Chapter Text
Savings would carry rent another three months, and only if I budgeted very carefully.
I relaxed my jaw— the last thing I needed was to crack a tooth— and set this month's stipend carefully in the (heavily trapped) space under the floorboards where I stashed anything legitimately valuable. I’d been expecting a punishment, now that my condition wasn’t critical and I hadn’t shut the fuck up… but… aw, fuck.
Putting me on probation meant no mission-bonuses until the probationary period was over. Fine. Putting me on probation means I’m not fulfilling my chūnin quota’s— that’s another pay-cut, fine, even though I’m fairly fucking positive my new stipend is too low even for that… didn’t genin make more than this?!
Somebody like me couldn’t get away with complaining— a clanless, orphan kunoichi didn’t have much clout on a good day. It was not a good day. It was, actually, a fucking terrible day.
Just. Dogshit.
Incomprehensibly bad.
And the landlord raised my rent.
“Fuck,” I swore, face down on my futon. “Fuckity fuck fuck. Motherfucker.”
It was just my rent, too. I’d seen the look on his face when he told me— and only me— about what I’d owe at the end of next month.
It’s possible I did not think through all the consequences of— not shutting my fucking mouth about the rat, when the rat was potentially a venerable councilman, which I could not and therefore did not know— of being seen at the Hatake Compound—
But if I wouldn’t throw Hatake under the bus then I was under the bus with him, and being the kunoichi whose (rumored) shit-idiot stunts had (probably, they said) helped sparked another world war, her and Hatake both, wasn’t good. Understatement.
All this mess, I thought, because of an idiot, but that was (begrudgingly) a little bit mean to Hatake who was— clearly, factually— Going Through It. Even though he probably had healthy savings, the rich bastard. And… clan assets?
And possibly his own food source.
If your name is crop field, are you obligated to at least have a garden…?
Okay. Actually. Being mean felt like an appropriate reaction. Before I could carry that tangent any further, my stomach growled, and I groaned. “Alright,” I said, “time to buy… non-perishables.”
The fruit basket had been nice while it lasted.
==
The fact that I might hit a point where henging to grocery shop actually seemed like a reasonable option was too depressing to contemplate. So I didn’t.
Flipping off every whispering cunt that spat in my direction wasn’t an option either— fuck, did I want too, though. It was just. Too many people. Too many whispers. Too many eyes trained on me, the background character, who’d lived very comfortably under the radar since I’d been born and abandoned and remembered what it felt like to die. Not that I needed people— the story goes on without me, and that’s fucking fine— but I didn’t need their goddamned condemnation, either, especially since I’d realized I liked living.
Shit-idiot situation. For shit-idiots.
“At least there’s a sale,” I sighed, comparing two differently priced sacks of rice.
A flicker of movement behind me—
“Yo,” said Hatake Kakashi.
—this time I didn’t flinch.
“What do you want, kid.” I squinted at him.
He was wearing an oversized scarf over his presumably still-masked face, and a knit hat designed to resemble dogs ears. There was something about seeing the kid in a completely normal setting— the aisle of a grocery— that made him seem even smaller by comparison. Thank god I didn’t have a maternal bone in my body. If push came to shove it was well within my ability to punt a toddler.
“You should buy vegetables.” Kakashi looked into my basket with disapproval.
I gestured mutely at the cans I’d grabbed from the shelves. Usually I warded off scurvy by supplementing myself with field rations, but— probation— I couldn’t requisition that right now.
“Real vegetables,” Kakashi amended. Holy shit.
“I will literally kick you.”
From the look in his eyes I didn’t think Kakashi believed me, but he did jump out of immediate punting range. “It’s healthy,” he said, slow, like I was a do— nope nope nope.
I tuned out the kids yapping and picked through the store for more essentials. This is the only mission I’ll be getting for a while— S class, top priority, hang on until the war heats up and not letting a medic-nin out on the field is a waste of assets. I was good at… other things… but since Tsunade left half decent medic-nin were in the shortest supply and that’s where I’d go. Where I wanted to go.
The clerk shot me a dirty look. Dirtier when he noticed Kakashi trailing me. The kid didn’t flinch but he did, briefly, go very still, which was telling enough. At least non-combatants weren’t stupid enough to cross active duty ninja unless they knew they could get away with it, and if the balding clerk had ever been a shinobi he wasn’t now. I paid for the groceries and left.
Kakashi followed.
So many eyes. Worse, because the White Fang’s spawn was here— there’d be rumors I was fucking his old man by the end of the day. I could bolt and lose him, he wasn’t anywhere near my league yet— but…
Baring my throat…
That’s too much.
And the kid was an annoying little bastard who made my head hurt with the severity of his own relevance— but I was in the mood to prove a point. I shuffled the groceries in my arms and snatched his small hand, ignoring an instinctive jab to one of my pressure points and the louders whispers. Weren’t they, also, background characters? “Come on, shithead,” I said, “you’ll help me put away my groceries,” and when he let me drag him down the road I felt a vicious sort of pride about doing it.
==
“I’m not a baby,” Kakashi complained.
“Uh huh,” I said.
“You don’t need to hold my hand.”
“Whatever,” I said.
“I’d be graduated already if Tou-san let me take the test.”
“…I don’t think they have hitae-ate sized for toddl— FUCK, ow— you stupid—! I’m holding eggs—!!”
==
The both of us were slightly worse for wear when we stumbled past the threshold of my apartment, kicking off our shoes by the door— but the eggs were still intact, so I counted it as a win.
I dropped the groceries and opened my mini-fridge, before setting the small collection of perishables on an otherwise empty shelf. Instead of being useful, Kakashi was gawking at my apartment… I couldn’t see his lower face but his eyes were big like saucers.
“Nee-san, you live like this?”
“You—” I swatted at his head, but he dodged. “Shut up, kid! Talk to me when you pay rent!”
“It’s cold!”
If I used any jutsu in here the landlord really would have my head— and kick me out on my ass early— so I gave up wrangling the shithead and went back to sorting groceries. There wasn’t much, but the rice would last a while. I’d probably boil some eggs tonight…
Kakashi fell onto my futon with an audible thud.
…and I could heat up ramen for dinner…
“Tou-san’s sick,” Kakashi said.
I paused. “Hm. Is he?”
“He gets sick sometimes. He just needs to sleep it off! …I made soup last night, but he wasn’t hungry.”
There were so many fucking things I'd rather be doing than listen to a four year old describe a depressive episode. Cans in the cabinet. Flour in the flour jar.
“He stopped drinking, so… Tou-san’s getting better.”
I remembered the empty bottles in his kitchen, and cringed. “…uh. That’s good.” Hatake Sakumo was— probably— a lot of things, I doubted ‘better’ was one of them. But at least the shit-idiot wasn’t drinking around his kid anymore.
I turned around and faced Kakashi. He was face down in the center of the futon, flopped like a starfish.The hat was off, but his scarf was tangled up in his limbs. He lifted his head up when he detected my eyes on him— probably— and folded his arms under his chin.
“Everyone else is making Tou-san worse,” he said, blunt. He was a kid… I wondered how much he really understood. “But you don’t think it was his fault.”
I was going to regret having this conversation. “It wasn’t,” I hazarded, “his fault.”
“You said there was a rat. You said you got sold out.”
“…I think so.” I couldn’t imagine how the situation had gone down the way it did if we hadn’t been. And, also, somebody important— whose name maybe rhymed with Hanzou— really wanted me to shut the fuck up, or else I was overestimating how much authority you’d need to fuck with someone’s stipend like that on short notice.
The only possible word for the expression that briefly flashed across Kakashi’s face was relief. Then it was gone. “Tou-san’s too good to get taken down if some rat didn’t cheat.”
That is not even a little bit true. Kakashi’s honest to god adoration of that idiot, Hatake Sakumo, made my teeth ache. “Ninja cheat all the time,” I said instead of cramming my foot down my throat. “We’re professional cheaters.”
“Not to our comrades, though,” Kakashi scathed. He paused, another funny look in his eyes. I really couldn’t read it. “Nee-san...” He sounded hesitant. “Tou-san was right. I don’t wish you were dead. Sorry.”
“That’s a fucking terrible apology.” I jabbed the air in his direction, and then froze. “Uh, I mean. Fine. Thanks. Don’t tell that to people if you don’t want them to kick your ass.”
“I’m gonna be a Genin soon.” Kakashi seemed to think that was relevant to the topic of people kicking his ass. “When Tou-san lets me graduate.”
Fuck, I thought, when was he supposed to graduate? Six? Five? The details were fuzzy, but I winced at whatever the answer was. The luck of a protagonist. “Sure you will,” I decided to condescend. If Hatake didn’t want him to graduate, but Hatake died… “And they’ll kick your Genin ass.” If he even had the clout to stop the process at this point, anyway.
Kakashi pulled down his mask to stick his tongue out at me.
Guh.
He really looked way too fucking young. In one or two years this kid was going to give a lot of grown ninja nightmares when he hamstrung them.
“Alright,” I decided, after a long beat of silence— “it’s time for baby shitheads to leave my apartment. Up and— how did you fall asleep that fast?!”
He wasn’t even faking it, I could tell. Fucking four year olds.
==
“You are a plague on my life,” I hissed, adjusting him in my grip. He made a sleepy whining noise (like a— yeah I’d admit it, like a dog) and shoved his head deeper into my shoulder. “I coulda just left you outside my door!”
“Nuh uh,” Kakashi mumbled.
“Nuh uh.” My right eye twitched. The only reason I hadn’t was because— well— I wasn’t completely heartless, and leaving the kid to nap in the hallway of an apartment building full of ninja who hated his dad’s guts was—
“Mmmhhhhmmm.”
I hustled faster down the street, and ignored the (eyes) whispering, totally irrelevant, mobs. “How’re you gonna make genin if you have to stop for naptime, huh?!”
Kakashi kicked my side. I tried to drop him, but the shithead was using chakra adhesion to stick to my uniform, and growled a little at the attempt.
“You suck,” I snapped, but I held him correctly, and he dozed off for real not long after. Oh, fuck. Oh, goddamn, I wanted this situation to be over— I took to the rooftops and bounced between an adequate shunshin and tree running. Kakashi must have been used to his dad doing it, because he didn’t wake up and complain.
The potentially non-existent Hatake Compound barrier seals still let me through, but I wasn’t sure if that was because I was holding the clan heir, I was still keyed in from last time, or if Hatake just let anyone through the gates. Probably the first, maybe the second. There was only evidence of neglect immediately surrounding the main house— not vandalism, like the outer wall had collected in the past week-or-so since I’d last been here. I doubted that was courtesy.
“Kid.” I shook him. “Kid, get the fuck off of me.”
Kakashi lifted his head and yawned. His eyes focused blearily on our surroundings. “...Okay.” He squirmed until I released him and landed lightly on his feet. “Nee-san, come on.” He unlocked the door with a specific pattern of chakra bursts, and pushed it open, holding it ajar.
“What. No. No?”
Kakashi looked unimpressed. “I wanna give you something,” he deadpanned. “Free food.”
I debated whether or not getting condescended too by a toddler was worth it– aw, I thought about the state of my pantry, fuck, it is. “If the White Fang takes my head off for invading his house my grave better be fucking spotless.”
“He’s sleeping.”
“That doesn’t mean shit! I worked with him! If he wants to take my head off he’ll just take my head off. What the fuck am I gonna do about that, huh, I’m just a goddamned chūnin–”
“...You do suck.”
We bickered through the house and into the central courtyard I had been correct in guessing existed– it was easier to do that then to think about that shit-idiot Hatake any more then I had too, and his whole… general… stupid, goddamned… thing. Imminent self-destruction. Debts owed. Whatever. This story was written before I arrived.
In the center of the courtyard was a thriving vegetable garden.
“I’ve been keeping it good, since Tou-san is– because it’s my job,” Kakashi bragged, “...Maybe Minato helps sometimes.”
“Namikaze?!”
The kid blinked. “You know that guy?”
Besides the obvious reasons I knew that guy, I spent a pretty good chunk of my stint at the orphanage avoiding the hell out of him. Thank fuck we weren’t the same age– I was a bit older, and it was bad enough he basically lived down the hall. “Uh, kind of.” I paused. I hated Namikaze’s guts, but… “He’s a sissy,” I decided.
Kakashi nodded. “Yeah, him.” Wow. “He’s Jiraiya-sama’s student, so him and Jiraiya-sama used to come over sometimes. He still does but Jiraiya-sama doesn’t because Jiraiya-sama is busy doing…” Kakashi paused. “...important Sannin things.”
“I’m sure,” I deadpanned.
Jiraiya’s stint with– I assumed, anyway, it’s not like I could confirm some of this shit– the Ame orphans was over and done with before he’d taken on Namikaze, but his flightiness (and creepiness, but that was mostly a kunoichi opinion) still put me and a hell of a lot of other rank-and-file off. It was almost funny: if I didn’t know exactly what kind of rat bastard Orochimaru was, I might have respected him the most.
“Here.” Kakashi shoved a basket at me. I didn’t know where he’d pulled it from. “You can take this.”
I wasn’t about to turn down free food. At least not now, when I couldn’t really– afford too... not turn down free food. Which, fucking, sucked– wait.
“Please don’t tell the White Fang I’ve been cursing in front of you.”
“Maa… I dunno, Nee-san…”
==
“Hey. Kid. How is the academy, anyway?”
The sun was starting to dip under the horizon. It painted Kakashi’s garden in pretty shades of butter yellow. I had collected as many vegetables as I had a vague understanding of preparing– the number was low enough it visibly horrified Kakashi, the shithead– and was seated propped up against a nearby tree.
Kakashi had started weeding, and shrugged in the dirt. “I already told you I’m gonna make genin soon.”
Woof. “No, genius– I meant, how are the other brats.”
I’d hated the academy with a passion, but I hadn’t been in Kakashi’s rush to graduate… obviously. I wasn’t naturally smart and the life-experience I’d been unwillingly saddled with (I tried not to think about what wasn’t immediately relevant) wasn’t tempered with wisdom. I was– I figured– more or less whatever age I currently looked like. Maybe I could have faked some degree of prodigiousness, and I supposed there were… things… I had always been good at, anyway, but bad shit happened to a lot of those clever little orphans. So.
No.
But Kakashi wasn’t like me at all. He was– or would be, it was weirdly easy to distance him from the concept of some cool, future, two-dimensional Kakashi– a protagonist.
“They suck.”
I snorted.
“They’re stupid.” He seemed properly agitated now. “The class they put me in is full of students who are bigger than me. They‘ve gotta be ready to graduate. Most of them can’t even tree walk! Not even the clan kids–”
I thought about the logistics of a bunch of pre-genin walking up every vertical surface in the village… whoever came up with the academy curriculum probably knew what they were doing.
“--and this, dumb Uchiha, doesn’t even bother to show up to class on time–”
Ah. “Uchiha Obito?”
Kakashi halted mid rant. “You know that guy too?”
“Fuck, no.” I decided not to elaborate. “Anyway, if you make genin, you know you’re gonna have to work with these guys… right.”
The kid crossed his arms and glared mutinously. “...not if I graduate before them.”
“Mm. Keep telling yourself that.”
==
“Yamada-san?” asked Hatake Sakumo, blearily— bewildered.
I shrieked.
==
He looked like shit.
“You look like shit,” I said.
Hatake was still wearing the gray yukata from earlier that week— I wasn’t even sure if he’d changed it out. His eye bags were darker than before. His hair stuck out wildly in multiple directions, like he’d been hit by his own lightning jutsu… and he smelled disconcertingly like dog. But maybe that was normal.
“What… are you doing in my house…?” Hatake cocked his head to the side, and then whipped it around to track the white blur that hit his legs at top speed.
“She’s gonna get scurvy,” Kakashi mumbled into his dad’s leg— I thought, it was hard to make out nosy little shitheads from that distance. He lifted his head, but I couldn’t see his face from that angle. “Hey! Tou-san! You need to eat too…”
My teeth ground together. That bastard. That shit-idiot. How the hell could he look at that kid and—
And—?!
“I’m— leaving,” I snapped, pulling myself to my feet and snagging my vegetable basket before the White Fang could tell me to fuck off about it. Or kill me. “…don’t kill me.”
“Nee-san thought you were gonna take her head off.”
“I’m not going to take her head off,” Hatake replied automatically. He blinked. “Ah, this was… nice of you, Kakashi? But next time… ask?”
“You need to sleep.” Kakashi detached himself from Hatake’s legs and crossed his arms. “So, I’m not gonna wake you up if you are.”
Hatake cringed.
“I’m leaving,” I repeated, sliding backwards towards the door.
He looked at me. I couldn’t read the expression on his face. “Mmm… stay safe, Yamada-san.”
I didn’t reply.