"Shiro." Shiro wakes and the first thing he sees is Alpha Kakashi's packmate, pajama-clad and shaking him. The warm hand on his right flank feels so good he lets himself fall over and his limbs splay. Shiro knows from experience that this isn't what packmate wants, he can see his human face frown and dark eyebrows slant, a trickle seeping of the feeling he gets when there's a fly buzzing in his ear. But he doesn't mind it any. Instead, Shiro wolf grins at packmate… Pakkun's told him that this works, a cute smile and a wiggle of his butt fur and defenses open that even the hardest, most serious shinobi can't help themselves but to give in. Especially Kakashi. Shiro curls his paws forward and hangs his tongue, lopsided waiting for his due petting. In response packmate scowls, but not to be threatening.

"No, Shiro. I'm not giving you a belly rub," packmate shakes his head fur and removes his warm hand. Shiro whines his upset. "Up. We have to go."

The ninken grumbles his protest but dutifully rolls over onto his four paws. He stands, he pats his farewell to the warmth spot of the bed and then pads his way off the mattress. Packmate leaves quietly, and Shiro thinks that in this case Pakkun was wrong. Sasuke never falls for those tricks.

But that doesn't mean he doesn't care. When he follows the human he scents the slight salt in the air… the thin hint of something pickled and sour and he understands in an instant. His tongue wags and his mouth salivates because Umeboshi is his favorite, and the flavor of the dried plum is so newunique to his canine senses it makes his claws tingle. The scent picks him on alert, he rushes ahead through bare feet because if he gets there first then it's his (not to mention Kakashi packmate will grunt non-threateningly, waving his human paw and let him have it.) Alpha Kakashi never lets him eat anything but standard, nutritional kibble and maybe some pieces of bacon. Boring. Goes for Pakkun too.

So when Sasuke brings the plate down to the floor, two rice balls made just for him, Shiro decides that Sasuke is effectively his favorite. He's stingy when it comes to sharing and wants the bed all to himself but okay, sometimes he'll pet him… And still feed him what he wants.

"Finish this and I'll be going soon," he says shortly. Shiro huffs. He knows where packmate's going, the same place he goes every morning and he's not dumb, he doesn't need a reminder. In fact – Shiro gobbles what's left of his onigiri lapping his tongue for the aftertaste of sweet alcohol in the aged fruit, sharp in edge and delightfully curious to his senses. He enjoys himself before he brushes himself off, a ruffle of fur and a cursory swipe of his teeth until he's ready. He'll follow Sasuke today, he's been fed and slept too much. It's boring in there where he's going, nothing to hear or smell around them but it's more boring alone. Shiro chases after packmate to their bedroom; Sasuke prepares.

First, it's always the empty smell. The noticeable lack is jarring to Shiro's senses, he sniffs and sniffs the air ineffectively until his nose hurts and his nostrils scrunch stuck. Packmate minds him none, continues down the papered hallway and if Shiro doesn't hurry he'll be left behind. The ninken begins to sprint.

Sasuke enters a large room but he knows where to go, a far paper mat where it smells the least like anything. There were people here, a lot if Shiro goes by the open space from his small body but not many went to where packmate is heading. Small hands peel the tatami mat from the flooring easily and the puppy wags his tail in anticipation when familiar stairs reveal. Cold stone against his paws, a dank, mineral taste – it's a dungeon down there. Even for his canine sight, pitch dark. Packmate doesn't mind so today Shiro doesn't either, he follows his human down the steps.

The further they go it only gets darker, and the lacking scent has him blinder with each step. His flank brushes Sasuke's leg and the slight touch helps, reminds him that pack is here. Shiro watches as his human activates his chakra minutely when they meet another door, this time a large un-binding stone in the middle of their way. He feels warm to his tail at the rush of familiar chi.

Sasuke's eyes glow red, Shiro can see it grab his attention and the blocking stone of a door makes a click. It rumbles alive, shivering and grinding itself open in order to make way for them. Shiro is curious at the technology, and still the lack of live scent, and how Sasuke activated the gate with just his eyes? He noses packmate's feet through his sandals, Sasuke glares him a little and Shiro snuffles. When the great block has finished moving he rushes ahead first before his human.

It's too cold. Even with his fur there's something more than temperature that makes him antsy, has him walking low to the ground and a growl growing in his chest. He sniffs at the dark stone floor searching, but the thing he's looking for smells to be everywhere? Shiro whines in confusion, looking up only to find a dark maze of pipes in the ceiling. Nothing. The coolness already is making his leg itch even with the two flames he finds at the backs of the walls. Fires that Sasuke hasn't lit, fires that are somehow still burning in their torches and the uncanniness of it all has his animal senses barking at him. The ninken has to force his paws forward – one pad, two – until he's glued to packmate again, the only natural thing in this cave. Packmate walks himself deep because he comes here to read, and the great black Uchiha stone tablet is at the end of the cave.

Carved kanji writing even and elegant that Shiro can tell is engraved all over the table, and in a placard against the wall. Shiro can't read yet but Pakkun can, and there's a speech written here with the Uchiha pack creed, he's guessing on the placard. Two red and white fans aren't enough to reflect the light here though he thinks they're just decoration maybe. If a distinguished Uchiha manages to get in here to begin with, they won't need light.

"Shiro, can you even read?"

He grumbles at him. I can't even see!

Packmate huffs air through his nose and Shiro can recognize the sound as laughing. It's a happy sound because this is Sasuke's favorite place, with the Uchiha markings everywhere. It's home. The ninken bumps his head against the stone investigating any scents he could read and then he pads a few steps back. Packmate squats to his level, and Shiro wags his tail.

"It's saying a riddle, Shiro. There's a long story behind the words, something archaic and outdated by now, I'm guessing. Even if I can read it I don't understand it but I'm betting it wasn't important information anyway. Someone once told me that here is where you'll find the purpose of the doujutsu that the Uchiha clan originally served, the Uchiha's true power." Subdued a little by the tone of his voice calm and older than his years, Shiro sits on his haunches to listen. He doesn't get it, but packmate does and is for once interested in interacting with him.

"Whosoever gains this power will lose. Wheresoever they lose they will never. The armored samurai will rise high with new eyes. And mixed blood is the fourth stage. I pieced that together but I could still be wrong. I don't even know what half of it means."

Me too. Shiro makes a sympathetic noise.

Packmate continues. "But I know he's right. This is the Uchiha's true power. And the only way I can beat him is with this power like he said. The only way I can get stronger is from here, and win against everything against me." Sasuke breathes deeply. With his ears perked, the puppy can hear him whisper. "But I don't really want to. Not if I don't have to. It just wouldn't make any sense..."

His human rises suddenly and stretches his arms high like a cat, long and boneless and more flexible than he seems. Shiro rises too on his cue and spins in a cursory circle.

"Gods, I don't know why I told you all that. You're just-" Shiro barks in dare and Sasuke scoffs. "-tiny." He starts a small, throaty growl in upset and rakes his nails on stone, raising a racket of noise.

"Shiro." Shiro whines louder and his claws feel numb with the cold and lacking give from the metal floor.

"Stop that, I get it that you're upset." He barks in succession until his voice echoes in this chamber. Packmate sighs. "But I'm right. We're both tiny. To him, not even worthy enough to kill. Plus I can't stop him from coming back and taking everything away again-"

"Arf!"

"Would you stop that, it's ringing my ears," Sasuke complains, hands cupping the sides of his head. He gives his temples a massage rub and Shiro can't stomach it, the tone of his voice and the whispering scent of cowering: coming from him is the smell of a dog that has forgotten its nature, something ranker than domestication. His nose itches horribly because it's a scent resigned, too even in calm that it's unnatural and he hates how it sours, so the ninken makes himself known if that's the last thing he can do. He will not stand to be beta to an alpha like this, to a human who's already given up.

When he doesn't stop barking the puppy can tell he's beginning to annoy this human. He promptly keeps at it.

"Tch. You think you can beat my brother or something? You think you are better than him?" Sasuke's mouth twists wrong. It's not a smile but it's not a frown, his teeth aren't showing but it has Shiro growling in challenge all the same. His lips turn up one corner as if he were to begin a snarl and from his human height packmate looks down on him. This itches Shiro at the joints of his bones, something deciding before he even had a chance to prove his place; he hates when Sasuke does this. Underestimate him.

Yes. He barks.

"Well, you're wrong. You and Kakashi. Both of you are going to be the death of me. Why do I even listen to you...?" Sasuke seems to ask himself. He turns his head and makes another sigh.

No! Shiro speeds until he's in front of the human because he's not going to lose his attention like this. A nip to open toes that packmate expectedly dodges, but he's been aiming for some movement anyway. Anything but this still acceptance.

"Come on, Shiro, enough. You've made your point," he says and something about his speech gives the ninken pause. Serious in its intention, he can hear the finality and knows this to be an order. Only Sasuke's facing away from him now, Shiro doesn't like that, the speed with which he walks to the door. He stands confused to his paws for a moment because the tension between them dissipated so quickly. And just as fast does the cold re-enter his fur and his skin, Shiro runs after him.

And even without his canine senses he could hear. "'Whosoever gains this power will lose,' hm?"

Shiro can smell it explode. Instantly it wets the air with a stenched poison, tingling the hair on his back and legs. His tail droops, his ears meld themselves deep into his skull and he lowers his flank because this smell is acrid, impervious, everywhere – somebody please make it stop. He whimpers and tries to move closer to packmate because that is what he is trained to do, protect his pack. But the closer he gets the more the smell sharpens, until Shiro wants to scratch his nose off until it bleeds. The fear is sour and coming from him, but he's not trained against this.

There's a heavy drop – the pipes – and then steps moving closer, slower, closing in and the both of them back away slowly. The fires at the sides of this cave don't help, shadows only flicker across this newcomers face, the majority of this human cast in darkness. His nose doesn't help too, all he can smell is profuse sweat, salt and hormones and flight-flight-flight! Shiro, who wants to escape dearly but he can't move, simply because packmate can't move.

"Ita-"

"Sasuke."

Oh. It's Alpha!

The relief in him is instantaneous, he can feel his muscles relax and go boneless. Packmate behind him hasn't gotten the memo however, his fear only heightens and Shiro thinks he can hear his little heart hammering.

"Kai!"

"I'm afraid not."

"How the hell did you get in here?" Sasuke finally takes a step forward. So does Alpha. When the low flame glows across his mask, still the man hides his scent, the ninken can see his hitai-ate is gone. A rare kind of Kakashi, the silver of his hair reflect red-orange and his left eye is freely open. Sharingan out, like his own Sasuke.

Packmate realizes this and warns. "You're not allowed."

"Oh? And you are?"

Shiro can smell when Sasuke's scent changes. Sudden and surprised and unsurprised and resigned, and there's a skip to his heart beat but the puppy doesn't understand what's going on, why are they looking at each other like that? Something's not right because Alpha doesn't change his walk, and Shiro's been on hunts before. Those times pack hunts on wild animals were a teamwork affair, mostly consisting of ambushing and this time is no different. Except that it is. This is not supposed to be a hunt – packmate is not prey – there's something felinepredatorywrong about the man's walk, his long legs and the way he doesn't so much as acknowledge Shiro's existence as he normally would. His eyes are a hunter's eyes, even that Sharingan, both are focused completely on Sasuke.

This makes the ninken nervous.

"That has nothing to do with anything," he speaks slowly and with special emphasis. "This room was made Uchiha-only. That Sharingan is not yours."

"I'm not too sure I follow, Sasuke. This has everything to do with everything, doesn't it?" Kakashi gestures with a nod of his neck beyond himself.

When he walks closer his talk is slow but not soothing, thick like the poison sap of Konoha's trees. The puppy makes a disjointed connection in his mind, a sudden and electrifying click – it's the calm before the storm. An instinctual message that he can't understand or explain, these words are dangerousbadscary, but it's coming from Alpha and it's going to packmate so the little ninken has no idea what to do. Who to go to. Kakashi is his father and Sasuke is his brother; Kakashi let him away to the genin and Sasuke, with a little time, let him stay – why are they speaking to each other like this?

For ninken, this is an anomaly. Shiro realizes communicating in such a manner is strictly a human thing. Upset with another dog is settled with an open challenge, sometimes loud barking, little times a jaw fight. Disputes are over pack hierarchy and mealtime order, desired mates or territory. "Disputes" are for play, messing around for fun. It's never like this.

The puppy whimpers in fear. Even Shiro knows packmate's too young to challenge Alpha. Too young to win. Shiro knows Kakashi knows this as a fact. And yet they look like they're going to fight, the universal spark of conflict in the air, in their eyes. He can feel something like warring dominance, foreign, strange animosity in the pits of his belly because he's of an emphatic species, they are pack, and he begins to pant. It's an itchy, uncomfortable confusion when the air tells him to roll over and expose his flank to submit, yet at the same time widen his stance and growl his noise. What in the world is going on? Neither of them seem to hear him, hear each other.

"I wasn't going to."

Sasuke doesn't seem to say this with intent, the sound is much like Shiro when he rushes to swallow something that didn't particularly taste good. A mistake. Shiro doesn't know what they're talking about exactly, but he can sense packmate in front of him, an unknown horror in the absolute still of his body, frozen unnatural. He's standing dead. The puppy doesn't want him to look like this, he butts ineffectively at Sasuke's legs, motion, attention; life, anything.

"I- I wasn't." The boy sounds cracked of submission, pleading.

"You weren't. Of course."

"I'm not weak; I'm not like him. I don't need it. Sensei-"

"I'm sorry, Sasuke. You're not supposed to be here at all."

Packmate changes tone so quickly it gives Shiro mental whiplash. His furry body priming this to be over soon and forgotten in the back of their minds because pack never challenges against an Alpha they can't win. Never. Except Sasuke. He's the one who bites when he's cornered, attacks when he's scared. "I know that and I told you I wasn't!"

Kakashi stares him down, Shiro can feel the weight of his gaze second-hand. "And yet," he says simply.

There's something not being said here, not in the way the words stopped but there in the silence of the room itself, smothering and gagging and one of the pipes is a little loose that droplets hit the floor with a ring that echoes in his ears. His ears that are hypersensitive because his body is tense on guard and he can hear when packmate decidedly stops shaking. When Sasuke makes a rustle shoving one hand into a pocket the other hand raises high and splayed. It is a weapon-less palm that faces Kakashi, like submission-surrender. Mocking him.

Sasuke huffs in poor humor and Shiro can bet the same smirk/not-smile on his face, no-teeth but threatening. "You got me there, Kakashi," the teen concedes with a shrug of an ease surprising, waving away a pass of his hand. Flippant. Deliberately disobedient. Shiro wants to bark at him to stop, don't act like this, don't do this because it is not appropriate behavior towards an Alpha. It is a lie. But his jaw is locked, his tongue tied and the puppy in him feels too little to speak.

"Just what do you think I'm gonna do, huh?"

"I don't know, Sasuke, what are you going to do." Alpha demands his answer, his voice low. No jokes. He doesn't appreciate the gesture. Shiro whimpers, shuffling in his feet and stamping the cold out where he stands because there's no place he can hide. "I come back to find you with a highly advanced Sharingan and then this. What do you expect me to think?"

"You wouldn't teach me."

"I'm afraid you're the one who doesn't learn."

"I can learn. I know how, better than Sakura will ever be. And I'm not an idiot like Naruto." He turns his face away, deliberately ignoring their Alpha. "You just didn't want to share in your power, so."

"Everything is just power to you, is it?"

"The hell it is."

Kakashi sighs. The sound is fake, put-upon bored like he's tired of how long this is taking, like he wishes for it to be over, Shiro fears. "You did say it yourself. You need power to get your revenge. It doesn't matter what I teach, it wouldn't be enough. Because you want the most against the one who wronged you, your brother; you want to kill him. Distance is just an idle thing for you. Which is it, which one is "closer": Naruto or Sakura? Is it Shiro?"

Red eyes alight like flames. "I said I wouldn't!"

"Hmm, you're right. It doesn't make any sense. To find you here and listen to you defend yourself when you don't even know the half of what you're talking about."

The words make Sasuke pause, hopefully long enough for him to think, the ninken pleads. He doesn't want any more trouble. They're still talking but the chakra rises in the air he breathes, it tastes like burning and sour gray, fire-burst and the steady crackle of electricity. It makes his mouth water like he's hungry, the backs of his teeth foam and overflow because despite him not wanting of this he has been trained to kill, his body knows itself what to expect. He is a canine assassin, an aggressive-type animal, and their combined fight is shared. He wants this. Sasuke feels the same, in the way the hand in his pocket clenches and release.

Kakashi… he can't read at all. The fact forms a well of apprehension in his soft underbelly, one that churns and boils until he wants to rip apart something with his teeth from the sheer nerves. It's indescribable the pain, he never wants to pick sides but his Alpha isn't suggesting a course of action. Sasuke is angry and Alpha stands there: unmoving, unfeeling, blank like white scroll paper he's quiet and tall and nothing in his eyes.

Shiro whines pathetically in the back of his throat.

(Not that that will stop Sasuke. Packmate will not be tamed, he will not be swayed because he is past the point of fighting over territory. He is fighting over something else. It is a feeling beyond Shiro, maybe he thinks something of cats, stiffy-regal and upright as they are, in the strutting swagger where they walk. Something that doesn't exist, yet is disappearing by the minute.)

Sasuke makes a connection, the golden light of clarity heard in his voice like finding what was lost, remembering what was forgotten. "You were waiting," he says with a gasp of incredulity. Click.

Kakashi doesn't say anything in response.

Faster. Faster. Louder. "You waited here. This whole time... waiting for me to do something. Waiting to watch me fall." When the man is silent, Shiro can see how packmate steadily grows red-faced in anger, where the veins of his ankles that he is trained to notice bulge with released sugars, and prepare themselves.

"Well?! What the fuck are you waiting for?! I'm here where you want me, say something!"

The man remains silent. Sasuke glares and heaves but Kakashi doesn't react to him; Alpha doesn't blip in his scent at all. Sasuke stares until he realizes that Alpha won't respond to such words, he retracts in the way he straightens tall, pulling himself from the emotion of it all, and laughs. The sound is wrong to Shiro's ears, too high-pitched and cracked, wrought with pain every time he exhales. Laughing is supposed to be a happy sound; the ninken can see him half-smile thinly. "And still you won't say anything. Tch. Shoulda figured."

Before packmate could turn around and leave, without the ninken because he must stay here, Kakashi speaks. "Let's not be hasty."

He won't let him leave.

Sasuke just as soon turns and barks, all sound and no depth like the dogs younger than him. "Quit joking around with me, you're not fooling anyone."

"I'm not."

"You say I don't know-"

"And you don't. You know nothing. Your clan perished when you were eight, your parents dead leaving you an orphan-"

"Shut up, you have no right!"

"-maybe you still love your brother?"

Before Shiro could blink, the smell of burning, rancid and steam from the cold ground until the loose rocks rattle and clack each other, dancing. A flaming fireball in the enclosed chamber, gold-white burning to his eyes like the sun, like death staring him in the face and he feels small. It rumbles when it blows, alive and roaring that the puppy trips and stumbles in his efforts to back away. This whole time he was scared along with Sasuke, scared of what Kakashi might think from every word and action… but he thinks maybe he was mistaken.

Packmate is someone to fear too.

Alpha swiftly cuts the fire off with a blue hand – gloved chakra lining – slaps Sasuke's mouth and with a single push sends him flying. There's a thick crash to the wall where packmate's met his back and he slumps down the rock to his feet. Shiro begins to bark, as large as his lungs can hold – more – but not loud enough to hear over Kakashi's footsteps.

No, stop this! Stop! Stop!

"I don't understand you. And I don't know what to do with you. Really, Sasuke."

"Let me go!"

"And do what? And go where?"

"Let go of me," Packmate twists and Kakashi lets him go, a release of a small wrist and smaller hands, they cup his head to the stone wall when he turns away from him, hiding away from his own. His Alpha. His teacher. His pack. There's a smell coming from him – Sasuke, Shiro whines – the tang of salt in tears and cold sweat that only smells colder, sharper. Sasuke gasps a ragged breath. He hides his face in rock, red bit lip and scrunched eyes until Shiro can't see him anymore from where he's standing, he can only read him, read the one thing that slams his nervous system powerfully, settles itself deep like iron chains sinking. Something absolute and from Sasuke, burst out into the open in the latent chakra, burning hotter than his katon.

It hurts.

The ninken keens at the sheer feeling – guiltloveshameweakness – packmate only falls into himself further from his sound, whipped dog and quick loss and having given up. He can't look his Alpha in the eyes, the puppy can't look at him, but this isn't what Shiro meant by ending the fight, beaten submission.

This isn't a win. It's rank shame where he's small – 'tiny,' Shiro remembers – and he curls onto himself accepting his loss. He's embarrassed where his face is strained, and Kakashi pulls away with something the same, the red disappearing from his eye, his hand that twitches once.

"You do, don't you. Love your brother." he says with something like horror, blame. "Sasuke, you-"

"No," he croaks. "No, that has nothing to do with anything."

But he's wrong. In the way Kakashi spikes, his chakra makes itself known and finally his scent and his presence is alive. Packmate must be wrong. Shiro can feel how Alpha feels, and it's the same like Sasuke, something darker in where he breathes calmly, measured and timed and heavy with the weight of the world. Something shamed. Alpha exhales one last time, a sigh that is more than just air. He makes his exit.

Shiro chooses. He doesn't go after him.