Title: Kakashi, A Koumajutsu Tale
Author: Tsubasa Kya
Disclaimer: I do not own "Naruto". I do not own "Inuyasha". Koumajutsu and its supplemental fics are InuyashaNaruto crossovers, though this particular story may not involve much from the Inuyasha world. Koumajutsu and any supplemental fics may or may not follow the actual canon events for the Naruto universe and will not follow canon events for the Inuyasha universe.
SUMMARY: A brief story to give Kakashi's back story, to be a supplemental fic for my story "Koumajutsu". One-shot. Complete as-is. Naruto-UniverseRin/Kakashi.
NOTE: Naruto's parents' names were unknown when I started writing Koumajutsu, so you will find as you read this that their names are not Minato and Kushina. I named them Kyo and Tsuke. And their backgrounds may not follow canon either.
Kakashi, A Koumajutsu Tale
"Please, Kakashi, come away from there…" she said to him, taking his hand in her small one and tugging lightly on his arm. She always pled with him, begging him to quit torturing himself.
She just couldn't understand, he thought bitterly as he stared at the name Obito Uchiha on the memorial stone. It was his fault Obito had died. If he had just gone with Obito to begin with…
"Kakashi, please, stop it…" Rin begged him. He turned to look at her; her expression showed only worry. He didn't know what to say to her anymore. He never really did before the death of Obito, but now it was exceptionally difficult to come up with something. Even a professional conversation seemed like too much to bear.
So he did the next best thing and restated a fact. "I will protect you, Rin."
She squeezed his hand and forced a smile. "I know," she agreed. "Come on… we have to meet with sensei."
"I won't be meeting him," Kakashi said, turning to glance at the memorial stone. He knew she was giving him a completely shocked look. He didn't want to see it; was that a bad thing? He promised to protect her, but looking at her reminded him of how Obito died.
Rules and regulations weren't helping him at all now. If he had followed the rules and regulations, Obito would be alive… but Rin wouldn't be. It seemed no matter which path was taken, Kakashi had to lose one of them.
It was ironic how he finally realized what his teammates meant after losing one to the point of no return.
"Kakashi…" Rin sighed.
It had been five months since either of them had been on a mission. Their return to Konoha from that awful mission had been a mostly quiet one. The Uchiha clan hadn't shed a single tear over the loss of Obito, but they were irate to find out Kakashi had a Sharingan eye.
Upon his return, Kakashi had transferred to inactive duty. He couldn't possibly think of being a team leader if his judgment was so screwed up that one way or another, someone had to die. He tried to tell himself Obito was just an idiot, that it would have happened sooner or later, but Obito died shoving Kakashi out from under that falling rubble.
"We're supposed to be introduced to the new person on our team." Rin tried.
Kakashi started to walk away from Rin, heading toward the city again. He was going to go home and find his father's hidden whisky bottle behind the third and fourth books of the bookshelf in the apartment. Maybe tonight, he would be able to kill the thoughts in his head.
"I'm not going back on active duty," Kakashi told her. He paused in his step when their joined hands stopped him from continuing. Looking at her and tugging lightly on her hand, "And neither are you," he said firmly.
She looked frustrated and as if she wanted to say something, but like usual she didn't. She just nodded in a placating manner and walked with him. She had always been the peace keeper between him and Obito. Now, she was the peace keeper between him and his self-loathing.
"Kakashi?" she asked quietly as they walked through the streets. No one looked queerly at him anymore when the two of them walked by holding hands. At first, people had been very shocked by the behavior. Now it seemed to have become a very normal occurrence.
Kakashi stared straight ahead, trying to ignore her soft inquiry. Was she not bothered by Obito's death? Did she not loathe him for being at fault? She cried in her sleep; he often watched her sleep because he couldn't.
"I really think you should go talk to sensei… he could easily get you therapy or something. It isn't healthy, your behavior," one glare got her to fall silent. He did not need therapy. Why was everyone suggesting he go 'talk' to someone about his problems? He had been debriefed, and he did his mission report. He was fine.
He opened the door to their apartment. Yes, it was theirs. His mother and father were both dead so he had been living alone before Obito died. Afterward, he made Rin move in. He couldn't protect her unless she was with him.
His clansmen objected to the move. They were only a minor clan, living in a small subdivision of a larger district, but they still wanted their heir to start seriously thinking about taking a wife. To them, Rin wasn't good enough.
Kakashi wasn't even giving marriage a thought. He just wanted to uphold his promise to keep Rin safe. Rin's parents had objected to the move as well, but Rin followed him obediently. The Fourth Hokage had told Kakashi to do what he had to. Kakashi had to have Rin near.
Rin let go of his hand once they were inside, closing the front door behind her. "Kakashi, please just listen to me… I'm running out of money; whether or not you're going to move back to active duty, I really have to!"
"I have money." Kakashi said tonelessly. "Tell me what you need and it will be received."
"No!" Rin's face flushed with embarrassment. "I won't take your money!"
"You would take your parents' money," he pointed out.
Rin's shoulders slumped; she was uncertain, nervous, and afraid. "My parents… Kakashi, as long as I live with you, my parents say they don't want anything to do with me. I need to go back to active duty. I need the pay."
"Take my money. Whatever you need. I will take care of you." He wasn't going to let her go out there and get hurt. In his head, Obito told him how Rin was the greatest of all kunoichi, easily as good as the Legendary Sannin Tsunade. He ignored Obito as he had done for months; he wasn't there. He was dead.
"Kakashi, you can't rule my life!" It was the first time she'd ever raised her voice to him—at least like that. His eyes widened and as usual there was a stabbing pain in the back of his head as the Sharingan pulled more chakra into it. He hastily closed that eye; he couldn't keep it open, because it was an instant drain on his chakra.
"I'm not. I'm merely seeing to your best interests, as you are not," his cheek instantly stung. She stood in front of him, glaring at him with tears in her eyes.
"Don't you even say it! If anyone needs caring for, it's you! You won't admit you have something to grieve over; you won't admit he was your friend. Yet you drag me along, Kakashi, and I love you so I come when you call!"
He didn't know what to say. "I hated him," he told Rin.
"You loved him! He had what you couldn't. You grew up with that damn mask on because your family said you could never show emotions. He was open, and free, and so unlike the others in his clan that you were attracted to that. But you lacked the ability to show him that because you still refused to show emotions." Rin sounded so sure of herself, but he didn't believe her.
Kakashi knew himself better than anyone. Who was she to say what he felt? "I do not love men; don't suggest it."
Rin's certainty deflated a bit and she begged to prove her point. "It's alright if you do! There's no shame in admitting it."
Kakashi reached out to her and she flinched away from his hand momentarily. He brushed a stray lock from her face and said, "Even if I were, Obito was never my type." The surprise on her face managed to lift his spirits better than drinking did and he basked in it.
"Kakashi, please, it's been a long day," Rin said suddenly, pulling away from him. "I think I'll go to bed early." He watched as she raced into his parents' bedroom for a three o'clock bedtime. He frowned; that wasn't her room.
He went over to his father's bookshelf and took off the third and fourth books. The whisky bottle sat there only briefly before he was pouring himself a large glass of it. He finished off the bottle before stumbling in a drunken stupor toward his room. He remembered banging his head on his night stand, and then small, warm hands were helping him take his socks and shirt off.
The next morning, Kakashi woke up to a retching sound. At first, he thought it was him puking, but after a moment he realized he was still lying prone on his bed. He dragged himself to the kitchen. Rin was half-way through fixing breakfast and puking in the sink.
When she noticed him, she laughed weakly. "Sorry," she said hoarsely.
He walked into the kitchen, looking at her breakfast provisions. He didn't even have to remove his mask to know the meat she'd been cooking was rancid. He immediately tossed the rotted food away. "Do not eat rancid food," he told her.
"Okay…" she said and rinsed her mouth out.
He was going to tell her to stay out of his parents' bedroom for a moment, but then he remembered she helped him into bed before she slipped in bed beside him. He let the subject go for now. As she rinsed out the sink, he shuffled through the fridge, taking out all the outdated foodstuffs and tossing them into the waste bin.
"Kakashi?" Rin asked hesitantly.
He shut the fridge. "What?"
"I'm going to see sensei this morning… Would you like to come?"
"No, I wouldn't. And you are not going. We're not going to active duty." He told her.
She clenched her fists and snapped, "I am going to see him! Stop ruling me!"
He couldn't look at her. He didn't know why he felt like he had to keep her from going anywhere. He just wanted to protect her and keep his promise to Obito. He opened his mouth to tell her she could go. Instead, his words twisted again. "You want to see him to return to active duty. We have money."
She fumed and stormed to the front door. He went and blocked her way, still unsure what reason he was keeping her in for. "Move, Kakashi!"
"No." He told her. "I will protect you, even if I have to do so from yourself."
Rin winced and instantly deflated. He had won. He watched her as she walked toward their bedroom. She paused with her hand on the doorknob. "So who will protect me from you?" he heard her muse before she closed the door.
Kakashi ransacked all of his father's things after that. There had to be a bottle he'd missed. Who was going to protect Rin from him? He wasn't hurting her. He was protecting her. There were dangerous people out there. Obito was killed by dangerous people.
He found a bottle hidden beneath the sink. He didn't bother with a cup; he drank it straight from the bottle. The world was beginning to spin when a familiar spiky haired blond entered his vision. His sensei knelt in front of where he had propped himself in the corner of the kitchen.
"You're a wreck." The older man said honestly. "Kakashi, give me the bottle."
"No." Kakashi hugged the bottle. It helped him shove the thoughts away when he didn't want to think. "Go 'way. Ge' ou'a my house," his slurred speech sounded wrong even to him. He was drunk again.
"If I have to wrestle it from you, we both know which one of us would lose," his sensei told him.
"Whys it you come?" Kakashi asked and then puzzled over his own words. For some reason, the question didn't make any sense. He couldn't figure out what was wrong with it; it sounded right, but his brain told him it was wrong. He put the bottle to his lips and drank heavily from it.
Kakashi was mid-gulp when the bottle was taken from him. Much of it sloshed down his front. "Kakashi, you need to stop this," the blond told him as Kakashi reached out for the bottle. "You're only hurting yourself and Rin by drinking all the time."
"No, Rin safe," he told his sensei.
"Kakashi, the war took a lot of great men and women from this world. There's nothing you can do to change that. Obito died to save you; he gave his Sharingan to you. You need to move on. Konoha needs you. I need you. I need both of you to return to active duty."
Kakashi didn't know what to say so he said nothing. He pulled his knees to his chest and buried his face in his arms.
"No one is expecting you to save the world, Kakashi. You're both still very young. But even just doing C-rank or D-rank missions would be a big help. Rin could be a big help at the hospital and I can get someone else to replace her on your team."
Kakashi reached for the bottle. "No, never." He said. "Too dang'rus out there."
The young Hokage wouldn't let him have the bottle. "I would have thought you of all people would understand what is happening. You've always been my sharpest student. Even my wife has returned to the hospital to work, despite being pregnant. We need every able-bodied person to do their part."
"It's jus' like you t' preach 'bout responsibility," Kakashi spat, making another grab at the bottle which was unsuccessful. "You won' even take up your seat on th' Clan Council!"
Kyo sighed, "I wish I could say I regret that decision, but I don't. Kakashi, I need you to sober up and return to active duty. When you get off your ass and realize Rin isn't here," Kakashi felt his stomach twist in knots. Rin… wasn't? He didn't see her leave… "You can find her at my house. She's staying there with me, Kakashi. I'm sorry to have to do this, but I'm not letting you near her until you get your head straight."
Kakashi felt anger spike inside him. "My head is straight! I'm fine!"
"You're not fine, Kakashi. When was the last time you ate a decent meal? Or bathed? Or cleaned up around here? Your hair is a rat's nest, your clothes hang off you, and you smell like cat piss."
Kakashi was going to object, but then he realized it was all true. His sensei was right; he wasn't okay.
"Make a change in your life, Kakashi," he was told. "I'll be checking in on you, and if you decide to take the easy way out and kill yourself, ask yourself who will take care of Rin in your absence. She loves you; she came to me in tears, nearly pulling her hair out for having left you."
Kakashi watched as his sensei dumped the contents of his bottle down the sink. When it was empty, Kyo left the apartment with a brief worried glance back at Kakashi. And then Kakashi was alone. Truly alone. He already lost his father and his mother, and Obito. Now Rin was gone too.
It was enough of a reality to crush even a drunk boy. He curled up on the floor; his world was disappearing from his fingers. He was in control of nothing. He'd been in control of everything for so long; he couldn't handle this new change. Rin felt she needed to be protected from him. What did he do wrong?
He managed to ghost through the next two days in a self-destructive stupor, finding more of his father's hidden alcohol bottles. There were no laws restricting Kakashi from purchasing alcohol because of his age, but as he soon found out, Kyo had sent a missive to the vendors requesting they refuse him sales.
After the two days had passed, he was out of hidden alcohol bottles. As he began to sober up, he realized he'd consumed more alcohol in just a few days than he had in five months when he first started to drink. He tried to order his clansmen to buy alcohol for him, but they refused. They wanted him to stop just like Kyo and Rin did.
A week after Rin left him, he realized she wasn't coming back. He'd clung to the hope that maybe she would just come home, but it finally settled in. There was something wrong with him. He couldn't see it, but others could. His own clansmen begged him to get help. His sensei told him to clean himself up.
As he thought of the way things were going, he realized something had to give. That something was him. He pulled himself together and thought about how Obito might fix the mess Kakashi had made for himself. "First, you gotta do some laundry," Obito would tell him. "You've been wearing that same outfit for a week now. It's pretty nasty."
So he gathered all his laundry up and went to the basement of the apartment complex where the washer and dryers were. He sat on the washer as his clothes cycled through, mentally correcting the idiotic statement Obito would have said. "Pretty and nasty do not belong together."
"Yeah, well, I can say how I want to!" Obito would respond, and Kakashi would recall Obito was a moron and promptly ignore him.
After he'd washed and dried his clothes, he carried the load up to his messy apartment and asked himself what Obito would do next. He imagined Obito saying, "You smell like stale booze and gross body odor. Take a shower, man."
He went and took a shower as Obito would have. He used up all the available hot water, scrubbing himself until his skin was pink and aching. As he dressed, he put back on the usual mask he wore. He hadn't worn it since the day Obito died. He pulled on his usual greens and blacks.
Kakashi found Rin's hairbrush in the bedroom. He grabbed it up and yanked the snarls out of his wet hair. He was trying to think of a way to keep the Sharingan from being a constant drain on his chakra. The solution came to him as he picked up his forehead protector. He pulled the metal plate away from the cloth it was attached to. A simple seal, he figured, should be able to keep the Sharingan from using chakra; right?
Because even keeping his eye closed constantly didn't do much to stop the drain. It still drained chakra, just not as much as when his eye was open. Even Obito would come up with a way to stop the Sharingan from being a burden. It took several tries to inscribe a proper seal in the back of the metal. He had to buy several new forehead protectors because of his screw-ups. He thought about just using a paper seal, but sweat would make quick work of killing a paper seal and if sweat didn't do the job, then one night caught in the rain would.
He tried to get the seal to work with his forehead protector on his forehead like he always wore it, but the only way it seemed to work was if the Sharingan was directly beneath the seal. It was going to take a lot of work to overcome the blind spot on his left side, unless he could come up with a better seal that allowed him to use the Sharingan at will.
His stomach growled, reminding him he hadn't eaten yet. He tied on the forehead protector and grabbed his wallet. He was already out the door when he realized he hadn't put on his shoes. Obito was probably laughing at him from the grave. He went back for them and then headed toward the nearest steak restaurant. He was hungry for something filling; meat and potatoes was always the best solution.
He had just seated himself when the self-proclaimed rival of his appeared. Gai bounced over to Kakashi and spewed the usual monologue about rivalry, beating Kakashi, and his usual challenge. Kakashi had lost a lot in the last five months, mostly because he had no will to give the challenges any effort. Today, Obito was telling him not to cop out.
"—and so, as I did win our last challenge," Gai told him, laughing in his usual (rather unordinary) way, "I will let you pick the challenge!"
Kakashi felt a smile similar to the one Obito liked to wear cross his lips. "An eating contest." He hadn't eaten much for a while, but he felt like he could eat a whole cow—raw. He was very hungry.
"I have eaten already, but I shall eat again!" Gai said excitedly. "Youth never vomits! And if I should lose, I shall do one thousand push-ups!"
"Sure," Kakashi said. Gai helped his girlfriend, Min, to scoot into the booth, and then sat across from Kakashi. Min was Gai's self-proclaimed future wife, though she hadn't actually accepted Gai's proposal yet since Gai had first proposed when they were four. Kakashi wasn't sure how Min put up with Gai. Kakashi thought there had to be some reason why Min stuck beside Gai; anyone else would have bolted.
As the meat grilled before them, Kakashi wondered if his own relationship with Rin was similar to Gai and Min's relationship. What did Rin see in him? When he thought about it, he was an ass. Why did she put up with him? Of course, Rin had left him. He shouldn't really be offended, should he? It wasn't like they were really together.
But a small part of him argued. He had been sleeping with Rin. He was drunk half the time, but he did sleep with her.
"Don't think about Rin," Obito told him. "Once you can take care of yourself, you can take care of her. Kyo-sensei can keep her safe until then. First, you gotta get your head straight."
Kakashi kept grilling and eating, watching as Gai turned green. When Kakashi raised his hand up for his third plate of meat, Gai dashed off to the bathroom. Min wasn't paying attention. She was staring out the window of the restaurant with her chin on her hand, looking very much in a daze. Kakashi decided to ask her what was bothering him. "Why do you stay with Gai? You could do better."
Min turned her eyes on Kakashi in surprise. Kakashi supposed it might be surprising since Kakashi never bothered to say a word to her before. "I love him," she said simply.
"Even though he's an idiot?"
Min scowled at Kakashi. "You're one to talk," she said. "You walk around like you own the world. Well, get a grip, Hatake. Rules fail. Regulations don't cover everything. There are contingencies to everything; the unexpected interferes, and plans end up changing. Just because Gai is happy doesn't mean he's an idiot. He's sweet, he cares about what I want, he brings me flowers, and he makes me happy. But then, I wouldn't expect a moron like you to understand that." She tossed some money on the table and went to wait for Gai outside the bathroom.
Kakashi thought about that as he stuffed himself further on meat. After he finished, he paid his bill and tried to think of what Obito would do next to fix the mess he was in. "Get some therapy, man," Obito said in his head. "Talking to dead people in your head isn't normal."
He knew just who to see about that. He made his way to the hospital, even though he wasn't sure his sensei's wife would be there. He just knew that Kyo told him she was doing some work at the hospital. He did find her, but she was with Rin.
Rin looked anxious at his appearance, and uncertain about what to say. He didn't know what to say either.
Kyo's wife Tsuke looked at Kakashi inquiringly. "What can I do for you, Kakashi-kun?" she asked him.
That was a question he could answer. Without looking at Rin, he asked Tsuke, "May I talk to you, privately?"
Tsuke handed Rin her clipboard and led Kakashi away from Rin. "What is it, Kakashi-kun? We're very busy here, with too many patients and too little staff." She spoke a bit sharply.
Her tone caused him to rethink things. He winced internally. "It isn't important. I'm sorry to bother you." He told her and hastily departed. He knew she watched him go.
He went home and started cleaning up his apartment. As he did so, he realized how trashed it was. He only got about an hour worth of work done before he felt too tired from a long day to do anything else, but he didn't want to sleep in his bed. It was filthy, so he dragged off the blankets and took out fresh ones from the cupboard in the bathroom.
He didn't bother really making the bed. Instead the job he did was half-assed and he didn't even bother with pillowcases.
It was very early in the morning when he was woken up by his sensei. Kyo looked exhausted. He had sleep bags under his eyes. Kakashi sat up, still fully clothed from the day before. He had been too tired to bother changing. "Sensei?" Kakashi asked, wondering why Kyo was around so early. Rin had better be alright, he thought.
"Just coming to check up on you," Kyo told him.
Kakashi looked at his watch. "At four in the morning?"
Kyo nodded. "Tsuke told me you went to see her today? Well, yesterday actually…" Kyo chuckled, amused at his inner contemplations. Kakashi blinked at his sensei. He knew full-well that Kyo was very weird when he hadn't slept in a long time. "I hope you weren't going there for Rin…"
Kakashi averted his eyes. "No, I wasn't. I thought Rin would be at your house, just like you said."
Kyo didn't elaborate on why Rin wasn't where he'd said she would be. It was obvious. Rin wanted to work. "What did you want to see Tsuke for?"
Kakashi didn't want to tell Kyo, but Obito said, "If you can't tell sensei, and I'm dead, and you can't see Rin, who else would bother to listen? It isn't like you got a heavy arsenal of friends. You were always too busy ruling and regulating to let anyone close."
Knowing the dead voice was true, Kakashi said, "I've been having mental conversations with Obito. He said I should see someone about it."
Kyo was silent for a long moment before he asked, "How long have you been talking to him?"
Kakashi had to really think about that. Finally he came up with an answer, "Shortly after his death, I think…"
"I'm going to have you see a therapist, Kakashi. Okay?" Kakashi wanted to protest. He nearly did, but Kyo stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. "Don't argue, Kakashi. Even if you don't do this for yourself, do this for me."
Kakashi nodded soberly. "I haven't had a drink in a week," he had to say.
"Go see Dyan-san, at the hospital. I'll make sure you have an eight AM appointment." Kyo ruffled his hair and left the apartment, once again having entered without permission, and once again sending a brief look back at Kakashi.
The next morning, Kakashi woke up at eight AM and remembered his early morning talk with his sensei rather belatedly. He raced to the hospital, taking every shortcut he knew to get there as fast as he could. When the receptionist he spoke with checked the schedule and said he was late, he found himself spewing something incredibly Obito-like.
"I'm sorry, but there was a cat stuck in a tree. I couldn't just leave it there!"
The woman gave him a skeptical look. "Uh-huh," she said, "and I suppose I'm supposed to believe that?"
He was annoyed at himself for the ridiculous excuse. "Just shut the hell up and get me in to see this fucking therapist," he snarled, his fingers twitching to take out a kunai. In his mind, Obito's voice was telling him not to take his aggression out on the poor, now-frightened woman.
She gulped and said, "Of course, Hatake-san. If you will just wait here a moment? I'll… I'll go get the doctor." She dashed off and within moments, Kakashi was faced with a sober looking doctor.
"Ah, you must be Kakashi Hatake." He said.
The session with the doctor didn't seem to help much. Kakashi didn't want to talk about his issues with some stranger, so he didn't. At the end, the doctor claimed to be pleased with their progress and invited Kakashi to return, though Kakashi said he doubted he would. Even the voice of his dead friend in his head said the doctor was an idiot, so he simply left.
That evening, Kyo stopped by again, but this time he had brought company. Rin. The three of them went out to eat, but it was a very silent affair. Kakashi didn't know what to say to them. He especially didn't know what to say to Rin. So he said nothing, and Rin said nothing. Kyo tried to coax them both into conversation, but it didn't work.
At the end of dinner, Kakashi finally managed to croak out in a weak voice, "You going back to stay at sensei's tonight?"
Rin gazed at him sadly before nodding. He had known her answer already, he supposed. "Yes…"
He scratched the back of his neck before realizing that was something Obito did, not him. He put his hand back down and said, "I know sensei's house is still only half built, so make sure he gives you an extra blanket."
Rin smiled gratefully at him and nodded again before leaving with their sensei. He trudged toward his apartment with a heavy heart. He hadn't known talking could be so taxing.
After another week, he managed to get his apartment cleaned up and began talking again with his personal advisors within his clan. Between them and the dead Obito voice, he had enough second opinions around as to what he should do next to give him more options than he really needed.
The Hatake clan was pleased to have him return at least to a semi-normal state of being, but every time they scheduled clan meetings, he always seemed to forget about them until he was already late. After a month, Kakashi finally just gave in and spewed out Obito's excuses; his clansmen did adjust to the new behavior, but it took them another couple months.
When Kakashi had leveled things out with his clan, he sought out his sensei and put in a request to transfer back to active duty. Kyo looked grateful. "I'll find you two teammates," Kyo told him.
"That's alright… just one," Kakashi told him. He wanted Rin back on his team.
Kyo shook his head though. "Rin can't join you."
"But… I'm not drinking… I'm doing better! Everyone says it."
Kyo sighed. "Rin can't use chakra right now, so I can't allow her in the field."
"Why can't she? Did something happen? Who hurt her?" He was already getting angry.
"She's fine, but you need to talk to her about it." Kyo stood up and walked around his desk, placing a large hand on Kakashi's shoulder. "She's at my house right now. Why don't you head over there and see her? I believe there are a few things the two of you need to talk about."
Kakashi looked away from his sensei. He felt almost as though the older man could see right through him, and could tell Kakashi wasn't going to see the therapist anymore. "Yes, sensei," he said quietly, rubbing the back of his head subconsciously. "May I go see her now?"
"That's my suggestion," Kyo chuckled.
He followed the suggestion and headed up into the mountains until he came to the point where he could look down into the small valley the young Hokage had spent every dime he had on. One large section of the valley was wooded area. The rest was a beautiful meadow, and at the base of the mountain there was a small, glistening lake.
Kakashi knew the area was the largest district in Konoha, but he also knew it was the cheapest due to it being unable to be developed by modern standards. At first, Kakashi thought it was strange to think Kyo would want to live in an entire district on his own when it was just him and his wife, Tsuke.
Now as he stood over the valley, he realized it was probably a good idea. Tsuke was a Summoner, and looking down into the valley he realized just how many Summon Creatures Tsuke had. The most recognizable one was a giant fox at least two stories tall at the shoulders with nine impressive tails. The fox Kyuubi was sunning himself by the lake.
At first he hesitated to proceed down to see Rin. That small, half-complete house seemed a thousand miles away with Kyuubi between him and it. Obito laughed at him for pausing. "Didn't sensei send you off to train with Reitle-sensei so you wouldn't hesitate if you saw a Summon Creature?"
He knew Obito was right, but that didn't make him any less nervous. He walked down the path, conscious of Kyuubi's crimson eyes on him, and passed Kyuubi without incident. When he arrived at the front door of the small house, he knocked politely.
Rin opened the door, but when she saw it was him, she averted her eyes. "Oh, hello…" she said.
Kakashi scratched the back of his head, "I was going to transfer back to active duty," he started, rather than beating around the bush. "I want you on my team, but sensei said no and that I should talk to you."
Rin nodded and placed a hand on her stomach, attracting his attention to that area as he registered she was much bigger than the last time he'd seen her. "Yes, we should really talk." She agreed.
"You're really fat. What do they feed you around here?" Kakashi asked her abruptly before realizing that was the stupid sort of thing that Obito would have said. His dead friend objected, saying he would never say something like that to Rin. He told Obito to shut up and go away, but the voice never left him.
Rin blushed at his rude statement. He quickly made an attempt to amend his blunder. "Not that it's a bad thing, Rin! It's good that you're eating… just…"
She shook her head. "I'm not fat. I'm pregnant," she told him.
He felt his stomach twist in knots. "Pregnant?" he asked, as Obito screamed at him for failing to protect her. "Who did this to you?"
For a long, tense moment she said nothing. She met his eyes and looked sadly at him before saying, "You."
It took him a moment to understand, but finally it registered in his brain. "Me? When…" He shut up as he remembered sleeping with her on several occasions, mostly when he was drunk. But she had said she was protected. "How?" he asked finally.
"When I started to run low on birth control, I thought it would be alright if I cut the pills in half, but I still ran out and I didn't have the money to get more. The day I left you was when I first thought I might be pregnant."
"Why didn't you say anything?" he asked.
She shook her head, "I didn't want to put pressure on you. You weren't well, Kakashi. I didn't want this to be the last straw."
"Why can't you use chakra then? You look alright to me."
"Chakra is dangerous for a fetus, so the female body produces hormones that suppress chakra during pregnancy." She left the house and sat down on the half-finished porch, patting the spot beside her. He sat next to her, feeling uncertain about being there at all.
"Does that mean you can't use chakra anymore?" He felt stupid for asking, but he'd never heard of chakra suppressing hormones before. It was possible it was because he was a guy so he might not have had to learn about it.
"I can use chakra if I really have to. It isn't impossible, but there could be negative effects on a fetus anywhere from developmental problems to the death of a fetus if I do use chakra. That's why my body produces the hormones, so that its harder." She placed a hand on her stomach again. "Sensei's wife is due a month ahead of me."
"So you're going to keep the baby?" Kakashi asked.
Rin glanced at him, "I was hoping we would keep the baby… together."
Kakashi thought for a moment about her hesitant offer. Did he want a baby? Did he want a family? Could he cope with that? Obito's voice told him he had better not say no or else he would regret it for the rest of his life. He smiled, though she couldn't see it through the mask. "If you can put up with me." He said. "I guess I can put up with a screaming, wiggling, annoying lump of pink flesh."
Rin giggled. "You sounded just like Obito," she said before glancing at him in apprehension, as if fearing saying Obito's name would send him back into his previous slump.
He paused for a moment before deciding he didn't mind being like Obito so much anymore. He smiled at her, pulled down his mask, and kissed her on the cheek. The first kiss he ever gave her while sober. She blushed red to the tips of her ears.
"Kakashi," she asked as he got to his feet. He had to go back and see their sensei, to finish the transfer back to active duty. He looked back at Rin, helping her to her feet. "I don't know if it's a boy or girl…"
Kakashi shrugged. "I hear surprises are fun sometimes." The old Kakashi would never have said that. Surprises were the worst thing to the old Kakashi. "I have to go see sensei," he told her. "Sleep well, okay?" She nodded.
While the walk to Rin had seemed like an eternity, the walk back to Hokage tower passed very quickly. He arrived in time to see his sensei leaving for his evening walk around the city. Kyo beckoned to Kakashi, suggesting the young boy join him on the walk.
"How did things go with Rin?" Kyo asked.
Kakashi shrugged. "It went alright. How soon can you get me back on missions?"
"As soon as tomorrow. Your two teammates will be in the city by tomorrow morning and I have a C-rank mission you can head out on first thing if you feel up to it." Kyo told him.
"Which of them will be in charge?" Kakashi asked. It was a reasonable question, considering he had been inactive for over eight months.
"Neither," Kyo told him. "I want you to take command."
Kakashi froze in his step. "Me?" he asked, certain it was about to be Kyo's biggest mistake. "I don't think I'm qualified for," he began but Kyo stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
"Don't start being insecure about yourself. If we had the time or the manpower, I might send you through a few training exercises, but we don't. The war left us dry. I know you can do this."
Kakashi found himself nodding along with Kyo. He could, and he would. "Alright, what's the mission?"
"It's a simple escort mission. Some merchants want safe passage to the Zodiac Mountains with their load of furs. They grew nervous at the rumors of bandits on a stretch of highway they have to pass."
Kakashi nodded again and accepted the mission. The next morning he was late meeting up with his new teammates, which caused a bit of animosity toward him from both the merchants who were also waiting for him, and from his teammates. He supposed it didn't help much when he accidentally vocalized the grandmother excuse Obito's voice spoke in his head.
"I'd heard Yondaime Hokage was losing his edge," one of the merchants muttered, "but this proves it."
"Shall we be going then?" Kakashi asked, not bothering to apologize for his lame excuse.
The mission proved to be as simple as Kyo had led Kakashi to believe it would be. The slow merchant wagons got stuck in the mud several times the first day. None of them were anywhere near clean by sundown that first day. The second day, it began raining again like it had off and on through the week. They hadn't even had breakfast before they were shivering and wishing for a nice warm room and hot drinks.
They made it to the Zodiac Mountains without any problems; once they were there they had to find lodgings. The merchants insisted Kakashi and his team stand guard outside their rented rooms as they slept. As annoying as the order was, it had to be followed. The three were wet and cold and sore and hating the snowy mountain city already.
Kakashi left his two subordinates to guard the two rented rooms, seeking out warm, dry clothing. Their spare clothes were as wet as the ones they were wearing. He managed to find someone who spoke Common and got them to help him get the fresh clothes.
When he returned to his disgruntled subordinates, he told them where they could go to wash up and change and said he would watch the rooms. They were a lot less annoyed at him afterward. When they came back, he went to bathe and change, then he sought out food for the three of them. Anything was better than travel rations.
Their moods were definitely improved after they had some warm stew and fresh buns in their belly. The merchants sold their furs and purchased several wagon loads of coal for the return trip. By the end of the trip, the only thing keeping Kakashi from lashing out at the merchants was Obito's annoying voice in his head.
The trip did prove he was right to engrave the seal directly into the metal of his forehead protector though. Had he not done that, the seal would've been useless one day into the trip. He also noticed he was having fewer Sharingan-induced headaches.
After a mission debriefing, the young Hokage offered to send Kakashi out again right away. Though Kakashi knew it was necessary for his team to go as soon as possible and complete as many missions as possible, he knew his teammates needed a short break. Digging coal-laden wagons out of a muddy stretch of road wasn't light work.
"My team needs a day to rest," Kakashi told Kyo. His teammates looked appreciative to the sentiment.
"Very well. There is a C-class mission that you can head out for tomorrow afternoon. You will be escorting a young princess and her entourage back home." Kyo nodded to them in dismissal, but then added as his teammates left, "Kakashi, I would like a word with you."
Kakashi waited for his sensei to broach a subject.
When they were alone in the room, Kyo asked, "Are you still hearing Obito's voice?"
"Don't lie about me," Obito told him.
Kakashi listened and nodded.
"I see…" Kyo said and paused. "What does he say to you?"
Kakashi shrugged. "He's become my second opinion. He's not afraid to tell me my ideas are bad ones." Kakashi hesitated to continue, but he did anyway, "And he keeps me from doing stupid things."
"Such as?" Kyo inquired.
"I'm cold, wet, and muddy. I wanted to beat the shit out of the merchants who were dry, clean, and warm."
"Did you ever have trouble keeping your temper before Obito's death?" Kyo asked.
Kakashi nodded. "After my father killed himself, I smashed a hole in the bathroom door."
"Were there any other occasions?" Again, Kakashi nodded truthfully. "When?"
"Before my father killed himself, we fought frequently over my displays of emotion." Kyo seemed to be urging Kakashi to continue talking, so he did. "There was once a time when my mother and I were grocery shopping and someone stole her purse, so I chased them down and beat them. And there was another time I was shopping and someone called me the 'son of disgrace' so I threw them into a very large sale rack of oversized tomato soup cans."
"And Obito's voice keeps you from getting angry?"
"Yes, sensei."
Kyo looked a bit worried. Kakashi supposed having a talking voice in his head was a bit unsettling, but he was becoming used to it. Finally Kyo seemed uncertain on what to add to that line of subject so he simply said, "Would you like to see Rin tonight?"
Kakashi nodded. At that, Kyo set aside his Hokage duties and led Kakashi to the hospital. Kakashi was nervous when he realized they were on their way to the hospital, but once they found Rin and Tsuke, his nerves were abated.
"What are you doing here?" Kakashi asked, doing his best not to sound accusatory or judgmental. "I thought you couldn't use chakra?"
"There's plenty of work to do around here that doesn't require the use of chakra," Rin said, smiling at him. "Tsuke-san is filing paperwork, and I am…" she trailed off and looked at the mop in her hands. "Well, it's not exactly what I had in mind when I decided to be a medic, but work is work, and I'm getting paid."
Rin was starting to look like a boulder got shoved down her throat, but he decided against mentioning that.
"So, strange lady," Kyo teased his young wife, "what time do you get off work?"
Kakashi looked straight at Rin and said, "Do you want to join me for dinner?"
Rin nodded. "Sure. Just let me put this stuff away." She began wheeling the mop and bucket down the hall. By the time the two young teens were leaving the hospital, Kyo was still bugging his wife.
Kakashi stopped by his apartment first to change out of his muddy clothes (and shower at Obito's suggestion). The detour didn't take much more than half an hour. After that, he took Rin to eat at the restaurant he'd beaten Gai in their last challenge.
Rin had never been there before, but she enjoyed herself and he had a laugh watching her eat. When he had finished eating, he asked Rin, "Would you like to be my wife?"
She half-choked on a piece of meat in her surprise, forcing him to note for future reference not to propose mid-chew. "Excuse me?" she asked.
"Well, I haven't got any other prospects, my clan wants me to get married, and you're already carrying my child, so I thought it makes sense." Kakashi told her, hoping his logical excuse was enough.
Rin blushed and nodded. "Alright," she agreed.
He smiled at her. "Great. I'll have everything set up so we can be married when I return from my next mission."
Rin stayed over at his apartment that night. Kyo came looking for her, worried about her, but when Rin explained she wanted to stay with Kakashi for the night, Kyo let her. The next afternoon, Kakashi was late again meeting up with his team before the mission. After a few months of spouting Obito's crazy excuses, he decided to make one up.
"Sorry but I was helping a squirrel bury nuts for the winter." Kakashi told them. They looked skeptical, but his new team was already used to his lame excuses. He was even pretty sure they were adjusting the time for anything they did to make sure he was on time, such as telling him they were meeting up two hours ahead of when they would actually meet (which was a strange thought, since he was their leader). He wondered what his second month with them would bring.
They escorted the princess back home and made it back to Konoha in what felt like no time at all, but the mission did take a month to complete. When he arrived back home, Rin was already six months pregnant. She half-waddled wherever she went.
He grinned at Kyo as his sensei asked him to take on another mission. "Actually, sensei," Kakashi said, "I thought I might take the ANBU test. Rin's really fat; I feel like she'll drop the bomb any day now and I want to stick around the city."
Kyo laughed uproariously at Kakashi's phraseology. The blond actually fell off the Hokage chair and started crying he was laughing so hard. Kakashi decided at that moment not to ever let Obito's mental words influence him.
He was given the ANBU tests, which turned out to be ridiculously easy, though Obito complained about how he'd never have made ANBU. Kakashi only ignored the dead friend. Upon making ANBU rank, he parted ways with his teammates of two months. He was assigned to an ANBU squad and the assignments they completed were based within the boundaries of the city.
As he'd promised her, shortly after his return, Kakashi and Rin's wedding day approached. Despite his clan's disapproval at Kakashi's decision to marry Rin, they decided to simply grow to love her. Kakashi made a concerted effort to be on-time for his wedding, going three hours early just to make sure. As it turned out, he needn't have made the effort as his clansmen had told him they scheduled the wedding for two PM when it didn't start until five PM.
Since he ended up being so incredibly early, he purchased a book from the bookstore across the way and immediately began to wonder why he had never read the book before. It was a little orange book from a small romance bookstore.
Kakashi actually contemplated skipping his wedding to finish the book, but when he saw Rin was going through some mega pregnancy hormone mood swings, he decided against it and put the book safely in his nin-kit.
That was the point where he realized he'd forgotten to get dressed in his wedding formals. His clan advisors came prepared, though. They'd brought his formals along for him. Therefore, he was on-time, and neatly dressed for his wedding.
Rin looked beautiful, and very large, in a white wedding dress. They were standing in front of Kyo, who was formalizing their wedding, when Rin suddenly turned green and put both hands on her stomach. "What's the matter, Rin?" Kakashi asked her.
Tears welled up in Rin's eyes. She didn't respond but she cried out and tipped into him. It didn't take long for blood to stain the white dress. Rin was already being taken to the hospital by that time, because her pained cries were anything but normal.
Kyo waited with Kakashi. He was grateful his sensei did, because if he'd been alone he wasn't sure what he would have done.
A few hours later, the doctors came out looking morose. He came over to the two of them and said, "I'm afraid its bad news." Kakashi didn't want bad news. "We couldn't save the baby."
"Is Rin okay?" Kakashi demanded.
The doctor sighed, "It's too soon to tell how this might affect her mentally. A miscarriage can be very taxing on a woman's mentality. Physically, she will heal with time."
Kyo asked, "Do you know what caused this?"
"We'll have to run some tests to be sure but as far as we can tell the baby was killed by an unanticipated burst of chakra as it ran the circuit of her circulatory system and leaked into the womb." The doctor explained.
Kakashi shook his head violently in disagreement. "You're wrong! She wouldn't have used chakra!"
Kyo placed a hand on Kakashi's shoulder. "We know, Kakashi, calm down." Kyo ordered him quietly. "Doctor, can you explain 'unanticipated'? What do you mean by that?"
"When a woman is pregnant, their body produces a hormone that suppresses chakra from being molded. This hormone will also effectively empty their circulatory system and keeps the fetus, the unborn child, safe from the potential damage chakra can cause. Within days of the child's birth, the hormone is no longer necessary and the body stops producing it. As the remaining hormone is absorbed into the body, the suppressed chakra undergoes a brief surge and will course the circulatory system, flooding it briefly. Ordinarily this process is harmless; the mother doesn't even notice it is happening."
"And you think this happened too soon?" Kakashi asked, despairing for answers.
The doctor nodded. "It does appear that her body stopped producing the chakra suppressant hormone causing the process to run its course early, leading to a miscarriage, but as I said, we will have to run some more tests before we can confirm this. This is only the third case we've had where anything similar to this has happened."
"Run your tests," Kyo told the doctor, "as long as the tests don't harm her further."
"Thank you, Hokage-sama," the doctor said graciously. "If you would like to see her, she is in the I.C.U. right now. Room 112. I'm afraid I must ask you to limit your visitation time, and to keep your voices down while present. She will be asleep still, and she'll need her rest."
Kakashi shoved his sensei's hand from his shoulder and immediately went through the indicated doors to the Intensive Care Unit. His only thoughts were for Rin. When he pushed his way into the room and saw her, he panicked. She wasn't okay. She was just lying there as pale as death.
He stumbled over to her and took her hand in his. Holding her cold hand, he realized he was shaking. He was almost ready to fall over. His heart was beating erratically. He couldn't lose her too.
A hand on his shoulder pulled his attention. Kakashi looked at found himself staring at his sensei. "Don't start drinking again because of this, Kakashi," his sensei warned him. Kakashi shook his head to indicate that he wouldn't. He hadn't even thought of it, but the warning wasn't without justification.
"I know… Rin probably wouldn't like it much if I did." He agreed. "Kind of ironic, though, isn't it? Every time I have a huge event in my life, something really bad happens. I'm about to make Jounin, and Obito dies. I'm about to get married, and Rin…" he couldn't finish. He hoped Kyo didn't blame him.
"I'd prefer if you didn't look at it that way," Kyo told him.
"Bad luck comes in threes," Kakashi told his sensei seriously, but he never indicated what he thought the next bad thing might be. He wasn't even sure what the next bad thing might be. He just hoped Rin got better. He could live without a kid.
Maybe that was a really dismal view, he thought. He didn't care if they lost the baby as long as Rin got better…? Sure, he would have preferred to have both the baby and Rin, but Rin was more important to him.
They released Rin from the hospital only a couple short weeks later. She improved in strides, adjusting to the change quickly which attracted attention. Every day he listened to her, the voice of Obito kept telling him how great it was that Rin was doing so well. At the same time, he became attuned to a change in himself. He listened less to what Obito told him, though his dead friend never left.
He grew very concerned over Rin's improvements because she was so unaffected by it. She still wanted to get married and she wanted to try having another baby. He wasn't ready for that. He didn't think 'children' was a topic to be brought up two weeks after a miscarriage, and he told her that.
She remained unaffected, but he couldn't find the words to express his concern to his sensei about her potential health failure. After all, he knew he wasn't exactly sore over the loss of the baby. A week after that, he found out that their sensei had allowed Rin back on missions with a Jounin team other than him. He was ANBU and she wasn't, so the chances of them teaming up were slim, but he went to confront his sensei about the change.
"Sensei," he said as he caught up to the man, having ditched his ANBU teammates just to make time to see Kyo. The young kage was keeping Kakashi very busy with work.
He could tell from Kyo's appearance that he wasn't the only one who had been kept very busy. The Fourth looked thin and gaunt in comparison to his usual muscular stature. Kyo's eyes had heavy sleep rings around them and his usually neatly kept appearance was shaggier than ever. "Kakashi," his sensei greeted him in a low voice.
Kakashi ignored the tone in his sensei's voice that said 'not now' and shot right into what was bothering him. "You're sending Rin on missions? Now? She just had a fucking miscarriage three weeks ago!"
"She's had the finest medics treating her. She has no medical issues to be concerned over." Kyo explained as he trudged over to his desk with a stack of papers.
"Medical issues or not, she hasn't trained or been on a mission in ten months! You can't just send her out there," Kakashi started, but he was cut off with an abrupt roar from his sensei.
"Who the hell are you to tell me what can and cannot be done, Kakashi? She wants work, we have it, and someone has to do it!" Kyo yelled, standing up so fast his chair tipped backwards.
Kakashi didn't hesitate to raise his voice. "You aren't going to even test her, or make sure she could handle the strain of a mission? No, you're just sending her out there?"
"Do you think it's easy for me, Kakashi? I wish I had the manpower to ignore Rin's request, but the truth is, I don't! The war that took Obito's life still has us in a handicap even nearly a year later. We can't even begin to calculate how many years it will take to get us back to the level we were at. I've had to pull people out of retirement, just to make sure this city doesn't collapse in on itself. When people come willing to have work, I can hate it all I like but I need the manpower!" Kyo's voice would have carried over a battlefield; using it in the middle of his office was very loud.
"SHE ISN'T HEALTHY! THERE'S SOMETHING WRONG WITH HER HEAD!" Kakashi insisted, raising his voice to match Kyo's.
Dead silence filled the room before Kyo narrowed his eyes at Kakashi and spoke in a dangerously soft voice, "You're a fine one to talk, aren't you?"
Kakashi flinched back, almost feeling the blow at that. "I…" he couldn't figure out what to say to finish his sentence so he decided to continue on with nothing.
After a few moments of silence, Kyo took a deep and exhausted breath and said, "There's something wrong with everyone. You aren't the only one out there who hears the voices of dead friends, and she's not the only one who has lost a child. Her doctors have informed me she is mentally sound and improving better than most under the circumstances. We're very lucky she adjusts easily."
"She could get killed out there," Kakashi insisted, once more trying to get his sensei to understand his fears.
Kyo closed his eyes for a moment and leaned against his desk, his head bowed slightly. "We all could," he said, "It makes no difference who we are. I've put Rin on a team with a highly experienced Jounin and with a Jounin-level Chunin. They'll be doing very simple C-rank missions. There is little to no danger with that."
Kakashi couldn't bring himself to be relieved. He was apprehensive and nervous. Rin was off on a mission to who-knew-where, and he couldn't be there to protect her like he promised Obito he would be. Obito was screaming at him to go after her, but the more logical part of him reminded him that doing such would be a mark against him.
"If anything happens to her," he spat, against Obito's crazed desire to chase after Rin, "I'm going to tear you apart." Despite the seal covering the Sharingan, he was still feeling a very strong drain on his chakra. Kyo didn't look intimidated, but he did look very cautious as he nodded soberly.
"She'll be fine." Kyo promised him. "The mission she's heading out on is brief; one week tops, and she'll be back to prove to you she's alright."
"She had better be," Kakashi growled before stalking out of the room.
The week that followed was filled with long hours and even longer minutes as the time passed. Kakashi couldn't sleep without seeing terrifying nightmares of Obito's death again, only this time with Rin in Obito's place. He couldn't eat without immediately feeling sick and throwing up. He could barely keep water in his stomach, so even if he could get at alcohol he doubted he would like the way it tasted coming back up.
He was pacing back and forth at the front gate, ignoring his ANBU teammates and their assignments, by the seventh day. Anyone who came near him to try to get him to go back to work, or to tell him he was unnerving the locals, he would glare at with the Sharingan, having pushed his forehead protector back onto his forehead so he could use the Sharingan to frequently spot for Rin on the horizon.
When sundown arrived and Rin had still not returned, he immediately went to see the Fourth.
Kakashi shoved his way into Kyo's office, furiously interrupting a meeting the Fourth was having with the Elder Council and the Sandaime Hokage. "YOU SAID A WEEK!" He yelled, feeling an intensive spike in the drain of his chakra. "ONE FUCKING WEEK!"
Kyo looked very upset and even the Sharingan could barely keep up with Kyo's movements as he body flickered across the room, gripped Kakashi's upper arm tighter than was necessary, and left hastily. When they were alone standing out beside the fire pond, Kyo brought his fist down on Kakashi's head. Kakashi couldn't even dodge with the use of the Sharingan.
"Don't you ever, ever, do that again! Do you understand me?" Kyo snapped.
Rubbing his head, Kakashi glared at his sensei. "You said a week! She isn't back!"
Kyo stared furiously at Kakashi. "Don't you ever barge into my office again," Kyo repeated, "is that understood?"
Kakashi felt his anger becoming swamped with apprehension. His sensei was very tightly wound and looked so exhausted he might tip over any second but as usual Kyo never did. Kakashi rationally decided to take a deep breath and calm himself down before Kyo's famous temper flared up worse than it was already doing.
"I'm sorry, Hokage-sama," Kakashi muttered grudgingly, thankful that Obito's words weren't influencing him at the moment. Regardless of Obito's great love of their sensei, Obito was currently very foul-mouthed. "It won't happen again."
Kyo calmed down minutely and sighed. "Look, I know you're worried about Rin, but I need you to stay focused on your own tasks. You just happened to barge in on a meeting discussing your fate as a shinobi. The Elder Council thinks you're unstable after all that has happened recently, and its going to be incredibly difficult to convince them otherwise after the scene you just caused—if I can even manage it."
The words, though a far cry from the talk about Rin he was intending to have, hit home very hard. "I'm not unstable!" he insisted as Obito agreed heartily in his mind. "Sensei, really, I'm not."
Kyo ran a frustrated hand through his shaggy mane and said, "You have to admit, you're acting completely different than you were before Obito's death."
"So what?" Kakashi asked, half panicking over what his future might bring. His mind whirled with the knowledge that unstable shinobi were usually locked up in a special ward of the hospital, and they didn't often get visitors.
"So, I'm…" Kyo trailed off and then tried again, "You haven't been yourself, and the Elders found out. You've been through a lot of things that could cause any adult to crack mentally, and with the change, they think that's what happened to you."
"But I'm fine," Kakashi insisted again, adding emphasis on 'fine'. "I'm sorry I rushed in, but Rin isn't back and it's after dark!"
Kyo rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms. "She'll be fine, Kakashi." Kyo told him. "Start worrying about yourself right now and go home and sleep. Her team is just behind schedule because of the weather."
"The weather?" Kakashi wasn't sure why the weather would hold up Rin's team to make them as late as they were… Obito called him an idiot for thinking that, and said that Rin wasn't really all that late.
"Heavy rain caused a mudslide on the high road. Her team has had to detour around it, and the shortest route is over Monty Rock Gorge in West Sands." Kakashi wondered if Kyo was making it sound like he knew for certain or if the young Hokage actually knew that was why Rin wasn't back yet. "They sent a messenger bird from Teela to let us know, and with the detour they're expected back anywhere from four to ten days from now."
"Why is there such a large uncertainty?" Kakashi asked, trying to keep his voice neutral. He knew he was already getting more information than he should, and he was grateful his sensei was answering his questions.
"One of Rin's teammates was injured in the mudslide. They don't know how long the detour will take with the injury."
Kakashi had a difficult time keeping himself from taking off. He would have absolutely loved to race for Monty Rock and meet up with Rin there. He wasn't even really sure what he would do if she weren't okay. But Kyo was right, as he usually was. Kakashi's abrupt personality change was raising questions in parties he really didn't need questions to be raised.
"She," Kakashi hesitated to ask, but Kyo smiled slightly in understanding.
"She's fine." He reached into his vest pocket, causing Kakashi to note the distinct absence of the kage robes. He pulled out a letter and handed it to Kakashi. With noticeably shaking hands, Kakashi opened the crumpled note.
It was written in Rin's handwriting, addressed to their sensei. Rin was reporting the situation. Her Jounin leader broke his leg and it was slowing them down considerably. Other than the broken leg, Rin said they were fine and would arrive back in Konoha as soon as they possibly could.
Kakashi calmed his apprehensions and nodded, handing the letter back. Kyo yawned before it turned into a sigh. "You know what?" Kyo said in a falsely optimistic voice, "I'm hungry. Let's go get some steak or something. You look like you could use a cow or two in your belly."
Kakashi couldn't help but roll his eyes at his sensei. "There you go again, using me as an excuse not to work." He muttered.
Kyo shrugged. "I don't care to go back to the Elder Council right now anyway. It's just as well that you burst in there, because another minute of it and I swear someone would've lost a head."
"I guess I can't say much on the subject, because I can't stand the Elders either. They keep butting their noses into clan affairs." Kakashi grumbled, grateful his sensei was shirking work to spend time with him. If he were alone, he would've just thought and worried about Rin.
"As if you know much of what your clan does, anymore…" Kyo snorted.
Kakashi thought about that before shrugging. "Well, my advisors keep things in order…"
"This is why I have to talk to the council, Kakashi. You're not doing things, or you're half-assing them if you do. You've become increasingly late or forgetful. A year ago you were involving yourself completely in your clan… now, you've just given up."
Kakashi looked away from his sensei and said, "I'm doing better…"
"Better than a couple months ago, sure," Kyo agreed, "but with as irresponsible as you've made yourself become lately, how much better off are you than a year ago when you wouldn't even think of being less than twenty minutes early?"
They sat down to eat at a small restaurant Kyo had always enjoyed. Soon they were ordering their meals, and Kakashi pulled his mask off his face.
"Just think about it," Kyo told him. "I don't care how you act, but with certain groups you're going to need to be the way you were back then. And as to the voice of Obito… if you still hear him, don't go telling anyone. Your situation is bad enough without people knowing you're hearing voices."
Kakashi nodded in agreement, promising he would change, and then he settled to eat dinner with his sensei.
It was only a bare week later when Kakashi received a visit from a somber and regretful looking Kyo. It was two in the morning, but Kakashi was still awake. Just as he'd promised, he was attempting to continue fixing his life so it was more like it had been before Obito's death. He wasn't doing a very good job, but at least some of the paperwork his advisors had been bugging him about needing signatures was getting done.
He wasn't actually reading the paperwork, so he didn't know what exactly he was signing off on, but after spending a long, boring hour several hours ago trying to go through the legalities he had decided he didn't like paperwork. Obito echoed his dislike and recommended Kakashi get a rubber ink stamp made with his signature.
Kakashi looked up from his place at his kitchen table as his sensei came into his apartment once more without permission. He knew it was habit for Kyo by now, since the old Kakashi never let Kyo into his house willingly. Kyo took a look at the sprawled out paperwork before asking softly, "May I have a word with you?"
"You always have words," Kakashi grumbled.
Kyo anxiously shifted from one foot to the other. "This is important," he said.
"My advisors say this crap is important too. Are signature stamps legal? Because I'm seriously considering the option of buying one, legal or not." Kakashi told his sensei.
"It's about Rin," Kyo added.
Kakashi's hand slipped and the pen made a giant squiggly line across the page, ripping a big hole in it. "R-Rin…?" He already knew he didn't like his sensei's tone. It was apologetic and – and not how Kakashi would have liked it to be.
"I know there's no easy way to say this…" Kakashi already knew what Kyo was about to say… or at least he had a pretty good idea. "Her team came back today…"
"Is she okay?" Kakashi asked, already fearing the worst. He wanted to get up and pound something already; he had failed Obito. He wanted to hurt his sensei for being dumb enough to send Rin out in the first place. But he couldn't.
Kyo slowly shook his head. If Kakashi hadn't already been seated at the table, he would've fallen over. As it was, it even felt as though the chair wanted to collapse beneath him. "Where is she?" he questioned, hearing his voice as nothing more than a dead one.
"Her team came back without her. They said she was keeping watch while the other two slept, but she was gone when they woke up." Kyo's eyes were looking suspiciously moist. "West Sands was never known for its friendliness…"
"Yeah…" It was all Kakashi could say. His voice was toneless.
In his head, he heard Rin say, "Please don't be upset with sensei… Being a medic-nin was always what I wanted…"
"Yeah," Kakashi agreed again, not even registering that Kyo had been talking to him. "It was always what you wanted," he told the mysteriously present voice of Rin in his head.
"Kakashi, are you alright?" Kyo asked.
Kakashi blinked at the young Hokage before saying, "Rin… She always wanted to be a medic-nin."
Obito grumbled, "Yeah, and you tried to stop her."
Kakashi pushed himself away from the table and stood on shaky legs. "I… I have an assignment tomorrow… with ANBU…" he said, trying to throw himself into familiarity. The last thing he needed was to get hooked back on the bottle. "I should get to bed…"
Kyo asked quietly, "Do you want me to hang around?"
Kakashi thought about that for a moment and then looked at his sensei with a quickly reddening eye. His mask was absent, but even if he'd had it on, Kyo would've seen his lip and chin quivering. "…Yes… Please…"
THANK-YOU to my Koumajutsu readers! I hope you enjoyed this. It ended up longer than I wanted it, and I still didn't get all the things I wanted in there. I was going to do his entire backstory right up to the point where he meets Team 7 after graduation, but I changed my mind since that would reveal too much that relates to Koumajutsu, and I don't want to spoil things for new/old readers.
COMPLETE. ONE-SHOT.