One thing I always knew from my time watching and reading Naruto:
The characters were fast, like, really fast.
Capable of traversing great distances in a matter of days or even hours and moving so quickly their entire bodies dematerialized into mere blurs of their respective colour schemes.
If there was one thing both Rin and I shared, it was our second-hand knowledge of the blistering pace the top-tier characters carried, moving with a speed that could run laps around a Ferrari.
I knew this, Rin knew this, yet there I was turtling up against the hard-hitting winds generated entirely by Kakashi's immense acceleration, motoring across the lands and hopping across trees like Tarzan amped up.
'This stinks!'
I wasn't even sure if he could even see straight running at such an electric speed. Didn't he need the Sharingan to see clearly when using Arcanine's Extreme Speed from Pokemon? Or was that only necessary when he was using the Chidori? Hm.
Regardless, I hoped we reached our destination soon. I couldn't discern anything around me like this. All our surroundings just kinda meshed and blended together like a child's scribbly painting. The cold, rigid winds blasting against my peach cream skin felt horrible, too. Turning my head into Kakashi's chest gave me no respite either since I would end up smelling his scent and feeling things I did not want to feel.
I was an adult woman trapped in the body of a teenage girl. I didn't need that.
Kakashi's feet easily cushioned the impact of our fall from atop a towering tree far taller than the ones in my own world, mercifully stopping on the ground trail beneath the gigantic root. "Nearly there. Let's rest here."
Whether he was taking pity on me or genuinely needed a breather himself I didn't care to question. I just needed a break.
"Oh, thank goodness." I breathed. I chanced a glance up. The sky had lightened and the sun and moon had switched sides for the day ahead. "We've been travelling for hours."
He didn't say anything in reply and turned toward what resembled a small hut with green banners hanging from the entrance that spelt out its name: Otake's Tea Parlour, written in Japanese kanji.
'I guess he wants to stop for tea.' I stared, blinking. Kakashi's feet moved toward a bench underneath the wooden window. My lips quirked. 'A girl won't turn down the chance for a cuppa.' I'm from Great Britain after all, the home of black tea.
Kakashi gently seated me on the bench. I monitored his face, particularly his scarred left eye socket he had closed now, and touched his arm. "Kakashi."
"I know." He apparently had the ability to peer into the recess of my mind (as terrifying as that sounded), because he slid one side of his headband over the gaping hole a red sphere with three tomoes should be. "Someone stole the Sharingan Obito gifted me while I was out cold." He smiled beneath his mask, but it didn't reach his eye. "It's a small price to pay for your safety, however."
"Oh, Kakashi." I covered my sobs. Fear gripped my heart with all the strength of a demon bear. This timeline was terrifying. I hadn't even set foot in Konoha and already there was a severe ripple effect. Although, it did make sense that Obito would look to take back his Sharingan from Kakashi. I mean, if you felt hard done by a friend you gifted something precious, surely you'd want it back?
Surely.
I never liked Obito being Tobi. Because Kakashi always had the Sharingan it meant he couldn't just take it back when his backstory was revealed because it contradict everything Kakashi did with its eye power, thus he didn't even acknowledge its existence and made up some tripe about not caring about his old friend. It was a giant plot hole the series could've avoided by never casting Obito as Tobi. That wasn't even mentioning the absurd suspension of disbelief required to buy Obito surviving after half of his flipping body was crushed by a darn boulder.
Like, it's seriously stupid that happened. Seriously stupid. The guy lost half of his brain and heart. No amount of anime logic could justify him coming back from that. There was always a sense of realism in Naruto, too, which made it refreshing in the usual power fantasy of shounen jump. Characters could be hurt and injured with kunai knives, hence why Naruto could force Zabuza to release Kakashi from his Water Prison Jutsu.
Obito living through fifty percent of his organs being ruined beyond all repair really pooped all over the initial 'realism' that made Naruto so compelling in the first place.
"It's okay," He continued, suffusing me with some measure of comfort when he patted my leg. "Let's get something to eat."
A nod, throat dying, "Okay." On the plus side of Obito taking back his Sharingan and frighteningly becoming even more powerful than he was, Kakashi couldn't just 'forget' he unlocked the Mangekyo until he was thirty, over half his darn life to when he acquired the Sharingan's second stage.
He brightened and dipped inside Otake's tea parlour. I still could hear his voice. "Hello. We would like to order please."
"Welcome!" An enthusiastic bright feminine voice greeted. "You certainly can do. Won't be a minute!"
Kakashi reappeared and not long after so did a raven-haired lady dressed in a jade-green kimono with an apron, the kindliest smile we would ever see lighting up her light brown face. "What'll it be?"
"I'll have a cup of Amazake and a serving of toasted Dango," said Kakashi, bowing. I tried not to do a double-take. Wasn't Amazake a type of alcoholic beverage served in Japan? Kakashi was about 13 currently, so he was underage. Well, we were in a fantasy land, so perhaps I should just assume the rules worked differently here, that, or it was a non-alcohol drink.
Come to think about it, I do recall shinobi being adults once they graduate from the academy.
I realized she was looking at me with kind patience and just ordered whatever I liked picking playing Like a Dragon: Ishin on my PS5 back home. "Um. I'll have Red Bean Soup with Green Tea, thank you.
"Excellent choices!" She said, leaving us with a bow. "Coming up."
My shoulders sagged, unbeknownst tension draining for the time being. That time wasn't long, however, body jumping indistinctly when Kakashi sat beside me.
"Listen, Rin." He kept his voice low. I didn't risk chancing a glance at his face and instead kept my gaze peeled to the long stretch of the dirt road in front of us. It really felt like I had time-travelled 100 hundred years back to the Meiji era or something, even though I knew Naruto had similar technology comparable to my world in 2002. "Let's keep your resurrection between us for now."
He didn't need to tell twice me. Just the thought of coming clean and potentially having my mind investigated by a Yamanaka scared the bejeebers out of me. Hiruzen was nothing if not kind, so I felt somewhat certain he would spare me from that horrible fate, but that didn't mean that snake Danzo and the other two ratty elders would, though. And the fact they were able to overrule him – the third Hokage – and set the Uchiha massacre in motion was evidence enough that I couldn't wholly trust him to protect me if it came to light I knew things and knowledge of the future Rin shouldn't.
Ugh. It was no wonder the fandom was convinced a 'Civilian Council' existed when Homura and Koharu could overrule him.
My throat grew drier, head bobbing. "…Yeah. Yup! That would be for the best I think." I looked down and fisted my hands on my lap. 'I feel like I'm gonna be walking on eggshells.' If they begin to suspect I wasn't Rin I easily could wound up in the Torture and Interrogation room. Konoha wasn't as light-hearted as it seemed on the surface, I grimly reminded myself of the breadcrumbs canon spread during its runtime. That included Konohagakure just allowing slavery to coexist within its grounds because that's what the Hyuga clan's branch family and the bird sealed in a cage metaphor entailed.
The Uchiha extermination included innocent children that had nothing to do with their attempted usurp of the Hokage's throne.
I wasn't sure how stealing a Sharingan eye off one of the best village's prospects and forcing him to commit honourable suicide to atone for his apparent dishonour was for the greater good or a necessary evil, but I will concede Danzo at least thought he was doing right by Konoha. He was an interesting and scary anti-villain for that reason and there was nothing more horrifying than a villain who believed what he was doing was right.
A hand reached over and blanketed mine shelled up on my lap, making me pan my gaze up. Kakashi's eye looked so soft and gentle, a promise of assurance and protection swaying within its depths like a pool. He was taking Obito's dying wish to keep me – Rin – from harm very seriously it seemed.
"It's going to be alright." He said, smoothing my panicked skin with his touch. "You'll get back to a sense of normalcy soon enough." He offered me a famous eye smile, filling my stomach with butterflies I didn't want. (Stupid nerves! I liked men, not boys!) "Soon we'll able to put all this behind us."
"Kakashi," I whispered tearfully, head propping on his shoulder against my better judgement. I felt pathetic, having to rely on a boy like nine years my mental age for moral support. I knew this like I knew the back of my hand, (uh, I think) but even still, even as the shame piled up in my stomach and threatened to ruin my appetite for the dessert to come, I still had to reach out and grab the hand the boy offered.
This was a scary world I found myself in.
Just having one ally would make a world of difference for my mental health.
"It'll be alright." He continued to offer sweet comforts like a soothing lullaby, "I promise."
Part of me really wanted to believe him.
We sat there practically huddled together, listening to the birds chirping and the sounds of mother nature all around us. We only broke apart when the lady returned, carrying our orders on an oval-shaped army-green tray.
"Order up!" She said brightly.
"Oh, wow!" My hunger bested my fear of the unknown when the lady seated my piping hot items billowing steam from the top beside me, chopsticks laying across the bowl. "It looks really good." Two round white mochi shaped like cookies swam in the centre of a pool of reddish-brown soup sprinkled with beans, like the kind my old Granny offered paired with brown rice.
She giggled, filing the emptied now in her elbow, "Enjoy, kids!"
"We will," I said, carefully lifting my handleless cup with both hands before Rin's memories appeared in my brain like an email. On instinct, I whispered, "Itadakimasu." I blew several times into the hot green liquid sitting in my cup, bringing it to my mouth and taking a small sip. "Ah." Another sip followed, and another, soothing and moisturizing my dry throat. I leaned and tilted my head back, feeling my body cleansed in relief. "I needed that."
I set my tea aside, ready to sample my gorgeously made Red Bean Soup until Kakashi's pensive stare caught the corner of my eye. "Um." I hesitated. "Kakashi?"
He didn't stare too long; just enough to let me know he was likely scrutinizing my behaviour. A disquiet swirled ferociously in the pit of my stomach. I was never the best actor in school, and couple that with the fact I didn't really know Rin. She never got much characterization in the manga or anime, seeming little more than a plot device to set the story in motion.
It would be an uphill struggle crafting a believable "Rin mask" when I didn't have anything to go on.
"Nothing." He said though it didn't feel like anything.
Still, I allowed myself a sigh when he put his back to me to eat. Then a flash of realization illuminated my eyes.
'I can see sneak a peek at his face.' I pushed my food and drink away, bringing my knees up on the bench and crawling closer to Kakashi, my face nearing his shoulder inch by painful inch to avoid spooking him the best I could. I could hear heart my heart drumming loudly inside my chest when my chin was basically atop his shoulder. I'm sure every Naruto fan could relate to my innate desire to steal a peek at Kakashi's evasive face.
The anime did wonderfully building it up as something mysterious and cool in one of the better fillers, even going out of its way to give Sasuke some much-needed levity in his character (not that I didn't understand why he was like that) when he banded together with his teammates to unmask Kakashi.
I was almost there, nearly touching his ear until:
He vanished, simply fading from existence in a manner my poor eyes could only compare to teleportation.
"Huh?" My treats being in front of me instead of behind where I left them prompted me to turn around and I found Kakashi, back still facing me like it was moments before on the other side, like he never moved but the world did. My cheeks ballooned as he chewed on a stick of roasted Dango. "Jerk."
He held up a hand in mock apology, tittering. I turned my cheek in playful disgust. 'I should've expected that.' I mused and sat my dark-green bowl on my lap, breaking apart my chopsticks. I was quite decent at using chopsticks even without the help of Rin's muscle memory having frequented a few Japanese and Chinese-based restaurants in England. I slotted them through my fingers like needles, clattering them together as if to test them. Then I picked up the small bowl with my free hand, plucking a mochi up and bringing up the bowl to my lips.
I shovelled a portion of sweet beans and soup into my mouth, biting a chunk out of the mochi held between my chopsticks. "Mmm!" A pleasant feeling of relaxation spread throughout my body, chewing on the delectable taste of the delicacy I had the pleasure of eating. The stickiness of the mochi went well with the sugary sweetness of the beans and soup, creating a whole new sensation that melted in my mouth.
The flavour on my tongue made the tea taste even better than it did when I took a few sips to wash it all down. "Ah." I felt like I was being carried away on cloud nine. I repeated the process of eating and drinking snippets of my soup and tea, relishing the palate cascading down my throat like a waterfall. I was in no real rush, taking my time to taste a slice of heaven to its fullest.
Japanese food was the best.
No wonder Japanese cookery managed to find a rank in the top 10 of the world's best cuisine back home, beaten only by the likes of Italy, France, Spain, Greece, India and Mexico. No shame in losing to any of those. (I did also love Indian cuisine, too).
It took me fifteen minutes to wax off my dessert and drink. I set my emptied cup beside my equally drained bowl and sat back with a leisurely exhale. "That was great." I held up my hands, fingers pressed together and clapped. "Gochisōsama-deshita."
Kakashi hummed. "Gochisōsama."
The lady reappeared, brushing under her banners. "Did you like the food?"
I nodded, pressing my fingertips together. "Oh, yes. Very much so. It was delicious."
"Many thanks." She bowed and gathered the dishes we used in each hand, balancing them with a precision of a Genin. "I'll go fetch your bill. Won't be a minute."
Soon as the words smoothly flowed through her lips my eyes widened. "Uh, yeah. Thank you." She left us with a polite smile though it felt like she was dropping a weapon on me. Rin didn't have any money on her when she was taken by those goons, which sadly made sense. It wasn't like your captors were going to be kind enough to make a pit stop at an ATM machine for you to pick up some cash.
I glanced at Kakashi hopefully, and his face warmed in sympathy.
I heaved a relieved exhale.
The lady returned with a small ashtray and a thin piece of paper upon it. "Here you go." She said. Kakashi reached into his pouch above his backside and placed a yen-looking Ryo note on it. "Thank you kindly. I'll go bring your change." She disappeared within the confines of her shop again.
I turned back to Kakashi, mouthing "Thank you" with a hand shielding my lips from potentially being read. I said out loud but in a hushed whisper, "I'll pay you back. Promise!"
"I know," He replied with a deceptively pleasant tone. "I intend to have you pay me back in just a bit."
I blinked, "You will?"
"Yes." That was all he said on the matter, turning his head to rest against the wall of the establishment.
'Kakashi can be a real jerk.' I pouted, unfurling my legs from the bench.
The lady re-emerged. "And here's your charge!" Kakashi picked his coins from atop the tray one by one. After all had been collected she awarded us a courteous bow. "Thank you for your percentage. Please stop by again."
"Wil do." I smiled because she was nice. She smiled back and vanished for the last time behind the curtains of her tea parlour. Kakashi then stood, reaching under my legs and behind my head, and to my horrified recognition, scooped me back up bridal-style once more. "…So this is what you meant about paying you back."
He feigned ignorance because of course he did, donning a mask of polite curiosity. "My, whatever could you mean? I was just helping a fatigued comrade back to the village."
I sighed heavily.
"Sure you were."
I take it back.
Kakashi wasn't just a jerk.
He was a super jerk.
Kakashi was a super, super jerk, I decided, my disoriented gaze spinning.
"You really couldn't have gone at a manageable speed, huh?" I said, barely being able to make out the grey metal balcony of Rin's single-story apartment complex we stood on currently. "You just had to go full blast knowing I wouldn't like it and would scream like a girl, didn't you?" The meanie didn't even let me drink in the sights of a place I would probably be calling home if I didn't wake up from this nightmare. He literally zoomed all the way from Otake's tea parlour to Rin's home with a ferocious acceleration that would've left a certain Roadrunner from a girl's favourite childhood cartoon growing up weeping with envy.
He gave me that ultra-annoying eye smile I genuinely contemplated slapping off his stupid smug face. "I'm not sure what you mean." I gave him the flattest deadpan stare I could muster. "I thought you wanted to get home as fast as possible considering everything that happened."
My eyes rolled, "Yeah, yeah." Setting aside Kakashi's general jackassery, I rifled through Rin's memories and found her apartment keys in her pouch. I considered myself considerably fortunate her house keys hadn't fallen out at any point during the whole ordeal when I retrieved them from my pouch, and that she lived alone. I wasn't quite ready to face her folks yet. Rin had parents, but she had fallen out with them and practically been disowned when she became a shinobi. Considering the tragic fate the original Rin had succumbed to, I had to say they were quite justified in their stance of their daughter entering the shinobi's life.
I pushed a golden-yellow key into a round door lock of a grey frame with a number 7 plated above, turning it clockwise. With a shove of a hand, the door gave way to Rin's tidy, but otherwise small apartment Kakashi princess-carried me into.
"I'm home," I murmured sarcastically to the void, gaze panning around. 'It's even smaller than Naruto's apartment in canon.' If I had to compare it to anything, it would be Haruka's room from Yakuza 5. I found a single metallic door off to our right just by the entrance just above a raised step with unseeable glass block windows I had to believe led to hers, or rather, my bathroom. Another door coated with a light brown paint like the floorboards on the left looked like her closet. A coat hanger opposite the bathroom housed Rin's many weather clothing, comprising of bright happy colours like pink and lavender.
"Forgive the intrusion," Kakashi said, tucking off his toed shinobi sandals coloured a navy blue. I haphazardly kicked off mine too, eliciting a titter from him. He stepped over the upraised step and headed straight to the end, past a small space where Rin's kitchen lay and into her minuscule bedroom containing a single futon, a beige table underneath an indigo-coloured circular mat and a legless chair, an old-fashioned TV straight out of the mid-80s and... a Famicon console of all things.
Huh? Never knew Rin was into games. My opinion of her went up a tad.
Kakashi placed me gently atop my futon mattress. "There you go." He said.
"Thank you, Kakashi," I said, stretching my legs before removing my tights under my lavender-pink apron-skirt.
"You're welcome." He assured, awarding me a genuine smiley face.
I folded up my tights and looked over at a particular photo frame on my table, one of us with Obito on my other side and sensei behind us. He tracked my gaze and inhaled.
"I could've been the last one standing yesterday." He noted.
I glanced down at my bare legs, curling my fingers, 'I have to get stronger somehow, not just for me but also for Kakashi.' He may've been a jerk but he wasn't evil or heartless like Fanfiction often cruelly depicted him. He genuinely cared about his friends, Obito and Rin; me, and was truly heartbroken when he couldn't protect Rin in canon and truly relieved that she had been resurrected. He probably stayed away from Naruto for so long because he was traumatized by Rin's passing. When I look at it from that angle, it made sense and painted Kakashi in a tragic light. He musta felt like he couldn't do anything for Naruto after failing to save Rin and his sensei and even had Obito throw away his life for him.
'I wanna get stronger,' My eyes gleamed with determination. 'If only a little.' Rin was kidnapped twice in canon and those two last times caused the 'deaths' of Obito and herself. I really couldn't afford to add to that tally.
"Get some sleep, Rin." Kakashi's voice yanked me out of my thoughts. I turned my gaze to find his eye lowering in concern. "You haven't slept since yesterday. I'll let Hokage-sama know you're safe."
"Yeah." I released a shuddering breath, untying my leaf headband. "Sleep sounds good right about now." He nodded and made his way to my front door while I tucked myself in underneath my warm bed sheets, turning to him before dozing off, "...And Kakashi?"
He stopped below the upturned step, unhidden curiosity swirling in his eye, "Yeah?"
"Thank you, for saving me."
He chuckled with warmth, slipping on his toed sandals and opening the door, "Thank you for coming back, Rin."
I beamed.
"G'night."
"It's not nighttime."
"It is to me."
Once my head hit pillow I was out like a light.
Many thanks to AnosDT95 for the kind, lovely review. Rin is the ideal character for a self-insert to transmigrate into given that she was really only used as a plot device to facilitate Obito's Anakin Skywalker-like face-heel turn into the dark side of the Chakra. All things considered, she's essentially a blank state the audience doesn't know anything about. I'm looking forward to fleshing out her history and giving her a bit of personality outside of just being kind and caring. Also, since we're 13 years from the mainline story, NQR (Not Quite Rin) has the chance to interact with characters that died before the story started, so that'll be fun.