Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Kakashi immediately noticed when the younger generation of shinobi started acting differently.

He may act carefree, with his nose constantly burrowed in his Icha Icha, but that did not mean he didn't notice.

He had been ANBU Captain once, after all, and he was still a paranoid veteran shinobi. He noticed everything.

Frankly, it wasn't like they were hiding the shift, really. Anyone with a pair of eyes could see that something was different.

And it was all centered around one person.

His student.

Naruto.

He wasn't surprised. It was always Naruto, somehow. Everyone else just seemed to gravitate towards him, like a moth to a flame.

But now that gravitation took an even more serious turn.

And he had noticed.

He noticed how Hyuuga Neji always followed Naruto around, two steps behind like the ANBU Captain would follow the Hokage.

He noticed how Yamanaka Ino left flowers at Naruto's door every morning for a month.

He noticed how Aburame Shino sometimes followed Naruto up to the Hokage Monument, and how he'd simply watch Naruto meditate for hours.

He noticed how Akamichi Choji invited Naruto out to lunch more often, and occasionally brought him home-made bentos.

He noticed how Inuzuka Kiba took every opportunity available to hug Naruto or touch him in some friendly way, so much so that Kakashi could constantly smell him on his student.

He noticed how Hyuuga Hinata no longer seemed quite so prone to fainting around Naruto, instead finding a renewed determination to maintain a steady conversation with him regularly.

He noticed how Tenten took to caressing her weapons while in the company of certain civilians and Naruto.

He noticed how Sakura punched Naruto less, and how she was prone to the occasional bout of depression.

He noticed how Guy's weird mini-clone shouted Naruto's name to the horizon every time he did one of his inhuman exercises.

And he noticed how Nara Shikamaru could often be found hanging around Naruto, gazing at clouds together, talking, playing shogi, or, when alone, talking in whispered voices to random civilians around the village.

And all of this was weird. Yet no matter how hard he dug, or casually eavesdropped on conversations, or asked discrete questions, he couldn't seem to find out exactly what caused this sudden change.

He had even asked Naruto, who was at the center of everything, about it, but the blonde had merely shrugged and said he had no clue. They had all suddenly started acting differently overnight for no apparent reason.

He would have asked the Hyuuga that was constantly following his student around, but detected faint traces of animosity directed towards him. It puzzled him, but he figured he couldn't be bothered to actually ask.

Yet the issue still nagged at him, and he kept expecting something to happen.

So he was not entirely surprised when the Hokage summoned him to her office.

Immediately upon arrival to the Hokage's office, through the window of course, Kakashi noted several things.

The drapes were pulled to block the sunlight and give the office a stagnant, dark feeling.

The desk was even messier than usual.

There was more alcohol than usual (which was quite a feat).

Shizune wasn't there to berate her master for her drinking and to get her back to her paperwork.

But the most discernable difference was the Hokage herself.

Tsunade looked like she had aged a hundred years.

There were dark bags under her eyes, indicating severe lack of sleep. Wrinkles had appeared on her face, suggesting intense worry. Gloom seemed to latch onto her and refuse to let go.

She looked like she bore the weight of the world upon her shoulders.

Kakashi immediately feared the worst. Were they about to go to war?

He hadn't heard even a whisper about war, though. Surely there would have been some sort of indicator that he could have picked up. The village was no more tense than usual, there had been no news of enemy moves that he was aware of, none of the other elite shinobi had been acting differently.

"Sit down, Kakashi." The Hokage ordered.

Kakashi was momentarily stunned by how gruff Tsunade's voice was. It sounded like she had been screaming at the top of her lungs recently… or crying.

Kakashi raised his eyebrows. A ninja didn't normally sit down in his Hokage's office, especially if said Hokage was about to tell him they were going to war. Point being, there was only the Hokage chair in the room, and it was currently being occupied by the Hokage herself.

Seeming to realize this herself (and how out of it was she if she hadn't noticed the lack of a second chair?), she called.

"Shizune."

He turned to see Tsunade's dark-haired secretary effortlessly bring in a chair.

She, too, seemed to have aged enormously since he last saw her. The energy and goodwill he had come to associate with her and her pig was gone, replaced by the same moroseness evident in their Hokage.

Shit, we really might be going to war. Kakashi concluded. That, or someone close to both of them has died.

"Sit down," Tsunade repeated.

He did.

Then, as though broaching a matter of great importance, she started,

"What do you know of Naruto's childhood?"

Kakashi was confused. This wasn't the announcement of war and impending death and destruction he had been expecting. What did Naruto's childhood have to do with this?

"Judging from your expression, not much." Tsunade continued. She laughed bitterly, "You might be as clueless as the rest of us."

Then her face shut down. "No… No. You could not have been as clueless as I was."

Kakashi frowned. He didn't understand why Tsunade was asking such things. And he wasn't clueless, he did know a bit. He had checked up on his sensei's son a few times as an ANBU, after all. Not enormously, but enough to know some things.

"I know that he lived alone at a young age, as I did. He spent most of his time playing pranks and skipping the Academy. It was a mostly happy, if irresponsible, childhood."

Tsunade heaved a world-weary sigh. She looked him in the eye, as though she was going to impart some dreadful secret unto the silver-haired shinobi that would change his life forever. There was a measure of pity in her eyes that discomfited Kakashi. He was not used to being pitied.

"It was not a happy childhood."

Kakashi opened his mouth to refute – to tell her of how Naruto always smiled as a kid, how he was a hyperactive bundle of excitement and joy, how he had seen all of this himself – when she continued.

"Naruto thinks he's expendable."

Kakashi didn't understand what she was saying, the words weren't computing.

Tsunade didn't give him any time to process the information.

"I thought it was a joke, at first." A shadow of a smile crossed her face as she seemed to remember something pleasant, "He's always pulling jokes, although even they are usually a bit more tasteful than this." The hint of a smile quickly disappeared and the melancholic air evaporated to be replaced with a heavy severity Kakashi had only heard during tragedies. "But then I noticed the sincerity in his voice." When she looked at him, her eyes were haunted, and there was a sheen of wetness that was barely detectable.

Tsunade looked into his uncovered eye, and there was such sadness in hers that Kakashi could hardly breathe.

"Kakashi, he believes it. From the bottom of his heart, he believes it's all right for him to die."

Tsunade started speaking more rapidly now, as though saying it faster would make it be over faster, or perhaps she was close to hysteria.

"He believes that that no one would be upset over his death."

What?

"He believes he is unloved."

No.

"He believes he is worthless."

Impossible.

"He called himself an unwanted demon-brat."

NO!

Tsunade gave him a look so full of helplessness Kakashi didn't know what to do. "When I asked him who called him that, who would have dared say it so much and so frequently that he believed that horrible lie truly and completely… you know what he said?"

It was all Kakashi could do to shake his head no.

"He told me 'everyone, Baa-chan.' As though it were the most obvious thing in the world."

Tsunade laughed, and it was perhaps the most painful-sounding thing Kakashi had ever heard.

"How can I just punish 'everyone'? How can I even start tackling this when the problem is everyone?" She looked despairing and lost, and very un-Hokagelike. "What can I do?"

Even Kakashi, bastard that he was, would have ordinarily made an attempt to comfort Tsunade when faced with such a sorrowful expression. But at this time he was too busy dealing with the myriad of emotions coursing through his own mind to deal with someone else's.

Just how badly have I wronged sensei's son?

He had always thought that Sasuke was the one who needed help of his three students. That Sasuke was the one with fragile emotional connections – the kid obsessed with vengeance, with killing his last remaining family.

Kakashi had immediately assumed that that was what the problem he'd have to deal with would be. That's what he'd have to focus on.

And look where focusing on Sasuke had gotten him. The avenger had gone and become a missing nin working with Orochimaru, a known enemy of the village. He had attacked one of Kakashi's students (Naruto. Of course, it was always Naruto) with the technique that Kakashi himself had taught him.

In comparison, Naruto… Naruto had always been so cheerful. He'd be kicked down, but then he'd get right back up again. He'd be cut, but then he'd just wipe the blood off with a dirty sleeve and proclaim he didn't even feel it. He'd be beat up, only to give a blinding – idiotic, Kakashi had thought at the time – smile and declare to all the world that he'd be Hokage.

Naruto possessed a sort of unshakeable confidence that made everyone around him believe that he'd be okay. A little hurt, but okay. Nothing could stop Naruto. He was a force of nature.

Kakashi had also bought into this for some reason. He failed to see these deep psychological issues that were present in his student. To call himself expendable… to think himself worthless… to refer to himself as a demon-brat… These were not the sorts of concepts that spontaneously appeared in a day. These deep-seated twisted, sick beliefs were the product of continuous exposure, of accumulation, of not days, not months, but years of psychological and emotional damage.

And Sharingan no Kakashi had detected none of it.

He had seen Naruto smile and laugh obnoxiously, and he assumed all he had to worry about with the blonde was getting him to stop being so loud.

Kakashi had been fooled. An ex-ANBU fooled by the act of a genin brat.

And that kind of skill didn't arise spontaneously either. He needed to know how Naruto learned to cover his pain with a mask of a smile – and why. Why did Naruto learn this, what twisted his perception of his own self worth in that manner?

"What-" Kakashi's voice sounded weak and vulnerable to his ears, completely unsuitable for a shinobi. He stopped, taking a deep breath to compose himself before starting again, "What makes him think these things?"

If possible, Tsunade seemed to deflate even more.

"Oh, Kakashi." And again she shot him a sorrowful look that left him dumbfounded. And scared. Scared in a manner he hadn't been in years. Scared of what he might learn about Naruto's past. Of what else he might discover that he had completely missed.

Tsunade closed her eyes as she recounted what Naruto had told her on that revolutionary day.

"He was neglected, Kakashi. He was kicked out of the orphanage when he was four, and has been living alone ever since. His neighbors, once they saw who it was, moved out, so he was left in an abandoned building in the middle of the red district all by himself. He has never experienced the love of a family.

"The civilians did not stop at only ignoring him, however. The merchants charged him three times the normal price for food and clothes, so he was deprived of stable nutrition and proper supplies. It is doubtlessly why he eats so much ramen – it is cheap, and one of the only foods he can get from people who do not hate him. Most of the other civilians insulted him, told him he was worthless, expendable, nothing but a demon-brat so much that he now believes it."

Rage and sorrow fought a fierce battle for dominance inside Tsunade, both bleeding into her voice at different times.

"It is all he ever knew. We may think him invincible and untouchable now, but he was just a child. For him, such rejection was normal. He grew up thinking that he could die the next day and people wouldn't care – no, that they'd celebrate! What does that do to the mind of a child? How does that change them?"

With every word Kakashi felt a piece of him die. Distractedly, he observed that his hands were faintly trembling by the end of Tsunade's speech, and he was numb all over.

But the worst was perhaps yet to come.

"And he was attacked." To this, Kakashi's numbness abated slightly and he looked up, alarmed. "Several times a year, there'd be an assassination attempt to kill the 'demon-scum', and always at least one on his birthday. The civilians would get in groups and try to kill him. He laughed about it when he told me. Said that the only reason he didn't have scars was because of his regenerative powers." Tsunade had a haunted look in her eyes, as though she were imagining the horrifying scenario. "He probably only survived due to the fox inside him. Ha! Never thought the day would come where I would be thankful the demon was put inside Naruto."

Tsunade sombered once more.

"His birthday presents were blood and pain. And always rejection. It's a miracle the boy has become the person he is today, isn't it?"

Tsunade looked at Kakashi for agreement, only to find him frozen in place.

Kakashi was horrified.

He had failed.

Again.

He had not realized what was happening to Naruto, to his student, to his sensei's son, to the only family (blood-related or otherwise) he had left.

Naruto had been suffering, and he had seen nothing.

Kakashi had seen his old team in Naruto's. He saw himself in Sasuke, the stoic prodigy child with stunted emotions. He saw Rin in Sakura, as the girl with a hopeless crush on the prodigy and who was crushed on by the dead last in turn. Worst of all was Naruto. Naruto was a cruel combination of Obito, as the cheerful dead last who was always foolishly competing with the team prodigy, and Minato-sensei, as the physical blonde and blue-eyed copy of his father figure.

It only got worse as Kakashi got to know Naruto better, and more of Minato's traits appeared. His charisma. His ingenuity. His leadership skills.

Was that why he had avoided Sakura and Naruto so much in favor of Sasuke? Because they reminded him of the team he had slowly learned to love and then failed to save? The teammates that were both deadbecause of him?

Had he truly allowed his past to influence his perception like this?

He should have spent more time with Naruto, should've looked deeper to understand him better. He, who always told other to "look underneath the underneath", had maintained a painfully shallow view of his students. He had been afraid of them, of their resemblance to his old team, and so fucked everything up.

How did he not notice the neglect? The abuse? The assassination attempts? There had been days that Naruto had been quieter than usual, but he had simply dismissed it as stomach pains. There had been days where he noticed that Naruto was thinner and shorter than he should be for his age, but he had dismissed it as the boy's unwillingness to eat anything other than ramen. There had been days where the boy looked at him with such longing, longing for a connection, (a friend amongst a team that either rejected him or incessantly insulted him?) and Kakashi had taken a look at familiar deep cerulean eyes and run away.

Because Kakashi was a coward.

Naruto had suffered for years because Kakashi was an absolute. Fucking. Coward.

He might never be able to face Minato-sensei again.

No, that was true. But that wasn't what was most important.

Most importantly, he might never be able to face Naruto again.

The amazing, selfless boy who still called him sensei. The person who was his family, whether the blonde knew it or not. The person who kept that small shred of compassion he had still alive. The person who inspired him every day with his words and his actions that inadvertently affected hundreds of others.

Shit. Kakashi cursed inside his mind. Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.

In a rare show of weakness, he burrowed his face into his hands, palms pressed tightly to his eyes that were suspiciously wet.

"I really fucked this up."

Tsunade snorted at his obvious stress. He glared at her in answer.

"Here ya go." She said, pouring a generous amount of sake in a cup. "Drink up, Kakashi."

Kakashi did.

"I'm going to apologize to him." This was said with such determination, such strength that Tsunade could only stare for a second.

"He probably won't understand what you're apologizing for."

"I don't care." Kakashi was resolute. "I'll apologize, and then I'll spend the rest of my life atoning." Kakashi stood up from his chair, fists clenched. "I'll support him in whatever he does, whether it's ramen chef or Hokage. I'll be a real teacher, and teach him everything I can. I'll show him how much I care. I'll show him that he is everything but expendable, that he is worth the world to me, to us, that he is irreplaceable and that I was a fool for not making sure he knew earlier."

"And then I'll rip the bastards responsible apart."

The end of his sentence had become little more than a snarl, but Tsunade understood, and was comforted. Kakashi understood and would help Naruto believe in his own importance again. Together with the rest of the rookie 9 surely, surely they'd be able to make a difference.

There was a knock on the office door.

"What is it?" Tsunade shouted.

Nara Shikamaru opened the door to the Hokage's office and entered with quick steps that were uncharacteristic of him and his clan.

"What? This isn't a good time." All she wanted to do was drink and find the bastards responsible for making her Naruto suffer for so long.

"I've got information you'll want to know." He replied, face stoic and posture straight.

"I have reason to believe that there is a plot to kill Naruto in Konoha."

Kakashi gave a bloodthirsty grin.