A Bad Time for Poor Judgement

Chapter 4

"What's wrong?" Anko asked, as he tugged at her foot.

"Wait."

Wrapping the electrical cords round his arm, he used chakra to anchor him to the spot before he made the hand signs. With a poof of smoke a clone appeared beneath him. Kakashi moved to one side creating room for his clone to get past. The riser was small - not intended to accomodate people.

Climbing over him quickly and carelessly, he seemed to make a point of elbowing Kakashi as he passed.

What's with the attitude buddy?!

Now level with Anko, she had moved to give him room too but suddenly he was unconcerned with the lack of space. Pace slowed considerably as he reached her, the clone pulled his torso up, pressing himself against her calves, thighs, then her hip, as his hand brushed hers.

Oh, very intimate.

The clone brought his other hand up, one long, slow and unbroken stroke up her body, before it rested on wires next to her chest

...

Noooooo.

The clone was past her now, his groin loitered at her eye level before he was up and out. With her free hand Anko slowly fanned herself, looking down at the real Kakashi, more than a little entertained by his expression.

Yeah, yeah, laugh it up

They were only seconds behind him, but in that time he had created an earth wall and shed the maintenance uniform and held a number of shuriken in one hand.

"Archives," she mouthed, before the mask came up. "2 o'clock."

The archive was essentially a bookcase on an enormous scale - a perfect marriage of form and function - in place of corporate artwork or a trite water feature. It filled the recess behind the reception desk, taking up one side of the entire building. There must have been thousands of books and scrolls behind the glass.

Leaping from the gallery, he sped past the guards who were woefully ill-equipped to deal with shinobi. They had fired metal bolts from crossbows after him, but the fastest guard was only able to make contact with his shadow.

Chsnkkk!

Metal canisters scuttled towards them, emitting thick, angry plumes of smoke. His lungs burned, and eyes streamed as he was temporarily blinded by the smoke, only reassured of Anko's nearby presence by the sound of her coughing beside him. No protection had been afforded by the fabric masks. Suddenly, pain spiked, he touched the spot on his thigh and found it, a syringe dart loaded with that all-too-familiar iridescent sheen and his heart sank as he memories that weren't his swamped him.

Yanking out another syringe from his stomach, plunger fully distintended. Frustration caused him to fling it on the floor and crush it underfoot. Fingers formed signs, but in place of a fireball jutsu a flame like that from a candle flickered and died on his lips. Anko emerged from the smoke, he watched her pull a syringe from her shoulder and another from her neck.

"Clone?"

"Shit."

Both looked towards the archive which loomed large. Without jutsu the only hope of destroying the lab lay in their bombs and traversing the lower ground now saturated with guards.

"Well?"

Anko nodded in agreement, her mouth set in a grim line. Leaping first, Anko landed like a cat, centre of gravity close to the ground and leg extended. Kakashi followed, and the ring of guards tightened with more than two dozen surrounding them. The guards nearest them flicked their batons out, and they ran towards them.