Prologue: October Tenth

by Emstar

The earth shook under Kakashi’s feet. He shuffled a foot back and forth.

“Orders from the Jōnin Commander.” Nara Shikaku said. “We’re to be held in reserve here, in case we’re needed. Mobilizing any more forces than necessary —”

Nara’s spiel was interrupted by a series of ominous booms echoing in the distance.

“— would just lead to unnecessary casualties.” The thirty year-old shinobi turned his gaze to the younger ninja in the clearing, locking eyes with each one of them. “Just to be clear, nobody is to leave this clearing yet. Nobody. That’s an order. Am I understood?”

He was answered by a chorus of Aye’s, Yessir’s, a few solemn nods, and a single “Yosh!”

Kakashi’s fingers twitched slightly.

Hatake Kakashi was no ordinary ninja, far from it. He was the best shinobi of his generation. A Jōnin at fifteen, an ANBU lieutenant at seventeen. He was the fastest, the strongest, the one with the most skill, the most jutsu, the most anything. He didn’t just have raw power or skill, he had something else. He wouldn’t have been able to tell you if his life depended on it.

“It was the Sharingan,” some of the older veterans said. “It must be.” But Kakashi knew that Obito’s eye was only one piece of the puzzle. It made him more perceptive, it let him copy an enemy’s ninjutsu on the fly, it even let him predict an opponent's movements a second or two in advance. It was incredible, and he silently thanked Obito everyday for his gift, but if it were that simple then any Uchiha could do it. No, he was just that good.

And right now he was standing here.

Doing nothing.

He was waiting for more orders while the Nine-Tailed Fox ran rampant in their village. While Minato-sensei and the Third Hokage and the clan heads and all the other senior ninja were off fighting it. While Aunt Kushina and her unborn child were… probably not doing that, since the fox being out here did not bode well for them. Not at all.

And so he stood here…

As he looked around impotently, he caught Gai’s eye.

Maito Gai. The one who answered Nara earlier with a resounding “Yosh!”. The person who probably best fit the description of “Kakashi’s best friend”. An up and coming taijutsu master that relied on jaw dropping amounts of hard work and grit (and the “Power of Youth”, whatever that meant) to excel in his chosen specialization. Many looked down upon Gai for his eccentric personality, but Kakashi saw him differently. Gai was made of sterner stuff. The weirdness wasn’t a downside, the weirdness made him stronger, it made the man who he was. He was a kindred soul, in a way.

The youthful titan in the lime-green outfit turned to him with a look in his eyes, bushy eyebrows raised, and shining white smile on his face. The expression was a message.

Want me to be the distraction?

Kakashi paused before replying with the slightest of slight nods. Gai’s fist contorted into a thumbs up. Not a second later, and he was standing in front of Nara, gesticulating wildly and shouting like a madman.

“Why, Captain Nara, I’ve heard you’re quite the philosopher but have you heard about the philosophy of YOUTH!? I’d be very interested to hear —”

One substitution later and there was a medium sized boulder in the spot where Kakashi was standing. By the time Nara noticed he’d be long gone.

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This is what it is to be Hatake Kakashi, at this moment.

The Copy Ninja darted over the landscape. He moves so fast that the average ninja would have trouble seeing him. He was pure speed. Lightning itself. His movements were precise. Sharp. Practiced. Not a hint of wasted movement. The tremors and fidgeting from earlier were gone, replaced by an icy chill that washed through his body with every heartbeat.

What if it was already too late?

What if you weren’t good enough? What if you failed them again?

Just like you failed them all last time. And the last time. And the last time...

What if…? What if? What if? What if—

As a thousand doubts sang like a thousand chirping birds from a thousand cracks in Kakashi’s soul... he responded with a burst of speed. He accelerated by sending chakra throughout his body. It caused an intense burning sensation in his muscles as the energy pulsed through his limbs.

He didn’t have time for doubts. He ignored those too.

Because there was a giant fox destroying his home.

Because Minato-sensei and Aunt Kushina and their child were in danger and he wouldn’t let Team Seven down again.

Because those who broke the rules were scum, but the people who abandoned their comrades to die were even worse than that.

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The killing intent of the fox permeated the village like a dense, cloying miasma. It was so strong it was almost physical. If Kakashi let his concentration slip, he could feel the phantom sensations of his airways tightening, his breath freezing inside him, his stomach dropping miles down to....

No.

Kakashi shook his head and kept moving.

He could feel the faintest glimmer of other ninja through the haze, flickering like birthday candles in a burning building some miles ahead of him. Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage, his usual grandfatherly expression flattened into a rictus of grim determination. Torifu Akimichi, the Akimichi Clan Head, his titanic personality roaring across the distance. Sensei’s own aura, a bastion of indomitable will cloaked in a raging storm that was two miles to his left. A sinister void of purest terror dancing around —

Kakashi planted his feet and sent chakra bursting through to the ground, barely keeping himself from sliding through the dirt and tumbling over. Minato-sensei was away from the main battle, and for some reason he was near a powerful ninja that Kakashi had never heard of before.

He turned mid-stop and blasted away in that direction.

o-o-o

Kakashi stopped at the sound of fighting. Not “desperately trying to contain a giant monster” fighting either. This was more business as usual.

He heard the distinct sound of his teacher’s signature melee ninjutsu sawing through a tree.

It took all the restraint he had to not immediately jump into the fray.

Minato Namikaze was fighting off a black cloaked figure and what looked to be… a horde of wooden plant monsters? They were a bunch of shambling, wooden caricatures of the human form, covered in roots and vines. The cloaked figure was also wearing a bizarre mask of polished metal, with some sort of opaque covering obscuring the face portion.

Aunt Kushina was lying half-upright in the dirt near the stream, holding a small newborn. Her Adamantine Sealing Chains floated above the pair, offering some protection. Minato-sensei didn’t look particularly fatigued, but Kakashi’s Sharingan could make out beads of sweat forming on his skin. The cloaked opponent rushed forward, and Minato-sensei vanished.

The Yellow Flash was everywhere and nowhere at the same time. The Flying Thunder God technique allowed him to instantly teleport between any of his special kunai, a tactical advantage that the Fourth Hokage exploited ruthlessly. He drew the cloaked figure out before vanishing through a dozen spaces and hammering them with an erratic flurry of blows. Every strike passed right through the assailant. He danced through the crowd of wood monsters, leaving a pile of regenerating splinters in their wake. He teleported back to help Kushina protect herself and his child.

Kakashi frowned. Something was off there, sensei’s strikes had passed straight through the mystery opponent, as if they were some sort of phantom. They had some sort of ghost technique that made them incorporeal?

No. The element of surprise could be what made the difference here. Kakashi clamped down on his own impatience and spent another couple seconds watching the fight from behind the overgrown foliage.

Ah, but there was nothing that said he couldn’t do both.

His fingers formed a cross-shaped hand seal.

The Shadow Clone technique was a very powerful and versatile ninjutsu that allowed the user to create fully functional and intelligent copies of themselves. Shadow clones could perform techniques from the chakra given to them, and the memories of their experiences would even merge back into the technique user’s own mind once the clones were dispelled. It also took a lot of chakra, so he had to be careful with it.

“Shadow Clone Technique.” Kakashi muttered, and two identical copies of him appeared in puffs of smoke.

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Kakashi rushed forward to join the fray, fingers flying through hand seals while the name of the technique ripped out of his throat.

“Fire Element: Fire Dragon Bullet!”

He blew and a jet of flames scorched through the air towards the wood monster things. While it was a very concentrated fire ninjutsu, it was also narrow. It probably wouldn’t hit more than one or two of them. If he were alone then it would’ve been a poor choice and he would’ve been swarmed afterwards.

But he wasn’t alone.

Minato Namikaze noticed his presence on the battlefield with a quick glance, before he paused where he was and began making his own hand seals.

“Wind Element: Emperor’s Gale!”

A massive gust of dense, chakra-laden wind swung through the clearing before crashing into his fire jutsu. The two techniques flowed into one another and then half of the clearing was a blazing inferno filled with shrieking effigies made of burning vines. He turned to run to support sensei before noticing a blur in his peripheral vision.

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Kakashi threw himself to the side, but he was too slow, and instead he found himself getting stabbed through the throat. For an instant he could feel a length of sharpened wood slicing through his neck and cutting through flesh and bone before punching through to the other side of him.

The clone popped.

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Kakashi winced as the memories from his clone slammed into him. He shook his head to dispel any lingering tingling and the excruciatingly painful feelings of being stabbed through the neck with a huge splinter. Having your shadow clones die was never… pleasant.

Back to the task at hand. The masked ninja.

Selective intangibility. They seemed to be able to phase through any attacks that hit their body. But their footsteps still bent the blades of grass, even when sensei’s attacks passed right through his torso. They probably wanted to maintain contact with the ground to move.

Hm. He could use that. He made more hand seals.

“Earth Element: Living Roots.”

A decent portion of his chakra surged through his feet into the ground. He became acutely aware of any vibrations in the earth nearby. The Living Roots technique was an excellent sensory jutsu, and it was incredibly useful if you expected to be moving around underground without the aid of sight.

“Earth Element: Hiding Like a Mole.”

Kakashi sunk into the ground like it was made out of water. He swam underneath the fight and waited, feeling out the vibrations from the clash above.

He adjusted his position a bit. And waited.

And waited.

And w— there! He quickly swam three meters to the right as a series of vibrations cascaded through that spot. He made a final set of hand seals.

“Earth Element: Antlion Strike.’

He shot upwards, exploding through the ground as it collapsed and felt something crunch in his grasp.

Gotcha.

He heard the telltale whirring screech of his signature jutsu above before he popped too.

o-o-o

Kakashi shot forward out of the bush the instant the ground shook and his clone made its move. His move. Bygones. Hand seals flashed in a familiar pattern.

“Lightning Element: Chidori.”

A ball of violently spasming electricity gathered in his hand. He accelerated forward, putting what little chakra still remained in his body to work. His Sharingan tracked the enemy’s movements. He would know. The assailant would have to dodge the shadow clone somehow. They hadn’t been phasing through the ground to attack them unseen from below, so chances were they couldn’t. They had to do something to move out of the grip his clone had on their feet, they had to.

The cloaked figure flicked their wrist and a spear of wood shot down through his clone’s skull, turning the clone into a cloud of slowly dispersing smoke. The memories from the shadow clone rushed into his mind. He ignored them. He was so close.

Then the masked figure seemed to look at him, and his soul was hit with a hammer.

Time seemed to stop. He couldn’t breathe. He was drowning in a sea of malevolence and spite and hate. He was being crushed by a mountain of will and purpose and pain.

Kakashi’s legs wouldn’t work. They wouldn’t move like he wanted, wouldn’t obey him, and he slowed to a stop. He was trapped in a vice grip of killing intent, stronger than any he’d ever felt before.

Sensei was fighting this?

Some part of him managed to stay lucid. So he remained upright, the ball of lightning chirping away in his hand. That part of him struggled with all of his might to move, to attack, to do something. Anything.

No. No. No no NO NO NO!

But it wasn’t enough. He still couldn’t move.

The figure flipped backwards, landing gingerly on one foot while taking care not to put too much weight on their mangled right foot— he’d managed something at least — before starting a jutsu.

flick

Kakashi couldn’t make out the name or the hand seals, but the figure placed his hands to the ground and the telltale markings of the summoning technique spread out from his palm.

whirr

Not an instant later, the Fourth Hokage appeared behind them with the characteristic whirring sound of the Flying Thunder God technique. Minato stood there as if he was always supposed to be standing there, and the universe just momentarily forgot this fact. A whirling ball of light and chakra hummed in his hands. Kakashi looked, and with his Sharingan he saw his sensei strike before his sensei stuck.

This time, the Rasengan actually hits.

The killing intent vanished. He blinked.

Minato Namikaze shoved his technique right into the small of the shinobi’s back just as the summoning technique completed. There were two explosions, one sending the masked assailant hurtling to the other side of the clearing. One was a gigantic cloud of smoke that filled the clearing as the summoning technique completed.

A blood chilling roar heralded the arrival of the Nine Tailed Demon Fox to their location.

Kakashi felt his legs give way. His Chidori fizzled out in his hands. He had nothing left. A massive clawed paw swiped downwards to crush him into bloody pieces.

whirr

Kakashi felt a familiar hand clasp down on his shoulder before he was whisked away to stand next to Kushina and their newborn. The fox led with a tail strike, but Aunt Kushina let out a roar and her sealing chains shot forward, wrapping around the tails in a deadly game of cat’s cradle. She gasped and grit her teeth from the effort.

Minato-sensei paused, looking at his wife. Then at his newborn. Then he met Kakashi’s eyes. His blue eyes had…

Was that doubt in his eyes? Uncertainty? Hesitation?

The Yellow Flash was hesitating?

“Just get it over with,” Kushina said. Her smile was marred by signs of incredible pain. “Not everyday you give birth and have something the size of the Hokage Monument ripped out of your stomach. ‘Sides, this bastard is damn heavy.”

Minato considered the scene for a long moment.

“Alright.”

The Fourth began a series of hand seals.

“Kakashi, you’re lucid?” Minato asked, looking over to him.

Kakashi nodded.

“Good. Listen carefully. No one was supposed to know about the location beforehand. We went to the cave nearby when Kushina went into labor earlier. The ANBU present were taken there at that time. We were ambushed after the birth by this man and those things. Everyone else who was there tonight is dead. That man knew that the seal would be weakened tonight. Do you understand what that means?”

What. That couldn’t happen.

Could it?

“Someone’s been snooping around our black sites.” Minato continued, a hard look in his eye. “Inside the village.”

Kushina let out a pained gasp and fell to her knees as the Nine Tails thrashed against her. The sealing chains wavered, then held. Concern plastered over Minato’s face, but he continued making hand seals at an even faster rate.

“Nobody should be able to do that here, Kakashi. Not with the ANBU, the Hyuuga, the Uchiha, the Inuzuka. Nobody.”

Not unless they had someone on the inside.

If Kakashi’s blood was merely frozen before, that thought turned his whole body into a glacier from the depths of northern Snow Country. Traitors? Here? Unthinkable.

Was it…?

Kakashi glanced uneasily at Minato. The Fourth Hokage nodded.

“You’re going to need to get to the bottom of it. Tell Hiruzen.”

“Tell Hiruzen? Sensei, what are you talking about?” Kakashi repeated.

“Yes,” Sensei said, ignoring the question. His eyes were… was he crying? “Please, take Naruto here and give him to Jiraiya. He needs to man up and take care of his godson. Listen to me, Kakashi. Naruto goes to Jiraiya, and only Jiraiya. That’s an order.”

His eye saw that Minato was about to say—

Wait, no!

“Sensei, wait!” he shouted. Ice gripped his heart.

“Goodbye, Kakashi. I’m proud of you.”

Minato finished with an unfamiliar hand seal, his hands clapping together.

“Uzumaki Clan Sealing Technique: Shiki Fūjin!”

A bright light burned through the clearing. Kakashi gasped in pain, shielding his eyes. He heard a roar and a thumping sound.

He kept blinking, and the light faded.

The Nine Tails was gone.

Minato was on the ground, unmoving. He looked pale. Lifeless.

Dead.

Kakashi let out a choked sob.

“What am I, chopped liver?” Aunt Kushina wheezed. She was doubled over on the ground, curled up next to Naruto. The newborn had a smoking array of mystical runes on his stomach.

He was the new container for the Nine Tails, the village’s new Jinchūriki.

Kakashi forced his body to move to the pair.

“It was a joke,” Kushina chuckled. “Don’t come thwack me, little Scarecrow. I’ll see him soon enough.”

He had to do something. He wobbled, forcing some of his chakra to his hands. He had to draw on the portion of his chakra reserves that were normally spent keeping his body alive and his Sharingan activated. His vision swam. He wasn’t a good med-nin by any means, but maybe if he…

Kushina swatted his hands away. Her violet eyes bore into his own.

“Don’t. I’m dead anyway,” she stated. “Can’t fix this sort of seal once it’s been broken anyway. Minato would’ve done it if you could...”

His hands were shaking.

“I suppose I wouldn’t mind one dramatic last request,” she spat out. “ If you could kill… the bastard who made him an orphan… I’d like that.”

“I’m.. I’m—“ Kakashi choked back a sob. “I’m sorry, I couldn’t... I wasn’t—”

He felt a hand smack him upside the head.

“Don’t you go blaming yourself for this, Kakashi,” Kushina whispered. She turned her head to stare at Naruto. “Just get my son to that pervert to keep him safe. Here, take him.”

She held out her son to him with trembling arms.

Kakashi quickly took the child. Kushina’s arms fell into the dirt. She stared up at the sky.

“Take care of yourself too, kid.”

The clearing went still. A child wailed. The world went wrong.

Just like you failed them all last time. And the last time. And the last time...

The last surviving member of Team 7 fell to his knees in the mud, cradling a newborn in his arms. The two cried together until the Third Hokage arrived.

Kakashi went missing-nin two months later.