Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ What He Wants ❯ Part 13 ( Chapter 13 )

A/N: I was going to take a little longer to release the rest of the chapters, but what the hell. Merry Xmas.

 

Each and every chapter of this story is dedicated to my marvelous betas, stinky_horowitz, bronzetigress and princessgolux.

 

 

 

 

Part 13

 

 

Kakashi wakes up instantly at the sound of the hallway door opening. The clock says it's three in the morning, so he doesn't know who could be coming to visit him or why, but he supposes he'll find out soon enough.

 

The overhead lights snap on, and he blinks open his eyes as someone knocks hard enough on the glass of his cell that the whole wall reverberates, even with the chakra-infusion. He sits up and looks over into the grim face of the Godaime with growing alarm.

 

“The procedure failed,” she announces.

 

Kakashi's heart freezes for a moment.

 

“Your memories destroyed the blocks we made,” she continues. “Iruka's got two sets of memories for the same time period fighting it out in his brain. There's so much junk in his head now, his mind doesn't know what to accept and what to reject, so it seems like it's settled on rejecting everything. There isn't much time before he's beyond help.”

 

Kakashi leaps to his feet, advancing on the glass. “I knew it. I knew it!” he shouts. “I told you, you should've—”

 

“Kakashi,” the Hokage hisses, “shut up.”

 

He grits his teeth, fuming.

 

“I can't spend any more time on this right now. I have an emergency meeting with the daimyo tomorrow that I have to leave for in half an hour, and I don't know when I'll be back. We've stabilized Iruka for the moment, but I don't know how long it will last.” She sighs, crossing her arms. “He begged me for the opportunity to speak with you, so I brought him along. He's with Ibiki right now,” she says, when his eyes dart along the dim hallway. “Listen to me very carefully, Kakashi. I want you to work out with him how you're going to resolve this, because it's obvious you're the only one who can help him now. And you will help him, even if it hurts you, do you understand me? No more fucking around.” Her voice lowers to a snarl. “If I get back from this meeting and you have not cleaned up this mess, Kakashi, there will be hell to pay. I'm talking about levels of hell you've never even dreamed of, and I know you have quite an imagination, not to mention having been there and back several times.”

 

“I understand, Tsunade-sama.” His voice is trembling with impatience. Just let me see him!

 

Tsunade nods in the direction of one of the hidden cameras and walks back down the hall without further acknowledgement. When the door closes behind her, he can hear slow, shuffling footsteps advancing toward his cell, and he has a hard time refraining from pressing himself against the glass to see further down the hall.

 

After what is probably about thirty seconds, but feels like a few hours, Iruka steps into view, leaning on Ibiki. The scarred man is carrying a folding chair, which he sets up in front of Kakashi, and then steadies Iruka as he slides into it with a sigh of relief.

 

Ibiki straightens up. “I'll be observing,” he warns, and then retreats down the hall.

 

Kakashi barely hears him. All his attention is on Iruka.

 

The man looks really ill. There is no color at all in his skin, except for feverish spots of flushing high on his cheeks. He's sweating and his eyes are glazed with pain.

 

It hurts to see Iruka that way, it's like a knife in his chest, but he can only think the same thing he thought when he saw the chuunin walk into the meeting room a week ago: Iruka is the most beautiful thing alive on this earth.

 

Kakashi opens his mouth to speak, but is surprised into silence when Iruka starts chuckling breathlessly.

 

“What a…grand old fuck-up this turned into,” Iruka says, wincing and rubbing the bridge of his nose.

 

Smiling, Kakashi kneels down so that he's closer to Iruka's eye level. “Yeah. I never meant for you to hurt this way, Iruka. I…”

 

He trails off as Iruka waves that away. “I know that, Kakashi.”

 

“Good.” Kakashi is a little surprised; he'd expected Iruka to be pissed off at him, or at least stand-offish. He seems more tired, amused and…sad. Kakashi's not sure what to make of it.

 

“I was really a dick to you, wasn't I?” Iruka says, apropos of nothing.

 

“Huh?” Kakashi says, brow furrowing.

 

“Before. Before all…ow!...before all this, before you had the Mangekyou Sharingan.”

 

The obvious severity of Iruka's pain makes it hard for Kakashi to focus on what he's saying. “The Mangekyou..?”

 

“You would ask me…to do things with you and I was always…always too busy, always brushed you off. Never really looked at you. Never really listened.”

 

Oh. Now Kakashi understands. He remembers all that far more clearly than he wants to. He turns his head away.

 

“Didn't understand,” Iruka continues. “Even after you came on to me, and I understood…I still didn't understand. I was patronizing. Pitying. To you, to a jounin who was…ANBU, I was pitying.” He huffs a laugh. “I'm surprised you…didn't kill me.”

 

Kakashi glares darkly at the floor. “I wanted to, sometimes.”

 

Another little laugh. “I pushed you…into this, I know. It's my…my fault too.”

 

Well, that's something Kakashi never expected to hear. He's thought that many times, but hearing Iruka say it makes him want to deny it. It sounds flimsy and unfair, to his ears.

 

“But…Kakashi…”

 

The jounin's head whips up in alarm as Iruka slumps to his knees in front of the chair. “Iruka—!”

 

Iruka hauls himself over to the glass, kneeling in front of Kakashi, so close that he'd fit in the circle of Kakashi's arms if it wasn't for that damn transparent wall.

 

“Kakashi, I understand now,” Iruka finishes with a tiny gasp.

 

“Relax, Iruka, don't push yourself.” Why is Iruka talking about things like this right now, anyway? Shouldn't they be talking about getting him well again?

 

“I understand. These memories you made…everyone talks about them like they're…something fake, something purely manipulative…”

 

They are, Kakashi thinks. You know that.

 

“Even you think that, don't you? But I can compare them to the original…memories now, and I know you're…wrong.”

 

Now Kakashi's really worried. If Iruka's starting to get delusional…there are far too many things that could be going wrong in his head, while they sit here having this weird one-sided conversation.

 

Screw it. Obviously whatever stability Tsunade provided Iruka is breaking down. Kakashi prepares to go in with the Sharingan, just to hold him together.

 

“You…put yourself into those memories. Not just some…image of you that you wanted me to see, but you.”

 

Kakashi falters, eyes widening.

 

“Your sense of humor. Your opinions. Your thoughts, your dreams. Your mannerisms, habits, idiosyncrasies. Hopes. Fears. Faults.”

 

What?

 

Iruka presses a hand flat against the glass. “I know you, Kakashi. I know you.”

 

“No.” Kakashi's voice is strangled. “No, you—”

 

“Yes,” Iruka whispers, and tears fall down his cheeks when he blinks. “I love you, Kakashi.”

 

Kakashi's hands slap against the glass in front of him, one in front of Iruka's. His eyes are tightly shut and his jaw clenches. The words sear through his brain like lava, white-hot.

 

“I love you.”

 

“Iruka…”

 

“So much.”

 

Kakashi's forehead falls against the glass. “Iruka, please…”

 

“But this is not the way. You can't…have it this way, Kakashi.”

 

Kakashi's eyes snap open and he raises his head. “What do you mean?”

 

Iruka doesn't look perturbed or angry, just very, very sad. “You need…someone to know who you are, but you can't…do it this way. You have to…put my head back in order, Kakashi.”

 

“You…what is it you're asking me to do, Iruka?”

 

“You need to…unmake these memories you've made. You have to take yourself…out of my head.”

 

Kakashi feels like slowly shattering glass. “I can't.”

 

“You have to.”

 

“I can't do that, Iruka.”

 

“Please…understand. I don't want to lose them. But I can't keep them. They're not…really mine.”

 

“If I block off the other memories again—”

 

“No,” Iruka snarls. “That's not fair…to anyone. Not to me, not to Shiko…not to you. You deserve more. Better. “

 

“I can obliterate the other memories,” Kakashi snarls, “so they never interfere and no one can recover them again. I can pull you out of Shiko's head; my control's a lot better, I can do it pretty easily now.”

 

“Kakashi,” Iruka whispers, “I'm begging you. Please do as I say.”

 

“You don't understand!” Kakashi hisses desperately. “I couldn't remove myself from you if I wanted to!”

 

Iruka's forehead bumps against the glass. Tears are streaming down his face now. There are cords standing out on his neck; his pain is obviously worsening. “Please, Kakashi. Do…whatever you can.”

 

Kakashi can't remember the last time he felt this impotent. “Iruka, listen—“

 

“I trust you.” Iruka's head lifts and thumps back against the glass.

 

That statement floors Kakashi. Why the hell would Iruka say that?

 

“God, it hurts,” Iruka whispers, raising his head again and hitting it harder against the glass.

 

“Stop that,” Kakashi snaps.

 

Iruka whimpers. Kakashi isn't sure Iruka is aware of what's going on anymore. He hits his head again, harder.

 

“Iruka! Stop!”

 

Iruka growls like a feral animal, and blood spills from his eyes before he rears back and slams his head forward into the glass so hard that Kakashi hears his nose break.

 

Kakashi pounds uselessly on the glass. “Ibiki, you son of a bitch! What the fuck are you doing?!”

 

“I'm here, calm down.”

 

Ibiki has appeared behind Iruka, is restraining him now as he thrashes, kicking the folding chair out of the way so it rattles down the hall and out of sight. Kakashi thinks Iruka might be seizing. Blood flies through the air and spatters the glass in front of his face, and Kakashi has never hated a wall so much. He punches at it, kicks it, hurls himself against it, but he can't get through it.

 

Finally he slumps to the floor, out of breath. Ibiki apparently alerted the medics before he came, because they are wheeling a gurney down the hall. Iruka lies limp in Ibiki's arms, but his bloody eyes are aware again. They are fixed on Kakashi, clear tears cutting through the drying crimson on his cheeks.

 

“Don't cry,” Kakashi chokes. “Don't cry, Sensei.”

 

Please help me, Iruka mouths. Speech seems beyond him.

 

It's almost beyond Kakashi as well, but he manages. “Okay. Okay. I'll do what I can. I'll do whatever I can. I promise.”

 

Iruka smiles, red-soaked and messy and still so beautiful, and then his eyes roll up in his head as he loses consciousness. Ibiki lifts him carefully onto the gurney, and hangs back as the medics hurry away with him.

 

“Kakashi, whatever you need me to do, whoever you need me to get, just let me know.” He looks down at his feet. “Let's do this right, this time.”

 

“Yeah,” Kakashi croaks. “Just…leave me alone for a while, okay? I need to think. I won't be long.”

 

Ibiki nods. “You want me to have someone clean off that glass?”

 

“Later. Not now.”

 

“I'm turning your room lights off, but I'll leave the hallway lights on.”

 

Kakashi nods, his throat too tight to speak again.

 

Ibiki finally walks away.

 

Kakashi remains leaning on the glass, tracing the patterns of blood that are spattered and smeared on it, as sorrow circles his heart and mind like a shark.