The Darkest Hour
Kakashi Hatake sucked in a breath through his nose and tested the steadiness of his stomach. He didn't immediately suffer the urge to fall out, so he counted that as a victory.
His muscles protested when he moved from his crouched position. He frowned as he remembered his encounter with Obito. He pushed that to farther part of his brain and suddenly remembered Rin all over again. She was dead. She wasn't coming back.
Obito's love for Rin had twisted into something ugly; twisted, corrupt, and delusional.
It may not have been that way before she died but it has become such that it has poisoned his mind and corrupted his very being. Plus, it has led him to reject the same person he claimed to care for so deeply. Not to mention if Rin was revived, there would be no way she would support his views or reciprocate his love.
He felt a tap on his shoulder and faced a tall man with a muscular built, a long face with pronounced cheekbones; as well as a full goatee. His long, dull pink hair reaches his lower back and his were a forest green.
He wore a long, dark tattered cloak with boots. No one so far seemed to notice him but Kakashi. Of course not. There was a far more, deadly threat out there already.
"Who are you?" Kakashi demanded.
"A friend," he said simply, his mouth curving into a half-smile. He thrust Kakashi a small envelope.
Kakashi glanced down at the envelope but didn't immediately see any identifying information. He ripped at the seal. He dragged out a stack of papers varying in size and shape.
Just what exactly were these?
They were photos. Several in his hand, splayed as though they were an array of cards. When he picked one up, his heart stuttered and all the breath left his chest in a painful rush.
It was a photo of a woman, obviously a jounin like him. She was a slender, fairly tall, and fair-skinned kunoichi, yet curvaceous. She was wearing her proper shinobi attire which consisted of a black turtle neck top and a purple mesh top underneath, black pants with bandages around her right thigh and calves, grey shin guards, black gloves that stretched to the top of her biceps and black shinobi boots.
She looked serious and… ruthless. The way she held her katana and her body. But that wasn't it. That wasn't what blazed his mind like a buzz saw.
The woman looked remarkably like Rin. His former teammate. Rin was dead.
What kind of twisted joke was this?
Kakashi rifled through the pictures for something that made sense. Maybe some haha note from sick fuck looking for kicks.
When he came across the short handwritten note, he froze. All the blood left his face at the simple four words.
Your friend is alive.
It was a kick right to the groin. Rage surged through his veins like bubbling lava. He crumbled the note in his fist and threw it across the battlefield.
"Who the hell would pull a stunt like this and why?!" he barked, but that still didn't draw any attention to him and this mysterious man who literally appeared out of nowhere.
He snatched up the photo again and then another. He gathered them all, his hands shaking so bad the pictures scattered like a deck of cards.
Cursing, he got down on his knees to collect the photos from the ground.
Get a grip. She's dead. These photos are fake. There's just no way…
Even though he told himself it was some morbid prank, he couldn't control the rush of anger. Hope. Fear.
The pictures stared back at him, mocking him. They were Rin. All were Rin. Her hair reached past her waist and the purple rectangles on her cheeks were gone. Why?
Beautiful, yet her facial expression was neutral and her bright brown eyes now appeared dull, probably due to the traumatization and harshness of reality. But it was Rin. A face he was familiar with.
He forced himself to look away from the strong, beautiful woman in the picture because if he continued to stare and if he gave nay thought to it being Rin; he was going to vomit.
"Believing it or not is entirely up to you,'' said the man who had given him the envelope.
"How do you know her?" Kakashi growled.
"What's your relationship with her?"
"All in due time, Kakashi Hatake. All in due time. I haven't introduced myself… I am Tatsuya Sato. These photos here… well, I should have given to you sooner, but I kept at bay. These aren't even recent… they're just over a couple of months old."
"…."
"Would it just be better if I showed you proof?"
Proof? What the hell was he talking about?
Tatsuya grinned.
"The day she "died"… she had made sure you had pierced her heart, Kakashi. And for that moment when the blood spilled from her lips and she uttered your named as her last word…. You believed for her to have died, didn't you? At least until I got hold of her. It was then I switched out her body with another corpse in her likeness. "It was so believable, even that Uchiha boy fell for it. Perhaps I'm saying too much."
Kakashi balled his fist.
"You said you had proof, right?"
"Yes, indeed. "
Tatsuya looked behind him and gave a simple beckoning wave of his hand. Someone was coming. She moved like a predator with such ease that it seemed so unnatural.
When she was finally up close, Kakashi's jaw dropped. She smiled at him slightly, pushing back a loose strand of her hair and tucking it behind her ear. She was wearing the same outfit in the photo and the same sword was holstered on her hip.
He looked back at her and started for her.
"R-Rin…?"
She almost laughed.
"Kakashi… it's been a while."
(A/N: A blast from the past! This is a teaser chapter, tell me what you guys think. This idea had been on my mind for a while now and I wanted it in words. Until then…)
