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Kakashi hates fire. He doesn’t hate much- but he does hate fire.
He figures, if he really had to pick, he’d much rather drown.
He should be used to it now, the billowing smoke, the way it clings to his hair for days and sticks to the fibers of his clothes. It makes it difficult to navigate while relying on scent too. It makes tracking difficult and oh yeah- also breathing.
Kakashi spends the next ten minutes engaged in combat in a burning cave, vision obstructed by smoke and heat. He relies heavily on the Sharingan- though his reserves say he really shouldn’t.
His opponent, skilled in combat but not graced with the flexibility Kakashi has, meets his fate at the end of a kunai of all things.
There is certainly something to be said about that- something Kakashi always finds rather silly- for lack fo better phrasing. Most of his opponents, however clever or strong, tend to die in the simplest of ways.
His vision swims while he seals the body, leaning heavily on his dominant leg. He can’t see exactly why, but it’s not able to hold weight correctly. He navigates his way out of the cave through touch and the way the light filters through the smoke intricately, almost like a painting.
Perhaps he’s lost a bit of blood.
By the time he emerges from the mouth of the cave, he registers how his lungs burn from the inhalation. Regardless of how long he’d been able to hold it off, he’d still needed to breathe through the last bit of that fight.
He’d been alone on this one, the anonymity of the Anbu mask has done him no favors in expecting an extraction or support team to come to his aid. It’s been a long time since that was an option. It had been a long time since he’d been in the village for more than a few days.
For once, he actually doesn’t think he’ll mind being back even if it’s on a standard issue cot, wheezing for the next two days.
He picks himself up, wraps the apparent gaping hole in his calf up tightly and starts moving towards the village with the scroll secured to him.
His tired brain repeats one thought over and over as his chest burns and throat itches.
Fuck smoke and fuck this mission.
“You ever gonna stop causing trouble kid?” Asuma knocks Umino Iruka in the head lgihtly with his elbow, before dragging him by his collar out of public view and towards his apartment.
“Pshh it was barely a big deal. Idiots are over-reacting.” Iruka rolls his eyes and let’s himself be dragged into a nearly-empty apartment. Asuma settles his gaze and blinks at him, long and impatient.
“You have got to stop using your creepy “sensing- not sensing” ability to fuck with the Anbu. Whatever you wanna call it- they’re gonna stop finding it amusing and start considering you a threat here soon if you keep escalating things.” He says. It’s a bit more serious than the last time they’d had a similar conversation.
Probably less than a month ago.
“I- like you’re one to talk.” Iruka folds in on himself at the scolding a bit, not meeting Asuma’s eyes, but his words hold bite all the same. Asuma wasn’t one to fuck with Anbu, but that’s not really what this conversation is about.
It’s rebellion.
Asuma and Iruka stand, two sides of a coin in this moment.
Pot meet kettle. Well played Iruka.
“It’s different. You know that. Don’t be stupid .” Asuma makes his way through the apartment, Iruka follwoing close behind despite the turn of conversation. The sliding door sticks for half a second, lack of use and the changing of seasons giving way to Asuma’s determination to smoke a cigarette on his balcony.
“So you get to piss off whenever you want, come and go as you please.” Iruka pushes, wrapping his knuckles around the railing, watching with rapt attention the way Asuma’s fingers habitually wrap around a cigarette.
They lock eyes and Iruka sees something in the way the flame reflects in Asuma’s dark irises.
It’s familiar, but he can’t place it.
“Look-,” He takes a drag and pauses, thinking.
“You’ve got a lot of potential Umino. And you’re wasting it on things that you shouldn’t. I know Hiruzen has been trying to push you into more and more clerical work, different missions and plenty of studying.” Asuma ignores the way Iruka cringes at the use of Lord Third’s name, staring out into the village skyline.
Iruka stares, silent with brows drawn together.
“He doesn’t do things like that for just anyone.” Asuma feels his voice betray him, becoming softer and a bitter taste lingers in the back of his throat. He takes another drag to smother that taste.
It goes unsaid: he didn’t do that for me, his own son. Didn’t give me a second thought. Doesn’t matter if im here or in the field. Miles away or just a block down the street.
Iruka doesn’t know what to say to that- not really.
“You leaving again?” Iruka mumbles, leaning his head on his arms where they’re crossed over the balcony railing, eyes following the leaves moving through the breeze. He can’t look at Asuma. Not when he knows he’s going to turn around and leave.
“Mmm. Yeah. Probably after this smoke, honestly. I’m sure he’s got something I can take an extended mission on. Besides, ain’t nothing worth sticking around for but you and- maybe some old friends.” He stares into the busy street below, like he might see a familiar face.
Asuma can hear her laugh distantly, red eyes and a smile he hasn’t seen in months. He does wonder distantly, what Kurenai is up to these days. Wonders if she ever decided to put on that mask or if she’s mission bound.
There are a lot of things Iurka wants to say to Asuma here.
Why don’t you just come home?
Why do you think you don’t have potential?
Why do you bother with me?
Why do you have to leave me too?
But the honest truth is that Umino Iurka is fourteen and angry and all he wants is that stupid cigarette in between Asuma’s fingers.
He stares at it, that faint glow at the end of it, thin trail of smoke at the end- fixated and desperate.
“What- you want a drag ?” Asuma almost laughs, looks at the cigarette, then at Iruka’s outstretched fingers and back at the cigarette.
“Ya know what- sure kid. You go right ahead.” Asuma, earnestly, passes it to Iruka who holds it clumsily in his hand. The kid stares at it before replicating what he’s been watching Asuma do for the past two years. He puts it to his lips and inhales while Asuma holds out the light, staring at him intensely.
It only takes half a second for Iruka to break.
His face goes red and he lets out a choking cough, shoving the cigarette back towards Asuma like it had burned him, eyes watering and trying to catch his breath.
“That’s fucking terrible!” Iruka wheezes, clutching his chest with one hand and the railing with the other.
To make things even better, Asuma is laughing his ass off, and mockingly taking another long drag while Iruka fights for his life.
“I gotta say kid, you do have some balls on you. But stick to your ramen and study hall. Leave the self destructive behavior to me, alright?” He puts the cigarette out on the steel railing, listening to the faint hiss as Iurka remembers how to breathe again.
The grin fades from his face and Iruka mirrors it.
“I’m gonna head out. I’ll see you when I get back, if you aren’t on to bigger and better things, alright? Oh- and lock up, will you?” Asuma places a firm hand on Iruka’s shoulder and squeezes it gently before making his way off the balcony, bag still over his shoulder.
It had never left. Not from the minute Iruka had seen him back. He hadn't even set it down to smoke. Asuma was not a man who Iruka could have changed the mind of.
“Be safe, Asuma.” He mumbles, watching him disappear off the balcony, alone again.
All he can think about as his vision blurs in unshed tears, lungs burning and throat itching is one heavy thought.
Fuck smoke and fuck whatever Anbu had snitched on him.