Hatake Kakashi was nothing if not an insightful man. His clear view of the world opened up a world of opportunities that he always took advantage of when he could, mainly because he could see these opportunities open up when others could not. Because of his insightful nature, he had been able to raise three kids without any of them having been his own, and he was able to focus on their strengths and encourage them much like a parent would.
And it was because of this insightful nature that he could read his favorite student's expression without her having to actually show it to him. Sakura Haruno, the Kunoichi he had tried to teach when she was a Genin, was miserable. She had always been the easy one of the trio. Easy to teach, easy to dismiss, and easy to read. Nothing much has changed since her Genin days, aside from the second point. He couldn't dismiss his favorite Kunoichi in the whole Shinobi world, the one who he had mentored and who in several ways mentored him.
"Here are your papers, Hokage-sama." Sakura, now his assistant, handed him a thick stack of papers. The cheerful smile on her face made him upset, because he knew she just wasn't as happy as she seemed. The glint in her eye held no real value, and that irked him.
A few weeks ago, he had stumbled in on her. Her facade had cracked, and she was crumbled against the wall, strangled and quiet sobs leaving her mouth as she tried not to let the tears in her eyes escape. Her face was puffy and red, and her pink locks were in tangles atop her head from where her fingers messed them around. He was lucky she didn't spot him, or used her sensory skills to detect him. Seeing her like this, Kakashi acknowledged he was an insightful man, and he knew exactly what she wanted.
She wanted to leave.
"Sakura, you know you can just call me Kakashi." He took the papers from her hands and smiled warmly at her, his eye creasing to show it in place of his lips. She chuckled softly, and assured her Hokage that she would remember next time.
When she walked out of his office, he wondered if she would ever give in to her desires and just leave. He enjoyed her company more than he enjoyed anyone else. She was an intelligent woman who had the strongest backbone she had ever seen in a woman. She didn't take second best when she could easily have the best, and she was one of the only Shinobi in the entire village who could rule with an iron fist, while also showing kindness and caring for everyone. He didn't want her to leave, but he wanted her to be happy.
Kakashi straightened his robes. Being the Sixth Hokage had no benefits when it came to the wardrobe. He hadn't been a stylish man before, always preferring baggy clothing over tight fitting ones, but this was too much. If any breeze were to enter the window on his far side, the outfit would sway uncontrollably, taking 'baggy' to the next level.
Sighing at the paperwork in front of him, he leaned back in his chair, returning to his thoughts. When had Sakura grown so sad? When did she decide she wanted to leave, follow the footsteps Tsunade-sama herself had stepped? It wasn't because of Sasuke, he was back, now. She rarely talked to him, anyway. Unless their lack of conversation was the problem? Kakashi shook his head, no, that surely was not the problem considering the Uchiha had tried to talk to her in the past, but she was the one who ignored the other.
Could it have been Naruto? No, surely not. His favorite fox ninja was Sakura's stepping stone, the one she could turn to at any time, the one who would always help her get passed waves of problems when the uncertainty got too high. So what was it?
His mind redirected to the blond ninja who was quickly taking after his father, and Kakashi's old sensei. Kakashi had to admit, his student had become quite the handsome young man. He had girls left and right who would gladly put up with his ramen-eating habits and his loud, scratchy voice. Even though he was nearing the age of thirty and had his life devoted to Team Naruto, of whom Kakashi had watched grow alongside his former student, Naruto was very popular with the opposite sex.
A pang of nostalgia hit the Hokage, and he nearly bowed over with the heartache and pain that came with it. When had he grown so old? When had his trio of small, young, and stupidly silly Genin grown so much? Team Naruto was almost entirely composed of Jounin. They didn't have the rank, but they had the skill for it. Naruto was tall, taller than Kakashi, now. Sakura was just shy of Kakashi's height, and Sasuke almost reached Naruto's height. Where had the years gone? Why had they fled from him when he just wanted to hold onto them and stay in place?
How long had it been since he was their teacher? Kakashi couldn't even remember off the top of his head. He had once been able to say with confidence that it had been one year, but how long ago had that been? Too long, Kakashi concluded.
Sasuke had his own little group of ANBU-to-be's, and Sakura would, too, if she would just pick up an application. Naruto took so much pride in his group of Chuunin, one might mistake them for his children basing off how close they were. Despite knowing this, no matter how hard he tried to, whenever he pictures his former students in his mind, the first thing to come up was the little kids they had once been. These images tugged at his heartstrings when they faded to reveal that these kids were now extremely capable adults. They hadn't needed him in a long time when it came to teaching, but sometimes he wished they still leaned on him for more than just mission briefings.
Maybe it was time to say goodbye to those thoughts in his head, the ones of three little adorable Genin staring up at him with admiration and wonder. He would never see them again. Genin still looked up at him with the same eyes Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura once had, but they weren't his Genin.
If he had the powers to turn back the clock that sat on his desk, he would keep turning it until he stopped at the day he met the trio of Genin he had come to care so much for. He would endure another few years with these Genin again and again if he had the choice. He enjoyed them now, but the world had lost its luster in their eyes, and they had seen too much compared to the silly little Genin they were.
A tap on his door halted his thoughts, and Kakashi quickly made it seem as though he hadn't just spent twenty two minutes slacking off in favor of nostalgic thoughts. "Come in," He called from his place at his desk. The door opened, and Sakura quietly stepped in, shutting the door gingerly behind her. He looked up from the stack of papers he had previously been pretending to look over, smiled, and waved, "Yo."
Although she had only just left a short while ago, she still bowed and addressed him in the formal way he had seen her do many times before. She rose, and slipped two scrolls from her pockets, things he wish his outfit had come with. "Would you like a coffee, Hokage-sama? Or perhaps some tea?" Sake was not an option for obvious reasons. One alcohol-loving Hokage had been enough for Sakura, and she would not tolerate another.
"What are you having, Sakura?" He asked. There were two scrolls with two beverage choices trapped inside, and unless she had more, he was not going to rob her of whatever she wanted. She walked over to her desk, which was near the wall to his right.
"Whatever you're not, Hokage-sama." Kakashi chuckled at that, and requested whatever she didn't want, which she returned with saying that she didn't want whatever he wanted. After that, he had settled for the tea, and she the coffee.
After she had performed the seals on the scrolls, and the beverages had been passed out, they sat in silence for awhile, his drink finishing before either of them talked again. Sakura was the one who broke the silence, and he was glad for that. "You haven't gotten any work done, have you?"
"No," He scratched his head in the light way he had done many times before when he felt as though he was agitating Sakura. He heard her groaned, and tried to suppress the smile on his lips, his voice resonating amusement. "Sakura, when do you think you will take a team of your own?" He didn't want to stop her from leaving if it made her happy. Elongating her stay was as selfish as keeping her in Konoha, but Kakashi had to try and bait her into putting off her inevitable leave, at least for a little while. Maybe if she connected enough to her team, like Naruto or Sasuke had, her inevitable leave would dissipate into dust, and it would be as avoidable as a kunai?
She hummed softly, replying with a gentle, "Never?"
"That's what I said to Hiruzen-sama," He nodded slowly, remembering how the late Hokage had made him take the three under his wing. Now, he was glad for that, but back then, he thought it to be an unjust punishment when he had done nothing wrong. "But then he forced me to take you three. Maybe I should do the same with you?"
She scoffed gently. "With all respect, Hokage-sama, but I have duties I must attend to. You cannot live without an assistant, and I am one of the only ones qualified." He cut in with the fact that being one of the only ones did not mean she was the only one. "Not to mention my role as top medic in the hospital. It is impertinent that I am available at all times in case something happens. It's fine to send me on missions, Hokage-sama, but if I were to turn my entire attention to a Genin Team, I would not be able to perform my duties as effeciently as possible."
He didn't humor these thoughts for much longer, his tone becoming serious. "As one of the top medics, the top medic, you admit that there are other medic nin's who can do your job. Perhaps not only one is needed, maybe it takes over ten of the best to match your skill, but the fact still stands: They can do it without you." Something lit up in her eyes, and a wry smile dripped onto her lips. He regretted his choice of words immediately.
"You're right, Hokage-sama. They can do it without me. Thank you. I am still not going to take a team of Genin, whether you force me to or not," He was used to this from his pink-headed assistant. It went her way, or it didn't go at all. "But I will acknowledge that the hospital does not rely on me entirely." She turned the subject against him even more so when she pointedly asked, "So, what were you doing? You weren't doing work, I know that."
"Oh, you know. Just how the sun sets and rises without anyone thinking of it until it has been years since it started." She looked at him, confused. It was a way of saying he was thinking about how time had passed, without directly saying it had passed. Warm silence and thoughtful expressions filled the room for several more hours, and he was glad that she was not shoving the paperwork down his throat by now.
Kakashi saw it in Naruto a week after he had asked Sakura about the Genin team arrangement. She had still denied him, but he might be able to trick himself into thinking she really was thinking about it. He couldn't trick himself into thinking Naruto wasn't sad, though.
The look that reflected off those bright eyes was not one he was familiar with. That emotion did not belong in the Kyuubi container's eyes, and yet, it lay dormant in them. In those eyes, he saw what he had heard in Sakura's cry. That longing, that heated desire for something you just couldn't have.
And Kakashi was going to confront Naruto about it, unlike his avoidance of Sakura's wanting.
"You want to leave." Kakashi stated blankly. His students were slipping from his hands like water racing through openly spread fingers. Naruto hardly looked shocked, they both knew he could read people as easily as he could read a book.
"Yeah," Naruto scratched the back of his head in a similar fashion to how Kakashi did whenever an angry Sakura confronted him. He was an honest boy, and in that fact, Kakashi settled. "I just don't want to say goodbye, you know? It'd be hard to say goodbye to Sakura and Sasuke, and especially my team." Kakashi's heart sunk. He wasn't an emotionless husk of a man, there was still something deep inside of him, and that thing was a heart. His heart went out to this boy as he thought of how Sakura might be gone before he would even breathe that word to anyone.
"Your team, they are almost Jounin, right?" Naruto nodded happily, his prideful smile evident on his face. His team was only ten years younger than him, and were reaching for their twenties. They both knew that the team Naruto had taught would make the promotion without much problems, thanks to their sensei. "When they are, I will grant your wish to leave, I'll even start getting the paperwork ready for you. You will be back, right?" This informal way of speaking was one he reserved for those he cared about, despite his position above them.
"Yeah, of course, Kakashi! I'll come back to steal the title of Hokage from you!" Kakashi sighed gently. The two were outside, and his breath came out in visible puffs and swirls in front of him. In his peripheral vision, he could see Naruto enjoying himself, making small clouds with his breath, sucking in more air, and doing it again. This boy was still very much a child, but Kakashi didn't mind.
His heart throbbed in his chest. Would Sakura come back, if she were to leave? And what of Sasuke? He and the boy were very distant, almost spitefully so, but he would miss him if he left, too. Would he leave, as well? The thoughts caused a stinging sense of regret inside of him, stirring up until he could focus no more on the walk Naruto and himself were taking part on, his thoughts demanding all of his attention.
He would have to see Sasuke soon, he would have to study him. Would he find the same light that he saw in the other's eyes? Would he abandon Konoha again, even with the promise of returning? Would Sakura come back if she ever left? He knew Naruto definitely would come back, there was no doubt about that, now. But would Konoha forever be void of two heads, one of pink and one of black? Would these Shinobi never walk these dirt roads again if they were given the option to leave? Or would they rush back, scrambling to rejoin the ranks of those they had grown up besides? Kakashi thought of how young they had seemed when he met them, that visage captured forever by a beloved picture.
Not a day went by that he didn't look at that picture on his desk, the one with his adorable little trio. Would he be able to live a day knowing that was purely in the past, and one, maybe two would never return again? Would he be able to go on looking at empty desks and Jounin-less teams, knowing who would be perfect there? Would he be able to take it if he found out one of his beloved former students needed him, but they were too far away for him to reach out a hand and help?
"Do you think Sakura-chan will be mad at me for leaving? I know my team will understand, and Sasuke-dobe will, too. But will she?" Kakashi turned from his thoughts in favor of looking at his favorite fox-containing student. If he could, he would tear out his heart and give it to Naruto as a condolence, but he couldn't.
"No, I don't think so." Kakashi looked up at the clouds that had been threatening to break from the weight of the snow inside of them for the last two to three days. As if he gave a signal, the snow could be seen coming down in gentle flurries, scattering across the village. The two continued to walk, both in deep thought. After awhile, the Sixth Hokage spoke again, "I think Sakura-chan will understand."
The grass crumpled beneath Kakashi. He wished he could have foregone the robes for something that wasn't so heavy and drafty, but Sakura would likely have his head on a stick if she found out he did something like that. The frozen grass continued to crunch, until he realized the sound was not like frozen grass at all. Looking down, he saw scorched earth that was beginning to freeze over. Odd, he knew there should have been grass where he was standing. His thoughts were interrupted, and replaced with an understanding, as he heard, "Kya!"
A feminine voice cried out in shock, an immaturely girly, but undeniably male at the same time, voice yipped in the cold air moments later. Kakashi heard his former student call out for his team to look beneath the beneath, and a smile crept onto his lips.
The students, each twenty years younger than their twenty nine year old sensei, shouted for their Sasuke-sensei to go easier on them. A deep chuckle was heard, before a cynical, "I thought you guys were complaining that it was cold? I just wanted to warm you up." The flames that had seared through and melted the snow around Kakashi was enough to attest to that, to a degree.
Sasuke came into view, running from his trio is much the same fashion Kakashi had done what seemed like decades ago. Sasuke was sporting baggy sweatpants and a short sleeved Jounin shirt. How, Kakashi didn't know. His feet thrummed against the ground with restricted speed, allowing the three younger Shinobi to get near him, but not close enough to touch him. The two girls howled in frustration as they tried to throw shuriken at their taunting sensei, while the boy ran in the back. Just as Kakashi concluded this boy was going to let the others get to Sasuke and then take over, he watched as the boy performed some seals, and the ground below Sasuke rose.
It was likely Sasuke had decided to teach them ninjutsu, but wouldn't he have expected that then? His predicting nature was easily dismissed as he tripped over upturned earth and stone. Kakashi watched as Sasuke gripped the ankles of the boy, bringing him down to join him on the cold ground.
"Aah! Sensei, the ground is cold!" Sasuke laughed loudly, and informed the boy that he knew.
Kakashi could not say he knew this man. He had taught him for a short time, but he did not actually know him. The man on the far side of the clearing was kind, he was determined, and he was loving. He was cruel, daunting, and was feared easily when others got on his bad side, but that did not outweigh his good side. He had changed from his moody Genin self, and he was a great deal stronger because of it. He was not as compassionate as some might think when they saw his smile, but when it came to his Genin, he was similar to Naruto in that he would show them sides no one knew the boy had.
The way the boy laughed and smiled with his team was enough proof for Kakashi. He didn't need to talk with the under-dressed male, he didn't needed to stare practically in his soul to determine where this boy was headed in life, and where he was going to go to get there. This boy was not leaving the village, he was not leaving his team.
Kakashi smiled. He could hold on to at least one face, it seemed. Turning on his heels, the aging Hokage continued on his way, stopping to check in on friends along the way around the village.
He knew now that it was time to say goodbye to the faces he thought he knew, and accept what they had grown into. And so, with this thought in mind, when he reached his office, he strode over to his desk, and in front of the curious Sakura, he whispered as his hand reached out to the picture on his desk, "Goodbye." The picture slipped face down on the desk. He made it his personal goal to replace it with another picture before any of his former students left, and then he would turn it back up. Much like a before-and-after, he decided. He did not look at Sakura as he whispered again, "Goodbye."