The Predicament:
Kakashi sighed.
In a mock attempt to quote a comrade he ruffled the silver hairs at the back of his neck and stated. "Maa, troublesome…" The term 'troublesome' was too light a word to be preaching; troublesome was what you called a bad hair day, troublesome was a day with mission reports due, 'troublesome' was not something one called his current predicament.
Of course his situation was rather original.
In that current moment in time, the silver haired Kakashi Hatake was perched upon a thick branch in one of Konohagakure's many towering trees, hidden - and shaded - by the foliage to the naked eye. To all others it was an ordinary day; civilians shopped, joked and chatted, ninja's leapt over rooftops towards a familiar ruby building and the market was bursting with hustlers and squealing children. Not only that, the day was beautiful – if he did say so himself - the sun bathed the whole village in radiant warmth and the humidity was close to none.
Usually he would be strolling down Konoha's busies streets, soaking up the vibrant kindness that vibrated from each villager as he read his beloved book. But there was one thing wrong with his whole situation.
In all honesty, he was supposed to be dead.
Any right minded man may have believed he had experienced too real a nightmare, or suffered a brain trauma of sort that came with his occupation but Kakashi was positive, one hundred and seventy two percent positive that he had been killed from chakra exhaustion after battling the ginger haired Akatsuki member.
In his mind the bustling, unknowing village below him was only mountains of ruins. True it had elevated his heart strings to see his village flourishing in a warm way she always had but that was not the only thing wrong with her, above the village he worked so terribly hard to protect were molded three heads – only three heads.
Not even a deformed rock face stood in the space of his teacher's mug; it was smoothed over as the rock was always before earth ninjutsu was used to protrude extra stone for molding. As if his sensei's proud, stern features that Kakashi had rarely seen in relevance to their team, had never been guarding over the village in the first place.
Clutching his masked chin with two gloved fingers he pondered on what his predicament could mean. Many a time he had thought on dispelling his chakra but his chakra was rather nonexistent at the moment and even in his exhaustion he could not rest until he understood even a little bit of what was going on.
With no chakra, it concluded that all he was seeing was true, unless someone was conducting an elaborate play with one major fault and even that didn't answer the question on how he still felt a beating heart in his chest and calm breaths upon his mask.
And so he resounded to fate and stated..."Troublesome." The only thing that made sense.
His voice vibrated in his chest and the feeling of actually being among the living snatched his attention for a few startle moments, a grateful smile crinkling one visible eye.
"Uh, hey mister!" Kakashi's eyes widened comically, the onyx eye almost popping from its place as he centered upon a black haired boy below him he only normally hallucinated of beside the memorial stone. "What'cha doing up there? Are you lost?" The ebony haired boy lifted up his familiar orange tinted glasses upward to squint up at the startled Kakashi's. "Argh, you know you look just like Kakashi-teme, that bastard…oh!" He face palmed his cheek and slapped his goggles in place. "I'm late, oh god I'm late!" And the child that haunted his nightmares kicked dust in his wake and disappeared from view.
Kakashi stared after him wordlessly, mouth still agape and jittering echoes of a once confident voice cracking from his throat. "w-w-wh-wha~…?"Never before had the Kakashi Hatake, copy-nin of the proud Konohagakure been so speechless, even including the instant he had received a new, signed, unpublished Icha Icha from his favorite golden haired student.
He dug a palm into his coal eye, hoping he would find his father by the camp fire's side but he remained where he sat, the kicked dust billowing up to greet him in a cool breeze. He ruffled a hand through his hair – no head injuries – and lifted his slanted headband ever so slightly to observe through his Sharaingan – no genjutsu, even though he had already checked – only to snatch vertigo from lack of chakra.
Snapping to attention he managed to catch himself before a mortifying fall, the infamous Hatake Kakashi did all one of his sature could do in such a situation; he up and fled to regroup. Dashing with a speed that rivaled his supposed 'eternal rival', he snuck through the village gates and swiftly claimed a training ground to ponder.
Kakashi sat heavily, pants heaving his chest and he waited calmly for it to pass in an attempt to delay the inevitable.
Still walking amongst the living was blissfully pleasant – even if he had no idea how it had happened – but arising in a mock village, an outdated version of his village no less, was something not even he, in all his glory, could comprehend.
Kakashi rubbed his chin in thought; he wasn't in a genjutsu, he was perfectly alive and had been reconfigured in a strange and familiar place. Perhaps, he had finally slummed to insanity? But, unfortunately, he doubted it, his thought process was the same after all – so the easy solutions were defiantly not in order.
Kakashi stared at his very much movable hands, frowning darkly. What in all hell had happened to him?
He didn't think he took any drugs lately…maybe he sniffed a bit too much of his furry partners medicine for that rash and this was just one huge hallucination that he would soon realize was just an hallucination by talking green and orange hippos parading through the village.
He had defiantly had that dream before.
In the end it had been fine of course, the hippo had only wanted to dance and the eggs it was plopping hatched to become energetic yellow and pink cats.
Kakashi scratched his head, but he was straying off topic again.
Sighing he flopped onto his back and stared at the clouds. He couldn't even concentrate on his precious book.
A burst of frantic chakra had the birds soaring over his head and a strong wind pressing his unruly hair against his scalp. Kakashi narrowed his eyes as he sat up, turning to glance over his shoulder in an attempt to see the culprit through the thick trees.
He knew that chakra; in his lifetime he had always only felt traces of it but it was enough for Kakashi (alleged genius as he was) to recognize it.
Kakashi walked towards the trees patting his clothes for dirt and cautiously staring into the depths darkened from the canopy.
It wasn't long before Kakashi heard the distance pants of a drained man; they were frantic almost borderline hyperventilation. Kakashi never pictured the man in question to be one to hyperventilate.
He peered through the trunks to happen upon a figure huffing and puffing as he leaned on a tree. In the figures current situation, he reminded Kakashi a fat civilian who had hurt his ankle during one of Konoha's annual civilian marathons. All hot and bothered, Kakashi had felt sorry for the man, of course, but still found it funny as he hobbled to the medic's tent.
"Really didn't expect to see you here." Kakashi began with his hands buried in his pockets. What he was said was true seeing as the man before he was supposedly dead as well. Kakashi pondered to himself, maybe this was some sort of 'afterlife extra curriculum'?
Kakashi was uncertain, there weren't that many people who could tell you what happened once your heart failed you.
"Kakashi…?" Itachi Uchiha managed between raspy breaths, coughing as he dared speak between his rapid panting.
Itachi's extravagant lashes clashed as he squinted his glassy grey eyes at Kakashi, removing a sweaty lock of hair from his face. Kakashi's head tilted as he stepped forward, squatting to be at the man's level. "You don't look so good."
At this Itachi gave a raspy chuckle. "Honestly not one of my best moments."
Kakashi stared at the man as he tried to regain his breath, speculating on the Uchiha's appearance in the strange play he was currently victim to. As it seemed the exhausted man before him was in his shoes.
Since it wasn't every day that two supposedly dead people (who both were certainly deceased – for he who hath doubts) miraculously returning to the living, to find themselves in an extravagant performance/hallucination.
"Kakashi…" Itachi managed, his heaving slightly abated as he fixed the silver eyed man dirty amusement. "Do you enjoy eyeing my lap?"
Kakashi flickered his glance from where it had been raised, only then realizing it had looked to all that he had been ogling the Uchiha's very craved family jewels (for genetic purposes, to all those of naughty, dirty minds).
Kakashi blinked at the amused man, obviously having trouble to keep his chuckle in as he breathed.
Kakashi didn't know that Itachi had a sense of humor…he had been lied to his whole life. At first he thought the man was a mini-arrogant kid who loved cuddling his little brother, then he was lead to believe he was a psychotic mass murderer in his spare time, and lastly finding out he had only been a true blooded patriot.
The man seated before him was a walking (well not at the moment) contradiction. As was their situation currently, so well, uhh, they fit together.
A finger poked his shoulder with as sigh. "I'm flattered Kakashi-sempai, but I highly doubt I'm looking for a relationship in our current predicament."
In hindsight he probably should have removed his gaze from the man's junk.
"So you know of the 'predicament'?" Kakashi's visible eye no longer glazed but sharp upon Itachi's own as he nodded. "What do you know?"
Itachi straightened against the bark he was leaning on, slicking his fingers through his sweaty hair as he sighed. "Unfortunately not much, but I realized something was amiss when I awoke to find myself in a functional Uchiha compound – living Uchiha and all."
He was obviously very troubled by this.
"I just had to come back…" Itachi looked over Kakashi's shoulder in the direction of the village Kakashi had just fled from.
Kakashi flopped on his ass and clutched his chin, rubbing it quickly. "This is disturbing…"
"And yourself, what have you learned?"
Kakashi rubbed his head. "That this is all one huge hallucination bought on by my dog's medicine." Itachi smiled at Kakashi lost look. "How long have you been, you know," He waved his hands to the surroundings. "here?"
Itachi shrugged. "Perhaps a week, I'm uncertain."
Another oddity.
Itachi, in real time, had taken his last breath approximately a month before Pein decided to rave their beautiful village. "I just arrived for all this merriment myself." He answered Itachi's silent question. Kakashi leaned forward and jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. "There all alive back there."
Itachi frowned. "What?" Itachi shook his head as if to rid himself of the notion. "All of them? Define all of them."
"As in before the hidden shinobi war, all of them. Alive and kickin' the lot of them." Kakashi spoke regretfully.
Itachi grunted, obviously troubled. "How is this possible?" He dug his dirty fingers across his forehead in an attempt to release the ache and leaving a glaring smudge in its wake. Itachi swallowed thickly, peering at Kakashi from underneath his lashes. "So what do we do know?"
Kakashi shrugged solemnly. "Haven't the faintest."
A/N: I really shouldn't be starting a new story, but I am so…yeah.
Warning: I am rather fickle – meaning, that characters may change their behaviors. I have good days and bad days my writing shows that, in some scenes detailed and flowly, if you know what I mean, and in others as boring as freaking hell.
Nothing I can do about that and I don't plan to change that, at least not for hobby.
Besides the warning, I hope you enjoy it.