"What is it this time?" Tsunade groaned as she poured herself a cup of sake. Alcohol was a necessity when it came to dealing with Kakashi. How her sensei had managed the man without it, she would never know.

"One of your shinobi is sharing information that they shouldn't be with their children," the bite in Kakashi's words was unmistakable. He had come to the Hokage's office once he had gotten the necessary names out of the daycare worker.

"That's a serious accusation, Kakashi, I'm going to need a little more information," the Hokage massaged her temples. Why is it always you, Kakashi…? She thought.

"Ueda Daisuke's son, Kouta, apparently knows I killed one of my teammates."

"That's not good, but I'm going to need even more context now."

"Ueda Kouta was bullying Ran at their daycare, and in her words said that 'I killed my teammate and that she was next.' What worries me is where he learned that."

Tsunade let out an exaggerated sigh, "I take it there was more than that?"

"Not important. The rest of what he said could have been picked up from anyone in the village. While most of what happened to my teammates isn't classified, not many people know about it."

"Still, we don't know whether he was referring to Rin or Obito. You and I both know there were more than enough rumors floating around about how you got your eye." Kakashi still didn't look comforted, "fine, fine. If it bugs you that much, I'll look into it."

"Thank you, Tsunade-sama."

She paused before continuing, "I take it Ran didn't take that all too well?"

"Beat the kid to a pulp."

"Atta girl."

"Shattered whatever trust she had in me, though."

"Ouch. Good luck with that."

"Thanks."

"I don't appreciate your sarcasm."


No one paid any mind to the small child walking through the now dark streets of Konoha all by herself. Anyone who did notice the crying child opted to do nothing, it wasn't like it was any of their business anyway. The lack of attention was quite the shock to Ran. You couldn't walk five feet in her village without someone at least saying hi. A crying child would have drawn out at least half the village to see what was wrong, but not here.

"I hate this place," Ran muttered to herself as she rubbed at her eyes. "I want to go back with Jii-chan…" She kicked at a pebble before continuing on her way. She had no idea where she was or where she was going, but Ran wasn't too worried about that right now.

"Oof!" The little girl exclaimed as she ran into someone. Staggering back, she risked a glance up at the person. With an arm resting in his robe, and the other holding onto a cane, the elderly man looked down at Ran with a look she couldn't quite place. It reminded her of how Baa-chan would look at her cat when it would bring her a dead mouse.

"I don't know what it was like where you were before, but here it is customary to apologize after running into someone, child," the old man spoke. His voice held no warmth or contempt, but Ran still wanted to shiver as he stared down at her expectantly.

"S-sorry…" She managed to get out. Her apology only caused the man's only visible eye to narrow and his face twist into an unpleasant expression. Ran wasn't sure if it was disgust, contempt, or anger. It may have even been a mix of all of them.

"I see the Hatake brat has indeed had a bastard child," the man sneered. Said bastard child bristled at the comment. Ran didn't know what 'bastard' ment, but the old man made it sound like an insult.

"Danzo-sama," a new voice called out, and Ran turned to find the last person she wanted to see right now. "Is there something you need with my daughter?" Kakashi stepped between the councilman and his young child. His voice may have held no disrespect, but there was a warning in his words.

"Watch yourself, Hatake," Danzo glared at the younger man. "There are many eyes watching you now that certain… failures have come to light. Tsunade-hime may have been merciful with you, but do not think the rest of us to be so kind. Despite your reputation, you are not as untouchable as you think," Danzo's voice was laced with a sneer, "I remember Sakumo having the same beliefs, and I am sure you remember how that turned out." Kakashi's eye narrowed, but Donzo only smiled. With one last glance at Ran, the councilman turned and walked away, his cane clacking against the stone of the street.

Kakashi bowed to the man's retreating back and waited until he was out of hearing range to turn back to his daughter. "If you ever see that man again," he explained as he crouched down to her level, "you aren't to speak to him and I want to run away as fast as you can." Kakashi didn't think Danzo would try something, but didn't want to take any chances when the leader of ROOT was involved.

Ran looked away and puffed out her cheeks slightly, but she did nod her head once.

Silent treatment? He wondered before standing back up, "well, we should probably head back now." Ran followed after him, but at the distance she used when they first met, close enough to not get lost but too far away for him to reach her. A pained look briefly passed over his face before he buried it in his book.

Just how was he supposed to fix this?


"I should take a look at those scrapes," Kakashi suggested as they entered his apartment. Being a jounin, he owned an extensive first aid kit, not like most of it would be needed for a schoolyard fight. With the kit and a wet washcloth in hand, Kakashi reached down to lift Ran up onto the counter for easier access to her cuts and bruises. Only, the little girl flinched away from his touch.

Kakashi would be lying if he said he hadn't felt a slight stab in his heart from the action, but he quickly squashed it down. "Get you get up on your own?" He asked. Ran nodded before running to get her stepstool. With its assistance, she was able to climb onto the kitchen counter with ease.

The jounin made quick work of cleaning her scapes and wiping off the dirt that had stuck to her during the fight. "This is going to sting a bit," he warned before disinfecting her banged up knees and what looked like nail scratches on her face. Ran only twitched slightly when the treated cotton ball came in contact.

As he started applying band-aids, Kakashi wondered if he should scold her for fighting. They weren't sparring and had the intent to harm, but wouldn't it sound a bit hypocritical coming from me? He thought as he slapped a cooling compress onto her black eye. She may even act out more because I scolded her! Did he want to make an even bigger rift between them? I'll just ignore it for now,Kakashi decided.

Dad of the Year right there. Now all he had to was address the elephant in the room…

… Tomorrow.

It wasn't like he was avoiding something he didn't want to face, no, Kakashi just needed some time to think of a plan of action. Yes, a plan of action.


Ran hadn't spoken to him since she had blown up at him. That was two days ago. Kakashi never had created a plan of action and was hoping that Ran would work through it on her own.

That probably did more harm than good.

Every night, Ran would spend progressively more and more time crying. During the day, she looked anxious and stressed out, and wasn't eating much. The daycare workers had told him that she was isolating herself off from the other children since the fight. The last thing she had spoken at the daycare was a question to Kasumi-sensei about what a 'bastard child' was. The woman had suggested that Ran ask her father, but that only made her more upset. When Kakashi tried to broach the subject with her, Ran only darted into their room and hid under her futon.

Kakashi was at his wit's end, and he had no idea how to fix this.

"Sensei!" Naruto's voice broke through the fog of his thoughts.

"Huh? What is it?" Kakashi asked, glancing up the page that he had been staring at for the past ten or so minutes.

"Finally! I've been calling you for forever! What's up with you lately? You're even more spacey than usual," Naruto grumbled. Sakura and Tenzo were standing behind him, both looking varying degrees of concerned. Sai stood a little ways back, not looking much of anything.

"You do seem to be more preoccupied than usual, senpai," Tenzo added.

"Does it," Sakura started, "have something to do with Ran?"

"Oh yeah, we haven't seen the kid pretty much since she got here. How's she doing?"

Kakashi wondered why those two had to be so intuitive when it came to others. Letting out a sigh, he guessed any professional distance he had maintained with them was thrown out the window once he introduced them to Ran. Despite that, Kakashi wasn't exactly jumping to share his parental problems with them. Especially since that would probably mean explaining just why she was so upset with him… and that was one conversation he really didn't want to have. Ever.

"Ran…" he paused to figure out how to phrase it, "learned about some of the… not so pretty aspects of being a shinobi…"

Naruto's face became pained, "that we sometimes have to kill people?"

"There was a bit more than that, but yeah…"

The boy's expression flicked briefly before he nodded. Sakura looked thoughtful while she figured out what to say. "She's probably scared and confused. You need to talk to her and explain."

Scared, Kakashi thought. It certainly would explain a lot of Ran's behavior. She was scared of him, and probably feeling as though he didn't care about her at all. It wasn't like he had gone out of his way to refute the claim that mission babies were never wanted or loved.

He had really messed up this time.

"Hatake-san?" A non-descript chuunin asked as he landed in the training field.

"Yes?"

"Tsunade-sama wishes to see you."

"A mission?" Naruto asked excitedly looking up at his teacher hopefully.

"She said it was about a matter you had asked her to look into."

"Ah, that," Kakashi nodded. Now he would know just how much he would have to beat up Ueda Daisuke. "I'll see you guys later," the jounin said before disappearing in a cloud of smoke. The chuunin sighed before following suit.

"A matter?" Naruto asked his teammate.

"And one that Tsunade-shishou personally looked into," Sakura added.

"Sounds juicy, dattebayo."


"I heard you found out where the Ueda kid got the information," Kakashi commented as he entered the Hokage's office.

"Yeah," Tsunade sighed, "Said his son had told him about Ran and had overheard him talking with his wife about it when they thought he was asleep. The teammate comment was apparently about your eye, and the kid added the 'you're next' after Ran beat the shit out of him. Now Ueda is pissed at you, his kid, and me. I hope you're happy, Kakashi."

"Yes, thank you, Tsunade-sama," the jounin said sincerely with a bow. Tsunade just snorted before waving him out of her office.

"Ran, I want to talk to you," Kakashi said after dinner. The little girl glanced up nervously from her kanji practice. She started to fidget anxiously before nodding slightly. "About what happened at daycare the other day." The girl nearly curled in on herself when he said that. "I'm not mad about what happened… I just wanted to clear up any… misunderstandings…"

Ran looked away, almost pained, but didn't say anything.

He had hoped that Ran would have given him someplace to start, and because of that, Kakashi hadn't bothered to think any farther ahead. Now he was stuck kicking himself.

"I get it," Ran eventually said while Kakashi tried to figure out where to start. Her voice was so quiet he nearly missed it, but Kakashi didn't miss the pain underlying her words. "You don't want me…"

"N-no! That's not it," Kakashi tried to correct her, but it seemed as though he had messed up again. He really wasn't any good at things like this. Ran didn't look as though she believed him. If only Naruto or Sakura were here… They're better at these things, Kakashi thought as he ran a hand through his hair. Wait… There was someone. Glancing back at Ran, who was trying her best to not look heartbroken, the jounin quickly made his way into their bedroom. There he bit his thumb and went through the necessary hand seals.

"Yo," a small pug greeted as the smoke from his summoning cleared.

"I need you to do me a favor," Kakashi requested.

Ran sat at the low table with her legs drawn up to her chest while she tried not to think about what was going to happen to her now. He wouldn't really kill me, would he…? Kouta seemed pretty sure… but he was also mad that I had beaten him… But… if he had killed a teammate… No, I'd probably just go back to Jii-chan and everyone else in the village… Because I'm a mission baby and those are never wanted… Her thoughts were broken when something plopped down next to her. It was too small to be Kakashi and it certainly didn't smell like him. Glancing next to her, the little girl found a small pug at her side.

"Yo," Pakkun greeted as he scratched at his ear.

"You can talk too?" Ran really didn't have it in her to be surprised anymore.

"Usually I get a bigger reaction than that, but yes."

Ran nodded before petting him lightly on the head, still looking straight ahead. "How come I've never seen you before?"

"Kakashi summons me whenever he needs me. Which happens to be a lot."

The little girl nodded before retracting her hand. "So what does he need you for right now?"

"The poor guy has the emotional range of a dish sponge, and is even worse at explaining things. I'm here to clear a few things up," Pakkun explained. Ran didn't say anything, and curled into a tighter ball. "Kakashi still owes me several explanations, but he told me that you're a mission baby." Another nod. "You shouldn't focus too much on that fact."

"But mission babies are never wanted…"

"Yeah, but they're more of surprises. Surprises aren't all that fun at first, but then you usually end up enjoying them. You were quite the surprise, one that Kakashi certainly wasn't expecting, but I'd say he's getting to point where he's enjoying the surprise."

Ran remained quiet throughout the dog's explanation and didn't make any effort to uncurl herself. Letting out a sigh, Pakkun managed to wiggle his way in between the little girl's chest and legs. "Listen," he started, "Kakashi is an idiot, there is no denying that, but I really do believe he's starting to care about you. Don't listen to what those lil' shits at your daycare say."

"But he never denied any of it…" Ran sniffled as a few tears fell onto the summon's head.

"Again, he's an idiot," Pakkun reassured her as he licked away her salty tears. "Can't say for sure what he was thinking, but you can try asking him." The dog nodded his head to the jounin who was crouched down a few feet away from the pair. He gave the girl a small wave and eye crinkle.

"What… what about your teammate…? You never said you didn't kill whoever it was… or-or that…" Ran's voice broke before lowering to whisper, "that I wasn't next…" Kakashi's smile faltered and Pakkun let out a low growl.

Wiggling his way out of Ran's grasp, the dog walked up to his master, and proceeded to bite him on the hand. "Idiot!" Pakkun barked, "you don't need to explain everything, just reassure the poor kid that you would never hurt her!" Letting out a huff, Pakkun returned to Ran's side, all the while muttering something along the lines of, "an even bigger idiot than I thought…"

Kakashi stared down at his hand in shock. Pakkun had never bitten him before. Just how badly had he messed up for one of his loyalest dogs to bite him? He was going to have to do something pretty drastic to get her trust back. Getting to his feet, Kakashi went and got the photo of Team Minato. "I don't know if this will make things alright…" he started as he sat across from Ran. Pakkun glared at him from his spot on the girl's lap. "But I'll tell you something not even Naruto or Sakura know…" He handed her the photo before continuing, "The story of how I lost my eye and ended up getting my teammate and best friend killed…"


A/N: So, this chapter was a bitch to write (part of why there are so many page breaks). I wanted to keep everyone as in character as I could, but Ran needed reassurances that Kakashi just isn't the kind of person to give. He seems more like the kind of person who lets people work out their own problems. Just look at Part 1 and the drama with Sasuke. Kakashi didn't intervene, at least from what I remember, until Sasuke was already way past the tipping point. Despite that, he's learned from his mistakes, but doesn't know just how to address the problems. Pakkun understands this is and stretches the truth here and there. A child isn't going to understand the complexity of the situation, all she's going to get is that she wasn't and possibly isn't wanted.

I hope that makes sense.

ALSO! We've broken 200 followers and 150 favorites! That's fucking amazing and way beyond my wildest dreams ; U ; Thank you all so much for your support and wonderful feedback!

For shits and giggles, have some alternative chapter names:

-You Don' Goofed

-Kakashi Screams Internally More Than Usual

-He's Not Dad of the Year, He's Not Even Ranked

-You Can't Just Go Throwing People Out of Windows Just Because They Talked Shit About You

-Pakkun Finally Makes His Long Awaited Appearance

-Pakkun, Registered Family Counselor