A shinobi is a high school student like an other

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It was warm, agreeably warm, as if someone had just left the space where I was. There was some light too. And there were voices a bit away, familiar voices. One was a woman’s voice, the other belonged to a man. I was still half-sleeping, not aware enough to understand what they were saying. Anyway, there weren’t any hints of immediate danger.

I opened my eyes. This was Rin’s apartment. I was in Rin’s bed, in the space she must have  just left. The night came back to my mind and I closed my eyes. Oh fuck.

The smells reaching me made me crinkle my nose in distaste … until I realized those smells were coming from me. I stank of alcohol, I still had my impregnated sweat-shirt on, I could smell the odor of stale vomit too, on my collar, in my mouth, almost strong enough to give me nausea again. A brave hand showed me that I had hair stuck to my cheeks – and that it was stuck by something tasting like salt…

I felt like shit. There was no other word to describe how I was feeling. I lifted myself up, and sat on the bed. The voices stopped. They were coming from the tiny kitchen. I got up, and crossed the few meters that were separating me from it. I leaned against the piece of wall separating the two rooms.

“Do you want something to eat or drink, Kakashi?” Rin turned herself away from the food she was preparing to look at me. The food looked like a heavy american home-style breakfast, with eggs, bacon, toasts and fruits. The smell of the sizzling bacon in the pan was sickening to me. I shook my head and slid into the free chair, sitting across the third person present in the room.

There were hands wrapped around a steaming mug. I recognized it as one Obito had given to Rin. It had two big bloodshot eyes drawn above the inscription “Party Animal”. Rin had laughed, and suggested that Obito should give the same mug to Genma. He hadn’t had the time to do so.

I kept my eyes on those hands. I hadn’t the need to cross the eyes of their owner, I already knew. Worry, concern, desire to help. Here was what I would find if I lifted my eyes up. As much as Obito had been rather the rude big brother who liked troubles figure, the kind of guy your mommy hates you to hang around with but with who you always find yourself hanging with anyway, the owner of the hands was more the level-headed big brother figure; almost a father figure. Not that I needed one more.

Namiashi Raidou.

A hand lifted the mug up. The silence was settling, the only noises being the ones Rin was making by dressing her plate and cleaning. Another hand drew me out of my zoning-out. A hand that was placing a glass of water in front of me.

“You can use my bathroom you know…”

I lifted my head to look at Rin, her hand still around the glass. I shook my head, swallowing my saliva; my saliva which tasted like bile…
“Thanks… I should get back to my place…”

“I’m bringing you back,” said Raidou. I started to refuse, but he spoke again. “Sensei’s orders. He also specified that your report could wait till tomorrow. The rest of the team already reported.”

I slowly nodded. Rin’s hand had left the glass for my shoulder; it was a warm, familiar and reassuring presence.

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Raidou was driving in silence. Kami be blessed, his car was in a much better state than Genma’s. The heater was adding its purring to the engine’s. The streets were speeding behind the window, under the grey sky threatening to rain; the snow wasn’t on the schedule for now. The old streets flanked by building for the most part still built in wood seemed to be more ancient under this morning light, ancient, empty and sleeping. The silence thickened.

I spoke up for the first time since we left Rin’s place. I had just answered by gestures  the question she had asked – ‘you’re not cold?’ ‘Do you want a jacket?’ and above all the one she hadn’t ask: ‘Daijobu?’- ‘Are you okay?’. I had slipped back into my old habits, the ones of before Obito, my face so neutral it was blank, my emotions and feelings sorted, cataloged, locked, refused to access to expression -not that I had so many feelings right now. I was feeling like I was a mere shell, hollow. The self-disgust was eating me from the inside.

“Park here.”

Raidou frowned but didn’t say anything, parking the car in the free space before the large portal closing the park behind, a park that seemed to be uniformly grey. I got out of the car without a glance behind me. Raidou wouldn’t follow me.

We were here on the border of the ancient Konoha, the Konoha of the ninja times. The surroundings walls had since long disappeared, but this place had subsisted as it was from the beginning. What man, during the wars between villages, as evil or stupid had he been, would have had the guts to disturb the dead?

The graveyard’s gate was open. Very few people were still coming here. It was the old graveyard, the one where the ashes of the older clans were still traditionally buried; when those clans were still existing, or when they hadn’t left the country. The remains of my father were resting here, alongside my mother’s, and the remains of my father’s parents before him. My remains, if remains there would be, would rest here too.
The wind rose, playing with my hair and sweatshirt. I supposed it was cold. I wasn’t feeling.

I walked between the dense rows of grey steles; some were so ancient that the kanji carved on them weren’t readable anymore because of the effects of time.

A whole corner of this place belonged to the Uchiha clan. I joined it with a few more steps. There were still flowers and half consumed incense sticks next to one of the newer stele. Obito’s stele.

“Hi old pal.”

How stupid was I, seriously? What was the point in talking to a grave? That was truly an excellent question. I stayed maybe a quarter of an hour in front of the stone. Then I turned on my heels and headed back toward Raidou and the warm car. The wind had ended up making me feel the cold; and had ended up making me realize I was crying again. I had finally put a name on what I was feeling. I thought I had betrayed Obito’s memory by forgetting the day of his death, even if my subconscious had not forgot, hence the nightmares. No, I couldn’t betray Obito that easily… everything I do referred in one point or another to him, everything I feel, everything I decide. He was staring at me straight in the eyes each time I looked at myself in a mirror. Without him, I would still be no more than a tool, a puppet with a brain.

So I headed back toward the car, a bit more at peace with myself, at least on the rational side. His death would still need a lot of time to scar in my heart.

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Raidou didn’t look at me when I climbed back in the car, and he started the engine again without a word, leaving the old town and the graveyard behind us toward the house. There was a bit more traffic as we moved.

Ookami lane was barely more lively than when I had left it, somewhere near twelve hours earlier. This Saturday morning was looking like  Sunday arrived early. Raidou stopped next to the mail box bearing the number 165.

“Do you need anything while I’m here?”

I shook my head as I undid the seatbelt. I suppose you know the picture, the one where a guy got an idea or got everything clicking together materialized by a bulb lighted above his head? That’s exactly what happened here.“Mitarashi…” Raidou turned his head in my direction, an eyebrow raised.

The girl with the dyed hair, who was with Itachi, it was the Mitarashi’s daughter, Anko.

“There’s a possibility for the Mitarashi and the Uchiha to be in contact,” I said in one fell swoop, turning suddenly toward Raidou. He frowned.
“Uchiha as in ‘the head of the internal security department Uchiha’? What makes you say that?”

“Anko and Itachi were together yesterday.”

Raidou was obviously thinking about all the  implications this could mean. I opened the door, and got out of the car. I turned before closing the door.

“I’ll come tonight to make my report.”

“ ‘Kay… I’m gonna see this with the Information folks… Nothing else?”

“Prevent Genma from loaning his piece of junk to Zabuza next time.”

Raidou couldn’t refrain himself from chuckling. I could have easily read in his mind. He  was relived I was going back to ‘normal’ -if you ever could put me in the ‘normal’ category. You seriously had to stretch it.

“I’ll see what I can do about that, sorry I needed my piece of junk yesterday… see you tonight.”

“Take care of Rin.”

On this word, I slammed the door and headed toward the front door of the house. I was pleased to have managed to make Raidou blush. This tiny stupid thing had lifted my mood a bit. What a shame I hadn’t had a camera… his expression would have been one to keep for posterity, on the HQ walls; no, better yet, in the locker rooms.

They weren’t hoping I wasn’t going to notice it, were they?

I opened the door. High spirits, here I come.

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Kami bless the one who thought about creating the shower… I wasn’t smelling of alcohol and vomit anymore, I had a clean shirt on; my clothes smelling of stale tobacco smoke, alcohol and others were in the washing machine; I wasn’t waiting for anyone and I was alone. I could take a little time for myself now.

It had begun to rain. I sat on the steps of the back door, sheltered from the water. The garden could have use a mowing, four month ago. The fallen leaves were surrounding in thick carpets the trunks of the few trees growing there. It was cold. It was relaxing. Behind the garden, beyond the fence which hadn’t seen a paint pot since my father’s death, the old oaks of the park were rising. Further beyond, even if it couldn’t be seen from there, I knew the old temple was silently resting.

There wasn’t any sound, save for the one the rain was making when falling on the roofs. Obito had hated this kind of weather, and he hadn’t missed a chance to remind me I had to be shady not to agree with him.

It was just a perfect weather for brooding. I circled my knees with my arms, and I rested my head on them, watching the rain drops with an half open eye.

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A dark figure armed with an umbrella walking up the street made me look up from the book I had picked. The rain had came down twice as hard as before a good quarter of an hour before, forcing me to retreat to the dry and warm inside.

The figure was slowly walking up the street, stopping next to the mailboxes with unreadable numbers. It passed up my window… and I didn’t see it pass up the next one on the other side of the door, to continue to the other side of the street. The bell of the front door rang.

I mentally drew up the inventory of the hidden weapons in my reach and of the jutsu I could throw in the face of my unknown visitor and that could pass for an accident. Yeah, I’m paranoid, I think I already mentioned that. I opened the door.

“Hi! I got your jacket!”

This was most known under the name of ‘The lethal attack of the too cheerful grin too early in the morning’. Okay, it was around ten a.m.. And he had a nice face when he was smiling. Hey, don’t misunderstand me! I didn’t say he was cute!

“Iruka, are you always this hyper in the morning?”

“Hangover?” he asked, smiling.

We were still face to face on the threshold. I eyed him from head to toe.

“Are you aware that an umbrella is supposed to keep the one under it dry? Get in.”

“Eh! I…”

I dragged him forcefully in the entrance/living/whatever it was supposed to be in the first place.

“I was just passing to give your jacket back, I gotta got back, I didn’t know you were living so far away when going on foot ; I’m on service for lunch!”

I threw him a towel fished from the kitchen.

“Dry you up a bit if you don’t want to catch a cold… Service?”

The trickling creature in my living nodded the towel.

“I’m working in my uncle’s restaurant on the weekends, we’re living above it. You should drop by one of these days…” He looked down to the little puddle his feet were making. “Oh fuck, I’m sorry…”

“Don’t worry about that.”

“You sure? I don’t want to get you in troubles with your parents…”

I cut him off. “You had to get up earlier to disturb them.”

Me and my sick humor… will I ever learn to shut up? He looked at me an instant, obviously wondering. He was better with his hair tied, his face was visible at least. Wait one second there. Who was I to say this?

He seemed to remember the presence of the pack on this back, took it, opened it and fished my jacket out from it.

“Here, thanks again. I’ve really got to go now.”

He gave me back the now very wet towel, and turned toward the door. I leaned again the opened door, him already outside. He paused, barely turning his head in my direction. His cheeks had the faintest trace of pink on them, making the scar on his nose stand out. The effect of the cold already?

“Y’know… you’re really different from in school. It’s strange to see almost all your face.”

Before I had found something to answer to that, he was gone. I checked myself. My hair was hiding the left side of my face as usual, so what… oh, yeah, I had just a tee-shirt on, without any kind of collar to hide behind.

He had warm brown eyes, almost of the color of chocolate, and I was beginning to wonder if the red color of his cheeks yesterday night had really been due to the cold.

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A huge thank to H_girl 69 who betaed this chapter.


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