Work Text:
Everything was more or less fine now.
Kaguya? Defeated.
Naruto? Studying for the first time, ever.
Gai? Youthful as ever, despite everything that had happened.
And yet, Kakashi was so bored. And overworked. Was it even possible to be bored and overworked at the same time?
He had no shortage of work: Paperwork (not as bad as Tsunade-sama’s), rebuilding Konoha, (im)patiently waiting for Hinata and Naruto to finally take the leap –and yet– he was so bored.
It wasn’t like he was entirely on top of his tasks either. Sakura had almost impaled him when he told her he needed more time to go through the records she had sent him.
Maybe he was just burnt out. Sometimes, he wished he could talk to Jiraiya-sama. That man always had something simultaneously wise and stupid to say. Inappropriate too.
Usually, reading Icha-Icha would quell his boredom. But not lately. It seemed like, no matter how hard he tried to re-immerse himself into his favorite novels, he couldn’t find the same thrill in the scandalous moments as he used to.
If Jiraiya were still around, he would probably give Kakashi a draft of a new edition for him to pre-read. But if he was being honest, there were a couple of plot threads Jiraiya dropped.
Like, the main characters should have taken the “next step” after they went on a third date where they should have gone to the beach together while searching for seashells.
It turned out that daydreaming about what could have happened was now more entertaining than rereading the novels over and over again. Jiraiya could have turned the story in a 100 different ways he didn’t and Kakashi now had incredible brain rot about what could have happened.
In fact, now that he had explored it a teensy bit, it was all he could think about. The millions of different date options, the thousands of different things Elizabeth and Tristan could have done before Icha-Icha Tactics, and how Tristan should have been nicer to Elizabeth in Icha-Icha Paradise before they went to their first coffee date. All the ideas in his brain swirled around like an elaborate “idea stew,” and he felt like his head would overflow with the endless possibilities that existed outside the Icha-Icha canon.
So, he did what any normal, not-obsessed, fan would do—he wrote down some bullet points to keep his ideas in check. His brain automatically made alternate worlds (universes?) for each of his ideas, like branches on a tree. The world where Elizabeth proposed was far different from the one where Tristan did, and he had elaborate plans for each world that he would sink back into after a long day of paperwork.
Boredom? Gone.
A new fervor to complete his work? You bet.
Daydreaming? In his free time. And outside his free time. (Basically all the time)
Ah, retirement is going to be so good.
The idea wafts over him as he’s lying in bed one day. With all these ideas rapidly building in his head and making their way onto paper as a vague skeleton for a story…
What if I filled that skeleton and wrote something substantial?
The idea struck him like a bolt of lightning. Electrified, he bolted out of bed, rummaging around in his bookshelves until he found some clean sheets of paper and a working pen at 40% ink capacity.
It was time to write.
The words flowed onto the page, all the ideas in his mind playing out as he envisioned them, in his words. It felt like he was vomiting onto the page, but he didn’t mind it all that much. It felt nice to release the contents of his brain after months of boredom and formally acting as Hokage.
Turns out, writing fanfiction makes your boredom poof away. There was something about changing the narrative of the story he loved so much in a way that made him love it more.
In fact, after forming the idea to write his own ending to Icha-Icha Paradise, Kakashi found himself more eager to get through his tasks for the day just to curl up in bed with the new, spiffy technology he was still getting accustomed to –a laptop– and type up (so much faster than writing) his own version of the beach date that never happened
Roughly two weeks after he had begun typing up the alternate ending to Icha-Icha, Kakashi realized.
He’d like to show someone his work.
But who? It’d be kinda embarrassing, honestly. They would all make fun of me for getting so invested in this. I can’t show any of my students, or their friends, or Tenzo, or Tsunade-sama, or–
Gai.
Maito Gai. Maito. Gai.
Ah, he should have realized sooner. Gai was the most nonjudgemental person he knew. (Gai wouldn’t understand many of the nuances… but that was okay. He just needed to show someone.)
“So… instead of liking each other sooner and then doing the stuff you like reading, there’s a slower buildup?”
“Yup.”
“I see…?”
Gai was flummoxed. Honestly, Kakashi knew he should have expected this, but still, it was kind of disappointing that someone who was also a fan of the series couldn’t read his work.
“Sorry, rival. I know you wanted me to enjoy it. I just don’t understand it.” Gai was, quite literally, the personification of the little sobbing guy that Naruto sent after every message.
“That’s okay. I just wish I could… you know, post it someplace where… other fans could, uhh, read it…?”
Why was he so embarrassed? It’s literally Gai. It doesn’t matter.
“RIVAL!!!” Gai was always so enthusiastic, but this was on another level. Kakashi was kinda scared.
“You should post this on those, uh, what do you call them? Like those forums? Where people talk about stuff. Post it anonymously!”
Gai does not get enough appreciation.
Kakashi made a mental note to shower Gai with all the sushi he wanted the next time they had dinner together.
Making an anonymous name was almost too easy. Kakashi was Kakashi no more, online. Now, he was Doglover28, and his profile picture was a cute pug that looked much happier than Pakkun ever could.
Posting his own work for the first time felt nervewracking, and frankly, a little ridiculous.
He never expected to find so many people who liked it. Or connect with so many people over their mutual love for Icha-Icha. In fact, it was so well-received, that people began reaching out to him to talk to him about their ideas for their own fanfictions. He would talk for hours to others about their ideas for what could have happened—and other people were so incredibly creative, that it blew his mind away entirely.
Now, he read Icha-Icha fanfiction almost daily. He talked to anonymous people about Icha-Icha daily. He looked at (spicy) fanart for Icha-Icha daily.
A new community.
It was no longer awkward at all. He just needed to get proficient with the slang the new generation used on technology.
Because what the fuck does skibidi mean?????