Cleared up a few mistakes in the previous chapter, like a contradiction I made with the hitai-ate. Onto the next one.
"Is God willing to prevent evil but not able?
Then he is not Omnipotent
Is he able but not willing?
Then he is malevolent.
Is he able and willing?
Then from whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing?
Then why call him god?"
Chapter three
"Boy, where did you get the idea that he was your father?"
Facing off against Pain, holding the rod an inch from Iruka's face, the crude but deadly weapon strangely warm to the touch.
His breath was released in quick short gasps, not even daring to grin as he watched Pain jump away. He had survived, but only barely.
"Child, I believe he asked you a question. We expect you to answer it?"
Watching the missile catch up to Chouji, as if the bulky ninja was running in slow motion. Then again, he had the Sharingan, so to him time also seemed to have slowed down, or maybe it was the state of mind his realization had put him in. The realization that to save Chouji and help the Leaf's efforts in defending their home, he would have to sacrifice his last bit of chakra, thus effectively ending his life.
He had not even hesitated in the slightest.
His life was inconsequential to the hundreds that he could save, perhaps millions if the leader of Akatsuki was allowed to leave this place alive.
"I am running out of patience. Do not make the mistake of thinking we will not call a Yamanaka here to tear your mind apart in our search for answers, just because you are a child."
His dad had been just as he had remembered him, at least before his failed mission. Half serious, half laid back, warm towards those he had loved.
The lady who had sent him here. An enigma. Who was she? Why had she done this to him? What was her role in this strange turn of events?
...How was she in the room without either of the elder ninja showing any sign of noticing her?
Kakashi blinked. He opened his mouth but her gaze, playful in appearance yet commanding in its nature, froze his voice in his throat. The finger she held up perpendicular to perfect lips in a shushing gesture made him swallow his words.
Instead, he turned to the ninja in the room.
"Well?" Sakumo ordered expectantly.
She finally spoke. "Act ignorant. Pretend he is the father you just left."
Kakashi hesitated before speaking. "You're my father." The situation had left Kakashi so bewildered, his mind was stretched thin in its search for a suitable way out of this mess, however impossible it may have seemed. He did not know when he had made the decision that this lady was his best bet.
Her rich noble voice floated into his ears, completely ignored by the room's other two occupants. "Tell him you were guided through your youth by his hand."
Kakashi repeated, "You raised me."
"How he trained you in your Shinobi arts."
"You trained me."
"Where you lived..."
"We lived in the Hatake estate. Just the two of us."
Sakumo and Hiruzen stared at the boy for a few seconds.
The boy was not lying.
Both men knew how to spot a lie. The ninja economy was practically fuelled by information. That information had to be sifted through very carefully as if separating the wheat from the chaff. An entire clan had techniques devoted to this. The two had lived long enough to be called experts in this practice.
No, the boy was not lying.
"Hiruzen...summon Inoichi."
"I'm sorry, Hokage-sama, Hatake-sama. I'm not sure why...I definitely don't understand it, but what the boy says matches with what I have seen in his mind."
Definitely not the words Inoichi's superiors had wanted to hear. Even so, this event was enough of an enigma that he was not worried that much about disappointing them.
"Are you implying that someone put those memories into his head? I can assure you that I have never seen this kid before in my life."
Inoichi replied, the theories on how this was possible almost distracting him, "It is theoretically possible. You know of techniques where in case a ninja is about to be captured, the information that is too valuable to be known by the wrong people is purged from the mind in varying ways before interrogation."
They both knew. They had these kind of fail-safes with them as they spoke, ready to be triggered at a moment's notice.
"To add a new memory into the subject's mind is much more difficult, yet again, doable. To write out a person's life however, even if it's a few years, that is a feat capable of someone with god-like abilities. Regardless of whether this was the work of enemies, I must admit I am impressed." Inoichi said, sounding less like an interrogator and more like a scholar.
Kakashi who was a bit light-headed from his session with Inoichi, nevertheless caught the slight smirk of the woman whose presence had yet to disappear.
"You said a few years? Anything more than a decade feels like a really long time to me," Sakumo observed.
"There is a gap," Inoichi continued uncertainly, "what looks like a five year gap, I believe from when he was eight years old."
Dad's mission, Kakashi thought in pure alarm.
"From that point it's just blank and I don't believe these are memories that are somehow hidden from me. They're just not there."
Sarutobi turned his gaze onto the boy. So someone had somehow got his hands on a boy who shared enough traits with Sakumo to be considered his son, stuck fake memories in him, given him a Sharingan recently, if the fresh scar across his eye was any indication and then dropped him right outside their doorstep.
He wished he could just blink and see all the answers before him.
Unfortunately, the cause of these events was a higher power in the same room with him, who was not keen on revealing her presence to him. Sarutobi would have to suffer for a while longer.
The old man sighed and decided to ask the simpler questions, "Inoichi, can you in any way tell if the boy is a threat to the village?"
The man turned to his Hokage, a stern expression on his face, "Not immediately Lord Hokage. Our only reason to be afraid is that he is still an unknown."
Sakumo grunted uncomfortably, clearly not pleased with the turn of events.
"You may leave Inoichi," Sarutobi allowed. "Remember what you learned here is strictly confidential, S-class."
Inoichi nodded. He bowed to both men, "Hokage-sama, Hatake-sama, by your leave." He shut the door gently on his way out.
The lady spoke up, this time from Kakashi's side where she sat next to him, clearly enjoying how her close proximity made the man-turned-boy fidget like the pre-pubescent boy he had become. She whispered in his ear, "I've done all I can, the rest is up to you now. Try to do a better job this time. I have such high hopes for you."
Kakashi was wondering how the two ninja didn't notice the slight depression on the bed where she sat. No, he was doing his best to focus on that.
There was a shift in the air, and she and all traces of her presence disappeared. Kakashi sucked in his breath slightly. Really, who or what the hell was she?
"Now," Kakashi turned to the elderly ninja and was not at all amused by the menacing and oppressive aura Sakumo was giving off, "What will we do with you?"
...
Kakashi's POV
When I woke up next, it was with a sudden gasp, a swift motion where I tried to suck in fresh air that eluded me.
It was an epic fail, as the strong overpowering stench of blood that had flooded my nostrils only seconds earlier was now in my mouth.
I could "taste" the smell on my tongue, so to speak, and it was revolting.
The urge to throw up was immediate, but I pushed it down with almost laughable ease. Years of experience both as an Anbu operative and a jounin, most definitely as an Anbu captain can give you such an ability or rather a resistance, even when you're flung into the past and into a thirteen year old body.
Ninja instincts coming to the fore demand I immediately investigate the source of the side stench. Grogginess from just waking up is all but gone, so my mind is not slow in picking up details.
First and foremost, I'm not in the hospital. I'm relatively sure that that was where I was last awake. I even remember lady Tsunade pushing the needle in me that made me black out, though plainly that is not important at the moment.
Mainly because I've identified the source of the stench and its a corpse, seated in those businessmen-type chairs on the other side of an obviously expensive desk.
A corpse that was once the body of one of the most ruthless businessmen in the Elemental Nations.
Gatou.
His glasses are askew, so for the first time I see his eyes; two black pits. His expression is one of horror and rage all mashed up in one face. I realize that Zabuza beheading him in my timeline was a much kinder fate, however undeserving he was of it.
Being stabbed through the middle of your chest is a painful way to die, especially when the hole is big enough to peer through. I wonder who could have done that...
"Stay calm."
Immediately, my left eye, which I always close instinctively to lessen the drain of chakra, snaps open searching for the owner of the gravelly voice. It reminds me of wet rocks sliding against each other and I swear I've heard this voice before.
The Sharingan is a special eye for a reason and the room lit by dim moonlight lights up like day for me. Any chakra in the room would take on a distinct colour therefore revealing anyone in hiding.
However, there's no one. Just me, dead Gatou, whose chakra is already almost completely dissipated and a disembodied voice.
"You have a mission to complete." my invisible observer states.
Waking up in unknown places with dead bodies is not my idea of "the right side of the bed" so I'm more than a little snappy.
"What if I don't want to do this mission?"
"You die," the voice replies and I keep quiet. The way he says it, not with arrogance or cockiness. It's the truth, plain and simple.
The voice scratches at the back of my mind, but no answers as to my overseer's identity surface.
"You'll need this though," and a figure melts from the walls. Standard Anbu uniform, with the concealing coat with a hood put on. The mask is supposed to resemble a ferret or some other kind of bird.
The most surprising fact of all: I am taller than this Anbu operative.
The shock is evident on my face and in my stiff posture as the ninja tosses the ninja pouch at my face rather than handing it to me. I barely catch it.
"You are to clear out this facility. It's an old paper factory that went out of order but is now a stronghold for Gatou's more criminal activities." He glances at the corpse, "at least while he was alive."
"That means this facility is full of hostiles. Rogue samurai, nuke-nin, none of them must leave this place alive to carry out other misdeeds. You will exterminate them."
I know Gatou. The man usually has close to a hundred mercenaries with him wherever he goes. They expect me kill them all? Alone?
At least they helped outfit me for it. I'm back in my old 'just made jounin' gear, with standard Anbu vest armour and a sword strapped to my back. The kunai pouch strapped to my thigh feels heavy - a good sign. The only thing missing is still my hitai-ate.
I study the nin's chakra. A vibrant blue and definitely above average for someone perhaps younger than thirteen, that is, if this ninja is not just a midget.
The hairs on the back of my neck tingle and I glance sharply at the door. Someone's coming.
I am already moving but the nin puts his hand on my shoulder, putting a halt to that.
"Remember, failure to complete this mission results in your death. Any actions performed contrary to completion of the mission, like trying to escape to wherever you came from, results in your death, again."
The doorknob is turning now. I glare at my observer. He's not really helping by holding me here. His grip is actually quite strong. I try to rip my shoulder from his grasp, but suddenly my face hits the floor hard with a resounding smack.
It takes a while to realize I've just been shoved to the ground, but by that time its too late. And my observer has already fled the scene.
Two rogue samurai have entered the room, thugs in every shape and form. Big and bald, both have a long katana that hangs from their hip. I'm not the type of guy who wants to know if they can use them.
Before I can react, they see the dead body of their boss.
"Shit Kawada! Some fucker killed him!"
"Son of a bitch...must'a been one o' them ninja types. Sneaked righ' past all o' us."
I'm still on the floor face down. I don't dare move. Hopefully they'll think I'm dead too.
" And what's this? A kid lying on the floor?"
"Nah Fukuda. He dressed up like 'em ninja. You know how they train 'em young." A slight pause. "I dunno why he just lying on the floor like that but whatchu wanna bet he knows what happened here?"
My ears catch the distinct sound of someone spitting on the floor. The rogues have taken steps around me to inspect their boss.
"Fuck it. I didn't like the bastard but I liked that he let us fuck shit up and get paid for it. This kid's gonna pay for messing with my job security."
And with that, I can hear the footsteps that signify one rogue's approach. With a rough grizzled hand, he turns me over and my hand flashes.
The rogue recoils screaming. His hands reach up to his face to rip out the kunai I stuck in his eye and as a result of his messy self treatment blood pours out of the hole. He screams even louder.
I'm already back on my feet, sword drawn and plunged into the stomach of the rogue. I rip it out, making a mess of his intestines.
Its too messy to be called professional and the warm blood that splashes onto my face is disgusting, but I'm trying to destroy all resistance quickly before they brings the rest of the mercs down on my head.
It does not work.
The alarm blaring horrid grating sounds absolutely destroys the possibility.
The other samurai glares at me from across the room, eyes filled with hate, his hand holding onto the lever he just pulled down.
His friend finally stops moving.
With a battle cry he charges at me like a rampaging bull.
Thinking quickly, I draw his friend's sword from its sheath and use both swords to block the overhead strike.
Unsurprising the rogue is angered that I'd use Fukuda...or maybe Kawada's sword against him.
"You little shit! You killed Fukuda!"
Ah, so it was Fukuda.
"I'll fucking kill you!"
With strength that can only come from being that big he pushes me away and I roll across the floor, get back on my feet while jumping off the floor in the same motion. Before I land I toss Fukuda's sword at Kawada.
My aim is terrible, but close enough that Kawada who is also too excited dodges and looks away from me to watch the blade fly by.
When he turns back, all he sees is an empty space where I once stood.
He's dead five seconds later, when I pull the kunai from the back of his head.
I'm going to definitely need some work. Even at thirteen I could have done it in two.
Sticking me in a mission at the drop of a hat where it's either do or die? I hope my 'father' doesn't think he can get rid of me that easily.
Read and review people.
I've placed the mission that indirectly killed Kakashi's dad at a time when he was around eight years old, since I could not find any specific date. If there is something official or if you think there is a contradiction with the eight year old part then please feel free to let me know.
The latter half of this terribly short chapter (I blame my laptop. Just turning it on is a process) is written in Kakashi's point of view so that you, anyone who reads this story has an idea of how my Kakashi thinks, however small the idea you'll get is.
Hope you enjoy it and a Happy New Year to all.