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Hatake Kiyoshi
He didn’t remember her all that much. He’d only been 2 when she passed, and that was a lot to remember even for a genius prodigy. But her loss still affected him greatly. Up until the moment that his mother was killed, they’d been a relatively normal family. Well, as normal as a high ranking and infamous shinobi family can be. Hatake Kiyoshi had been a well known Anbu operative known as Hound. She married into the Hatake family and had previously been a civilian.
Which was what made her genius skill all that more impressive. Despite having her identity being secret, she’d always been easily identifiable by her 3ft long and shiny black hair and chakra woven mask. The mask covered everything from her nose down and the chakra protected her face from the prying eyes of those with a doujutsu.
Apparently her civilian family had made a tradition to hide their faces, and it was a rumour that no one save Sakumo and Kakashi had seen her face; not even the Hokage or her team! And that’s why Kakashi had begun wearing a mask by the time he was 1 year old. Sakumo said he’d gotten all hs looks from his mother, save the gravity defying silver locks; but other than that, Kakashi realized his father. And if the civilians thought he wore the mask because he looked identical to Sakumo, well that was their problem. People rarely saw Kiyoshi due to her extended Anbu service, so no shinobi bothered to try and correct the rumours.
But all the same, they were a happy family of 3. Then Kiyoshi went out on an S-ranked mission with her Anbu team and didn’t come back.
Sakumo had been lost in his grief for a grand total of 3 months before he remembered that he had a 2 year old son he was the only parent for. Then he got his shit together and things went back to ‘normal’ even if Kiyoshi’s absence always hung over the household like a heavy cloud. Kakashi might not remember all that much about his mother (save for the picture of his father and mother smiling briefly with his chibi self between them, her mask was down) but he could never forget those 3 months where he’d been alone.
Luckily he’d been a Nara level genius even then, and capable enough to feed himself enough to survive. Although mental fortitude and physical ability were still 2 very different things. There would always be a part of him that resented his mother’s workaholic nature, because that had taken her away from him by the time he could walk. The life of a ninja wasn’t fair; that didn’t make her death feel any less like being abandoned.
Hatake Sakumo
Fast forward 3 years, and now their village was on the brink of war. Kakashi with all his genius and prodigious nature, had convinced his father to get the Hokage to make the exception and allow him to enter the academy at age 4. Sakumo had taught Kakashi everything he could about both his mother and the ninja arts; combining that with his intellect, it was no wonder he was a genin by 5 and 6 months later, a chunin.
But within those 6 months, Kakashi’s life had been turned upside down all over again. Merely a week after becoming on official shinobi, his father had been called for an important mission. It had to have been very serious, because at that time Sakumo had been revered as sannin level, equal in strength to Jiraya, Orochimaru, and Tsunade. But Sakumo was also human. He’d never been brainwashed with “ninjas are tools” propaganda like Kakashi had.
And because of this humanity, Sakumo sacrificed the mission to save his comrades. On any other mission, at any other time, he would have been considered a hero. But they were on the cusp of war and needed a scape goat. It didn’t help that the ‘brink of war’ had turned into ‘full on war’ by the time Sakumo and his team returned.
Civilians who knew nothing of war – nothing of Sakumo and Kiyoshi’s integral involvement in the end of the second shinobi war – openly scorned Sakumo. They blamed anything and everything on the man. Eventually, even the shinobi began to blame the elder Hatake for the start of the third shinobi war. Even the ninja that Sakumo had saved resented the silver haired man.
This series of events caused a chain reaction of misery for the remaining 2 members of the Hatake clan. Sakumo fell into a deep depression nd that only worsened when elder Hatake no longer making ANY public appearances (he even sent Kakashi to get groceries in between the D-ranked missioned with his new jonin sensei) civilians and shinobi alike had taken to whispering about the “Hatake brat”.
They wondered how the infamous and beloved Yellow Flash could handle teaching the Hatake whelp and they questioned the Sandie’s sanity with putting the disgrace’s son with the pride of the village. Kakashi had simply ignored them because he knew Minato-sensei believed in him and he knew his own skill. The civilians knew nothing of what shinobi life was.
However, Kakashi didn’t not shun his father either.
That might be the thing he regrets the most.
Because of his lack of attention – although it wasn’t like he was home all that much. He had lessons with Minato-sensei and training and mission. He was lucky if he even slept at the Hatake compound – his father had completely and utterly wilted away. It had gotten so out of hand and Kakashi had only seen glimpses of it. He had hated being at home and avoided it at all costs, but that didn’t mean his father’s state hadn’t affected him.
But then, Kakashi was sent out with Minato to go to the front line for a week. It was routing now ever since he became a chunin. The mission wasn’t really what scarred him – he’d killed his first man, quickly followed by his second – on his first time out of the village when he was 5. There hadn’t been time for a freak out, and he learned quickly to accept he truths of war r die. And death wasn’t an option. Not yet.
However, his father thought differently.
Kakashi had returned to his house after the week on the front lines to silence. That in itself, wasn’t all that unusual, but the air was stale and held the distinct tang of blood. Old blood. Kakashi, still holding on to the last dredges of battlefield adrenaline and his ever-present hyper-vigilance, crept silently through the compound. Following the scent of blood, he eventually found the source in his father’s office.
Fearing the worst and knowing deep down what he would find as soon as he opened the door. Throwing caution to the wind and threw open the door.
The room was dark and the only light was the moon from the large window facing the woods. A thin layer of dust had settled over the previously impeccable minimalist room. Nothing was out of place, save a single body in the middle of the room. The light hit just enough of the floor to glint off a blood-stained blade and the pool of semi-dried blood on the white carpet.
The body was his father, and the blade that had gone clean through his abdomen was clutched tightly in Sakumo’s hand. This was clearly self-inflicted. Sakumo had committed seppuku. Sakumo had chosen to kill himself instead of sticking around to be there for Kakashi. He’d fucking left him again. It’s just… this time was permanent.
Kakashi had sat down beside his father’s cold corpse. He had sat there frozen for 2 and a half days before and he’d needed a lot of physical and mental therapy (that he ended up ditching) to get back to his previous level skill.
A month later, the Sandaime assigned Minato and Kakashi two genin – one being the infamous dead last Uchiha and the other from the no name Nohara clan – to take into their team.
Uchiha Obito
Kakashi hated having a genin team. It was obvious to anyone who had eyes.
He’d graduated the Academy when he was 5 years old, and he’d practically destroyed the competition in his chunin exams when he was only a month or so into his 6th year. He hadn’t needed a team then – he’d even won the tournament against people up to a decade his senior – why on earth would he need one now? They’d just drag him down. Minato was the youngest jonin in the village and a genius as well (he was already making a name for himself as the Yellow Flash) so he was needed on the front lines.
Kakashi, although 6 years old, had earned his rank of chunin. He’d been out on the front lines; that’s more than a lot of shinobi can say. He didn’t understand why they were going to be joined by fresh-from-the-Academy genins. It was stupid. This was a massive handicap. Not to mention that they won’t have any respect for him because the two will be either 6 or 7 years older than him. He was lucky that he had earned enough of a reputation (both on the battlefield and in the chunin exams, he had used his clan’s famous white chakra to decimate everyone) that, combined with his teacher’s own fame, got him respect from the people (even the enemy) on the front line.
But these newbie genin wouldn’t think twice about judging him by his skill. Heck, Minato sensei would only be 5 years older than them. And that wasn’t even taking into account their abysmal skills. They’d have to learn so much very fast, and with the Academy standard, they definitely weren’t up to par. He’d looked at their records; they only got average grades and the Uchiha nearly flunked the practical. At this point Kakashi would rather have arrogant chunins on his team; better to be disrespected by skilled people than children.
All in all, Kakashi was very unhappy with the future additions to his team. But he was even more unhappy with the reason behind the Sandaime’s decision. He believed that Kakashi should spend more time around ninja closer to his age – being the only 6 year old ninja, never mind chunin, made it difficult to find anyone his age. Therefore, he was stuck with stupid useless genin because that was the youngest they could get.
Goody.
And it especially didn’t help his mood when he was proven right about his team mates. Nohara wasn’t so bad because she actually showed some promise with medical ninjutsu. The downside was apparently she’d been under the assumption that Kakashi was just a really short 11 year old and had been holding a massive hero worship crush thin n him. When informed that he was in fact 6, she had shrieked and er productivity had been shot for the rest of the day.
The Uchiha was a fucking idiot.
There was no beating around the bush He had been the dead last of the Academy and hadn’t even activated his clan’s famous doujutsu, the over powered Sharingan. He was loud and dumb in all the ways that really just push all of Kakashi’s buttons. He was complete rubbish at learning new jutsu and fighting hand to hand or taijutsu too. He flat out refused to learn anything about genjutsu because he ‘will’ have the sharingan and won’t need the knowledge on it.
But the worst thing about the Uchiha’s black sheep was the fact that he was always late.
You’d think that this would be tolerable bcause he’d be spending less time with the cry baby, but the complete dumbass excuses. Seriously, who wakes up at 5 in the morning, help and aold lady with he rgroceries and then gets lost in their own village while taking a ‘shortcut’ to avoid crossing paths with a black cat? It was just absurd and so obviously a lie. He was infuriating and he’d apparently made it his life mission to a. become Hokage, and b. surpass Kakashi.
Which was of course, a stupid pipe fream.
Needless to say, Kakshi insulted the Uchiha mercilessly and made it a hobby to improve so fast he left his team behind in the dust. But no matter how much he disliked it and fought with the two genin, he was stuck with them for the long hault because Minato-sensei absolutely loved having 2 genins who weren’t prodigies and actually let him coddle them and their ‘youth’.
Eventually, they all fell into a comfortable routine. Obito and Rin took and thankful passed their chunin exams after 2 years together and then a year after that (Kakashi was 9, had to believe, right?) Kakashi took and passed his jonin exams, allowing him to lead mission with Rin and Obito. This allowed Minato-sensei to go to the front line sand gain Konoha some ground.
By that time, people ha d gotten a bit more used to the idea of a 9 year old leading troops occasionally 10 to 15 years younger than they were. Kakashi was the genius student of the Yellow Flash and the son of anbu Raven and the White Fang. He’d been a more than capable ninja since he was 5 years old; arguably even earlier than that.
Still, despite all of Kakashi’s quiet (and sometimes loud) confidence, he was still nervous about leading his first mission as a jonin. It was completely irrational (it wasn’t like he hadn’t done this shit before as a chunin) but Kakashi was 9. He should be allowed a little bit of leeway even if he was a prodigy..
To both celebrate his first mission, his team had given him gifts. His sensei, an odd 3 pronged kunai; Rin a small medical kit filled to the brim with anything he could possibly need. Obito, had shown up late for the mission and then made a scene at the front gates, complaining once again, about how Kakashi was 9 and he was 16. Minato-sensei had frowned and smacked Obito on the head, lecturing him about how Kakashi hall worked very hard and had earned his position.
Obito had pouted until they had separated 200 miles from Konoha.
Their mission was simple; blow up the Kanabi bridge, which was a major trade route for Iwagakure. It should have been easy. But like all too-good-to-be-true missions it quickly went to hell. Not even a day after they separated from Minato-sensei, they were ambushed by a group of shinobi. They were high level chunin – giving both Rin and Obito a challenge in one on one battles, and Kakashi a challenge through virtue of numbers.
It was chaos, and in that chaos, Rin was taken. Kakashi, who (in his own opinion) had learned his lesson from his father’s ‘mistake’, had wanted to finish the mission and abandon Rin. Obito, who was having none of it, brought up the White Fang, and left to go rescue Rin by himself with a half-baked plan. Kakashi hesitated for a bit before going after Obito. He couldn’t very well complete the mission by himself, so going after Obito would be the most efficient. It was lucky he had chosen this path, because he arrived just in time to save an overwhelmed Obito (at the sacrifice of his eye).
Despite his newfound handicap, the two team mates had managed to save Rin and kill the enemy ninja’s. Or so the y thought. One of the surviving Iwa ninja had brought down the cave on top of their heads. Rin made it out okay, being in the best shape out of the three of them. Kakashi’s eyes was blinded. His depth perception was shot (he couldn’t help but remember his most prevalent thought at the time was that he’d have to train harder to overcome the weakness having only 1 eye would create); he wasn’t going to be able to dodge.
Because of how unaccustomed he was to a singular eye, he completely missed the appearance of a large boulder right over his head. The only thing that had saved him from dying in that moment, was none other than Obito. He had unlocked his sharingan when Kakashi lost his eye, and as such, could see the boulder long before Kakashi could ever hope to .
He then made the decision to push Kakashi out of the way, knowing full well that he wouldn’t possibly be fast enough to save the both of them. The boulder had crushed Obito’s entire right side, while Kakashi landed about 5 feet away without any additional injuries.
In a split second, Kakashi was in a panic. He scrambled towards Obito frantically, push on the boulder and trying to come up with something, anything, that would get the rock off Obito without killing the 15 year old chunin. Rin had crawled forward at a much slower pace, coming to rest beside what showed of Obito’s face and began stroking his hair in a weak attempt to soothe. She was a medic – still in training, but a medic nonetheless – and she knew that Obito wasn’t going to survive this.
Kakashi was 9. Obito was the first comrade he actually cared about that was going to die in front of him and it was going to be his fault.
He was the jonin leader of this mission and he didn’t know what to do.
“Ka… ka… shi,” Obito choked out, his voice slightly muffled from both the rock and Rin’s shushing. Kakashi collapsed beside his team mates, tear began to leak from his good eye against his will.
“Why would you do something so stupid!” he yelled, furiously wiping tear and blood from his eyes. Rin’s upper lip trembled as Obito coughed wetly. His smile, tight with pain, was still somehow bright.
“W-who’s the c-cry b-b-baby now?” he said weakly, earning an equally weak chuckle from Rin. “And a real hero, protects his comrades.” He took a breath, shifting the piercing gaze of his red sharingan from Kakashi’s tear streaked mask, to his injured eye. “I never did get you that promotion gift, did I.” he mused almost absentmindedly. His gaze flickered over to Rin, his head making a valient but futile attempt to turn towards her.
“Rin, Kakashi,” he said softly, his voice nearly inaudible over the seemingly distant rumbles of collapsing rock – they had a short reprieve where the cave might be stable now. “I need you guys to do something for me. Rin, can you perform an eye transplant surgery?” he rasped. Rin’s eyebrows furrowed slightly as she puzzled over why Obito would be asking that now.
Kakshi, however, wasn’t called a genius for nothing, and quickly caught on to the Uchiha’s plan. “No! Obito! You just got your sharingan, why would you give it up now?” he demanded, looking at Obito in confusion. He’d been anxious to get his clan’s infamous doujutsu for years, and he was just going to give it away?!
The elder teen smiled weakly. “Kakashi,” he whispered, “you know I’m not going to live muh longer… you lost your eye saving me, the least I can do is replace it. You’re brilliant without a true bloodline limit, imagin what you could do with the sharingan. Kakashi I-“ he cut himself off with a hacking cough filled with blood and a wince of pain. “See the future for me? P-protect Rin b-because I can’t any more.” He treid to smile brightly, but it fell short and become more of grimace oin pain.
And how could Kakashi deny Obito’s last request?
So, Rin performed the operation in record time and Kakashi watched with the sharingan blazing as Obito took his last breaths, leaving Rin and Kakashi alone in the still collapsing cave.
Nohara Rin
The third shinobi war ended when Rin and Kakashi had blown up the Kanabi bridge and effectively destroyed a very important supply route. Konoha quickly settled negotiations with the other villages, and came out better than some of the others. Minato-sensei was training to take over the position of Hokage as the Yondaime. Rin was taking more and more shifts at the hospital and a very skilled field medic.
(Ever since word spread of her emergency eye transplant done in 2 minutes while in the middle of a collapsing cave, she’d been revered for her skill in the field. Tsunade may have been the most skilled medic, but Rin was more than capable of handling nearly any operation in the field.)
The Uchiha’s had been informed of Kakashi now possessing Obito’s fully evolved sharingan. Needless to say, they were far from pleased at the fact. They called him a thief and shunned him. They pretended Obito never existed and called for the return of the sharingan. The Sandaime and future Yondaime protected him by invoking some law or another. Kakashi had been too emotionally overwhelmed to pay all that much attention. Obito’s sharingan had burned the teen’s death into his memory forever.
Every time he closed his eyes, all he could see was Obito’s eyeless, broken and bleeding form half hidden under the cave rock.
But other than the Uchiha, no one shunned him. In the span of like, 5 days, they seemed to have completely forgotten their hatred for the Hatake clan and instead praised the silver haired child. Kakashi was past caring what the civilians thought. He would take Obito’s words to heart.
Those who break the rules may be trash, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash.
As a jonin of the new leaf village, Kakashi had been doing a spree of solo missions to help improve Konoha’s financial position. But his next mission was to go to Iwagakure, and so the Hokage in training refused to send his 10 year old student into former enemy territory (the former not even being more than a couple months old) alone. So he sent what was left of his team. It was a simple scroll retrieval – just some jutsu, nothing major – and a seasoned war vet jonin and chunin would (should) be more than enough. If they hadn’t just ended a war with Iwa, Minato probably would have sent a jonin sensei and their genin.
And by all rights actually retrieving the scroll was easy. They were in and out without any injuries or even being detected. It was on the way back from Iwa that the mission went to hell. They were ambushed shortly after crossing Konoha’s Borders and returning to the Land of Fire. Kakashi had been able to take out the enemy easily enough but by the time he was done, Rin was nowhere to be found.
Those who abandon their comrades are wore than trash.
He did the only thing he could do: he summoned his ninken. Sending the scroll and a message asking for reinforcements for retrieving Rin with Pakkun so that the mission wouldn’t be a failure; then he went after Rin by tracking her scent. Luckily she hadn’t been far; only a couple miles back into Iwa territory – of course, it also had to be in another bloody cave. He knew he was at the right place because of the screams.
Rin was screaming in pain.
He’d burst in, not hesitating to form a plan like he might have at one point. He just launched in, grabbed Rin from where she was curled around her stomach on a table, and ran. He left his ninken to slow down any pursuers, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to handle them on his own. There were 30+ unknown ranking shinobi and Kakashi was 10 years old. He may be skilled, but his size allowed him to be easily overwhelmed. He wasn’t going to risk an injured Rin unless it was absolutely necessary.
He was flying through the trees with an unconscious Rin in his arms and panicking. He only knew what Rin had deigned to show him concerning medical knowledge so he had no idea what was wrong with the chunin. Luckily, she regained consciousness shortly after they re-entered the Land of Fire. Her eyes snapped open, and she rolled out of his arms, catching herself as she fell. Kakashi halted his run and turned to face her.
“Rin, you’re safe! I rescued you and were only a couple miles from Konoha but we need to hurry before the people who took you catch up.” He said, trying to relay an underlying message of urgency. Rin blinked for a moment, staring at Kakashi’s raised but empty hands, knowing full well what they were capable of. Kakashi was sure she would relax and follow him back to the village so that she can get medical attention – as a medic she would know the protocol and her own condition.
However she didn’t do that. Instead, she flipped the fuck out “No!” she yelled, gripping her stomach. “I can’t go back to the village. I, I need to get away from here!” She was clearly in distress and Kakashi had no idea what he was supposed to do.
“Rin, we need to get you to medical.” He insisted, “you’re not making sense!” he was panicking, what was he supposed to do. Rin shook her head frantically, falling to her knees. Kakashi leapt over to kneel beside the crumpled form of his team mate.
“Kakashi! You don’t understand,” she pulled up the bottom of her shirt (Kakashi had a brief moment of panic at the idea of Rin pulling up her shirt but he quickly pushed it down because that was just stupid), revealing a rather messily carved incomplete seal that was sluggishly bleeding. “They sealed the Sanbi into me; I’m a time bomb! As soon as I cross the village wall, the 3 tailed turtle will escape and go on a rampage. You have to kill me!” She exclaimed, looking up at Kakashi with wide tear filled eyes.
Holy shit. That was…
“There has to be another way! Minato-sensei is a genius with seals. He can fix this. We can fix this.” He needed to reassure her; he couldn’t lose another team mate. He couldn’t break his promise to Obito; he needed to save Rin. Rin opened her mouth as if to respond, but she was cut off by the arrival of around 45 enemy ninja. They didn’t waste any time in attacking, and both Kakashi and Rin were too distracted to continue their argument.
Kakashi – who was already tired – and Rin – ho had just had an unstable bjuu sealed in her in a rushed manner – were tired and struggling to dispatch the multitude of high level ninja. It was looking very grim, and Kakashi prayed – one of the few times he actually considered asking the cruel and absent kami for anything – for the back up to arrive. He charged Chidori after Chidori, being able to effectively use his unique jutsu thanks to the sharingan. With emphasis on killing quickly and fleeing towards the village (not so much the latter due to Kakashi’s need to stay close to Rin). They were making their way through the enemy nin.
Kakashi was putting all of his promising future anbu skills to use as he did his best to protect Rin. Surprisingly, between the two students of the Yondaime, they were left with a few high chunin level ninja and a clearing full of corpses. Kakashi charged another Chidori, knowing that his chakra was running dangerously low and this was probably the last Chidori he’d be able to make during this battle lest he pass out from chakra exhaustion in the middle of a fight. He couldn’t leave Rin to fight the Iwa shinobi alone. He lunged forward, meaning to drive his fist full of chakra through a ninja’s chest–
Thunk
“Ka…ka…shi”
He froze, staring wide eyed with both his and Obitio’s eye at his arm protruding through Rin’s chest. There was an odd sense of déjà vu and he frantically tried to just wake up. This wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real. She’d jumped in front of his attack; his hand had torn right through her heart. How symbolic.
As the chirping and bright light died down, more of the hideous hole through Rin’s chest became visible. Blood had begun to drip from her mouth and it completely covered his arm. He twitched, staring at her in horror as she fell off his arm, her head lolling to the side to stare blankly in the direction of Konoha.
He let out a shaky breath before releasing an almost canine howl of grief.
The anbu team arrived 15 minutes later to find a field full of corpses and an unconscious Kakashi.
Namikaze Minato
The two strongest memories that Kakashi had of his beloved sensei, was the day he began dating Kushina, and the day that he died.
Kakashi was naturally a jealous and possessive person. It wasn’t exactly a great thing, but it stemmed from his childhood and how he basically raised himself. He had abandonment issues. Sue him.
It was when Minato had first begun teaching Kakashi. His father had been taking more and more missions and leaving Kakashi by himself for longer stretches of time. The Hokage had assigned the village’s youngest genin to the youngest jonin and Kakashi had quickly gotten attached to having an ‘adult’ (terms used loosely) actually pay attention to him. And even like him too.
His young mind had quickly deemed Minato ‘pack’ and that made him his. Others weren’t allowed to have him unless they became pack. Old classmates that Minato had, were not pack. It was a simple concept really, but apparently Minato didn’t operate under pack rules. Instead he chose to chase the skirts of non pack members. To a 5 year old Kakashi that was not okay. Because it meant that Minato was going to leave. And that was not okay.
They had just finished training and were eating some Ramen at Ichiraku’s when a red hair kunoichi had sauntered over and sat behind his blond-haired sensei. She was bold and loud and ate more Ramen than Minato and Kakashi combined. She flirted with Minato and seemed to be quite powerful if her aura was anything to go by.
Kakashi didn’t like her.
Minato had turned into a bright red stuttering mess around her. But he also laughed and looked at her like she’d hung the moon and held all the secrets to the universe. That was how Sakumo had looked at his mother. He knew what happened when one of them died. He didn’t want to see Minato act like his dad had. So he had tried in his own quiet way to get Minato to leave the stand and forget this red headed loudmouth. They didn’t need her. Their pack of two was more than enough.
Minato, being the dense buffoon that he was concerning feelings, completely missed the point. Instead, he flirted back, and actually managed to stutter out a request for a date. He asked that red haired she-demon on a date. And she agreed.
Minato had grinned with a smile that was so bright it could have powered the entire village for years. Then he gave a lame excuse to Kakashi, slammed some money down beside his and Kushina’s empty ramen bowls, then left hand in hand with Kushina. Kakashi was left to finish his lukewarm and soggy ramen by himself. Minato had had a dumb facial expression on his face for the entire week afterwards.
Kakashi had thought that that had made him feel awful, but then the next few years happened and he realized that war was just death after death and at the end of the day, you end up alone.
After Sakumo’s suicide, Obito’s accident, and him killing Rin, all he had left was his teacher. Even that wasn’t anywhere near enough. Minato had officially taken the hat and become the Yondaime and married Kushina. His time and love was split between his wife and the entire village. Kakashi was just a reminder of his failed genin team and a relic of the past. He’d grown up at the front lines of the war, there was no innocence left, and all he was, was alone.
So knowing he would only bring his sensei pain and distract him from the future, he chose to join anbu. He was the first anbu that was instated by Minato, and the youngest anbu captain to date. He learned from his mistakes of making friends and leaving comrades behind. He distanced himself emotionally, but he never left a man behind. He developed the sharingan beyond what any of the Uchiha expected from him and he learned everything he could.
He even learned things about fuinjutsu just to spend some extra time with his sensei. He became the ‘man’ of a thousand jutsu; Sharingan no Kakashi. He spent two years, not failing a single mission, and looking after his sensei and his chosen mate; even if the she-fox rubbed his back the wrong way. He was short on pack, and if he had to include her to make Minato happy then so be it.
For 2 years, he was falling apart on the inside, but still able to keep the pieces of his cracked shell together; gluing them back in with Minato and Kushina’s kindness, Rin’s gentleness and Obito’s personality. Then Kushina got pregnant and he was put on guard duty. Truly there was no greater honour than the alpha trusting him with his mate’s safety.
Doesn’t mean he liked the woman any better than he did when he was 5.
For 9 months, the village was truly prosperous, and his pack actually acted like a true family. Kushina was oblivious to Kakashi’s true feelings and treated him like he was her son. It was nice to have people want to spend time with him. Despite popular belief, he wasn’t oblivious to the reputation he had with the other anbu. He was the stone cold and ruthless captain; the one with the stolen doujutsu and the friend killer who never left a comrade behind. He was whispered about, but all of anbu was weary. Were he to snap, chaos would reign amongst the ranks from those who believed themselves to be loyal to him, and those who wished he’d die on one of his many suicide missions.
The village had finally recovered from the third shinobi war and thriving under the reign of the Yondaime Hokage. But it was not to last.
It was Kushina’s due date, and Kakashi had been standing guard as Minato’s personal anbu for what felt like hours. Nothing had happened all day, but Kakakashi should have known that that was a blessing. Not even half an hour after he’d had the damning thoughts of boredom did the worst possible thing happen.
There was an explosion from the building behind him, and then there was a flurry of motion. A large fox with 9 flowing tails had appeared and trashing the village seemed to be its main goal. Kakashi had followed protocols and had started evacuating citizens and trying to get everyone to safety while waiting for the other ninja to take over so he could go to his Hokage. He was an anbu captain, and as such, he was one of the most qualified to fight the escaped Kyuubi. He could provide some support and protection to the Yondaime and his wife, at the very least.
By the time he’d gotten even close to the damned fox demon, it was already too late. Minato had been self sacrificing as fuck and had ended up sealing the bjuu in his newborn son and killing himself in the process. The Pack Alpha was dead and Kakashi was back to how he began. Alone and with way too many kills under his belt for someone his age. He was 12. He shouldn’t be in anbu, let alone a captain. Sure he’d been self-sufficient since he was 5, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t a pack person at heart.
Minato had chosen to end his life and that was what hurt the most. There had to have been other options to get rid of or contain the Kyuubi. Leaving Kakashi all alone couldn’t have been the best way. It hurt too much to think that Minato chose to do so, knowing he would be hurting two (Naruto would never lead a normal life now – and there was no way that anyone would grant Kakashi custody of a baby when he was a 12 year old anbu) members of his small and yet infinitely large pack.
It couldn’t be what he meant.
Uchiha Itachi
Itachi was one of his greatest regrets.
Kakashi had been a thorough mess for a long time after Minato’s death. He had barely taken care of himself and taken way too many suicidal anbu solo missions. He was much more careful when he was forced to take his team, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d practically shut down. Luckily, his team seemed to care enough about him to try and get him out of his slump.
By the time he was 15, he was about as sane as any other anbu. Not exactly ideal considering it was anbu sane, but he was actually trusting his team and making new pack bonds, even if they were tentative. He’d gotten familiar with the way that Yugao, Genma and Raido had operated. Yugao was a monster all her own, and Genma and Raido had a way of working together that it almost seemed to be the result of telepathic communication. They worked well with him and they were a balanced team.
Everything was fine, but then Sandaime-sama decided to disrupt Kakashi’s world once more by moving Yugao to another team. He could understand how she might work better with those team mates, but his team had just begun operating at peak efficiency after the training period was over. They knew each other; they knew how to cover weaknesses and silently communicate.
As a replacement, they were given Uchiha Itachi, the Uchiha’s prized prodigy. He was just a year older than Kakashi had been when he joined anbu, and he was still a starry eyed little pacifist. Kakashi would admit that he hadn’t been too impressed with the kid when he’d first met him. But, he proved that he was willing to work hard, and with the right training, he managed to fit into the 4 man anbu team rather well. His sharingan worked very well with Kakashi’s own, and Genma and Raido saw him as yet another little brother that had joined anbu far too early, even if the two prodigies with the sharingan were far more skilled than the duo.
They worked together for many years, and their team had gained a rather impressive reputation by the time that Kakashi was 18. He’d been a captain for a long time, and since Itachi joined their team, they hadn’t failed a mission. If Team Ookami was sent after you, then you were screwed. The team had even received its own page in the bingo book.
That’s of course, when Danzo approached Itachi, and he started acting… off. They had had no idea what was wrong with their youngest team mate, but they’d found out along with the rest of the village when Itachi had seemed to snap and murdered his entire clan save his little brother. It was inconceivable. Itachi had been a pacifist who hated violence. None of them could understand why Itachi would have done something like this.
Putting his little brother under Tsukiyomi had been the hardest thing for them to accept.
Then Itachi was a missing nin and causing havoc amongst the other shinobi villages. Not long after that, Kakashi had stuck around anbu only 2 years longer, long enough to make sure that Genma and Raido would be able to take over his position when he left. Long enough, that his leaving wouldn’t be so painful when compared to the dull ache of Itachi’s betrayal.
Uchiha Sasuke
After the failure that was Uchiha Itachi, should Kakashi have really been all that surprised at the fact that Sasuke followed right in his footsteps? Sure he hadn’t killed his entire clan and then become and internationally S-ranked missing nin, but what he did do wasn’t much better than that if you want to go there.
Kakashi had seen so many similarities between Sasuke and a young Itachi, but Sasuke had also reminded him greatly of how he had acted before Obito’s death. Seeing the potential for the Uchiha survivor to become as bitter and broken as he himself was, he tried to save the kid from that fate. He took him under his wing and drilled in every lesson that he’d learned from Obito. But apparently none of those had stuck. Sasuke had been too obsessed with killing Itachi.
It was a foolish obsession considering Kakashi knew what the Uchiha genius had been capable of when he was still only in anbu. Sasuke was an idiot to believe that he even had the slightest chance of even getting a tie with someone as skilled as Itachi. Heck, he’d frozen up at the slightest hint of killing intent that Zabuza had released. He’d still gotten nervous around the Kakashi when he released a little of his own. That kid still didn’t know how to fight against the Sharingan, and just like Obito, he believed that his clan’s prized doujutsu was the best trump card.
To the young genin nothing could beat it.
Except, the Sharingan had of course, been overcome by Itachi. Sasuke seemed to forget that while he was a gifted student, he was nowhere close to the title of genius. Even Neji Hyuga, whom his ‘eternal rival’ had gotten to teach really met the definition that Kakashi held for genius or prodigy. Perhaps he just hadn’t seen enough of the branch member, but he wasn’t all that impressed regardless. The only genin that Kakashi could think of that would come close to meeting the prodigy standards of war time Konoha was Nara Shikamaru. And all the Nara’s were geniuses, so did that really count?
Asuma was lucky that he got to teach the Nara heir. In fact, there had been an awful lot of clan heir children in that batch of genin. But that was beside the point.
Sasuke was so full of anger and the urge to just get stronger that he completely ignored the fact that if he had the help of his comrades then he could take out Itachi much faster. Sasuke only had enough self-preservation to keep himself alive until he could kill his older brother. Kakashi had thought that perhaps he’d gotten through to the kid when he started actually working with Naruto and Sakura, even if he was reluctant to at first.
But then the chunin exams happened, and Orochimaru had gotten to Sasuke.
There was a time when things hung in a limbo. They were at the edge of a knife and a breath away from falling to one side or the other. Sasuke then made his choice; choosing power and a vain shot at killing the elder Uchiha instead of the village and the Will of Fire. Naruto and Sakura had been heartbroken by the fact that he’d left them. They’d honestly believed that maybe Sasuke had changed and that only made Kakashi feel even more guilty.
Maybe if he’d been a better teacher, Sasuke wouldn’t have felt the need to leave the village to get stronger. Maybe, if he hadn’t constantly doubted Sasuke’s ability to change, he would have changed. But instead Sasuke fell into the deep end and began to swim away. He’d left the village and Team Kakashi without so much as a backwards glance.
Uzumaki Naruto
With the loss of Sasuke, began the inevitable shattering of Team 7. When one team mate leaves (most often by reassignment or death) the others are quick to fall apart. Especially in a team like Kakashi’s (and Minato’s) that had emphasized team work above all else save skill. Kakashi had seen the signs that this would come long before Sasuke had even considered leaving. They were ill matched for each other as they were, and it really didn’t help that Kakashi just sucked at teaching.
He knew that he might have fucked up – a lot – while teaching (if you could even call what he did teaching). He had favoured Sasuke because the last loyal (well… not anymore) Uchiha reminded him so much of himself when he’d been on a genin team. He’d tried to do better by the stoic teen, maybe he wouldn’t make the same mistakes as Kakashi had.
He did anyway. He made a whole lot of his own too.
But that’s not the point. The point is that in his need to make sure that Sasuke didn’t become like himself, he had ignored Naruto and Sakura. Sakura was understandable because as long as Sasuke was present she was basically unteachable. Kakashi had never exactly learned how to be around fangirls because Rin and Kushina had both been very capable kunoichi who didn’t faun over boys. Sakura sacrificed literally everything in a pathetic attempt to gain Sasuke’s favour. It was absurd.
Naruto had been fighting for attention all his life, and Kakashi had just been another person that Naruto had had to try to win over. The difference, was that looking at Naruto reminded him about his sensei. It physically hurt him to look at the last reminder of his beloved sensei and the alpha female. He looked at him and he saw all of his mistakes as well as a ghost of his past.
He couldn’t exactly be blamed for not getting over his trauma, but he still should have done more for the boy.
So, it indeed came as no surprise that Naruto would choose to go on the 2 year long training trip with Jiraya. He was a sannin, and he was probably actually good at teaching. He’d certainly been good enough to help Minato become the great ninja and Hokage that he’d been. He could show Naruto some of his father’s beloved fuinjutsu.
In other words, he was the teacher that Naruto really deserved. After all, Kakashi couldn’t let go the slight resentment he held for the yellow haired brat due to the fact that he was here and his father wasn’t. Minato who’d been that father figure that he’d needed even if he hadn’t wanted it at the time. But his own selfish emotions had gotten in the way, and Naruto had slipped through his fingers.
Sure on some fundamental level he understood that it was a temporary training expedition, but that didn’t mean that it hurt any less. Naruto had done the same thing that Sasuke did and chose a sannin level teacher over whatever pathetic attempts at teaching Kakashi could do. Another bird was leaving the nest, and Kakashi should count himself lucky that Naruto would come back. Sasuke had left the pack and he was now a missing nin.
Even if Naruto succeeded in brining back the wayward member of Team 7, he would have to face the consequences of abandoning the village.
Kakashi was greatly regretting letting this particular genin team pass his test. They were proving to do him more harm than good, and he knew that they would fare better under the tutelage of others. This was a sign that he wasn’t meant to teach. If he couldn’t even handle a team of genin who were slightly competent, what was he going to do when Tsunade wanted him to join the roster of jonin senseis once more.
His team were all leaving him. It was only a matter of time before he was back to where he was when he left anbu.
Haruno Sakura
It wasn’t all that long after Naruto left, that Sakura did as well.
She followed in her team mates footsteps and found another teacher, coincidentally or not, another sannin. Tsunade was an incredible medic and would be able to teach her infinitely better than Kakashi would have been able to. He was man enough to admit that he was a shit teacher now, but he’d like to think that he at least gave her a decent foundation for medical jutsu. She reminded him so much of how Rin could have been had Obito not died. Full of life and with so much promise as a medic.
Sakura had tried to stick with him for a bit after Naruto left – they even did a couple escort missions together – but she inevitably figured out that he wouldn’t be able to teach her what she wanted to know (although she might have jumped to the conclusion that he didn’t know any medical jutsu, which was of course, incorrect because he had served a long ass time in anbu and was more than proficient in saving himself and his comrades) and had instead sought teachings elsewhere.
Sakura had been a good little student and had even tried to manage being taught by two different teachers at once, but with the awful habits that Kakashi’s Obito mask gave him, she quickly grew tired of waiting for hours on end when she could have been studying under one of the sannin. So she informed him of her decision in the worst way possible. At least, in his opinion.
He’d been called in by Tsunade for an urgent meeting. Thinking it might have something to do with Akatsuki or one of his students, he actually made the effort to arrive on time. He was only 2 minutes late. When he arrived, Sakura and Tsunade were there to greet him. Sakura refused to meet his eyes; that should have been the first warning sign, but at the time he hadn’t thought much of it. Tsunade pursed her lips, and for once didn’t comment on his lateness.
That was warning sign number two.
“Kakashi,” she began, looking pointedly at his face – or what was visible on his face. “I regret to have to inform you, but I’m dissolving Team 7; at least until Naruto returns.” Kakashi felt his breath catch in his throat at this revelation. He knew it wouldn’t be permanent, but the only words that were running through his head were dissolving Team 7 and you’re losing your pack again. He did his best to not outwardly show his emotions about this decision and instead asked one thing.
“Why.”
He had to know why Tsunade was doing this. She had seen how the war had effected the Hatake clan and she knew that his clan were big on pack. He’d been packless for too long, and he knew now that a Hatake without a pack was a dangerous ninja. You didn’t know who they would turn on. They were almost like wounded animals; this would handicap him severely. Tsunade sighed, looking at him in defeat.
“It wasn’t exactly my choice, but you have to face the facts. You’re now down to a team of two, and Sakura needs to spend more time perfecting her own choice of study while Naruto is away. There’s nothing more you can offer her, so until Naruto returns… I’m afraid it’s out of my hands.” Tsunade said, looking away from his singular grey eye and instead focusing on the paperwork on her desk. Sakura shuffled awkwardly behind her fiddling with a stack of files and scrolls that were in her hands.
“I was the one to request this, Kakashi-sensei.” She confessed, “It just doesn’t feel right to do this without Naruto… or Sasuke.” She said softly.
Of course, to add insult to injury, it was his own pack that had deemed him unworthy. And she hadn’t even had to decency to warn him first. No, instead she chose to let him break right in front of the new Hokage. He’d been foolish to believe that as long as he had Sakura things would be fine. But no, his last remaining pack member has decided to dissolve the pack bonds altogether.
He froze for a moment, trying desperately to accept the reality of his situation and to not break outwardly. He was sure that any anbu that were watching would see the signs of a shattering ninja – anbu had to learn how to handle their own breaking as well as the shattering of team mates otherwise they wouldn’t be able to last long with how much horror they were forced to commit in their time of serving as the nameless and faceless operatives – but Tsunade and Sakura who had never been anbu wouldn’t see the signs.
Anbu. Everything always eventually came back to anbu didn’t it.
He shook his head lightly before scratching the back of his head and smiling the bright smile that was so reminiscent of Obito that he rarely looked in the mirror while smiling anymore. “Maa, Sakura-chan that’s quite alright. I understand the sentiment. If you could step out for a moment? I’d like to talk with Tsunade-sama about something.” He said gently, smiling brightly to hide just how much this entire situation was affecting him.
Sakura smiled weakly before ducking out of the room. Such a good little genin right up until she left his teaching, wasn’t she.
As soon as his pink haired former student left the office, he allowed himself to lose his slouch and the bright smile faded from his face in exchange for an expression that wouldn’t have been all that foreign to see upon his face while he was an anbu. He stood ramrod straight, falling back on old habits from his teenage days; before he started wearing his Obito mask to hide from the world. How Obito had acted was more widely acceptable by the jonin world, while the cold blooded killer anbu would have stuck out like a sore thumb.
“What do you want to talk about Kakashi?” Tsunade asked, also beginning to reveal her own weariness at the entire situation. She knew what it was like to lose people. The difference between them was that Kakashi hadn’t run away when he’d lost everything. He hadn’t been the one to abandon the village for years. He’d been loyal, and would be loyal to the end.
After all, this village was all that was left of his beloved comrades.
“I’d appreciate it if you could take me off the jonin roster, Tsunade-sama. I feel it might be time for me to return to the shadows, and forget about my time in the light.” That phrasing was special. Anbu identities were supposed to be left unknown to all but the Hokage, even if an anbu did have some rather identifiable features. Tsunade might not have had time to look through all of the anbu files yet, but she should know about this particular protocol.
She raised an eyebrow tiredly, “And why should I do that? You’re quiet the skilled jonin. Wouldn’t your talents be wasted on the shadows. It seems to me you’re more of a frontline fighter.” Oh, she really had been out of the loop hadn’t she. Kakashi was far from the frontline fighter that his teacher had been. Perhaps in another life, his fighting style might have developed in such a manner, but he’d been keeping up his anbu training and downplaying his skills when around those who would find such a thing suspicious.
“Take a look at my files, Hokage-sama. I believe you’ll find quite a different tale than the one you know being told there.” Ah, speaking in riddles, how he’d missed this particular quirk of pissing off various Hokages. He had lived through 3 of them after all; technically 4 with how the Sandaime had taken over after Minato’s death. Tsunade didn’t look all that enthused at reading through more paperwork, but she went to the cabinet nonetheless and pulled out his rather thick file.
He saw her lose a bit of her composure as she began to read through the file, eyes windening at the long list of accomplishments, missions, and psych evaluations that he’d had the pleasure of completing. His file ahd started when he’d joined the academy, including his scores and some comments from his various teachers. There was a list of jutsu and techniques that his father had taught him, and his early years as a genin. He was sure that Minato had written over half of those notes, considering he was his primary teacher for the majority of his learning career. He had had only one official teacher after all.
It showed his chunin exam results and notes from the judges, and it probably had the psych evaluations from after his father’s suicide, Obito’s death, Rin’s death, and Itachi’s betrayal. He was sure it held the medical records of his transplant, and how his first mission as a jonin leader had gone. But the most important parts were his anbu career. Rising from anbu to captain in barely 2 months had been impressive without adding in his age as a factor. He’d spent more than half of his life in the anbu force, and his impressive list of successful missions spoke for itself on his skills at assassination and leading teams.
He really didn’t know what had happened with his genin team. Maybe it was the lack of trust they held in their teacher, but for some reason, leading anbu in and out of dangerous situations was easy. Despite his silver hair and rather recognizable sharingan, he had been very good at hiding in the shadows. Add on the fact that he knew more than 1000 jutsu and his white chakra, well he wasn’t someone that you’d want to have sent after you.
It wouldn’t take all that much more training on his part to get himself back to his peak form, and then he was more than capable of following his captain on missions, even if it ended up being some fresh meat. He was experience and if things went to hell he’d be more than capable of pulling them out of the worst of it. Truly, Tsunade would be foolish to not accept his proposition.
What good was he doing the village as a jonin? He’d failed as a teacher and he was too high profile to be able to do any good missions without disappearing into the anonymity that anbu promised. He would even be better served at training future anbu. Seriously, anything except teaching genin.
When Tsunade finished reading his file, she looked up at him. “Are you sure you want to do this? You understand that you wouldn’t be able to tell anyone anything unless given permission to, and that this would only be effective until Naruto returns to the village? Upon his return you’ll need to return as the team leader for Team 7.” He nodded in agreement. Some time in the shadows might do him some good.
Losing himself in the anbu world had saved him from his grief before. He needed a safe place to go lick his wounds. The other anbu who had left the force only to return would understand him infinitely better than the other jonin senseis. They knew what it was like to lose and to no longer belong amongst the light ones. When you felt like you were tarnishing their innocence just by being around them.
Tsunade sighed and reached for yet another bottle of sake. “Well if you’re sure, then welcome back to anbu, Ookami.” She said, saying his old code name with a regretful tone. Kakashi was grateful all the same, taking the offered wolf mask and placing it over his own face mask, removing his hitai ite as he went.
“Hokage-sama” he said one last time before disappearing in a swirl of leaves.