Chapter 2 Mistakes

Kakashi once again leaned back in his chair and looked at all three kids. How far should this tale go? Should he pepper it with non fiction or should it be complete truth. But then what tale has complete truth? A fantastic story that could make them go home and wonder, Kakashi had plenty of those. But they wanted to know about things he didn't tell many. A ninja's secrets were to be kept. But these kids were also his soldiers, and in the aim of teamwork a good story could build moral.

He could tell them this tale. It wasn't something he had to keep from them. It was simply something he preferred not to talk about. He looked up at the ceiling and closed his eyes, and began.

"Konoha was not always a peaceful place. Even after Kyuubi was defeated we had restless times. As many of you know in these times we had differences with the sand nin and thunder village. It was always important to have Anbu our Hidden Ambush squads. It was important to me to be an Anbu, it summed up that I had learned everything I needed. And Assassination was something I excelled at. It was also important to me because my best friend Obito was on my squad. The two of us had a lot of good times together, and we had hard times too."

Sasuke gasped "Obito? I know that name from somewhere."

"Yes you probably do he was a great ninja." Kakashi countered. "But please dont interrupt my story." Sasuke nodded his answer.

No more words were needed.

"As I was saying Obito and I were on the same Anbu squad for a very long time. We had grown up together and had been on the same jounin team, same as you three. About the time the Hyuuga family had their differences with the Thunder village we were given a mission on the outskirts of the village. Our Captain was a very scrupulous man who was only a few years older then Obito and I. He had been recently assigned as our captain because of ranks being moved about and some Anbu taking on other tasks for Konoha. Either way we felt like we were a newly assembled team and we really didn't know what to expect from this new captain. He seemed to brood a lot and was very quiet." Kakashi shrugged looking at the kids he could tell the introduction was waning, time to go off on a tangent before he lost there interest.

"...and he wasn't to good at taking jokes. Obito and I had decided on about the fifth day of sitting outside the village watching for, we didn't know what, that it was time to liven things up a bit" Kakashi smirked and chuckled. "Obito found a small rodent I think it was a mouse or shrew, and he tied a small explosion scroll, you know the kind that make a loud fire cracker noise but nothing to serious." He smiled and the boys nodded and smiled with approval.

This was a common trick that boys in Konoha played on people who were unsuspecting. You tied a scroll on something that moved and tied another string onto the string that held the scroll in place and let the animal run. You would pull the string you still held just in time to release the scroll from the animal but also to cause a loud pop, that often caught the surprised of others. It was a grand trick and many of the boys in town played this game.

"So we let the mouse go and it went right into the log that our captain was sitting on. Can I tell you? We could barely stop ourselves from bursting out laughing out right and spoiling the trick. I mean it was absolutely perfect that it ran under there. Obito felt a slight tug as the mouse decided to run again. He pulled the string and the mouse ran out of the log unharmed. And at that moment, POP! And the whole log jumped. Captain Osamu fell off the log, feet in the air onto his head." Kakashi took a moment and laughed very hard at this memory. It was nice to relive old times and the kids seemed to enjoy it too. Naruto was laughing and slapping his knee and Sasuke smirked and nodded his head. Sakura laughed and held her stomach. Kakashi remembered the prank Naruto played on him when he met them for the first time. This made him chuckle a bit more. It figures that Kakashi would get Naruto the great prankster. It was probably some payback from Hokage. Naruto kind of reminded him of Obito with his great sense of prankery. But then Kakashi was pretty good at playing pranks too. After all his best friend taught him a lot.

Still chuckling a bit he began again. "Truly the best part was his feet in the air. Here he hadn't hardly grunted at anyone on the squad in five days since we had not only met him but got the assignment. It was a thing of beauty. Osamu was mad. He got up from the ground with a red face and a sore ass. That's when Obito and I were made to go scouting, in opposite directions. I guess Osamu didn't like our teamwork. Hehehe.

So I did as I was told, and scouted ahead and made camp that night all by myself. It wasn't a big deal except that in a scouting mission most squads tried to keep at least two Anbu together. One ahead and one behind, but here I was alone." Kakashi put his hands up in the air with a slight shrug. "If anything happened there was little help or news to be heard. Same for Obito, but I wasn't as worried about him as I was myself. In the beginning of the evening everything seemed normal. But as the night progressed there was a lot of whispering in the air. I couldn't hear it quite clear but I could tell someone was speaking quietly somewhere near by. As a scout it was my mission to find out where the whispers were coming from who was whispering and what they were whispering about. I broke my small camp and went forward into the forest. I probably went about a 1/2 mile from my camp when I found nins from thunder village talking quietly in their camp. There was a small smokeless fire, but these nins weren't very skilled because they hadn't thought much about the attention light and the smell of food might bring them, or possibly they weren't worried about it. I am not sure, but I got close enough to listen right into what was going on."

Kakashi remembered that night long ago like it was yesterday that it happened. He sat in the dark night right behind the large loud nin that wanted to talk so much. He sat so close he could feel the warmth of the fire. He almost dared himself to get closer. Its true that he was sitting almost back to back with him. It's funny how recollection will bring back second thoughts and one thing Kakashi remembered was that their camp wasn't fortified in anyway. There were no traps that he had to worry about. Or so he thought. Kakashi sat forward and gripped a pencil from off the teachers' desk. Damn if he hadn't been playing around trying to get as close as he could. Thoughts swam in his head and then he looked up. He must have stopped long enough to cause interest the kids were looking at him with slightly puzzled looks on their faces. He gave them a comforting smile, tapped the pencil on the desk once, and continued.

"What I heard wasn't very alarming. The nins were on a mission to ambush Konoha if negotiations with Leaf Village didn't work out to their favor. I did however pick up talk of a third nin that was part of their group. They commented that they were glad he had left to scout for spies. I guess the guy kind of creeped them out. At this point I was quiet sure that I was being watched from somewhere near by but I stayed as still as I could so he could listen to their conversation. As weird as it seemed I began to get tired. For some reason I felt warm and started to drift off. I did a genjutsu release. That's when I heard a deep voice from above me.

'It seems that wolves don't run in packs anymore' he said from above me. I could tell by the tone in his voice that he was smirking and he though he had me pinned. I didn't move but I started to think ahead as to what I could, should, and would do. The other two nins in the camp stood up and turned at their comrades voice. I heard kunai flying towards me in the air, and deflected them with my own. I continued to sit as still as possible. The nin from above jumped down at me through the trees and threw a few more kunai at me. I got up from my crouch as quick as possible and jumped up into the trees where he had come from, and made my escape as quick as possible. This is when it began to rain. But these guys were quick and I had to do all that I could to keep ahead of them. Also the creepy guy had genjutsu knowledge and that could cause problems with an escape if he got ahead of me or if I lost my bearings. It took me several hours to get out of the forest, when it had only taken me minutes to find them. It was while trying to avoid them and get away that I realized they had wanted to pull me away from the post I was at. They removed me so they could move forward towards captain Osamu, undetected and without problem. These three were simply a diversion. I was a bit angry at my mistake. Boredom and fatigue had done me in. It was my own brooding that had helped me make this mistake. And now I needed to get back to the captain and see if there was anything I could do at all to help.

I moved as quickly as I could towards the last place that I knew they were stationed. Unfortunately the Thunder nins were also close behind me. I figured I could out run them and then have reinforcement when I arrived at camp." Kakashi stopped. Opened his jacket and pulled out a toothpick from his pick holder. This is where the story began to get harder to tell. He breathed deeply. It was time to start the journey into facing the past.

"But when I got to camp the squad had been overwhelmed. Captain Osamu was alive and gutted. His intestines were strewn all over the ground. He was lying on his side gathering them closer to him and muttering something. The medic on our team was lying dead on Osamu's legs. He died from a simple Kunai in his chest. Kami had been kind to that healer. He was another one of the people I had grown up with from the village. And quite it was a shock to see this sight. The entire camp was covered in the blood of my fellow squad members. I came to Osamu and asked if I could help and he looked at me but his eyes were already glazed over, it was the look of a dead man. Osamu was no longer there. He had died but was continuing to gather his remains together. I had seen it before and I saw it happen afterwards. Sometimes the soul leaves and the body continues the souls fight. There is nothing you can do when this happens. It is the way of death."

Kakashi began to stare off again and Naruto coughed.

"Kakashi sensei if this is.." Sakura began but Kakashi waved his hand at her.

"Sakura it is of no mind. While memories are hard to speak of they remain to haunt you in vivid detail. I probably could never describe the brutality at which out squad was decimated. But I was there and on days like this when I think of it. I can still smell the wet blood in the air and I can still feel the cold and the rain. It is possible that the rain had made the scene more gruesome by way of washing the blood around the ground. But for some reason I still felt that it was meant to be this way. I stood up from my Captain and I said to him 'Osamu you are a good captain you can go now I will avenge you.' Osamu reached out to me from the ground and then laid his head in the bloody mud and died. I was exhausted but had found new energy in this anger. I had found rage inside me swelling and blinding. And I realized my best friend was out in the other direction and that he had probably met the same situation as I did. I had information that could possibly help the Hokage. But could I get there before the nins that did this got to Konoha? Would my information matter at this point? Was it even all true or good information? I didn't know, but on instinct and adrenaline I made my next decision. I was going to defeat those following me and take care of those ahead of me. I was going to avenge my new captain who I had failed and I was going to make sure I could take care of my own business as soon as possible." Kakashi had a hard look on his face. Sasuke knew that look he had felt those feelings many times before in his life. The boy simply nodded his head. He needed to know now. Did his teacher fulfill his quest for vengeance? Sasuke was really glad he had waited for Kakashi in the rain all day.