Title: Not Broken...
Author: Fuyu no Akegata
Pairing: none
Rating: PG/T
Warning: theoretical, hypothetical death, angst, teh emo
Summary: History has a way of coming full circle, but sometimes in a roundabout way...
Disclaimer: Kakashi and Sakumo unfortunately aren't mine, but I've bought enough merchandise I've subsidized a nice little share of them ;)
Wordcount: 427 words
A/N: Written back in late April, 2009. Found it on my harddrive and decided it doesn't entirely suck, so I polished just a little and am posting.
Kakashi couldn't be broken. He was still in one piece. He still functioned. He still did his duty, completed his missions, did everything required of him. He was fine. He did more than was was required of him. He volunteered. He asked for even more missions, the ones no one else wanted, the ones no one else could manage, keeping himself busy enough he couldn't hear the voices inside his head, the ones telling him how futile everything was, telling him no matter how much he did it would never be enough, would never be good enough. He'd failed his precious people. It was only a matter of time before it happened again, before he failed the village when it counted.
He failed when it counted. They called him a coward for trying to regain his honor through death, after the unspeakable choice between duty and comrade.
Kakashi's cowardice was in hoping somewhere deep inside that he would never be asked to make that decision again, that he would die as a shinobi before he failed everyone again, before the hairline cracks beneath the surface shattered, exposing the lie he forced himself to live, the fiction he believed and clung to desperately to make it through every day, that he wasn't broken, was still in one piece, still functioned, still did his duty, completed his missions, did everything required of him, that he was fine. It was a deception the sharingan couldn't dispel, that no one would see until it was too late, and his blood seeped into the soil the floorboards as he gave took his life for his village, and history, as always, came full circle.
And yet again at a Hatake funeral, eyes would slide away, not meet, not wanting to acknowledge that they didn't see, wouldn't see, refused to see, pretended not to see, didn't watch a pale-skinned, silver-haired jounin fall to his knees again and again, then rise again and again, cracked and scarred more each time, but never giving up, never broken, still in one piece. Once again they would stand and not say anything and smile and lie to themselves, telling themselves there was nothing they could do, and go on pretending everything is fine, that they aren't broken, that they're still in one piece, that they still function, that they still do their duty, complete their missions, do everything required of them.
It's time to move on, time to let go. They don't really want to know. Let them go on believing it's nothing but blue skies and sunshine...