Cheap ink and old paper
Kakashi doubted any Leaf nin would ever understand just how much courage it took to refuse Jiraiya of the Sannin when he asked to take Naruto.
It was after all altogether too easy to forget the strength of allies. That was something Kakashi had become increasingly sure of as time had passed. It was easy for people to forget the power of those who had fought beside them and wreaked destruction on their enemies, when that very power helped them sleep sound at night.
It was infinitely more difficult for people to forget the power of their enemies. Those who had rained down destruction on all they held dear, and returned every night to haunt their nightmares along with the blood of their comrades, and the dead dead eyes of their kin.
For the Leaf nin Jiraiya had only ever been an ally, saviour, hero, protector. No leaf nin woke up screaming in fear of the toad sage. It was easy for them to forget, to fall for the persona of a harmless, washed up, old pervert. Intellectually they knew he was dangerous, but the toad sannin was good at his work and it was so very easy for them to see exactly what he wanted them to see.
It was easy to forget the strength of an ally and so the leaf nin had forgotten. But the strength of an enemy is far harder to forget, and Kakashi had spent his childhood as Konoha’s enemy. He remembered. He couldn’t not. The warnings of teachers, and comrades, and bingo books burned into his mind as deep as the knowledge of how to throw a kunai. Jiraiya of the Sannin was dangerous.
And now Jiraiya of the Sannin wanted his student, and Kakashi had to refuse him.
…
They spoke in private, quietly because some things shouldn’t be said too loud. The kids were a little way off, watching with a studied casualness that proved they were listening in. Good, they probably needed to hear this. Kakashi could scent traces of sealing ink and paper underneath the perfume of the women’s baths that didn’t quite manage to drown out the pervasive blood and metal cent that clung to any ninja worth the name. The ink smell that marked a funijutsu master and to those who knew was a far more frightening scent than the blood. Still Kakashi wouldn’t back down though. There were some things worth fighting for.
“His father would have wanted me to teach him.” Jiraiya argued half angry, half desperate, and Kakashi wondered how he saw him, the foreign interloper that stood between him and his student’s son.
“His father is dead in the ground.” Kakashi had snapped back, aggression to mask the fear. He knew he wasn’t fooling Jiraiya but he couldn’t let the genin see him weak, not when they needed to rely on him. “So it really doesn’t matter what he wants.”
“You don’t really believe that.” Jiraiya hissed, and something in his eyes, old hurt, exhaustion, abruptly drained Kakashi’s fear. Jiraiya didn’t have the strength of will to fight him, he realised and that knowledge reduced the sannin from a nightmare to a man. In the face of that man, Kakashi just sighed.
“I believe that people have a right to make their own choices, regardless of what their parents may or may not have wanted. Naruto wants to stay with me, are you really going to force him away.” Jiraiya looked slightly uncomfortable, but showed no signs of backing down, so Kakashi continued ruthlessly, blood in the water and he couldn’t stop now. “He won’t love you for it you know.” His voice was like silk over razorblades as he said it, and maybe it was cruel to hit so hard, to remind him that Naruto had no reason to love him, that keeping his distance had left him a stranger to his own godson. But Kakashi couldn’t forget, Jiraiya was a dangerous man, and he didn’t dare hold back against him.
Kakashi could see the exact moment when Jiraiya crumpled. It was in his eyes, and his voice, and the lines of his face, and it was strange to feel guilty for hurting someone he once knew only as a nightmare.
“Could I see him sometimes?” Jiraiya asked, with a hopefulness that was all out of place on an S ranked nin, “Maybe help with some of his teaching.”
“Of course.” Kakashi smiled graciously, his mask hiding the teeth the expression would otherwise have shown. He could afford to be magnanimous in victory. As long as Jiraiya didn’t think he had a right to steal one of Kakashi’s students away, it was all to the better to allow him close. He was after all a powerful ninja with a lot worth teaching, and Kakashi would be a fool to turn that away. Just as he would be a fool to unnecessarily anger one of the Sannin when he already had what he wanted. He didn’t want Jiraiya for his enemy.
Jiraiya either didn’t detect the thoughts running through Kakashi’s mind, or more likely, he just didn’t care, because his responding smile was all gratitude. Listening to the man babble his thoughts and plans on things he could teach Naruto, Kakashi found himself wondering cynically how often Jiraiya would actually show up once the excitement wore off. He did after all have a history of neglecting his responsibilities.
Sometimes Kakashi wondered just how Konoha any of the Sannin really were, the Sannin were powerful yes, forces of nature even, but Konoha nin were strong when it mattered, and the Sannin had, each in their own way, broken under pressure. Orochimaru obviously insane and an enemy, Tsunade a wandering drunk who couldn’t bear the sight of blood, and Jiraiya, all dramatic gestures, and honourable intent, and running running running from any hint of someone else relying on him, too haunted by his own failures to bear that weight.
Kakashi might understand, but he couldn’t respect it. Not when he’d seen Iruka sensei speak up against people with ten times his power for the sake of a child most would blame for his parent’s deaths, not when Obito had been dying by inches, and still had the courage to reach out to someone who should have been an enemy. Not when he’d seen such strength from Konoha nin in the very darkest moments. The Sannin were strong, but not where it mattered most, not the way Konoha nin should be.
Jiraiya left to retrieve their new Hokage in a flurry of grandiose promises, and high drama, and Kakashi was forced to warn his kids not to rely on the toad sage.
“Listen to him.” Kakashi said, “He’s smart, and knowledgeable, and very, very, good at his job, so if he tries to teach you something pay close attention. But he’s unreliable. He’s tired, and broken, and his coping mechanism is to run. Expect nothing and you’ll save yourselves a lot of heartbreak.” He looked at Naruto especially as he said it, and was glad to see the boy was listening. Still there were more things than grabby sannin to be worried about with the village missing a Kage, and the council free to act with impunity.
…
Sakura breathed steadily in and out as the blood roared in her ears, too loud for her to hear what was being said. She hadn’t known she was capable of that kind of anger. No that was a lie, she’d always known she had a temper no matter how hard she tried to keep it buried. She knew she could feel that kind of anger, she just hadn’t expected to feel it here. Not in the heart of her own village, directed at the people she was supposed to trust to lead her. Maybe she should have. Kakashi sensei had tried to warn them all. Blood under the carpets and bones in the foundations of the city walls and the people in front of her knew where and why and who had died.
They were old, and age, she was starting to understand meant something different for ninja than civilians. Old didn’t mean frail, and weak, and the responsibility of the young to care for and protect. Old for ninja meant too vicious to die, too jaded for mercy, too dangerous to ignore. She stood with her team in front of the council and every movement and meaningful glance they gave, screamed predator. There was nothing frail about the elders of their village.
She stood with her team in front of them, and tried to breathe through her anger as they discussed Sasuke’s forfeit in the chuunin exams. They thought he should have fought, said that Konoha had lost face when he surrendered. They blamed Kakashi sensei for his cowardice and in the same breath questioned Kakashi sensei’s loyalty. She could see Sasuke’s nails biting into his palms out the corner of her eye and she wanted to speak out, to shout, and rage, and force them to see reason. But a warning look from Kakashi sensei held her back.
“Bite your tongue Sakura.” He’d told her before they went to see the council. “Bite your tongue and hide your anger. They’re watching to see how you react.” So she bit her tongue and breathed, and was grateful she wasn’t expected to speak because she didn’t think she could keep her rage out of her voice. Gaara had been a monster, mad and deadly in a way that no genin of six months training could ever hope to match and Sasuke could have died. She had killed three people to keep Sasuke alive, and they would have rather thrown that away for pride.
She remembered the things Kakashi sensei had told her, told them all, the things she had hoped weren’t true, things that part of her knew were true, because they were too cruel to be lies. Blood and bones and so much killing, and the forests of Konoha were watered in blood. She looked at her leaders and knew that they could be a threat, and sometimes she wished that Kakashi sensei had been kind enough to lie to them.
If Kakashi sensei was shaken by their accusations it didn’t show. His face was blank and unreadable behind his mask, and his voice carefully neutral and deferential. She didn’t like it. He was polite and respectful as he explained that he thought the village would have lost more face if the last Uchiha had been turned into jam by Suna’s jinchuuriki. Not that he knew those words, but Sakura knew how to read between the lines.
The council said that hadn’t been Kakashi’s call to make, and Kakashi had agreed, and reminded them that it had actually been Sasuke’s call, and then they’d called Sasuke up to speak. For once she was glad of Sasuke’s unwillingness to open up. The council got no more out of him than anyone else had since his family died.
In the end they’d had to let it slide. Kakashi sensei hadn’t technically done anything against the rules, and their team was too high profile to disband without a good reason, and she breathed a sigh of relief after they left that room. Kakashi sensei hadn’t been kind, hadn’t tried to shield them from the truth, he’d told her things she wished she’d never known, and he’d been right to do so. She didn’t want a different Sensei.
If she had wanted a different sensei, she suspected all she’d have had to do was report exactly what kind of books he’d given her to read while her teammates were training for the chuunin exams.
“You’re smart Sakura.” He’d said, as he handed her the books and it sounded more like a warning than praise. “And it’s a dangerous kind of smart so you need to be careful. All of you have your strengths, Naruto is good with people, and Sasuke has a gift for practical skills, but you’re smart the way I’m smart. You’re good with ideas, and ideas… they can be dangerous.” She stared quietly at the books he’d given her. Wrapped up in orange covers to look like copies of the latest Icha Icha books, but she’d opened them, and there was nothing as innocent as pornography in those pages.
“If ideas are so dangerous why are you giving me these books?” She asked.
“Because you need to know. Because people as smart as you can’t afford to be ignorant. Because it’s nothing you wouldn’t figure out yourself given time, and so it’s safer to just tell you, so you know what not to say out loud.” His voice too soft to carry far turned still softer as he added quietly, “and because part of you can’t stand not knowing.”
He’d been right of course. He was right all too often, and she wondered what it was that let him read her so well. She wondered if she wanted to know.
She’d read the books, all of them, and now she knew that treason smelled like cheap ink and old paper. Treason was histories that didn’t match what they were taught in the academy, was personal accounts of places that had no hidden villages, was manifestos from organisations long since destroyed by figures in bone white masks that came in the night. She knew that if she was caught reading such things then being reassigned to another genin team would be the least of her worries. And yet the sheer thrill of reading them, of knowing that they were forbidden, of knowing what would happen if she was caught, and that hardly anyone else had dared to read them, it was intoxicating, and she wanted more.