Archive of Our Own ^beta

He drifts.

No one supposed to be here, caught between one place and another.

Caught between—what was it?

Between…between a journey and a destination?

This place isn’t meant to keep anyone for long, but he keeps returning.

The end calls for him, a beckoning voice promising rest and an effortless slide to where he is supposed to be. He can’t remember why, but he is to ignore the flow in the right direction, even as he knocks against others following what must be the easiest path.

His only companion is discomfort, or exhaustion, or frustration, or simple boredom that wearies him to the marrow—unceasing, incurable, unstoppable by anything within his power. Why must he trust that another will save him, will reach through the grey, will pull him back to where he needs to go?

The call grows stronger.

The place he belongs is far from where he needs to go. What a difficult choice. Has he made it before?

He forces himself away, away. But his drift to the inevitable end slows, doesn’t halt, doesn’t reverse. Soft and sweet, the darkness expands, filling all that he is and that he will be.

He wants to give in.

But he doesn’t know how to give up.

Would it matter? If he let himself fall into his conclusion, would anyone care?

And after all his questions, asked without expecting an answer, comes a voice. It does not rend the heavens, it does not split the earth. The light it accompanies does not pierce the darkness like a blade, its warmth does not sear the numbing cold. Like a slow sunrise, he hears:

I would care.

A hand hovers before him, extended in invitation. Memories he can’t quite reach expect to be grabbed, manhandled, forced back to where he is told to go.

But it’s simply an invitation. A hand, two hands, palms open.

Please.

He accepts.

The hands meet his own and pull, gentle at first but—

The invitation held no pain, but the return has it in spades.

One half of his chest burns with an ache that makes i difficult to notice the numb that hovers over his heart. The warmth of the soft light intensifies by a thousand degrees in half a second. All he knows is too much glare, too much bright, choking his senses and overwhelming his mind. There’s no thought in the face of such pain and light and complete annihilation of the self because they haven’t come to save they’ve come to destroy what could possibly be worth all this hurt—

“Breathe!”

He obeys the command.

Suspended within the jaws of death, Kakashi is snatched back to life.  

He wakes up in a stranger’s arms.

Given his history and long list of enemies, Kakashi should be more concerned about this, but—

His lungs fill with air, desperate to replace the oxygen he’s lost in the interim he’s been dead. As his chest expands rapidly, just on the edge of hyperventilation, the arms around his shoulders tighten. Kakashi is tucked into a solid warmth.

His skin tingles with the familiar sensation of healing, pain fading to aches, those aches brushed away with a skating touch. The throb in his head quiets and the light stabbing his eyes becomes easier to handle. How odd. Potions usually throw him into health so quickly he gets whiplash, and his own subconscious restoration makes him more itchy than anything.

He forces his breath to slow, to take in that oxygen his brain and heart and lungs are so desperate for at a reasonable pace. But his chest continues to shake in jagged gasps, as if trying not to sob—

Oh. That’s not him.

Kakashi stirs in the arms of the one who pulled him from the reaper. This must be the cleric.

The cleric—Umino Iruka, his mind supplies as it reconnects enough to do petty things like remember—clutches Kakashi tight against himself. His breath stutters into Kakashi’s hair, unsteady and tripping, just on the edge of tears.

Kakashi has been returned to life more times than he can count—and isn’t that something? He can’t even count the number of times he’s been pulled from the crushing abyss—one that threatens to consume him more completely every time he faces it. He has no idea when he stopped counting. What does that say about him? What does that say about his soul? What does he lose when—

Kakashi has been returned to life more times than he can count, but he’s never been held while his soul reknits his bloody and beaten body.

His hearing fades in and out as his exhausted nerves try to reconnect to where they receive and send information. But he must be still readjusting. Because along with the sound of his own breath and the wind running through the trees, he hears gentle, gliding whispers.

“You’re alive, you’re alive, I’ve got you, it’s okay, I promise you’re okay.”

The words can be coming from only one source, so Kakashi forces himself to listen, to get his hearing back to functional. Even if the man is just the cleric here to drag him back to life, he’s still his partner on this mission and clear communication is essential to success. Kakashi takes a slow, deliberate breath.

“Just breathe, breathe just like that, you’re back now, you’re safe, you’re alive.”

But the words make no sense. They contain no information about their location, their circumstances, the status of their mission, where the threat that took him out went, or why…he is being held this way.

These assurances mean nothing. They’re just words.

He shouldn’t find them so soothing.

“Everything is okay, you can rest, I’ve got you, you’re alive, rest now, just breathe.”

Normally after his deaths, Kakashi would be already up and moving. Teams don’t function long with their captain downed. The cleric has a minute to revive him, maybe perform some light healing of whatever wound killed him, and then he trots off to try again on whatever threat he couldn’t take care of the first time.

But maybe, this time, he’s allowed to recover a bit longer. Here, cradled in Umino Iruka’s arms and gentle chatter, Kakashi can take just a moment to relearn to breathe, to be a person again.

The healing energy sweeps quietly through his system, rocking his blood and bones to sleep.

“Technically, part of our duty is to complete our assignments in an efficient and timely manner, Cleric Umino.”

Umino whips his head around to glare at Kakashi, still stuffing the remains his provisions into his pack. The pack nearly tips him over as he scrambles to stand. That warrants another burning glare, as Umino’s inability to organize his pack correctly is clearly Kakashi’s fault. He returns the stuck-up pencil pusher with an innocent blink—one he has specifically calculated to infuriate people not used to getting caught up by technicallys. Umino is probably more used to be on the giving side of them. Having your own tools turned against you builds character.

“Thank you for the reminder,” Umino grits out once he finds his balance. “But perhaps we would have been further along if Honored Paladin Hatake hadn’t insisted upon stopping to fight that strange beast alone.”

Kakashi kicks out the footprints they’ve left in the dry patch of earth in this clearing. Not that this assignment requires stealth or he suspects anyone meaning harm is following them, but.

Old habits die hard, he justifies.

Out loud, Kakashi is much less forgiving. “Willfully ignoring dangers to Konoha is grounds for dismissal from the guild.”

“A beast,” Umino continues without acknowledging him, “that you didn’t even defeat. Technically.”

Kakashi refuses to stoop to childish actions like dragging Umino out of the clearing by his stupid hair. But he thinks about it.

“I have vowed to face evil wherever I find it, taking no rest as it is restless.” Ramen comes to his side with the click of the tongue. The familiar feel of his faithful companion’s strength under his gloves grounds Kakashi to his purpose—his core.

“Nothing matters more than my oath, Umino.” He tightens the straps of the pack saddle. “Not even my life.”

Ramen follows easily as Kakashi leaves the clearing, one hand on the reins. With a scuff, a grunt, and something that sounds like a pack sending a cleric off balance and his scramble in overcorrecting, Umino follows.

The wind sends the leaves chiming against each other. Somewhere a small furry creature squeaks; the birds chatter in response. Kakashi is just thinking that they’ll have a reasonable silence until they reach their destination, when—

“As if you have a life worth living,” Umino grumbles, too quiet to be part of the dialogue, too loud to be ignored.

A tug of the reins has Ramen trotting, Kakashi matching his speed. Umino huffs, no choice but to follow the punishing pace he’s set.

It takes about half the day before Kakashi’s instincts turn from “routine mission” to “oh it’s going to be one of those ones, huh.”

Kakashi has respect for other skilled predators and doesn’t begrudge the fact that nature occasionally has the upper hand. That’s just the way of the world. Every creature is trying to protect itself and its future the best it can.

Today, nature provides them with a pack of a dozen wolves, all larger than any wolf he’s ever seen.

Ramen notices the pack an instant after he does and clears out immediately. Good horse.

Kakashi draws his sword.

“What are you doing?” shrieks Iruka from behind him.

A wolf lunges in their direction. Kakashi brings the butt of his sword down on its forehead and it pulls back. The thing is massive, it’s shoulders at his ribcage height. Four of its pack settle in behind it, staring down Kakashi with their yellow eyes.

“Just let them go! You’ll just regret hurting them!” calls the cleric, even as Kakashi sees a ball of flame crash into the side of a wolf trying to flank him.

Kakashi manages to hit two of the wolves drawing near with his blade, clipping another with the flat of it as he puts distance between himself and the pack.

It’s childish, but Umino seems to draw this trait out of him: “They started it.”

“There’s no way we can take on a dozen wolves of this size! There’s too many.”

With a word under his breath, Kakashi’s blade begins to glow. The next swing sends the nearest wolves yipping back, the smell of burnt fur and flesh filling the forest.

“I will take care of the threat.” Swick, schwip. He wounds the lead wolf enough for it to pull back. “Fall back and be prepared to revive if necessary.”

Two wolves replace the one that has retreated. Their teeth fail to penetrate his armor, but one slams its side into his legs. Kakashi keeps his feet under him, but only barely.

Umino is suddenly by his side. His glowing hand slams against the flank of the wolf attempting to knock Kakashi to the ground. The attacking wolf bares its teeth and takes two steps back, out of touch range but refusing to retreat.

“This is ridiculous,” says Umino. “They’re probably just afraid—fleeing the blighted lands.”  

Kakashi gets another two good swings on the pack but every time he injures one individual, it falls back to be replaced by a fresh wolf. One part of him is impressed by the teamwork the pack embodies. The larger part is annoyed he’s getting outmaneuvered by a bunch of wild animals because he has to protect this idiot cleric.

His right gauntlet dents as it takes a bite intended for Umino. “I gave you an order Cleric Umino. Fall back,” he growls, feeling a strange kinship to his current opponent.

Umino doesn’t acknowledge, but Kakashi catches a flare out of the corner of his eye.

Another shining swing has the wolves nearest them jumping out of his reach, but they’re learning. They eye the sweep of the sword and dart in while he leaves himself open. His armor is thick enough to protect most of him, but it’s only a matter of time until he’s knocked off his feet or one bites hard enough to tear through his plate.

A glance tells Kakashi that Umino still hasn’t moved.

“Cleric! Retre—”

“On my signal, leap upward,” interrupts Umino.

“In plate mail?!” Kakashi is distracted from his next parry against an approaching wolf that he only manages to shave off a handful of rough fur.

Umino doesn’t answer, instead darting into the gap left by Kakashi’s sword to snatch the lump of wolf fur. Pivoting, his hand glows, the fur sinking into his palm. Wolves snap at his heels as he leaps at Kakashi, his glowing hand curling around the back of Kakashi’s neck.

Kakashi’s system floods with energy, his muscles shedding their ache—he feels like he could run for hours. Without a thought, Kakashi sweeps Umino into his arms, the cleric casting flame on the pack trying to flank them. Light even weighed down by his armor, Kakashi springs against the ground, ricocheting off a trunk, a wolf’s back, and ascending into the forest’s canopy.

The pack circles the base of the tree he lands in, but even their superior height doesn’t allow them within an armlength of the lowest branches. The old wood of the forest is their unconventional fortress.  

“Oh,” sighs Umino, still in his arms. “I’m glad that worked.”

Kakashi drops him, half hoping he’ll lose his balance on the branch and fall into the waiting maws below. But he’s learning that Umino is annoyingly competent when he needs to be, as the cleric manages to find footing after pinwheeling his arms. He glares at Kakashi.

What right does he have to be angry? “You disobeyed a direct order,” he snaps.

“It was a stupid order.”

The wolves below bat against the tree with their considerable weight, but the roots run too deep to be shaken.

“I could have handled them.”

“Really? Twelve direwolves alone?” Umino points at Kakashi’s greaves, expression incredulous. Kakashi doesn’t want to humor him, but he glances down. Deep gouges in the plate mail circle his calves, revealing that he was moments away from a bone crushing lucky bite.

“I can’t heal a shattered leg from so far. It’s too complex and I can’t leave you with such a disadvantage.”

Kakashi leans against the trunk, pulling the greave off to inspect the damage. He’ll have to get it replaced the next time he’s in Konoha.

“May I remind you that I am known for facing foes beyond my limits,” he says, suddenly tired, the energy Umino fed him draining away.

Umino rolls his eyes. “I know your reputation, but that doesn’t mean you have to fight alone.”

“It is not logical to put others needlessly at risk.”

“So, I’m just supposed to sit back and let you throw yourself at every danger?”

“You are on this mission to—”

“Watch you die until you win?”

“Revive me, if necessary,” Kakashi grits out.

“Support you as necessary!” Umino shouts.

A few of the pack growl up at them. Kakashi turns his attention to more pressing matters than uppity clerics trying to tell him how to fulfill his oath.

The pack paces around the base of the tree, scratching at the trunk and peering around the forest floor. Now that they’re no longer attacking, the wolves seem on-edge. They pace and brush one another, eyes shifting everywhere—not with malice but with nerves.

And from this higher angle, their large size can’t hide that their proportions are strange.

“Are they starving?” Umino asks, voicing Kakashi’s own conclusions. “They seem desperate.”

Kakashi doesn’t reply, too keen on observing the largest pair of wolves split off and disappear into the forest. Minutes later, they return, leading five pups.

“Ah,” he says, the reason behind pack’s behavior becoming very clear.

“They’re escaping the blighted land,” Umino mumbles. “We stumbled too close.”

After the pack disappears into the woods, Kakashi slides down to the forest floor. When his feet hit the solid ground, he whistles long and shrill.

Umino lands next to him. He glances over at Kakashi, who pays no mind to the fidgety cleric. His toe rubs a divot in the ground as his mouth opens and closes, as if searching for something, anything to say.

“I hope Ramen is all right” is what Umino lands on.

“He knows better than to be taken down by random wolves.”

Umino’s smile is still awkward. “Oh. Good.”

“Let’s go.”

They continue. He didn’t manage to hurt any of the pack too much, but Kakashi can’t help the small relief he feels at that thought. Not that he’ll admit it to Umino.

The next night, they make camp on the edge of the blighted lands, barely sheltered by the trees. The blighted area begins abruptly at the edge of the forest, or rather, it is the edge of the woods. Kakashi is no druid (though he’s been around one long enough), but even he knows that trees gradually taper off in height and density as normal forests end.

But here, towering pines and oaks stand a few paces from a devastated and barren ground. The soil of the blighted lands contains has nothing in it to support life, dry and brittle. The landscape that is their destination contains nothing but ash grey stumps, bones, and a fog that not even the burning sunset can pierce.

The entire land is empty, without life, water, or color. Both he and Umino shiver as they inspect the border between the woods and what lies past it. Beyond its appearance, the feel of the land sinks into his bones, proclaiming loudly just how wrong It is in his very marrow.

Whatever they’ve been sent here to solve is not to be taken lightly.

“It feels like the land itself wants us dead,” Umino says as he takes first watch.

Dropping into a thankfully dreamless sleep, Kakashi silently agrees.

Some leagues into the blighted lands, Kakashi is gored to death by a monstrous elk. With antlers sharp and strong enough to pierce both bone and plate, the herd stampedes through their group with a vengeance rarely seen in herbivores.

There’s nowhere to run or hide in the blighted lands. Ramen gains a tear across his side that Umino is quick to heal. But he’s not fast enough to stop Kakashi from bleeding out as he faces the stamping and snorting herd.

Kakashi is only close enough to see their eyes as he dies. Rather than the desperation of the wolves or the intelligence of a cursed creature, the elk standing over his cooling body is crazed. There’s too much in its eyes. Too much ma—

The pained cry of “Paladin Hatake!” is the last thing he hears before he falls into nothing.

He drifts.

No one—

Immediately, he is returned to his feet. Umino props him up, somehow having teleported directly to his side in the moment his body and soul were disconnected.

“—back. Please wake up, we need to run,” comes the familiar whisper.

Kakashi’s throat readjusts itself into something useful as the bloody cavity becomes whole.

“We must stand and destroy them.”

Umino grip on his arms tightens. “For what purpose? Let the beasts continue to tear up this place—it’s deserted!”

The elk still baring blood on its antler circles them, shaking its head. Kakashi doubts it has enough capacity to realize the man it killed continues to move. It only seeks to destroy.

“They’re not natural creatures anymore.”

“And naturally, they’ll continue to gore your guts out!”

Kakashi readjusts his grip on his sword, the blade flaring red with a word, ready to smite this wretched creature to the depths of wherever it came from. He takes a step forward.

“Paladin Hatake—” A tug on his wrist.

“Try to stop me again and I’ll personally escort you back to Konoha to request a new cleric.”

The hand around his arm slides down to squeeze his hand, the pressure warm through his glove.

“Be careful Kakashi.”

He springs into battle, carefully blank-faced.

In the end, Kakashi only kills three elk—the rest of the herd scatters after their leaders are destroyed. It was difficult to tell from a distance, but only the three largest had that unsettling look in their eyes. He hopes that whatever infected and changed the three hasn’t spread to the rest. If the rest of the herd refuses to attack him, he’ll have to assume that it won’t attack any travelers or settlements.

Kakashi only allows himself to lean on his sword for a moment, watching as Umino deals the final blow to the last crazed elk. Then they set off again.

But by all nine infinite hells! He aches like something that just crawled out of a pit of torture. There doesn’t seem to be blood leaking out of him, or at least he can’t feel any telling warmth beneath his clothes. Is he getting soft? Kakashi has always been the first in and last out of battle; he can’t go about whimpering at every pulled muscle and strained joint. And magical exhaustion has all but been the norm since he worked his first spell. Surely, he can’t be slowing from lack of power.

Umino hands him a canteen from Ramen’s pack. While the cleric’s back is turned, Kakashi mutters the words for purification under his breath. Casting feels mostly like it always does—though there’s an odd bit of push at the tail-end of his spell. But he senses nothing unusual about his own reserves or the energy that dissipates off him. The water tangs with the odd aftertaste characteristic of purification. His magic must be in order.

“There’s something odd about this land’s aura,” Umino says, fingers drumming on his crossed arms.

It’s stating the obvious, but he’s often found it beneficial to hear the unprompted and unguided thoughts of an outside perspective, without the input of Kakashi’s percolating opinions. “How so?”

“Whenever I cast a spell, I get what I can only describe as kickback. Not just spells, but little cantrips too, which shouldn’t be enough to disturb the mana environment. Even simply expanding my senses gives me pushback.” Umino pauses. “It should be pulling.”

This is news to Kakashi. “Pulling?”

Tucking his hair behind his ear, Umino straightens his spine, pace increases slightly. Is he lecturing? “When a land is devastated by disaster of any kind, the earth itself will pull from living organisms to restore balance. Even druids skilled in earth magic can’t sense everything it needs, but the land knows. Those familiar with the arcana who travel through wasted areas often report a faint tug on the edges of their reserves.”

“And you’ve experienced this.”

Umino almost stumbles but recovers smoothly enough. “I—yes. Often powerful creatures can damage their surroundings without meaning to. It can be as simple as beginning to drain the area of natural mana.”

He thought Umino mostly stayed in the village: did something with the innerworkings of the guild, chased after the apprentices, tasks that kept him far from forces that decided life and death.

“You’re around such dangerous creatures often?”

This flusters Umino further. “Well, not dangerous, not really, not anymore—try convincing anyone of that though—but I’m probably just more sensitive from overexposure.”

“What does—“ Kakashi remembers why he knew Umino Iruka’s face and habits before this mission. “The Fox in the Uzumaki boy.”

“Naruto is a good kid! A little loud and maybe irresponsible as an apprentice, but he’s not a risk,” Iruka prattles, “at least, not to anyone but himself when he’s pranking someone he shouldn’t be. And the runes are all intact. I think he might have befriended the demon? He scolds himself sometimes and I know he’s not that self-reflective. I can’t believe no one’s noticed he upsets the mana landscape besides me, which is probably for the best considering the guild’s absolutely abhorrent attitude and behavior toward a child, so if you wouldn’t mention this to anyone—”

“Iruka,” he says, cutting through the babble, “if anyone tries to harm Naruto for something he can’t control, I’m sure you’ll punish the offender thoroughly before I can get my turn.”

With a gentle tug on his arm, Iruka pulls them to a slow stop. He meets Kakashi’s eyes with a clear intensity that Kakashi has seen if very few people. “You really care about him, don’t you?”

More than a decade later, Kakashi can still only see the dead in Naruto. His father’s gentle face, his mother’s bright eyes. Does he know that he shares ambitions and a smile with a dead boy? Would he recognize his thirst to understand others in a girl who ended up with a hole through her sternum?

“I try to.”

Iruka smiles, just a small thing. “Good.” He nods to himself and pulls Kakashi back into their march through the barren wasteland. “I hoped you did. You wouldn’t be so involved but so invisible if you were trying to take advantage of him.”

Kakashi coughs, choking down surprise. “Does he know it’s me?”

“The one providing meals, money, and housing? I figured I’d let you tell him. But you better hurry. He’ll figure it out sooner than you think.”

His shoulders slump in dramatic resignation, weighed down by an exhaustion that is only partially feigned. “He’d probably confront me in public with something embarrassing, wouldn’t he?”

“The kid likes his pranks.”

“Wonder where he got that from.” Kakashi’s breath catches strangely.

“I’ve never encouraged it!” Iruka all but whines.

His vision goes grey for a moment before returning to normal. “Close proximity is bound to have an influence.”

Iruka glances at him out of the corner of his eye. “You should stop by after the mission.”

“No promises.”

Then Kakashi collapses.

The moment before death, the thought: He’s going to be angry—things were going so well.

He drifts.

No one is supposed to be here, caught between one place and ano—

Kakashi, please!

The call—hands—light and pain and—breathe!

Iruka; life.

But Iruka isn’t angry.

After ushering Kakashi back to life, Iruka insists they break for a moment under a rocky overhang—the only hidden area for leagues. In the low-lying mist, Iruka pushes every bit of healing he has into Kakashi, apologizing again and again that he didn’t offer sooner.

“I could have asked,” Kakashi says as Iruka holds his skull. Gentle hands repair the crack in his occipital region that must have bled into his brain.

“You shouldn’t have to ask. I swore to bring life.”

They get back on the road, continuing to the epicenter of the devastation.

The easy conversation they managed to dig up doesn’t return, but they have a productive discussion on possible causes of the mystery they’ve been sent to resolve. Iruka defers to Kakashi’s experience and judgement, biting down comments that Kakashi is sure would have been scathing. There is a canteen or a map or whatever in his hand before Kakashi can ask. He doesn’t grovel, but Iruka checks himself, keeps his words and actions pleasant. When before, he would speak his mind without regard to Kakashi’s feelings.

Kakashi expected a lecture for an unnecessary expenditure of energy and magic to cater to a meaningless death. But Iruka retreats from the fire he displayed earlier in favor of banked coals, warm but dull.

Unease dogs Kakashi’s step. He can’t tell if it’s just their surroundings or his latest death. Kakashi hates dying outside of battle. With a cleric around, it hardly ever happens, but it always makes his efforts feel more absurd. At least when he dies in active defense of his companions, there is an obvious goal he has accomplished. Even a death in the face of lone defense against a great enemy is a learning opportunity: what he did before didn’t work, so it’s time to try something new.

But succumbing to injuries that destroyed slowly and silently, weakening him to the point of uselessness? There is no honor in being too weak to fulfill his duty.

His father couldn’t handle the weight of what was required of him. He broke under the load.

But Kakashi is different.

He can break and shatter and crack and fracture a thousand times and still get up the next moment to do what he needs to do. No one doubts Honored Paladin Hatake Kakashi will fulfill the mission, bring honor to the guild, protect the innocent. No one in the village has any reason to look at him with an expression of pity or distrust or contempt.

The power that Kakashi received in exchange for his oath is a classic example of give and take in the arcana. He will return from death if he trusts that his life is worth those he throws it away for. Magic loves to reward sacrifice with fabulous abandon. It believes in tit for tat; the greater the giver misses their gift, the more power they can take.

Give and take.

He gives and gives and gives and death cannot take.

And after all he selfishly took, it’s only fair.

“Do you think you’ll ever break the curse?” Iruka asks after three-quarters an hour of silence.

“Wh—what?”

“Sure, for now it’s convenient, but there’s gotta be downsides. Most people want curses broken. I mean, it’s a curse.”

Kakashi can only blink at him. “It’s not a curse.”

“It’s not?”

“My deathlessness? No, not a curse.”

“Then,” Iruka says simply, “What is it?”

He’s never had to explain this before. Those who need to know were either told by those higher within the guild or involved in finding and then hiding the obscure texts that explained how this happened in the first place.

“It’s a condition of my oath. I can be revived without cost.”

Iruka furrows his brow. “I was way off then.”

“You’ve already brought me back, more than once. How did you not know this? What did you think was going on?”

“I thought death wouldn’t take you!”

What does that even mean? This is why Kakashi doesn’t discuss death with other people. “I clearly die every time?”

At least Iruka has the self-awareness to look embarrassed. “Like you were going to suffer in some in-between until someone brought you back. Because death had forbidden you from moving on.”

Kakashi is at a little bit of a lost. “I agreed to this. It’s not a curse.”

Iruka turns scarlet, his scar pale against his blush. “Well. That’s better, I think.”

He flashes Kakashi a self-conscious smile.

“Sorry,” Iruka says easily. “It’s probably none of my business.”

“I suppose you have a right to know about your companions.”

“Yes, it’s difficult to protect them without knowing their strengths and weaknesses.” Iruka pauses. “Oh, that’s probably why, huh? It’s for protection.”

“You have a rather annoying habit of jumping to the next thought without bringing anyone else along with you.”

Iruka laughs, head thrown back and eyes closed. He looks carefree, which is not how one is supposed to look mid-mission. “You’re kind of a funny person, aren’t you Kakashi?”

“I find a little humor necessary for survival.”

“See, I didn’t know that about you. I’m glad I do now.”

Iruka’s smile is kind and open. It’s the sort of vulnerability that begs for reciprocation.

Kakashi’s life story is practically an open secret within the guild. It’s easy to build a reputation as team killer when future party members want to know about the fate of previous groups. The circumstances surrounding his father have become practical wisdom by now, everyone rehashing the same events to apply a new meaning. Even without his past, Kakashi is one of the strongest and most successful members of the guild. Competence breeds celebrity, which invites scrutiny.

But even so, he wants to trust Iruka. It’s an odd and unfamiliar feeling for Honored Paladin Hatake Kakashi, equally alarming and enticing.

Before his mind can think better of it, his mouth blurts, “I don’t like it. The dying. It hurts every time.” It’s silly. A silly, obvious statement that he’s never bothered to voice aloud to another person.

Iruka places a gentle hand on his arm, his expression open and sad. Kakashi doesn’t like causing sorrow for others, but it feels undeniably good to have someone’s sympathy. It makes him feel human.

What a dangerous feeling.

“Hello?” Iruka shouts. His call rebounds off the wooden walls of the inn and dissipates into nothing in the empty landscape.

“We’re from Konoha?” he tries again, rattling the locked door, “We’re looking for shelter for the night!”

Kakashi pulls Ramen over to the well, too deep to judge if it’s dry. A stone toss tells him that there is some kind of liquid at the bottom, so he begins the process of hauling enough water up for his horse.

“You drink like you’re challenging Tsunade. You really need that much?” he grumbles to Ramen, a beast of burden who definitely needs several bucketfuls of water to survive. “Make me do all the work.”

“Okay!” Iruka shouts from the porch of the tavern, “We’re gonna take that as implicit permission!” Then he kicks the door in.

Kakashi allows Iruka to do the commandeering of what is probably a deserted inn while he hauls water for Ramen. Iruka can scream if he finds anything he needs Kakashi to kill.

Once Ramen is situated for the night, Kakashi wanders into the inn to find his lost cleric.

The inn is nothing special, a common room with a bar and two staircases, one leading up to rooms, another to what must be the cellar where they keep the liquid goods. Slipping behind the wall that backs the bar, Kakashi finds a kitchen in disarray.

But not as much disarray as he might have expected. The scattered produce is starting to go off, but it looks like someone left mid-dinner preparation, an organized chaos. A short investigation turns up enough dried fruit, meat, and cheese for two men, which Kakashi counts as a minor victory.

Somewhere beneath him, he hears a door slam, a shout, and a….splash?

Kakashi doesn’t hesitate, dashing to the stairs leading down. Did Iruka knock a barrel of ale over? Is there someone lying in wait for a hapless cleric to walk into a dark cellar?

His feet pound down the stairs, turning the corner at the landing to see—

“Kakashi!” Iruka calls, soaked and grinning. “The inn is built around a natural spring!”

While not as extensive as the baths back in Konoha, the pool hidden in the cellar is a welcome blue in contrast to all the brown that has surrounded them since the forest ended abruptly a day and a half ago. A few shelves are stocked with towels and bathing essentials, fully serviced, if small. The benches on the old, tiled floor surrounding the natural spring are barely visible in the late afternoon light filtering from upstairs.

A fuse hangs at the bottom of the stairs. Once Kakashi sets a lit match to the end, a spark races around the room. One after another, lamps embedded into the stone cellar walls flare to life, casting a warm glow upon the spring and its occupant.

Still in his tunic and armor, Iruka props himself up by his arms on the water’s edge, though the water is just shallow enough to stand in. He brushes his hair back from his face and rubs his eyes, water running down his cheeks and nose. His eyes flick up to meet Kakashi’s, crinkling as he breaks into a wide smile.

Kakashi coughs and turns away as Iruka boosts himself out of the pool, clothes heavy with water. Practical armor leaves basically everything up to the imagination, but Iruka manages to pull off the soaked adventurer look. There’s a reason why so many of Jiraiya’s colleagues begin their novels with a rainstorm driving a pretty young thing to seek refuge at a castle. If he was the ruler of a forbidding manor on a hill, Kakashi would at least let Iruka make his case.

Not that Kakashi has anything to offer. Or that Iruka is even asking. Or that Kakashi wants him to ask.

He grinds that thought process to a paste.

“Well!” Iruka says with a wet clap of his hands. “I guess I already got my soak in. Why don’t you take a turn and I’ll secure the building for the night?”

Kakashi squares his shoulders and turns to the stairs. “Security and preparation for tomorrow should be our first priority. I’ll begin warding.”

With a damp shlorp, shlorp, shlorp, Iruka pulls in front of him, blocking his exit. “Protection spells are my specialty, I insist.”

“May I remind you, Cleric—”

“That you’re the captain of this mission, yes. Be a leader and delegate! I don’t mind.”

Kakashi glares at him.

Iruka’s smile dims. Very firmly, Kakashi does not think that the lights dim with it.

“I dragged you back from death twice today. Just, rest.”

Dripping wet and with an unconvincing smile, Iruka and his concern weighs against the duty Kakashi holds as a shield before and around him. The scale in his mind tips back and forth, trying to find a balance.

“For my peace of mind, at least.” And Iruka reaches out, hovers a hand over his armored shoulder. But then he pulls back and slips up the stairs, still dripping.

A moment later, Kakashi feels the foundation of a protective circle settle itself around the inn. Whatever Iruka is building, it’s solid.

Kakashi is very used to protecting, standing between danger and those who might be harmed. Few can match him in either combat proficiency or pure arcane power, let alone match his mastery in seamless and simultaneous use of both. Suffice to say, he is not used to being protected.

But Iruka’s magic doesn’t bristle at him like thornbush-prickly defenses that grate on his senses or sit heavy on his head and shoulders like an oppressive cave shaped from the arcane. Instead, it flows in a steady pattern around them, constant in its path and purpose, but curving gently around its charges, allowing give for their movements and eccentricities.

Reliable, adaptable.

As is its wielder, thinks Kakashi as he touches the wards Iruka is building upwards.

Rather than some deeper insight, all Kakashi senses in his contact with the shifting arcana is a twinge of embarrassment, a slight scold, and another pinch of self-consciousness.

So, maybe Iruka isn’t like water flowing over the same surface, carving a path. Maybe he isn’t in balance against the intangible weights Kakashi places on himself.

Maybe he just wants to care for a companion. A friend.

Kakashi sheds his weapons, his armor, his stained underclothes, and slips into the warm and waiting water.

It’s a peaceful scene. Kakashi doesn’t have his hand through a brilliant prodigy healer’s chest and there’s no promising apprentice dying mid-ritual spitting deserved obscenities in his direction.

The guild leader holds his wife loosely around the waist as she belly laughs at a joke she just told. Their son sits at their feet, with no pinched stress lines under his eyes, no distrustful glances thrown his way.

A dream, Kakashi realizes, the unreality of the situation sweeping over him like a cool breeze.

He can only watch, disengaged and disembodied as Rin and Obito, looking older, looking how they should be, greet their former teacher, their hands clutched tight between them. A demon-free Naruto is dragged away and suspended between the two now grown apprentices, as they swing him into the air to peals of great laughter. Minato kisses Kushina on the cheek as she yells instructions to bring him home before nine. An older man, still spry, approaches them from behind, his face worn with deep lines—evidence of a life of smiles.

His father, comes the second revelation. Kakashi braces himself. His dreams of Sakumo always turn to pain sooner and never later.

He spots Gai and Yamato trailing after the older Sakumo, something about their pace lighter as they lean together, shared smiles reflecting in on one another. Itachi rolls his eyes a few steps behind them, shoulders lighter than Kakashi has ever seen them.

The entire village seems to filter in, congregating around Kakashi’s precious people, all smiling, all full of life. He knows, understanding filtering from somewhere deep within himself, that if he joins them, that if he touches them, they will all dissipate away like smoke.

Is this the new torture his mind has decided to inflict upon him? To see the happiness of those he cares for but never be a part of it? Maybe this is the reality where Kakashi never existed at all, maybe that’s the deciding factor for his loved ones’ joy. Maybe he is the agent that bring suffering into the lives of all that he dares to love, perhaps it would be better—

“Love, what are you looking at?”

A hand rests on his elbow, who else but Umino Iruka leaning into his space, soft eyes and soft hair and soft hands.

The smile that Kakashi is rapidly becoming far too fond of makes an appearance. “Shall we join them?”

What has he done to deserve this? Why are the gods inflicting him with everything he cannot have? Kakashi does his duty, he keeps his oath, and protects who he can, what more can possibly be asked from him?

Dream-Iruka clutches his upper arm, shaking him gently. “Are you all right, darling? You look a little flushed, are you—"

“—sure you should be in the bath for this long? We already discussed why you have to tell me if you’re injured.”

Kakashi rouses to Iruka’s rambling admonishment, the cling of the dream slipping into the water.

“You’ve been down here for two hours, did you fall asleep? I was getting worried. Honestly, are you sure you’re all—”

“Did you need something?”

Iruka finally released Kakashi’s arm, drawing back from the water’s edge where he had propped himself up as he dozed.

“Ah, no. I just came to let you know that upstairs is secure. The bedrolls are set up and there’s food if you’re hungry.”

“Good. If that’s all…” Kakashi boosts himself out of the water, letting his back crack from the bad posture he’s sunk into.

From Iruka’s direction, there’s an odd squeaking sound.

“Wou—eh, hm—would you like a towel?”

Kakashi raises his head from wiping away the grit in his eyes. Iruka faces away from him, one of the large towels from the corner thrust in his direction.

Accepting it wordlessly, Kakashi paces over to where he left his clothes and armor, running the towel through his hair before slinging it around his waist.

“If you don’t mind—” Iruka says in a low voice, his hand glowing slightly with what feels like healing magic.

Kakashi looks between the cleric and himself. “I’m not injured,” he says, questioning tone slipping in.

“I can see that. Just—your scars.”

Ahh, yes.

All eyes in the cellar-bath drift to Kakashi’s torso, which is riddled with puckered scar tissue and discolored skin, all in different ages from angry-red-barely-healed to silver-stretched-out. Idly, Kakashi notes the history of each scar. A bugbear bite, a slash from a cursed sword, a fireball he couldn’t quite get out of the way of. A hundred things that should have and did kill him, yet still he stands. For reasons even he’s not sure completely of.

A slight shake of the head clears his thought process.

“They’ve already healed over, no use wasting magic on them,” he tells the cleric, who’s hand continues to shine.

“Just let me—”

And Iruka closes the gap between them, running his hands, both now filled with light, over Kakashi’s repeatedly restitched skin. He doesn’t quite touch the surface of the skin, but Kakashi feels it all the same.

Everywhere Iruka’s mild light casts relaxes incrementally, his muscles slipping from tension one by one. Not every scar, but some, loosen and fade. The mark of the injury remains, but the tightness that remains from stretched and magically repaired skin eases. Recent scars, still fiery and hateful, age rapidly before their eyes—the swelling reduced to something manageable.

Kakashi lifts his eyes to Iruka’s face, furrowed in concentration. Their eyes meet briefly before Iruka blinks and bites his inner cheek, gaze returned firmly to his hands’ work. He turns a pretty sort of red, color deepening as the moments tick past.

After Iruka makes his way around Kakashi’s shoulders and back, he steps back a pace, still well within reach. He’s still flushed, Kakashi notes with idle wonder.

“There,” he says, quiet in the echoing cellar, “I hope that’s more comfortable for you.”

“It is.”

“Good.” Iruka smiles. “That’s good.”

Maybe it’s the remnants of the dream, or how Iruka’s hands were never quite on him, or the sheer novelty of how he’s been treated this mission, but something tires to tumble out of Kakashi, some truth he’s only half aware of.

“Iruka, I—”

“You know, Kakashi—”

Krrr-WHAM!

Kakashi feels the assault against the wards the seconds after he hears it, apparently two seconds after Iruka, who is already rushing up the stairs—

Without backup! Honestly, who does this cleric think he is! Kakashi practically leaps into the leather he wears under his armor—he ought to have some kind of protection, even if full plate will take too long in this emergency—and races up after him.

He’s only halfway up the stairs when he hears:

“NARUTOOOOOO!”

His last few steps slow as he reaches the ground floor. There’s no way…

But there is. Standing in the wide-open doorway, looking sheepish but not repentant, stands Konoha’s most surprising apprentice. Naruto glances at Iruka, then briefly at Kakashi, before crossing his arms and glaring at the floor. Iruka has already stormed halfway to him, in total contrast to his calm in the baths. Currently, Kakashi is the one holding a sword, but his money is on Iruka for cutting the more intimidating image.

“Just what were you thinking young man!” shouts Iruka as he manhandles Naruto inside, slamming the door behind him. “What have I told you a thousand times about leaving the village without an escort? This isn’t some game or challenge or dare, Naruto, you could have been terribly hurt! Or killed!”

Naruto opens his mouth to interrupt, but Iruka is too busy checking his every inch for any sign of harm to give any opening. But Iruka seems perfectly capable of carrying on the conversation without his input. Kakashi settles in for a long lecture, leaning against the bar.

“Yes, even with that demon’s protection! There’s bigger fish out here than some weakened Fox trapped in a kid. You’re not immortal, you punk! Why do you think apprentices spend so many years in training? Just to sharpen swords and shine armor?”

“That’s all we do though,” Naruto interrupts as Iruka fusses, wrapping him in a blanket and setting him on a bedroll.

Iruka squishes Naruto’s cheeks together, forcing eye contact. “That is for discipline! Something you clearly have none of! I will march you back to Konoha myself and ohhhh, you won’t be out of my sight until you’ve scrubbed every piece of armor to a mirror shine. Then, maybe, we can see about getting the guild leader to reinstate you because you sure aren’t staying apprentice after a stunt like this.”

“Who cares what that stupid old man thinks—!”

“Sarutobi is our head, if you can’t show him some respect than—”

“—he sent you out here to die!”

His shout echoes around the empty common room, suddenly quieter.

Iruka blinks down at Naruto, before kneeling to meet him on eye level. His expression is still stern, but some of the anger has drained away. “I know missions can be dangerous, but I knew and agreed to the risks. Besides, I’ve got this guy here for protection.” Iruka smiles at Kakashi, who gives a little wave.

Naruto just shakes his head, a little petulant and a little frantic. “No! That’s even worse! You never take missions—don’t you get that this one is weird?”

A strange expression comes over Iruka’s face as he scratches the back of his head. “Ah, well, I know I don’t usually take missions like this but I figured—I thought that maybe the higher pay would—this isn’t exactly the way I wanted to ask you but—”

“This whole mission is a trap!” Naruto cries, tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. “I heard them talking about it! He wants you and him to get killed on an impossible mission!”

“Huh? Naruto, what are you—?”

Iruka sounds confused but Kakashi is a paranoid bastard.

He steps forward. “Who? Who did you hear?”

“That stupid old man—”

“Sarutobi?”

“—and his creepy friend. The one with the bandages.”

“Ah.” Kakashi catches Iruka’s eye. “Danzo.”

Iruka furrows his brow. “Sarutobi and Shimura? But why—?”

“I promise I heard them!”

“I wouldn’t put anything past Danzo,” Kakashi says.

“I’m not saying I don’t believe you Naruto, but why this mission?”

“Can’t you feel it? Everything about this place is—broken. They said that he’d die,” Naruto points to Kakashi, “and the land would drain you when you tried to revive him.”

“But I’ve already revived you here, and there was no drain on my mana. If anything, there was too much.” He trails off, lost in thought.

Kakashi watches Naruto watch Iruka. He hasn’t been this close to Minato’s boy in a very long time. His looks are his father’s, but his personality is all his mother, just as Kakashi had assumed from the occasional check-ins over the years. The strength of Iruka and his relationship has been on full display since he arrived; Kakashi has to conclude that whatever lectures and backtalk they give one another, it doesn’t affect their bond.

The boy must feel his gaze, because he whips his head to meet Kakashi face to face. His nose scrunches up and he gives Kakashi the up-and-down that only a bratty child can pull off.

“Do you really come back from the dead?” Naruto asks, sounding like he won’t believe him no matter what Kakashi answers.

This shakes Iruka from his silence. “Naruto! Show Paladin Hatake some respect!”

“I do.”

“Does it make you stronger?”

“No. I’m just me.”

Naruto drops his head to one side like a puppy. “Hm,” he says, the sound full of judgement, but in which direction Kakashi isn’t sure.

With nothing to be done against the wisdom of youth, Kakashi straightens to his full height. “If you don’t have any other questions, I suggest we bed down for the night, as we’ll have an early and long day tomorrow.”

“Huh, why?” Naruto asks, already curling up in what is hopefully Iruka’s bedroll and not Kakashi’s.

“We’ll need to return to Konoha,” Iruka says, heading to the door and the keystone of the wards that burst at Naruto’s battering ram of an arcane presence.

“I came to help!”

“And you have,” says Kakashi, as he feels the wards rebuild themselves around the three of them. “But we need answers and we’re not likely to find them out here.”

“And,” Iruka says with a significant look, “we need to escort you back to safety.”

Naruto grumbles a bit more, but the exhaustion of trailing them for days, somehow dodging danger, and the sheer force of Iruka’s lecture must get to him. He drops off to sleep not much later.

After gathering up his belongings from downstairs, Kakashi and Iruka convene in the kitchen, voices low as they plan the route back to the village.

Kakashi wants to ask what Iruka was going to say, when they were standing close and the air was buzzing between them, but the atmosphere of before doesn’t return. He watches with hooded eyes as Iruka curls around Naruto’s sprawled form with practiced ease. That image of safety burns into his mind as he drifts to sleep, wards humming and Naruto gently snoring.

The first leg back is uneventful, mostly filled with Naruto’s chatter to Iruka as Kakashi pretends he isn’t listening in. But Naruto is as skilled as his teacher in drawing people into conversation, whether they want it or not.

Kakashi builds camp as he explains the uses of each type of sword, what a pommel is, and why most swords need a cross guard. His explanations gain him a trailing duckling, hanging onto his every word.

Once Naruto drops to sleep, Iruka laughs and shakes his head.

“You ought to be the one to continue his training.”

“Hm?”

“He never pays such close attention to me. Maybe he needs someone who can push him.”

The idea of taking on a dedicated apprentice frankly terrifies Kakashi, but it would be rude to stop the conversation so abruptly.

“May I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“That spell you cast, for the scars—I’ve never seen anything like it.”

If Iruka is thrown by the change in subject, he doesn’t show it. “I’m not surprised. Most clerics trained for battle wouldn’t waste time on such specialized healing magic. I picked it up because kids don’t know how to care for scars. It’s just supposed to prevent tightness and increase mobility where it may be reduced.”

“It relieved some pain. Though none faded completely.”

“That’s the scope of the spell. I don’t believe in teaching my students to cover their scars or try to magic them away. That’s not what they’re for.”

With a rueful half-smile, Iruka scratches his nose, tracing the line of his own very visible scar.

 Now he must ask. “What are they for then?”

“To remind us.”

“Of victories? Of failures? A scar can represent any number of past conflicts. Not all are worth remembering.”

“That we’re still here. That we can take a hit and keep living, not just surviving.” Iruka glances away, out into the night. “Or at least, that’s what I think.”

Without his permission, Kakashi’s eye traces Iruka’s silhouette.

“You’re kind of a strange person, aren’t you Iruka?”

“Eh?” Iruka whips around to face him, expression squished like he’s not sure if he’s supposed to be offended.

“I didn’t know that about you. I’m glad I do now.”

They make it safely back into the forest and are approaching the village before their newly formed trio has to face their first fight. Kakashi frankly can’t believe their stealth and use of backroads kept them unnoticed this long.

In a turn of bad luck, a group of two and a half dozen bandits approach on three sides, crowding them away from the little-known track mere hours from the village.

In a turn of terrible luck, the bandits recognize Naruto as the container of the Fox demon, quickly and loudly switching their goals from simple highway robbery to kidnapping and ransom.

Kakashi releases a latch on Ramen’s tack, dropping the supply pack to the ground. His next motion swings Naruto onto the horse’s back, shoving the reins in his hands.

“Go with him,” he growls to Iruka, who has already settled into a battle stance.

Iruka looks very much like he would like to fight him on the impossibility of this situation, but is too conflicted by the complication of Naruto’s safety. “I—”

“I’ll need backup and Naruto must be kept safe. The village is less than an hour at Ramen’s speed.”

It‘s been said that Cleric Umino Iruka is stubborn, argumentative, and willing to verbally spar with anyone, no matter the rank. But never let it be doubted that he knows his duty.

Iruka climbs up behind Naruto.

Kakashi raises a hand to urge Ramen away, but Iruka catches it.

“Only if you come back to us. To me.”

“Come get me and I will.”

The moment stretches between them, the forest atmosphere and the rough language of the bandits’ taunts in a pause, before Iruka gives him a single nod, releases his hand, and disappears into the brush with Naruto.

Kakashi allows his attention to ignore his enemies for a second longer, watching them go.

Then he charges into battle, knowing that life awaits him on the other side.

He drifts—

No, he doesn’t drift. He fights and fights and fights. The current tries to push him away from where he is supposed to be. Where he wants to be.

Over and over again, he stretches out a hand, reaching for something he can only half-recall.

Kakashi!

Hands grabs his, he grips back.

Iruka!

“—‘s all right, you’re safe. You did so well. Just breathe, you fought so hard,” comes the whisper of the most precious voice.

“—lucky we were so close by on business,” comes a despised one, cold tone cutting.

“Did we interrupt your important experimentations on more orphans, Sir Danzo?” Kakashi rasps out, his vocal cords returning to use.

“Well, all’s well that ends well, I suppose.” And that must be Sarutobi.

Kakashi manages to raise himself from Iruka’s half-cradle, meeting the eyes of his guild master.

“We heard some interesting rumors out in the blighted lands.” Iruka’s healing energy seeps into him as he speaks, face concentrated and concerned.

Sarutobi’s eyes dart behind Kakashi for the slightest moment, a tiny tell, but enough to confirm his sinking feeling. Leaning on Iruka, Kakashi brings his still sore body to standing, clocking Naruto still perched on Ramen behind him.

“Children will say the strangest things,” Sarutobi says mildly. “The fact you returned relatively unharmed means the matter must be resolved.”

Danzo and Sarutobi exchange a significant glance, the guild leader almost stern and the other almost petulant.

With a final narrowed eye, Danzo hisses out, “This is far from over,” then turns on his heel, leaving the clearing.

After he is out of range, Sarutobi lets out a small sigh. “I believe I will pay for that later. But I suppose congratulations are in order. Very good work both of you. All three of you,” he corrects, with a smile to Naruto. “I had full confidence you would succeed.”

“Just politics as usual, guild leader?” Kakashi asks, already knowing the answer.

“What can you do in the face of it but learn to play the game?”

“With all due respect,” Iruka grits out in a tone that implies that amount is very small indeed, “you were gambling with our lives. With Naruto’s life, a child’s life.”

“And yet you triumphed in a task deemed to be impossible by an enemy. Unless it was impossible. What news from the blighted land?”

Sarutobi turns from facing them and begins to lead the group back to the village. Kakashi stays attached to Iruka, even though he should be fine by now. So what? He died again. He’s going to take what he can get when Iruka is so obviously not moving away from him, still filtering gentle healing throughout his veins.

“It sucks!” Naruto declares. “The magic feels crowded and terrible, like it’s got no place to go!”

Kakashi clarifies. “The entire area was razed of all life, in a radius of at least two days on foot. All animal life had fled the area, but some had grown strange from the changed mana.”

“Large and crazed,” Iruka adds. “They pose a threat if they don’t revert to their natural state. The magic was aggressive too, pushing in against any spell I tried to cast.”

Sarutobi nods. “I see. And your recommendations?”

“Send a druid.”

Both Sarutobi and Iruka swivel to stare at him in different levels of disbelief.

“But the magic was out of control, any magic user would be just as confused as we were, especially one who relies so heavily on mana for combat.”

Kakashi shrugs. “Who better to deal with wild magic?”

Sarutobi just shakes his head, but Iruka considers.

“Actually, wasn’t all the plant life destroyed? Not just trampled or knocked over, but completely wiped out and blackened.”

“A druid could repair that I suppose.”

“No, think about it, what was the main difference between the forest and the blighted lands?”

“Besides the magic and crazed beasts? The fog, I suppose.”

“The trees,” says Iruka, as if this explains everything.

“…And?” Kakashi prompts when no one else bothers to ask.

“Aren’t you friends with the guild’s only druid? What do trees store?”

It must be the teacher in Iruka, because Kakashi usually doesn’t have to play these guessing games.

“Wood, water, bugs maybe—” he pauses. “Energy.”

Iruka grins, patting the arm slung around his neck. “We thought that there’d be a dearth, but with the natural storage of natural mana gone—”

“It had nowhere to go but crowd into people and animals.”

Naruto whoops from his perch. “Another mystery solved by Konoha adventurers!”

“Brat!” Iruka laughs. “Are you trying to take credit?”

“Honored Paladin Hatake Kakashi said I helped,” Naruto says, prim and self-important. “Show him some respect, huh?”

Kakashi laughs so big and long that his side hurts.

After returning everyone to their respective homes, after filing an official report with the guild leader, Kakashi is sent on a mission within a day of stepping foot inside the village.

He’s assigned another cleric, someone who respects him but isn’t interested in knowing teammates more than necessary.

The entire time, he finds himself turning to say something to Iruka, but he’s never there. Apparently, Iruka doesn’t usually take missions out of the village for longer than a day or two because he’s too valuable as a teacher and Naruto’s only advocate. It was only through Danzo’s maneuverings that he got assigned with Kakashi at all. It was all in the hopes that Iruka’s supposed rusty skills and the unpredictable magic would get both of them killed, robbing Sarutobi of two loyal allies and Naruto of protection.

Obviously, he had guessed wrong, so now Kakashi is stuck missing someone he spent less than ten days with.

The other cleric is competent, and they wrap their mission within three days instead of the allotted five.

Kakashi doesn’t die once.

When Kakashi returns, Iruka isn’t within guild headquarters or running around Sarutobi’s office or even at the apprentices’ training grounds.

After he loops back to Sarutobi’s office on an invented errand just in case, the guild leader takes pity on him.

“Our resident Fox-holder had a shift in his residency forms earlier today.”

Why didn’t he check at Naruto’s one-room, of course. “Oh?”

“He’s in a newly purchased house on the edge of town, near the training grounds. It’s a cozy little home, but I imagine it fits two quite comfortably.”

Kakashi is already out the door and down the street.

“Maybe even three,” notes Sarutobi to an empty room.

Naruto swings the door open on the second knock. Kakashi tries not to stiffen under the repetition of the critical sweep up and down his person, but it’s a near thing.

“Did you know this was our house?” Naruto asks without exchanging greetings.

“I just heard.”

The judgmental tone returns, tinged with amusement and not sharing the joke. “Hm. That’s good, I guess. Aren’t you going to congratulate me on the move?”

“Congratulations.”

“Thanks. This is good for you too, you know. Now you don’t have to watch me from far away, you can just come inside.”

Before Kakashi can reply to that, Naruto turns on his heel and yells into the house.

“Honored Paladin Hatake Kakashi has arrived, make room for his presence!”

There’s a bang! from deeper within, then a returned shout.

“Sarcasm isn’t going to help me unpack faster!”

“But he likes it when I make fun of him! Look at his face!”

Iruka appears around the corner, dressed in loose-fitting clothing suited for chores. It’s nothing like the cleric’s uniform he wears in the field, kept meticulously clean and repaired. Instead, he’s rumpled and a little out of breath, hair in a loose tail at his neck. He looks gorgeous.

“Go on, you brat. You’ll have to unpack if you want anything to sleep on tonight or anything to play with tomorrow.”

“Oh right,” Naruto says, evidently remembering how moving works. He races off.

Iruka turns to Kakashi and everything else fades away. He wonders if they’ll ever stop getting stuck in moments like this, time slowing to nothing.

“Welcome back,” Iruka finally says. “I’m glad to see you’re safe.”

“I’ve returned safely. Thanks to you.”  

“Your mission was successful?”

“Yes.” He pauses. “I didn’t die at all.”

“Oh! That’s amazing work by you and your team.”

“It was thanks to you,” Kakashi repeats.

“It’s not as if I was there. And you didn’t even need me for revival.”

Kakashi steps forward. Takes Iruka’s hand. “I promised I would come back.”

“Oh.” Iruka blinks rapidly several times, a slow grin spreading across his face. “Oh.”

“Only if I’m welcome.”

Iruka seizes Kakashi’s outstretched hand in both of his. “I said I’d come get you, and didn’t I?”

“Yes. You always did.”

Iruka gestures inside.

“Would you—?”

“Yes. As long as you’ll have me.”

Now a deep, deep red, Iruka pulls him forward. “You seem like a man who doesn’t mind a little hard work. How can I say no?”