Second Sight

Quotation in the summary is by Og Mandino.

Enjoy. :)

"Goddamnit!" Obito swore, tripping over an empty beer can on his way to the back door, "I just cleaned this yester--" He sighed, shaking his head. It was no use, really. His old man was passed out, snoring, on the sagging couch in the living room and the entire house smelled of stale alcohol. There was no way he was going to get his research paper on Konoha's ancient wars done in here, and he really needed to get a good grade in this class or else his temporary academic probation was going to get a lot less temporary. Muttering to himself, he checked his wallet for the last of the money from his last paycheck only to find it gone. The sight of his empty wallet exasperated Obito to the point where he almost physically fell over. Instead, he cast the man who unfortunately had sired him a look that was at least as dirty as the floor of their living room.

"For a fat bastard who can't get off the couch without needing to catch his breath, you make a hell of a pickpocket," Obito grumbled, resigned to his life as he shoved his wallet back into his pocket and shifted the weight of his backpack on his shoulders. There went studying at a cafe or over dinner. Ah, well. Obito was used to it. There was one place he could still go that was quiet and comforting and gloriously free. Outside. Ever since the forests around Konoha had been established as federally protected land, they'd become one of Obito's favorite places to hide because his dad could never find him there and the best stuff happened there. Like he'd turn around and find someone'd left him lunch. Or if he complained loudly that there wasn't enough sun in the clearing, the next day half the canopy would be gone. Obito wasn't big on the faith stuff, with his crap life and all, but he was sure someone was looking out for him in those forests.

"I hope you die in your sleep, Dad!" Obito piped cheerfully the way most children would say 'ittekimasu' as he left out the front door, pointedly leaving it open. If someone wanted to come in, rob his father blind, and murder the old man in his sleep, who was Obito to ruin their plans?

He arrived in his favorite clearing after a pleasant fifteen or so minute walk, in a much better mood already. Everything about this clearing was strange, really. Sometimes he would be walking to the store or the library or school and he would zone out and find himself here instead. Sometimes he would toss and turn at night and not be able to sleep, feeling unrest in his very bones. Like he was bursting with energy, like he needed to get out of the house and just run. And sometimes, when his dad locked him out of the house either just to be a dick or because he was too drunk to tell his son wasn't home yet, he would come here and sleep. He would wake up in tears, unbearably sad from a dream he could never remember, and there was always an indent in the grass beside him. Once he found a few silver hairs on his shirt. And even though he always woke up crying, he was also aware that he never slept better than when he spent his nights here.

"Forest spirit guys!" he called as his customary greeting, "I'm just studying for my research paper! Help me not fail my class if you guys can, okay? Then again, you guys do favors, not miracles, yeah?" Then he sat down and dumped out the contents of his bookbag, talking to himself the way people who were usually left to themselves tended to do.

"Alright, so... ninja wars. Boring old guys dying for stupid causes. Why do I always get the retarded topics? Let's see... some guys didn't get along, started killing each other 'cause that fixes everything. Politics politics yada yada. Kids are sent to war. Jesus, why didn't more kids go insane and kill their whole families after? Some... what's this...?" Obito's eyes narrowed as he saw the title to one of the chapters he was skimming, "The Battle of Kannabi Bridge...? Where've I heard th--ow!" Obito clamped his hand over his right eye as it began to water, stinging sharply. He blinked, trying to get whatever had gotten in there out, trying hard not to rub it because he knew it made it worse but... but... he wanted to rub it so bad.

"Stupid dad and his stupid stepping on my goggles. He knows I need those! But no, he can't tell his son's prescription goggles from the wrong end of his last prostitute. Stupid, stupid, stupid dad--" The pain gradually faded, though Obito still couldn't figure out for the life of him what had managed to get in there. It wasn't like there was any wind or anything--

"Right. Battle of something-or-other Bridge. I swear I've..." Obito frowned again, absently rubbing his right eye as he began to read, hoping to jog his memory.

"Pictured above," he read to himself, going for picture captions because those were easier than the huge blocks of text no one cared about, "The young Fourth Hokage with his team..." Obito's grip on his book tightened as he suddenly got a sick feeling in his stomach. It felt like remembering a terrifying childhood dream. He could only remember vague sounds and smells that didn't really remind him of anything except being afraid. He threw down the book before he realized what he was doing, hands shaking as he pulled them back to his chest.

Kannabi Bridge.

Obito's scent was scared, agitated, upset; the look on his face, it kind of hurt-- He was shaking. It was-- that was -- that was bad--

Pictured above, the young Fourth Hokage with his team...

and there were the four of them smiling out at coming generations -- well, the three of them -- all unknowing of the misery and torment and the horrors that would come to comprise the entirety of each of their short lives before they all ended violently.

A fox padded out from between a couple of trees, into the clearing.

From time to time they appeared around here, lazing on rocks under the moon, making off with bugs, flitting through the undergrowth so fast that they were gone in the space of a blink. Usually the foxes here were of the average orange variety; but there was something different about this one. It seemed a little bigger than foxes usually came. Its fur was a shade of silver-white that almost glowed where the sunlight touched it, and its left eye was squeezed shut; it looked like it might have been in a fight...

The other unusual thing about this fox was the way it simply sat there, seemingly staring in Obito's general direction.

Its tail swished back and forth restlessly.

It was the silver fur casting off the midday sun that caught Obito's attention, flashing in the corner of his vision like the gleam of a blade. Instinctively, Obito's hand went for his right thigh, grasping... nothing? Obito froze, trying to remember what he had just tried to do, staring down at his hands as though they weren't his. Then his gaze snapped up to the strangely colored fox and his felt his breath catch in his throat. Silver fur.

"You," he whispered, licking his lips as though it would make his voice less hoarse, "You... you know what's going on, don't you? You're... you're the one who makes me feel like this. When I sleep here you make me dream those things. And right now... why are you doing this to me? I don't understand! He... he looks just like me. I-- I don't understand."

The fox cocked its head at him silently.

This time around, Obito was Obito. He'd kept his own name... he was eighteen years old and he wasn't dead yet. That never happened. That never happened. He should have been dead five years ago, gone at age thirteen, like every other incarnation he'd gone through in the last three thousand years.

But. He wasn't.

Kakashi could almost bring himself to hope. Almost. Maybe...

Just maybe, this would really be it...

Maybe he finally dared to try.

The fox padded over the grass and across the clearing, so silent it almost seemed as if its paws weren't touching the ground. It halted in its leisurely walk as it reached Obito's side, tail still flicking back and forth, a certain nervousness seeming to enter the unconscious gesture. Obito's left hand was resting on his textbook; the fox gently butted against it with its soft, fur-covered head, tentatively licking the back as it looked up into the young man's face, almost seeming to seek approval.

Don't be sad.

Touch me... please?

Please?

Oh god, please...

Obito blinked at the fox momentarily, trying to decide what to make of the creature's strange behavior. Then he laughed a little bit like a sob and closed his eyes, hand instinctively stroking the animal's soft fur as though he were petting nothing more uncommon than a cat or a dog.

"I... I'm finally losing it," he told the fox as though it were the funniest thing in the world, "All the weird shit that's made up my life is finally driving me off the deep end. I'm talking to some fox-thing that thinks it's a dog. Not only that, I'm accusing it of making me freak out at my textbook. I'm hallucinating myself in my history book. I don't even like history. Jesus, Obito. You're such a piece of work. Now I'm talking about myself in third person. Ugh. I should go ask Shimenawa-sensei if stress can actually make you go insane or if it's just a saying and I'm fucked."

Don't worry, you're not losing it. It was already lost.

The thought, and the sad, slightly unhinged little laugh that accompanied it, were clearly not Obito's. Yet there they were all of a sudden, sitting in his head, standing out like an eyesore with their bright blood-red flavor among Obito's blue-green-orange-yellow thoughts.

The fox's tail slowed down in its restless movement, a quiet little sound beginning to emanate from the creature that resembled nothing so much as a purr. It seemed to hesitate for a moment before moving to curl up in Obito's lap, lying half on top of his textbook. The fox lay its head down tiredly next to the photo of the smiling Fourth Hokage and his doomed team.

"No, see, the point is not being insane, so that doesn't really help me--" Obito stopped himself, regretfully no sharper in this incarnation than any other. He blinked once, then again.

"Wait." He experimentally prodded the fox curled so contently in his lap.

"Do that again."

He -- really shouldn't have said anything. Really.

He'd learned his lesson. Sharing thoughts was bad -- scarybadno it can't happen again, he wouldn't let it happen, it felt good to be inside Obito's head and he was so much better at it than he had been before no. He mustn't he wasn't going to screw this up it was going so nicely he just had to keep it up and be brave and not do bad things and nomoresharing thoughts so--

No, he thought at the other boy.

The fox blinked once, and kept staring down at the picture.

"Aw, c'mon! Just one little--" Obito stopped himself once more, "...it was you! Oh thank God, I thought I was starting to hear voices--" The boy paused rather thoughtfully, staring down at the creature in his lap, still absently petting it.

"...not that a freaky fox that can communicate telepathically is much better than hearing voices, but at least it's not me. What's up with you, anyway?" He was still feeling a little anxious, as though he were about to become terrified of something and the only thing stopping him from having an outright anxiety attack was his fear of thinking about whatever made him afraid. Yeah. It was complicated and Obito wasn't used to complicated feelings, nor was he particularly fond of them. But somehow the fox in his lap made him feel better, as though... Something definitely wasn't okay. Something was definitely very, very wrong. But... as long as the strange colored fox stayed, things could be okay. Eventually. Or something. Obito's head was beginning to hurt.

Kakashi didn't really want to answer that question.

It felt so nice, being touched and being with someone and and, andbeing with. Obito -- and there was a part of him that wanted to just stay here and be petted, comfort and be comforted until the sun went down and then just vanish back from whence he had come; but really, he'd already begun, there was no point in cowardice now. but it just felt so good and not-bad and not-cold and not-by-himself-being-nothing-forever-and-ever-until-Obito-needed-him because he was a nothing now but he wanted, he wanted to be a something and not-bad and not-hurt and not and that was why he needed to get up and try to answer the question, dammit and stop thinking stupid thoughts and just do it.

After a long moment of silence, in lieu of answering immediately, the fox rose from its place in Obito's lap. It shook itself, seeming a little perturbed, and turned to nuzzle Obito's hand one last time before climbing down, circling around to plop down on the ground right in front of him, leaning over to look at the picture in the textbook again.

It made something in his chest hurt every time he looked at it, so he couldn't help looking again and again.

The fox made a little sound, a quiet huff of breath; one might even have called it a sigh. It looked up at Obito again with its single dark eye, tail flicking back and forth again, and then it glanced away. Its posture seemed almost regretful.

Kakashi took a very, very deep breath.

There was no magical transformation. No noise, no fanfare. One moment there was a little silver-white fox curled up on the grass next to Obito's feet; the next, suddenly, there was a young man with silver-white hair, barefoot, wearing a loose white yukata trimmed in red. His tail still swished restlessly under the crimson hem.

It was there and it was gone again. Obito hated that. The moment Kakashi transformed, in that split second before he realized the little fox had changed, a name, some spark of recognition, flitted through his thoughts and disappeared by the time Obito actually saw Kakashi. The feeling of absence that always hit him when he almost remembered and then lost something that seemed so important filled him and he pressed his hands against his stomach.

"I... I know you," he managed trying to bring the thought back even though he knew it was useless. How many times had he sat alone in his room trying remember why he'd woken up that morning and not recognized where he was? Where he could almost remember what he thought his room was supposed to look like. Or he almost remembered who was supposed to be in the room with him. Or was it a room at all? But he had been alone his entire life. And he never felt more alone than the mornings like that. The memories never came, and they faithfully failed him this time as well.

"You--" Obito's eyes widened, "No, I don't know you, that's not it-- You look... you look like the kid in the picture! Next... to the guy that looks like me!"

The other young man looked back down at the textbook again, thoughtfully. It had been a long time since he'd practiced reading upside down. He remembered that one time on that one mission where they were but he was busy. Stop that.

The caption on the picture continued with: The Fourth Hokage's cell during this period in the war was known as Team Yellow Flash. From L to R: Hatake...

"Obito, what's your name?" Kakashi asked, absently.

"Huh? Matsudaira Obito-- wait! How did you know my name? ...and why are you asking me if you already know? Is this some freaky kitsune thing, 'cause--" Obito finally followed Kakashi's gaze back to the textbook.

"Ohmygod, the kid that looks like me has my name too!" For a moment it looked as though Obito was having an epiphany and then...

"...I don't get it," Obito frowned in a near pout and crossed his arms over his chest, "My dad named me after some dead guy? I didn't even know he could read." It was good to know that a few millenia of torment and short, violent existences hadn't really changed the former Uchiha.

The young man in the yukata looked down at his photograph and decided he'd probably needed a haircut.

"My name's Kakashi," he murmured as his gaze flicked upward to meet Obito's face again. "Hatake Kakashi."

There was something just a little apprehensive in his placid, quiet expression; he pulled his knees in a little closer, curled up a little more.

"Hi," he said to Obito's soul.

The other boy shuddered a little as the simple, single syllable left the fox demon's lips, very briefly closing his eyes. It felt a little bit like... he'd just gone out to the store, and while he was at the store, it started to rain. The rain was very, very cold and pounded very, very hard. On the way home, he had gotten lost. Very, very lost. Until he didn't remember where home was. And then someone had taken his hand and lead him back home again, and home had been right around the corner all along and there had simply been too much rain for him to see. And right now, right now, Obito had come in from the very long walk in the very cold rain. And it was warm. He buried his face in his hands.

"Kakashi," he repeated, quietly. The name felt familiar. He wrapped his arms around himself as well, though he knew somewhere inside his very conflicted self that it wasn't himself he wanted to be holding.

"I want--..." he broke off, shaking his head. It was almost like a memory, this urgency that filled him.

"I need..."

Obito opened his arms, doing his best not to think. How and why meant very little right now. Because it was warm again, and the world made just enough sense that Obito didn't precisely care how or why.

Kakashi's dark eye widened, and from under a tangle of messy silver hair there was a glint of red.

A moment later Obito's arms were full of fox, or boy, or man, or whatever he was. A single whimper drifted up to Obito's ears as Kakashi's arms wrapped around him, so tightly it felt like they might never come off again, and Kakashi buried his face against the other boy's neck, rocking them back and forth reflexively and trying to ignore the tears. He still had his pride.

"Obito... oh god... oh god oh god oh god oh god..." He kept mumbling it to himself reflexively and he was probably pissing off all the other more-than-one gods but he couldn't-- think-- he was thinking a million zillion googol things at once so he couldn't think them and definitely couldn't say any of -- "You remembered -- something -- about--- you really really--" The words never got more coherent than a mumble, so it was unlikely Obito could understand any of them.

but he still needed to -- explain something -- maybe -- yes -- there was -- when he could think, then all the other stuff...

oh, god, how many hundreds of years had it been.

"Shhh," Obito whispered, shaking his head, "You're gonna give yourself a headache like I did. It's... okay, yeah? Feels better, right? So... The making sense stuff can come later, I guess?" That was how it felt. As soon as the words left Obito's lips, he realized it. Holding Kakashi... it didn't feel familiar at all, didn't feel like it was something he had ever done, but it made everything feel better. Like a warm cookie and a cold glass of milk. Like a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup. Like peanut butter and Doritos. Things that just weren't okay by themselves but together, made the world a better place. He could almost physically feel himself... recharging. There really wasn't any other word for it. He felt like he was slowly waking up from a long and unpleasant dream, and all he had to do was hold on to Kakashi.

"Kakashi..." he repeated, mostly to himself, trying out the name again. It definitely felt familiar, though something still seemed a little off about the way he said it. As though it would sound more familiar if he... yelled it? What an odd notion.

"Say it again..." came the plea, mumbled against Obito's skin. Kakashi's rocking motion had gradually slowed and then ceased, and now he was just shaking slightly as he held on, still seeming to cling for dear life. "Not real yet... it's not..."

He trailed off, and after a moment he'd pushed himself away from Obito's body a little, wearing an expression of slightly dazed horror as he stared in the general direction of the other young man's chest. Both of his eyes were open now. The one that had been hiding behind his hair was the same bright, intense red as the trim on his yukata. Something seemed a little off about it; it looked like it had more than one pupil, and it didn't seem to be focusing quite right as Kakashi sat there, gaze far away for a moment, hands fisting in the other boy's clothing.

"Maybe I'm not really here..." His eyes widened; he looked quite young and terrified as his tear-streaked face turned up to seek out Obito's gaze. "Say it again?" he begged, high-pitched voice on the verge of breaking.

"K-kakashi...?" Obito's shock registered clearly in his voice as he watched the other boy in his arms go near hysterical. And then he felt something. Something profound.

He was worth something. He wasn't just the accident that happened while his father was drunk. He wasn't just the worst day of his mother's life. He wasn't just some poor sap doomed to live out his life in futility. He meant something to someone. He was a part of something that was bigger than himself. Kakashi needed him, wanted him, cared about him for reasons that Obito could almost grasp but knew he could never fathom. He brushed away Kakashi's tears with the back of his hand, slowly, fingers lingering near the mismatched crimson eye with something not unlike recognition.

"Kakashi," he whispered, "You're here. You're definitely here. And I'm here. Right... here." Obito caught another tear right at the corner of Kakashi's eye, before it had a chance to fall.

Kakashi gave a little shiver at the feather-light brushes of Obito's skin against his face, keeping the tears from falling. He couldn't even remember the last time...

"I'm... here?" He looked down at himself, suddenly unsure not only of whether he was where he thought he was, but whether he was in general. Having more than one physical form made it so confusing -- quick check -- "I'm... here," he stated experimentally, running a hand over his chest, splaying fingers against his face. "I'm here," he murmured to himself with more conviction this time, nodding slightly, before his gaze turned back toward Obito's face. He just stared for a moment, disbelieving Obito, disbelieving himself -- it couldn't really be real, it couldn't, but it was, he'd really worked up the nerve and done it--

"...You're here. You're here... We're here-- we're both here--" He gave another slightly unhinged little laugh, this one coming out more than half a sob. But there was a smile on his face. A small, wavering, sweet and beautiful smile.

"And it only took three thousand years," he murmured unsteadily, and laughed again, quiet and a little nervous. At first, Obito simply smiled, well, rather, beamed radiantly back. Because, really, how could he look at that watery little, absolutely perfect (perfect? where did that come from...?) smile on Kakashi's lips and not smile back? But then--

"Three thousand... what?"