Chapter Text
xXx
Kakashi jolted back up into a sitting position, shoulders hitting the high chair of the Hokage’s office so abruptly his head made a loud cracking sound against the wood. He reached up to rub the base of his skull, grumbling something under his breath. He had his left eye closed, but when he saw Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke staring down at him, he opened it on instinct.
“What?” He touched the scar bisecting his eye and looked down at his hand, temporarily fascinated with the fact that he had normal sight. “Did I get hit that hard?” Kakashi asked aloud, though it was more of a rhetorical question.
“Kakashi-sensei.” Sakura peeled open his eyes and shined a bright light into each of them. “How do you feel? Do you know where you are?”
“Sakura? Wha-?” He leaned away from her probing hands. “I am fine, I was just too slow to dodge the kick.” He was finally working through the shock and his eyes landed on the third member in the room. “ Sasuke ?”
Sasuke’s mismatched eyes narrowed, hand propped on his hip, but he leaned back when he came to a suitable conclusion. “It’s the one from the past.”
“WHAT?!” Naruto’s voice shattered the illusion that this was a dream; no one could sleep through that. “So this isn’t our Kakashi-sensei?!”
“I just said that, usuratonkachi.”
“You’re back.” Kakashi stood up from the chair despite Sakura’s irritated huff. “You’re… older?” He looked at each of his pupils in turn, taking in the changes in their appearances. His eyes lingered on Naruto and Sasuke’s lack of appendages. “You’re missing arms.”
“I was going to yell at you for using that jutsu without us, but I see there’s no point now.” Naruto scratched his cheek with a frown. He looked at Sasuke a little helplessly. “What do we do? None of us expected this was a possibility.”
Sakura grabbed Kakashi’s jaw and made him look at her again. “What is the last thing you remember?” She tried again.
“I…” He glanced down at his hands, surprised to find that he was not wearing what he last remembered. He was wearing plain black gloves, and no flak vest. Instead there was a white robe hanging off his shoulders, one quick glance around indicated that he was sitting in the Hokage’s office, but-
Sakura snapped her fingers in front of his eyes. “Focus. One thing at a time. What do you remember?”
“I was sparring.” He told her automatically, intimately reminded of Tsunade from her no-nonsense tone and responding accordingly. “I was about to get kicked in the face.”
“By who?” Naruto pressed, leaning over his desk to loom at him eagerly.
“Gai.” Kakashi watched as all three of them let out relieved sighs, stances relaxing, and exchanging loaded looks between one another. Sasuke’s was much more muted than the other two, but there was a softening around the mismatched eyes. “What is happening? Why is Sasuke here? Why are we in the Hokage’s office? Where is Tsunade-sama?”
“Oh, man, the amount that we could mess with you is astronomical.” Naruto got a particularly gleeful look on his face, but Sasuke slapped him upside the back of the head before he could do or say anything else. “Ack!”
“This isn’t funny, Dobe. He’s not going to be happy when he learns what happened.” Sasuke sounded almost concerned, which was alarming in its own right.
“I wish he would have waited for us.” Sakura sat on the edge of the desk and eyes downcast towards the scroll that was merely a pile of ash and smudged ink. “I would have liked to say goodbye.”
“He knew you’d try to stop him.” Sasuke reminded her. His voice wasn’t gentle, but it was less sharp than it could have been, given the circumstances. “How old are you?” He directed the words towards an increasingly more befuddled Kakashi.
“I don’t think I’ve ever told you my age.” Kakashi remained purposefully obtuse. He was now realising that he was an idiot for not trying to dispel the genjutsu as his first action. He gathered up his chakra and tried to release it, but nothing changed.
“You’re thirty one right now.” Sasuke tried a different tactic. “How many years have you lost?”
None of them mentioned Kakashi’s attempt to break a genjutsu, giving him the courtesy to come to terms with the fact that what was around him was very real on his own. He had no idea how Sasuke knew his age, or how approximately five years had passed in the span of a few seconds. How hard had Gai kicked him? There was no mistaking that his students looked older; all of them had lost most of their remaining baby fat, and Sasuke and Naruto were now much taller than Sakura, even though she had grown, too. He stepped around the desk and went to look out the window, eyes widening when he saw how nostalgic but also different Konoha appeared.
“Have I been in a coma for all these years?” Kakashi looked at Sakura first, he trusted that she would tell him the truth. She’d always been pragmatic, but also sympathetic when the situation called for it.
“No.” Sakura shook her head, giving him a wry smile. “You were very much awake, Kaka-sensei. I’m going to guess that, in your timeline, Sasuke had already left Konoha to chase after his brother. Am I correct?”
Kakashi was surprised to not hear a ‘kun’ on the end of his most troublesome student’s name when it came from Sakura’s mouth. Things certainly had changed. Sasuke didn’t even flinch when Sakura brought up his desire for revenge, but he did meet Naruto’s gaze when the blond turned to give him a searching look.
“Yes.”
“Had Naruto left Konoha yet to train with Jiraiya-sama?” She asked next.
“Left? Left the village? No.” Kakashi wracked his brain for the memories, but they would not resurface no matter how much he tried.
“Then it’s been five years.” Sakura deduced. “I’m sure you can appreciate that a lot has happened in that time.”
“Five years.” Kakashi gripped the tall back of the hokage’s chair to steady himself. “How have I lost five years?”
“Because you wouldn’t listen.” Naruto had that look on his face, the hurt one that he used to see all the time when he thought he was being left behind. “It could have killed you.” Blue eyes locked with his; voice grating lowly on his vocal cords to betray the severity of the situation.
“Killed me?” Kakashi’s eyes landed on the blackened scroll sitting innocuously on his desk. “Are you implying that I somehow… reversed my psyche with my future self?”
“We thought it would send you back- body and all.” Sasuke supplied. “We never expected it was a sort of mind-swap Jutsu.”
“We are all alive. Konoha isn’t under attack…” Kakashi glanced back out the window again, just to confirm that. “Why did I want to go five years in the past?”
They all looked away from him then, unable to meet his gaze. It was Sakura who collected herself first, spine straightening and gesturing to the seat in the room. “Sit down, please, Kakashi-sensei.”
“I can’t stay in here for this.” Naruto took a step back towards the door, but Sasuke grabbed his arm in a fierce grip.
“Don’t you dare.” He growled acridly.
“Gai’s dead.”
All three of them snapped their attention back to their sensei, confirming his words before he could even steel himself for their truth. “That’s it, isn’t it?”
Sakura’s eyes immediately filled with tears, but she met his gaze. “He opened the eighth gate. He… He’s breathing , but he…”
“He won’t wake up.” Kakashi closed his eyes.
Kakashi could feel the pain threatening to split him in two, like a chidori slashing directly down the centre of his chest. He quickly changed the subject, despite the worried looks his pupils all gave each other, they answered his questions one by one. There had been a war, an ancient goddess, and Obito had been sacrificed by Uchiha Madara. He was glad that he didn’t have to live through all of this, because it sounded like a fantastical tale that he could hardly wrap his genius brain around. Sasuke had helped to save the world, which was why he was free instead of shackled behind bars, not that anything they had could keep him- Sasuke assured him cockily. Perhaps it wasn’t arrogance, perhaps he really was that strong. Kakashi had no way of knowing.
He had led the Konoha army, which secured his position as Hokage at the end of the war. Tsunade was alive, which was a relief, but she was currently running a hospital full of severely injured patients.
Gai was one of them.
Kakashi wasn’t prepared to step out into Konoha later that evening, with his three very much grown up students pressed at his side. They planned to usher him to his apartment that he refused to give up even after being Hokage for two months. No one had any idea how long he would remain in this reality, or if he was stuck there forever. The scroll that his predecessor had used was destroyed, and Sasuke and Naruto had only reluctantly helped with the seals. He could see it on their faces that he had been in rough shape, and they expected him to break down soon.
He knew it was possible; he had yet to deal with the most crucial piece of knowledge they’d given him. None of it felt real, after all, and it probably wouldn’t feel real until he saw the truth with his own eyes.
They tried to keep the conversation as lighthearted as they could as they essentially escorted him home. Naruto told him all about his new jutsus he’d perfected, and Sasuke told him he intended to go on a year-long journey to check for any residual effects of the war in the surrounding lands. Naruto had already insisted on accompanying him, which they bickered about in such a way that was so reminiscent of their genin selves, that Kakashi discreetly pinched himself. Sakura had already finished her medical ninjutsu training, and was Tsunade’s top doctor; she didn’t have the luxury of leaving Konoha, which she said pointedly at her two teammates.
It was an attest to his students' skills that they felt the chakra before he did. He hadn’t been prepared to feel such a familiar signature, and especially not one that was layered with bloodlust. Naruto threw the kunai that intercepted the one coming straight towards Kakashi’s face, not that he couldn’t have done it himself, but it would have been a few seconds later. The two kunai ricocheted off of each other and lodged themselves in a nearby tree and the dirt before them.
“He did it, didn’t he?!” Tenten’s voice was shrill and furious. She jumped down from the tree closest to his apartment and stormed towards him, brown eyes narrowed in barely-controlled fury. “How DARE you?!”
Tenten shoved past Naruto, who was trying to reason with her, and grabbed the front of Kakashi’s Hokage robes. Sasuke grabbed onto her forearm, but she wrenched it out of his grasp with a flick of her wrist. She was older now too, and the muscle under her chinese-collared top was no joke. She had clearly blossomed into her taijutsu in the last five years, and Sasuke couldn’t hold her without using brutal force.
“You abandoned him!” Tenten screamed in his face. “What the hell is wrong with you?!”
“Tenten! How did you even find out-” Sakura grabbed onto her shoulder, but Tenten shoved her off without breaking eye contact with Kakashi, making Sakura grunt and skid back in the dirt.
“You three aren’t fucking subtle.” Tenten threw over her shoulder. “I swear to whatever gods are left, Sasuke, if you touch me again I will rip off your other arm.”
Sasuke lowered his hand, but his tomoe in the sharingan started to swirl menacingly. “I’d like to see you try.”
“Enough.” Naruto yelled, stepping in between Tenten and Sasuke, but his back was to his teammate, instead of Tenten. Clearly he considered her more of a risk. “Tenten-chan, you need to let go of Kaka-sensei. You’re going to get arrested.”
“What?!” Tenten scoffed, gesturing to Sasuke with a dismissive wave of her arm. “Like he should have been? Or does special treatment only apply to people with useful eyes that the village can actually use after they’re dead?!”
“This isn’t about Neji-kun.” Sakura tried to soothe her.
“The fuck it’s not.” Tenten rounded on her, finally letting go of Kakashi’s robes. “It’s about Neji and Gai-sensei, and even Lee. You got everything back and I had it taken from me. You think I wanna be there when they pull the plug on the man who was essentially my father? You think Lee does? Fuck all three of you.” She turned to each of Team Seven in turn, but then she returned the full blunt force of her grief back on Kakashi. “How far back did he go? One year? Two?”
“Five.” Kakashi saw no reason to lie to her, it would be even more cruel.
“Five years.” She scoffed, shaking her head. “Must be nice getting five extra years with someone when everyone else gets none .”
“I lost that five years.” Kakashi’s voice was hard. “I woke up five years in the future.”
“Good.” Tenten hissed. “You don’t deserve another five years of him when you abandoned him at his worst.”
“You’re right.” Kakashi agreed severely. “I suppose I am far more selfish than I gave myself credit for.”
Tenten let out a scream of pure unbridled loss, shoving at his chest. “You’re not even him! This is pointless.” Kakashi stood his ground, letting Tenten’s shove only move him a half a foot back. She was strong, just like her sensei, and it forced the air out of his lungs. She dug her fingers into the front of his robes and collapsed her upper body forward. He could feel her trembling through the fingers twisted in the front material of his outfit, tears splattering onto the ground between them. “Everyone’s given up. You. Lee.” She collapsed to her knees, hands falling from his chest onto her own legs. “I’m alone.”
“Tenten.” Sakura took a hesitant step forward, but Tenten tensed. Kakashi lifted his hand to stop her. It was clear that Tenten resented Sakura, even if it wasn’t logical. She’d probably take any of her compassion and twist it into loathing.
It was Naruto who knelt down beside her and pulled her into his arms. He cried with her, fat droplets hitting her shoulder. She tried to fight him off, but then her whole body just let go. She grabbed onto his arm, crushing it to her chest, and started to sob. Naruto had lost Jiraiya, and for a long time he’d lost Sasuke. He was probably the only one there who could even begin to understand her loss, even then, he didn’t kid himself. He still had Iruka-sensei, Kakashi-sensei, and Sasuke and Sakura.
“Tenten.”
Lee wasn’t wearing the jumpsuit, which was probably for everyone’s sake except his own. Kakashi’s heart panged, because Lee looked so much like Gai now at eighteen. He was wearing a long-sleeved green shirt, but his pants were jounin black. It was wrong. All of it was wrong . Why had he stopped wearing them? Was it because he set off Tenten, or… Had he set off Kakashi ? Even the seriousness of his eyes was achingly similar to the way Gai’s eyes narrowed in grave concentration.
“None of this is Hokage-sama’s fault.” He knelt down beside her, but she refused to look at him, instead burying herself further into Naruto’s chest. “You know that. Neji and Gai-sensei made their choices. They chose to protect their precious people. We must honour that.”
“Lee.” Kakashi drew his attention. “Don’t call me that. I’m just Kakashi to you.”
Lee looked back at Tenten, but he saw the dismissal for what it was. “Of course, Kakashi-sama.” He unwound Tenten’s solid grip from Naruto, and then slung her arms around his own shoulders, lifting her into his arms like she barely weighed anything at all.
When he turned to Kakashi, he stared directly at his chin. “Please make a decision regarding Gai-sensei soon. It is more painful for her every day she waits.” Then he was gone with Tenten in his arms in the blink of an eye.
“ That’s why I left.” Kakashi realised with horror. “I’m his medical proxy.”
xXx
Kakashi barely slept that night, staring at the ceiling of his small, cramped, jounin apartment as his ANBU escorts outside gave only a perfunctory attempt to hide their chakra from him. It was invasive, and it made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up when he thought about someone staring into his apartment. Perhaps this was their plan to force him to move into the Hokage compound, and his previous self had stubbornly stayed put.
To say a lot had changed in five years was an understatement.
What he didn’t understand, and what he was scared to ask, was what had changed interpersonally and then internationally . Were there people he was supposed to know? People who would become suspicious if he didn’t recognise them or answer accordingly? Last he remembered, Gai had been more present in his life because his kids went through the same chuunin exam, and then things just sort of… shifted . Kakashi had let his weakness win, and Gai instinctively knew exactly when to slip in through the gaping cracks he left.
Not that Kakashi had been much of a friend in return. Gai had needed someone when Lee almost lost his career as a shinobi, and all he’d done was challenge him to a sake glass stacking contest. He’d spent most of his life pushing Gai away, scared to get too close to someone else, and yet it all ended the same. Someone he cared about was on death’s door, probably because he’d allowed them in his life. He was a scourge, a jinx, a bad omen.
They’d become close enough that Kakashi had told Tsunade to make Gai his second in command during the war, they’d become close enough that they were each other’s medical proxy, and they were close enough that his future self had fled away from the responsibility of pulling the plug.
He was tired, and he wanted to be angry, but he was just… too tired . This body was run down and wired at the same time. When was the last time he slept? He didn’t know, because he wasn’t FROM this time.
Did he let someone know that his eyes were fucked? That he kept missing steps, bumping into things, and reaching for things that were not where he thought they were? It was easier to keep his eye closed than try to see out of it. He could feel the strain of it, and it hurt. He’d kept it open because he was used to his sharingan, and he’d wanted the familiar advantage of it while he navigated his bizarre future. Now he was paying for it.
Kakashi laid there with his eyes closed until the sun started to peak over the horizon. He got up, got ready, and then headed to the hospital.
xXx
Kakashi hesitated at the door, and it was kind of Tsunade to not mention it. When Sakura had informed her of Kakashi’s choice to return to the past, she couldn’t bring herself to be resentful. Kakashi hadn’t abandoned a world in turmoil; there was peace across all the lands for the first time ever. Perhaps, she allowed to herself, he deserved a little selfishness. She probably would have done the same to try to save Jiraiya, or any number of people, if that meant she wasn’t leaving Konoha in shambles because of it. Her circumstances had been different than Kakashi’s, and so she had to reserve judgement.
This Kakashi didn’t deserve it. He was just as lost as the rest of them, if not more.
When Kakashi finally stepped into the room, he didn’t stop until he was all the way at Maito Gai’s bedside. His sharp eyes took in the various tubes, the beeping monitors, the drips, and the layers of bandages that covered up most of his fissured skin.
“I was sparring with him yesterday.” Kakashi had the strange urge to reach out and touch him, but the body looked like it would crumble to dust if he applied too much pressure. “How long has he been like this?”
“Approximately fifteen weeks.” Tsunade responded succinctly.
“Any changes in condition?” Kakashi tried to keep to the facts.
Tsunade’s breath hitched as she breathed in to answer. “He’s had to be resuscitated three times. His chakra network is almost completely unusable. His skin will always have the scars of being cracked open, but it’s mostly healed except for near his chest. He will never be able to use his left leg again the way it is now. We have no signs of awareness, and the last time we tried to completely wean his sedation, he didn’t regain consciousness and didn’t fight the breathing tube. He is protecting his airway but we are keeping him hooked up to the ventilator to keep his lung capacity up. We do have him hooked up to nutrients, but it is nearly impossible to know if he’s still there.”
“How long do we have?” Kakashi wouldn’t take his eyes off of Gai’s face.
“Three months is standard.” Tsunade’s hands gripped the chart in her hands a little tighter. “He’s already lost significant muscle mass and lung capacity.”
Kakashi could see that. His face was gaunt and his arms had lost a lot of their tone.
“It’s almost February, correct? Tenten’s birthday is a month after.”
Tsunade made a noise of surprise. Kakashi didn’t see a point in pretending he hadn’t heard every tidbit of information Gai had told him over the years.
“He already missed Lee’s.” Tsunade responded lowly.
“He missed the funeral for Neji, I imagine, too.”
“Yes.”
“I see.”
Tsunade waited a few more moments before she realised she was being dismissed. She closed the door behind herself, and Kakashi pulled the chair that was by Gai’s bedside over so he could lean over and adjust anything if he needed to.
“I wonder if you can tell I’m not the same one that left.” Kakashi murmured aloud callously. “Do I feel different? Can you even tell?”
Gai continued to breathe cyclically, the steady beep of the machines showing Kakashi that his heart was beating in typical sinus bradycardia. Gai’s resting heart rate had always been forty five, thanks to his peak physical condition. When Kakashi spoke, the rhythm didn’t even stutter. He wondered how often his future self had stared at those numbers, hoping they would change.
“He left.” Kakashi felt like this Gai should know. “He’s a coward, but when have I ever not been one? Your students are furious.” He paused here, grasping for things to say. It felt stilted and awkward, like when he’d first started talking to the memorial stone. He wondered if he was already talking to Gai like he was dead. Had he pleaded? Had he cried? Had he refused to leave Gai’s side?
“You challenged me to a sparring match yesterday. I don’t know why I said yes, and now here I am and you’ve been like this for fifteen weeks?” He reached up to rub the back of his neck. “What, exactly, did you want me to do?”
Gai said nothing.
For the first time since he arrived, he felt the first real stirrings of anger and grief. His future self was such a bastard for this, screwing literally everyone in his life over when they’d just fought a war. Now they had to baby him, too? What if this Gai did wake up? Would he be disappointed that the man who had considered him important enough to be his second commander was gone?
Must be nice to have all the answers and not have to take responsibility for them.
He sat by Gai’s side, like a fixture in the room. Nurses flitted in and out, checking on things and offering him small nods in acknowledgement. He must have been there quite a bit. No one seemed surprised to find him by Gai’s side.
One of the nurses kicked him out so he could freshen Gai up, and Kakashi walked out into the harsh sunlight, unsure what to do. The nurse had mentioned maybe he should go get something to eat, his tone a bit judgemental. So this Kakashi hadn’t been taking care of himself. What else was new?
“Senpai.”
Kakashi turned to blink at Tenzo, out of his ANBU uniform and in regular jounin clothing. He’d felt his chakra on and off, but this was the first real contact they had since his mind-swap. All of the important ANBU must have been debriefed on his situation.
“Come. I got us some lunch, you must have questions.”
Kakashi followed him to his place, which was surprisingly close to Gai’s old apartment. Was he supposed to be looking after something there? Lee probably would if he noticed Kakashi was slacking off on his duties.
“You really feel sorry for me, huh?” Kakashi eyed the spread on Tenzo’s table sardonically. All foods he tended to force himself to eat when he didn’t have the energy to make anything more substantial. “Are you on the official fake-Hokage babysitting duty?”
“I volunteered.” Tenzo had always been a straight shooter. Kakashi appreciated that about him.
Kakashi sat down and stared at the eggplant miso soup steaming in front of him. Tenzo didn’t look at him, giving him wordless permission to pull his mask down just far enough so he could take a cautious sip.
“You’re covering your eye again.” Tenzo pointed out with a frown.
“It’s annoying.” Kakashi shrugged. “He could have at least left me the damn sharingan.”
“It won’t get better if you don’t use it.”
Kakashi just shrugged again.
Tenzo switched gears. “What are your questions?”
“Were Gai and I lovers or something?”
The question would have made him uncomfortable in any other circumstance, but frustration was a good motivator. If he fucked up this life, what did it matter? It wasn’t even his. What little he had left had been stolen from him by the asshole that left this all behind. He couldn’t even think about the ramifications of what it really meant to be Gai’s partner, because he was still numbing that part in self-defence.
Tenzo put his chopsticks down and considered the question. A true professional, because the topic should have made him grimace or at least show some discomfort.
“I don’t think so.” He said at last, he waited until Kakashi pulled his mask back up after finishing the soup before he made eye contact. “I think… perhaps, you were on that road.”
“You sound so sure.” The comment was a prompting; clearly they’d been acting in some sort of way that indicated there was more than just comrades in arms.
“Right… You don’t remember.” Tenzo put a finger to his chin. “Do you want me to put you in a genjutsu and show you?”
The idea of watching his own life and the potentially embarrassing choices made him feel a weird sort of revulsion, so he shook his head. “Just tell me the basics.”
“Well, we were at the brink of war, they told you that much, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“There were many people you could have chosen to be your second in command, but you told Tsunade-sama in no uncertain terms, that it would be Maito Gai. The decision to send Naruto to train with another jinchuuriki, Killer Bee, was made. You asked for Gai to accompany him to keep Naruto safe. You trusted him with your student’s safety implicitly… I was also tasked with accompanying Gai and Naruto.” Tenzo trailed off here, pausing to take a fortifying sip of his tea. “However, while you were preparing for war, Gai accidentally sent you his S.O.S. turtle summon while he got terribly seasick.”
Kakashi put his hand to his forehead and sighed deeply, it must have been pretty dire for him to send Gai on a boat . “So, what, I sent someone after him?”
Tenzo shook his head. “No, you came yourself.”
Kakashi was slightly taken aback. “I left mid-preparations to find you? I suppose I would have been worried about Naruto getting abducted…”
The other man across the table was giving him a very strange look. “Kakashi-senpai, you came for Gai . I’m sure Naruto was a part of it, but you were more concerned over why Gai was acting strange and sent the S.O.S. I even heard you ask him if he’d come running if you were in danger.” The wood user laid his hands on the table and it was like he was looking directly through the ex-ANBU’s mask. “I never thought much of it, to be honest, but Gai said you even corrected him on your rivalry score at the time. You knew it better than he did.”
Heat flooded into his cheeks and he let his forehead hit the table with a resounding ‘thunk’. What the hell? That was nauseatingly embarrassing. All the implications, all the honesty . What had happened in five years?!
Yet a small niggling voice at the back of his mind that sounded suspiciously like Minato-sensei reminded him that he did know the current score of his rivalry, and he probably would drop everything if Gai actually admitted he needed help. Gai never admitted he needed help, at least not to him. Probably because he knew better than to trust Kakashi with something so vulnerable.
This Gai? This Gai did, and he would come running in return.
The only reason why they weren’t fucking was probably Kakashi- he was his own worst nightmare. In fact, he could see himself waiting until after the war to tell him, just in case admitting his love killed Gai. Jokes on him; it happened either way. The universe knew what he wouldn’t say out loud.
He was attracted to Maito Gai, no, he was in love with Maito Gai. When had his future version admitted it to himself? What had been the catalyst? When did all those complicated, jumbled, emotions untangle? Was it all at once, or little by little? One second they’re five and Gai is declaring Kakashi to be his Man of Destiny, and now he’s thirty-something and watching him slip away?
The loudest, most full of life person he knew, leaving this world in nothing but a whisper.
His stomach protested and he had to do deep breathing to not immediately throw up the first bit of food he’d probably had in days.
This revelation was useless though, because he would have to pull the plug on Gai sooner or later.
“Any other questions?” Tenzo prompted him, and Kakashi shoved that to the back of his mind, grateful for the distraction.
xXx
The room was exactly the same as he’d left it. His afternoon had been filled with grilling Tenzo-no, Yamato - over his life and circumstances. He could have gone to the Hokage’s office and started his work, but instead, when they parted, his feet led him here. Was this the remnants of the previous Kakashi? Was this him?
He sat down and stared at Gai, and something like instinct told him to talk. That the other man would listen, that he could trust him with his real thoughts.
“Lee isn’t wearing the jumpsuit anymore. I wonder who asked him to stop. Do you think it was me? Maybe he could see how much it hurt others to look at him and see you. Maybe I yelled at him. He wouldn’t even look at me yesterday.”
Kakashi was already reaching for Gai’s hand before he really thought about it. The bandages were irritating his subconscious. Tsunade had told him that his skin had mostly recovered, hadn’t she? Perhaps they kept the bandages on to stop people from seeing the damage. Kakashi didn’t care about that. He couldn’t articulate exactly why he needed to see them, but he did. He carefully unwrapped the wrappings until Gai’s entire hand up to his mid forearm was completely bare. It wasn’t pretty. It looked like ropes of scar tissue stitched his skin together.
“Huh.” Kakashi traced one of the lines idly. “It kind of looks like lightning.”
He flipped Gai’s hand over and looked at his palm. There were the remnants of blisters there, raised and shiny. He put his fingertips over them, feeling the difference in texture. He had never held Gai’s hand like this- he couldn’t compare.
He sort of wished he had.
“Lots of wasted years.” Kakashi was starting to understand, little by little, the same mindset that his future self had been in before he nearly killed himself trying to escape from this reality. “I think there was a part of me that… always assumed I’d have more time.”
He was exhausted.
“We’re in our thirties now, I hear. I don’t know. I think… Maybe he thought he’d tell you after everything was all settled? Did you know that was coming? Has he already told you? I’ve always been a bit of a coward, though, so I doubt it.” Kakashi leaned down to rest his cheek on his crossed arms. Now he was just sort of idly playing with the darkened fingers of his best friend.
“I never understood why you had so much patience for me.” He closed his eyes, surprised by the sudden flush of tears that flooded into his vision.
No, no, he was here for a reason . He was here to do what his previous self could not. What was the point in ‘what if’s?
He would do it soon, tomorrow maybe, and then… Then he’d live the rest of his life truly alone.
The room smelled like a hospital, but it also smelled like Gai. That in itself was soothing. He wondered how he was supposed to give this up. Gai’s scent would fade with time. His apartment probably just smelt stale now that he’d been out of it for so many months.
Kakashi drifted off to sleep thinking such nonsensical things.