Warning: Spoilers for the Kakashi Gaiden arc and well…lots of other spoilers too.
I'm dead, Kakashi. But. You know. I think I'll be coming to see you soon.
Where are you, Kakashi?
Well, if Naruto was right in his prediction and Kakashi and Uchiha Obito were related, the first thing Shikamaru thought of was that they were in the same team when they were genins. It was rather logical, since the strongest friendships were between those genins together on a team. So he'd put the records book back and calmly walked out of the library, trying to think of where he'd find information on Kakashi's former team.
He himself wasn't quite sure why this interested himso much that he'd actually research on it – then again, he had just seen someone who'd supposedly been dead for fourteen years (according to the Uchiha records, anyway). Someone who, Shikamaru added, didn't have a shadow. Those two things were enough to get Shikamaru interested.
Well, if that Kabuto was still around, Shikamaru could've gone to him since he had those chakra cards, but Shikamaru had learned that Kabuto had actually been working for the Sound – a spy. The chakra cards fit in, then – a spy was, after all, a collector of information.
Anyway, Kabuto wasn't around, so that option was gone. Shikamaru's interest wasn't high enough to make him want to search through the library for records on teams of the past and the librarians there scared him.
He walked past the barbecque that Chouji frequented and waved to his best friend and Asuma through the window as he walked by. Chouji had recently undergone rapid progress through training, and so Asuma had taken to treating Chouji…
Asuma.
Asuma was around the same age as Kakashi, and the two were friends and comrades, so perhaps they'd been on the same team. Even if they hadn't, surely Asuma would know the members of Kakashi's team – heck, Shikamaru knew all the members of three rookie teams, at least.
He backtracked and walked through the door just as Chouji began to devour his food. Asuma looked up from the table and waved to Shikamaru, motioning for him to sit down. Walking over, Shikamaru did so, next to Chouji.
Wasting no time with greetings, Shikamaru asked his teacher, "Asuma-sensei, were you on Kakashi-sensei's team?"
Looking surprised at the question, Asuma shifted the position of the cigarette in his mouth and said, "No, I wasn't. Why?"
Ignoring Asuma's 'why?', Shikamaru asked his second question. "Do you know who was on Kakashi-sensei's team, then?"
"Mm…" Adopting an expression of deep thought, Asuma leaned backwards and stared up at the ceiling for a moment. Patiently, Shikamaru waited and Chouji looked up from his food.
"What's the matter, Shikamaru?" Chouji asked of his friend, after he finished chewing and swallowing.
Leaning over to whisper in Chouji's ear, Shikamaru hissed, "I think I met a ghost."
Keeping his voice equally quiet, Chouji echoed back. "A ghost?"
"Yeah. It seems like Naruto also saw the ghost, and I saw him and Sasuke and Sakura in the library looking through the Uchiha records because the ghost wore the Uchiha clan symbol on his clothing. They identified the ghost as 'Uchiha Obito' and Naruto started babbling on about thinking that the ghost had a connection with Kakashi-sensei. So I'm trying to figure out if there is a connection."
Chouji was about to say something, but Asuma leaned forwards towards Shikamaru and said, "Yeah, I know who was on Kakashi's team."
"Who?"
"His teacher was the Fourth Hokage himself, though at that time he still wasn't Hokage (1). One of the genins was a girl named Rin. She was an extremely skilled medical nin. The third member was a boy named Obito, of the Uchiha clan, I think."
Admittedly, Shikamaru wasn't all that surprised that Uchiha Obito had been on Kakashi's team, as he'd suspected it all along. The reason that he widened his eyes in surprise was that their teacher had been the Fourth Hokage. Well, then again, they must've been a strong, talented team, considering the members; Rin, a skilled medical nin, Obito, from the great Uchiha clan, and Kakashi the Copy-nin, who was, according to Rock Lee and Gai, a genius.
"Why'd you want to know, anyway?" Asuma asked, brows moving upwards in skepticism.
"Oh, I was just curious," Shikamaru said, unable to come up with a good excuse.
Hearing this, Chouji apparently had the sense to keep silent and not ask about the subject of Uchiha Obito the ghost. Undoubtedly, he was also interested in the subject, but for the moment he was content enough to continue eating, and he did so with great relish.
So before Asuma could inquire any further, Shikamaru excused himself and left.
"How're we going to find out if Obito was Kakashi-sensei's friend?" Naruto demanded of his teammates, arms crossed in irritation.
"Gai-sensei must know Kakashi-sensei pretty well, if they're both rivals," Sakura immediately pointed out. "Maybe if we ask him, he'll know?"
Making a face, Naruto immediately rejected her idea. "He scares me, with those huge eybrows of his! Put together with Lee, and I would rather fight Gaara again!"
Sasuke only smirked at Naruto's outburst and offered no input whatsoever on what they should do.
"Oh, really? Then what do you suggest we do?" Sakura shot back, scowling. "Do you have a better plan?"
"Well…"
"See? You don't have a better plan! Sasuke-kun, we should just ask Gai-sensei about it, right?" Sakura turned her back on the yellow-haired boy to face her crush, smiling sweetly.
Shrugging indifferently, Sasuke only said, "It doesn't matter to me."
"Alright, Sasuke-kun and I will go then! If you're so scared, Naruto, you can just stay back and wait for us! Okay?"
"No, wait! I was kidding, I'm not scared by him! I'm coming too, wait!"
The place was a wreck.
That was the first thing Kakashi thought, and he suspected that it was the first thing that the other nins amassed in the room thought as well. Luckily, he'd gotten to the scene quickest and had a good view of the place.
The Uchiha clan's homes had never been destroyed, but no one lived there either, most likely because of the whole clan having been murdered there. Obviously, after Itachi had killed them all, the place had been cleaned up and tidied, belongings removed to put into storage, and so for a long period of time it had been neat and empty and of no interest to anyone.
Now, however, one of the rooms was filled with both other ninjas and common civilians, all craning their necks to take a look at the place.
On further reflection, the wreckage wasn't too bad. It wasn't as if the walls had been torn down and the ceiling blasted off. In fact, the severity of it was comparable to Naruto's room, as if someone had recklessly thrown things over their shoulder in search of something.
The bed's covers had been pulled off and left scrunched up on the floor, pillow thrown halfway across the room. The cabinet doors were all flung open as were the closet doors. Within the closet, spare sheets and pillows had been chucked out into the room. A table had been pulled away from its original position up against the wall and tipped over – gently, as there were no marks left on the floor.
A loose floorboard near the bed had been pulled up.
With a pang, Kakashi recognized the room as Obito's.
It was familiar now. Although when Obito had been alive, Kakashi had never entered his room or gone anywhere near it, he'd paced around it many times after Obito had died. He'd been allowed the privilege of clearing out the Uchiha's room and had done so, though he hadn't taken any of Obito's personal belongings for himself. They'd all gone into storage.
He did remember the floorboard being akin to a treasure chest. When he'd just finished clearing out Obito's room the floorboard had been poking out of the floor and his foot had caught on it, pulling it up even further to reveal the hollow space below it. Upon further inspection, Kakashi had found many things that had undoubtedly been important to the boy. Among them had been a few scrolls, a medium-sized shuriken that Kakashi recognized as the one that Yondaime had given to Obito, an arrangement of pressed flowers that Rin had given, a pair of broken goggles, and a notebook with hastily scrawled journal entries. The notebook had quite clearly been stamped private, as the red letters scratched onto the cover declared.
All of the things Kakashi had found in the floorboard had been put into storage, never to be touched again. When he'd picked up the notebook he'd been tempted to read it, but had seen the 'PRIVATE' stamp and believed that even though Obito was dead, Kakashi still had no write to go looking in something that he'd obviously wanted to keep secret. In the end, he'd never opened it.
The hollow space was empty now. Kakashi had been sure to securely replace the floorboard when he'd finished with the clearing out of the room, and made sure that it looked completely normal before he'd left. Even so, it could be fairly easy for any shinobi to find it, so it being pulled up wasn't unusual.
"What do you think, Kakashi?"
It was Kurenai, to Kakashi's left. He glanced over at her and said, "Looks like someone was looking for something here."
"Do you think they found what they were looking for?"
"Ah…no. I cleared this room out myself, and I'm sure that there was nothing here of interest to anyone." He chose not to tell her that he'd cleared the room out before the Uchiha massacre, so she believed that it was after the horrid event.
"What do you think they were looking for?"
"No clue." Kakashi was very aware of the fact that he was being unhelpful.
"Out of the way!"
An imperial-sounding, female voice came from behind the crowd and instantly, shinobi and civilians alike jumped aside to clear a path. Without turning around, Kakashi already recognized the source of the voice – Tsunade, the current Hokage.
She walked up besides Kakashi, looking around the room. "What's been going on?"
"No clue," Kakashi repeated, quite cheerfully.
"Kakashi said that he thinks that someone was looking for something in this room," Kurenai said, looking up at Tsunade. "However, aside from that, there isn't any serious damage done. The house itself is intact, except for maybe a few scratches on the ground when the table was dragged away from the wall before it got tipped over."
Tsunade sighed. "I thought something big had happened, from the crowd around this place. Well, someone clean it up, I've got a few things to do."
"Yes, Tsunade-sama," Kakashi said vaguely, still staring at the wreckage.
Still can't find you. Can't find a lot of stuff, now. So many changes. I feel so left behind.
So left behind.
(1) : I don't think that he was Hokage when he was still the teacher of Kakashi's team, anyway. O.o;
HoSHIT. The Kanjii updated. Gasp!
So…dun dun dun! Stuff is happening! Oooo!
(slapped)
Kay, I'll stop now. -.-;
Anyways, people, while I procrasinate more on the next chapter go read Diminishing Rayne's Naruto fanfic(s?)! I help her out on some of the ideas :D
Oh, and to mkh2 and anyone else who cares about the name change: Kanjii's just the name I use at just about every site/forum I register in. x3; So I figured before I start confusing myself I'd change my name here on to Kanjii as well n.n