Kakashi cracked his eyes open slowly.
A crusty film had hardened over the blood smeared across his eyes and glued them shut. As he blinked his eyes open, the flaky skin of dried blood cracked and trails of cooled sanguine seeped down his masked cheeks like tears. Gobs of undried crimson, caught between his pale, feathered lashes, stretched and split as he peeled his lids apart. His blurry, watery vision was spider-webbed with gossamer tendrils of sticky red.
The first thing he saw was a storm of hot cinders flurrying about his face. Each spark was a sharp orange pinprick that swirled, glowing and mote-like, through a backdrop of churning black and grey billowing clouds of smoke. Disoriented, for a moment he thought that it looked like the night sky, a black canvas sprinkled with tiny droplets of sparkling clear light.
Then agonizing pain ripped through him, and Kakashi knew it wasn't beautiful.
"Sen-sei..." It came out a pitiful raspy, pleading croak. His throat felt raw, like it was bleeding. It hurt to just to breathe. The air was stifling and the smoke was so thick it could be mistaken for a black fog, tumbling endlessly over the piles of wreckage surrounding him. Each choked breath through the thin fabric of his mask made his eyes water. He could feel his heart pulsing in his head, in his stomach, and in each of his arms and legs. A dull stab of pain that sharpened with each pulsing throb. His entire body hurt. Everything felt painfully hot-everything except for the front of his head, which felt strangely numb, wet, and cool.
But this didn't worry Kakashi nearly as much as it should have.
A heavy weight was pressing against him from what felt like all sides, crushing him. He was lying on his back atop a hard, uneven surface that was littered with sharp protrusions and razor-sharp edges. His diaphragm was straining with every breath, his ribcage threatening to shatter under the immense pressure, his lungs burning. His legs were pinned in place, but both were twisted and bent. His left knee ached and shoots of hot pain were shooting up his thigh to his hip. One of his arms was bent behind his head at an angle that had his shoulder burning.
Kakashi's small and skinny fourteen-year-old body was buried under roughly a foot of broken-down, charred building.
"Sen-" he choked out instinctively, "Sensei!" A dark, icy panic spread quickly through him. The straining muscles in his chest tightened and Kakashi was left gasping breathlessly in wide-eyed panic, unable to think in his terror. Red spots popped lazily in his vision, mingling above him with the fiery-orange sparks in a nightmarish dance. He thrashed about wildly, crying out in silent fear, oblivious to the pain it caused him.
By the time he had managed to free himself from all of the broken wood and crumbled cinderblocks, his black ANBU gloves were torn and his fingernails were ripped and bloody. His entire body was scraped and cut and bleeding where broken shards of glass, rough brick edges, or bent nails had torn through the thin material of his uniform. His shoulder throbbed painfully and his arm lay heavy and limp beside his head.
Kakashi hyperventilated, his chest heaving, as he kicked a broken window pane off his legs. He squirmed and wriggled on the shattered glass until he was lying on his belly atop the pile of rubble. Reaching up with his shaking hand, trails of sticky blood caremalizing in the heat along his forearm, he yanked his mask down under his chin. A rush of smoky air rushed into his lungs, making him cough. He lay there for an immeasurable amount of time, shivering and sweating and panting, his mismatched eyes opened wide and looking around fearfully. Hot liquid trickled down his forehead and into bangs sticky with sweat and grime. Kakashi brushed it away from his eyes and his fingers came away painted in rosy crimson.
The heat buffeted him on all sides. The dry air was scorching against his fair skin, which was scraped and bruised, showing through the tattered remains of his uniform. Kakashi took a moment to catch his breath and take a mental inventory of his condition. Judging by the piercing pain in his shoulder and the shoots of agony in his knee, he guessed that his shoulder was dislocated and his kneecap fractured. At least three of his ribs were either broken or severely bruised. He had a large pain along the front of his head.
And, to top it all off, he had lost a shoe.
This particular discovery brought with it a bizarre and powerful desire to cry-which, Kakashi scolded himself, was stupidly ridiculous and pathetic. In addition to losing a sandal, one of the straps to his vest was torn. The flexible hard-plastic porcelain was pushed up to his chin. Some of his shurikan were pricking his thigh through the supposedly sturdy material of his weapons pouch, he had misplaced yet another personalized ANBU mask, and he was pretty sure that there was an embarrassingly large hole over his backside.
Kakashi groaned.
A scorching gale of smoke and cinders blew over him, ruffling his stiff, blood-caked hair. A fine spray of ash and grit followed the burst of sweltering air and misted over him, stinging as it skittered across his raw skin. Kakashi coughed and shakily pushed himself up into a pitiful hunched position. His blurry vision carreened wildly with the movement and he had to catch himself as he started falling forwards, reaching out blindly and-
Kakashi yelped as the wood under his palm splintered and gave way, sending him rolling and tumbling down the pile of rubble.
His wild fall was brought to a sudden stop as he landed on his side abruptly. His bruised ribs groaned painfully in protest at the jarring impact. A sharp spike of pain pounded through his head, and his shoulder and knee throbbed. But, even as his body crumpled in pain, he felt intense relief at the small size of the drop rush through him. That is, until his stomach, which he seemed to have left behind him at the top of the pile, caught up with a stabbing lurch of nausea.
Kakashi moaned and hugged himself, trying to find some inner anchor as the world revolved beneath him counterclockwise to the nauseating churn of his insides. Once again he laid in a collapsed heap, struggling just to breathe, unable to keep track of time.
Finally, the wave of sickening dizziness seemed to wane, and he was able to think more clearly. He pushed himself up with one elbow, breathing raggedly, and tried to calm himself down. He had been in difficult situations before. He had been sent on missions alone and with only a couple sentences briefing multiple times. Kakashi had been a jounin for over a year now, and he had a considerable amount of experience in dangerous, complicated situations. This wasn't the first time he'd woken up somewhere, having no idea how he'd gotten there. This shouldn't have been any different.
Except it was.
Kakashi couldn't remember what had happened or what he had been doing before waking up, alone and hurt, lying in a pile of broken-down building like so much trash. He couldn't even tell where he was now, his surroundings were completely unfamiliar to him.
As far as he could see were the singed remains of broken-down buildings. There were bright spots of flickering light, where blazing fires hadbroken through the thick haze of black smoke that roiled and spilled over everything. Beneath him was the sooty asphalt surface of a road, the dirty metal rim of a man-hole cover glinting through a fine layer of ash a couple feet to his left. Parts of the road appeared to have been torn up or crushed. Large craters the size of buses and cresting waves of crumbling asphalt, that were nearly as tall as he was, marred the expanse of the street before him. Broken bricks, splintered wood, shattered glass, and twisted hunks of metal littered the scarred road in front of him. The pile of rubble he had slipped down was to his right, leaning against a slanted half-wall and spilling out onto the sidewalk.
Kakashi's eyes caught on a partially buried sign, advertising the opening of a brand-new dingo shop. The street name was familiar to him, he ran by it everyday on his way to ANBU head-quarters.
A sick feeling of cold dread pooled heavily in his stomach. That meant that this smoking, broken-down mess around him was, Kakashi swallowed thickly, Konoha. The only thing that he could think of that could cause this much destruction was an explosion... An explosion or...
"The Kyubi!" Kakashi cried out as he shoved himself recklessly to his feet, looking around anxiously as memories of the last couple of hours flooded through him.
The Kyubi had attacked Konoha.
As a junior ANBU operative, he had been ordered with the task of evacuating civilians rather than being sent directly to the front lines. He had been upset when the rest of his team had been sent to the frontlines without him, and he had been hurt when told that it was the Hokage's orders that he be treated differently. Feelings of hot shame, helplessness, and innadequacy had overwhelmed him-insecurities never completely buried since the death of his father.
But he had gone, seething silently under his emotionless, white ANBU mask all the while. He had once again pushed his own feelings down somewhere deep inside his stomach, where they couldn't touch his head or heart, and did what he was told.
He vaguely remembered flitting through doorways wreathed with flame, sprinting through caving-in hallways, and kicking down doors as he searched a collapsing apartment building for a women's newborn. He had found the infant, but had been forced to leap out of the thirteenth-story window when the building around him had given an ominous lurch and a groan of finality.
It had been then, as he was skidding down the side of the tilting building on the heels of his feet, bawling infant clasped to his chest, that he had seen it.
The Kyubi had broken through the front-lines-a snarling, viscious mess of snapping teeth and whirling tails, surrounded on all sides by crumbling buildings and pillars of flame. Gamabunta, Minato-sensei's enormous frog-summon, sprang up before the monster in a swirling cloud of dust, the distant figure of the white-robed Hokage perched on his head. By the time Kakashi had landed, rolling, on the street below, he had already made up his mind.
Pausing only to deliver the screaming child into the arms of a tearful woman, Kakashi sprinted up the nearest building and starting traversing the rooftops, racing towards the Kyubi. He had willfully abandoned his ANBU post, disobeying a direct order given to him by a superiour. This was a strict violation of shinobi conduct and was a crime that could warrant the full stripping of ranks and, on the rare occasion, result in banishment. But none of this had mattered-the fact that his only source of income, the only thing keeping him off the streets, was thrown carelessly aside. It hardly registered.
The only thing he could think about was that his sensei, the man who had raised him, protected him, and loved him, was in danger. It didn't even occur to him that he was only a fourteen-year-old kid-a kid who didn't know what to do when girls would giggle and blush behind their hands as he walked by, much less how to stop the Kyubi.
All he knew was that Minato-sensei was in danger and that he had to help him.
Kakashi vaguely recalled feeling a sort of anxious, terrified determination as he leapt from rooftop to rooftop, approaching the spitting nine-tailed demon with all the speed his fourteen-year-old body could muster. Even as he had raced towards the monster he had been unable to look away from the tall, white-robed figure of his sensei, standing strong and straight-backed upon Gamabunta's head. He remembered calling out his sensei's name desperately as he came parallel with the man who had practically raised him.
And then a great wall of orange fur and searing heat had cut through the building before him.
There had been a loud noise of cracking stone, splintering wood, and shattering glass. A powerful rush of hot air had sent him hurtling backwards, chunks of broken building and smoke swirling around him. And then-
Kakashi shook himself out of his reverie, wide eyes focusing back to the devastation around him. A slow type of budding horror was building within him. The Kyubi was gone. His sensei's frog-summon was gone. The buildings around him were nothing more than smoldering piles of ruin. He had woken up alone, his sensei hadn't come to help him. His sensei...
Sweaty, matted white locks, stained pink and red, whipped about his face as he turned his head, peering desperately through the smoke. Kakashi forced his itching eyes to open wide, looking through his sharingan for some flicker of chakra and his other for some sign of his sensei. His breathing picked up, making him cough harshly, at the sudden flash of white that flutter weakly in of the corner of his eye. He turned his head and craned his neck to see around a small mountain of crushed cinderblock and charred wood that had spilled out onto the street.
Kakashi cried out loudly as his eyes focused in on the sight.
Lying on his back with his upper torso bent backwards and disappearing into a shallow crater of slowly steaming asphalt, one of his legs bent at the knee and the other twisted in a broken angle, his white Hokage robes fluttering in silence about his still form, was Kakashi's sensei.
"Sensei! Sensei!" Kakashi quickly shoved himself to his knees and scrambled, with bloody hands and a fractured kneecap, towards the broken form. He scrabbled blindly through the shattered glass, nails, and splintered wood that littered the wood-oblivious to the pain.
Kakashi tumbled bodily into the miniature asphalt crater, skidding on his side roughly before clawing his way up to the Hokage's side. He kneeled there, his head reeling, and struggled to breathe around the heavy lump in his throat.
"Minato-sensei..."
His teacher's name tumbled out of his chapped lips as a harsh, broken whimper. He tried to swallow, but his throat was too dry and tight, and he ended up choking back a sob. He fisted his hand against his side, bloody half-gloved fingers clenched tremulously an inch away from the pale, limp open hand in front of him. He ducked his head, catching his wobbling lower lip with his teeth, and squeezed his eyes shut hard, trembling.
Kakashi wasn't stupid and he wasn't six years old. He knew his sensei was dead.
Slowly, flinchingly, he forced himself to raise his glistening eyes up to the face of his teacher. When he did, a sensation very much like being punched in the stomach came over him, and he was left gasping, open-mouthed, for air.
Minato was looking back up at him with those blue eyes.
A fine layer of ash had sprinkled lightly over his blonde lashes. The dust and grit had mingled with a few beads of moisture that had gathered in the corners of his eyes, forming cloudy droplets that slid smoothly down tan cheeks. Kakashi tried to close his eyes against that stare, but he couldn't look away, held captive by the blue of the man's eyes.
It had always been the softest of blues.
A calm, reassuring, understanding color. Swathes of soothing sky-blue that twinkled with an inner radiance, an unshakable crystalline resolve that glinted through the glowing turqoise. For years those oceanic blue depths had been a home to him. The promising shade of freedom from his father's dark shadow. The comforting cerulean hue of unquestionable acceptance and protection.
But now... now...
Kakashi made a strangled choking noise, his mouth wet and ashy. His bruised and sooty face contorted into an expression of horrified, disbelieving agony. His dirty fingers snarled shakily through his stiff blood-crusted hair, torn fingernails raking raggedly along his scalp. Tremors wracked his body, his every muscle clenched tightly, desperately, against the sobs that threatened to break free.
His sensei's azure orbs were glassy and dull.
Obito was crying when Kakashi woke up.
It was cold, lying there in his dark room with his sheets tangled around him. Kakashi lay on his back for a few moments and just looked at the ceiling, a delicate sky-blue glow still following his blank gaze as his eyes traced the white surface. He stared, unblinking, till the color faded completely.
He rolled over onto his side, kicking his sweaty sheets off wearily, and checked the clock on his desk. The glowing green numbers 2:17 glared back at him, their sharp light threatening to give him a head-ache. Kakashi groaned, frowning back at the obnoxious neon light with heavy, half-lidded eyes for a moment before exhaling a harsh sigh of defeat. He swiftly rolled onto his stomach and let his head fall with a dramatic plop into the fluffy softness of his pillow. His forehead knocked loudly against the head-board on the way down.
Kakashi let out a frustrated groan that trailed off into an pitiful whine.
All he wanted-the only thing that he longed for on this God-given, green Earth-was just to sleep! A couple minutes rest without seeing the dead faces of his family and friends, a few seconds, was all he asked for. But no, he hadn't had a dreamless sleep since his last mission.
Kakashi expelled himself angrily from his messy bed with a resentful shove, ignoring Obito's tears as they dried on his cheek. He knew there was no point trying to sleep now. He would just end up lying in his too-cold bed for hours upon hours, staring pleadingly at his indifferent ceiling, wishing for sleep to come. And then, when hours on top of restless hours had passed, Obito would succumb to restless tears of frustration. The cry-baby.
Kakashi hissed when his bare feet came into contact with the icy coldness of his hard wooden floor-boards, curling his toes against the chill. It was a shame he couldn't stand going into bed wearing socks and that he thought slippers were for grannies.
Kakashi grunted, rolling his shoulders, I guess this is the price you pay for manliness.
He meticulously checked the health and general well-being of his collection of potted plants, who were all flowering nicely, on his window-sill before moving over to his closet.
Kakashi was a little worried about Mr. Ukki. Three days ago he had accidently fed him the wrong plant feed, and, on top of that, had been forced to give the plant bottled water. This may not seem like such a big problem to the random passerby, but Kakashi was experienced enough in these matters to know that it was grave mistake. Mr. Ukki was used to the rich water from the tap, which was visibly enhanced with many colorful nutrients and vitamins. The Copy-ninja sighed, sorely disappointed that his landlord had been knuckled into fixing the faulty plumbing in the kitchen area of the apartment complex.
Jerking his favorite pair of very worn and faded sweatpants off his hips and kicking them away from his ankles, Kakashi quickly slipped into his jounin uniform. By the time he had finished zipping up his jounin vest he was shivering with cold and it felt like the hairs on his arms were standing up under the dark long-sleeves of his shirt, prickling with goose-bumps. He shivered and thought idly about how the other day Sakura had told him that he felt cold all the time because he was losing weight.
He really liked it when the angry flush of her cheeks clashed in that particular shade with her pink locks, it was such a refreshing change of color-scheme from the normal hospital decorum of bland, indifferent white.
Kakashi made it to his doorway, gloved hand on the doorknob, before he had to stop. His shoulders fell with a disappointed sigh and he stared wryly at his toes for a moment before pivoting on his heel to face his apartment room again. It's like an itch...
He casually swiped up the trousers that he had purposefully left in a crumpled heap on his dustless, wooden floor. He folded them swiftly over his forearm and then stacked them on top of one of the neat pillars of folded clothes in his hamper. He made his bed in a matter of seconds with military precision and then he stepped back into the center of his one-room apartment.
Kakashi bit his bottom lip as he perused the room, fingers fiddling nervously with the sides of his pants. His apartment was once again spotless and organized in every way. The picture of perfection.
"Well shit..."
At some point in the last few weeks, Kakashi had noticed that his childhood compulsion to fix and arrange things until they were just right had made an inopportune reoccurrence in his daily bachelor life. This was somewhat annoying, not to mention a little embarrassing. He supposed it wasn't often that a full grown man stopped by a shelf in the department store to rearrange a bin of pens so that they were color-coordinated and the clicky-pens were separated from the twisty-pens.
But it wasn't his fault, not really.
Kakashi half-heartedly tilted the shade on his lamp, feeling unsure.
He remembered being dragged by his exasperated sensei to the hospital to see a psychiatric evaluator at some point during his chunin years. His sensei's suspicions were deemed correct and a seven-year-old Kakashi was told that there was something wrong with him, that he had a problem. Funny how he didn't remember anyone telling him how to fix it... He just remembered squatting miserably in the mud next to his sensei and picking lint off the back of his teacher's jounin vest during their next mission, when they were supposed to be watching a road for approaching bandits.
That was probably one of the few times Minato-sensei had ever slapped him.
So now Kakashi had taken it upon himself to cure himself. He knew he could do it. If he had eventually slipped into slovenliness during his teen years, Kakashi was sure that he could do it again.
Every day he went out of his way to be as messy and disorganized as possible. He had been spending a lot of time with Genma lately, observing the man's habits and playing Copy-cat like only he could. But so far all he had learned was to not wash his hands after going to the bathroom and to suck on various objects without any regard for who might have touched them or where they've been. Kakashi wasn't comfortable doing either, but it was a work in progress.
He quickly plucked an Icha Icha book from it's pile, causing the rest of them to spill and tumble out over his desk. Kakashi nodded, feeling pleased with himself. The various colors of his hard-backed collection were fanned out across the smooth wooden surface in what he felt was a very elegant manner, complimenting the lopsidedness of his lampshade nicely.
"It'll have to do..."
The Copy-ninja smiled and patted the keys in his pocket. He whistled to himself as the slightly dented door to his apartment complex swung shut creakily behind him. He skipped down the stairs, pausing only to give a friendly kick to the stray cat perched on the steps. His long-legged stride slipped into his tell-tale strut, which was more of a slouched swagger really, and he moved quickly through the night towards the memorial grounds.
He had some friends to catch up with.
"Thanks fortha drinks Takumi!" Ino flitted over and kissed the boy's reddening cheeks before turning to his friend, "Bye-bye Haruno-I mean Haruo!" She laughed at her mistake and patted her new friend's hair, accidently poking him in the eye. She smiled beatifically in apology at his pained wince, but the expression came out a little more predatory and mocking than she had initially intended. He smiled shyly back at her, rubbing tenderly at his watering eye. She giggled.
Ino loved going out with boys who didn't kill for a living.
She quieted her laughter and cupped his chin, "Sorry, sweetie!" And, as she spoke, her thumb absently brushed over his bottom lip. She ignored how his eyes slipped closed and his mouth parted open willingly, fixing her feline grin on the blushing boy behind him instead, "I'll seeyah later..."
And then, with an unsteady pirouette that she felt was actually rather graceful given the drunken circumstances, she turned around and stalked off down the deserted street. She fancied she heard a disappointed sort of moan rise up behind her, but soon forgot to think about it as she stumbled upon something that was far more important.
To her left, a couple of shops ahead, was a flower shop. A new flower shop.
Ino growled. She staggered over and, her eyes widening in disbelief, pressed her face up against the cool glass. Below her nose, which was squished up against the glass at an angle that was sure to leave a significant smear, there was a collection of flower arrangements. Ino wrinkled her nose.
They were pretty.
She stood there for a long time, face and hands pressed obnoxiously to the glass, eyes narrowed to resentful slits. What was this adorable, charming little flower shop doing here? What was it thinking, stealing potential customers from her own family's adorable little charming flower shop? How dare it-
Ino jumped in fright, shrieking at the top of her lungs, when a heavy hand suddenly fell upon her shoulder.
She whirled around, swinging her arms in a frantic attempt to keep her balance, still screaming. Her left hand somehow curled into a sloppy rendition of the tiger claw fighting style, which, with the intention of pushing away her assailant, she dug into his hard stomach and twisted viciously. Her right arm whipped about in a wide, sweeping circle above her head as she struggled to balance on only her left leg, her right was presently occupied with the difficult task of stabbing her attacker's armpit with her flexed heel.
"Ow!" Her masked antagonist let out a surprised cry as the unsteady flailing of her right arm transformed into a stinging karate-chop to his eyes. He staggered backwards a couple steps, his gloved hands covering his face. Ino took advantage of this momentary lapse in concentration and lunged forwards, seeking to grab him around the waist and throw him bodily into the air.
However, her head connected with him before her arms could-a loud crack echoed down the empty street as he skull rammed solidly into his pelvis. There was a strangled groan and he crumpled around her, falling to his knees, her head in his crotch. Ino shrieked as her feet flew out from under her and her face fell rapidly towards the hard ground. She managed to dig her hands into his pants pockets just as her nose brushed the dirt, stopping her descent for a split second before the extra weight pulled him down on top of her.
Then her nose was buried in the dirt.
It took a while for him to roll off of her, there was a lot of moaning and wincing involved. Ino was more than happy to lay there silently as he disentangled them, a sudden drowsiness had washed over her upon the realization that she was lying down... It was night-time after all. She heard him rise shakily to his feet beside her, panting.
"Ino." Kakashi's deep voice shook and she heard him cough weakly above her, "Where..." he panted, "Where did you learn the drunken fist?"
Ino rolled over onto her back, stretching as she yawned, and regarded him cheerfully. He was hugging himself with one arm, the other hung limply at his side, evidently incapacitated by her heel's swift jab to his armpit. Ino giggled at his furious glare, the blood-chilling effect was slightly weakened by the redness around his watering eyes.
"You're dirty, Kakashi-sensei." She informed him pleasantly, smiling up at his dark expression through the dirt painting her face. He blinked and tilted his head, looking a little concerned. Then he looked incredulously angry.
"Ino, did you-" his voice caught and he blinked his visible eye in profound disbelief, "Did you know it was me the whole time?" He sounded distressed.
Ino grinned and nodded sweetly up at him, her eyes twinkling with delight.
His shoulders slumped and his head fell forwards, brows contorting into an expression of incredulity so profound it looked painful. Ino found it to be a rather endearing, adorable expression. Sort of like the pleading look of a puppy that had just been kicked and didn't know why. Her mud-smeared face broke into a watery smile as she lifted her arms out to him like she wanted a hug, cooing.
Kakashi's anger seemed to melt away as he stared down at her. He sighed, exasperated, before carefully gripping her wrists and pulling her slowly to her feet. Despite his considerate gentleness, Ino still wobbled and weaved once her feet were under her. She bumped her nose briefly against his chest and began to back-pedal sluggishly, forcing him to strengthen his hold on her wrists.
But, due to his holding her out at arms length and both of her feet having tottered right up next to his, she ended up slipping and swinging feet-first between his legs. He uttered a low curse and quickly shuffled his feet further apart, falling into a rather graceless half-split.
Ino shrieked with laughter and surprise, her flushed face hanging inches from the low crotch of his baggy pants. Kakashi cringed and froze, a rush of heat coloring his ears.
"Kashi-sensei!" she called out joyfully from between his legs, "I didn' know you knew howta swing-dance!"
He quickly stepped over her and, a little less gently, yanked her back to her feet. Ino giggled, shaking her head sloppily. He grounded her with a grimace and two heavy hands on her shoulders. As soon as she seemed to have regained her balance he stepped away, open hands raised before him. Ino couldn't tell if it was a gesture of ready support or a sign to stay away. She smiled sleepily up at him. Sakura's sensei was cute-just like those two boys at the bar, shy and sweet. The thought made her giggle again.
"Ino," he said tiredly, "What-" he grunted when she suddenly fell forwards against him. He just barely caught her under the elbows, halting her slide down his chest, "What are you doing out so late?"
Ino hummed and closed her eyes contentedly, pressing her dirty cheek against his warm chest. "I'ma givin' you a hug..." she mumbled through slightly drooly, squished lips as her arms looped around his waist, "Yah need more hugs, Kashi-sensei... 'cause you're always so..." she yawned deeply, "You're always so sad."
He stiffened in her arms and she heard his heart stutter faintly within his chest. He seemed to try to step away from her, but she frowned and tightened her grip. Didn't he know that pillows were supposed to stay still? His grip on her elbows tightened fractionally as he leaned away from her.
"Um, I'm okay." he said quickly, his voice low and hoarse. He coughed and slowly unwound her arms from around his torso. She blinked and stared at him with wide eyes, still leaning into him. She didn't think he looked okay. He looked upset and embarrassed, avoiding her eyes. For just one second she was shaken out of her drunken stupor-memories of flickering lights on hospital tile-floors and wordless cries of agony flashed before her eyes, ringing in her ears.
"No." Ino stated, frowning up at his uncomfortable grimace with childish stubbornness, "You're sad." He seemed to flinch at this, but his single grey eye still flickered up to meet her accusatory gaze. In that cloudy grey orb she saw a flash of uncharacteristic fear, a momentary slip in his armor, before his shields fell solidly back into place.
Kakashi's eye suddenly curved in exaggerated cheeriness, "But you," he roughly pushed her away, even as he smiled down at her, "It looks like you could use some sleep..." he paused for a moment, peering at her, "And later some painkillers. Where do you live?"
That split-second glimpse of the fear in the Copy-ninja's eye was forgotten upon the mention of sleep, and Ino blinked slowly up at him before telling him her address.
And so they set off, Ino swinging his loose hand happily and weaving unsteadily on her feet.
It was at least a half hour, four attempted hugs, and a five-minute-long giggle attack later that they finally reached the door to her apartment. Kakashi anxiously watched her search every single pocket on her person for her ever-elusive keys. Finally, when he had just began to dread that he might have to camp out in the hallway for the rest of the day, she found them hiding in her left pocket. He pretended not to notice the fact that she had already checked that certain pocket three times already.
She was halfway past the threshold and entering the dark recesses of her apartment when she paused, looking back at him. Kakashi raised one fine silver eye-brow, choosing to look cooly indifferent even as a thread of trepidation slithered through him at the perceptive glint in her glassy eyes.
"Y'know," she slurred thoughtfully, "you could always ask me for'a hug if... if you need one..." she paused, thinking hard, "And... there's a lotta people who love you, Kashi-sensei... so..." she seemed to lose her train of thought for a moment, but then she smiled brilliantly, "So you don't needta be sad!"
"I'm not sad." he answered quickly, not moving from his slouched position against the wall opposite. Tense.
"I don' think..." she continued as if she hadn't heard him, her voice falling to a whisper, "I don'think they would want you tobe sad..."
And before he could effectively dispel the sharp pang of hurt that stabbed through his chest or wipe the shocked expression off his face, she had stumbled into her apartment and shut the door clumsily behind her.
"Tell me Tsunade, is the term 'elite' awarded to everyone who is ill-mannered?" The finely-dressed woman remarked casually as she bent over the Hokage's desk to peer disdainfully at the untidy pile of papers covering the scuffed wooden surface, "Or," she sniffed, turning away dismissively, "is it only given to those who have somehow managed to achieve the highest level of disrespect and insolence?" A perfectly-curled lock of voluptuous raven hair was twirled idly between long, intricately painted finger-nails as a pair of thickly-lashed ice-blue eyes flickered loftily over the rigid frame of her companion.
Tsunade turned around, the movement stiff and jerky, and fixed the woman with a strained smile. Everyone else in the room unconsciously shuffled closer to the only available escape routes. Namely, the door, the windows, and a rustic ornamental sword hung on the side-wall for decoration. Naruto gulped.
"Actually-" The Sannin started, her tone one of venom sweetness.
"-The term 'elite' is strictly awarded to those who have a profound understanding of all things offensive, fraudulent, and subsidiary-so that we may condemn with all of the derision and carefully-practiced haughtiness expected of one in such a position of power." Kakashi remarked off-handedly as he sauntered slowly through the door he had just slammed open. He glanced imperiously about his surroundings as if he had never seen the Hokage's office before, his countenance one of closely mimicked lofty indifference. His slow swagger came to a graceful halt in the center of the room, his condescending gaze finally resting cooly on the shocked face of the rich lady before him.
The stunned silence he had carried in with his commanding presence spread throughout the room and settled heavily over everyone present. The rest of his team was frozen around him in various positions of cringing disbelief and horror.
The air of hushed awe that followed this seemingly impressive entrance was quickly dispelled as Tsunade, with an air of someone who was embarrassed, slapped Kakashi quickly across the cheek. He flew bodily into the book-case on the other side of the room with a terrific crash. She laughed sweetly, her face still pulled in that strained grimacing smile, and stepped neatly in front of the collapsed jounin. A couple of loose pages fluttering daintily to the floor behind her. Kakashi groaned.
"And," she drew out the word, smiling blankly as she thought, "That! Would be our janitor." her face fell into a studied expression of polite befuddlement, "He has an unfortunate tendency to forget when cleaning hours are and he pops up at the most unfortunate-"
"-Tsunade-shishou, how could you!" Sakura suddenly shrieked, her sweet face twisted with righteous anger, "I've just signed all of his health forms! I can't believe-"
"-You broke Kaka-sensei!" Naruto wailed despondently. The blonde Jinchuriki, his eyes closed with despair, threw himself heavily upon his teachers half-risen form. Kakashi's grunt of pain went unnoticed as his hysterical student, bemoaning the passing of his teacher, smashed him back down to the floor.
Sai giggled.
"Do you have any idea how long it took for me go through all of those papers, shishou?" Sakura marched angrily around the crumpled form of her sensei, blind to the pair of pleadingly outstretched hands reaching out desperately from under Naruto, "I went through an entire folder's worth of-"
"-He'll never see me become Hokage, or invent the world's first ramen-flavored ice-cream, or-"
"-And you would not believe some of the stuff I had to fill out! I had to sign a form expressing my medical consent to his participation in sexual intercourse! That's just wrong, Tsunade-shisou, so wrong-"
"-and then I had to flush Panda down the toilet! But I had fed him so much fish-food that he got stuck in the pipes, and my landlord threatened to-"
"ENOUGH!" Tsunade roared.
Everyone fell silent, Sai still giggling occasionally to himself.
"Enough." The Hokage panted, glaring around at the team she had summoned to her office, "If you all can't conduct yourselves like normal human beings than you're all off the mission-and you!" She stomped over, her heels clicking loudly on the floor, and jerked Kakashi up by the collar of his jounin vest, "If you've ever entertained the possibility of having children and do not want to pee out of a catheter for the rest of your miserable life, then you will keep your mouth shut!" Kakashi just nodded mutely, staring up at her furious face, his grey eye wide.
"Good." Tsunade released him and he staggered backwards. Her hair, which had been whipping around her face in what must have been the tempest of her rage, settled down elegantly along her back again. She turned gracefully to regard her beneficiary, a sugary smile crossing over her face again.
The rich lady's ice-blue eyes were wide with shock, trained on the cringing form of Konoha's sheepish Copy-ninja. Tsunade saw this and quickly stepped forward, launching into the mission debrief, perhaps to distract her from the smart-mouthed jounin.
"This is Ito Izanami, the wife of River Country's daimyo, Ito Hitoshi. She has been touring across all of Fire Country during the last month and a half, observing our flourishing businesses in the hopes that she could borrow some of our economic methods and apply them to River Country's struggling economy. She has requested that a tightly knitted team of elite ninja escort her safely across the border and back to the capital. She is paying us a very generous amount, and I expect that you all," Tsunade turned to glare pointedly at Kakashi, who flinched, "will show her the utmost respect and obedience."
"Yes, Hokage-sama." they all chorused.
"Good." Tsunade clasped her hands together behind her back, peering at them stonily, "That is," she glanced at Izanami out of the corner of her eye, "If Izanami still wants you all as her escorts after that disgusting display." Sakura and Naruto both looked at her with wide eyes, gasping in horror-they hadn't been on a mission for nearly two weeks! Kakashi just sighed, resigning himself to at least a weeks worth of well-manneredness and polite behavior. Sai just stared blankly forward.
"Hmmm..." Izanami's eyes seemed to have never strayed from Kakashi's slender form, now slouched and hiding inconspicuously behind the others. They flickered down and then up again in an expressionless appraisal. A slow smirk budded darkly on her rose-red lips. "I suppose they will do, at least I will have a source of... entertainment," Kakashi's grey eye flashed up to meet hers, and he stared at her, his expression unreadable, "on my journey home."
"Hey! Naruto!" Shikamaru called out as he filed out of the Hokage's office, behind Sakura's bouncy, excited gait, "Can I borrow you for a minute? I need your help with something."
"Uh, yeah..." The Jinchuriki floundered for a moment, not quite comprehending the fact that the Nara genius was asking him for help, "Yeah, sure!" he brightened, "What's up?"
And then Shikamaru did a strange thing. His dark eyes flitted warily over each person in the hallway, a look of subtle unease on his face, and then he took a step closer to Naruto.
"Note here." he paused for a moment, as if deciding something, "Come with me."
Naruto glanced over his shoulder at the retreating backs of his teammates, checking to see if they would notice him leaving. Sakura exclaimed loudly in disgust as she shoved Sai away from her, nearly knocking him into their team-leader. Kakashi just quickened his steps hastily, slinking quietly down the hallway ahead of the squabbling duo.
Naruto turned quickly back to the Shadow-user, his blue eyes glinting with excitement, "Okay." he said, "But it's gotta be quick. They're expecting me to meet them at the gates within the hour." Shikamaru just nodded in agreement and hurried back down the hallway, not once looking back to see if Naruto was following. Naruto blinked in surprise, staring after him for a split second, before speeding after him. He frightened a young desk-worker into dropping a large stack of papers as he sprinted down the hallway towards the stairs his friend had disappeared down.
Shikamaru led him out of the building and out into the street, moving at a brisk walk the entire time. Naruto caught up to him, unsticking a random piece of paper from his cheek absent-mindedly as he fell into pace beside him. "So where are we going?"
They took a sharp left, leading them away from the crowded market-place. "I'm taking you to the ANBU head-quarters." Shikamaru stated calmly as he swiftly weaved around a woman with a stroller. He had taken five steps when he realized that Naruto was no longer with him.
"Wh-What?" Naruto was standing stiffly in the middle of the street, his blue eyes wide with terror, "But I didn't do anything!"
A wry smile broke over the Shadow-user's serious face for a moment at his friend's silly antics. "Of course you didn't," he stepped back over to him and, feeling spontaneous, added darkly, "But you don't think that really matters to the ANBU, do you?" Naruto yelped in horror as Shikamaru firmly grasped the sleeve of his shirt and dragged down a dark alleyway.
Several scrungy alleys later, and ten minutes worth of Naruto's desperate pleading, they reached their destination. A dead end.
The alleyway itself was plunged in darkness, sheets of thin metal and planks of wood were nailed haphazardly between the two rooftops on the buildings on either side. Thin slivers of dusty daylight filtered through the gaps and rusty holes, illuminating the muddy dirt ground, littered with trash and broken bottles. Naruto clung to Shikamaru's indifferent elbow, his forehead pressed fervently to his friend's shoulder, mumbling a low string of guilty confessions that held no more weight to them than a young child's.
Shikamaru struggled not to smile.
The Shadow-user stepped over to the single window, it's thick yellowed glass lying in crumbled remains within the frame, and peered in. Naruto remained fixed in his woes. So when Shikamaru pulled out the lighter from his pocket, held it out before him into the dark room through the window-frame, and flicked it on and off three times-he paid no notice.
It was only when, after Shikamaru knocked one sharp knock on the rough brick wall next to the window, the ground suddenly opened up beneath them that Naruto was brought to attention. He screamed as the dirt beneath his feet swirled down, but before he could leap out of the growing sink-hole, the soil had closed in above them, throwing them into complete darkness. Naruto screamed again and he found himself latching onto Shikamaru's still frame in a desperate sort of panic. He was so terrified that he hardly felt the crumbly soil moving along behind him, occasional stones or tree roots brushing against his back, much less the slight up and down motion of his friend's shoulders.
And then, suddenly the muddy ground beneath them seemed to rise, the compact dirt above their heads break open, and they were spit back out into fresh air again. Naruto, his eyes closed tightly, yammering with fear, slid down to his knees and patted the solid earth beneath him in a tearful sort of reunion. There was a low chuckle to his right.
"New guy, huh?"
Naruto, his wide blue eyes still sparkling with unshed tears, whipped his head up at the voice. A short, stocky man, clothed in ANBU regalia stepped back from his half-squat, his gloved hands falling back to his sides from their clasped position. He stepped forwards to clasp Shikamaru's forearm tightly and clap him on the shoulder, chortling all the while.
"You should've known better than to take a first-timer through this entrance," he tilted his head, peering down at Naruto's shocked expression through the slitted eyes of his porcelain mask, "He looks about ready to wet himself."
The young Jinchuriki flushed and stood back up sharply, glaring at his so-called 'friend' with still bright eyes. "You could've at least warned me." he growled, crossing his arms huffily. They were standing in a small square enclosure, made of tightly packed-in dirt, with only a softly flickering candle sitting on a nearby wooden table as a source of light.
"Ah!" The ANBU exclaimed gleefully, "Nara, you're terrible!"
Shikamaru just shrugged, smiling quietly to himself, and flashed an identification card at the gate-keeper before walking off down the narrow dirt tunnel before him. Naruto grumbled but, with a cool glare at the still sniggering ANBU, stomped after the Shadow-user. He would get Shikamaru back one of these days... No one pranked Naruto Uzumaki.
After following the thin, dark passageway through a couple twists and turns, Naruto realized that they were going upwards slightly. Soon he could see a faint, flickering yellow light ahead, and he unconsciously pushed against Shikamaru in his earnestness to get out of the oppressive darkness.
They stepped through into a large, high-ceilinged hallway, the dusty grey stone walls reaching seamlessly up to the triangular roof with no windows. Great stone pillars, with black metal lamps filled with flickering fire, proceeded down the middle of the hallway. The atmosphere was, to Naruto's distress, just as oppressive as before. The dimly lit interior was filled with shadows and the dry, dusty air seemed to smell of neglect and hopelessness. This was ANBU head-quarters?
He followed Shikamaru, who seemed very at ease with these unpleasant surroundings, along the passageway and through a thick metal door to the left at the end of the hallway. They traversed down a squeaky metal staircase, the walls covered with a white paint and the fluorescent lights above casting out all traces of darkness, before exiting the stairwell at the lowest level.
Shikamaru paused half-way through opening the door, glancing back at Naruto as if to reassure him, "It's a little cold in here, so don't be surprised if-"
"-Aw shut up." Naruto grouched, his wounded pride smarting at the delicate treatment. Shikamaru just shrugged and held the door open for him.
When Naruto stepped into the room his first impression was that it was very big, very bright, and very cold-his breath rose in puffs before him. There were rows of what appeared to be large filing cabinets that towered up to the ceiling, ladders with wheels attached to the rows like ones you would find in a library. People in white lab coats hurried around, some staring intently at clipboards in their hands, others leading ANBU through the maze of rows.
"C'mon, don't you have to be back within the hour?" Shikamaru called, and Naruto jerked to attention, his arms hugging himself, and saw that his friend had already started walking down one of the aisles.
Shivering, he followed Shikamaru down the seemingly endless aisle, watching curiously as his the jounin seemed to mouth numbers to himself and glance at the cabinets as the walked by them. Finally, they came to a stop before a drawer labeled '386B'. Shikamaru glanced at him again, looking like he was going to warn him again, but Naruto just scowled at him.
And so, with another shrug that seemed to say 'suit yourself', Shikamaru grasped the handle and pulled open the cabinet.
Naruto gasped in disgust, stumbling backwards despite himself.
Resting within the confines of the drawer was what appeared to be an amputated head. Flakes of ice dusted the white, stiff face, twisted and frozen in a determined grimace. Naruto quickly looked away, a dark superstitious feeling of that he was being very disrespectful falling over him.
"Do you recognize this man, Naruto?" Shikamaru asked it casually, but there was a slight tremor in his voice. Naruto wondered if he was more disturbed than he let on. But his friend stood stoic and collected before the open drawer, and a wave of embarrassment washed through Naruto at the thought that he was acting like a fearful child again. He swallowed his misgivings and forced himself to take a steady step forwards, and peered into the drawer.
Dark, glassy eyes glared back at him from under a heavy brow streaked with silver, the eyelids narrowing the gaze to wrathful slits. Wrinkles lined the dry, aged skin, accenting the intense frown and and the stubborn set of cracked lips. A thin grey mustache, with hints of black peppering the hair, and a long goatee curled in an elegant twist accented the broad face. The balding crown seemed shinier than the rest, as if, in life, it had been more oily and covered with sweat.
Naruto, his fingers plugging his nose, turned to Shikamaru and said blithely, "Oh yeah, that was that Makoto guy-he kept telling me all these really gross stories. Guess it's a good thing we got'em, haha." He elbowed Shikamaru.
But Shikamaru did not smile back at him, he seemed frozen, and continued to stare down into the drawer at the disembodied head. After a couple awkward minutes of one-sided conversation, Naruto checked his watch and, calling out a hurried good-bye through his chattering teeth over his shoulder, went back the way he had come.
Shikamaru stayed where he was for a long time.
Finally, when one of the lab aides came up to ask if he needed any help he was jolted out of his reverie. He reached forward, his fingers stiff and clumsy with cold, and fumblingly pulled out the card behind the card labeled '386B'. He read the label.
Suenami Hijame.
Hey there, sorry that it took me a disgustingly long time to update. I have every intention of finishing this story and I hope that I can update more frequently in the future. I'm sorry. Please don't give up on me! I hope that my negligence hasn't lost me any readers :( But anyways, here you go! Longest chapter yet. I hope you enjoy! Please review and tell me what you think. I'll try to get another chapter in during the week, but just in case I don't finish it in time I won't be able to write all of the coming week so you'll have to wait a little while again unfortunately :( Thankyou so much for reading!
~Flintyminty25
Oh yeah and, I just have to comment. Does anyone else think that all of those dancing guys in Lady Gaga's new music video 'Alejandro' look like a bunch of Gai-senseis, or is that just me? Majorly creepy... Dancing Gai-sensei...