Time for Kakashi Hatake moved at two different speeds: the lightning speed of a mission, where every second was a gamble between life and death; and the slow, creeping silence when he was not on a mission. The days in Konoha, when he wasn't beyond the borders of the Land of Fire, felt like an endless pause. It was a familiar emptiness, one he filled with deliberate routines to keep his mind occupied.
He would wander the village, walking with no clear destination. His feet would take him down the same streets he had walked a thousand times, past the same stalls, seeing the same faces. In his hand, there was almost always a small, orange-covered book. Reading was an escape, a way to immerse himself in the emotions and relationships of others without having to feel his own. Of course, occasionally Guy would find him, challenging him to some absurd contest with the fiery passion of youth, and Kakashi would accept with feigned reluctance. It was a welcome distraction, a noise that could cover the silence in his own head.
But most of his time was spent in observed solitude. He was a ghost in his own village, an elite Jonin known by everyone but truly known by no one.
One bright afternoon, his routine was interrupted by a summons from the Hokage Tower.
The Third Hokage's office always smelled the same: a mixture of old paper, tobacco, and the unseen weight of responsibility. Hiruzen Sarutobi sat behind his desk, his wise eyes looking at Kakashi through the smoke from his pipe.
"Kakashi," the Third Hokage greeted in a calm voice. "I have a mission for you. A long-term mission within the village."
Kakashi just nodded, waiting. A mission within the village usually meant surveillance or protection.
"It's about Naruto Uzumaki."
The name hung in the air between them. Kakashi showed no reaction behind his mask, his posture remaining relaxed and nonchalant. But inside, something tightened. Of course, it was about Naruto.
"As you know, the boy... attracts the wrong kind of attention," Hiruzen continued, his tone growing heavier. "The council has their concerns. Some villagers still harbor resentment. I want you to watch over him. Discreetly. Ensure he is safe. Report any unusual incidents."
It was a clear order. A standard assignment for a ninja of his caliber. But they both knew it was more than that. This wasn't just about 'Naruto Uzumaki'. It was about the son of Minato Namikaze, the Fourth Hokage. It was about the Jinchuriki of the Nine-Tails. It was about the legacy of his sensei.
"I understand, Hokage-sama," Kakashi replied, his voice flat and emotionless.
Truthfully, Kakashi would have done it, even without being ordered. Ever since the boy had started walking and running around the village, Kakashi had often found himself observing him from a distance. From a rooftop. From the shadows of an alley. It was an impulse he couldn't explain, a magnetic pull towards the last remnant of his team, of his shattered world. This order just made it official. It gave him a reason, a justification for doing what his guilt-ridden heart was already doing.
And so his surveillance mission officially began.
Kakashi quickly learned the rhythm of Naruto's life. The boy was good, well, not exactly good. He was a chaotic ball of energy, driven by a desperate need to be noticed. Kakashi saw him try to 'help' a vegetable vendor by stacking tomatoes, which ended with the tomato pyramid collapsing and turning the street into a sea of red sauce. He saw him try to show off his own version of a 'concealment jutsu' to other kids, which basically consisted of hiding behind a lamppost that was too thin, his bright orange jacket clearly visible.
He liked to do silly things to get someone's attention. Anyone's.
Often, Kakashi would find him in the park, playing alone. He would laugh out loud at jokes only he knew. He would play both sides in a game of ninja, leaping from a swing and shouting, "I got you, villain!" then rolling on the ground and answering in a different voice, "You'll never take me alive, hero!"
The sight always made Kakashi's chest ache. The boy was so full of life, so full of an unbreakable spirit, even in his deepest solitude. And it reminded him of someone else.
It reminded him of Obito.
The same foolish optimism. The same stubborn spirit. The same big dreams that everyone else laughed at. Seeing Naruto alone on a swing, but still able to smile, was like seeing an echo of his old friend whom he had let die. The friend whose eye now looked out at the world from Kakashi's own left socket. Kakashi's heart ached just thinking about it. Every one of Naruto's cheerful laughs was a reminder of his failure. He had failed to protect Obito. He had failed to protect Rin. He had failed to protect Minato-sensei. And now, he could only watch his sensei's son from a distance, too afraid to get close.
One afternoon, that ache turned into something sharper, more vicious.
Kakashi was perched on the roof of a bookstore, reading his novel, while occasionally glancing at the street below. Naruto, who was about five years old at the time, was walking around, looking at shop windows with childish curiosity. He stopped in front of a small general store, his eyes fixed on a row of toy masks displayed outside.
He reached out his small hand, just to touch one of the brightly painted fox masks. He wasn't trying to take it. He wasn't trying to steal it. It was just the curious touch of a small child.
The shop door opened violently. A large, sour-faced man came out. "Hey! What are you doing, you monster brat?!" he snarled.
Naruto snatched his hand back as if he'd been burned. "I... I was just looking," he said in a small voice.
"Looking, huh?! Your filthy hands are touching my merchandise!" The man stepped forward, his shadow covering Naruto.
From the rooftop, every muscle in Kakashi's body tensed. He lowered his book. He could see this was going to be bad.
"Get out of here!" the man yelled. "We don't want your kind here!"
Naruto didn't move, too shocked or too scared. And then, the man did the unthinkable. He raised his hand and slapped Naruto hard across his small face.
SLAP!
The sound was shockingly loud in the normal street noise. It was like a clap of thunder on a clear day.
Naruto staggered back, one hand clutching his reddening cheek. His eyes were wide with shock and pain.
On the roof, something inside Kakashi broke. A cold, honed killing intent, one he had sharpened in hundreds of ANBU missions, surged to the surface. The air around him grew cold. In an instant, he had calculated a dozen ways to kill the man before he could even take his next breath. The man would never know what hit him.
He's a child.
He did nothing.
He's Minato-sensei's son.
The rage was so strong, so pure, it almost made him tremble. No one should do that to a child, let alone his sensei's son, the village hero's son.
He wanted to move. Every fiber of his being as a shinobi, as a protector, screamed at him to go down there. To stand between the man and Naruto. To make that man feel a fraction of the pain he had just inflicted.
But he didn't move.
He stayed there, crouched on the roof, frozen. An invisible wall, built from his fear and his past failures, held him back. He was afraid. If he went down there, if he revealed himself, he would create a bond. He would become 'Kakashi-san the helper'. And he knew what happened to people who got close to him. They died. He was a curse. He would only break this child more deeply if he let him into his life.
So he just hid. Like a coward. The elite Jonin, the former ANBU captain, 'Kakashi of the Sharingan', hid on a roof like a terrified Genin, paralyzed by his own ghosts.
Below, Naruto didn't cry. Not there. He just looked at the man with tear-filled eyes, a heartbreaking mixture of pain, confusion, and defiance. He turned and ran, disappearing around a corner.
The shopkeeper just grunted, spat on the ground where Naruto had stood, and went back inside his shop as if nothing had happened.
Kakashi stayed there for a long time, long after the street had quieted down. His rage had subsided, leaving a cold, bitter self-loathing. He looked at his own hands. Hands that had taken so many lives to protect the village, but couldn't lift themselves to protect one little boy.
He was an unseen guardian, a failed protector.
He was just there, watching, a haunted shadow. And when night fell, wrapping the village in darkness, he finally left, disappearing back into the silence, with a new pain to add to his collection.
...
Kakashi returned to Konoha under the cover of dusk. The mission on the border of the Land of Rain had been exhausting, a brief but brutal fight that left a bitter taste in his mouth and a bone-deep weariness. After giving his concise report to the Third Hokage, the first thing he did—as he always did—was to look for the boy.
It had become a reflex, an ingrained habit. He leaped to the rooftops, moving silently across the familiar tiles, his single eye scanning the streets below. Usually, he would look for a flash of bright orange, or listen for the distinctive shout of "dattebayo".
But this time, he found something different. Something that made him stop mid-stride.
In the same park where he had often seen Naruto playing alone, Naruto was not alone.
Kakashi narrowed his eye, his focus sharpening. Next to Naruto, who was enthusiastically trying to skip a flat stone across a small pond, sat another boy. The boy wasn't playing. He was just sitting on the grass, hugging his knees, and staring at the water with an expression that could only be described as profound boredom. His face might as well have had "Go away, don't bother me" permanently written on it.
Kakashi recognized the boy. Yuji Yamashita. The son of the mask maker down the street. A child from an ordinary civilian family.
This was new. This was very new. In all his years of observation, Kakashi had never seen Naruto have a consistent friend. There were kids who would play with him occasionally, before being pulled away by their wary parents. But never anything like this. Never someone who deliberately sat next to him.
"Look, look! This one skipped five times!" Naruto exclaimed, pointing at the water.
The Yamashita boy just glanced over. "A fine stone," he said flatly, without a hint of enthusiasm. "It is now at the bottom of the pond. Congratulations."
Naruto, instead of being disappointed by the cold response, just grinned widely. "I know, right?! I'm going for seven skips!"
Kakashi watched with genuine confusion. Their dynamic was bizarre. Yuji clearly did not want to be there. Every fiber of his being radiated reluctance. And yet, he stayed. He was serving as a backboard for Naruto's overflowing enthusiasm, albeit a backboard of silence and over-the-top cynicism.
From that point on, Kakashi's surveillance had a new focus. He wasn't just observing Naruto; he was observing Naruto and Yuji.
He saw them almost every day after the academy. They would play, or rather Naruto would forcibly drag Yuji to the park to play ninja. Yuji would play the role of "bored hostage" or "lost merchant" and spend most of his time leaning against a tree complaining, while Naruto would run circles around him, creating an epic adventure all by himself. Other times, they would fish by the river. Naruto would impatiently jiggle his fishing rod every few seconds, while Yuji would actually fall asleep next to him, his hat covering his face.
Gradually, Kakashi began to notice a deeper change in Naruto. A subtle, but significant change.
His antics began to diminish. The paint pranks on public property, the shouting in the middle of the market, the desperate acts for attention—they all but stopped. Naruto no longer needed to make the entire village look at him, because he already had one person's guaranteed attention, even if that attention came in the form of grumbling and deadpan stares.
He was just there with Yuji, more contained. His chaotic energy seemed to have found an anchor. He was still loud, still hyperactive, but there was a quiet center to his world now. Someone to tell his jokes to. Someone to share his discoveries with. Someone to just sit with in silence.
Kakashi didn't understand. He truly didn't. Why did Yuji, who was so clearly reluctant, still hang out with him? The boy radiated the aura of someone who would much rather spend his time alone with a book. He could have just left. He could have just ignored Naruto, and after a few tries, Naruto would have gotten the message, just like the other kids did.
This wasn't like Kakashi's relationship with Obito. They were bound by a team, by a teacher, by a rivalry that fueled their spirits. They had a reason to stay together, even when they annoyed each other. But Naruto and Yuji? They had no such bond. They had no reason.
His professional suspicion kicked in. Maybe there was something more. Maybe the Yamashita family wasn't as simple as they seemed. Using his Jonin connections, Kakashi did a thorough but discreet background check. The result? Nothing. The Yamashita family was exactly what they appeared to be: third-generation mask makers, respected civilians, no shinobi affiliations, no debts, no criminal record. They were 100% clean. Not some fabricated spies or secret agents. They were just... ordinary people.
And their son, for some reason, had decided to befriend the village's Jinchuriki.
Kakashi kept watching, and the more he watched, the more he realized he had been focusing on the wrong thing. The key wasn't why Yuji stayed. The key was what was happening to Naruto because Yuji stayed.
One afternoon, Kakashi was hidden in the shadows of the trees near a training ground. Naruto and Yuji were sitting on the grass after one of their exhausting "training" sessions (exhausting for Naruto, who did the running; and exhausting for Yuji, who had to watch).
"So," Yuji said, looking at the clouds, "if you were Hokage, what would be your first decree?"
"I'd make ramen the official food of Konoha!" Naruto exclaimed without hesitation. "Everyone would have to eat it at least three times a week! It would be the law!"
"A terrible plan," Yuji said flatly. "You'd destroy the economy of the other restaurants. The dango shops would go bankrupt. The yakiniku vendors would protest in the streets. You'd have a food-based rebellion on your hands within your first week in office."
"Oh," Naruto said, looking flustered. "I didn't think of that."
"Of course you didn't," Yuji said. "You have to think about the economic impact. Maybe you could start by subsidizing the price of narutomaki. That's a more fiscally responsible move."
Naruto just stared at him with a blank look, and then he laughed. It wasn't the forced, boisterous laugh Kakashi often heard when Naruto was alone. This was a different laugh. A deep, heartfelt laugh, born from the sheer absurdity of his friend talking about fiscal policy as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Kakashi noticed how Naruto's days were filled with more of that kind of laughter. Real laughter.
Then, there was something else. Naruto would often disappear into the Yamashita house around lunchtime or dinnertime. Kakashi had seen it several times, entering through the front door like a family member, and not coming out until hours later. He didn't need to be a genius to figure out what was happening. The boy, for the first time in his life, was probably experiencing what it was like to have a family dinner.
Sitting at a warm table. Sharing stories about their day. Being offered a second helping by a caring mother. They were small things, ordinary things, but for a boy like Naruto, they were everything. They were a foothold. A solid foundation that had, perhaps, somehow, given him enough security to no longer feel the need to prove his existence to the world in destructive ways.
One evening, Kakashi saw them walking home together after a long day. Naruto was chattering about something, and Yuji was just listening. As they were about to part ways at a crossroads, Naruto suddenly beamed at Yuji.
"Thanks for today, Yuji!" he said. "It was super fun!"
It was a pure smile, with no trace of sadness or pretense. A smile so bright and full of hope it lit up the dimming street.
And that's when Kakashi saw it. That smile reminded him of a sunflower. Always facing the light, even when surrounded by darkness. Beautiful, strong, and it made his frozen heart feel a little warm. That smile was an echo of Minato-sensei. That smile was the legacy of Kushina-san. It was the most precious thing in the village, and almost no one realized it.
Except for one strange boy who seemed to care about nothing.
Kakashi shifted his gaze to Yuji. The boy just nodded in response to Naruto's thanks, his face as flat as ever. But as he turned to walk home, Kakashi saw something else. A tiny twitch at the corner of Yuji's lips. Barely perceptible, but it was there. A ghost of a smile.
And Kakashi understood. This boy, Yuji, wasn't the anchor. He was the soil. He was the calm, fertile ground where that sunflower could finally grow freely, without having to scream for the sun.
Looking at Yuji's deadpan face, Kakashi's lips under his mask twitched into a genuine smile. A quiet, unshakeable resolve formed in his heart. The Hokage's order was to watch Naruto. But his own mission had just been updated.
I'll protect you too, you strange kid, Kakashi thought, his eye on Yuji's retreating back. I'll protect you, just to keep seeing my sensei's son's smile.
It was a promise. A vow made in the silence of the rooftops, by a shadow guardian to a boy who had no idea he was being watched.
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