Chapter Eighteen
Akane squirmed against the man holding her. She looked up at his face and found him staring straight ahead with an empty expression. He didn't even blink. He had gone completely still. She twisted in his arms and saw that everyone else was also frozen in place, as if they were all playing a game of Red Light Green Light.
"Akane-chan."
She jumped and saw the black hooded figure turn his masked face to her. She hunched her shoulders and tried burrow deeper into the rigid arms holding her.
"We'll take you home soon, I promise," the hooded man said. "Why don't you come over here and keep me company? He's going to be standing like that for a while."
Akane eyed the old man and hesitated. His voice was hoarse but gentle. He lowered himself onto his knees in the snow, his right hand fixed in a peculiar sign. Then he lifted his free hand to remove the mask, revealing an angled face softened by many small wrinkles and a warm smile. Coaxed by her inherently trusting personality, Akane wriggled out of the frozen man's arm and slid down his body. Then she paused again.
The man extended his hand invitingly. "My name is Jin. Nice to meet you."
Akane tipped her head as she approached him and looked up into his face. "Why are your eyes red?"
"It's called the Sharingan. It runs in my family."
"Oh." She looked over her shoulder at the four figures standing frozen in place. "What are they doing?"
"They're in a dream world. I'm afraid I'm too old to manipulate the passage of time for four minds so we're going to have to wait a little, but don't worry, they'll be back soon."
She didn't understand, but she nodded nonetheless and looked back up into his face. What she saw made her gasp. "Your eyes are bleeding."
Jin smiled gently. "No need to worry. It's the fate of all Mangekyou users. I've been lucky to have kept my sight for so long." She looked up at him with large, clueless eyes and he gently pulled her into the folds of his cloak. "You don't need to understand, little one. This isn't your world. You'll have forgotten any of this ever happened by the time you're his age."
He looked up at Hatake Sakumo's son. The boy stood in the act of stepping toward the medic girl and the Lynx, frozen in the moment Jin had activated the Tsukuyomi that ensnared them all. The Goose and Lynx had each set up their own layers of separate genjutsu on the two young shinobi. Jin had watched the Goose, in particular, taking his time to slowly encroach into Hatake's chakra system with every strike he had landed over the course of their fight.
Even without the Sharingan, Uchiha Masayuki was a formidable genjutsu user and was known for his knowledge and skills in seamlessly weaving together multiple illusions. So much so that Jin doubted Hatake even realized his mind was trapped in another dimension. If by any chance he did, there was still no escaping Jin's Tsukuyomi – much less the hell Yuki had coordinated – when the medic girl was equally caught up in their trap.
"Sometimes we have to make tough choices," he murmured softly. "Shinobi or not, we're only human."
The White Fang had chosen compassion over duty. What would his son choose? Would he be able to perceive the real intent behind the test? Because to Yuki, it wasn't about the choice at all, but how one lived with its consequences.
Jin wrapped his free arm around Akane to keep her warm and then focused on the movements that flashed like a second vision within the Mangekyou Sharingan, overlapping the four shinobi who stood motionless to the naked eye.
This would be his last act as a shinobi. When Yuki had approached him late last night with the request, he had felt surprisingly content with the opportunity to give up what remained of his sight for the next generation.
"Don't make me regret it Hatake."
.-.-.-.
"Are you out of your mind?!" Kakashi shouted at Yuki.
"I'll let you be the judge of that," Yuki said, sliding his mask back into place. "Not that I care about what you think. The only thing that matters now is the mission at hand, Hatake."
Yuki pressed the sword closer to Akane. The girl turned and came face to face with the weapon, staring wide-eyed at her own reflection in the blade. Then her face slowly scrunched together and a long wail broke out, triggered more by the child's instinct to the cold menace emanating from the ANBU rather than a full recognition of the danger she was it.
Rin struggled against her bonds and twisted to look at her captor in alarm. "Let me go, please! She's just a child! You have no right to put her through something this!"
"Be quiet." The Lynx tightened his arm across her throat, choking her into silence even as she continued to strain against the wires.
"No right?" Yuki spoke over Akane's sobbing cries while he held her still with a firm grip on the back of her small neck. "We have every right. We aren't here to play games. We're here to test whether Hatake Kakashi has what it takes to make the right decisions when he's entrusted with a mission that puts the Village at stake."
Kakashi glared at him. "Not a game? Putting a mission and a life at risk just so you can recreate this?"
He had often wondered, in the dead of night, what he would have done in his father's shoes – what he would do if faced with the same situation. But this… This was different. The deliberate setup to present him with this deadly, point blank provocation was nothing short of a sick game.
"This is something we all have to face sooner or later. You think there's always going to be some miracle way to succeed missions without making sacrifices?" Yuki laughed derisively. "Wake up kid. Start acting like a real shinobi. You want to be like your father and save your friend? Fine. It's a life for a life. It means you're prepared to see this girl die."
"You wouldn't dare," Kakashi hissed. The safety of the girl was the Lynx's mission. Exam or not, no one had the right to voluntarily sabotage a mission. "That's treason."
"You'd think so, wouldn't you? But work in ANBU long enough and you'll see things you'd wish you never knew. For example, what if the mission was in fact to kill this girl and make it look like the Rocks did it? What if my story was a lie and we're the ones who actually abducted her? The fact is, she's a useful pawn. Whether she lives or dies isn't my concern."
"What about him?" Kakashi nodded to the Lynx. "It's his mission."
The other ANBU gave a shrug. "I've done worse than lie on a mission report. We were ambushed. The girl tried to run. She died. End of story."
"Why?" Rin rasped. "Why would you do something like that?"
"There is no why. I only do what my captain tells me to do."
"We'll know the truth."
"You won't remember."
Rin's hand flared with chakra and she twisted against the wires to strike it against the ANBU's body. One touch and she could paralyze him. There was no way she was going to stand here being a useless deadweight. Her fingers scraped against his thigh and she felt a second of triumph. Then in the next, he kicked her legs out from under her and threw her into the snow.
She had a moment to gasp in a breath before he weighed her down from above and dug his fingers into her throat.
She heard Kakashi call out her name but her eyes were fixed on the mask above her, a sense of disorientation unnerving her to the core. Why hadn't it worked? By all means, he should have been suffering from a severed ligament. How was he still able to move?
"It won't work," the Lynx murmured quietly. "You're not in control here."
Here? Rin frowned and tried to speak, but her voice gagged in her throat as the ANBU tightened his choke. She thrashed in the snow, panic rising as the pressure mounted against her windpipe.
"Rin!" Kakashi lifted his hand to throw the kunai, only to be stopped by Yuki's voice.
"Make another move and I'm going to take it as your decision to abandon the mission."
Kakashi clenched his teeth and turned on him. "You call this a mission? This isn't anything but –"
"Call it whatever the hell you want kid. Nothing's changing. Make a decision: be like Sakumo or prove you're different. Keep spouting pointless arguments and they'll both die."
Kakashi tightened his grip on the kunai until his knuckles hurt. He knew he didn't have time. Tears were running down Rin's face as she voicelessly struggled to draw breath. He needed to act. He had promised Midori and made a vow with Obito. He wouldn't let Rin die. Not now, not ever.
A pained shriek echoed between the trees from the other side. He snapped his eyes to Yuki and saw him sliding the edge of his blade into Akane's skin. The eyes behind mask were fixed on Kakashi.
He bit his lip hard enough to draw blood but didn't even register the pain. Wasn't there a way? Was his strength not enough to save them both? It wasn't even about the exam anymore. It was two lives on a scale, threatened by a pair of lunatics who were no better than enemies.
Then with a start, he remembered there was a third. His eyes darted around the clearing and landed on the black cloaked ANBU leaning against a tree with his arms crossed. What was he doing? Was he only there to assess the test?
His instincts said otherwise. Yuki didn't do anything by half-measure. The Raven wasn't just watching. Then what was his role? Kakashi tore at the inside of his cheek in frustration – and finally noticed. He wasn't feeling the pain. The burn on his left arm still throbbed, as did the gash along his shoulder, but the inside of his mouth was whole.
A genjutsu? If so, how much was an illusion? The girl? Rin? No, he knew Rin was real. He wouldn't mistake her presence. His mind raced. Even if it was an illusion, he was fully aware that advanced genjutsu techniques could infiltrate so deeply into the victim's mind that a hypothetical death would also kill the physical body.
He cursed the ANBU. That meant the presence of an illusion didn't make the situation any better. Then why use one in the first place? He glared at the ground. Think, think. Something wasn't reality. What? Akane? The Lynx?
Whatever the case, he had to break free first. Though half knowing the outcome, he concentrated on his chakra flow and disrupted it. Kai.
Nothing changed.
His options were limited. He couldn't count on someone on the outside dragging him out. Neither did he think a bit of pain was enough to pull him out of such an advanced illusion. The ANBU were experts in subterfuge. They wouldn't let him out so easily. He needed something more drastic – something capable of overturning their predictions and shocking his system out of this static dimension.
There was only one way to do that.
And then what? What if it didn't work?
Kakashi shoved the thoughts aside. He was out of time. Rin's wheezing breaths and Akane's cries were deafening in his ears.
He raised the kunai.
If he could only save one of them…
If a sacrifice had to be made…
Grow strong, Kakashi. Strong enough to complete your missions and not lose your comrades. Do you hear? Grow strong.
He had never hated his father so much as he did in that instant when he realized – it was impossible.
Sacrifices had to be made.
Kakashi swung down his arm and buried the kunai deep between his ribs. Blood rushed up his throat and the pressure on his lungs nearly made him squeeze his eyes shut. He forced them open, pushing back against the pain and nausea as he concentrated on the surroundings.
It was still snowing, but the surroundings had grown much darker. To his right, Yuki stood frozen, his arms empty. On the other side, the Lynx and Rin were on their feet and the wires that should have been binding Rin lay slack in the snow. The Raven was kneeling on the ground close by with Akane wrapped in his cloak.
Yuki cursed violently but Kakashi didn't spare him another thought. Hanging precariously between reality and illusion, his vision blurred and twisted between motion and repose. It was like seeing and feeling double. The pain in his chest eased for a second and then flared with a vengeance, sending him to his knees. In one moment, his hand was empty and in the next, it was drenched in the warmth of his blood. His mind reeled in panic but he clung to the vestiges of both worlds and the thought of impending death that had pulled him free of the genjutsu.
"Rin!" He shouted through the foul taste of blood in his mouth. He saw the one in the snow turn her head weakly toward him. The other was motionless. "Breathe! This is an illusion! You're on your feet! Get the girl –"
Kakashi choked on his blood and coughed violently. He didn't know if it would work – if Rin trusted him enough to believe in his words with the single-mindedness she needed to control her body while her mind was still trapped in the illusion.
He raised his face from the snow that vacillated between bloodied red and pristine white. He saw Rin struggling against the ANBU's hold in the genjutsu, while stumbling through the snow in reality. From the other corner of his eyes, he saw Yuki bearing down on him.
Gathering the last of his sanity and consciousness, Kakashi raised his voice again. "Move! There!"
He jerked the kunai from his chest and hurled it at the kneeling Raven. The agent spun to protect the girl in his arms and the weapon struck him in the back. He caught a glimpse of Rin tackling him just as Yuki knocked Kakashi to the ground. Then the world went dark.
.-.-.-.
Rin stared down at the Raven, her chest heaving. She had no idea what was going on. How had she been able to knock down an ANBU? Blindly following Kakashi's words and the trajectory of his kunai, she had willed her body to move and crashed into nothing – that turned into the cloaked ANBU a second later.
She immediately reached out for the young girl cushioned in his arms, but Akane turned her face into the Raven's cloak and clung to him as she sobbed.
"It's alright," the Raven soothed, stroking her head as he lay motionless in the snow. His mask lay buried beside him, revealing the Mangekyou Sharingan in his bleeding eyes as they faded to black. "It's alright little one, it's all over now."
Rin staggered to her feet. "What… is going on?"
The Raven's eyes turned to her and for the first time, she noticed they were looking right through her in the characteristic way of one who had lost his light.
"Your eyes," she mumbled.
"Don't worry about me. You'd better go check on your friend."
Even as he finished speaking, a voice rang out through the snow.
"You dumb shit!"
Rin snapped her head to where Kakashi was. The two other ANBU were kneeling over his prone body and she felt her chest constrict.
"He's dead, captain," the Lynx said.
"I can see that," the Goose snapped, tearing off his mask in agitation.
"Move!" Rin was pushing the two out of her way before she knew it, her hands alight with healing chakra. Her palms pressed down on Kakashi's eerily quiet chest. There was no pulse. His heart was still. Biting her lips hard, she poured chakra into his organs, manually circulating the blood through his unresponsive body. "Kakashi! Can you hear me? Kakashi! Wake up!"
"The idiot killed himself in the Tsukuyomi," the Goose said. "There's no way his physical body's going to survive that kind of trauma."
"Whose fault do you think it is?!" Rin cried, blinking at the tears that spilled all the same. She rubbed her face with a shoulder and shook her head. She needed to concentrate.
Talk to them, the medics always said. Call them back.
Her voice shook. "Kakashi!"
.-.-.-.
Kakashi lay staring at a bright afternoon sky. Thin wisps of clouds drifted steadily overhead, carried by the early spring breeze. At his feet, he could see the target post that his father had erected in the garden for him. The entire surface was pockmarked with shallow slices left by shuriken and kunai. Idly, he mused that if only the weapons were a little lighter, he would be able to throw them more consistently into the dot in the center.
A slow frown pulled his brows at the thought. He hadn't reflected on the weight of kunai for years. Besides which, the shuriken currently embedded in the post were far too disarrayed for his standards. Had he really thrown them? What was he doing on the ground in the first place? He felt like he had to be somewhere else but his limbs were too heavy to move.
As the muddled thoughts swirled in his mind, he heard voices from the house.
"Yuki? Have you seen my son? He's not in his room."
"He's buried in the grass over there. Seriously, you need to teach him not to use up all his chakra throwing weapons. The kid can hardly walk and he's hitting bullseyes. It's creepy."
"Don't blame me, I only showed him what chakra was. He figured out the rest on his own. Where?"
"Below the post. See the hair?"
"Oh, right. I'm coming Kakashi!"
A sigh. "If only our enemies knew the legendary White Fang turns into a puddle of goo for his son."
"You would too if you'd spend time with him."
"Hard pass. I have enough clan brats clinging to me already."
A deep, full-throated laugh carried over the garden and Kakashi closed his eyes. He had forgotten how his father used to laugh.
"See you tomorrow sensei."
"Thanks Yuki."
Kakashi didn't know when this memory happened or why he was seeing it in such vivid details but it all seemed irrelevant. He listened to his father's feet treading the grass and then felt his warm presence settle beside him.
"You'll catch a cold sleeping out here," Sakumo said.
Kakashi almost said it's warm. Then the cold hit him out of nowhere and he snapped his eyes open. It was dark. The sky was gone and so was the garden. He tried to sit up but couldn't feel any part of his body. It was unbearably cold, like frost had settled right into his bones. His breath hitched.
"Shh, don't worry, you're in a state of shock." Sakumo shrugged out of his vest and draped it over Kakashi. It was so big it engulfed him whole and the warmth that slowly sank into his skin filled his chest with nostalgia.
He remembered now. The Jounin exam. Yuki. The hopeless no-win situation. Had he died? Was Rin safe? Had she been successful in saving the girl?
"Father."
"Mn?"
There were so many things he wanted to say, but for the first time in years, he felt something other than indifference toward his father. The walls that had held in his childhood confusion and misgivings were crumbling in the wake of understanding.
"You made a mistake. What you wanted to do was impossible. They were nothing more than ideals."
"I know," came the quiet reply.
"Then why did you kill yourself? Why did you leave me with an impossible task?" Why did you leave me alone for the sake of your own honor?
"Because I thought you could do it. I still believe you can."
Kakashi gave a mirthless huff. "I did what I could and died."
"Not yet."
"Then why am I talking to you?"
Sakumo only smiled and ran a hand through Kakashi's hair. "Grow strong, my son. Find your strength."
Kakashi frowned and searched his father's face. Just as he was about to ask what that meant, he heard someone call his name.
Kakashi.
Kakashi!
"Midori?" He turned and searched the darkness. It was silent. He looked back to Sakumo. "Did –"
His father was no longer there. The Jounin vest was gone.
Kakashi!
He recognized the voice now. It wasn't Midori. It was Rin. Was she safe?
He willed his body to move and follow the echoes of the voice. It was like wading through a sea of mud. Something clogged his nose and mouth. He couldn't breathe. The warmth was all but gone, leaving him vulnerable to the oppressive cold once again. His legs felt like they were sinking into quicksand, his hands hanging useless at his sides.
Still, he pushed on. He needed to find her. He still had promises to fulfill.
He couldn't die – not yet.
"Kakashi!"
He opened his mouth with an audible gasp and filled his lungs. It hurt to breathe. He didn't know if he was breathing, coughing, or choking, but it felt like he was drowning in air.
"Breathe Kakashi, slowly, you're doing fine. Thank god… thank god…"
It took him a moment to blink his eyes into focus, cringing against the sharp contrast of snow against the backdrop of night. Rin was leaning over him, mumbling incoherent words and wiping away the tears on her face.
She was safe. Good.
No sooner had the fact registered in his mind than he saw a fist snaking out from behind Rin and he threw himself to the side. Rolling clumsily to his feet, still feeling weak and lightheaded, Kakashi barely managed to raise his hands to block Yuki's kick. The force sent him crashing into a tree and knocked the breath from his lungs. Before he had a chance to recover, Yuki had him pinned to the tree with a fist in his shirt, his face contorted with fury.
"What the fuck sort of solution was that?!" he snarled. "You want me to fail you right here and now and cripple you so you can never fight again? Huh?!"
"No! Stop!" Rin cried out as she lunged after them.
A hand on her wrist stopped her and she spun to face the Lynx with rare anger etched into her face. Enough was enough. But she paused when the ANBU lowered his mask to expose a young man with soft, green eyes clouded with concern.
"Let's give them a minute," he said. "You may not believe me after what we just did but Captain really cares about the kid. Hatake Sakumo was his teacher and hero. His suicide devastated Yuki and he just watched his son try to do the same thing just now."
Rin wasn't sure she believed him, but when she tugged her hand loose, he let go without a word. Curling her fingers together, she turned her eyes to Yuki and Kakashi, preparing to jump in if it escalated any more.
Kakashi glared back at Yuki and dug his fingers into the ANBU's forearm, not even caring about the armor. "You think your test was any better? Rin could have died! And you call yourself a Konoha shinobi? My father's student?!"
"I'm trying to save you from making the same fucking mistakes he made and what do you do? The exact same shit!"
"At least he tried to save his team! Anyone who thinks that was his mistake can go rot in hell!" It was the first time in his life that Kakashi had voiced a defense of his father's actions. But the fact was lost in the haze of exhaustion and anger that blinded him to rational calm.
"I know that. You think I'm an idiot? His failure wasn't choosing his team over the mission, it was not having the resolve to live with his decision and thinking his life was worth throwing away!"
Words lodged in Kakashi's throat and silenced him – because he saw a part of Yuki's anger right in his own heart and understood the pain.
"We live in a world of sacrifices and shit decisions," Yuki went on. "It's not about which decisions we make, it's about owning up to them. Sakumo was one of the best shinobi Konoha's ever seen but it meant jackshit when his heart was so soft he couldn't bear to be hated by the people he loved. That was his weakness. That's what he wanted you to overcome. And what do you instead?"
His grip tightened on Kakashi's shirt, knuckles pressing against his chest with bruising force. For a second, he felt as if Yuki wasn't looking at him at all, but the specter of his father. Like a bucket of water over his head, it pulled Kakashi back to his senses.
"What the hell were you thinking?" Yuki's voice was hoarse. "Trying to kill yourself just to avoid making a decision isn't a solution!"
Kakashi loosened his grip and glanced over the ANBU's shoulder at Rin. "Father died for nothing. Honor isn't worth dying for. That was his mistake. I'm not going to repeat it. If I have to sacrifice my life, it's going to be for someone else. It's going to mean something."
Yuki opened his mouth and then snapped it shut again as if biting on something unpleasantly bitter.
"Masayuki."
They both turned to see the masked Raven treading slowly through the snow with Akane still in his arms.
"He passes. You may not have seen what you wanted, but he far exceeded our expectations on all counts."
"Not if that wasn't an illusion," Yuki objected.
"But it was and he saw through it. Regardless of whether you agree with it, he made a decision based on the circumstances and the factors at hand." He turned to where Rin and the Lynx stood. "That was a fine display of teamwork and trust. He has good instincts, good judgement and the skills to match. I, for one, am satisfied with the results."
Yuki scowled but pulled his hand back and turned away. "Lynx, take everyone home. The exam continues."
"Wait," Rin said. "Kakashi's hurt. Let me take care of him first."
"No." Yuki held up a hand before she could protest further and the Lynx threw a book to him. He in turn tossed it over to Kakashi, who caught it out of reflex. "That's what your next task is about. Read that and learn everything in it. You have 24 hours."
Kakashi flipped through the hand-bound book and found a series of ninjutsu techniques related to emergency field treatments. He raised a brow. So that was how Minato knew the basics of healing while insisting he had never received medical training.
Yuki gave Kakashi a last sidelong look but it was growing too dark to discern his expression. Stooping to pick up his mask from the snow, he fixed it over his face.
"I'll find you in the morning," he said simply, his voice devoid of emotion.
Despite Rin's attempt to object, the Lynx and Raven disappeared into the night, taking the two girls with them. Yuki lingered for a moment longer before leaping up into the trees.
Kakashi was left to stare at the trampled snow, trying in vain to make sense of everything that had just happened. It was a long minute before he allowed himself to sag against the tree and sigh heavily. He watched his breath smoke out and fade among the falling flakes, then closed his eyes.
He couldn't believe it was only day one.
A/N: Whether intentionally or not, I seem to be focusing a lot on gray zones between the stark contrasts that were highlighted in Gaiden, namely the extreme way Kakashi reacted to his father's decision and suicide. I'm actually a little worried that some of you may feel unsatisfied with the way I handled this chapter, in which case, please tell me because I can learn so much from talking with readers. That said, there will be more scenes dealing with the issue, so bear with me!
Thanks for reading and if you have anything else you want to comment on, I'll be waiting with open arms :)
.LinSetsu.