Someone you loved

Chapter 40

This is the second update today, so make sure to read Chapter 39 before this one. 

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'Please accept this.'

"O-obito?" gasped Kakashi, suddenly feeling weak in the knees.

Madara... Obito... whoever that man was, he stared coldly at Team 7, dark hair shaggy and unruly, half of his face scarred into unrecognizable, and two sharingan. Two when there was supposed to be only one... because the other one ... the other one was with Kakashi. A promise made and a promise broken.

"H-how are you alive?"

"Sensei?" asked Naruto confused. "Do you mean your teammate Obito? That's him? But I thought he was dead?"

Numbly, Kakashi activated his Mangekyo sharingan, staring with desperation at the shinobi across him ... at the reason his loved one was in the hospital ... at the reason he was fearing for his packs' safety every day ... at the reason for his nightmares and guilt.

One second passed, then two, three... but Kakashi couldn't change the truth, no matter how hard he wished for.

Wide-eyed, he murmured: "There's no doubt about it. You're Uchiha Obito."

His sharingan showed him the honest, brutal truth.

Uchiha Obito was alive.

Uchiha Obito was Madara.

Uchiha Obito was the reason for all his pain.

Uchiha Obito ...

Said shinobi snarled angrily: "If you wish to call me by that name, I won't stop you. It means nothing at all to me. "

Without Sasuke, Kakashi would have crumbled right there and then, but his student was there, catching him just in time. The Hatake hadn't known his past still had its claws so deeply buried into his soul that the appearance if his 'dead' teammate – 'dead' almost-pack – would steal him of all his strength.

"Kakashi-sensei, what's going on?" whispered Sasuke, eyeing the older Uchiha hatefully.

However, Kakashi ignored him, ignored anyone who tried to talk to him because he wasn't in the presence right now, memories and guilt pulling him back into the dark hole he had been in before meeting his pack.

"If you were alive, why have you been..." He couldn't finish the question, unable to speak out the things Obito had done, the despicable deeds his almost-pack had done.

Carelessly, Obito shrugged, replying coolly: "If I must answer because you let Rin die."

The hate in the Uchiha's eyes chilled the Hatake to his core and his venomous words burned his soul. Frozen and terrified, Kakashi couldn't move.

"I suppose."

Sprinting past the still frozen shinobi, Naruto and Sakura attacked Obito while Sai ran towards Sasuke and Kakashi. Together, the two boys tried to shake the petrified shinobi from his frozen state.

Pulling the attacks easily into his kamui dimension, Obito never moved a step, still standing tall when the dust settled down.

"Snap out of it," hissed Sasuke.

Shaking his head wildly, Kakashi pushed their hands away, stumbling forwards.

"Why would you do that?"

Laughing hysterically, Obito doubled over until he suddenly stopped, hissing: "I've got nothing to say to you."

Suddenly, the attacks pulled into kamui came back and Team 7 jumped away, dodging the flaming inferno. But Obito appeared in front of Kakashi nevertheless, a large shuriken in his hand, hitting Kakashi's knee.