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Whispers in the Dark, Smiles in the Light

The house was still when Kakashi slipped through the door, moonlight spilling across the floorboards. He tugged the hitai-ate from his hair, the Hat from his shoulders, every inch of him humming with the tired weight of the day. The Sixth’s home had become little more than a place to collapse between duties, the quiet too sharp, the emptiness too constant.

But on the low table by the window, something waited.

Another note.

Folded with care, tucked beneath a small sprig of wildflowers. The scent reached him before his fingers did—sweet, clean, threaded faintly with something warmer, almost dizzying. Omega. Subtle enough that no one in the village would notice unless they leaned close, but Kakashi had been trained on the battlefield too long to miss it.

He exhaled through his mask, long and steady.

Years. That was how long this little ritual had gone on. Anonymous gestures appearing at his door, sometimes a phrase inked in uneven brushstrokes, sometimes no words at all—only a token left behind. At first, he’d dismissed it. Some infatuated villager nursing a crush on their Hokage. Harmless. If he ignored it, it would fade.

But it hadn’t.

Persistence. Consistency. Not desperate or demanding, never reckless enough to reveal themselves—just… steady. A whisper in the night that he had not been forgotten.

Kakashi brushed his thumb over the fold of the paper, lips tugging in spite of himself. On days the Hat weighed heavier than armor, when the council’s voices rang louder than his own thoughts, these little offerings had become a reprieve. A reminder that someone, out there, saw him as more than Hokage, more than the Sixth.

He opened the note.

“You looked tired today. Don’t forget to rest. I’ll keep watch in your dreams.”

The handwriting was uneven. Playful. Young.

Kakashi chuckled under his breath, sliding the note into the drawer where every other one rested in neat order. He told himself he didn’t care who it was. That the mystery mattered less than the comfort.

And yet—he caught himself glancing once more at the empty window, the faint trace of omega scent curling in the night air.

As though he might catch a shadow vanishing into the dark.

Kakashi’s office was already warm with morning light when the door slammed open.

“Yo, Kakashi-sensei!”

Naruto strode in, scrolls tucked under one arm, his grin as careless as ever. He moved like he owned the place already, dropping into the chair opposite Kakashi’s desk without waiting for permission. His presence filled the room the way it always did—sunlight spilling through every crack.

Kakashi lifted his head from the stack of reports, one brow quirking. “You’re late.”

“Pfft, only by a little.” Naruto propped his chin in his hand, smirking. “Besides, I brought these from the archives. You should be thanking me.”

Kakashi made a noise low in his throat, flipping one of the scrolls open. “Mm. I’ll add it to your list of heroic deeds.”

Naruto’s laugh rang out, quick and unrestrained. He sprawled sideways in the chair, legs sticking out in a way that made the aides in the hall shake their heads whenever they passed. Hokage-in-training or not, Naruto never seemed to lose that edge of wildness.

Kakashi glanced at him over the report, eyes narrowing just slightly. This had become their rhythm—Naruto shadowing him most days, peppering the monotony of politics and paperwork with noise and warmth. Half the time it was exasperating. The other half, it kept the silence from growing too sharp.

“Don’t smudge the margins,” Kakashi said mildly as Naruto reached across the desk.

Naruto rolled his eyes but pulled his arm back, grinning. “Yeah, yeah. You’re such a perfectionist, sensei.”

Kakashi turned back to the scroll, his expression unreadable beneath the mask. Outside, the village was already stirring with a hundred demands on his time. Inside, the room buzzed with Naruto’s familiar energy—bright enough to push the weight of the Hat a little farther off his shoulders, if only for the moment.

By midday, the office was already thick with parchment and petitions. Kakashi signed one scroll, slid it aside, and reached for another without pausing.

Naruto groaned theatrically from across the desk. “You can’t seriously read all of these without going crazy.”

“That’s the job.” Kakashi didn’t look up. “You’ll get used to it.”

Naruto shoved his chair back and stood, pacing toward the window. “No way. This is worse than training under Pervy Sage. At least that had hot springs.”

“You’re supposed to be learning, not comparing me to your questionable mentors.”

Naruto laughed, leaning on the sill to stare at the village below. Children were racing down the street with wooden kunai, the distant clang of the blacksmith echoing through the midday air. He tapped the glass. “See? This is what I wanna protect. Not… stacks of paper.”

Kakashi paused in his writing. For all Naruto’s noise, the words had been soft. Honest.

“You’ll find,” Kakashi said after a moment, “that protecting this view requires more paperwork than jutsu.”

Naruto wrinkled his nose but didn’t argue. Instead, he turned back with a sudden grin. “Bet you’d rather be on a mission right now too, huh?”

Kakashi hummed, neither agreeing nor denying.

Naruto crossed the room in a few quick steps, dropping back into the chair and reaching for one of the reports. “Fine. I’ll help. But you owe me ramen tonight.”

“Do I.”

“Yeah! Hokage-in-training clause. Page three, subsection… uh… whatever.” He waved the report dramatically.

Kakashi’s eyes crinkled faintly, and though the mask hid it, Naruto knew he was smiling.

For a while, the office settled into a rhythm: the quiet scratch of ink on paper, punctuated by Naruto’s grumbles, his jokes, the occasional burst of laughter when he found something amusing in the margins. And through it all, Kakashi worked steadily, the Hat’s weight a little less heavy with Naruto’s presence filling the room.

The Tower quieted as the aides slipped out for a break, leaving only the two of them with their mountains of parchment. Naruto leaned back in his chair, arms folded behind his head, eyes half-lidded with boredom.

Kakashi, however, was not bored. He slid a thin folder from the bottom of the stack and placed it neatly in front of Naruto.

Naruto blinked at it. “What’s that?”

Kakashi’s eyes curved. “The one you’ve been avoiding for three weeks.”

Naruto groaned. “Ugh, not this again.” He pushed it away with a fingertip as though it might bite.

“Unfortunately, the council doesn’t see it that way.” Kakashi tapped the folder once. “Clause seventeen. ‘Before assuming the Hat, the successor must secure a mate. For medical stability, political reassurance, and continuity of leadership.’”

“Medical stability my ass,” Naruto muttered, scowling. “I’m perfectly fine.”

“Mm.” Kakashi tilted his head. “Tell that to the council. They’ll argue omegas push themselves too far without an alpha bond stabilizing their health. And politically…” He gestured vaguely at the village beyond the window. “You know how much they love their traditions.”

Naruto scrubbed a hand through his hair, cheeks puffing. “It’s stupid. I don’t need some mate to prove I can protect the village.”

“No,” Kakashi agreed softly, “you don’t.” His gaze lingered, unreadable behind the mask. “But the council isn’t asking what you need. They’re asking what makes them comfortable.”

Naruto fell silent at that, jaw tight. His bright scent — usually warm, sunshine-sweet — dimmed to something edged, defensive.

Kakashi leaned back, letting the silence stretch. He’d learned long ago not to push Naruto too hard. But he also knew the boy’s stubborn streak. If this clause wasn’t addressed now, it would fester.

Finally, Naruto growled, “I’ll deal with it later.”

Kakashi’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t press. Instead, he gathered the folder back into the pile, sliding it on top where Naruto couldn’t ignore it forever. “Later,” he said mildly, “has a way of becoming never.”

Naruto shot him a glare, but the corner of Kakashi’s eyes crinkled faintly.

It was infuriating, Naruto thought—not for the first time—that his sensei could be both the most annoying and the most grounding presence in the room.

Naruto’s glare lingered on the folder, heat prickling at the back of his neck. Finally, he snapped, “Tch. Easy for you to say, Kakashi-sensei. You got to take the Hat without a mate.”

Kakashi stilled, quill pausing mid-stroke. His gaze lifted slowly, gray eyes steady on Naruto.

Naruto pressed on, arms folding tight across his chest. “What—because you’re an alpha? That makes it different? The council never forced you to prove you were fit. Never shoved some stupid clause about your health in your face.”

The words came out harsher than he meant, frustration crackling in his scent. But he didn’t pull them back.

Kakashi set the quill down with deliberate care. “You’re right,” he said at last, voice calm but edged. “They didn’t.”

Naruto blinked, taken aback by the lack of pushback.

Kakashi leaned back in his chair, fingers lacing loosely in front of him. “The council let me take the Hat because I was convenient. Because no one else wanted it. They overlooked what they didn’t like because they were desperate.” His gaze sharpened. “That doesn’t mean they respected me.”

Naruto opened his mouth, then closed it again.

“They see you differently,” Kakashi continued. “Not just as the next Hokage. As an omega carrying the village’s legacy. That makes you valuable, yes—but also vulnerable in their eyes. They’ll fight harder to cage you than they ever fought to cage me.”

The silence stretched. Naruto’s fists tightened in his lap, nails digging into his palms. “…It’s not fair,” he muttered.

“No,” Kakashi agreed softly. His eyes curved faintly, almost a smile. “But fairness has never been part of the job description.”

Naruto huffed out a breath, frustrated, but something inside him eased at the steadiness in Kakashi’s tone. He slouched back in the chair, muttering, “Still stupid.”

“Very,” Kakashi said, returning to his paperwork as if nothing had happened.

But beneath the mask, his mouth tugged faintly upward. Naruto’s fire hadn’t dimmed; if anything, it burned hotter for every chain they tried to place on him. That, more than any clause or tradition, was what would carry him to the Hat.

Kakashi returned home later than usual, the weight of the council’s demands still clinging to his shoulders. Their arguments had been dull noise, but Naruto’s anger—bright, sharp—still rang in his ears.

He slid the door shut behind him. For a long moment, the house was still. Empty. He almost thought the rhythm had ended at last.

Then he saw it.

A small parcel on the low table. Wrapped in plain paper, tied with twine. Beside it, a folded slip of parchment.

Kakashi stepped closer, loosening the string with practiced fingers. Inside, dumplings. Still faintly warm. The scent of broth and spice curled upward, mingling with that ever-elusive trace of omega sweetness he could never quite pin down.

He opened the note.

“Even strong shoulders need rest. You’ve carried enough today. Don’t forget there’s warmth waiting for you, too.”

No mention of politics. No hint of the council. Just quiet assurance.

Kakashi let out a low breath, folding the paper closed. The brushstrokes were familiar now—messy, quick, heartfelt—but never reckless. Whoever this was, they understood distance as much as devotion.

He set the note with the others, stacked neatly in the drawer, then took one of the dumplings in hand. The heat sank into his skin, and for the first time that day, something unknotted in his chest.

Whoever they were, this phantom voice in the night had perfect timing.

When Kakashi stepped into the Tower the next morning, he expected the usual: the office quiet, papers stacked where he’d left them, Naruto tumbling in half an hour later with excuses and a grin.

Instead, Naruto was already there.

He sat at the desk opposite, shoulders hunched, flipping through the slim folder Kakashi had left on top of the stack. The mate clause. His brow was furrowed, mouth set in a sulky line that didn’t quite match the seriousness in his eyes.

Kakashi paused in the doorway, watching. It wasn’t like Naruto to be this still.

The pages rustled as Naruto turned another, scowling faintly at whatever he read. He muttered under his breath—too low to catch, but sharp enough to carry the shape of frustration. His fingers pressed hard into the edge of the parchment, as if he could wring answers out of it.

Kakashi stepped inside at last, setting his own reports on the desk. “You’re early.”

Naruto glanced up, surprise flickering across his face before he masked it with a crooked grin. “Figured I should beat you here for once.”

“Mm.” Kakashi lowered himself into his chair, eyes flicking to the folder Naruto tried, a little too casually, to shut.

“I was just—” Naruto waved a hand, lips pressing thin. “Looking.”

“Ah.”

Kakashi let the silence stretch, pen rolling idly between his fingers. Inside, though, his thoughts tugged in two directions. Part of him was relieved—Naruto finally taking the council’s demand seriously, acknowledging the part of his nature he so often shoved aside. Another part twisted with something he couldn’t quite name.

Glad. Uneasy. Protective.

None of the words fit.

Naruto slouched back, arms crossing defensively. “It’s still stupid.”

“Very,” Kakashi agreed softly, without looking up from the stack of reports he hadn’t started.

The quiet stretched, broken only by the scratch of Kakashi’s pen against parchment. Naruto had gone still again, arms folded, gaze fixed somewhere past the window. The sulk in his mouth hadn’t softened.

Kakashi glanced up once, then again. He weighed his words, then let them fall before he could think better of it.

“…What kind of alpha would you want?”

Naruto’s head snapped around, eyes narrowing. “Why does that matter?”

Kakashi gave a small shrug, feigning nonchalance. “Maybe I could pull some names. A list. Introductions. Save you from the council’s matchmaking.” The words sounded ridiculous the second they left his mouth, but he let them hang in the air anyway.

Naruto stared at him. Long enough that Kakashi shifted in his chair, pen still between his fingers.

Finally, Naruto said quietly, “I have one.”

Kakashi’s pen stilled.

“…But he’s not for me.”

The words dropped heavy between them. Naruto looked away at once, pushing to his feet with too much energy. “Anyway. I should check in with Shikamaru about the patrol reports.”

Kakashi opened his mouth, but Naruto was already halfway to the door.

“Don’t drown in paperwork, sensei,” he called over his shoulder, voice back to its usual careless brightness. The door shut a moment later, leaving the office silent again.

Kakashi leaned back in his chair, pen tapping once against the desk. He told himself not to linger on it. Not to wonder who Naruto had meant.

But the words echoed anyway. I have one… but he’s not for me.

The office didn’t feel the same after Naruto left.

Reports stacked higher, aides filtered in and out, and the council sent yet another summons that Kakashi ignored until the last possible minute. The rhythm of the day pressed on, but his mind snagged on a single thread he couldn’t untangle.

I have one… but he’s not for me.

The words rang sharper than any complaint, quieter than any argument, and yet they clung to him long after the sound of Naruto’s steps had faded down the hall.

Kakashi found himself staring out the window more than once, quill paused mid-sentence. He pictured Naruto’s mouth in that sulky line, the quick flash of seriousness before he masked it with his usual grin.

Not for me.

Kakashi had heard that tone before. Soldiers after battles, villagers in the wake of loss. The voice people used when they reached for something they could never let themselves hold.

By late afternoon, when Shikamaru arrived with his reports, Kakashi caught himself asking without meaning to, “Did Naruto stop by?”

Shikamaru raised a brow, shoving a stack of scrolls onto the desk. “Yeah. Dropped off the patrol notes and bolted. Why?”

Kakashi shook his head. “No reason.”

But when the Tower finally emptied and silence settled again, the weight of the Hat pressed a little heavier than usual. Not because of the council, or the endless reports.

Because of a voice that still lingered in his ears, admitting to a want it could not claim.

Kakashi’s door slid shut with a muted click. The house was dark, still, the kind of quiet that pressed against his ribs. He slipped off his sandals, shoulders heavy, mind still circling words he hadn’t asked for but couldn’t shake.

On the low table, something waited.

A small cup covered with cloth. Steam clung faintly beneath it, carrying the scent of ginger and broth. Beside it, a folded slip of parchment.

Kakashi crossed the room, lowering himself onto the floor. He uncovered the cup, warmth rising into his hands, then opened the note.

“Don’t overthink. You’re not expected to always give. Sometimes your presence is enough for someone. Thank you for always being here.”

The brushstrokes were the same as always—messy, uneven, but earnest. Tonight, though, they felt steadier. Less playful, more deliberate.

Kakashi sat with the cup cupped between his palms, staring at the words until they blurred. He could still hear Naruto’s voice from earlier, sharp with want and denial. He could still feel the council’s weight pressing against him.

And here—this. Quiet reassurance. A voice in the night reminding him he was allowed to simply exist, to be.

Kakashi let out a low laugh under his breath. Half incredulous, half tired. He folded the note with care and set it on top of the others, the pile now thick enough to weigh its drawer closed.

“…Persistent little ghost,” he murmured into the empty house.

The silence gave no answer, only the faint curl of omega warmth lingering in the air.

By the time Kakashi reached home, the moon had climbed high. The house greeted him with its usual stillness. He slid the door shut, gaze flicking automatically toward the low table.

Empty.

Not unusual. Whoever his admirer was, they’d skipped nights before—long stretches, even. Their rhythm wasn’t perfect. And yet, tonight the sight of bare wood made something in his chest pinch.

He stood there longer than he meant to, sandals still on, staring at nothing. Then he let out a soundless breath, shaking his head at himself. Ridiculous. He was the Hokage—well past the age of brooding over whether or not some anonymous ghost had left him supper and a note.

Still… today of all days, he’d caught himself waiting for it. Hoping for it.

The office had felt different without Naruto sprawled across the opposite chair, noise and heat filling every corner. Shikamaru had delivered reports with his usual sharp efficiency, but the air had hung taut, as though something essential was missing.

And now, coming home to silence upon silence—no trainee, no secret note, no trace of warmth—it left the house feeling emptier than it had in a long time.

Kakashi rubbed a hand across the back of his neck, exhaling through his mask. “Pathetic,” he muttered, though the word held no bite.

He set his things aside, dropped into his chair, and let the silence press in around him.

The silence stretched for days.

Kakashi told himself it wasn’t new. The rhythm of his admirer had always been irregular—weeks of steady offerings, then sudden gaps, nights of nothing. But after Naruto’s absence in the Tower, the empty space had cut deeper. He found himself listening too long when he came home, glancing too quickly toward the low table, pausing before he admitted to the quiet.

It hadn’t always been this way.

He still remembered the first time. Years ago, a long night at the Tower had left him crawling home near dawn, mind fogged with exhaustion. And there—on the step outside his door—waited a small packet wrapped in brown paper. Inside: a rice ball, unevenly shaped, sprinkled with sesame. A note no bigger than his thumb tucked beneath the string.

“Don’t forget to eat. You look tired.”

The brushstrokes had been clumsy, ink blotched where the hand lingered. He’d laughed quietly then, shaking his head. Harmless. Someone would grow bored soon enough.

But the rice ball had been warm. And the note had smelled faintly of ink and something softer, almost sweet.

After that, they came in bursts. A pressed flower folded between reports. A hand-stitched charm slipped beneath his door. A steaming cup of broth on the coldest nights. Always small, never extravagant, but each one deliberate.

Years passed. The notes filled a drawer. What should have been forgettable had become rhythm.

And now—absence. Days of it.

Until one evening, when he returned home to find the low table no longer empty.

A parcel waited, tied with neat string. Inside was a delicacy he hadn’t seen in years—a sweet dumpling glazed with honey and crushed nuts, the kind sold only at the border markets to the west. The smell alone was memory: campfires, treaty patrols, nights spent under foreign stars.

Beside it lay a note, folded crisp.

“Sorry for missing. I thought of you when I passed this stall. Hope it brings a smile.”

Kakashi sat down slowly, the weight in his chest loosening. He lifted the dumpling, studying it as though it held the answer to the question he had never managed to catch.

“…Welcome back,” he murmured into the empty house.

The silence felt warmer than it had in days.

The next morning, the Tower was loud again.

Kakashi stepped into his office and found Naruto already there, sprawled across the chair opposite his desk, yawning wide enough to crack his jaw. His hair stuck out at stranger angles than usual, uniform travel-wrinkled, the faint tang of road dust clinging to his scent.

“You’re early,” Kakashi said mildly, setting down his reports.

Naruto grinned through the yawn. “Mission wrapped up quicker than expected. Thought I’d come straight here.” He stretched, arms overhead, then dropped them with a sigh. “Man, border towns are exhausting. But the food stalls—” his eyes lit up, bright even through the fatigue, “—worth it.”

Kakashi’s pen paused in his hand. The memory of honey-glazed dumplings lingered sharp on his tongue, their sweetness still tucked in the back of his mind.

Naruto leaned forward on the desk, chin in his hand. “So, what’d I miss? More council nagging? Or did you drown in paperwork without me?”

Kakashi’s gaze lingered a moment longer, tracing the familiar slope of Naruto’s grin, the warmth in his eyes. The coincidences pressed closer than he liked.

He set the pen down, mask tugging faintly at the curve of his mouth. “…Welcome back,” he murmured.

Naruto blinked, then grinned wider. “Heh. Thanks, sensei.”

The room filled again with his usual brightness, as though the days of silence had never been. But Kakashi’s thoughts snagged, repeating the words he’d spoken into the empty house the night before.

Welcome back.

And for the first time, he wondered—really wondered—just how much coincidence he was willing to believe in.

By the fourth night after Naruto’s return, Kakashi stopped pretending the notes were chance.

He’d never been careless on missions, never missed the smallest detail — yet for years he had let this admirer slip past him. Now, with the border gift still fresh in his memory, he found himself looking closer. Listening harder.

The next evening, he laid a trap.

Nothing elaborate. Just left the lantern burning low in the front hall, his sandals placed neatly to the side, as if he had already gone to bed. Then he lingered in the shadowed corner, waiting.

He almost thought it wouldn’t work. The hours dragged, quiet stretching thin. Then — the faintest creak of the door. A whisper of air disturbed.

By the time Kakashi reached the table, the note was there. No trace of a figure. No sound of retreat. Just parchment folded clean, resting beside a covered bowl that still steamed faintly.

He unfolded it, reading in the dim light:

“For long days and longer nights. Strength isn’t only in battle. Take care.”

Kakashi’s thumb brushed the strokes, thoughtful. Whoever they were, they were fast. Careful. And yet—

He caught himself hoping. Hoping for something reckless. Hoping for a shadow too familiar, a scent too bright. Hoping the mask might crack, just once.

He set the note down with a quiet sigh. Dangerous thought, Hatake.

The next day, he tried another angle.

Naruto burst into the office with his usual grin, plopping down in the chair opposite. Kakashi didn’t look up from his papers as he said casually, “You know, I’ve been getting anonymous gifts for years now. Someone must think I need looking after.”

Naruto froze for the briefest heartbeat before laughing, scratching the back of his neck. “Heh, really? Guess even the Sixth has a fan club.”

Kakashi’s eyes lifted, catching the grin that was just a little too quick, the flush that was just a little too easy to blame on the morning sun. His chest tightened with something he didn’t want to name.

“Maybe,” he said lightly, turning back to the scroll. “Maybe I should try to find out who.”

Naruto hummed, too brightly, and changed the subject.

Kakashi let him. For now.

But when he looked at the note again that night, he found himself smiling before he could stop it.

It started small.

“Strange thing,” Kakashi murmured one morning, flipping lazily through a report. “I found a note at my place again last night. Said I should rest more.”

Naruto blinked, mid-rant about council procedure, then barked a laugh. “Sounds like good advice, sensei. You never rest.”

“Mm.” Kakashi’s eyes curved faintly. “Funny thing is… the handwriting’s not half-bad, if a little messy. Almost reminds me of—” He trailed off deliberately, watching over the edge of the paper.

Naruto’s grin wobbled for half a second before he crossed his arms and leaned back. “What? You think I’ve got time to sneak around the village writing you love letters? Please. I’ve got better things to do.”

Kakashi hummed, returning to the report. “Of course.”

A week later, he tried again.

“Had something interesting left for me last night,” he said idly while Naruto sprawled across the opposite chair. “Border fruit. Sweet. Can’t get it here.”

Naruto perked up immediately. “Oh! I had some on my last mission. Best stuff ever. You gotta eat it while it’s fresh, though.”

Kakashi let the silence hang a beat too long. “Mm. Yes. Mine was still fresh.”

Naruto’s ears went faintly pink, though his grin stayed stubbornly in place.

By the third “test,” Kakashi was no longer pretending it was just curiosity.

“Sometimes I wonder who this admirer is,” he said lightly, closing a folder. “To be so persistent, they must be very fond of me. I imagine they’re brave. Maybe reckless. Someone who can’t help but charge headfirst into things.”

Naruto snorted. “Sounds like a pain in the ass, if you ask me.”

Kakashi’s gaze lingered, unreadable. “Mm. Maybe so.”

But beneath the mask, his mouth tugged upward, even as something heavier twisted deep in his chest. Because the more he set his little traps, the more he realized how much he wanted the answer to be Naruto—wanted it enough to almost forget the danger of hoping.

The office had thinned out for the evening, aides dismissed, sun slipping low through the tall windows. Naruto was still sprawled across the opposite chair, flipping through reports with the kind of scowl that suggested reading was worse than root canal.

Kakashi signed the last of his own stack, then leaned back, stretching slow and deliberate. His gaze slid over Naruto, thoughtful.

“You know,” he said, voice lazy, “if my admirer is really this persistent, it’s a little unfair, don’t you think?”

Naruto didn’t look up. “Unfair?”

“That they get to leave their little notes, their gifts, and never face me directly.” Kakashi pushed his chair back, stood, and walked around the desk. “If they cared this much, shouldn’t they be brave enough to come close?”

Naruto’s head snapped up just as Kakashi stopped beside his chair. Too close. Close enough that his presence pressed down like shadow, close enough that his scent—calm, grounding, distinctly alpha—brushed against Naruto’s skin.

For a heartbeat, Naruto froze. His shoulders tensed, mouth opening and closing before he forced a grin. “Heh. Maybe they just don’t wanna deal with your scary face up close.”

Kakashi’s eyes curved faintly. He leaned down, bracing a hand on the desk beside Naruto’s elbow, angling close enough that his mask nearly brushed Naruto’s temple. “Scary, am I?”

Naruto’s laugh cracked, too high. His scent wavered, sunshine-bright but edged with something sharper—something that betrayed nerves. He leaned back in his chair, just slightly, as if the heat of Kakashi’s nearness was too much.

Kakashi caught the flicker. Subtle. Barely there. But enough.

He straightened, pulling away as if nothing had happened, returning to his desk with the same lazy grace. “Mm. Perhaps you’re right. Maybe they’d rather keep their distance.”

Naruto huffed, rubbing the back of his neck, cheeks pink. “Tch. Whoever it is, they’ve got weird taste.”

Kakashi didn’t answer. His eyes dropped to the pen in his hand, though his thoughts stayed across the desk, lingering on the way Naruto’s scent had flared before he masked it.

If. If it were him—

Dangerous thought. And yet, Kakashi wasn’t sure he wanted to stop himself from hoping.

The following afternoon was quieter than most. A rare lull in council demands left the Tower still, only the scratch of quills echoing between the two of them.

Naruto sat opposite, brow furrowed over a pile of reports, lips pursed in that telltale sulk. His foot tapped restlessly under the desk.

Kakashi set down his pen, eyes lingering. He’d let the silence stretch long enough.

“So,” he said casually, “this alpha you mentioned the other day.”

Naruto’s head snapped up. “What about him?”

Kakashi tilted his head, tone light, almost lazy. “Why do you think you can’t have him?”

For a second, Naruto just stared. The silence stretched, too long, too tight. His scent flickered—sunshine layered with the faintest thread of tension.

Then he barked a laugh, too loud, scratching the back of his head. “Heh, sensei, you really don’t let things go, huh?”

Kakashi’s eyes curved faintly. “Not when they catch my interest.”

Naruto’s grin wobbled, then steadied into something more stubborn. He looked down at the parchment in front of him, voice quieter when he finally answered.

“Because some people… they don’t look at me like that. Not the way I…” He trailed off, jaw working. Then, louder, “Anyway, it doesn’t matter.”

He shoved the scroll aside, forcing brightness back into his voice. “C’mon, we’ve got three more stacks to clear, don’t we? No time for dumb questions.”

Kakashi let him change the subject. But he didn’t miss the weight behind those half-swallowed words, or the way Naruto’s grin hadn’t reached his eyes.

And when he returned home that night, to find another note waiting—short, simple, messy ink lines that read “You’re you. And it mattered to me.”—he felt the twist in his chest deepen.

Because if it was Naruto, then the boy wasn’t nearly as good at hiding as he thought. And if it wasn’t—Kakashi wasn’t sure he wanted the truth.

Kakashi left the lantern burning low again.

Not carelessly this time. Deliberately. His sandals arranged by the door, his cloak draped neatly across the stand. To anyone peeking in, the Hokage was asleep.

But Kakashi lingered in the shadows, breath measured, ears tuned to every creak of the old floorboards.

It was past midnight when he felt it—the faint shift in the air, a subtle ripple of presence. His instincts flared before sound confirmed it: the softest step, careful, reverent.

Kakashi’s eyes narrowed.

The figure moved with practiced speed, barely more than a shadow gliding across the floor. Something was set gently on the low table. A small parcel, tied with twine.

Kakashi moved. Silent. Swift.

By the time he crossed the room, the shadow was already retreating, the door sliding open with only a whisper of sound. He reached the threshold just as the figure slipped into the night. For a heartbeat, the moonlight caught them—a glint of blond hair, a flash of movement too quick to catch.

And the scent.

Bright. Warm. Omega-sweet, threaded with something achingly familiar.

Kakashi froze, one hand braced against the frame, watching the night swallow the figure whole. His chest tightened, breath shallow beneath the mask.

He turned back slowly, eyes dropping to the parcel on the table. Inside: a sweet bun glazed with sugar, still warm from the oven. The note beside it, brushstrokes messier than usual:

“Couldn’t stay. Just wanted to say… thank you.”

Kakashi sat down hard, the bun untouched in front of him. His hand lingered over the note, thumb brushing the uneven lines.

He’d spent years dismissing the possibility. But tonight—tonight there had been no denying it.

And yet…

He leaned back, closing his eyes. “Naruto,” he whispered into the empty room, the name cracking softer than he meant.

The silence answered only with the faint curl of sweetness still lingering in the air.

By morning, Kakashi didn’t need proof. He already knew.

The glimpse in the doorway, the scent that lingered sharp and bright—it had been Naruto. There was no denying it now, not to himself. The drawer of notes at home might as well have had his name scrawled across every fold.

But knowing was one thing. Understanding was another.

Naruto barreled into the office at his usual hour, a grin already plastered across his face, chatter tumbling out before he’d even sat down. He flopped into the chair opposite Kakashi’s desk, arms sprawled, as though the night before had never happened. As though he hadn’t slipped through shadows like a ghost, leaving sugar buns and ink-stained words behind.

Kakashi watched him all day.

Not obviously—he was too practiced for that—but every tilt of Naruto’s smile, every careless laugh, every easy sprawl of his shoulders under that sunlit scent felt sharper now. It gnawed at Kakashi that he couldn’t reconcile the two halves: the brash omega who filled this office with noise, and the quiet hand that had written thank you in crooked brushstrokes, night after night.

Why this way?

Naruto had never been shy. Reckless, stubborn, infuriatingly direct—but not shy. Why spend years whispering from the dark instead of standing in the light?

And that line—I have one, but he’s not for me.

Kakashi turned it over in his mind as Naruto bent over a scroll, tongue poking out in concentration. What could make him think that? That Kakashi—his alpha, his sensei, his Hokage—was out of reach? That their bond couldn’t exist in daylight?

The council’s mate clause burned at the edge of his thoughts. Political demands, medical excuses, chains dressed as tradition. Naruto had railed against them at every turn, bristling at the suggestion that he needed anyone. Yet in the silence of night, he had reached out anyway. To him.

Kakashi’s quill hovered over parchment, unmoving. The realization pressed in tight, heavy in his chest.

He wanted to ask. To demand an answer. To peel back the mask Naruto wore in daylight and match it to the one he shed in the dark.

But across the desk, Naruto looked up with that same grin, sunlight spilling from him, and Kakashi’s voice caught before it could form.

So instead, he dipped the quill, bent his head, and signed another report.

All the while, the words twisted louder in his mind:

Why do you think you can’t have me?

Kakashi didn’t confront him. Not yet.

It wasn’t hesitation, exactly. It was calculation. The part of him that had survived too many wars, too many betrayals, refused to leap without certainty. If he was wrong—if his instincts had tangled want with truth—he’d break something he couldn’t repair.

So he watched. Quietly, deliberately.

He leaned closer during their late hours at the Tower, reaching across the desk to adjust a margin or smooth a crease. Naruto would go still for a fraction of a second, his scent spiking faintly before he smothered it under forced brightness. Kakashi noted it, filed it away.

He let slip mentions of the admirer again—never accusations, only idle musings. “Persistent, isn’t it? Years, and still they don’t give up.” Naruto’s laugh was always too quick, his grin too wide, his eyes sliding away as if the parchment in front of him suddenly mattered more than breathing.

At night, the rhythm returned. The notes came steady again—sometimes playful, sometimes tender, always carrying that faint curl of omega warmth that lingered just long enough to make the house feel less empty. Kakashi kept each one, rereading them before sleep, wondering if Naruto’s hands still smelled faintly of ink come morning.

Day by day, piece by piece, the picture became clear. The tilt of Naruto’s grin when Kakashi teased, the way his scent faltered under proximity, the uncanny timing of absence and return. All of it wove together into a truth Kakashi no longer tried to deny.

And beneath it all, something heavier stirred.

It wasn’t only about unmasking his admirer anymore. It wasn’t even about answers.

It was about admitting—quietly, privately—that he wanted it to be Naruto. That somewhere along the line, he had stopped wishing the notes belonged to anyone else.

Kakashi sat late in the Tower one night, Naruto dozing against the opposite chair, mouth parted slightly in sleep. A half-finished report slid from his hand to the floor. The moonlight caught in his hair, softening the sharp edges of his face.

Kakashi’s chest tightened.

Yes. He was sure now.

The only question left was how long he could let Naruto keep whispering from the dark before he reached out and answered.

The house lay steeped in shadow. Kakashi didn’t light the lantern this time. He wanted the dark—wanted the edges blurred, the world narrowed to sound and scent.

When the air shifted, he was ready.

A soft step across the floor, careful as always. The faint scrape of twine being set on wood. Kakashi moved like a blade unsheathed—silent, decisive—catching a wrist before the figure could vanish.

A startled breath broke the stillness as he spun them, pressing the hooded body back against the wall.

Close. Pinned.

The hood shadowed their face, but there was no mistaking the scent now—bright, omega-sweet, spiking sharp beneath the weight of his hold. The faint tremor of breath, the twitch of fingers against his grip.

Kakashi braced one hand beside the stranger’s head, his body crowding close, until escape was no longer an option. “So,” he murmured, his voice a low drag of velvet and steel, “this is the ghost that’s haunted me all these years.”

The figure stiffened, but no denial came. Just a caught breath, a betraying tremor.

Kakashi didn’t ask. He didn’t need to.

He bent down, mouth brushing theirs in the dark. No preamble, no mercy. Just a kiss, deep and demanding, rough enough to make the omega gasp against him. The taste was everything he’d imagined—heat, sweetness, defiance—and it seared through him like fire in dry grass.

The figure squirmed, caught between resistance and want, hands pressed uselessly against his chest. Kakashi pinned them tighter, swallowing every muffled sound, teaching with lips and tongue what quiet notes could never say: this is what you’ve been denying, this is what you could have demanded instead of hiding.

When he pulled back at last, the hood had slipped low, revealing just the curve of flushed whispered  cheeks, the glint of eyes wide in the dim light. Familiar. Achingly familiar and one of a kind.

Kakashi’s thumb brushed the corner of the omega’s mouth, his voice rough with dark amusement. “Hn. You’ve been missing out.”

The hooded figure trembled, chest rising and falling too fast, caught between shame and hunger.

Kakashi let the silence linger, then eased his grip just enough for escape, though his presence loomed close. “Go, then. If shadows are all you want. But remember…” His eyes gleamed, half-lidded. “…I don’t stop once I start.”

The figure bolted into the night, leaving Kakashi alone with the lingering taste of heat and sweetness on his lips.

He leaned back against the wall, exhaling slow. Tonight, the mystery no longer felt like a reprieve.

It felt like a promise.

The next morning, the office door banged open.

“Yo, Kakashi-sensei!”

Naruto came in louder than usual, grin stretched wide, a bundle of scrolls tucked under his arm. He dropped them onto the desk with a flourish, flopping into the chair opposite like he hadn’t just spent the night fleeing through the dark with his lips still burning.

Kakashi looked up slowly from his own stack of reports, eyes steady. “You’re early.”

Naruto barked a laugh, rubbing the back of his neck. “Heh, figured I should, y’know, get serious about this whole Hokage-in-training thing! Can’t let the paperwork scare me off, right?”

Kakashi hummed, pen scratching against parchment. “Mm. Admirable.”

Naruto leaned forward, elbows on the desk, too bright, too quick. “So, uh, what’s on the docket today? More council nagging? Patrol shifts? Bet you wish you had an assistant, huh?”

Kakashi didn’t answer right away. He let the silence stretch just enough to make Naruto fidget, then turned a page with calm precision. “You’re chatty this morning.”

“Me? Nah,” Naruto said too fast, too defensive. “Just—just in a good mood, y’know?”

Kakashi’s eyes flicked up, catching the faintest flush still clinging to Naruto’s cheeks. The grin was there, but it sat crooked. Forced. He leaned back, folding his arms loosely. “Good. Hold onto it. Days like this, it helps.”

Naruto blinked, thrown off by the lack of teasing, then grinned again, lopsided. “Heh. You’re weird, sensei.”

Kakashi let his eyes curve faintly, hiding the satisfaction behind his mask. Weird, maybe. But he’d already tasted the truth, and no amount of sunshine grins would scrub it from his tongue.

So he let Naruto talk, filling the room with noise, while he sat steady in his chair—cool, unruffled, quietly savoring the way the boy squirmed under a gaze that saw too much.

The rhythm changed.

Kakashi no longer waited politely for tokens left on the table. He lay in wait, traps woven into the dark, patience coiled into predator’s stillness.

The first night after, it was the same: a hand caught, a body pinned against the wall. The hood dipped low, shadows hiding features, but Kakashi didn’t need to see. He pressed close, kissed rough, swallowed the muffled gasp like it was owed to him. When he pulled away, the admirer bolted again, but not before trembling under his touch.

The second night, he pinned him against the doorframe. One hand braced above his head, the other gripping his hip, the kiss deeper this time, more insistent. The omega shivered against him, clutching at his cloak as though torn between fleeing and falling. Kakashi let him slip away only when his knees had begun to shake.

The third, against the desk. Kakashi caged him there, mouths colliding, tongue sliding past resistance until the admirer whimpered into his mouth. He broke the kiss deliberately slow, leaving his lips grazing the other’s ear as he murmured, “Persistent little ghost.” The words left the admirer flushed and rattled, fleeing into the dark with no note left behind.

And on it went. Each night, the rhythm less about offerings and more about collisions in the dark, about the heat of mouths meeting, about Kakashi teaching with every kiss what could be claimed if only the admirer dared.

Until the last.

This time, Kakashi caught him in the kitchen. Swift as ever, he spun the hooded figure up onto the counter, standing between his knees, pinning wrists against wood. The sudden height brought their mouths level, the kiss hotter, hungrier, Kakashi’s tongue claiming every muffled protest.

The omega arched against him, squirming, gasping between kisses, lips swollen and wet from Kakashi’s mouth. His scent flooded the space, sharp and sweet, wrapping around Kakashi until restraint frayed thin.

Kakashi pressed harder, one hand sliding from wrist to jaw, tilting his face up to taste deeper. The omega whimpered, thighs tightening at his sides, heat pulsing through every shiver.

And still, Kakashi broke it. Just short of ruin.

He drew back slowly, mask long discarded, his breath ragged but his gaze steady. His thumb brushed across the omega’s spit-slick lower lip, savoring the sight of him undone but unclaimed.

“Not yet,” Kakashi murmured, voice low, rough, a promise and a warning all at once.

The admirer stared at him, chest heaving, hood fallen back far enough to show flushed cheeks and storm-colored eyes wide with want.

Kakashi held him there one more heartbeat, then eased his grip, stepping back.

The night swallowed the figure again—but not before leaving Kakashi with the taste of heat and the knowledge that the rhythm would never be the same.

The Tower was too quiet.

Naruto had been fidgeting all morning, shifting in his chair, tapping his quill against the desk until ink blotched the margins. Every time he looked up, Kakashi’s steady gaze was there — calm, unreadable, but never wavering.

By midday, Naruto snapped.

Slamming the quill down, he glared across the desk. “I’m not running anymore.”

Kakashi tilted his head, eyes curving faintly. “What do you mean, Naruto?”

Naruto’s cheeks flushed, frustration leaking sharp in his scent. “Ugh, you’re a bastard when you really want to.”

“I still don’t know what you mean.” Kakashi turned a page with lazy precision. “You’ll have to be more specific.”

Naruto growled low in his throat, shoving back his chair. “You’re impossible.” He stalked toward the door, heat prickling at his nape.

“Mm,” Kakashi said lightly, “well, I’m not the one hiding in the dark behind love notes.”

Naruto froze, hand on the frame. His storm-colored eyes flicked back, cheeks burning pink against the stubborn set of his jaw. For a heartbeat, the room was thick with silence, their gazes locked.

Then Naruto huffed, turned on his heel, and left, the door sliding shut harder than necessary.

Kakashi sat back in his chair, a smirk tugging behind the mask he hadn’t bothered to wear today.

Finally.

The game had changed.

Tonight would be the last time.

He told himself that as he sat at the little table beneath the one thin window of the inn, the paper trembling in his hands. The candle guttered, painting his fingers amber, and the words he’d written a thousand times before felt both familiar and impossible.

Why had he done this — for years, in quiet pockets of the night, leaving food still warm, a pressed flower, a stupid rice ball wrapped in too-thin paper? Why had he refused to go to Kakashi properly, to say the things that made his throat tight and his hands shake? He could list a dozen reasons and each of them sounded like an excuse.

Because there was the council, first of all. Tradition dressed as prudence; rules wrapped in “medical stability” and “political reassurance.” They treated omegas like a contingency plan rather than people. If he stepped forward as Naruto — loud, clumsy, unfiltered Naruto — the paperwork would swallow him. They would turn a private thing into a public negotiation. They would turn Kakashi into an emblem again and make of them both a headline. Naruto could be brave with kunai and with rallying villagers, but brave in the face of committees? Brave enough to hand his life to their approval? He had no illusions.

Because there was the teacher line. Kakashi wasn’t just a man; he was a shape that had held Naruto’s life in its hands when he was smaller than his courage. Respect and affection tangled into something too big and too solemn to say aloud, and he did not trust himself to unscrew it from its axis without breaking something sacred. To confess would be to rearrange the whole world they moved in. He feared that the light that came from calling Kakashi by name — not as sensei, not as the Sixth, but as the man who was the center of something in him — might snap whatever careful balance the Tower kept.

Because there was shame, selfish and sharp. He’d learned early to hide the parts of himself that could be used. What if Kakashi thought him weak? What if the man he’d followed since he could run thought him small and needy? It hurt less to leave a note than to watch that look appear on Kakashi’s face, to see pity where he wanted something fiercer, something reciprocal.

And because — simplest and truest — Kakashi was Kakashi. He was steady in a way that made Naruto ache. Strong and soft in ways Naruto had no right to crave. An alpha in the old country sense and in all the other senses that had nothing to do with bloodlines or council forms: a person who took space without bullying it, who held people and duties and the ridiculous weight of a village with hands that somehow kept from trembling. How do you reach for a person like that directly and not look like a child asking for attention? How do you not flinch at wanting a thing that seems too precious to demand?

So he’d learned another language. Small gifts. A sentence folded and left under parchment. The practice was cowardly and perfect in equal measure — the notes let him say what he could not say to Kakashi’s face. They let him prove to himself that he could be seen, even if that seeing occurred in the dark. They let him demand, without asking, that someone show up: presence instead of grand declarations. In those small things he could keep control; in those tiny offerings he could be brave without authority translating that bravery into vulnerability.

Then the nights changed. Kakashi stopped waiting politely for tokens; he began to wait for the giver. Naruto had felt the catch of breath the first time the man moved like a shadow and took him — too firm, too fast — pressing him against the wall until he couldn’t tell where his own pulse ended and the other’s began. That first kiss was a theft and a lesson at once. It left him raw and wanting and too exposed to go on pretending he could hide behind a slip of paper forever.

After that—after the mouths and the weight of Kakashi’s hand on his wrist—pretending became smaller than dangerous. Naruto discovered that he wanted the audacity of claiming, not only leaving scraps of affection at doorframes. He wanted to stand in the daylight and not shrink. He wanted Kakashi’s name to be a thing he could say without swallowing it.

But there was fear, still. Fear laced to everything sensible people warned him about. Fear that if he showed himself fully — open and unashamed — they would take the moment and make it into an institution, a negotiation, something clinical and public. Fear that Kakashi would not want the messy, loud, stubborn boy for more than a night’s heat. Fear that the man’s steadiness would be a gentler kind of rejection, the sort that would hurt for years because it would come without drama, without fire.

Tonight, though, he had decided to stop hiding. Not because he was brave — though maybe he was, finally — but because he’d learned the cost of silence in the dark. The kisses had taught him what he’d been denying: that proximity could be a kind of permission. That when someone like Kakashi let you taste him briefly in the night, it was not always an absolution; sometimes it was an invitation to demand more.

He folded the paper with hands that no longer shook the way they used to. He wrote nothing grand. The note needed no great speech; he wanted it to be true and small, the way everything that mattered between them had been until now.

“This is the last one I’ll leave. I can’t—won’t—hide like this anymore. If you want me to keep going, stop me. If you want me to stop, tell me to. — N.”

He stared at the initials, as if his own name there might steady him. Then he tucked the tiny parcel — two sweet buns he’d kept warm in a cloth — and slid out into the night.

The streets smelled of dust and the ocean beyond the walls. He moved quick and low, hood up though no one saw him anymore. Each step toward Kakashi’s house felt heavier than the last because this time he was not leaving another message to fill a drawer; this time he was leaving a door open. This time, there would be no safe anonymity to retreat to.

He set the parcel down with hands that trembled only a little, folded the note beneath it, then paused with his palm on the doorknob. Anything could happen next. He could be pushed away, mocked, blessed. He could be kissed again and again, or he could be told, gently, with that unshakeable calm that Kakashi used for everything that bled and broke in the world: “not now.”

He slid the door closed behind him, stepping into shadow, and for the first time since the first rice ball, he felt like a man who’d finally put himself at risk on purpose.

If not for the council, not for the world, then for the possibility — small, ridiculous, real — that Kakashi might want him back. For the chance to stop pretending, and to ask for more.

Before he could take to the street, a rustle stirred behind him, and a voice cut low through the quiet.

“So. You’ve decided to stop?”

Naruto froze, pulse lurching. He turned slowly, the night air heavy against his skin. Kakashi stood framed in the doorway, one hand resting casually on the frame, but his eyes were sharp, steady, as though he’d been waiting there all along.

Naruto’s mouth went dry. His fingers curled helplessly at his sides, caught in the air between them. All the nights of secret confessions, the quiet gestures, the ink-smudged notes — they felt like stones pressing against his ribs.

“…Someone has to,” he said at last, voice rougher than he intended. “I started it, after all.”

Kakashi stepped forward, silent, measured. Crossing the space until the glow of the lantern inside brushed across his face, softening nothing.

“Well,” he said, eyes curving faintly, “I’ll take that as a sign of a new beginning.”

Naruto’s breath caught. The words knocked against the wall he’d built around himself, and the cracks spread fast.

Kakashi reached him in three unhurried strides, hand catching Naruto’s wrist before he could pull back. The warmth of that grip seared down his arm. Naruto wanted to jerk away, to preserve some dignity, but his body betrayed him, leaning forward instead.

“I—” The protest tangled on his tongue, burning. “Kakashi-sensei, I didn’t… this wasn’t supposed to—”

“Supposed to what?” Kakashi cut in, low, amused. He tugged Naruto closer, until their chests brushed, until Naruto could feel the press of calm alpha heat thrumming against his frantic pulse. “End here?”

Naruto swallowed hard. His hood slipped back, and the night air felt too thin.

Kakashi bent his head, the familiar brush of his breath at Naruto’s temple dragging a shiver down his spine. When Kakashi kissed him, it wasn’t the stolen, testing heat of nights before. It was deliberate, claiming, a demand that melted every excuse Naruto had hoarded.

Naruto gasped against his mouth, fists curling in the front of Kakashi’s cloak. His body trembled with the truth he’d been hiding for years: this is what I wanted, this is who I wanted, this is why the notes were never enough.

Kakashi pushed him gently back through the open door, mouth never leaving his, until Naruto’s back hit the wall of the entryway. The parcels he’d left behind slid forgotten to the side, the note crumpled under Kakashi’s boot.

“Kakashi—” Naruto managed between kisses, his voice breaking on the name.

“Hm?” Kakashi murmured, lips tracing down the curve of his jaw, teeth catching lightly at the skin. “You’ve had years to talk. Tonight, you only need to feel.”

Naruto groaned, his head tipping back helplessly. The years of hiding, of holding himself tight, collapsed under the heat of Kakashi’s mouth. He arched into the touch, heat rolling through him, the ache of denied want finally breaking open.

Every kiss, every press of Kakashi’s hands told him the truth: he’d never been alone in this. The alpha he thought he could never have was here, now, devouring him whole.

The wall was cool against Naruto’s back, but Kakashi was all heat pressed into his front, steady and immovable. His mouth bruised with every kiss, lips and tongue leaving Naruto gasping, trembling, clutching at the cloak like it was the only thing left to grip.

Naruto had dreamed of this—half-formed, cowardly dreams he never let himself hold for long—but nothing compared to the reality of it. Kakashi’s body was firm against his, his scent rich and grounding, alpha weight spilling over him until it was impossible to breathe without inhaling it.

“Why?” Kakashi murmured between kisses, voice low, rough, curling against Naruto’s ear. “Why hide all these years? Why not come to me?”

Naruto’s chest seized. His hands fisted harder into the fabric, his voice cracking. “Because—I didn’t want to make it harder for you. You’re the Hokage, Kakashi-sensei. The council, the—”

“Stop.” The word cut sharp, command laced with alpha resonance that silenced him instantly. Kakashi’s eyes burned, narrowed, his mouth close enough to sting against Naruto’s skin. “Don’t you dare decide what I can or can’t carry. Not when it comes to you.”

Naruto’s breath broke, a sound half protest, half plea. He wanted to explain, to defend the years of cowardice, but Kakashi wasn’t giving him the chance.

“You thought you were protecting me?” Kakashi’s grip tightened at his jaw, tilting his head up until their gazes locked. “Idiot. I’ve been waiting. All this time, you were here. Hiding. Do you know how many nights I wished it was you?”

Naruto’s knees weakened, heat rising to his face, his throat thick with words he couldn’t force out.

Kakashi kissed him again, deeper, harder, dragging the air from his lungs. When he pulled back, his voice was dark velvet, threaded with a roughness Naruto had never heard.

“You’re mine, Naruto. Not a ghost in the night. Not a whisper in ink. Mine. The alpha you thought you couldn’t have is the one you should have had all along.”

Naruto’s chest heaved. The words seared through every wall he had built. He couldn’t hide behind notes anymore, couldn’t pretend this wasn’t what he wanted, what he had always wanted. “Then—” his voice broke, desperate, “then let me have you. Please.”

Kakashi’s smirk curved sharp under the faint glow of lantern light. “Glady.”

He lifted Naruto off the floor as though he weighed nothing, carrying him deeper into the house. Naruto clung to his shoulders, dizzy with the press of scent and heat, dizzy with the reality of finally being seen, finally being claimed.

Kakashi laid him down on the futon, slow, deliberate, but his gaze never softened. It pinned Naruto in place more firmly than his hands.

“Tonight,” Kakashi said, stripping his gloves with unhurried precision, “you don’t leave anything in the dark. No more pretending. No more holding back.” His fingers brushed Naruto’s cheek, then slid down his throat, lingering over the frantic beat of his pulse. “I want everything. Every demand you thought you couldn’t make of me.”

Naruto shivered under the weight of it, tears pricking unbidden at the corners of his eyes. It's been so long. He felt the walls he had braced around himself collapsing—not from weakness, but from finally being allowed to want without shame.

Kakashi’s mouth pressed against his again, unrelenting, and Naruto let it take him. Every gasp, every sound he’d once bitten back spilled freely now, swallowed between kisses that dragged him deeper under.

The cloak slipped from Kakashi’s shoulders, heavy where it fell. His hands followed—one braced at Naruto’s jaw, the other trailing down, steady as it slid across his chest, his stomach, until heat pooled sharp and aching between his thighs.

Naruto trembled, his own hands desperate, tugging at Kakashi’s flak jacket, the buttons, the seams that had been barriers for too long. “Kakashi—” His voice broke, raw. “Please.”

Kakashi caught his wrists, pressing them to the futon, pinning him down. His eyes burned, sharp even in the dim. “Patience. You’ve been waiting years, Naruto. You can wait a few more breaths.”

Naruto whined despite himself, arching against the hold. “You’re cruel.”

“I’m thorough.” Kakashi leaned down, lips brushing the shell of his ear. His voice dropped, velvet-dark. “And I’m not letting you walk away from this pretending it was anything less than real.”

The words cracked something inside him. Naruto’s chest heaved, his eyes wet, his voice trembling. “I don’t want to pretend anymore.”

Kakashi’s grip eased, letting Naruto’s hands slide free, only for him to catch at the older man’s vest with a desperation that embarrassed him and yet felt truer than anything else. He pulled until Kakashi let him strip the layers away, until skin met skin, heat against heat.

The sight above him burned—Kakashi unmasked, bare in a way he’d never dared imagine in daylight, every line of muscle and scar painted by years, every ounce of him steady, immovable, his.

Naruto swallowed hard, his voice barely holding. “You’re—god, you’re everything.”

Kakashi kissed him again, slower this time, almost unbearably so, like he was savoring the shape of Naruto’s mouth. Each drag of lips, each slip of tongue, deliberate. Naruto shuddered, his body jerking against him, every nerve pulled taut with need.

“Too fast?” Kakashi murmured, brushing kisses down the side of his throat.

Naruto shook his head, voice cracking. “Too slow.”

A low chuckle vibrated against his skin, sending heat spiraling through him. Kakashi’s mouth trailed lower, over the curve of his collarbone, down the line of his chest, each press of lips and teeth leaving fire in their wake. Naruto’s hands fisted in the sheets, thighs shifting restlessly, the ache between them growing sharper with every second Kakashi refused to rush.

Then hands — rough, calloused, steady — slid over his ribs, his hips, mapping him like territory long withheld. Every touch was claiming, but not hurried. It felt like Kakashi was deliberately undoing him one stitch at a time, leaving nowhere left to hide.

“Kakashi—” Naruto gasped when a thumb pressed slow circles over the sharp jut of his hipbone. “Please—”

“Shhh.” Kakashi’s voice was low, a thread of command curling through it. “I told you. I want everything. No scraps. No shadows. You waited this long; you’ll let me give it to you right.”

Naruto bit his lip, heat flooding his cheeks. He wanted to argue, to demand more, but every kiss and every brush of fingers stole the words from his throat. His body betrayed him, arching, trembling, breaking open under Kakashi’s patience.

Then Kakashi’s mouth was lower, teeth grazing along his stomach, tongue pressing into the hollow just above his waistband. Naruto nearly came undone, his back arching hard, a strangled cry slipping past his lips.

“You’re beautiful like this,” Kakashi murmured against his skin, voice raw, reverent. “Do you know how many nights I imagined it? How many times I thought about having you trembling under me, begging me to take you?”

Naruto whimpered, fists twisting in Kakashi’s hair. “How could you have known— Please. Just—”

Kakashi lifted his head, eyes burning, lips glistening. “Oh, you're not exactly subtle at the end, Naruto. This is why you deserve more than a hurried claim in the dark. You deserve every second of knowing I’m yours.”

Naruto swallowed hard, his body burning, his chest aching with something bigger than want. For years he’d thought Kakashi unreachable. And now the man was here, on his knees, undoing him slow, like it was Naruto’s prize, Naruto’s victory, Naruto’s right.

And god, it was unbearable.

And Kakashi decided to take his time.

It was torture. Pure, exquisite torture.

Every kiss was drawn out, every scrape of teeth perfectly placed. Kakashi’s mouth mapped him slowly, deliberately, until Naruto was writhing against the futon, dragging in ragged breaths he couldn’t seem to hold.

“Still with me?” Kakashi’s voice was low, unhurried, his lips brushing over the sensitive skin of Naruto’s inner thigh.

“Y-yeah,” Naruto gasped, though it sounded more like a plea than an answer.

“Good.” Kakashi’s hands spread his thighs wider, pinning him down when instinct made him try to close them. “Don’t move unless I tell you to.”

The command curled through him like lightning, his body arching, every nerve on fire.

Then Kakashi’s mouth was on him — slow, wet, devastating. Naruto’s cry tore out before he could swallow it, his hands clawing uselessly at the sheets. Kakashi worked him like he was unraveling a puzzle, tongue and lips drawing him higher, holding him there, never giving enough to let him tip over.

Again. And again.

Naruto writhed, gasped, begged, but every time he thought the edge was close, Kakashi pulled back, dragging his mouth away with infuriating precision. His hands replaced lips, stroking slow, deep, until Naruto was trembling, dripping, eyes wet with frustration.

“Why—why are you—” Naruto choked, breathless, body shaking.

Kakashi glanced up, his eyes gleaming, his mouth wet. “Because you challenged me.” His voice was calm, infuriatingly calm, like he wasn’t dismantling Naruto piece by piece. “You asked for me to take you. And when an alpha accepts a challenge…”

His mouth descended again, hot, relentless, drawing another raw cry from Naruto’s throat.

“…we don’t stop until you understand exactly what you’ve asked for.”

Naruto’s nails bit into the sheets, tears slipping down his temples. His body ached, soaking, strung taut with want so sharp it bordered on pain. Every nerve screamed for release, but Kakashi’s patience was merciless.

It hit him then — Kakashi wasn’t just teasing. He was teaching. Reminding Naruto what it meant to demand an alpha like him: that there would be no half-measures, no hiding, no pretending.

When he finally broke, when Kakashi finally let him, Naruto knew he’d never be able to look him in the eyes in daylight without remembering this lesson.

Never again would he doubt who owned him.

Naruto had lost track of how many times Kakashi had dragged him back from the brink. His body was trembling, soaked in sweat, every nerve screaming. He’d begged until his throat was raw, gasped until his lungs burned, but Kakashi had been merciless.

“Please—please, Kakashi, stop playing—” His voice broke, more sob than words.

Kakashi’s eyes softened just slightly, though his smirk didn’t fade. “I'm not playing, Naruto. I'm showing you what you’ve been resisting for years.” His mouth brushed teasingly against Naruto’s swollen tip, sending another violent shiver tearing through him. “But since you asked so nicely…”

Naruto barely had time to gasp before Kakashi’s mouth engulfed him fully, hot and wet and devastating. The sudden shift — the mercy — tore him apart. His back arched violently, a cry ripping from his chest that echoed through the house.

Kakashi didn’t let up. His hands held Naruto’s hips down firmly, his mouth working him with unrelenting precision, drawing him higher and higher until the world blurred white.

Naruto shattered.

The climax ripped through him, violent and overwhelming, years of want and denial collapsing in a single flood of heat. His whole body seized, trembling, his voice breaking into Kakashi’s name as he came undone in his alpha’s mouth.

Kakashi swallowed every drop, slow and deliberate, like he’d been waiting for this exact moment all along. When he finally pulled back, his lips glistened, his eyes half-lidded with satisfaction.

Naruto was wrecked. Chest heaving, face wet, every limb trembling with exhaustion and relief. He felt stripped bare, body and soul, every secret he’d clung to now laid out between them.

Kakashi leaned up, bracing his hands on either side of Naruto’s head, his mouth hovering close. His breath was hot, his voice low, velvet-dark.

“This,” he murmured, brushing a kiss against Naruto’s damp cheek, “is what happens when you try to pursue an alpha.”

Naruto groaned weakly, shoving at his chest in protest, though his hands had no strength left. His body betrayed him anyway, arching into the closeness, needing more even after being wrung raw.

And Kakashi’s smirk told him he knew it as he stroked his hair once, twice, then shifted back. His eyes were steady, his lips curved faintly. Without breaking that gaze, he reached for the ties of his trousers, fingers working slow until fabric fell loose. Piece by piece, he stripped himself bare — the last barriers sliding away until nothing remained between them but heat and want.

Naruto’s breath hitched. He’d imagined this before — a thousand shameful nights of imagining — but the reality of Kakashi laid bare before him knocked the air from his lungs. Scarred, strong, beautiful in every line.

Kakashi knelt over him, the weight of his body caging Naruto in without pressing down. His hand slid along Naruto’s cheek, thumb brushing tenderly against flushed skin.

“You’ve been circling this for years,” he said quietly, tone rough with something heavier than heat. “Leaving scraps in the dark. Waiting for me to guess.” His eyes sharpened, fierce. “No more.”

Naruto swallowed hard, caught. “I—I didn’t — God, what do you want me to s-say–” When you look like that in front of me?

Kakashi silenced him with a kiss, softer this time. Then he drew back, his voice low, commanding but not cruel.

“Claim your prize, Naruto. Touch me however you want. Learn me. I’m yours.”

Naruto’s eyes widened, tears pricking again. He reached out with trembling hands, hesitant at first — fingertips brushing scars, tracing the solid heat of Kakashi’s chest. Kakashi didn’t move, didn’t guide. He only watched, his expression unreadable but steady, letting Naruto explore.

And with every line of muscle, every ridge of scar beneath his palms, Naruto realized the truth Kakashi was forcing him to face: This wasn’t just something he wanted. This was something he deserved.

Naruto’s hands shook as they spread across Kakashi’s chest, fingertips tracing every hard line of muscle, every scar that told a story. He’d seen glimpses before — a flash of skin beneath the collar, the shadow of old wounds when Kakashi moved carelessly — but never like this. Never all of it, bared to him.

He swallowed hard, his throat tight. “Gods…”

Kakashi tilted his head, eyes steady on him. “Naruto. Just me.”

That only made the ache in his chest worse. His hands slid down, across Kakashi’s ribs, his stomach, palms memorizing the warmth of living flesh. He leaned forward before he could stop himself, lips brushing a scar that ran jagged across Kakashi’s side.

Kakashi inhaled sharply, but didn’t move.

Naruto pressed harder, kissing the scar with a reverence that made his eyes sting. “You carried all of this,” he whispered against the skin. “And I… I made myself think I couldn’t have you. That I shouldn’t. Stupid.”

“Mm,” Kakashi hummed, his hand carding slowly through Naruto’s hair. “Very.”

Naruto huffed a breath that was half a laugh, half a sob, then kept going. He kissed lower, mouth mapping each scar, each mark, each part of Kakashi that had felt untouchable until now. He nipped lightly at a line across his hip, soothed it with his tongue, gasping at the taste of salt and heat.

Kakashi’s body responded beneath him — subtle at first, then unmistakable. Muscles tightening, breath hitching, his scent spiking hotter, thicker, filling Naruto’s lungs until he was dizzy with it.

Naruto’s hands slid lower still, greedy now, stroking along Kakashi’s thighs, over the curve of his ass, pulling him closer. He mouthed at the firm lines of his stomach, biting lightly, kissing deeper, every touch a prayer, every sound from Kakashi a confirmation this wasn’t a dream.

“This is real,” Naruto murmured, half to himself, kissing just above the sharp line of Kakashi’s hip. “I get to have this. I get to have you.”

Kakashi’s hand tightened in his hair, a low growl rumbling in his chest. “Yes, Naruto. Mine. But right now—” He tugged gently until Naruto looked up, lips swollen, eyes wet and burning. “—I’m yours.”

Naruto’s chest squeezed so hard it hurt. He surged up, kissing him again, messy and desperate, his hands roaming everywhere at once. He couldn’t get enough, couldn’t believe that every inch he touched belonged to him now, that Kakashi had given him this.

This wasn’t a fantasy anymore. This was his alpha.

His kisses trailed lower, his hands roaming greedily over Kakashi’s hips, thighs, the curve of muscle and scar. He’d meant to just touch, to keep worshipping in the quiet way he thought he was allowed. But the heat in his belly screamed louder than hesitation.

And Naruto had never been one to back down from something he wanted, not until Kakashi. But tonight, that wall just came down. He is his now.

“Kakashi…” he whispered, breath shaking as his lips hovered lower still. His hands framed Kakashi’s hips, thumbs brushing over bone. “I want—please, let me.”

Kakashi’s eyes burned down at him, sharp and unreadable. For a moment, Naruto thought he’d be denied, that the alpha would pull him back up and claim him instead. But then Kakashi leaned back slightly, his hand never leaving Naruto’s hair.

“Show me,” he said, voice low, steady, threaded with something like command and surrender all at once.

Naruto’s heart slammed in his chest. He bent lower, kissing along the sharp line of Kakashi’s hip, tasting salt and heat, then finally—finally—took him into his mouth.

The weight, the taste, the sheer reality of it knocked the air from his lungs. Kakashi’s breath hissed through his teeth above him, his fingers tightening in Naruto’s hair but not forcing, not guiding. Just there.

Naruto moaned around him, the vibration making Kakashi’s hips twitch. The sound was needy, unguarded, the kind of raw want he’d buried for years spilling free at last.

He worked slowly at first, clumsy but earnest, tongue dragging, lips sealing tight, swallowing down every sound Kakashi gave him. His hands gripped strong thighs and above him, Kakashi groaned low, the sound rough, real, stripped. “Naruto…” His voice cracked, husky. “Kami—don’t stop.”

That broke something in him. Naruto moaned again, deeper this time, taking more, hungry to give, to prove, to finally claim the alpha who had always felt untouchable. His eyes watered, his jaw ached, but he didn’t care. Every noise, every twitch of Kakashi’s body told him he was wanted, needed.

And for Naruto, that was everything.

Naruto hollowed his cheeks, took Kakashi deeper, and nearly choked on his own want. His jaw ached, his throat burned, but he refused to pull back. Every sound Kakashi made — low, rough, bitten-off groans — only drove him harder.

His hands slid up, bracing on Kakashi’s thighs, squeezing as if to steady him, but really it was himself he needed to ground. The weight, the taste, the heat of it filled his senses until nothing else existed.

Above him, Kakashi’s breath stuttered, ragged. The fingers tangled in Naruto’s hair trembled, tightening and loosening as if he was fighting for restraint. “Naruto—” His voice cracked, broken, warning and plea tangled together. “Enough, you’ll—”

Naruto moaned around him, the sound desperate, shameless, vibrating down his length. Kakashi’s hips jerked, his composure fracturing.

Naruto pushed further, swallowing, forcing himself to take more. Tears slipped from the corners of his eyes, but his determination burned hotter than the sting. He wanted Kakashi undone, wanted to see the man who’d haunted his nights unravel because of him.

“Kami—” Kakashi’s growl tore out, low and feral. His body shuddered, his hand clamping down in Naruto’s hair as his control snapped.

Heat spilled down Naruto’s throat, sudden and overwhelming. He gagged, coughed, but forced himself to swallow, to take it all, clinging to Kakashi’s thighs like he’d fall apart otherwise.

When it was over, when Kakashi finally sagged back with a groan, Naruto pulled away, gasping for air. His mouth was wet, his chin slick, his chest heaving like he’d run ten miles.

Kakashi stared down at him, eyes dark, lips parted, his breath still rough. And for the first time Naruto had ever seen, Hatake Kakashi looked wrecked.

Naruto wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, his face hot, his voice trembling but proud. “Told you… I could handle it.”

Kakashi’s laugh was broken, breathless, his hand stroking once through Naruto’s damp hair. “Idiot,” he murmured, soft but shaken. “You’re going to kill me.”

Naruto grinned, sloppy and tired, but something fierce burned in his chest. Because he’d done it — he’d risen to the challenge, and Kakashi had broken for him.

And gods, it felt like winning the only battle that had ever mattered.

Kakashi was still catching his breath, hand lingering heavy in Naruto’s hair. His chest rose and fell with each ragged inhale, his eyes soft now, unreadable in a different way.

He tugged gently, guiding Naruto up until their mouths brushed again. This kiss was different — no edge, no demand. Slow. Reverent. Kakashi’s lips moved like he was trying to seal something into him, or maybe keep something from spilling out.

When he pulled back, his forehead pressed against Naruto’s, his voice was low, rough but steady. “Naruto… if we keep going, I won’t stop halfway. It’ll be all of me. So if you don’t want this—if you don’t want me—say it now.”

Naruto blinked, hazy from heat and want, then let out a startled laugh. “You think I’d stop now? I literally just had your cock in my mouth, sensei.”

Kakashi froze. His ears went visibly pink, his expression flickering somewhere between exasperation and flustered horror. “…Do not say that out loud.”

Naruto burst out laughing, the sound cracked and hoarse but real. He shoved at Kakashi’s chest playfully before collapsing against him, still shaking with amusement. “Well, you're asking something obvious. You think I can refuse you now?"

“Good. Because—” Kakashi muttered, glaring half-heartedly even as his arms wrapped around Naruto, holding him tight against his body. “You’re the one—” He cut himself off, sighing into Naruto’s hair. “…You’re the one I can’t refuse.”

Naruto sobered, his grin softening. He tilted his head up, pressing a firm kiss to Kakashi’s mouth, then whispered against it, “Then don’t.”

His body pressed flush against Kakashi’s, every line of him answering the question without words. His scent was thick with want, his hands clutching, pulling, desperate to erase any last distance between them.

Kakashi groaned, the sound torn from deep in his chest, and kissed him back — slow at first, then harder, hungrier. But the reverence stayed, woven into every brush of lips, every stroke of hands over skin.

For years Naruto had dreamed of this, hiding behind scraps of paper and coward’s gestures. Now, finally, he was in Kakashi’s arms, wanted, claimed, cherished.

And nothing in the world could make him stop.

Kakashi kissed him slow, his hands roaming steady, grounding. Naruto pressed back, greedy and reckless, but Kakashi’s grip at his hips stilled him.

“Not yet,” Kakashi murmured, lips brushing the corner of his mouth. “You’ve waited this long. I’m not going to hurt you rushing now.”

Naruto groaned, frustrated, but the heat in his chest softened at the words. Kakashi wasn’t teasing — he was serious. Serious enough that his eyes stayed sharp, watching every flicker of Naruto’s face, weighing every sound.

Big. The thought hit Naruto as Kakashi’s hand slid lower, fingers circling his entrance, slick gathering where his body had already betrayed him. He shuddered, the reality setting in. Kakashi was big. Bigger than anyone he’d ever thought of having.

But gods, he wanted it.

Kakashi’s fingers pressed in slow, stretching, working him open carefully. One, then two, steady and unyielding. Naruto gasped, head tipping back, clutching at Kakashi’s shoulders as his body adjusted. The burn was there, but so was the heat, slick easing the way, instinct pulling him deeper into it.

“Breathe,” Kakashi murmured, pressing his forehead to Naruto’s. “Let me in. That’s it.”

Naruto whimpered, forcing himself to exhale. Kakashi’s fingers moved deeper, curling, stroking until sparks shot up his spine and his hips jerked helplessly.

“Gods—Kakashi!”

“Mm.” Kakashi’s mouth curved faintly against his cheek. “There. Good. You take me better than you thought, don’t you?”

Naruto’s laugh broke on a moan. “Cocky bastard—ahh—”

“Not cocky,” Kakashi growled softly, sliding a third finger in, stretching him wider, slow enough to make him feel every inch. “Just yours.”

Naruto shuddered, slick dripping freely now, his body clenching and yielding around Kakashi’s fingers. The burn eased, replaced with a throbbing want so deep it made his chest ache.

When Kakashi finally pulled his hand away, slick glistened on his fingers, and his eyes burned with restrained heat. He braced himself above Naruto, every line of his body taut with control.

“This is the last chance, Naruto.” His voice was low, raw. “If I take you now, it won’t be gentle. I’m big. I’ll stretch you until you can’t think of anything else. If you want me to stop—say it now.”

Naruto’s breath came in harsh pants, his body shaking with want. He laughed — hoarse, desperate, but certain. “Stop now? After all this? You think I waited years just to quit at the finish line?”

Kakashi’s composure cracked, a sharp groan tearing free as he pressed his mouth hard against Naruto’s.

“Then hold on,” he muttered, voice breaking against his lips.

And slowly, carefully, Kakashi pushed in.

The stretch was blinding. Naruto cried out, clutching at Kakashi’s shoulders, his slick working desperately to adjust. He felt split apart, filled, his body straining around the sheer size of him. But Kakashi was steady, patient, inch by inch, his hand stroking Naruto’s cheek, grounding him through the burn.

“Breathe, Naruto. You’re doing so well.”

Naruto gasped, whined, then forced himself to relax. The ache shifted, melting into heat, into fullness that made his whole body sing.

And when Kakashi finally bottomed out, deep and heavy inside him, Naruto sobbed — raw, overwhelmed, undone.

Because this was it. This was everything he’d hidden, everything he’d begged for in shadows, everything he’d been too afraid to demand.

And now it was his.

Kakashi. His alpha.

The stretch had barely settled before Kakashi moved. Slow, at first, only enough to test Naruto’s body around him — then deeper, harder, until every thrust dragged a cry from Naruto’s throat.

“Ah—Kakashi—” Naruto clutched at him desperately, nails biting into scarred shoulders, legs locking tight around his waist. Each push filled him, split him, left him trembling and gasping for air.

Kakashi groaned low, the sound tearing out of him. “Gods, Naruto… you’re perfect.” His pace shifted sharper, his hips snapping forward with precision that had Naruto’s back arching off the futon. “You take me like you were made for it.”

Naruto sobbed at the words, his voice breaking into a ragged laugh. “Y-you’re too much—fuck—too good—”

“Too much?” Kakashi’s mouth curved faintly, sweat slicking his temple. He slammed deeper, grinding hard against the spot that made Naruto scream. “Or exactly what you wanted?”

Naruto’s answer was incoherent, strangled moans spilling out as he clung tighter, every nerve unraveling under the relentless rhythm. His body clenched, slick dripping, the alpha’s size filling him to the hilt with every thrust.

Kakashi’s hand slid down, gripping his thigh, pinning him open wider. The angle shifted, and Naruto cried out again, his voice breaking. The pleasure was brutal, overwhelming, his body stretched around Kakashi’s cock until he thought he’d shatter.

Then he felt it — the swelling at the base, pressing harder with each thrust. His heart slammed, realization flooding.

“K-Kakashi—”

“I know,” Kakashi growled, voice wrecked. His thrusts slowed, deeper now, grinding, the knot nudging insistently at the edge of him. “I know what you need.”

Naruto sobbed, pulling him closer, body yielding even as the pressure built sharp and heavy.

“Please,” he gasped, raw and desperate. “Please—tie me—don’t let go—”

Kakashi’s restraint snapped. With a final, hard thrust, he forced the knot inside. Naruto screamed, his body seizing around the sudden stretch, pain and pleasure colliding in a white-hot flood.

The knot locked them together, tight, unbreakable. Kakashi groaned low in his ear, his voice ragged with relief. “Naruto—mine.”

Naruto shattered around him, climax tearing through his body, slick soaking the futon, his cries muffled against Kakashi’s shoulder. The fullness, the weight, the bondless tie held him captive, every nerve alight with the alpha deep inside him.

Kakashi held him through it, arms steady, mouth pressed against his hair, whispering broken curses and reverence alike.

And as Naruto trembled in the aftershocks, still knotted, still caught, he realized there was no going back.

This wasn’t just want anymore.

It was need.

The knot eased slowly, the ache fading into a sore fullness that left Naruto trembling in Kakashi’s arms. They stayed tangled together until the last pulse of it slipped free, leaving slick and heat a ruin across the futon.

Kakashi shifted carefully, lowering them onto their sides, his arm braced around Naruto’s waist to keep him steady. His touch was gentle, but his gaze burned, unflinching even in the dim.

“Listen to me, Naruto.” His voice was low, roughened not just from the act, but from something heavier. “This—” his hand pressed against Naruto’s chest, over his racing heart, “—this wasn’t just release. I want you. All of you. I intend to have you as my mate.”

Naruto blinked up at him, his chest tightening.

Kakashi’s eyes softened, though the grip on his waist stayed firm. “When your next heat comes, I’ll claim you. If you’ll let me. If you’ll allow me to mark you as mine.” His voice cracked just slightly, stripped of command, raw with plea. “Say yes. Please.”

For a beat, Naruto just stared, breath catching in his throat. Then a laugh bubbled up, hoarse and half-broken, but real.

“What else do you think I’d say,” he rasped, pressing closer until their foreheads touched, “after what we just did?”

He gestured vaguely at the mess — the ruined futon, the damp heat clinging to his skin, the aching reminder inside him of Kakashi’s knot. “You think I’d go through all that just to turn you down?”

Kakashi exhaled, a sound caught between a groan and a laugh, relief flooding his expression. He kissed Naruto hard, reverent and desperate all at once, his hand sliding up to cradle his jaw.

Naruto smiled against his mouth, his chest warm, his body sore, his heart unbearably light. For years, he’d thought Kakashi was out of reach. And now, here he was, begging for permission to make Naruto his.

There was no doubt in his answers of course. Because Naruto had always been his.

Two hours of sleep and a hasty wash later, Naruto shoved the office door open with all the energy he could muster.

“Oi, Kakashi-sensei! Good morning!”

He was too loud, too bright, grin stretched wide like he hadn’t spent the whole night tangled naked in that very man’s arms. His body still ached in places he’d never admit aloud, and he could still feel the ghost of Kakashi’s knot when he shifted too fast. But none of that mattered now. He’d chosen the antic, and he was going to commit.

Kakashi didn’t even look up from the papers he was reviewing. Eyes flicked lazily toward him, smirk tugging faintly at the corner of his mouth.

“Morning, Naruto.”

Just that. No tell. No slip. No reminder of how they’d only parted at dawn. But the curl of that smirk, the spark in his eyes — Naruto flushed hot under it, biting back the urge to grin like an idiot.

Instead, he flopped into his usual chair, tossing a stack of half-finished forms onto the desk. “So what’s on the docket today, sensei? Council still whining about the mate clause?”

Kakashi hummed, calm as ever. “They’ll whine no matter what we do.” His eyes flicked up again, catching Naruto’s stubborn grin, holding it a second too long. The smirk tugged wider before he returned to his papers.

The rhythm played out like it always had — Hokage and Hokage-in-training, sparring words, shuffling papers. But underneath it, smirks lingered, lips tugged at the edges, glances held a beat too long.

And Shikamaru, standing off to the side with his own stack of reports, raised a single brow at the exchange. He said nothing, but his gaze lingered between them, sharp and knowing, before dropping back to his papers with a muttered, “Troublesome idiots.”

Naruto kicked his feet up on the desk, grinning wider. If anyone asked, it was just another morning in the Tower.

Only he and Kakashi knew better.

Council Chamber

The council chamber was thick with incense and paper dust, the usual weight of too many voices filling the air. Naruto sat in his place just behind Kakashi, the Hat looming above his head where it rested on the table.

He hadn’t expected this. Kakashi hadn’t said a word to him this morning, hadn’t hinted at anything during their quiet breakfast. So when the older man cleared his throat and said, calm as ever, “I intend to hand down the Hat,” Naruto nearly fell out of his chair.

The chamber erupted.

“What—”
“Already?”
“Surely the Sixth is still fit—”

Kakashi held up one hand, and the voices fell into an uneasy hush. “Naruto’s been in training for two years. He’s shown progress enough to handle the responsibilities. It’s only natural for me to retire.”

A ripple of protest stirred again, but one of the elders leaned forward, voice sharp. “With respect, Lord Sixth, the clause is clear. The Hokage must be steady in omega terms. Mated, bonded to an alpha. Naruto is—”

Kakashi’s gaze cut sharp, silencing him mid-sentence. Then he nodded once. “He is. All requirements are met. Shikamaru will prepare the succession details.”

Silence.

For a heartbeat, the council sat frozen, eyes darting between Kakashi’s unreadable expression and Naruto’s stiff shoulders. Then the murmurs began — frantic, spiraling, disbelief laced with scandal.

“Mated?”
“When?”
“With whom?”
“How—”

Naruto felt heat crawl up his neck, fingers twitching toward the faint bite hidden under his collar. The bond throbbed steady, soothing, but that didn’t help with the dozen pairs of eyes staring at him like he’d just sprouted a second head.

Kakashi didn’t flinch. His posture stayed relaxed, his voice as steady as if he were discussing the next renovation at the Academy.

“The matter of whom is irrelevant,” he said. “The clause requires a mate. He has one. That’s all you need to know.”

Naruto bit the inside of his cheek to keep from grinning at the stunned faces around the table. Trust Kakashi to play it this way — calm, precise, infuriatingly smug.

Shikamaru, standing off to the side with his arms folded, only sighed. “I’ll draft the paperwork,” he muttered, looking far too unsurprised for Naruto’s comfort.

The council, meanwhile, spiraled louder.

Naruto ducked his head, shoulders shaking with the effort of holding back laughter. They could speculate all they wanted. Only he and Kakashi knew the truth, and judging by the faint smirk tugging at the corner of his alpha’s mask, Kakashi was enjoying every second of it.

Yet, the murmurs were turning sharp, questions thrown like kunai.

“When did this happen?”
“Who is his alpha?”
“We can’t approve succession without—”

Kakashi’s chair scraped back, the sound cutting through the chamber like a blade. He rose to his feet, tall, composed, one hand resting lightly on the Hat.

“That,” he said, voice even but carrying to every corner, “is not your concern.”

The room stilled. His eyes swept across the council, cold and unflinching. “The clause requires Naruto to be mated. He is. That is the beginning and end of your involvement.”

An elder bristled, lips parting, but Kakashi didn’t let him speak. He leaned forward just slightly, enough for the weight of alpha presence to press heavy through the air.

“If anyone in this room,” Kakashi continued, his voice like velvet wrapped around steel, “dares to challenge Naruto’s legitimacy, I will come out of retirement to put you in your place. Personally.”

The silence that followed was deafening.

Naruto blinked, heart slamming against his ribs. Heat crawled up his neck, not from shame but from the sheer force of Kakashi’s words. His alpha. His protector. His partner.

Across the table, several councilors shifted uncomfortably. None met Kakashi’s gaze.

Shikamaru only sighed, lips twitching faintly like he’d been expecting this all along. “Guess I’ll need two sets of paperwork ready,” he muttered.

Naruto nearly laughed out loud. He ducked his head instead, biting his lip to hide the grin threatening to break across his face.

Kakashi settled back into his chair, posture relaxed again, as if he hadn’t just silenced the entire chamber with a single threat. His hand brushed the edge of the Hat, but his eyes flicked sideways, catching Naruto’s.

A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

Naruto’s chest ached, warm and tight, and for once he didn’t mind the council spiraling. Let them wonder. Let them whisper.

He already knew who he belonged to.

Coronation Day.

The coronation flames burned high against the dusk, lanterns strung across every street. From the Tower balcony, the cheers rolled upward like a tide, the voices of thousands calling his name.

“Seventh! Seventh Hokage!”

Naruto stood at the rail, cloak heavy on his shoulders, the Hat weighing more than he’d imagined, but none of it felt like a burden. Not with the warmth of the village blazing below, not with the pride in their voices. For the first time, he wasn’t chasing shadows or trying to prove himself. He was home.

He waved until his arm ached, grin stretching wide, soaking it all in.

Beside him, Kakashi stood in his own robes, the Sixth still for this one last moment. Calm, steady, a faint smirk curving under the mask. On the other side, Tsunade stood straight-backed, her gaze sharp but warm, the lineage unbroken — Fifth, Sixth, Seventh.

Behind them, the council shifted, their presence a shadow even in the celebration’s light. Their whispers weren’t meant for the balcony, but Kakashi’s ears caught them easily.

“…a waste… could’ve secured a stronger alliance if we’d known…”
“…Naruto’s alpha — whoever it is — locked out of our hands…”
“…we’ve lost leverage. He’ll never bend…”

Kakashi’s eyes narrowed, though his smile didn’t falter. His gaze stayed on the crowd, on the boy—no, the man—standing beside him, waving down at the people he’d fought so hard for.

He intended to let the council grumble. Let them stew in their lost schemes.

Naruto had his village. Naruto had his Hat. Naruto had his alpha.

But guess Kakashi has sides he couldn’t rein in sometimes.

Without turning from the balcony, he let his eyes cut back over his shoulder, landing sharp on the council. The weight of it was unmistakable. Cold steel behind the lazy slant of his lids, a glare that promised he had heard every word — and would remember.

The silence behind them was telling. A shuffle of robes, a muttered curse swallowed back down. They understood.

Kakashi, however, wasn’t finished.

He stepped forward, crossing the short space between himself and Naruto in two unhurried strides. Before Naruto could turn, Kakashi’s arm slid around his shoulders, pulling him close, steady and undeniable.

Then, in full view of the village below, Kakashi bent and pressed a slow, deliberate kiss to his temple.

Naruto gasped, his body jerking in shock.

The crowd gasped with him.

Behind them, the council’s eyes widened, their mutters breaking into panicked disbelief.

“Wait—the Sixth—”
“His alpha?”

And below, the village erupted.

Cheers swelled so loud the balcony shook, voices rising in laughter, cries, joy. They had seen Hokage and Hokage-in-training side by side for years, but this—this display wasn’t just camaraderie, wasn’t just mentorship. It was a bond, plain and fierce for all to witness.

Naruto flushed scarlet, frozen for a heartbeat before his own grin broke wide across his face. He leaned instinctively into the warmth at his temple, his eyes bright as he waved harder to the crowd.

Kakashi didn’t move his arm.

The message was clear. To the council. To the village. To anyone who thought Naruto could be made a pawn.

He was bonded. He was loved. He was untouchable.

And Kakashi — the Sixth Hokage, the unshakable alpha — had just made sure the whole world knew it.

Years later, the Tower still smelled faintly of ink, wax, and smoke. The Hat was his now, worn-in and heavy, and the Hokage’s office had long since bent to Naruto’s chaos. Scrolls piled like barricades, cabinets stuffed until their hinges groaned. Shikamaru still sighed every morning, muttering about “troublesome paperwork,” but Naruto had found his rhythm.

He had thought he’d buried every secret confession years ago, tucked into drawers and boxes under his bed where Kakashi teased him for hoarding them. But the Tower had ways of coughing up ghosts.

The first one, he found under a false bottom in the top cabinet — a slip of parchment, faded with age.

“You are more than you think, Naruto. One day you’ll see it too.”

Naruto had laughed, shaking his head, his cheeks warm despite himself. Kakashi had probably hidden it there during his last week as Hokage, smug bastard.

But then came another, pressed between two dusty ledgers.

“Remember to rest. You carry enough.”

Then another, tucked in a book of old war reports.

“Your smile is the light of this village. Don’t let anyone take it from you.”

Naruto had groaned aloud, dragging a hand down his face, but he couldn’t stop the grin that broke after.

They kept turning up. Under wax seals. In drawer corners. Stuffed behind stamps. Some simple, some teasing, some so bluntly affectionate that Naruto had to shut his office door before anyone saw his face go red.

It hit him then — Kakashi must’ve spent his last days as Hokage not just wrapping up reports or preparing transitions, but scattering these little bombs all over the Tower. A private joke, a love game stretched across years, waiting for Naruto to stumble into them when he least expected it.

One evening, after the aides had gone home, Naruto sat back in the Hokage’s chair, a slip of parchment in his hand. This one had been tucked in the Hat itself, hidden beneath the lining.

“I let you chase me for years. Now it’s my turn. Good luck catching up, my Hokage.”

Naruto laughed so hard his stomach hurt, then tipped his head back, grinning up at the ceiling.

“Damn it, Kakashi-sensei,” he muttered, cheeks aching with his smile. “You’re impossible.”

But his chest was warm, the ache of years softened into something steady, whole. Because even now, with the Hat heavy on his head and the village in his hands, Kakashi was still finding ways to remind him — they would always belong to each other.

And Naruto wouldn’t have it any other way.