Roses {Kakashi Hatake}

8. Death

Naoki and Mako looked down, watching over a sleeping girl, who seemed to be barely breathing, yet moving around a bit too much.

"Do you think she's turning into a zombie?" Naoki asked, "or are there multiple fases of dying?"

Mako sighed, "She's asleep," he stated, "and she's a very heavy sleeper. A silent one-" He was interrupted by a loud snore coming from the girl, "Nevermind."

"We probably should wake her up," Naoki said.

"That's what we've been trying for ten minutes," Mako retorted, "and no, dead people don't snore."

As the two started quibbling, Akahana was starting to wake up, "Watching someone sleep, that's not creepy at all."

"In our defence, we were trying to wake you up," Naoki stated.

Akahana chuckled, "Sure you did!" She did believe they were trying to wake her up, yet she was pretty sure they had watched her for a while too.

"We leave in ten minutes," Shibi suddenly said, opening the door to the hotel room. They were on their way back to the village and the Aburame seemed to be in a hurry for some reason.

Akahana looked at her male teammates, gesturing towards the door. Neither of them responded to her movements, so she decided to rely on her voice, "Get out!"

***

Upon arriving in Konoha the next day, Akahana decided to inform Kakashi of her return first. She figured her parents were out spending some well-deserved time together.

Unable to find Kakashi, thinking he was on a mission since his teammates weren't in the village either, she headed home.

What she found was heartbreaking. Aoi knelt over Sora, tears streaming down his face. Beside him lay another body, her mother's. Both her parents had bloodstains on their clothing and the walls were decorated with blood. On the wall where their clan symbol was supposed to be, was the symbol of Kirigakure.

Akahana tried to speak, but only mumbling came out. She felt fresh and warm tears running down her cheeks as Aoi moved towards her, throwing her in a hug, "I'm sorry," he kept repeating.

"Why?" Akahana eventually managed to say, "Why them? Why now?" Her anger grew with every word she spoke, it was all just so unfair. Neither one of her parents deserved this fate, they were innocent.

"They were after me," Aoi said, "I'm a traitor in their eyes." He looked away when Akahana looked up to see his face, "I will avenge both your parents, they had no right to do this."

The two of them spent some more time hugging each other tightly, trying to comfort the other. Was this what tou-san meant when he told me about heartbreak? the nine year old thought, Is this how Kakashi felt?

"It's not your fault," Akahana eventually told her uncle, "You couldn't have known they'd go this far."

"I know," he said, "but I should have."

---

Whilst Aoi was taking care of the process of taking her in, Akahana sat outside somewhere on a bench, staring at the kunai her parents had given her when she became genin. To others, it was an ordinary kunai, but to her it was very special.

"Oi!" a voice called out multiple times, "Don't ignore me, you arrogant douche!"

She looked up to see Obito and Rin. Kakashi had gone to the Hokage's office with Minato, wanting to catch up with the girl later. "Sorry," she mumbled, "I'm just thinking."