Last three chapters have been re-written and the plot has changed (improved) and I actually have a coherent direction for this thing. Praise God.
"Are these hands a waste? Well, this side of mortality is scaring me to death." Soldier On, The Temper Trap
INOICHI, YOUNG THOUGH he was at this point in time, was apparently the Yamanaka that Minato had mentioned two days prior.
Kakashi's instructions had been to show up at the main house of the Yamanaka clan. While some clans like the Hyuuga had a large familial compound, the Yamanaka had elected to build a more colony-like district of separate, extravagant homes.
The buildings loomed, spacious and elegant with traditional roofs swooping low to the ground. A lot of the homes had wrap-around porches with beautiful outdoor furniture and permanent tea-sets. The low, sweeping roofs covered the engawas (porches) and created beautiful outdoor spaces that looked ornate and impressive. Despite the implied financial prowess of it all, the overall effect was calming and classic— not gaudy as it could have been.
It was a necessary part of their work. The Yamanaka, for all of their mental techniques and partnering genjutsu, found that creating solid bases of aesthetically pleasing visuals (this extended to but was not limited to their personal appearance) made layering genjutsu much easier.
The only reason Kakashi did not get lost within the Yamanaka District (it was a quarter mile plot of land with similar and yet different looking homes) was because he'd already been here many times in a life past.
When Kakashi knocked politely on the door, Inoichi greeted him with a surprised life.
"Ya know, I actually alerted a few of my aunties that I had a guest today. I am surprised you found it all on your own," the teenager mused, outright ignoring Kakashi's bow.
"Sensei told me you had some techniques he wanted me to learn?"
Inoichi nodded, smiling easily. "Yeah, I figured we could get to know each other first, though. He warned me you might try to be all business."
Kakashi frowned beneath his mask, knowing that what Minato wanted was for them to develop rapport so that Inoichi could begin to walk him through whatever it was that had happened. But how to explain? "Well. What do you want to know?"
"Geez, kid, let's at least sit down with some tea first. Usually I have tea out on the engawa, but I can already tell you're pretty private. I'll bring some down to the inside garden. It's pretty cool. Make yourself at home."
The young ninja nodded, slipping off his ninja sandals and leaving them by the door. Inoichi disappeared into a side room– Kakashi had the privilege of knowing that it led into the kitchen and pantry. He could hear the tap release and water flow into the basin. The tea would be a while.
The home was more calm and peaceful than he had remembered, but then again, the times he had been here were usually late-night strategy missions with other ex-ANBU as they prepared to do heinous helps during the last war efforts.
Kakashi wandered past the grand entry-way into the home, and down the softly spiraled stair that led toward the terrarium that was nestled downstairs. Kakashi knew that at the end of the corridor downstairs the large indoor garden housed the beautiful plants and down another corridor the more dangerous ones were kept. The photos that lined the wall were not as numerous as they would be eventually, but it was nice to look at them all the same.
The largest picture on the wall was a family portrait with Inoichi and his parents. He had been just a child here, his smile shy and gentle. In the portrait, his father and mother stood behind him and each had a hand on his shoulder. His mother, Yasei, appeared soft and demure but Kakashi knew that she was true to her name. Inoichi's father Kenta was not someone Kakashi had originally meant, but the man in the photo looked severe and imposing as a wartime shinobi should have been.
He stared at the face, wondering what the man would have been like. This picture had not been here in the future. In the back of his mind a memory was triggered of him in his late teens, begrudgingly following after Shikaku who'd been dragging him by the wrist. In this very place there had been a pale yellow square where it was obvious a large portrait had been moved. Even then Kakashi had assumed it was probably due to a death. You don't move a portrait that big after that long–why else would the wall colour have been so changed– unless it was for an upsetting reason or a revamp of decor.
"I think they made me look bigger than I am," grunted a voice from behind him. Kakashi started a little, turning around to see the man in question. "Probably because he was worried he'd offend me if I didn't look scary enough. Clan-head and all."
Kakashi hummed in agreement and nodded. "But what is a greater honour, flattery or sincere truth, Yamanaka-sama?"
Kenta tilted his head, his heavily mustached lip curling into the slightest of smiles. "That is indeed the question, isn't it?"
The youth found himself nodding his head a few times before turning back to the painting. He was rescued by the hasty sound of clinking and the two turned to see Inoichi paused at the bottom of the stair.
"Tou-san," he bowed and nodded a greeting to his father. "I wasn't aware you were here. And I wasn't aware you knew the way to the garden."
"I–Sorry, this just seemed like the way to go," Kakashi murmured. His embarrassment was genuine.
Kenta smiled and ushered the child and teenager down the hall. "I hope you don't mind if I cut in, Inoichi-kun. No need to be so formal in front of your guest, I'm sure he's not going to feel any less cared for by you simply because your old man is present, ne?"
Inoichi reddened a little and bowed again. Kakashi repressed a chuckle. He'd never seen Inoichi so flustered and he couldn't tell if it was that Kenta was actually scary or that Inoichi just wanted his dad to be proud of him.
As they walked, the walls began to bow, becoming more tunnel-like. They were still the same pleasant dandelion colour as they went on, but the wall-hangings obviously decreased.
Kakashi could feel his body tangibly relaxing and what should have comforted him actually inspired fear into the core of his being. That sensation was as foreign to him as the deserts of Suna.
"Are you aware of the Yamanaka's reputation, shinobi-san?" Kenta asked abruptly, his wisened eyes peering at him over his half-moon spectacles. To anyone else, it would have seemed innocuous but Kakashi was a well-trained shinobi who was somewhat expert in the subtleties of human expression. He'd had no poker face in his youth and hence the mask. It had taken years to train himself up into the aloof figure he'd become.
He regretted not knowing more information about this man. Unwilling to show his hand, he nodded in the uncertain way a child would.
Kenta nodded surreptitiously. "Very good. What is your clan name?"
"Hatake."
The inner garden had an entryway that was shaped like a honeycomb, each of the walls at the end of the corridor made of a thick glass pane that served as a climate controlling factor.
Kenta busied himself with the opening the door, beckoning them through. Kakashi bowed ever so slightly as he passed. The wet, loamy air clung to his skin like fabric and then he moved through and noticed it no more.
Thick plumes of leaves decorated the space, polka dot plants and creeping fig merging together to create walls of plumage. Hostas grew in some areas of natural shade within the glass-box room. There was a large, circular flower bed in the midst of the space that had a healthy amount of azaleas and hydrangeas were outfitted with other, leafy plants.
The overall effect of the room was almost dizzying, and Kakashi's nose was filled with the scent of flowers and wet earth.
Inoichi set the tea tray down on a low table off to the left of the flower bed in the middle of the room. Kakashi took a moment to admire the far end of the room where there was a reinforced glass hallway that led back towards the "under-grow room," which was where the more delicate (poisonous) specimens were kept.
The show of trust would have actually been wasted on young-Kakashi. It made sense that Kenta was here to oversee the meeting as the two were so near to certain family secrets. But Inoichi hadn't expected his father to be home.
It was likely that any really tricky ingredients were tucked away in a separate greenhouse all together, but Kakashi was honoured that Inoichi was giving him such intense privacy as they moved through whatever it was that Minato was wanting them to do.
Kakashi settled onto the pretty mat next to the low table, patiently waiting as Inoichi poured him a cup of oolong tea. Inoichi and Kenta sat side by side across from Kakashi with the younger blonde awkwardly scratching his nose.
"Ano, Tou-san, Kakashi and I were–"
"Aa, yes, carry on."
Inoichi sat awkwardly for a moment. "W-well. Minato and I spent a lot of time together as kids, even though neither of us were in the same class or training group. He told me you've been having some struggles lately. So, I'm meant to teach you some methods to maintain your mood, assist you with sleeping, and general health."
Kakashi nodded uncertainly. This was better than expected.
"Are you aware how killing intent works, Kakashi?" asked Kenta.
The 'boy' paused, not minding the way his brows screwed up in response to the question. This was not something he'd ever particularly thought about. He'd always thought of killing intent and how to quash it as a matter of overcoming the energy of another's chakras with his own.
"I thought so. But I'd like to hear what's on your mind, Yamanaka-san."
"Call me Kenta, please. Killing intent is actually the chemical make-up of emotion expressed through chakra. It disperses through the air the way smell does, except your brain processes it as hostile chakra entering your body in micro-doses. (A/N I am making this up) Because it is hostile chakra. The same way food has a particular taste when you eat it, there is a particular 'smell' to chakra, if we continue with this analogy.
So, think of it this way. Have you ever been healed by a medical ninja yet?"
"I know how it works. The chakra enters the body to do the work."
"Right. So, that chakra is very easily sensed by a sensor. People's chakras have different… flavours."
That made sense. It was very easy to tell apart different chakras and know who someone was once he'd been around them for a while.
"So, it is possible for us to actually do the very opposite of killing intent with our chakra. Great leaders have done this before. They are able to let out chakra intent that actually calms, inspires, or rouses their charges to battle. Did you know that?"
Kakashi thought back to the future when he had been linked to Inoichi through the mental link. It had never occurred to him how reassuring that presence had been until that moment.
"It.. it is not something I had thought about. "
"You are quiet chakra sensitive, Kakashi-kun. I tried to put you at ease when we were upstairs and you outright rejected it. Were you even aware of that?"
Immediately, Kakashi was reminded of the journey down the hallway to the indoor garden and how he'd felt suddenly peaceful, how the very sensation had disturbed him, and how he'd immediately shrugged the feeling off. He chuckled ruefully. "Yes. I was not aware that was you… It was jarring. I… I haven't felt that peaceful in a while and it was sudden."
"Interesting…" Kenta twirled his blonde mustache thoughtfully before sweeping his long curtains of hair back off of his shoulders and up into an imperial looking bun. "Why is that?"
Kakashi studied the cherry-stained table top, allowing himself to fidget as a child his age and level of skill would've been tempted. "I'm not entirely sure. It's like I woke up one night from a nightmare and they never went away. That night I woke up from the first nightmare, I ended up in the hospital for chakra poisoning and chakra exhaustion but I don't remember doing anything to exhaust myself and I definitely didn't think I'd come into contact with anyone who could cause me to be … well, chakra-poisoned."
Inoichi looked stiff and uncomfortable. "Minato didn't mention that."
"I.. Well, I think my father and I have neglected to mention that to him," Kakashi confessed. "I'll be sure to tell him when he returns from his mission. Or you can. I trust that you two are in communication over this particular set of meetings."
The younger of the two Yamanakas stared at him thoughtfully. "Do you have friends?"
Kakashi reeled for a moment before responding in genuine offense. "What the heck does that have to do with anything?"
"You are so stiff and serious. You spend all your time training and obsessing over how to get better. That's what Minato told me. Don't you have anything else to do?"
It was quiet for a moment as Kakashi considered. Even in his youth he'd not really had friends. After he made Chunin, he'd been placed under Minato as a solo-student due to his accelerated growth and prodigious talent. When he was need for missions outside of Minato's tutelage, he was sent on other units. His poor attitude and unfriendly demeanor had ensured his solitude, especially after his father died. He'd always been a bit shy (he covered that with anger in his youth and mystique in his adult days) but any sense of relational desire had been replaced with rigorous duty after his father's passing.
When he realized that he'd been silent for a few minutes too long, Kakashi looked up with a guilty expression. "I don't have friends, it seems."
Inoichi and Kenta exchanged pained looks.
"We're your first two, then," laughed Kenta. He extended his hand. It was broad and strong– the hand of an old war-hound. "You'll have to introduce him to your friends Shikaku and Choza. I'm sure that's a good enough start, eh? I bet he could give Shikaku the most thrilling game of shoji he's experienced in a while."
Kakashi cringed internally, knowing that interacting with Shikaku would be difficult. It wasn't an emotional issue. The man was just a walking brain– not much got past that one. Choza would be an exceptional friend, though. That he was sure about.
"Alright, yeah, that sounds great. Would you say that you're having a lot of the same, intrusive thoughts over and over again, Kakashi-kun?"
He thought about the way certain phrases "not enough, have to get faster" would cycle through his mind while he was furiously rehearsing and going through katas. He thought about how he would lay in bed at night and witness the deaths of all of his favourite and most beloved people before he fell asleep.
"Yeah."
"Okay, great, I've got just the thing for you. I have some simple genjutsus I'd like to start out with. I can show you how it works and cast it for you so that you can relax a little and eventually you'll be able to do it for yourself. You can do an area of effect genjutsu to help yourself sleep. There's an incredibly low risk of you getting stuck in it."
"That's good. I always want an exit strategy," Kakashi murmured. It would be nice to at least be able to sleep.
"Great. Well let's work on that. If you ever want to talk about the nightmares you're having, that probably be good for you. But there's no pressure right now. Just want to get you some relief."
Kakashi nodded and then watched closely as Inoichi began to show him the handseals for the jutsu.
SWEAT GLISTENED ON his brow as he pulled himself out of the ground. The earth closed back over on itself, hiding away the small hideout he'd begun carving out for himself in the ground.
Kakashi needed a place to think and to draw out the different plans of attack he had for the future, but nothing screamed 'psycho' quite like a conspiracy map of unprovable 'facts' from the future quite like an exposed mission board.
So far the space wasn't finished, but his minute chakra reserves meant he only had about ten minutes with the Hiding-Like-a-Mole technique to be in the ground, scooping large portions of the earth out the way to create an underground chamber.
As he trudged back towards his empty house, he tried to mentally organize himself. The techniques that Inoichi had taught him the day before were largely helpful. The simple area of affect ones calmed his body when he laid down at night so at least his adrenal system was able to rest and come out of fight mode.
Minato was only seventeen which meant that he had a few years before the man came into power as Hokage. That also meant that he had ample time to focus on his fathers survival and then saving his teammates from the mess that they had waded into in his youth.
Before he did much of value he knew he was going to need to start working on his mental health and actual concrete ability to respond well in any circumstance.
The body he was in was slowly responding to the training he was putting it through, but that didn't make hiding his emotions any easier. He hadn't realized the actual physical component of automatic responses to emotion, though he supposed this did help to account (at least in part) for his inability to shed or show emotion in his adult body. That had ruined many a relationship and he'd been of being a sociopath by more than one girl because of his inability to cry and participate in the broad spectrum of human emotions.
He was sure that part of that issue was clinical depression but that was not a box he was ready, willing, or equipped to open. His PTSD-like responses to a lot of his current stimuli was his next obstacle to cover, aside from mastery over his expressions.
Kakashi pushed the door open with a sign, intent on getting cleaned up so he could get something to eat. A shuriken whizzed by his ear and he was immediately on the defensive, a kunai finding it's way into his palm without him even thinking about it.
He flung the kunai in the direction the shuriken had come from and groaned in annoyance when the weapon was caught with a boisterous laugh. "Your response time is getting better, shinme."
"Nice to see that your first thought upon my arrival is to attack me," Kakashi pouted, folding his arms across his chest and lifting his chin in faux-petulance.
Sakumo laughed again as he crossed the room, tucking his son into his arms for a hearty hug. "You seem happier."
Kakashi allowed himself a small smile, not wanting to kill this kind of a response. He nodded, enjoying the way his dad's hands cupped the base of his skull. In years passed, he would have sincerely maimed, maybe even killed or even a brief return to a moment like this.
There was so much pain to be felt in this return to youth and so many opportunities to fail. But also so many for it to go right.
A/N.
I am back. I am trying. I am sorry.
Let's see what else happens. :) review, plz!