This is for Kalira on the Umino Hours discord, I hope you like it. 3 And HUGE thanks to booleanWildcard for betaing this and making it worlds better. 3

It was too early in the morning to be awake—but then again, Iruka always thought that. He hoped being a shinobi wouldn't mean he had to get up as early as he did for school. His dad said that humans were made to rise with the sun; if that were true, then Iruka definitely wasn't human.

The tree line beside the graveyard made a shortcut to where civilian school and boring lessons awaited him, allowing a precious extra six minutes of sleep. He didn't see a reason why he had to bother going at all, but his mom made the excellent argument that even shinobi had to write up mission reports. He hadn't quite understood her explanation for why math or history were necessary, but it sounded very important, so Iruka dutifully went to school and made an attempt to listen.

Most importantly, it gave Iruka something to do when his parents were gone.

He didn't like being alone.

The forest and graveyard were quiet this early in the morning, with fog still in the air and the sky starting to flush orange as the sun crept above the treeline. It cast a warm glow on the gravestones, bringing life to the statues and fresh flowers that dotted the aisles.

The graveyard was constantly expanding, forest being cut into every few years to make way for new graves. By the time Iruka became a shinobi, the trees he now walked through would likely be a distant memory. That was why he shouldn't disturb them, his father said; it was disrespectful to the people that would eventually make the land their home. Iruka took the long way back from school because of that. He never saw visitors in the morning, though. There was no one for him to disturb.

Until now.

Iruka thought the boy was another gravestone at first. The gray of his hair matched the stones, but he didn't fit in the neat rows, and stood a foot too high. The ebony of his clothes was also deceptive, not the grieving attire Iruka expected. They were combat blacks, similar to what his dad wore, but with belts lacing his chest. He had utility pouches, a kunai holster, and a hitai-ate, yet he only looked a few years older than Iruka. A mask covered most of his face, but his shoulders were slim, musculature undeveloped, and stature too short to have hit puberty.

The boy stood in front of a grave.

Iruka hadn't encountered anyone on his morning shortcuts before. He felt uneasy suddenly, like he was intruding, certain that at any moment the boy would look up and see him and tell his dad about his morning shortcuts. He hesitated, thinking about stepping farther into the treeline, when a strip of sunlight highlighted the boy's face.

He wasn't crying.

He wasn't angry.

He wasn't calm.

His eyes were empty, dark gray and hooded, gaze reflecting off whatever name was carved in front of him.

He looked lost. Empty, hollow, carved out and hung up to dry.

But people's outsides didn't always match their insides. His dad said that, and Iruka knew it to be true.

He knew, because people didn't look that hollow when they didn't care. They looked like that when they cared so much they thought they would die. When they cared so much that paper cranes of thoughts and emotions filled their stomach and throat and stayed clogged there, each fighting to break free first, but none succeeding, dry paper soaking up all moisture that could have gone to tears or snot or speech.

That was how his mother looked after a bad mission. There had only been two, twice so bad that he remembered when she came home and sat at their kitchen table with empty hands, empty mouth, empty eyes, and stayed there all through the night, standing guard or waiting for something that would never come.

Iruka didn't know what his mother had lost those times. He didn't know what this boy had lost, either, not really. But he knew what his dad did on those bad days. He made Kohari green tea, and he replaced it every time it grew cold. The first three or four or ten cups went undrunk, and Iruka asked if it wasn't a waste. His dad said that it was worth all the ryo those leaves cost, for the one cup that she would drink. That single warm, fresh cup was the only one that mattered, that one cup that greeted her when she was ready to fill the emptiness.

Iruka didn't know what that meant, but he thought someone should make tea for this boy, too. Iruka wasn't technically allowed to, because he burned himself the last time he tried to pour the kettle, but that was a whole month ago. Iruka had grown since then, would be six in less than two weeks. He could take this boy's hand and lead him home, and surely his dad wouldn't mind if he skipped school, just for one day, because Ikkaku stayed up all night when his mom was empty, replacing cup after cup. He would understand.

The boy looked up. Empty gray met warm brown, and abruptly, there wasn't emptiness anymore. Silver brows rose, then fell, descending past neutral and settling on a scowl.

The boy brought up his hands, made seals so fast Iruka couldn't have interpreted them even if he had memorized their names yet—

—and disappeared.

When Iruka unfroze, he resumed his walk to school, having lost all the time he normally saved.

The chill of early morning settled into his bones, but not his stomach. That was full of warmth, because for a moment—just a tiny, transient moment—the boy had looked relieved to see him.

Iruka didn't know why, but he liked it.

He hoped someone made the boy that tea.

Maybe it wasn't about the leaves at all. Maybe the reason his dad stayed up with endless cups and boiling kettles was the same reason Iruka went to school, even when his parents weren't around to make him. Maybe the tea was just a sign that someone was there, whenever they were needed, to fill the emptiness or wet the paper cranes so their mashed pulp would finally spill out, leaving room for something else.

It was nice not to be alone.

Kakashi's plumed tail swept across the dusty floorboards, accruing dirt and debris from two years of desolation. His claws clacked on the wood, which creaked with the strain of his weight. Kakashi hesitated, paw lifted, and looked around to see if anyone heard.

Of course not.

There was no one here.

Not even Kakashi.

There were blood stains splattered on the boards, incongruous with Kakashi's memories. The only one should be on the tatami in his father's study.

Kakashi didn't go in there to check. This was his dream, and he would avoid it if he wanted to.

Pattering down the front steps, Kakashi descended to the well-kept grounds. This part was exactly as he remembered it, with blooming zinnia and jasmine and freshly-mown grass. The sun illuminated the greenery, casting no shadows, even beneath the gnarled white oak that should have painted shade over the koi pond.

Kakashi couldn't smell the flowers until he thought about them, couldn't hear the buzz of cicadas or the heat on his fur until he realized that he should. The world was discriminating and unbalanced, highlighting only the parts the brain deemed most important—or perhaps those that it remembered best. Kakashi didn't know how dreams worked, really, and didn't want to. That was the sort of thing Rin would enjoy studying, and Obito would foolishly pretend to have interest in to get her attention.

Kakashi didn't live in fantasies.

Except for now, of course, but he could hardly help what happened when he slept, no matter how much he tried.

Kakashi padded to the edge of the pond, bending his head to peer into the surface. What he saw staring back at him was fuzzy and blurred at the edges, distorted in places, and yet somehow exactly what he expected. A silver wolf. Young, not quite fully grown—Kakashi was only ten, after all—with full cheeks and a rounded muzzle and ears that drooped at the tips. There was no mask covering his features, but Kakashi supposed the fur served that purpose. The canines that were a touch too prominent in his human form fit perfectly now, even elongated and whitened to lethal perfection. His nose was a glossy black and his eyes dark charcoal, much as they were in real life. They didn't fit the wolf, Kakashi reflected morosely, too round to not be human. The one incongruous feature in the wolf's face.

Fur and a tail couldn't quite hide what was inside, after all.

A sudden swish of color in the pond caught Kakashi's eyes, drawing his attention away from himself. He tilted his head curiously, leaning his weight on his front paws to peer inside. He caught it again, a flash of umber and blue, and those were strange colors for koi fish, but who was Kakashi the Wolf to judge?

Except it wasn't a koi, he realized, when a human head broke through the surface.

Water cascaded down its crown and rolled from slim shoulders, causing ripples in the water that shook too much, like waves in a tsunami. Then they disappeared all at once, someone putting a damper on vibrating strings.

Brown eyes blinked open, lined with damp eyelashes, and peered at him curiously.

It was a boy. Small, probably a few years younger than Kakashi. His skin was tanned and smooth, his features pleasantly symmetrical, his long hair falling in a wet mass over the boy's collarbones and back, ending somewhere around his waist.

As Kakashi watched, the boy brought up a hand and scrubbed at his nose, sniffing loudly and wetly.

"You're a wolf." The kid said abruptly, foregoing a greeting. His gaze flickered around the Hatake Estate, seeking out corners that faded into unnatural mist. "This is your dream, right?"

Kakashi didn't consider that wolves couldn't speak, and so words flew from his mouth smoothly, rolling off a stagnant tongue. "Well, I don't think it's reality."

"Huh." The boy's eyes settled back on him. "I'm Iruka." He grinned suddenly. His upper-half tilted as something splashed above the water beside him, throwing up little droplets that reached Kakashi but somehow didn't dampen his fur. "I'm a mermaid, see?"

"You're a boy." Kakashi thought so at least, and he certainly hoped a little girl wasn't swimming around bare-chested in his dreams.

"Yeah, so?"

"'Maid' is for women. You should say 'merman'."

Iruka scowled. "I'm the mermaid, so I think I'll decide what I'm called, thanks." Kakashi caught a hint of iridescent blue scales as the tail briefly flicked above the surface once again. Despite the clear water, Kakashi couldn't see anything below his reflection. Iruka's expression turned thoughtful. "You might be right, though. I'll ask mom."

The boy started to sink down, and Kakashi felt a flicker of unease at the thought of him leaving, stranding Kakashi alone in this place. He didn't remember mermen in his father's koi pond, but as far as he was concerned, the farther away his dream stayed from the real Hatake Estate, the better.

"Your name is Iruka?" Kakashi asked quickly. Kakashi didn't like talking to people, usually, but then he usually didn't mind being alone, either. He wasn't himself right now. Wolves were social creatures, he excused to himself. It made sense for him to want to be around someone, even if it was a fish. "Isn't that a bit too obvious?"

"Duh. That's why I chose it." Iruka rolled his eyes childishly.

Well, he was a child.

Kakashi didn't consider himself a child. He was already a chūnin, would probably be recommended to the jōnin examination before long. He was an adult in every reasonable sense of the word.

"You named yourself? Didn't you say you have a mom?" Kakashi wondered if this was his subconscious telling him that he didn't like his own name. It had been chosen by his mother, or so he had been told.

"Not my name. A mermaid! I chose to be a mermaid because of my name. Merman." Iruka frowned, then nodded his head decisively. "Merman."

Kakashi didn't think creations of his imagination should have free-will, especially so much as to choose their own species. That seemed like a recipe for disaster. But at the same time, he didn't really want to control Iruka, either, and his dreams never seemed quite within his power to change, anyway.

Dreams were as inevitable as death.

"Shouldn't you be a dolphin, then?" Kakashi drawled, tail flicking, collecting drew from the grass as he sat back on his haunches. That water felt real, unlike whatever Iruka swam in.

"I was going to be." The boy grimaced. He twirled in the water, spinning in absent circles, occasionally bobbing high enough that the seam where skin melted into scales was visible. It was slightly unnerving. "My mom bought me a t-shirt with a dolphin on it. But Mizuki said dolphins are assholes."

"Maybe Mizuki's the asshole."

"That's what I said!" Iruka beamed at him. His smile stretched across his features, taking over Kakashi's vision until everything else was out of focus. A droplet of water fell from his lip. Kakashi wondered if it tasted like fish. He liked fish, but not living ones. "But he said my hair makes me a mermaid. It's not this long when I'm awake, though. It's more like this." He waved his hand somewhere in the proximity of his neck, wobbling too much for Kakashi to get an accurate picture.

"You know he was insulting you, right?" Kakashi lifted a paw to scratch at one floppy ear. It wasn't itchy, per se, he just had the urge to move. He didn't know his muscles could ache even in a dream; maybe it was a subconscious remnant of his real body's post-mission strains. Settling his paw back in the grass, he was careful to avoid a vibrant green caterpillar with black and yellow stripes that crawled along the water's edge. "Calling you a girl?"

Iruka's smile slowly faded. "Oh."

Something hard lodged in Kakashi's stomach; Obito had called him an asshole lots of times, but he never felt it before.

If he comforted a figment of his imagination, was that comforting himself by proxy?

"You can be a mermaid if you want. Or a girl." He said awkwardly. "If he thinks that's an insult, he's the dumb one. Kunoichi are strong." He thought about Tsunade of the Sannin and Uzumaki Kushina, both of whom could, and would, beat down anyone in their path. Rin wasn't a fighter, but she was intelligent and good with chakra control. A lot better than Obito. "And… merpeople can be cool."

He dragged his paw across the ground, pulling up grass way too easily and exposing soft dirt below. There were more caterpillars. Dozens of them. He pushed the grass back over them.

"You think?" Iruka didn't look hopeful.

"Yeah. They… they're probably good at water jutsu."

"Huh. I don't know any of those." Iruka swam closer to the edge of the pool, placing his forearms on the side and pulling himself up until he was almost nose-to-snout with Kakashi, who fought the urge to crane his head back. "Do you?"

"Of course I do." Kakashi wanted to frown, but he wasn't sure how well canine lips could accommodate the expression. Iruka's wide eyes didn't change either way. "I'm a shinobi."

"My parents are, too. I'll be one, someday." Iruka smiled. It was softer this time, not boasting. "You must be really amazing."

Kakashi blinked, looking away, nose twitching. He could faintly smell salt and clams, like the koi pond was part of the ocean rather than fresh water. He guessed it wasn't a koi pond anymore, though. It was a mer-pond. An Iruka-pond. And if it was an Iruka-pond, then this wasn't really Hatake Estate, and his dad hadn't really died behind a few thin rice-paper walls. It didn't matter what he told Imaginary-Iruka. "I'm going to be better than my father."

Because Kakashi was going to follow the rules.

"That's good." Iruka's smile widened. Kakashi wasn't sure if he was being patronized or not. The boy pushed back from the edge of the pond, floating out to the center. "You're pretty. Can I pet you next time?"

Kakashi was not impressed. "I'm not a dog."

"Why not? Dogs are great!" Iruka laughed. The water around him bubbled with the sound. "You're nicer than I thought you'd be. I'll come back soon!"

With that, Iruka turned in a somersault, tail cutting into the sky before disappearing beneath the surface.

Kakashi stood on all fours, leaning forward to peer into the water, his right-front paw slipping partially into it.

He couldn't see Iruka, or koi, or anything living.

Just a silver wolf and white, white fangs.

Iruka came back to his dreams many times after that, although at different places and in different forms. One time, he had spikes along his back, which he quickly admitted were quite uncomfortable and dissolved into black sand. The next time, he was a merperson again, but they were in a hot springs. Kakashi had perched on a large rock in the middle (he wasn't an expert, but he didn't think hot springs typically had those) and watched Iruka play in the steamy water. The third time, the boy had a long, scaled tail as well as human legs, and they were perched on the top of a giant building.

Another time, he was a rambunctious terrier who ran circles around Kakashi in an open field, barking playfully until Kakashi finally got up and puppy-wrestled with him, winning easily. It reminded him a bit too much of someone else, someone with a penchant for green and loud declarations about rivalry.

The next time, Iruka was almost entirely the same as merman-Iruka, except with human legs and no scales, shorter hair that only fell to his shoulders, and a long scar that ran over the bridge of his nose. When Kakashi asked, he said he was trying something new, and he wasn't sure if he liked it. That time, they were sitting at a kotatsu in a messy living room that smelled of freshly baked bread.

Everytime, Kakashi was a silver wolf.

One time, he had purple streaks on his cheeks.

Iruka asked curiously what they were, and Kakashi didn't know what to say, so he didn't.

He was pretty sure Rin had a crush on him.

He was pretty sure he respected her, and also sure he had thought once or twice about kissing her, like any twelve-year-old boy starting the first signs of puberty.

He was completely sure Obito was in love with her.

He was also completely sure he didn't want to deal with any of it.

Iruka, however, was easy to be with. He was content to splash around quietly while Kakashi closed his eyes, or keep up most of a conversation on his own, asking occasional questions that were sometimes naive, but not thoroughly stupid.

It wasn't bad. The dreams with Iruka were better than any others, even if Kakashi often found himself wondering during waking hours when he had become a creative enough person to dream of such a creature.

That seemed like something Rin would do.

Not him.

"How come you never change?" Iruka asked.

He was a fox that night, red with white socks and bushy tail and silky fur. He and Kakashi lay on the grass beside each other, sides pressed together. Iruka's small brown eyes were fixed on the copper-colored clouds passing over the forest canopy, while Kakashi lay on his stomach, muzzle on his paws, breathing in the astringent scent of pine needles. He had been in a lot of forests over the last few years. This one was definitely near Konoha.

"I don't know how to be anything else." Kakashi murmured. One of his ears twitched as a gentle breeze rustled through the leaves. His left ear grew fully upright now, though his left one sometimes flopped down on the corner, and his paws were still too large for his slender frame. He would grow into them.

"You can be anything you wanna be." Iruka pressed.

Kakashi sighed through his nose, the air rustling the undergrowth and raising a stronger scent that made his nostrils twitch. About a foot away, a spiny black-and-red caterpillar crawled, crossing blades of grass like tiny mountains. "I've only ever wanted to be one thing."

"A dog?"

"I'm a wolf." He growled, a low rumble in his chest. Iruka didn't take it seriously, if the way he wiggled until he could nuzzle Kakashi's ear was an indication.

Kakashi still refused to let Iruka pet him, but some contact wasn't bad. Occasionally.

It was all a dream, anyway.

"You sure?" Iruka's tail flicked, laying across Kakashi's. His pointed nose pressed coldy into the sensitive inside of Kakashi's ear. Kakashi bared his teeth, nipping lightly at Iruka's fur in a warning that had never been heeded before, and wasn't now. "I don't think wolves have droopy ears."

"Some do. When they're young."

Kakashi refused to say 'as puppies'.

Iruka snorted. He had started to develop a teasing, sarcastic streak in the last few years. Kakashi wasn't sure if that was his own brain trying to tell him to get a sense of humor, or if his dream figments really had started to take on a life of their own. Well, just Iruka, really. He never remembered much of his other dreams, unless they were nightmares.

It was always possible that an enemy nin was using some new, long-range genjutsu to spy on Konoha nin in their sleep to glean information, but Kakashi was careful not to say anything confidential, and Iruka never probed.

"Fine. Whaddaya wanna be then, Wolf-san?"

Iruka never even asked for his name.

"A shinobi." Kakashi responded automatically.

"Aren't you already one?"

"Yes, but that doesn't mean I'm done." He paused, opening his eyes. "I need to be a better shinobi. I just took my jōnin test, but even that isn't the end."

"Did you pass? Are you gonna try to be Hokage?"

Kakashi made a disgruntled noise and nudged Iruka's snout until he was farther away. "They'll tell me tomorrow, and you don't have to be the Hokage to be strong. The Kage may be one of the most powerful shinobi in a hidden village, but they're also chosen for political clout, and at the Daimyo's whims. They end up doing paperwork more than fighting."

"Oh." Kakashi could fear the frown in Iruka's tone. "That doesn't sound as cool as I thought it would."

They were silent for a few minutes. Birds chirped in the trees, but Kakashi couldn't smell or see them, and the sunlight didn't extend beyond their small clearing. It didn't need to.

"Hey." Iruka started, pausing with uncharacteristic hesitancy. "When you're a big-shot jōnin… will you still talk to me?"

"Maa, I guess." Kakashi closed his eyes and settled back into his paws. "For a figment of my imagination, you're surprisingly hard to ignore."

Iruka didn't answer. A moment later, he was gone.

When Kakashi awoke, there was a lot more on his mind than dreams.

Within a week, Obito was dead, and Kakashi's eye had been replaced.

This one cried tears of blood.