Life sucks, but reincarnating into your dead relative's body sucks even more.
His body was too small and too large and had an uncomfortably large amount of chakra yet so much less than what he was used to and what-
Kakashi awoke with a start, sitting up in his too, too large body, soaked through with blood. There were bodies thrown about the clearing and he was wearing an ANBU mask and he couldn’t breath. Frantically, Kakashi clawed at his mask, tearing off the object from his face. Holding his hands to his throat, he coughed and coughed and he could feel something coming up his throat and with a final heaving cough, he spit out a river of blood.
Kakashi finally breathed in, and that was wrong. He always, ever since he was sixteen and took a sword to the lungs, had a small amount of trouble breathing and yet, as he took another breath, he could breath perfectly fine. It wasn’t right. His body was too tall, yet too slim, and his reserves were so much larger than he ever remembered them being but they were filled so much less than they were when he fell asleep.
As Kakashi looked around, he wondered if maybe he had an ANBU mission and he didn’t remember it. But no, that didn’t make sense. He was forcefully discharged from ANBU last month so he could take on a gennin team . With a last cough to get the last of the blood out of his throat, Kakashi tried to stand on too-tall legs and immediately fell, landing on his face with a sickening splat.
And he didn’t have his cloth mask. That was also wrong. He always wore his mask, even for sleep. It should have been there. Maneuvering himself so that he was laying on his back, he wiped some of the blood off of his face and ew, was that a bit of guts? He could taste blood on his toung, so he spit that out with passion in case that it also contained guts. This was why he wore a mask.
Sighing, he put some of his weight on his left hand so he could take out his ANBU mask. He might as well where it, if only to keep out the awful smells of the massacre around him. Looking at it, he noticed something was off, if only a little bit. It looked… well, newer than he’s ever seen it. There were only about a dozen scuff marks, where last time he had it, there had to be over fifty on there.
Putting it near his face, it seemed to reach out to his chakra. So yes, this was his mask. It was just a little different. With a great sigh, Kakashi tried to stand up, this time being more careful and kneeling before he stood up, and even then, he felt a little shaky. He had to be at least five inches taller, and that didn’t make sense. He was of average height, not too tall, but not short , either. As he stood there, Kakashi didn’t dare take a step, but he did notice that his left leg throbbed horribly even when he tried to keep most of his weight on his right.
That was bad. That meant that his leg was likely broken, but he had to get to Konoha. He was on an ANBU mission. Maybe. He was going to treat it like he was, because that usually made everything more straight-forward. Clamping down on any remaining confusion and emotions, Hound tried to take a step forward, without falling on his face this time.
It was more difficult than he anticipated, his left leg wanting to give out every time he even thought about putting weight on it, and he kept on expecting his legs to be shorter than they actually were. Hound got past that bit fairly quickly, far too used to sudden growth spurts back in his younger years to let this get at him too much. But at twenty three, he thought that he would have been over them.
The possibly broken leg was a problem that likely wouldn’t go away unless he stopped to give it some attention and ANBU Hound was on a mission. He didn’t have time to things like that, not when he had to get back to Konoha and report. When he looked around as he let his leg calm down a little, he saw how most of the bodies there had Kiri masks and attire. All of them besides what looked to be a small team of Konoha ANBU; Crow, Fox, Cat, and Frog.
Carefully, he bent down and grabbed a sealing scroll, sealing their bodies in it.
He must have been sent on a last minute infiltration mission that they had no one else for, and no one really retired from ANBU so they called on him. Hound must have messed up and erased his memories so that the enemy wouldn’t know what information he had got. And there was a squad sent after him. But the fact that Hound escaped with his life was a little but surprising.
That still didn’t explain why he was taller and slimmer and had too much chakra. But it explained some of it, and that was good enough for Hound. But he had to get back to Konoha. When he was home, he could figure out why he had a new body. Maybe he did have a growth spurt? It wasn’t unprecedented for a Hatake to grow late, and they always have been on the taller side.
So Hound set off into the trees, ignoring his leg and ignoring just about everything that was wrong with the situation.
On his way back, Hound noticed several things.
Like how that tree that he just passed was supposed to have thousands of kunai slashes from when Gai came out to this part of the land of fire to train. Or how that forest was supposed to be a clearing. Or how he took a D-rank once to fill up that crater, he knew it was filled so why was it there-
No. Focus on the mission now. Rant about how things aren’t supposed to be that way later.
As Hound finally came into distance of the village, he noticed one more glaring difference. There were only three heads on the Hokage Mountain, what-!?
No, he was on a mission. He could freak out about that later, but for now, he would report to the Hokage about his mission and try to figure out what happened.
Dashing past the guards at the gate, Hound made his way to the Hokage tower. He had no clue what happened, so he started formulating a report in his head even though, usually, the Hokage would ask questions about the mission and the ANBU operative would have to respond accordingly. Hound doubted that he could answer most, if any, of the questions, so he made his own.
Shunshining into the Hokage’s office, Hound knelt and said, “Hokage-sama.”
He heard a muffled gasp from his right, and though he wanted to see what it was, he didn’t dare raise his head until the Hokage acknowledged him.
“Hound.” He heard he Hokage say, “Report.”
Raising his head to look at the Hokage, Hound said, “I do not remember most of what happened on the mission. I assume that I forcefully removed my memories to stop intel from getting into enemy hands-”
“No,” the Hokage said, “You weren’t sent on an infiltration mission. You were sent to take down a team of Kiri-nin that were too close to the border.”
“I don’t have any memories of the getting the mission, either.” Hound said again, “I remember waking up with everyone around me dead, including operatives Crow, Fox, Cat, and Frog. We must have completed the mission.” All of this was said in a monotone voice.
The Hokage looked down on him suspiciously, and Hound guessed that it was deserved. He had no memory of a mission, after all. That practically screamed imposter. “Operative number?” And Hound was glad that it was that, instead of his shinobi registration number because if what he thought had happened was true then-
“9-2-3-6-6-1-7-0, ANBU Hound” He replied. Operative numbers were a random string of eight numbers passed down by the mask, and they were almost impossible to get ahold of unless you were the ANBU giving that number. ANBU hound always had that string, no matter the time.
The Hokage relaxed almost imperceptibly, and the growing tension in the room dissipated. “ANBU Hound,” the Hokage started, “As promised, at the success of your mission, you shall be released from ANBU and integrated back into the regular forces, known as Hatake Sukea.”
And, oh, how could Kakashi forget the namesake of his most used alibi? How could he forget the man that everyone always said that he took after? Kakashi was occupying a dead mans body, and while he supposed that it made things make more sense, it also opened up a whole load of new troubles.
Because now he was Hatake Sukea, younger brother to Hatake Sakumo and the uncle that Kakashi never met.