The World Was All Before Him

The World Was All Before Him

- SuishouTenshi

A/N: Note that Tanabata is a festival celebrated on the 7th of July in Japan.

Note all information on the characters’ ages and accomplishments are canon except Yondaime’s… since he croaked in canon.

Also note that “motherese” is a scientific term.

If you read something you don’t understand, I suggest you google it first before asking me.

Act II, Scene III: For the Formation of the First Link

In the beginning, there was chaos.

But even chaos fell weak under Kakashi’s determination. Using the same skills that made him a Genin at 5, Chunin at 6, and Jounin at 13, he managed to bring about some semblance of order.

Now, in his arms, there was a drool-monster. To his right, a group of high-pitched pink fluff-balls. His left, a pile of brawling, territorial, hungry leeches.

Kakashi wasn’t sure if these babies were truly human. Somehow he couldn’t see himself as nearly as annoying when he was an infant.

But duty was still duty, and Kakashi took his missions seriously. Yondaime had put him in charge of taking care of this small group of the most precious babies in Konohakagure while their parents dined and mingled with the Fire Country elites, and no matter what Kakashi thought of his sensei at the current moment, he wasn’t going to sabotage a mission just to piss his boss off.

It was official. Kakashi never liked the idiotically romantic ideals of Tanabata before today, and he was definitely going to hate the seventh of July for the rest of his life.

He glanced at the dozens of babies around him and considered briefly the most efficient way to run a Chidori through his own chest.

“Hey, Naru-chan, pee on your daddy for me the next time he changes your diaper, okay?” Kakashi squeezed the bundle in his arms lightly, and Naruto stopped struggling for a blissful moment to gurgle saliva all over Kakashi’s left sleeve.

It was teething time, and it wasn’t pretty.

“I surrender,” the teen grumbled. After he wiped the remaining drool from Naruto’s chin, he set him down on the tatami amongst the group of little boys that were fighting over a dull plastic kunai. Kakashi spared a glance at the quieter side of the room and noted with some relief that the girls were merely tugging harmlessly on each other’s hair and none was truly making a fuss.

Ah, a momentary reprieve. Kakashi definitely deserved a bathroom break. He made sure no sharp objects were within reach of any of the babies, that all exits were secured, and slowly made his way to the restroom down the hall.

Who would have thought that baby-sitting was more exhausting than a month-long stakeout mission?

And it was extremely puzzling that most of the prominent clans in the village decided to have children in the same year, as though there was a specified mating season for the rich and powerful. Setting aside the larger Uchiha and Hyuuga clans with more branch families than they cared to keep track of, even the smaller ones like the Nara, the Aburame, the Akimichi, the Inuzuka, and the Yamanaka somehow ended up producing their new heirs one after another.

Maybe it was a contagious, limited, honorary clan-club-only pheromone that spread once an individual couple started to...

Oh, no, ew, he was not going to think about any of the Uchiha or Hyuuga stiffs in that way. Their “sunny” dispositions made Kakashi’s pre-Obito days look like a kitten’s hissy fit.

Kakashi had a special vendetta against the Uchiha clan. When he first came back from that mission with one glaring Sharingan and no Obito, the Uchiha clan leader actually proposed to Sandaime to surgically remove the precious Sharingan eye from him, claiming clan secret and some archaic tradition. The proposal was never accepted, of course, especially since the eye was given away freely, but it didn’t stop Kakashi’s animosity from growing.

The Uchiha had always been the number one clan in Konoha, and generally saw anyone without a fan on their clothes as an outsider. They had their special police force and family compound and squiggly retinal abnormality and would even ridicule one of their own if he or she didn’t live up to the clan’s expectations.

Kakashi knew better than anyone that his taunts at Obito’s belated blood-limit developments were nothing compared to the derision Obito faced at home.

But now that their most precious possession was in Kakashi’s protection, he intended to use it to make a name of himself and let Obito live vicariously through him. They already had a nickname for him, “copy-ninja Kakashi” or something like that, and he had the rest of his life to spread it throughout the world.

It also helped to appease his irritation at the Uchiha clan since the so-called genius heir Itachi, at age 6, still remained in the academy.

Kakashi, you’re being petty, a familiar voice suddenly echoed in his head, a voice that sounded just like his blond sensei. The young Jounin grimaced. His conscience had been trying to decide on a voice for years and it always oscillated between his father and Obito. Yondaime was never a problem until now.

And besides, Yondaime had no rights to accuse Kakashi of pettiness. After all, he suspected that the reason why Yondaime gave him such a mundane task was to pay him back for calling him “Hokage-sama” for the last two weeks.

But really, Yondaime should’ve known his reaction. What made him think that Kakashi would tolerate a bumbling, newly inducted ANBU member as replacement when his second-in-command was stuck in physical rehabilitation?

Kakashi was still rolling his eyes as he approached the sole window in the public bathroom. Outside the sky was just getting dark, and below on the grounds, Yondaime was surrounded by his usual horde of admirers. He donned a simple dark blue yukata for the occasion, not even bothering with his forehead protector. Buttery yellow tresses framed young eyes far too weathered for the man’s age, and Kakashi found his finger involuntarily tracing the window as if to wipe away a stray strand of his sensei’s locks.

Yondaime stilled in his mild indulgence of his attentive audience. As if he knew Kakashi was watching from a third-floor window, cerulean eyes sought him out with ease and to Kakashi’s indignation, winked teasingly at him for the briefest moment.

Kakashi scowled at Yondaime’s head. Gradually, the scowl faded into a confused frown. He tugged down his mask and stared at the horrific scar along his left eye. Against the darkened sky, Kakashi’s damaged reflection was perfectly juxtaposed with Yondaime’s exquisite profile.

His sensei had to be mocking him when he called him “beautiful”.

He scowled again and replaced the face mask. The villagers all thought his sensei was kind, gentle, and tolerant, but Kakashi knew better. Inside that blond head was a world of mischief and enough charm to fool the wisest of men. Though not necessarily malicious in any way, Kakashi wasn’t going to deny that his sensei was just a bit evil in some sense. And so he huffed and puffed and returned to his duty, not wanting to spare Yondaime another ounce of his thought.

His light tread back to the temporary nursery was soon disturbed by an unfamiliar bawl coming from his destination. Kakashi’s speed came into good use as he practically fled back to his post. There would be hell to pay if one of the parents found out that he had left the children alone.

The actual situation wasn’t all that bad, Kakashi later reflected. He had known that Naruto was teething, and Kakashi’s fingers had been frequently sought out as a chew toy, so of course another kid’s nose would be a viable choice as well.

Naruto’s selection in noses, however, was just a bit too precarious.

Kakashi always thought that the Uchiha clan had some kind of unspoken clan rule book with sections and clauses of how an Uchiha male must act, and if he was right, then Uchiha Sasuke was currently breaking the sacred rule of boys don’t cry.

And doing it in a spectacular manner too.

“Now, now...” Kakashi rushed over to pet the little Uchiha prince in an attempt to cease what can only be described as animalistic bellowing. Meanwhile, the other little beasts continued to look on with predatory anticipation, and Kakashi came to the belated conclusion that they were merely waiting for the right moment to join in when the two little girls known as Ino and Sakura broke open their own floodgates.

As if listening to pure screeching in surround sound wasn’t bad enough, little Naruto somehow found this to be more amusing than the time Kakashi accidentally stepped on one of Naruto’s used diapers. And to celebrate his joy, Naruto decided that he should bite down on Sasuke’s ear this time with his ragged baby teeth.

Though Kakashi would never let out how panicked he really was at the moment, he did nevertheless try to pull Naruto away from his victim. But Naruto held on with exuberance, Ino and Sakura were in a competition to see who could scream the loudest, and the little Uchiha was now leaking from both his eyes and nostrils.

Oh god no. Kakashi heard footsteps.

The nursery door burst open to let in the faces of some very nervous parents. In facing his impending doom, Kakashi let his expression fall flat, and relaxed his limbs as if this chaos was exactly what he had planned to happen.

Somehow that didn’t reassure the angry ninja parents very much.

Ino and Sakura’s mothers went over to separate the girls, as if knowing their mere proximity was the cause for their cries. The other uninvolved mommies and daddies mumbled some trite apology to the astounded Yondaime who was staring at Kakashi with an incredulous appraisal bordering on amusement and picked up their children and left.

Lastly, there remained the Uchiha head family who was shooting daggers at Kakashi with their eyes, as though it were somehow his fault. On the other hand, Naruto’s teeth were still firmly fixed on Sasuke’s earlobe, so Kakashi settled with just glaring blankly back at the six-year-old Itachi.

Hah! Take that, you little midget!

Yondaime took the appropriate moment to cough loudly enough to drown out Sasuke’s teary whines of protest against the abuse on his ear, and when the Uchiha parents’ attention were on him, the tall blond recited some slightly recycled apologies that Kakashi recalled from the days when Yondaime had to deal with Obito’s incompetence on a daily basis.

So while the “grownups” traded fake pleasantries, Kakashi watched Itachi like a hawk as the seemingly harmless boy made his way toward his little brother.

Somehow sensing his older sibling looming near, Sasuke bawled even harder, mumbled some battered form of his brother’s name, and reached for Itachi with two chubby arms. Itachi, on the other hand, reached over and squeezed the fat below Naruto’s chin and opened Naruto’s mouth effortlessly.

Now free, Sasuke crawled hurriedly away from his tormentor and dove into his brother’s arms. But that, of course, didn’t stop him from sniffling like a little baby. The cowardly little bastard hid his snot-ridden face into his brother’s neck and would occasionally turn around to check whether Naruto was still eyeing his ear and turn back with keener whines.

Urgh, Uchihas... Naruto couldn’t have hurt him that badly.

Most absurd was that Uchiha Fugaku and Mikoto were doing nothing to comfort their youngest son and merely observed the situation as if watching an uninteresting movie.

“He will apologize to my brother,” Itachi suddenly spoke.

Kakashi raised his one visible eyebrow. “I don’t know what to say to you, Uchiha-san, but Naruto is only ten months old.”

Itachi wasn’t fazed; in fact, he seemed a bit disgusted at Naruto’s lack of speech. “I spoke at six months.”

Kakashi snorted. “Well, then I beat you by two. But Naruto still can’t speak, much less apologize for doing something instinctual.”

“Is it an instinct to chew off my brother’s ear?”

“No.” Kakashi paused for effect. “He was actually going for the nose earlier, but your little brother was leaking too much snot.”

“This is not a joke, Hatake-san.”

“No, I wouldn’t dare joke around you humorously superior Uchihas.”

“Kakashi, that’s enough,” Yondaime’s calm yet chiding voice drifted over, and Kakashi stopped in time to remind himself that he was bickering with someone nearly ten years his junior and more than two feet shorter.

That, and Yondaime’s rare authoritative assertion had just sent a very inappropriate shiver down Kakashi’s spine.

“Perhaps you should apologize in Naruto-san’s stead, Hatake-san,” Itachi intoned carefully, effectively killing off Kakashi’s awakening hormones.

Thankfully, the attention was diverted away from both of them when Naruto, who up until then had been observing the banter with drool flowing down his chin, decided to finally react to his name. He crawled over to Sasuke with the determined speed of a quadruped infant, sat down heavily on the tatami mat, grabbed Sasuke’s pink ears before the surprised Itachi could defend his little brother, and planted a loud, wet, and not entirely sanitary kiss to the tip of baby Sasuke’s bruised nose.

“Gyah!” Naruto exclaimed when the room fell into a thundering silence, including snotty-Sasuke, who had now even ceased his sniffles.

In Kakashi’s experience, that overly exuberant “Gyah” could have meant anything from “Thank you for changing my diaper”, or “Why, I think my vomit looks lovely on your Anbu uniform”, to “A magical baby-kiss on your boo-boo makes all the pain go away”.

That last interpretation came from the time Kakashi arrived at Yondaime’s home with a foot-long gash on his right thigh.

Again, in his experience, Naruto’s magical kiss was quite effective.

“Well... Itachi-kun, I think there is nothing left to say but ‘apology accepted’.”

Kakashi blinked at the new voice. He didn’t even notice when Uchiha Mikoto had finally interrupted his little standoff with Itachi and picked up Sasuke, who was still staring at a giggling Naruto with amazement. When his distance from Naruto had gotten too far, a plump little hand was stretched out toward the young blond and the bawling started once more.

“No,” Sasuke announced distinctively as he struggled in his mother’s arms.

Mikoto smiled gently as she tried to quiet her younger son. “It is said that men form the strongest of bonds after combat, but I never thought it applied to children as well. Hokage-sama?”

“Yes, Uchiha-san?”

“Sasuke-kun’s first birthday is in less than three weeks. There will be a large celebration in the Uchiha compound. Do you think Naruto-kun would like to attend as Sasuke-kun’s special guest?”

Kakashi stiffened. Though Naruto was Yondaime’s son, villagers who knew of his Jinchuuriki status had never stopped being wary of him. Kakashi knew that Konoha’s mothers constantly gathered together to show off their children, and to his knowledge, aside from Naruto, the other infants all had formed stable playmates. While Kakashi was openly hostile toward the Uchihas, he knew there was no way to prevent Yondaime from accepting Mikoto’s invitation. Naruto needed friends; even an Uchiha would have to do.

Kakashi listened in a daze as his sensei made plans with the Uchihas about Sasuke’s birthday celebration and arranged a few play-dates for the upcoming weeks. When they left, the Uchiha patron didn’t even deign to spare a glance at Kakashi, and the young Itachi rolled his eyes dramatically.

Sasuke, however, had whispered a “’bye” at Naruto, whom promptly raised an open palm to his mouth, kissed it loudly, and swung out his arm in an unbalanced arc.

Kakashi had taught Naruto that form of good-bye when he was in a particularly good mood one day, and he was man enough to admit it stung a bit to see Naruto use it on someone else aside from himself, Yondaime, and Sandaime-sama.

With the Uchihas gone and the room finally back in silence, Yondaime suddenly broke into laughter. When he noticed Kakashi’s bewildered stare, Yondaime answered the unasked question, “What a woman! Did you know for the past year, Uchiha Mikoto adamantly refused to find her son a playmate?”

He then picked up a squealing Naruto and swung him about. “Look at you, Naru-chan, Kyuubi or not, someone still wants to use you for political connections. Now, we’re not going to let them have it that easy, will we? Daddy’s going to teach you a few tricks. Yes, Daddy will! Yes, yes, you bet Daddy will!”

Kakashi let the most respected man in the country run around the room teaching an infant the most outrageous pranks through motherese. Though Yondaime was treating it as an opportunity for practical jokes, Kakashi was not one to underestimate the extent the Uchihas would go for their aspirations. Naruto needed someone to look after him, and not just as a fussing piece of furniture in the Hokage office.

Kakashi knew what needed to be done.

- TBC

A/N: Title of the chapter comes from Charles Dicken’s “Great Expectations” in an excerpt about meetings and fate entwining. I thought it’d be appropriate for Naruto and Sasuke.

I think it can be agreed upon that apparently, ninja kids develop faster than regular kids, because I was like, 15 before I stopped tripping over my own feet, much less throw a kunai. So I didn’t think it was too preposterous for Kakashi to speak at 4 months. So try not to argue with me about that, please?