A/N: My writing life is undergoing metamorphosis. As a result, this story no longer has a publishing schedule. I do not know how long this will continue.
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Orochimaru listened to Kakashi's story without moving so much as a finger. Afterward, he didn't say a word. He stared in that analytical, dissecting way he had. Kakashi began to sweat. Does he disapprove of my asking Semblance to imitate me? Of something else? Why is he acting like this? He must have some reaction.
Whatever it was, Kakashi was only going to know it if he broke his own rules and read his companion's mind. Orochimaru got up to fetch writing supplies. With his body language, he indicated that Kakashi should leave the room. He did not offer to show Kakashi what he wrote. Such an offer plainly would not come in the future, either. Kakashi backed out of the room slowly. It's as if his true reaction to my story is a creature, and he must protect it from me. Does he think I would hurt him? Mah, I have before. No use getting offended; he's right to do this.
Kakashi made himself busy attending to any business that could possibly distract his companion. He found Simo and Mitsuki laughing together; the young wolf had perfected a way of dancing around before comically falling on his side that Mitsuki found hilarious. "Dada, look, he likes me!" Simo said, hindquarters wagging back and forth in joy.
Kakashi leaned over the baby with a smile. "Hello! Did you miss me?" Mitsuki stared up with fascination. His skin was mostly pale like Orochimaru's, but flecked with black spots that resembled scales in their shape. His scalp was turning dark; most likely, his hair would be black like his father's. Mitsuki's eyes were rounded and superficially human. His behavior, too, was typical of a human infant. Unless something radically changed, he would fit into human society much better than his father. Kakashi received an answer in the form of a tiny tongue sticking out. He likes me!
"I must give you a cuddle, since I've been away for so long." Kakashi picked him up and held him close, dissolving layers of clothes so that Mitsuki could feel bare skin. The baby made a soft happy sound. "You want to know something?" Kakashi whispered to Simo. "I think this little one likes everybody."
"Everybody?"
"Yup. Everybody. He's an angel, you see. I've met grown angels before. They don't seem to be capable of hating anyone."
"What's an angel?"
"Well, you know how I can shape darkness? Angels can do similar things, but with light."
Simo produced the wolf equivalent of a smile. His tongue lolled out over the side of his lower jaw. "So he's like the sun? Can he make heat too?"
"No, no heat. He can't cook food or boil water. But he can make you feel warm all the way down to your toes with his smile."
"Anyone can do that," Simo whined.
Kakashi grinned. "But angels do it a lot better."
Mitsuki squeaked, giving them both a rush of joy that proved Kakashi's point. Simo wagged his tail. "Who did you talk to, Dad? Mom said it was somebody who could tell you really interesting things. What'd they say?"
"I spoke with another being who can manipulate darkness," Kakashi answered. "There are very few of us. I've never spoken to another one before. As for what he said… Hmm…" He stroked Mitsuki's cheek while he thought. "He taught me that my kind, us darkness-wielding beings, are normally very limited. Other demons have their purpose in life spelled out for them, and they can't do anything else. I'm different. I haven't been told what my purpose in life is, so I can do anything I want."
Simo looked confused. "Isn't your purpose to protect us and look after us?"
"That's what I've chosen to do," Kakashi replied. "But I could have chosen differently. Other demons, they never had a choice at all."
"You could have chosen something else?"
"Yes. But I don't mean it was a close choice," Kakashi said quickly. "When I say choice, I'm not only talking about the choices you have to really think about before you can make up your mind. I'm also including the things that are so one-sided that it feels as if you don't have a choice. But you do. You, Simo, have the choice every day of relaxing next to a fire or playing instead of training. That would be a crazy thing to do, but it is technically possible."
Simo tilted his head. "Other demons can't do that? If they tried to not train, they'd feel really sick?"
"If they tried to not train, all of their tries would fail," Kakashi replied. "They'd end up training whether they wanted to or not, as if they didn't have control over their own bodies. But you always have control over your body, don't you?"
Simo's eyes widened. "Yes!" He shivered. "It sounds so scary not to, like those stories Mom tells me about ghosts that knock you out and crawl into your body and use it while you're asleep."
Kakashi's eyes narrowed. Orochimaru's telling impressionable children that story, is he? I have some opinions about that. "Yeah, it's scary. But you don't need to think about it very much. These are my people, not yours."
"Was he nice?"
"Yeah, he was nice. Young, confused, just trying to live up to the role he'd been given."
"Can I meet him?"
"No. He's much too busy."
"Busy with what?"
"Busy taking my advice."
Simo lolled his tongue out again. "Are you sure you have a choice not to help people?"
Kakashi deflected this question by putting Mitsuki down and engaging Simo in play. It was so easy to deal with young children. They didn't have decades of history behind them, invisible and unknowable, waiting to distort every word you said. Adults, on the other hand… Who knows what Orochimaru hears when I talk to him?
Kakashi learned something of Orochimaru's intentions sooner than he expected. Orochimaru asked him to deliver a message to the drop-box they used to communicate with Tsunade. Kakashi asked one simple question about what response he hoped to get, received no answer, and decided not to press further. I'll be there for any meeting we have with Tsunade. I'll find out then.
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Weeks passed. The rift between them healed. At each family dinner, tension dissipated. Mitsuki's improving health also helped. Soon Kakashi and Orochimaru were finding moments here and again to simply enjoy each other's company, as they had used to. They remembered why they had started out on this new life together and why they stayed that way, even though it sometimes hurt, even though sometimes it would be easier not to. If they were ever to drift apart, both of them would feel a piece of their souls die and rot. That would be worse than any amount of pain.
Simo's training could no longer be performed entirely in one location. In ninja terms, his skills had reached Genin-level. Kakashi began to take him out on simulated missions, testing his traveling speed and ability to navigate unfamiliar environments. Simo advanced rapidly. He was a genius, just like generations of his family before him. Kakashi's heart panged with sadness at the thought that Simo could never advance to Chunin or Jonin level. No matter how skilled he got, those levels required leadership ability, and Simo simply couldn't practice leadership skills without a village.
Or could he? Kakashi started to watch Mitsuki more closely. Mitsuki progressed through infancy more quickly than a human child. Born premature, he'd already reached the physical ability of a human baby his same age but born full-term. It wasn't long before Mitsuki showed signs of surpassing them. He started attempting to crawl as soon as he learned to roll over. Mentally, one need only look into his eyes to see a toddler looking back. He wasn't really a baby. This would have frightened ordinary human parents, but Kakashi and Orochimaru took it in stride. It was their idea of normal. A baby that wasn't mentally years ahead of its physical age was the thing that would have frightened them.
"Are any of the other hatchlings showing humanlike intelligence?" Kakashi asked one night as he and Orochimaru nestled together.
"Not as far as I've seen," Orochimaru murmured. "Why do you ask?"
"Humor me. Test them. Perhaps they just haven't had an opportunity to show it."
Together, they devised some tests that only a humanlike mind would pass. Kakashi painted a single white stripe down the length of a black rock, placed a small wooden hoop on a stand after it, then spilled a bunch of small blocks of all different colors over a square meter of ground. At the end of this obstacle course, he placed a live mouse in a cage. All of the hatchlings were gathered up and released onto the starting line of this obstacle course at once. Used to being ignored and having their run of the base, they were all hissing with displeasure. Kakashi had to torture the mouse a little bit to make it squeak loudly enough to draw their attention.
The hatchlings all reared up, scented the air, then started toward the frightened prey. They came to the painted rock. Most of the hatchlings hesitated briefly, determined that the stripe was no threat, and crossed right over the rock in any way they pleased. A few of the hatchlings altered their course in order to cross the rock on the white stripe, treating it like a road. Those few passed the first test.
All the failures slithered around the base of the hoop, as did one of the snakes that had passed the first test. The remaining two stopped to investigate the hoop. Both of them elected to raise themselves up off the ground, passing their bodies through the hoop. Those two passed the second test. By now, the failures had reached the end of the course. Kakashi had, of course, captured enough small rodents to feed them all. He discreetly did so while keeping an eye on the two remaining candidates.
Only one of them passed the third test. While the other candidate explored the blocks by slithering over them instead of simply through them, the one that passed noticed that the blocks could be moved. Thanks to the rest of the hatchlings, there were numerous open paths, but this one snake moved a few blocks seemingly just for the joy of shaping its world. "That one," Kakashi said. He rose from his crouch, grabbing the cage that contained the tortured mouse as he did so. He swung the cage back and forth in front of the last hatchling, getting its attention. He then created a single-layer two-block-high rectangle and placed the cage inside. The blocks were simple and smooth-sided; they did not lock together. Even so, with them organized into a wall, can it figure out how to move the blocks sideways? For a being without fingernails, this is a tough challenge. It would be much easier to simply climb over.
The hatchling bumped its head against the blocks a few times. With the cage supporting the walls from inside, the blocks did not move. The frightened mouse was clearly audible. The hatchling raised its head up and discovered that the wall really wasn't very high, nor very deep. The "wall" really did not present an obstacle to it. There was no reason to do anything about it. And, after some hesitation, the young snake decided not to waste its energy. It climbed over the wall and into the cage. But then, it froze. Kakashi's eyes widened. Damn! If it eats the mouse, the resulting bulge will prevent it from slithering back out through the bars of the cage. It can eat the mouse or investigate the wall, but not both. Damn. This is supposed to be a test, not a torture session. I certainly don't want to dissuade it from any humanlike tendencies it has. What can I do?
"With prey right in front of it, it hesitates," Orochimaru murmured. His eyes glittered.
Kakashi sighed. There's only one thing I can do. With demonic manipulation of physics, he teleported the mouse out of the cage. It stood on top of the wall now, though he made sure to keep it immobilized. The young snake did not hesitate anymore. It slithered out of the cage, sank its fangs into the mouse, squeezed the rodent until death, then ate it. After eating, it grew drowsy. Nonetheless, it came down from the wall and resumed butting its head against the blocks. On the nearest corner, it discovered that pressing at a certain angle got results. It spent a while investigating the fallen block, pushing on the block's corners over and over to make it rotate. Then it returned to the wall and used its newly-gained understanding of rectangles to make another block rotate out from the wall and fall to the ground. Then it fell asleep.
"Creativity and problem-solving skills," Orochimaru whispered. He looked as eager as a hatchling faced with a frightened mouse. "This one has potential."
"Indeed it does," Kakashi replied. "Simo and Mitsuki have their third team member."
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Simo and Mitsuki got along well with Adana, as the hatchling was named. But there wasn't time for anything more than introductions because they got a reply from Tsunade. This time, Orochimaru told his companion what was going on. "I told her that you had made contact with another demon and discovered that they are essentially malfunctioning machines, as well as the identity of the demon you replaced. Let's see what they think about that."
The two of them read Tsunade's reply together. It resembled a mission briefing, because that was what it was. She couldn't officially do so, but she was effectively assigning them a long-term mission to catalogue the identities of all demons. They were to create a list of names with basic descriptions attached. Those descriptions were to include a few non-negotiable items: mental status, location, immediate objective. Orochimaru got a scroll and created an entry on the spot for Semblance. Mental Status: Detached from the world. Location: Near border of Land of Waves. Immediate Objective: Imitate a human. To this basic description, he added, Submissive to Puppy, willing to accept guidance.
"I'm unsure how I feel about being called 'Puppy' in official documents," Kakashi muttered.
"What else should I call you? Your actual name?"
"Of course not." Perhaps I should make up a false name to go by.
Orochimaru created another entry for Malice. Status: Deceased. Location: None. Immediate Objective: None. Possessed powerful reputation among demons and people alike. Puppy's inheritance of this reputation may prove useful. "It's an excellent thing that you happened to replace a powerful demon, Puppy. I understand you do not like serving as a tool, but nonethe-"
Aaaaaggghh! Danger!
A shipload of memories hit Kakashi all at once. He forgot all about Orochimaru, about their mission, about everything. For a moment, he was not Kakashi. He was the clone that had been sent out to protect Tomoda.
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The journey started out easily enough. Tomoda, filled with pride in his new clothes, walked the roads with shining eyes. The clone got an increasingly powerful sense that there was something it was failing to perceive. It hung back on Tomoda's first interactions with other people, hoping to find out what this something was. Tomoda's first interactions with others were astonishingly successful; despite his odd speech, people warmed to him, even people who should have been quite distrustful of foreigners. The clone concluded that Tomoda was putting out a charming aura that anyone with a body would have recognized instantly.
This aura served them well. Tomoda continued to have much less trouble than expected for several months of traveling, taking temporary work, socializing, etc. The clone wished it had a material body so that it could perceive whatever aura the boy was emitting. It hypothesized that the aura might be powerful enough to constitute a form of divine favor. Tomoda was just so joyous that misfortune fled from him. The clone tried to interfere as little as possible while keeping its senses spread for anything powerful enough to break through.
Unfortunately, something like that appeared. It all began with an ill-fated decision to travel farther, outside the Elemental Nations. They got seats onboard a boat in the Land of Waves. Secretly, the clone helped Tomoda leave the boat in the dead of night. They traveled in a boat of their own, enjoying the open ocean. The clone hoped to find foreign lands with people in them. If not, they'd turn back and journey through the Elemental Nations once more. But for a while, they simply relaxed and enjoyed the water. They dove, watched birds, etc.
The clone was diving when disaster struck. A terrible feeling of being watched temporarily paralyzed the clone. Then it made for the surface at breakneck speed. Tomoda, shaking, asked what was going on. The clone had no time to explain. The feeling returned; whatever had seen it was pursuing it. The clone propelled their little boat across the water fast enough to leave small tsunamis in their wake. Not daring to return to the continent, it kept going until it spotted a reef that the boat could anchor to. There, it finally found the time to send a distress message. It did not know how long they could rest before the pursuer found them.
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"Kakashi?"
"Tomoda's in danger," Kakashi blurted. He turned and fled. Abandoning the use of leg muscles, he surrounded his body with darkness and flew. Through the halls, past the children, out the door, into the air, heading south. If they'd boarded a ship out of the Land of Waves, they must have traveled a looooong way in their flight. Thank the gods. I don't need Semblance getting involved. Because of his location and the fact that he didn't show any inclination towards pursuit, I know this must be another demon. Who?
Knowledge.
Kakashi slammed down a wall of darkness, causing the demon that lurked beneath the sea to hit its head painfully. His clone continued to flee. Kakashi thought he saw Tomoda waving, but there was no time to wave back. He turned his wall into a net and hauled the other demon to the surface. It broke his net and flew up to meet him of its own volition. Its body was intact, but warped. The lungs were collapsed, several bones dislocated or broken, and it wore no clothes. That didn't reveal very much, because most of the body was covered in darkness. The legs were wrapped inside a large whale-like tail, a fin stuck out of its back (spiny, like that of a tropical fish), and fin-like gills (or perhaps gill-like fins) stuck out the sides of its head. It held itself in the air, watching, not bothering to breathe. How are we going to talk if it refuses to breathe air?
This demon, unlike Semblance, was very powerful. The amount of power it held right now was less than Kakashi's. However, it regarded him with such cold and callous confidence that shivers ran down his back. It was actually much more powerful than him, but presumably a large amount of its power was stored elsewhere.
This encounter could have been the end of…everything. Tomoda, the mission, the children, even Orochimaru himself. The only saving grace, which Kakashi latched onto desperately, was the other demon's name: Knowledge. I can give it that. We can make a deal, negotiate. We have to.
Because of this one reason to hope, he did not back down submissively. He formed a platform in the air just above the water and lowered himself to sit on it, gesturing for Knowledge to do the same. Knowledge obeyed. It was very, very curious. Instead of sitting across from him as he hoped, it spiraled around him, examining him from all angles. It opened its mouth and expelled all the water from its collapsed lungs at once, then fixed several broken structures of the chest in order to allow the lungs to fill with air once more. "So this is the result!" it exclaimed.
"Were you there when Malice was…?"
"No," Knowledge whispered. Its eyes were dilated far, far too wide. The expression on its face was that of a fanatic. It reached out to touch Kakashi's face. "But I should have been…"
Kakashi turned its hand away before it could touch him. Time to begin negotiations. "I know what happened to Malice."
"So that's it!" Knowledge cried. "Humans are amazing, aren't they? I wonder if I can feed someone else to her, what'll happen." Kakashi thought of poor, defenseless Semblance. "Oh, yes, that one would do nicely."
It's reading my mind! Kakashi snarled in rage. A blast of anger he didn't know he was capable of filled his mind. When he returned to his senses, he found himself leaning forward digging dark claws into Knowledge's belly. Knowledge felt no fear. It was even more curious about him than before, if that was possible. "Don't try me," Kakashi growled. All fear, all urges towards submission, all of that had evaporated. Although he knew the other demon had more darkness than he, it felt like he nonetheless had the advantage. His body tingled all over. Somehow, despite his demonic nature, other powers were on his side. He didn't understand how or why, but he'd accept whatever help he could get.
"Ah, so that's why I didn't know about this. I wondered why my future was getting so unclear." Knowledge giggled. "Beautiful!"
Mental status: cackling madman. If he's reading my mind and I'm connected to the power source, can I charge him up and restore him to sanity? It's worth a try. Kakashi sat back and summoned to mind everything he had told Semblance. Every thought, feeling, and sensation he could recall, he ran it all through his mind so that Knowledge would know it. He no longer feared mind-reading powers, because what did he have to hide? This soul-to-soul communication was exactly what he wanted!
He looked up to see Knowledge looking slightly saner. It still stared at him with too-wide eyes and a mouth that drooled as if it wanted to devour him, but it sat straight instead of leaning right into his face. "Wowee," it whispered. "That was some ride."
There are things about life, the world and everything that can only be understood from the inside perspective, from imitating a human so hard you very nearly become one. Will you do this?
For the first time, Knowledge expressed something other than glee and hunger. Kakashi felt anger, defiance, resistance coming from it. He was asking a demon named Knowledge to give up many forms of knowledge for a mere chance at gaining others. Frankly, why should it do so when he was right there, knowing all of the things it wanted to know? It could just read his mind. He was smaller than it. It could do whatever it wanted to him. Kakashi didn't need mind-reading to know these were the thoughts running through Knowledge's mind. He'd had these thoughts himself at various points in his life. He faced Knowledge without fear and imagined what he would say to past versions of himself. That wouldn't be true knowledge. True knowledge etches itself into your soul. Knowledge that you absorb from other people's words can't do that. Only your own experience can leave deep etchings in your soul.
"I know everything," Knowledge angrily whispered.
You can't know everything unless you are everything. Kakashi felt pity. This poor demon had been created with a need to know everything, but it didn't understand that the sort of knowledge it craved could only be gained firsthand. It didn't realize that to know what it is to be afraid, it had to be afraid. In order to know what it is like to earn a living from the sea, it would have to earn a living from the sea. In order to know what it is like to be a human, it would have to be a human. And in order to truly know what it was like for a demon to die, it would have to die. The only way to understand this world is to be this world. To become one with…them.
Knowledge and Kakashi stared at each other. This time, they both felt precisely the same way: shocked by an epiphany that had come from beyond them.
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Orochimaru was ready. He interrupted reading lessons as soon as he heard footsteps, reaching into a pocket of his vest and taking out the scroll he kept there. By the time Kakashi entered the doorway, he had a bottle of ink and a brush out, ready to write. Simo and Adana stared with fascination. Mitsuki cooed from his basket a couple meters away. Orochimaru dipped the brush in the ink and waited.
Kakashi eased himself into a sitting position with a sigh. "Knowledge. Mental status: gleeful megalomaniac. Location: one self deep in the ocean, unknown quantity of other selves in unknown other locations. Immediate Objective: most likely, to reunite all of its selves before thinking about whether to take my advice or not. Other notes: Knowledge is much more powerful than me and, at least up until now, has had zero problems with using its time-defying and mind-reading powers. However, it still can't use its powers to see anything divine, which means it knows almost nothing about me."
Orochimaru looked up. "You don't have anything divine about you."
"I don't, but my life apparently does. My life recently and into the future, I mean. My efforts to use my body to tap into the ultimate source of power in the universe have been successful." Kakashi yawned. "Too much tapping recently. I need rest." He greeted the children, then went off to get some sleep.
It was a very good sleep.