A/N: A friendly reminder that the sharingan has left the building (!) BUT we have that Hokage confidence now hehe~
same drop (2/3)
Ch. 7 - Arrival
Konohagakure.
The color of spring is ever-present. Green coming out of the ground and out of the sky. Somehow making the destruction less harsh, less heart-breaking. The enduring nature of life is everywhere.
It calms her nerves.
Inori looks at the small piece of paper in her hand. The address to her lodgings. Do all appointees of the Hokage get the benefit of lodging? Maybe because she's a foreigner.
The apartment is bright and well-appointed. No comfort is spared. An oasis of civility amidst the surrounding chaos and damage. Inori stands in the living room, her suitcase pulled next to her. A strange mixture of gratitude and unease. Unsure how to process the kindness that has been extended to her.
A single thought: Why?
The question gives her pause.
Hokage Rock.
It's only time before she finds herself at his door. The office of the Hokage.
Inori had walked by the building several times, looking up at its curved exterior before finally going in. To announce her arrival. To pay her respects.
She wants to see him with her own eyes again.
Two firm knocks.
The sound pulls his attention away from the stacks of paperwork. From signing yet another document. He knows who is at the door. He had been expecting her arrival for weeks now.
A door hardly separates her from him. Hardly stops the familiarity of her from filling his senses the same way it did in the Land of Waves.
Kakashi strides towards her, footsteps steady and even. Then the metal click of the doorknob turning. A gradual reveal.
"Come in."
He looks different dressed in all white. Then she spots most obvious difference: two eyes. She had only seen half his face before. He covered it with his headband, hadn't he?
A scar bisects his left eye, the pink skin wide and long. Grotesque. A nasty injury. A life-changing injury.
She notes that it must be an old scar. How young was he? How close to age six?
Inori tries not to stare.
She's taken aback, isn't she? Her face is too obvious to him.
He stands aside. She steps inside.
"Please, have a seat."
Piles of paper are everywhere. Astounding in both size and number. Proportionate to the enormity of his position. And here she thought she had seen the worst a workspace could get. Academics are like that.
She has never interacted with a diplomat of this status. A Kage. It's intimidating.
She looks at him expectantly.
Inori hates formalities; she has no intuition for it.
Kakashi hates formalities; it gives things a false importance.
Make conversation. She starts:
"I'm not sure what to say." She's dumbstruck by the image of him.
He leans back in his chair, expression stoic and unchanging.
"That's unlike you." A teasing tone. He takes her in, the path of his eyes deliberate. "It's good to see you."
The words come easily to him.
"It's good to see you too."
What she means: It's good to know he's alive. Good to see that he looks well, albeit visibly exhausted. Good to sit across from him again. Good to look into his dark grey eyes.
He understands the unspoken gratitude in her words. That he is alive and whole enough. Good enough to be here, let alone lead Konohagakure into an uncertain future.
"I appreciate you thinking of me for this appointment. I never would have thought that my work would have ever reached you, or gotten to you- or that it's something you would ever even know about… let alone consider..." A genuine wonderment. The fact still stuns her.
He listens intently before leaning forward, his gaze steady.
"You're exactly who I thought of." An unwavering directness.
There's more to it than the surface meaning. He's choosing his words carefully, measuring their impact. Measuring his effect on her. Searching for the pulse of any effect after so much time.
"Your work spoke for itself. Your expertise, your experience, your dedication." The corners of his eyes crinkle with an earnestness. "It all spoke for itself."
Her hand moves to her heart to hold onto his words. That her work reached him, spoke to him on her behalf, deeply moves her.
Those careful words of his again.
Kakashi's eyes are still fixed on hers. There's more behind them than just a professional admiration. A moment of intuition. She knows to look down into her lap.
"It's an honor to support your administration."
"And I'm honored to have someone of your caliber on my team."
It comes so easy to him.
She tries to deflect, never being the best with compliments. "Well, now you're just being polite. Thank you." A hesitant laugh. There's nothing more to say.
Make different conversation.
She gestures at him in acknowledgement. "I never would have thought that any of this was in the stars for you. I guess I really didn't know who you were, did I?"
The question hangs in the air. He hooks his thumb under his chin, giving it serious consideration.
"No, I don't suppose you did." He says softly, voice tinged with irony. "To be completely open with you… I didn't see this either." A solemn pause. "Fate has a strange sense of humor."
Anywhere but here.
Her eyes shift between his. She's smacked by the surprise of seeing two eyes, the scar. Even his hair loose and unencumbered as it falls over his forehead.
She really didn't know anything about him. And she still doesn't. To think he was a candidate for Hokage. That he had a genuine shot at it for a while now. She didn't know that he was really someone in that way. A somebody. Whereas she lives her life as a regular nobody.
His requesting her labor is the biggest honor of her life. He bestowed it upon her. His hand. His decision alone. It's as humbling as it is humiliating.
Kakashi can see the way her eyes keep shifting between his. Processing. Trying to wrap her head around all the incoming information.
She exhales deeply: "Yeah, fate."
He senses the unease in her remark. That her words are commenting on herself more than him. He leans forward to look fully into her face.
"And fate has a way of surprising us when we least expect it." His voice quieter this time.
What he's trying to say: He wants her here. He pulled all the strings and levers necessary to bring her to his doorstep.
She tugs back on the core thread of the conversation: "Ah- I look forward to becoming more familiar with the Leaf, the history and heritage of it."
Kakashi nods slowly at her words. He's amused by how clumsily she regains her composure. The hard shift in her disposition.
"The Leaf has a rich history and heritage." He leans back casually, crossing his arms. "I'm certain that you'll learn to love it."
There's more space between them, but there is a closer connection between their gazes now. Something more tangible. Metaphysical.
"I look forward to becoming more familiar with it." A warm smile. The Land of Waves will always be home, but perhaps the Leaf is a place she could fall in love with.
She checks her watch as it buzzes abruptly. "I hope I'm not taking up your time, coming into your office out of the blue like this... but I just wanted to let you know that I've arrived. I'm here now."
Kakashi's eyes flicker towards the device. In truth, he's annoyed by the way it reset the air between them. He regards her with a stern look. One that has unintentionally hardened over the last year.
"No, you're not taking up my time." His voice serious yet again. "You're here on my invitation, after all."
He did in fact summon her across the other side of the map, didn't he? This fact being thrown back in her face flusters her. She presses a hand to her cheek in embarrassment. "That's... absolutely true, isn't it?"
He finds it endearing that she worried about taking up his time. He's used to being the one chastised about his use of time. His lateness, his casual disrespect for the time of others. Always spending time where he's not supposed to be. Just to be alone.
"It is. I asked you to come here, remember?" A teasing tone again. Leaning forward again.
"I remember, I remember!" She says too loudly. Then the words start coming out faster. "I'm really, completely out of my depths right now. You know, just- being so far away from home and anything that's familiar. Being in the shinobi world, period. And I've never been in the Land of Fire. And—and then there's the shock of who you are! I'm having a hard time looking past you as the Kage of this land. I'm having a hard time speaking casually to you and just feel like I'm embarrassing myself. Repeatedly."
Kakashi lets her speak without interruption, his eyes roaming her face. Watching the revelations tumble out of her mouth. The way she is struggling to reconcile the man in front of her with his title.
She finally pauses.
"You don't need to be embarrassed." He says coolly. Aways ready with a response.
"I think..." She grasps for words. "I think I just can't wrap my head around the fact that you were ever someone up for this role. You were such... a tough nut to crack. Just so hard to talk to until you weren't hard to talk to." How honest to be? "I thought you were just a regular person. You said you were teaching school-aged kids and didn't have much going on. Please don't take any of this personally -what I mean is that- there was nothing out of the ordinary about you. Just a salt of the earth kind of person."
Not someone so objectively exceptional and ordinary to no one.
Kakashi lets out a small huff of amusement. Her frustration is not unreasonable by any means. How does he fit into the role of Hokage? It's a question he still doesn't have an answer for.
"I was all those things, wasn't I?" Cool and casual.
She's dissatisfied with his lack of response. The total lack of reaction.
She doesn't want to say that their connection from last time now feels false. Maybe she was too honest with him. Too earnest in sharing herself with him.
A genuine disappointment in only having a fraction of any real information about his life.
Then another thought: Perhaps her life is so small that it only takes one evening to divulge the whole of it.
"Nevermind." She stops herself. Just accept the fact of it now.
"No, go on. Say it." An urging.
"I just feel... kind of duped." A defeated shrug.
Concern passes over his face. It's her disappointment that hits him the hardest.
"Duped." He repeats, testing the sound of it. "You feel like I wasn't honest with you?"
She scrunches her nose, having taken this too far down a road she didn't want to go down.
"I shouldn't be so surprised by this. I had told you that I never interact with shinobi. That I find the whole thing intimidating and foreign. That shinobi are working at a level I could never comprehend- always so many steps ahead at all times. Always in control in a way I could never be. I can't maneuver relationships in that way."
She's not resentful. The truth just stings: the inferiority of her reality to his. The gap in their worlds a hard fact.
Finally, he speaks. "I didn't mean to deceive you." Voice low and serious, the teacher voice coming through. Damage control.
The differences between shinobi and civilians is a difference he's all too familiar with. Kakashi leans forward on his elbows, trying to make her understand.
"You're not the only civilian who's ever felt overwhelmed or out of their depths here." He reassures. "But you have something that others don't."
A meaningful pause.
"You have me, and I understand the complexities of the village better than anyone else. You're going to do just fine here."
He shifts back, his hands resting on the desk next to a set of alphabetized folders. His eyes intent on hers.
His tries to impart the weight of his words: She has him.