"K-Kakashi?"

Dazedly, he investigated his surroundings, finding that extensive damage had been done to the rocky landscape, smoke and rubble in the distance. He heard a familiar chirping sound, and the smell of fresh, gushing blood began to overwhelm him. There was something grossly warm that tightly engulfed his forearm.

"Kakashi…"

It was that voice again.

When the Hatake looked up, he saw Rin's brown, doleful eyes looking back at him, filled with tears. His eyes went wide in horror as he realized that his attack had torn straight through her chest, the chidori still sizzling at his fingertips. She coughed wetly, gore gushing out of the massive wound, and dribbling down the length of Kakashi's arm.

"Kakashi!" she seethed angrily, grabbing his shoulders and digging her nails into his flesh, "You hurt me!"

He gasped desperately, pulling his arm out of her and stumbling backwards. As she glared at him with her enraged, restless eyes, he felt his breath quicken, and within seconds, it felt like he couldn't catch it. She inched forward, a gaping hole in her chest. He suddenly felt paralyzed to his spot, unable to move or talk.

However, she started to slow down, the fury leaving her gaze, her skin going gray. She tilted backward, completely silent as she fell. Her eyes were wide open, lips slightly parted, like she was about to say something.

Rin was gone.

Kakashi crumpled to his knees, under an immense amount of stress. To him, this wasn't just a dream. He grabbed at his face as his ears began to ring, the sound of his own labored breathing blocking out the rest of the world.

He killed Rin. He killed Rin.

Everything disappeared in an intense blast of white.

As soon as Shizune saw that her frantically beeping pager was indeed summoning her to Kakashi's room, she was on her feet. Rushing there, she wondered what happened with concern that was apparent in her face, as it was around 10:00 pm, and he usually slept through the night without issues, due to the painkillers they gave him.

The elevator ride to the fourth floor tied her stomach into knots with dread, but as soon as she was out, she released the suffocating feeling by running to his room. She knew she shouldn't be naive—he'd recently had a seizure, so this could quite possibly be another one.

She opened the door without hesitation, her eyes focusing in on the chaos in the middle of the room. There were at least 4 nurses around Kakashi's bed, holding his writhing form down, and clearly struggling to administer a sedative. He fought against his restraints, with a strength that the nurses weren't prepared for.

Underneath the hostile display, the Hatake was shaking violently, hyperventilating with a look that made it clear that he wasn't fully there. His heart rate was over 130 bpm, making her wonder exactly what had happened.

Shizune hurried forward. "What's going on!" she demanded, her brows furrowing. The nurse looked at her in a panic, being jerked back and forth as he tried to hold Kakashi down.

"I was doing rounds...and he was sleeping fine at first, but then he started saying he killed someone...maybe in a dream?" he started, "He was breathing real hard, so I called in backup. The moment we tried to sedate him he fought back."

"Because you tried sedating him," she told him with a furrowed brow, agitated at how quickly the situation had gotten out of hand.

Shizune pushed past the rookie and went to Kakashi's side. It seemed to her that he was scared, and possibly blaming himself for his past.

"Kakashi?" she said softly, putting a hand on his shoulder, effectively making the nurses relinquish their hold on him. He focused his gaze on her in confusion, almost mistaking her for Rin.

"Shizune…"

He almost felt his heart jump in his chest, with both the surprise of seeing her, and the added anxiety that came with her perceiving a new level of vulnerability about him.

"It's okay," she said sincerely, locking contact with his guilty eyes, "You don't want to be sedated, right?"

He nodded weakly, unable to stop his whole body from trembling. Kakashi watched in relief as she told everyone to leave the room, trying to slow his breathing, but to no avail.

"Are you okay?" she asked once they'd left, sitting at his side and gathering the sheets further up his form, her hand resting on the curve of his shoulders. She could tell that Kakashi was experiencing an intense amount of anxiety.

"I…" he choked out, finding it difficult to talk, as if his throat was constricted or swollen. He looked away for a second, overwhelmed with shame. Shizune felt her eyes gloss over, as she heard the pain in Kakashi's voice.

He glanced at the woman blearily, noticing how she quickly wiped her eyes, but not really registering it.

His muscles were painfully stiff and sore, and it felt as if he could smell the blood pouring out of her chest, tainting his callous hand.

"I can't even begin to imagine how you feel," she told him, observing how he'd paled, and seemed newly stressed, "But it's not your fault, Kakashi. It never was."

He exhaled shakily, closing his eyes. As much as he'd love to believe that, he just couldn't. It was his fault. Even so, it was questionable why the heavy guilt of being responsible for Rin's death had suddenly decided to haunt him. It had been a while since he'd had a nightmare about her.

Perhaps, he was subconsciously thinking about his late team, as he'd felt a strong pull to visit them lately.

"Kakashi…" Shizune began, noticing how he'd begun to breathe hard again, and the way he'd paled, "What do you need right now?"

His tormented gaze shifted back to her, and it became quickly apparent to her that he didn't have a clue what he needed.

"...I don't know," he began with a shaky inhale, feeling as if he were still in somewhat of a dream, "I...Can you stay?"

He didn't want to be alone. He wanted someone to stay, and let him be anxious, and sad, and terrified without forcing him to stop, or getting so worried, that it made him feel claustrophobic, and worse. And a part of him wanted to be embraced, however uncharacteristic that desire felt.

"Of course," Shizune responded warmly, smiling when he timidly turned his gaze towards her.

He opened his mouth suddenly, and then closed it just as abruptly, looking away. The lump in his throat only seemed to have gotten bigger, making him feel as if it were hard to speak.

"What is it, Kakashi?" she asked, noticing how he'd begun to say something, "Are you okay?"

The Hatake nodded, turning on his side as he felt his ashen cheeks began to redden. To his embarrassment, hot tears were gathering in his eyes, threatening to spill. It had been so long since anyone had asked him if he was okay, and now that someone was, he couldn't help but realize that he was far from it.

His face out of her sight, Kakashi exhaled deeply, trying to contain his feelings—to his utter bewilderment, a tear trickled out of his eye and across the rim of his nose. He quickly moved to wipe it in embarrassment, unable to understand why his chest felt so full and heavy with emotions, and why he felt so unhappy.

"Kakashi?" Shizune questioned with concern, noticing how the change in his body language, and the way his back was quickly rising up and down, as if his anxiety was anew.

He sniffled a few times, rubbing vigorously at his eyes, which were leaking without his permission. Maybe if he feigned sleep, she would leave him to rest and not be able to see that his mood actually wasn't great.

Unbeknownst to him, however, Shizune began to understand Kakashi's predicament, feeling a heavy aura of grief surrounding him. She knew him well enough to know that he turned away because he didn't want her to see him so vulnerable.

For a few moments, the kunoichi sat there, not really knowing what to do. She felt for him—he'd been doing worse as of late, with the recurring seizures, horrible migraines, and of course, his stubborn pneumonia. On top of all that, he was having nightmares about Rin?

Kakashi obviously needed a break. If she was going through all of that, she would've cracked long before him.

"Can I hug you?" Shizune blurted out of nowhere, having a strong feeling in her gut that he really needed one. Perhaps her own compassion for his situation was making her feel like he needed to be comforted; Shizune knew that she herself would've definitely wanted to be hugged and consoled, if she were in his predicament.

For around five seconds, Kakashi was awkwardly silent, unsure of how to respond. He discreetly wiped the slight wetness coating his dark circles, wondering if it was obvious that he was...sad. The last thing he wanted was for Shizune, out of all people, to perceive him as weak, or emotionally unstable. He wasn't usually like this.

No, before all of this, he didn't feel much of anything.

After a while, he nodded slowly, back still turned to her. Whether he liked it or not, he needed this.

Noticing the subtle movement of his head, she smiled slightly, pausing, and then shyly pulling her legs onto the mattress, adjusting her long kimono so that her pale calves were out of sight. Gazing at him from behind, she drew herself closer to him, inhaling quietly as the distance started to close between them. She knew they'd decided to part ways romantically, but she couldn't help that she was getting butterflies in her stomach.

Resting her head onto his pillow, next to his wild, silvery mane, she wrapped an arm around his torso, feeling electricity coursing through it as she made contact with his waist. She couldn't help but notice the way his bony torso felt, and how he smelled like the antiseptic of the hospital, instead of his usual mixture of sandalwood and earth .

Shizune wondered how Kakashi had really been, and what had happened after she'd left him at his apartment. When he was with her, Kakashi never really let on how he was feeling; he cracked jokes, and teased her, having a certain way of talking that made pretty much anything sound interesting.

This Kakashi was different.

He was quiet, and more gaunt since she'd last seen him- back then, he was thin, but able to pass as slender. Now, he was clearly underweight.

She felt him trembling in her hold, and rather than asking him why he was shaking, she inched closer to him, holding him tighter, and pulling more of the blankets over him, in the hope that the warmth would calm his racing heart.

The reason why she didn't ask him was simple; she knew he didn't want to be asked. The constant sniffling, and the uneven breathing had led her to suspect that he was upset. He didn't come across as the type that wanted to talk about it, especially with the way he'd turned away from her- also, Kakashi had been pretty silent the whole time.

She knew that if he wanted to initiate a conversation about something, he would, because that's just how he was.

After a few minutes of her embracing him, he drew up the courage to slowly turn onto his other side, and face towards her. Shizune pulled her hands away as he readjusted his position on the bed, noticing how the light reflected on his silvery eyelashes when he looked down.

Once comfortable, he laid there and stared at her blankly, as if to say, "Go ahead, you can hug me now". Holding back a chuckle, she scooted closer to him, slipping an arm under his neck, allowing him to nuzzle his head onto her chest. He closed his eyes and wrapped a lanky arm around her midriff, soothed by the way she played with his hair.

Soon, his breathing evened out and slowed dramatically; he drifted off, his arm growing limp and heavy on Shizune's torso. Even though he'd gotten a relatively long nap in before his nightmare, he still felt like he hadn't slept in days.

She closed her eyes, leaning her head on his, and relishing in his presence.

Hearing light snores, she glanced down, seeing that his slightly parted lips were the source of the noise, and that he'd fallen completely asleep, a relaxed expression on the visible portion of his face.

Making sure to be as gentle as possible, Shizune slowly eased Kakashi's head onto his pillow, proceeding to climb off of the bed and onto the floor. She straightened out her hair, combing a finger through her bob, while gazing at the Hatake's unconscious form.

A part of her was amused at how quickly he'd fallen asleep in her embrace, while the other was concerned at his astonishing decline in health.

With one last, lingering glimpse, she turned to leave.

"Kaka…"

"Kakash…"

There was a distorted voice calling his name, but he could barely make it out, as if he were under water, and this person was above the surface, on land.

"...kashi?"

"Kakashi? Are you okay?"

He felt someone rub his sore arm to try and get him to wake up. He made the mistake of opening his eye; as soon as he did, it felt as if the fluorescent light was shooting electricity through his head, so he was keen on shutting them again.

A throbbing agony overwhelmed the left side of his head, spreading down his cheek, to the sharp edge of his jaw. His sharingan pulsated painfully from deep within, and even his ear was affected, aching intensely for what had felt like hours.

The Hatake had been suffering from the migraine for a while by this point, but in his dazed, semi-conscious state, he hadn't found the strength to ask for help, resolving to sleep it off.

"Kakashi? Hey, talk to me," Gai questioned worriedly, noticing how pale he'd gotten, and the sheen of sweat laying dormant on his visage. The man opened his mouth carefully to respond, only to close it when he felt a wave of nausea overtake him.

"Gai…" He rasped with a gulp, opening his eye slightly to get a look at him, despite his bleary vision, "My head really hurts."

Gai furrowed his brow, wondering if he should go get a nurse.

"Okay, I'm going to get someone so they can give you your medicine," he said suddenly, getting up from his seat, and eyeing the tray on the side table that he'd brought up for Kakashi's dinner.

"Want to eat something in the meantime? It's your favorite," Gai said, holding the soup and plain rice closer to Kakashi's face, so that he'd get a whiff of the miso broth and finally gain an appetite.

Feeling a threatening rise of bile up his throat at the strong, savory smell, Kakashi lurched up, ashen and white in the face, his mouth filling with saliva.

"Are you okay?"

He urgently pulled off his mask and vomited over the side of the bed with no time to find a trash can, narrowly avoiding Gai's feet.

Gai shuffled backwards in shock, surprised that simply the smell of food would trigger such a reaction in him. Staring at the pool of clear throw up, streaked with a little red, and Kakashi's unnaturally heaving form, he dove into action, hurrying towards the door to get help.

Kakashi wiped his mouth with trembling fingers, gently easing his upper body back into the pillows. He eyed the vomit on the tile guiltily, a frown adorning his features underneath his mask. For some reason, he felt distinctly sorry for whoever had to clean up his mess.

He shut his eyes wearily, concentrating on dealing with the perforating pain stabbing his skull. Though he still felt nauseous, Kakashi didn't think he was in danger of puking anymore.

"Kakashi?" he heard a woman say in his ailing state, "I have some medicine for you."

The man opened his eyes, squinting to make out who it was, as the light hurt, and even made involuntary wetness gather at his tear ducts. He quickly saw that it was an older nurse who was speaking to him, one that he recognized as the woman who'd administered his chemotherapy to him several months before.

She gave him a small, clear container with a capsule in it, and a styrofoam cup filled to the top with a cool liquid. Kakashi downed the large pill and quickly drank the water, unable to avoid spilling some of it onto himself, given how tremulous his hands were. Wiping his mouth, he stared at the blank wall in front of him for a few moments, before deciding to lay down and wait for the medicine to take effect.

"Kakashi," the nurse spoke softly, glancing at the vomit next to her feet, her voice rough and aged, "Next time you tell me, or someone when you have a migraine, okay? Without treatment, they can progress and become more severe, so administering medicine early on helps a lot. And If you ever need it, there's a call button next to your bed."

She looked at him with a hidden pity that she couldn't help— he was panting in the bed, his eyebrows woven in pain, skin a ghastly hue. The nurse had seen many patients on the cancer ward that were near death, and she could tell that Kakashi was headed down the same path.

"...okay, i will. I'm sorry," he said in response, "for the throw up."

"No, no, no, don't apologize. It's not your fault," she reassured him immediately, shaking her head profusely, "There's nothing you should feel guilty about."

"Now if this happens again, tell someone!" she told Kakashi, turning around and giving Gai a meaningful look, as if to tell him to keep an eye on the Hatake.

Taking the cups out of Kakashi's hands, the nurse headed towards the trash can to throw them away, proceeding to exit the room afterwards.

The next several minutes were rather silent- a staff member had come in to clean up themess on the ground, and Kakashi had drifted off, his pain gradually succumbing to the migraine medicine. He looked exhausted, his droopy eyes blinking open every once in a while to glance at his friend. Though his head was getting better, the whole ordeal had left him thoroughly drained.

"Hey, how are you feeling now?" Gai asked from his spot on the plastic chair next to him, gazing at his rival's still, relaxed form, which contrasted greatly with the way he'd looked half an hour ago.

Kakashi shifted onto the side facing Gai, tenderly wrapping an arm around a pillow placed next to him.

"I'm fine," he started with a comical yawn, "I feel better now. Just kinda tired."

Gai nodded gratefully, secretly fearful of the Hatake's condition. His headaches had never been this vehement, not to mention the seizures, and the persistent lung infection. He was always tired, always sleeping—it was concerning, because it seemed as though Kakashi was getting significantly less coherent, his lucidity wearing away.

"Want to eat something?" Gai asked him patiently, almost shaking his head at the sight of the untouched tray next to him. Kakashi barely ate anymore. It was like he actually couldn't.

He shook his head, placing a hand over his stomach, quickly finding that it was hollow and caved in, with prominent hip bones. Everything tasted like nothing, so he had no interest in eating.

"Kakashi, you never finish your food. And then when you get meal shakes, you don't finish those either!" Gai told him worriedly, "You need vitamins and nutrients, my rival, and you're not getting any. That could also be why you're so tired."

"I also have cancer."

"You know what I meant, Kakashi."

The copy nin sighed rather obnoxiously, sitting up and running a hand through his messy silver hair.

"Fine, I will. But I just threw up, so maybe in a little, okay? And also, I'm not eating cold food."

Gai smiled widely at the compromise, happy at the simple fact that his friend was sitting up and speaking to him like normal, and of course, also because he agreed to eat.

"I'll get you anything you want! You name it, I'll bring it to you! Just tell me and I'll be at your service," Gai exclaimed, standing up and mock saluting at the end.

Kakashi chuckled deeply, glad that Gai was getting his old spark back. He was quieter as of recent, solemn with a distinct air of sleep deprivation about him— so, to see him scream and jump around like his old self, was refreshing.

"You know...I think after this pneumonia gets better, you'll be strong enough to restart treatment," Gai started tentatively, making eye contact with him earnestly, "What do you think, Kakashi? Is that something you would consider?"

He looked away as he processed the blunt proposition, unable to come up with something to say in return.

It didn't feel as if he were going to be strong enough after the chest infection cleared; the constant coughing, and viscous phlegm were a common occurrence at this point. What pained him more, if he had to decide, were definitely his neurological symptoms: monster headaches, dizziness, and seizures.

And at this time, if he was able to fight off the infection, it would truly be a feat. He doubted he could. Even Tsunade doubted he could, even though she didn't say that directly.

Kakashi had come to terms with his future. Death didn't bother him nearly as much as it had before. Starting treatment again would only add more pain to the last few months of his life. Though it would be more courageous and noble to live as long as possible for his comrades, there was also the alluring idea of a quick end that enticed him every day.

"I don't know, Gai," Kakashi started unsurely, his gaze downcast, a frown hidden behind his mask, "I was actually thinking the opposite."

Gai grimaced, fidgeting with his hands.

"What do you mean?"

Kakashi leaned back with an exhausted exhale, closing his burning eyes.

"Come on, we both know I'm going to die soon. I don't think it's fair to make me think about treatment right now," he started with an uncharacteristic hastiness, "I've actually been thinking about… going DNR...I'm tired of all of this. It's too much."

Gai's breath caught in his throat, his visage paling slightly. He averted his eyes, in somewhat of a shock. If he was dying himself, he would fight till the last breadth, for Kakashi, for Lee and the rest of his students.

"Are you sure this isn't because... you don't want to live?" he hinted boldly, remembering how depressed and reclusive Kakashi had been for most of his life, until he was assigned to Team 7.

Though he'd feared death initially, because of his innate, evolutionary need to survive, a part of him wanted to pass away, and thought he might even deserve it. And of course, his parents, and his old team lived in a different world, so he was drawn to it.

"Maybe…" the Hatake responded weakly, willing to admit that life had never been for him, "But i'm still dying. I wasted too much time, Gai."

"So if you had the chance to go back a few months and start chemo, would you?" Gai asked him with a sense of brutal honesty that was, in a way, necessary for Kakashi's confused mental health.

"I don't know."

A/n: hey guys I have to work in literally one minute so gotta make this quick. I'm planning on being a few minutes late so I can post this chapter hehe:) I had an idea to write another fanfic about Sakura or Naruto with cancer or another disease, because I really like describing diseases and how they progress and yeah...I'm weird. But let me know any ideas and who you'd want to be affected! And what time frame (older or younger Naruto/sakura). Ok bye leave reviews!