Gracie Abrams is eking out a solitary existence, fighting day-in, day-out against the drain of working customer service and nursing two newborn kittens in her off time. Out on her own ever since her sister moved in with her boyfriend, the burden of...
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"Gracie." Kakashi's voice turned to a murmur, his covered nose nestling right in my hair. "What's this, now? Weren't you the one who told me not to get sucked into my head earlier?"
The shuddering of my stifled sobs receded slowly as I gripped onto the truth of Kakashi's statement. I had just told him something similar, hadn't I? What was I doing now, being a hypocrite to my own words?
If I didn't act on my own philosophy, it would seem like my advice to Kakashi had been insincere. Even if I hadn't known what I was doing comforting a man during a night terror, and even though there had been so much more I had wanted to say...had I been insincere?
No.
I have to get a grip. Now.
If I don't, then I'm going to lose all credibility before this man. He's been lied to and cheated throughout his whole life...I can't be another one of those people. I can't be another reason this man falls further into darkness.
"Sorry," I said, my voice thick but understandable. "I was just overcome for a moment. I'm sorry."
"Can you look at me now?"
Slowly, I unclenched myself from around Kakashi's neck, slowly pulling my face back to take in Kakashi's gaze.
The unnatural silence felt electric. Each breath shared between the slim space between our faces, each stray muscle twitch or reshifting, felt alive.
When would Rengoku fire at us next? How far was his sense of hearing, and how was that affected by his current state?
I feared Kakashi wouldn't stand a chance against Rengoku's speed if he wasn't warned first. Such was the might of a Hashira on the hunt.
If Kakashi didn't see it coming, he could be in serious trouble.
Would one blow take Kakashi down, or would he be able to recover?
I never cared about inter-anime discussions centered around who would win in a fight. I always thought it was stupid to compare characters from two completely different worlds with two completely different scales of power levels.
Now I wished I'd paid attention to those random articles showing up on my Google homepage. If I at least understood the way people looked at differences in power, then maybe I could help strategize how this specific match-up would turn out.
My heart burned at the thought of watching Kakashi and Rengoku fight each other.
I absolutely didn't want to see that.
In any other situation, such a thing would never have a chance in hell of occurring. They might even be friends.
Their roles were similar in their respective worlds. In certain ways.
