So...?

She signed the fucking contract. Her personal summon was Bisuke, who she told herself she chose because he had the most medical experience out of the ninken and not because he was the cutest. Her Sensei hadn’t informed her of the sheer legal paperwork related to having ninken until 3 minutes after she signed the contract with her blood.

Similar to service animals, they needed to be registered for her to take him in public with no leash. Luckily the Inuzuka clan had pushed so adamantly during the founding of Kohona that it wasn’t too difficult. Just, a lot of busy work. The stack of paper as thick as her thumb haunted her from her desk at home. For right now though she was not only getting Bisuke a new bandana, red to match hers, with the leaf symbol on it to represent loyalty, but to get medic patches for him. At this rate dogs had a stricter uniform than shinobi.

Bisuke happily followed her through the specialty store, aimlessly inspecting the varying muzzles, vests, bandanas and embroidery examples. The nice employee with a beauty mark near her upper lip told her that the customized bandana would be ready for pickup next week and gave Sakura her receipt and a friendly wave away.

“Thanks Boss!” Ah, right. Now that he was a personal summon he mimicked Pakkun’s approach. Much to her and Pakkun’s dismay.

“Bisuke, just Sakura is fine,” He grumbled to himself before slumping his head down as he followed her. Tail limp compared to the nonstop wagging from before. Oh well he’d get over it. Now she had to return the scrolls she nabbed from Kakashi Sensei before heading to the hospital for shadowing. She swung home and was stopped no less than 4 times by people asking to pet Bisuke.

“Ahhh he’s so cute what’s his name?” “He looks just like mine!” “May I pet your dog, ma’am?” “Isn’t that Hatake’s….can I pet him?”

The curse of ninken, strangers’ affection towards them.

She had just barely grazed the handle to the apartment building she lived in before-

“HEY! WHEN DID YOU GET A NINKEN?”

Not Kiba…..

“BARK BARK,”

Not Akamaru either…

He had already started to close the distance between them, not quite running but an awkward speedy trot towards her with his hands clasped in tight fists. Set eyebrows, no smile and focused eye contact. Yikes.

He’s close enough for her to smell the sweat, mud permeating his aged jacket, and his breath. Did he have a barbeque?

“Congrats!” He exclaims, shoving his face into hers. Yeah he definitely had barbeque. She opens the door,

“Uh thanks, Inuzuka.” he completely ignores the cue that the conversation was over and follows her.

“How long have you been partnered with him? Do you have multiple summons? Did your smelly Sensei let you summon the Hatake wolves?” She thinks fondly of Naruto due to Kiba’s boisterous approach to talking. Naruto smelled better at least and didn't have a cloud of a bitter tang of body odor hovering around him. Wait. Wolves? She was about to get pissed before remembering Kakashi Sensei most likely didn't keep it from her on purpose. Bless his dumb heart.

“I’ve only had him for a few days, we haven’t even trained together yet,” She answers, knowing ignoring him would only make him more aggressive.

“You’ve had him for days and haven’t trained with him? What have you been doing!” Kiba shouts. Akamaru barks at her with the dog version of a dirty look. Bisuke ambles alongside her, on the side as far away from the Inuzuka duo. Giving Akamaru sideways glances and peeking at her occasionally.

She walks by her apartment, not planning on letting a random boy with anger and boundary issues know her address. To the roof to circle back inside it is.

“I’ve been busy,” She says as monotone as she can with inner internally screaming at Kiba to take a step (or four) back. Kiba stops in his track sputtering,

“How can you be that busy?!” His claws were outstretched in disbelief. “He’s your partner!”

“I-”

“Train with me. And Akamaru! Tomorrow! At training ground 23, it’s on the eastern side of town, we train from 8 am until 2 pm.” With that he spins on his heel and runs away. Literally. Launching forward into a full sprint until he turned around a corner and Sakura heard a collision and an adult voice yelling a curse. She promptly decides that’s none of her business and slinks back to her apartment.

She enters with Bisuke darting between her legs to enter. She grabs the bag she left on the counter and collects the scrolls to return. How did one get under her dresser? She whistles to get Bisuke’s attention before exiting the apartment.

Bisuke's keeps a steady stream of observations and thoughts on the way to the Jounin apartments.

‘That boy from early on seems nice, he smelled like spicy pork, I like him. The pup that was with him could learn some manners though, I can’t believe he said that to you! Hatake says Inuzuka are valuable allies and are also great in bed,” She splutters and pushes him at that last bit of information. Receiving a few odd looks from passersby. How could her Sensei embarrass her when he’s not even around?

She knocks on the door. Apartment 203 with a beige door, brass handle, and a no smoking sign like the other nine apartments in this hallway. Kakashi Sensei calls out

“Maa, who is it?” It was too clear...a genjutsu in his voice? So she couldn’t track his location from sound? Paranoid Jounin much?

“Sensei it’s me,”

He opens the door in a flash with an eye smile,

“ah , my favorite student,” and only the student goes unsaid.

She holds up the bag,

“I brought your scrolls back,” He gingerly steps away from the door, on guard but trying to look relaxed,

“C’mon in, I’ll make some tea for us,” God he’s stiff, by Kakashi Sensei standards. His eyebags are putrid dandelion yellow mixed with wet cement gray. The burst vessels in his eyes remind her of an ancient forest root system. None of his summons were around, or at least visible. A soft pity overtakes her. She enters nonetheless.

“So, how are you Sensei?” He perks up, waggling a finger at her,

“Just dandy! I got a new houseplant, you can help me name it,” Classic diversion. She plays along.

“How about Fernando?” She suggests as she gently plops the bag on his rich, near black wooden coffee table in the living room. She starts taking scrolls out to put them back correctly.

“Hmmmm, not too bad of a name, I’ll consider it,” He wanders off to the kitchen leaving her to her own devices.

“He smells like whiskey,” Bisuke “whispers” to her. Kakashi had definitely heard. Wonderful.

“You want me to heal up your hangover headache?” Kakashi leans into the living room, with a near snarl and a bitter look in his eye,

“You’re too young for this shit,” Bisuke curls closer to her leg and into himself as she puts three scrolls on the smallest shelf,

“Sensei-”

“Green tea okay?” He switches back to his cheerful persona. The tense aura thinning, but still present. One day her Sensei will face his problems headfirst. Today is not that day. She lets him know green tea is fine as she slithers into the kitchen. He’s slouching and staring at the kettle. She just now notices how greasy his hair is, having limp clumps and darker streaks throughout. She lights up her hand with healing chakra, Kakashi Sensei bristles like a cat threatened with a hose.

He snarls at her. Snapping at her when she touches his forehead. He growls as she heals him. He’s quiet when she removes her hand. Words are hard for him after missions sometimes. Between village rumors, his ninken gossiping, and his muttering during breakdowns she has a plausible theory that after his dad died he lived with his dad’s summons for a while. Most likely mimicking them. Then it clicked, Kiba mentioned wolves. She snickers internally, of course her sensei would be literally raised by wolves. It was out of some cheesy dramatic book. As popular as the tale of a child raised by wolves was, Sakura thought it was possible for her Sensei. He was bad at social skills, he just snarled at her and he got along better with dogs than human folks.

Just a theory though.

She stared at the kettle with him. When it started to scream she let Sensei pour them both cups. As they sat at the kitchen table, that had a houseplant on it (This one’s name is Alex, Sakura!) Sensei rests most of his weight on the table through his arms, while Sakura sits primly across from him sipping her drink.

“Bad mission?” She prompts,

“You’re too young, far too young, a young pup like you shouldn't be pushed to be so mature, you shouldn’t have to deal with an old dog like me problems” Kakashi Sensei drags out of his throat, each word sounding raspier than the former.

Bisuke eventually waddles into the kitchen and hops into her lap. Kakashi-Sensei is looking at the wood floor. Sorta. That’s what his eyes are pointing at but Sakura is willing to bet good money he wasn’t actually processing it.

After they’ve both finished their respective drinks and sat in silence for a while, Sakura glides off her chair to go put the rest of the scrolls away, just to arrive at the bag and find it empty.

“I hope you don’t mind but I put them away,” Bisuke pipes up, Sakura gives him a sullen smirk,

“Thank you Bisuke,” She snatches her bag, lest she leave it and find it with a henohenomoheji embroidered on it when she remembered to snag it back from her Sensei. Whether he was just weird or used it as a deterrent to prevent people from leaving things at his home, she didn’t know. If it was the second one it was effective. She calls out,

“I’m leaving Sensei!” She gets a grunty bark sound back from him.

As she headed onto Konoha streets she kept an eye (and Bisuke’s nose) out for a certain green jumpsuit clad jounin. Having Gai visit her Sensei seemed like a good idea. A great idea actually. As much as Gai creeped her out, she'd seen him drag her Sensei to the hospital...literally. Kicking, screaming and biting. Only for Kakashi Sensei to bring him flowers, food, and thank him a few days later.