Chapter 4
Kakashi Hatake didn’t dream of Team Minato, his father, and comrade’s death, the failing relationship in Team 7, or the turmoil of the shinobi wars last night…which was strange now that he thought about it in his Hokage office, since these were events his mind often hit replay for him once he falls to bed.
Instead, last night he dreamt of walking through a field of scarecrows.
When he was still a boy trying to piece together every piece of knowledge he had of the world, he lived in a house with his father, Sakumo Hatake, near the edge of the Hidden Leaf village. Sakumo Hatake, also known as ‘White Fang of the Leaf’ was renowned throughout the ninja world; ‘an exceptional shinobi’ people would praise until the day of his fall came.
Sakumo’s reputation corrupted, when he failed in pursuing his ideologies. As a kid, Kakashi resented his father’s choice but now, being a living body with a dead soul roaming around the ninja world for almost thirty-one years plus having a chance to converse with his deceased father (during Pain’s assault), Kakashi could only look at Sakumo as his father, a great shinobi, a good man and nothing more.
Kakashi leaned back on his chair, his index finger tapping at the blank space at the corner of a piece of paperwork, where a red stamp of approval from him was needed.
Although Sakumo was busy and always attacking the enemies and defending the village his entire life, he would never forget to take some time off his days of rest to spend time with his son…There was a place where they would always go for training, meditation, and conversations. A large cornfield at a very isolated corner in Konoha, the home of a lonely scarecrow.
Strange that it was the place that appeared in his dreams last night.
After rereading a few lines on the medical request placed forward by the Leaf Hospital, Kakashi reached lazily for the stamp on his right and smashed it down on the blank space below the paragraph. ‘Approved’ it would now read, Kakashi snatched another copy down from a one-meter-tall stack of files and shuffled the pages between his hands as his eyes scanned over the letters.
In that dream of his, Kakashi knew he was seeing the cornfield through the eyes of someone else when he saw himself stepping foot into the meadow, trudging toward him along a trampled dirt path. Kakashi ignored the duplicate of himself; he tried to turn his head around to survey the entire pasture…but he couldn’t do that. Somehow, he couldn’t move his body as if his hands were tied to a wooden cross and someone else had already stitched his limbs up to create his position at this moment.
As if…the thoughts in Kakashi’s head stood still like his body when he captured a fleeting idea in his head——he was examining everything in this grassland from the perspective of that solitary scarecrow.
Why a scarecrow, Kakashi opened his eyes to stare at the other Kakashi, who suddenly stopped walking and was staring at him with a doubtful expression. They were probably like reflections, only that the Kakashi in front of him was wearing a haori, and Kakashi had never worn that ever since he became a Jonin.
Kakashi's eyes flitted to the clock hanging above the office’s door, it read noon; he recalled from the back of his head what he had done in the dream during that moment.
He blinked.
And the Kakashi in haori was gone, replaced by the same-looking scarecrow in his childhood.
Kakashi didn’t believe the man turned into a scarecrow at first, he glanced around hurriedly trying to spot himself again but as he did so, from the corner of his eyes, he caught an army of scarecrows…rooted in different spots on the meadow past his back.
———
“You’re lucky that I chose to stay at this dumpling shop before continuing my journey,” Tsunade shot a confident smirk at her disciple before she dropped her head back to blowing on her tea, “what’s the matter anyway?” She raised an eyebrow at the figure entering the room.
“Tsunade-sama,” Sakura began, folding her cloak and placing it gently beside her as she squatted down on the opposite side of the wooden table on the tatami. A moment ago, she finished hauling the body from the forest to the lodging; Moegi had already set up a bed on the tatami using some blankets she found in the closet and was now washing the man’s Chunin jacket and shoes in the backyard. Sakura was currently in room four, meeting up with Tsunade as she didn’t want their discussion to disturb the patient.
“Earlier today, whilst Moegi and I were returning from our mission, I found the body of a man lying around the river bank,” Sakura watched as Tsunade poured her some tea, “thank you, Tsunade-sama.” She paused for a split second while her mind assembled the way she needed to provide her information to the master who taught her.
“The man had the Konoha symbol on his Jonin headband. Moreover, he looked exactly like Kakashi sensei except he didn’t have a scar on his left eye…Tsunade-sama, have you ever seen anyone with such an appearance around the village before you left?”
Tsunade shook her head; Sakura sighed and resigned to a sip of her tea. I thought so too…
“That’s one of the strange things about him,” she droned on, “another is that when I found him and applied my chakra to cure him. I found out that there’s no chakra in his body, there isn’t even a chakra pathway system.”
“Huh?” Was Tsunade’s reply. Silence enveloped the room, Sakura played around with her teacup awkwardly.
“But he is alive, and resting in room six right now,” Sakura added, “I——”
“He’s alive?!” Tsunade interrupted slamming her cup down on the table, causing it to wobble slightly; the hot liquid in Sakura’s cup made a swooshing sound as she grabbed it before it fell. Tsunade leaned back to her side again, her eyebrows pulled to the center of her forehead in suspicion. “Sakura, both you and I know that people can’t live when they run out of chakra,” the phrase came out like she was talking to herself.
“And that’s the problem, Tsunade-sama. Now putting that aside first, his internal organs were badly impaired when I found him. He is much better now, but…” Sakura trailed off ominously, “As I was curing him, the connection between my chakra and his organs got cut off a couple of times by an unknown substance. It felt like something was trying to repulse my chakra but it died down as quickly as it had appeared. I have never experienced this sort of event so far as a medical ninja so I came to ask for your help: do you have any idea what it could be, Tsunade-sama?”
The two women sank into silence. Sakura eyed her master, who had her chin on the back of her hands, and whose eyes stared grimly at the closed window behind her.
“No identity, no chakra, and a body harnessing some strange powers,” Tsunade summarized plainly. There was too little information and too much to comprehend at once. Chakra is an essential substance for all life forms, running out of chakra would mean death but it doesn’t mean that there was no way to obtain it. However, if a man could live without the need of chakra, then— “this is a very peculiar case. Would you let me have a look at him?”
A least impossible proposition suddenly popped into Tsunade’s mind.
A fuzzy memory of Team Hiruzen in one of their missions to the Hidden Mist emerged in her head.
When she was eleven, Tsunade embarked on her first journey to the Hidden Mist, guarding an elderly man called Sakai.
Sakai was a man whose hair already faded to white at the age of thirty; whose skin was as white as the snow; whose eyes were like galaxies of their own, pale and blue…more like ice; whose shoulders hunched, and whose body swung back and forth as he trudged alongside them because his right leg was just a little longer than his left. Even as an ordinary villager, he wore strange clothing (at least that’s what Tsunade thought), a dark cloak that split into the tail of a swallow at the back, and a black shirt with a high collar that was like hands cuffing his neck. Sakai would always wear black. Nevertheless, his personality was the complete contrast to the choice of his attire. Sakai had a young-looking face and lips that would stretch into a lopsided grin every time he shared some of his stories with them. It was his gentle voice and smile that cheered the team of young ninja on when it was their first time traveling into an unknown land.
Before the mission, they were informed with the information that Sakai was renounced as a respectful person with unlimited wisdom throughout lands and people were eager to hunt for him for this piece of knowledge. Tsunade and Jiraiya didn’t get it during that time, everything Sakai said about the world made him sound as poorly as a seer rather than an intelligent man, but Orochimaru was interested and would constantly discuss with Sakai, the adult’s favorite topic: the existence of multiple past and multiple futures. But Sakai was too chatty of a talker and soon Orochimaru got bored too and quickened his step to catch up with his companions, leaving the two seniors trekking idly behind the trio.
“Why don’t they build a bridge here in the Hidden Mist, Sakai-san?” Tsunade asked when their boat swam through the rolling waves, “Getting here by boat is good, but sometimes it would be so inconvenient…”
“Ha ha,” Sakai laughed heartily, his hands crossed over his chest as his back tilted further down the rim of the boat, “I don’t know much about that. You see, it’s my first time here at Hidden Mist too!”
“What?!” Jiraiya jumped up from his spot. His sudden commotion made the boat wobble viciously, Tsunade’s knuckles whitened as she clenched onto her seat. She peeked at Orochimaru, that poor boy was no better than her, he was accidentally flung to the rear of the boat by a wave of Jiraiya’s fist. At the boat’s front, Hiruzen heaved a disappointed sigh.
“Then why did you say in the mission scroll that you’re returning home to the Hidden Mist?” Jiraiya threw in his question, eyeing Sakai with distrust, “Did you know how long I planned to visit the bathhouse in the Village Hidden in the Mist? (There have been sayings that Hidden Mist had one of the best bathhouses on this continent and a great deal of ladies happened to visit there for a peaceful bath during the colder seasons).
Sakai smiled apologetically at Jiraiya, “Maybe it’s not the best to lie on the footnotes of a mission scroll but this lie might come in handy when you know that people are trying to track you down!” He wiggled his finger at Jiraiya who pinned his gaze back with a look of betrayal.
“Ahem,” Hiruzen coughed, “Sakai-san is correct, sometimes lying about one’s location and past is indeed necessary for protecting oneself. But, Sakai-san, knowing that you’ll be safe with us and the officials of Leaf, maybe just explain your circumstance a little more instead of giving us the wrong information.”
“Ah, sorry,” Sakai’s playful demeanor dropped but his apologetic smile stayed plastered onto his face. However, Tsunade knows that Jiraiya’s true intention wasn’t about the safety of the mission target or anything. At once, she threw her fist into Jiraiya’s face, “Jiraiya——!!! You’re dead!”
“Ahhhh!!! ——I’m sorry!!! I’m truly sorry——AHHHH!!!”
“Heh heh heh,” Sakai coughed dryly, peeking at the two bruises on Jiraiya’s face, “little girl, you have the potential to become a great ninja one day with that strength.”
They got off one by one when the boat bumped into a wooden pole of the pier, Sakai gave the boatman a few coins and bid him goodbye.
“Wait——why did we get off the boat?” Jiraiya whipped his face around in panic when he realized the boat had left without them minutes ago, “isn’t the——”
“You just realized?” Tsunade chipped in, clicking her tongue against her teeth, “Jiraiya, you need to sharpen your dull senses as a ninja.”
“Hey hey hey,” Sakai banged his hiking stick against Jiraiya’s head gently, “the mission required you guys to accompany me until I have found a place to rest. So let’s be quick and look for shelter before it gets too dark for you guys to go home.”
…
“You must have traveled all around the world, Sakai-san,” Tsunade mumbled sleepily, her body hunched forward with her chin resting on the table. Sakai had offered to treat them to dinner before they started on their way home. He explained that he wanted to repay his thanks but with a gurgling stomach Jiraiya standing next to him, it came out as if he was forced to do this.
But, as Sakai had said so before, I am a man of my word.
Tsunade watched the man sitting beside her through her fluttering eyelids. The wind blew softly on the windows of the busy restaurant; the orange lights around them would constantly dim and then brighten again like flickering candles; the room swarmed with noises and smelled of sake.
Tsunade rubbed her full tummy and savored the taste of the last bite of the miso soup on her tongue. Gradually, she felt the voices in the noisy restaurant stop hitting her eardrums and in that instant, it felt like there were only her, Sakai, and the rest of Team Hiruzen (which was pretty much just a sleeping Orochimaru as Jiraiya and Hiruzen have gone to the bathroom) in the room.
“Let’s see,” Sakai rubbed his hands together, he peered at the blonde girl to his left. Tsunade gazed back tiredly at his blue eyes, which twinkled with mirth. Still a kid on the inside, huh, Tsunade turned her gaze away. “Hmmmm…
“Well, it’s a yes and a no. Depending on how you look at it, but I have been to the Land of Lightning, stayed for a few nights there in the Village Hidden in the Clouds then went down south to come to Konoha,” Sakai winked, “I haven’t traveled much. Ha, my next destination after this will be the Land of the Moon. I heard from quite a few that it’s a great place to go to for some adventure and fun.”
“Travelling around the world, hm?” Sakai’s voice suddenly dropped to a hush. His gaze fell to the empty plates sitting on the table, “I think I have done, very, very much more than that.”
The eleven-year-old Tsunade didn’t get what he meant by the last line he spoke but she wouldn’t care anyway. However, she did imagine they would have the same goal: to travel around the world.
Yet what she didn’t anticipate was that Sakai had done much more than that, but whatever he did wouldn’t matter to a Genin like her.