Paper Moon

by Anjelle

Summary:

His son is eight years old when Sakumo takes his own life. Then he wakes up in a long-forgotten room, in a body not his own. He's not sure when or why but he's there, awake when he shouldn't even be alive, and everything around him has changed.

This body is not his own and Kakashi is no longer eight years old.

Notes:

I wanted to practice present tense because I've never written in it before. So I was like 'okay, I'll just write a 1K drabble' and um. You know how it goes. 24 hours later and it's 17K and it's over and the whole thing is absurd and I'm sorry. A warning that I skewered the timeline a bit. I'm not sure how noticeable it is, though.

A warning that the first 2 scenes deal with Sakumo's suicide and suicidal thoughts, but the rest should be more or less okay other than some brooding and regrets.

He casts his eyes out into the darkness of the room, broken by moonlight that seeps in through the lone window, casting long shadows across the hardwood floor. He breaths and the sheath of his tantō clatters to his feet, its blade reflecting pale from the glow of the moon. There are thoughts there, and there is hesitance because he knows what he’s about to do can never be undone, but it’s something that he’s come to terms with long before tonight.

He sees the way that his son looks at him, hears the voices of the village erupting all around him with bitterness and venom in their words, and it is enough. He’s had enough. If what he did that day was truly a mistake then he will regain his honour the only way that he can, the only way he deserves.

It… hurts, a bit, knowing that he’ll never see the fine shinobi that his son will grow into. But that’s fine, it is , because he already knows, can already see ghosts of the great things that Kakashi will grow up to do in the young boy that he’s spent the last eight years raising. It is a small comfort but one that he holds dear as he closes his eyes and raises his blade and breathes.

There’s pain and he chokes, gritting his teeth as he pushes the blade deeper into his abdomen. A cold rush consumes him, starting from the tips of his fingers and toes and working its way inward. His legs shake, weak beneath his weight, and soon he’s sprawled out across the floor, staring vacant-eyed at the wall. His breaths are raspy and wet and weakening by the second, and he waits out the bloodloss, feels the body around him breaking down, feels himself dying , and thinks with a fading hope that at least now, his son can live with honour.

He thinks of Kakashi’s face and smiles, even as he remembers the hard looks and cold silence that seems so common as of late. Live well, my boy. Live long. Be loyal and be kind. Be the man that I never could.

The light fades from his eyes and the world goes numb, and all he can think is that it is a blessing to leave on such a beautiful night.

---

 

The first thing he wonders when he wakes up is ‘why am I waking up?’ It’s a jolting thought, one that has his eyes open mere seconds after coming back to the world, and he’s staring at the very same wall he watched as the life left his body. But his body is very warm for being very dead and he frowns as a chill runs through him, a chill of the room and not a chill of the self. His arms come up, wrap around each other, and he curls inward as he tries to capitalize on his body heat. After a time, he deems it a failed endeavour and pushes up from the floorboards to sit upright. There are many things wrong that all come to attention at once and he wavers, bringing a hand to press against his forehead as he tries to order his stray thoughts.

This is not the room he was just in, he surmises. It looks the same, with the very same window casting bars of moonlight in a square across the floor, the sliding door on the adjacent wall right where he remembers it, but it is not his room. The air is thick with musk and age, a light film covering the windowsill, the glass tinged and weathered and streaked, and he never kept his home in such a state. Sakumo was an orderly man in life, and though he is very unsure of what state of life or death he is in, he is certain of that . There are cobwebs in the corners, things crawling out of the dark, stretching shadows, and he frowns at the state of disrepair around him.

What is this?

The other thing he notices is that something feels off about his body. Unfamiliar. Wrong. He’s not sure he wants to know what's so off about it, is pretty sure that he’s better off not knowing. But Sakumo is a dead man, he reminds himself, and no matter what it is, it cannot possibly be worse than death. The fact that there is air in his lungs and light in his eyes is more than he deserves. So he sucks in a breath, pulls his hands down in front of his eyes, and stares, taking one breath at a time. They're small hands, with tiny, stubby fingers. When he sees them, he thinks of Kakashi, of the son that he left behind in an unfair world. He does not think of himself, of Konoha's White Fang. He does not think of a weathered shinobi, but of a fresh genin, budding and new with so much potential to be something great .

These are not his hands.

Sakumo looks down at himself and frowns more. He realizes that he would be naked, if not for the very oversized jōnin uniform pooling around his body, the desaturated green vest hanging loose around his shoulders. He died in that uniform. He should have died in that uniform. Then he lifts a hand, touches the hitai-ate hung limp around his neck, and thinks that it must have slid off his forehead when his body became… whatever it is now.

The last thing he notices is his tantō on the floor beside him. He lifts it—it feels uncomfortably large in his hand—and turns it, seeing himself in the aged and dull blade. Big, dark eyes stare back. Kakashi , he thinks, but that’s not quite right. As he gets a closer look at himself, he realizes that no, that’s not Kakashi, that’s a face he knows well. His own face. A face from decades past, the face of his childhood.

“Why…”

His voice is raspy and hoarse, unused, and he coughs as the word scratches the back of his throat. With a frustrated groan, he cards a hand through his hair, shakes himself free of the blank stupor of his thoughts, and allows the tantō to fall back to the floor forgotten. He could end everything again, really. He could drive that blade through his abdomen a second time that night and taste a death as hauntingly real as the first. But it feels wrong in a body so small, and he can’t even bring himself to truly consider it. And, above all, there’s a mystery in there somewhere. Uncertainty. Curiosity.

Why is he like this?

Sakumo makes up his mind and loses the vest—it’s too big and bulky against his lithe form, and the oversized pants and shirt are bad enough. He doesn’t even think about trying to put on his sandals.

He tries for the light but there’s no electricity. Fantastic. Okay, that is fine—his eyes worked well in the dark, even in this strange, foreign body. He slides open the door and pads out into the hall, then locates his son’s room. It’s there, at the end of the hall like it always is, and he finds it just as abandoned and dark as the rest of the estate. He hates that. But that’s something to mull over some other time. The boy’s clothes are there, even if the boy is not, and they fit pretty decently, all things considered. They’re a bit too tight, a bit too small, and he decides that this body is at least a little older than his son. Ten, maybe? Twelve? At the very least, he’s somewhere close to genin age. Ever the optimist—at least in his younger years—Sakumo decides that he’s grateful to not be any younger. It would be shameful, trying to act a parental figure while in a body younger than his own son.

Not that he’s a stranger to shame, really.

Flexing and twisting to test his new robes, Sakumo deems himself satisfied and heads out the front entrance. If nothing else, meeting with the Hokage should shed some light on the situation. Well, maybe not light. But the Hokage is the man Sakumo trusts mosts in the world. At the very least, he’ll have support. It… would be nice to have, that.

Sakumo sees the front garden as he passes and it breaks his broken heart. The plants are long dead, a forgotten, shrivelled brown, like they haven’t seen water in decades. He thinks to get a good look at the body of the estate but can’t bring himself to turn around, to see what it’s become or to wonder what strange world this is.

With a heavy heart, he slips out the front gate and follows a path he walked many times before, his body moving naturally through the streets, and he tries to swallow the oncoming sense of wrongness in his mind.

---

 

It turns out that trying to walk into the Hokage office in the middle of the night looking like the poster child of a newly graduated genin is not the wisest thing to do. Lord Third’s bodyguards decidedly do not let him waltz in for a chat, and while he should have expected as much, he didn’t. Having unplanned audiences with the Hokage was never something he had an issue with. He was Konoha’s White Fang. Dishonoured or not, that title still stood, and he never thought to consider being turned away at the door.

He takes a few steps back from the front of the building, dips out of the line of the guards’ sights, and looks at his hands, flexing them experimentally. He wonders if he still has full control of his chakra in that body. He wonders if he can still do the things that he did as an adult.

After a moment, he shakes his head and snickers. What is he thinking?

Sakumo reaches for his chakra and is pleased to find that it still obeys, bringing his hands into a half-thought hand seal as he decides that a quick shunshin will solve the problem.

Before he can complete it, he hears something. A shiver crawls up the back of his neck and he lunges left, hitting the ground with a duck-and-roll and sliding through the dirt. The kunai aimed at him imbeds itself in the bark of a tree and he curses himself for not sensing the enemy sooner; he’s the White Fang and it’s a disgrace for him to overlook something so simple. His hand goes to his kunai pouch—except that he doesn’t have his kunai pouch and is completely unarmed and he regrets leaving his tantō behind at the estate. But Sakumo has seen worse and they’re in the middle of Konoha, not out in the forests, and this is about as best he could get for an upper hand.

He eyes the kunai in the tree. It’s there, just waiting to be taken, and he thinks that maybe with that he can turn the tables. The attacker hasn’t shown himself yet, but Sakumo can smell him. The scent is vaguely familiar, and he wonders if he knows the assailant.

The moment he tries to make a grab for it, another kunai shoots out from the leaves. He pulls back just in time to save his hand and his brow furrows. His reflexes are duller. He isn’t sure if that’s a result of the body or his own disorientation, or perhaps it’s his punishment for not taking on any big missions in so long.

“Ah ah,” a lazy voice drolls out from somewhere, chastising and teasing all at once. “Kids shouldn’t be out playing so late at night.”

Sakumo twitches and his eyes snap up to the figure seated on one of the low-hanging branches. The man’s legs dangle overhead, one arm resting lightly on his knee, a book hanging loosely from his fingertips. The other is held up warningly, shuriken looped around bent fingers.

A lazy eye fixes Sakumo under an entirely indifferent glare.

Sakumo’s eyes shift again to the imbedded kunai, and he considers.

“I wouldn’t.” The man is smiling behind a black mask, his crinkled eye the only real tell. But Sakumo notices then that this stranger is wearing a standard jōnin uniform. He thinks that maybe it’s another of Lord Third’s bodyguards, though he doesn’t remember ever seeing this one before. But, well, he doesn’t recognise the other two, either. Perhaps that’s his own fault for being caught up in his own failures for so long. He’s ignored the world around him for a great many months, and it’s never weighed on him more than it does now.

If this really is a Konoha-nin, then he doesn’t need to fight. There’s no real danger, and in a body so much physically weaker than what he’s used to, he isn’t sure he could win. So, with a steady breath, he lowers his arms to his sides and considers the man carefully. “I need to see Lord Hokage,” he states, swallowing the dryness in his mouth. “It’s urgent.”

“An urgent summons from a genin,” the man muses, nodding. “I’m sure this can’t wait.”

“I’m serious , Shinobi,” he urges. “ Please .”

The man’s eye bears down on him through the shadows of the leaves before he slides off the branch and hits the ground with a powerful thud . Sakumo braces himself, eyes narrow and waiting, and the man has a perfectly patronizing smile in place. “Maa maa,” he drolls, “what a scary face you’re making. You want to see the Hokage, don’t you?”

Sakumo watches him warily. From up close, that scent is even more familiar, nagging at the back of his thoughts, begging to be explored. The man’s pale skin and paler hair are bleached out by moonlight, his eye a dark contrast along with his dark mask and dark clothes, and he looks more phantom than shinobi in that light.

“I do,” he nods and hopes that this man is actually going to take a leap of faith and listen. “ Please .”

The man casts another empty look across Sakumo’s face, searching it for… something , and then closes his eye and hums. Aggravatingly. “What to do…”

---

 

Sakumo very much does not appreciate being treated like a child at his age. He certainly doesn’t appreciate being held up by the scruff of his shirt and left to dangle before the Third Hokage like some misbehaving brat. Sakumo doesn’t squirm because that would be undignified. He settles instead to shoot his captor a dark look that goes pointedly ignored. The most aggravating part of it all is probably the man in question—this unknown jōnin whose colouring looks so typical of the Hatake clan. That can’t be, Sakumo knows; he and his son are the last of his clan. Still, it’s an unnerving thought that sticks with him far longer than it probably should.

Hiruzen looks up from the many forms on his desk, his pipe drawn halfway to his lips, and he settles them beneath fond amusement. “And who’s this you’ve brought me?”

It’s only when Sakumo pries his attention away from the jōnin to give his Hokage the body of his attention that he makes the solemn discovery of just how old and weathered dear Hiruzen looks. The man has aged decades in the span of a night and Sakumo finds his words stuck in his throat as he tries to understand just what this means.

Sakumo is dropped, then, and manages to land deftly on his feet despite his stupor. He takes a few slow, unsteady steps forward, studying the old man’s kind eyes and fond smile. “Lord Hokage…”

Hiruzen raises an eyebrow and considers his pipe a moment longer before setting it down on the desk. His hands come together, fingers interlocked as he leans forward. “It’s not like you to make unplanned visits, Kakashi.”

Wait. what?

Sakumo looks down at himself, at his hands, and then out the large windows behind the Hokage. He sees himself in their reflection, small and young and looking so very much unlike himself, and it’s a sobering sight. He realizes that, at that age, he really does share a strong resemblance with his son. It’s… surreal, hearing Hiruzen mistake him for his boy, but he tries to think of it optimistically. At least that means Hiruzen sees the similarities, and that should make explaining who he really is a lot simpler than it would otherwise be.

“Ah.”

Sakumo’s brows twitch and he slowly turns on the jōnin, still wearing that same lazy slouch with that same indifferent tone even in the face of the Hokage. Hands in his pockets. Shifting his weight.

A dark eye falls on him, bearing down on him, and he takes a step back. “I found him skulking around back. It seems he has urgent business with you,” he says, and there is something mocking hidden there somewhere, “but the guards wouldn’t let him pass.”

“Is that so?”

Sakumo frowns, facing forward again. Hiruzen looks amused. There’s something… not right about this. Kakashi is…

No. Hiruzen wasn’t referring to Sakumo when he said that name. So then…

“I best see to it, then,” Hiruzen states, nodding to the door. “Would you mind waiting outside a moment?”

“Of course.” Kakashi closes his eye and bows his head. He settles Sakumo beneath one more look before turning out of the room. Then Kakashi’s gone and they’re left alone.

Kakashi.

That man, that strange, lazy jōnin…

It can’t be.

Hiruzen clearing his throat is what snaps Sakumo out of his stupor. His mouth opens and closes and he finally remembers his manners, taking a knee and lowering his head. “I’m sorry, Lord Hokage. I forgot myself for a moment.”

There’s a laugh, low and quiet at the back of Hiruzen’s throat. He sounds fond and tired and so many things all at once. “Up, child. There’s no need for that.”

Sakumo’s mouth is pulled taut and he hesitantly rises back to his feet. It feels… odd, being called a child by that man. He can so clearly remember fighting alongside that man, can remember the war and everything that came from it. Hiruzen has never called him a child before, and the whole thing is surreal.

“What is it you need?” Hiruzen asks.

Sakumo opens his mouth to say, but his eyes find the door and he’s thinking of the jōnin looming beyond it, of the scent that’s still lingering faintly in the room, and he can’t help but ask, “That young man… That was Kakashi Hatake?”

Hiruzen closes his eyes and hums. “So word of the Copy-nin has even reached someone so young. I’m not surprised.”

Copy-nin?

Sakumo is practiced at remaining calm, is able to smother his frantic thoughts down long enough to focus on the issue at hand, but he can’t stop them from wandering every now and then despite himself. “Lord Hiruzen,” he starts, hoping that his young voice can still carry with it the gravity of his words. “What I have to say may sound absurd. But I implore you, please listen until the end.”

Hiruzen’s eyes narrow but he does not speak.

“I’m Sakumo,” he states bluntly, placing a hand on his chest. “Sakumo Hatake. I know I don’t look like myself, Hiruzen, but please—”

“You’d best do a quick job of convincing me, boy,” Hiruzen warns. His voice is calm and level as always but there is urgency in those words, and Sakumo has known him long enough to see a fine rage bubbling beneath those tired eyes.

“We fought together, Hiruzen,” he quickly urges, his mouth dry as he licks his lips. “In the Second Shinobi World War. You sent me into Suna territory to scout before the bulk of our battalion could get there. That’s where I got—”

Sakumo’s eyes widen and he prays to the Sage that this body really is his own as he pulls down his shirt, freeing his right arm, and cranes his neck around to get a look at his shoulder. He can’t make out much but can see the bleached white edge of a scar and feels relief. He strides around the Hokage’s desk and presents it proudly to Hiruzen, feels a ghost of a smile tug at his lips because for all that it’s a painful memory it’s proof and it’s just what he needs. He can see the recognition in those old eyes as they switch from the scar to Sakumo’s face.

“When I went ahead,” he continues, “there was an ambush waiting, do you remember? I was gone an additional four hours because of it.”

“You—” Hiruzen considers him then, really looks at him, and reaches for his pipe. “You almost lost your arm that day. Tsunade is the only reason you made it out in one piece, you fool.”

Sakumo laughs because that chastising tone is so achingly familiar and because he’s recognised and it feels like this is the first good thing to happen to him since he woke up in that dusty old room. He feels like he can breathe fully for the first time all night and slides his arm back into its sleeve.

Then there are arms on his shoulders, gentle but firm, and a tired old man is staring at him with a million questions that he just doesn’t have the answers to.

“By the Sage,” Hiruzen breaths. One of the hands lift to his chin and he allows it when his head is turned left then right. “How?”

“I—” He swallows and can’t meet the Hokage’s eyes. “I’m… not sure, if I’m entirely honest. I woke up here, like this. After…”

Hiruzen waits, finally releasing him, and this time he does light his pipe.

Sakumo doesn’t want to say it, to admit his weaknesses to this man that he respects and admires wholeheartedly. He knows that it’s foolish, that if he died Hiruzen would have learned the truth regardless, but it’s still a hard thing to face head-on. “After I tried to end my life.”

Hiruzen’s face turns hard. He closes his eyes, breathes out a plume of smoke, and twists around in his chair to stare out at the night. “You come from that night,” he sighs, nods. He seems to come to terms with something then and hums. “You died that night, old friend. You have been gone for well over a decade.”

Sakumo just nods, solemn and reflecting. He’s already gathered as much from what he’s seen of this world. The buildings aren’t as he remembers and even the walk there was fraught with strange new sights in a world that was not his own. But hearing it spoken aloud is hard in its own right, too.

He casts his eyes to the door and breathes. “That young man…”

“Your son.”

Sakumo thought as much. It stings to hear and he wonders what’s become of the bright boy that he knew, for him to turn out so… bizarre. So unlike himself.

“You mustn’t think poorly of him,” Hiruzen cautions, as though he can read Sakumo like a book. “Life has been hard on that boy.”

Sakumo smiles. It’s tired and bittersweet and more than he feels like the can conjure at the moment, but he tries nonetheless. “I would never think lowly of my boy.”

“I’m glad.” Hiruzen smiles back but his holds more weight to it, as though he’s staring into the face of nostalgia. It only lasts a moment before it fades to careful consideration as he drums his fingers thoughtfully along the arm of his chair, eyes wandering the small body before him. “We need to find a place for you, first and foremost.”

“That won’t be a problem,” Sakumo assures. “I can—”

“No.” He’s shot down before he can even get the words out. Hiruzen looks dead-set on that decision, and Sakumo knows that there’s no arguing with him when he’s like this. “The Hatake estate has been abandoned for a great many years, old friend. You can’t stay there.”

Sakumo sighs, rubbing the back of his neck, his other hand resting on his hip to keep from fidgeting. “I’m not sure where else I could—”

They exchange looks then, silent words passing between them. Hiruzen arches a brow, thoughtful and amused, then he considers Sakumo’s new body a second time. “You certainly still look like yourself,” he muses, “if a little young.”

“I do,” Sakumo acknowledges, his eyes flitting to the door. “I carry with me all the markers of the Hatake clan, even as I am now.”

“It will defile your name,” Hiruzen cautions.

Sakumo lets out a jaded laugh and lowers his eyes to his hands, so small and insignificant and reminding him of the young boy that he left behind. “My name has already been raked through the mud. There’s no honour left to spare.”

Hiruzen sighes, long and burdened, and pinches the bridge of his nose as he turns to face forward. They both brace themselves, steel themselves against whatever chaos this may dredge up, and Hiruzen carries his voice, “Kakashi.”

The door opens and Sakumo can feel the thunderous beating of his heart as the young man from earlier enters. Sakumo can see the cover of an orange book being slid back into his pocket. Kakashi is well-read, he remembers, but not… not like this. What is that boy reading?

Who is this boy?

“You called, Lord Hokage?”

Hiruzen clears his throat and relaxes into his seat. He pushes Sakumo forward, a hand on the boy’s back, and nods to the jōnin. “I have a favour to ask of you.”

Kakashi raises an eyebrow but says nothing.

“This boy,” he gestures, pushing again, and Sakumo stumbles forward. “I would like to ask you to look after him for a time.”

Kakashi’s gaze is empty even as he manages a short, “I’m sorry?”

This is the moment. Sakumo is sure that this will end badly, and that if his son bothers to do the math that none of this will add up, but it’s just a cover story—a temporary way in, because he doubts that Kakashi will go along with this situation as easily as Hiruzen is. It doesn’t need to be a permanent fix, just a start, and what Hiruzen’s about to say is so ludicrous that it’s likely to stall any deeper thoughts.

If Hiruzen’s word is to be trusted—and Sakumo would never doubt him—then Sakumo’s death succeeded many years ago. Kakashi grew up without a father. Knowing that, he feels that perhaps it’s wise not to tell the boy who he is so suddenly. What does Kakashi think of him now? Is there resentment, hate?

Hiruzen sets Kakashi beneath a careful gaze. “This boy is Sakumo Hatake,” he states. There’s a flash of— something —across Kakashi’s face. “He’s your brother.”

“I am an only child,” Kakashi corrects quickly, but his eye does glance to the boy, settle there, and even beneath the practiced indifference Sakumo knows that there’s something going on in that man’s head.

Hiruzen nods. “I thought so, too.” Nice touch.

“With all respect, Lord Hokage—”

“He carries the markers of a true Hatake,” Hiruzen cuts in firmly, placing a hand atop Sakumo’s head, carding a hand through his hair, and Sakumo isn’t sure how he feels about that. But, well, best to suck it up, right? He may be seeing a lot of it. “I see your father in him.”

That time Sakumo definitely sees something in that dark eye, a crack beneath the practiced mask. He thinks it’s okay if Kakashi hates him because he probably deserves it. No, not probably. Definitely. For all that he’s put the boy through… and now he’s just making it worse, isn’t he?

Hiruzen tilts his head forward, the brim of his hat falling over his eyes. “He has no home to return to, Kakashi. If nothing else, do this as a favour to this old fool. I can’t bear to see him on the streets, and it will be hard to find a place for him on such short notice.”

For a moment, Kakashi isn’t slouching. But the moment is over quickly and then he is, and his hand is in his pocket as he sizes the boy up.

Sakumo watches quietly, meeting his eye. What are you thinking, hm?

---

 

Kakashi abandoned the family estate in favour of a small, one bedroom apartment. That’s fine , Sakumo thinks, because he lost his right to an opinion on his son’s choices when he made the decision to end his life. A part of him can’t help but be bitter about it, though.

The apartment is tiny and cramped and empty. He thought that when he saw it, he’d get to know a little bit more about the man that his son became, who he is and what path he’s walking down now as an adult. But there’s nothing, aside from a small shelf of books in the living room, and perhaps that’s more telling than it ought to be. There’s very little furniture, too. No pictures on the walls or knick knacks on the tables.

Kakashi looks down at him then, vest half off, and nods to the living room. “Go on.”

Sakumo nods. It feels like he’s intruding as he takes off his shoes and steps inside. For all that Kakashi is his son, Kakashi does not feel like his son. It feels like he’s gone to stay with a stranger—like his little son is waiting for him back home and like he should be there and not here . He swallows those nonsense feelings and takes a seat on one of the chairs. Now he doesn’t know what to do. He’s at a loss.

Kakashi drags himself into the living room as well and drops onto the beige sofa beneath the large window of the far wall, stretching out cross it. One hand is cushioning his head, the other is cracking open the spine of that orange book, and Sakumo stares at the title carefully. His stomach lurches when he reads it, and he has to look away when he sees the ‘mature’ label across the back.

To him, Kakashi is the eight-year-old chunin prodigy he’s raised by himself for the past few years. For all that he’s a chunin, Kakashi is still a little kid, will always be a kid—even if he’s a jōnin or the damn Fourth Hokage. To see him reading—was that porn ?

Sakumo covers his face with his hands and breaths. He can do this. He can. For all that he’s changed, this young man is the son that he loves. The best part of his life.

Lately, though, when he looks at Kakashi, he finds the boy giving him the same cold looks that he gets from everyone else.

When he finally gets up the courage to lower his hands, Sakumo finds a dark eye on him. He sits up straight, feeling like he’s being judged, analyzed. Then it’s gone. It doesn’t feel like he can relax, though.

“He must have died before you were born,” Kakashi muses. His words hold no inflection, no tell, and that’s the most troubling thing of all.

Sakumo considers that a moment. It looks like Kakashi’s already started with the math. He hums, eyes to the ceiling, and then nods. “That sounds about right.”

Then the room is quiet. But Sakumo is coming to understand that he does not like the quiet. The quiet is cold and choking and it forces him to think . Only bad things seem to come when he starts to think. He thinks about his son, about where life took Kakashi in the years since his departure. But he does not want to think about that.

So, he finds something else to fixate on.

“Hey,” he calls, his eyes sliding back to his son. They settle on the slanted hitai-ate. It’s been bothering him ever since he found out who Kakashi is. “Why do you cover your eye?”

A hand automatically goes up to press against the metal plate and Kakashi hums, using his other hand to turn the page of his book. “I wonder.”

Fine, alright. Kakashi won’t trust him with that. That’s fine. Sakumo probably doesn’t deserve an answer.

He takes a breath and tries not to sigh. This is going to be a very long night.

---

 

Kakashi’s idea of sustaining himself is food pills and ration bars. This, Sakumo decides, is wholly unhealthy. It makes him hate the tiny size of his body, the knowledge that he has no place to lecture the man. But , he thinks, I’m a child. I have my own way of lecturing.

Complaining, he decides, is mildly satisfying. He nags his son about the sheer lack of real food in the fridge and, come morning, he’s pleased to find the boy at the door readying to go out. Sakumo goes with him, because if all Kakashi has is food pills then the likelihood that he can trust Kakashi to handle grocery shopping by himself is slim.

What happened to you, child? He always thought his boy would make such a responsible adult.

It turns out that it’s good he tags along because he’s left to do a bulk of the work. Kakashi is relegated to ‘money dispenser.’ Whatever Sakumo picks out, Kakashi throws money at. It, too, is satisfying. He thinks that he can make some pretty delicious meals with everything they pick up. Kakashi isn’t so optimistic; with every demand he’s met with, he insists that they don’t need it. Sakumo doesn’t relent so easily, though, and tends to win most of the debates. Kakashi’s reluctant to part with his money but not so reluctant that he starves. That’s fair.

They head back from the market and Sakumo looks down at his hands, flexing them, wondering if he could take on missions as he is. He’ll need a new tantō—something lighter, at the very least, so that he can maintain his reflexes. And he’ll need to train to see just where his skills are at. He hopes that Hiruzen will let him on B-rank missions, at least, so that he can repay Kakashi for all of the food.

Sakumo does not like having to rely on his son. Kakashi should be relying on him—should be allowed to rely on him.

They’re halfway home when he pauses and thinks. Kakashi notices—eventually—and twists around to settle him under an indifferent stare. Sakumo smiles. “Would you mind stopping by the training grounds?”

---

 

To his dismay, Kakashi doesn’t carry a tantō with him. Kakashi doesn’t use one at all, in fact. That, like everything else, is fine.

Sakumo steals every weapon that Kakashi does have for target practice and substitutes his tantō with a decently weighted branch. He launches himself at the training posts with practiced speed but the whole thing feels off—his body is too small, he carries no weight, and his swings don’t hit with the impact that they usually would. There’s a definite loss in power. It makes him wish that his proficiency lied in ninjutsu, not kenjutsu, so that the physical limitations of his new body wouldn’t be such a hard blow. Still, there’s something there—a strength to be sharpened. With some training, he’ll still have bite to his swings, even if it takes time to mature back into Konoha’s White Fang.

Kakashi’s watching him. He can feel it—a lazy eye settling on his back from the bench. Kakashi drapes an arm over the back of the bench as he reads that embarrassing little book of his— porn , Sakumo reminds himself, in public —but his focus is split. For all that he looks like he doesn’t care, he’s watching. He’s curious.

Kakashi wants to know what his ‘little brother’ can do.

It’s a comforting thought that, despite outward appearance, Kakashi is still interested in shinobi skills; Sakumo worried that all of his boy’s passions were dead and gone.

Once he’s decided he’s sufficiently tired, Sakumo twists around to smile at his son. Kakashi isn’t looking anymore, but Sakumo is no fool. There’s curiosity still, even if hidden away. “Not bad, eh?”

Kakashi flips the page of his book. “Kenjutsu,” he observes, humming. “Like him.”

Sakumo’s smile falls. “I suppose so,” he nods. “What about you? What’s your specialty?”

“Maa,” Kakashi dismisses, “that’s neither here nor there.”

Another diversion. Kakashi doesn’t like giving straight answers.

“Taijutsu?” he prods, and already knows the answer. It amuses him to see the faint twitch of Kakashi’s brow at the mention of it. He walks over after gathering up the ninja tools and returning them to Kakashi’s confiscated pouch. “No? Genjutsu, maybe?” It’s still only a formality. He knows what his boy’s proficient at. What kind of father would he be if he didn’t? Well, he’s already a bad father. Worse, then, he supposes.

“Ninjutsu, then.”

Sakumo takes a seat beside his son on the bench and leans in close, pretending to try to catch a glimpse of what’s written in the book. To his horror, Kakashi doesn’t try to hide it. Bold, if nothing else. He makes a face, because he’s supposed to be a kid and not a horrified parent, and leans away again.

Kakashi’s eye flicks up, watching him, and there may be the faintest traces of amusement in there somewhere but Sakumo isn’t sure.

“You look like him,” Kakashi states simply. The words are so soft, so calm that Sakumo almost overlooks them.

“Do I?”

“Ah,” he nods. “Pity.”

Sakumo isn’t really sure whether to be offended or not. He raises an eyebrow and decides that it’s likely bait, because that’s what Kakashi seems to like to do—to bait people, goad them on—and Sakumo isn’t so easy a target.

He pretends to be offended, though, and crosses his arms. He thinks he can be forgiven if it comes off a little weak. “We should spar,” he decides. “What do you think?”

Kakashi smiles with cheer and thinly veiled threats. “Ahh, but Kumo,” right, Kakashi apparently refuses to use his real name on top of everything, so he’s been granted the same name as one of the enemy hidden villages, so there’s that, “I thought our spar last night was enough.”

Sakumo grins amusedly. “I wouldn’t really call that a spar.”

“Neither would I,” Kakashi hums. “There was no challenge to it.”

Sakumo is coming to understand that Kakashi’s ultimate goal is to mildly infuriate everyone that he comes into contact with. It’s a good thing, then, that Sakumo has the patience of the Sage.

They smile at one another, and it comes off as a threat on both sides.

---

 

Sakumo is in the kitchen. He has two pots going on the stove and is a bit miffed about the fact that he has to use a chair in order to reach them. He's never been an overly tall man, but he at least hasn't been so short as to need to do that in a very, very long time. Certainly much longer than Kakashi is old. It's small things like this that remind him of the absurdity of his situation. He's distracted from stirring one of the pots by that thought. For a while, he stares vacantly at nothing. Then it's time to set the table, which is a more difficult task with his gangly arms than it ever was when he prepared dinner in his own time.

In my own time. That's another strange, grounding thought. This is another time. He is a man trapped in the body of a boy, in a time where his young son is now an adult. It's absurd, really. The whole thing is. But in a way he’s… grateful. To whatever powers are at work here. At the end of his life, he gets to see his son again. There are no careful looks and muttered words. The dishonour of his past is little more than a faded memory. Things will never be the same, no. But maybe they don’t have to be.

He regrets leaving the way that he did. He wishes he had a do-over. Maybe this is his do-over. If it is, he won't waste it.

Sakumo struggles as he brings the pots off the burners. The ting of china is heard through the kitchen as he gets out the plates and bowls, and there’s a kettle going as he gets the kitchen organized. Then he serves the food, portioning it out evenly between the two places he's prepared, and it's satisfying to see. There's rice and miso and a whole host of sides because he got carried away; he hadn't felt much like cooking towards the end. Their last weeks together were filled with bland, tasteless meals.

Kakashi hasn't been watching so much as he's been listening. Scenting, too, if Sakumo has to guess; a trait of the Hatake clan is a keen sense of smell.

Sakumo smiles at him and takes one of the seats at the table. He pours himself a cup of tea and holds the cup between his hands, absorbing the pleasant warmth through the porcelain. “Well? Come sit. Quickly, before it gets cold.”

Kakashi is reluctant. That book is still glued to his palm. If Sakumo knows his boy as well as he thinks (hopes) he does then he's finished the damn thing by now. He's using it as a way to keep his hands busy, to maintain that schooled look of disinterest that he hides behind. Knowing that makes it a thousand times easier to tolerate.

Kakashi joins him. Eventually. It takes a lot of coaxing but he does get there. Kakashi picks at the food, looking so much younger than he is—a comfort, really—and then his hand goes up to the edge of his mask. But he pauses, an eye flitting over to Sakumo, and then the hand goes down. The mask stays up.

Realizing that Kakashi doesn’t want Sakumo to see his face is hard. His easy smile gets a lot harder to maintain. He tries, vainly, “What's wrong?”

Kakashi says nothing. He also does not eat.

Sakumo sucks in a breath and resigns himself to it. Then the smile is back in place. He grabs a tray from the cupboard (is a little surprised that Kakashi has one at all) and arranges his dishes on top, maneuvering until he's standing with the tray balancing between his arms. Kakashi is watching now, and he winks before heading down the hall and taking up residence in the bedroom.

He hoped to eat as a family, yes. It hurts a bit to be sent away. But the sounds he hears from down the hall, the unmistakable shifting of china and the scrape of chopsticks along the surface of a plate, is comfort enough. He closes his eyes and in his mind he's back home with his eight-year-old son seated across from him. They're sharing a meal and he is ever so content.

It's an hour later when he hears a knock at the bedroom door. He looks up to unsurprisingly find Kakashi standing there. No words pass between them. Sakumo is growing accustomed to Kakashi's silence. That silence seems to speak volumes more than his son's words do. Words are misleading; it's the quiet that really conveys Kakashi's world.

Kakashi moves the tray onto the nightstand and takes a seat on the bed in its place. He doesn’t look at Sakumo and the book is nowhere to be seen, so Kakashi is left to stare vacant-eyed at the wall.

It’s so quiet that Sakumo is confident he could fall asleep like this.

“It tasted like his,” Kakashi observes, eye distant and refusing to look his way. “...Thank you.”

Sakumo smiles, a familiar warmth bubbling up within him. He leans into his son's side and feels the way that Kakashi tenses. But Kakashi doesn't pull away, so neither does he. “You think?”

“Ahh,” he nods.

Sakumo chances a peek at his son, a teasing grin on his lips. “You're not going to say that was horrible now, are you?”

Kakashi hums as though considering it. Cheeky brat. He doesn't, though. Instead, a hand comes up and ruffles Sakumo's hair. It's a strange feeling, one he knows he'll never get used to. But it's something that he remembers doing to Kakashi, too, and there's comfort in that.

Kakashi closes his eye and takes a breath, then releases it. He shifts on the bed so that he's fully facing the boy and hooks his thumb beneath the bottom edge of his hitai-ate, pulling it up to lie straight across his forehead. The eye beneath it is closed, a long scar running over it vertically. There's a story there, one he isn't quite sure he wants to hear.

“You want to see, brat?”

Sakumo—mildly amused by the nickname—nods, scooting a bit closer.

Kakashi allows his eye to open and, through the dim lighting, Sakumo sees red. The glowing, spinning black and red of a long prominent clan in Konoha. By the Sage, where did he pick up that?

“The sharingan,” Sakumo breathes, and he finds that he can’t look away.

“You know of it,” Kakashi observes. He raises a hand to touch the skin beneath the eye, the bump and ridge of the long scar there, and sighs. “Someone precious gave me this eye. It was a gift.”

Sakumo nods. He isn't sure what he can say to that. His mind is filled with missions gone wrong, with the painful understanding that Kakashi must know what that feels like now, and it's hard. It’s hard, knowing his son has gone through that, knowing that he's likely lost people along the way.

“Transplanted sharingan are active indefinitely,” he continues. “I cover it so that I don't overuse it. Understand?”

Sakumo pulls himself from his thoughts and nods. “It drains your chakra otherwise.”

“Exactly.”

Kakashi pulls his hitai-ate down, back over his eye, and then ruffles the kid's hair again. Something about him feels… not softer, really, but perhaps less tense. The air isn't so stifling anymore, and the silence doesn't seem like its own form of threat.

Sakumo thinks back to something Hiruzen said, thinks of the sharingan and its many uses, and hums. “That's why they call you the Copy-nin.”

“Oh, look,” Kakashi starts, lowering himself down onto the mattress, “he can learn.”

One day, they were going to have a deep, meaningful conversation about how to have a deep, meaningful conversation.

---

 

It’s a bit lonely to find Kakashi gone come morning, but Sakumo understands better than most that the village comes first. He’s experienced firsthand the weight of a last minute mission tearing one away from the world, and that is okay. As much as he wishes that Kakashi warned him last night, he’s not bothered by it. For all that he’s grown into a strange young man, Kakashi is a loyal shinobi of the Leaf and Sakumo is proud.

He wonders if the mission is the reason he woke up in Kakashi’s bed and not the couch. He wonders how Kakashi managed to carry him there without rousing him. He doesn’t wonder for long, though, because between this and their first encounter, he’s coming to understand that his son knows stealth well. Sakumo was never one for stealth. He was the type to go headlong into battle wherever he could.

A day becomes a week. Sakumo uses that time to adjust to his new body, uses it to train, and by the eighth day Hiruzen agrees to allow him on missions. The first is an escort mission, simple enough, just a  two day travel across the Land of Fire. It’s C-rank because Hiruzen is a cautious old fool and wants to ease him back into work, and that’s fine. He’s amused, not insulted, to find himself on a genin team, filling in for an injured member.

Might Guy, too, is filling in for an absent jōnin instructor. Sakumo is happy to see that the boy’s grown up well, looking so much like his father, with an unrelenting optimism that’s too infectious to ignore. He hopes that Guy holds the same feelings for Kakashi that he did so long ago. Kakashi needs friends like him.

The mission goes over without incident. It’s nice when that happens. From Sakumo’s experience, missions like those are few and far between. Of course, he was a genin a lifetime ago; perhaps many of his missions were simple back then.

After collecting payment from Hiruzen and making their report—there’s an amused wrinkle to the Hokage’s eye, seeing Sakumo a part of that budding little genin team—Sakumo starts on the long walk home. It brings him pause when he realizes that his feet are taking him straight to his estate and he adjusts his path, recalling the little hole-in-the-wall apartment that his son rents.

He wonders if Kakashi has returned from his mission yet. He’s been gone a long while, but that’s par for the course with higher ranked missions; Sakumo has been away for months at a time.

It’s outside of the complex that brings him pause. A tall, lean figure is standing at the gate, silhouetted by the vibrant warmth of the setting sun, one hand buried in a pocket and the other reaching out to open the gate. Kakashi is mostly in uniform—the flak jacket is absent—and settles Sakumo beneath a lazy eye. There’s a twitch there, something so small and subtle that to anyone else it would go overlooked. Sakumo sees it. He wonders about it.

Sakumo smiles as he stops before his son, his neck craning back to look up at Kakashi. He tosses his wallet and Kakashi catches it on reflex, bringing it in front of a dull, inspecting eye, brow arched.

“For the food,” he supplies, shoving his own hands into his pockets; apparently he’s picking up mannerisms through observation and he isn’t sure how he feels about it. “I made you spend a lot. Sorry about that.”

Kakashi narrows his eye on the wallet, head cocked to the side, then smiles. He leans over and flicks Sakumo’s forehead, eliciting a groan as tiny hands go up to baby the sore spot.

Then there’s a hand on Sakumo’s head, carding through his hair, warm and gentle and so very awkward that he isn’t sure whether to feel touched or sympathetic. Kakashi is trying, though. He’s trying so, so hard, and Sakumo is proud.

“What kind of brother would I be if I took money from a cute little genin, hm?”

Sakumo raises a brow and cracks a smile, allowing it when Kakashi takes his hand and places the wallet against his palm. “Oh, so I’m cute now, am I?”

Kakashi is crouching before him, looking up at him, and it’s maybe a patronizing gesture. Sakumo isn’t always sure with this boy. Kakashi is smiling, though, bright and wide and full of plastic cheer behind his mask. Definitely patronizing. “Maa maa,” Kakashi placates, “you shouldn’t be so distrusting of your brother. You’ll never make friends like that, Kumo.”

“Oh?” Sakumo shoves the wallet back into his pocket and crosses his arms over his chest, shifting his weight. Countering his lazy son’s words is likely to be a new skill, he thinks. “And I’m sure you know a lot about making friends, big brother .”

The smile is gone and Kakashi is watching him with a narrow eye. For a moment, Sakumo worries that he touched a nerve. “You wound me,” Kakashi says, a hand over his heart, and it’s relieving to hear. “To think that my own flesh and blood would say something so harsh .”

Sakumo’s smile is gone, too, replaced by a practiced frown. “A shinobi should be honest and loyal,” he says, and it takes effort to keep a straight face. “I would never mislead family.”

“You’re a cruel child, Kumo.”

Sakumo grins, wide and bright, because he feels he’s beginning to understand his boy a little more. With time, maybe their relationship will be more than a mere ghost of what it once was. That thought brings him comfort.

When Kakashi looks at him next, there’s fondness. It isn’t hidden or hesitant, and it doesn’t carry with it the grim weight that it did before. Kakashi is still crouched there, looking up, and Sakumo thinks that maybe it’s out of respect, not mockery. The moment he thinks that is the moment that he starts to feel warm.

“Your first mission as a Leaf shinobi?” Kakashi prods, his voice soft.

Sakumo salutes. “Success.”

“Good,” Kakashi nods, firm and decisive. “I’m proud of you.”

The words hit hard and Sakumo’s grin falls away. There’s a tightness in his chest, weighted and burdened and aching with a memory of a lifetime ago, of the dark of night and a moonlit glow across the floorboards, of a boy eight years old staring up at him with contempt. The world crumbles at his fingertips because of his own mistakes, his own failures, and nothing is left but the sobering thought that this pain is of his own making.

Sakumo has no time to dwell on that feeling. He yelps, suddenly in the air. Soon he’s on Kakashi’s shoulders, a hand on each of his ankles holding him steady. His hands search blindly through gravity-defying silver hair for some sort of anchor but there is none, so they instead go to Kakashi’s neck. He can’t see Kakashi’s face from this angle so there’s no way to read the situation.

“Kakashi?” he asks, wordlessly begging for some sort of explanation.

Kakashi adjusts Sakumo and starts forward, taking lazy strides down the road. He’s not heading to the apartment but away. They take the path alone the riverbed. The light reflects perfectly against the calm waters below and the world is bathed in rich pinks and golds that make everything feel so very warm. Sakumo remembers carrying Kakashi the way that he’s being carried now, wonders if Kakashi’s using him as a role model, a base off of which to treat this little brother that he never knew that he had.

“Maa, we should celebrate,” Kakashi finally says. “Are you hungry?”

Sakumo eases up. He relaxes, heaves a sigh, and rests comfortably against his son, watching the light on the water as it shifts and glints. “I don’t want to eat if you won’t,” he chastises. “If you aren’t willing to part with your mask then let’s go home, alright?”

Kakashi hums, considering that. He tilts his head, eye on the sky. “What to do…”

“Go home,” Sakumo repeats scoldingly, nudging the brat with his foot. “I can make dinner again. I restocked the fridge before I left on my mission.”

“With my money,” Kakashi says flatly.

“I can pay you back. I have my mission reward. You saw it.”

But Kakashi is ignoring him, and Sakumo is pretty sure that Kakashi isn’t worried about the money at all.

“No,” Kakashi finally decides. “We should celebrate.”

---

 

Sakumo isn’t quite sure how Kakashi manages to eat all of his food without anyone— including Sakumo—ever seeing him so much as touch his mask. He’s practiced at it, skilled to the point where it’s become a fine art. With every glance down at Sakumo’s food, he looks up to find more gone from his son’s bowl. But there’s no trailing movement, no evidence that anything is happening at all.

It’s amusing, probably more so than it should be.

If he’s honest, he’s not sure when Kakashi started wearing that mask. It was sometime after his mother passed, sometime before he joined the academy. It’s been so long that it’s become a permanent fixture on the boy’s face. Really, when he first saw the jōnin in the trees, that mask should have been the perfect tell as to who the man was. But, well. That’s in the past.

Kakashi was never bothered with Sakumo seeing his face while he ate. In his time, Kakashi’s mask would come down at meals. It was the one part of the day where Sakumo would get to see the whole of his son’s face, so meals were important to him. Now, things are different. Kakashi does not want to be seen and Sakumo can respect that. Even if he’s a little curious to see what his boy looks like all grown up.

He only realizes that he’s staring when Kakashi stares back. There’s quiet between them, Kakashi looking bored with his chin in his palm and his eye half-lidded as it studies Sakumo’s face. But Sakumo is starting to find that the boredom his son wears isn’t as genuine as it appears.

“Where are you from?”

The question is so innocent that it’s honestly a shock to Sakumo. Kakashi hasn’t yet asked any questions about Sakumo. He hasn’t considered much of anything out loud, wearing a mask of perfect disinterest for about two weeks now. Sakumo hasn’t thought of a cover story—hoped in vain that there would be no questions, that he wouldn’t have to lie to his son. He considers being upfront and honest but thinks better of it. The risk of losing the small relationship that they’ve built up is too high for him to take. Nothing would make him happier than to stay a part of Kakashi’s life, even if it’s as a brother and not a father.

“Konoha,” he answers before he can stop himself.

Kakashi arches a brow.

Sakumo mentally backpedals, “I grew up in a small village in the Land of Fire.”

Kakashi nods. His hands come together on the table, their meal long over, and he considers. “Your mother?”

“She died long ago,” and it isn’t a lie, it’s truth, because Sakumo lost his mother in much the same way that Kakashi did.

“You’ve been alone.”

“I work well alone,” he assures, because he doesn’t like the threads of pity he hears in those words, not from Kakashi, not from his son .

Kakashi flicks his forehead and he winces, rubbing the spot and setting his son beneath a pout. Sakumo is too old to pout, but he justifies it in the knowledge that his body is lagging behind a great many years.

“You look like him,” Kakashi considers, head tilted, dark eye searching, “but perhaps you’re a little too much like me.”

Sakumo lowers his hand to the side, jaw slack as he repeats those words in his head.

“Maa, not that I was around when he was your age. Who knows?” Kakashi closes his eye and shifts. He calls over a waitress and pays for their meal and they stay there as their dishes are removed. The sun has set, the world is blanketed in soft velvets, and Sakumo has a lot of things to consider.

---

 

Sakumo fusses when he has a lot on his mind. He isn’t sure why he starts cleaning the apartment but he does. It seems Kakashi is a little lazy in that regard, too, because he notices that nothing is ever dusted unless he’s the one who dusts it. It’s not that his son is a slob by any means—Kakashi is neat and organized in much the way that he’s always been—but he’s perhaps never going to be as meticulous as Sakumo himself. He starts in the living room, then the kitchen, and moves his way into the bedroom while Kakashi is in the shower. The bedroom is the most empty room in the house with nothing but a bed, a nightstand and a lamp, and that’s probably the saddest thing about this place. There’s a closet—all of Kakashi’s clothes are kept in there, along with Sakumo’s own few outfits—and other than that, there aren’t really any personal effects to bring the place to life.

Well, no. That’s not entirely true. There is one picture, lying face down atop the nightstand. It’s been there since the night that he came here but Sakumo hasn’t had the heart to take a look. He felt it was too intrusive, too rude for a stranger to that household. Now, though, he wonders if he has a right.

He doesn’t, he knows, but he hopes that maybe one day he will.

“My team,” Kakashi says simply as he steps into the room, drawing long strides across it as he goes to the closet. His hair is wet, slick against his skull, weighed down by water. As he passes, the first thing that Sakumo notices is the familiar red of an ANBU tattoo on his shoulder. It’s a sobering thought, to know that his boy is or was in that sector. “You can look.”

The permission brings with it relief even where the tattoo knots his stomach, and he discards his cloth in favour of carefully, meticulously picking up the one sentimental item in this whole rundown apartment. He turns it over in his hands to see four faces staring back. Kakashi is the first he notices. His eyes are soft and fond as he traces over the young, familiar face staring back, brows furrowed and looking grumpy as ever. His boy was developing a bit of an attitude in early years and it shows. That face brings with it a rush of nostalgia because it’s Kakashi, the Kakashi that he knows , perhaps a few years older and a little more hardened, but it’s the biggest reminder that all of this is real, that the young man standing behind him is the son that he left behind. His boy is all grown up, and he’s different , but that’s… that’s okay.

He recognizes the two genin from the academy, familiar faces from days where he’d pick his son up after class. Rin Nohara and Obito…

Obito Uchiha.

Oh.

Sakumo looks over his shoulder to find his boy—the young man —standing over the closet, a dark eye settled on the tiny, child-sized set of spare clothes hanging from the far end of the rod, something deep and meaningful in his stare that Sakumo can’t bother to consider at the moment.

That sharingan eye is Obito Uchiha’s, isn’t it?

He pulls his eyes back to the picture, to the last face, the very exasperated but also very fond smile of a familiar blond. “Minato Namikaze,” he acknowledges. It feels safe to do so. Minato is someone well known outside of their little village. That boy was gaining a name for himself, rightfully so. He was a young upstart in Sakumo’s day but already he had so much potential. In a way, he reminds Sakumo of Kakashi, of the little boy left behind in a cold and cruel world.

“Ah,” Kakashi acknowledges after a time, “the Fourth Hokage.”

Wait. What?

“Minato-sensei was my jōnin instructor for a time. Maa, that’s long in the past.”

Sakumo’s stomach turns. There’s a lot of information hitting him at once that he doesn’t like. He remembers Hiruzen in the Hokage’s office, there as he’d always been, feeling something like a permanent fixture. The Third is still in power. He is, and yet Minato is the Forth.

Minato is dead, isn’t he?

Obito Uchiha is dead.

Rin Nohara, well…

Sakumo braces himself to take another look at his son. An ANBU, current or former. The last survivor of his team. A jōnin who is lazy with disinterest, quiet and dismissive, who always has his nose in a dirty book. Sakumo sees a face as broken as his own, crushed by the weight of an unfair world but continuing to move even though he’s lost so many pieces along the way.

Kakashi is a man who has been beaten down but has yet to submit. Even if he can’t be the person that he once was, even if the horrors he’s lived through are there to repeat every time he closes his eyes. Even if everything is against him, Kakashi is still there, alive, taking the world one step at a time.

Kakashi is a greater man than Sakumo has ever been. It hurts to know that he has to be, but even still, Sakumo is endlessly proud.

Kakashi is holding up one of Sakumo’s shirts, his hand following the length of his sleeve, and he hums his thoughts. “It runs a little small,” he says, and that’s true because they’re Kakashi’s old clothes from when Kakashi was eight, and Sakumo isn’t entirely sure how old his body is but it’s certainly not that young. “Tomorrow we can—”

The words fail. Kakashi raises an eyebrow and his hand and the shirt fall carelessly to his side as he turns to face the child. He’s frowning behind the mask, Sakumo can tell, and then he’s approaching. The shirt is tossed to the floor, unneeded, and Kakashi kneels down with a drawn-out, burdened sigh, scratching his head. “Maa maa, what did I do to deserve the waterworks?”

Sakumo is not one to cry. The last time he cried was the day that he buried his wife so many, many years ago. He is not one to cry. He tells himself that as he brings up a sleeve to scrub away his red-faced tears, to try to save some of his honour or some lasting thread of pride. But then Kakashi is in front of him and through his tears all he can see is that little boy and he hates it, hates the way that he’s coming to understand that he’s contributed to something horrible in that boy’s life. Even if Kakashi hates him. Even if he abandoned his mission and failed his village. Even if that boy no longer wanted him around. Sakumo feels guilt in waves and he can’t help but reach out his arms and wrap them around his son’s neck. He holds Kakashi close even as the short burst of tears comes to a close, and breathes.

Slowly, hesitantly, he feels hands on his back. Then there are arms around him, too, securing him in place, and the relief that Sakumo feels is immense and overwhelming and so, so real.

“Hey,” Kakashi calls, a soft whisper so unlike himself, “what’s wrong?”

Sakumo closes his eyes and smiles and rests there, his chin on Kakashi’s shoulder. He feels very, very tired.

“Nothing for you to worry about.”

---

 

When Sakumo hears from his old friend Hiruzen that his son was honourably discharged from ANBU to become a jōnin instructor, he is nothing if not faintly amused. He knows that boy, and for all that Kakashi is a genius he does not to people very well. So, he does a little digging. A little prying.

He’s unsurprised that it’s a request from Kakashi’s peers, and even less so that Gai is at the forefront of it all. That boy was always such a sweet child. It warms Sakumo’s heart to know that even then, when Kakashi has grown cold and distant, there are people in his life who care so deeply for him. Even if he, himself, is ignorant of their support.

Sakumo is curious, of course, to see who Kakashi’s little genin team will be. He’s pretty sure that Kakashi realizes he’s watching from the blanket of trees—Sakumo, again, has never been a master of stealth the way that he is kenjutsu—but if he does, he doesn’t say anything. Sakumo thinks that his brat may want to show off a bit to his ‘little brother.’ There’s something cute about that.

The bell test. It brings fond memories, not that Sakumo was ever one of Hiruzen’s students. He remembers dear old Jiraiya’s complaints, though, about how hard the damn thing was. He remembers sitting in, watching a young Minato Namikaze’s team try to take them from Jiraiya. And he assumes Kakashi got it from Minato.

It’s painful, watching those genin work separately to try to get those bells from a former ANBU. Sakumo almost doesn’t want to watch as they’re completely overpowered by the very aloof, somewhat angry jōnin they’ve been put in the charge of. Almost , but it’s quality entertainment to him.

To his boy, not so much. This is the first time he’s ever seen Kakashi look so disappointed, even if he’s still wearing a mask of perfect indifference, and Sakumo can’t help but sympathize.

There’s no surprise when he fails the team. Sakumo agrees with his decision, even if he understands the heartbreak that the children wear as they’re dismissed from the training grounds.

Sakumo waits until they’re gone. Kakashi has made his way to the stone monument, is seated before it by the time Sakumo leaves the trees and makes an approach. Sakumo knows this place well. There are names on that monument that mean more to him than he could ever express. He thinks that Kakashi, too, understands the weight of those names now.

“Was I too harsh?” Kakashi asks, resting his elbows on his knees as he stares at a name carved into the stone.

Sakumo stops beside the man, hands on his hips as he finds the name: Obito Uchiha. It hurts, a bit, to know that his assumption is correct. “No,” he says finally. “Well, maybe a little. But your decision was the correct one.”

“Is that so?” Kakashi closes his eye, lowers his head, and is quiet a moment.

The wind is loud around them, howling like a haunting song of loss and regret that they both can relate to more intimately than they’d like to admit. When Sakumo hears it, he thinks of a day that haunted the last of his days as the White Fang, of a mission abandoned for the lives of his comrades, those very same comrades that turned against them when they returned to the village. Sakumo decides that he does not regret the decision he made that day. He does regret the decision made months later, the day that the White Fang died.

Sakumo is no longer the White Fang, he realizes. He lost his right to that name when he took his life, when he left his son without a father. Sakumo is instead content to play the part of the White Fang’s second son, even if there’s a lie in there somewhere. Even if Kakashi may hate him for the truth.

“Maa, Kumo?”

“Hm?”

“What do you think,” a dark eye opens and watches him carefully, “is most important for a shinobi to have?”

Sakumo crosses his arms and hums. There’s gravity behind those words but it doesn’t bother him. Despite the disgrace that he became, there’s only one answer that feels right, and he can’t bring himself to say anything else. “Comrades,” he says, as though it’s the most obvious thing ever. “Your comrades should be everything to you.”

When Kakashi says nothing, he wonders if he’s touched a nerve. He rubs the back of his neck and does some quick mental backpedalling as he tries to justify his rather ballsy claim.

“The mission is important,” he acknowledges, “is the most important thing. The mission comes first. There’s a reason we follow that rule as law, but…”

“But?”

Sakumo makes a face, scratching his head. His eyes find a familiar name and his chest tightens as he thinks back to an old friend’s loss. One of many. “You can’t just abandon your teammates to complete an objective. There’s something… inhuman about that. Those are people’s lives, and…” He sighs, long and tired, and shakes his head. “I could never bring myself to do something like that. No matter what the cost. If I see an opportunity to save them, I will. Every time. No matter what.”

Kakashi nods. It’s slow, methodical, and his mind is elsewhere. “Ah.”

Sakumo is surprised to hear the simple acknowledgement. He smiles, placing a hand on the fluffy, ridiculous mess of his son’s hair. “The people are the village, Kakashi,” he says. “ We are the village. Without us, there is no Konoha. That’s how I see it, anyway.”

Kakashi is quiet. Kakashi is always quiet, but his quiet can mean a great many things. This time there’s something more behind his silence, something deep and meaningful. Then there’s an arm wrenching around Sakumo’s neck, pulling them to sit side-by-side, and through his protests and flailing he can see Kakashi smile. It isn’t patronizing or teasing and there’s something very real, very human about it.

Even as he’s ruffling Sakumo’s hair into an unrecognizable mess.

“How do I put this…” Kakashi tilts his head, eye raised to the sky as though deep in thought. “You do take after him, after all.”

Sakumo swats his hand away and sighs. “Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?”

“I wonder.”

---

 

Sakumo is looking quite proud, standing over the Hokage’s desk with seven A-rank missions under his belt. Perhaps he shouldn't be as proud as he is, considering that he came from a life where he held such high regard, but he is. He's proud of how far he's come in a body sorely lacking in experience and strength, proud that he can consider himself a real shinobi again. After a month of depending on his son, he’s found his legs to stand on, just like he’ll find his way through this new, strange world of the future.

“Well,” Hiruzen sighs, breathing out a mist of smoke as he draws his pipe away from his mouth, “I retain the notion that we should avoid any S-rank missions until your body has matured. But you’ve proven yourself to still be of jōnin skill, at the very least.”

Sakumo is grinning even as he bows his head low in gratitude. His old friend made it so that he could avoid the jōnin exams—which happen to have taken place last week. This fact will be omitted from Kakashi, if only to avoid suspicion. He raises his head and before him is a tiny, child-sized flak jacket and a Hokage-stamped certificate. He takes them both reverently, eyes alight with eagerness and triumph.

He sucks in a breath and pries his eyes away to look at Hiruzen, the old man with kind eyes and a knowing smile. “Thank you, old friend. I am forever in your debt.”

Hiruzen chuckles low in his throat and waves a dismissive hand. “You’ve earned it, Sakumo. As you did the last time.”

Sakumo shakes his head. “For everything, Lord Hokage. Thank you .”

The Hokage sends him off with another laugh and he’s gone in a swirl of wind and leaves.

---

 

Dinner has been made. It’s cold on the table as the evening ebbs away. Sakumo is busying himself with dishes. He hasn’t eaten because he at least wants to eat with his boy. Then he’ll give Kakashi the good news. He’s felt bad, really, about taking up so much space in his son’s life. Kakashi is a solitary man and it can’t be fun for him to constantly have the presence of a child in his home, especially as it turns out that Kakashi does not like children.

Sakumo thinks back to the boy that he raised and is somehow not surprised by this.

Kakashi is slated to return from his mission tonight and Sakumo plans on telling him then. He’s already started looking at apartments nearby—because living alone will be strange for him, who’s always loved company, and he at least wants to stay close to his family where possible—and figures that, give or take a few years of saving, he’ll be able to find a permanent residence at some point in the future. Nothing will ever replace his family home, no, but maybe it doesn’t have to.

Kakashi is late, the food is cold, and the dishes are sitting in the drying rack.

Through a puff of smoke, Sakumo is confused to find a small pug sitting on the floor. A summon. One of Kakashi’s summons, if he’s remembering right.

“You’re Kumo Hatake?”

“Sakumo,” he corrects, if only out of habit, and he twists around to face the dog full-on. “What’s happened?”

---

 

Sakumo stares down at the sleeping body of his stupid, reckless son lying horizontal atop the hospital sheets and sighs, shaking his head. The smell of antiseptic is overpoweringly strong and it brings with it long-faded memories of his own visits to Konoha Hospital in the past. The nurses have been friendly and have offered him juice and snacks because they feel pity and he’s a kid and he gets that, but why is it so hard to get a damn cup of tea?

Kakashi is by no means critically injured. He’s banged up, sure. The Kiri-nin beat him like a drum and he’s black and blue and there are bandages across his chest that indicate some sort of laceration of some kind, but the main reason he’s here and not getting bed rest at home is because of chakra exhaustion, of all things.

He’s told that Kakashi makes a bad habit out of overusing his sharingan. Somehow, Sakumo is not surprised.

When he’s alone, Sakumo climbs onto the edge of the bed, watching his stupid, irresponsible child with fond eyes, carding gentle fingers through Kakashi’s hair. He doesn’t understand how one man can cause him to feel so much exasperation and so much pride all at once. But, well. He supposes that’s what it means to be a father.

Kakashi doesn’t stir right away. There’s an overnight stay in there somewhere, and Sakumo manages to go home and get a few hours of sleep in the middle of it. But then Kakashi’s opening one eye, keeping the other closed with practiced habit, and his attention is immediately on Sakumo.

Well, it helps that Sakumo has been looming over him on and off for a good fourteen hours.

“You’re a fool,” Sakumo sighs. He’s smiling, though, because he can’t help it.

Kakashi sighs back, bringing up a hand to press against his forehead. “Maa maa,” he placates with a lot less energy than usual. If that’s possible. “I’ll be fine.”

“You will,” Sakumo acknowledges, “but you’re going to give your little brother a heart attack one of these days.”

Kakashi smiles, teasing, and it’s through that that Sakumo can be sure that he’s alright. “Ahh, is my cute little genin worried about me?”

Sakumo rolls his eyes and snorts. He twists and leans and reaches over to the stand by the bed, snatching the certificate up—he brought it because he expected this—and hits Kakashi’s head with it lightly. “Not genin,” he states proudly. “Not anymore.”

Kakashi pries the paper away from his face and draws it back to read with careful consideration. He makes a noise, an impressed sort of exclamation, but it comes across with a lot less energy than it probably should. “Jōnin,” he nods. “Quite the jump from genin.”

Well, yes. Because it has not happened before. But, well, he technically wasn’t a genin, either. Technically , he was always a jōnin. He doesn’t say anything, though, because he feels like trying to defend himself or justify it will only come off as cheap, and that Kakashi will only be more suspicious if he does. So he just smiles, accepts it.

He rolls his eyes again when Kakashi pats his head but he’s long since used to it. It’s an expression of fondness, he knows, one of the few expressions that Kakashi allows himself. It’s… okay, he thinks, even if it’s strange, and even if their relationship can never truly be the same.

“Nice work, Kumo. I’m proud of you.”

Those words still hurt a bit, deep down in the pit of his stomach, but he doesn’t let it get to him.

After a bit more rest, he helps Kakashi up. Kakashi’s arms are heavy and awkward like lead from exhaustion, but he isn’t so far gone that he can’t move. It’s only a mild case of chakra exhaustion and they’ve promised that he’ll be back to one hundred percent within a few days. To regain his strength, though, he needs food. Sakumo is gone for only a few minutes as he reheats the miso that he packed and soon there’s a bowl resting on Kakashi’s lap and Sakumo is looking with practiced ease out the window.

Kakashi watches him then sighs. The mask comes down.

“Kumo,” Kakashi calls, voice tired and resigned. “It’s okay.”

It takes a moment for Sakumo to register just what he means. When he does, he hesitates. His mind stalls for a moment before slowly, hesitantly, he turns around. The boy seated there is pale with paler hair and a dark eye. There’s a long gash running down the left side of his face, long healed. He looks different without the mask, softer. Even when not smiling, he looks like he is, something friendly in the curl of his lips.

You look like your mother , he wants to say but can’t. Instead he smiles and sits back down beside the bed, resting his chin in his hand and watching his boy eat, just like he did so many years before. Probably making the brat a thousand layers of uncomfortable, but who cares?

---

 

Sakumo frowns as he flips through the realestate section of the the newspaper, brow twitching as he stares at the listed fees and thinks back to the small bundle of savings he has stocked up. Kakashi is moving about the kitchen around him, making a fresh pot of coffee, and he glances up now and then to eye the tattoo on his son’s shoulder. “How well does ANBU pay?”

“You’re not joining ANBU,” Kakashi states plainly. His exasperation is clear by now because this is probably the eighth question that Sakumo’s asked about ANBU over the past twenty minutes while looking for a place to rent. Kakashi is adamant that Sakumo is not allowed to join ANBU, but last he checked, he was the parent. Even if Kakashi would forever remain unaware.

“I don’t know,” Sakumo muses, turning the page and folding the spine over to rest the newspaper more comfortably in his small hands. It’s a joke, really. But only a bit. Only a bit, and that is the scary part. “I’m starting to think that my options are slim.”

“You’re not selling your soul to Konoha for a little pocket change,” Kakashi sighs, pouring himself a fresh cup before dropping down into the seat across from his brother.

“You did,” Sakumo counters, and it probably sounds a lot more childish than it should.

“Extenuating circumstances,” which is Kakashi’s shutdown whenever the topic is broached.

Sakumo sighs, tossing the newspaper onto the table with a strangely powerful disdain. He glares at it, as though it personally wronged him, because back in his day the prices of rent weren’t nearly so steep. Oh, he’ll be able to afford it with his jōnin missions, sure. After a while, once he can save up enough for first and last. And can afford food. And other bills. And apparently it’s very hard for a child to get accepted as a tenant. Well, with the Hokage as a reference, he’s sure that something will work out.

“Stay,” Kakashi mutters, and it sounds like it’s pulled out of him by force. He won’t look at Sakumo, won’t lift his eye up from where its staring vacantly out across the room, and there’s a strange level of shame on his face, like this is a weakness that he hates to admit to. The mask comes down and Kakashi takes a sip of his coffee.

He burns his tongue, if the split-second wince is a tell, and that’s so, so unlike the boy.

Sakumo smiles, leaning his head on his hand as he watches his ‘brother’ fondly. He’s gotten the feeling that Kakashi isn’t so keen on him leaving but this is the first time it’s said out loud and he finds it ever so amusing.

“I can’t,” he says simply. “There isn’t enough room, and I feel bad stealing your bed from you.”

“Maa, I don’t mind.”

“I know that you don’t,” Sakumo sighs. “ I do.”

Kakashi smiles then with a thick layer of cheer that promises bad things. “We’ll get a two bedroom.”

“We could.”

“We will, my cute little brother.”

“ However —”

“We will. ”

Sakumo rolls his eyes. It’s hard arguing with Kakashi when he’s like this. He waits, just to make sure there won’t be any more interruptions, and clears his throat. “ However ,” and he waits, dares the brat to interrupt him again, “there’s something I’ve been wanting to discuss with you.”

The cheer is gone, instantly, and Kakashi looks confused. “Ah?”

Sakumo is hesitant. He’s coming to understand that a lot has changed since he left this world. A great many things. Lives have been lost, the children he remembers have grown up and carved their own paths in the world, and Kakashi has long since rejected his father’s name. And that is okay. It’s okay, but that does not mean that it sits well with him, and he knows there’s no time like the present if he wants to get that across to his son. This is the one thing that Sakumo wants out of this life. It’s… scary to broach, he admits. It’s scary because he doesn’t want to upset Kakashi, but he can’t leave things unsaid. He won’t repeat that mistake again.

“I want to restore the Hatake estate.”

Kakashi does not say anything.

“I know you’re the rightful heir,” Sakumo breathes, clasping his hands together to try to quell the shaking. All he can think of is dust and age and a world that smells just as forgotten as he felt that day, and he hates it. “And I’ll respect your decision if this is something you’re against. But I want to restore it. It’s just… sitting there, forgotten. No one’s doing anything with it. It’s the home of you and your father, and—”

“Enough.” It’s not sharp, though, not biting the way that Sakumo expects. It’s… soft. Uncharacteristically soft, and he chances a look at his son only to find Kakashi’s fingers interlocked, pressed against his lips. His brow is scrunched up with concentrated thought and he’s not looking anywhere in particular. The tension leaves his shoulders slowly, and then he settles an eye on Sakumo. “Maa, you’re an heir, too. You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

Sakumo blinks. “A-ah. I… I suppose that I am.”

Kakashi snorts, shakes his head, and there’s humour in his eye. “Alright,” he breathes. “Fine. We’ll play it your way, little brother.”

Sakumo should be unendingly happy. He should be, but as he watches Kakashi set the mask back in place, get up and bring his empty mug to the sink, he realizes that he’s not. He’s not because he realizes that Kakashi completely, wholeheartedly thinks of him as a brother. Not a father, not a stranger. A little brother, born of different mothers, separated by villages and time.

He’s happy, and it’s that happiness that makes this so hard to bear.

---

 

The Hatake estate looks different in the daylight. Not better, and in fact maybe worse, as now he can see just how decrepit his poor family home has become over years of neglect. He’s not bothered by it. He knew this wouldn’t be easy and, being ever the optimist, Sakumo feels that he can treat this as a bonding experience. Father and son—or, well, two brothers—working to restore their childhood home. Because it is Sakumo’s childhood home, just as much as it is Kakashi’s. He grew up there, raised by his father, a humble man of smiles and honour who passed away shortly after Kakashi’s birth. Shortly before his wife.

Sakumo slings the small backpack off his shoulder and whistles, hands on his hips and a grin on his face. He ignores the blank stare on Kakashi’s face—already knows that this is going to be hard for the boy and won’t needlessly draw attention do it. “We’ve got our work cut out for us.” The gardens will need to be completely ripped out; the few plants that aren’t dead are overgrown weeds, the shōji and windows will all need to be replaced. Overall, though, the bulk of the building is sturdy enough even after all of this time. That’s reassuring, because replacing rice paper and glass is a lot easier than digging up the foundation and patching up walls.

Sakumo winces as the cover of Kakashi’s porn hits him lightly atop the head and he pouts, watching his son drag himself forward with uneven steps. “Stop staring, Kumo. There’s work to be done.”

Kakashi is the first to enter, which is a surprise. His back is even more hunched than usual, his strides even slower and more awkward. He slides the door open and breathes in the musky air, dropping his things against the side of the hall.

Sakumo follows shortly behind, dropping his own little backpack—he doesn’t have many things—amidst his son’s. There are cleaning supplies in one of the bags, which they’re definitely going to need. A lot of. Like, probably ten times the amount that they have, because all he can smell is musk and mold and his sense of smell is too strong to be dealing with it. Kakashi’s, too, but Kakashi isn’t complaining.

Sakumo wanders in but stops, looks back at his frozen son, and frowns. “Are you okay?”

Kakashi closes his eye, sucks in a breath, and nods. “Ah. It’s… hard,” he admits, and that’s something that he’s never said out loud. “There are lots of memories here, is all.”

Sakumo nods gravely. “Not all of them fond.”

“Ah,” he breaths. “I… found him. Our father.”

Oh.

The world falls away for a moment and Kakashi is all that he sees. A small, young boy of eight years standing over the cold, dead body of his father, of the last family that he has in this world. He sees the cold, merciless glare of black eyes staring fixedly from within a picture frame, hardened by the world. All he can manage, all that he has the courage to say, is a short, quiet, “I’m sorry.”

Kakashi smiles then, pats Sakumo’s head. “Maa maa, it’s in the past. No need for sad faces.”

Kakashi grabs his small hand, dwarfing it in his own, and heads first to the room at the end of the hall. The door slides open and his smile widens, all cheer and amusement. “My room,” he supplies. He gives it a cursory glance and nods. “You can take it.”

“Me?”

“Ah,” he affirms. “It shouldn’t take too long to patch up. It needs a good clean, but there’s only one window and one door.”

Sakumo lets out a soft snort. They are going to be applying rice paper for the rest of their days . And that is okay.

As the day goes on and they work through it, cleaning up what they can while going from one area of the home to the next, they pointedly ignore one room in particular. Neither of them speak of it, they never agree to it, but somehow they both just… conveniently avoid it whenever they walk past. The night makes its fast approach, though, and with most of the rooms so clean that the floorboards shine it is getting harder and harder to justify.

By the end of the night, they both stand side by side in front of the door and don’t move. Sakumo looks up, sees the way Kakashi’s eye darts across the door, unfixed and unfocused and clouded by a million thoughts. He sees it and feels the burden of guilt on his heart, lifting a hand to touch his son’s sleeve.

Kakashi tenses and looks down at him. It takes a moment to calm down, to orientate himself again, but Kakashi manages.

“I’ll do it,” Sakumo states simply. “Wait for me at the apartment.”

Kakashi takes a breath and shakes his head. “No,” he sighs. “I won’t run away anymore.”

The door slides open and they’re met with the calm tranquility of a moonlit room. It’s just as Sakumo left it, his uniform scattered across the floor, sandals kicked off haphazardly. His tantō is there, too, where it fell. The blade is clean as he’d cleaned it, glinting in the pale glow of the moon, the window casting bars across the floor. There’s nothing in this room, really—no furniture, no personal effects. It’s a spare, a remnant of when their clan was a little bigger. It was his father’s room. Maybe that was why he chose it, he thinks. To be close to his father as he passed. Maybe he’s just an old, sentimental fool.

He sucks in a breath and steps forward, wandering over to the uniform. He picks up the shirt, then the vest, and is unsurprised to find the bloodstained tear in the fabric from when he—well. Beneath them is his hitai-ate. It was too big for his head, and he was too frantic to think to adjust it, so he begrudgingly tossed it aside with the rest.

That was where it all started. A part of him is mournful, regretful, but another part…

It’s bittersweet , he thinks, and that is enough.

It’s only belatedly that he realizes that Kakashi has not followed him into the room and he shoots a curious glance to the door. His stomach drops. Kakashi is pale—paler than his hair—his face contorted into a strange, unreadable mess of emotions. Kakashi does not emote like that. When things get hard, Kakashi shuts down. He goes blank. Why, why would his son ever have—

Sakumo looks down at the uniform in his arms and immediately loses his grip. Oh. Oh. He staggers back, away from his things, and covers his mouth as the weight of what Kakashi’s seeing sinks in.

Kakashi is staring into the room where he found his father, bloodstained clothes and a family heirloom discarded on the floor where his father fell. His brother is not surprised, not confused. His brother steps inside, gathering the uniform like it’s laundry. Like he knew it would be there. Like he is resigned to it.

Kakashi is a smart man. Kakashi is a smart, earnest man, a sweet boy. He’s learned humility with age and he’s been through hardships that Sakumo can only guess at but he keeps trying, keeps picking himself and Sakumo is so, so proud. And it hurts, then, to see that dear, sweet boy come to understand just what he’s seeing, to realize the truth of everything that’s led to this one, fixed point.

Sakumo takes a step back. His head is spinning. He rights himself and opens his mouth to say—something, anything —but the words are stuck in his throat. He clenches his fists at his sides and takes a deep, steadying breath because if this is hard for him, then it’s twice as hard for his son, and he smiles. He smiles because he wants to get across that it’s okay .

“Kakashi,” he manages after a turn. His voice cracks in the middle and he swallows. “For whatever it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

Kakashi slams the door shut. There’s the sound of wavering footsteps muffled from the hall, a door sliding open and closed, and Sakumo heaves a sigh and rubs the back of his neck.

That’s fine. The boy needs time. He deserves it.

Sakumo looks around at the mess of a room and sighs and figures that the least he can do is finish this up on his own. He makes a face at the blood stains on the old uniform, shakes his head and rubs the back of his neck.

“I’m good at making messes, aren’t I?”

---

 

By midnight, there are lights. Oil lamps, but still lights, scattered throughout the estate. They give off a soft, warm glow and the whole place is starting to feel a little more like home. Cozy, like a long forgotten dream, and despite the heavy tension Sakumo finds himself at peace. There’s no gas, but he’s able to make use of fire style ninjutsu that be picked up to get a fire going, and soon there’s a hot meal ready. Sakumo knows better than to hunt down his son and force him to listen. He knows how badly that will end. Kakashi is a smart, rational man and is able to come to his own conclusions.

Cooking is something that eases Sakumo’s nerves. It always has, ever since long before his son was born. He cooked for his wife whenever he wasn't away on a mission. When they would fight—because they did, as much as Kakashi had the image of a perfect couple in his head back in the day—Sakumo would make a big spread of all of her favourite things. She would get home from work after a long day, take off her shoes at the door, and the house would be thick with the sweet scent of a warm meal. It’s fitting, he thinks that he’s trying the same thing with his son. He doesn’t have all of the ingredients that he needs even after taking a short trip into the market two hours ago, but he does his best. All of the furniture has been left untouched which he’s grateful for because he knows where everything is.

He isn’t sure if Kakashi will come back, only hopes. He sets the low-sitting table in the dining room with a feast fit for the Hokage and now that he’s done his two hour cooking session, he’s feeling his exhaustion. He takes a seat at the table, rests his head in his palm, and closes his eyes. His arms and legs and muscles are sore from a day of cleaning and stress—so much stress— and he’s yawning, blinking back tears. Waiting his boy out.

The scent hits him first, the familiar scent of the Hatake bloodline, and he wonders how he ever had trouble placing it when he first met his son. The dogs , he thinks, nodding to himself, he smelled like his summons.

Next is sound. The steps are low, cautious down the hall, muffled behind newly applied rice paper. Then the door slides open, quiet resumes, and Sakumo blinks open heavy eyes and smiles, longsuffering and tired.

“Welcome home.”

Kakashi swallows. His shoulders slope as he sways in the doorway, and it takes him a moment of staring and observing before he braves sitting down. They’re across from one another now, the same way that they always eat, and Kakashi is stealing glances at him. Glances, but not looking. Not seeing.

Kakashi takes a deep, steadying breath. “What… should I call you?”

Sakumo arches a brow, a smile tugging at a corner of his lips as he snatches up his chopsticks and starts filling his plate. “Kumo is fine,” he hums. “You seem fond of it.”

Kakashi seems… dissatisfied, as though he expects Sakumo to say ‘Dad,’ But he won’t, never would, not after what he’s done to the poor boy.

“It wasn’t my plan to deceive you,” Sakumo assures. The smile fades. He’s picking at his food, not quite confident that he can stomach it. “I didn’t know where else to turn, and I didn’t think you would believe me otherwise.”

Kakashi nods. It’s jerky, hesitant, but understanding. He places his elbows on the table and puts his hands together, pressing them against his lips, looking at Sakumo like he’s a bomb waiting to go off.

“You’re—” He stops, finds his voice. “You’re really…”

Sakumo let’s out a snort and shakes his head. His eyes fall to his hand, to his tiny, stubby fingers that he’s grown strangely accustomed to. He supposes that, with enough time, any absurdity can feel normal. He studies the old scars there, left from the war, from endless battles spanning decades of his life, hairline reminders of what he’s come from. “You don’t need a father,” he says. He raises a hand to stop whatever Kakashi plans to counter with. “You did , and I failed you. And I’m sorry, Kakashi. I really, truly am.”

Kakashi’s hands tighten into a white-knuckled grip and he nods, eye downcast to the table.

“You don’t need a father,” he repeats, firm and unrelenting, and tries to smile. He hopes it comes across sincere. “But I think I need a brother. If you’ll have me.”

Kakashi laughs. It’s the most broken, jaded, human sound and Sakumo dares to look up. He can’t see Kakashi’s face before it’s hidden behind hands but he thinks he sees tears. He decides that’s only fair, after Kakashi saw him cry all those months back.

“Maa,” he chokes out, trying to regain some of the indifference in his voice and coming off weak, “that doesn’t feel very fair, Kumo. What would I ever do without my cute little brother?”

Sakumo feels his eyes sting and looks away in a rush, pointing animatedly across the table at the spread he prepared. “Now eat, before it gets cold,” he demands. “I spent two longsuffering hours on this, and you’re not letting it go to waste.”

Kakashi laughs again and he won’t look up but that’s okay, because Sakumo knows that if he does his eyes will be red and his face will be flushed.

And if Sakumo’s is the same, maybe that’s okay.

---

 

There’s something surreal about staring down at his own name on polished rock. His eyes linger for perhaps longer than they should but he thinks he can be forgiven. It’s nice, he thinks, that he shares his tombstone with his wife. He feels Kakashi is responsible for that but doesn’t want to ask, so he just accepts and appreciates it.

They discard the old, wilted flower stocks and replace them with new bouquets—Sakumo responsible for his wife’s vase, Kakashi left with Sakumo’s. It was Kakashi’s idea, really, surprisingly , and the sentiment is warm and kind and more than he deserves.

With one last, long gaze, he turns away from the tombstone and starts down the path to—

A finger hooks around the collar of his shirt and keeps him in place. He looks back, up at the cheery-eyed, smiling jōnin standing over him, and pouts.

“Ah ah,” Kakashi scolds, waggling his finger patronizingly. “Pay your respects properly, Kumo.”

Sakumo rolls his eyes to the heavens and turns back around to face the stone. Kakashi’s fallen headlong into the role of ‘big brother.’ Sometimes, Sakumo thinks that Kakashi enjoys it. Other times, he’s pretty sure that it’s a way for his son to passive-aggressively get back at him for, well. Everything. Nevertheless, Sakumo complies. He brings his hands together, closes his eyes, and prays.

When he opens his eyes again, Kakashi is already heading down the path. He sighs, expecting as much, and hurries to catch up to the brat.

They stop next at the grave of Rin Nohara. It’s a sobering sight, looking at the dates beneath her name, seeing someone so young in someplace so somber. War is cruel like that, he knows, but it’s not something one can ever get used to. It sticks with him now the same way that it did long ago, a weight on his heart that he’s sorry his son has to carry as well. He leaves Kakashi to switch out the bouquet, to replace it with the fresh one, stands back and allows the boy his space.

Kakashi talks to her, his voice soft and fond. He tells her everything that’s happening in his life, everything that’s happening with her classmates, with the village and the world.

“Ah,” Kakashi noises, and his eye falls to the child beside him. “I seem to have acquired a brother, Rin. Isn’t he cute?”

Sakumo raises his eyes heavenward and figures he deserves this.

When he’s done, Kakashi steps back, takes a breath, and then sighs. He stays there, staring at her name for a stretching moment. “I resented you,” he states simply. “For a long, long time.”

Sakumo nods. “You had every right.”

Kakashi smiles behind the mask. It’s soft and sad and filled with the weight of the world, but it’s not angry. “Maa, things happened. Someone precious to me shared with me their nindo, and I think now I understand.”

Sakumo blinks, watching his son carefully. “Oh?”

“Those who break the rules are trash,” he says and Sakumo winces. But Kakashi’s looking at him with a smiling eye, soft and kind with an uncharacteristic light. “Those who abandon their friends are worse than trash.”

He breaths, listens, and closes his eyes. The weight of the world leaves him then and he thinks maybe, just maybe, he can breathe.

“That’s a good nindo,”

“Ah. I think so, too.”

Notes:

I never really appreciated Sakumo's character until I tried writing him for myself. I'm honestly more attached to this story then I ought to be, and I really do want to write more, so I've made a series for it. If you'd like to be notified if/when I make more, go follow it! I'm not sure if I'll just be doing drabbles in this AU or if I'll make a full sequel, but I do have a lot of ideas. I'd also like to make a version from Kakashi's POV. Let me know if there's anything you'd like to see! Gah. Okay. I shouldn't get ahead of myself.

Thank you for reading!!

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of Paper Moon
• Part 1 of Sakumo Appreciation Club