Disclaimer: Nothing. I don't own nothing. Lalalalalala….
Author's Note: Here's the next update! So sorry to make you wait so long! Gomen Nasai!
CHAPTER 10
"Why do you need someone to die for you?" Kakashi's voice had a slight bored tone, and he leaned back a little, shifting his body weight onto his right leg. Something about his eyes, a deep gleam that shone from within them caught Sasu-Naru and the two who were one starred at him with eyes that gleamed with half-shed tears. Kakashi reached up with one hand and scratched his silvery grey hair, cocking a masked face at them as if waiting for an answer.
The wind blew up chilling water and sprayed it onto the impromptu snowy battleground of the leaf ninjas. The older man looked down at his forehead protector and casually rubbed at the scratches on the metal. The steel was cold but he didn't feel it much as the mix of wet water soaking into his uniform and cold frosty air had chilled his hands and body to numbing insensitivity. Pain was not there so much as a cold lack of any feeling at all. His breath mixed with the air and dissipated.
"Don't be pathetic," he said softly, a cocky slant to his sleepy-looking eye. The sharingan was closed, conserving the remainder of his chakra.
"Hokage-sama!" Arms reached out to grab at the Hokage, hands reaching and pulling desperately on his long sleeves. The Third turned and dismissed the Anbu team with a slight nod of his head before turning back to the child before him.
The pink-haired girl had a set face of determined single-mindedness, the large dog next to him starring non-chalantly down the long corridor.
"I'm going with you Hokage-sama."
The Third breathed in deeply and tapped his long pipe.
"I'm bringing two Anbu teams with me. You will stay here and wait until we meet you back here at the village, Sakura." He took a long draw of his pipe and turned to leave but she refused to let go of him, pulling him back to her.
"But Hokage-sama!"
"It's too dangerous. We won't be able to protect you if something should happen. It'll be much safer for you if you wait here for them."
Sakura refused to let him go, moving quickly to step right in front of the Third, forcing him to stop in his steps.
"Kakashi sensei always says that we're a team. No one ever abandons anyone else for any reason. He sent me here with Kuroune because that was my job, that was my mission just like theirs was to watch the spring. Now my mission is over and they're waiting for me to come back. I have to get back to my team."
"Sakura." The soft sound of his voice came to her.
"We will be here. Waiting for you to get back." His eyes meeting hers, indecipherable in words, but understanding in empathy.
"Don't take too long."
:Wait for me, Kakashi-sensei, Naruto…Sasuke-kun:
"They're waiting for me, Hokage-sama."
The Third starred at her, her eyes narrowed and determined, and he was reminded of watching another girl, not much younger than her, sobbing and beating at someone else, crying because she had been one of the ones left behind.
Kakashi didn't used to have such a strong sense of companionship and teamwork. He was a child prodigy, a genius tactician and one of the strongest of the leaf. But he'd lacked empathy to work with others, lacked the ability to see the world as more than just black and white.
The small girl beat at the Blonde jounin's stomach and chest with her fists, yelling at him.
"We should have been with him, sensei! You told us that we're a team! A team works together!" A dark haired boy with big goggles covering his eyes stood to the back of her, reaching out with one hand as if to comfort her, then let it drop to his side again.
"If we'd been there…If I had been there…Kakashi might not have been this badly injured!" The girl ninja yelled at the Fourth who said nothing, just looked down as she grabbed at his green jounin vest.
"I'm the medic ninja. It was my job…our team is suppose to work together. But sensei…you didn't let me …us…go."
"Rin…"Yondaime didn't finish, just shook his head a little and directed his gaze at the third member of the team.
"Obito, take Rin back to her place. You guys can visit Kakashi tomorrow."
The boy glanced at the girl with tears plastering her hair to her face and looked back at their teacher, hesitant.
"Sensei-"
"Go." The boy took Rin by the arm and guided her out of the hospital room and down the corridor, their steps and her soft weeping fading. The Fourth said nothing but moved back up unsteadily until he reached the wall and then leaned his head back, silent. The Third waited a few minutes before stepping into the hospital room. Kakashi had always been a slender child but bundled in hospital white, he looked fragile, the sound of his breathing muffled through an oxygen mask. Yondaime didn't look at him, but kept his eyes closed. The Third puffed on his long pipe and looked over Kakashi in the hospital bed.
"You never had this kind of problem with Anbu teams."
Yondaime gave a little humorless laugh.
"Yea…kids, they just seem to get to me more." He sighed and turned to the Third, his teacher's teacher.
"It was an A rank mission. Kakashi shouldn't even had gone, but there was no choice. Everyone is fighting, everyone is over-whelmed by missions and he is a Chunnin regardless of age. If…" He faltered a little but recovered and continued.
"If Rin and Obito had gone with him, they probably would have all died. Kakashi can't protect his whole team and successfully complete that mission. The others' levels just aren't high enough yet. They should understand…"
"So you sent him off on a solo mission and prevented the others from following?"
The Fourth sighed and nodded.
"It was a no-win situation. But now…now I feel like I've made a mistake."
He continued in the soft gentle voice of his. Not for the first time, the Fourth could see the almost child-like youthfulness of the Hokage that he'd chosen.
"Are you unsure of your own decisions for your team?"
The fourth looked away from him, at the wall, searching for some private answer. When he didn't seem to find what he was hoping for, he look back at the boy-child lying next to them, tiny in the huge hospital bed.
"Teamwork is more than just the ones fighting physically but also those that support mentally. Even though when ninjas go out it may be in ones or twos or teams, the mental support of the entire village is behind them. It shouldn't matter that the other two weren't there, they are still a team. But for the other two…I think I underestimated my own team for once. Rin and Obito are just as important to the integrity of the team as Kakashi is. Sometimes you try to change things so that if works out to what you want it to be, to plan everything so it'll go as you expect it to go. But even a Hokage makes mistakes. I was wrong to separate them so."
The Third brought his pipe up to his mouth and puffed out a small cloud of smoke.
"Hindsight is always easy to see. Sometimes, leaders, Kages, are like parents. You spend so much time and energy trying to protect, trying to guide your team into a perfect and safe existence, trying to plan everything out. We're like a parent, never wanting our children, our ninjas to be hurt. The village is like our family. But parents can never replace experience." He tapped his pipe a little before returning it to the corner of his mouth.
"Children always have to get hurt before they learn and undertstand. But sometimes, when they get hurt, it's the parents that learn. You're never too old to learn something new." The Fourth laughed at the look that Sarutobi gave him. He opened his mouth to reply but a sharp voice interrupted him.
"Hokage-sama! Sandaime-sama!" Kyoko, the nurse in charge of Kakashi stood at the opening to the door fuming at the two ninjas.
"Smoking! In a hospital? You two should know better!"
The Third looked at the girl child in front of him, starring him down, daring him to leave without her.
:Never to old to learn something new…or at least remember a lesson forgotten.:
"Go wait outside with the Anbu team, Sakura. We'll bring you back to your team." The bright glow of joy and hope on her face touched him as her mouth opened and closed, unable to express her thanks. She turned to leave and then suddenly spun back and gave him a hug before leaving hurriedly, embarrassed at her own display of affection.
Sarutobi stopped walking down the hall and looked up at the wall where portraits of the Hokages of the Leaf Village of Konoha hung on the wall. He stopped and looked up at the un-lined face of the shyly smiling Yondaime, his hair a bright yellow splash, eyes crinkled in a smile.
"This is your legacy, child. This is your team too, your next generation. Kakashi is as much your son as Hatake's. Guard him well, wherever you are." He kept walking down the hall and stepped out of the building.
Sasu-Naru spun up from their crouch on the ground and landed on their two legs standing straight up on the ground. They turned their face partially and only Naruto's gleaming familiar eye looked back at Kakashi, a slight smirk twitching the corner of his lip.
"Don't worry Kakashi-sensei. We won't let you down. Even if we die, we won't betray the village of Konoha and all that it stands for." A slight shift of the body and Sasuke's side came into view.
"Once we come to agreement, the Spirit lost its total hold on us. We have regained control of our body again, sensei." The solemn boy's dark eyes starred out strongly from under the shaded dark bangs that fell over his forehead.
"Spirit! Get ready to receive a major ass-whooping!" Naruto's unmistakable tone of voice called out in challenge as the boys raced towards the spring. Their hands moved together, unsure at first about how to work together, but then more confidently flashing in a jutsu as a huge fireball was created and shot at the spring.
"No spring means no power!" The fireball blasted at the spring. The water roared up in a furry of giant waves as the Spirit reformed in its physical form on top. Sasu-Naru skidded across the edge of the spring, trying to stay just out of reach of the water's liquid grasp.
:Fools! If I can't use you, then you'll be the first I kill:
AN: Thank you for reading (and reviewing!) You're all so kind to me. I love reading all your comments on this story. I know I'm not a very good writer, but I hope my meager share in the fandom world has perhaps added something to think about at least. Keep reading & revieiw and I'll try to get the next chapter out ASAP. Au Revoir!