Kakashi realised, with a sharp pang of disappointment (mostly for himself), that he didn't know what his father would have wanted him to do in this kind of situation. Either he had forgotten, or he had simply never paid any attention. A common theme, he thought bitterly.
The sun was beating down on his back as he stared at the memorial stone, two white chrysanthemums in his hand. Sakumo might have loved flowers, or he could have hated them. One thing was for sure, nobody was laying any flowers at his grave. Kakashi hadn't even known that his father was given one, as he certainly wasn't looking for it in his previous life. The heat was starting to make him feel slightly uncomfortable, beads of sweat forming on his brow, but he wasn't about to move. He wasn't going to take this moment away from his father.
Breathing deeply, his throat already dry, Kakashi stared hard at the stone and willed his father to hear him somehow.
"I forgive you."
He wished he could see his father's response, to know that his only son didn't hate him anymore. Despite the impossibility of this idea, Kakashi felt a weight lift off his shoulders. His father could finally move on, and Kakashi didn't have to carry the heavy guilt he so often felt when he imagined Sakumo sitting by that fire, waiting to see his mother.
Kakashi, perhaps subconsciously, had for a long time understood and admired the reasoning behind his father's choice to place the lives of his teammates above completing a mission. Obito, as much as he despised him at the moment, had a lot to do with that. What he had truly struggled with was Sakumo's decision to take his own life, leaving Kakashi alone as the last living Hatake at such a young age. His younger self's obsession with rules was often just a cover for the betrayal that he had felt, a way to channel that anger into what he had viewed as useful. As his purpose. But he was an adult now, no matter how damn short he appeared, and he could understand. He could forgive.
Placing one of the flowers carefully beside the grave, Kakashi let the soft calls of the birds and sound of the breeze rustling through the trees envelope him. After a few beats of stillness, he moved slowly to another nearby grave. There was already a bunch of bluebells below the name 'Maito Dai', and Kakashi smiled slightly as he positioned his single flower next to them.
The moment of peace was interrupted when he sensed a presence (poorly) disguised in the trees behind him, he had been so focused on his father he hadn't even considered anyone would be watching him. He was really losing touch, perhaps the younger body and mind really was having an effect on him. Walking away from Dai's grave, he stared intently at the source of chakra, letting him know that he knew he was there.
And he knew it was a 'him', because he had spent years training with the idiot and he was exceptionally poor at repressing his chakra. At least he was as a child.
"Are you stalking me, Obito?" Kakashi called out, rolling his eyes as he felt the presence stutter in surprise. Honestly, how this kid turned out to be a mass murderer, he would never understand.
"No!" Came the indignant response from behind the tree, before Obito meekly appeared from his hiding place, his hands behind his back. Kakashi gave him his best deadpan look. He felt considerably more relaxed than a few hours ago, as seeing Obito did not almost give him a heart attack this time around. However, Kakashi could still feel the coils of hatred twist uncomfortably in his stomach. He could not forgive Obito like he forgave Sakumo. "I was just wondering where you went, the dango was amazing by the way."
"Well… here I am." There was no immediate reply from Obito, and Kakashi raised an eyebrow at the boy who looking anywhere but at him.
"Er… why are you here…?" Obito asked, confused.
Kakashi realised that going from thinking his father was the scum of the earth to paying his respects at his grave looked mildly suspicious. Time to do what he did best; deflect.
"Why are you here?"
"I just said why!" Obito fired up immediately, and Kakashi hid a smile. "You idiot, we just wondered where you were! You've been acting even more weird than usual."
"So they sent you to spy on me? If Minato-sensei didn't want me to find out, he shouldn't have sent the shinobi equivalent of an elephant."
Obito huffed angrily, "Sensei didn't send me to do anything… I just wanted to make sure you weren't sacrificing small animals or something."
Kakashi blinked, Um… what. He had forgotten how weird Obito could be sometimes.
Stuffing his hands in his pockets and relaxing his posture, he gave Obito his best bored look before starting to slink away in the direction of his home. It was hard seeing Obito here (although it was hard seeing him in general), a place where he had once come to remember the boy and apologise to him, not knowing that he was still alive and wreaking havoc on the world.
"Hey!" Obito called out and Kakashi stilled, his instincts screaming at him to fling a couple of kunai at the source of the voice. He could hear the undisguised footsteps coming towards him and turned slowly, his hand twitching. The Uchiha didn't appear to notice his struggle though as he thrust a container into his hands.
"Sensei wanted to give you a couple of dango sticks… I told him the shinobi rules probably forbid eating yummy food, but he told me to give them to you anyway."
Obito was standing close enough that Kakashi could see the unease partially hidden behind childish agitation. Although it was likely a subconscious shinobi instinct and Obito may not even recognise it, Kakashi realised as he eyed the boy, it was pretty clear. Obito was slightly afraid of him.
"I thought you said that sensei didn't send you?" Kakashi said, accepting the box. Obito discreetly took a step backwards away from him.
"He didn't," Obito replied. "I just told him I was going to look for you and then he gave me the dango. It took me forever to find you, by the way, have you been here the whole time? Wait, what were you doing here-"
Headache returning and rapidly losing his patience, Kakashi gave Obito a hard look.
"None of your business, Obito," he hissed rudely, earning a surprised look from the Uchiha at his seemingly random mood swing. He started to walk away, hoping to shake him, but Obito was not getting the message (or was just ignoring it).
"Er… okay," Obito replied awkwardly, matching his strides. There was no angry reply this time.
They walked in silence towards the village, Kakashi debating whether or not to shunshin away and leave Obito to make his own way back. A part of him was intrigued, however, by the boy's change in behaviour towards him. Obito was pretty oblivious a lot of the time in most situations, but he was pretty in tune to other people's emotions. Maybe he was simply curious is to why he was acting differently?
So many things had changed in the two days he had been back in the past. For one, Kakashi was one hundred per cent sure that Rin had never asked him to help her with taijutsu. Had one missed training session caused such a change? What had happened when he wasn't there that morning?
He stole a quick glance at Obito, who was staring intently ahead. The sun was reflecting harshly off his goggles and Kakashi could see beads of sweat forming around the side of his face, and he was clearly working hard to control his breathing. Obito was obviously uncomfortable with more than just the heat. Again, he did not know if this was a subconscious reaction to Kakashi's internal struggle about the boy, or if he could actually sense his ill feelings towards him. He had held a general annoyance towards the Uchiha previously at this age, but some part of Obito must have sensed that this was different.
So why was he still walking with him?
"Oh, I forgot to tell you," Obito interrupted his thoughts, "We have to report to the Hokage's office."
Kakashi sighed, "When?"
"Uhh… like now I think," Obito frowned thoughtfully. "Or it could be a bit later, I'm not sure, I can't remember."
Kakashi rolled his eyes and Obito had the decency to look mildly sheepish. They fell back into silence, finally arriving at the outskirts of the village. The silence was more comfortable this time, but Obito had gained some confidence and seemed determined to fill it.
"Are you going to stop wearing your headband like a dumb eye patch when we go on the mission? Don't get me wrong, eye patches can be cool, but only when there is a cool story to go with it. Like losing your eye in battle or something. It's not cool though when you just start wearing it randomly, it just looks stupid. No one thinks you look cool with it, Kakashi-"
Kakashi ignored Obito's rambling and looked around the village, still keeping hold on the box of dango. More people were milling around as it was getting close to dinner time, the sounds of conversation and laughter calming his fraying nerves. He spied the Hokage tower up ahead and wasn't sure whether to shunshin straight there and leave Obito babbling about what constitutes a 'cool eye patch', or shunshin home so he didn't have to see the Third and receive a mission so soon.
"-Are you even listening to me? Oh look, it's your new best friend," Obito gestured over to one of the smaller open eateries, and Kakashi followed his gaze to see a familiar flash of dark green.
Gai was waving at him enthusiastically, sitting next to a couple other familiar faces. Ebisu he had not known very well at all, he was a rather stuffy individual (not unlike himself) and Kakashi had only known him as one of Gai's teammates and later as Sarutobi Konohamaru's sensei. Genma on the other hand, Kakashi did know well, although not at this age. Genma had been on his ANBU squad for years and had seen the worst of him, he had been one of the few people Kakashi could trust to have his back. After Minato's death and before he had his genin team, which had also forced him to interact more with the other jōnin, Kakashi's inner circle had included Gai and Genma (and Tenzō, but it hurt too much to think of the boy right now).
Kakashi nodded in return, causing Gai to positively beam back at him. Genma raised a curious eyebrow at the exchange, a senbon needle positioned lazily between his teeth.
Next to him he could hear Obito huff in annoyance, "Don't you care about being on time anymore?"
"I thought you said it could be another hour before we were scheduled to meet the Hokage," Kakashi replied, tearing his gaze away from his old friends and continuing towards the tower.
"What I said was I don't remember. It could have been an hour ago that we were supposed to be there," Obito paused before looking at Kakashi with eyes that were as accusatory as this Obito could ever muster. "The Kakashi I know would never even risk being late, especially to see the Hokage."
Letting the sound of the rapidly filling streets fill the silence, Kakashi held back an amused snort at the fact that the first person to come to him with any sort of mild confrontation was Obito. He should have seen that coming, really.
Instead of showing his amusement, he kept it light in response, "And what is that supposed to mean?"
"I don't know…" Obito narrowed his eyes. "But I'm not ruling out demon possession."
This time Kakashi really did snort. Obito stared at him in disbelief with wide eyes and a slack jaw, so distracted by the show of emotion that he nearly walked smack into the door to the Hokage tower. Kakashi could feel the hatred that had been bubbling away inside him calm down ever so slightly at the familiar antics of the young Uchiha, and he quickly reminded himself that Obito was exactly the same as before. He was enthusiastic and happy, if not a little idiotic, but there was also something there that harboured dark thoughts and evil actions.
Within a couple of years, this same kid would kill Minato and Kushina.
He could not forget that.
Mood soured, he opened the door and they made their way up to the Hokage's office. Two men passed them on the way up and Kakashi stuttered up a step when he recognised them as Uchiha. Although he had never seen them before, just the fact that there were regular Uchiha shinobi just walking around threw him off for a second. He hadn't associated Obito with the Uchiha massacre, probably because he had died before it had occurred, and he had forgotten what it was like having them so present in the shinobi system.
Glancing back, he wondered if Obito had noticed his reaction. His teammate had his eyes downcast with almost an aura of shame surrounding him; perhaps Obito had known the two shinobi.
They finally reached the door to the Hokage's office, and Kakashi couldn't help but feel a swell of happiness as he saw Minato and Rin waiting for them. It was just so great to see them alive and well.
"Ah, just on time!" Minato called out cheerfully, he looked at the dango box in Kakashi's hands and smiled happily at his youngest student. "Luckily you had Kakashi with you to make sure you weren't late again, eh Obito?"
Obito spluttered indignantly, "Sensei! Kakashi has been later than me recently! Besides, I can't help it if old ladies are always asking for my help."
"It's alright, I believe you," Minato said. "The Hokage will be waiting for us now, let's go in."
They entered the room and bowed respectfully towards the figure behind the desk. Kakashi sensed a number of ANBU stationed around the building, not recognising the two stationed behind the Hokage.
"Ah, welcome Minato," the Third began kindly, "My apologies to you and your team for the late notice of this meeting. We had another team lined up for this assignment but they were called to more pressing matters."
"It is of no problem, Hokage-sama," Minato replied. Kakashi snuck a look at Hiruzen and was immediately drawn to how much younger he looked. It was around fourteen years before his death at the hands of Orochimaru, but Kakashi remembered how quickly the Third had aged after Minato died. The stress of the position, particularly after losing the village's most promising leader, had really affected him.
"Good to hear. The mission is B-ranked, mostly because of its location in Kusagakure. Konoha shinobi have gathered information on the Iwa shinobi and their strategies which have been stored in scrolls. Unfortunately, these cannot be transported any other way other than by foot and we can't risk bringing back those on the frontlines to Konoha, so we need your squad to retrieve them." Hiruzen held out a mission summary scroll towards Minato, who took it dutifully.
"B-ranked, you say?" Minato asked, pocketing the scroll.
"Yes," Hiruzen replied. "The information gathered is not of the highest intelligence, but it would be helpful in the war effort. Expect some enemy shinobi, but it is unlikely that Iwa will follow you back into Fire Country for the scrolls."
Kakashi stayed silent as Minato nodded. He remembered this assignment. Mission-wise, it was successful, but he remembered that he and Obito had gotten into a huge argument and didn't speak for days afterwards. The details were fuzzy, but it had started when Obito overestimated his skillset and had gotten himself hurt. This time around, Kakashi was worried about his own abilities. A couple of practices with Gai and the wooden dummy hadn't gotten him properly used to his younger body yet; it was hard to forget around twelve years of conditioning.
What was further concerning was how distracted he was. He wasn't as observant and his mind tended to wander, getting caught in the past and thinking about the future. He had been blaming the younger mind for his lapses in concentration, but his younger self at eight wouldn't make the mistakes he had been committing in the few days he had been back in the past. Kakashi didn't want to risk the success of the mission or the safety of his teammates because he suddenly got caught in his own mind.
"-In five days," Hiruzen's voice shook him out of his thoughts. "That will give you enough time to prepare for the assignment and to fully recover from any lingering injuries." The Third shifted his eyes towards Kakashi briefly, showing that the latter comment was directed at him.
Feeling Minato's eyes on him, Kakashi maintained his steady gaze at the desk in front of him. They had not been given five days to prepare the first time, Minato must have expressed some sort of concern to the Hokage. His stomach dropped slightly; this would be a new mission, he wouldn't be able to rely on past knowledge to get by.
Hiruzen dismissed them and they regrouped outside the Hokage tower.
"Is everyone confident with the mission?" Minato asked as the gathered them into a circle of sorts. "The B-rank sounds mostly precautionary, but just be aware that war-related missions can easily jump up in rank."
"We can handle it, sensei," Obito puffed out his chest in reply, causing Minato to grin at him. Kakashi could understand his concern though. Obito and Rin were mid to low-level chūnin and he himself was only a high-ranked chūnin (that Minato knew of), and despite Minato being a high-ranked jōnin, the war brought an unpredictability factor to every mission. He had seen it first-hand.
"Actually, sensei…" Rin replied, bringing everyone's attention to her. "I'd feel a lot better knowing that Kakashi's eye was properly healed."
"I was thinking the same thing, Rin." Minato crossed his arms and looked at him expectantly.
Kakashi sighed in resignation, "It's just scratched is all. It will be fine," he deflected, but it was no use arguing at this point.
"Yes we know it's all fine. But Rin is our team's medical shinobi and I'm sure it hasn't been easy for her to see you injured and be told that she can't help."
Was Minato guilt-tripping him? Well, it was working.
Sighing again, Kakashi turned to his kind teammate and lifted up the hitai-ate. His vision from his left eye was blurry and distorted due to lack of use, and he closed it immediately. Rin hummed thoughtfully but did not show any other outward reaction, simply closing the distance between them and lifting a glowing hand to the affected area. He did not want her this close to him. Keeping his other eye cast downwards, he thought of his students to keep his mind occupied and away from the image of a dying young Obito offering him his eye. He thought of how different Sasuke and Naruto would be if their respective families had not been killed. Would they still be his students?
"All done," Rin smiled at him, her wide eyes creasing at the corners. Minato was right, she was relieved that she could finally help him.
"Thanks," he replied quietly, adjusting his headband into a more comfortable position. He could no longer feel the scratches around his eye and his vision was perfectly clear; she had done a good job (which was to be expected). Obito was watching him with a strange expression.
"Did one of your dogs try and eat your eye or something?"
Kakashi rolled his eyes and Rin admonished the Uchiha, who quickly tried to defend himself to the girl.
"I think I'll go home and reheat the dango," Kakashi said to Minato, who was clearly pleased that his student had gotten his eye looked at. "Thanks for saving me some," he added, knowing Minato was the sentimental sort.
"You're welcome, Kakashi," Minato smiled happily and placed his hand on his silver hair. "Just make sure you eat it."
He huffed in frustration despite himself, causing Minato to ruffle his hair good-naturedly.
Waving goodbye to his teammates, he could hear Obito ask Minato if he could answer a couple more questions about the jutsu he had been practicing. He wasn't sure he'd seen Obito at this age put so much effort into training, it was refreshing (if not a little disturbing).
Walking back towards his home, his stomach growled suddenly and he grimaced. Perhaps Minato's annoying obsession with his diet wasn't without merit, his appetite had been severely lacking in the past few days and perhaps it was catching up to him now. He looked back to the Hokage tower which was now over one hundred meters away, his teammates had dispersed and he could only spot Rin conversing with a grocer at one of the nearby stalls.
He felt terrible every time he saw her. A weight had lifted off his shoulders when he had paid his respects to his father, and he felt that the only way the guilt would stop gnawing at him would be to prevent her early death. He knew the actual action of her dying was not his fault, she had thrown herself in front of his raikiri, but they should not have been in such a helpless position in the first place.
He broke his gaze and continued walking, fiddling with the box still in his hands. There was so much for him to do, so many people to save. The thought made him exhausted. He needed to plan, to devise a strategy. He wasn't going to save anybody if he kept on getting caught in his own head.
A couple of notes:
- White chrysanthemums in Japanese culture represent truth and/or grief. Bluebells represent gratitude, which I thought would be a nice touch for Gai to his father
- I did some research on the 3rd shinobi war, and for those who are not aware or can't be bothered finding out for themselves (I can relate), a lot of the fighting between Iwa and Konoha occurred in and around Kusagakure (Village Hidden in the Grass).
I wanted this chapter to be a little longer, but decided to hold a scene (an important one story-wise) for the next chapter since it was a little too different in tone.
Also, it's been about 5 or 6 years since I've written any stories or anything fiction (and even then I don't want to count my early teens work it was so shit) so I'm a little rusty. If anyone has constructive criticism or ways I can improve please let me know.