In the empty space between one breath and the next, Kakashi had his hands fastened back in the ragged cloth of Ryouma's collar. This time there was no comfort in the gesture. Ryouma's head snapped around hard enough to crack tense neck bones, expression broken between horror and fury and something Kakashi couldn't even read in the chalk-pale angles of his face.

Kakashi didn't give him the chance to speak.

"No," he grated, and his voice twisted out like a beaten-dog bark. Dull panic, so old and familiar it felt like a weapon he could use, made him reach for the words that hurt; the only ones that ever worked. "I just dragged you back from one mission with a teammate's blood on your hands--what makes you think I'd be the reason for it? I didn't--" He clenched his jaw, wiped his face blank. "I didn't let you have Sadao. I'm sure as hell not letting you have Ginta for less."

You didn't kill your teammates. You especially didn't sell the victim short when you'd let the rapist go. Even when the rapist still turned up dead, slaughtered at the victim's hands--but that had been orders. Ginta's revenge, held back until it could be sanctioned by someone in a position to make the right choice. Sadao had died to keep other ninja safe, other teammates, and that was something else entirely.

That wasn't murdering someone over a kiss that didn't even matter.

"And what the hell do you mean you wouldn't step in the way?" Kakashi demanded, voice splintering as his thoughts jerked sideways. Hands tightened in cloth hard enough to tear it. "There is no way. I'm not on the market for any of you bastards--I don't date. And--and--how can you step back if you keep promising to stay?"

He was losing the battle to keep his face guarded; his mask had fallen to the side somewhere, crumpled and forgotten. It didn't matter anymore. All that counted was the man in front of him, determined to thwart every single attempt made at keeping him safe--who wanted to stay and go and break down doors in the only place Kakashi could really sleep, even when he couldn't. And the other man, the even more complicated man, who apparently couldn't be trusted not to get himself killed even when Kakashi wasn't in his life.

To his side, Hoshika uncurled slowly and stood up, a soft-edged noise rumbling deep in the back of her throat. Kakashi almost snapped the summons on her, too tired to focus on one more thing.

"Tell me what I'm doing wrong," he said, when he managed to find the words, torn between anger and aching. "There's some secret to keeping you all alive and--away from me. Or keeping you alive and close. I don't care anymore. Just--whatever it is, I'll do it." He'd done everything else; he could do this too. "Please."