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depressedhatakekakashi · 4 months

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Mistakes Were Made

Characters: Tenten, Maito Gai, Hatake Kakashi

Words: 2,997

Note: Thank you to @celestialmudd for reading this through and helping me improve it <3

Slugs were the superior summoning animals. That much Tenten knew without a shadow of a doubt. Lady Katsuyu’s healing powers were second to none with her ability to split into hundreds of forms of herself and heal multiple people at a time. More importantly, she was Tsunade-sama’s summon. Tsunade, who was known across all of the lands for her incredible chakra control, the Byakugou seal that allowed her to store up her chakra until she required a huge burst for a tough battle, and her medical ninjutsu.

There was no better Medical ninja in the world, and Tenten had always looked up to her. Becoming a shinobi like Tsunade-sama was a dream of hers, and to do that she needed all of the same skills.

That included having the same incredible summon.

Not a single summoning animal could compare, no matter how cute it may be or how powerful it was. Tenten’s eyes were set on signing a summoning contract with Lady Katsuyu and only Lady Katsuyu.

There was no chance she was going to budge on that, especially when the only other option she’d been given was that grumpy old tortoise Ningame. She was certain that there was no summoning animal she liked less than her Sensei’s.

It was just awful.

“I can’t believe you would suggest this,” she waved toward the Tortoise that her Sensei had summoned up with such pride. “This is what you think I should summon? What does it even do?”

The tortoise just stood there staring at her. Not a single word left its mouth for a whole minute, which seemed odd since all the books she’d read about summons said they could speak.

The silence didn’t last, though. Just as Tenten was about to continue her complaints and demand an explanation from her Sensei, the tortoise opened its mouth.

“What I do, child, is fight,” it answered her question. “Like any animal summon.”

Tenten could hardly contain her disbelief. Rolling her eyes, she lifted a finger and poked the tortoise right on the nose. “Fight? You?” She laughed. “Tortoises are slow. How could you provide any help in a fight?”

‘Stupid’ she scolded herself as soon as the words left her mouth. ‘ Slugs are slow and Lady Katsuyu is still amazing.’

It was hard for her to believe the same for her Sensei’s tortoise. Lady Katsuyu was a healer so speed wasn’t a real necessity. It would make no sense for her Sensei to have a summon that healed when he didn’t have the skill set to heal himself.

Everything she’d read said summoning animals was supposed to compliment their summoner. Since her Sensei was a fighter, with Taijutsu being his main style, it only made sense that his summon would also be a fighter.

Tortoises weren’t fighters though. Their speed would impede them from being truly effective in a battle.

“I am not slow!” The tortoise snapped back at her.

“Hmm,” examining the animal for a second, she sighed. “No, I don't see it. This type of Summon can’t be useful to me, Sensei.”

“Useful to you!?” If the tortoise had fur she was sure it would be standing up on end right now. “Why you brat! Gai!” It turns to her Sensei with fiery eyes. “Why did you summon me if I'm going to be insulted like this!?”

“Sorry, Ningame,” he sighed before turning a sharp gaze to Tenten. Apologise,” Gai-Sensei insisted, earning himself a defiant grumble from Tenten. “Apologise or you’re doing five hundred laps around the village.”

The dread that fell over her with Sensei’s threat almost caused her to crack. Five hundred laps was a lot and she’d already suffered through a grueling morning of push-ups and sparing.

“I-” she shivered, the words refusing to leave her mouth even when she tried screaming them. Even the threat of laps around the village couldn’t make her take back her insults.

“Tenten…”

“I can’t!” She huffed, lowering her eyes when her Sensei leveled her with the same disappointed glare that he always used when she’d done something he didn’t agree with. It was a look that had worked many times in the past, including the one time she’d been forced to apologize to Kakashi-Sensei for suggesting there were better books out in the world than Icha-Icha Violence, even though she knew she was right.

She refused to budge this time. It didn’t matter if she had to do five hundred laps or five thousand, she would never apologize for speaking the truth again. Ningame was grumpy, slow, rude, and not even the smallest bit cute.

There was nothing about that crummy Tortoise that made her want to sign a contract with it.

Sighing, her Sensei dropped his shoulders and turned to Ningame. “Go home,” he instructed while reaching out to pat his head. “I’ll have a chat with her.”

“You’d better,” Ningame huffed, earning himself a swift glare from Tenten. “Even the Hatake brat wasn’t this bad.”

A shiver ran down Tenten’s spine. The ‘Hatake brat’ could only be one person, and the fact that she was being forced to hear someone call her worse than Kakashi-Sensei, the man who read a porn book in public, was downright insulting.

She could never be that bad. It simply wasn’t possible. She had standards and class.

Something Kakashi-Sensei would never understand with his poor sense of humor and terrible taste in books.

Smoke exploded from Ningame’s spot, signaling the Tortoise’s exit and Tenten’s freedom. For the first time since her Sensei had summoned the thing she breathed a sigh of relief.

The relief didn’t last long, though. As soon as she let down her guard a hand came down on her head, parting the long strands of black hair that she’d spent so much of her morning organizing into two perfect buns.

“Now,” glancing up, she cringed when she saw her Sensei smiling down at her. “I believe I said five hundred laps, did I not?”

“No way,” she balked. “Why do I have to apologize? It’s not my fault that your summon is a grumpy old tortoise!”

It didn’t even make sense. As weird as her Sensei was, he was also energetic and lively. The complete opposite of a Tortoise. If she’d ever given it a thought before she would have imagined him with a tiger summon, or maybe a leopard.

An animal that matched his personality much better than a Tortoise.

“Ningame is not grumpy,” Gai-Sensei sighed. “He can be…difficult, but that’s just part of being a tortoise. A hard outer shell and an even harder personality.”

“Exactly!” Throwing her hands up into the air, she smacked his hand away from her and fell back against the ground with a low grunt. “You’re not like that at all. You’re bright and friendly and-” She stopped herself. Insulting Ningame was exactly what had gotten her into this situation, and she had no doubt her Sensei would add more laps to her punishment if she used a descriptor that he deemed insulting. “It makes no sense, Sensei.”

Leaning forward, Gai-Sensei placed his hands on his hips and frowned down at her. “What makes no sense?”

Tenten threw her arms up into the air and flailed them around. “You! Him!” she tried, but failed, to explain. “What even are you doing with a summon like that,” Sensei’s frown only deepened with each word she said. Realizing that her words weren’t making any sense, she dropped her hands at her sides and stared up at the ceiling above her.

For a second her Sensei just stood there staring at her, confusion etched into his face. Then, as if he’d been struck by realization suddenly, his eyes widened. “Oh!” A smile tugged at his lips, and then slowly it began to stretch until it reached right across his face. “You’re confused how someone as youthful and energetic as me could have a summon that is more relaxed?”

‘Relaxed’ was not the word that came to mind when she thought about that grumpy only tortoise, but she didn’t want to cause any more insult. If she did that her Sensei was sure to add more laps to her punishment.

“Well,” he continued, unhindered by her silence. “The Tortoise summons were not what I was expecting for myself either if I’m being honest. When I first learned about summons I would imagine myself with tigers, or perhaps wolves.”

“Wolves?” she snorted at the mental image of a wolf standing on her Sensei’s flank. If there was any animal that made even less sense to him than a Tortoise, it was wolves. They were too aggressive for her cheerful, happy-go-lucky Sensei.

“Well,” she watched as her Sensei cupped his chin between his left forefinger and thumb and stared ahead with a thoughtful expression. “I was thinking about what kind of Summon would be able to keep up with my Eternal rival's hounds and a wolf seemed like the perfect answer.”

Hounds.

She tried to imagine Kakashi-Sensei surrounded by dogs, or even with one dog standing at his side, but it didn’t work. There was no doubt in her mind that the man liked dogs, she’d seen him petting a dog in the street before and he seemed to be enjoying the interaction, but as a partner animal, it just didn’t fit.

If there was anyone who fit with a tortoise summon, it was Kakashi-Sensei. He was cool, and calculated, but also lethargic. Every Time she saw him he looked exhausted and did everything with such slow, careful movements that she sometimes forgot he was an elite shinobi capable of sneaking up behind her.

At least, she forgot until the next time he appeared directly behind her with such speed that she hadn’t even seen him move at all, resulting in her almost crawling right out of her skin from panic.

She hadn’t seen him in a fight, but personality-wise a tortoise seemed like the perfect fit for him. Hounds would go better with Gai-Sensei. Even if he was more powerful and straightforward, like a tiger, he was also energetic and all over the place at times. Only dogs could match his personality.

“Oh my…” realization struck suddenly, and without a thought, Tenten jumped to her feet and turned toward her Sensei. “You got yourself a Kakashi-Sensei summon!”

“I-” her Sensei stared at her as if she’d grown a second head. “I don’t understand.”

“You,” she jammed a finger into her Sensei’s chest. “Got a Kakashi-Sensei summon. He’s just as rude, just as straightforward, and even more grumpy. You got a summon that reminds you of your boyfriend!”

Confusion melted away almost instantly, and what replaced it was a panicked embarrassment. For the first time since she’d met him, her Sensei refused to meet her gaze. In fact, he actively avoided it.

Every time she tried to initiate eye contact he would look the opposite way.

“Ha,” leaning back, she flashed a triumphant smile. “I knew it. No one is that close to their ‘eternal rival’”

“We- we’re just rivals!” Her Sensei insisted in a panicked voice. “Eternal rivals, but just rivals!”

“Right,” rolling her eyes, she turned her back to him. “And I’m the greatest medical ninja in the world.” there was so much she was learning today. Her Sensei had a boring old Tortoise as a summon, Kakashi-Sensei had dog summons, and her Sensei was without a doubt dating his eternal rival.

It was a lot to process, but she had no doubt she was taking it like a champ. At the very least she was certain that her Sensei had no idea just how much she was freaking out on the inside.

‘Neji and Lee are never going to believe me when I tell them’

“Oh,” glancing back at her Sensei, she grinned. “He’s still not as cool as Lady Katsuyu.”

Gai-Sensei stared at her with a dumbfounded expression for a second, only shaking it off when she stuck her tongue out at him. “That- you realize you called Ningame slow, right!?” he argued. “And you’re going to tell me that a SLUG is better?”

Tenten simply shrugged her shoulders.”Slugs may be slow, but at least they’re not ugly.”

Ugly.

Of all the things she’d chosen to say, why had it been that one? She didn’t even think Ningame was particularly ugly, he just wasn’t as beautiful as Lady Katsuyu looked in all of the pictures Tenten had seen of her.

It wasn’t the Tortoise's fault that her standards were high, but rather than thinking things through and choosing her words carefully, she’d just blurted out the first insult that came to mind.

“U-Ugly!?” In an instant, the area around her seemed to turn bright red. It was as if her Sensei had opened one of the gates and his chakra was now surrounding the area, but that wasn’t the case. Tenten knew that he wouldn’t waste the gates on her. This was something different.

This was unrelenting rage.

“Six-Hundred!”

Tenten slunk back a bit. “No, Sensei I-”

“Now!” He pointed forward, directing her to the door. “Six hundred laps, now!”

Over the last five months, Tenten had convinced herself that her Sensei had no breaking point. That no matter what she said he would never become truly angry with her. Disappointment was likely, and annoyance was possible, but anger was something she simply believed her Sensei didn’t experience.

Now she was faced with the reality of just how wrong she could be.

Today was going to be the day Tenten died and it was all because she dared to call a Tortoise ‘ugly’.

“Yo!” Turning her head, she stared at the man sitting so calmly on the railing behind her. With a cheerful expression and a small wave of his hand, Kakashi-Sensei greeted her as if she wasn’t about to be run into the ground by her own Sensei. “Am I interrupting?”

Seeing her opportunity, Tenten rushed forward and grabbed hold of Kakahsi’s arms. “Get him to calm down!” She pleaded with a panicked voice.

“Whoe,” turning his attention to her Sensei, he tilted his head. “What has you so heated, Gai?”

Seeing her Sensei take a step forward, Tenten moved back against the railing. There was nothing in the world she would admit to being afraid of before today, but with death staring down at her she found herself cowering.

“Gai,” Kakashi-Sensei stepped off of the railing and landed just in front of Tenten, his body placed perfectly in front of her. “Talk to me.”

“She,” Gai-Sensei lifted his left arm and pointed directly at her. “Called Ningame ugly!”

For a second the three of them just stood there in silence. Red flames of anger radiated off of her Sensei, Tenten continued to cower behind her Sensei’s boyfriend, and Kakashi-Sensei just stood there staring at Gai-Sensei.

Then, without warning, Kakashi-Sensei started to laugh.

It wasn’t a great, boisterous laugh, but it was laughter nonetheless.

Tenten was about to die, and Kakashi-Sensei was laughing. She’d never felt so insulted in her life.

“You’re upset over that?” he asked after a moment, his voice full of cheer even as he faced down the human equivalent of a fireball jutsu.

“Ningame is not-”

“Who cares if he is or isn’t?” Kakashi interrupted with a shrug. “Ningame certainly doesn’t. If he heard her say that he’d just call her a brat and go home.”

“I am not a brat,” Tenten grumbled under her breath, earning herself a rather unimpressed look from Kakashi-Sensei.

“Would you like me to step aside-”

“No!” Planting her hands on his back, she shoved him toward her Sensei. The last thing she wanted to do was face her Sensei on her own. Clearly, that was not working out in her favor.

“Well then,” turning his attention back to the issue, Kakashi-Sensei reached out and pulled Gai-Sensei into his side. As soon as his hand touched Gai-Sensei’s shoulder the anger seemed to dissipate.

There was no longer a fiery aura burning around her Sensei, or a feeling of impending doom weighing down on her shoulders. With one small touch, Tenten was saved. She was being granted another beautiful day of life.

“I was thinking we could go out for lunch,” Kakashi-Sensei continued as if nothing had happened. “Some Sushi maybe? And then a challenge?”

Gai-Sensei’s shoulders relaxed. “A challenge?” He asked with a hopeful tone.

“If you want.” Kakashi-Sensei agreed, his free hand moving behind him and waving Tenten away.

Seeing her opportunity, Tenten made a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn and immediately jumped off of the balcony. There was nothing in the world that could have kept her there for any longer. Not even her curiosity to see just what Kakashi-Sensei had planned would convince her to stay.

One close call with her Sensei’s temper was enough for her.

“Still,” she whispered as her feet touched down on the ground. Glancing back up at the balcony, she couldn’t help but smile to herself. “It could be a date.”

As soon as the thought struck her she was assaulted with the memory of that angry red aura. The way the air around her had burned with her Sensei’s emotions, and how she’d even cowered behind Kakashi-Sensei for safety.

“No,” she shook her head. “I think one close call is enough for today.”

In the future, she would have to be more careful. Ningame might be the farthest thing from ‘cool’ that she could think of, but it was obvious that he was important to her Sensei. Insulting him was no longer an option if she wanted to continue living. She would simply have to focus all of her insults on Kakashi-Sensei. As long as she kept it basic, her Sensei would continue to allow her to speak her mind without hindrance.

Boyfriends fell somewhere under summons on Maito Gai’s ‘willing to kill for’ list. An interesting thing for Tenten to learn, though she would have rather learned it without risking her own life.

#Maito Gai #Tenten #Hatake Kakashi #Hinted Kakagai #but that's not the focus #Tenten bonding/arguing with her Sensei is XD #GaibirthdayBingo #Gaibirthdaybingo2023

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lemony-snickers · 1 year

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helloo, i hope i'm not bothering you! i just saw your recent april showers do spring lem flowers posts and was wondering if you could write something about gai and the reader dancing in the rain? your writing is just too beautiful to resist to ask, so i hope i'm not asking for too much! i'm sending you loads of love and the best wishes <3

not a bother at all; thanks for your patience. <3

You almost trip your way down the stairs when your shift is over, so delighted to finally be finished with your work week that you all but skip from the stairwell to the front door.

You're about to tumble out into the street, mouth stretched in a delighted smile when a sharp crack of thunder pulls you from your daydreams of how you'll spend the rest of your evening and weekend.

Looking out the doors to the mud-spattered walkway, you groan. Apparently, the lovely sunshine-filled day you'd left behind when you entered your windowless workspace this morning has since clouded over.

Sometimes, you think, life truly is unfair.

Defeated, deflated, and very much regretting your choice of footwear, you step out into the rain without a coat or boots or umbrella, resigning yourself to a soggy deommute.

Maybe you'll just order food and stay in tonight, you think, because a cursory glance overhead makes it very clear very quickly that the weather is not likely to improve any time soon. You curse internally that you worked through your lunchbreak--when the weather might still have been nice!--so you could leave a little early.

What a waste.

As you trudge toward home, the rain and wind seem to pick up in intensity out of spite, and soon you're grumbling under your breath at the injustice of it all. A bit dramatic, perhaps, but so is this damn weather. If you didn't know you'd be teased mercilessly by the first person who saw you, you think you might even stop to shake an irritated fist at the storm-clouded heavens for good measure.

You're only halfway home, hair plastered in a sopping mess and feet squelching in the thick muck of Konoha's streets with every step, when you're finally granted a respite from the downpour.

Confused, you peel your gaze away from the ground to look up and see if maybe the clouds are finally beiginning to disperse. What you find instead is the underside of a bright green umbrella.

"It appears you neglected to check the weather when choosing your attire for today!"

Gai Maito's deep, smooth voice cuts through the noise of the storm without any trouble and he's smiling brightly despite the copious mud speckled over his leggings and bodysuit. You're not sure how someone can be so cheerful in the face of such dreadful surroundings, but then, you don't think you've ever seen him wear any other expression, so perhaps that isn't as strange as it seems at first.

You offer Gai a grateful smile, blinking raindrops from your eyelashes as you thank him for providing a little protection from the storm. "I think I just got too excited about the sunshine this morning, I didn't think to check whether it was permanent."

Gai chuckles, the sound rumbling like the thunder overhead, only you find it much more pleasant to listen to.

You think if anyone can understand blind optimism, it must be Gai. You've ever met anyone so completely capable of finding the good in all things, all people.

"This morning certainly was lovely," he agrees as he falls into step beside you, holding the umbrella as much over both of you as you can.

You grimace when you realize his opposite shoulder is now quite exposed to the elements and so you tell him, "It's okay, I'm soaked anyway, no reason for you to get wet, too."

He frowns, almost as if he doesn't understand what you're saying.

"I just mean you don't have to waste the umbrella on me, since I'm already drenched."

Gai smiles at you again, but it isn't the usual beaming, gleaming grin. It's something much softer, his dark eyes gazing at you fondly from beneath his thick eyebrows.

You yelp when the umbrella retracts, leaving you both standing, unprotected, in the downpour.

"What are you doing?!" you ask, gawking at the way Gai's vest and jumpsuit immediately begin to darken as the rain seeps into them. His hair plasters itself to his forehead and he sweeps his fingers thorugh it, pushing it away from his face in a way you have to admit suits him quite well.

You've always thought he was handsome, but there's something about Gai a little disheveled that's even more enticing than usual.

He tilts his head back, letting the rain slick over his face, droplets tracing down between the taut tendons of his neck to disappear beneath his flak vest. "There is nothing more youthful than seizing the moment!" he proclaims, then adds when he looks at you again, "Wouldn't you agree?"

You don't have time to answer before Gai grasps both your hands in his. If it weren't for him holding you upright as he yanks you off course, you certainly would have face-planted in the thick mud at your feet.

"Gai!" you yell over the din of the storm, "What are you doing?"

But his only response is another laugh as he begins to twirl you around. You have no idea where his umbrella has gone and you find quickly that you don't really care. His enthusiasm is infectious as always and soon you're laughing right along with him as the two of you prance and splash in the mud. When he wraps one strong aroumd around the small of your back to pull you closer, you feel the vibration of his happiness in his chest.

Suddenly, the rain and the mud and the wind no longer matter. That you had hoped for sunshine and got grey skies instead doesn't feel like the betrayal it did a short while ago.

Because Gai Maito is dancing with you without a care for how silly you both look in the middle of the village, or whether his leg warmers are ruined, and you know in your heart that no amount of sunshine could ever compare with Gai's radiant energy.

You hardly notice when you make it to your front door, breathless and dizzy from your rainstorm promenade. Gai's sharp cheekbones stand out as he grins at you, his eyes sparkling far more than the dewdrop-like rain gathered on his lashes should make possible.

"Would you like to come in?" you ask between bouts of laughter and catching your breath, "A cup of hot tea seems the least I can offer for your trouble."

"Trouble?" he asks. "I'm afraid I don't know what you mean?"

You gesture to all of him--his mud-caked toes and sopping wet uniform. In a rare moment of courage, your reach up and pluck a wet leaf from his tussled black hair and hand it to him.

Gai chuckles. "While I'd love a cup of tea," he says, "I feel it's important I make it clear that spending time with you has never been and will never be troublesome."

Your smile falters just a little, heart beating rapidly in the wake of his admission, hoping it means what you think it does.

"Come in," you say, smile growing wider again by the moment, "I don't think I'd like to stop dancing quite yet."

Gai follows easily and suddenly your weekend seems a lot less dreary than it had only a little while ago.

#gai x reader #gai x you #gai x y/n #gn!reader #lemony scribbles #april 🌧️ lem 💐

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electrasev5nwrites · 11 months

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Ninja Daily: Vapors 55

Gai was the ANBU physical conditioning leader.

'No,' Aiko internally corrected, trying not to breathe too hard. She was winded, but the panting hurt her ribs. Her first assessment didn't quite sum up the situation.

GAI. WAS. THE. ANBU PHYSICAL CONDITIONING LEADER. Gai.

It was the sort of thing that had to be expressed in all capitals, even in her head. The whole experience was a miserable, humiliating cesspit. She was the only person beginning the introductory physical conditioning, although there were two men who were several weeks ahead of her in the program. That meant that they shared workouts, and that they had had a chance to adjust to the hellish regimen. Consequently, they were not interested in bonding over the muscle pain and semi-frequently cracked bones that high intensity training with Maito Gai involved.

At least ANBU had damn good medics on call—it was pretty much expected that trainees would need medical attention after every workout, so someone was always there to briskly fix them up. Their practices went so long that Aiko thought Gai almost had to be using a solid clone: there was no way Lee wouldn't question his absence for six hours at a time every morning from 6:30 am until half past noon.

The first time he had broken her radius bone after a sloppy block barely executed in time to save her poor aching ribs, she had dismissed the theory that she was sparring with a clone. No. This had to be the real Gai. The sheer physical power that he used all spar, every spar, would have dispelled even the hardiest of clone techniques.

'Although I suppose that for all I know he's invented a diamond clone,' she snarked internally, carefully rotating her newly healed ankle when directed. She didn't speak: her mouth still tasted of bile when she'd thrown up during the workout, and the medic didn't deserve a face-full of dinosaur breath.

The idea of a diamond clone was ridiculous, of course. But there wasn't much else that could withstand that much abuse. He really was a monster—a cheery monster, but a monster nonetheless. She was never going to even allow herself to feel amused about his posturing and self-given titles. If he wanted to declare himself the queen of Sheba, she would just fucking smile and nod.

If he had wanted to be her eternal rival, she would have defected. For the first time, she thought that Kakashi was fucking nuts for having anything to do with Maito Gai. She knew Kakashi's skill set inside and out—he wasn't as physically strong as Gai, and even his prodigious speed wasn't enough to make up the difference.

Of course, the assessment may not have been fair, because she knew damn well that Kakashi was a ninjutsu specialist. Just because he couldn't defeat Gai with straight taijutsu didn't mean that he wasn't still the stronger combatant on the whole. If they'd had a no-holds barred, with-

The medic released his grip on her with a jolt, tugging her shirt back down to cover the newly healed contusion. It brought her sufficiently back to the real world to wonder, 'Why am I contemplating who would win in a Mortal Kombat match-up? It's not like I can pit them against each other.'

She was almost glad that Gai didn't know who he was training… Would this be worse if he knew he was helping the girl who had ditched his student, or would he be more lenient because she was his rival's student?

Aiko just didn't want to find out. Leniency in her training could kill her later on, but it was hard to wish for a stricter regimen.

She both loved and hated the anonymity in processing. Everyone but ANBU Turtle wore blank masks. As far as she knew, she was the only one with a wig, but there was no way to know for sure. Gai wasn't wearing one (unless he always wore one, she supposed). Tsunade had really pulled through on the wig. On some level Aiko had thought that was a joke, but she was now the owner of a 100% human hair sky-blue wig. It was relatively short—it barely pulled back into a messy ponytail at her nape that did give it an air of authenticity it would have lacked if it were perfect. Originally she had thought that a totally human hair wig was a ridiculous investment. It had to have been very expensive, and it wasn't like anyone would be complimenting her on her hair.

The purpose behind that detail was now vividly clear. By the time she was given four minutes for the first water break of the day, she was soaked with sweat. It was utterly repulsive. Aiko had barely enough time for the salt to dry on her skin before it was time to limp back to work. If the wig hadn't been real hair, she couldn't have properly washed it. It was so well-made that she actually was able to shower with it on in an ANBU locker room attached to the training facility. That was a blessing, because the idea of having to drag herself home before she could clean up was almost enough to make her want to cry. She had stumbled through the first two days with difficulty—on the third, she had actually passed out on the shower floor and woke up an hour later, shivering and blue because the water had turned cold. No one had noticed or cared enough to do anything about it. That, more than anything else, told her that the patterns she was seeing in training weren't in her imagination.

ANBU processing was designed to mold a specific kind of soldier. She could easily recognize the influence of various psychological truths: the vicious brutality was meant to inure recruits to physical discomfort. The mindless repetition was preparation for nudging minds to follow orders at all costs. The facelessness of her fellow recruits was meant to isolate her, so that recruits didn't form possibly disruptive friendships that could endanger missions or manage to spread malcontent within the ranks. It was designed to force the recruit to internalize everything. (And now that she saw it with her own eyes, it made so much more sense that Danzo could have hidden another organization in here).

She knew that, and it was still all but impossible not to see the results it had on her. Being aware of the manipulation didn't make it all go away, even if she refused to accept it blindly.

Dragging herself home after training ceased to be an issue the second week, when she was required to temporarily move into the barracks. Aiko had the goddamn lonely realization that she didn't have to tell anyone. Karin had gotten assigned to a temp team for the Chuunin exams coming up very soon and was doing last minute team training so they could push through, and Hinata was nowhere to be found. Probably she was on her own mission.

Not having to sneak home had its charm. The logistics of not being seen as Aiko in or near the training facility but also not being seen as an ANBU trainee in public made her head hurt, after all. But it quickly became clear that the second stage of training had been in order to control their daily conditions and not a kindness. The second week was when the sleep deprivation started.

She wasn't entirely sure that what they had her doing to force her to stay awake was important. It might have been. Alone in a room with a single lightbulb, she plowed through what must have been a literal pile of paperwork as quickly as she could in order to get a chance to go to bed soon. There was no way to know how much work she had done—the blank sheets were passed through a metal tray under a one-way mirror, one at a time after she pushed over what she had just done. There literally seemed to be no end, and there was no way to judge the passage of time except by how often a shrill alarm was blasted to force her awake if she'd been beginning to nod off or slow down. Her initial instructions had been that how much 'free time' (sleep isn't free time, she'd thought indignantly, back when she could care about things like that) she had was dependent on how efficiently she performed the small tasks they had for her.

It was ham-handed mental manipulation, she had scoffed when it began. When it began to grow wearisome, her pace had slipped for a while, but desperation to just get it over with and get out of that goddamn tiny room had taken over her body and she frantically sped through the work. That meant she made mistakes, signaled by that horrible shrill alarm and the torturous necessity of waiting for the person on the other side of the glass to stop fucking with her and pass the paper back so she could fix it and move on.

Eventually, she couldn't ignore the sinking feeling that she was not going to have an opportunity to sleep at all.

She was right. The next thing she knew was that the door had opened, releasing what looked like but couldn't be morning light into her prison cell. Then it was blocked by the disapproving form of a masked man. "That was pathetic. I hope that your next performance is more satisfactory. You have half an hour for bathroom and rations before you report to conditioning."

'You're full of shit,' she thought angrily, pushing her way out of the room. (She knew better than to talk back.) 'I didn't do anything wrong. The intention was to keep me here all night from the start.'

Knowing that factually didn't stop her from actually crying something like seven hours later when she was collected from the mess hall and brought straight back to that same box of a room after Gai had finished brutalizing her for the day. The constant pain (the medics didn't heal muscle soreness because that would undo the work building muscles) was somehow ever worse when she just. couldn't. stop. shaking. Taijutsu had been even worse than usual—she was exhausted and literally could not stop wavering and misjudging blows. Gai mercilessly harangued her for falling below her previous low marks while her two peers looked on with what seemed to be amusement behind their white masks. Aiko hated them. She hated them.

At this point, her body seemed to have given up on nodding off regardless of consequences, leaving her in a hazy, wide form of consciousness where she knew she wasn't thinking like she usually would but she couldn't dig deeper into anything without losing her train of thought. It was terrifying for someone who spent most of their time thinking. She'd do anything to make it stop.

The first document of the night was ruined by saltwater falling on it, and that horrible alarm went off again almost immediately. Somehow, she managed to collect herself in the long stillness while that man who had scolded her that morning got a replacement. She had to hold together. Having an emotional reaction to the stress was only making things harder on herself.

Despite being more exhausted than she had ever been before in her life, Aiko managed to slip into a focused state. It didn't require thinking—it was just scanning and motion. She just had to do what she was told and they would stop jolting her with that sound. She did task after task, and she did them perfectly. Eventually, her mind settled into a deep meditative calm, and she felt the stress fade. The lightbulb still swung above her head, but the shifting shadows didn't bother her as much as they had before. It was just an inconvenience. Just an obstacle. They had to be planning on letting her rest at some point. When she'd finished what they wanted, they would let her go.

If they didn't, she would die here. Or worse, live like this every day.

'Or use the Hiraishin to get out,' her mind whispered, naturally rebelling against the idea of letting these people reduce her to their mercy. No. She wasn't. She could leave at any time, if she was over her head. They had no idea she had a nearly effortless escape route. No matter what they did to her, she could always leave if it was too much. Aiko was miserable, but she wasn't broken. She was in ANBU training because she wanted to be, and no other reason. It certainly wasn't to be someone else's tool. She had her own agenda, even if it was the frighteningly vague 'Don't die and don't let Naruto die'.

It wasn't like she gave a shit about Konoha one way or the other. It was just a place to live, not a home like it was for Naruto. Aiko wasn't stupid enough to claim she hadn't been affected at all by the propaganda and conditioning, but she knew she hadn't come to the conclusions Konoha would have wanted.

Konoha worked hard to inspire collectivism and patriotism—a genuine belief that they were somehow intrinsically different and superior to all other places. They were the kindest, they were the strongest, they had the best dango. It was widespread inundation meant to resonate with all types of people. By inverse, all other places were either enemies, pitiable, or allies to be kept at a distance. There were exceptions, of course, but on the whole Konoha was looking out for number one.

Aiko took a decidedly Marxist perspective on it. Konoha wasn't really a nation belonging to the people. Konoha was a highly centralized military power run by a few elites who were a class as removed from the people they ruled as Konoha supposedly was from Rock. It was those people, like Danzo, who intentionally manipulated and sacrificed other human beings for power and privilege that she despised. Most of her comrades were just chumps. Their mealy-mouthed repetition of the party line was due to the fact that they didn't really know better.

Really, coming to other conclusions would provide severe cognitive dissonance. No one wanted to think that they might die so a few old people might get more powerful. No, Konoha shinobi died for a cause.

Her own sarcasm almost gave her a headache in her weary state.

She did genuinely like Tsunade. Their Hokage seemed to want to serve her people, not gain power or privilege. For her, Aiko would be willing to keep an eye out for Root subversion.

But her first loyalty wasn't to the office of Hokage. It was still with the one person she could honestly consider family (because no matter what anyone said, it gave her severe cognitive dissonance to think of herself as ever having been a child and therefore having parents. She had been an adult consciousness for as long as she'd lived in this world: adults couldn't have parents if they hadn't had a childhood). But Naruto could be family without straining her sense of self. She'd raised Naruto—he felt more like a son than a brother sometimes, but she was willing to blur the lines between those roles to obfuscate her own oddities. If he'd wanted to leave, she would have been long gone. Maybe they would never have had to get involved in all of this ninja stupidity.

She couldn't help but give a sad smile at that. 'No chance of that, Naruto was brainwashed by the glamour of being a ninja since he was like, six.'

To comfort herself, she reached out and lightly strummed the connection she felt to one of her seals. Aiko had no idea which one it was—either Kakashi or Yamato had gone north—but she didn't much care either. If things got bad enough that she wanted to leave, she would be willing to deal with even the embarrassment of ending up in Yamato's lap.

'Whoever designed this really isn't as thorough as they think they are,' she noted, doing her best to contain the muscle spasm that made her calligraphy ugly. At least, not with the mental conditioning and testing. The physical requirements were certainly rigorous enough. But if they'd really done an accurate mental profile, she would have been rejected for service when it became clear that she wasn't particularly loyal to Konoha. Her loyalty was to a couple of people. If they died or left...

Well. In any case, she'd lied all over her entrance paperwork and association tests, but there was always a way to tell. No lie was perfect, and all falsehoods had patterns unless you knew the test.

"You've earned yourself a break."

Her fingers tightened around her ink brush in surprise, but she didn't argue. She carefully laid it down on her workspace, neatly and horizontally. These people wanted preciseness and outward perfection. She could give it to them, since they were so insistent on seeing meaning in the mundane.

Morino Ibiki checked his watch, knowing that no one would judge him or ever care if he woke recruit 279 up from her rest period early so he could just go home already. "Sixteen minutes…" He settled back down to wait. 'May as well give her as much time as possible'. She wasn't looking too well. Of course, that was largely his fault.

"Hell, I hate this part of the job," he grumbled to himself. He put up with it, though. It would be pretty shitty of him not to be able to see recruits through the gauntlet he had designed for them personally. ANBU conditioning wasn't meant to be wasteful. It was his job to tailor the programming that each soldier would need to get them sufficiently obedient and emotionally distant from their job.

He fuckin' hated it, if he were to be honest. Sometimes it felt like Konoha wasn't any better than, say, Mist. Granted, this sort of conditioning would be ham-handedly done to one standard regardless of the individual being processed, but that only made it less precise and not less amoral. Mist just got a lot more nutjobs because they put all of their shinobi through conditioning like this periodically without any apparent regard for just how delicate the human mind was. At least Konoha only did this for their black ops. It wasn't pretty, but it was necessary in order to build soldiers who could compete with the nastiest everyone else had to offer.

Now that the first 37 hours of intentional sleep deprivation was over, the recruit had been afforded three hours to crash. They didn't want to kill her, after all, which was a definite possibility with all the stress that the physical conditioning put on raw recruits.

It was hard to do this to someone who looked an awful lot like a kid in the oversized black uniform that disguised the fact that the girl was a petite teen. He'd been surprised to find out she was going to turn fifteen during the course of her training—that was shitty luck, and she sure didn't look that old with her face and body covered.

Even harder to swallow was the bitter medicine of knowing that she'd had the shit luck to test into one of the highest intelligence categories and possessed more than a healthy amount of independent thought for an ideal shinobi. If she'd been more pliable or less intelligent, she probably would have slipped by with 30 hours sleep deprivation so that they could do their best to mold her psyche in the most vulnerable state. As it was, when she woke up thinking it was time for her workout, she would instead be fed and then taken back to the working room for another 4 ½ hours before it was the six am wakeup call.

Regardless of how unpleasant what they were doing was, it was necessary. Elite ANBU, those who got the most stressful and fucked-up missions possible, couldn't be too resistant to authority. That never ended well, and Ibiki hated having to put his own soldiers down if they got rabid. He quietly hoped that the kid sleeping in a fetal position on her camp bed had used that brain of hers to downplay any rebellious personality tendencies in her processing files. It was always a shame to see a personality totally quashed during this process, even if that was supposedly the goal.

She was over the worst of it, now. The next time he checked his watch it was one minute past her free time, so he wordlessly signaled an assistant to drag her out of bed and strode away from his monitors. If she had been going to have a breakdown, it would have been in the last session. Now that she had displayed unquestioning obedience, she would gradually be rewarded with more and more sleep and less critiques. In a few days, she'd reach the next phase of training—where they would build her up around her new identity. Her profile had displayed a natural proclivity towards utilizing compartmentalization, so separating her ANBU identity from her outside identity should be piteously easy. He really did mean that—it was both strange and sad for such a young teenager to have the mindset of a traumatized adult. But it worked well for their purposes.

Inadvertently, he glanced back down at the statistics he'd been working with while compiling the new ANBU's profile. It wasn't the first time he'd seen it, but he still had to shake his head in disbelief.

'I bet that if the Hokage had known what exactly the mental conditioning entailed, she would not have honestly handed over the corrected intelligence data.' Ibiki would certainly never have expected to see that number attached to a teenager's file. 4.5? That was just ridiculous. He wouldn't have known the damn difference. But Tsunade had never been ANBU, and she had never asked in too much detail about his methodology for determining how to tailor this program. The results spoke for themselves: since he had taken over, their ANBU had been much more healthy, mentally stable, and effective than in past.

It wasn't like she'd been honest about the kid's stats anyways. Tsunade had pretty obviously classified something above his pay grade, because the total stats number he had definitely did not reflect the 'good-but-not-shockingly-good' graph he'd been given. The preliminary graph showed 22.5 on the skill count-up, but Tsunade had marked the total as 26 in another area. 3.5 points were just missing.

It was a hell of a jump, especially since it almost had to be between just a couple stat categories. There would have been no reason to hide a gradual, all-around increase in abilities. Seeing as she'd trained with Sharingan no Kakashi and had a measly '2' for her ninjutsu score, he would bet his right ass cheek that some of the discrepancy came from a seriously destructive ninjutsu.

'Actually,' he mused, 'Didn't I hear something about Rock claiming we had a chakra chains user? Could be hysteria, or it could have been her. It'd make sense for Tsunade to keep that as quiet as possible, and it would be a decent bump in Ninjutsu…'

Oh well. It wasn't like he was going to find out anytime soon. It was a weird decision on Tsunade's part, but part of keeping his job was not asking stupid questions. He'd just have to trust her assessment of Uzumaki's combat readiness level without knowing what exact skills contributed. Of course, with her lowest skills being taijutsu, strength, and genjutsu, it had made most sense to push her off onto Gai for a high-intensity training session.

With the expedient of having their newest recruit around full-time and getting what was essentially private tutoring from the best taijutsu artist Konoha knew of, Ibiki would be damn shocked if Gai didn't manage to shoot both her strength and taijutsu up by half a stat point.

Such a thing was very hard on the body, but the recruit was young enough that she would probably bounce back. Gai knew how to give just as much as a student could handle.

ANBU could push their recruits in ways that would be considered shocking on the outside. Damaging a student severely during every training session was more than a bit discouraged on the outside: chakra healing wasn't perfect. What the body could do on its own over time was best in many cases. But for ANBU, the immediate benefits outweighed the potential ramifications and increased burn-out rate. Shinobi like Hatake who were capable of staying in ANBU for ten years were stupidly rare. It was mostly a short 3-5 years or irregular assignment instead of a career.

The taijutsu assessment he'd received had looked to be a little outdated anyways—she'd clearly been working on it since that evaluation. It was standard to give a full ability assessment after they were done. It wouldn't matter much to Ibiki (who would never get to see the full compiled records after she left his care), but Tsunade would know exactly what her new resource was.

Regardless of what that test showed, Uzumaki's genjutsu abilities were definitely unacceptable for ANBU. They'd have to work on that as well.

While he closed up his office for the night, Ibiki made a note to check and see what identity the Hokage had chosen for the Uzumaki girl. She'd bemoaned that it was unfortunate Hound was unavailable, but her sick sense of humor would no doubt pull through with something painfully apt. Then he pulled on his coat and headed for the door.

It was the end of his shift and he had to get to his own bed soon, after all.

After a while, a body just stopped noticing the buzz of low-level pain.

Factually, Aiko knew that she had to have been in training for considerably less than 3.5 weeks. That was the projected ending time they had given her to pass around as the length of her supposed mission, after all.

ANBU wouldn't risk people looking into what had happened to her by making her late. Late returns from missions were a nervous affair—every so often, she spotted a team or girlfriend or just a concerned comrade hanging around the notice board to see if a late arrival had been updated. It was a rather nice service. It didn't share anything crucial, of course, but if there was any news at all, people wouldn't be left to wonder if their loved one was dead in a ditch somewhere.

'But it feels like I've been here for an eternity…'

At least they were done jerking her around, making her sleep and eating schedules erratic to ensure that she knew how to take orders like a good dog.

She didn't even blink at physical training anymore. –Not that she was somehow up to snuff, of course. No, it was more that the variations on Konoha standard that she had beat into her flesh felt as natural as her old katas did. So did broken bones and the massive, melon sized bruises scored into her flesh every day. There was no point in getting a little upset about a bit of pain. Before this experience, she would not have been capable of standing so stoically to wait her turn for the medic, fingers laced lightly behind her back. At least, not with the throbbing on her left shoulder from where Gai had come down with a high kick that sent her to the floor. It wasn't like Kakashi had trained her with kid gloves, but he had never been that brutal either.

"Recruit 279. Come with me." Aiko flicked her eyes over to look at the person she'd thought to be just an observer for the day. It wouldn't be the first time that someone had silently sat by to watch training.

Just like everyone else in this place, they wore loose black clothing and a mask. This one, however, had a design on it. Not a trainee, then. ANBU Turtle didn't make a comment one way or another, striding out of the room purposefully and leaving her to decide whether or not she should go with this stranger.

She went. Commenting would have been pointless. She wouldn't get an answer. These people had a serious grudge against intellectual curiosity. It wasn't like they were going to quash hers, but it would be easier to let them think they had than to go through more of that sadistic reprogramming.

She followed along a series of hallways she had never seen before. They seemed to be traveling down. The air became frigid, which made the sweat drying against her skin particularly unpleasant.

"Kai."

The polished hallways fled without a whisper, turning into a cement enclave. The person she'd been following was standing at attention, head cocked. "Acceptable."

Aiko wasn't certain, but she thought that might be a woman. Either that, or a young man. They were relatively slight, and the voice was a bit androgynous.

She didn't accept or reject the compliment, just keeping her expression bored under her mask. No one would know, but Aiko found that schooling her features helped her match her posture to what she wanted to convey.

"I was informed that your abilities are very low."

That was a request for clarification.

"I have some talent in dispelling genjutsu. I have never attempted to learn an illusion."

Actually dispelling most genjutsu wasn't difficult. The hard part was knowing when one was affecting you. Being observant helped with that… as did relying on senses other than sight. She was never going to be a ninken, but she'd realized that she no longer smelled floor polish when she had been walking earlier. Most illusions relied on fooling sight.

"So I see." The person in front of her seemed to waver, then melted into a pillar of lilac colored petals that collapsed out in all directions.

Aiko wordlessly turned her head to the left, following the shinobi she could sense but not see. They were good—completely silent, signature obscured to a point that she doubted anyone but Karin could pick out, and moving fast—but they still smelled faintly like the compound upstairs and not like this stuffy, dry chamber.

"You seem aware of a fundamental truth of genjutsu. The senses cannot be fooled… unless the caster possesses senses comparable to their victim."

She froze, back stiff. Eyes wide, Aiko worked to keep her neck as still as possible.

Her new friend had an ANBU short sword held to it, after all… and they must have taken off their mask, because she felt hot breath on her ear, and a hand caressing her left hip, fingers digging in painfully to the clothed skin. She grimaced, muscles taut with tension.

"Don't think you're better than anyone here, rookie," the genjutsu user whispered into her ear, leaning their chest into her back in a bizarre parody of a hug. She was pretty sure it was a man, now. Either that or a woman with a tightly bound chest, because there was nothing soft about the figure pressed against her scapulae.

It was getting a little bit creepy at that point.

'If this freak licks me, I'm going to get out of here so fast they won't believe it.'

Luckily, the blade withdrew, and the body pressed against her back moved away. She didn't turn her head, but the 'scent' she'd been using to track had suddenly disappeared and she appeared to be alone. Aiko had the unnerving realization that she couldn't assume she was alone in headquarters now after this.

"In order to create a perfect illusion, you must be intimately familiar with your subject matter. Genjutsu difficulty goes up in class for two reasons: the layers an illusion possesses, and the number of senses involved."

She was actually paying attention at this point, and not just because the omnipresent voice was unnerving. Her education hadn't gone into much depth with genjutsu. The Academy had taught her how to dispel them, and Kakashi had taught her how to spot them by using them on her. But he couldn't do anything like this. His genjutsu all tapped into what a mind either wanted or most feared to see and let the victim do the work for him.

"I will not concern myself with teaching you genjutsu. That is your concern, and should be undertaken in your personal development time. But I have been tasked to ensure that you can detect genjutsu. How would you go about trying to locate me now, in this specific room? List all possibilities."

"Irregularities," Aiko offered immediately. "Shadows or object placement that does not reflect the original configuration of the room. Scent, hearing, sound, vision, Chaka sensing…" She trailed off.

"And taste." The addition sounded a bit amused. "Your sense of smell is connected to your sense of taste, but very few genjutsu users are thorough enough to account for the possibility that a scent user will have the creativity to try to taste the air. And, of course, the sense of touch cannot be fooled with genjutsu alone, but a genjutsu user can make use of solid clones and henge to take care of those discrepancies, as well as create a tailored illusion that compensates for what the victim physically feels. Attempt to find me again."

She felt monumentally stupid, but she concentrated chakra to her olfactory glands to enhance her sense of smell and flicked her tongue out like a snake, breathing in to pass air over her taste buds.

'God, I hope I don't look like Orochimaru doing this…'

It was the most bizarre ninja skill she'd even been taught, a poor man's trick to substitute for a precisely suited jutsu for the situation. What was worse—it worked. She could 'smell' something, though she didn't know the exact origin. She tried again, breathing in more slowly and walking forward a bit. It was… it was like…

"Kai."

'Well, that is fantastically disturbing.' Aiko shifted uneasily. The first release she had done had been part of a multi-layered illusion.

The underground chamber of cement she'd 'discovered' was actually her own assigned sleeping room. She'd managed to taste the scent of her own laundry soap on the clothes she had worn in on the first day, neatly folded on the dresser at the head of the bed. Aiko was standing directly in front of her bed, and hadn't even noticed her toes digging into the thin rug. That implied there had been a distracting element to the genjutsu—it had been fooling not just her senses but her perception using her expectations. This person… was excellent.

The person reclining on her bed gave her a slow once-over from behind their mask. "That wasn't what you were supposed to do, but it was an acceptable job nonetheless." She registered that there were no creases on her bed indicating the weight of a human being before she realized that there was no one on it at all.

'Not the disembodied voice trick again…'

"I have my own duties to attend to, but I will be your tutor in future. Don't bother looking for me—I'll find you when I have time."

After a few minutes of stillness and silence, Aiko reluctantly sat down, pulse thumping and body in fight-or-flight mode. 'I have no way to tell if I'm observed or not.' She swallowed, hard.

Despite her exhaustion, getting to sleep that night was difficult. It was hard to rest when you didn't feel safe.

Not giving a single fuck about procedure at the moment, Kakashi blew by the gate and left his subordinates to check him in. That's what minions were for. He made a straight path across the village to Hokage tower. At one point an ANBU patrol route spotted him and jerked as if they wanted to intercept him. It was generally considered worrisome to see people sprinting from the village entrance to their center of power, so he didn't blame them for the impulse.

That didn't mean he was about to indulge them and stop for a chat. Most of them knew him by reputation. Hell, he'd participated in training no small number of them. If he wanted to go and get in a fist fight with the Hokage, no one was going to stop him.

Of course, that wasn't his intention. He actually had a time-sensitive report to make, one of the kind that even Kakashi wouldn't dare be late bringing in. It probably wouldn't be addressed for at least a day, but since his normal modus operandi was to wait anywhere from half a day to a week to report, well... His tardiness was a tribute to Obito and mockery of his own adolescent stuffiness, not an indulgence or excuse to endanger his fellow shinobi.

The thought of his fellow shinobi brought up guilty thoughts about his own various students. Naruto would be returning soon, of course. The other two would be delighted in their own ways. Sasuke put up a front, but it was easy to see that Naruto was his best friend. And Aiko was crazy for the kid. Kakashi almost sighed to try to push off the heaviness on his chest at the reminder of a topic he'd been recently circling, but refrained.

ANBU was no place for a teenager. He and Yamato had both been younger than Aiko when they enlisted, but it was too late to do anything about that.

'Of course, it's now too late for Aiko as well.' So there was no point in mulling it over. Still, it kept bothering him.

Really, it had been too late to dissuade her at the instant Tsunade recommended it to her. If there was a specific reason that his Hokage wanted his student, Kakashi had to give her up. He could back-talk and dig in his heels at times, but he could not outright fight the will of the village head. It would be treason. Tsunade wasn't a woman who did things without plan and cause. He had to trust that, and hope he'd eventually know what was going on,

Knowing that he had trained a young woman who was so talented that the highest authority in the country (the Daimyo was a useless idiot) sought out her skills was both a source of pride and sorrow. It was impossible to deny that his student had grown into an adult when she sought him out with such a serious expression. He'd really thought that she'd intended to tell him she was ending the apprenticeship, to be honest. It would have been a sensible decision, one that he'd been putting off for a while. Aiko was not an apprentice level shinobi by any stretch of the imagination. Despite showing absolutely no desire for command, she was qualified to lead her own team by now.

He had tried to tell himself that meant he had done his job. He had originally set out to ensure that his students could take care of themselves and planned to drop them like hot rocks as soon as that was possible. Kakashi had never seen himself toting around baby shinobi. The very idea that someone would trust him with them was ridiculous. Yet it had happened, and he was in the strange position of feeling a bit melancholy at the idea of his long-time subordinate leaving the team forever. Despite not having the sheer hitting power he expected from an equal like Gai, Aiko wasn't dead weight on a team anymore—she felt like a teammate. She was like a member of the pack with a specialized skill: it was okay and logical to steer her away from the most difficult targets in a head-on confrontation to be on the safe side because she could fulfill other roles.

Finding out that she had instead moved to redefine herself as a normal subordinate like Tenzou instead of an equal team head with Genin or Chuunin of her own was… a bit of a relief, frankly. He could do that—he could treat her like Tenzou. If she had thought he was smothering her Aiko would have left entirely, so it wasn't a painful move indicating he had failed yet again. This role would be a much more comfortable set of interactions. She had been straining at the way the apprenticeship fit her for a while, wiggling and pushing for more freedom.

He'd known something like this was coming when she made the decision to give the Kazekage a Hiraishin tag independent of his guidance. There had been a time when she didn't want to so much as choose a route home without his approval.

Her decision hadn't exactly been a wrong one (he saw the sense in it even though he disliked the concept) but it was irrefutable proof that their working relationship needed to be redefined.

That had been his overwhelming sense when she'd confronted him, which had made the casual way she continued to touch him and enter his personal space a bit baffling. Either she was a young kunoichi under his protection or she was an equal. Conceiving of a circumstance in which her behavioral patterns didn't adjust for that change in status was difficult. Perhaps the problem was with his perception and not her behavior. Was sitting immediately next to someone when there was plenty of space normal and acceptable between two coworkers?

Granted, he didn't care much about what convention said, but he had assumed that Aiko's habit of physical affection would fade in time. Perhaps it was just something that made her feel comfortable and safe; like her habit of deferring to him even when she could have come up with the same plan. Or it could be part of how she communicated. Naruto and Sakura had incorporated a lot of touching into their communication, even if it wasn't positive.

Possibly it was just something he had never learned and didn't quite understand. He'd missed out on no small number of lessons on human interaction in his youth.

"I wouldn't go in there if I were you."

Kakashi blinked and turned to look at a very serious Shizune. "Why not?"

She cast a wary glance at the closed office door. "Well… Ah. Tsunade is in a bit of a temper. Sasuke's getting the brunt of it, but it would probably be in your best interest to wait a minute. Naruto thought it would be clever to send an entire cake along with the toad who was delivering their report."

He had a sinking feeling he knew where this was going.

"It ate the entire thing, of course," she said, clearly vexed. "And then proceeded to vomit all over Tsunade-sama's office when transporting here disturbed his stomach. Toads really aren't that bright, are they?"

"Not particularly."

It was the truth. He was torn between amusement and pity. In no way did he consider opening that office and getting drafted to help. Speaking of which…

"Am I correct in assuming Sasuke is cleaning it up?"

Shizune did a rather poor job of hiding her smirk. "Yupp." She leaned over, as if confiding a great secret. "It's rainbow colored. That carpet is never going to be the same, but Tsunade hasn't given up yet. Since Naruto is unavailable, I think she's punishing Sasuke by association."

The 'and you are more responsible for his behavior than Sasuke would be, seeing as how Naruto was your student' didn't need to be said.

"I see."

He sat down on one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs, painfully aware that it was too short and his knees were almost up to his chest. (It was intended to be an indignity that would keep long lines from accumulating. And to think that Tsunade thought he was passive-aggressive).

That report could wait a few minutes. How long could Tsunade really watch a grumpy teen scrub at what had been white fibers in a previous life before she admitted defeat and sent Jiraiya a bill for a new carpet?

#vapors #uzumaki aiko #electrasev5n #ninja daily #fanfiction #naruto fanfiction

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ao3feed-hashimada · 1 year

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ao3feed-hashimada

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/qDOHsjp

by AndreyaHalms

“Tobirama,” Madara croaks, mouth dry. “When did I get married?” “Six months back,” Tobirama says stoically. “To whom?” There’s a crack in Tobirama’s mask, and deep, deep sympathy bleeds through. “You know whom.”

Or, how Agents Senju (the older one) and Uchiha (also the older one) end up on the same page.

Words: 9106, Chapters: 1/2, Language: English

Fandoms: Naruto

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: M/M

Characters: Senju Hashirama, Uchiha Madara, Senju Tobirama, Other Naruto Character(s), Maito Gai | Might Guy, Rock Lee, Black Zetsu (Naruto), Uzumaki Mito, Uchiha Izuna

Relationships: Senju Hashirama/Uchiha Madara, Senju Tobirama & Uchiha Madara

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Spies & Secret Agents, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fake Marriage, Humor, HSMD briefly join an mlm sex cult

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/qDOHsjp

#IFTTT #ao3feed #fanfic #hashimada #hashirama x madara #hashirama senju x madara uchiha

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shokoraa · 2 years

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Quantum Grace

By: Koistral

Summary: In which I overpower the hell out of our favorite traumatized boi, spit in the face of canon, self-indulge in every way known to man, and completely ignore the dynamics of the Naruto universe to make plot points happen.

Or, alternatively, Todoroki Shouto learns the bittersweet beauty of second chances.

Status: Incomplete Updated: Nov. 14, 2021

Words: 12,811 Chapters: 4/?? Language: English

Fandom: Naruto, 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia

Rating: Not Rated

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category: M/M

Characters: Uchiha Sasuke, Hoozuki Suigetsu, Uzumaki Naruto, Karin (Naruto), Hatake Kakashi, Orochimaru (Naruto), Haruno Sakura, Uchiha Itachi, Otogakure no Shinobi Yonin Shuu | Sound Four (Naruto), Gaara (Naruto), Haku (Naruto), Momochi Zabuza, Maito Gai | Might Guy, Rock Lee, Akatsuki (Naruto), Kyuubi | Nine-tails | Kurama, Todoroki Shouto, Bakugou Katsuki, Todoroki Touya, Dabi (My Hero Academia), Bijuu | Tailed Beasts (Naruto), Other Naruto Character(s)

Relationship: Hoozuki Suigetsu/Uchiha Sasuke, Hoozuki Suigetsu & Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Sasuke & Uzumaki Naruto, Hatake Kakashi & Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Itachi & Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Sasuke & Team Hebi | Team Taka, Orochimaru & Uchiha Sasuke, Orochimaru/Yakushi Kabuto, Dai-nana-han | Team 7 & Uchiha Sasuke, Haku & Momochi Zabuza, Haku & Uchiha Sasuke, Gaara & Uchiha Sasuke, Akatsuki & Uchiha Sasuke, Akatsuki & Uchiha Itachi, Hoshigaki Kisame & Uchiha Itachi, Hatake Kakashi & Todoroki Shouto, Todoroki Shouto & Uchiha Itachi, Haruno Sakura & Todoroki Shouto & Uzumaki Naruto, Bakugou Katsuki & Todoroki Shouto, Bakugou Katsuki/Todoroki Shouto, Todoroki Shouto & Todoroki Touya, Dabi & Todoroki Shouto

Additional Tag: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Dimension Travel, Uchiha Sasuke-centric, Todoroki Shouto-centric, Todoroki Shouto is a Little Shit, Uchiha Itachi Being a Good Brother, Gaara Needs a Hug (Naruto), Protective Hatake Kakashi, BAMF Todoroki Shouto, BAMF Bakugou Katsuki, Touch-Starved, Touch-Starved Todoroki Shouto, Not Canon Compliant, Timeline What Timeline, Todoroki Shouto Needs a Hug, Conspiracy Theorist Todoroki Shouto, Todoroki Shouto is a Dork, Found Family, Todoroki Shouto is So Done, Severely Overpowered Todoroki Shouto, Still Emotionally Constipated Though, Hurt Todoroki Shouto, Orochimaru Being Orochimaru (Naruto), Slow Burn, Not Really Character Death, Eventual Romance, Crack and Angst, Out of Character Todoroki Shouto, no beta we die like men

#ao3 #mha fanfic #CrossOver #naruto #todobaku #sasusui #shoto #todoroki shouto #todoroki shoto #Sasuke Uchiha #orokabu

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goldfishlover73 · 1 year

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I posted 457 times in 2022

That's 415 more posts than 2021!

55 posts created (12%)

402 posts reblogged (88%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@kakashis-kunoichi

@terra-lu

@goldfishlover73

@skykashi

@bougiebutchbitch

I tagged 311 of my posts in 2022

Only 32% of my posts had no tags

#naruto - 106 posts

#kakashi - 87 posts

#kakasaku - 67 posts

#kakashi hatake - 57 posts

#hatake kakashi - 53 posts

#fanfic - 46 posts

#maito gai - 18 posts

#sakumo hatake - 14 posts

#hatake sakumo - 12 posts

#naruto uzumaki - 11 posts

Longest Tag: 72 characters

#he asked where naruto was and i told him i left him at home eating ramen

My Top Posts in 2022:

Chapters: 3/88 Fandom: Naruto Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Hatake Kakashi Characters: Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto, Maito Gai | Might Guy Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Time Travel Summary:

When a girl called Sakura seemingly falls in the sky, Kakashi is skeptical. Far more skeptical than the rest of Team Minato are. War is approaching quickly and this strange girl is leaving more questions than answers in her wake, Kakashi must decide where his trust and loyalties lie in a constantly changing world.

26 notes - Posted January 6, 2022

Chapters: 27/89 Fandom: Naruto Rating: Mature Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Haruno Sakura/Hatake Kakashi Characters: Hatake Kakashi, Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto, Maito Gai | Might Guy Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Time Travel Summary:

29 notes - Posted February 27, 2022

I can't even guys... LOOK AT HIM. he's so cozy!!!!

I haven't decided which drinking container to put him on but he just brings me such joy when I spot him chillin on my desk.

Man, so cute!

@oyster-mash

35 notes - Posted December 2, 2022

I’ve got a whole bunch of new followers now. I’ve been inspired to write something else other than Naruto.

Who knows how long this will last.

This is based loosely on the same prompt @sandradoodles gave a few days ago. It’s stupid and nonsensical and I love it.

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug

Rating: PG?

Pairing: Marichat

Summary: Adrien messes up and kisses Marinette as Adrien instead of Chat. He rolls with it. Until she confesses to Chat that she’s kissing another guy, the mysterious Buttercup.

AN: In the process of writing these two little guys I’ve fallen in love with the idea of ‘teenage/ Adrien.’ He’s a high school boy! Hormones!

This probably needs some revision. I’ll do that if I post to AO3!

Adrien saw stars as his head collided with something hard. Loud crashing sounds could be heard in the distance beyond the ringing in his ears. More crashing was followed by loud shouts. He felt large hands on his shoulders, pulling him up.

He blinked slowly his vision coming back. The first thing his saw was red. Marinette’s face was the color of a ripe tomato.

Marinette was against the far wall, her hand pointing at him accusingly. “What was that?!” She demanded, her voice cracking, sounding like minor arpeggios on the piano. Her blue eyes were bright and full of fear. “Who do you think you are!?”

Shouting came from behind Adrien as he gripped his head.

The second thing he saw was wide green eyes peeking out from behind the wall.

Plagg.

Oh shit! Adrien looked down, his brain unfogging as shouts came from behind him; Nino, Max, and Kim while Alya’s voice carried from beside Marinette. Adrien heard more female voices as he stared down at trembling bare fingers. Shit.

He looked back up, eyes locking with Plagg’s. Plagg might have smirked. Might have gloated about how he was right. That kissing Marinette as Chat Noir was a bad idea. That he should just do it as Adrien. But the Kwamii knew now was not the time.

Because, if the tingling on his lips was any indication (or in his fingers), he had kissed Marinette as Adrien. Which wasn’t something he’d done before.

Therefore her reaction is entirely justified.

Plagg ducked out of sight and his eyes fell on Marinette. And then Alya, who stood with her hands on her hips and daggers in her eyes.

“Dude…” Adrien slowly turned to Nino, who’s face he couldn’t read. Mainly because he kept moving it between him and Alya. “What did you do?”

Adrien swallowed thickly before turning to look at the girls. Marinette was in the crux of Rose’s arms.

“I kissed her.” He said breathlessly. He wasn’t sure if he was breathless from the fear or still from the kiss.

Because it didn’t matter how many times he kissed her, she left him breathless. He cursed his stomach as it erupted into butterflies.

Now was not the time.

Marinette was having a little get together. The class had been spread out over the floors of the Dupain-Cheng household. There were snacks in the bakery, video games on the main floor of the house and a movie had been playing in darkness of the bedroom.

When it was apparent that no one but Marinette and Adrien were interested in the movie, they had snuck up to the roof.

Then they realized that they were stuck until the movie was over.

Which was fine with Adrien and to his delight, seemed fine with Marinette. They talked about school and fashion and soon about nothing at all. They laughed and watched the people of Paris move around on the streets as they just…hung out.

And then Adrien forgot who he was. Literally.

See the full post

60 notes - Posted June 15, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Miraculous Ladybug/Marichat Fic - “Hickey”

Came to me on my way to work. Still in the same universe where Chat Noir and Marinette are ‘together but not really’ because they like other people.

Title: Hickey

Rating: G

Summary: Marinette comes to school with a hickey and Adrien comes to her aid

“Marinette Dupain-Cheng!" Adrien twisted in his seat at Chloe's shrill voice. He watched as Marinette smacked her hand away, her face a dusting of pink. Chloe recovered, the smacked hand coming up to get face in mock shock. Adrien's fingers curled against the back of his chair. This couldn't be good. "What is that on your neck?" She went to touch Marinette's collar but her hand was smacked away.

"Get out of my face, Chloe." Marinette said darkly. Chloe laughed as Ayla stepped up to Marinette's side, crossing her arms. The rest of the class was watching, but only Choe, him, and maybe Nino could see it.

A dark smudge right under Marinette's shirt.

Adrien's eyes widened. Is that- "a hickey, Dupain-Cheng?” The class went silent as Marinette stood with her head high, her hands balled at her sides, jaw clenched.

“And what do you know of hickeys, Chloe?” Ayla snapped, “Don’t act like you’ve ever seen one.”

Chloe’s voice faded away as Adrien watched Marinette’s bright eyes blinked away unshed tears. Her lip trembled and a voice similar to Plagg’s whispered in his head do something.

“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for this.” Adrien said, standing up. He heard Nino say something, but he was already moving up the steps. He looked between the two girls, smiling passively before looking at Marinette. She was watching him with big (beautiful) eyes that swam with emotion. He winked before leaning in - perhaps a little too close since Marinette took a step back. He smiled up at her and gazed around the rest of the class.

“It looks like powdered cocoa.” He said, hoping that was an actual thing. “You live in a bakery.” He said stupidly. He tilted his head in a smile he knew would divert Chloe’s attention. “I think you’re just seeing things.” Chloe’s face faltered before it scrunched up in frustration before morphing again.

She never knows how to be made at me.

Chloe spoke again but Adrien’s hand had already grabbed Marinette’s. “Let’s get you cleaned up.” He tugged gently before leading her down the stairs, grabbing his bag before they left.

They passed Madame Bustier as they walked out. He gave his award winning model smile. “Only a moment, ma’am!” He said, his smile broadening as Marinette grasped his hand tighter.

III

Adrien leaned in close to her neck, studying it closely. He couldn’t help the small flip his stomach did as he inspected the mark. He could almost make out teeth marks.

He was proud of how his face stayed impassive as he pulled out concealer. “Good thing I have a shoot today.” He carefully dabbed the mark. His eyes flickered to Marinette’s whose face went scarlett. She hadn’t spoken since they left the classroom.

He grabbed more makeup out of his bag as he hummed lightly to himself as he went to work.

The whole coverup took no more than three minutes, though if you looked close enough you could still see the small teeth marks. He bit back a smirk. “Good as new!”

“You’re not…going to ask?” Marinette said softly as he placed everything back in his back.

He looked at her wide eyed. “Of course not, Marinette!” He said sincerely. “It’s your business and no one else's.” He shrugged. “And maybe Ayla’s?” He smiled as her lip quirked.

“Thanks, Adrien.”

He smiled warmly. “Of course.” It didn’t help that he already knew where that was from.

Him. He did it. Yesterday on her roof at roughly 6 o’clock (he’d heard the bell chime the hour). She had made a particular noise and he couldn’t help it. Especially when she did it again.

“It didn’t mean anything!” She said, drawing his eyes back to her. He pushed that memory out of head for now.

School wasn’t the place for that memory. He shifted in his stance, moving his back slightly

Her face was so red it was almost purple. “We were just…fooling around. It doesn’t mean anything.” She looked up at him. “It’s not like I like him or anything.”

Adrien felt his heart twist nastily in his chest. He knew this too. It was part of their arrangement. A way to vent. So he wasn’t sure why it hurt. Maybe it was the tears that were back in her eyes. He hated seeing her cry.

See the full post

71 notes - Posted August 15, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

On my mainly Naruto blog my top two post were not, in fact, Naruto.

I find joy in this.

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

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maireyart · 1 month

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Part 1: -> Kakashi's ObiGai nightmare <-

Part 2: ⬆️

Part 3: Kakashi's second nightmare

Part 4: Taijutsu training

#narutoart #kakashi #hatake kakashi #obito #uchiha obito #maito gai #might gai #obigai #imaginary obigai #crackpairing #crack #comedy #the joubito we deserve #thanks Ana for all the crack ideas xDDDD #im dyinnnn #Kakashi's bloodshot eyes #Kakashi's not the only troll in that village

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ao3feed-nalu · 1 year

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Chatfic

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/tcDPEVr

by FrxitCxps

CRACK/VENT CHATFIC WITH SOME OCS IDK WHAT I'M DOING BUT I'M DOING IT 😍

Words: 203, Chapters: 2/?, Language: English

Fandoms: Multiple fandoms - Fandom

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage

Categories: F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi

Relationships: Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto, Hatake Kakashi/Maito Gai | Might Guy, Gaara/Rock Lee, Jiraiya/Tsunade (Naruto), Haruno Sakura/Yamanaka Ino, Aang/Katara (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong/Suki, Korra/Asami Sato, Boscha/Willow Park, Hunter | The Golden Guard/Gus Porter, Lilith Clawthorne/Camila Noceda, Eda Clawthorne/Raine Whispers, Amity Blight/Luz Noceda, Emira Blight/Viney, Edric Blight/Jerbo, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added, Mako/Prince Wu (Avatar), Lloyd Garmadon/Kai, Nya/Skylor (Ninjago), Cole/Jay Walker, Lord Garmadon/Vinny (Ninjago), Kong | Aether/Xiao | Alatus (Genshin Impact), Tartaglia | Childe/Zhongli (Genshin Impact), Amber/Ying | Lumine (Genshin Impact), Kamisato Ayato/Thoma, Rosaria/Sucrose (Genshin Impact), Albedo/Xingqiu (Genshin Impact), Il Dottore/Scaramouche (Genshin Impact), Diluc/Kaeya (Genshin Impact), Bennett/Razor (Genshin Impact), Cyno/Tighnari (Genshin Impact), Yanfei/Yelan (Genshin Impact), Natsu Dragneel/Lucy Heartfilia, Jellal Fernandes/Erza Scarlet, Gray Fullbuster/Juvia Lockser, Gajeel/Levy (Edolas), Aries/Loke (Fairy Tail), Walter Beck/Jasper (Fable), Logan/Reaver (Fable), Hero of Brightwall/Page (Fable), Hammer (Fable)/Hero of Bowerstone, Original Male Character/Original Male Character, Original Female Character/Original Female Character

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/tcDPEVr

#ao3feed #fanfic #Nalu #Natsu x Lucy #Fairy Tail

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ao3feed-dottorescaramouche · 1 year

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#genshin impact #genshin impact scaramouche #genshin impact dottore #dottore/scaramouche #il dottore/scaramouche

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ao3feedzukka-blog · 2 years

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Chatfic

https://archiveofourown.org/works/42463983 by FrxitCxps CRACK/VENT CHATFIC WITH SOME OCS IDK WHAT I'M DOING BUT I'M DOING IT 😍 Words: 54, Chapters: 1/?, Language: English Fandoms: One Piece, Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga), Metal Fight Beyblade | Beyblade Metal Saga, My Little Pony, 鬼滅の刃 | Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba (Anime), Fullmetal Alchemist (Anime 2003), Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga, Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Anime), The Owl House (Cartoon), The Loud House (Cartoon), Avatar: The Last Airbender, Avatar: Legend of Korra, 原神 | Genshin Impact (Video Game), Naruto, Blood of Zeus (Cartoon), Centaurworld (Cartoon 2021), Adventure Time, Digimon - All Media Types, Amphibia (Cartoon), ウマ娘プリティーダービー | Uma Musume: Pretty Derby (Anime), Fable (Video Games), Kulipari Series - Trevor Pryce, Rise of the Guardians (2012), High-Rise Invasion, Raya and the Last Dragon (2021), A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004), Johnny Test (Cartoon), Dexter's Laboratory, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018), Power Puff Girls, Watership Down (Cartoon 2018), Skylanders Academy (Cartoon), Monster High (Cartoon 2010), Ever After High, The Dragon Prince (Cartoon), Lego Ninjago, LEGO Monkie Kid, LEGO Nexo Knights, No Fandom, Hunter X Hunter, 七つの大罪 - 鈴木央 | Nanatsu no Taizai | The Seven Deadly Sins - Suzuki Nakaba (Anime & Manga), Fairy Tail, Soul Eater, Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic, ナンバカ | Nanbaka, more to be added - Fandom Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage Categories: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi Relationships: Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto, Hatake Kakashi/Maito Gai | Might Guy, Gaara/Rock Lee, Jiraiya/Tsunade (Naruto), Haruno Sakura/Yamanaka Ino, Aang/Katara (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar), Toph Beifong/Suki, Korra/Asami Sato, Boscha/Willow Park, Hunter | The Golden Guard/Gus Porter, Lilith Clawthorne/Camila Noceda, Eda Clawthorne/Raine Whispers, Amity Blight/Luz Noceda, Emira Blight/Viney, Edric Blight/Jerbo, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added October 18, 2022 at 03:08AM

#IFTTT #Zukka #AO3Feed Zukka #Sokka/Zuko

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depressedhatakekakashi · 10 months

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One Day A Year

Words: 1742

Note: thank you to @skykashi for giving it a quick read and assuring me i hadn’t done a terrible job 💜💜💜

Au: Iwa Gai

@kakagaievents

Tanabata had always been Kakashi’s favourite holiday. As a kid he would always grab the old story book that his father kept in the bookshelf and shove it into his father’s hands so that he would read it. Even if his father was still laying in bed peacefully sleeping, Kakashi would wake him up with demands to hear his favourite story.

After his father’s death he resorted to reading the story to himself every Tanabanta. There was one year that he’d debated asking Minato-Sensei to read it to him, but to do so would mean admitting he missed hearing the silly voices his father would put on for all of the character’s, and he wasn’t ready to do that yet. So, instead he read to himself in the quiet of his empty house. With no one cuddled up against his side adding stupid commentary to the story or making silly voices.

This year was diffrent.

This year, he wasn’t alone.

“Read it,” Gai nudged him with an elbow, smiling that stupid bright smile of his when Kakashi glared his way. “You brought the book to read, right?”

“I did.”

“Then read it,” placing a hand against Kakashi’s hand, he gently pushed the book towards him. “Please?”

Kakashi refrained from rolling his eyes. “We’re supposed to be on a mission,” he reminded the other man. “Separate missions.”

“Well, we sort of are.” there was no mention of the nature of their missions or the fact that they shouldn’t be here, sitting side by side as if they were friends. Gai never spoke about that stuff. Never acknowledged it, because to do so would mean admitting that what they were doing was wrong.

Maito Gai didn’t like admitting he was wrong.

Kakashi wasn’t any better, though. Sure, he was willing to admit that meeting up with an Iwagakure shinobi while he was on a mission wasn’t the ‘right’ thing to do, but that didn’t stop him.

“Please,” Gai’s finger’s drummed against his hand. “It’s my favorite story, and you’re my favorite person. It’s a perfect match.”

Snorting, Kakashi cracked the book open. “You’re cheesy.”

“You love it.” a fact that they both knew was true, even without Kakashi having to confirm it. If he didn’t love it he wouldn’t be here, sitting side by side with an enemy shinobi enjoying the feeling of his touch against his skin.

“The story of star crossed lovers,” he began, adding a little energy into his voice. “Once upon a time there was a princess named Orihime who could sew the most beautiful clothing.”

The words rolled off of his tongue. He didn’t even have to look at the pages to know what to say next. Every single word was committed to memory after years of reading the same story over and over again. It didn’t matter if he spared a glance towards Gai and dared to watch as he leaned in a little closer and smiled a little wider at the sight of the beautifully painted picture on each page. The words continued to fall, one after the other in a perfect retelling of a story older than either of their villages.

With each page he finished he could feel Gai leaning into him a bit more. At first his weight rested slightly against Kakashi’s shoulder, but by the time he reached the end of the story and closed the book he was practically laying across his lap.

“Comfy?” He asked, staring at the man who had so willingly made his lap his home.

“Very,” Gai grinned, his eyes sparkling with what Kakashi could only assume was excitement. “You’re really good at telling that story.”

Shoving a hand against Gai’s cheek, Kakashi shoved him away with a groan. “You’re the worst.” he grumbled, annoyed by the warm feeling that filled his chest. It was a feeling he only ever seemed to get when he was around Gai, and which he tried desperately to ignore for his own sanity.

It was hard, though. Whenever Gai smiled or laughed that feeling would spread more. It would reached from his chest all the way into his cheeks, tinting his skin a bright red that burned so bright that he could feel his body heating up with it. As if a sun was burning inside of him.

A sun by the name of Maito Gai.

“You like it,” Gai chuckled as he shoved Kakashi’s hand away from his face. “Admit it.”

“No.” He turned away, refusing to meet Gai’s eye. “And would you stop pushing it? You know better.”

They both did, but that didn’t stop them.

It never had.

No matter how much they told each other that what they were doing was wrong, they kept doing it. Putting off mission’s to spend a few precious minutes together. Seeking out each other’s company even though they knew that if anyone caught them they would be punished.

Settling back into his spot, Gai tilted his head back and stared up at the sky. It was still mid day so they couldn’t see the stars, but they didn’t need to. The story told it all. Orihime and the Cow hearder would see each other today, just as they did every year on the seventh of July.

It was their one day to be together.

“Do you think…” Kakashi trailed off. There was a lot of things he wished he could ask Gai, but he always kept it to himself. Questions that stayed tucked away, hidden from the rest of the world even when he wanted so desperately to scream them at the top of his lungs.

“It’s July Seventh,” Gai smiled up at the sky, his eyes sparkling even brighter than they usually did. “I’ts their day.”

“Their day,” Kakashi repeated the words, willing himself to memorize them in the way that they were meant to be memorized. The Seventh of July was the day of Lover’s. Orihime and the cow herders day to spend together while the rest of the year the world would force them apart so that they could focus on their jobs.

So that they could be the hard working seamstress and the dedicated cow hearder, instead of getting lost in each other’s love and forgetting all about their duties.

It was their day, not Kakashi’s. They were the one’s that had stories told about a love that held strong no matter how much distance was put between them.

Gai nudged his shoulder, forcing him to push aside his thoughts and return to the present where he was sitting under the open sky beside Maito Gai. Iwagakure shinobi, enemy of Konoha, and the one who had stolen Kakashi’s heart.

Though, he’d never admit it out loud. That would mean dealing with his feelings and having to make a choice that he didn’t want to make. A choice between staying loyal to his village, or following his heart.

“It could be our day, if you want,” Gai offered. “One day a year. What do you think?’

Kakashi stared at him as though he’d grown a second head. “Our day?”

“Ya,” The smile on Gai’s face grew impossibly wide. “One day where no matter what’s going on, we meet up.”

The idea sounded ridiculous. A specific day just for them to shirk their duties and hang out. A day when they didn’t have to be enemy shinobi, but instead they could just be them. Kakashi and Gai, star crossed lovers.

“Where?” He asked, unsure of whether or not he should be agreeing to such a ridiculous idea so quickly.

“Why not right here?” Gai answered as he patted the ground between them. “This is where we always meet up if we’re in the area, so why not just make it officially our spot?”

Our spot.

His heart skipped a beat.

A spot just for them. A place where they didn’t need to pretend that they didn’t want to be together. Where they could simply exist without restrictions.

“July Seventh,” he turned his eyes towards the sky, a smile tugging at the edges of his lips as he thought about the ridiculous idea Gai had just presented to him. “Tanabanta.”

“Their day and ours,” Gai leaned into his side once again. His head dropped against Kakashi’s shoulder, and as he let out a small, content sigh Kakashi could feel all of his worries washing away for just a few precious moments. “A day for star crossed lovers. It seem’s perfect, doesn’t it?”

Kakashi wanted to cry.

He wanted to wax poetics about what a perfect choice it was for them and how much he looked forward to it even though they’d only just come up with the idea.

Instead, he rested his head against Gai’s and closed his eyes. “Perfect.” he whispered his agreement. “

July Seventh. A day when Konoha would be bust celebrating star crossed lovers with food and games. For the rest of the year Kakashi would be dedicated to his job doing missions and protecting Konoha, just as the cow hearder was dedicated to caring for the gods cows.

But every July seventh he would steal away a day for himself. He’d sneak away from the confines of his village to spend time with the one who had stolen his heart. The one who he couldn’t be with, no matter how much he wanted to be, at any other time throughout the year.

“It’ll only be one day a year,” he whispered as his heart ached. It wasn’t as though the two of them saw each other any more than that. In fact, it there had been years in the past where they hadn’t seen each other at all. A set day would at least guarantee them that one day even if it was all they got. “Like Orihime and the cow hearder.”

“One day a year to love you,” Gai corrected him. “That’s better than nothing.”

Tanabata was Kakashi’s favorite holiday. It always had been.

It seemed only fitting that he would take that holiday and use it for himself. Surely Orihime and the cow hearder would understand. If they were to look down on the earth during their time together and see Kakashi and Gai sitting there staring up at the sky together, they would see two human’s who faced the exact same problem as they did.

They would be more than happy to share their day with Kakashi and Gai, of that Kakashi was certain.

#iwa Gai #Kakagai #Taryn delves head forst back into the Iwa Au #i don’t know why #i just got an idea and two of my friends liked that idea #so here we are!

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