🌸 The Flower He Saw 🌸 A Kakashi and Sakura Story

Prologue: The Flower He Saw

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There he stood, his hand on the memorial stone as he peered down to the names that'd been engraved onto the hard rock of cement. His eyes roamed over specific names, ones he once dared to forget. 

"I won't forget either of you, Obito, Rin."

When even uttering the names under his breath, sorrowful feelings seeped their way into his heart. The only people to whom he had shared his happiness with were gone, and here he stood with little to no will power of trying to comfort himself about the said matter. 

"I'm sorry, Minato sensei" his brow just slightly twitched. 

The masked man closed his sole eye and attempted his best to control his breathing, brows twitching when he was unable to do so. He leisurely dragged his feet to the end of the graveyard to see a grave stone that was just barely constructed properly. He silently walked over to it and blankly stared upon it.

"You didn't follow the rules, father," Kakashi affirmed. "As Shinobi, we must follow the rules no matter the consequences. You knew that, yet avoided that rule as a whole."

Kakashi tried his best to let his own words sink into the pillars he created deep down within himself. Even after everything─ after all the lives that had been sacrificed, he still believed that the mission is of superiority to the lives of his comrades. And this was the main reason as to why the village began to see him differently. He was known as "Kakashi of the Sharingan" but also known as "The White Fang's Son". Both were truthful in their respected ways, however one of them brought undesired feelings of disgust to rise in himself more than the other. 

"I won't make the same mistake you did."

He offered his father's isolated grave one last glance before heading off to his house. He stood at their graves for hours, silently and blankly staring at them while his mind thought over concepts he wanted to forget.  

He was lucky, because now, he really did forget what the concepts of love and friendship symbolized. 

As he trudged his way pass the dango shop, he noticed that Guy, Kurenai and Asuma resided themselves in their usual spot while consuming the sweets they love with merriment. 

Guy's eyes widened in delight. "Oi Kakashi─ come join us!"

He was reciprocated a blank gaze, making his own smile fall flat just slightly. Kakashi averted his attention back in front of him without returning a verbal answer to the invitation and plodded himself away. 

"How long has he been like this?" Kurenai entreated worriedly. 

"When Obito and Rin died," Asuma placed his now empty dango stick onto the counter, sighing. "But when Yondaime-sama died, he got worse."

Growing up as Shinobi, they were trained to be prepared to lose a brother or two on the battlefield. Their generation was different; they were kids when they were sent to the battlefield. They were all in their early twenties now, striving to find meaning in the deaths of their loved ones to convince themselves that indeed, their brethren needed to die for the peace they've achieved today. 

Kakashi was different, however, or at least that was what Asuma presumed. Kakashi didn't reflect on the deaths of his comrades to further pursue peace in the Shinobi world. Instead, he used their deaths as a way to convince himself that not enough people have been killed for them to even think of achieving that sort of peace. 

He felt that until he died on the battlefield too, then he wouldn't have played his part in the Shinobi world correctly. 

Guy smiled without regrets. "I know he'll get better, I just know it."