Therapy Dog
Slowly, eyebrows furrowed in confusion, the boy's one good eye pans from his teacher, to the woman beside him, and then finally to the thing she's got cradled in her arms.
Minato and Kushina are, without question, two of the most amazing people he'll ever know, but right now, Kakashi is fairly certain that they've collectively lost their minds.
He knows they're worried about him, as are many of his fellow leaf ninja (one persistent, green, madman comes to mind), because they're all good, decent, people who can't understand that he deserves to be miserable. Minato, at least, has always had the decency to pretend that he isn't concerned, all his efforts packaged as casual requests rather than charity. This mission, for example, that he suspects has less to do with Kakashi watching over Kushina than the other way around.
And every night, when Minato comes home from the his office and Kakashi's duties as bodyguard are technically over, suddenly Kushina's made far, far more food than the pair of them (even eating for two as she is) could possibly manage, and he just has to stay for dinner. Most nights he's able to excuse himself as diplomatically as he can, usually with something about having to go train here, or there, or practice this or that technique, because there's really no polite way to tell someone that he would rather sit at home, in the dark, eating cold takeout tempura that he doesn't actually enjoy, than stain the warmth of their happy home with his presence.
Today, though, Minato hadn't gone in to the office and Kakashi's services hadn't been required. Which is why, when his teacher had popped by the window of his ramshackle little apartment insisting that Kakashi come over that night, to discuss some matter of great importance, he hadn't been able to say no. He'd been ambushed immediately, dragged inside by a grinning Kushina and steered towards their living room. The couple's seated in the sofa opposite him, smiling hopefully.
"Long story short," his teacher says, gently lifting the thing from his wife's arms and holding it out towards him, "someone left this little fellow in a box outside the office."
His wife nods, patting the small bump of her abdomen. "We'd keep him ourselves— he's just so cute— but with the baby on the way, you know?"
"Yes, one thing at a time. Of course, when he or she is older—"
"We've just gotta get one when the baby's older!"
"—but that won't be for a while, and this little one needs a home now," Minato continues, beaming at him. "We thought maybe you could take him in."
The fabric of his mask shifts helplessly as he tries, and fails, to protest, and before he can find his voice again the man has eased the squirming little creature into his hands. It's soft, its fur like warm velvet where his ungloved fingertips rest against it, with a squashed, caved-in face and bulging eyes.
It is, in the loosest possible sense of the word, a dog.
He had liked dogs once, he thinks. He knows his father had kept them, and can almost recall coming home from the academy to bury his face in shaggy white fur, but it's so long ago that it's more of a vague impression than a real memory. Kakashi isn't entirely sure what happened to them, now that he thinks of it, though he may remember a sympathetic neighbour taking them off Sakumo's hands when the barely concealed glaring and the whispers behind his back had made walking them down the street unbearable.
And so, for years afterwards, he hadn't been able to look at a dog without a deep sense of disgust pooling, cold and persistent, in his stomach.
It's the same feeling creeping into his veins, just locked on to a different target.
Now anything that makes him think of his father, and all those years of misplaced resentment, just makes him think of Obito, and Obito leads him to Rin— this endless mental pile up of everyone he's ever failed.
It's a very big pile.
In his arms, the puppy's started to squirm, tiny needle teeth pulling at the fabric of his sleeves. It makes a high, mewling, snuffling sound, and wags its little curled tail with such force that its entire body wiggles from the effort.
"I…" the boy finally manages, looking back up at his teacher. Minato is watching his expectantly, still beaming. "I'm not home enough for a dog."
"Nah, it'll be fine!" Kushina insists, nodding enthusiastically. "You can bring him with you during the day! I'd sure like to have him around, and he'll be big enough to leave alone for a little while by the time you go back to regular missions, you know?"
Missions aside, Kakashi can never really be a permanent home for anything. Beneath the dark fabric of his mask, the young black ops agent's mouth quirks hesitantly to one side. In six months, give or take, Kushina will have her baby, he'll go back to regular ANBU assignments, and sooner or later the luck (good or bad, he can't decide) that's seen him home safely from every mission so far will run out, and the dog will need a new home again. He means to say no, but what comes out is 'I guess I could.' "Until I can find somewhere else for it," he adds quickly.
The next thing he knows, he's ducking into a pet shop he remembers sitting just past the bookstore, just past the stall always selling little stuffed ninja dolls for the village children. There's a civilian girl with the store's name emblazoned on her shirt standing behind the counter, but otherwise the store is empty and he begins to wander the unfamiliar aisles. He grabs the first, smallest bag of kibble he can find and makes a beeline for the cash. The girl's been making doe-eyes at the puppy from the moment he walked in.
"He's adorable," she coos at the wrinkled little puppy. "Can I pet him?"
"Here," he says flatly, lowering the puppy into the cashier's arms. "What do you know, I'm actually looking for a home for him, sooo…."
"Oh. Oh no," she insists frantically, holding the puppy back out to him, her expression reluctant. "I'm sorry. I've got more than I can handle as it is. I mean, I would adopt them all if I could but—" helplessly, she gestures to the massive cork noticeboard against the wall behind her. Stacked, one on top of the other like shaggy white scales, the board is overflowing with flyers, each one emblazoned with the sad-eyed picture of an unwanted pet. It's a sight that would bring a tear to even the most hardened Inuzuka's eye.
Kakashi sighs, defeated, and reaches out to accept the little creature back into his grasp. When he sees his person reach for him, the pug starts to squirm, tail whirling wildly, and the cashier quickly hands him back over
"See? He likes you," the girl insists.
Of course the dog likes him, it's too stupid to know any better.
Kakashi resigns himself to buying his kibble and going home, but no, she insists he's grabbed the wrong bag (apparently old-dog food is a thing, and feeding it to a puppy is some kind of war crime). He finds himself following her down the row of colourful bags until she finds one marked 'puppy,' and on the way back she's trying to coax him into buying tiny squeaky toys. He just maintains that this is a temporary situation and that he has no use for tiny rubber steaks.
"You should at least get him a collar and a tag with your address," the shopworker asserts. "In case he runs away."
Kakashi raises his eyebrows at her incredulously, and glances upwards towards the metal plate of his forehead protector and then downs to the puppy and its absurd, stumpy little legs. "I don't think that's going to be an issue."
He leaves the store with kibble, a roll of baggies, and an estimate that the pug is little more than a month old. Just enough to make-do until he can rehome the puppy, and they should probably be the ones to name him, anyway.
The walk back to his apartment is slow, as civilians and fellow ninja of all ages and genders stop him every block or so to fawn over the puppy. It's a bizarre feeling, as he's never really been someone 'approachable' to anyone but Gai, who simply takes no notice of the reluctance to socialize practically radiating from his person, but the puppy seems to act as an invitation for anyone who sees it. Despite their interest, no one is actually willing to take the dog home with them, so he presses on.
The puppy's tail whirls constantly as he stumbles around the apartment, sniffing everything and biting at everything else. He had planned to largely ignore the dog and get in a few chapters of his latest morbid read, but taking his eyes off the thing for so much as a second results in a mutilated pair of sandals, and twice he looks up just in time to catch the dog lifting his leg.
"No, no, no, no—" he chants frantically as he grabs the dog at arm's length and vaults out the window to the grassy patch beside the street.
The puppy needs to go outside nearly once an hour for the rest of the night, crying miserably.
"I shouldn't be laughing," Kushina says when he stumbles into her living room the next morning, disheveled and bleary-eyed, puppy wiggling away gleefully beneath his arm. "That's gonna be me, soon!" She pats her belly, lovingly.
He's to accompany her while she handles some errands, today, and Kushina waits until they're halfway there to mention that their first stop is an appointment she had arranged at the veterinary clinic. The assistants all light up at the sight of the little puppy, endlessly patient of its squirming as they try to take its weight. He glances over at Kushina whenever they ask a question, but she gives him a stubborn look in return and nudges him closer to the counter.
"So, what's your puppy's name?" the young man behind the counter asks, pen clicking to attention as he takes a hold of the nearest clipboard.
"Doesn't have one," the jonin answers flatly, not flinching at the startled, disapproving look he receives in reply.
The veterinary assistant quickly forces an uneasy chuckle. "I'll just… leave that blank, for now."
The veterinarian herself looks the puppy over, carefully examining his teeth, his ears, listening to his heart and lungs, and feeling along its squishy body for any abnormalities. Its tail flops happily even as she's administering a vaccine, the puppy too engrossed in the treats she leaves on the counter to care. The puppy will need the next shots a month later, so the doctor quickly scribbles another appointment date on a card, and it's only as they're making their way from the clinic to the next stop in Kushina's itinerary that he realizes how long it's been since he's made plans for any future beyond the next morning.
Kushina spends the better part of the afternoon sorting through a huge pile of letters, largely requests or concerns from civilians who were unaware of the proper procedure and simply dropped their messages through the village leader's mail slot. She considers each carefully before assigning it to one of the growing piles on the kitchen table: what needs the Minato's immediate attention, what should have been sent to a particular department, irrelevant complaints from villagers convinced that shinobi can control the weather, scratch-card results, or the common cold.
Kakashi's busied himself with a book, though he never drops his guard completely, always attentive to their surroundings for threats to Kushina's life that he knows full well will never come. Threats to her carpet are far more credible, and he carefully maps the puppy's snuffling and sniffling around the room, once it's decided that it's napped long enough. It finds his shins soon enough, and Kakashi glances down as a wet nose bumps against his exposed toes, followed by affectionate little laps of its tongue.
"D'you bring any toys for him?" Kakashi shakes his head, Kushina blinking in surprise when he confesses that he doesn't have any to begin with. "Wait, wait, I've got an idea. Gotta have some stuff for the little guy to play with, you know?" she says as she rushes down the hall and emerges with a balled up sock. "It's already got a hole in it," she tells him happily, "so go nuts." The puppy scrambles after it gleefully when she lobs it across the room, dropping it expectantly at Kakashi's feet.
He finds he can read well enough with one hand while occasionally reaching down to toss the sock again with the other. During a particularly engrossing passage, however, he doesn't throw it fast enough for the puppy's liking and it's soon digging its teeth into the material and pulling, unraveling the sock as it yanks and shakes its head, growling away contentedly. It seems as good a way as any to let the little creature tire itself out, trying in vain to wrench the sock from Kakashi's hands (because Kakashi is a jonin who regularly climbs mountains with one hand behind his back, and the puppy has the grip strength of a rigged crane-game), but he persists far longer than the boy and expected, and every so often he gives a little tug to encourage the pug when he starts to lose interest.
He stops back into the petstore on the way home, returning to his apartment with a toy for the puppy to chase, one for him to chew on, and a bag of dog treats. Perhaps if he's trained, Kakashi realizes, someone will be more willing to take him in.
He barely needs to bribe him with the little biscuit pieces. The dog is so overjoyed at his attention that he's as responsive to an approving tone or a pat on the head as he is to a treat. It's slow going, but by the time he finally goes to bed, he's taught the thing to sit. He has to be reminded again the next day, but he catches on more quickly than Kakashi would have thought, and remembers it perfectly the day after.
He finds he barely needs to carry the puppy anymore. The dog is perfectly happy to trot along beside him. At the end of the day, he's beginning to find it a welcome change when it naps in his lap as he reads, when he manages to clamber his way onto the bed and curl up beside him, the way he wriggles and licks when Kakashi pokes at the soft little pads of his feet.
The way the puppy looks up at him with such total, and totally undeserved, affection.
When it's finally time to return to the vet, the puppy trots in beside him. Kakashi has the little dog sit as she examines him, he lies down when asked to, and with a few gentle reminders, offers the veterinarian a tiny paw when she reaches for it.
"That's very good," the vet says, glancing back at the puppy's records with a critical quirk of her mouth. "How have you a little…No-name, been getting along?"
"Pakkun," Kakashi corrects, shrugging. "I've been calling him Pakkun."
Pakkun has grown a little in the months that he's had him. He's surprisingly energetic, and their walks have turned into a slow daily jog around the block. For Kakashi, it can hardly be called a stroll, but for the tiny pug it's a serious workout as he determinedly follows after him. If it weren't for his enthusiasm, Kakashi would stop, but the puppy's always excited for the morning run and waits eagerly by the door. It's sad, though, watching the little thing pant and struggle, but never give up. It's like watching Gai when he got started.
Of course, the other thing about Gai was the rate at which he'd improved, and the puppy is much the same. The slow trot around the block becomes a jog, on and off, around the village and by the time he's four months old, it's a real run.
Kakashi lounges against his kitchen counter waiting for his tea to steep one morning before they head out, pakkun's nails clicking against the tiles as he shadows him around the apartment. He goes through all the commands Pakkun knows, hoping to refresh his memory before adding the one they'd only just started working on. "Sit," he says, nodding appreciatively when the dog immediately does. "Down," and again, the puppy quickly does. "Alright," he says, mug in hand, watching the puppy as he absently takes a sip, "speak."
"Kakashi!"
The mug shatters into pieces when it slips from his grasp, Pakkun gleefully rushing forward to lap the drink from the ground.
Minato gives some shrugging, speculative explanation when he rushes over, something about exposure to Kakashi's chakra from such a young age, and the difference between the toads you find under logs in the woods and Toads from Mount Myoboku. He knows Inuzuka can communicate with their canine partners, and the Aburame clan can, to whatever extent, understand their insects. How exactly Pakkun is talking, aloud, in a voice everyone can hear and understand, remains a mystery, but by five months he's speaking in full sentences, and by six he can carry a conversation.
"Hey, Kakashi," the puppy asks one day, voice growing lower, gravelly, as he matures, gradually matching the gloomy, wrinkled face, "I wanna come to the training ground with you today." He can't keep up with Kakashi's rigorous routine, but the dog sets to training of his own, running laps, leaping puddles, and benches, breezing through the obstacle courses meant for much larger people and eventually the ones Kakashi sets up specifically for him. Walks become less a pet owner's obligation and instead, a casual stroll with a friend. Just one who stops to sniff things more often than his other friends might.
Pakkun is eight months old the day they decide to visit the civilian dog park just for a lark. Human as he's become, it's still nice to let Pakkun visit with some other dogs for a change, sniff, play fetch. He's definitely humoring the Akita whose owner keeps throwing a tennis ball for them, blissfully unaware that the seemingly normal, stumpy, little pug could snatch it and run rings around the larger dog if he so chose, and then out manoeuver the owner in a discussion of current events. Kakashi keeps watch out of the corner of his good eye, just dimly aware enough of his surroundings to feel both secure, and properly engrossed in his book. That's how he notices the irritable civilian man being dragged from one end of the dog park to the other by the massive, drooling, puppy happily tugging at the leash.
The dog shadows him lovingly when he unclips the leash, frolicking with agility surprising in a dog of his size and build, between the increasingly frustrated owner's legs. Kakashi hears the whir of air as a stick is sent spinning, end over end, into the bush at the edge of the park with a resounding crash, and the puppy pursues with a deep, gleeful, bark.
The reasonable assumption is that the sound of slow civilian feet through the grass is an attempt at play, enticing the puppy to chase after, but the bulldog is still rooting through the underbrush and with a sense of dawning horror it becomes obvious that the man isn't stopping.
The book snaps shut, and eyes narrowed dangerously, the copy ninja starts after the fleeing civilian desperately trying to outrun the dog he'd intrinsically promised to love and care for when he'd taken it in. Pakkun must also have realized what's happening, because there's a familiar growl beside him. He could catch him easily, tempted to follow him home and frighten him half to death, but Kakashi reconsiders, instead focusing on the dog that bursts happily from the bushes, turning one way then the other in search of his beloved person, cracked branch and huge globs of drool hanging from his mouth. He pauses his search—frantic snuffling in circles, stumpy little tail wiggling emphatically when Kakashi approaches, and happily surrenders the stick for throwing. He gives the man time to reconsider, but when he's been playing with the well-muscled, liver-coloured, puppy long enough for the sky to begin dimming, he and Pakkun share a resolute look. There's no address when he checks the strange bulldog's collar, just a name—Bull. Wow, such thought put into that name— scratched hastily into the leather. Bull follows him home happily at first, taking a thorough smell around the apartment to familiarize himself, but when night falls and the dog's beloved owner has yet to collect him, he begins to fret at the door, refusing food and sulking, nose pressed to the crack beneath the door to smell the hallway.
Reluctantly, Pakkun approaches him, and he must be letting Bull know what's happened because the larger dog begins to wail. There's something else to it, beneath the howling. It's an eerily human sound, sorrowful and piteous. It goes on for a long while, despite Pakkun's seeming attempts to comfort the larger dog, neighbours above pounding on their floor, his ceiling, to express their distaste. Rage and disgust pool in his stomach as he contemplates what kind of pond scum abandons something so devoted to him.
"Pakkun," Kakashi says, decisively. "Tell him he lives here now."
Slowly, Bull quiets, the bright eyes shining between heavy folds of skin turning to Kakashi in a kind of hopeful disbelief. He lumbers over, hesitantly, gauging the new human's reaction and then flopping down to lay his head in Kakashi's lap, letting him pat him reassuringly and stroke the folded flaps of his ears.
Pakkun is more than capable of looking after himself, he reasons, and if Kakashi were to die, he's certain he could look after Bull, too.
The little apartment is already cluttered and cramped, but they'll make do. He's already huge, and by the size of his paws, it's clear he's nowhere near done growing.
Bull doesn't seem aware that Pakkun is barely the size of his head, and he immediately defers to the smaller dog. When Kakashi reports for duty the next morning, Bull trailing behind him with Pakkun perched atop his massive head, Minato blinks in surprise, but grins, and hurriedly waves him in to towards the couch where a very pregnant Kushina is resting. She squeals in abject delight, and spends the better part of that day fussing over each puppy in turn.
It's overcast midday by the time Kakashi stumbles home through rubble and smoke.
His limbs are leaded as he makes his way back towards his apartment, and only when he arrives to find it intact does he realized he had been afraid it wouldn't be. It's alright, he thinks dully, through the cold haze settled over his mild and beneath his skin, Pakkun is smart enough to get them out if he had to.
It takes him a moment to find them, dusted in plaster from the ceiling and crammed as far as they can get into his closet to protect themselves against the tremors the Ninetails' rampage had sent through the village. Bull uncurls from the ball he'd assumed, Pakkun dragging himself out from beneath the safety of the other dog's heavier body.
Something clenched tight in his chest loosens at the sight of them, safe and sound, but it's only a flicker in the emptiness filling the spaces between his skin, and he doesn't bother to take off his gear or sandals before collapsing in bed, feeling nothing but numb and stunned as he stares at the new cracks in the ceiling. Exhausted but unable to sleep, the same thoughts repeat as a slow crawl, over, and over, blocking out anything else: Minato and Kushina are dead. Minato and Kushina are dead. Minato, Kushina, Rin, Obito. Minato, Kushina, Rin, Obito, his father…
All gone. Gone, and left him behind.
He's left, and it's horrifically unfair. He has to lie here, unable to breath, crushed by the weight of their absence. Why is he still here?
He's only vaguely aware of the dip in his pillow where Pakkun lies beside him, the mattress sinking under bull's weight at his feet, the solid warmth of him curled behind Kakashi's bent knees. He wakes in the evening surprised to find he'd fallen asleep. Pakkun is snoring beside him, directly into his ear, and his legs have gone to pins and needles beneath the heavy bulldog sprawled over his knees. Still, he's certain it's these things that lulled him to sleep.
Kakashi glances one way, then the other, ensuring that no one is left watching before he pulls the dog mask from his face, and slowly sets it down on the ground. The dog facing him growls, low, at the movement but doesn't lunge, his hackles relaxing as the unsettling mask comes away.
His target, the ninja and the assorted bandits who were protecting him all lie dead around the abandoned factory they'd been using as a base. Only this little fellow, presumably raised as a fighting dog by the hired criminals, remains, his wariness, displayed teeth, and the multitude of scars riddling his well-muscled body outlining his upbringing. Kakashi can't bear to leave him here. He's some kind of mutt, built like a Doberman with hound markings, and Kakashi waits, stock still, until finally the dog relaxes. It's a slow process, coaxing the mistreated creature closer without alarming him, but after hours it finally creeps close enough to accept the rations Kakashi holds out in offering.
He does snap eventually, sharp teeth closing around Kakashi's wrist, but the jonin doesn't pull away, doesn't flinch, and soon the dog realizes that his bite has no effect on the superhuman creature that's slowly luring him towards Konoha. It's a hard sell with Pakkun, but the pug eventually forgives him for bringing this temperamental, snarling thing – Uhei, he's calling him—into the apartment. Slowly the battered mutt braves the small open spaces of the apartment rather than hiding beneath furniture and skulking to the food dish when no one is looking. It's months before he settles, half a year before Kakashi feels it's right to take him training with the others rather than just extended runs to burn off his nervous energy. He takes them, regularly, to visit the Inuzuka family compound, Kuromaru more than able to deal with any aggressive outburst from his newest acquisition, while his more sociable dogs entertain Tsume's three new puppies. After a year, Uhei is curling on the floor against bull's side to fight off the bite in the winter air, readily submitting to Pakkun, and happily letting Kakashi bandage the extensive scarring and bald patches marking his skin.
Finally he accepts that Kakashi will never hurt him, that he'll be loved and fed and cared for, that Bull and Pakkun want nothing more than to be his family, and he becomes as loyal a companion as any dog has ever been, if not a little overprotective of his new master.
Pakkun gets his attention one night after one long mission, as he's packing for the next. "We've been talking," he says, "and we want to come with you. On missions."
Kakashi shakes his head emphatically, turning back to his gear. He's happy to train with them, and they're certainly capable. Pakkun is clever, Uhei is fearsome, and Bull's sheer size is enough to intimidate even the most hardened enemy, but…
Minato, Kushina, Obito, Rin, Father, he remembers, again and again, like a mantra. The dogs adore him, they need him. He can't put his new companions in harm's way.
Kakashi tells him no more firmly, and again the next time he asks, and again, and again.
"We care about you, we want to help you, and we want to be with you," Pakkun insists stubbornly, following Kakashi as he heads out on his latest assignment. The young ANBU operative tells him no and takes off at a run, leaving the three dogs far behind.
When they find him three days later, deep into the Land of Wind, he finally has to relent.
It's on his next dogfood run that he finally looks closely at the stall next door, inclining his head in thought as he studies the dolls behind the blank eyes of his ANBU mask.
It's always felt wrong, buying a collar for Pakkun. Initially he hadn't wanted to claim him, and now it feels wrong to mark him as something owned, as a pet. Instead, Pakkun is a friend, and now, more than ever, a teammate.
The tiny doll-sized Hitai-ate is just perfect for the pug, and gives Kakashi something to tag with a seal. The mark on the reverse side of his tiny forehead-protector, and the other dogs' full sized ones, allows him to reach them with a summoning jutsu, and he teaches them how to answer when he calls.
The more dogs he brings home, the more doggy he must smell. A pair of ragged looking creatures pause their digging through trash bags as he passes an alley, and begin to follow him. He names them Shiba, and Urushi, and Pakkun looks at him balefully when he brings them home, glancing around to the wall-to-wall dogs lounging around the apartment. Bull's grown to a truly massive size, and between Bull, Uhei and the crafty little dog, Bisque, he'd found at the pound, they all have to step over and around each other to move.
The next morning he leads them out of the village. Still within sight of the walls, the forest gives way to a stretch of farmland. Technically, though abandoned, Kakashi still owns his father's home.
It's dusty and decrepit, but with a little bit of work (and the addition of a run) it's suitable for six large dogs, and he happily gives them the run of the place. The fields give them plenty of room to play, and is perfect for new and more challenging training courses.
Pakkun finds a lanky little stray already living under the stairs.
Kakashi names him Guruko, and invites him inside.
Between visiting the old Hatake farmhouse to feed and train the dogs, and visiting the Memorial Stone, Kakashi suddenly finds himself late for everything rather than simply most things, but everyone seems to have accepted it as a fact of life. Rather the way the village as a whole has accepted the regular parade of dogs past the gates and through the streets, to the training ground, or Kakashi's apartment, or wherever he's arranged with Pakkun to bring his pack.
After years as an ANBU operative, the life of a regular jonin seems replete with leisure time. It's hard to complain when it leaves him so many more opportunities to spend time with his dogs and catch up on the latest in adult fiction. It also gives him plenty of chances to participate in the daily village life, like an open house at the Konoha pound.
Hana's smile is gently reproachful when she catches him leaning into one of the enclosures again, visiting with another abandoned dog and enthusing about bringing him home. "Kakashi-sensei, it's wonderful that you want to help, and I know how much you love them, but how many is that now?"
"Seven," he replies cheerfully, still tipped over the edge of the pen.
"Including that one?"
"…Eight." Kakashi admits. He picks the dog up easily, holding it out to her, giving his most charming puppy-dog look in response to her sigh. "Hana. Hana, look at him. He's calling to me, Hana." He catches the startled blink when she notes the dog he's holding, all golden fur and one mangled eye, clouded over by thick cataracts. Kakashi's one visible eye arches as he beams at her. "See? He's meant for me."
She explains his condition as he fills out the familiar paperwork, some injury prior to being picked up by the shelter, likely a fight with another dog. "He can still see out of the damaged eye, but it's very sensitive to light," she informs him, indicating Akinos squint under the fluorescent lights. "You can get a kind of goggles for dogs, if you'd like."
"Doggy sunglasses," he muses as he signs his name, "amazing."
The dogs greet the newcomer in a rush of sniffing noses and wagging tails, and by the evening's training, Akino has settles seamlessly into the pack. They all know where they fit into the group, secure in their position. There's no quibbling over orders, no politics or pettiness, just flawless, innate, cooperation. Perfect teamwork and support.
He wonders, sometimes, if they aren't giving him unfair expectations for the human students he's sent. Either way, none have come close to meeting the standards of his Ninken, and Kakashi refuses to settle.
The dogs run with him, and together they work out new battle strategies and formations, how best to seize a target, how best to arrange themselves so that Akino's blind side is covered, so that tiny Pakkun is protected, so that the less maneuverable Bull is covered by the more nimble members of the pack, how each member of the team can contribute his best and protect his companions. Together they prepare for the challenges ahead, for their shared future.
They collapse around him in a great, contented, pile, panting, and groaning, and wriggling into more comfortable positions, bull behind him, the smaller dogs piled on his flak jacket and in his lap, the others tucked at his side. He's content here. Buried beneath so many happy, furry bodies and wagging tails, he can almost ignore the emptiness always eating away at him from the inside, the void left by losses and failures that he's beginning to understand will always be with him. Met with eight pairs of dark eyes, all shining with loyalty and adoration, it's easy to catch himself, for just a moment, feeling worthwhile, whether or not he deserves it.
He smiles to himself beneath the dark fabric of his mask, lazily rubbing at one of Bull's massive, silky ears. He still can't quite believe that he does deserve it, but if the messes he's come home to have taught him anything, it's that dogs love trash.