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Chapter 79 - Arc 5 - Trauma Diving - Talking to Kakashi
🕑 Added 2024-09-02 03:38:36 +0000 UTCSunday's Chapter, on Sunday, woo!
We're all blessed.
This chapter was long needed, I hope you can all appreciate Sakura getting a much needed pep talk from Kakashi.
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Being released on terms of ‘probably not being dangerous’ isn’t the feel good moment she was expecting to have when she left the facility. There’s a lot to be said about her friend expressing deep concern for her while also reluctantly letting her go. She knew it’d be bad, but her conversation with Ino inside of her head won’t leave her alone. She doesn’t hate herself, she swears she doesn’t hate herself.
Why does her head consider her an enemy? It’d be one thing if it attacked Ino too, then it’s just a very hostile landscape and maybe they need to figure out what’s up with that. Protecting Ino proves that her brain is capable of recognizing that something belongs, and it’s also very capable of considering that thing benevolently. So why did those shields refuse to leave? Why did she get cut up on entry to her mind in the first place? Why did her nerves attack her directly, and is there anything more to Ino possessing the glowing sword which free’d her from the attack?
Symbolisms have never been her forte, and now she’s expecting herself to decode her actual brain. That’s dumb, she’s being dumb. She could never do that, she needs to leave that to Ino and her father and people that actually know what they’re doing.
She has people to visit, but first she needs a shower and a long nap.
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“Sakura!” Naruto greets her the moment she steps out of the bathroom, the boy practically attacking her with a hug that slams her back first against the wall with a thud. She doesn’t miss two other blonde entities joining the hug almost immediately, or the suit the main boy has on. “Business Naruto,” she greets, patting his back with a surprised rub while looking down at the other two and finding Naruto’s experimenting with clones of different ages and genders, “where is the real you?” She has two little sister clones now, that’s very interesting, she should figure out if it’s weird to treat them that way later when she has a good chance.
“He’s with Kakashi, I haven’t seen him the entire time you’ve been gone, but I’ve gotten a lot of memories sent my way. The amount of clones that have died…” Business Naruto pouts quite visibly for her.
“I suppose it would be more meaningful to you to lose what could have been you.” Sakura ponders, thinking of whether Business Naruto would have experienced her substituting with normal Naruto’s clones to avoid Gato’s attacks in Wave. It was very far away, can the memories travel like that? She should ask, or maybe look into it, but not now.
Now, whatever Ino was referring to needs to be stopped. “Where?”
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“Sakura.” Kakashi greets her as her feet step onto the perimeter of the Forest of Death. He’s not even trying to hide where they’ve been, he affixes her with a smile behind the mask like he’s done nothing wrong. He looks like he’s been on vacation the entire time, clean and in fresh clothes and looking very well fed.
“You hurt Ino,” Sakura accuses him, stomping her foot into the dirt and packing it in, red eyes shine brightly at the man with her inner malevolence, “Naruto and Sasuke make sense, but you should know Ino’s not ready for your crap.”
“Her sensei signed off on including her in their training.” Kakashi defends himself, hands in his pockets, he walks up to her without a care in the world. She bats him away when a lone hand slips out of that pocket and speeds towards the top of her head. The smack is loud and resounding, the man symbolically letting her smack solidly connect. “I never put her in any real danger, Sakura, I promise you.”
Her glare focuses itself, staring right into his eye with a swirling heat that threatens to overwhelm her at any moment. This time, she lets his palm land on her head and rub the ‘cute Genin’ he’s been ‘put in charge of.’ “You really promise?” She asks, a feeling she can’t explain makes its way up her esophagus, and she finds her voice cracking and wavering, like something heavy and solid is blocking the way of her words. It’s thick, and hurts more than she’d like to admit.
“None of them were ever in any real danger, nothing in the Forest of Death could pose a threat to me, and I have a medic ninja on retainer in the event I need to race them somewhere. At this point they’re just doing basic survival training, I haven’t touched them since Ino left.” Kakashi confirms, rubbing in circles that make her feel like a little girl. To him, she is, so it makes sense. She can accept that. “I hear you were detained and interrogated, how did that go?”
“You say that like you weren’t already given a report.” She grumbles lowly.
“I want to hear it from you,” he dismisses her point, “do you feel okay, Sakura?”
“I don’t know.” She has to admit, because it’s Kakashi, and she’s supposed to be talking to him even if she doesn’t want to. “Ino thinks I hate myself, and I don’t think I do, but what if I just don’t know it? How do I deal with that? How do I deal with any of this? And why is one of the most supportive feeling people in my life my freaking demon sword?”
“Okay, there’s a lot to unpack there.” Kakashi admits, taking his hand away finally, he looks away a little, frowning, biting his lip, looking back and giving her a serious gaze. Shifting from the playful man she’s used to, to someone who’s giving her focus. “Why is Hunger a person now?”
“Ah, well, um…” She looks down at her hands, she doesn’t really know how to answer that.
Slip of the tongue maybe? “I dunno, it doesn’t make me feel bad, while everyone else does. I’m always wondering what’s wrong with me or trying to step around eggshells when I talk to people, but the sword doesn’t do that. It tells me I’m right, and supports my decisions, and makes me feel strong. I feel good about myself with it, and without it I’m always so worried.”
“Okay, uh, gonna nip that one in the bud. Sakura, that’s not how people feel like, that’s how drugs feel like.”
“What?”
“Drugs.” He explains, poking her in the forehead. “Drugs make you feel good, and right, and strong. People make you feel scrutinized and judged, that’s just how they are. Never confuse the two. If people don’t make you feel a little bad sometimes, that’s called a hallucination, sometimes it’s a Genjutsu.”
“Ah…” She nods to herself, glumly but understandingly.
“Any relationship worth keeping is going to have disagreements, and sometimes those disagreements are severe enough they can come off harshly. When you’re messed up there’s added layers to it too, like that they want you to be less messed up. It’s hard for someone that has a brain that works right to accept that it feels good when you slit a throat, or understand the excitement of Henging into the corpse you just made to trick their teammates and execute them when they look away.”
“Err-” She gulps as he keeps talking.
“They won’t get what it means to lay back in a puddle of blood and let it seep into your clothes so you can feel at one with your actions, or how good it feels when the blood on your hands is real for once so you don’t have to question yourself.” Kakashi gives her a solid thumbs up that clashes heavily with his words, “and that’s okay, that’s good for them. They judge you because they don’t understand and they want better for you. Their judgment means they’re healthy and you should be happy about that. Misery loves misery, you shouldn’t wish that they understand you, you should cherish that they don’t. Their judgment feels good, Sakura. You just have to change your mindframe and accept that not understanding can be a good thing. Because the less they understand, the better a job you’ve done ensuring they never can.”
“Okay, I think I can do that.” She takes a deep breath, hissing through her teeth only to take another. “So they’re judging me because they want me to be better, not because they think less of me?”
“It’s a bit of both.” He says.
And she expects more.
He doesn’t give more.
“Oh, okay, um… So the sword is drugs, and the bad feelings people give me are good?” She winces at the thought, she really doesn’t like that.
“Yep.” He lets his answer hang just like that.
“... Why did you give me drugs?” She can’t help but ask, after a long moment of awkward silence.
“Dead people told me to.” He answers her with a deathly seriousness, in fact it’s more firmness than such a statement should ever contain.
“Ah… Iruka’s right, I think I did need to talk to you.” She remembers her little conversation with Iruka, her old teacher said she’d end up like Kakashi. Kakashi’s batshit and she doesn’t want to end up that way. She needs to figure her shit out before that happens.
“And I thought you could handle it,” Kakashi continues, after a long moment to let her doubt her everything, “I’ve kept watch. You’re handling the sword better than anyone in history. Besides, you could use some validation when in combat, doubting yourself is fine at home, it’s terrible when you’re in a life or death situation. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen you confident about anything besides when you hold onto that sword, so, I don’t regret giving it to you. Just, measure it and ensure you form meaningful bonds while you’re at it. The kind of bonds that make you feel good because they’re judging you.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Yep, Kakashi’s batshit. That sounds a little better though, she can kind of accept that.
“You’re amazing Sakura, keep on the path you’re going and one day you won’t need a sword like that to feel strong, you’ll get everything you need from those around you, and from deep inside,” he turns towards the forest of death, “at least that’s what Gai’s message about you said. He likes you a lot, you should see if he’ll train you any.”
“You think he would?” She shifts her feet a little, clacking her toes together.
“I know so.” He nods.
“And he’ll be better at helping me feel okay than you?” Sakura asks.
“Oh no, Gai’s crazy.”
Comments
Kureiji Ryuu
That ending about Gai was perfect! LOL
Dopplerdee
Kakashi is right that doubt can be good but people shouldn't make you feel like that all the time either. Then again Kakashi is definitely not a paragon of Mental health and this is very in character.
