Naruto: Dreaming of Sunshine

Be careful of success; it has a dark side. ~ Robert Redford

.

.

"Okay," Aoba said, days later when I arrived for my shift. "I picked up a small mission for us."

He gave me a missions scroll and I opened it curiously.

"It's just an Intel pickup," he explained. "Someone has to go out and grab the packages left at dead drops and bring them back. It shouldn't be too hard."

"Okay," I agreed, going over the information in the scroll. The town it named wasn't far away, so it really did seem like a single day job. Or overnight, as the case might have been. Go, retrieve, return. Simple. "Do I need anything?"

He shrugged. "It'll be a C-Rank mission, basically. So take what you would normally take when leaving Konoha, but you won't need anything extra."

Most of my stuff was in scrolls, anyway, so it wasn't like it took up a lot of space. And Tenten had been teaching me her Hammerspace – or Infinite Pocket, as she called it – which I was slowly getting the hang of. We'd both taken to wearing the seals written on bracers, so that we could iron out the final problems before actually inscribing it on skin. I felt like I would need to make a few changes to it before it came as naturally to me as it should because I hadn't had that much to do with the design process.

"I'll meet you at the gates?" I offered.

It didn't take me long to dart home and get my mission pack and let mum know. I actually got to the gates before Aoba, which proved he was in no hurry at all. Izumo and Kotetsu were on gate duty, and it was unreasonable of me to be disappointed that Sasuke wasn't there. It had just been… a while…

I frowned.

"Forgot something?" Aoba asked, appearing and disrupting my chain of thought.

I jolted. "Oh, no, nothing like that." I shook my head. "Sorry. I'm ready to go."

We set off at an unhurried pace. It was 'nearby' but it would still be a few hours of travel to get there. It was nice, though, to be stretching my legs for something that was important but not as hugely time critical as our tracking mission had been.

It was just after sundown when we arrived, leaving the trees to approach the village more normally on foot. The place was still reasonably busy, being a good sized town with a nightlife, and no one really looked at us too hard.

"Hmm," Aoba said, just a touch uneasily, as we walked. His voice dropped low so I could barely hear it. "The signal isn't up. The apartment at the top left… see the window? The pot plant is supposed to be on the other side."

We'd covered signaling devices – innocuous marks or signs that would let us know that the informant had made a dead drop. If it wasn't done, then that suggested the drop hadn't been made. Not really a good start.

"I guess you'll get to see how we deal with non-routine work instead," Aoba murmured. "He's usually pretty punctual, I don't like it." He seemed to weigh up his options. "We'll wait until morning, in case he simply didn't get the chance to make it today. If it's not done by then, we'll investigate."

He didn't seem unduly worried, though. And there were probably all kinds of reasons why a person wouldn't make a drop if they were trying to maintain secrecy.

Still… "The curtains aren't closed," I said. "And the lights aren't on."

Which made it different to the apartments around it and suggested there was no one inside it.

"Yeah," Aoba agreed. "I saw that."

There were plenty of hotels around and we picked one not too far away, pretty much at random. Aoba brought us a room for the night and the motherly woman at the counter smiled at us.

"Do let me know if you need anything, dearies," she said. "It is nice to see men spending time with their daughters."

Aoba dropped the key. "Daughter?" he squawked, looking quite horrified.

I laughed at his expression, but… "Sister," I improvised quickly. "Nii-chan is visiting his girlfriend, but mum told him I had to come too."

Her expression smoothed out again. "There I go, assuming things," she said, laughing with me. "Do forgive me."

Aoba coughed and resettled his sunglasses, trying to regain some dignity. "Yes, well," he said, uncomfortably. "No harm done."

I dragged him off by the arm, waving to her, but both of us exceptionally eager to get away. As soon as we were around the corner I dropped his arm.

"I'm only twenty nine," he muttered.

I rolled my eyes. "I'm thirteen," I said. "The math isn't impossible. You should probably be glad she assumed family relationships."

He looked twice as uncomfortable.

"Besides," I said. "My dad is awesome. You should be flattered."

He had no comeback for that. You could hardly argue against the Jounin Commander being awesome.

Sixteen hours later, we were twenty kilometers away staring at a bonfire as it burnt itself out. Aoba seemed rather perturbed by it, which… it was his bonfire. If he hadn't wanted it, then he shouldn't have started it.

"That," Aoba said, with great finality, "is not how we normally deal with these things."

"It worked?" I offered, because that was true. We had the information we'd come for. Mission success.

He nodded. "Yes. But just so you're aware: that's not standard operating procedure. It's just… not."

"Alright," I agreed, because it seemed important to him to acknowledge that. "Back to Konoha?"

"Back to Konoha," he agreed and shook his head. "No one is going to believe this."

.

.

We did a few more interesting Intel missions, before the Cryptography gossip network – by which I mostly meant Aoba – let me know that Kakashi-sensei had returned to the village from whatever mission he'd been on.

And was in hospital for chakra exhaustion. Of course.

I swung by after my shift – completely out of visiting hours – and found his room. The bed was empty and the window was wide open.

I located his mission pack under the visitors chair and slung it over my shoulder. Then I hopped out the window. It was a bit of a fall to the ground, but nothing too bad. I crouched low to absorb the shock of the fall.

Kakashi-sensei had clearly done the same, and then managed to make it an additional three steps before having to take a break. He was leaning against the stone wall that circled the hospital compound and gave me a baleful look.

"Welcome home, sensei," I said, quietly.

I probably should have made him go back inside and stay in the hospital. It would probably have been the responsible thing to do. But he obviously wasn't going to stay, or anything, so it would have been pointless.

"Need a hand?" I asked casually.

Kakashi-sensei looked like he really wanted to say 'no', but we both knew that it wasn't true. Eventually, he grudgingly dropped an arm over my shoulder and let me help prop him up.

"I've been doing missions with Aoba-senpai," I said, instead of asking him how his mission had gone. I kept up the low grade chatter as we walked, filling him in on things that the gossip network had told me that I thought he might enjoy.

At his apartment, he unlocked the door and disarmed a few traps before nudging the door open.

I helped drag him inside, dropped him down on the bed – with a shuriken print duvet, of all things – and set his mission pack down in easy reach next to it.

"Hungry?" I asked, turning to dig through the small kitchen. The fridge was basically empty, but the cupboards were full of canned and dried and vacuum sealed goods; clearly prepared for sudden long absences. I filled the kettle and put it on, because soup would clearly be the easiest thing.

"Ah," Sensei said vaguely, but didn't tell me to stop and get out. His fingers twitched, and he gave a mournful look to the book sitting on the bedside table, clearly debating how much energy it would take to pick it up.

I picked it up and gave it to him. It was worth it for the tired eye-smile it got me. I rolled my eyes at him in return.

I made soup, and then extra for breakfast and set the little rice cooker going. I doubted he would have much more energy then, and food helped.

Not having to do things like make food also helped.

I was just cleaning up and getting ready to go, when someone thumped on the door. "Brat," Tsunade called through the wood, voice loaded with irritation. "I don't do house calls."

I looked at sensei.

He wiggled deeper into the bed and dropped his book over his face, like that would hide him. It did not.

Right.

I opened the door. "Tsunade-sama."

She paused and looked at me, then gently shouldered past and into the apartment. "Getting your students to break you out, now?" she asked, still sounding irritated.

"I didn't need to be there," Kakashi-sensei said, voice slightly muffled on account of having his book over his face. "I'm fine."

She actually rolled her eyes. "If you walked here under your own power, I will give Naruto the hat right now," she dismissed. Her hands glowed briefly green, coming down to land on his forehead and chest. "You can't keep doing this. Repeated chakra exhaustion isn't healthy."

"I'm dealing with it," he said back, voice suddenly flat and tight.

I tried to pretend I was part of the wallpaper because I was pretty sure I wasn't supposed to be hearing this. Even though it was deliberately being had in front of me.

"There are options," Tsunade said, in the tone of someone who had had this conversation before, and thought that the other person was being a complete idiot. "Reconsider the surgery."

Kakashi-sensei was silent for a long moment. "No," he said.

He couldn't see it but she smiled, just a brief uptick of her lips in victory. Like somehow that 'no' had been less firm than any other response in the past. And she was pleased about it.

I tried really, really hard not to wonder what surgery she was suggesting, or why Kakashi-sensei was against it. Really, really hard.

"I'm going to go," I said meekly, because the feeling of being an intruder – a game piece, even – was too strong. Too uncomfortable. "Good night, Kakashi-sensei."

.

.

After a few days, we picked up training again, though thankfully not at five am. Kakashi-sensei was clearly still tired and did more instructing that training, but it was just as useful for me.

Given that it had taken him a week to recover from chakra exhaustion in the Land of Waves, I wasn't going to push.

I went through my warm up stretches in the training grounds, waiting for him to show up. I'd been making progress with the muscle rejuvenation medical jutsu, and I thought I was noticing differences. Nothing so dramatic as Sakura's sudden muscle growth, but I wasn't trying to build a lot so that was fine.

"Boo," a voice said softly, directly into my ear. A hand clapped down on my shoulder.

I shrieked, whirling round, elbow coming up directly for the voice – the fastest, shortest attack I could manage from that position.

His black eyes whirled red. Sharingan!

And all the colour drained out of my world.

My elbow swung through empty space. My hand uncurled, chakra blossoming to my fingertips, a Touch Blast forming with a thought. It extended, swiping out towards him.

He dodged back, back, back, chakra flaring high in preparation for an attack.

No!

I pushed chakra into my Gelel stone, pulled it back out. My flesh dissolved into shadow. I blurred forward, racing towards him, a deep formless shadow. If I could just smother him –

He breathed fire, straight at me.

It forced me back, to disperse and go around, reform and try attack again. But he pulled the fire back, making it creep over his arms, holding it close to provide light against me.

And then Kakashi-sensei appeared in the clearing, suddenly, in a rattle of chakra smoke. "What is going on here?"

I reformed next to him, crouched defensively. He wasn't at full strength. But there were two of us now, one could –

"Kakashi-sensei!" we both said.

We. Both. Said.

I looked. And my world felt like it tilted sideways.

It was Sasuke. I'd just- I'd just tried to kill –

My jutsu released, dropping me to my flesh and blood knees on the grass.

"I don't know!" Sasuke said, voice rising. "She just! I."

I swallowed, throat dry. "You snuck up on me," I said. And it was the weakest of defenses. "You startled me."

And I'd tried to kill him. I'd attacked with full intent to kill. I could still feel the tingle of the missed Touch Blast on my fingers. If he hadn't had the Sharingan, he might not have dodged it.

That wasn't-

That wasn't-

My hands were shaking. I pressed them flat against my legs.

Sasuke let his fire go out. His arms were red but unburnt. He came closer, but cautiously. "I didn't think you'd try and kill me for it," he grumbled.

Kakashi-sensei took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I listened to it, trying to ground myself on my senses. The sounds of their breathing. The wind. The birds in the trees. The warmth of the noon sunlight.

"That's a lesson then, Sasuke," Sensei said. "It's not a good idea to sneak up on a ninja, no matter how well you know them."

I closed my eyes. "I should have sensed him coming," I said. I should have. I just hadn't been paying attention. What was the point of training my skills up, if I didn't use them? Didn't pay attention?

"I've been practicing my suppression," Sasuke objected. He crossed his arms. "That's why I tried…"

"I should have," I repeated. Because the alternative was what had just almost happened. The alternative was attacking people I cared about, just because I was off in my own head.

"You've both got things to work on," Kakashi-sensei said firmly. "But the important thing is, no one got hurt!" He gave an eye smile and dropped a hand down to ruffle my hair.

I didn't flinch.

"Sorry," I said, barely looking up at Sasuke. It was inadequate.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Me too. I didn't… I didn't think." He shrugged, awkwardly, then sat cross-legged across from me. "How long have you been able to do that shadow thing?"

"A while," I said softly.

He snorted. "Before the Exams? And you didn't use it against Gaara?"

I managed a ghost of a smile. "I wanted to keep a few cards up my sleeve for the future." I tried to go on, say something. Anything. "That fire thing. It's new?"

He lifted a shoulder in a shrug. "Fire style chidori variant," he said. "It's easier to hold than lightning, and it burns rather than penetrates so it doesn't have to be used in a straight line."

"Usually," Kakashi-sensei said, settling himself down on the ground too. "The aim is to set the other person on fire."

"Oh, it'll do that too," Sasuke said. "It'll probably set everything on fire. Except sand. It didn't work so great against Gaara. Maybe if I'd managed to make it hotter…"

"Right," I said. "I missed that fight."

Clearly I had missed more than I had thought. I rubbed a hand over my eyes. It had stopped shaking. That was something.

We were silent for a bit, but the tension was draining away. My heart had stopped racing.

"I guess it's a bad time to ask for a favour," Sasuke said.

I managed a laugh. "I think you can ask whatever you want," I said. There was no way I could say 'no' right now.

"I need something picked up from one of the outer Uchiha strongholds," he said. "And I can't go get it myself."

Obviously, since he couldn't leave the village.

"Sure," I agreed. "Just give me a list or whatever. I'll get a pass to leave and pick it up."

There would probably be a slight fee, because it technically would fall under the 'mission' category, but I'd waive payment and it would just end up being the village charges. Or something like that.

"It's just a scroll," Sasuke said. "A summoning contract. I think I know where it is. But there might be… traps or something."

"We'll both go," Kakashi-sensei said, mildly. He had his book out, but clearly wasn't ignoring us. "If they're Sharingan deactivated, I can deal with that."

I nodded. "Yeah, I'll get a chakra sample from you, maybe. That might work, too." The storage stones didn't hold much chakra for that long, but it should be enough to fool a few traps into thinking Uchiha were about.

"Thanks," he said. He looked upwards and sighed. "I have to get going, they didn't give me much time, and that only because I said there were people that would notice if I went totally dark."

"You bet we would," I said, frowning over the 'they'.

Sasuke gave me a look of exaggerated surprise. "You? Oh, I meant the Hokage. She would probably assume I'd been kidnapped or something."

I made a face at him. "Get out of here."

He smirked and vanished in a body flicker.

I rubbed a hand over my face again. "Shit," I said, very quietly. "I can't do that again."

Kakashi-sensei regarded me very seriously. "No," he agreed. "You can't. Someone will get hurt."

I curled forward, bringing my knees up to my chest. "What do I do?"

Kakashi-sensei's response was both surprising and not. "Train," he said. "Don't worry, I have just the thing."

"Ominous," I said dryly. But I would gladly take any help.

.

.

I didn't know what Kakashi-sensei had planned until later that night when I was in the Intel Division and turned a corner and walked straight into him.

"Tsk, tsk," he said, after I bounced off his flak jacket. "And I wasn't even sneaking that time."

He pulled out a black vivid, uncapped it and with lightning swiftness drew a single line down my left cheek beneath my eye.

"One point to me," he said, eye curving into a ridiculous smile, and vanished.

I stared after him in bafflement, and then down at the documents in my arms. Right. Obviously the best training for 'not being snuck up upon' was… to be snuck up upon.

He got me three more times before my shift was even half way through, by which point I was trying really hard to spot him coming.

There was a brief flutter of chakra. I spun, and caught his wrist just as he reached for me.

"Good job!" Kakashi-sensei beamed. He drew a line down my other cheek. "Now I can stop holding back."

All the ninja in the room were looking at me. I scowled, just daring them to comment on the ridiculous marks on my face that shouted out the score. Sure it was ridiculous, as far as training went, but I'd like to see them try and spot Kakashi-sensei coming.

The tally grew – more on the left than the right. Sometimes I didn't even notice them being made until I caught sight of them in a window reflection, or checked.

I scrubbed them off at night, which wasn't easy. Vivid didn't like to come off skin.

"You've got something on your face," Mum said in the morning, trying to scrub it off with her finger. "Did you fall asleep on your ink brush again?"

I blinked at her and went to the bathroom mirror. There was a single black mark running down my cheek.

Maybe I didn't wash them all off last night? I wondered, but immediately knew it wasn't true.

I'd come home. I'd thought it was over. I'd thought it was safe.

But what was home, really? It was walls. A roof. Windows and doors. The same as any other building. There were no special properties that made it invulnerable.

If I had to keep my guard up, then I had to keep it up here, too.

Lesson learnt, sensei.