Afore I start, kinda got a BIG SPOILER in here. Anyways, as before there are no similarities with the manga story, but some of the other (Non story) stuff is canon. Don't want to be too specific cos that would make it worse. As before if you've read that far in the manga you'll recognise it, if you haven't you won't, but you may have an aha! moment when you, or the aninmé, get to it. So… you've been warned, read at own risk.

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Kakashi was woken by a shaft of moonlight shining, like a beacon, through a break in the clouds. The first thing he was aware of was that it had stopped raining. The second was the way his body felt light and… disconnected… from his brain. Right, Iruka had given him opium, to sleep. So why was he awake now? The dose he'd swallowed should have kept him out cold until morning. That is, unless he had built up some tolerance, from a much larger dose, taken fairly recently. Iruka had said he found the opium in the pirate's cabin. No doubt they used it to drug their captives… including him. That explained a lot, and it must have been a large enough dose to have wiped his memory.

So the Mermaid pirates drugged their victims, sealed their power and then used the sennin's blood to 'turn' them before they took off the seal. But he'd escaped. And the 'boss' had plainly said he had no use for jounins anyway. Maybe jounin strength chakra directed against the blood curse made them too dangerous, too hard to control, or maybe they just went insane. Well it was decent evidence that they wouldn't have to fight anyone beyond the rank of chuunin. Speaking of chuunins…he looked around for Iruka. A dull feeling of dread started to seep through him as he realised that Iruka was gone.

The absence of the teacher's familiar presence suddenly made everything feel empty, like a void, a vacuum. He reached out further with his senses and sprang to his feet, too fast. The world swirled around him, forcing him to lean against the rock to catch his balance. Then the moon broke through the clouds again, just for a few seconds. But it was enough.

In the moonlight he saw a single line of footprints in the wet sand. Headed away from Konoha. He sank back to his knees and spread his hands inside two of the indentations, they were as good as a suicide note. With them Iruka had clearly stated his intention to die in the desert, for without the use of chakra he couldn't possibly survive alone. He knew that by morning he would be too far away for Kakashi to go after him, leaving him with no choice but to go on to Konoha alone, unencumbered, well rested, and with the speed Hatake Kakashi was legendary for. Iruka had tricked him, done the only thing left within his power to help save his village. The lying, sneaky, impossibly loyal, wonderful, bastard. But he hadn't counted on him waking so soon, after less than… Kakashi scanned the unclouded patches of sky for clues, three hours. Maybe he still had time.

For the second time in his life Kakashi was faced with this same hopeless choice. Did he abandon his teammate for the sake of his mission, or risk his mission to try to rescue someone he loved? The drug induced chaos in his brain hurled him towards the edge of that same dark place he'd spent half of his life, and three quarters of his mental energy, avoiding.

Iruka or Konoha? The choice was stark and clear, which was his greater loyalty? His greater love? The phantom of twisted logic reached up to touch him from the abyss. For him Iruka was Konoha, its very heart and soul. He was what he fought for, came home for, lived for. To rescue one was to save the other, or save that much of it that was worth saving.

He stabbed the tip of a finger with a needle and watched the drop of blood form, like a jewel on his fingertip, then fall onto the summoning scroll.

"Pakkun, I need you to go on to Konoha, alone."

The little dog stared at him in disbelief, then sniffed the air. He sat back and scratched behind an ear with his hind foot, the ghost of a smile visible on his thin black doggie lips.

"You're stoned out of your mind Kakashi-kun, but you had me going for a moment there."

Kakashi folded his legs under him and leaned all the way down, to look at his summon eye to eye. "Yes there's some opium in my system, but I'm deadly serious. You must complete my mission, in case… in case I don't."

Pakkun froze, his leg still poised in mid air. "You realise how much desert there is between here and there, I may not make it either."

"I know, I'm sorry. But it just rained for two days straight, probably it's share for the next ten years, so it won't get too hot, not at this time of year. And they'll be plenty of water along the way. I'd send one of the others if I could, but it's complicated, you're the only one who can explain."

Pakkun flopped onto the sand on his belly. His brown eyes big, loyal, sorrowful. Why did he have to use that look, of all his puppy dog looks? Brown eyes were just too heartbreaking right now. "Ok Master, I'll do my best. Gimme the details."

Moments later the little pug was lost to the darkness. Kakashi gathered everything into his pack and set off in the opposite direction.

Naturally there was no chakra trail, but for the first few miles the tracks were easy to follow. Then the desert became stony and the footprints indistinct or non-existent. It was dark too. The wind picked up, blowing in denser clouds, blocking the stars and dimming the moon to a faint circle. Without it's light the landscape was almost black on black, not even the horizon was visible. Well his chakra was low, but he'd worn it down further than this in the past couple of weeks, there was no point holding back now. He uncovered the sharingan.

Instantly he saw them. Two piercing orbs, like stars of chakra. Shit, and there was no way he hadn't been seen too.

Itachi was beside him before he had time to blink. Hair and silken robe, as dark as the night, billowing in the wind. Even though his pale features registered no emotion of any kind, there was no denying his sex appeal.

"Hatake-san, or can I call you Kakashi? And all alone, just as I'd expected. So loyalty to Konoha won out, although it seems you needed something to calm your nerves. Did you bury him here, in the desert? That's what I would have done, after the necessary… precautions."

Kakshi felt his nostrils flaring under his mask as he maintained his casual slouch and calm voice. "Don't compare yourself to me Uchiha-san there's nothing alike about us."

Itachi trailed a finger down the scar on his face, pausing to hook a finger under the edge of his mask. "Really? I think we have quite a lot in common. Two misunderstood geniuses, ambitious beyond our years, I think we're ideally suited for each other. Konoha can be so heartless with its orphans."

Right, orphans. Kakashi gently lifted Itachi's hand from his face then dropped it as if it was something disgusting. "Congratulations, you've just made it onto my shortest list, right between Orochimaru and Tsunade. The list of people I would never consider sleeping with, no matter how desperate or horny I was."

His one sharingan saw the angry flash of power in Itachi's two. "No, you prefer chuunins, weaklings that you can bully and dominate, like my cousin."

Kakashi almost laughed aloud, even though he was holding back tears. Dominate? He obviously didn't know Iruka at all. "Obito was my friend and rival, nothing more."

"Oh? That's not what I saw in his eyes."

The memory Itachi had shown him flooded back, making his heart skip a beat. Fuck, there was no way he would have missed that. "Well it's been a delightful conversation, but if you'll excuse me… You know, places to go, people to see."

Itachi stiffened his stance. "I'm sorry, but I can't allow that. I've been instructed to bring you in."

Double fuck. He couldn't win a fight now. Not in this sorry, worn down, drug impaired state. "Not alive I hope." Of course he wanted him alive, he'd be dead by now if he didn't. "It would be a pity for Uchiha Itachi to fail in such a simple request."

Uchiha's used fire, what did he have that could counter, that Itachi wouldn't know? Kakashi flashed through seals, copying from the sharingan's memory, adjusting, improvising.

Desert Tsunami!

A wall of sandy water rose from the saturated ground and crashed onto Itachi, just as fire was starting to flare in the palms of his hands. It swept over the rough ground, sucking the stones in its path into a hissing roar, and leaving them piled in concentric heaps.

As it drained away Itachi was still standing, wet, bedraggled, but unmoved. "Is that the best you have to offer?"

But his words fell on nothing more than retreating water and stony ground. Deep below his feet Kakshi held in his chakra and his breath, quieting all signs of life. It was a cheap trick, which was why it might just work. Itachi would expect more of him.

The Uchiha scanned the horizons with his sharingans spinning frenziedly. "So you teleported away under cover of that wave. Well you were too weak to go very far Kakashi-kun. And I still have a few days."

When he was completely sure that Itachi was gone, Kakashi struggled back above ground and lay panting on a pile of wet stones. By sheer force of will he pulled himself to his feet. He had nothing left, the signs of his body starting to shut down were all too clear. Then, as the clouds parted again, he saw something. The water from his jutsu had flattened a small rise in the ground, merging into a pool of rainwater that lay beyond. And within that he could see something else, something darker. His nose told him what.

He staggered towards it, desperate to know, but wishing with all his heart that he could stay away. Iruka was sprawled face down in the water, his hair floating around him like an aquatic weed. Kakashi's worst fears were true. The blood in the water was Iruka's blood.

Even as consciousness slipped from him Kakashi choked out a laugh as he felt one more piece of the puzzle slide into place. So that's why they'd done it. The two Cloud nin's hadn't opened their veins in that underground lake to confuse him at all. It had been their last defiant act to die free, to wash away the wolf's blood contaminating their bodies. And instinctively Iruka had chosen the same path.

With one final effort he managed to touch the tips of Iruka's fingers. Cold… like his. He was spent, lacking even enough energy to fight off the chill of the wind and the night. So this was it, they would both die here tonight. He'd tried to save Iruka, he'd tried to get to Konoha. He'd done his best. But as usual, it wasn't quite enough.

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He hadn't expected to wake up at all, and especially not here, wherever here was. Kakashi found himself lying on padded mat, in a large dark space, cool, moist, windowless, filled with the dark odours of human habitation. And Iruka was gone… again. A presence entered the room, casting a weak light from the lantern in his hand. Kakashi had a kunai at his throat almost instantly. Unusual, whoever had brought him here had left him fully armed.

"Where's the man who was with me?"

A tremble ran through the man holding the light. "You're awake, I'm sorry I was only gone for a few minutes. We found you yesterday, out on the desert, almost dead."

Kakashi wasn't about to be distracted, he let the kunai draw a pinprick of blood. "The other man, where is he?"

The man's simple fear took on a more complex shading. "You were half dead but…" He took a deep breath. "Since you're awake now I should take you to Dakatsu, those were my orders."

Kakashi's sinking heart rallied at the familiar name. He appeared in front of the man, searching his face for truth, but with his weapon still drawn.

"You mean this is Dakatsu's village? The village under the sand?"

"Yes. Come with me and I'll take you to them… er, to her."

With determination that belied the dizziness and faintness he was still feeling, Kakashi put away his weapon and followed the stranger. The tunnels led for what seemed like miles underground until finally branching off into a dimly lit chamber. He sensed Dakatsu at once. She was sitting on a plain wooden chair next to a low cot, like the kind they used at the hospital in Konoha when they didn't have enough proper beds. There was a man lying on it… Iruka. So why couldn't he feel him?

He knelt next to the cot and traced his fingers over the red line on the teacher's wrist. His uniform was clean and dry and his black hair was neatly combed and arranged spread out on either side of his face. But even without the colour contrast he would have looked pale, beyond pale, white. As if he was carved from wax. Iruka should never look pale, should never look like this. Iruka was tan, and blush, and flushed red with passion. He was embarrassed, amused, scolding and yelling in fury, sighing and groaning with pleasure. Not white and still and… dead.

Through the terrifying emptiness Kakashi heard a familiar voice. "I'm so sorry dearie, so sorry. But when we found him he'd already lost so much blood, there weren't nothing we could do."

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Iruka felt calm, nothing but intense breathtaking calm. Far ahead he could make out the outline of a single tree, so he started towards it. The light was white, bright and strangely even, like the kind of mist often seen in the early morning of hot summer days, before the sun rises high enough to burn it off. But it wasn't misty. The air was cool and completely clear. He realised with shock that the fuzziness of the tree was caused by its incalculable distance from him. And the only reason he was able to see it at all was because of its immense size.

He continued walking towards it, even while he told himself that there was no point, that it was too far, tens, hundreds, maybe thousands, of miles. And that he could never reach it. And then he was standing next to a trunk wider around than the largest building in Konoha, looking up into a canopy of branches that encompassed the whole sky. It was like the Hero Tree in Taki, but a thousand times bigger, or rather the way the Hero Tree should be. A vast, sheltering, presence. Protecting and requiring nothing in return.

In fact this was the Hero Tree, or rather the Hero Tree was a refection of this. A mere reflection, distorted and twisted by the imperfections and failings of the mortal world, to a weak and feeble parody of itself. But still with the power to sustain and protect a whole people.

"Hey Ru-kun. Wotcha doin' down there? Come on up." The voice of his childhood friend sang out across more than two decades.

But Ichiri had died when they were children. He'd never known how or why, he'd simply been told that his friend was dead, and even at five he'd been enough of a ninja to understand what that meant. So why was this boy from his past calling to him now?

Ichiri's voice was joined by others, children, teens, friends, teammates. A chorus of welcoming voices, each one the voice of the dead.

An arm grabbed his, reaching down from the leafy branch above, from the sky. It was a strong well-muscled arm, exceptional, even for a ninja. A swordsman's arm. Hayate's face stared down at him.

"That's right Iruka, we're all here." A friendly smile curled his lips. "Your parents are here too, don't you want to see them?"

It was true, he could see them, his mother and his father, looking just the way they had on that last morning. Happy, kind, his mum and dad, just that. Dressed in their Konoha uniforms. They'd said goodbye, told him to work hard at school, then left for the mission room. Little knowing that within hours half the village would be a smoldering ruin and that they'd both be dead.

And he felt… calm. Was that all he could feel now? Calm? No love, no hate, no fiery fury at the man whose cursed blood had torn him away from his life and his future.

"Mum, Dad. But… but you're dead. What are you doing here? In this tree?"

His mother smiled, radiating calm. Nothing like the quick, funny, hot tempered woman he remembered. "We are this tree, each of us is a leaf on the tree of life."

They moved apart, opening a space for him, just as they always had. They were so close, so bound by love that they had seemed melded together at times, but they always made room for him, between them.

"The tree of life? But… but you're dead?"

"Life and death are two sides of the same thing. It's like a leaf, you can't see both sides at the same time.

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Kakashi knew what he had to do. He started to mold chakra, he just hoped that he'd had time to get back enough. He'd fashioned the first of the seals and was partway through the second. Following the pattern etched into his brain by the sharingan. Suddenly his hand was grabbed out of the air and forced down by his side. He stumbled back a few paces in surprise. Dakatsu was standing square in front of him, her arms folded sternly in front of her chest. If her eyes had been brown instead of blue the look would have been familiar. It almost made him want to cry.

"Oh no you don't, not that. I know how you're feeling my lovey. But I'll not allow it. It were my people that saved your life out there on the sands, I won't let you throw it away on a forbidden jutsu. Not while you're still here in my care."

Kakashi flashed a desperate look in her direction. She knew? How could she possibly know about that jutsu? She wasn't even shinobi. "I won't do anything reckless."

Dakatsu's face wrinkled into her familiar smile, but somehow there was no warmth or joy in it.

"Liar. A desert's not like a forest ya know, there's only a fraction the people in Wind Country as you've got over in Fire. And pretty much all of us is related one way or another. Gaara's my cousin once or twice removed, and Chiyoba-sama? Well she were my mother's aunt."

So she did know.

Kakashi uncurled the rigid fingers of his right hand, he hadn't noticed that he'd fisted it, blood ran down his palm from where it had been cut by his fingernails.

His words came out as hard as flint. "I don't let my teammates die."

Dakatsu's pale eyes glinted with something he hadn't seen in them before. "Oh… teammate, so that's what you calls him."

Even Kakashi couldn't maintain a lie in the face of such determined honesty and unconditional kindness. "You don't understand, I can't live without him. I… I thought I'd lost him, forever, just days ago. I can't go through that again."

She grabbed his face as if he was a stubborn child. Turning it towards hers.

"Look at me! Do you think he can live any better wi'out you? I know the cost o' this jutsu, would you force on him what you can't stand yourself? Make him live out every day, alone, knowing that he was only alive because you was dead?"

Kakashi's whole body froze rigid. Like Obito did to me.

Dakatsu's voice softened. "Look at me lad. I knows. Trust me I does know. You might not want to at first but you'll survive." Her voice became distant as she looked up sharply. "I lost my partner two years ten months and seven days ago. We'd been together thirty-three years. But I's still here. You'll survive, 'syour duty to your village, just as it's mine to my clan."

She watched the light go out of his eyes. Maybe there was another way.

She left him slumped on the rough matting.

When she came back she dropped a fiery opal, the size of a goose egg, onto his lap. "Try using this lad. It's my clan's treasure, the snakehead. It's got power and if you can make use o' it you're welcome to it."

Kakshi cupped the stone in his hands, feeling the energy within and gazed up to meet her eyes as she continued.

"You can use it for your bargain, instead of yourself. But you must promise me two things. If it's not enough you must come back, choose duty over love."

Kakashi pulled himself to his feet. It would be enough, he was sure of it. Swirls of purple and gold were already flowing into him from the stone, molding his life force the way he'd learned to mold chakra since he was a toddler.

"I agree. What else."

"If he doesn't want to come you must leave him. Not force him to do something he's not willing to do."

That was harder. Could he have Iruka within his grasp and turn away? Live the rest of his life shadowed by a loss even greater than those he'd already suffered?

Yes he could.

He'd never forced Iruka to do anything and he never would. If he didn't want to come back he'd accept his decision, however hard.

He looked down at Dakatsu, searching for answers in her rosy wrinkled face. "Why are you doing this for me? For us?"

"Cos I can dearie, you came here in trouble and I got what it takes to help you out. I don't need no more reason than that."

She sighed and smiled a sheepish half smile then shook her head. "And that's the honest truth, but… In your case there is just a speck more to it. I ain't never told no one this afore, but I had a wild side, when I were young. First I got myself pregnant, then I got myself kidnapped."

"Kidnapped."

"Yeah, down in the port. Stupid kid that I was. That's why I go there so free now. Damn place can't scare me. It already did the worst to me that there could ever be."

"You mean you were…"

She shook he head, making her red curls bounce in a way that seemed inappropriately cheerful. "Worse'n that dearie. I got bumped around pretty bad and went into labour afore my time. I had a little boy, wi white hair like yourn, and like his father's. But the poor little soul didn't make it. I never even had a chance to hold him, to say goodbye. I expect they just threw his little body overboard."

Kakashi looked at her with new understanding. She did know true pain and loss. And she'd had a child with white hair? "Overboard? You were at sea?"

She shrugged. "Port Koizuko, the pirates been doin a trade in girls, boys too, for centuries. But they wouldn't a got much of a price for me in that condition, so they took me aboard and waited. Lucky for me my old dad tracked me down afore too long and ransomed 'em off."

A pause stretched between them, but it was thoughtful, companionable, not awkward.

"Did you tell Jiraiya?" There was no doubt in Kakashi's mind who the child's white haired father must have been.

The wrinkles deepened around Dakatsu's eyes, but again there was no happiness in them.

"No. Weren't no point. It were just a fling, between two kids. Funny thing was when I did fall in love for real it were with another woman, so there never was no chance for another child. I used to lie awake and think sometimes, what it would have been like, watching our little boy grow up, together." Her eyes softened and she ruffled her hands through Kakashi's fluffy hair. "I hope he would of turned out a lot like you dearie."

So the pirate boss was Jiraiya's natural son, stolen from his mother at birth. Dakatsu must never know what a brute he'd been raised to be. Kakashi felt the weight of the world's sorrows pressing down on him, but he could help Dakatsu with this one. He'd hold the secret in his heart for her, after everything she'd done for him it was the very least he could do in return.

Kakashi slowly lowered his mask and brushed his lips across her cheek. "It's a pity, you'd have been a wonderful mother." He swallowed, trying to dislodge the sudden lump in his throat. "I wish you had been mine."

He stood up straight, the swirls within the sharingan glittering with the vibrant colours of the opal. "Ok."

Dakatsu stood back as he placed the stone on the chest of the body that looked so much like the man he loved, while having nothing left of that man within it.

He fashioned the seals.

And he was standing in a strange place, surrounded by even white light, under a tree that towered over him, in a cloud of calm peacefulness. It was as if the tree itself had a powerful aura, pulling him in. The tree wanted him and he wanted to be a part of it, nestled in its branches.

Suddenly Iruka was standing beside him. He wrapped a hand around the teacher's waist as if it was the most natural thing in the world. As if they were in Konoha, going about their daily lives.

"Iruka? Where are we?"

"In the shadow of the tree, the tree of life. The shadow between life and death. This is the only place where you can see both sides of the leaves at the same time."

The tree of life? He'd never heard of it, but somehow he'd been familiar with it his whole life. "Are your family there?"

Iruka nodded. "They're all there, waiting for me to go up and join them."

Kakashi looked up into the towering branches. Everyone he loved was there too, he couldn't see them, but he could feel them. He felt a hand tugging at the back of his clothes, and realised that he had started to climb.

"Kakashi. Where are you going."

"Up there. Up there with you, I don't want to go back. There's too much pain on the other side, too many regrets."

He landed crouched on the tree's gnarly roots and sat down. Iruka nestled himself on his lap, facing him, with his legs hooked behind his back.

"But Kakashi, you aren't dead."

He looked up, meeting brown eyes with mismatched red and blue. "I am while I'm here."

Iruka had never seen such soul piercing truth in them. He shook his head, making his loose hair ripple around his face.

"No. You came to get me, not to join me." Kakashi felt gentle lips against his cheek. "You don't belong up there, not yet. And my place isn't with my parents anymore, it's with you."

Iruka's brown eyes flashed with a stubborn glare through the gentleness. It was a look that, surely, could be seen on no one else. Alive or dead. "Besides we still have a mission to complete, and a lifetime to live, together."

The next thing Kakashi was aware of was the cup of hot tea being pressed into his hands. For a moment the coils of steam rising from it merged in his mind with the featureless white landscape he had just come from. Then his senses were assaulted by its fragrance, the smell of the earthy chamber, and of antiseptic.

Iruka!

He tried to stand but his legs didn't obey the commands from his brain. Dakatsu's voice reached him through his confusion.

"Best rest up for a few ticks lovey, you just come back from the dead remember."

He looked over and saw her sitting by the cot where Iruka was lying. But now his wrists were bandaged and he was covered in a blanket.

She ran her fingers through his silky hair. "He's asleep. Drink up then it wouldn't hurt you none to get a bit 'o sleep yourself. I'll have a few of the lads take you to my place. You can sleep in my bed for as long as you like. Both of you."

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A/N This chapter was actually my starting point for the story, love that is stronger than death (sigh). Everything so far (believe it or not) has been leading up to this.

So… now onto the resolution. Lots of good stuff and many sharp pointy storythreads to tie up.