Impossible to Foretell

Chapter 20: Night Air

Kakashi grabbed my hand and pulled me back up to my feet, "If Kanaye left that for you to find, then we should get back to the safety of the village as quickly as possible."

"Is the village safe, though? I mean, he was able to get me there as well..."

"No, even the Leaf isn't completely safe, but it is much safer than this stretch of road out in the middle of nowhere."

I nodded and started to hobble off again on my bad hip, "Then let's get the hell out of here."

"Agreed."

The rest of the way back, Kakashi was on high alert. He looked like he was enjoying a lazy stroll, but every movement was calculated and no detail went unnoticed. I was really happy that he was there with me because between my jumbled emotions and bad hip, I was pretty much useless. It took far too long for the welcoming green gates of the village to come into view, and I gave and audible sigh of relief as we walked through them.

The two us continued to walk through the village, and Kakashi stopped in front of my apartment complex.

"Why'd you stop here?"

"Uh, well, I had thought that you'd want to head home..."

I raised a single eyebrow, "Do you even know me? I have stuff to do so I'm heading back to my office."

Kakashi just scratched the back of his neck sheepishly and started walking away from my building.

The rest of the day was spent frantically trying to catch up on my work. But I was hopelessly behind. I barely have enough time to get everything done on a normal day so with the last three days of having my work time shortened, I was drowning. Being the perfectionist that I am, I simply couldn't just put in less effort to make the whole thing take less time so at this rate I was never going to catch back up.

An ANBU knocked on my office door, "Ma'am, we are closing up for the night."

With a sigh, I pushed everything into my desk and stood up. "I'm sorry. I'll get out of your hair now."

I walked out of the office, locking it behind me, and the ANBU agent followed me out, locking the main door to the building behind him as well.

I looked at the stars glowing above the village and watched as the dark grey cotton balls of the clouds drifted in front of the small pinpoints of light. I loved the night air. It's cold, brisk nature rejuvenated my sleep-deprived mind.

I knew that I should probably go home and get a little bit of sleep, but that just wasn't a very appealing prospect at the moment. Going for a walk at midnight? That sounded much more pleasant than any attempt at sleep.