Chapter Text
Plan One went like this:
A young Kakashi, recovering from Obito’s death, walked past Obito’s street before training. There, struggling to open a door with her arms filled with groceries, was an elderly Uchiha woman. Her name was Uchiha Naka, and Obito had been stopping to help her with her groceries every day for the past five years.
This time, one week after Obito’s announced demise, Kakashi helped her bring her groceries inside.
Kakashi was thirty minutes late to team training when he realized that he’d just helped an old woman put her bags of groceries in various cabinets and a fridge, and chopped some vegetables up for omelets.
Kakashi arrived at training, forty-five minutes late and with a delirious smile under his mask. He’d never felt so peaceful in his life.
“Ah, sorry Rin, Minato-sensei. I was helping an old lady put away her groceries.”
And so it began.
–_–_–_–
Kakashi had never been a particularly relaxed person.
At ten years old, one might even call him ‘high-strung’ or ‘paranoid’ or ‘in need of a psych eval’.
Kakashi could not necessarily disagree.
He’d been training since he could stand, been on the battlefield for most of his life, and not once had anyone ever told him to slow down.
For the first time in forever, Kakashi had been late to something. Kakashi had been-
unreliable.
It was freeing.
He was grounded from training – from missions – for two weeks, and his jounin status was temporarily rescinded in light of his overwhelming grief and unstable mental state. At least, that was what his Minato-ordered psych evaluation said.
–_–_–_–
So maybe Kakashi liked not having people rely on him.
Maybe he was actually unstable. Maybe he was crying out for help. Maybe failing his psych evaluations was the only way he could get a break. Could he pass them? … sometimes, sure! Did he know exactly how to act to fail them and sometimes act on that knowledge? Yeah.
Was he always acting?
That was between Kakashi and his dead parents.
–_–_–_–
Plans Two Through Thirty-Six were a little more thought-out.
Kakashi wanted to avoid responsibility, and if anyone got even a hint of what he was doing, responsibility would be dumped on him like trash in a junkyard.
Kakashi decided to take inspiration from the many great Avoiders before him: Orochimaru, who was frequently restrained to his lab and was perma-banned from both ANBU and the Hokage hat; Jiraiya, who was basically a nuke-nin with none of the Running-From-Bounty-Hunters problems; and Kushina, who was village-bound for weeks every time she let too much Kyuubi chakra escape on a battlefield.
Lesser known, he took on bits from those who Avoided the greatest responsibility of all: life.
Kakashi adopted Obito’s permanent lateness, and Kushina-nee’s terrible handwriting, and Minato-sensei’s refusal to explain anything, and Rin’s permanent smile.
The ultimate responsibility to avoid, Kakashi thought, is the Hokage’s Hat.
It had killed Minato-sensei. It had killed Kushina-nee. Its power and presence had caused Team 7 to be attacked numerous times and had resulted in Rin being kidnapped and killed. Kakashi was tempted to blame the Hat for Obito’s death, too, but that one was solely on his own shoulders.
By Konoha (and Team 7) tradition, there were seven living people who could become Hokage after the Third passed away. Danzo, Homura, Koharu, Jiraiya, Orochimaru, Tsunade, and Kakashi.
Homura and Koharu were no longer active shinobi, Jiraiya was an ever-absent spymaster, Orochimaru was not allowed to have that much freedom, Tsunade was on a drunken, grief-fueled gambling binge throughout the Elemental Nations with her niece, Shizune.
That left Danzo and Kakashi.
Maybe Shizune, who wasn’t technically a ninja, could be trained for the hat, but it wasn’t likely.
Other options? Danzo or Kakashi took on a student, and they became Hokage.
…
Pfff.
Kakashi? With a student??
Hah! As if! Sometimes, Kakashi cracked himself up.
Danzo wouldn’t be too bad as Hokage, and he was a decent trainer. He’d take on a student and Kakashi could continue ignoring the world.
–_–_–_–
Two years later, sixteen-year-old Kakashi would regret that thought.
–_–_–_–
Being in ANBU was a means to an end.
If Kakashi made himself invaluable to ANBU, then he couldn’t take the Hat when Lord Third Sarutobi Hiruzen eventually passed of old age or assassination attempts.
His plan worked.
Kakashi first heard of the new Lord Fifth Shimura Danzo while deep in the foothills of Lightning Country, where he’d been for several months.
When he returned to Konoha, it was almost unrecognizable.
Kinoe-kun, a ROOT (Roudou Te) agent who had been integrated into ANBU, greeted Hound at one of the secret mountain entrances that the ANBU used to get around.
Kinoe gave Kakashi the rundown.
It was a long rundown. More of a marathon than anything.
The Uchiha Police Force had been disbanded. The new police force was made up of the ROOT, which was an interesting change. Kakashi was used to ROOT policing ANBU, and not policing everyone. Danzo’s face was solidly engraved on Hokage Mountain, and the Hyuuga were refusing to play nice with the Cloud delegates that had come down to negotiate for peace.
Understandable.
The peace talks were rescheduled for another year.
Life went on.
Perhaps, if Kakashi had been aware of The Plot, it wouldn’t have snowballed the way it did. Unfortunately, hindsight is twenty-twenty, and Kakashi does not have a future-seeing glasses prescription.
With the Uchiha forcibly integrated, there was a long period of discontent.
Luckily, since they weren’t contained to their insular ways, this meant that Konoha shinobi once again became Konoha shinobi (as opposed to Konoha shinobi and the Uchiha clan who live here).
Those Cloud peace talks resulted in three-year-old Heiress Hyuuga Hinata being kidnapped and only rescued because Jinchuriki Uzumaki Naruto (and his ANBU guard) came across her by chance. The regularly scheduled World War was back on the agenda. Thrust back into pre-wartime (as opposed to wartime, post-wartime, and peacetalk-time (not peacetime, never peacetime)), Konoha altered their Ninja Academy graduation standards and sped up the curriculum.
Instead of graduating at thirteen-ish and being given to a jounin-sensei, every student would be rushed through, graduated at nine, and tossed in the Genin Corps until they caught the eye of a senpai.
This was great for Kakashi, as it meant that he would never become a jounin-sensei. It was less great for the nine-year-olds tossed onto battlefields, because they were not very good at fighting.
“Danzo-sama,” Kakashi said with the force of someone who was next in line for the Hokage hat and the hesitancy of someone who didn’t really approve of child murder, “perhaps you should consider reintegrating four-man teams for fresh genin. This year has the most Clan Heirs of any graduating class.”
Danzo didn’t even look up from his paperwork.
“That sounds like you hold some favoritism towards Clan children over civilian children. Should a shinobi of Konoha be treated differently because of their heritage?”
That is not what Kakashi meant, and Danzo knows it. “The Clans are getting restless. The Ino-Shika-Cho trio is in this class, as well as the Aburame and Hyuuga heirs. The Uchiha and Inuzuka seconds are graduating along with-”
“Konoha’s jinchuriki?”
“Naruto.”
“And what would you have me do? Withhold promising young shinobi from the battlefield and risk losing the war?”
“Withhold children from an unprepared battle so that they can become actual threats.”
Danzo looked up from his paperwork, his one eye meeting Kakashi’s.
Beyond Kakashi’s knowledge of the situation, their covered Sharingan’s met easily. Kakashi’s a gift from his teammate Obito, and Danzo’s stolen from his teammate Kagami. Uchihas really need to keep better track of their eyes.
“You are on leave, are you not? The Graduating Class of the Year 78 AFK (After the Founding of Konoha) is under your command.”
That did not help Kakashi Avoid Responsibility.
…
This is what he gets for attempting to prevent child murder.