Starting from the End

15. Encounters...

***Only italic means thoughts to himself. I will delete this note when I edit previous ones... Enjoy***

"He was speaking the truth...!?"

"You have to find out your own way. But his own story was true. About others, I don't know. Goodnight Sasuke." Kakashi left using the leaf shunshin.

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The cacophony of the birds was welcoming a new day in the hidden leaf village. The first ray of sunlight was washing away the darkness of the previous night... the unspoken tales of terrors and nightmares. The villagers were waking up from their peaceful sleep. Shinobies were changing their shifts. Some were coming home... some were going away.

And then some stayed awake without apparent reason. Among them was Kakashi Hatake, jonin sensei of team 7. It was not difficult for him to stay awake. He had continued for 5 days straight without any sleep. But his mind was restless with the unknowns. The incidents from the genin selection day were playing in his head in replay mode. Where did everything go wrong?

Life of Shinobi was not a happy-ending fairy tale. They complete their works, assignments, missions by washing their hands in blood, stepping on the bodies of foes and friends alike. It didn't matter whether it was old senile, women or child, guilty or innocent. They were given a job. And they had to complete it. Being a normal jonin or jonin sensei was more desirable. At least they had the chance to change their mind for a proper reason. But serving in Anbu, a person became cold-blooded murderer, in the name of his Kage,  in the name of his village.

For Kakashi Hatake, it was no different. He had been already a ghost of his past self. His father's suicide, his best friend's sacrifice and death, his only teammate's death in his own hand and the last string, both Kushina and Minato's death, any resemblances of humanity had left him all alone. He was the perfect weapon, the perfect tool for Konoha. And his lost and broken self was appreciated by the very same village, where he lost everything. The shinobi nation gave him names... Copy-Cat Kakashi, Kakashi of Sharingan and Friend-Killer. For him, the last name was more fitting. He did kill his friends.

If it was not the Third's order, he would be still serving in the Anbu. If it was not Third's threat, he would not be accepting genin responsibilities. So, it did matter very less when he failed three genin teams. He might have valid reasons to fail them but failing them by humiliation was like an icing on the top. He thought the Third would have enough with him. He would go back to his anbu life, his cold-blooded self. It was true, he did look after a child but that was also temporary. What did he know about a child? He stopped being a child when his father, Sakumo committed suicide, for a reason Sakumo should have been rewarded. He became rule-abiding shinobi. He stopped being a child when he lost his new-found best friend Obito in exchange for his own life. He became rule-breaking shinobi. 

After Obito's death, only one person remained constant... Maito Gai. After Rin's death, Gai became Kakashi's self-proclaimed Eternal rival. If it was not for Gai's absurd, idiotic and embarrassing competitions, he would have lost his sanity a long time ago. I thought him a nuisance. And now, he is the strongest taijutsu master in Konoha... no, maybe in the whole shinobi nation.

Then he was appointed to another genin squad. A dysfunctional team of three where two were supposed to hate each other's guts and a possible love triangle with a definite break. It would be easy to fail them if it didn't consist of his sensei's jhinchūriki son and the last loyal Uchiha. The sudden comradeship between them caused him to rethink his resolve. Another main factor was the blonde's sudden change of personality. The haunted look, vacant but wise eyes, smile, well-hidden wariness, alertness... those were too familiar for him. Those words could define any adult shinobi. Why did he have them? And then those pieces of information... choices of words... Something bad did happen. But what?