He only had three puppets. Three puppets should have been enough. But the fucking jounin wouldn't stay still.

Kankurou's painted lips twisted in concentration, fingers writhing through a complicated dance, the hands of a composer directing his orchestra. He tugged, and Sanshouuo slithered forward in attack; he let go, and Karasu sprung back from the jab of a kunai. Strands of chakra slipped through his fingers, and his puppets spun and danced to a tune only he could hear.

A tune only he could hear, but one that whispered to the older ninja as well. The Copy Ninja danced better than Kankurou's bulky Kuroari, faster than his Sanshouuo, knew all the steps to stay in synch with his Karasu. He slipped away from the traps and seals and poisoned needles like water through a cupped hand, and it would have been beautiful if it wasn't so damn frustrating.

And Kakashi wasn't even using his Sharingan.

The kugutsu-nin spun his webs faster, picking them up and dropping them, pulling them and letting go. He slammed Sanshouuo's tail through a whipping arc with his thumb, flew Karasu over the crest of the attack with pinky and forefinger, bladed arms controlled with middle and ring. Kuroari converged from the opposite direction with Kankurou's other ring and pinky; he dropped Sanshouuo's tail, letting its weight and speed carry it forward, and with his remaining four fingers activated a hail of kunai and shuriken from the trap in Kuroari's chest.

Kakashi slipped through the attack like a breath of air and spun back for more.

It was a game to the older man, Kankurou knew, but he didn't care. It was all just fun and games, but games had winners and losers same as battles, and he never aimed to be the latter. The thrill of the hunt and the lust for blood fueled them both, but Kankurou would. not. lose. Kakashi's defeat would come at the Sand-nin's dancing hands or -

There was no 'or'.

Steel raked on steel, shedding sparks like the two ninja were shedding sweat. The earth was gouged in great rents where Sanshouuo's attacks had missed, trees studded with Kuroari's and Karasu's explosive attacks. There was a tear in the fabric of Kankurou's pants, on the thigh, where Kakashi had thrown one of Kuroari's shuriken back at him. It was a bloodied wound, but no insult; there was blood on that silver hair as well, and blood (if only a little) on the fair skin between mask and hitai-ite. Kakashi might be the superior dancer, but he could not afford to slip - any misstep was deadly in this orchestrated ballet.

The sun shifted, if fractionally, in the blue dome of the sky; this was taking too long. Kankurou's painted lips were smudged and sweat striped the foundation on his temples and forehead. Kakashi's wild, silver hair was matted to his head, but he breathed no faster and moved no slower. The bones in the kugutsu-nin's fingers ached, and Kuroari had long since run out of spring-able traps, but he spared a chakra strand here or there to fling a discarded weapon at the older ninja anyway. Kakashi just dodged them.

I want you, Kankurou told the Leaf ninja with his twisting fingers and smeared grin. I want Konoha's best shinobi on his knees, beaten and bloodied, too weak to stand up, too weak to fight back. I want to break you. I want to taste your blood.

He dropped Kuroari and Karasu, their bodies collapsing in a tangled heap of metal limbs and knives, and heaved Sanshouuo forward with both hands. The weight of his largest puppet resisted him, but the kugutsu-nin set his teeth against the screaming in his bones and whipped it forward regardless.

Kakashi almost didn't avoid the snapping teeth, the slashing claws, the great weight of Sanshouuo's tail as it split the air in half. The very tip of that tail caught the Copy Ninja's hip pouch as he spun away, rending it, spilling shuriken and first-aid material and a battered orange book. Kankurou dropped half his chakra threads to grab the falling shuriken and fling them at Kakashi's exposed back.

Only to have them meet the wooden log of a kawarimi. The Sand-nin snarled and ducked before he could hear the whistle of a kunai; dropped Sanshouuo to snatch up all the abandoned weapons he could with what chakra strands he had, but they were too far away, too far to bring into play when Kakashi had materialized right behind him and all of Kankurou's weapons were twenty feet out of physical reach. But he grabbed them regardless, spinning around, whipping them about with invisible threads, because Kankurou would not lose, Kakashi was his -

Kakashi's knee slammed into the kugutsu-nin's sternum, and for a bright second all coherent thought was lost along with breath; it was shocked back into him alongside oxygen when he hit the ground on his back and skidded to a halt. His chakra strings had snapped, his weapons lay scattered, and Kakashi just stood there with a reversed kunai in hand as though waiting for Kankurou to get up or give up.

Kankurou wondered what the Leaf-nin looked like under that mask. What he looked like when he was smiling. What he looked like when he was getting off. What he'd look like when he was dying.

The kugutsu-nin forced more chakra through the aching bones of his fingertips and wove them around the other ninja.

He knew Kakashi couldn't see the threads, not with his Sharingan covered like that. So he relished the look in that one visible eye as it widened in surprise, as Kankurou muscled Kakashi's unsuspecting limbs into moving, into stabbing himself with his own kunai. The Sand-nin aimed for the liver. Kakashi would bleed more that way.

Kakashi's other arm intercepted. He stabbed himself in the hand instead.

Shadows moved on the fabric of the black mask. "I like you," the Leaf-nin murmured, and pulled the kunai out from between the bones of his third and fourth fingers.

Kankurou's lips stretched into a grin. "You should play with me more often," he said, and wrenched his chakra strings around.

The older jounin was ready this time; muscle pit itself against chakra, until Kankurou's bones were screeching all the way up to his elbows, until Kakashi abruptly stopped resisting and swung forward in attack. Kankurou did not anticipate the slack and didn't have enough time to re-string his chakra before he was pinned back to the ground with a bloodied kunai at his throat.

Kakashi was straddling his stomach, left hand braced in the dirt next to the kugutsu-nin's head. The steel blade pressed into his throat but did not penetrate the flesh.

Kankurou wanted to grab him by the hips and ask if he liked to be fucked this way.

"It's too bad the Kazekage's your brother," the older man murmured. The movement of his lips was so slight Kankurou could hardly pick it up beneath the mask. "I'd hate to start a war over killing you."

The Sand-nin kept grinning. He couldn't help it. It was as though someone else's threads of chakra were pulling at his flesh without his consent. He wanted to start laughing.

"You won't start a war by fucking me," he said, and reached up with one hand to draw down Kakashi's mask.

Or tried to, anyway. Kakashi reared his head back and batted the kugutsu-nin away with his wounded hand. It slapped wetly against Kankurou's palm and left blood on his exposed fingertips.

The cloth mask creased in an undecipherable expression. "Perhaps not," Kakashi said. "But I don't fuck minors."

"Pity," Kankurou replied. "You should try it sometime."

The Copy Ninja left not long after. He didn't kill Kankurou. Didn't speak. Only gathered up his battered orange book and medical supplies and left his weapons on the ground and his blood on Kankurou's fingertips. It was a disappointment. Rather like paying for a lap dance and being left with a hard-on.

He'd lost. Kankurou hated losing.

He licked Kakashi's blood off his fingers and smiled at the salty taste.

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