✔️Heal My Heart {Kakashi Hatake}

95 | finding him

"Well, what are you waiting for?" I demanded of the shinobi who were standing around and glancing at each other. "Let's go!"

I followed Juuki at full sprint, the others behind me. I didn't care about formation anymore; we were still in Land of Fire territory, so it was unlikely we would run into any enemy ninja. Besides that, I needed to reach Kakashi as soon as possible.

"This way." Juuki suddenly took a sharp turn around a tall rock and bounded up a slope. I followed, almost tripping over a tree root in the process.

Juuki disappeared around a tree, and I followed, then stopped suddenly. Kakashi was collapsed by the side of the thick trunk, leaning against it. He was covered in blood; his ANBU mask had fallen to the floor beside him and there was a thick stream of scarlet trickling down in head into his eyes and seeping into the fabric of his mask. There were deep wounds in his arms and legs, and a deep, fatal looking one that carved through his chest to his stomach.

"Oh my- Kakashi." I dropped to my knees beside him. "Kakashi, can you hear me?"

Kakashi's breathing stuttered, then his normal eye opened a crack. "M- Mi-"

"Shh." I cut him off. "You're really, really hurt, okay? Don't talk."

"He..." Kakashi forced the word out. "Waiting... traps..."

"Shh, I know, I know," I whispered. "We already ran into him. It's okay, he's dead. You need to lie down now, okay?"

The others were arriving now. I felt a slight twinge of annoyance that it had taken them this long, but I needed to focus my attention on Kakashi. Juuki helped me guide him down so he was lying on his back.

"Teren, go get help, I don't care where from as long as they're friendly," I said tersely, not even looking back. I felt Teren's chakra recede as he turned and ran.

"Kakashi, my rival!" Gai exclaimed. "Do not give up!"

"Gai, you're really not helping," I snapped, pulling out my first aid kit. What I really needed was to get Kakashi to hospital, the sooner the better. For now, I'd have to make do with a field surgery.

Yūgao crouched beside me, her mask making her face unreadable. "Will he be okay?"

I don't know. "He'll be fine," I said with what I hoped was an air of confidence. I had no idea if Kakashi would make it or not, but I couldn't let myself dwell on that.

"D-don't lie," Kakashi gasped. "I'm n-not gonna-"

"Shut it," I snapped. "You'll be fine."

"I-I'm sorry... Miyoshi..."

"I told you to shut up," I cut him off. He was talking like he was about to die, and it was killing me. "Can you guys give me some space, please?"

"Of course." Yūgao stood and moved away somewhere far back, motioning for the others to do so as well. I felt their chakras retreating back, and waited until they were a comfortable distance away before carefully removing Kakashi's jacket, mask and shirt to get close to the wounds.

"You're not allowed to say anything, okay? You need to preserve all your energy," I told him, taking a cloth from the kit and dabbing at the worst of the blood. I wondered just how brutal Kokuyōseki had been to put Kakashi in such a miserable state and come out seemingly unscathed, but I didn't ask. I had to concentrate on healing.

Kakashi looked at me for a moment, then his eyes fluttered shut. I had a brief moment of panic, then realised he was only unconscious. Perhaps that would make it easier to heal him. If not...

I couldn't think about that. I smeared the Lyashinoha paste onto my fingers and spread it over the long cut on his chest. I barely had enough to cover the whole thing, and even then it didn't get to work immediately. I had a fleeting moment of horror as nothing happened. I placed my hands over the widest part of the gash and started to use medical ninjutsu to attempt to stitch it together. To my immense relief, the bleeding began to slow and the skin closed up a little.

"This way, hurry!"

I heard Teren's voice calling urgently, then sensed his chakra approaching along with two more I didn't recognise. I quickly pulled Kakashi's shirt over his face - why, I didn't know. Perhaps it was just an instinct. A second later, Teren appeared accompanied by a shockingly busty blonde woman and a younger girl, not much older than I was, carrying a pig.

"Miyoshi, this is Tsunade... you know, the Sannin?" Teren said.

How could I not know? Tsunade was the most highly regarded medic in history. But I didn't have time to bow down and kiss her feet when Kakashi was in such terrible shape.

"Well, is she helping or am I going to watch him die?" I snapped.

"Shizune, you help the girl," the blonde said quickly, too quickly. Her hands were trembling every so slightly, and the briskness in her step as she walked a distance off seemed forced. Some sort of fear? Anxiety? No time to pursue it. The dark haired girl, Shizune, set her pig down and knelt beside me.

"Wow, this guy... he's in terrible shape," she whispered.

"You don't say," I commented sarcastically. "These wounds were made with obsidian. I have Lyashinoha paste here."

"I thought that was extinct." Shizune goggled at me.

"Well, it's not," I said bluntly, applying some more to the gash on Kakashi's chest. I was running low on chakra, but a thin layer of pink flesh had now sealed up the worst of it. There would likely be a scar, but I was working on preventing the worst of that.

I wasn't really paying attention to what Shizune was doing, but when I looked up I saw that she was actually doing a pretty good job of healing the cuts on Kakashi's face and arms. As much as I was stressed and frustrated beyond belief, I had to admit that she was a pretty good medic.

It was a while before I deemed Kakashi stable enough to step back and take a break. It was in the pause that I realised quite how exhausted I was, with laboured breathing and heavy sweating. Not to mention my hands were trembling because I'd locked up all my muscles while I had been healing.

Shizune wiped her forehead. "Man, that was intense. How'd he end up so beaten anyway?"

"There was a guy who's been after me for a while," I explained. "Kakashi took a solo mission to assassinate him, but he's too tough to be beaten alone. This is what he did."

"Kakashi?" Shizune repeated. "Like Kakashi of the Sharingan?"

"That's the one," I replied. "Didn't know he was that famous."

Tsunade stomped over with her hands on her hips. It was really quite intimidating, but I didn't have time to be scared of some big-shot medic who wouldn't even heal. She peered down at Kakashi, then hmph'ed and turned back to me and Shizune.

"He needs to get to hospital, that wound's infected," she said briskly. "He'll survive being carried on a stretcher. You and you-" she indicated Teren and Guy "-carry him back to the Leaf."

I unrolled a sealing scroll and summoned a stretcher from it. Shizune and I carefully lifted Kakashi onto it, then Teren and Guy picked him up.

"Will you not return with us?" Itachi asked Tsunade.

"No," the Sannin replied bluntly. "I don't care what happens now, I helped you and now you can go and leave me alone."

"Well?" I demanded. "You heard the woman, get moving!"