A/N: this will be a coverage of the drastic stages in Kakashi's personality over the course of his Anbu career. Will not concur with the events from the anime arc during this time. enjoy. review. thank you.
Prologue
There is blood. Too much blood.
Never in my short life have I seen such décor. It garnishes the wall behind him. It is the finish on the hardwood floor. It is an apron of scarlet.
It smells of iron. A stench that fills my nostrils and sends me reeling. I try to step back, try to run – anything. I am frozen in place, my feet bound by the congealing stain under my shoes.
His back is to me. White hair, long and spiky as always. Like a bolt of lightning, he always said, our hair.
I can do nothing but tremble. I feel my mouth unhinged in a silent scream, I hear the high-pitched shrillness in my mind, yet no sound is emitted.
I could call him if I wanted.
No, I cannot. Fear silences me; that should I ask him, he would remain where he is – too quiet, too still.
"Dad?" I would say. My voice would squeak, quiver like a kitten confronted by a ninken.
And I would imagine that he'd stand up, get on his feet and laugh like nothing had happened. And we'd go for ramen and he'd hand me the bill and I'd hand it back to him, laughing.
And in my heart of hearts, I know that it would not be.
…..
I am a jonin – old enough to learn my father's wrongs, and to hate him for them. He died most cowardly, I tell myself, and I will not go the same way. He broke the shinobi code, I tell myself, and he suffered for it. I will not do the same.
"Hatake Sakumo was a hero." Obito has told me.
I want to believe him. So badly, I want to. But how can I, when Hatake Sakumo's 'heroic' actions earned him a disgraced name and a permanent stain on my floor?
For once, I've chosen to believe, to go on feeling rather than logic. And look what it got me.
The same Obito lays now on cold stone, only his left half visible – no, not even that much.
He's dying with a smile on his lips as his face follows Rin's footsteps. He cannot see her, for I have taken his sight. I will show you the world now, Obito. May you live on through my body, in my eyes.
Uchiha Obito too, is a hero. Shinobi law will turn against him, but humanity will know him as a hero.
Like my father, Obito will die knowing that it was a choice he made.
I want to brand him a coward for dying intentionally. I want to ask him if he doesn't know he's burdened me with survivor's guilt for the rest of my life.
And in my heart of hearts, I know he's braver than I am.
…..
I am thirteen years old. Lightning crackles up my arm, tingles in my fingertips.
Sakumo always told me I was in too much of a hurry. I'm going too fast now – moving so quickly I barely know what I'm hitting.
Cut, slash, punch, kick.
Stab.
This one is too light, I know immediately. None of the Kiri anbu should be this small. And . . . none of them wear red stockings. I swallow and look up.
Her blood mingles with my chakra and Lightning Cutter turns an eerie shade of pink. Her face is almost surprised, eyes wide, mouth half open. Like she didn't expect this. Like she didn't purposefully just step in front of me.
In a half-second the anbu will be upon me. And in that half-second her eyes meet mine, she's crying. Rin didn't want to die.
And she alone is the kindest person I know; she values human life above all else. Yet it is she who dies in the true way of the shinobi. Not by her own hand, and not having abandoned he mission to save a friend, but for the sake of the village.
My eyes well up. I don't remember the last time I cried. The tears from my right eye are mine.
And in my heart of hearts, I know that those from the Sharingan are his.