"Rin..."
Obito ignored Kakashi and Minato completely, all of his attention fixed on the girl in the photograph. His eyes were full of longing, the kind that made it obvious he had already forgotten the rest of the world.
He was still not quite used to this sort of thing. The last time he had tried to sneak a kiss, Kakashi had caught him red-handed, and that humiliation had left a deep scar.
So before making another attempt, Obito glanced around carefully to make sure no one was nearby. Then he pulled out tape and toilet paper with the solemn seriousness of someone preparing for a major tactical operation.
First, he pasted over Kakashi's face in the photo so he would not have the disgusting illusion that he was kissing Kakashi by mistake. Only after completing that crucial step did he wad up the tissue, lean toward Rin's picture, and prepare to enter his own private world of fantasy.
"Rin..."
His voice slipped out before he realized it. The name was soft, almost trembling, the kind of sound a person made when they were completely defenseless.
"Uh... Obito, I'm here."
A real voice answered him.
Obito froze on the spot. His fingers clenched around the tissue, and his head lifted a fraction at a time, as if moving any faster might shatter his soul completely.
Two figures were standing outside the window. One was Rin Nohara. The other was Kiyohara.
"Ahem. It's Rin and Kiyohara," Obito said, changing direction in a panic and pretending he had merely been wiping his nose. His movements were so stiff they practically screamed guilty conscience.
"What were you doing just now, Obito?" Kiyohara asked, looking at the photo frame in his hands. He could not see the front, but he didn't need to. There were only so many reasons a lovestruck idiot would stare at a team photo like that.
"Nothing. Just reminiscing about the past."
With Rin standing right there, Obito shot Kiyohara a desperate look, silently begging him not to say another word.
Kiyohara answered with the kindest expression he could manage. "Take care of yourself, Obito. And remember to practice restraint."
His tone was sincere. Too sincere.
"Take care of yourself?" Rin repeated, blinking in confusion. She clearly had not caught the real meaning behind his words.
Obito, on the other hand, understood instantly. His face turned bright red. Veins bulged at his temples as he flared up like a cat whose tail had been stepped on.
"How can you slander my innocence like that?" he demanded.
"Really? Weren't you secretly kissing Rin's photo?" Kiyohara asked with a half-smile.
Honestly, Kiyohara felt Obito ought to have become Jiraiya's disciple. One of them liked peeping at bathhouses. The other liked sneaking kisses at photographs. Master and student would have fit together perfectly.
Obito's whole face turned crimson. "There was dust on the picture, so I bent down to blow it off! How can something as pure as preserving the bond between comrades be called stealing a kiss?"
After that, he launched into a torrent of nonsense about the Will of Fire, the value of friendship, and the sacredness of team bonds. He sounded so righteous that anyone ignorant of the truth might actually have believed him.
The room instantly filled with a cheerful atmosphere. Rin only thought the two of them were teasing each other, and did not suspect a thing.
"Obito, if we don't leave now, we'll be late for the mission," she said. "Kakashi and Minato-sensei are still waiting for us."
Only then did Obito truly relax. Since Rin showed no sign of anger, his image as a reliable, heroic man had been preserved. That was what mattered most.
"Got it," he said, turning at once to grab his backpack and ninja pouch before settling his yellow goggles over his eyes. He had actually finished preparing a long time ago. He had just been too distracted by Rin's photo to remember the passage of time.
Rin stood by the window waiting for him. As Obito put the photograph back in place and reached for another kunai, her gaze landed on the taped-over face in the picture.
"Why is Kakashi's face covered?" she asked.
Obito answered in a flash, "That way it won't collect dust."
Rin found the explanation a little strange, but after a moment she still nodded. "I see."
Kiyohara watched the scene from the side and sighed inwardly. This was probably the last time Obito would look at Rin's photo so carefree and whole.
Once his body was crushed under that falling rock, a lot more than his future would be damaged. Kiyohara did not let the thought show on his face, but his gaze toward Obito inevitably carried a trace of pity.
Obito noticed it immediately and frowned. He had no idea why Kiyohara suddenly looked at him like that.
***
At Konoha's gate, Kakashi folded his arms and looked coldly at the boy rushing over. "You're late again, Obito."
"So what if I'm a little late?" Obito muttered. "Do you really have to act like a few minutes will kill someone?"
"A real ninja follows the rules," Kakashi said, his tone as sharp as a blade. "Anyone who can't do that is trash."
He did not leave even a sliver of mercy in those words. Ever since the death of Konoha's White Fang, Kakashi had become a person who placed rules above everything else.
In his eyes, his father's tragedy had begun the moment Hatake Sakumo chose his comrades over the mission. The mission failed. The village turned on him. In the end, that single choice destroyed everything.
Because of that, Kakashi believed more firmly than anyone that a ninja who abandoned the rules deserved nothing.
"Alright, Kakashi, that's enough," Minato said gently, stepping in before the quarrel could grow worse. He understood part of Kakashi's pain, but there were some things even he could not say openly.
As a ninja himself, Minato also knew the harsh truth of the system: their duty was to obey orders.
"Once the mission begins, everything else comes after that," Minato continued, sweeping his gaze over the team. "Don't keep arguing. We need to stay united."
Teamwork mattered too much for him to let the two of them continue clashing like this.
Then, as they stood at the gate, Minato began explaining the situation in the calm, steady voice that always put people at ease. The mission itself was highly classified, so he could only reveal the details once they were close enough to the border.
Kiyohara listened from the rear and wondered, not for the first time, why every departure seemed to require stopping at the village gate first. Maybe this was just one of those ninja rituals no one bothered to explain.
While Minato spoke, Kiyohara quietly asked the rogue-nin version of himself a question in his mind. "Did you ever find a girlfriend in the future?"
The urn trembled slightly. Then the spirit of rogue-nin Kiyohara rose inside his consciousness and shook his head with a weathered expression.
"No," the future Kiyohara said. "Just staying alive took everything I had. There wasn't room for anything else."
He had tried, once or twice. Unfortunately, the only women willing to get close to a rogue ninja were usually rogue ninja themselves, and not the romantic kind either.
Not everyone could be like Sakura, who knew perfectly well that Sasuke was an S-rank missing-nin and still wanted to chase after him. Then again, to receive that kind of treatment, a person probably needed Sasuke's face first.
Rogue-nin Kiyohara was not ugly. He just looked too worn down, too weathered, too much like a man life had already chewed up and spat back out.
"Yeah..." Kiyohara answered inwardly.
Looking at that bleak future, he silently swore his own life would not end that way. No matter what happened, he refused to become that kind of lonely, exhausted man.
Not long after, Minato finished speaking and gave the order. "Move out."
The team set off at once.
They traveled from dawn to dusk, then dusk to dawn again. One day bled into the next in a blur of green forest, flying shadows, and the steady rhythm of sandals striking bark.
During the day, they moved quickly through the trees. At night, they camped only long enough to rest before continuing on. Everyone carried light gear, so their speed was fast, and before long they had reached the area near the border.
"We're almost there," Kurenai said as she used a branch for leverage and leapt forward again. Like most ninja, she traveled by stepping through the trees, using the terrain itself to build speed.
A little later, she glanced toward Kiyohara. "I wonder if we'll be able to complete the mission."
"Just do your best," Kiyohara replied.
Failing a mission might bring punishment. Death was final. To him, the difference between the two was obvious enough that the answer barely needed thinking about.
He was only a genin drawing a genin's stipend. In the hierarchy of the ninja world, that placed him so low he might as well have been at the bottom of the pit.
To put it bluntly, why would anyone throw away their life when they only made three thousand a month? If your pay was three thousand, why work yourself like you were earning thirty thousand? Kiyohara thought it was already admirable that he didn't slack off outright.
Of course, many ninja wore the Will of Fire over their hearts like a brand. For the sake of belief, they would endure suffering that ordinary people could not even imagine. That was their choice.
Kiyohara, however, had never considered blind devotion a substitute for survival.
Up ahead, Minato suddenly raised a hand. "That's enough. Stop here."
Everyone landed lightly and came to a halt at once.
They had arrived at a broad stretch of meadow. Wind swept through the tall grass in rippling waves, pressing the green blades low as though the entire field were bowing under some invisible hand.
The peaceful scenery only made Kiyohara more alert. Places like this were the easiest to hide danger in.
The others were still focused on Minato, waiting for the classified part of the mission briefing. Kiyohara, meanwhile, could already feel the tension gathering in his chest.
The closer they drew to Kannabi Bridge, the more vividly he could sense the shadow of the future pressing down on him. This was the battlefield that should have been a death sentence for him.
And now, they had finally reached its doorstep.