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Arguing with Koharu and Homura was an endless, exhausting task. As a Jonin Kakashi learned to pick and choose his fights carefully because the two elder’s were exceptionally skilled at wearing down their opponents. He’d seen shinobi older and more experienced than him cave to the elder’s demands, including Lord third.
He never gave up because he didn’t genuinely care about the argument, but because he ran out of energy to fight for his cause any longer. There had been many times growing up that he wished he’d had more power because it seemed like the only way that he would have the power to shut the elders up. Now, Kakashi had that power. He may not have wanted it when he first took the position of Hokage from Tsunade-sama, but Kakashi couldn’t deny the fact that he finally had a power he’d never had before.
“Shut up.” he groaned as he rubbed his forefinger against his temple in an attempt to will away the headache he could feel creeping up on him with every word the two elder’s said.
Koharu gasped, acting as though this was the first time in her life that a Hokage had told her to silence herself.
“Lord Sixth-” Homura began, only silencing himself when Kakashi glared his way.
If it were anyone else Kakashi would insist that they drop the ‘Lord’. It was an honorific meant to refer to those who had earned other people’s respect. People like Tsunade and Jiraiya had earned the right to be referred to using that honorific, but not Kakashi.
He was just Kakashi. Nothing else.
In this instance, though, he was willing to let it slide. If the two elder’s were going to insist on arguing with them he was going to allow them to remind themselves of just who it was they were trying to pick a fight with.
This wasn’t a fresh faced Jonin Kakashi arguing for a change in his team selection for a mission because he knew he could do the job better with Rin and Gai at his side.
It wasn’t Anbu Kakashi who was so broken and lost that he barely had a back bone to hold himself up let alone argue with the elder’s.
The two of them weren’t picking a fight with someone they still out ranked. No, today they were picking a fight with Hokage Kakashi. A man who’d never wanted the responsibility of taking care of an entire village, but who’d come into the job determined to make changes to the system that had taken so much from him.
“This is not up for discussion,” he lowered his hand onto the desk. “You can tell me how much you hate what I'm doing but I’ve already signed the paperwork and begun the process of retraining Konoha’s shinobi.”
“This is ridiculous,” Koharu straightened herself up, recovering from the shock of being told off. “Konoha is a village of shinobi. It is our job-”
tilting his head, Kakashi stared at her until . “Not ours,” Kakashi corrected her. “You two are no longer active shinobi. You have not been on a mission in over thirty years. If I could remove you from your positions I would but unfortunately even the Hokage does not have that power.” He’d checked and Tsunade had just sighed and shook her head. If there was anyone in Konoha who understood his desire to get rid of the elder’s it was her. “And in the past you would have been correct. When you were shinobi Konoha was in the midst of war. Killing our enemies may have been the only option. That’s not the case anymore.”
It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t allow the next generation to suffer through the guilt and regret that he had.
“Lord Sixth, you must see reason on this,” Homura continued to argue. “To change something so engrained into our society is foolish. Konoha’s shinobi are used to the way things are. They won’t change just because you ask them to.”
‘They won’t change that easily’ Tsunade-sama’s words echoed back to him. She’d been the first person he’d spoken to of his decision. Someone he could speak to who would tell him honestly what she thought and whether or not he should move forward. When he’d heard those words from her he’d prepared himself to give up on a better future, but then she continued speaking. ‘Then, of course, nothing that’s worth fighting for is ever easy’
Kakashi had a choice to make as Hokage. Which fights were the one’s he was willing to pick, and how far was he willing to dig his heels in and stand his ground?
For this one, the answer was simple to find.
No matter what anyone else said, or how much they fought him, he would stand his ground. This was a change that had to be made and there was no one in the village who would be able to stop him.
“They will learn,” he spoke calmly, keeping his voice steady even though he wanted to scream. “I don’t expect it to be an easy transition for anyone. There will be struggles and we will have to learn new methods.” the inclusion of ‘we’ was deliberate. Kakashi knew that it wouldn’t be just the shinobi under his command who would struggle with the new rule.
He had been raised to be a killer. Molded into the perfect ideal of a shinobi, ready to take a life at a moment’s notice. His hands were stained with the blood of countless enemy shinobi.
Learning to capture rather than kill would be just as much of a struggle for him, but it was something he was willing to put himself through so that the shinobi of Konoha knew he was serious about this change.
“Now,” focusing back on the pair in front of him, he narrowed his eyes. “This conversation is done. I will not hear another word about it so unless you have something else to speak with me about I would suggest you leave. I still have a lot of paperwork to finish before my day ends.”
Homura opened his mouth but quickly rethought whatever it was he wanted to say and instead turned his back to Kakashi with a huff.
“I hope you know what you’re doing, Lord Sixth,” Koharu sighed as she copied her friend’s movements, sparing Kakashi a glance over her shoulder. “The Hokage’s before you went through a lot to set the village up as it is. What you’re doing is dismantling all of that work.”
“Perhaps,” he sat back in his chair. “But they set up the village for war. I want this village to thrive and grow in ways they never could have imagined.”
He didn’t need to be known as the best Hokage Konoha had ever had. In fact, he’d resigned himself to being known as the worst Hokage in history as soon as he’d taken the seat and he was still prepared to take that title.
If being the worst meant pushing his village into a brighter, more hopeful future, he would happily wear that title.