Chapter Text
Kakashi wanted to puke. Why does he have to have His eyes?
Kakashi shuddered and tore his gaze away from the pair of empty blue eyes that stared back.
Fighting to look anywhere except the baby’s face, Kakashi took stock of the situation. The nursery was plain to the point of being sterile. There were no toys, not in the crib or around the room. It was quiet. The only sound was the soft whisper of wind through the cracked window and the distant birdsong. The baby lay on his back in the crib with only the shifting shadows for entertainment.
Kakashi couldn’t claim to know much about babies, but he was fairly certain that they were supposed to have things to play with. And people to talk to them. And people to cuddle them. And people to change their diapers.
The baby clearly hadn’t been changed in some time, but he wasn’t complaining. He wasn’t really doing much of anything. Again, Kakashi wasn’t sure if that was normal, but he thought babies tended to be wiggly, noisy things.
Kakashi sighed and looked back over the baby. This time, he was able to see past his dead mentor’s eyes. The baby was skinny and a bit pale. Nothing about this looked or felt right.
Kakashi had watched the house for days before daring to sneak in.
It wasn’t hard to find the civilians who had been saddled with the Ninetail’s vessel, or as they liked to call him, the Demon. The husband liked to complain loudly when he got drunk, which was often.
Kakashi had been staking out their house in his spare time.
Which is how he knew, no one had bothered to check on Naruto since he was fed early that morning and if patterns held, they wouldn’t be back until evening.
Some caretakers… Kakashi grumbled to himself. He must have made an audible noise because Naruto started and turned to look at him.
The baby grinned up at Kakashi, all wide eyes and gummy smile.
Without even thinking, the young shinobi stepped closer and reached into the crib. He gently ruffled the baby’s blond hair and found himself grinning back when Naruto made a happy little gurgle.
Then, realizing the number of rules he was breaking, Kakashi snatched back his hand.
The baby didn’t cry, but his face fell and he shifted, trying to reach for Kakashi, but too small and too weak to actually do anything.
Kakashi wished the baby would cry. It’d justify doing something. As it was, he couldn’t do anything. He’d been specifically ordered not to do anything.
No one was allowed to seek out the Fourth’s son and Kakashi had been explicitly forbidden from trying to interact with the child. The order had come with some long winded explanation involving a unique and potentially unstable seal and fear of what a child jinchuuriki aware of their powers could do.
Kakashi had nodded along, but he hadn’t really been listening. He’d still been digesting the idea that his mentor’s son had survived. Minato was gone. Kushina was gone. And so many other. But the baby, Naruto, had survived.
Kakashi pressed his forehead to the rail of the crib and closed his eye. Not for the first time, he wondered what he was doing here. There was no closure to be found here, not in those empty blue eyes. It was as simple as the Third and the Anbu made it sound. Minato sensei was dead and all he’d left behind was a monsterous weapon.
Kakashi shuddered at the thought. He knew what was hidden in the baby, but seeing it-- seeing him-- all Kakashi could see was a baby.
Kakashi forced himself to leave. He walked home without paying attention to the village around him. People stepped out of his way. Between his reputation and the dark expression on his face, no one dared bother the copy-nin.
At his empty house, Kakashi flopped on the couch and stared up at the ceiling. It’d been six months since Minato Sensei died saving the village. Six months since Kakashi lost the last of his family.
Kakashi had thought he was past grief. He’d shed enough tears and lost enough people that he’d expected to just feel empty. Instead, his chest ached day and night and it felt like someone was driving a kunai through his skull. He was lost and miserable and had no idea how to ask for or accept help. He’d tried talking to Jiraya Sama and had been brushed off. The man hadn’t even understood that Kakashi was trying to ask for help.
That was another thing to miss about Minato Sensei. He’d always been good at seeing through Kakashi’s masks, even the ones that weren’t physical.
Now, Kakashi was really alone.
I could just disappear and no one would notice until they needed me for a mission, Kakashi mused.
The sound of claws on hardwood jolted Kakashi out of his misery.
“Well?” Pakkun asked. The little dog jumped onto the couch by Kakashi’s feet and clambered over the ninja until he was sitting on a Kakashi’s chest.
Kakashi scratched the dog’s head and didn’t answer.
Pakkun leaned into the petting. “Did you find any answers?” Pakkun pressed.
Kakashi sighed. “No. I feel worse now,” he admitted.
Pakkun shifted to nuzzle Kakashi. He didn’t know how to help his young master and he was worried. The sadness that clung to Kakashi was terrifyingly similar to the one that had taken Sakumo.
“He’s just a baby,” Kakashi said. “I know he’s not just a baby, but he’s just a baby.” Kakashi was frowning. “He’s all alone in the room. They aren’t taking good care of him and I don’t think they’re even feeding him enough.”
Pakkun whined and pressed his nose to Kakashi’s cheek.
“No one deserves to grow up like that. It’s like no one even sees that he’s a person. It’s like they don’t remember he had two parents who… who loved him so much… they…” Kakashi’s voice faded as he choked back a sob. He hugged Pakkun and squeezed his eye tight.
Someone watching wouldn’t have realized Kakashi was fighting tears. His face was impassive. Only Pakkun could feel the way his young master trembled.
“You could talk to the Third. He could find other caretakers,” Pakkun suggested when Kakashi stopped shaking.
“Do you really think it would make a difference?”
“Probably not. People are afraid of the fox.”
“I’m not,” Kakashi growled. “He’s not the fox. He’s got a name, even if no one uses it.”
“The Third already told you to stay away from the kid,” Pakkun reminded.
Kakashi snorted. “I bet I could take Naruto and it’d be at least a week before the Third found out.”
Pakkun raised an eyebrow at that, but didn’t bother arguing.
The pair lapsed into silence.
In the silence, Kakashi dozed off with Pakkun on his chest and the dog let him sleep. The teen hadn’t been sleeping enough and Pakkun was happy to put up with being cuddled if it meant his master finally got some rest.
When Kakashi came home from grocery shopping the next day with a library book on childcare, Pakkun resigned himself to another of Kakashi’s hairbrained schemes.
The dog swore it must be Obito’s influence rubbing off on Kakashi. Since the Uchiha’s death, Kakashi had become odd. Pakkun had even caught his master making jokes and snorting at stupid puns, but that was all before Rin and Minato.
Kakashi was sent on several missions back to back after his first real visit with Naruto. Missions helped ease the ache in his chest and if he worked himself to exhaustion, he could fall into bed at night and the headache and the nightmares couldn’t touch him.
Weeks turned into months since, but in his quieter moments Kakashi kept finding his mind back on his Sensei’s orphan. Naruto’s happy little grin seemed to be painted on Kakashi’s eyelids and he found himself preferring that to the usual figures that haunted him.
When Naruto turned 9 month old, Kakashi went back to check on the baby. He brought a small, stuffed dog that he’d picked up on a mission in Suna.
When Kakashi slipped in the window and saw Naruto, the toy hit the floor.
The baby was way too skinny. He was laying on his back in the same crib, in the same spot, staring silently at the ceiling. His hair was dull and his eyes were empty and glassy.
“Hey,” Kakashi called. Without hesitating, he reached in and ruffled the baby’s hair. Naruto barely reacted. Kakashi’s stomach dropped. He didn’t need to know anything about babies to realize this was really bad. “You poor thing,” Kakashi murmured. He forced the words out around the lump of anger in his throat. “You can’t just lay here all the time.”
At Kakashi’s voice and the continued physical contact, Naruto seemed to come back to life a bit, leaning into Kakashi’s touch, like Pakkun did when he wanted more ear scratches.
In that instant, Kakashi made a decision. They could fire him from the anbu and take his forehead protector for this, but he didn’t care.
Kakashi scooped up his sensei’s son and cradled Naruto to his chest the way he’d seen in the books.
Naruto just stared up at Kakashi with those wide, innocent, blue eyes.
Kakashi found himself babbling to the baby as he puttered around the nursery and packed a bag of supplies.
“We’re going to go get you some sunlight and some good food,” Kakashi promised. “You’ll feel better with the wind on your face and food in your stomach.” It was the same thing Pakkun had been telling him for months.
In the end, Kakashi decided to leave a note. Not leaving one would have given him more time before someone came looking for Naruto, but it would also put this squarely in the kidnapping category.
Leaving a note meant Kakashi could claim he was just babysitting right?
If Pakkun was surprised to see Kakashi come through the front door with a baby, he didn’t show it.
Kakashi held Naruto with one hand and pulled one of the couch cushions onto the floor with the other. He settled the baby on the cushion and turned to Pakkun, “Watch him while I figure out how to make a bottle?”
Pakkun nodded and trotted over to the baby.
The good news was Naruto wasn’t a fussy baby and he took to Pakkun like a dog to a bone.
Kakashi came back with a bottle and found Naruto with one of Pakkun’s ears tight in his little fist and grinning away.
The bad news was books on childcare really don’t prepare someone for a baby.
Feeding Naruto was easy enough. It only took a little experimenting to figure out how to hold the baby and the bottle and get an angle that worked. The problems started when Kakashi didn’t know to keep Naruto from chugging the bottle and kept building though a disastrous burping attempt and diaper change.
“That’s definitely not how a diaper is supposed to go on,” Pakkun commented.
Kakashi sighed. “He’s covered. Isn’t that good enough?”
Pakkun snorted and nosed Naruto who was back on his couch cushion and already looking better despite his inexperienced caretakers. The baby had some color back to his face and his eyes were alert.
“Can you watch him?” Kakashi asked.
Pakkun settled on the pillow beside Naruto as an answer.
Kakashi went to work cleaning up vomit and disposing of a diaper that had been way past needing changing.
When Kakashi got back from taking out the trash, Naruto was sound asleep curled around Pakkun.
Kakashi couldn’t help but grin at that. He decided that the two of them had the right idea and grabbed another pillow off the couch before settling on the floor beside the baby and the dog.
Kakashi fed Naruto again three hours later, careful to go slower this time.
And so started their routine.
Kakashi made Naruto a bed out of couch cushions and an empty drawer and set it beside his own bed.
Kakashi was up every three hours whether Naruto cried or was awake. The kid never had to wait to be fed or changed.
Sometimes, Kakashi woke up just to watch Naruto sleep, his little nose crinkled as he dreamed. Kakashi wondered if the baby was having good dreams or bad dreams. In case, Kakashi stayed awake, stroking Naruto’s hair until the baby’s face relaxed.
Kakashi didn’t know when the Third Hokage was going to show up at his door, but he was determined that Naruto was going to be better than he was when Kakashi decided to start babysitting.