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Chapter Text

Kintsukuroi (n) - The art of repairing pottery with gold or silver joining the pieces, and understanding that the piece is more beautiful for having been broken.

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part i: rin is always watching

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Do you remember, Obito, how I used to tell you I’m always watching you?

That hasn’t changed, you know. Not even now that I …

I was there, the night your world ended. I saw you battle Minato-sensei and I felt the Kyuubi’s roar rattle the earth - flames brilliant against the night sky as half the village burned and crumbled. You weren’t yourself, I could tell. Something dark and timeless and terrible had infested your mind and body, moving you against your will.

You fought it, because you’ve always been brave, always been strong, but this was too powerful, too ancient, and you were too human.

But I … I did what I could. I brought the light, as much of it as I could gather, and forced it through your skin and marrow and sinew. The timeless, terrible thing roared - as loud and furious as the Kyuubi - but it was enough.

You broke its hold on you, and I’d never felt so much pride, even in the midst of hell.

Forward, though, to Kakashi: mismatched eyes devastated and desperate, tears leaking from the Sharingan and blood all over his hands and face as he knelt over you. His mouth moved, beneath his mask, and I know you can’t remember what he said, but I heard and …

He was screaming.

You were lying in the dirt, unable to move. Kakashi stood over you, facing down three approaching ANBU squads - the glint of his tanto reflecting fire and moonlight. He was shaking, he was shattering (everything was), but he held his ground and the first clash of steel echoed like thunder.

I couldn’t stop it, Obito. No matter how hard I tried, how loud I yelled. Kakashi couldn’t hear me and you - everything was fuzzy and bleeding and you were so close to dead I could almost see you flickering between one world and the next. All we could do was stare in horror as Kakashi drove his blade through the chest of the closest ANBU. Then came Chidori, turning him into a vengeful whirlwind of lightning and chaos.

It only stopped when they were all dead, every last one of them, and Kakashi crashed to his knees amidst the corpses, head bowed and blood-smeared tanto clutched in one trembling fist. He’d gone mad (everything had), and you couldn’t move your battered body to reach him. I tried, for you, but my shaking fingers merely passed through his shoulder.

(I’m sorry, Obito, that I couldn’t help either one of you, then.)

_ _

But go back, to a different night and a different ending. Mine, this time. (Though maybe it was all of ours, looking back.)

It exists for me only in flashes: the choice, the leap, the blinding pain of Kakashi’s Chidori punching through my chest - though not nearly as terrible as the look of horrified devastation on his face.

(I don’t regret any of it, Obito. I fulfilled my duty as a shinobi of Konoha. I’m only sorry it damaged you both so deeply.)

The next clear memory is looking down at my own broken body while the sound of your rage tore the world apart. I didn’t recognize you then, with the power of a forest inside of you and Mangekyō turning your lone eye red-and-black-and-furious. What you did to those men … I don’t blame you for it. You were shattering - I had shattered you - and Kakashi was …

I tried to wake him up, but he’s never been able to hear me. He was faded around the edges, dying slow, and you … you were Death itself.

I was afraid of you, when the water around us ran crimson with blood and you towered over Kakashi’s unconscious body like a vengeful wraith. You were going to kill him, I could feel it, and I screamed.

I think you heard me, didn’t you, Obito? You must have, because you finally, finally stopped. Knelt beside Kakashi and me. Reached out to take Kakashi’s limp hand in your own bloodstained one.

“Take him back,” I begged you. “ Go home, both of you. Please…”

And maybe … maybe you would have been all right, if it had ever been a choice. Maybe you would have made it - you were getting ready to pick him up, to listen to me, but the body that wasn’t yours stopped you.

I know you don’t remember this, either. You’ve tried, in the years since, and it frustrates you - the black holes in your memory. But I was watching. I saw the creature wrap tight around you, force your hands to let go of Kakashi and your legs to move. You screamed again, before it stopped your voice, too.

It took you away from us. Made you leave Kakashi’s body and mine to lie there, forgotten in the water.

I tried to follow you, to see where it took you and the things it did to your mind, but I was too weak.

_ _

(I’ll always be sorry for that, too. That you were alone and hurting, when monsters took your will away from you. And I will always hate that you don’t remember the choice you made that night - that it was the right one.)

_ _

Forward again, to the smoking remnants of Konoha. To a prison cell. I was with you, then, too. I watched you wake up - struggle to fit all the scattered, ruined pieces of yourself into a coherent whole. Watched as your name came back and then Kakashi’s, as you realized you were both in chains. The events of the past twenty-four hours came back next and the sound of horror and agony you made cut me in two.

And then there was Kakashi. Oh, Kakashi. He loves us both so much, Obito, but this was the first time I could see it plainly on his face. He was terrified and desperate and unable to bear the thought of losing you a second time, asking if you were all right even as he was bleeding.

I wanted to comfort you both - give Kakashi the words of reassurance you couldn’t say and calm the maelstrom raging through your mind - but I could only hover, helpless.

(Being dead is really annoying sometimes, Obito.)

And the horror on your face when Sarutobi stepped into your cell, dressed in Hokage robes once more. The rising flood of grief and understanding that filled your eye - it’s etched in me forever. Right alongside your expression of relief when you got the news that the council had decided on execution.

Until you found out they were executing Kakashi, too.

_ _

Some things never change - you stood before the council, shaking in your chains, still half-dead, and told them it was all your fault, that they needed Kakashi alive, that it was a fit of madness that took hold of him and he can hardly be blamed for that, considering the whole damned world went mad, didn’t it?

(I didn’t know that I could be furious at someone and proud of them at the same time, but I was, then.)

The council didn’t listen, of course, and neither did Kakashi, telling you to shut up in the same tone he always used before, though cracked through the middle.

Back in your cell, you cried, and my hands ached with the desire to wipe the tears from your leaking eye. I put them on your arm instead, trying to project warmth and comfort that I don’t think you felt. Your grief was too huge: a yawning abyss swallowing you whole.

“Crybaby,” Kakashi murmured into the stillness, voice empty and broken, and you … you laughed. Just as empty, just as broken.

“You just couldn’t let me win, could you?” You rasped, bitter. (But I was so glad you were finally talking to each other.)

“It’s better this way,” Kakashi said (and then I wanted to smack him. Neither of you were supposed to follow me so soon). “You’re all I have left. I don’t want to be alone.”

Surprise washed over your face, that he would admit that (but you’ve never been able to see how much your death changed him, Obito), and you reached for him, do you remember? Pressed your forehead to his shoulder and took his hand in yours, twining your fingers with his just like you did the night I died.

“I won’t leave you, either,” I wanted to say. “ I’ll be with you both until the very end.”

(Even if, in my heart, I wasn’t sure how I would be able to bear watching you die. Not again.)

_ _

Life is always unexpected, though, eh, Obito? Yours didn’t end there (though sometimes, I think you wish it had and I want to smack you, too).

Sandaime had other plans.

I walked with you and Kakashi through the village gates, escorted by ANBU and Sarutobi - for once out of his usual robes. The moon was high in the sky and I could almost taste the smoke on my tongue, lingering in the wake of the fires.

In safety of the forest beyond the walls, Sandaime called for a halt. There were more ANBU now, crouched in the trees above us - weapons glinting.

“I have decided to ignore the council’s decision.” Sandaime said, expression cold, but I could feel the grief lurking beneath his composure. “Whatever power orchestrated this - this war is not yet over, and I know you both will have parts to play in the coming events. Therefore, I trust you will understand this for the mercy that it is and not act directly against the interests of Konoha.”

Kakashi, with all his love for protocol, was the one who nodded first. Stammered out, “h-hai, Hokage-sama.”

Sandaime nodded. “Good.” He drew himself up straighter, every inch a leader. “Uchiha Obito and Hatake Kakashi, I am officially exiling you from Konohagakure no Sato. Your names will be struck from the records of active Shinobi, and should you ever try to return to Leaf, or enter the border of the Land of Fire, you will be granted the execution I have currently spared you of.” He gestured to the gathered ANBU. “Take them.”

Your words were gone again, your face slack with shock, and Kakashi had to nudge you back into motion, following the ANBU towards the border.

(Neither of you looked back, and I was proud of you for that, too, in spite of the heaviness in my heart.)

_ _

At the edge of the Land of Fire, I watched in fury as one of the ANBU stepped forward and grabbed a fistful of Kakashi’s hair, holding him still while she slashed through the tattoo on his upper arm. You roared, that barely-controlled forest inside of you surging to the surface, and I reached for you, but Kakashi got there first, pressing a hand against your chest.

“Obito.”

You quieted, tamped down on the power just enough, and we stood side by side, trembling with rage, as the ANBU cut Kakashi’s arm until the tattoo was no longer visible - lost beneath bloody wounds.

Kakashi, stoic to the last, bore it in silence, though his fingers curled tight in the front of your shirt. I put my hand against his back, wanting to ease even just a little of it, but my palm sunk right through him.

(Being dead really sucks, Obito.)

And then it was over, and the ANBU stepped back with a snarl of, “get lost, traitor. ”

Kakashi walked with his head and shoulders bent, smaller than I’ve ever seen him: blood covering his arm, bangs hanging in his eyes. (I know he regrets the lives he took that night, even if he never regrets that they were to save you.)

You followed him, still seething. And beneath that: terror, because you didn’t expect to live, did you? Right then, you didn’t see exile as a mercy.

But it was. This was a beginning, not an end - you still have so much to do, Obito.

(And I promise I’ll be watching. Always.)

Chapter Text

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part ii: obito, in the aftermath 

_ _ 

On the border of Grass and Earth, it’s been raining for two days, and even though he stood out in it for an hour, he can still feel the blood beneath his skin. Thinks that maybe it’s sunk through tissue and muscle to stain his bones - that when he dies and rots, all that will be left is a reddened skeleton. Or maybe he’s just being morbid, because it’s been raining for two days and he’s trapped in a frigid cave with dwindling supplies. And Kakashi, who hasn’t said a single word since their exile. He’s sitting now, back against the cave wall, staring into space - eyes emptier than an abyss.

Like they were in the wake of his father’s death, when he used to haunt the playground at sunset - a ghost of a boy, with a dried up voice.

And just like then, Obito doesn’t have any idea what to do. Not when there is blood on his bones and he feels a step from shattered. Besides, how do you fix this? Summoning the fucking Kyuubi to attack your own village, resulting in the death of your sensei (your Hokage) and his wife, and before that Rin. What do you say to someone you died for? Gave your eye to? What do you say to someone who gave up their home for you in eventual return? Turned on their comrades for you? Killed for you?

(Drove Chidori through the chest of the girl you loved?)

What words are powerful enough for any of that?

He has questions (namely why), but Kakashi won’t answer them; he wants to punch Kakashi for being a self-sacrificing martyr (for killing Rin), but that will probably only widen the cracks between them; he wants to scream, but he’s afraid of accidentally unleashing the strange, foreign power he can still feel crawling just beneath the surface of his skin.

So he makes dinner.

He doesn’t need to eat anymore (just another monstrous thing about him), but Kakashi does and the motions of it are comforting: building a fire, heating up the food, dishing it into the chipped bowl he managed to swipe from a street vendor yesterday. Kakashi doesn’t look at him when he approaches. (The bandage on his arm is spotted with blood again and Obito makes a mental note to find medical supplies as soon as possible.)

“Here,” he says, thrusting the bowl towards Kakashi. “Eat.”

Kakashi doesn’t even blink. Obito fights down a rush of anger and nudges him roughly with his foot. “You need food, baka. Eat. ”

You’re not allowed to die on me, he doesn’t say, because he doubts Kakashi would hear him. But it’s true. Kakashi isn’t - not after everything. Obito fucking died for him and Rin … he wants answers and he can’t face this burden - this crushing, consuming guilt - on his own. He’s stronger than he ever thought he could be, but not strong enough for that.

Kakashi still hasn’t moved and, out of patience, Obito reaches down and fists a hand in the front of his shirt, shaking him. “Eat, Hatake, or I’ll make you.”

He’ll pour the soup through the fucking mask if he has to.

But Kakashi finally yanks himself momentarily free from whatever abyss is consuming him and holds out a timorous hand for the bowl.

“Good,” Obito huffs, passing it over.

Kakashi moves to pull down his mask and Obito turns his back, strange habit taking over to allow his old teammate some privacy. If Kakashi’s surprised by this, he doesn’t react - just eats in silence. The eventual clink of metal against stone signifies that he’s finished.

Obito still tries to get him to talk. “Done?”

A long pause. Then, “yes.”

Obito turns around. Kakashi is masked again, back in the same position as before, huddled against the cave wall. He looks exhausted and disheveled, more ghost than human, but his gaze tracks Obito this time as he moves closer to collect the bowl.

“I’m sorry,” he rasps when Obito’s fingers brush the edge of it. “For Rin, I…”

“Don’t,” Obito snaps, because he isn’t ready for Kakashi’s explanations or excuses. The anger is still too strong, too feral, and he’s not sure he’ll be able to hold himself back if he learns that Kakashi sacrificed her for a mission, if Kakashi chose rules again over someone he was supposed to protect - swore to protect. Forgiveness was easy when they were about to die, but now?

Kakashi goes quiet immediately, so fucking placid, and Obito watches his mismatched eyes slip closed - circles bruised dark under them, almost like Obito punched him in the face after all.

_ _

The rain finally stops and they move, skirting the border of Earth on their way to Claw. Obito has no destination in mind besides as far away from Konoha as possible and Kakashi seems content to follow along. Whether it’s guilt or depressed apathy motivating his complacence, Obito doesn’t know. Either way, it’s infuriating. They need a plan, and Kakashi has always been better at those. Maybe, with a strategy for survival to focus on, Obito will stop tasting ash on his tongue, stop hearing the crack of the earth and the crash of rubble, stop seeing the Kyuubi’s tails blotting out the moon, and no longer feel the grit of Sensei and Kushina’s blood beneath his fingernails.

(Maybe the desire to cut his own throat with a kunai will lessen, too.)

Instead, he focuses on the ruined wasteland of his memories. He’s missing time, from what he can tell. A lot of it. There was the cave in - rocks slowly crushing every last drop of life out of him - and then a different cave. With Madara and those … creatures. Did he have something to do with the Kyuubi? Obito doesn’t know for sure - because then there was Rin, and his world cracking in two, and after that nothing. Until he woke up in the middle of a burning Konoha - half-dead and feeling like he’d just managed to claw his way free of the blackest, most all-consuming darkness he’s never known.

He tries now to remember. Anything, even the smallest detail, but there is only empty space - a grey, infuriating void. He’s certain, though, that the memories were taken from him. Sandaime was right, this isn’t over.

But there is nothing he can do right now. He doesn’t remember the location of the cave, or the exact features of the man who saved him. He dips his fingers under the collar of his shirt, tracing along the seam where synthetic flesh meets natural skin, and takes a deep breath.

Right now, there is him and Kakashi and the continent spread out before them. He can keep them alive, he can drag Kakashi back to him - kicking and screaming, if need be. Let his unnatural right side serve as a reminder, he decides, that he’s stronger than he ever believed possible.

He survived death’s cold, grasping claws, and he can survive this, too.

_ _

Kakashi has nightmares, though it takes a while for Obito recognize them as such. Like Kakashi, they’re quiet: faint, rasping breaths and twitching limbs. But one night Obito hears “Rin” slip out in a horror-laced whisper and then Kakashi jolts upright, scratching frantically at his own hands like he’s trying to tear them to shreds using only his blunted fingernails.

Obito moves without thinking, rushing over to grab Kakashi’s hands and hold him still. There are bloody lines across Kakashi’s palms and he looks up at Obito without recognition.

“I’m sorry,” he croaks, somewhere far away. “I’m sorry.” His fingers tremble in Obito’s grip. “It won’t come off.”

The blood…

Obito’s hands tighten on reflex and he still has no idea what to say.

“Here,” he manages after a moment and stands up on unsteady legs. They’re camped on the edge of a small stream, so it’s easy to crouch on the bank and fill a bowl with water. This done, he sits in front of Kakashi again and takes his hands, dipping them into the icy water to wash them off. “There. Gone, see?”

Kakashi shakes his head, still looking half-convinced that he’s talking to a ghost. “No, it’ll never come off.”

And he’s right about that, isn’t he, Obito thinks bleakly as he drops the bowl into the grass. They’ve got blood on their bones.

_ _

“What happened to you?” Kakashi finally asks him, somewhere in the middle of Fang. He’s been coming back in starts and stops over the last week, though he’s still nowhere near ready to start strategizing about the future, much to Obito’s frustration.

The air is getting colder now - Fall bleeding steadily into Winter - and they’re huddled together at the base of a towering tree, in the middle of a towering forest. The thick canopy shields them from some of the cold, but Obito can still see the mist of his breath hanging in the air.

“I don’t know,” he says. “Someone saved me.”

“How?”

“I don’t know,” he repeats. Madara never offered up that information - only that it had been a lot of effort.

“Who was he?” Kakashi asks, undeterred. In the dim light, his Sharingan seems to glow. Obito wonders, suddenly, if his own eye looks that creepy.

“He said he was an Uchiha. Madara. I don’t remember anything else.” He doesn’t want to talk about Madara’s dream, or his insistence that Obito shouldn’t thank him. Doesn’t want to think about the blur of days trapped in that cave, trying to heal so that he could go home - not realizing that everything was about to be brutally ripped away from him once again. Because then he would have to think about Rin and not doing that is probably the only thing currently keeping him sane.

Or close to it, anyway.

Kakashi absorbs this in silence, though. Obito can almost see him mentally slotting puzzle pieces into place. “I see.” They sit in silence for a long moment, watching their breath form and dissipate. “Do you want your eye back?”

Kakashi’s voice is steady when he says it, but Obito can hear the cracks underneath. Knows, suddenly and with deep certainty, that if he demanded it Kakashi, in his guilt, would probably cut the eye out himself and hand it over.

“No,” he says, firm. “It was a gift.”

“Even though…” Kakashi starts and Obito shakes his head.

“It was a gift.”

Kakashi looks away, shoulders tense. The stillness of the forest is suffocating.

_ _

They’ve been on the road for three months, living rough and half-starved (in Kakashi’s case), when Kakashi takes an assassination contract from a village leader in Bear Country - sneaks away while Obito is sleeping and comes back blood-covered and haunted.

“What did you do?” Obito demands, around his creeping dread.

Kakashi dumps a large bag of cash on his battered sleeping roll. “It doesn’t matter. I got us rooms at the inn.”

The dread has amassed into lead lining the pit of his stomach, but Obito doesn’t protest. When they reach the inn, though, and Kakashi is safely in the shower, he climbs out the window and heads for the market. There is always gossip in small villages like this, even about things that should be secret. (And they desperately need more supplies, anyway.)

Sure enough, as he’s sifting through vegetables at one of the stands, he overhears the owner talking to what must be one of his regulars. The son of a rival village was found dead last night - throat slit. Only ten years old, what a shame - to be caught up in dirty politics like this, even if his father was a murderous bastard.

It isn’t hard to put the pieces together and he crushes the tomato in his hand as he feels the blood freeze in his veins. Beneath his skin, the power roars.

“Hey,” the merchant says, as he turns away. “You have to pay for that!”

Obito ignores him - can’t even hear him through the hurricane of fury in his mind. He knew Kakashi was cold, but this…

Back at the inn, Obito holds on to enough control to grab Kakashi by the shirt and haul him outside, into the boundaries of the thick forest surrounding the village on all sides. Kakashi makes no protest, which only fuels his rage, and once they’re alone he unleashes it. Wood sprouts from his arm and shoulder in dark, twisting branches, slamming Kakashi against a nearby boulder. Bones crack and Kakashi gasps in pain, but still doesn’t fight.

“What the hell, Kakashi?” Obito snarls. “A child? ”

“A warlord’s son,” Kakashi rasps. The wood tightens around his wrists and middle, turn the words into a quiet hiccup of pain. “Being trained to kill like his father.”

“He was ten years old.” (And he can’t think of Minato and Kushina’s child, who might not have survived. Dead or orphaned because of him. )

“We needed the money.”

Obito growls, deep and furious, and the branches shift to Kakashi’s neck, lifting him off his feet. “Was it easy, then? To slit his throat?” Kakashi just wheezes in response, fingers scrabbling against the ring of wood steadily choking the life from him. “Is that how heartless you’ve become? First Rin and now this?”

“Kill me … then,” Kakashi manages and drops his hands.

Obito wants to, in this moment. Wants to wring every drop of oxygen from Kakashi’s lungs, wants to turn his mokuton into spears and rip Kakashi to fucking shreds - just like the Kiri nin the night Rin... .

Instead, he snarls and hurls Kakashi against the boulder again.

Kakashi cries out this time, crashing to the ground on shaking hands and knees. “Why did you do it?” Obito demands, shaking just as hard, rattling apart at all of his edges and seams. His Sharingan is spinning, the forest is seething, and he feels strong enough to tear the world asunder - weak enough to break completely.

Kakashi coughs - a wet, disgusting sound; bile and blood mixed together. “I … told you. We needed the money and-”

“No,” Obito hisses, cutting him off. “Rin.” Kakashi stills, head bowed, and Obito doesn’t have time for his fucking guilt. Uses mokuton to wrap around his wrists and haul him roughly to his feet again. “And tell me the truth.”

Kakashi still says nothing. Obito tightens the branches until he can hear Kakashi’s bones creak again, see the agony flash across his face - obvious even with the stupid mask.

“She killed herself,” he says at last.

And Obito reels. No. That … that can’t be…

“She was captured by Kirigakure,” Kakashi continues, voice heavy with grief. “And made a jinchūriki for the Three Tails. It was unstable, and Kiri planned to unleash it on Konoha when Rin returned to the village. She realized this and insisted that I kill her. I refused so she … she made the choice for me.” He squeezes his eyes shut and his hands flex in the wooden bindings. “She jumped in front of Chidori and I couldn’t … I couldn’t pull back in time. She died to protect her village.”

The ground rises up to meet Obito as his legs abruptly give out. Rin … Rin chose … his heart rebels from this, even as he knows in the soul of him that it’s true. Rin loved Konoha and Rin was braver than all of them. Of course she would choose to give up her own life instead of risking the lives of her people.

She probably didn’t even hesitate.

Fuck, but it hurts.

“I’m sorry,” Kakashi whispers and Obito releases him, listens dully to the crunch of earth as he drops to his knees. “I’m so sorry. If you need to … I won’t stop you.” He laughs, wretched and broken. “I deserve it.”

“We both do,” Obito says, empty. He’s spilled enough blood to drown in and Kakashi isn’t much better and this is what war has made them, isn’t it? Weapons, instead of children, who will justify murder for money, who will raise monsters from the pits of hell to take innocent lives, who will kill themselves to save their village.

Look at us, Rin. Except he hopes that she isn’t watching this time, that she can’t see what they’ve become.

Kakashi slumps, folding in on himself. “Yeah.”

It would be easy, Obito thinks. In spite of the mokuton and the foreign cells that regenerate. He’s still human - fragile flesh and bone - and it would be so easy.

But Rin would never forgive him.

“We do this together,” he says, gathering up the pieces of himself. “Okay? No more taking contracts without telling each other, no more blood money. No more children, got it?”

Kakashi wraps an unsteady arm around his middle. Obito’s sure that he cracked a few ribs and shoves the guilt aside. “Y-yeah.”

Obito reaches out and puts a hand on Kakashi’s chest, swallowing more guilt when Kakashi flinches, slightly. “We’re gonna survive. For Rin.”

(And Sensei.)

“For Rin,” Kakashi echoes and leans forward, pressing his forehead to Obito’s.

And that’s a start, at least.

_ _

There is no memorial they can visit, so they buy flowers in the village in Bear, and hold their own funeral for Rin, for Sensei and Kushina. For the boys they used to be and the future they will never have. Kakashi’s got bandages around his ribs and wrists, bruises mottled in a vicious ring around his neck, but he waves off Obito’s apologies.

They’ve got enough guilt between them, he insists. They don’t need more. And it sounds like a beginning, really. Or another step forward. Something worthy of note.

For now, though, Obito lights the flowers on fire and lets the wind carry the ashes away - as close to a goodbye as his sore heart can manage.

_ _

They keep moving - Bear to Mountain to Earth to Grass to Waterfall to Iron - and they get stronger. Obito trains with his Sharingan until he can phase through even high level ninjutsu and wrestles with the restless forest until he has it under some semblance of control.

(“I didn't know mokuton worked like that,” Kakashi comments after one particularly grueling training session. “How are you doing it?”

Obito shrugs. “I just … think. And it goes.”

He’s pretty sure that Kakashi is gaping at him behind the mask.)

Kamui is harder for Kakashi - drains his chakra reserves so fast that even one warp attempt leaves him exhausted for a full day. Obito tells him they’ll work on it, build up his chakra levels, and Kakashi laughs from where he’s slumped against a tree, barely able to move.

“You were right. You got stronger than me.”

Obito still doesn’t think of himself as such - not when Kakashi is a genius and brilliant and made up of so many layers that Obito still feels like he’s peeling them back and finding new secrets underneath.

“No,” he says, bending down to help Kakashi up. “It’s just a different kind of strength.”

They learn how to see out of each other’s Sharingan, learn how to coordinate attacks until they feel like two extensions of one body, and Obito wonders if Minato’s proud of their teamwork now. Wishes that it hadn’t taken so much death and pain for them to get over themselves and figure it out.

(He still nearly guts Kakashi on reflex, the first time Kakashi uses Chidori, but it’s a work in progress.)

He takes Kakashi into Kamui, too, since Kakashi’s still having trouble warping on his own. Shows him around the dimension that belongs to them and no one else in the world.

(“It’s kind of creepy,” Kakashi murmurs, looking around at the eerie light and jumbled pillars - the void stretched out above them like a black hole. “But I like it.”

Obito laughs, and they spend the rest of the evening there, sorting through an arsenal of weapons that Obito should be able to grab in battle.

“I don’t regret it,” he says halfway through. Kakashi pauses in the middle of sharpening a kunai. “Not for a second.”

He would rather have Kakashi here, sharing this space with him - so fierce and alive - than stare down the void alone. He’s even stopped thinking of the other eye as his. It’s Kakashi’s - who is so very good at using it that he’d probably put half the Uchiha Clan to shame - and it always will be.

Kakashi’s mismatched eyes are soft in a way Obito didn’t know they could be. “I’m glad.”)

As for missions, they take enough to keep themselves fed: assassinations (though only of adults and only justified), bounty hunting, escorts - it’s a never-dull blend and somewhere along the way, they start to become formidable. By the time they’re sixteen, their names are in several hidden villages’ Bingo Books.

(Obito’s not sure if he should be proud. But they’re surviving, that’s the important thing.)

_ _

When they’re sixteen, Kakashi also almost dies on a mission. It was supposed to be a simple enough delivery, taking a set of scrolls from one village in the far reaches of Hot Springs to another, but the bastard who hired them lied about the value of the scrolls, apparently, and they’re accosted by bandits halfway through the run.

They hold their own, for a while, but the leader of the bandits is a missing-nin in possession of a very nasty earth technique that brings half a mountain down on top of them. Obito immediately abandons the stupid mission to look for Kakashi - buried somewhere in the avalanche - and tries not to give in to the panic clawing at his nerves.

It takes two agonizing hours of digging through rock crusted snow to find him and when Obito hauls him out, he’s shaking and sporting a broken leg but breathing and alive and Obito doesn’t even think before kissing him clean on the mouth - mask and all.

They both freeze in the middle of it, staring at each other with equally wide dark eyes, and Obito pulls back quickly - aware that his face is probably on fire. In his head, though, something clicks that he didn’t even realize was out of place, lurking beneath the surface. (Stuff from when he was kid, stalking Kakashi through the whole fucking village just to be closer to him, makes a lot more sense now.)

Huh.

“Uh, I’m glad you’re alive, baka.”

Kakashi blinks at him. He can almost hear Rin laughing from the afterlife.

“You kissed me,” Kakashi says, very slowly. Like he’s trying to make sure that he isn’t actually dead or hallucinating.

Obito rubs the back of his head and thinks about running. Or just using Kamui to teleport to a completely different country.  Kakashi can make his own way back down the fucking mountain, even with a broken leg.

But that would be cowardly, and he’s not a coward.

“Yeah,” he says, less steady than he was aiming for. “I did.”

Kakashi absorbs this, still looking shocked. “Do you want to do it again?”

Obito manfully resists the urge to drop his head into his hands and scream. “Yes.”

Kakashi nods, a contemplative expression that Obito can’t decipher replacing the shock. “Okay.” He holds out a hand. “Get us out of here?”

Obito threads his fingers through Kakashi’s and teleports them away.

_ _

They table the kiss while they get Kakashi’s leg patched up and suitably threaten the merchant as punishment for lying to them, making the bastard pay double for them to retrieve the scrolls from the bandits.

(Which Obito does with glee that’s perhaps a little too vicious. But the look on the leader’s face when Obito brings down half a mountain on him is priceless.)

Obito’s half thinking that they’re going to forget it entirely and he will shove this rapidly developing crush so deep down into his mind that even he won’t be able to find it again. But when he gets back from delivering the scrolls to their original destination, Kakashi snags his arm on the way to their current inn, balancing carefully on his crutches.

“Do you still want to kiss me?”

Tongue-tied, Obito nods.

“Do you want to do more than that?” Kakashi presses. His fingers feel too hot on Obito’s arm, even through a thick layer of fabric.

“You have a broken leg, baka,” Obito huffs, trying to dodge the question, but Kakashi pins him with a knowing stare. “Okay, yes.” His face is on fire again, because he never really thought about more with anyone. His idiotic, twelve-year-old self pictured kissing Rin, sure, but that was about all his brain could handle without exploding. Now, thinking about touching Kakashi, falling into a bed with Kakashi … he’s never been with someone, but he has a decent idea of how it works - how it can be good.

His head might still explode, actually.

“What about you?” he asks, to get the attention off himself. And this is a two-way street, in spite of the fact that Kakashi seems even less inclined toward romance than he is. “Do you want any of that?”

Kakashi's grip tightens on Obito’s sleeve and he tilts his head to the side. This is another layer coming off, Obito realizes with a jolt, revealing a vulnerable openness underneath - an affection that knocks all the air out of Obito’s lungs. “Yes.”

_ _

They have sex for the first time three weeks later, in a room at a remote Hot Springs resort that Obito splurges on because he wants to do this right , no matter how much Kakashi laughs at him.

(Kakashi actually doesn’t laugh at him at all.)

They’re both nervous and Obito feels so clumsy and awkward that it’s like he’s sprouted extra limbs that he has no idea how to control. His hands seem too heavy on Kakashi’s narrow hips and how fast is this supposed to move - does he start undressing Kakashi or let Kakashi take care of it - and what about his scars, his synthetic flesh, should he try to keep that out of way - will it repulse Kakashi or -

Kakashi pulls down his mask and Obito’s brain grinds to a halt because fuck, he’s gorgeous and then kickstarts into high gear, leaving most of his fears in the dust. Kakashi’s mouth on his feels amazing and Kakashi’s hands dipping under his shirt feels even better and it’s almost easy, after that.

(This is just another layer of knowing, really, peeling back the final defenses they’ve held against each other.)

They end up on the bed, eventually, with Obito’s fingers tangled in Kakashi’s hair and Obito’s tongue exploring Kakashi’s mouth. Kakashi grinds down on him, making his grip tighten on reflex, and he winces at the faint whine that slips out of Kakashi’s mouth.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, relaxing his hand and shifting his lips to Kakashi’s neck, then down to his shoulder. A gentle scrape of teeth that makes Kakashi shiver. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Kakashi says, leaning into him, kissing the scarred right side of his face. “We’re okay.”

And they are, more than. And somewhere in the middle of it, with Kakashi’s soft groans echoing in his ear and the blistering heat of Kakashi’s skin against his, Obito thinks, fuck, I love him.

It settles in his soul: an absolute truth.

_ _

After, he leaves Kakashi asleep and steps out onto the balcony, robe wrapped tight against the chill spring air. He leans against the railing, staring up at the cherry blossoms overhead, and tries to sort through the tangle of emotions in his chest.

He loves Kakashi: absolute truth. But there is still Rin, a gaping hole, and this would be truly letting her go, wouldn’t it? This would be moving on and he’s not sure he’s ready for that. He’s -

The door slides open behind him and Kakashi leans against the frame - clad in a matching robe and face still bare. It’s strange, being able to see his hesitant expression extend from the tightness around his eyes to a nervous tic in the corner of his mouth. Obito’s used to reading his emotions in small pieces: the arch of an eyebrow, a clenched jaw just visible through dark fabric, the narrowing of an eye.

Stop, he almost says, you’re showing me too much.

(Which is ridiculous, considering what they just did. Surely they have nothing left to hide from each other now.)

“Are you okay?” Kakashi asks, in a carefully measured tone.

Obito nods. “Just thinking.”

Kakashi echoes his nod and crosses his arms over his chest. The robe’s a little big on his skinny frame, slipping down one shoulder, and Obito’s gaze is drawn to a darkening bruise on his collarbone. The sight of it brings on a new rush of heat and giddy disbelief. He did that, Kakashi liked it when he did that - made a noise that’s still bouncing around in his head - and just. Holy shit.

“Obito,” Kakashi says, still careful. “We don’t have to do this again … if you don’t want to.”

Obito frowns at him, thrown. He’s pretty sure he made his enthusiasm very clear - but sneaking out of bed immediately after probably wasn’t a great move.

“I know,” Kakashi continues in response to his silence, “how you felt about Rin and…” He trails off with a shrug that would be casual if not for the tension in his shoulders.

Obito chews at his lip, because Kakashi is worth more than a quick denial or an empty assurance that everything is fine, perfectly fine.

“She loved you, you know,” he says, without accusation, and no surprise breaks over Kakashi’s face.

“I know,” Kakashi says quietly, sliding his eyes to the ground.

“I figured you did.”

Obito takes a deep breath, tilting his head back to stare up at the blossoms and the stars beyond them. The edges of that hole are still tattered, and he can see the same wound in the middle of Kakashi’s chest. Like he punctured his own heart with Chidori instead of Rin’s. And these holes might never close - he knows that grief can be stubborn, even against something as inevitable as the forward march of time - but holding on, ripping open the stitches over and over again, isn’t right.

Rin would want him to let go. He can feel that in his bones - almost as if she was standing next to him, shoving him towards Kakashi with a roll of her eyes.

“She’s gone, Kakashi,” Obito says and the words cut the inside of his mouth like glass, but he gets them out. “And I…” He clenches a hand on the railing and drops his gaze to Kakashi’s. “I want this with you. All of this. Whatever we decide it is. I’m - look, I’m pretty sure I love you, okay? Even if you’re a massive idiot.” Kakashi’s eyes widen, but he says nothing. “So if you want this, too, then - I think she would be happy for us. I think we should be happy. Or try to be, in spite of - in spite of everything - and can you please say something so I can stop talking?”

Kakashi shakes his head and closes the distance between them in two quick strides, curling his fingers in the front of Obito’s robe so he can slot their mouths together - which is an even better idea than talking, honestly.  

When they pull back, Kakashi doesn’t go far, just presses his forehead to the side of Obito’s face and winds an arm around his waist. “Me too,” he says simply. “Even if you’re a massive idiot.”

Obito laughs, then - loud and full, shoulders trembling with it. It’s bright and weird in his mouth - he can’t remember the last time he had anything to laugh about - but he doesn’t try to stop.

He’s happy.

_ _

(They spend three days at the resort - learning each other’s bodies and being stupid, hormonal teenagers in love. And in the decades to come, those three fleeting days will remain some of the best of Obito's life.)

_ _

They get stronger and stronger. When they’re seventeen, Iwa tries to have them assassinated.

When they’re eighteen, it’s Suna.

Nineteen, Kumo.

They thrash all three groups of shinobi and earn themselves S-ranks in the Bingo Books of each of the five great countries. (This time, Obito is definitely proud.)

At twenty, though, Kiri almost kills them. The bounty hunters are black ops and the fight is brutal. Their fault, too, Obito supposes, for trying to skirt the edges of Water on their way to deliver a message to one of the daimyos of Wolf. Maybe even for thinking themselves strong enough to defeat anything. There is always someone faster, always someone better. And the Mizukage who sits in Kiri has earned the village the moniker of Bloody Mist - of course someone that paranoid and ruthless would have eyes on every nook and cranny of their country.

In the end, he has to resort to mokuton, and there are no survivors among the Kiri nin. (Not that he cares. That fucking village still deserves it for what they did to Rin.) He’s also bleeding for the first time in two years - a vicious slash across his side that’s deep enough to be concerning.

Kakashi keeps him from sinking beneath the turbulent surface of the ocean and, lacking the strength for Kamui, they limp back to shore to take shelter at the base of one of the towering cliffs that guard the Land of Honey’s coastline.

“That was too close,” Obito wheezes, sprawled out on his back on the grainy sand.

“Agreed,” Kakashi mutters, already unrolling bandages from his pack. “We need to be more careful.”

“I think … we’re famous,” Obito says as Kakashi lifts his shirt up to take a look at his wound. “They called me the Ghost - isn’t that a cool nickname?”

He can practically hear Kakashi’s eye roll in his voice. “I don’t think you’re focusing on the right thing, here, baka.”

“They called you the Wolf, that’s pretty cool, too.”

Kakashi pauses in the middle of threading a needle. Obito manages to turn his head, catch the haunted look on Kakashi’s face. “That’s what they called my father.”

Obito coughs and winces at the fire that licks across his ribs. Fuck, they really got him. Bastards. “I know. Doesn’t mean you can’t make it your own. Or! We can spread a different nickname around. Like … like the Copy Nin.”

Kakashi gives him a flat look and jabs the needle into his side, ignoring his hiss of pain. Bastard. “That’s a stupid name.”

“Then quit complaining, Bakakashi.”

“Hold still,” is all Kakashi says in response and Obito obliges with a sigh, staring up at the storm clouds gathering overhead.

“I think we need more eyes of our own,” he suggests after a few minutes of silence.

“Like a spy network?”

“Yeah. Or at least a system to let us know if there are more bounties on our heads.”

Kakashi makes a contemplative sound and ties off the stitches. “I suppose it’s something to think about.”

Obito flicks his leg. “I do have good ideas. On a regular basis.”

“Maa, on occasion. ”

“Fuck off.”

Kakashi flicks his forehead. “Fine, you can bandage yourself, then.”

Obito is tempted to try, just out of spite, but quickly decides it isn’t worth the pain and discomfort. “Sorry,” he says, waving a placating hand. “You’re the genius, I’m the idiot, I get it.”

Kakashi begins deftly wrapping gauze around Obito’s torso and his eye crinkles in one of those infuriatingly false smiles that Obito always wants to punch off his face. “Good.”

_ _

He doesn’t miss Konoha, even though he keeps expecting to. It’s been him and Kakashi for nearly seven years, on the fringes and in the shadows - scraping together a life in the wilds of the continent. He’s more used to the sky at night than a ceiling, a sleeping roll on hard ground or a rope tying him to a tree than the warmth of a bed. In some ways, it’s like the war again: him and Kakashi, back to back, with weapons in easy reach.

There are weeks when their supplies dwindle to almost nothing because they’re unable to find work - when Kakashi starts to get a little too thin and worry gnaws at the lining of Obito’s stomach - but those are getting fewer and farther in between. As their name spreads, bouncing through towns and settlements often overlooked by the towering hidden villages, people begin to seek them out.

(“Please go see Kato-san in Suzume! She needs help with some important errands.”

“Please come to Marsh Country as soon as possible, I need an escort for my trip to Bird.”

“Bandits have been troubling Tora - please help the village!”)

It’s strange, but he feels like he’s making a true difference out here - much more than he did as a soldier on a frontline of someone else’s conflict. Out here, they’re more likely to get paid with a meal and a few coins than a hefty shinobi paycheck, but he cherishes all of their evenings and mornings and afternoons around tables, listening to stories and gossip from elders and mothers and fathers and young adults and children. He watches some of Kakashi’s coldness leech out of him (it’s very hard to stay aloof in the face of a tiny grandmother insisting that “you’re too thin, child!” and making you enough food to feed an army) and feels more threads tying up the hole in his own heart.

(Sandaime called it a mercy, that night he exiled them, and Obito is finally beginning to understand that it was. Perhaps even the biggest mercy he could have given them: freeing them not only from execution, but the shackles of a war-torn village.)

_ _

When they’re twenty-two, the Uchiha are massacred in Konoha.

They’re all the way out in Wood Country, spending a few days helping on a farm, so it takes several weeks for the news to reach them. When it does, via a message from Sandaime himself, a new crack rends through Obito’s world.

“The whole clan?” he whispers in disbelief, clutching the scroll with shaking hands. “Itachi killed …”

He can’t imagine it. Not the child he knew, who held so much light and joy in his heart. Who refused to shun him, even when his father insisted that he stay away, climbing into Obito’s lap and tugging gleefully on his goggles.

Obito can still hear the laughter in his ears, picture Itachi trying to fit the oversized goggles onto his face. The the paper of the scroll makes a loud crackling sound as his grip tightens enough to tear it.

Itachi murdered his entire clan, save for his younger brother. There are only three Sharingan users left in the world and Konoha has lost all of them - what will that mean for…? No - he can’t focus on that. His brain is stuck on a loop of Itachi and killed and the forest, so often silent now, is waking up, preparing to roar.

“Obito.” Kakashi’s hand lands on his shoulder, squeezing tight.

“I should kill him,” Obito says, with a fury he hasn’t felt in years. “I need to stop him.”

“No,” Kakashi says.

Obito surges to his feet, dropping the ripped scroll on the table and shoving Kakashi back. “He killed my entire clan.”

Kakashi’s expression is calm, even as Obito fists a hand in the front of his shirt. “I know.”

“And you expect me to just do nothing?”

“Yes.”

Obito snarls. Branches pierce through his synthetic skin, tearing his sleeve to shreds. Kakashi doesn’t flinch - just presses his palm over Obito’s heart. “Let it go, Obito.”

Wood winds around Kakashi’s wrist. “You aren’t allowed to say that.”

“I love you,” Kakashi says, still steady. “So I am. We’ve spilt enough blood for three lifetimes - don’t add more by seeking revenge.”

Kakashi’s right - Obito knows that even through the haze of rage still consuming him. Kakashi’s right, and the wood slowly retreats. Breaks free of his skin and clatters to the floor. He takes a deep, grounding breath, and then another before easing his fingers free from their claw-like grip on Kakashi’s shirt.

“Sorry,” he whispers.

Kakashi shrugs and reaches down to take his gloved right hand, threading their fingers together. “It’s understandable.”

Obito slumps forward, pressing his forehead to Kakashi’s shoulder. He thinks about crying, but his tears dried up long ago. He didn’t even like the Uchiha, or growing up under the shadow of their greatness, but that doesn’t mean he wanted them all to die. So many of them never even awakened their Sharingan - weren’t warriors at all, just ordinary people. Innocent people.

Kakashi’s hand cups the back of his neck. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” Obito whispers through the dryness in his throat and the burn of his Sharingan.

_ _

They hold another funeral: more flowers, more grief. This time, he lights them on fire one at a time and lets the ashes drift out over the sea. For his grandmother, who raised him when his parents could not. For Mikoto, who always tried to be kind, in spite of his status as a black sheep. For Fugaku, who believed in Konoha, in spite of his overbearing sternness and pride. For Shisui, who burned brighter than all of them.

For Itachi, and all that he will never be.

(And for Sasuke, left behind to carry on alone.)

After the last of the ashes have been swallowed by the waves, he lets Kakashi lead him back to the inn and into bed. Vents some of his grief and heartbreak onto Kakashi’s skin.

(“I’ve got you,” Kakashi murmurs to him, as his nails scratch Kakashi’s sides and back and his fingers press bruises into Kakashi’s thighs. “I’ve got you.”)

_ _

The sun rises bright and full the next morning, lighting the horizon on fire and spreading gold across the surface of the ocean.

Obito sits on the roof of the inn to watch it, to remind himself that life carries on. Wounds heal, grief ebbs like the tide, and the sun comes up.

Kakashi sinks down beside him - mask back in place and hair hanging in his eyes. He’s got purpling bruises in the shape of Obito’s fingers on his arms and wrists, but he glares when Obito opens his mouth to apologize.

They are what they need to be for each other - it’s an unspoken promise they made a long time ago.

“It’s beautiful,” Obito says instead, glancing back out at the water.

Kakashi hums in agreement and Obito drops a gentle kiss on his bare shoulder.

Forward, he tells himself, tasting salt from the sea on his tongue, don’t look back.

_ _

They’ve been exiles for ten years when Konoha tries to kill them. Oh, they don’t advertise themselves as Leaf ANBU, but it’s evident in the way they fight, the way they move - especially to Kakashi, who used to be one of them.

“You’re sure?” Obito asks him when the short but brutal battle is over.

Kakashi slides his katana into its usual sheath on his back and crouches over one of the bodies, wiping away blood from a cut above his eye. “There were rumors, when I was in ANBU, of a secret division. One that didn’t answer to the Hokage. I think it was called the Foundation.” He lifts the cracked Kiri mask off the man’s face. “They might be from there.”

“I hope so,” Obito mutters, joining him. “I don’t know why Sandaime would suddenly decide to kill us.” This close, he realizes that the ANBU isn’t a man at all, but little more than a boy. Probably no older than they were, when they went on the mission to Kannabi Bridge. “Fuck. Who do they answer to?”

“Danzo,” Kakashi says, grim. “Or so I heard.”

“Danzo?” Obito fishes around in his memories. “Wait - the creepy guy? On the council? With the bandages and the scar and the overwhelming desire to see us publicly executed?”

“That’s the one.”

“Fuck.” Obito stands up. “Why the hell is he trying to kill us now, though? He would have had a much easier time when we were fifteen.”

Kakashi rocks back on his heels. “What’s changed?”

He’s using that tone that means he’s already arrived at the answer, but he wants Obito to catch up on his own. Obito bites down the urge to hit him that always arises in response to that tone and thinks. It would have to be a fairly seismic event, to spur Danzo into coming after them when he’s previously seemed content to let sleeping dogs lie - as it were.

Oh.

“The Uchiha are dead. There are no Sharingan users left in Konoha.”

Kakashi nods and gently closes the ANBU kid’s eyes before rising to his feet. “He’s probably nervous about the fact that the only three Sharingan users still alive are missing-nin.”

“And he didn’t think he could get Itachi so he decided to go after us instead. Two wielders, one stone.”

“Except he obviously underestimated us,” Kakashi says, glancing around at the other corpses. “If he only sent two squads.”

“I guess our reputation doesn’t precede us enough.”

“Hard to imagine.” They’re in dozens of Bingo Books, for all that they’ve tried to keep to themselves. They’ve got flee-on-sight orders next to their names from Iwa, Kiri, and Suna.

Obito sighs. “Do you think he’ll try again?”

“Probably.”

Obito bends down to pick up the mask. They can’t return to Konoha, or contact Sarutobi directly, but they can do something.

“Help me collect the bodies?”

Kakashi arches an eyebrow at him but complies, laying them out for Obito to warp into the Kamui dimension.

“I’m assuming you have a plan?” he asks mildly - once the last corpse has been safely stored.

“We’re going to the border,” Obito says. “To leave a message.”

Kakashi tilts his head slightly to the right, and Obito can clearly picture the smirk he’s sporting beneath the mask. “Good plan.”

“I know. I have them all the time.”

“Maa, on-”

“Don’t start.”

_ _

They arrange the bodies amidst the dense Fire Country trees, five feet from the official border with Hot Springs. On each of the Kiri masks, they paint the Leaf symbol (which Obito is surprised he remembers, even after ten years without seeing a Konoha hitai-ate) and underneath it the kanji for Foundation.

Hopefully that’s blatant enough.

_ _

A written apology comes from Sandaime two weeks later, along with the promise of a thorough investigation. Obito doubts any real change will come of it - this is the way of the shinobi world, and from Kakashi’s info Danzo has his claws sunk deep into the heart Konoha - but he appreciates the fact that, even after all these years, Sarutobi Hiruzen is still on their side.

_  _

When they’re twenty-six, they get word through their network that a corrupt businessman has installed himself in Wave Country.

“Gatou, huh?” Kakashi remarks, reading the scroll over Obito’s shoulder.

“They’re asking for help getting rid of him.”

“Sounds like he has a lot of resources.”

Obito rolls up the scroll and smacks Kakashi’s arm with it. “C’mon, Bakakashi, it’s a corrupt businessman hiding behind a bunch of goons.” He grins, fierce. “How hard can it be?”

Kakashi sighs.

Chapter Text

_ _ 

part iii: hatake kakashi, jounin sensei?

_ _ 

If Kakashi survives this, he’s going to kill Obito. Violently. Slowly.  

A simple mission - what could go wrong? Just a corrupt businessman and a bunch of goons - easy! Of course, the corrupt businessman used his vast wealth and resources to hire the fucking Demon of the Mist. So now Kakashi is strapped to a table in the middle of a torture chamber, with an interrogator slowly sinking a blade between his ribs for the sixth time, and it is one hundred percent Obito’s fault. Yes, falling for a water prison was a rookie mistake, he’ll admit that here - in the privacy of his own thoughts - but the wealth of blame still lands squarely at Obito’s feet.

The blade slides sideways, cutting deep, and he swallows back a cry of pain. Tries to take stock of his injuries though the fog steadily coalescing in his brain. He’s got at least three broken ribs and a massive bruise blooming along his right side that might be a sign of internal bleeding; numerous deep cuts, some of them almost to bone; his left leg is broken in two spots on his tibia and one on his fibula; his left lung has been punctured, making breathing difficult; when he coughs, he can taste blood in his mouth, which is another sign of chest trauma.

And they’ve been draining his chakra since the start of this, leaving his reserves dangerously low.

Fortunately, they’ve left his Sharingan covered - probably afraid that he might be able to use it to escape (a valid fear, but unfounded, considering his low chakra levels).

In summary: not the worst situation he’s been in, but definitely in the top ten. Potentially even top five.

A hand fists in his hair, hauling his head back. He wheezes, feels more blood flood his mouth, and blinks up at the frowning face of his interrogator.

“I said, who hired you?”

Oh, right. They’re still asking questions.

“No one,” he says. “I told you, I’m just a tourist. I heard Wave Country has amazing beaches and-”

The man slams Kakashi’s head against the table hard enough to briefly white out his vision. His ears are also ringing, and he’d very much like to pass out, but at least the interrogator seems to be getting impatient. He’ll probably either give up soon and let Kakashi rest, or kill him.

With how much pain he’s currently in, Kakashi’s not sure which option he’d prefer.

“Fine,” the interrogator growls. (He keeps pitching his voice deeper, like he thinks that will make him more intimidating. Mostly he just sounds ridiculous.) “Let’s see if a night in a cell makes you more cooperative.”

Unlikely, Kakashi thinks, but keeps his mouth shut as his hands are released from the straps and a chain is threaded through the suppression cuffs.

“Take him,” the interrogator says to the guards stationed at the door.

The world blurs when he’s hauled to his feet, black spots filling his vision from the agony of putting weight on his broken leg. He’s not sure how long the trip to the cell is: minutes, probably, but could be hours. He experiences a brief flash of clarity when his body hits the rough dirt floor and he ascends to a level of pain he’s only experienced once before - half a mountain coming down on him when he was sixteen.

He wheezes, ignoring the furious protest of his collapsed lung, and coughs as the knives internally stabbing just about every inch of his nervous system retreat, allowing the fog to make a swift return.

(Death might be too much of a mercy for Obito, at this point.)

It takes him an embarrassingly long time to realize that he isn’t alone in the cell. But eventually he registers eyes on him and manages to lift his head enough to catch a hazy glimpse of a kid.

No, he realizes, as he gingerly pushes himself up on one elbow and sees the gleam of a hitai-ate, not a kid. A shinobi. A Leaf shinobi - with Obito’s dark eyes and aristocratic features. And behind him: two crumpled forms, one orange and one pink. Of all things.

“Are you real?” he asks, because better safe than sorry considering his current state.

The kid blinks in surprise. “Yes?”

“You don’t sound too sure,” Kakashi points out, and the kid looks even more confused. Probably not a dream, then. His brain isn’t kind enough to throw random, meaningless strangers at him. “Never mind. You wouldn’t be what I hallucinate.”

(It would be Rin, most likely, eyes lit by the blue spark of Chidori. Or Obito, with half his face crushed in. Or Minato-sensei, bleeding out in Konoha grass.)

“What’s your name, kid?”

The kid’s eye twitches subtly. Definitely a fucking Uchiha. “Sasuke.”

Oh fate really does have a sense of humor, doesn’t it? “Kakashi.”

He wants to say more, but his body chooses that moment to remind him of his extensive injuries, throwing him into a violent coughing fit that feels like weathering a private earthquake - blood and bile climbing like lava up his throat and past his lips.

“Are you dying?” Uchiha Sasuke asks, without much concern.

“Maa, probably.” ( Definitely, but no need to worry the brat.) “My partner’s late.” He wheezes out a bitter laugh and pictures himself wringing Obito’s neck. “As usual. At least this will piss him off.” (Imprisoned kids and a hurt partner - Obito is going to go postal.) “Why are you brats locked up in here?”

Sasuke’s eye twitches again, more blatantly this time. “Ransom.”

Ah, yes. The Last of the Uchiha will probably fetch a hefty price from Konoha, and Gatou is never one to pass up a business opportunity. “Well, if I live long enough for my partner to show up, I’ll make sure you get out.” Might as well offer some reassurance, because there is fear lurking in Sasuke’s eyes, beneath the layers of aloof bravado. “Otherwise, he’ll kill everyone avenging my death and then let you out himself. He’s caring that way.”

And I will haunt him from the afterlife until the end of his days.

Sasuke merely frowns at him, like he’s gone insane. Which is somewhat understandable, even if the loss of sanity happened years not hours ago. Oh well, he has bigger things to worry about than Uchiha Sasuke’s opinion of his mental health. Like the black seeping in again and the weight of chakra exhaustion turning his limbs to lead.

“Damn suppressors,” he mutters, coughing again. Hopefully whoever invented them was swiftly assassinated in retaliation. He squints at Sasuke through the rapidly encroaching darkness. “I’m gonna pass for a little bit, okay?”

He’s gone before he hears Sasuke’s reply.

_ _

Obito, predictably, arrives and goes postal . While taking out half a prison wall is a little much, in Kakashi’s humble opinion, the look of awe and terror on the genin brats’ faces is hilarious.

“You’re late,” he still says in accusation, waving a limp hand.

Obito has the grace to look somewhat sheepish. “Sorry, a black cat crossed my path, so I had to take the long way. And then I got lost.”

Oh, he’s going to drag it out so long Obito will beg for death by the end - and then Kakashi will kill him, learn how to use Edo Tensei, and start all over again. As soon as he’s strong enough to move on his own.

For now, he lets Obito break open his cuffs. “Gatou?”

“Dead,” Obito says sharply, and that’s a consolation, at least. Knowing Obito, it was swift and extremely brutal.

“Zabuza?”

“Gone.”

He’s not surprised, even if he would have liked to pay the bastard back for that water prison.

Obito touches his cheek, a fleeting, intimate reassurance, and heads over the check on the brats. Kakashi’s world fades to black again - swift and final, like the close of a film.

_ _

He wakes up briefly to Obito lowering him onto soft grass outside the compound. The smell of the sea is overwhelming and he can feel the breeze coming off it, ruffling his hair and rattling the leaves in the towering trees.

“Man, I can’t believe you got caught, Bakakashi,” Obito says, voice light and eye dark with worry.

“Shut up, moron,” Kakashi huffs. How many times can Edo Tensei be used on the same person?

Obito crouches next to him, drags warm fingers through his hair, and Kakashi’s irritation eases a small fraction. “Can you handle Kamui?”

“I’d rather that than you carry me all the way back to town,” Kakashi says and Obito nods. “I’m probably going to pass out again, though.”

“That’s okay,” Obito says, Sharingan swirling. “Just don’t die on me, yeah?”

“I’m not dying in Wave Country,” Kakashi grumbles as the world starts to spin and contort. “Or without killing you for this first.”

“That’s the spirit,” Obito says with irritating cheer and finishes teleporting Kakashi before he can throw a punch.

_ _

Time passes in flashes: Obito knelt over him, palms glowing green; the blurred brown of a ceiling; the drumbeat of rain on a roof; Obito’s fingers tangled with his; the scratch of blankets and bandages against his skin; the searing press of Obito’s mouth to his temple; voices murmuring from somewhere far above him …

And then blue eyes framed by riotous blond hair.

The air seizes in his still-healing lungs. Minato-sensei?

No, he reminds himself. Namikaze Minato has been dead for twelve years. This is just - he spots three vertical marks on a pale cheek, like whiskers, and feels realization punch him in the stomach. This is just his son.

Never mind a sense of humor, fate is cruel.

“Hey!” Namikaze Minato’s son yells. “You’re awake!”

So loud, Kakashi thinks. (So much like Kushina.)

“Yes?” he rasps. While he certainly aches enough to be awake, he’s still not entirely sure this all hasn’t been a weird dream - first the last Uchiha and now Minato-sensei’s son? In Wave Country of all places?

Minato-sensei’s son grins - crooked and wide and infectious, just like Kushina. “Awesome, I’ve been so bored.”

Kakashi, tired of staring up at the ceiling, grits his teeth and tries pushing himself into a sitting position. His arm wobbles and his injuries protest, but before he can flop back down onto the pallet in an undignified heap - Minato-sensei’s son reaches out to steady him.

“Whoa! Easy. Obito-san said not to let you move too much yet.”

Kakashi waves a dismissive hand. “Maa, Obito’s an idiot. Don’t listen to him.”

He shifts to get a clearer look at the kid: small, still a little baby-faced; Minato-sensei’s hair and features but Kushina’s eyes; also covered in bandages; and wearing the most hideous orange jumpsuit Kakashi has ever laid eyes on. Gods, he’s found a more offensive dresser than Gai. (Though that was twelve years ago - maybe Gai has moved on from the green spandex.)

“He’s kinda scary, though,” the kid is saying. “With the eye and everything and when he glares it’s like the air gets all dark and weird, but I’m glad you’re awake! Obito-san is showing Sakura-chan some stamina stuff but I’m not allowed to train yet and Sasuke's being a sulky bastard so I’ve been stuck in here for ages and you’re kinda boring just lying there - I even thought you’d died a couple times because you don’t snore or anything. Plus Obito-san seemed really worried about your injuries and kept muttering that he ‘killed Gatou too quickly.’ Anyway, I’m Naruto, and Obito-san said your name is Hatake Kakashi and I should call you Kakashi-san since only he’s allowed to use Bakakashi…”

Kakashi stares, understanding one word in maybe ten. This is definitely Kushina’s child - might even put her to shame, in fact. And Naruto, huh? After ramen? That doesn’t seem like something Minato-sensei would do, but it suits the kid.

Who is still talking. “...don’t know why no one listens when I tell them I’m fine - I heal really really fast and I don’t need bed rest. I should be training and getting stronger so I can defeat Zabuza next time! He-”

Not knowing how else to shut him up, Kakashi reaches over and puts a hand on his head. Naruto freezes instantly, eyes widening. “Slow down,” Kakashi murmurs. “How long have I been out?”

Naruto frowns and tilts his head, mentally counting. “Three days?”

Well, not as bad as he thought.

He hums in acknowledgement and drops his hand. Takes stock of himself again. He’s covered in bandages and he can feel that his leg’s been splinted. Obito stripped him out of his combat vest and shirt, but thankfully let him keep his mask and wrapped him up in a loose, comfortable yukata. His eye’s also still covered by its usual black band. And he aches, everywhere, but he isn’t dead.

Which is also more than he expected, if he’s being honest.

Next to him, Naruto is practically vibrating from the effort of keeping quiet, and Kakashi decides to put him out of his misery. It might be nice to have a distraction until he inevitably falls asleep again. (Plus he’s curious about what life is like for Minato and Kushina’s child.) “You’re from Konoha?”

Naruto looks surprised again, like he wasn’t expecting Kakashi to talk to him. “Yeah!”

“I haven’t been there in a long time, do you like it?”

Naruto nods and launches into story mode, talking a mile a minute as he helps Kakashi lie down again. He jumps topics rapidly, making it difficult to follow, especially in Kakashi’s condition, but he tries his best. He gathers that Naruto lives alone, loves ramen more than is healthy, is an incorrigible prankster, and wants to become Hokage (another knife to the heart, that one). But his mind mainly sticks on just how alone Naruto is. Apart from an Iruka-sensei and Sandaime, he doesn’t seem to have anyone looking out for him. He soaks up attention like a sponge, lighting up every time Kakashi murmurs another simple question (like what his favorite ramen is) or laughs at a prank (painting the Hokage monument and evading a squad of ANBU is quite the feat). It reminds him of saying goodbye to an empty house every morning and he aches - sharp and piercing, like a kunai sliding between his ribs.

His eyes are getting heavy again, though, so he reaches out, fumbling, and snags Naruto’s arm. “Maa, I need to sleep, okay, Naruto? We can talk more later.” Naruto nods. Kakashi gives his arm a squeeze. “You should rest, too.”

“I’m fine,” Naruto grumbles, but at Kakashi’s pointed look, he returns to his own pallet.

And falls asleep in under a minute, breathing deep and even. Kakashi, in contrast, stares up at the ceiling, thoughts churning wild and restless.

He survived, he lived wars with but what kind of life has he had? Who’s been taking care of him?

He misses Minato-sensei and Kushina, too, though that particular ache is dulled and mangeable - tempered by time. Still, when he closes his eyes, he’s back in a Konoha as snow falls and Kushina shops in the market, radiating joy so strong and brilliant it’s like standing next to a sun.

_ _

He heals, slowly. Meets the other members of Team 7: Sasuke, quiet and sullen, and Sakura, whip-smart and crushing so hard on Sasuke it’s painful to watch.

Zabuza killed their sensei, he also learns, and sees the horror they can’t keep off their faces. A part of them are no longer children, having witnessed that, and while it’s sad to see kids shedding their innocence so fast, even during times of peace - he knows it will help them in the long run. They survived, and they’ll use this to get stronger.

(Hopefully.)

There’s just one problem.

“You’re getting attached,” he says to Obito during one of his rare excursions outside. He can only make it to the front porch of Tazuna’s house, but he can see the forest from here - and the three brats trying to use chakra on the poor trees.

“No, I’m not,” Obito says too quickly and as though he didn’t spend half the morning teaching them how to channel chakra into the soles of their feet.

Kakashi pokes him.

“Fine,” Obito huffs. “They’re cute.”

“They’re little shits.” Sakura called him old this morning and he still hasn’t forgiven her.

“But cute little shits. With lots of potential.”

(He doesn’t mention Sasuke or Naruto’s heritage - the only other survivor of his clan that’s not batshit and the son of the man he thinks he killed. But he can’t keep the shadows out of his eye and two nights ago, he curled up next to Kakashi on the sleeping pallet. Kakashi put his good arm around him and let Obito tuck his face into the curve of his neck - held him while he shook.)

“Put your bleeding heart away, Obito,” he says quietly, with as much gentleness as possible. “We have to give them back.”

Obito glowers at him and raps Kakashi's chest with a gloved hand. “Easier said than done, Hatake. Not all of us have ice in there like you do.”

“We still have to give them back.”

In the forest, Naruto crashes to the ground for the umpteenth time and moans, clutching his head. From her perch high up in the branches, Sakura laughs.

“He doesn’t know who his parents are,” Obito says, watching Naruto pick himself up. “No one’s told him.”

“It makes sense,” Kakashi counters, even as he wonders about the loneliness he can still feel beneath Naruto’s overconfident veneer. “If the other hidden villages found out that Yondaime had a son, who is now jinchūriki to the Kyūbi no Yōko, Naruto could be put in a lot of danger.”

“But they’re his parents,” Obito says, fingers curled into a fist against his thigh. “He deserves to know who they were.”

“Maybe,” Kakashi concedes. “But it isn’t our place.”

Team 7 belongs back in Konoha, with a new jounin sensei to guide them into their no-doubt bright futures. Interfering with that would only invite trouble.

Obito sighs and scrubs a hand over his face. “I hate it when you’re right.”

“Mmm, you should be used to it by now, considering how often it happens.”

“I misspoke - I hate you. In general. As a person.”

Kakashi crinkles his eye in the fake smile he knows pisses Obito off, and Obito predictably rolls his eyes in response, getting up to call the brats in for dinner.

_ _

Because Obito is a sentimental idiot, he insists that they escort the kids back to the border themselves. Kakashi isn’t eager to face down a squad of ANBU and a potential execution, but Obito is also stubborn, and he’s learned when to pick his battles.

It’s a week long journey to the Land of Fire, taking their slow pace into account, and Naruto spends most of it trying to convince them to train him. Sasuke broods - darkness wrapped around him like a shroud - and it sets Kakashi on edge. There is a deep well of anger there - that reminds him of Obito in the early aftermath of the Kyuubi and Rin - and if Sasuke isn’t careful, it will take him to treacherous places. Places not easily returned from.

Hopefully Sandaime finds a jounin that can help steer him towards a better path.

Sakura is quiet, too, though hers is the contemplative kind. The events of Wave shook her harder than the other two, he suspects, and she’s facing a crossroads of her own.

It isn’t his place, but maybe he can help her with the decision.

“Sakura,” he asks her one night over dinner, taking advantage of the fact that Sasuke and Naruto are pestering Obito about something, “why did you decide to become a kunoichi?”

She also seems surprised that he’s acknowledging her (what kind of sensei was Ebisu?) and nervously plays with a strand of her long pink hair. “I, um, I wanted to…” A furtive glance towards Sasuke.

“No,” he decides and she blinks at him, “that’s not it.”

“W-what?”

“Forget about him,” he says with a nod towards Sasuke. (He suspects it might save her a lot of heartache.) “Why do you want to be a shinobi?”

She bites her lip, brow furrowed in thought, and he lets the silence stretch. Lets her search inside herself for reasons she probably unintentionally buried. “To … to prove that I can,” she says at last. “To become strong. And - and help others.”

“Mmm, that’s a good reason.” (There’s hope for her, after all.)

“But I don’t think I can do it,” she whispers, bowing her head. “When we … when we fought Zabuza, I couldn’t do anything. I’m not strong like Sasuke-kun. Or even Naruto. I was … useless. ”

He shrugs. “So get stronger.” At her startled look, he sighs. “You have potential, Sakura. You’re smarter than those two by a mile and your chakra control is impressive, especially considering your age. You could do great things, if you use what happened instead of giving up.”

“You … you really think so?” she says with a combination of disbelief and amazed hope.

He leans in closer, conspiratory. “I do. You can leave them in the dust.”

She nods slowly, fidgeting with the hem of her dress, and he hasn’t convinced her, but this might at least be something for her to think about.

“I wish you would train us,” she says suddenly, fierce frustration stealing over her features. “Ebisu-sensei never even looked at me.”

That answers some of his questions about Ebisu - and confirms some of his doubts. But, “we can’t, Sakura.”

She nods again - a disappointed slump in her spine. He swallows down his own strange disappointment and puts a comforting hand on her shoulder. “But I’m sure your next sensei will be better. And if they don’t look at you, make them.”

The fierceness returns, just a little. Maybe enough. “Right … thank you, Kakashi-san.”

_ _

After the brats are asleep, Obito sits down beside him with a knowing expression. “You’re getting attached.”

He doesn’t bother with a denial that Obito will see right through. “They are kind of cute.”

“Yeah,” Obito agrees softly. “They grow on you.”

We could help them, Kakashi thinks, which is absurd. They can’t - the past cannot be erased, they cannot go back to Konoha, and three genin cannot leave it. But he hates the idea of Sasuke returning to a quest for revenge, Naruto to the loneliness of an empty apartment, and Sakura to obscurity.

They could be something, if they were given a chance. A motivating kick. A guiding hand.

But also, what the hell does he know? He hasn’t been a jounin in twelve years - hasn’t set foot in a hidden village since he was fourteen. He’s got innocent blood on his hands and still-mending cracks in his foundation. It’s presumptuous to think that he could train a new generation of shinobi. That belongs to another life - one where he didn’t raise a sword to his comrades, one where he stayed.

Obito’s fingers brush through the hair at the nape of his neck. “I’m gonna miss them.”

“They’ll be okay,” Kakashi says, trying to convince himself.

“Yeah,” Obito murmurs. “It’s better this way.”

He doesn’t sound like he believes it, either. But they’ve both gotten good at accepting what is, what isn’t, and what can never be.

_ _

Naruto doesn’t give up, even two days from the border. Kakashi almost admires his tenacity, even though he also wants to put tape over Naruto’s mouth to shut him up.

“Naruto,” he says the night before they’re meant to rendezvous with the ANBU, “come help me get water?”

(Obito’s been fielding most of Naruto’s arguments/pleas/demands/questions, and he figures it’s his turn.)

Naruto abandons his haphazard attempt at placing wood for a fire and snags the large canteen Kakashi holds out to him. The stream is half a mile away and Kakashi doesn’t trust his still-healing leg in the trees just yet - plenty of time to have a chat.

“You’re not subtle, you know,” Naruto announces once they’ve left the camp behind.

Kakashi arches an eyebrow - that isn’t an accusation he’s heard often in his life. “Oh?”

Naruto glares up at him. “I know you wanna have a talk and you’re just gonna say the same stuff as Obito-san -” he pitches his voice lower, in a dramatic impression of Obito, “‘we can’t train you, Naruto, you need to stop asking.’”

Kakashi forces down the amused smile trying to overtake his mouth. “We can’t train you, Naruto, you need to stop asking.”

Naruto punches him in the side. “But why? ”

It’s amazing, how much an idiot Namikaze Minato’s son can be - though this is probably more willful blindness than anything. Kushina always saw the good in people, too - even if she had to reach inside them and drag it to the surface herself. “Because we’re missing-nin,” he says. “Konoha considers us criminals.”

“You saved us, though,” Naruto argues, like one good deed is enough to erase someone’s entire bloodsoaked past.

This kid, Kakashi thinks around the increasingly familiar ache in his chest. “That’s not enough to pardon us.”

“That’s stupid,” Naruto huffs, crossing his skinny arms over his chest.

“It’s the way of things.”

“Then I’m going to change it! When I become Hokage.”

The ache sharpens. “Maa, I’m sure you will,” he says quietly and Naruto’s mouth opens in shock. “But for now, this is the reality.”

Naruto’s fingers scrape against the edges of the canteen as his expression slowly crumples. “But … you might be my only chance.”

Kakashi stops walking. “What?”

Naruto clutches the canteen to his chest like a shield. “No one … none of the adults in the village like me, even the jounin-sensei. It’s always been that way, and I never knew why, but Mizuki-sensei told me that it’s because I’m a monster. That - that I’m the Kyuubi - and even though Iruka-sensei and Hokage-jiji told me that isn’t true, it’s still sealed inside me. I’m - I’m a jin-jinch - something.”

“Jinchūriki,” Kakashi supplies on autopilot.

Naruto’s eyes widen. “You know?”

“Yes. I was there … the night it attacked.” Which is all he wants to say about one of the worst days of his life.

Naruto flinches. Hugs the canteen tighter. “Everyone hates me,” he whispers. “Or … or is afraid of me? Maybe that’s the same thing - I don’t know - but Ebisu-sensei didn’t really want to train me, only Sasuke because he’s an Uchiha. He told me that it was better if I didn’t become a shinobi - that it was dangerous. And I was worthless, anyway, and--”

Naruto wipes an arm viciously across his face and Kakashi tries not to let his rage consume him. If Ebisu wasn’t dead already, he would be now.

I should have been there, is all he can think - painfully reminded of the whispers that followed Sakumo around the village, then him. (Son of a traitor, a failure, a disgrace - hope he doesn’t grow up like his father.) Of the emptiness of his family home and the blood that never washed out of the tatami. I should have been there.

In another life…

And where was Sandaime in all this? How could he have let this happen to Minato and Kushina’s child? Let a whole village shun and hate any child?

“Sorry,” Naruto mutters, still battling his leaking eyes.

Kakashi moves on instinct, crouching down and pulling Naruto into a tight hug. Naruto hiccups and stills for a moment, stunned, then hugs back just as hard. Shaking fingers clench at the fabric of Kakashi’s shirt and he can feel warm tears on his neck and shoulder.

“It isn’t fair,” Naruto whispers - a rare moment of childish frustration.

“No,” Kakashi agrees, petting Naruto’s riotous hair. “It isn’t.”

Naruto pulls back, then, sucking in a deep breath. Gives Kakashi Kushina’s crooked smile, trembling at the edges. “But I’ll be okay, Kakashi-san! I’m gonna show them all.”

“I’m sure you will,” Kakashi repeats. “And if Obito and I could train you, we would.”

“Will you come to my ceremony?” Naruto asks, with rare vulnerability. “When I become Hokage? I’ll pardon you so you can make it.”

Kakashi takes a deep breath of his own and squeezes Naruto’s shoulders. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Naruto nods, determined. “Good. It’s a promise.”

“A promise,” Kakashi agrees, and stands.

There’s a half-baked, Obito-esque idea forming in his head, but he already knows he can’t go through with it. As much as he doesn’t want Naruto to be alone, as much as he wants updates on the kid’s life now that he knows Naruto survived and is stumbling forward on his way to greatness, there is too much risk involved. He would potentially be putting not only his and Obito’s lives in danger, but Naruto’s as well.

The summoning scroll is still burning a hole in his pouch, though - all it would take is one signature and then Naruto would have access to Pakkun whenever he needed. And the dog could-

No. Don’t be an idiot, Hatake. Put your bleeding heart away.

“Come on,” he says, taking the canteen from Naruto. “We should get a move on.”

Naruto’s eyes are still red-rimmed, but he gathers himself up and nods again. Lurking beneath that exuberant personality is Minato’s steely resolve, and it gives him even more hope for the kid’s future.

He might actually become Hokage - hideous orange jumpsuit and all.

_ _

Life, he feels he should remind himself more often, doesn’t enjoy being predictable. Which is why he’s once again standing across from Sarutobi Hiruzen in a Fire Country forest. The man looks ancient and small - battered by time and the burden of the robes he still wears. But his gaze is as sharp and calculating as ever, and the pipe in his hands is the same one he’s been using for over three decades.

“You can’t be serious,” Obito is saying in disbelief - the same thought that rattled around in Kakashi’s head when they were exiled instead of executed.

Perhaps time is a strange cycle, after all - always doomed to distorted repetition.

“I’m very serious,” Sandaime says, though not without a degree of amusement. “I think you should train them. They clearly want to go with you.”

Yes - enough to demand it from the Hokage himself. Kakashi isn’t used to this level of popularity.

“We’re missing-nin,” Obito says slowly - like he thinks Sarutobi has somehow forgotten. “Worse than that - exiles. The council would never agree to us taking away three genin.”

“Two of which are the last of the Uchiha and the Kyuubi’s jinchūriki,” Kakashi adds dryly, finally shaking off some of his shock.

“I’ll tell them after you’ve left,” Sarutobi says with an apathetic shrug.

Obito’s eye narrows. “I don’t want ANBU chasing after us.”

Sarutobi sighs around his pipe. “Allow me to lay out my argument, at least?”

Of course, they’re going to let him - they both want this to work far more than they should. And maybe there will be an explanation for Naruto’s isolation in there somewhere. Or how Team 7 got assigned such an abysmal jounin-sensei.

“Fine,” Obito says, crossing his arms. “Argue away.”

Sarutobi inclines his head - that amused smile twitching in the corner of his mouth again. “To put it frankly, you two are the best possible option for sensei - status as exiles or not. Obito, the combination of your Sharingan and mokuton is the only thing that could keep the Kyuubi under control should it somehow break free from Yondaime’s seal.” Obito’s glove creaks softly, as his hand tenses, but he says nothing. “Not to mention your experience as an Uchiha, now that young Sasuke has awakened his own Sharingan.” Sarutobi’s gaze turns dark and troubled. “He is walking a perilous path - one that perhaps you can dissuade him of.”

Obito bares his teeth. “Me? The mass murderer?”

Kakashi glares at him for being difficult, for the guilt he still refuses to completely let go of.

Sarutobi puffs serenely on his pipe, a knowing expression on his face. “You? A fellow Uchiha who has survived brushes with the madness that often plagues your clan? Yes, I expect you can help him.”

Obito huffs and glares mulishly at the ground. Point: Sarutobi.

“Not to mention, I believe it would be good for him to get away from the village. The last of the Uchiha is a difficult burden to bear and….” Here Sarutobi hesitates. “There are … other extenuating circumstances that I cannot speak on, but contribute to Sasuke being safer outside of Konoha for the time being.”

Well that sounds ominous.

“Circumstances surrounding the massacre?” Kakashi asks, with false casualness.

Sarutobi’s silence is answer enough. Obito’s frowns, fury rising in the air - Kakashi can almost feel the heat of it against his skin. “Obito….”

“As for Naruto,” Sandaime continues, ignoring Obito’s anger.

“No,” Obito interrupts. “What about the massacre, old man?”

“You know I cannot tell you,” Sarutobi says softly, something like grief on his weathered face.

“Fine,” Obito snarls. “Fine, let’s talk about Naruto, then. Let’s talk about how he doesn’t know who his parents are, or that he’s apparently been shunned by the entire fucking village his whole life. Do you want to explain that? ”

Kakashi stops trying to rein him in - in this, he’s as upset as Obito. Sarutobi’s grief deepens, compressing him down to the tired old man he always pretends he isn’t. “I will admit to my own mistakes, Obito,” he murmurs. “I was trying to protect Naruto, both from the interest of other villages and the distrust of our own, but … my methods have left much to be desired.”

“No shit,” Obito says.

“He said that no one else will train him,” Kakashi says, fusing as much ice into his voice as he can “Is that true?”

“Probably,” Sarutobi admits. “Which is why I want him to go with you. Away from the village’s fear and resentment, he will truly have a chance to grow. Too many here elevate Sasuke and cut down Naruto - I doubt either of you will make that same mistake.”

No, Kakashi thinks, remembering Naruto’s fingers curled desperate against his back, they won’t.

“And Sakura?” he asks.

“She will be more difficult,” Sarutobi says, taking another contemplative puff of his pipe. “Of the three, she is the only one with a family - and a civilian family, at that. But she wants to go, and I’m sure that with my backing she’ll be able to convince her parents.”

“What will you tell them?” Obito asks, some of his anger lessening.

Sarutobi smiles at them. “That I’ve sent her to train with two of the greatest shinobi our village ever produced.”

Obito clenches his jaw. “We did this without you. Without Konoha.”

“Yes,” Sarutobi agrees, quiet. “You did. Which is another reason you should teach them. You both survived, despite all the odds against you.”

“How would it work, though?” Kakashi asks, because focusing on technical details is easier than dealing with all the emotions swirling in the air like a gathering hurricane.

Sarutobi straightens, some of his usual authority returning. “I would expect monthly reports from you, detailing their progress. They would remain on our official rosters, but they would not wear hitai-ate or identify as Konoha nin beyond the village, for their safety. You two would be unofficially instated as jounin-sensei, though we would use code names for the records. We would be unable to pay you a stipend, but all commissions from your missions you keep for yourselves, so that should more than make up for any discrepancy.” He puts his hands behind his back. “You would also be required to return them to Konoha once a year, for official assessments. Beyond that, I give you free rein.”

Kakashi arches an eyebrow. That’s … far more independence than he thought they would be granted. At the very least, he figured that extensive and powerful tracking seals would be involved. “You’re trusting us with a lot, Hokage-sama.”

“I am,” Sarutobi agrees easily. “But somehow, I don’t think you’ll disappoint me.”

Obito laughs, a brittle sound, but not humor. “Fine,” he says, as though it was anything other than a foregone conclusion. “We’ll train the brats.”

Sarutobi nods, obviously pleased, and that, it seems, is that.

_ _

(Sarutobi also asks that they don’t reveal the identities of Naruto’s parents to him, just yet. At least until he’s old enough to reliably keep such a massive secret.

“I’m telling him about them, though. At least what they were like,” Obito says, stubborn and cracked open. “He deserves to know and I … I owe it to them.”

Kakashi squeezes Obito’s shoulder, hard enough to bruise, and Sarutobi doesn’t argue.)

_ _

They meet the brats in the forest outside Konoha (he can almost see the gate towers, rising above the canopy, and it strings his nerves taut with anxiety) after the sun has set. They’re all sporting large packs and eager expressions (even Sasuke, though he’s hiding it fairly well). They’ve also lost their hitai-ate, but Naruto’s still got on that awful orange jumpsuit.

“Maa, we’re going to have do something about this,” Kakashi comments, plucking at the fabric.

Naruto tilts his back to meet Kakashi’s gaze, a defensive clench to his jaw. “Why? I don’t tell you how to dress, Kakashi-sensei.”

Kakashi-sensei - he’s going to have to get used to that.

"I don’t wear fabric bright enough to be seen from miles away, Naruto,” he says, keeping his voice mild.

Naruto harrumphs and crosses his arms over his chest. “It doesn’t matter if they can see me - I’ll just kick their asses.”

“It’s also just offensive,” Obito chimes in. “To the human eye.”

“Eh, Obito-sensei, not you, too!”

Obito ruffles Naruto’s hair, ignoring the glare strong enough to put him six feet under. Kakashi’s own grin is safely hidden behind his mask. “There’s a small town a few miles from here," he says. "We’ll find you something more suitable there.”

“Thank god,” Sasuke mutters under his breath. Sakura just shakes her head.

Naruto grumbles, but it’s half-hearted at best. Mostly he looks pleased at the idea of a shopping trip. Or maybe it’s having people that care enough to take him shopping.

Either way, Kakashi’s heart is oddly full.

_ _

The moon is high in the sky when they settle down to camp for the night - once again safely beyond Fire’s borders. The brats are asleep (Naruto now clad in much more sensible blacks and greens - though he insisted on buying a jacket with orange stripes on the sleeves) and Kakashi’s stationed himself in a nearby tree to keep watch.

The branch trembles and the air whirls, heralding Obito’s return from the Kamui dimension. He sits down next to Kakashi, automatically reaching out to put a hand on his leg. (It took some getting used to, Obito’s easy affection, but he’s had nearly a decade of practice now, and he leans into the touch without hesitation.) “We should be stocked for the next month - plenty weapons and food, even for three genin.”

“Mmm, good.”

Obito pauses and shakes his head. “Jounin-sensei. Didn’t see that one coming.”

“I don’t think anyone did. Except maybe Sarutobi,” Kakashi says - still half convinced that the God of Shinobi sees just about everything.

“I’m terrified,” Obito admits in a low whisper. “Are you terrified?”

“Completely.”

“But … excited, too.”

“Mmm.”

Obito shifts to take Kakashi’s hand, threading their fingers together and squeezing tight. “We can do this, right? We’re not going to corrupt them or get them killed within the first week?”

Kakashi scoots closer so he can pull down his mask and press a reassuring kiss to Obito’s neck. “We’re not going to corrupt them or get them killed within the first week. Maybe the first month, but…”

“Asshole,” Obito grumbles.

Another kiss. “I don’t know if we can do this. But we owe it to them to try, ne?”

“Yeah,” Obito says, squeezing Kakashi’s hand again. “We do.”

Another beginning, Kakashi thinks, resting his head against Obito’s. They’ve probably been granted far more of those than they deserve, but. He’s excited for this one. For everything Team 7 is capable of becoming.

“They’re going to be the death of us,” Obito declares. “I can tell. My hair’s already going gray, which you don’t have to worry about. Bastard.”

Kakashi laughs, muffling the sound in Obito’s shoulder. “I’m sure it will make you look very dignified.”

“Asshole,” Obito says again, but the word is full of affection and there is a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Below them, Naruto rolls over in his sleep and crashes into Sasuke, invoking angry spluttering and a low, furious, “watch it, dobe.”

Oh, Kakashi can’t wait. What an adventure this is going to be.

Chapter Text

_ _ 

part iv: team 7, on the road of life

_ _ 

She didn’t think about it, when Hokage-sama asked if she wanted to go with Sasuke and Naruto - the yes left her mouth of its own volition. But she also didn’t want to take it back, in spite of the fear churning like a whirlpool in the middle of her stomach. And she didn’t want to take it back in the face of her parents’ tearful acceptance or when she stood in the middle of her bedroom and realized she didn’t know when she’d see it again. She couldn’t imagine the village without Sasuke-kun in it - and deeper, beyond that, Kakashi-sensei’s words were echoing: you could leave them in the dust.

Further back, to Wave, where she stood useless as Sasuke and Naruto went up against a shinobi at least three times more powerful than them. They didn’t even hesitate and she just … froze. A tearful, helpless kid.

She never wanted to feel like that again, so she packed her bags and told herself it would be okay. This was the right choice.

It still is, she knows that, but after two weeks on the road she might regret it. Just a little.

She’s tired and sore and she misses her bed and showers and maybe even Ino - which is truly a testament to how dire things have gotten. She refuses to be weak, though, or break down. She won’t let Sasuke and Naruto - who both look like a weight has been lifted from their shoulders - see her cry. She shoves her homesickness as far into the recesses of her mind as she can and vows not to look at it. It’ll dissipate eventually.

And if her eyes are blurring a little right now, it’s dark and the boys are already asleep. Obito-sensei is keeping watch, perched somewhere above them in the canopy of the massive Grass Country trees, but dry grass crunches as Kakashi-sensei sits down beside her. She wipes quickly at her face, hoping he didn’t see anything.

When she dares to meet his gaze, though, it’s far too knowing.

Shit.

“I’m sorry,” she mumbles, hoping the shadows hide the embarrassed flush rising to her cheeks.

Kakashi hums and pats her on the head. It’s awkward, like he’s trying to pet a dog, but weirdly comforting, as well. “It’s okay, Sakura. Nothing wrong with missing home.”

“They don’t miss it,” she argues, with a furtive glance to where Sasuke and Naruto are still fast asleep in their bed rolls - burrowed so deep that tufts of black and blond hair are the only visible parts of them.

Kakashi shrugs. “It wasn’t home. It’s different for you.”

You have a family, she knows he isn’t saying. A normal life.

In this small group full of survivors of tragedy and loss, she’s the odd one out.

“Did you miss it?”

She regrets the question as soon as she asks it, sees the way Kakashi tenses in response. There are invisible lines surrounding both him and Obito-sensei - a minefield she can barely detect - and she has a sinking feeling she just crossed one. She’s opening her mouth to stammer out apologies when Kakashi’s shoulders sag and he says, with a quiet sigh, “yes, I did.”

Don’t make a big deal out of it, she thinks frantically, because he’s obviously still on edge. Just move the hell on. “Did it get better?”

“Mmm.” Kakashi throws a few more sticks on the fire. “You just have to give it time.” His eye crinkles in what she’s coming to realize is his equivalent of a smile. “That’s how it works for most things, I’ve learned.”

She nods, not sure if she believes him yet - or maybe it takes longer than she’s imagining. She’d prefer a change of subject, though, instead of contemplating years with this heaviness lining her bones, squeezing her lungs. “Did you mean it? What you said … before?” She sounds too young, she thinks, too timid, but she can’t take back the question.

Kakashi tilts his head, regarding her with that fathomless eye of his. She can’t read the expression in it. “Of course I did. In fact,” he gets up to rummage around in his pack, pulling out a book - a red cover, she notices with relief, instead of the orange one she usually sees him with.  (She got a glimpse of the contents of that one and immediately wanted to pour bleach directly into her brain, or learn a memory-altering jutsu to use on herself. She should still look up memory-altering jutsu, actually, in case of future incidents.)

“Here,” he says, holding the book out to her. “Sealing basics.”

“Sealing?” she says, surprised, and carefully plucks the book from his grasp. The cover is faded and the pages worn with use. When she cracks it open, she can see notes scribbled in the margins - diagrams and technique alterations in what she guesses is Kakashi’s neat handwriting.

His eye crinkles again. “I think you’d be good at it.”

She wonders how much time it will take to get used to this: his easy faith in her. “Really?”

He nods and pats her head again. “But start it in the morning. You should get some sleep, we have a long way to the border of Earth tomorrow.”

She nods, clutching the book to her chest. One final head pat and Kakashi is standing, no doubt to keep watch. She returns to her sleeping roll, mimicking Saskue and Nartuo and pulling it up to cover her head in an attempt at warding off the spring chill.

It’s a long time before she falls asleep.

_ _

Sasuke and Naruto still don’t get along. She’d hoped that what happened in Wave would get rid of at least some of their rivalry, but they’re both stubborn. Especially that idiot Naruto, insisting that he’s on par with Sasuke. That it’s Sasuke’s fault the team isn’t properly functioning.

Today, like every day for the past week and a half, they’re supposed to be helping a small coastal village in the Land of Tea rebuild after a devastating flood. Obito-sensei ordered Sasuke and Naruto to take care of transporting building materials from the cargo boats to the center of the village, where they can be distributed to the various houses. Sakura offered to help, as well, hoping to get closer to Sasuke (who’s seemed determined to ignore her since Wave), but was roped into helping Kakashi-sensei hammer shingles onto one of the roofs instead.

She can hear them fighting, though, even from here. She can’t make out exact words, but the raised voices are frustratingly familiar.

Kakashi sighs, but doesn’t looking up from laying down a new batch of shingles. “They’ve always been like this.”

It doesn’t really sound like a question, but she feels the need to answer. “Since the Academy. It’s mostly Naruto’s fault. He keeps antagonizing Sasuke-kun.”

“It takes two to fight,” Kakashi says, dry.

And she supposes he is right on that front.

From below them, an almost deafening crash echoes, startling her so badly she nearly pitches backwards off the roof. A glance down reveals an overturned cart of wood and Sasuke and Naruto shouting at each other, inches apart.

And Obito-sensei, stalking towards them with fury crackling around him like Kakashi’s lightning chakra.

“ENOUGH.” He roars, grabbing the back of their shirts and yanking them apart. “You brats are on the same fucking team, so start acting like it.”

“But Naruto-”

“Sasuke-”

“I don’t care."  The words are sharp as a katana, cutting through their protests and shutting them up faster than she’s ever seen. Even though none of this is directed at her, she’s still frozen - hammer raised halfway to striking a nail. Obito-sensei is projecting so much killing intent, it’s a miracle Sasuke and Naruto haven’t dropped dead on the spot. “Work together. Or so help me God, I will chain you together and leave you in the most inhospitable forest I can find. Do you understand?”

They gape at him, equally pale. He gives them a rough shake. “Nod, at least.”

Twin nods.

“Good. Argue again and it won’t be a forest, it’ll be the Land of Snow.”

He releases them and storms off as quickly as he came, leaving them to glare at each other, but start cleaning up the mess they made. Together.

Still a little terrified, she glances at Kakashi. He must read the question she can’t voice on her face, because he says, quietly, “they need to learn to work together. Or someone could end up getting killed.”

“Killed? ” That seems a bit extreme.

Kakashi’s gaze darts to where Obito is now helping several men raise the wall of a house. “Yeah.” Back to her, and solemn in a way she hasn’t seen before. “And you shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss Naruto.”

She crosses her arms defensively, ignoring the way the hammer she forgot she was holding digs into her ribs. “But he’s an idiot! He barely graduated and he’s always mouthing off and bragging, but he didn’t even know how to pronounce ‘chakra’ properly!”

“He also went up against an S-ranked missing-nin and survived,” Kakashi comments, light but pointed. Her mouth snaps closed. “And Obito was bottom of his class at the Academy.”

What? No way. Obito-sensei was? That seems impossible. He’s the strongest shinobi she’s ever seen - stronger than even the Hokage, maybe - and he was… “what?”

Kakashi hums. “He was. Dead Last.”

“You’re kidding,” she insists.

A careless shrug. “Maa, ask him about it sometime. Now come on, I want to finish this roof by nightfall.”

She’s not sure she’s going to be brave enough to do that any time soon. For now, she lays out a few more shingles and watches, through furtive glances, as Naruto and Sasuke work together (albeit grudgingly) to bring in the next batch of materials.

_ _

She can’t put down the sealing book once she starts reading it. She’d never considered fūinjutsu as a potential specialization but the possibilities. They seem almost endless. She finds herself scribbling her own notes next to Kakashi-sensei’s - more modifications and ideas she wants to try. She’ll have to get stronger, build up her chakra reserves and fine tune her control a lot, but … it doesn’t seem impossible - out of her reach like Sasuke’s Sharingan or Naruto’s raw power. She’ll never match them in terms of brute strength, she knows that, but with this?

Maybe she at least won’t get left behind.

_ _

There are few routines on the road - not like there would be in the village, going on D-rank missions - but evenings quickly earn the nickname “Survival Skills with Kakashi-sensei” in her head. He teaches them how to catch fish (“Maa, maa, be more patient. You’re scaring the fish away with all your yelling.”), how to cook various meals (“You can’t live off ramen, Naruto.”), how to sew (“Wipe that look off your face, Sasuke, no else is going to fix your clothing for you.”), and how to patch up simple wounds (“Pull it tighter, Sakura, to stop the blood flow. Sasuke’s just being a baby.”).

There are lessons on which plants are poisonous (and how to take advantage of that) and which ones are edible; the best way to set traps for small animals and how to prepare them for meals (or, in Sakura and Naruto’s case, get over how cute they are before death); and the quickest way to build a fire (which is not Great Fireball, no matter what Obito-sensei says).

It’s often tedious work, and the boys grumble constantly, but she feels as triumphant catching her first fish as when she finally learned how to create a bunshin; and Naruto actually whoops in victory the first time he successfully mends a giant tear in his jacket; and even though he tries to hide it, Sasuke looks pleased when it’s his turn to cook and they all compliment him on the meal.

Then Obito-sensei announces, with cheerful sadism, that it’s time for them to put everything into practice.

_ _

He dumps them in the middle of Swamp Country with a map, two packs of supplies, ten kunai, twenty senbon needles, and five shuriken, and announces brightly that he’ll see them in a week at the rendezvous point, if they survive that long.

“Let’s kill him,” Sasuke announces as they watch him teleport away.

“Slowly,” Naruto agrees.

“Painfully,” she adds through her already mounting dread.

They shake on it.

_ _

Two days in, she wants to kill her teammates instead. They bicker incessantly, about everything, and as a result they spent half a day going in the wrong direction before realizing and correcting course. Now they’re arguing over the best way to ford a flooded, fast-moving river. Naruto wants to try to swim it (the idiot) while Sasuke is insisting they try to get a rope to the other side and cross that way (also stupid.) Meanwhile, she’s barely slept in two days; she’s drenched and has mud in places she didn’t think it was possible for mud to go; and she’s starving because the rain has kept them from building a fire.

They’ve also been ignoring her ever since this nightmare began and watching them, glaring daggers at each other, something inside of her snaps - brutal and final.

“STOP IT!” She screams loud enough to scare several nearby birds from the trees. They whip around to stare at her, startled. Like they forgot she was present. (Typical.) “You’re both idiots.” She clenches her fists at her sides, digging her nails into her palms so she doesn’t punch them both, or dump them headfirst into the river. Honestly. Boys. “And you’re going to get us killed. We’re doubling back to find a crossing.”

“Sakura-chan that would take too long!” Naruto insists. “We’ll be fine if we just-”

“We’re finding a crossing,” she snaps, pinning him with her best imitation of Obito-sensei’s terrifying glare. He freezes.

“We’re already behind schedule,” Sasuke starts, sounding like he’s lecturing a small child. Her nails press in deeper. “If we don’t cross now, we won’t make the rendezvous in time to-”

“We won’t if drown either,” she says, glaring at him, too. “We. Are. Finding. A. Crossing.”

And then she marches off, parallel to the river, realizing that she doesn’t care if they follow her or not.

(They do.)

_ _

“You were right, Sakura-chan,” Naruto tells her that night, as they huddle in a cave to escape the incessant rain. “I’m sorry I didn’t listen.”

Sasuke merely grunts, but it sounds vaguely apologetic, which is a start. At least.

_ _

Five days in, and Sasuke and Naruto are too tired to fight anymore. They managed to save time by using chakra to scale a large ravine, which means they’re a day ahead of schedule, but she’s still reached a level of exhaustion she didn’t think was possible and she’s been dreaming of showers for three restless nights. They also ran afoul of some nasty, massive bugs yesterday and she’s got two bites on her arms that Sasuke helped patch up but still itch beneath the gauze.  

“How about poison?” Sasuke asks, wiping mud from his face and reaching over to rescue Naruto as he sinks into marshy water up to his knees. “I saw nightshade the other day.”

“We could lace his food,” Naruto agrees, grimacing down at his ruined pants. He’s got a bandage over one eye from being scratched in the face by what they thought was squirrel but turned out to be some kind of mutant swamp demon that did not appreciate being trapped. They’ve stuck to fish and plants since then.

“He probably has an antidote, though,” Sakura points out as she skirts the edges of the puddle.

“Damn it,” Naruto mutters while Sasuke sighs. They’re on plan N of Mission Revenge Against Obito-sensei and so far nothing is sticking.

“He’s not immortal,” Sasuke insists, though he actually sounds a little doubtful. “There must be a way.”

“Maybe we could bribe Kakashi-sensei?” Naruto suggests.

“With what?” Sakura asks. They don’t have any money, and she can’t think of anything else that would interest Kakashi-sensei enough. Maybe the prospect of humiliating Obito, depending on the day.

“Oi, stop shooting holes in our plans, Sakura-chan!”

“Baka,” Sakura counters, though somehow, in the past five days, she’s bypassed annoyance when it comes to Naruto and landed on amusement. (He did also kind of save of her from one of the bugs, too.) “Someone has to be the voice of reason, here.”

Sasuke huffs. “She’s right.” A rush of familiar elation runs through her at that admission, though it’s far weaker than it was even a few months ago. “We’ll have to keep thinking.”

_ _

“Maybe something with seals?” Naruto asks that night, as they make camp. The rain has finally stopped, allowing them to build a fire - and Sakura has never been more grateful for the warmth in her life. “Sakura-chan, could you come up with something?”

“Like what?”

“We could turn him into a bug … or a frog or something!”

“I don’t think there are seals that can do that, dobe,” Sasuke says, in the process of winding a fresh bandage around Naruto’s arm. Apparently, fish in the river they’ve camped near like to fight back. With a vengeance and very sharp teeth. “And hold still. ”

Naruto glowers at him, but obliges. They haven’t really fought in the last two days and Sakura feels like she’s witnessing a miracle continuing to unfold in front of her. (Or someone cast a genjutsu she missed.) 

“Then you come up with something, asshole.”

“I think getting Kakashi-sensei on board is our best shot.”

“Hey, that was my idea-” Naruto freezes and then a gleeful smile takes over half his face. “You’re backing up my idea, Sasuke?”

Sasuke rolls his eyes and pulls the bandages so tight Naruto’s expression immediately collapses into an offended grimace. “Don’t get so smug about it.”

“We could offer to take care of all the chores for a month?” Sakura suggests.

“A whole month?” Naruto protests, then pauses and shakes his head. “Never mind, you’re right, Sakura-chan. Kakashi-sensei wouldn’t accept anything less.” Another grin, even more smug than the last. “And I know what we should do.”

Sasuke arches a questioning eyebrow.

“Land a hit on him,” Naruto announces and while that’s a step down from the violent murder a part of Sakura is still craving, it would be  just humiliating enough for Obito-sensei to be satisfying. And she’s already imagining the look of shock on his face when they pull it off.

Sasuke ties off the bandages. “That’s … not bad, dobe.”

“Eh, who’s the genius now, Sasuke?”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, usuratonkachi,” Sasuke insists, shoving Naruto (but lightly and with regard to his wounded arm).

Naruto smirks at him, then turns to her. “You in, Sakura-chan?”

“Of course, baka,” she huffs, battling a smile of her own. In spite of the mud and exhaustion and bug stings, she feels excited. 

And like she’s finally part of a real team.

_ _

They make it to the rendezvous point with twelve hours to spare and Obito-sensei actually looks proud of them. (And rents them rooms in a village with a wonderful bathhouse, so her desire to murder him lessens somewhat.)

They still corner Kakashi-sensei, though, and lay out their plan. It takes them all of five minutes to convince him. (Literally all they have to do is mention “chores for a month” and “tricking Obito during training” and Kakashi’s eye takes on a dangerous glint.)

It works like a charm. Kakashi-sensei teleports her into the Kamui dimension beforehand, while Naruto and Sasuke provide a distraction. Then, as soon as Obito-sensei starts to phase through Sasuke’s fire jutsu, Sakura punches him clean in the stomach, with chakra channeled into her fist, like she’s been practicing.

He staggers, coughing, and then slides fully into Kamui so he doesn’t get roasted alive. His clothes are still singed, though, and the tips of his hair, and he’s looking at her in a way he never has before - a mixture of surprise and awe and pride all packed into the smile he aims her way.

“Well,” he says with a shake of his head, “guess I should’ve seen that coming.”

“You dumped us in a swamp for a week,” she grumbles at him. “You dumped me in a swamp for a week with them.”

“I did,” he agrees, and stands, grimacing at the burn on his sleeve. “And look at you three now. You might just become shinobi after all.”

She splutters indignantly, because they already are shinobi, thank you very much, but Obito just laughs and ruffles her hair, and somehow that knocks all the anger out of her. Maybe it’s the admiration she can still feel radiating off him, too. “Good job, Sakura. I think you cracked a rib.”

She winces. Maybe that was a little too much chakra. “My control’s not perfect yet.”

“And I’ll live in terror of the day it is,” Obito says cheerfully and holds out his hand.

When they land back in the forest, she’s nearly tackled to the ground by an exuberant Naruto. “That was awesome, Sakura-chan! You should have seen Obito-sensei’s face.”

Sasuke gives her a nod of acknowledgment, something like approval in his eyes, and she feels a flush immediately overtaking her cheeks.

“Oi, Bakakashi,” Obito says, with a good-natured glare. “You should sleep with one eye open for at least the next week.”

Kakashi waves a dismissive hand. “Maa, Obito, I was just encouraging our cute students’ determination. Isn’t that what being a sensei is about?”

“Shithead,” Obito grumbles, but it’s unmistakably fond.

_ _

She collects several more sealing scrolls and continues to practice until she’s gradually built up a mini-arsenal: a seal to hold various weapons, a seal to boost chakra and another to drain it, and one that still needs some fine-tuning, but should allow her to release a poisonous mist when properly activated.  Kakashi-sensei also works with her on chakra control and when she cracks a tree trunk sparring with Sasuke, she decides she’s going to cherish the brief look of terror on his face for a at least the next year. 

They both so fast though, Naruto and Sasuke. They seem to get stronger every day, and she can almost see the titans they’ll become. Powerful enough for legends, for statues, for tales like the ones Obito and Kakashi tell them around the fire at night. And she’s proud of them, she is, but…

“I’ll never catch up,” she says to Kakashi one afternoon as they work on medical ninjutsu. She can hear the destructive sounds of Naruto and Sasuke sparring down near the river and the oppressive summer heat of Vegetable Country weighs heavy on her skin, thickens the air in her lungs.

Kakashi blinks at her and shifts to give her better access to the cut on his arm. (She freaked out, the first time he cut himself to let her practice, but it’s never deep and he’s experienced enough to patch up anything she can’t.)

“You said I would leave them in the dust,” she elaborates. “But they’re leaving me.”

“Maa, that depends on how you define strength,” Kakashi says. “You’re not as strong as them, in terms of raw power, like I’m not as strong as Obito.”

“I’m sensing a ‘but,’ sensei,” she says without looking up. The cut is knitting back together much faster than the last one.

“But ,” Kakashi continues, “that doesn’t mean you’ll get left behind. You’re a part of this team, Sakura, and you’re important to them. You hold them together - keep them from being too reckless.” He sighs and scrubs his free hand through his unruly hair. “It was like that with our team.”

She’s heard the story now: the kunoichi who died.

“Rin.”

“Yeah,” Kakashi says quietly, grief-tinged. “She may not have been as strong as me or Obito physically, but she had more determination than either of us. She was the glue of our team and when we lost her … we almost didn’t come back from it.” He taps a finger over her heart. “This is the most important thing, Sakura. Everyone’s strong in their own way - and one strength isn’t always inherently better than another. Those idiots need you.”

Down by the river, a tree cracks and slowly begins to topple over. Kakashi winces. “They’ll get themselves killed otherwise.”

“I guess you’re right,” Sakura says, and isn’t sure if she believes it. Not yet.

_ _

(An hour later, Sasuke and Naruto stumble back into camp, soaking wet and trailed by a very amused Obito. They’re elbowing each other, arguing about who won, but they stop when they reach her and Kakashi.

“Whoa, Sakura-chan!” Naruto exclaims, watching her close a fresh cut on Kakashi’s palm. “That’s so cool!” He flops down next to her with an excited grin and holds out his own scratched up arms. “Do me, too!”

“You heal faster than me, dobe,” Sasuke says, taking a seat on her other side and also holding up an arm, showing off a shallow cut running from the crook of his elbow to almost the top of his wrist. “So I’m first.”

“Idiots,” she grumbles to hide her affection and avoids Kakashi’s knowing, amused gaze. “Sasuke-kun’s right, Naruto.” She moves her glowing hand over to Sasuke. “You heal fast.”

Naruto pouts and she nudges him with her foot. “But I can help you with that Earth technique you were stuck on yesterday.”

He lights up and punches a hand in the air. “Awesome! We’ll all train together! I wanna make one that can stand up to Sasuke’s katon jutsu.”

“Or just stand up,” Sasuke says with a smirk.

Naruto glares and soon they’re bickering again, but Sasuke’s careful to hold himself still so she can work on his arm and Naruto drags her into the argument immediately, wanting back up against Sasuke. She bites her lip and decides that okay. Maybe Kakashi-sensei was right.

About this, anyway.)

_ _

Obito and Kakashi love each other. It’s something that takes her a while to see, since they’re subtle about it, but eventually she builds up a collection of moments and fits them into a coherent picture. A hand on a shoulder that lingers, an entire conversation contained in a single glance, Obito’s fingers against the back of Kakashi’s neck, Kakashi’s curled around Obito’s knee - each one that she catches makes something twist in her stomach she can’t identify.

It’s a quiet sort of love, she realizes, and very different from what she’s always imagined love to look like. There are no sweeping gestures, no fiery passion, just Obito taking Kakashi’s hand at dawn, when he thinks they’re all still asleep, and murmuring, “hey, happy anniversary.”

And it’s just the soft affection in Kakashi’s eye when he tilts his head and whispers, “happy anniversary,” right back.

It’s not her parents’ boisterousness and it’s not knights in shining armor - doesn’t line up with her fantasies of Sasuke sweeping her off her feet. It’s the fact that Kakashi knows to take the eggplant out of Obito’s food. It’s that Obito routinely buys scrolls or books in the villages they pass through and deposits then in Kakashi’s pack when he’s not looking, then smiles when he sees Kakashi reading them later. It’s in the way they fight together, so seamless they’re like two extensions of one person, and in the worry Obito can’t hide whenever Kakashi gets injured.

(“Don’t scare me like that,” Obito whispers one night, after a fight with a large group of bandits went south. She lingers in the hall of the inn, wondering if she should leave. Through the crack in the door, she sees Obito bend down to press his forehead to Kakashi’s, one of Kakashi’s hands clutched in his own. “You have to stop scaring me like that.”

“Maa, I’m fine,” Kakashi says, gentle, and reaches up to brush his knuckles against Obito’s scarred cheek. “I promise.”

She creeps away, hand over where her heart is aching.)

The other two don’t see it, oblivious idiots that they are, but  she does and she marvels at it: this strange, fascinating portrait of love.

She works up the courage to ask Kakashi-sensei one afternoon, taking advantage of the fact that Obito took Sasuke and Naruto on a supply gathering run while she and Kakashi remained behind to guard the camp.

“How … how long have you and Obito-sensei been together?”

Kakashi looks up from the scroll that Obito picked up in Bird Country - apparently about supernatural myths, from the glimpse she got. “Hmm? We’ve been teammates since we were ten, but I’ve known him since the Academy. Five-years-old, maybe, when we first met?”

“No,” she says, flushed. “Together together.”

His eye widens and he coughs. “Ah. Noticed that, did you?” At her nod, he sighs. “Guess we’re not as subtle as we thought.” (They are, but they didn’t give her enough credit.) “Ten years,” he says, that soft note in his voice she sometimes hears when he’s talking to Obito. “It was ten years last month.”

Ten years. In spite of Naruto’s teasing, they’re not that old. She’s done the math: fourteen when they were exiled, right after the Kyuubi attack, which is when Naruto was born. Add twelve years and you get only twenty-six. And if they’ve been together together a decade already.... “You were young.”

“Maa, it didn’t feel like it,” he says. “We grew up faster than you brats, considering the war.” A shrug. “I don’t think we ever felt young.”

That’s too sad for her to focus on. “You really love him, though, don't you?”

“Sadly yes,” Kakashi says, wry, which is a good as she’s going to get from someone allergic to any kind of emotion.

She lets the matter drop, knowing Kakashi won’t delve into his and Obito’s private life, but she watches closely when Obito returns - notices the way he immediately hones in on Kakashi’s location in the camp and goes over to him.

“Hey,” he says, dropping his pack of supplies in Kakashi’s lap.

Kakashi lets out a slightly pained “oof" and frowns up at him. “What the hell did you collect? Stones?”

“Potatoes,” Obito declares brightly. “Figured we could put them in a soup or something.”

Kakashi hums and moves the pack to the ground. “Good idea. And hey,” he raps Obito’s leg with the scroll. “Thanks. It’s interesting.”

“I thought you’d like it,” Obito says, reaching down to card his fingers through Kakashi’s hair - a quick, affectionate gesture.

I want that, Sakura thinks, watching them. Someday.

She glances over to where Sasuke and Naruto are laying out supplies for dinner. Naruto spots her and waves enthusiastically. “Hey, Sakura-chan! We got umeboshi, too!”

Sasuke also lifts a hand in greeting, a faint smile in the corner of his mouth. She doesn’t love him, she realizes with a sudden, awestruck jolt. Not in the way Kakashi and Obito love each other. And maybe she never will.

And maybe that’s okay. For now, she wants to keep getting stronger, on her own and with her team. She wants to face the future with them, whatever it may hold, and if love does happen to come along, she doesn’t want to settle.

She wants something quiet, something unshakeable, something like Obito’s fingers in Kakashi’s hair and the tenderness in Kakashi’s gaze - as though Obito’s brought the sun back with him.

_ _

Eight months after leaving Konoha, she barely recognizes herself. She ditched the red dress ages ago for more breathable pants and a sleeveless shirt. She’s got muscle definition in her arms and legs and yesterday she managed to punch the ground so hard, she created an elbow deep crater. She perfected the poison mist seal and is now working on one that might be able to create a magnetic force to drag enemies in.

She can mostly keep up with Naruto and Sasuke in taijutsu training, mend a broken bone with medical ninjutsu, and wield several fairly powerful Earth techniques (as well as at least one technique from the other four elements, due to Obito-sensei’s insistence they have a good arsenal at their disposal) without feeling like she’s going to collapse.

Overall, she thinks she’s managed to become pretty badass.

There’s just one more change she wants to make - one final letting go. Perhaps the most important one of all.

Sasuke’s been pestering Kakashi-sensei to teach him kenjutsu, so she knows she’ll find him in the woods just beyond the camp, running through the katas Kakashi assigned. He looks a little surprised when he notices her, but not frustrated or standoffish like he would’ve been eight months ago.

“Sakura.”

“Can you help me with something?” she asks, before she can lose her nerve. She could technically do this herself, but, well … maybe she’s a sucker for symbolism.

“Sure,” he says, easy - another indicator of how much has changed. “What?”

She holds up the scissors from her medical kit. “Can you cut my hair?”

He stares at her like she’s suddenly grown an extra head. “Me?”

“Yes, you.”

“Why?”

“Because Naruto would mess it up and I don’t want to bother Obito-sensei or Kakashi-sensei.” That isn’t the real reason, but it's still plausible enough.

He frowns, but it’s a resigned one. “Okay.”

He follows her out of the forest, dry leaves rattling over their heads, and into the meadow beyond, bathed in sunlight.

“Here,” she says, handing him the scissors before sinking to the ground.

He sits down behind her and she can feel his hesitation. “Sasuke-kun, it’s hair. Not live snakes.”

“I know that,” he says, defensive. “How short do you want it?”

“Short,” she decides. “Shorter than yours.”

“You’re sure?” he asks dubiously.

“Yes, just cut it all off!”

“Okay, okay,” he grumbles and then he’s gathering her hair in his hand.

He cuts through the bulk of it quickly and it’s strange, having the back of her neck bare, but freeing, too. “Why now?” he asks her after a few minutes, moving around to the front so he can get her bangs.

“I felt like a change,” she says, closing her eyes so he doesn’t see the expression on his face when she adds, “besides, I only grew it out because there was a rumor that you liked girls with long hair.”

He pauses and she waits for irritation or teasing, but he just snorts. “That’s stupid. You look better this way.”

Eight months ago, the comment would have had her swooning. Now, she just smiles. She may not love him with all the passion of a teenage crush anymore, but she’s glad to have him as a friend. (It’s much better, having him as a friend.)

“Thanks.”

Eventually, he sits back. “Okay. That’s probably as good as I can get it.”

She slides her compact mirror out of her pocket and holds it up. She looks … different. Very different. He’s cut it as short as she asked, even shorter than his or Naruto’s, and with this style her bangs just barely brush her forehead. It’s choppy, and sticking up in the back, but she likes it. Likes how fierce it makes her look, how much older, too.

She feels like a kunoichi.

“Thanks,” she says, grinning up at Sasuke. “It’s fine.”

He grunts in acknowledgement, which she decides to also take as “you’re welcome.”

Back at camp, Naruto exclaims over the haircut as soon as he sees her. “Whoa, Sakura-chan, you look badass! ”

Obito-sensei grins at her, nodding in approval, and Kakashi-sensei just pats her on the head, same as always.

They all see her, she thinks, accepting the arm Naruto slings across her shoulder and the feel of Sasuke falling into step on her other side. And she belongs.

And one day, she’s going to be amazing - they all are.

She’s sure of it, now.

_ _

He expects to miss Konoha, but maybe that’s only because he thought he should. It’s his village, and all shinobi should love their village, right? But his village has never loved him. Twelve years of isolation, loneliness, glares, and whispered insults - he thought, more than once, that he was going to break. Especially when Ebisu-sensei started training them and his harsh words cut to the bone. (The realization that the man would never want to train him, no matter how hard he worked, cut even deeper.)

Out here, though? It’s a different world. Strange enough that after they first left Konoha, he whispered “kai” several nights in a row and waited to wake up back in his crappy, empty apartment.

This feels like a dream. Not only does he have one sensei, but two, who are strong and cool and don’t get mad at him if he doesn’t understand something right away. The villages they pass through don’t know about the monster sleeping inside of him and so the people in them aren’t afraid - smile and wave back at him like it’s nothing.

He’ll even accept Sasuke’s presence if it means he gets to keep this.

“Oi, Naruto.” Something raps him on the head and he blinks up at Obito. “Pay attention.”

Right. Chakra types, that’s what they’re going over today. They spent all of last week pursuing a group of bandits who stole treasure from a daimyo, and Obito and Kakashi have decided to take some time off for lessons.

It’s weird, having them in the middle of a field instead of a classroom, but he likes that better, too.

“Sorry, Obito-sensei,” he says.

Obito shakes his head, but he’s smiling.

Kakashi-sensei, seated at the head of their circle, holds up slips of paper. “Right, so we’ve discussed the five basic elemental natures. Now we’re going to determine which ones you have.”

“Using paper?” Sakura asks, brow furrowed.

“Special paper,” Obito elaborates and plucks one from Kakashi’s hand. “It reacts to chakra and responds according to the nature.” The paper catches on fire, burning to ash in Obito’s fingers. “See? I’m Fire.”

“Typical Uchiha,” Kakashi agrees and holds up his own paper, ignoring Obito’s responding glare. The paper wrinkles. “I’m Lightning.”

“Typical Hatake,” Obito says with a wink at them.

Kakashi also ignores that, holding out the paper to them. “Now your turn.”

Sakura’s paper crumbles to dust, Sasuke’s wrinkles like Kakashi’s, and his own slices in half.

“So, Earth, Lightning, and Wind,” Kakashi declares. “Though, considering you’re an Uchiha, Sasuke, you’ll probably have some Fire affinity, too.”

“Interesting team combination, either way,” Obito says brightly.

Naruto stares at the paper fluttering in his hand and feels an excited grin stealing over his face. This is so much more fun than the Academy.

_ _

It’s weird, not being automatically recognized as a shinobi. The official story is that the three of them are orphans in Kakashi and Obito’s care, which usually gains them a lot of sympathy, at least.

It’s also fun, when they do go up against bad guys, to be constantly underestimated. The look of shock on their faces never gets old, especially the first time Obito-sensei phases through someone or Naruto breaks out the shadow clones.

A little deception, Naruto is learning, can go a long way. And sometimes, being overlooked isn’t always a bad thing.

_ _

“You just charge in with those all the time,” Kakashi-sensei mutters during training, kicking away a shadow clone. “Why don’t you try strategizing a little?”

“Strategizing?” he asks, curious about what Kakashi might have in mind. He has a few tricks up his sleeve - is learning to use his kage bunshin for misdirection and to gather information - but Kakashi is a genius who isn’t an arrogant snob about it, and so Naruto's happy to get advice from him (most of them time).

“Here,” Kakashi says, crouching in front of him and walking him through a series of seals. “This will allow you to hide clones underground.”

Oh. That’s interesting.

_ _

He tests it out on Sasuke the next day and it’s highly effective. The bastard doesn’t talk to him for two days, nursing a bruise on his jaw where Naruto manage to land a near-finishing blow.

“Good job, kid,” Obito whispers to him over dinner and he hides his pleased smile behind his bowl of soup.

_ _

Obito and Kakashi tell him about his parents, in bits and pieces. Apparently, his father was their jounin-sensei back when they were part of a three-man cell.

His name was Minato (though they refuse to provide a last name, which is weird) and he was married to a kunoichi named Kushina, from the Land of Whirlpools - a country that was apparently destroyed in the Second Great Shinobi War.

“They were renowned for their sealing techniques,” Kakashi-sensei says. “An Uzumaki was actually married to the Shodaime. That’s why Konoha shinobi have a spiral on the back of their flak jackets. It symbolizes the alliance between the two countries.”

And it’s cool and all, learning that he comes from a clan that was once great and important, but he cares much more about the other details Obito and Kakashi offer. How his mother’s hair was red and her temper was just as distinctive. How his father was a genius who still gave unnecessarily long names to all his jutsu. How they were rivals as genin who eventually fell in love, got married in secret, and then reveled in everyone’s shocked reactions. How his father loved to cook and his mother was a sealing master, just like the majority of her clan.

His heart aches in a way he can’t define, having this picture painted of them. He always thought he came from nothing - an unlucky orphan chosen to be a sacrifice - but his parents were shinobi, incredible ones, and they …

“They loved you,” Kakashi-sensei tells him one night, soft and sad, and he has to duck his head to hide his tears from the firelight. “They loved you so much.”

“But how did they die?” he asks, even though he’s not sure if he wants the answer.

“Protecting the village,” Kakashi says, and he should have known, really. So many shinobi die that way, it seems. It’s probably expected that all shinobi will eventually die that way.

(He’s not sure how he feels about that, either.)

_ _

In Fang Country, they run into a group of mercenaries after a bounty that’s apparently on Kakashi-sensei and Obito-sensei’s heads. The fight gets nasty fast and somewhere in the middle of it, he takes a katana to the stomach.

Stupid, he thinks, right before the world goes dark. Not fast enough.

_ _

The next few days are hazy: hushed whispers, the familiar whirring sound of medical ninjutsu at work, blurry colors.

When he comes to fully, he’s lying on a soft bed in a small hospital. A breeze flutters the curtains and there’s a hand resting over his. He blinks down at a familiar head of messy black hair and then around the room. Sakura and Sasuke are crashed out on the bed next to his, while Kakashi is asleep in a very uncomfortable-looking chair - arms folded over his chest and head tipped back against the wall.

He tries to speak, get their attention, but all that comes out is a weak cough.

Obito still sits bolt upright, eyes wide.

“Thank God,” he says, when he sees that Naruto is awake. The hand moves, smooths the hair back from his forehead, and he realizes, shocked, that Obito’s eye is wet. “Don’t fucking scare me like that again, brat. When I tell you to stay back you stay the hell back. ”

“You were … worried about me?” Naruto whispers, still trying to wrap his fuzzy head around this. No one worries about him, especially adults.

“I was scared to death,” Obito snaps. “To death, Naruto.”

“Why?”

Obito freezes, blinking down at him. Naruto can’t identify his expression. Sadness? Surprise? Anger?

“Because,” Obito says, stroking his hair again. “You’re my kid. All three of you brats are. Do you know what I would do if something happened to you?”

He doesn’t. His brain is still stuck on my kid.

“Well it would be bad,” Obito mutters when he remains silent. “And probably violent. So don’t be so reckless, got it?”

He nods.

“Fucking hell,” Obito grumbles and stands up to get him a drink of water.

My kid, Obito-sensei said. Like it was nothing. Like it was just a fact. My kid.

_ _

They all stay with him for the three days he’s in the hospital. Even Sakura-chan and Sasuke lecture him about being a reckless idiot, looking pale and shaken like he’s somehow managed to rattle their world by almost dying.

Kakashi tells him if he’s going to be bed-ridden, he might as well study, and dumps a history book right on his face. But he also stays in that uncomfortable chair all afternoon, feet perched up on Naruto’s bed, and answers Naruto’s myriad of questions about passages he doesn’t understand.

This is what it feels like, he thinks, listening to Kakashi patiently explain the details of the long-standing conflicts between Iwa and Konoha, to have people who care about you.

_ _

(Please, he prays to fate, or whoever might be listening, let me keep this.)

_ _

“Right,” Kakashi-sensei says, beaming at them even though it’s barely even dawn and they spent all of yesterday traveling. (They’re venturing west again, back towards the ocean and warmer climates of Tea and Noodle Country.) “Today we’re going to be practicing mud walls.”

They all groan. Even though Naruto’s excited to learn more ninjutsu, he doesn’t want to do it before the sun is even up.

He watches, blearly, as Kakashi forms a series of seals and slams his palms against the soft earth. “Doton: Doryūheki!”

A wall rises up in front of him, shielding him from view. “This is a basic defensive technique,” he says, waving a hand around the barrier for them to come closer. As they gather behind him, he raps the wall with his knuckles. “The chakra-infused earth is resistant against most fire and water attacks. The trick is to channel your chakra into the ground below you and then push it out in the shape of the wall.”

He repeats the jutsu several more times before nodding at them. “Now you try.”

Naruto’s first wall explodes into a thousand pieces and Kakashi taps his head. “Maa, less chakra, Naruto.”

Right. That’s a running theme.

“Got it,” he says, trying to dial back. The next wall lasts a little longer before exploding.

“See,” Kakashi says. “Progress.”

They spend the afternoon practicing with varying success. Sakura, naturally, has hers mastered in an hour. But she comes over to give him some tips, before flitting off to do the same for Sasuke, whose walls aren’t holding their shape.  

He’s exhausted by the end of it, and covered in dirt, but when Kakashi tests them at sunset, all of their walls hold up against the fire and water jutsu he sends their way.  

“Maa, you three are too good at this,” Kakashi grumbles good-naturedly as they head back to camp. “I don’t know why I bother.”

“We’d be lost without you, sensei,” Sakura says, deadpan.

Kakashi gives her a wounded look while Naruto tries not to contemplate how true that would probably be.

_ _

In Bear Country, it’s Kakashi’s turn at the brink of death.

Naruto feels the ground open up beneath his feet, watching Kakashi leap in front of a blow meant for Sakura. Watching, helpless, as the rogue ninja’s armored fist crashes into his chest. Bones snap and Kakashi chokes on a bloody, agonized breath before he crumples to his knees and doesn’t get back up.

Obito roars, as fierce and terrifying as the echo of the Kyuubi Naruto sometimes hears in his head, and wood sprouts from his arm and shoulder.

Ten minutes later, all of the rogue Iwa nin are dead, and Kakashi still isn’t waking up.

“Fuck,” Obito snarls, lifting him gently from the ground. “Fuck.”

“I think he has internal bleeding,” Sakura says, hands glowing and eyes wet.

Naruto can’t move, all his limbs have turned to stone and his heart is trying to climb up his throat. Kakashi-sensei can’t die - Naruto never even considered the possibility. He’s too strong for something as ordinary as death.

(He’s not allowed to leave them behind.)

“I’m taking us,” Obito says, extending a bloodstained hand.

They all crowd in, allowing him to wrench them into Kamui.

_ _

Kakashi’s unconscious for two days and Obito wears a hole in the hospital floor, until an exasperated nurse throws him out.

So Naruto sits by his bedside instead, clutching his cold, clammy hand.

“It’s my fault,” Sakura whispers, curled up in the chair next to him. “He was protecting me.”

“It’s not your fault,” Naruto insists through his own terror and grief that won’t ease up, no matter how many times he reassures himself that Kakashi-sensei is still breathing.

“He would have done it for any of us,” Sasuke murmurs.

This is what it feels like, Naruto reminds himself, putting a hand over his churning, lead-filled stomach. To have people who care about you.

_ _

Kakashi wakes up (eventually, finally ) and Naruto climbs right on the bed to hug him. He grunts, a little pained, but his arms come up to return the hug.

“I’m okay,” he says, mild and unaffected as ever.

“You almost weren’t,” Naruto whispers into his shoulder.

Kakashi sighs. “I know.”

It’s life, he doesn’t say, but Naruto has learned the lesson now. Death can take anyone, even the strongest and fastest and bravest, but he refuses to be afraid.

He’ll just have to fight harder, become even stronger, so that he can protect his precious people like they protect him.

_ _

(He finally understands what Haku meant, all those months and forests ago.)

_ _

Fall is giving way to winter when they stumble across a destroyed village in Water Country, on the coast of one of the smaller islands. Someone sent a message two weeks before, asking for help, and they spot the plumes of smoke from the boat.

Obito’s over the side before Kakashi can snap at him for being reckless, dashing across the waves so fast he’s little more than a blue and black blur. They catch up with him on a hill overlooking the smoldering village - ash streaked across his face and sorrow cut deep in his eyes. Naruto can smell the death even from here, chokes on the lingering ash in the air. Something dark and awful crawls up his spine as he looks down at the blackened buildings and scattered debris.

“What happened?” Sakura whispers.

“They were attacked,” Obito spits, throwing a hitai-ate into the dirt. “Kiri.”

“Kiri did this?” Sasuke asks in alarm. “To one of their own villages?”

No, Naruto thinks, the chill increasing. No that’s not possible.

“They might have been planning a rebellion,” Kakashi says with the same sorrow.

On autopilot, Naruto starts down the hill - towards the village and the bodies he can just make out in the rubble. Obito catches his arm, pulling him to a halt. “I checked. No survivors.”

His hands are shaking, or maybe it’s his whole body.

“ None?” Sakura whispers, horrified.

“Why?” He manages. “Why would they…?”

“Because their kage ordered them to.” Obito stares down at the hitai-ate, fists trembling at his sides. “Because they told themselves it was for the good of their village, their country. Because they were raised as fucking children to believe that’s enough of an excuse. But death is death and blood is blood and we’re all just fucking murderers in the end.”

“Obito,” Kakashi says, a note of reproach in his voice.

“No,” Obito snaps, glaring at him. “They need to understand this.”

Naruto doesn’t want to. Would rather run and hide than face the truth barreling towards him - the suddenly unsteady ground beneath his feet.

“Understand what?” Sasuke asks, sounding young and scared and exactly how Naruto feels.

“That some things aren’t worth their cost.” Obito sweeps a hand to encompass the ruin below them. “That if your village asks you to go war for it, to kill for it, to stain your hands with innocent blood, think, always, about the price you might have to pay. And remember that you’re human. No matter what they tell you, you’re human, and you’re allowed to…” He cuts off with a shuddering breath and shakes his head, like he’s trying to clear it. “Sometimes I hate this world.”

It’s a confession that doesn’t seem meant for them, and he doesn’t wait for their response before heading back down the hill.

“Where … where are you going, sensei?” Sakura asks.

“To dig graves,” Obito says with grim determination.

Sasuke lets out a strange, broken sound, but follows him - Sakura a few steps behind. Naruto still can’t get his feet to move.

“Kakashi-sensei…?” Kakashi stops next to him. Puts an anchoring hand on his shoulder. “Their … their kage ordered this?”

He can’t imagine that. Can’t imagine telling anyone to … to do this.

Kakashi squeezes his shoulder. “Most likely. Not all kage are like the Sandaime, Naruto. In fact, most aren’t.”

“I … I can’t accept this.” The fear is slowly morphing into fury. “What kind of kage orders something like this!”

Kakashi crouches in front of him. “Good. Don’t accept it, Naruto. Don’t accept any of it.” Kakashi’s hand moves from his shoulder to press over his heart. “All this anger you’re feeling - remember it. Remember this.” He nods at the village. “Carry it with you. And when you become Hokage, maybe you can change it. Maybe your generation can find a better way.”

He stares at the village over Kakashi’s shoulder, watching the shadows of Obito, Sakura, and Sasuke moving between the buildings, gathering bodies.

“Did - Kakashi-sensei - did you ever….?”

Kakashi bows his head. “Yes. Nothing on this scale, but I shed innocent blood for Konoha. I told myself the same lie that these shinobi probably told themselves.”

“It’s for the good of the village,” Naruto whispers.

“And that makes it noble,” Kakashi finishes, standing.

He wanted to become Hokage so that the village would acknowledge him, but suddenly that seems childish. Stupid. He’ll do it for this. For the people of this village whose own kage betrayed them, for Obito-sensei and Kakashi-sensei whose shoulders are bent with guilt and grief. He doesn’t care how weak it might make him, or how much he’ll have to sacrifice, he will never be a kage that takes innocent life.

“I will,” he says, squaring his shoulders. “I’ll carry them with me. I won’t forget. And I will change it, Kakashi-sensei. Believe it.”

Kakashi squeezes his shoulder one last time and together they descend into the village to help bury the dead.

_ _

The sun has long set, by the time they’ve finished filling in all the graves. (Several of them belong to children, even younger than Konohamaru, and Naruto can still taste the salt of tears on his cheeks. Doesn’t know when he’ll next sleep without seeing their damaged faces.)

Kakashi and Obito trade a weighted glance before Obito steps forward and claps his hands together.

“Mokuton,” he says, pressing his right palm to the ground. At the edge of the newly formed graveyard, a tree breaks free from the earth - wood twisting and shifting until there is a trunk and long, leaf-filled branches. “There. Watch over them.”

The leaves shake in the grip of the ocean wind, almost like acknowledgement.

“Let’s go,” Kakashi murmurs. “There’s nothing more we can do.”

_ _

At an inn the next night, Sasuke starts screaming in his sleep. Not knowing what else to do, Naruto hurries over to his bed and drags him into a tight embrace. He struggles, lost in his nightmare, but Naruto grits his teeth and doesn’t let go.

“It’s me, Sasuke,” he says. “You’re safe.”

He repeats it until his throat aches and his arms feel ready to fall off and Sasuke finally, finally stills and lets himself be held.

_ _

Life moves on, and they move with it, heading north into Honey and Forest. Missions are easy for a while - a few escorts, some farm work, serving as bodyguards during a big festival - but Naruto isn’t about to complain (suspects that Kakashi-sensei and Obito-sensei are purposefully choosing tasks that focus on life, for the moment, and preserving it). He likes the myriad of people that he meets - grannies and children and parents and retired shinobi and farmers and merchants and nobility. Likes the freedom of travel, of the feeling of belonging to the world, instead of just one village.

Out here, he’s never alone. There’s Sakura and Sasuke, who have become teammates and friends and precious people. Together with Obito-sensei and Kakashi-sensei, they’re a patchwork, probably-crazy family that Naruto never expected to have and wouldn’t trade for anything under the sun.

He watches them all now, from his spot by the fire, mending yet another tear in his jacket (which is the third jacket he’s gone through in two months, but that’s one of the hazards of shinobi life, he’s learned). He’s got Sasuke’s to fix next, since the idiot is still hopeless with a needle and thread and agreed to trade cooking duty for a week in exchange for the repair.

Which is why Sasuke is currently by the fire, dumping ingredients in a pot for stew and glaring at Obito-sensei hovering close by.

“Why are you putting beets in there?”

“Why do you care, you don’t even have to eat.”

“I still have taste buds, and beets are fucking disgusting.”

“So don’t. Eat. It.”

“Bakakashi doesn’t like beets, either.”

“Leave me out of your family squabbles,” Kakashi says from his perch in the tree above them. He’s got a new book of fūinjutsu that he’s reading using the patch of moonlight he’s strategically planted himself in.

Obito glowers up at him. “You’re part of this fucking family, Hatake.”

“And I still have no opinion,” Kakashi says airily, turning a page.

“I don’t either,” Sakura declares as Obito turns to her, seated at the base of Kakashi’s tree with a rather mind-boggling array of weapons around her. “And I’m in the middle of taking inventory, so don’t mess up my concentration.”

Obito, like any sensible person facing an irritable Sakura surrounded by kunai and shuriken, nods and backs up. “Right, right, sorry.”

“I already put the beets in,” Sasuke says. “I’m not taking them out.”

“You’re a monster,” Obito declares. “How are we even related?”

“I wonder that every day,” Sasuke snaps right back.

Naruto ducks his head so they won’t see his amused smile and drag him into their argument, too. But in his chest, his heart is warm and full and overflowing.

He would take the first twelve years of loneliness again, weather them without complaint, if he knew this was waiting for him at the end: happiness, acceptance, precious people, family …

A home.

(Everything he ever dreamed of and so much more.)