" she growled, "Hatake is pursuing you?"

"Yes!" Sakura growled out, "Why is everyone tripping over this?"

It was then when Shizune realized that Sakura had no freaking idea what the hell she was getting into, or she tripped and fell on her head that morning and had no idea who she was and why Kakashi couldn't pursue her. "Um, Sakura, you do realize that when Hatake Kakashi is pursuing, it means that he's pursuing you. It also means that he's breaking about fifteen protocols – and that's a lot of paperwork I have to fill out, Sakura, because you'll be too busy shacking it off with Konoha's infamous Copy Nin!"

"Excuse me?" Tsunade snapped. "Shacking it off with who?"

"Whom." Sakura corrected before wincing and being promptly glared at. "Er… you know, 'who' if you want it to be – you're the Hokage."

Shizune winced herself, "Sorry, Tsunade-sama." She apologized, then turning to Sakura. "Sakura, this is a big deal. And I don't know why you're not worried about this, but a teacher pursuing their student and willingly admitting that to her is a big deal."

The kunoichi promptly turned pink at that. "Wh-what? You think that – that Kakashi-sensei… Kakashi-sensei – what?"

Did she raise an idiot? Sakura was smarter than that. The Hokage concluded that someone must have slipped something in her coffee that morning because this was definitely not Sakura. Tsunade began to massage her forehead with her right hand as her left hand began to recycle her desk into mulch. "What do you think pursuing means, Sakura? Oh, god, I made an idiot – Shizune! Get me some sake."

"Wait, you mean he's actually pursuing me?"

Thump-thump.

Something in the air shifted, and Sakura was no longer in the Hokage tower, filing paperwork. She was in the basement of the hospital, looking at the same body. This time, the heart of the person was in her hands, and she was squeezing it tightly. Then, it began to pulse.

Thumping strongly, even under her vicious grip. Frightened, Sakura dropped the hurt on the floor, it seemed to stutter with its even pulses, but continued as a bloody mess on the floor.

Thump.

Sakura swallowed the rock hard lump in her throat. Two times within the same hour was something to be worried about.

Shizune would have thrown herself out of the window, "Yes!" Shizune finally yelled; juggling multiple papers, which just flew everywhere when Genma, who just came in to drop off his mission report, tried to help her. The medic-nin just huffed in exasperation and walked away. "He's pursuing you!" She sent him an apologetic smile and promptly blushed when she turned away. "What did you think he was doing?"

Nonetheless, Sakura had to continue on. Sakura shrugged, "I don't know. I thought it was some weird challenge him and Gai-sensei were doing."

Genma put two and two together and got ten. "Wait – Kakashi is dating Sakura?" All three women snapped their heads toward Genma at the mention of the ludicrous thing he was saying. There was no way – absolutely no way – that Hatake Kakashi wanted to date Sakura, his student. With the look they were giving him, Genma concluded that he would definitely not make it out of this alive. "Er… maybe it was a challenge?" he suggested, finally gathering all the papers and giving it to Shizune.

The dark haired woman attempted to calm her breathing, "Yes," she half-hyperventilated (this was too much to take in – there was going to be so much paperwork), taking the papers that were offered to her, "thank you," she stuttered with her words, however, when she realized how close Genma was to her general physique, "Yes – a challenge." She quickly sent him a pointed look to get the hell away from her and went back to her desk; he just followed.

"Are you sure?" Sakura asked skeptically.

Tsunade inwardly noticed that Sakura was still putting up the 'stupid girl' act. "Sakura," the blonde woman began, "Why are you acting so stupid?"

Because the nightmares hadn't stopped. Because she was worried that she was going to slowly go insane. Because she didn't want anyone, especially Kakashi to worry about her. "Because I don't want to get in trouble!" she blurted. Her inner-self smiled evilly; everything was going according to plan. Ever since Kakashi proclaimed that he was going to be courting her, Sakura thought of a plan to get Tsunade to know about the relationship and stop it. It wasn't that she didn't like Kakashi; it was just that he kept messing up every chance at a relationship. First, she would bring up the topic casually like it was nothing. Secondly, she would blame it on a challenge of some sort, which she knew they wouldn't believe. Thirdly, Tsunade would disapprove after uncovering the truth and forbid the relationship. Therefore, Sakura would be finally free to date whoever she wanted.

Ah, that explained a lot. "So you thought acting stupid was going to get you off the hook of whatever Hatake is planning?"

The kunoichi shrugged and smiled bashfully, "In a way, yes." Yes, the plan was working, indeed.

"Well," she grinned maliciously because she knew exactly what Sakura was doing. That'll teach her to try to trick her. "I approve of the relationship."

Sakura eyes widened; she definitely was not expecting that. There goes all the budgets and patient files. "Wh-what? You approve? You can't approve!" Sakura wailed. "Why? Why do you approve? He- he's a pervert, and-and a bad influence on me! And he's my teacher! Isn't that forbidden or something?"

The Hokage grinned at her apprentice. Poor, poor Sakura had no idea that Kakashi had come to her a week before, and requested that she approve of the relationship. Besides, out of all the 'men' Sakura dated, Kakashi was by far the best. "Well, he's an excellent ninja and a good man. He'll be good for you, Sakura."

At the look of Sakura's wilted and horrified expression, Tsunade knew that Sakura would never lie to her again. "B-but! But! He – he's… uh… but why?" she cried, already hanging over the edge of her desk.

"Well, truthfully-" Sakura sent a glare at Genma, but he decided to ignore her anyway, "-the guys you date suck, essentially." Shizune sent him a reproachful look when he began to trace circles on her thigh; he, too, decided to ignore her.

"They do – okay, most of them do – but some of them are winners."

Genma snorted, "No, all of them are losers. Compared to Hatake, they've already lost fourteen times." Shizune shifted away from Genma, who just shifted closer and traced more circles on her thigh.

Sakura was convinced that the world had abruptly ended, and that any minute now Tonton would grow wings and fly away while Tsunade proclaimed Naruto to be her predecessor. Sakura fought the strong urge to throw Genma into a wall when she saw his name in the patient files. "Oh, Genma, you're four months overdue for a physical."

The dark-haired woman threw him a look. "You told me that you went to get your physical."

It was that moment when Sakura decided to flee the scene and forget that this morning ever happened.

.

Thump-thump.

Relationships were always hard.

For Kakashi, they were exceptionally hard because half of (see: mostly) the reason why the relationship failed in the first place is because he broke it off. Whenever he got close to someone, he would totally freak out, flail and hide in a closet for a few days until he decided to break off the relationship. Everyone knew that Kakashi was secretive. He was the very definition of an enigma. Look up it in the dictionary, and his picture was right next to it. And he just didn't like the fact that someone else would know that about him. Thankfully, a few relationships have endured the test of time.

Yamato, for example, was subordinate that Kakashi was forced to associate with, but overtime Kakashi grew to tolerate the ANBU and even began to kinda like him. Now, he was officially a part of his team, and Kakashi even considered him to be a good friend.

Genma was an annoying example. He was his friend, begrudgingly, and Kakashi learned to accept that.

Before Kakashi could muse over anyone else who liked to annoy the complete and utter crap out of him on a daily basis, Sakura (see: teammate, ex-student, love of his life, future wifey) rounded the corner. Ever since he showed up at her door, proclaiming that he would court her, she was avoiding him.

Sure, it sounded a little far-fetched coming from Kakashi and she probably thought it had to do with some challenge Gai made him do, but it wasn't. Now was his chance.

"Yo, Sakura."

As a ninja, Sakura killed all the time. Ninjas are murderers. Whether it was in the hospital or on the battlefield, Sakura killed – murdered even – regular, normal people just like her. And it didn't change that they were people if they attacked her first. If they decided that they were going to risk it all for the sake of survival or for their country, Sakura was fine with that, because she did the same exact thing.

Yet it was different as murder. When you murdered someone, you went in for the kill – not that ninjas didn't do so, also, but they were mostly doing it for a cause – you were doing it for yourself. Murder, to Sakura, is possibly the most selfish thing a person could commit. Sometimes, we she did it herself, it didn't feel like murder. It felt like duty.

Other times, when murder wasn't completely necessary, Sakura found it almost disturbing that she thought of the prospect.

But there were some instances that made Sakura freeze in her tracks.

Thump.

She murdered her friends; one by one, she killed them all. In her head. The first time it happened, it was Ino who induced it. Ino was berating Sakura on how awful she looked, criticizing her hair style and clothing choice when Sakura saw the pretty little teacup on the table and wondered. What if she broke that little teacup on the side of the table and carved out Ino's pretty blue eyes? Next, she would cut clean into her jugular, making her bleed out for a few minutes.

Then, Sakura would watch as her friend's face, without any eyes to see her own death, contort into a look of horror and anguish as she finally drifted off into the afterlife. Sakura remembered that time vividly, and she couldn't look Ino in the eye for ten minutes without wanting to throw up at her thoughts.

Thump.

She killed Ino ten times seriously, and about one thousand times not-so-seriously. In her mind.

Thump-thump.

Sakura killed Naruto four times. In her mind.

Thump.

Sakura killed Sasuke eight times. In her mind.

Thump-thump-thump.

She killed Sai nineteen times. In her mind.

Thump.

She even killed Yamato. Twice. In her mind.

Thump.

She killed nearly everyone she came in contact with. In her mind. First, she'd analyze them, focusing on their strengths and weaknesses. Second, she'd see whether or not she liked them as a person and if they were trying to be a good human being. Thirdly, she would think of how to do the deed. Each time it was different.

If they were kind-hearted and nice to her, she would spare them the trouble of suffering a long and painful death. They would go quickly, sometimes even in their sleep. Other times, they would be completely aware of it, but Sakura finished the deed quickly so they wouldn't suffer.

Thump-thump.

But Sakura hadn't killed Kakashi, not even once jokingly. Yet, as she was looking at him right now, she was sure as hell considering it. For real.

"You!" she pointed an accusing finger at him, "You complete and utter jerk! I can't believe you!" Before Kakashi could ponder on what he did, Sakura punched him across the face. Then she marched over to him, hauled him to his feet and began to abuse him further. "Why?" she asked, tears brimming at her eyes, "Why?" First, he ruins all her chances with every man she comes in contact with. Next, he decides to stake his claim on her, without her permission, effectively ruining any of her chances for happiness.

Thump.

Kakashi frowned to himself; he hadn't meant for this to happen. In fact, Sakura crying was probably the last thing he was expecting. Okay, so maybe he was a little full of himself, but Sakura seemed to have feelings for him, and so did he. What was the problem?

"I…"

Thump.

"You've been giving me nightmares, haven't you?" Sakura muttered.

The Copy Nin's brow furrowed. Why would he give her nightmares? "Sakura, are you alright?"

Her heart was beating erratically now. "You did, didn't you?"

Kakashi reached out to touch her forehead, but she smacked his hand away with a terrified look on her face. "Sakura, why would I give you nightmares?"

Thump-thump-thump.

"Be-because you – you said you wanted to date me and – and I – oh, god, what is wrong with me?"

Hatake Kakashi had seen many go through the aftermath of a particularly harsh genjutsu, but he had never seen one affect Sakura like this. She was slowly going insane, and the girl he once knew was about to slip through his fingers if he didn't help him. "Do you remember the mission you had three weeks ago?"

"Yes, the one with the genjutsu user who – oh, sorry."

"It's alright," he gave her a happy eye-crease to show that he wasn't mad. "Tsunade-sama said it would take a while for the effects to wear off. Now, what's this about dating me?"

Sakura deadpanned and smacked him on the arm. "Oh, don't act like you don't know."

.

Sakura's eyes cracked open to see the moonlight filter in through her window and curtains. She snuggled closer to the body attached to the arm wrapped around her waist. Behind her, she could hear his steady breathing and even heartbeat.

The pinkette inwardly noticed that her nightmares were gone. Her sigh of relief went unnoticed by her mostly unconscious lover. Now Sakura could finally sleep in peace without those vivid thoughts and creepy dreams that quickly turned into nightmares.

Thump.

Her eyes snapped open.

Thump-thump.

It was getting louder. The beating sound of someone's heart. Sakura tilted her head towards her bedside table. The silent scream caught in her throat when she saw the same heart from her dreams, beating on her table. It was just a dream. It was just a really vivid dream.

Sakura squeezed her eyes shut and pinched herself.

Thump.

She opened her eyes. The heart was still there. Beating.

"Sakura? Are you awake? Did you have another nightmare?"

The pinkette shuddered at the heart on her bedside table continued to pulse. "No. Everything's fine. Go back to sleep."

Thump-thump.