Grey Dawn, Part Four - Cold
Beloved, Grey Dawn Remix - VNV Nation
It's colder than before
The seasons took all they had come for
Now winter dances here
It seems so fitting don't you think
To dress the ground in white
And grey.
Fic written for a prompt from Vernajast and because I needed something to fulfill my angst quotient. Semi-AU, post-Kyuubi where Minato didn't die. Kakashi is 17ish. Overall rating M.
Thanks to lecanis, frackinsweet, and frickencheng (Lady Kementari) for discussion, input, and beta work.
He made it to the walls quickly, but there were men everywhere, many more than they'd been led to believe. He dodged, he dashed, keeping to darkness when he could, running as quickly as possible when he couldn't, plotting his path carefully to minimize exposure. He spared no thought for the successful completion of the mission. At this point, he didn't know exactly what that entailed, or if it was even possible anymore. He, personally, would not count it a failure if they merely reached the borders of Fire Country alive. But obviously the council had differing views on what constituted success on this mission, since they most assuredly had other objectives than the ones laid out in the mission scroll he and Kakashi were given.
He searched for the best place to reach the top of the wall. This stretch was relatively lacking in tree cover on both sides. It would be difficult, but not impossible. He heard the buzz of the arrow just in time to duck, blessing his luck that the fletching had bent enough to alert him. Archers. Fuck, fuck, fuck. He shifted Kakashi on his shoulder, wincing when the hilt of the tagged kunai poked him in the side. The kunai! That's it! He funneled a burst of chakra into the tag, reactivating it, no longer worried about subtlety or finesse or stealth. He draped Kakashi over his left shoulder and pulled his arm back, letting fly with both strength and chakra. The kunai finally slowed, embedding itself in a tree over half a mile away. He felt the tug and willed himself toward the seal, holding tightly to Kakashi, and they materialized in the trees as another flight of arrows raked the darkness they'd just left.
He didn't stop for breath, just began leaping, jumping, pushing off from limb to limb, boosting himself faster, farther, higher, using as much chakra as he dared. The wind began picking up, making his footing more treacherous, and he resignedly watched the occasional flickering of distant lightning across the sky. It was never comfortable being caught out in a late autumn storm, but a steady rain or downpour would definitely hinder pursuit.
Almost two hours later, they neared the little spring-fed pool where they'd stopped earlier that afternoon. He cast out behind him, seeking signs of pursuit. Finding none, he gradually let his chakra flow ease to nothing, merely leaping from branch to branch, finally dropping to the ground beside the water. He laid Kakashi on a mossy area and tore the cuff from his haori. He wished they'd had time to retrieve the packs from beneath the pine trees, but it was much too late to worry about that now. Nothing in the packs was necessary for their survival, although they would definitely have made things easier.
He dipped the fraying scrap into the frigid water and dabbed the spots of blood and dirt from Kakashi's skin. He pulled the porcelain mask from the silvered head, wincing as he saw a nasty gash almost hidden beneath the thick tangle of hair at his temple, and thanked the gods he'd taken the extra seconds to immobilize Kakashi by chakra point instead of merely knocking him unconscious. Luckily, little more of the spattered blood belonged to Kakashi. He wasn't unscathed, but the head wound was the worst hurt. Minato tended Kakashi's injuries with the small pack Rin had given him four years ago, settling an eyepatch into place and sitting back on his heels as the ANBU began to rouse. "Feel better now, Kakashi?"
Kakashi blinked awake, then sat up, scrambling backwards against the rocks. "Stay away from me!" He curled up in a small, tight ball, breathing hard. A few fat drops of rain spattered across the battered armor.
"Kakashi... It's okay. Everything's alright. I'm here, I'm okay. It wasn't me, it wasn't me." His voice was pitched low, soothing.
"No! You're dead, I saw it, I killed you! Stay away!" A fine sheen of sweat beaded the pale forehead and he sprang up, fleeing for the edge of the clearing.
"Kakashi! No!" Minato gave chase, his unnatural speed and Kakashi's stumbling confusion the only things that finally allowed him to catch the panicked youth, press his back against the rough treebark. He stayed close even as Kakashi's stomach emptied, and he moved ever so slowly, talking quietly, almost hypnotically, as his fingers rubbed soothing circles across Kakashi's back. Shit. This is not good. "It wasn't me, Kakashi. I'm still here, see? Look." He pulled open the haori and kimono, showing his chest. A faded scar crossed the upper left side of his ribcage, hooking up and over the collarbone. He caught a pale hand and brought it to his exposed torso, gently keeping the slim fingers entwined in his.
"Do you remember this, Kakashi? Remember how it happened? You'd just made chuunin, and I asked you what you wanted to do to celebrate. You didn't want sweets or ramen or a movie or anything any other new chuunin would have wanted to do. You wanted to spar with me. You didn't even fit into your uniform, yet, but you wanted to start training for jounin." And surely it was only the flickering lightning that made Minato look a bit sad and lost as he recalled events eleven years past, lifetimes ago. "We went to the training field by the river and you managed to slip through my guard and cut me. I fell backwards and hit my head on a rock and you thought you'd almost killed me. Sakumo and Jiraiya didn't let me forget for a month. Remember? It's me. I'm not dead, Kakashi." Please, Kakashi, you have to snap out of it. Now is not the time to give in to battle fatigue. Just see that it's me and I'm still alive. Just make it home and we'll fix everything then.
Kakashi was shaking his head, but he kept running his fingers across the scar, stroking the line as it went over the sharply defined clavicle. He trembled and quivered like the last unfallen aspen leaves in the forest nearby, whispering and murmuring like the quickening wind that shook them from the tree. "I never meant to kill you, Sensei, I didn't mean to..." The broken words fell repeatedly from chapped lips, and Minato could barely make out the next utterance, buried as it was amidst sudden hitching sobs and choking intakes of breath. "All my fault, I killed all of you. My team and my family all gone because of me."
Minato dropped Kakashi's hand and grabbed both shoulders, gripping hard and almost shaking him with his sudden intensity. "Kakashi... look at me." Minato waited until Kakashi dragged his unwilling gaze to his. "That wasn't me, it was someone else. I'm. Not. Dead. You can feel me, touch me, hear me. I'm right here with you, now." Minato dropped to his knees, pulling Kakashi with him, looking directly into the visible eye.
"Obito made his decision himself, felt he could better serve Konoha and his team by doing what he could to ensure you lived. Rin... I think maybe Rin... She'd seen too much, too quick, too soon. She didn't care anymore, just couldn't bring herself to move when she should have. Sakumo made his own choice, for himself, even though it affected you and so many others, and although I keep thinking there had to be another way, I can't really fault him for what he did, not when he believed it so deeply. Your mother... That could never be your fault, Kakashi. You didn't choose to be born or do anything to make the birth difficult. It just was. You couldn't have stopped any of them, didn't cause any of them. Sometimes, things just... happen, and they aren't anyone's fault, they just are." At his final words, the heavens opened up, releasing the heavy drizzle, soaking them in moments.
If Minato hadn't been watching so closely when he felt the first cold drops, he would have thought it was the storm, or Obito's eye, but streams of tears fell from both eyes, joining the autumn rain, both wetting Kakashi's face, the eyepatch, the torn mask pooled around his neck. Minato eased his crushing grip on the bare shoulders and slipped one arm behind the stiffly shaking back as the other futilely wiped wetness from red-blotched cheeks, smoothed drenched hair away from the face it hurt Minato to watch. Seeing the normally stoic Hatake grieving so openly hurt as much as the unwavering coldness he had displayed to Minato since their team had disbanded. Fallen apart.
"Shhhh, it's alright, Kakashi." Minato gathered him into a loose embrace, trying to calm and comfort, but comfort was something Kakashi had little experience allowing or accepting. He reacted to the hug as if it were a blow, struggling and backing himself into the tree's roughness. Minato held tightly. He couldn't let a confused Kakashi run loose in this weather with unknown pursuers gods only knew where. He wasn't sure if it was battle stress or the blow to the head or some combination of both, but he'd make Kakashi stay with him, make him see. He wouldn't lose another student, another teammate, another precious person. He couldn't. He'd promised himself. He'd promised Rin and Obito and Sakumo every time he offered incense and the prayers Kakashi didn't seem to believe in any longer. Every day.
Despite the wild struggles, the elbow striking his nose came as a surprise. To both of them. They knelt together in the mud, dripping and cold, Minato's clothing pushed hopelessly askew. Bright blood streamed from his nose, thinning and turning pink in the rain. Kakashi stilled immediately, staring at the flow. His eye was wide, pupil impossibly large and dark as he watched in sick fascination and dawning comprehension. "Sensei?"
Minato wondered if Kakashi even realized how telling that one little word was. He'd ceased being Kakashi's teacher four years ago. They were more properly kohai and sempai or ANBU and Hokage. Despite any interferences and political doings of the Council, the ANBU stood apart and always answered directly to the Hokage. That tiny slip showed him just how human and flawed Kakashi could be, how shaken and uncertain Kakashi was, and set off conflicting emotions within Minato. "It's okay, Kakashi. I'm not hurt, and we escaped. Everything will be alright." He'd make sure everything was alright. He'd promised. Himself, his team, and Sakumo.
Kakashi raised shaking fingers to Minato's face, wiping at a trickle of blood, not even feeling the seeping stickiness in his own wild mess of hair.
"It's only a bloody nose, Kakashi. Nothing serious. It isn't broken. You have worse injuries, right now, that you're probably not even acknowledging. Do you feel any headache, dizziness, numbness anywhere?" Minato pushed the hair back from Kakashi's temple, frowning a bit at the slight swelling.
"I'm fine." Kakashi sounded as if he might have been deciding as he said it, and he brought his own fingers to his head, probing and wincing when the pressure was too much. "It hurts a little, but that's all. I'm fine... I just... I..." Kakashi's voice trailed off, and he turned his face to the side, lowering his gaze, hiding as much of his visible face as he could behind his drooping hair. It was a gesture from earlier days, had been a response to Sakumo's disgrace, and later, the Uchiha's disapproval and the village's pity. He shrugged silently.
"Kakashi?" Minato brought gentle fingers beneath the stubborn chin, feeling the slight roughness of almost invisible stubble beneath his touch. He forced the barest hint of command into the name, turning it into an order. "Kakashi." Minato rarely used the tone with him, and the results were instantaneous.
The storm-grey eye met his, full of pain and confusion and something that Minato could not put a name to, something that lay in between unwilling desire and repressed longing. Pale skin flushed red, and breath quickened again, but no longer in confusion. Hesitant fingers caressed a tan cheek, touched the slick skin of Minato's chest before tangling in the material that clung in wet folds to Minato's body. He was dazed as lips pressed against his, not sweet, warm and pliant as in too, too many long nights' fantasies, but cold and stiff, chapped, bitter and salty with blood and tears. "Kakashi..." The name was but a breath, a prayer against clammy skin.