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Entropy	By : ersatzbeta Category: Naruto > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 1332 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, nor do I profit from writing this or any other fanfiction.

Chapter List
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Author's Note: Apologies, apologies! I have nothing but excuses for my recent lack of updates. This chapter has been sitting on my hard-drive, half finished, for weeks and weeks. At least it's done now, right?

Chapter Thirty Five
Kakashi waited impatiently in the living room. He'd left Sasuke a few minutes prior, gave him some time so that he could, presumably, collect himself. It seemed somehow wrong to have this sort of conversation in the bedroom. Kakashi tended the woodstove carefully as he waited. At last, light footsteps sounded on the upstairs landing. Kakashi looked up expectantly. Sasuke's ankles and calves came into view.
"Tell me," said Sasuke. "What do you know about the Amaterasu?"
Kakashi's blood ran cold. As Sasuke descended the stairs, Kakashi studied his face carefully.
"I see you've heard of it," said Sasuke.
It was gallows humor, pure and simple.
"You don't mean to say," said Kakashi. "The flux was�"
Sasuke was quiet, but he nodded. He crossed the living room and came to a halt a yard in front of Kakashi. He stared at a point somewhere above Kakashi's left shoulder, looking in his direction but not directly at Kakashi.
"Sasuke," said Kakashi. "Sasuke."
He found that was all he could say. He walked forward a step or two and laid one now-trembling hand on Sasuke's shoulder. He watched his fingers for a minute. At last, he forced himself to speak.
"Are you all right?" said Kakashi.
His heart pounded as he asked the question, and he made himself take slow, even breaths.
"I have it under control for now," said Sasuke. "But I'll need to train with it, so that it doesn't get away from me."
Sasuke tilted his head to the side, embarrassment and shame written in the way he refused to meet Kakashi's eyes. Or perhaps it was fear. Kakashi had heard terrible things about the Amaterasu, though he'd not seen Sasuke using it, and he knew that one glance was all it took to send the black flames to a target. It did strange things to Kakashi's insides to know that Sasuke was being so careful around him. He allowed his hand to tighten over Sasuke's shoulder, and the other reached out to turn Sasuke's face toward him. Was it his imagination, or did Sasuke lean into the touch? Kakashi blinked into Sasuke's dark eyes and saw nothing but his reflection.
"Of course," said Kakashi. "We'll have to pick somewhere rocky, though."
"We?" said Sasuke.
"It wouldn't do to set the whole woodland ablaze," said Kakashi.
Kakashi looked at him without flinching. The explanation was perfectly rational and, better yet, quantifiable. Amaterasu gone wild? It could be fixed. Kakashi felt both better and worse now. Amaterasu was very dangerous, but its value to the village would outweigh the risk, Kakashi hoped. Once Sasuke could prove his mastery�It made Kakashi's head spin with the possibilities. He removed his hands, gentle and slow.
"Is there any way we can prove it?" said Kakashi.
Sasuke looked thoughtful for a minute.
"Not directly, no," he said. "I can demonstrate my control over the Amaterasu, and I suppose there could be testimony about my chakra control in general�"
The things Kakashi had been pushing to the back of his mind were dangerously close to the surface, possibly brought up with the force of his relief. He struggled to control himself; this revelation wasn't about him, wasn't his to celebrate but indirectly. And yet, Kakashi couldn't help the warm dizziness that was spreading through him at the idea that finally, finally, Sasuke might be safe and beyond reproach. The recent troubles weren't really anyone's fault-- was neither Sasuke's fault nor his, at any rate-- and with time and a little luck and a lot of hard work, Sasuke would be in full control.
He made a note to himself to get word of these latest developments to the Hokage as soon as possible, though, of course, with the utmost discretion. Kakashi hoped whatever demonstrations they could provide would be enough to satisfy the critics. He studied the young man in front of him. He hoped Sasuke would not be found wanting. Things might even work out well enough that he might finally be cleared for field missions again. Nothing dangerous, of course, but he might be allowed on C and D ranks. Supervised. Sasuke would probably never accrue enough good fortune and trust and goodwill for anything unchaperoned, but surely it was better than sitting around the house all day. He knew this life they lived wasn't easy on Sasuke.
At that thought, Kakashi found that his hands were clenching at his sides without his conscious permission. He found he was feeling perversely selfish. On the one hand, he desperately wanted Sasuke to enjoy all the freedoms he could be convinced to have--including missions, if that was what he wanted. On the other, more selfish hand, Kakashi didn't want Sasuke to go anywhere. He'd gotten dangerously comfortable with having Sasuke close by. If he started doing missions, he'd be gone some of the time. Kakashi forced himself to relax, to slow down the too-fast beating of his heart. One step at a time. He didn't even know if the powers that be could be convinced to let Sasuke have a little more slack.
Kakashi didn't want anything to change, even though he knew it was inevitable. If Sasuke hadn't had--and solved--his chakra control problem, something else would have come along to nudge the direction their futures took. Kakashi frowned. Surely he hadn't assumed that Sasuke would always be there with him. Surely not.
"Kakashi?" said Sasuke.
Kakashi came back to himself.
"Are you all right?" said Sasuke.
He made a half-step toward Kakashi, though they were scarcely three feet apart. Kakashi waved him away. Sasuke stepped back again, the corners of his mouth turned down. He redirected himself to his favorite seat by the fire.
"Just thinking," said Kakashi. "Nothing important."
He made himself swallow all the things he had no right to say and kept his tone light and pleasant. He focused on the immediate, the smaller things that he could deal with, the things that didn't overwhelm him and make him wish the circumstances weren't what they were. He sat next to Sasuke.
"So what kind of training were you thinking, again?" said Kakashi.
The lightening of Sasuke's expression at that made all Kakashi's private sacrifices worth it. He vowed, deep in the back of his head, to do whatever it took to keep Sasuke this side of happiness.
A/N: It took me a long time to come to terms with this chapter. To be frank, I hated it for quite some time. I've found this story to be tremendously difficult to write as of late. It's not that it's suddenly become hard work to do, because it's been hard work all along. I just am not feeling the same joy and accomplishment writing it that I used to feel. I want to write this story. I do. I have plotted it out all the way to the end: I know what's happening the next chapter, and the next, and so on. I'm just struggling to actually flesh out those utilitarian lines of plot.
All that being said, I'm already thinking about chapter thirty six. I cringe thinking about when I might be ready to post it. Maybe this chapter was just exceptionally difficult and I'll be able to turn out 36 with relative ease? I don't know. Every time I think to myself "Aha! I can do this in a week!" it backfires on me.
About the chapter itself...well...I will say that, while the Amaterasu is part of the problem, it's not the only thing going on. Yes, Kakashi is letting himself believe the easy way this time because he wants to, very badly. ^_^ How altruistic of him.
My sincerest thanks to you readers! Maya-Nara, your reviews are always a bright spot! ^_^ See you all another time!
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Entropy