Situational Hazard

Situational Hazard

CHAPTER TWO

Kakashi wanted to get home as fast as he could before it began to rain. From what he could tell there was going to be one hell of a storm hitting Konoha and he wouldn’t wish anyone to be out and about when it happened. He hopped from tree to tree gracefully, realizing that he wasn’t going to make it to his apartment before the rain started.

As he jumped over a large patch of clearing, he happened to look down and spot an orange figure down below. Instantly one person came to mind. Who else would wear such a loud color and be so easy to spot? He stopped and crouched down on a branch.

Naruto looked to be sleeping or something, probably the result of training too hard again. He sighed and was about to continue on his way when something else caught his attention. A bag. Not much bigger than what could fit in a bed sheet, Kakashi noted that he had not seen Naruto with it when he left after their mission today. His eye narrowed.

He silently leapt out of the tree and landed next to the sleeping boy. Even though his face was soaked with the already pouring rain, Kakashi could see the red rings around them that indicated that he had been crying. He watched his student for a while longer before he decided that he couldn’t just leave him where he was. He picked up the small pathetic bag of belongings and bent down to shake Naruto awake. The boy didn’t move. He tried again, and still Naruto’s too-calm breathing did not change.

‘How long has he been out here?’ Kakashi wondered off-handedly.

Touching his hand to Naruto’s cheek, he wasn’t surprised to find it cold and firm with exposure to the low temperature rain.

Naruto had passed out.

Putting the bag on the blonde’s stomach, he carefully scooped him up began his now delayed journey home. Now that he had another person with him, sprinting through the trees wasn’t going to be an option, the added weight making it very possible for him to lose his grip if Naruto woke up too suddenly in an alarmed panic.

‘Oh well, I’m already wet.’

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Naruto’s eyes cracked open to unfamiliar surroundings and for a few seconds he instinctively froze all movement and shut his eyes to feel for any other presence that might have been silently waiting for him to come to so they could do something horrible to him.

Panic washed over him briefly when he realized that nearly every stitch his clothes were gone, but he stayed still until he was sure that wherever he was, he was alone for the moment. Opening his eyes he sat up slowly and looked around.

The room was simple and rather bare, simply furnished with an oak dresser and a lamp on the side of the bed. It was obvious he was in a bedroom. Wherever he was, it---

“I see you’re awake.” A voice said from out of nowhere.

Naruto’s head snapped to the side and he blinked at the last person he expected to see.

Kakashi stood in the doorway with nothing on but a towel around his neck and some baggy pants and his ever-present mask, watching him with that bored gaze. He even still had his hitae-ate on to cover his left eye, despite being at home and having nothing more casual to wear.

“Oh….Kakashi-sensei….w-what am I doing here?” He looked around, further emphasizing his uncomfortable curiosity.

“Would you rather I take you back to where I found you?” Kakashi replied flatly, slipping a shirt over his head. Naruto blinked again at seeing his sensei so….at home.

“Well…why didn’t you just leave me there?” He asked in a small voice.

Kakashi simply stared at him, turned, and pointed to the door. “We could go back.”

Naruto swung his legs over the side of the bed and shivered as his feet touched the cold floor.

“But if you really believe you’d be better off sleeping in the woods than someplace warm and safe, then you can leave. I’m not keeping you here.” He turned and walked over to another door, which Naruto had guessed to be the door to his bedroom that led out to the rest of the house, meaning that he had just come from the bathroom.

The blonde boy’s eyes narrowed as he stared at the floor, feeling ashamed all of a sudden. He obviously hadn’t thought things through in his distressed state so that nobody skipping through the trees would happen to find him out there. It was embarrassing enough to be suddenly homeless and now he was being taken pity on by his lazy perverted sensei that had never even taken so much as a second glance at him when they went on missions together. He barely knew Naruto existed as far as Naruto was concerned. What would make him consider taking a nobody like him into his home?

“Wow, I don’t believe I wasn’t invisible this time around, sensei. It’s normally when I’m around the other two that you recognize that you have a three man Genin team and that the third person must be somewhere among his two best students. It’s actually surprising that you noticed me at all. I guess that ugly orange jumpsuit does come in handy sometimes after all.” He mumbled to himself. He was so busy staring at the floor that he didn’t notice that Kakashi was in the room again and watching him with a lazy brown eye.

“You’re right, the color of your clothing is what made me initially spot you….. However, to think that that’s the sole reason I recognized you, makes me think that you need someone to talk to. I guess you normally reserve this side of you for Iruka.”

Naruto was startled but didn’t show it. He should be used to the exceptional skills of his sensei by now and actually berated himself silently for not being aware of his presence in the first place. Or was that another one of those things that Sasuke and Sakura were better at than he was?

He got up, fully intent on leaving when he realized he was in nothing but his soaked underwear and that he had to get past Kakashi and find his clothes.

Seeing Naruto’s apprehension, Kakashi quickly, but boredly explained, “I suppose you would rather I had left you in your freezing cold, soaking wet clothes and given you a reason to skip out on missions, but I took the liberty of making sure that you would be healthy for our next mission. Oh, and I didn’t think you’d be very happy if I took everything off, so I left that little piece of dignity on you.”

Naruto’s head snapped up to glared heatedly at the silver-haired asshole. “You bastard! Nobody even told you to rescue me in the first place, I would have been just fine where I was if you didn’t show up!”

“Right. For how long?”

Naruto grit his teeth and jumped out of the bed, stomping up to Kakashi, he held his hand out. “Give me my clothes, I’m out of here!”

Kakashi sighed wearily. “See now, if I gave them to you, you’d leave.”

“That’s the idea!”

“Iruka’s gone. You obviously need a place to stay. I’m being nice. Why don’t you just take it?”

Naruto crossed his arms indignantly. “Oh yeah, so you can patronize me whenever you feel like it? Yeah, tough toenails old man, I’m not letting you insult me just for a place to stay! Now give me my clothes!” He growled.

That damn bored ass look Kakashi had on his face was seriously ruffling the young Genin’s feathers. He acted like they were in the field again, and he wasn’t even paying attention to what Naruto had to say. Naruto hated his lack of expression, it made him feel like he wasn’t being taken seriously.

“Your clothes are on my radiator in the kitchen. You could get them and get out, or you could shut up and eat the ramen I made for you on the kitchen table. Either way the decision is entirely up to you. I’d probably take the ramen.” Kakashi leaned against the wall next to the door, put his hands in his pockets. If the little runt was going to be so bold as to take on the force of nature, he’d better eat something first.

Naruto’s blue eyes narrowed suspiciously. Why would Kakashi make him anything to eat? What did he expect in return? Naruto had no money and certainly nothing of value on him.

“I don’t have anything to give you, just so you know.” He said warily, the hint of his statement was strong with meaning.

When had Kakashi taken out that book?

Without looking up, Kakashi replied in his frustratingly monotone voice, “If I wanted something from you, I would have just taken off your boxers.”

Naruto nearly singed his sideburns with the fore of anger bursting out of his ears. “You pervert! I wouldn’t let you touch me for a million bowls of ramen! I’m telling you right now, if you even so much as look at me the wrong way, I swear I’ll---

“Look, you can stay here as long as you need to, but this little trip you’re having isn’t what I had in mind when I brought you here. I could have just took your limp body to the Hokage and left you there to end back up in the forest or worse. You should be lucky I choose to consider letting you stay at all.” Kakashi hadn’t raised his eyes from his book, almost as if he were partially detached from their conversation.

Naruto looked at him warily before edging around the Jounin and toward the kitchen. “I was just curious as to why you’re acting like you give a shit about me now.” He mumbled on his way out.

Kakashi hadn’t heard him, too absorbed in his book to care what the boy did after he left the room.