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Kakashi jolted awake, limbs trembling and tense. Rin, Rin, Rin his mind chanted. Find Rin, keep your promise, find her, keep her safe. Trying to shake off the thoughts, Kakashi swung open the door to his bathroom, the motion of his head only causing him slight nausea.Unbidden, an image of Rin came to his mind, blood dribbling down the side of her mouth as she tried and failed to reach a hand up to his arm, which was currently in a cavity in her chest. Rushing to the toilet, Kakashi expelled his guts. In a moment of hysteria, all he could think about was how Rin looked tinged blue with the exaggerated night the visions contained. Looking up to a clock wearily, Kakashi noted that it was almost time for training. It wouldn’t do for him to be late to practice, even if he recovered from memories that weren’t his. It was becoming a sort of pattern, erratic as it was, over the last few weeks. Wake up in a cold sweat, dizzily make way to the bathroom, get struck with a random memory from the blurring dream, expel bile into the toilets. Check, check, check, and check. Ugh. Opening the tap and sticking his hand under to wash his face, Kakashi tried to compartmentalize. Realistically, he knew something was wrong. He was getting visions of what might be a future of his (alternate past? Different universe?) where his only friends team has died. He’d gotten “nightmares” of Obito too. And Minato and Kushina. He could not escape the blood on his hands, no matter how hard he scrubbed or how long he ran the tap.Pulling himself away from his thoughts, a scarecrow watched almost absently as he went about his daily tasks. He felt detached from himself in a way, as though a foreign entity were controlling his body, and he was a mere spectator. Hm. Hopefully it wouldn’t hinder his training. When the clock it 5:30, Kakashi headed to the training grounds. Resigning himself to wait for his team, he started practicing his aim with some shuriken, before switching to kunai. At 5:50, Minato emerged from the trees, looking content. He must’ve come from Kushina’s. At 6:00, Rin arrived. It was soon 6:25, and there was still no sign of Obito. Kakashi felt an odd anxiety claw up his throat Obito was usually here by at least 6:20.
What if those rocks fell on him in some cave near Iwa, with no way to recover the body? What if a horned woman clad in white used rods of bone to pierce his skin, and he disintegrated, just as Kakashi had seen? What if Minato and his team waited here forever as Obito died, all alone, when they could have saved him? What if, what if, what if—
Kakashi was saved from more spiraling thoughts when Obito arrived, panting, with small scratches on the right side of his face. Kakashi tensed as images of warped and scarred skin flitted through his mind. “Sorry I’m late! I would’ve been on time, but there was a rock—“Kakashi flinched. Hard. He wasn’t even sure why, but there was a rock and it hit Obito it crushed his right side and they never found the body. The thought induced an odd panic, but he simply ignored it. What better way to deal with emotions than pretend they don’t exist? Obito, for once not the dense idiot, noticed his younger teammate flinch and paused his explanation. He looked at the boy oddly, for he didn’t even cut in quoting a rule from the shinobi book. His eyes were distant. “Kashi-kun?” Minato gently inquired, using the nickname without thinking. “Are you feeling alright? You’re not sick, are you?”Kakashi didn’t acknowledge him. He was lost in his own head, a place he knew well. Jolting up, he suddenly snapped his attention to Obito and Rin. Eyes wide, he saw a flash of grey-blood-smirking-Iwa-nin-tears-Sharingan, before Obito flashed back to normal. He had nothing but a small cut on his face. His body wasn’t crushed, and all bones were in place. There were no spinning red and black eyes, or wry smiles, or interrupted goodbyes and late promotion gifts. Just Obito, late as always. Kakashi could not help the slight terror that flashed in his eyes. But Rin. Rin kept turning blue, and it would be absolutely hysterical if there wasn’t blood down her mouth and a cavity in her chest. He fought the nonsensical urge to close his left eye. See the future for me, a dead boy whispered in his mind. He did not oblige. Deciding to rid himself of whatever hallucinations (he would check for genjutsu later) plagued him, Kakashi turned sharply the other way, not daring to glance at Minato for fear of seeing something he didn’t like. “We should start training. It’s already late,” he stated flatly, any emotion in his voice stamped down to nothing but a dying bug. The other members of Team 7 could do nothing but agree. Minato tensely started to explain a new taijustsu form to the team, still on edge from Kakashi’s odd behavior. He’d noticed it start a few weeks ago, but Kakashi had lost control of himself in whatever spiral he’d found himself in. Minato briefly wondered if it was a late effect of the trauma of Sakumo’s suicide. Leaving that unattended had probably come to bite them in the ass. About an hour later, the sun was risen a bit higher. Seven-thirty, then. Minato called a break. “Let’s call it for a second guys! We can cool down a bit, get some water, and then we’ll move onto ninjutsu!” he said to his team. Obito bounded over mid-exercise, plopping down and sighing in exhaustion. Rin paused for a moment, frowned at losing her stance, but walked over after Obito. Kakashi finished off his kata before stiffly walking over to where Minato sat, who smiled at the unchanged habits of his students. Minato thought it was nice that some things hadn’t changed. Team 7 sat for about ten minutes, resting and discussing areas for improvement in their training. Bringing his hands together, Minato hopped up. “Let’s get onto ninjutsu then!” he exclaimed, far too cheerfully for his students’ liking. Nobody believed them, but Minato was a sadistic bastard at heart, and his glee could only mean one thing. Suffering. Humming and skipping(?), Minato dragged them to training ground 3 by their collars. Obito was pretty sure he’d heard Kakashi actually growl at Minato when he’d been grabbed. It was pretty funny, so Obito was willing to forgive being transported like a kitten held by its scruff. Arriving at the training ground, Minato sat Kakashi to the far right, Rin in the relative center, and Obito to the far left. Training ground three was mostly flat ground, with no trees, rocks, or other terrain, so there was nowhere for Kakashi to run and hide, not that he was considering it. “Well then, now that you three lovely students of mine are here, I will admit that we are not doing ninjutsu training. But! Before you get too upset, we’re doing something even better!” (the psychopath) Minato said. His three students all fixed him with a flat look. Even Rin seemed annoyed at his messing with them. Oops. But then the verdict came. “We’ll be doing a team bonding activity until lunch at 12:50!”
Fuck.
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All three of Minato’s little demons groaned in unison. “A team bonding exercise? But sensei, you said you’d teach us new jutsu!” Obito cried, outraged. Rin sighed longsufferingly, and Kakashi whipped his face away in annoyance. Minato’s grin faltered slightly. Shaking his head, he decided he actually didn’t care. “Well my joyful little students, if you’d listen, I’m going to explain the exercise now!” Minato proclaimed. “This will be a stealth practice as well as building trust between comrades. You will have to ready a list of ten things about yourself, from anything like a secret hobby to interesting dreams, and ten questions for each of your teammates. Your mission is to share the information with both of your teammates, then receive answers for all of your questions. And as a bonus, if one of you receives a duplicate question, you have to inform the other two. I won’t make you change your question, but I will ask you if it happened at the end and look at your lists. You’ll have 20 minutes to prepare the three lists.” At this, he pulled out paper, ink, and brushes, handing the necessary amount to each student. “Oh,” he added, “and you aren’t allowed to speak to each other during planning.”He looked over them once, each with a majorly displeased look on their faces, then shouted, “Go!”They scattered around the training ground, plopping down and beginning to write.Minato jumped into the trees, observing his students where they couldn’t see him. Rin had torn one of her papers in half, scrawling what looked like coded phrases on one piece and ten things about herself on the other. She was always quick-witted, and Minato was proud that she planned ahead. She wrote the code first, and also quickly worked through her personal list. However, she gave pause at the lists of questions for her teammates. Minato understood. She knew practically everything about Obito, and had millions more than ten questions for Kakashi. Minato sighed and moved to look at Obito. He was afraid Kakashi would never open up to his team, and that was a dangerous game to play in the shinobi world. Obito did not have the same forethought as Rin, and was hastily scribbling ten questions for her. However, he could (just barely) make out one of Obito’s questions; “Do those Academy boys still give you shit trouble?” He thought it was nice that Obito cared, but also hysterical that Obito knew Rin would smack him upside the head for cussing. The ink blot didn’t really do much to cover the word though. Oh well. Finally, Minato hopped to a tree closest to Kakashi. He was worried about the little prodigy’s behavior recently, but hoped Kakashi was just in a slump he’d get out of soon. As he peered at his youngest student’s papers, he found one item. On the list about himself, Kakashi had written, “I sign my name with henohenomoheji.” Which, personally, Minato found SO CUTE. He was glad Kakashi was acting a little his age for once, but was also rather concerned at the lack of.. anything else on the papers. The papers had titles; FIRE for Obito, EARTH for Rin, and LIGHTNING for his own page. The discreet titles were a good choice, in Minato’s opinion. Then Obito started talking, loudly. “Y’know, it’s so odd that sensei told my team not to talk to each other. I guess I’m glad he never said we had to stay quiet though, because I love sharing my thoughts, even to myself.”Kakashi looked vaguely annoyed before his eyes widened as he caught on. In a much quieter voice, Kakashi said, “I haven’t been able to think of anything good to put on these lists. I wonder if Obito and Rin would have any good ideas, if I could talk to them. Rin also joined in. “I wish I could tell my team that I developed a code to help us transmit messages, and that I have it on a paper I can share with them once the activity starts. Obito huffs. “Rin is so clever. I’m sure she’d come up with a solution, and that it would be great.”Rin smiled and tried to hide a chuckle. Kakashi rolled his eyes.”I WISH someone would give me suggestions for these lists, because I honestly have nothing to write down,” Kakashi said rather aggressively.Obito hummed. “Y’know, sensei mentioned interesting dreams.. maybe I’ll put something like that down.””I really liked sensei’s ideas for hobbies that I don’t tell people about. I think that might work as a question too! I’ll definitely put that down, and maybe simple things like my favorite flower or a fond Academy memory,” Rin stated to the air, smirking lightly.Kakashi’s eyebrows raised. “I think I just had an idea. Maybe I could put down my progress in training, or something I’m interested in learning.”Obito grinned sharply at a tree. “Maybe I’ll just put down my less-than-nice opinions on Minato-sensei as one of my ten items,” he said viciously. Minato silently gasped, dramatically mock-offended but still hidden. Rin and Kakashi both had to stifle giggles. Kakashi looked mildly appalled at the giggle he let out, but Rin was red in the face from holding back her laughter. All three of them quickly got back to work, writing up lists of more obscure personal facts and questions. Kakashi’s lists had started to fill up, and Obito was finishing his last one— the questions for Kakashi. Rin was done, busy doodling little images on every open bit of paper she could find. At the three minute mark, all of them were done. Perfect!Minato dropped down from the tree, landing right in front of his students. “Alrighty! Since you three all finished early, I’m giving you a bonus. I will turn around and not peek, and you three will have your remaining three minutes to prepare the information exchange. You may not swap information yet, and you must be silent. Ready… three minutes start now!”Minato turned away, listening to the rustles of fabric and metal as the seconds ticked away. Movement slowed, and, turning around, Minato called, “3… 2… 1… time up! You may begin.”Rin made the first move, pulling the boys toward a patch of grass and dragging them to sit. “Are you guys up to some cloud watching? I feel like we haven’t had a chance to just sit together in a while.” She sighed, and put her left hand on Kakashi’s shoulder. If Minato wasn’t observing closely, he would’ve missed the way her fingers curled ever so slightly under his overshirt, and how her ring finger stayed pressed to her palm when she lowered her hand a few moments later. The three sat in somewhat companionable silence for about twelve seconds, before Obito cut in, groaning loudly, “Rin, you’re great, but this is so boring. Can we do target practice or something?”Kakashi nodded, and Rin looked thoughtful for a moment. “Sure,” she conceded. “That might be fun. And it’d be good for you to get some practice in!” she teased lightly. Obito grinned crookedly at her.They (read: Obito) bounded over to the target gleefully, before opening his weapons pouch. “I just have one kunai and a shuriken..” he grumbled miserably.Kakashi just shrugged. “I can go grab them for you. Or you could borrow mine. Rin too, if you don’t have any with you,” he offered quietly. “Sure! Thanks Bakakashi!” Obito exclaimed, quickly throwing his two weapons. Both missed the center pretty badly, but at least they landed on the actual target. Obito winced. Kakashi just raised an eyebrow, but handed Obito a kunai. It had an exploding tag attached. However, when Obito threw it, nothing happened. “Huh,” Kakashi said. “It must be defective.”Obito walked over to the target, Kakashi following close behind. Rin had propped herself against a tree, a book pulled out from her pack open in her hands. A folded paper was stuck inside, looking like a makeshift bookmark, but Minato knew better. Still, he was very impressed. Rin had gotten two of Kakashi’s lists already— apparently they had been tucked together under his shirt— and she was already beginning to write her responses to the questions.”Ah, this book is wonderful!” she had said to nobody in particular. “I should write the author to thank them for their work.” So she pulled out a paper and ink, writing “Heki-san, your work is truly thought-provoking. I wanted to ask a few questions about some minor themes you brought up in the book as well as my personal answers to questions some characters ask..”