Gato's apoplectic when they bring him the news. Letting him know that they'll be up to trying again in a week calms the man down some, although it turns out to be just so he can better glower at Kakashi suspiciously. Kakashi, with both arms in slings, both legs in splints, and a crutch under each armpit, assures him, "I heal fast."

In any case, they're allowed the ostensibly necessary week as a reprieve to do as they like. This largely consists of Hoshigaki sitting near the window of the room they've been given, from where he spoils Samehada and shuts down Kakashi's attempts to leave the bed. He's been less than pleased with Kakashi since he heard the (mostly) full explanation.

In regards to goading Gato into a public murder attempt by continually failing at their job: "You know, most people don't have to prove their incompetence by breaking multiple bones."

In regards to the identity of the jounin who nearly killed an Akatsuki member: "He's whose son?"

In regards to following through on his hacked-together plan even after recognizing the team's jounin-sensei as the strongest ninja in Konoha after the Hokage: "Kakashi-san."

In summary: "Maybe you should tell me these kinds of things before they become a problem for both of us."

"I took care of it," says Kakashi, for the sake of his point choosing to ignore that Hoshigaki had to step in.

Hoshigaki kneads his forehead, looking somewhat constipated. "I am here so you don't have to." He takes a deep breath. "Look. Would you let me challenge the Yondaime if you knew beforehand that I would refuse to use Samehada, summons, and half my techniques, and if I told you I would spend the first half of it faffing about until I lost every advantage I'd earned through a successful ambush?" It's more words than either of them usually speaks to each other in one go.

Kakashi wonders why Hoshigaki thinks he might care if Hoshigaki dies. At the end of the day, the swordsman's a highly dangerous missing-nin who in a few months will infiltrate Leaf, injure its defenders, and attempt to abduct Naruto. In another time he would stand back and watch while his partner tortured Kakashi into a coma.

(It was not the worst day of Kakashi's life, but... top fifteen.

Since then, at certain hours of sunset and sunrise and during particularly drawn-out fights, he used to experience phantom pains in his abdomen that occasionally bordered on debilitating. It hasn't happened since Pein, so he suspects these days that it wasn't so much psychosomatic as it was that Itachi's genjutsu caused related nerve damage.)

And yet. That is not, anymore, the only memory he has of Hoshigaki etched in the unfading precision of the Sharingan.

The man's waiting for an answer, Kakashi realizes; it wasn't rhetorical. Maybe Hoshigaki just wants to hear him say it. He hedges, "I'd assume you'd have a reason."

"So did I," says Hoshigaki, and gestures pointedly at Kakashi's injuries, which in practice means gesturing pointedly at Kakashi in general. "I don't get it. What's the reason for fighting someone like that man if you don't go all in?"

He relaxes a little. So that's what Hoshigaki's taken issue with. "I was – "

He realizes midway that he can't finish the sentence. They've each put together by now that he didn't do it for a paltry motive like selling the act to Gato. Gato sees what he wants to see. If they meant to pretend to him they fought and lost they could easily have waited until the Leaf team passed through before cutting down trees, leaving ash and impact marks, and dressing up in bandages and rabbit blood. Kakashi would be insulting Hoshigaki's intelligence by continuing to push that line.

"...Right," says Hoshigaki finally. He draws Sameheda over from where she's leaning against the wall and unravels the wrappings, then oils a square of canvas and sets to polishing the sword. "What's the plan a week from now?"

"I was going to wait under the bridge for Gato to turn up, then use a genjutsu to let him see us losing and Gai injured. He'll order every person on the bridge killed."

"That's very specific."

Kakashi doesn't shrug since his collarbone is healing, but he projects the general sentiment. "He's very predictable." Kakashi has been beat-by-beat recreating the context that led him to turn on Zabuza. His actions are unlikely to deviate under identical circumstances.

The battle on the bridge, however, is going to go very differently if Kakashi has anything to say about it. He remembers the role it played in shaping Team 7's dynamics and the personal growth it inspired in the other three, but frankly the outcome was not worth the cost, especially considering how the team turned out anyway.

"He is that."

After a while Kisame wanders off to find food, leaving the door locked and Samehada propped against the window. He seems surprised to find his partner still there when he returns with porridge and medicine. Kakashi smiles and waves his fingers, then absconds four days later at sundown once Hoshigaki's dropped his guard.


Kakashi comes across Naruto, Lee, and a tortoise in the forest near Tazuna's home. Lee's guiding Naruto through taijutsu forms. Kakashi hides until he hears Naruto mention that the others are with Tazuna at the house, then transforms into the Kiri missing-nin and maneuvers into the clearing.

The tortoise barks, "Brats, pay attention!"

The genin look over. Lee startles, then hurries in front of Naruto and into a combat stance. Naruto edges around him and into a less standard combat stance.

"I'm getting Gai," says the tortoise.

"Summon-san," Kakashi says hurriedly, "I'm not a threat." He wiggles a sling. He also has a fever and is slightly buzzed on painkillers too mild to actually kill the pain (Gato's influence has done little for Wave's pharmaceutical industry), the visible effects of which he made sure to carry over into the henge.

"Wow," says Naruto, impressed and much less wary. Kakashi briefly regrets playing up the injuries, although he wouldn't change his choice if given the chance. He's not terribly comfortable with the gawking, even if it's not really him Naruto's making a scene over. "Gai-sensei did that!"

Lee hauls him back. "She is still an enemy and a highly skilled ninja." He faces Kakashi grimly. "We will stop you here. You will not harm Tazuna-san or the team."

"Wasn't going to. You're fine. I don't think I can try again, anyway."

Lee lowers his fists only slightly, eyebrows drawing together. "I see. What about your partner?"

"You don't have to worry about him. He doesn't care about any of this." Almost true. If Kakashi was in a state to assist effectively, Hoshigaki probably wouldn't turn down the prospect of a proper match with Gai. "I'm not here to fight. I came to apologize."

That confuses them as it would anyone in their position. Kakashi offers a sheepish smile that's more himself than Red, then to Naruto says, "I'm glad it's you out here. I'm sorry about the kawarimi. I responded slowly and panicked, I wouldn't have switched with you if I was thinking."

Naruto looks at him oddly. "Really?"

"From the bottom of my heart," says Kakashi. "When you see your Uchiha, can you let him know too? That's – a bad position to wind up in."

"He took it hard," Naruto says, back to glaring. Kakashi grimaces. "And – and you worried him with Sakura-chan, I thought – but she woke up when Gai-sensei came back."

"How is she doing?"

"Those injuries could never keep her down for long!" says Lee, which is less reassuring than Kakashi likes.

"Stiffness, muscle aches, tremors, cramps, and joint pain," he says, and Lee deflates a little. She'll be up for moderately strenuous activity in a few days, but it'll take months for the symptoms to phase out completely. A hospital visit will halve that.

He'll admit he jumped the gun on blaming Gai. Teaching a recently graduated genin without a taijutsu specialty how to open her gates was inadvisable, but Gai knows the dangers and would have made sure Sakura does as well. He likely meant it as a last-ditch contingency for her to resort to in life-or-death cases. Unlike her teammates she has no Bijuu or bloodline limit to fall back on, and having teammates who do possess those abilities means that any out-of-Village mission she takes carries the potential to escalate far past what a genin should expect to face.

It's still extreme, though. There's a difference between caution and paranoia, and giving Sakura a technique like that leans precariously towards the latter.

"Is she sitting out of training?" No responses, but Naruto's uneasy look, like he thinks he should be upset but isn't quite sure what over, acts as answer enough. Good. "Might not be a bad idea to have her learn medical techniques if she's going to keep doing things to tear up her body."

Who knows, maybe she'll reveal herself to be a medical prodigy the likes of which hasn't been since Tsunade and Orochimaru.

"She would have been fine," Naruto blurts out. "If we didn't fight you, she wouldn't have gotten hurt."

If it wasn't Kakashi then it would have been Zabuza and his apprentice, and if it didn't happen in Wave it would come up in some other mission down the line. Maybe the first time would be against Gaara. He starts to answer as much, but closes his mouth when Naruto keeps going.

"What are you doing?" Naruto's voice rises. "You're weird, 'ttebayo! You're so strong, your clone was better than us and even Lee-senpai couldn't help sensei but then you're saying sorry like you weren't – like you're apologizing for trying as hard as you did! We put in everything we had, Gai-sensei and Sakura-chan could barely walk, and you're hurt badly too and why would you do any of that if you were going to come back and say sorry for it? Aren't you our enemy?"

"You sound like Blue," Kakashi says, a little fondly despite everything. He's missed Naruto. "Was this your first time encountering opposition on a mission?"

Naruto nods.

"Well, maybe don't use me as a benchmark." Naruto squints at that, and Kakashi amends, "Don't expect your future opponents to act like me."

"Why not?" Naruto demands.

"My client wants your client's life, but I'm not getting paid enough to hurt preteens."

"You fought us!"

"You were in the way. Even though I tried not to cause damage, I had a task to complete. And... you know your teacher's famous, yeah? I was curious what kind of team had Maito Gai for a sensei."

While Naruto reconciles yosh! I will run one hundred laps around Konoha on my hands! with famous, Lee says, "Gai-sensei said he could not sense any killing intent."

...He knew he forgot something.

"Not only was there none directed at us. Even when he fought – "

"I'm used to hiding it," says Kakashi lightly. Ah, I got called out by two genin. "On that note, let's end the interrogation. My partner's going to notice I ran off soon if he hasn't already, and there's actually something else I've been meaning to do. Has your sensei taught you how to block a kawarimi?"

"You can do that?" Naruto says.

"Do you want to learn?"

He wouldn't be Naruto if he turned down a new technique. Lee has a little more in the way of healthy caution and pulls him back whenever he unconsciously gravitates closer to Kakashi, but he's not uninterested either, especially once he recognizes it as something he can do. "Does it follow the same principle as a kai?"

"It is a kai. You're timing it for after the kawarimi catches on but before it goes through," says Kakashi. "Stupidly difficult, but it's useful if you can hone it into a reflex. Here, one of you try to substitute with me."

Naruto does since Lee can't. Kakashi snaps his chakra's hold in that split-second window. Naruto sneezes.

"The timing's unforgiving. You're not gonna nail it consistently for a while." He glances obviously at the sky through the trees. Most of the light has gone. "You can practice at it with your teammates. I should – "

"What about that other jutsu?" Naruto says. "The water one? It went splsh!" He whips his arms upwards.

Water wall? "You can't learn that one." Naruto doesn't know elemental manipulation. It's possible to brute force an elemental technique anyway, but only for a primary affinity.

"But – "

Lee nudges him and says patiently, "Red-san refused, Naruto-kun. We cannot badger enemy nin to teach us their techniques."

Lee's not wrong. Besides, the kawarimi counter should keep them occupied for a few months on its own. Even Kakashi when he learned it needed more than a day.

...But how long is it going to be until Kakashi sees them again?

"Your senpai's right," he says. Then, after a deliberate pause, he sighs, "Just this once."

Naruto whoops.

"Settle down," he says without heat. He coats his hand in a glove of water and waves it as much as the sling allows to draw their attention. "The most basic form of water-natured elemental manipulation. If you can do this, you can theoretically learn any water jutsu."

"Water-natured..." Kakashi sees the instant Naruto decides to ignore the first sentence in favor of the far more exciting second. "Really?!"

"Theoretically," Kakashi repeats. "For this, you convert your chakra to water elemental chakra. Water naturally clings to water, so if you're doing it right it shouldn't be hard to gather the moisture in the air to yourself. You should start with your whole body, though. Isolating it to a particular part can come after." He disperses it back into the air. "It's no shame if you can't manage it in the end. Most Leaf shinobi are fire-natured, after all."

Naruto looks indignant at the mere suggestion. It's a good thing he likely can do it. The nature release that wind users get along poorly with is fire.

The genin closes his eyes and strains to... do something with his chakra. Well, he's clever, and it's not a particularly hard exercise. He'll get it. Kakashi's about to sneak off and leave him to it when Naruto grunts and flares a visible chakra cloak.

Kakashi's witnessed impressive failures from shinobi learning elemental manipulation, from releasing part of a Bijuu (Naruto) to setting one's upper body on fire (Obito), but this is his first time seeing a mistake that displays such a fundamental misunderstanding of the whole point of the exercise. Lee leans away and gives Kakashi an is he supposed to be doing that sort of look.

Kakashi shakes his head and calls, "Hey! Stop!"

Naruto doesn't hear. Lee has to yell his name to break his concentration. Naruto flinches away from his senior, rubbing his ear. "What?"

"This isn't a problem you can just solve by pouring more chakra into it," says Kakashi.

"What?" Naruto says again in a rather different tone. He points at Kakashi. "So how are you meant to do it?"

Evidently "make your chakra water-natured" was not enough explanation. Kakashi supposes Naruto might not know what water chakra's supposed to feel like, so after thinking it over he says, "You know how water's... wet?" Moving right along. "You want to make your chakra feel the same way." For lack of ideas he shows off the exercise again.

There's a reason he offloaded teaching Naruto wind manipulation to Asuma.

Naruto seems like he's about to demand better instructions, which Kakashi's fairly sure he never did while Kakashi was his teacher. He hurries to head it off: "You'll work it out. I believe in you."

The phrase paired with a smile diverts the genin, as it does every time. Kakashi perhaps doesn't feel as much guilt over abusing it as he should since he means it honestly. While Naruto fails to blink back tears he turns to hobble off.

Lee bows and says, "Thank you for the instruction, shinobi-san." He'll be a good influence on his juniors.

Kakashi hums and shunshins.

Making it back across the island is a pain and a half. Crutches were not designed for use alongside slings, or it might be the other way around. Hoshigaki catches up to him while he's skirting the edge of town, scents no blood, and says casually, "I would've carried you where you needed to go, but now I'm definitely not carrying you back."

"I'll manage somehow," says Kakashi stiffly. Despite Hoshigaki's words, as they head back to Gato's compound he walks close enough for Kakashi to lean on. "I met two of the genin," he adds, because Naruto and Lee are liable to give it away anyway. "Told them how to avoid an enemy kawarimi."

Hoshigaki digests that. "That jounin wasn't with them?"

"No."

That proceeds to become all that Hoshigaki ever says on the matter. Kakashi's wary, but he doesn't particularly want to explain himself either so he's unfortunately stuck.


Then it's the end of the week and Kakashi and Hoshigaki are lurking under the bridge waiting for the sharks to alert them to Gato's arrival.

They have, however, revised the plan somewhat. When Baburu pops his snout out of the waves and reports an inbound boat four minutes away, Hoshigaki heads up top. Kakashi conjures a mist and tries not to feel too antsy about leaving Hoshigaki to coordinate with Gai alone. Things stays quiet, so he has to assume it's going well.

After a minute he feels the mist part as Hoshigaki walks away from Gai. He hears Gai's voice shout something too far away to make out, though presumably it's a call for the workmen to move to shore. Gai, Naruto, and Sasuke go with them. Kakashi can't find Sakura or Lee within the mist's range.

Once the boat arrives and Kakashi senses it anchor, he finds a distance where his own eye can't make out individual shapes through the fog but the Sharingan barely can, and then he signals to Baburu, who leaps out of the water nearly to the bridge's height and falls back into the waves with a thunderous splash. The people on the boat look over at the noise, and Kakashi meets Gato's gaze with the Sharingan.

His role complete, he joins Hoshigaki on the bridge. "Konoha's sitting it out," Hoshigaki tells him as soon as he leaves the shunshin.

Kakashi nods and lets the mist over their half of the bridge fade.

The scene that prompts Gato to climb onto the bridge involves the workmen and most of the genin dead, Lee guarding Tazuna, Hoshigaki and Gai bleeding heavily as they clash, and a Kakashi fully recovered from the first battle sitting off to the side and again too injured to stand. The scene his hirelings see is Kakashi sitting on the railing with Hoshigaki nearby. All of them imagine they're looking at easy marks.

Kakashi tunes out Gato's gloating – he's heard it before, and it's no less vile directed at different targets – but his partner's baring his teeth by the third line and at the end of it is grinning one of his tamer humorless murder-grins. Gato over the space of a minute talks Hoshigaki into developing an investment in the mission's outcome, and Kakashi even did Gato the favor of ensuring he doesn't have a dead child to kick this time. The genin in the genjutsu are well behind Kakashi and Hoshigaki.

"I didn't imagine I'd look forward to this so much," Hoshigaki says, not bothering to lower his voice.

"How safe do you want to play it?" Hoshigaki can take these numbers in a melee on his own, but there's some chance of his getting injured in the process. He's only human. No one without a dedicated bloodline can keep perfect track of so many moving bodies.

Still, the swordsman hefts Samehada. "I'm killing him."

"I'll just be here."

Kakashi doesn't care for the proposed amount of bloodshed, but in the end he has little pity to spare for Gato or the members of his private army. Zabuza, Haku, and the people of Wave's deaths were a waste.

Hoshigaki waits for the enemies to charge, then meets them head-on. He rips through the mob like an S-rank shinobi through a crowd of common mercenaries.

When someone in the chaos almost gets the drop on him Kakashi staggers them with a burst of wind. That's the only instance he intervenes, since it takes Hoshigaki less than fifteen seconds to thin the enemies' numbers to a degree where he can maintain control over the battlefield. More than a few break and run at that point, which the swordsman allows with surprising magnanimity.

It's a good thing, Kakashi reflects, that this was not the member of the Seven Swordsmen Team 7 faced before.

Soon all that's left on the end of the bridge are Hoshigaki, Gato, and a scene that could pass for an abattoir's killing floor, and Hoshigaki doesn't waste any time in removing one of those and adding to another. For someone who enjoys the adrenaline rush of combat as much as he does, Kakashi has never known him to draw it out or be anything less than terribly efficient. Itachi was sloppier by far.

He rolls his shoulders and returns to where Kakashi waits, Samehada on his back purring. "Anything else you needed to do?" he asks.

Kakashi thinks of Team 7 at the other end of the bridge. Gai's unlikely to bring the team out of the Village again anytime soon after what happened here, and if he does the chances of their running across Kakashi by chance are functionally nonexistent. This might his last chance to see them.

But he's made too many mistakes with them already. If he carried out the mission with anything approaching competence, the only missing-nin Team 7 would have met in Wave would have been Hoshigaki just now. He's apologized to them for that. There are other things he still wants to say, but not as a deserter, not as an Akatsuki member, and absolutely not as the murderer of Sasuke's family. The person he wants to meet them as has no room to exist in this world.

He replies, "No." But: "Maybe we should leave a smaller mess."

Hoshigaki looks back at the bodies with a frown. A few seconds later his confusion clears, and he runs through the seals to sweep a wave over the bridge. It misses some gore, Gato's head included, and leaves half an inch of foam and red-tinted water behind. It's still bound to be a less uncomfortable sight for civilians and inexperienced genin.

Good enough. Kakashi levers himself to his feet, then stops and tips his head towards the lingering mist. "Gai." It could be any human about his size, to be sure, but he's moving at chakra-reinforced speed and Kakashi recognizes his gait. "In four."

Enough time for a shunshin, except that there's nowhere to go aside from open water. Kakashi throws on a henge. Hoshigaki follows suit and pitches Samehada over the railing for his summons to catch, though by leaving corpses marked by the sword he's already given himself away to anyone who cares to look. His disguise is a formality. If he reveals his own identity unprompted, it would raise questions about why his partner will not.

Gai bursts out of the mist. As he comes to a stop Hoshigaki volunteers, "We were leaving."

Gai takes in the scene. His frown shutters into an expression strangely, uncomfortably blank. "Then your employer betrayed you, just as you suspected. That was not a well-conceived plan." He turns to Hoshigaki. He hasn't once glanced at Kakashi, and Kakashi muses briefly that this is probably not how Gai feels whenever Kakashi ignores him. It's strange, though. He's not one to become passive-aggressive over a grudge. Or at all. "No matter your reasons, the people of this country will appreciate this outcome."

"And your mission should be easier as well," Hoshigaki says.

Gai nods. Kakashi narrows his eye. No one's died in the past few days, have they? "You are leaving Wave Country? Right now?"

"Is that going to be an issue?"

He opens his mouth. Hesitates. Closes it.

Says, eventually, "I have not decided."

Hoshigaki doesn't so much as twitch in his partner's direction, but Kakashi shrugs faintly in answer to the unvoiced question and trusts that the Kiri-nin catches the motion.

Gai says, "I don't know what to do with you, my rival."

Ah.

Hoshigaki's eyes widen. The surprise passes and he grins with as much genuine amusement as threat. "He has you there, Kakashi-san." At least someone finds this entertaining.

Kakashi sheds the henge, and finally Gai turns to look at him. He hasn't been so aware of the slashed headband since the first time he saw it in a mirror. "You could do nothing," he suggests, thereby guaranteeing that Gai will choose anything but.

The last time Kakashi met him face-to-face was a little over two months ago in passing, Gai racing by with a shouted-out greeting and Kakashi pausing in his jutsu practice to wave flimsily back, but the last time Gai met him occurred at least six years ago, some point after which his rival apparently lost his mind and murdered an entire founding clan on a conspiracy theory. Gai watches him like Kakashi is a frayed and weathered memory he's trying to piece again into the shape of a person, into something real and present and capable of offering more in response than his own doubts reflected back at him.

Not that Kakashi would understand the feeling.

"How many times have you played out this conversation in your head? If there's anything you want to say, now is your best chance to get answers."

Something sparkles on Gai's lashes. More somethings wind down his cheeks. Now's as good a time as any for Kakashi to practice that Sharingan counter of only looking at the other person's feet. "I searched for you," Gai says, "with Itachi-kun and Shisui-kun that night."

Kakashi must have been less thorough than Itachi, then. The thought makes him a little sick.

"And afterwards, when the Village could spare me. You were ever one step ahead."

Was he? It's a large continent and Kakashi's a fair enough hand at running away when he puts his mind to it, but he hasn't been. He and Hoshigaki can't be all that careful about hiding traces. It's one thing to act the ghost for a mission, another entirely to try living a life that way. A sufficiently determined Gai should have tracked him down at least once. Other Konoha shinobi have managed to, or the unhinged footnote in his bingo book entry wouldn't exist.

Someone in the Village must have deliberately steered Gai away from him. Which – makes sense, really. Despite what Team 7's relationship with Sasuke would suggest, sending ninja after targets they have personal attachments to is the opposite of standard practice. Only look at how poorly Kakashi handled himself on this mission the instant he became emotionally compromised. Maybe someday Hoshigaki will let him live it down.

Gai asks, "How long did you spend planning it?"

He considers a flippant response – it was more of a spur-of-the-moment decision – but. Well. No. "Not... too long." He has no idea. He doesn't have those memories, and he doesn't want them. Then, because it's obvious enough why Gai chose that as his first question, he adds, "Gai, I know what I just said, but don't do this to yourself."

"I am trying to understand," Gai says, and the absolute worst part is that he means it.

"There's nothing to understand. I made up my mind. You don't get to blame yourself for something I did."

"Do you regret it?"

"Gai – "

"Yes or no, Kakashi."

What changes by his answer? Yes will not bring back the dead, and is untrue in any case. He can't regret it. He didn't do it.

This man might be the only person in existence who would believe him if he says as much, but what would that accomplish either? Gai apparently already feels partially responsible for not stopping him, even though Kakashi probably gave about as much warning of the impending break as Itachi did. Adding to that by implying that Kakashi wouldn't have done it in his right mind would not help anyone.

In the end he shakes his head.

(It's probably for the best that he's not looking at Gai's expression then.)