In the beginning, he could remember everything. From the shine of her hair, to the tilt of her smile, the curve of her body as she dodged an attack. The way her eyes sparked when she caught on to one of his plans or the feel of her hands, warm and comforting, as they patched him up.
As time went on, he remembered less and less.
Conversations faded away, he couldn't quite remember the exact feel of her wrist between his fingers as they practiced checking for each others' pulses. Did she smell like lavender or rose water? Or perhaps something else entirely?
He dreamt of her, because how could he not, but it was never of her, always calm, always smiling but of her dying, always dying, blood dripping down her chin, her eyes wide and unfocused, his name on her lips.
Somehow, he managed to forget a lot of things. But a few things remained.
She had said it all the time, so often that they soon fell on deaf ears. Kakashi would even roll his eyes at her sometimes. The words never hit home until the moment Obito died.
'Kakashi, you have to kill me, now.'
He almost lost his balance, thrown by her request. 'What are you saying, Rin?' he asked, glancing at her. 'I promised Obito I would protect you.'
She hadn't brought it up again.
They were backed up against a tree trunk. He held one arm out, keeping Rin behind him. He was going to keep his promise, even if it killed him.
Her fingers closed around his wrist, rough from callouses and wet from the rain. He didn't looked away from the shinobi advancing on them.
Her voice was soft as she spoke but he still heard her. 'You've been so brave but you can't stop yet. It's only for a little longer now.' She squeezed his wrist and repeated her earlier request.
'Rin, no,' he said, an edge of desperation creeping into his voice. Enemies were closing in around them. They didn't have enough time. His hands flew through the signs and birdsong filled his ears. 'Rin, go!' he yelled, not bothering to check if she had listened.
Her words still echoed whilst at their graves. 'You've been so brave but you can't stop yet. It's only for a little longer now.'
At the funeral for his sensei and Kushina-san. 'You've been so brave but you can't stop yet. It's only for a little longer now.'
They followed him, nipped at his ankles, wrapped their insistent hands around his wrists and pulled him back from every narrow edge. Kept him coming home after every ANBU mission. 'You've been so brave but you can't stop yet. It's only for a little longer now.'
For how much longer, he would plead, when the nightmares became too much. When he drowned himself at bars and went on every mission he was offered. When the Hokage forced him to stay home and his mind would become haunted with ghosts.
He'd be in his bathroom, alone, with the shower water pelting his head. The water running red through his feet. How much longer do I need to be brave for, Rin? His body trembling with sobs he wouldn't let himself release. When can I stop? And she would always smile at him, a sad smile, and hold his face in her soft hands. 'You've been so brave but you can't stop yet,' she'd always whisper, tears falling for the both of them. 'It's only for a little longer now.'
At every milestone, every promotion, he asked her the same question.
When he got accepted into ANBU— for how much longer, Rin?
When he went back to being a jonin— a jonin-sensei, no less— when can I stop?
He repeated it back to his students, the words she always said to him. The first time he had said it, in the Land of the Waves, they had all looked at him like he was mad. And he understood why. Hatake Kakashi, strange, brooding Kakashi with the emotional range of a dewdrop, saying something sensitive?
They had brushed it off in the same way he had.
When Obito— but it wasn't Obito, not really— came back. When he had to fight the body of his dead best friend and his most promising student— You've been so brave but you can't stop yet.
When he saw her, all young and there. At the tips of his fingers. All he needed to say was 'yes'— It's only for a little longer now.'
He had never stopped fighting, never stopped being brave. For her. For Obito. For Minato-sensei and Kushina-san and his students
He never stopped being brave, even when he reached an age he never thought he'd reach, when he could feel his life slipping from his finger tips. He swallowed and lifted his chin, facing whatever there was to come.
The image of her grew clearer. And there was Obito, as he remembered. And Minato-sensei, and Kushina-san, and his Dad, and his Mom, and everyone else he'd lost.
'Rin,' he gasped, reaching for her. Her eyes were bright. Brown, never magenta. Her face was smooth and clean, clear of blood. She smiled at him.
'For how much longer?' he begged.
She was crying. He reached up with steady hands, wiping her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. He cradled her face like she had cradled his, like he had wanted to, all those times. She was crying but she had always cried enough for the both of them.
'Can I stop?'
She sobbed, the sound full of relief, full of hope. 'Yes, Kakashi,' she whispered, placing her hand over his. 'You can stop being brave now. You've been brave long enough.'