I break the kiss to stare at his lips. “I want you,” I tell him. He smiles.
“Me too.”
--
I wake up feeling sore. I don’t think any workout in my entire life has made me feel this sore. Kakashi’s arms are wrapped around me. I can’t believe I just did that. With Kakashi Hatake, an anime character. I sigh and close my eyes, waiting for Kakashi to wake up.
That was so good.
My eyes shoot open. I look quickly at Kakashi. His mouth isn’t even open. I could’ve sworn I just heard his voice right now.
God, I’m so sore. I wonder if he’s a virgin…
I laugh. “Kakashi, I think I can hear your thoughts.” Kakashi sits up.
So, can you hear me right now? Say-
“Yes, I can hear you. On a scale of one to ten, last night was ranked eight. Yes, I’m a virgin. Or was.” Kakashi’s eye widen.
Holy-
“Shiitake mushrooms,” I finish.
He starts to sign. “Do you think it’s because we had sex? Or is this a side effect of you not from this universe?”
“I’m not sure,” I reply.
Kakashi lies back down. Come lie with me. Practice doesn’t start to ten.
“It’s eleven.”
Shhh. Just turn around so we can spoon.
“Can you read my mind?” Taco cat. Taco cat. Taco cat.
No.
“Bummer.”
His arms wrap around me as he pulls me against his body tighter.
“Just ‘cause you were on top first doesn’t make you seme, okay?” I tell him.
Okay. We’ll leave in thirty minutes.
--One hour later—
I wake up before Kakashi again. I slip out of his arms and try to find my underwear. I look at the ripped fabric with mysterious stains on it. Yeah, that’s not okay anymore.
“Kakashi, I know you’re awake. I’m borrowing one of your boxers.”
Suure.
I slip on a plain grey one before putting on the rest of my clothes. I kick Kakashi’s torso.
“Sensei, hurry. It’s already noon.” I roll the mat from under him and put it away. He gets up and sleepily grabs a pair of boxers from behind me.
“Sensei, you can’t put on the same one!” He looks at my boxers and puts them on with a smile.
It’ll be fine. But what excuse can we use?
“We woke up late. And if they ask any more questions, change the subject.”
Oh. Sounds good, Tobi.
I made sure that my clothes didn’t have any weird stains on it, and my hair didn’t look too messy. Kakashi obviously didn’t care; he just slipped on his usual clothing. I smirked at him as we left the apartment.
When we finally got to the training area, Sakura and Yamato were steaming mad. It’s hard to take them seriously when they sign. Kakashi and I both answered that we woke up late.
After a couple minutes, they let it go. Since I was still genin, I had a lot of catching up to do. Thank kami I looked up those hand signs and practiced some of them daily back in ol’ reality. I was wind and lightning natured, an odd coincidence considering Kakashi was also wind and lightning natured.
I learned how to do Shadow Clone in ten minutes. With my chakra bracelets, I can make about fifty. Without them, well, they would never amount to Naruto’s, but there are still a lot. I tried to transfer some chakra down to my feet. It’s a lot harder than I thought, but I’ve almost got the hang of it.
Yamato finds me behind some trees away from the main clearing. “What are you doing?” he signed.
“Just practicing. Why? Is something wrong?”
“No.”
I looked at him. “Okay.” I focused on moving chakra to my feet and started to run up the tree. I got about halfway, made a cut, and fell back down. Out the corner of my eye, I see Naruto and Sakura. The three watch as I make my way up the tree. This time I got up three quarters of the way. I just have to focus.
I closed my eyes and imagined chakra flowing through my body. I felt it well up in my feet. Once I felt like I was ready, I ran up the tree as far as I could go. I reached the furthest branch on the top and walked under it so that I was upside down.
“YES!” I shouted. I looked down at the rest of the team below me. They were clapping. I wish I could hear them.
I walked down the length of the tree, but stopped midway to carve something in it. In English, I wrote: Tobi was here 2013. Happy with my handiwork, I walked the rest of the way.
“You got it faster than Naruto, but still slower than me!” Sakura signed.
“That’s ‘cause you were only good at the little things,” Naruto signed. I laughed. Inner Sakura seemed to have come out and started banging on Naruto’s head.
“Poor Naru-chan,” I told him. I ruffled his hair. “Where’s sensei?” I asked Yamato. He pointed to the clearing. “Thanks.”
“Sensei!” I called out to him.
He turns around. Good job back there.
“Thanks,” I sign. “I was wondering if you could teach me something.”
“Sure. What is it?” he signed.
“Chidori.”
He paused. He started to cover his mouth, a gesture to show he was laughing. “Chidori?”
“Yes. Then, I’m going to ask Naruto to teach me rasengan.”
He stared at me seriously. “Okay. How do you even know about these?”
“Are you going to teach me or what?”
Kakashi shrugged. He started telling me to focus chakra in my hand. Just lightning chakra. It took a while, but it seems that mentally producing a picture of separating chakra really helps. We practiced for about thirty or forty minutes before we saw a spark of lightning emit from my hand.
“Did you see that?” I shouted excitedly.
Yeah, good job.
After fifteen more minutes of focusing chakra into my hand, Team 7 left the training grounds. We made our way to the ramen stand. As usual, Naruto ordered ten bowls, and Kakashi ate his ramen really fast. I remembered that one filler episode where they tried to see his face. Haha, suckers, I got to see it!
I laughed, but so did Kakashi. No one said anything funny out loud. They were all stuck on Naruto finishing his ninth bowl.
So you can read my mind, you liar.
Yes, I can. I was hoping you would have more inappropriate thoughts about me, but I guess not. Kakashi smirked mentally.
I shook my head and ate the rest of my ramen.
“Thank you for the meal, Naru-chan,” I said. Naruto’s face went from happy to suddenly burdened quite quickly. He looked at his stack of bowls. Ten from him plus another five. Fifteen bowls that each cost around five bucks. We watched as Naruto glumly took out his frog wallet and handed the required money to Teuchi, the ramen stand owner.
“My best client, bahahaha!” he laughed. I smiled.
“It’s only 1:45, what should we do for the rest of the day?” I asked out loud.
“You should probably find an apartment, Tobi,” Yamato signed. I nodded.
“There’s an opening in my building, we could be neighbors!” Naruto signed enthusiastically.
“There’s an opening in my building, too,” Kakashi signed.
“Well, that’s a tough decision.”
“You should probably go with Kakashi-sensei. Maybe you could be Kakashi’s alarm clock!” Sakura suggested.
“Tobi slept over senpai's and look how that turned out,” Yamato said out loud. I saw Teuchi sneak a glance over to us.
Yamato’s just jealous I got to you first. Don’t worry about it.
Kakashi, don’t tell me he was also your lover.
Well, one-night-stand is a more accurate term. We were drunk. I’ll tell you about it later.
I sighed. “I’ll have to visit the apartments. I know Kakashi’s apartment is smaller than Naruto’s, and Naruto’s is definitely cheaper,” I said out loud. I pinched the bridge of my nose as if I was thinking.
Go with Naruto, Tobi.
“C’mon Naru-chan, let’s go check out the apartment.” I got up and smiled. Naruto jumped out of his seat and swung his arm over my shoulders.
We walked a couple blocks until we finally made it to Naruto’s dump of an apartment building. He led me up the stairs and stopped one door from his own apartment.
“Here!”
“How much a month?”
“Pretty cheap. Only 500 ryo.”
“That’s not bad. Does that include utilites and electricity and trash?”
“Yeah. The moment we start going on missions, you’ll probably be able to pay ten months in advance.”
“Where’s your landlord?”
--
I walked to Kakashi’s house after I signed the contract with the landlord. Luckily, the landlord was willing to be lenient on the down payment, meaning he’d wait until my first mission for me to pay.
I knocked loudly on his door. No answer. I knocked again.
Sensei, I’m outside.
Oh, duh.
He opened the door, wearing nothing but his pants. I told him about my good fortune.
“So when can I start going on missions?” I asked.
When you learn the basics. C’mon, let’s go train. I want to introduce you to the rest of the Konoha 11.
I couldn’t stop thinking about meeting the rest of Konoha 11 on the way over. I can finally meet Shikamaru, Chouji, Kiba, Shino, and Neji. Then, we’ll be friends, and my life will be complete. I smiled at the thought.
Kakashi placed his right arm around my shoulder’s casually. We walked into one of the training grounds. It seemed that they were already there sparring. What a coincidence.
“Aah! My rival!” Mighty Gai sauntered up to Kakashi. “Are you back to play another round of Rock, Paper, Scissors with Mighty Gai?”
Kakashi turned to face me. “No, actually. I wanted to introduce my newest student to the rest of Konoha 11.” (He’s saying this in his head too, so that Tobi can hear. Of course, when someone speaks, they hear what they’re saying and that filters into the mind, so it’s sorta the same)
“Aah, what a wise choice to introduce him to me first! What is your name?”
“Tobi,” Kakashi said.
“Tobi... Tobi... TOBI?” Gai looked at me. “Tobi, huh?”
“He’s deaf.” Gai looked at me, then Kakashi, then back at me.
“So he can’t hear what we’re saying?”
“No.”
“Good. Is he your lover now?” Gai stared at me with an intensity that only Rock Lee could imitate.
Kakashi eye-smiled. “Are things okay with you and Rock Lee?”
I couldn’t help but smirk. This has to be some thirteen year old’s fantasy. All the yaoi ships. I bet Shikamaru and Kakashi had a thing.
“I can read your lips,” I said. Gai looked shocked, but recovered smoothly.
“I knew that, Tobi. I was testing you.”
“Uh-huh. Sure, sensei.” I walked over to Kurenai who was on the other side of the clearing.
“Ohayo-gozaimasu, I’m Tobi.”
“Oh, are you Kakashi’s student?” she sai over her shoulder.
“Yes, I’m deaf, so it would be useful to talk facing me,” I told her politely.
She smiled and laughed. “Oh, haha, of course. Do wanna watch the match? It’s my team plus Tenten and Rock Lee versus Asuma’s plus Neji. Where is the rest of your team?”she asked.
“They’re off dicking around probably. They might come over here soon. I don’t know if Kakashi-sensei informed them.”
“C’mon, Tobi, follow me.” She hopped onto a branch and started to run from branch to branch. I followed her to a smaller clearing where Shikamaru was holding down Kiba and Akamaru with his shadows, and Ino seemed to be lying limply, while Tenten was punching herself. Neji and Hinata seemed to be having another Hyuuga palm match while Shino and Rock Lee were ganging up against Chouji, who had just stuffed his face with a bag of chips.
“Did Sensei tell you that we developed our own way of communicating via hand signs?” I asked the woman.
We looked at each other. She seemed impressed. “Will you share it with us?”
“We’ll have to talk about it.” I smiled. Kakashi and Gai joined us a minute later.
You wanna say hi or what?
They’re sorta busy right now, Sensei.
Then I’ll teach you chidori while we wait.
Kakashi signed saying to meet at the clearing so that it wouldn’t be weird if we just left together without saying anything.
He told me to visualize the electricity running through my veins down into my right hand. To imagine my hand spark with thousands of volts of electricity. To think of the birds chirping. I closed my eyes and did exactly that. It started out as a spark, then finally burst into the real thing. I ran into the nearest tree, thrusting my hand into it before my chidori died down.
“Now I just have to refine it.”
He made me practice just holding the chidori and compared mine to his. He told me that Sasuke didn’t get it as fast.
In my universe, I used to practice the hand signs and pretend I was in this universe. Maybe that helped me?
I must’ve caused a commotion, because after thirty minutes of hitting trees with chidori, I noticed that they came to watch me. I waved at them.
“Sorry,” I said loudly, bowing.
They might’ve said something, but I didn’t hear (obviously). I continued practicing my chidori with Kakashi.
He made me charge at him now, with chidori in hand, to see how fast I can adapt to a change in movement. I sucked. I felt like a bull in tunnel-vision.
The downside of the chidori, haha. Kakashi pulled up his hitai-ate to reveal his Sharingan. He got a chidori ready and started to charge. I waited until the last moment to substitute. He did a fancy little back flip and charged at me again. I didn’t wait this time. I ran left and right, sometimes stopping in the middle, faking him out, and going around him. His Sharingan took it all in and anticipated my next moves. I finally got tired of running and charged at him too. It was a game of chicken, basically. He knew my chidori would never be able to cancel out his, so he stopped as soon as his hand was a foot away from my torso.
I was sweaty and exhausted and just wanted to sleep, but Konoha 11 was still there. Kakashi pushed me towards them.
“This is my deaf student, Tobi,” he said simply.
“Hi,” they all said. One by one they introduced themselves. Even though I knew them, they didn’t know me. I have to get them to like me.
“So we heard that you came up with the idea of a new language,” said Shikamaru.
“Yes, I came up with the idea, but it was really Yamato and Sai who did all the work. We combined all of the villages’ sign language to make one complete language. There are some placebo words placed deliberately in speech to misguide the enemy. For example, it can be a combination of Sand, Rain, and Leaf. We’d place an empty word like ‘fish’ somewhere in there, and since the sign language for the villages vary, an enemy would have a really hard time deciphering it. So a sentence as simple as ‘We attack on three’ can be ‘Is the bomb fish?’, ‘The spy is in the building’ or even ‘You look nice today.’ We also incorporated some jutsu signs in to make it seem as if we are sending allies directions to attack with this jutsu, but it really is a placebo word.”
“So how do you know what your ally is talking about?” asked Ino.
“It’s basic memorization. We memorize which words are used and which words are placebo words. It gets easier the more you practice. Watch.” I turn to Kakashi and start to sign. He signs back an answer.
“What do you think we said?” I asked them.
“Well, if you were using Konoha sign, it looked as if you asked if he had a spare room and he answered yes. But there were some jutsu hand signs in there and some signs I couldn’t understand,” said Neji.
“I asked him ‘How hard do you think it will be to teach this?’ and he answered ‘On a scale, 7.”
“That explains him holding seven fingers up,” Chouji noted.
“We can start today, if you all want,” I told them. I didn’t wait for them to answer. “On second thought, let’s do it when we’re all here, so that there will be more teachers. Sound good?”
There was a little rumbling of agreement.
“Cool.”
The crowd dispersed into its groups. Ino came up to me.
“How are you, Tobi-kun?”
“I’m good. I appreciate your effort to heal me the other day, Ino-san.” She blushed. Ugh, do I really have to put up with this?
“Please, you can call me Ino-chan, if you like!” She laughed a little and winked.
“So how are you, Ino-chan?”
“Well, good. I like your outfit by the way.” She steps closer to me to feel the fabric of my clothes. I’m pretty sure she just wanted to see if I was muscular.
“Yeah? Sakura and Naruto helped pick them out.”
“Are you good friends with her?”
“Who? Sakura? Yeah, sure, I mean, we get along fine. Why?”
“No reason, just wondering.”
As if they heard my silent prayers, the boys headed towards me. Ino backed away, feeling a little overwhelmed and went to the other girls.
“Hey, man. You looked pretty good out there,” Kiba said.
“Thanks. People are saying I learned chidori faster than Sasuke. Is that true?” I asked them.
“Oh yeah. When did you start?” asked Chouji.
“Today.”
“You’re definitely faster than that Sasuke brat,” said Neji. I looked over to Hinata. Poor Hinata, who confessed to Naru-chan and never got a reply.
“I feel like we’d be good friends, Tobi. You don’t seem like the psychopathic killer that also has your name, so that’s good,” Shikamaru said. I smirked.
“Thanks. We should spar sometime,” I said. The group nodded enthusiastically.
“Sounds cool,” said Rock Lee. “I’m excited to see your skill.”
“Well, I’m basically an Academy level kid.”
“Sure, as if an Academy kid could pull off a chidori,” Kiba said with a smile. The boys laughed.
“Are you sure you and Naruto aren’t related?”
“No, we aren’t. I’d know if we were,” I said laughing. We joked around for a couple more minutes.
“We’ll see ya around,” Shikamaru said. He turned and waved good bye.
“Bye, guys.”
I walked back with Kakashi. It was almost seven, so we went to the barbeque place that Chouji and Shikamaru usually go to. We get a booth to ourselves. He stares at me. To other people, we aren’t saying anything and we probably look like idiots just staring at each other and occasionally laughing. But on the inside, we’re having a conversation, where we can just think of a memory and have it explain itself without putting it into words.
Kakashi finally asked me what my universe is like.
Well, we don’t look like this. I think of a comparison between me now, and me in real life.
Wow, we look like cartoon characters?
Yeah. This is actually a show called “Naruto” where I come from. I know everything, except what episode I’m in right now.
How many episodes are there?
Well, a lot. You have “Naruto” which was about 400 episodes, or 3 seasons, and then you have “Naruto Shippuden” which is still continuing. I forget what episode I’m on.
So you know what’s going to happen?
Basically, but I’m not telling you anything.
What? Why not, Tobi?
I don’t want to ruin the surprise. Plus, like I said, I don’t know what episode we’re in right now, so what if what I say doesn’t happen?
Okay… I’ll tell you what’s happened so far!
Awesome.
The waiter arrives with our hot plate and a plate of raw meat.
“Ittadakimasu!” I say.
So, Kakashi, what has happened so far?
You know everyone, right? So I won’t have to explain?
Correct.
Jiraiya-sama has died fighting the Pains. I died. Blah blah blah, and we’re going into war with Kabuto’s dead people.
I know exactly where we are. It seems that whoever put me here didn’t want me spoiling too many plots. I know who’s going to come alive, but tell me who has so far.
We don’t know. We’ve barely begun. We just know we’re going to war soon.
Good. I really need to train then.
We ate the rest of our meal in silence. Kakashi and I split the bill, but he paid for most of it. There was nothing I could do considering that I haven’t earned any money. Kakashi escorted me to my new apartment.
You need furniture.
I rolled my eyes and chuckled. Well, yeah. I don’t have money, though, so it’s going to be on my to-do list. I opened the door and turned on the light.
“I’ll see you tomorrow at 11 for another practice session, right?” I asked. I turned to face him.
He pulled his mask down. “Yeah, I’m gonna send a message to everyone about the sign language lesson too, so just meet up at the training grounds.”
“I’ll just meet you at the memorial tomorrow at ten.” I smiled.
How do you know about that?
I’m from another universe. I practically know everything.
“Alright, bye, Tobi,” he said, pulling his mask up again. He was halfway out the door when I stopped him. He turned around and I kissed him through his mask. My hands ran through his hair. I could feel his tongue through the mask. I pulled away and pushed him playfully out the door. I put a finger to my lips.
Naruto could hear! It’s still early…
Then we’ll have to be really quiet.
No, Kakashi, stop. I laughed. C’mon, sensei. Yamato’s probably onto us.
He sighed. Yeah, you’re probably right. He pulled me to his body while pulling his mask down and gave me one last kiss. I’ll see you at the memorial. Good night.
Good night, Kakashi.
He winked as he closed the door. I waited for his chakra signature to fade away before shouting happiness. All I could think of was the taste of his skin on my lips, our sweaty bodies crashing against each other, the shivers he sent up my spine. I smiled at the memories.
It started getting hot again so I took off everything but my boxers and used the clothes as a pillow.
Ahh~ I wish this never ends.