Memory 1

.

"Oi! Kakashi! We're having a group match, come on!" yelled one of them. Kakashi knew it was Guy, it had to be Guy, but who cared? He walked on without a word. Out of the corner of his eye, Guy's body language slowly, reluctantly, grew less enthusiastic as he realized Kakashi wasn't going to join in. The wolf ninja walked on. He was eight years old, and the anniversary of his father's death the year before was approaching. Who cared about sparring? Kakashi had a memorial to plan.

He walked past the flower shop. Inoichi sat outside, visibly reminding himself not to reach out and try to talk to Kakashi. Shikaku sighed. Even he, Kakashi thought, did not know the full story behind Kakashi's silence.

Yes, he had gotten quieter in his overall personality since his father had died. Shikaku had no doubt remembered the upcoming date and reasoned that Kakashi had things to plan, too. It brought a little smile to Kakashi's hidden face sometimes, when he thought about how much more than that they didn't know. Keeping secrets held its own strange pleasure. It was the only reason he ever smiled these days.

One of the things they didn't know was that Kakashi had yet to plan anything. Inoichi knew to hold himself back because Kakashi had descended into his own little bubble a full month ago. Yet, he still had not the faintest clue where to start planning a memorial. Kakashi had spent the past month trying to figure out who his father had been and what Hatake Sakumo would have liked. He had also spent the past month failing.

He saw his father as he had seen him that last time, as Sakumo lay curled on the floor. The image floated over Kakashi's eyes, replacing the outside world. His subconscious mind and ninja instincts could deal with navigating reality. Let his real mind float off somewhere else for a time.

Hatake Sakumo was more of a mystery to his own son than he was to anyone else. To anyone else, Sakumo's life and death probably seemed quite simple to explain. He was a strong hearted man, always fighting in one way or another for his friends, village, and, if he could get away with it, for complete strangers too. To have his love spurned by people who would rather die than be saved, would rather kill than live, was utterly confusing, a bizarre part of reality that was just a little too much for his heart to take. These sorts of people had hearts that didn't belong in the version of reality Sakumo saw. And yet, he devoted his life to them. Why? Anyone around the village who knew him could point to this mismatch as the reason why he had lost hope, lost all desire to live.

Kakashi had a different theory. He'd noticed the way his father wore no mask. He'd noticed the way his father could always be located whenever the Hokage or anyone else needed him. He'd noticed the lack of forest smell inside their home, except for when Sakumo took him out as part of his fatherly duties, passing on their heritage and all that. It was confusing. Kakashi's hands tightened in his pockets. Why? Once Kakashi had learned the first thing about his clan, the very first thing, he understood from then on that something was wrong with his father. If they were all half beast, why was his father only ever human? Why did he never take any time to disappear into the other half of his world? Kakashi had learned, too, that masks were common features among his clan. When he was 13, something his father called "fang teeth" would grow in. Kakashi did not know what they would look like because there were surgeries available for them. If someone of his clan wanted to get their fang teeth removed, they could contact certain other members of the clan who had medical training. Sakumo had always, as far as Kakashi could tell, gone maskless. He must have gotten the surgery practically as soon as he could. Why?

Another one of the things nobody knew was just how angry Kakashi was at his father. His theory of Hatake Sakumo's death was simple: He'd died because the human world turned its back on him and he had nowhere else to go. If he'd had anywhere else to go, if Kakashi's father hadn't turned his back on and abandoned his other world first, he would not have died when the human world rejected him. He'd tried too hard to be only half of himself, so when the slightest thing came along to disturb that he was ruined. It was his fault that he'd died! Kakashi's keen analytical mind saw it as similar to a political leader's base. Anyone could see that a full base was better than half of one, and infinitely more stable. For their clan, it was impossible to be completely human, so why try? Kakashi had developed something of an irrational loathing for stupidity in his days sitting alone in the classroom, far ahead of everyone else. Why would his father do something so nonsensical? It was stupid.

It also left Kakashi without any idea of what to do for a memorial. He liked to go out and scent the world, take some time for himself to occasionally run with one or two members of the pack just outside Konoha. This was completely different from what his father had liked, whatever that had been. What did someone who was trying to be fully human like? Kakashi understood that his father had been a nontraditional human, so the majority of traditional gifts were out. Sakumo had died for the sake of human connection, but that couldn't be given as a present. Some part of Kakashi's mind whispered otherwise. Sometimes at night his pulse suddenly rose, his hands clenched into claws, and he was forced awake. Upon awaking, he would be angry, and not know why. He never remembered how human connection could be given as a present. Even after death, it was something Kakashi could give his father. But that thought never intruded on his waking life. Kakashi's temper just flared sometimes for no reason. That was all.

Maybe I could go the other way. If he wanted to be just a human so bad, let him be remembered by wolves. He has to still miss that even if he goes and gets surgery to run away from it, right? Well, yeah. It was plainly obvious to him. They were half wolf, therefore they would always belong with wolves. Kakashi knew for a fact he would always long for the feeling of furry nuzzles, no matter what. Yes; a memorial among wolves would be more appropriate than anything else. Then his father would understand his mistake, and feel sorry, and never do anything so stupid again.

What reason was there for trying so much to be human, anyway? All Kakashi's classmates wanted to do was spar, with weapons and on two legs. All they talked about was human business, missions, who had a crush on who. Kakashi always left the play yard as soon as the last topic was mentioned. He knew from experience it would result in way too many females shyly or boldly claiming him as the target of their affections. About the only thing he liked to participate in was the occasional contest of strength. It was like how the young pups in the pack wrestled, fighting for the right to boss others around. It had been a shock to learn that humans did any of the same things that wolves did. But most of the time it was all talk, and at those times Kakashi drifted away to be anywhere else.

The vision of Hatake Sakumo broke apart. Kakashi's legs twitched. His eyes scanned the ground reflexively, before he reminded himself that he was in a human village, walking along a street populated with people. If there was a snake near anyone's ankles, he would already know. It probably never would have reached this far into the village without someone making up a D-rank mission to catch and kill it. Kakashi doubled his efforts to locate the snake, so he could avoid having to interact with a bunch of obnoxious Genin.

He came to a stop against a signpost covered with flyers. One of them said something about something, all in overly large blue font on an orange background. Kakashi felt like tearing it down for distracting his senses from the intriguing smell. He settled for turning his back to the flyer instead. The more he inhaled, the stranger it became. His first sniff had picked up the most obvious notes, the ones that screamed Get away! and Jump! Every subsequent sniff turned Kakashi's mind on to a growing mystery. Those warning notes sketched the bare skeleton of a serpent's scent, but all the flesh of it was wrong! Kakashi had smelled many snakes in the forest. None were like this. He became as excited as a normal eight year old. This was officially the most interesting thing he'd found ever.

Kakashi tracked the smell to a ramen stand, employing his ninja training so that it wasn't obvious he was following anything at all. He ended up pretending to have his attention caught by an amazing deal on pork ramen. The deal really was amazing; he'd come back and try it, definitely. Kakashi took as much notice of this as he took of the lone customer sitting inside. He saw the standard Konoha uniform; it could have been anyone. But wait; was that a few strands of black interrupting the red spiral?

Kakashi retreated to a safer distance, where the wind could alert him to any movement of the target, but Kakashi would be safely out of sight. He racked his brain for information on the smell capabilities of snakes. He knew they didn't have noses. They smelled with some kind of special things around their tongue somewhere. But how would that translate to a…

Kakashi blinked. Until that thought, he had not been consciously aware of changing his target. He wasn't looking for a snake now. He was thinking about that person he'd seen. His heart beat fast, and something burned in Kakashi's throat. Was it…? Could it be…? He blinked away tears that came from nowhere to invade his eyes. Someone to talk about the forest with… Kakashi's temper flared again. Those were some of his best memories of his father! Why had they not had more?

The target left the ramen stand and began to move south, away from Kakashi. Kakashi headed east, beginning to angle south after a couple blocks. The more leeway he gave the wind, the harder it was, but he was fairly sure the target was still heading south. Eventually, the scent of the target stopped shifting so much, and Kakashi started getting a consistent signal. He must have shortened the distance between them so the wind couldn't change as much. Kakashi followed the scent a little ways north. He'd somehow managed to get in front of the target.

Or behind, as the case may be. The target was facing away from him on a bench, enjoying what seemed to be a popsicle. He was fully relaxed, as leisurely as any shinobi on a day off. Kakashi's jaw dropped open as he recognized one of the Hokage's students, the legendary Sannin! He'd heard of them, of course, but Sannin and Chunin did not go in the same circles at all. Doubly so for Kakashi, who generally did not mingle. To meet one here was an opportunity he might never get again. Kakashi was determined to take full advantage of it, because he only now made the connection between people's whispers of snakelike features and his own desire for someone else like himself. Kakashi berated himself for being stupid. But only for a second, because in another second he was leaving cover and approaching the bench, with no time to focus on anything else.

He reached out and touched the back of the bench, behind and to the left of the Hokage's student. Nothing happened, but Kakashi had no doubt he was not being ignored. "Forest of Death, 5 o'clock, the tallest tree overlooking the tower," Kakashi whispered. He turned and walked away, like he hadn't just changed his life forever.

At 5 o'clock, Kakashi sat in a high branch of the tallest tree overlooking Ground 44's central tower, staring at birds. The birds in this training ground were fascinating. Their appearance was nothing special, but Kakashi loved to stare at their behavior. Ground 44 had left its mark in these birds as clearly as a stamp to their breasts. They fluttered out at the very end of the smallest twigs that would take their weight, every few seconds lifting into the air and settling down again. They paid no mind to the wolf boy sitting there watching them, because if he moved they could easily see him and avoid him. The birds' fluttering was because of all the tree-climbing giant insects and snakes they had to worry about. There could be one clinging to the underside of those twigs right now. Kakashi had the feeling that an experienced birdwatcher could identify exactly what this little patch of the food chain was like from their behavior alone.

The smell of snake came from above. Kakashi couldn't possibly mistake it for a real snake. Not only was it fleshed out wrong, but it had arrived too suddenly for an animal. He continued to stare at the birds. Secretly, his heart was pounding in his chest. Kakashi resisted the urge to fidget his toes. He was very nervous, and very convinced that this was the most important thing in his entire life and he'd better not screw it up.

There was silence for several minutes. Then came a voice. It sighed, almost a part of the wind. "My patience has been rewarded." Kakashi twitched his ears, unsure what to make of it. It was a raspy voice, which would normally be unpleasant, but it worked somehow. Maybe it was more sibilant than raspy. It definitely wasn't the rasp of sickness. Kakashi could live with it very well, he decided.

"What were you waiting for?" he asked.

"A second chance." Kakashi heard that he would not be getting any further explanation.

"Me too," he answered. The Sannin were all around his father's age, of an older generation. Kakashi had realized a long time ago that he'd never actually known anyone like himself. His father would never have looked into the forest like this. Maybe this time could be different. Someone as smart as he was, who looked in the same places, who Kakashi could understand anything about for the first time ever. Of course, he also would not be providing any further explanation.

The Snake Sannin chuckled. "It's been a year, almost. My condolences."

Kakashi couldn't be surprised one of the Sannin knew all about his father. It was one of those stories too interesting not to spread. "I'm trying to think of something, but it's hard," he admitted. "I have no idea what he liked."

"Hmm," the voice said. "Flowers. He appreciated those. I don't recall what kind."

Kakashi immediately had some idea what second chance the Snake Sannin had been waiting for. It wasn't all conscious yet, but he had it. He just had to wait for his thinking mind to piece together what some other part of his mind already had.

"Thank you." Kakashi started to see in his imagination a little stand of flowers next to something of his father's, with the wolves smelling the item and whining their grief. It could definitely work.

"I'm quite happy to help." A dark shape dropped down between Kakashi and the fluttering birds, sandwiching him between it and the tree's trunk. Kakashi would have preferred to be on the outer side so he could keep watching the birds. His hands curled in a quiet show of displeasure and frustration.

The glittering golden snake eyes of the man watching him paid no mind. The Sannin smiled as if nothing was wrong, just two friends having a chat. "I knew him. He was okay. When you know where the memorial will be, let me know."

Kakashi finished sizing up his companion. There was no threat here, and he'd been given the perfect way out of his natural suspicion. "You knew my father?"

The Sannin nodded once. "He was annoying as hell. But I've known worse." His eyes narrowed as if gazing off at something unpleasant.

Kakashi nodded. It sounded like they were in agreement. That nod was the first time he'd admitted to anyone that he had problems with his father. Kakashi consulted his gut and found that it'd been long enough; he had long since stopped giving a crap about what people thought of him. Well, what humans thought of him, anyway. He kept eyes on the Snake Sannin, waiting for some response. A normal person would expect more loyalty to his family. Was the Sannin a normal person, or trustworthy?

The snake was regarding him with the same kind of look. "I hear you're known as a genius. Kakashi, is it? Already a Chunin at your age."

Kakashi nodded. "You're one of the Sannin. The smart one."

A wide involuntary grin spread across the snake's face in a network of spreading cracks. He finally gave up on trying to control it and laughed to himself. "The smart one! I'll have to remember that."

It was difficult to avoid overhearing angry women complaining about the white-haired Sannin, and the other one was known for being stubborn, strong, and more stubborn. Kakashi shrugged. All he knew about this one was that he had also been thought of as a child genius. That was enough.

The Sannin looked at him with approval fresh in his eyes, and obvious confidence that Kakashi was no threat. "I'm Orochimaru. And yes, your father was annoying as hell. He never did any...unusual things, let's call them."

Kakashi's eyes widened. Did they, perhaps, agree for the same reasons? It was a clan secret that they were anything unusual, but then again there wasn't supposed to be anybody outside the clan that was like them. Kakashi still didn't know anything about the smell abilities of snakes, but maybe snakes had some other abilities. If anyone could see past Sakumo's mask, this one could.

Orochimaru shrugged again. "Enough about that. How has it been for you?"

Kakashi looked away. "Annoying," he decided to say. What he really felt was that he'd like to never have to put up with other people again, but that could be construed badly.

Orochimaru chuckled. What did that mean? "I understand that," he muttered. His golden eyes glittered in a strange way. Amusement? Kakashi wondered if he knew what Kakashi had really meant to say. Underneath the underneath. That's where shinobi talk.

The wolf boy shrugged. "What about you?" Spoken underneath the underneath, that translated to: Why are you a snake?

The Sannin looked around. "I discover new things every day in this place. Do you see those birds? I hadn't seen them do that before."

He doesn't know? Kakashi blinked in surprise. How could someone not know why they were half snake? Perhaps - No. He's like me. He looks around places like this. He can't be from my clan, because he would never have gotten the surgery. The Snake Sannin was still watching the birds, looking away from Kakashi. Kakashi watched him with full focus. A mystery, then. It was difficult for someone like Kakashi to find mysteries. He knew then that he would always be on the lookout for this man, who held the first mystery.

He looked away as Orochimaru turned back. "I have," he said. Underneath the underneath: I have mystery too. Look for me.

The Sannin shifted. "I could use a little snack," he murmured softly. Kakashi's jaw dropped open again. That was really forward! It was...exactly what he wanted. Kakashi was pretty sure he wasn't supposed to be hunting with someone he barely knew. If we're the same… But who cared about caution or manners? It wasn't like Kakashi had ever gone hunting with his father, or anyone else. His eyes started to hurt. Kakashi leaped from the tree, reaching the ground and gaining control of himself before it was noticeable.

The slightest puffing sound of earth squishing announced Orochimaru landing behind him. "There." And he was off, leaving Kakashi with the choice to follow or not. He hadn't really been invited, after all. Kakashi felt that was one message there was no need to say this way, since he didn't actually have any choice. Not if he planned to live with himself after today. He inhaled the thick scents of the forest and plunged forward, after his new companion.

.

The hunt was...okay. It wasn't quite what Kakashi had hoped for. It struck him as more like the hunt of two shinobi, rather than the hunt of two beasts. He'd had to actually see Orochimaru at one point, and exchange hand signals. Hand signals! But after all, he had no idea what kind of prey a human-sized snake would select to pursue, nor what hunting style such a snake would have. Would he prefer to make the killing blow from ambush, or run the prey down, or end its life with a highly efficient kunai and call it done? In return, Kakashi had had to signal his own intent to chase the prey, which he felt should have been obvious from his canine heritage, but he wasn't hunting with a mind reader. Without the hand signals, the choice of prey would have escaped him for certain. Kakashi swallowed frustration and promised himself that it would get better if they hunted together again. This was how two hunters came to know each other. In the meantime, he peeled his segment of giant centipede very carefully so there would be no exoskeleton shards in the flesh.

Orochimaru finished first and rolled the soft flesh around his mouth. "Interesting texture," he commented. He seemed to like it well enough.

Kakashi hesitated after peeling his segment. The mask rule was very clear: it could only be taken off around others of the clan, and only under conditions of assured secrecy. If he was with an outsider or there was the slightest chance an outsider could be watching, no taking it off. Kakashi was happy enough with his cloth uniform and how it got stains which needed to be washed out, thus giving him excuses to be by himself on missions. He'd be damned more than he already was if he put in all the effort to learn the super secret eating and drinking techniques, though. His father wasn't knowledgeable on them anyway. The mask was the first item of clothing Kakashi replaced with darkness, after the first teaching session of the secret eating techniques. He pretended allowing food to pass through his darkness was jutsu mastery the next time, and they'd both been relieved. His father had never even asked how Kakashi mastered that so fast. Still Kakashi hesitated. This outsider was an excellent shinobi who could probably tell he wasn't using special eating techniques, but the real reason that Kakashi hesitated was because he wasn't sure if he wanted to keep his mask on now. They were alike.

Orochimaru swallowed and looked sideways at his young friend. "I need something to call you," he announced. "How do you feel about Puppy?"

Kakashi looked at him with a bewildered look that said, Why would you ever suggest that? "You're weird," he retorted.

Orochimaru stayed silent, but his eyes changed. He seemed to be looking somewhere else again. Kakashi swung his legs back and forth off the side of the branch. "It's fine." It was accurate because Kakashi was still a pup, and revealed that the snake definitely did know what species he and his father were. Thoughts raced through Kakashi's mind. Annoying as hell. No unusual things. He was fine. Kakashi at age 4, wondering why his father wouldn't come hunting with him and the rest of the pack. Kakashi's heart beating too fast just an hour ago from the thought of someone like himself.

Is he like me? Did he wonder about someone like himself too? But my father can't be that. He won't talk with anyone about the forest…

Kakashi pushed himself upright and pulled his mask down. He sank his teeth into the centipede's flesh, wincing at its strange texture. No matter. He tolerated it well enough, ripping it to shreds before swallowing it all at once. His teeth were the teeth of a wolf, but much smaller and malformed. Kakashi had no idea if his father had known about this or not. All Sakumo had said was that the fang-teeth would grow in at 13, and he would have to wear a mask to cover them because it was a clan secret. Or, Sakumo had sheepishly scratched his head and muttered, there are ways to get the fang teeth removed after they grow in. They aren't really necessary or anything… Even at three years old, Kakashi felt that his father was telling him a great insult. Teeth connected to wolves, which were his family. If Father was trying to accuse him of wanting to leave his family…! Sakumo had explained all this with Kakashi's first mask, if he chose to wear it, there on the cushion beside them. Kakashi had snatched it up and held it over his mouth, fury blazing in his eyes.

Sakumo definitely had not known at that time. The mask was offered as a choice because, for most of the clan, it was one. All Hatake clan members effectively had to choose between accepting their fang teeth or not at a very young age. If they needed more time to make that decision, the price was having to invent a plausible reason for suddenly starting to wear a mask years into their career. For Kakashi, wearing a mask was a given. The fact that his father had acted as if he had a choice was proof that he had known nothing of his son's dentition. Not when the wolf boy was three years old, anyway. Kakashi didn't wear a mask all the time, so his father could have found out at some other time, like when Kakashi was sleeping. Probably he didn't. That made Orochimaru the first human person to know, Kakashi realized. He licked his lips and settled into his meal without looking at Orochimaru, as if this was normal.

He pulled his mask up and scrutinized Orochimaru's every move after he was done eating. The Snake Sannin was also pretending nothing was unusual at all. When he was done, he looked away from Kakashi, at the remains of the giant insect. "That looks like dinner for another two days," the snake announced. "Unless you want any, of course."

Kakashi shook his head. Meals ought to be an experience. Chase squirrels or go out, that was what he did. Storing food seemed too unexciting to bother with.

Orochimaru shrugged. "In that case, it's mine." He tore off the insect's plates of armor, leaving the rest flexible and able to be rolled into a small ball. "Puppy?"

Kakashi was still scrutinizing his every move. Revealing his teeth for the first time was a very big deal. He wondered if he'd done it right, if it hadn't been maybe a little foolish to just trust his instincts and go for it. Should he have thought more, or did overthinking spoil the moment? Kakashi pondered using his other powers to remove Orochimaru's memory if he laughed or told anyone or otherwise ruined the sanctity of this occasion. Revealing his teeth was something he should only do with someone he really trusted. Dammit! Why hadn't Kakashi held off, waited until he could at least hunt with this guy?

"I'd like to hunt with you again," Orochimaru said. He was as relaxed as he had been before, like he was on vacation. "As long as you keep this just for us. Will you do that, Puppy?" Thus Orochimaru unwittingly saved his memories.

Kakashi nodded. The Snake Sannin sensed this even with his back turned to the boy, and nodded back. "In that case, we might have something fruitful in time."

.

A week later, Kakashi found a note under his door with a location in Ground 16 and a time. As he returned from that, his nose picked up a strange smell. It was an extremely faint trail of centipede. Kakashi followed it to a house that smelled of snake, with mingled human scents overlaid. He slipped a note under the door next time, and from then on it alternated.

The memorial was three weeks after that first meeting. Kakashi told several people something vague about the chosen site being personally important to his father. Some of the other students who came jumped when the wolves unexpectedly showed up, but Kakashi continued on with his business, giving them no opportunity to leave. The white-haired Sannin came, and the other one too, both following Orochimaru's lead. They paid their respects as colleagues. Orochimaru paid his respects with a certain something in his body language to indicate he'd known Sakumo as just a little more. The whaite-haired Sannin looked wistful for some reason. Kakashi pretended to be a small child after the memorial and asked about it. The white-haired Sannin mentioned that his teammate had never had many friends, and he'd hoped things would go well with Sakumo. He lacked knowledge of why it hadn't. The blond Sannin had no reactions of interest to either of her teammates.

Kakashi confirmed his suspicions several meetings later, when Orochimaru led him to a small and quiet place and proceeded to rant about Jiraiya, his white-haired teammate, for several minutes. His body language indicated there was a little more there. Kakashi didn't ask about it. The way Orochimaru mentioned their time apart from the rest of the village was changing. Two meetings ago, Orochimaru had canceled. Kakashi had dropped by his house and tasted something very disturbed in the scent there. Orochimaru had been quiet in the meeting before the one where he ranted, always staring off at something else and telling Kakashi to "always, always watch out. People can fool themselves as well as everyone else. You have to be able to see them for what they are, even if they don't." His hands stayed curled that time, and Kakashi had been motivated to try to offer comfort. He couldn't remember ever trying to comfort someone before. It didn't help very much. Orochimaru had left that meeting just as tense as before, so Kakashi wasn't surprised that he'd turned angry and started ranting this time.

Kakashi left with Orochimaru's rant still in his ears, and very worried. There had been several mentions of the village in there, as if Jiraiya stood in Orochimaru's mind as a representative of Konoha in general. With that in mind, the things he'd had to say about Jiraiya could be construed very, very badly. Kakashi puzzled over the content of that rant all the next day, until he was assigned a difficult mission. It was all about the past: Jiraiya was always like this, even as a kid he was, you could tell he was going to be a moron, let me tell you about this one mission he did that sums up everything about him. The mission in question was Jiraiya's quest to find some mythical creature in the mountains, and he'd apparently come back with some exaggerated tales of fighting the creature, which he had clearly failed to find, all drawn in crayon. Kakashi doubted the reality of the crayon. But more importantly, why now? Why tip over these unshared grievances and spill them out to Kakashi now? He itched to know what had happened. It must have been something very important and very bad.

Kakashi was not surprised when Orochimaru left the village a year later, and even less surprised when Jiraiya failed to convince him to stay. He considered telling Jiraiya that something had been wrong, but thought better of it. What could change now? Most likely, that event the year before was only one of several things. It wouldn't help Jiraiya anyway, to be blaming himself in addition to grieving over Orochimaru's defection. Kakashi kept silent on the outside.

On the inside, he mourned their time together. Somehow, it was easier to be with normal people once he had hunted with someone like himself. The fact that they weren't like him was far less irritating after that. Kakashi began to count Guy as a friend, and Asuma, and also Rin and Obito. He probably should have started with his teammates, but they had too many accumulated memories of his coldness to warm up to him very quickly. Rin came around first. Kakashi thanked everything he could thank for her being very subtle about her affections. Obito was weird and harder for Kakashi to understand than anyone else, but he found his reserves of patience had somehow expanded after a month and a half of understanding Orochimaru and being understood. So he made kind-of friends with Obito too. Obito's patience was not so expanded, probably because he didn't have any family or other friends beyond Rin and Kakashi. That might turn into a problem. Kakashi thought of keeping an eye on him in case Obito's optimism failed to hold him high enough to compensate.

But still Kakashi could be found once a week, swinging his legs back and forth on a tall tree in the Forest of Death. He wondered how Orochimaru was doing, if the Snake Sannin was alright, and if their paths would come together again. Sometimes a serpent would slither by, and it would not bite. Kakashi drew everything Orochimaru had done for him around himself like a cloak, and promised himself they would. They were alike. If their paths did not draw together again, it would be a sign that reality was incorrect. Kakashi couldn't fix it, but he was aware of his power to break it.

.

A/N: I've said this story started as a thought experiment, with a few scenes to illustrate it. The Memories are those scenes. I have 3 planned as of now. No, I don't know why I thought this was a good place to insert the first one. I just did.