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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
- 6
- 7
- 8
Chapter Six
When the message came from the Hokage, Kakashi couldn�t believe it. He looked at the paper several times, just to be sure. It was a mission, a bona fide out-of-the-village mission. No other person or group of people could do it as he could. Despite his ongoing responsibility for Sasuke, he needed to take it. He had a few days� advance notice to figure out what--and how--to tell Sasuke. For a moment, Kakashi imagined not telling him. He tapped the paper against his leg. He looked around. His bedroom door was closed, but he shut the window, just in case.
Sasuke didn�t seem to trust anyone right now, and he certainly didn�t extend trust to anyone he�d not had faith in beforehand. Kakashi snorted. That is, if it could be called faith, this thing that had brought and kept that grudging presence constantly at the edge of his awareness. He sat on his bed. Keeping an eye on Sasuke had to be the most difficult job he�d ever undertaken. He didn�t like babysitting, and that was exactly what his orders were. Keep Sasuke out of trouble. Don�t kill him. Try not to let him kill you. (Really, it was unfair because Kakashi was good, maybe even great, at killing.) He suspected that no one had planned for this exact situation. His grip on the notice tightened. The paper wrinkled up and Kakashi smoothed it out against his thigh. A darker, more cynical part of him thought this mission was a test: it was a bit convenient, a mission coming up like this so soon after Sasuke had been deposited into his care.
Kakashi still didn�t know Sasuke well, and he fumbled just as often as he succeeded in handling him. Maybe this new mission was a better use of his skills. The village needed its strongest out there working. Still, he felt a twinge when he rehearsed his explanation and tried to imagine Sasuke's response. Kakashi sighed. Sasuke was a singularly difficult roommate and ward at the best of times, and he was entirely too quick to assume conspiracy. Even now, Kakashi caught himself sweeping the room for signs that he was being spied upon. He had caught Sasuke at it occasionally and was certain there were more instances when he hadn�t. Sasuke would make assumptions if he found out about the Hokage's message on his own, and Kakashi didn't want any misunderstandings.
A week after they�d broken from their apartment hunt--one day after the notice had arrived--Kakashi was nearly ready to leave on the new mission. He�d given himself a little time to think about what to say. Sasuke wasn�t an idiot. He�d know that Kakashi was leaving the minute the traveling packs came out. Kakashi decided this was one of those rare times that honesty really was the best policy. He was prepared to tell Sasuke everything he could about the mission and, perhaps, a few things he shouldn�t, if that's what Sasuke needed or wanted to know. Kakashi dragged his packs out into the living room. He dropped them on the floor. Sasuke came out of the kitchen.
�I�ve got a mission tomorrow,� said Kakashi. �It�s not going to last too long. A few days at the most.�
Sasuke looked at the partly loaded bags. He didn�t seem very surprised, but there was something not quite right with his expression. There was a tightness in his eyes and the way he held his jaw that bothered Kakashi. He tried to soften what he had to say.
�I can�t take you with me. You know that," he said. "But you�ll be able to stay here, and it�s only the usual four-man ANBU squad.�
The knowledge that they would seal Sasuke�s chakra hung in the air between them. Kakashi suddenly found himself unable to face Sasuke�s sharp gaze. He cleared his throat and tried to pretend that, even now, the ANBU were not watching them from outside. Kakashi lowered his voice accordingly.
�I�ll tell you about the mission, if you want to know,� said Kakashi.
It wasn�t much consolation, but it was all the reassurance he had to give.
Sasuke sat on the couch. Kakashi pulled up a chair in his line of sight, blocking the mission packs from view. He gave him a moment.
�Well?" he said. "You want to hear about it?�
Sasuke nodded. Kakashi sighed inside and hoped that, with this knowledge, Sasuke would be able to relax some. There was nothing either of them could do to prevent Kakashi leaving. Even if he could have turned the mission down, Kakashi wasn�t sure he would have. He ignored a prickle of guilt. This was important and he had to do it. Sasuke would be fine. He�d be fine.
Kakashi left for four days at the height of summer. He made his way through the waving veldt of Grass country and into Earth. He was doing surveillance and groundwork for a further, later mission, which meant he spent a lot of time hidden in trees and behind boulders, waiting to see what he needed to see in order to make reports to the Hokage. Kakashi made judicious use of his Sharingan and mapped particular places of interest, but mostly he endured the tedium of waiting. Discounting the possibility of being found out, it was boring work. Hot, too. Kakashi felt sweat trickling down his neck. He didn�t wipe it away as it inched toward his collar. There were too many people around now for him to be making unnecessary movements. It looked like the background information for this mission was accurate--they were building some sort of military installation, and swarms of people were coming and going all the time. Kakashi was careful to limit his activities even at night, when the largely civilian body of workers were least likely to see him. During the day he held perfectly still for hours, if need be. Kakashi was perched in an elm today, giving him both a great vantage point and a shaded hiding spot. It was almost comfortable standing with one arm wrapped around the trunk.
Still, knowing he couldn�t move put an extra sting in every fly landing on him, every drop of sweat that rolled into his eyes, and every piece of grit that worked its way through his clothes to chafe him. Each urge his body gave him was magnified. Kakashi had to distract himself. Fortunately, he had plenty of experience at passing the time. His Sharingan continued to track the movements of the people and supplies and he was careful to keep a firm grip on the tree, but that left most of his mind free to think.
As someone passed underneath the elm, whistling enthusiastically, Kakashi thought about what a pleasure it would be to put him out of his tone deaf misery. Someone else did it for him, smacking the offender across the back of the head and into silence. Kakashi rolled his eyes. The whistler probably wasn't a ninja at all, as no ninja, low-ranked or not, would allow someone to hit him like that.
Thinking about civilians made him think about the disastrous apartment hunt�which led him to Sasuke. Once he came to Sasuke, he couldn�t not think about him. Kakashi wondered how he was getting along. He imagined Sasuke doing all the sorts of things he normally did: housework, cooking, reading, sleeping. How was he coping with a lack of people to glare at? After all, the ANBU guards weren�t exactly a visible presence. Scowling would be a nice distraction from the hard truths of the situation, though. Kakashi worried, just for a moment, that this house arrest was too close to what Sasuke had endured in prison. He tried to think of other things because in the end, Sasuke had survived.
The afternoon passed slowly, and Kakashi found himself in a strangely languorous state. He felt, distantly, that he should be more alert, but he couldn�t quite force himself into complete awareness. A breeze relieved the worst of the heat, and he�d long since grown accustomed to the bark pressed into his flesh. Kakashi finished his Sharingan work at this location, and he pulled down his hitai-ate to stifle the nascent ache in his eye. He just needed to wait until dark, when he could slip away and make paper copies of his surveillance for the Hokage. He'd be free to make his way home after that. Kakashi could dispatch the scrolls with one of his ninken once he got a little closer to the Fire country border. This mission was turning out to be almost relaxing.
Kakashi started thinking about missions and, in a connected train of thought, Sasuke. Did Sasuke have a lot of mission experience? He had had a fairly average life as a genin despite his skill and genius. There were a few standouts, but mostly it had been catching pets and pruning hedges like every other genin. Who knew what Sasuke had done and had experienced after he�d left Konoha? It was obvious that he didn�t have enough of a foundation in ordinary ninja work, which was the whole point of being a genin. Sasuke had gone haring off almost before he�d started, and he had come back with an aptitude for mayhem and little else. A ninja so one-sided couldn�t fit well into the current society. If there had been a war on then yes, Sasuke could have been a valuable tool, but these days...he was worse than useless. Kakashi felt himself tense and grow angry.
The whole situation should have been preventable. Sasuke shouldn�t have been allowed to leave. Kakashi should have kept better watch on him, should have sat on him harder, should have seen that their last confrontation wasn�t enough. He should have known their conversation wasn�t something that would protect Sasuke and stand between him and his hatred of his brother, Orochimaru's offer of power, and all the other dark things he had secreted away inside. Kakashi should have kept him safe, in Konoha.
He eased his grip on the tree. Shreds of bark flaked off and fell to the ground below. What a joke. Being a ninja was never safe. It was patently unsafe if you were any good at it, and Sasuke had been the best, the brightest, the most promising of his class. Anger welled up again, molten and thick. Kakashi struggled to control a sudden surge in his chakra. After all this time, Kakashi still couldn�t understand why Sasuke didn�t see that Konoha would have helped him. The village acted as a safety net for all its ninja and particularly the young, no matter that its people bled and killed and died in its service. Sasuke had desperately needed the stability the village offered, but he was the only one who hadn�t seen that. Maybe he hadn�t been capable of that sort of perspective then. Perhaps he still wasn�t.
Kakashi continued to think dark thoughts as twilight fell. A small part of him still kept watch on his surroundings. When there was a minimum of people around, he started flexing the stiffness out of his muscles, group by group. He felt pretty good for having spent upwards of eight hours standing in a tree. It didn�t hurt to be thorough, though, considering he was getting old for an active ninja. He didn�t relish the thought of limping carefully all the way back to Fire country because he'd torn a ligament or strained muscles, or done something that warming up could prevent.
Between stretching and thoughts Sasuke, Kakashi�s attention wandered more than it should have. When he leapt down from the branches of the elm, the nearest guard was closer than he�d been anticipating. Crap. Kakashi took off into the countryside, using what cover he could find while the guards gave chase. He�d have to lead them around for a while and then ditch them without engaging because orders were orders, however inconvenient. He shook his head and wiped the sweat away from his eye. At least he could move around now. He was also thankful that his pursuers were mediocre chuunin at best. Even so, he would almost prefer fighting them to running. Kakashi sighed and kept moving, working his way toward home one stride at a time.
A/N: Well...I'm pleased that, for the most part, this chapter went smoothly. I struggled with a couple awkward spots, but I think I've done all right fixing them up. Somehow I had remembered this chapter as being longer than it is, but that's probably a memory left over from when I first started writing this chapter. I had originally planned for more things to be covered in six, but I ended up breaking the material into two chapters (six and seven.)
If I don't get post chapter seven tomorrow, it will be Tuesday or Wednesday before I upload more. I'm still working out a schedule for updating that accommodates both the editing of finished chapters and the writing of the new. Anyway, thank you for reading! I hope you've enjoyed the story so far.
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- 8
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Entropy