How Yamato Says That He Wishes He Could Trust Kakashi? - Tumblr Posts

I love platonic kakashi and yamato! Do you have any headcanons?

TOO MANY TO CONTAIN IN MY LITTLE HEAD

I love the idea that Kakashi introduced Yamato to so much! He really helped him grow as a person, and showed him that there was more to life - and to being a shinobi - than becoming a mindless tool for your superiors.

But having Yamato on his team really helped Kakashi, too.

[discussion of dark stuff under cut. TW: self harm, mentions of suicide]

Like, obviously, Kakashi met Tenzou in the midst of his bad PTSD/depression phase, and that didn't magically go away because he had a kohai to care for. He was in a pretty messed up place when they booted him from ANBU.

He might not have been willing to take his own life, after what happened to his father, but he is deeeefinitely willing to die unnecessarily on a mission. He takes the hardest, most suicidal solos; he dives in front of every blade that flies at any member of his team... He's big on self-sacrifice to the point where it becomes suicidal ideation and self harm.

And Yamato sees that. Up close and personal.

He's fucked up in the head, too. He still struggles to make his own choices. He's uncomfortable with selecting his own food at restaurants for years, and has to slooooowly build up his own opinions on simple things like clothing or favourite colours.

Sidenote: I like to think Kakashi randomly springs questions on him that he's never had cause to think about before, like 'what's your favourite animal?', just to help him gain more ownership over his own personality🥺 Maybe Yamato copies the copy ninja a lot at first?? But then he tries to read Icha Icha one time and goes 'LOLNOPE THIS IS A BAD IDEA' and starts defining himself instead sdlkfgjhsdfkg

Point is, he's no therapist. And Kakashi's the team leader - he looks after them. Yamato doesn’t know how to stage an intervation without breaking the chain of command.

But after months of dancing around the issue, pretending not to see how Kakashi flings himself into every fight like he doesn't care if he comes out the other side, how he's twisted his philosophy of protect your friends (a philosophy Yamato still struggles to understand) into this strange delusion that his life is worth inherently less...

Well. Fate conspires to ensure that Yamato can't ignore Kakashi’s self-destruction any longer.

He sits by Kakashi's hospital bed. Watching him breathe.

In, out. In, out. Each rise of his chest a tiny miracle.

Yamato slows his own breaths to match. They're considerably less obstructed, given the lack of a plastic tube shoved down his throat.

Bandages bulk sempai's chest, filling out his shape under the sheets like he's still strapped into his ANBU armour. He took a kunai to the lung for Yamato. A kunai that could've easily been deflected with Mokuton - at least, so Yamato thinks. Still, he had a solid chance, and sempai knows him well enough - has fought him enough - to know that.

Point is, there was no need for Kakashi to get hurt. But he got hurt anyway.

And here they are again, in a familiar room that Yamato suspects has Kakashi's name on the door, treated by a doctor who refers to sempai by his surname, not his ANBU code. In familiar positions too: Kakashi on the bed, nursed back from the brink and undoubtedly mad about it. Yamato on the chair, mad at him.

It takes him embarrassingly long to realise sempai isn't asleep - just feigning it, waiting for him to go away. Like he doesn't want to face him. Like he's ashamed.

Good, thinks Yamato. Sempai should be.

He sinks lower on his chair and glowers through the eyeholes of his porcelain mask.

The medics care little for ANBU eccentricities; they've removed both of Kakashi's own masks in order to intubate. The longer Yamato stares, the more Kakashi shifts, until he's not even pretending to sleep anymore. He makes a feeble attempt to pull the covers up over his nose.

Right. Sempai hates it when people stare at his face.

Yamato crosses his arms and refuses to blink.

"You," he says, "are very cruel, you know."

Kakashi's dark eye flicks to him. The other twitches behind its scarred lid, but stays shut. Pale lashes cast shadows on his cheeks. He makes a gurgly noise around the tube that might be a denial or an apology. Either way, Yamato doesn't want to hear it.

"How many people have died for you?" he demands.

Kakashi looks away. Too many.

Yamato squeezes his thumbs at the centre of his fists until they ache. It's the wrong way to throw a punch, but right now, they're only sparring with words - and it's a one-sided match.

That's for the best. Sempai can sweet-talk his way out of anything. Right now, Yamato needs him to shut up and listen.

"So, you know what it feels like. And you would inflict that on me? You'd make me watch you die for me?"

Kakashi's shoulders stiffen. Then, slowly, slump. He slackens against his bed like he's finally given up the ghost, staring dully at the ceiling. No more gurgles. It seems that, for once in his life, he has nothing clever to say.

Yamato leans over him. His expression is wooden as ever, under his mask, but all the churning emotions inside him - anger sempai would put himself in this position, relief that he made it, absolute terror that he'll do this again - manifest in the tremble in his hand, as he grips Kakashi's wrist.

"Don't," he says. Though it's not the subordinate's place to question a taichou, he pushes as much authority into the word as he can muster. "Don't you fucking dare, sempai. Don't leave me like that."

ANBU die. It's practically in the job description. Yamato has made his peace with it: his own death, and that of his comrades. What he cannot accept - what he cannot abide - is that Kakashi, who helped him to give his life meaning, might throw his own away. Like it means nothing. Like he means nothing.

"Don't," Yamato repeats.

Kakashi still doesn't look at him. But he nods once, order accepted.

Yamato trusts him implicitly in the field. They've trained together for years, and fought together too, taking down foes back-to-back and side-to-side. He knows Kakashi as well as the balance on his own knives.

He wishes he could trust him right now.