The door closed softly behind him.
Kakashi did not return to the room where he was staying. He stood in the courtyard for a while, tilting his head back to look at the sky.
The night was deep.
The night sky over the Land of Waves hung low, as black as a great overturned pot, without a single star showing through.
He walked over to the old tree beside the courtyard wall and braced a hand against its rough trunk, as though trying to hold up something else.
Then he sighed.
That breath had been trapped in his chest the whole way here.
He remembered when this child had first arrived in Konoha.
The child had stood before him, half a head shorter than the others his age, his smile holding a young girl's mischievous charm, his eyes impossibly bright.
What had he said back then, when he invited him to join his squad?
-"I'll protect you. I promise."
Something like that.
He had said it casually, but he had meant every word.
He had even been the one to assess this child's graduation.
Seeing those icy blue flashes of steel during the exam, he had thought that with him around to keep an eye on things, nothing could go too badly wrong.
Now, it all seemed like a load of bullshit.
Protect him.
How many things would I fail to do in this lifetime?
How much would I have to loathe myself, to hate myself, before I could reach the other shore...
This was not the first time something like this had happened.
But he had thought this time would be different.
That child, with his beautiful, almost unreal smile, now lay in the sickbed inside, his pulse frighteningly weak.
Had his squad really reached the point where this