Chapter Five: The Awakening
The last thing that Kakashi expected after completing an S rank mission was an ambush. It was a running morbid joke among the jonins and Anbu of Konoha that S ranked missions were called that for a reason, the S stood for suicidal, yet for Team Ro - the most stacked team in terms of ability - that meant they got out with a couple of wounds, nothing too major, but severely chakra depleted.
And normally that wouldn't be too much of a hindrance for Team Ro, as their taijutsu skill was good enough for them to beat normal jonins, but the group that ambushed them weren't normal jonins. They were a group of S ranked missing nins of various origins, hired by some client that Team Ro undoubtedly pissed off during their slew of assasination missions to assassinate them. The handsome sum of money, plus the high bounties on their heads was more than enough of an incentive for them to attack.
When they attacked, Kakashi had about less than a quarter of his reserves left, which was slowly dwindling as Obito's Sharingan still greedily sucking up his reserves. Using his sharingan had been out of the question, that would only serve to drain his reserves at an exponential rate so Kakashi merely relied on his battle experience to predict the enemies' moves.
The Uchiha cousins were in slightly better condition that Kakashi, with about a third of their reserves left, but Itachi had suffered a grave arm wound during the completion of their mission. It hindered his movements and the enemies capitalized upon that, striking at his left side at every chance they got. Shisui tried his best to cover for Itachi, but the enemy nins noticed that and successfully launched an attack that separated the two Uchiha cousins.
Shisui was stalling, throwing a handful of shuriken and kunai at his enemy opponents. He vaguely registered the enemy insulting him, saying something along the lines of he was weaker than they had expected, but Shisui was too focused on layering genjutsu over the entire clearing to care.
The rowdy nin was the first to get caught in the genjutsu, evident as his attention was no longer fixated on Shisui. Instead, he turned towards his comrade and began attacking, causing a string of expletives to slip out of his mouth.
The cursing stopped as soon as the genjutsu took hold and the comrade switched from being on defense to offense.
Shisui lifted his right hand, placing two fingers in his mouth before whistling out the code for retreat. From the branches, Shisui could see Kakashi eyeing his enemies in suspicion as they turned on each other and retreated cautiously. Itachi took the opportunity to scramble away, having scored another wound, but he had been too careless. Itachi didn't notice the enemy nin diving after him, sword swinging to slice him in half. Lightning crackled, running all along the length of the sword.
Shisui's sharingan began spinning wildly as his eyes saw the outcome. Grabbing Itachi by the shoulder strap of his Anbu uniform, Shisui yanked him behind him right as the sword came down on the two of them. Shisui let out a grunt as he felt the sword digging into his side, the lightning chakra frying some of his nerves.
He attempted another genjutsu, although it was nowhere near as elaborate as his previous one, and the rogue Mist nin didn't seem to be affected in the slightest. Shisui managed to block the nin's next blow. Upon realizing that it was merely a distraction and that the nin's real target was Itachi, Shisui's body moved out of instinct and took the sword that was meant for Itachi.
Straight through the stomach.
Kakashi dove into the fray, tossing a kunai with an explosive tag at the end of it along with a smoke bomb. He grabbed Shisui by the shoulder, pulling him out of the nin's sword and grabbed Itachi by the wrist, before using the last of his reserves to teleport the three of them away from the battlefield.
Kakashi huffed from the exertion, slightly stumbling as he landed, knees buckling under Shisui's weight. Besides him, Itachi fared no better, face contorted in pain as his shaking hands reached in his weapons pouch for a roll of bandages. Using his right hand and his teeth, Itachi began to wrap up his arm.
They were still too close for comfort and too far away from Konoha, but Kakashi needed to do something about Shisui or else he would die before they could reach the village. Pulling out Rin's medical kit, the one that she gave him as a jonin gift, Kakashi began to pile on gauzes, both on Shisui's stomach and on his backside. The blood seeped through the gauzes at an alarming rate.
"Itachi, come help me," Kakashi ordered through gritted teeth as he placed even more pressure on Shisui's wound. Obediently, Itachi was immediately at Kakashi's side, his own wound halfway bandaged. Itachi took over pressing the gauzes over Shisui's wound as Kakashi rummaged through the medic kit for anything else of use.
"He's losing a lot of blood," Itachi informed Kakashi after a minute had passed.
Kakashi spared one glance at Shisui, noting his complexion getting paler and breathing becoming shallower by the second. He yanked the Anbu armor over his head, before taking off his undershirt. Ripping the shirt in half, Kakashi knotted the two ends together, using it as a makeshift bandage and tied it around Shisui's waist, as tightly as he could. After pulling back on his armor, he reached for Shisui's arm, swinging it over his shoulder while Itachi did the same on his other side.
"We have ten minutes to get him to Konoha's hospital before he bleeds out," Kakashi informed Itachi.
"But Konoha is twelve minutes away," Itachi said.
"Exactly." Nothing more needed to be said, using the last dredges of their chakra, the two men darted into the woods at an alarming speed. Every muscle in Kakashi burned, especially with Shisui's added weight, and he knew that his own body was reaching his limit. It was pure adrenaline that kept him on his feet, and continued to push him towards the direction of Konoha.
Itachi was determined to not let his cousin die. Beyond being family, Shisui was also a lot of things, his mentor and best friend. Itachi couldn't imagine a future without Shisui with him, constantly seeking him out for missions or being his sole confidant when Itachi wanted to complain about his father's actions.
Relief had never coursed through them so strongly before when the two men saw Konoha's gates in the distance. Seeing their destination so near spurred the two of them to quicken their pace even further, crossing into the village by the nine minute mark.
The chunin on duty attempted to stop them, but Kakashi and Itachi deftly ignored them and continued to make a beeline to the hospital. The chunin took the hint and one of them darted off to inform the Hokage of the situation.
Ignoring the horrified, curious, and shocked stares from shinobi and civilians alike as Kakashi and Itachi carried a dying Shisui between them through the streets, they pushed forward. The crowd parted for them, understanding the gravity of the situation. A medic nin in training emerged from the crowd and attempted to stop the blood flow on their way to the hospital.
Barely two steps into the hospital, Kakashi felt his knees giving out from underneath him. The tiled hospital floor was rapidly approaching...before everything went dark.
The hospital erupted into chaos as three Anbu members dragged themselves into the hospital, leaving behind a trail of blood. The man in the white hair had been the first to collapse face first onto the ground. Itachi Uchiha stumbled at the loss of Kakashi's support on Shisui's other side.
Two nurses came wheeling a bed towards them. Itachi was separated from Shisui, as the two nurses lifted Shisui onto the bed. Gari, the head doctor of the critical condition department, appeared checking for a pulse as the nurses wheeled Shisui towards one of the operating rooms. Itachi lumbered after them, ignoring the protests from the nurses that he needed to get his arm checked out.
"Dead on sight," Gari announced, hands moving to already take off his blood stained latex gloves.
Dead? No it couldn't be, Itachi tried to convince himself, but Gari's words continually rang in his ears over and over again. Itachi felt his Sharingan activating against his own will, the three tomoes morphing into a different pattern, allowing Itachi to see the world with more clarity. Allowing him to see Shisui's dead body with more clarity before Itachi promptly passed out on the hallway floor.
Rin overheard the commotion and appeared just as Gari announced that the Uchiha was dead on sight. Right as the nurses began to wheeling Shisui in the direction of the morgue, Rin barked orders at them to move him to the operating room and set up a blood transfusion stat. Shoving aside Gari, ignoring his protests about how she was violating hospital protocol, Rin's hands glowed green as she rapidly mended the ruptured blood vessels.
She knew she had approximately five minutes. Five minutes until brain damage began to occur. Those incompetent nurses were nowhere to be seen by the time Rin was done repairing all of the damage to Shisui's blood vessels; instead it was Izumi who appeared with a single bag of type A blood. Immediately, Izumi worked on hooking up the blood transfusion while Rin began to perform CPR, hoping to get his heart pumping again once blood entered his system.
Two minutes later, his heart was stayed still.
"There's not enough blood," Izumi informed her as the first bag was almost drained.
Rin stuck out her left arm in response. "I'm type A."
Izumi looked hesitant to follow through, but stuck the needle in Rin's arm anyways and began drawing blood. Rin hardly noticed as her right hand was still trying to do everything that she could to get his heart started again.
Civilian methods of jumpstarting his heart wasn't working so Rin sent a jolt of chakra through Shisui's system, hoping that it would be enough. It wasn't. Rin tried again, only to end up with the same result.
By the time that Rin had approximately forty five seconds left until brain damage began to occur, she was running out of options. She had gone through every method in the many medical texts at how to restart a heart, but nothing was working. At this point, most doctors would have declared Shisui to be dead, but Rin wasn't giving up.
"Should I get the AED?" Izumi asked.
"No time," Rin replied, hating herself for not remembering about the device that civilian doctors used. The AED sends a shock wave through the body and so using the same principle, if Rin added lightning nature to the chakra she sent through Shisui's body, it should work. Theoretically.
Rin didn't have time to contemplate on all of the things that could go wrong, like if her lightning nature proved to be too strong for the human body to handle. Twenty seconds left, it was Rin's final option to save him.
Thump.
It was barely there, but as seconds passed, the thumping became more prominent and consistent. Relief coursed through her body as her hand glowed green, closing the stomach wound completely. Izumi's hands joined hers, speeding up the process. A few tears slid down Izumi's cheeks.
"We almost lost him," Izumi whispered.
Rin burned through the remaining of her chakra reserves, before she unlocked another reservoir. The glow on her hand was even stronger than before.
When the wound finally closed, Rin resisted the urge to collapse onto the floor, partly out of exhaustion and lightheadedness from the blood she gave to Shisui. Rin unhooked the blood transfusion, deeming that Shisui's blood amount was more than enough to pull him through the next twenty four hours, the most critical hours of his life.
"Put him in ICU," Rin ordered. "Make sure someone is monitoring him for the next twenty four hours."
Izumi nodded and left the room to make the appropriate preparations while Rin stumbled out of the operating room. Apparently, fate didn't want her to catch a break as Rin registered that Gari was marching towards her, the anger written all over his face. Rin attempted to act busy, grabbing the nearest nurse to inquire about the other Uchiha's condition, but to no avail. Rin felt a hand on her shoulder, his grip tightened and whirled her around to face him. Behind her, Rin could feel the nurse muttering a quick apology before scrambling away in haste.
"How dare you disobey my orders!" Gari roared, his voice booming throughout the hallway. If Rin had been a bit braver, she might have snarked at him to keep his voice down since they were still in the hospital. "If it wasn't for the fact that you were Tsunade's pupil, you would have never gotten to where you are right now."
Of course, Gari had to bring his personal vendetta against her into this.
"I saved his life," Rin countered.
"You act so arrogant right now, but what if you hadn't succeeded? The Uchiha clan will be out for my head."
"Well you deserve it," Rin retorted, without a single ounce of compassion in her voice. "You're the one who left him to die. Even if I failed, at least I tried!"
"Oh your success has made you gutsy now, huh? Just you wait, not even being the Fourth Hokage's pupil will be enough to save you from your punishment. Now-"
Rin didn't care and didn't bother to listen to what Gari was saving. Not when another medic bursted out of the neighboring operating room, saying something about Itachi Uchiha and dying in short clipped fragments. However that was enough to propel Rin into action, grabbing the medic by his arm, dragging him back into the operating room alongside her.
From somewhere behind her, Gari was still yelling at her, screaming orders most likely, but frankly, Rin didn't give a damn. If it had been up to him, both Uchihas would most likely die.
"What's wrong?" Rin asked as she automatically channelled chakra to her hands, hovering them over Itachi's body.
"His chakra levels keep draining and we don't know how to stop it," the medic explained hurriedly. "At this rate, his chakra will be completely depleted."
Rin frowned as she ordered for the medic to fix up Itachi's arm. Closing her eyes in concentration, she reached out into the room to feel for Itachi's chakra. Like any other shinobi, Itachi's chakra was concentrated at his core, with chakra running evenly through his network. Except, it seemed that more chakra than normal was flowing upwards. Locking into that feeling, Rin found the particular chakra pathway that was sucking his chakra away.
His eyes.
Rin's eyes snapped open as she lifted two fingers to Itachi's eye, prying open his eyelids to confirm her suspicion. As expected, his Sharingan was still activated albeit it was in an unfamiliar pattern. An advanced form of the Sharingan? Even if that was the case, Itachi was an Uchiha, which meant he should be able to deactivate it.
There were two options. Either Rin found a way to wake Itachi up and be able to orient him to the point where he could deactivate his eyes himself, or she would have to forcibly deactivate it. Judging from Itachi's low chakra levels, the former wasn't an option.
That meant…
"You," Rin ordered, making the younger medic's attention snap to her. "Bring Izumi Uchiha here." With a nod, the medic practically bolted from the operating room, understanding the gravity of the situation. Rin took over healing Itachi's arm wound, noting the bacterial infection, while constantly monitoring his chakra levels.
There wasn't enough to keep him alive for Rin to figure out a way to deactivate his Sharingan.
But she would be damned if she let him die on her.
Rin activated her strength of hundred seals, letting the black markings run down her face before extending to her torso and limbs. Propping Itachi up into a sitting position and maneuvering his body so that his back was now facing her, Rin placed both of her hands on his shoulders.
Using the precision that she was known for, Rin manipulated her chakra in her hands to match the flow of Itachi's own chakra before pushing her chakra through. She could practically feel his discomfort, but to be fair, Rin hadn't really mastered chakra transfer quite yet, but it was working. Itachi's Sharingan greedily latched onto her chakra and began to drain it, at an alarming rate.
Just like the Sharingan drained Kakashi's chakra at an exponential rate, Itachi's was doing the same to her because they weren't Uchihas. Even with her vast reserves, courtesy of constantly storing away Isobu's chakra, Rin knew that she could keep this up for eight minutes max before Itachi burned through her reserves.
In the next moment, Izumi bursted into the operating room, fear for her childhood friend written all over her face.
"Izumi, I need you to concentrate," Rin ordered her. Wiping the stray tears off of her face, Izumi nodded, standing a bit taller in a show of her resolve. "How do you force someone to deactivate a Sharingan?"
Izumi frowned. "Usually, when Uchihas first unlock their Sharingan, they can't control it, so their parents or someone with a more developed Sharingan can use their eyes to force them to deactivate it."
Rin nodded. "Go get me the most advanced Sharingan user. You have six minutes before he dies."
"Hai!" Izumi's voice quivered. With one last glance at Itachi, Izumi disappeared in a puff of smoke.
Now that Izumi was gone, Rin placed her entire attention, constantly molding and manipulating her chakra in hopes that her chakra would feel less intrusive to his system. By the fourth minute, Rin managed to figure out the exact mix of Itachi's chakra and worked to imitate it.
Six minutes had passed and Rin feared the worst. Was Izumi not able to find someone in time? In another minute, Rin would burn through the last of her reserves. She still had Isobu's massive pool of chakra to tap into, but she wouldn't be able to utilize her perfect chakra control on such a massive quantity. If she tried channelling that through Itachi, it might end up killing him before chakra depletion did.
Thirty seconds left, a man that Rin recognized to be the head of the Uchiha clan barged into the operating room, with Izumi following closely behind.
"I need you to use your Sharingan to deactivate his," Rin told him calmly.
"What happened to my son?" Fugaku demanded. "What are those black markings? What are you doing to him?"
"With all due respect Uchiha san, your son has approximately eight seconds to live, so please do as I say." Grudgingly Fugaku allowed his black eyes to bleed red, forming three tomoes before spinning into a pattern that looked vaguely similar to Itachi's, except the black was thinner and the three tomoes were still present.
Nodding at Izumi, Rin released her connection with Itachi, allowing the black markings to recede. Ignoring the wave of exhaustion that hit her, Rin worked to pry Itachi's eyelids open in his right eye while Izumi did the same to his left.
"The Mangekyo," Fugaku whispered in awe before a burst of chakra was emitted into the room. The redness in Itachi's eyes slowly faded before returning to its normal black color. Rin gently laid Itachi back down on the bed.
"Thank you for your assistance," Rin said, addressing Fugaku. Fugaku gave a head nod in response, mouth opening like he wanted to say something but refrained when Rin swayed on her feet.
"Are you alright?" Izumi asked. Rin waved off her concern.
"His Sharingan sucked more chakra than I anticipated. I'll be fine after I rest. Get an antibiotic shot for Uchiha san; his wound was infected." Izumi nodded, eyes filled with concern as she wordlessly left the room.
Rin ambled her way out of the operating room, too tired to bother kicking out Fugaku. Luckily this time there was no Gari around to attack her the moment she appeared. With a hand pressed against the wall, Rin slowly made her way in the direction of her office as black spots began to dance around in her vision.
By some miracle, Rin successfully reached her office. After shutting the door behind her, Rin promptly collapsed onto the cot. And proceeded to sleep through the entire day.
"Shisui!" Itachi woke up with a jolt. Scrambling, Itachi pushed himself into a sitting position, eyes already drinking in his surroundings. On the bed next to him, Itachi registered Kakashi's presence, but Shisui was nowhere to be seen. His hand reached to pull the needles out of his arm, but Mikoto entered the room at the moment. Horrified at what she was seeing, Mikoto immediately rushed to Itachi's side, placing her hands over his, stopping his movement.
"Kaa san." Itachi acknowledged. Mikoto reached for the pillow, propping it upright. Itachi allowed himself to relax upon seeing the no nonsense expression on his mother's face.
"You had me so worried," Mikoto chided. "The least you can do is to stay still so you can recover properly."
"Ahhh Uchiha san, Itachi isn't the type to stay still," Kakashi interjected. A grimace graced his features as Kakashi pushed himself into an upright position, the blanket pooling in his lap. If Mikoto was annoyed that an outsider was interrupting their conversation, she didn't show it.
"Shisui, he's-" Itachi struggled to find the words.
"Safe. Izumi chan informed me that he's out of critical condition," Mikoto informed Itachi. "Don't worry about him. Both of you need to focus on recovering."
"Safe?" Itachi echoed. "But the medic declared dead on site."
Kakashi's visible eye widened a fraction of an inch; this was the first that he was hearing this. Then again, he had practically collapsed the moment he stepped foot into the hospital.
"Izumi told me that a young girl was able to save him. She saved you from chakra exhaustion. Your father didn't want to admit it, but he's grateful to the girl, even if she broke a lot of regulations in doing so. However, that's for the council to decide."
"What happened?" It was Kakashi who asked. "Why is she in trouble?"
"There's a lot of different rumors on what exactly happened, but the girl disobeyed her superior's orders. And apparently, she didn't follow medical procedure when she was saving Shisui's life."
"Her superior's orders to let Shisui die?" Itachi questioned through gritted teeth. "Who is he? I'll set him straight for her." Itachi wasn't the type to threaten a person, but it pissed him off that the superior had so blatantly dismissed Shisui's condition, to pronounce him dead without even trying. And he was pissed that their savior was currently in hot water with her higher ups, all because she tried to save his life.
"Do you know the girl's name?"
Mikoto shook her head. "Izumi chan knows, ah there she is."
Izumi's timing was flawless; she entered the room at that moment, looking curiously between the occupants at the fallen silence.
"I didn't interrupt anything, did I?"
"No," Mikoto assured her. "In fact, Itachi was just inquiring the name of the medic who saved Shisui's life."
"Ah yeah. Rin Nohara, the girl that was with me when you saved us from Mist nins, a while back, remember her?"
Itachi nodded, filing a mental note to express his gratitude for saving both of their lives.
"Rin is so cool," Izumi continued, not really caring if anyone was listening. "Nobody really liked Gari to begin with; ever since he got promoted, he acts like he's better than everyone else. Seeing Rin snap at him was the best thing ever. And the way that Rin single handedly revived Shisui was so amazing. She was donating blood to him while she tried to restart his heart. I've never seen anything like that before, using lightning nature to shock his heart into restarting."
"Lightning nature?" Mikoto questioned. "Wouldn't that fry his system?"
Izumi shrugged. "I think Rin's affinity with lightning is so weak that it didn't do much damage. I think some of his chakra networks might have been affected, but that can be fixed."
"I heard that she saved me too," Itachi prodded.
"Your Sharingan was still activated and wouldn't turn off. It was sucking away at your chakra reserves and at the rate you were going, you would have died from chakra depletion. Rin transferred her chakra to you to stall for time while I went to find Fugaku san so he could deactivate your sharingan. It took up the rest of her chakra reserves, so Rin's still recovering, last I checked."
"Please invite the girl over for dinner once she is fully recovered," Mikoto instructed. "You are also invited, Izumi chan."
Izumi frowned. "I'm not sure when that will be. Rin will need to appear before the council to be charged for her actions. Gari knows that he won't get anywhere with taking it up to the head of the hospital, so it brought it before the council, where the older geezers are more likely to agree with him."
"Don't worry about it. I will speak to the other clan heads on the behalf of Nohara san." After all, that was the least that Mikoto could do for the girl. She had faith that the Fourth Hokage wouldn't let anything happen to her, but the more support he had, the easier time he had.
A few hours later, Kakashi snuck out of the hospital through the open window while Itachi had snuck to visit Shisui. Despite being forced on bed rest due to chakra exhaustion, the two of them left clones albeit weak ones, in their stead.
Kakashi paced back and forth in front of the Nara compound, wondering if it was appropriate to just waltz in. He didn't think so, but there was also no one in sight, who could bring him in. Kakashi settled for whistling out an Anbu code, one that confirmed his identity as Hound, on the off chance that Shikaku Nara was nearby. Perhaps cloud watching or playing shogi on his patio.
He kicked a small pebble with his right foot as he waited. During the next three minutes, Kakashi contemplated his next move if no one showed up. Would he just enter the compound or would he try to find Shikaku later? But Shikaku did invite the team to visit him anytime...or had those words just been out of courtesy?
Kakashi cursed his overactive mind and figured there was no harm in trying. Only to turn around to see that Shikaku had snuck up to him. Instinctively, he backed up two steps, putting some distance between him and the intimidating man.
"Took you long enough to come visit," Shikaku grunted. "Come on."
Kakashi followed Shikaku to his house, taking a seat on the patio while Shikaku muttered something about making tea. He eyed the shogi board next to him, the pieces already set up for a new game and briefly wondered if Shikaku just wanted him to play a game of shogi. Was it bad that the first time Kakashi appeared was to ask him for a favor?
"Here." Kakashi accepted the tea with a thank you, holding the warm mug between his hands to humor the man. It wasn't like he was going to drink it in front of Shikaku, not if it meant he would have to take off his mask. Shikaku merely shrugged, not seeming to care as he took a sip from his own mug.
"So what gives? You must be desperate for something if you tried to find me here."
"I have a favor to ask."
Shikaku sighed. "Don't we all? Shoot kid. I'll hear you out only because you didn't cause me any trouble while you were on my team."
And Kakashi did, telling him everything that he knew from Mikoto and Izumi as well as overhearing some of the hospital staff's gossip. At one point, Kakashi had confronted a nurse to clarify what he overheard, but she had been too tongue tied to give him coherent information.
Shikaku nodded in appropriate intervals while his gaze were fixated on the clouds that floated above them. A nice, cloudy day and Shikaku would have let his mind wander to guess the shapes of the clouds if it wasn't for the white haired nin.
"So you want me to make a biased decision based on incomplete information?" Shikaku questioned, head turning so that his gaze rested on Kakashi.
"Yes."
Well at least the kid was gutsy enough to follow through, Shikaku mused. There was a lot more to Kakashi than Shikaku originally thought.
"Well I'm not going to do that," Shikaku told Kakashi honestly. "As a trusted advisor to the Hokage, I can't make biased decisions like that. However, if all that you've said is true, then I am sure that your comrade won't be in any trouble. Besides, there's another way you can help her besides asking me for a favor."
"How?"
"The council is comprised of prominent clan heads and higher ups in some of the shinobi divisions in Konoha. You realize that the Hatake clan's seat in the council has been empty since your father died, right?"
When Kakashi shook his head, Shikaku sighed. Clearly no one bothered to explain anything to him; perhaps they thought Kakashi was too young to be on the council. And well, Kakashi wasn't the type to express an interest in being on the council to begin with. Most days, Shikaku found council meetings to troublesome himself.
"Does it still count if I'm the only member of the clan though?" Kakashi pointed out.
"Hypothetically, there are still some distinct relatives wandering around...the council can't refute that. It might also help that the Fourth Hokage likes you and most of the clan heads like you because you've dragged one of their members back from death sometime or another. But that's just what I think."
"I understand. Thank you, taichou."
"None of that. I'm no longer your taichou. I heard you were leading your own platoon now?"
Kakashi nodded and told him about his new team, making sure to gloss over any details that would reveal their identities. Of course, nothing got past Shikaku.
"They wouldn't happen to be the same people that your comrade risked her career to save, would they?"
Kakashi's silence told Shikaku everything that he needed to know.
"Welp, you better get going if you want to guarantee yourself a seat on the council tomorrow."
Shikaku smiled as the boy immediately disappeared in a puff of smoke, so much without a word of goodbye.
Kids these days, how troublesome.
A/N: Hi again!
Hope you enjoyed this chapter! In the very early, early drafts of this story, this was supposed to be the opening scene for this story, but I decided to give some background. But technically this is the first chapter that starts the "actual" story, so I'm super excited to share the following chapters with you as well because well, the plot is beginning. :)
The semester is going to begin for me next week, so for the last couple of days, I'm going to be writing as much as I possibly can so I can have content to post since I am terrible at keeping up with writing during the semester lol.
Thank you to both of my guest reviewers! I can't reply to you individually, so I hope you are reading this.
TBNRkurama: KakaRin is a confirmed ship in my story, but it will be a slow burn. As for the rest of the pairings, thank you for the suggestions! As for your plot suggestions, I will take them into consideration. Thanks for taking the time to let me know!
Anonymus: To answer your question, I was really going for Catalyst Kakashi to be equally strong with Catalyst Rin, but I think Rin will probably beat him in a one to one fight (further down the line when I introduce more of her skills) simply because she has a larger chakra pool. Not to say that Kakashi won't be badass in this story because he will.
It honestly irked me in the series that they had to downplay Kakashi's skills so that Naruto and Sasuke could have a chance to shine, so this story will be his redemption lol. And yes, Team 7 will appear in the story further down the line, but they won't be the focus of the story.
If anyone wants to take any guesses at what the next chapter will be about, the title is Newfound Respect.
Thank you for reading. Feel free to let me know what you think and until next time!
-MM