Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Shinnen ❯ Monogatari ( Chapter 9 )
“The human heart feels things the eyes cannot see, and knows what the mind cannot understand.”
--Robert Vallett
Chapter 9: Monogatari
When Iruka opened his eyes he found himself staring at the ceiling. Or at least it looked like the ceiling. It was hard to tell, his eyesight was blurred and his eyes burned.
Burned…
With a gasp Iruka lurched upright. Before he could leap out of bed a pair of hands grabbed his shoulders and held him in place with a strength that was surprising.
“Calm down Iruka. You’re all right.” A voice soothed.
Iruka let out a shuddering sigh. He knew that voice. “Kakashi…” he whispered. Relief flooded through him, so strong that he felt lightheaded. He bit his lip to prevent letting out a sob that seemed to be trying to force its way up his throat.
Kakashi let out a dry chuckle. “Yeah it’s me.”
Iruka turned his head to stare at him. He was paler than usual and looked… tired. He was seated on a chair at the side of his bed, draped over the wooden thing in his usual casual slump. “What… what happened?” Iruka asked slowly, the words coming out of his mouth thickly. He began to slowly take in his surroundings, noticing the bed he was laying down on, the unfamiliar room he was in.
Kakashi’s face turned serious, though it really wasn’t much of a change from his previous expression. “I was going to ask you the same thing.” He said quietly.
Iruka took a deep breath and let it slowly out. “You first.” He said, and grimaced at how weak and hoarse his voice sounded. Probably from all the screaming he thought bitterly, and shuddered in spite of himself. He didn’t want to tell his tale to Kakashi. It seemed too personal to utter out loud. Too personal and too… wrong. He didn’t think the Jounin would understand anyway, and he didn’t think he could handle Kakashi not understanding.
Kakashi stared at him silently, but he quickly turned away. It occurred to Iruka that Kakashi might not have an answer, or even a response. After a moment however, his musings were cut short by Kakashi’s voice.
“I don’t honestly know what happened Iruka, and I’m not sure if I want to hazard a guess.” he replied honestly, spreading out his hands as if to show that he held no answers.
Iruka digested that sentence, mulling it over in his mind. It seemed difficult to think about anything, like there was a haze in his mind. And he felt… disoriented? That didn’t seem like the right word. There were thick cobwebs in his brain, dry and burning. It was a headache, and a bad one at that.
Iruka let out a half sigh, half moan, and massaged his temples with his hands.
“I’ve got one killer headache.” He declared.
After a pause, “You didn’t, by any chance, happen to partake in some sake earlier today?” Kakashi asked.
Iruka stared up at him incredulously. “Are you insinuating that I would get drunk before I taught my students? A job which, I might add, includes several sharp and dangerous objects?”
Kakashi scratched his cheek thoughtfully before replying. “Of course not.” He said innocently. “I would never insinuate anything about you, Iruka-sensei.”
“That’s what I thought.” Iruka said smugly, and felt a small smile tug at the edge of his lips.
“Unless you count this time.” Kakashi corrected. “Just now, I was definitely insinuating that you would drink and teach.”
Dead silence reigned for a few seconds before Iruka burst out laughing. He knew it wasn’t really that funny. He knew that his laughter probably sounded forced and he knew he was probably just looking for an excuse to laugh. He knew a lot of things just then, but above them all was one realization. Damn, laughing felt good. He suddenly didn’t care how he sounded, what Kakashi thought of him. He didn’t care that his head felt like it was going to split open, he didn’t care that his eyes were starting to water, and that his laughter was turning to crying, and soon he was sitting on the bed, crying in the silence, his hands clutching the sides of his head. Tears rolled down his cheeks, cool against his warm skin, where they quivered for a moment on his chin, before falling down to be soaked into the nothingness of the bed sheets.
“Iruka…” Kakashi whispered and hesitantly reached forward to touch Iruka on the shoulder, awkwardly, as if unsure of what he was supposed to do. After a moment, he moved closer to the bed, the arm moving from Iruka’s shoulder to around his chest. Kakashi pulled Iruka into the hug, and Iruka clung to him fiercely, torn between laughter and sobbing. They stayed like that, clinging to each other, for several minutes, Kakashi murmuring reassuring words, not really noticing what he was saying, just holding on to Iruka and talking softly. Gradually Iruka quieted, and the laughs and tears faded away.
When Iruka at last settled down and wiped the edges of his eyes, he felt better. He suddenly realized how bad he felt, and how good being around Kakashi made him. I wish he would stay with me, Iruka thought. I don’t want him to leave me here. With a start, Iruka realized that he had no idea where he was. All he knew was that he was sitting on a bed, in a strange room, crying into Kakashi’s chest. Suddenly feeling extremely embarrassed, Iruka looked fixedly away from the Jounin, blushing. There was an awkward silent before Iruka worked up the nerve to say something.
“Kakashi, how long have I been here and where is here?” Iruka asked, casting a glance around the room. It didn’t look like any hospital room he’d ever been in, not that he had been in an overly large number of them.
Kakashi glanced out the window at the sun, which was shrinking off in the distance. “You’ve only been here about 5 hours. And here is at Hokage-sama’s house.”
Iruka raised an eyebrow. “Hokage-sama? His house?”
Kakashi shrugged. “He didn’t explain and I didn’t ask. I’m guessing he wants to talk to you.”
Iruka didn’t say anything aloud; he just nodded his head and stared down at his hands. With a soft grunt Kakashi stood up. Iruka guessed, by the way Kakashi was rolling his shoulders and stretching out, that the Jounin had been sitting at his side the entire time. Gratitude flooded over him and he turned his head and looked earnestly at Kakashi.
“Thank you.” He said sincerely, if a bit quietly.
There was no reply for quite some time, and Iruka began to wonder in confusion if he had said something wrong. When the reply finally came, he wished it hadn’t.
Seriously and quietly, Kakashi asked “What happened, Iruka?”
Iruka shook his head. “It would take too long to explain, and I’m not entirely sure myself.” He admitted. He shivered, and rubbed his arms.
Kakashi stared at him. “You cold?”
Iruka shook his head. “No.”
Kakashi looked at him strangely for a moment, then coughed and looked away. “You know, Naruto’s been worried about you. He would have been here long ago if the Hokage hadn’t told him away. Or rather, threatened him, since Naruto has never done what he’s told if he doesn’t agree with it.”
Iruka laughed softly. “That’s my Naruto.” He said, then fell silent.
Kakashi flashed Iruka a smile. His gaze flickered idly over the room, not really looking for anything, just staring because he found that he was uncertain of what to say. The question that was just begging to slip out from the tight grasp his lips had on them was the ‘what happened?’ but Kakashi wasn’t sure he wanted to ask that again quite yet. It didn’t take a genius to know that something had happened that only Iruka could understand, and prying wasn’t the best way to find out what he wanted to know. Iruka would tell him in his own time, when he was ready. In the mean time, Kakashi figured he’d try to coax it out.
“You know,” he began softly, “I became a Chuunin at the age of six.”
Iruka was slightly surprised at the sudden seriousness and the strangely wistful tone of voice Kakashi used, and he realized that Kakashi was about to talk to him. Not chat with him, but talk with him. He turned his gaze to Kakashi’s face, and fell into a surprised silence, listening attentively.
“I was so proud of myself. My mother and father praised me over and over and told me how proud they were of me. Back then, to be honest, I didn’t really care much about what other people thought of me. I just wanted to do things the way I felt like doing them. And I decided that I would be a Shinobi, in my own way. It came naturally to me, I felt like I was born to do this.” Kakashi told Iruka, keeping his gaze fixed on some spot in the distance, his only visible eye unfocused. Iruka stared at him with interest.
“I trained my little body as hard as I could, I watched and I listened and I copied what everyone else was doing, trying to be as good as them. I was enrolled in the academy at a young age, and I became a Genin with such ease I probably could have skipped the academy altogether. I was assigned the Fourth as my Jounin instructor in recognition of my skills. The Fourth…” Kakashi paused. A brief flicker of emotion crossed his face, then he continued in the same monotone he had been using.
“He was a great man, a great teacher. Not just in the Shinobi arts, but in people as well. He taught me so many things, so many different ways to think and perceive the world. He taught me everything he thought I could handle, and a little bit more. I spent a couple months, building up my skills and ambition, and then requested that the Fourth enter me in the Chuunin exam. There was a Chuunin Exam only a couple months away, and I decided then and there that I would see how far I could go.” Kakashi said in same tone of voice. His expression never wavered, though Iruka had the vague feeling that Kakashi was telling him something important. Kakashi kept his gaze fixed everywhere but on Iruka. He was talking slightly faster now, as if he wanted to get what he was saying out and over with.
“I entered the Chuunin Exam and was so excited that it presented a true challenge to me, something that had never happened before. I met people that appeared to be stronger than me. They were older, more experienced, but they underestimated me. I was determined to show them just what I could do. I wanted to show myself that I could be something great.
“I passed the Chuunin Exam. I was six. I remember the last match I had. It was against…” Kakashi face took on a wry expression. “…It was against Gai. Gai was the same age as me, a fellow ‘genius’. I took an instant dislike to him the moment I laid eyes on him, if you can believe that.”
A brief smile.
“But I had been watching him during the Exam, and I knew that he was my challenge. He was the wall that I had to climb over. And I decided that instead just of climbing over that wall, I was going to break it down, make sure it could never stand in my way again. I was going to beat Gai, beat him in such a way that everyone would recognize me. The match started, and about five minutes into the fight, I realized that it wasn’t going to be an easy win. It was going to be a challenge, and that got my blood excited. I can still feel it, the way my blood sung and cried for a fight, my whole body quivering with the rush of it. I remember that fight like it was yesterday. Do you know how long that fight lasted?” Kakashi asked.
Iruka shook his head, caught up in the story.
“It lasted two hours. I’m sure you understand how rare it is for a battle to last that long. That’s just proof of how impossibly equal we were. Those were the two longest hours of my life. Every moment I savored, every blow exchanged, every jutsu played. God, what a rush it was. I had never felt anything like it before. The thrill of it went beyond anything I had experienced. It was an even match, you see. Gai excelled at taijutsu, while my taijutsu skills were average. I had greater skill with nin and genjutsu, though my knowledge of jutsus was limited, but not so much as his. I had a few jutsus that I had learned from the Fourth, but Gai seemed to have the answers to beat every one of them. Oh, he was good, there was no mistake about that. But I was just as good as he was. We managed to keep at a steady stalemate for two hours before my inexperience caught up with me, and I made a mistake. A stupid mistake, one blow misjudged…”
---
Kakashi breathed in and out steadily. It would be stupid now to lose his breath and be slowed down. He flexed his fingers, wanting to keep them nimble. They were his greatest assets now. The jutsus those fingers could perform would be his only path to victory, if victory was what he could achieve.
His gaze kept steady on his opponent, eyes trained on that stupid face, that stupid mask. For a mask is what Kakashi thought of it now, a mask to keep his moves hidden, a mask to keep him off guard. But unlike Kakashi’s mask of cloth, Gai’s mask was a mask of stupidity.
“Aii, give it up now, Kakashi! There is no hope of victory against the Green Beast!”
The taunts were all old now, but they still made Kakashi grind his teeth together at the idiocy of it. Even though he knew it was ridiculous to get so angered by it, he found he couldn’t help it. He was young still, and it was only later that he realized his anger was his downfall. A cool head would have helped him stand back and take stock of the situation, and a calm body was more apt to respond that a tensed up one.
With an effort, Kakashi stopped grinding his teeth. A muscle in his jaw twitched, the only sign of his annoyance.
With no time of preparation, Kakashi leapt forward. His hand dipped down and drew a kunai with blurring speed. His other hand dived into his side pouch and withdrew a piece of parchment, not sparing a glance at the black lines written upon it. His hands came together, rolling the paper around the kunai. A brush of a finger filled the characters on the paper with volatile chakra. He had been planning this, studying Gai fiercely since the fight had began, looking very specifically for the spot that would cause the most damage.
Gai, instead of leaping back to give himself more time and more preparation, leapt forward with abandon, his bowled hair pushed back with the speed of it. His form blurred around the edges as he came forward at Kakashi, yelling a ridiculous battle cry.
Kakashi quickly tossed the charged kunai up, carefully catching the blade with his teeth. His hands moved in rapid succession, one seal after another. “Katon!”
He spat out the kunai, one hand catching it while the other came up to his lips, fingers circled in an oxygen chakra amplifier. Fire issued from his mouth, passing through the ring his fingers made and spreading out into a great ball of heat. Kakashi took a quick flash of pleasure as he saw the comical look of surprise on the idiots face. The pleasure vanished as his opponents form seemed to disintegrate, and the flame passed by harmlessly.
Behind me! He thought quickly.
The flame stopped immediately. He whirled around just in time to catch the flash of green materialize into human shape. He barely got his arm up in time to block the punch, and caught the leg that came at him. He blocked the next punch with more certainty, and flicked his wrist around to grab at the bandage covered wrist. He felt a moment’s flare of victory, before the wrist twisted itself out of his grasp. In the time it took him to adjust, a knee came up and struck him in the stomach, and he flew back.
His teeth snapped together painfully as his back collided with the stone wall of the stadium. Cracks radiated out from the impact, and his feet came into contact with the hard ground. He wavered minutely, but all trace of weakness vanished as if it had never been there. Kakashi’s eyes blazed with anger.
Gai, standing at the same place since the kick, flashed a V of victory with his fingers. “Haha, you underestimated the glory of the Green Beast, Kakashi! A fatal mistake!”
“Fatal this!” he ground out between his teeth. He leapt forward, pushing every ounce of his effort to gain his maximum speed. His movement was just a flash, and Kakashi was satisfied to see that stupid looked wiped off his opponent’s face. Gai leapt back this time, his arms shifting into a defensive stance. Kakashi rocketed forward, throwing a punch at that idiotic face with its bowled haircut and bushy eyebrows. Gai’s hand came up to meet it, and Kakashi threw all his strength into that punch. His fist was caught by Gai’s hand, but the force of the punch drove both of their fists into Gai’s face. The green idiot let out a grunt of surprise.
It was with a certain maliciousness that Kakashi tightened his grip around the kunai in his other hand, and without a moment’s hesitation, drove it into Gai’s thigh, the spot of maximum damage he had been searching from. He took a sick satisfaction in the gasp of pain from his opponent. He carried through his punch, causing Gai to go flying back. Kakashi shifted his legs to gain leverage and leapt backwards, his hands coming together in a seal.
Gai’s surprised and pained eyes met with his briefly, before Kakashi looked away. A horrible victorious smile twisted Kakashi’s lips.
“Boom.”
An explosion rocked the stadium. Kakashi brought his arms up to protect his face, squinting at the dirt and dust that rushed at him.
That shut the idiot up. Kakashi thought to himself. He waited with patience as the dust cleared. He tensed. The moment he saw Gai, he was going to rush forward and finish him off. He was bone tired of this stupid match, and he was going to shatter this wall while everyone watched.
The crowd had gone deathly silent, the faces of the citizens surprised and shocked. The shinobi of the other villages were leaning forward, their eyes intent.
The dust cleared, and the twisted smile slowly faded off Kakashi’s face.
He began to see through the thick dust, squinting against the sunlight reflecting off the dirt particles. A human form began to vaguely take shape. A rough outline of a body appeared, then the shape became more definite. The dust was rising into the air, so the first thing he saw was Gai’s feet. They were a sharp contrast to each other. One rock steady, the other crimson and trembling. The dust rose higher to Gai’s waist, chest, neck, before finally revealing Gai’s face, which was shadowed and unreadable, his eyes veiled. The left side of his body, where the kunai had exploded, was smoking and charred, his clothing hanging in taters off his arm and leg. Streams of blood were running down his side, pooling on the ground at his feet. His leg had obviously given out, a mass of bloody and charred flesh. His body trembled as his other leg tried to support himself. But he was standing, refusing to fall. His entire body had gone rigid, as if possessed. Kakashi felt a small murmur of grudging respect.
“A fatal mistake.” Kakashi repeated. His voice echoed across the silent stadium. For once, the Green Beast did not have a reply. At least not at first. Just when Kakashi was about to race forward and attack, Gai lifted his head.
His eyes were bright and startling, full of a fierce fire that gave Kakashi pause. Such will, Kakashi found himself thinking.
“If you think…” Gai said, his voice clear and full of steel, “that I can be stopped so easily, you are gravely mistaken.”
“Bark, Green Idiot.”
Gai laughed, something that didn’t reach his eyes. “What doesn’t kill me will make me stronger.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Kakashi demanded.
But Gai only shook his head. “I swear, if I lose here, I will run 100 times around the village before I receive medical aide.”
“You’re insane.” Kakashi breathed.
Gai laughed louder this time, the annoying idiot’s laugh. He brought his bandage covered arms up, crossed them in front of his face. Kakashi could only see his opponent’s shadowed eyes.
There was a pause, and Kakashi suddenly found his breath leaving him. Minutely, the ground beneath him began to shake and tremble. Kakashi’s mouth opened slightly and his eyes were riveted on Gai’s trembling form.
The hell—!?
Blue tendrils of chakra began to emanate around Gai, rising off him like steam. Something in Kakashi’s chest tightened at the power of it, like he was having trouble breathing. It seemed to suck all the oxygen out of the air. The shaking of the ground grew more pronounced. Kakashi’s wide eyes, both of them normal, human eyes, were trained on Gai, watching as the chakra crept off him like something alive. He could see the veins standing out on Gai’s face, and wondered what on earth he could possibly do in his state.
“Omote Renge!”
Gai’s arms came down, and Kakashi leaned forward against the powerful gust of wind and dust that shot towards him.
Kakashi was caught so off guard that he barely ducked out of the way as a leg swung at the spot where his head had been moments before, feeling something impossibly fast brush past him and he saw a few silver strands of hair fall to the ground. A shower of blood splashed his face. He meant to kick me with his wounded leg! Kakashi marveled. But Kakashi was nothing if not a genius, and he struck out with his hand the moment he felt it brush against his hair, and clamped down on the leg. His grip was a poor one, and when Gai whipped his injured leg back, Kakashi’s fingers slid off, covered in slick blood.
Gai’s other leg whipped forward simultaneously with the withdrawing of his other one. Kakashi brought up an arm and blocked it, his muscles straining with the effort. The power of it sent him skidding back a few inches. He ground his teeth together, feeling a short lightning flash of pain through the muscles in his arms. He should end the fight, and end it now. There was no way that Gai had the strength left to be much of a challenge. This was likely his last ditch effort. If he stopped him now, it would be the end.
Kakashi heaved the leg away with a burst of strength and quickly brought his hands together.
“Don’t think so!” Gai’s pained voice said harshly. Gai’s formed blurred a final time. “Konoha Senpuu!”
Kakashi’s eyes were too slow to catch the leg that connected with his chin, and his body had no chance to react in time. He felt the wind pull at him as he was thrown into the air. He tried to bring his body back in his control, but none of his appendages seemed to be obeying his command. His vision was filled with dark spots, his body reeling. He felt a sharp spike of pain shooting through his chest. The lower half of his face had lost all feeling.
“Kage Konoha Buyou!”
Kakashi felt someone press up against his back, where his shadow would have been. A voice began whispering in his ear, barely audible over the roar of the wind. “You think you’re a genius, don’t you? Don’t you wonder now, what’s more powerful? Your genius or my will?”
Kakashi was surprised at the rawness of that voice, laced with pain, rage, and thick determination. For the first time since the match began, Kakashi slowly began to realize that he might not win. That this flamboyant, bushy-eyed boy that was currently gripping his arms just might be a wall that he couldn’t knock down. The thought filled him with anger. He had come so far, had worked so hard. That he should lose now--?
Drawing from a well of strength that he still had left, Kakashi brought his hands together a final time. He could feel Gai straining to get his arms apart, but he could also feel his opponent’s strength waning. Kakashi’s back was sticky with Gai’s blood.
“Kage Bunshin no Justu!” he ground out. He poured his charka into the jutsu, and five clones sprang to life around him. They were beginning to fall back towards the stadium floor now. He had twelve seconds, maybe thirteen to break free of Gai. The clones spun in the air, a kunai glinting in each of their hands. They couldn’t throw them- Gai would just twist and use Kakashi’s body to block them. One chance, Kakashi thought. Kakashi jerked his head back, smashing the back of his skull into Gai’s face. He was rewarded with a pained gasp, but the hands holding his arms did not loosen. What’s he planning on doing? Kakashi found himself wondering. Then he thought, doesn’t matter. His left side is weak.
Suddenly the grip on his shoulders tightened impossibly. Kakashi couldn’t move. A trill of fear went through him- he hadn’t thought Gai would have this much left. The ground was only seconds away. Kakashi realized suddenly—it screamed in his mind To late--!!— that he had waited a moment too late. He moved his arms frantically in a last ditch attempt to escape, only to realize that his arms had been snared by the bandages that had been wrapped around Gai’s arms. A second before he hit the ground, the five clones surrounding them threw their kunai at Gai, before they disappeared into smoke as all of them hit the ground and sent up a forbidding plume of dirt.
Kakashi had braced himself the best he could. After an initial moment of blackness as Kakashi’s body struggled to recover his senses, Kakashi tried vainly to take stock of himself. The most pressing matter- could he fight?- needed immediate attention. The weight against his back was gone – Kakashi realized Gai had used him to cushion himself from the fall, and had probably jumped away after they had hit the earth. He gingerly began to move portions of himself. An arm, legs, back, chest, neck, testing each for damage, all the while stretching out hesitant bits of chakra to try and detect any attacks that were sure to come after Gai had recovered himself after the impact, as Kakashi was sure that’s why he hadn’t immediately been put out of commission. Gai was surely as injured as he was.
He hadn’t expected to be wounded this much. He had landed on one of his arms wrong, rendering it broken in several places. When Kakashi tried to move it, it didn’t respond. Surely Gai’s doing. It would make sense that Gai would go through such pains to be sure Kakashi could no longer perform any seals. The fight was now officially in Gai’s favor. Left with just taijutsu, Kakashi felt a looming sense of frustration and bitter disappointment. The rest of his body had several broken and cracked ribs, his back kept sending odd little needles of pain down his sides, so he figured something must have been damaged there. His jaw was broken- after the kick from Gai, it had probably shattered easily from the impact with the ground. He could feel a thick, wet patch of blood from where he was sure his jaw line was gashed open. He couldn’t even talk, either. His legs were thankfully unbroken, though his left one was a bit stiff. He could move adequately.
Kakashi, tensing himself for the pain, began to lift himself up off the ground. The waves of pain were intense, but he roughly shoved them aside. Suddenly, he felt a change in the air. He’s coming! Kakashi stumbled to his feet, reaching into his side holster and throwing a handful of shuriken out in a wide spray. The dust had yet to fully clear, and Kakashi couldn’t see where Gai would be coming from. Kakashi was tense, his eyes darting from side to side, searching. His breath rushed in and out, heavily. Gai did not appear. Kakashi, thinking that perhaps he had been mistaken, that maybe he had overestimated Gai, slowly let himself relax. Standing in a battle ready defensive stance was putting a great strain on his already damaged body.
Kakashi could really do nothing but stand there as the dust slowly cleared. In the time it took to do this, Kakashi was going through a mental war. Everything was telling him that he was going to lose. There was nothing he could do. No jutsus, no physical strength strong enough to take down Gai. Even his intelligence, which was running rapid-fire through dozens of possible scenarios, was coming up short.
Suddenly, Kakashi flinched violently. A huge burst of chakra shot through his senses. Kakashi felt a trembling in his muscles that had nothing to do with his injuries. His dark eyes darted frantically through the rising dust, his breathing grew faster. God, how could Gai possibly have so much chakra left? Where was his incredible strength coming from?
The dust eventually parted, dissolving away into nothingness. Kakashi was briefly startled to realize that Gai was standing right in front of him. There was no way Kakashi could have missed him standing there, not with the way Kakashi’s eyes had been darting all around. Kakashi came to the conclusion that Gai must have been moving too fast for Kakashi to follow. But that didn’t seem possible– the high speed would have moved the dust particles enough for Kakashi to notice. No, Gai must have been standing around the outer edge of the dust ring. Standing there, staring at Kakashi with all the time in the world. Mocking him silently about his weakness. His failure. His loss.
The rage that Kakashi felt building startled him. It was raving through his body, screaming from his arms and legs to move forward and strike at that mocking face. Kakashi, in a moment of abject failure, listened.
There was only a second of surprise on Gai’s face as Kakashi rushed forward. Kakashi failed to notice the nearly invisible trails of chakra that leapt from Gai’s flesh like life-blood. Another gate opened, another doorway down a hallway of no-endings. The genius of will over the genius of blood. It was clear to every shinobi in that stadium, except for one.
Kakashi could only see the red haze. It wasn’t fair, goddammit! It was never fucking fair! All his hard work, all his passion, all his superiority- vanished. Gone to some green bastard in an idiotic skin-tight suit. A kunai was in his hand, another explosive one this time. A specialty of his, a close combat trump card the Fourth had taught him, and one the Fourth had warned him about. Fire consumes everything, Kakashi. If you can target that one spot, that spot of least defense and maximum damage, then victory is yours. But if you miss that spot, if you fail…
A true shinobi never fails. In some measure, no matter how small, there is always victory.
He hadn’t understood then. He wouldn’t come to understand it until so much later in life, when a tentative friendship had formed, and that ridiculous contest that was sometimes the only victory life didn’t always take from him. When a wall he had sworn to crumble was now his pedestal.
For this fight, however, there was only the red in his eyes, the roar in his ears, and the warm metal beneath his fingers. He rushed forward, trying to scream his rage, but unable to due to his shattered jaw. Gai was there, forward just a few more feet, and his kunai would be buried in that green chest and victory would be his, if only he could trust his hand forward and feel that satisfying second of resistance, and then the smooth movement as the kunai penetrated skin…
Gai’s form blurred, and Kakashi felt something too fast to comprehend hurl itself at him. He had a moment of clarity where he saw Gai’s hand shoot forward. Kakashi felt an intense flash of knowledge- that he was feeling fear, feeling pain, feeling hatred and weakness, but most of all, there was the bitter knowledge of a battle lost. That was the worst feeling of all. He almost welcomed the hand that struck his chest, welcomed the pain that, in a split second, overloaded his consciousness, and he welcomed the bliss that was darkness.
His last image was a merely a shaky blur of green and bloody red. A few words whispered in his mind. “Konoha no renge wa nido saku.”
---
“Gai won the match. I slowly recovered from the fight, as did he. His wounds were a bit more critical than mine. I’m sure you’re aware of the effects of opening the Celestial Gates. The damage from my kunai also mangled a few muscles that probably would have been better of un-mangled, and it took him so long, and so much work to be able to move fluidly again that I felt a rather large amount of guilt, but never enough to shadow that horrible anger I held. I remember, days later after the match, shaking hands with him. I vowed, then and there, that I would get stronger. I was going to learn as many jutsus as possible, and I was going to find a way to beat Gai, and nothing was going to stand in my way.” Kakashi’s eyes turned downcast. “That’s where I went wrong. I was so determined back then, so determined to be the best, that I was willing to do anything.” He paused, the sentence feeling unfinished. Kakashi looked straight into Iruka’s eyes, a sudden sad expression flicking over his face.
“Ambition is a good thing to have, Iruka, but sometimes your dreams get the better of you.” Kakashi fell silent and leaned back in his chair, exhaling softly.
Iruka stared at him silently. He kept turning over things to say in his mind, but discarded each of them. He couldn’t really put it into words, what he wanted to say.
First and foremost, he was amazed that Kakashi had told him that, and wondered what had brought it on. His state of mind was still a bit fuzzy, and while his intuition whispered that there had been a deeper purpose, he found that he didn’t care really why Kakashi was sharing this with him. For the longest time, Naruto was the only soul in Konoha that had, in some measure, deeply confided in Iruka. If anything, Iruka was feeling flattered to be on the receiving end of such a story. The mystery that surrounded Kakashi had cracked for a moment, letting Iruka find out a little bit about the Jounin under the mask, and Iruka let himself feel an indescribable emotion. Gratitude, perhaps. Iruka began to sit up farther in the bed, a surprising warmth flooding through him. Suddenly he flinched and halted, and vibrant flash of something jumped across his vision. That was all a lie, it said. The thought was like a blow to the stomach. So unexpected that for a moment he though he had imagined it, despite the ache in his head that reinforced its reality. Shaking his head slightly to rid himself of sudden hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach, Iruka turned a grateful gaze to Kakashi. He felt ready now, ready to share something of his own, and the words bubbled up from his chest, whether he really wanted to say them or not.
.
.
.
&n bsp;
~*~
A brief side note. According to my Naruto knowledge, Gai and Kakashi are the same age at the beginning of the manga. They’re both 26. Now, we all know that Kakashi became a Chuunin when he was six. My knowledge ends at knowing when Gai became a Chuunin, so I just had them both become one at the same time. I’m not sure quite yet what higher purpose that serves, but it seemed like a good idea at the time… and
Edit: 2-22-05: My Naruto knowledge has increased to find out that Gai, in fact, did not become a Chuunin at the same time as Kakashi. However, I’m sticking to my version because it’s a damn good plot device. Yes, you know it is.
Konoha no renge wa nido saku is Gai’s phrase, which can be translated to mean ‘The Lotus of Konoha blooms twice.” If you’ve seen the anime, you’ll understand.