Stepping Stones (Naruto ~ Kakashi/Obito ~ Pt 2 of 2)
Kakashi's apartment is small and Spartan, immaculate only because it’s never used. He has a guest room with a relatively comfortable bed, though, and a kitchen, and that’s all Obito has ever needed to be content.
(The company is nice, too, and Obito basks in it whenever he’s able, because it’s Kakashi and they're friends and it’s everything that Obito has ever really wanted out of life.)
Obito isn't entirely certain whose idea it was that he live with Kakashi, but whoever it was, he’d like to thank them from the bottom of his heart. Here, with a Kakashi who is a friend and a companion and a cheerful, easygoing roommate, it’s easy to look at his choice to leave his own world as a good one, because with Konoha whole and Kakashi always firmly next to him, he can look forward instead of back. He still mourns, of course, and knows that a part of him always will, just like the part that mourns his clan and Itachi and the sweet, cheerful child that Sasuke once was, but he can focus on the good instead of the grief, the joy of a new, peaceful life instead of a lost world devastated by Orochimaru and Oto.
He’s lounging on the couch, reading-not one of Kakashi's beloved Icha Icha, because regardless of how rotted Kakashi's brain has obviously become from all that sappy, cheesy porn, Obito has standards, damn it-when a knock on the door echoes through the apartment. Obito looks up, because Kakashi is out, and few people ever visit him at his apartment anyway. Moreover, those who do generally come in through the window without waiting for Kakashi (who has become lazy, which, just, geez) to open the door for them.
The knock comes again and, curious, Obito marks his place and gets up, crossing quickly to the door and pulling it open.
“Yes?” he asks politely, but even that single syllable catches painfully in his throat when he sees the young man standing there.
Uchiha Sasuke looks back at him, blank-faced in the way that means he’s feeling something but hiding it, and asks, “May I come in?”
Thrown, mentally in turmoil, and very certain that he isn't hiding it half as well as Sasuke is, Obito steps back, wordlessly swinging the door open in invitation. Sasuke takes it, stepping in, and Obito stares at the tall young man he last saw burning Konoha to the ground, killing shinobi as quickly as they could face him. From what Kakashi has said, this Sasuke was able to lock Orochimaru away in his subconscious, all but dead, but Obito can't bring himself to feel glad.
After all, this Sasuke made the same choices that his did, became an avenger regardless of his team and sensei, and Obito hates it with all the passion his tired heart-too used to hate, after what Orochimaru did to his village-can still muster.
The silence in the room is thick and awkward, but Obito doesn’t know what to do to break it. He clenches his hands into fists, uncertain, and decides to wait for Sasuke to make the first move. After all, this Sasuke is a stranger to him, as he is to Sasuke-‘dead’ before this boy was born, and then an enemy of Konoha, wanting only to destroy it.
At length, just as Obito is about to start fidgeting, Sasuke breathes out, long and steady and too quiet to be a sigh, and then says, “Naruto told me that you…raised me. The other me. After Itachi…”
(In Obito's world, it was Madara who helped wipe out the Uchiha clan, and regardless of what trauma his self in this world might have faced, Obito can't imagine helping with something like that.)
“Yes,” he answers, because there's not really anything else he can say. “I…don’t think I did a very good job, though. I never knew my parents, and I had no idea how to deal with someone who had known and then lost theirs. We were pretty much strangers, the first time we met-I wasn’t really a proper Uchiha, and I didn’t even live in the compound, so I’d only ever seen you in passing.”
Sasuke looks down, and Obito watches his hands clench into fists, relax, and tighten again-about as much a sign of nervousness and hesitance as the younger man will ever willingly show. “I'm…grateful,” he says slowly, like the words are being dragged from him. “I don’t know what my other self was like, but having another relative when I was growing up…it would have been…nice.”
Unable to help himself, even in the tense atmosphere, Obito chuckles and raises a hand, letting it rest on top of his cousin’s bowed head. “I never had a little brother,” he offers gently, “and I know you already had an older brother you adored, but I’d like to think that I was at least that crazy uncle no one ever talks about. You have the potential to be amazing, Sasuke, not just as a shinobi, but as a person. In my world, you never got to fulfil that, but I think here, you’ve got a pretty good chance if you just keep at it. The Uchiha clan has had plenty of good shinobi; now we need some good people to balance it out.”
Sasuke doesn’t bat his hand away even when Obito lightly ruffles his hair, which for him is the same as grateful acceptance, and Obito smiles at him. “I was about to make some lunch,” he offers. “If you aren’t scared of catching Kakashi's perversion by staying in the apartment a little longer, I’d be more than happy to cook for two.”
Sasuke casts a quick glance at the shelf full of lurid orange books and immediately blanches. “The Korean Barbeque is open,” he says, and for Sasuke, that tone is the next best thing to desperate. “My treat. Let’s leave. Now.”
Obito laughs and lets his cousin all but drag him out of the apartment. Whatever Sasuke has done, whatever crimes he’s committed or wrong choices he’s made, the boy is family. As far as Obito is concerned, he’s got little enough as that as it is. Maybe this time, in this world, there's a chance for them to be everything the term ‘family’ implies.
Kakashi glances at his watch as he meanders down the street, casually checking out merchant stalls as he waits for the necessary two hours to pass. Conceivably, it’s no longer necessary, what with Obito alive and well and cooking dinner for him each night, but fifteen years of habit is a hard thing to break, and Kakashi still gets a kick out of driving people nuts-a personality flaw, perhaps, but all of the elite shinobi have them, and at least Kakashi isn't running around dressed in brilliant green spandex. Things could be much worse.
Kakashi buys some dango and whiles away another twenty minutes before he judges he’s sufficiently late. Tucking his hands into his pockets, he wanders towards the Hokage Tower and his meeting. Idly, he wonders what Obito is doing today. Probably training, as he has been for the last few days since his chakra suppression seals came off, in an effort to get back into shape after his stay at the hospital. Kakashi's accompanied him a few times and seen just how competent Obito has become, and it’s impressive. He still favors fire, his elemental affinity, but he’s created a handful of his own jutsus that are quite impressive, and his command of his Mangekyo is even better than this world’s Obito-likely because this Obito hasn’t augmented his strength with mokuton or a Rinnegan eye.
(Every time they face each other across the training field, as friends in a spar rather than enemies on the battlefield, Kakashi feels his heart twist and flip, and maybe he’s never really considered romance before, but this Obito makes him want it. But Obito hasn’t said or done anything, regardless of his confession of love that day in the hospital, and Kakashi feels maybe perhaps possibly a little impatient and confused; Obito had said that he had never approached that Kakashi [not his, because that Kakashi doesn’t deserve that kind of title] because he wanted at least a basis of friendship between them. Well, they're friends now, aren’t they?)
He takes to the roofs with an easy leap and picks up his pace a little before aiming for the Hokage’s window and leaping across the distance. It’s open-Naruto learned the hard way to always keep it open, after three shinobi in a row hit the glass face-first-and Kakashi settles on the sill, mouth already open and spilling, “Maa, maa, sorry I'm late. A little old lady needed help across the street, and then she-”
Then he realizes who else in the office and promptly chokes on his tongue.
Obito looks somewhere between delighted, horrified, and just plain flabbergasted. His mouth is hanging open, good eye wide as he stares. Across the desk, Naruto is laughing his ass off, and Shikamaru looks entirely amused where he’s slouching in the corner.
Deciding that, just this once, he can leave an excuse unfinished, Kakashi slides off the windowsill and slinks into position in front of the Hokage’s desk, hoping beyond hope that his mask hides the flush creeping up his cheeks. He casts a fairly sheepish glance at Obito, who’s still staring, and then glares at his former student.
“You wanted to see me, Hokage-sama?” he asks with all the tattered remnants of his dignity that he can gather around himself.
Naruto, the rude, ungrateful brat, manages to choke back his laughter long enough to wave a mission scroll at Kakashi and Obito and gasp out, “A-rank, kidnapping ring, Wave,” and then goes back to chortling.
Obito pulls himself together and snags the scroll, quickly committing it to memory before passing it on to Kakashi. Kakashi scans it. It’s thankfully straightforward: a kidnapping ring operating out of Wave, taking children for ransom, orders to eliminate the members and free the hostages. There aren’t any catches that Kakashi can see, even if he feels a bit wary after his last mission to wave.
Apparently, Shikamaru sees that, or anticipated it, because he offers, “I sent a chuunin to check it out. As far as we can tell everything checks out, and the kidnappers are bandits without formal training. It should be easy enough; the only reason it’s A-rank is because of the hostages. Kakashi, you’ve got the lead, but we figured it would be good for Uchiha-san to get back into the swing of things, as he’s been out of the hospital for a month now.”
Kakashi nods, rerolling the scroll and tucking it away. He inclines his head to the snickering Hokage and heads for the window, Obito half a step behind him as they head back to the apartment to get their packs.
Unfortunately, for two shinobi of their level, crossing the rooftops doesn’t require any concentration at all, and they're only a few blocks from the Tower when Obito glances over at Kakashi and arches an eyebrow. “Little old lady?” he asks with badly smothered humor.
Kakashi keeps his eyes fixed firmly ahead of him and curses his inclination for lateness to this of all meetings. “Yes,” he says archly. “If you can get away with it, I thought I might as well. Problems?”
Obito just shakes his head, laughing a little. “Nope,” he says cheerfully. “But you know, I broke that habit years ago. Something about good shinobi never being three hours late to everything?”
Kakashi is hardly going to tell him that it started when he kept losing track of time visiting the Memorial Stone for this man in particular, and then the habit evolved from there. He just keeps his mouth shut and braces himself for the way Obito will doubtless hold this over his head forever.
Thankfully, Obito lets it drop, and they slide through the apartment window one after another, separating to grab prepared packs and double-check weapons. Less than ten minutes later, they're back out on the rooftops and heading for the gates.
They find where the kidnappers are holing up easily enough, because even a ninja would have a hard time concealing their trail from a tracker of Kakashi's level, and these men are definitely not ninja. It’s a cave by the sea, narrow in the front and widening out into a large open space a little ways in. Kakashi signals a halt, hidden in the shadows of the forest, and Obito drops down onto the next branch over. These aren’t Fire Country trees, vast and sturdy, but they're good enough for brief concealment.
“Ideas?” Obito asks softly, eyes fixed on the cave. Shinobi eyes can easily pick out the man concealed in the shadows of a large boulder, though a civilian would doubtless miss him. Still, caves carry sound, and the land leading up to the cliff face is pretty much entirely barren, so they’ll have to be careful on their approach.
Kakashi checks the position of the sun. “Night is safest,” he decides. “Take out the guard, slip inside, and kill the rest as quickly as we can, before one of them can raise the alarm. They're not expecting us, so the hostages should be out of the way.”
Obito nods. “I’ll go first, use Kamui to make myself intangible in case there are any traps. You’ll cover me?”
That doesn’t bear acknowledging; of course Kakashi is going to watch Obito's back. He’s got bad memories of missions in caves, and even the fact that they're facing simple bandits isn't helping ease his mind. Instead, he fixes his eyes on the cave mouth and says, “Get some sleep. I’ll wake you at dusk.”
Perhaps it’s entirely predictable that Obito rolls his eyes at that. “You'll wake me at three,” he tells Kakashi, tone not leaving any room for argument. “Then you can rest and I’ll wake you at dusk.” With that, he leaps to a higher branch and settles with his back against the tree, eye closing and breathing evening out. Like any experienced shinobi, he knows to take advantage of any downtime he gets.
Kakashi stares at him for a long moment before smiling in spite of himself. He settles himself more comfortably and lets his awareness spread, watching for unexpected visitors and keeping track of the men who emerge. At least ten, maybe as many as fifteen, he thinks. Easy enough for two former ANBU operatives. Obito's completely recovered and back in shape, so hopefully nothing will go too drastically wrong.
And, in the beginning, nothing does. They take the guards-two of them at night, rather than one-without fuss, and Obito slips into the cave with Kakashi just far enough behind to avoid any possible traps. There's only one, however, and it’s simple enough to sidestep. One more guard on the inside of the passage, but Kakashi gives Obito the signal to engage and the bandit dies before he can so much as notice their shadows. Kakashi leaps into the cave, half a beat behind his teammate, and they catch the twelve men around the fire completely unaware. Four of them are dead before they can draw their weapons, and three more follow shortly after.
Even if he’d been told to show mercy, Kakashi wouldn’t, because these men target children, and even for shinobi, there are some things that are entirely unacceptable. The larger villages all make it a point, with few exceptions, to deny assassination contracts for children, and even kidnappings are carefully scrutinized for motive. For all that shinobi children never stay children for long, the Hidden Villages value their young.
Obito clearly feels the same, because he takes just as many heads as Kakashi, darting back towards the secondary room where the hostages are being kept. The guard there sees him coming and swears, ducking back into the other room-likely going for a hostage, Kakashi thinks darkly, even as he catches a rusty, dull-bladed sword on his kunai. The bandit snarls in his face, and without hesitation, Kakashi rams a second kunai through his heart. He falls, the last beyond Obito's current opponent, and Kakashi-
A rumble shakes the cavern, followed by the shriek and crash of tumbling stone, and Kakashi's heart and mind both freeze in numb terror.
No, he thinks, and then, Obito.
Obito, who still hasn’t spoken of love, even after a month, and Kakashi hasn’t brought it up because he’s a damned coward who’s wasting his second chance, and if this is the end of that chance Kakashi will never, ever be able to forgive himself. He won't be able to bear it, not again, not when he knows what a friend Obito can be, what the closeness of a best friend is like with the possibility for more, and-
A little girl darts out of the passage, smudged with dust and dirt and trailing a rough rope around one ankle, a younger boy in her arms, and like a dam giving way, more children flood out, not one of them a day over twelve. Kakashi absently wishes for another bandit alive, just so he can kill him slowly, but dismisses that and calls to the girl, “Wait in here. Don’t leave, they could have backup coming.”
He doesn’t wait to see if they obey, but leaps for the other room, heart in his throat and mind whirling, because he can't-
The choking dust stirs, and a figure in a dirt-streaked shinobi uniform stumbles forward, almost directly into Kakashi's arms. Automatically, Kakashi grabs his shoulder to keep him upright, and Obito favors him with a crooked grin, clearly aware of just why Kakashi's face has been leeched of all color.
“Sorry,” he apologizes. “There was another guard back there as well. I had to bury them both before they could go for the kids, but I guess my Doton jutsus still need work.”
Kakashi feels like punching him. Or, barring that, pinning him to the blasted stone and kissing him senseless. Instead, he settles for a heavy, slightly shaky sigh and leans forward, clanking their hitai-ate together. “Bastard,” he mutters, and Obito just smiles at him.
“Shinobi-san,” the first girl says timidly, and they both turn to look at her.
Obito steps around Kakashi and goes to her, putting a hand on her matted, filthy hair and smiling down at her. “Come on,” he orders gently. “Let’s get you back to your families. I'm sure they're missing you very much right now.”
The girl beams up at him, entirely uncaring of the bodies all around her. Kakashi wonders at the resilience of children, even as he leans down to scoop a wavering younger boy onto his back. “Off we go,” he says, injecting a note of cheer into his voice. “It’s a bit of a walk, so if you want to hitch a ride, just ask.”
Perhaps predictably, riding ninja-back is the newest big thing, and they all want to try. Kakashi ends up creating a few shadow clones to split the burden, and he’s altogether so relieved to be leaving the damned cave that he doesn’t even tease Obito about his inability to make a long-lasting, stable kage bunshin.
(Well. Doesn’t tease him much.)
The innkeeper’s daughter is among those rescued, and the man is insistent about offering them a room for the night. Since it’s a two-day trip back to Konoha, even moving quickly, Kakashi agrees, and Obito is entirely grateful. Regardless of the front he puts up for his partner, caves still manage to freak him the hell out, and he plans to spend a good, solid hour in the bath, scrubbing the cave-dirt out of his skin.
Thankfully, there's plenty of hot water, and Obito emerges from the bathroom feeling like an entirely new person, slightly pruney but altogether refreshed. Kakashi, who beat him to the bath (by way of cheating, rather than seniority), is lounging on his bed with that ridiculous orange book, already mostly dry. Obito grins at him as he collapses on his own bed and rolls onto his back, crossing his arms behind his head and closing his eye.
“A good day’s work,” he says happily, thinking of the jubilant children and their overjoyed parents. Wave is still a poor country, and while a handful of families were able to scrape up enough money for a ransom, the majority of them weren’t. It’s times like this that Obito enjoys being a shinobi the most, because tools or not, they can do good. They can do a lot of good.
There's silence from the other bed, not even the rustle of a page turning, and Obito is just about to roll over and ask what’s wrong when something heavy-a hundred and fifty pounds, give or take-pins him to the mattress, strong fingers closing around his wrists and trapping them above his head one-handed. He tenses automatically, fighting down the instinct to activate Kamui and go intangible, and instead carefully opens his eye to stare up at the face hovering over him. Kakashi's hair is loose, for once obeying gravity as it falls around his face, and his hitai-ate is off. Obito looks into his own eye (more or less) set into another face, and wonders at the intense expression there.
“Kakashi?” he asks warily, because he’s behaved himself, he’s kept them firmly as friends and hasn’t allowed himself to think of anything more. Just friends is more than enough, even if it’s not everything he’s ever wanted, but he’s already gotten his second chance at a decent life and he refuses to be greedy.
But when Kakashi looks at him like that, the same way he did in the cave, it’s really fucking hard not to want more.
Kakashi stares right back at him, dark grey eye and blood-red eye both unreadable, and then reaches up with his free hand and carefully tugs down his mask. Obito doesn’t even have time to suck in a breath-because this is something he’s never seen before, not in his world, not even after a month of living together, but Kakashi is gorgeous-before Kakashi's mouth is slanting over his like a firebrand, hot and hungry and perfect. Obito whimpers into the kiss as that hand skims down his side, tracing and teasing, and he arches up against Kakashi, who’s lean and limber but has a good two inches and more than twenty-five pounds on Obito.
“I'm tired of waiting,” Kakashi says as they separate, holding Obito's gaze without a hint of hesitation. “So I'm taking this step for you. That’s enough solid ground already, I think.”
Obito recalls his words to Kakashi in the hospital, his first day awake. We…never really managed to become friends, and I didn’t want to do anything without at least a bit of solid ground between us, so…I just never said anything. And Kakashi remembers that. He’s been thinking about it, if that look is anything to go by. Obito feels something lurch in his stomach, anticipation or worry or joy or elation, or maybe all of them mixed together. He catches his breath and then tugs gently on his captured hands.
“Let me touch you,” he whispers, and Kakashi's eyes go dark and hungry.
“Strip,” he orders hoarsely, sitting back on his heels and dragging his shirt up over his head. Obito does the same as quickly as he can, because Kakashi is lean and pale and perfectly muscled, every daydream he’s ever had brought to life and wildly improved upon. He strips off his shirt and wriggles out of his pants, a move that makes Kakashi growl and shove his own pants down with little finesse. Then Kakashi is on him again, one hand twisting in Obito's long hair and tugging sharply. It makes Obito arch his back, and Kakashi steals the cry right from his lips.
“Fuck,” Kakashi whispers, words warm and humid against his cheek. “How did I never see how hot you are?”
“Willful blindness,” Obito gasps back even as he grins, raking his short nails down Kakashi's back and adoring the way he arches and twists.
Kakashi chuckles at that, settling his weight fully over Obito and pressing down, mouthing along his throat in burning nips and soothing licks until Obito keens and twines their legs together, pulling the Copy-Nin even closer. Kakashi growls low in his throat, darkly predatory, and as Obito's hands settle, one on his shoulder and the other twined in his silver hair, he reaches down to grasp their cocks in one large, deft hand. Obito cries out, shuddering at the touch even as Kakashi pressed him into the bed with fierce, breathlessly hungry kisses.
Two tortuously slow pulls of Kakashi's hand and then those fingers are dipping lower, spreading Obito's thighs a touch more and sliding down to circle around his entrance, making him gasp. Kakashi swallows the sound, and then breathes against his lips, “Have you done this before?”
Obito manages a shaky chuckle, opening the eye he doesn’t remember closing and arching a brow at the man above him. “I'm hardly an untouched virgin, Kakashi,” he says with amusement. “I'm just about your age, after all.”
Kakashi kisses him again, but this time it’s harder, harsher, like Kakashi is going to eat him from the mouth down then come back for seconds. The fingers press down, just barely sliding inside of him, and the rough drag of dry skin makes him buck and cry out.
“Doesn’t matter,” Kakashi tells him, pulling back. He slides off, leaving Obito aching and cold, but he’s back with a jar of salve in hand before Obito can do more than gasp. He rolls on top of Obito again, capturing one hand and lacing their fingers together before he leans down for another kiss. This one is calmer than the last, easier, but just as hungry. They break apart, breathless and panting, and Kakashi stares down at him with his unmasked face, expression unyielding. “Doesn’t matter,” he repeats, “because this-” a tip of his head takes in the two of them, the bed, the heated air between them “-is permanent. I'm not going to give it up, Obito. Not again. Not ever.”
Obito has to laugh at that. He laughs and rolls his eyes and pulls Kakashi down until they're chest-to-chest, bodies entirely aligned. “Like I’d let you,” he says cheerfully, looping his arms around Kakashi's shoulders. “A really stubborn burr, remember?” Then he untangles their legs, slinging one of his over Kakashi's hip and dragging his nails over the back of Kakashi's neck. “Now, I believe we were in the middle of something?”
A slick finger sliding inside of him steals his breath, even as Kakashi takes another kiss. “Mm,” Kakashi agrees lazily. “We were, weren’t we?” The first finger is joined by another and Obito arches into the touch, biting back a loud cry as they spread and stretch, dragging over deliciously sensitive nerves and sending shivers of pleasure up his spine.
“Kakashi,” he gasps, “either move or I'm going to flip us over and ride you ‘till your brain melts.”
Kakashi goes very, very still, pupils dilating even more as he sucks in a lungful of air. “Was that supposed to be a deterrent?” he asks, voice gone hoarse and low. Then there’s another finger pushing inside of him, and Obito can't hold back his keen this time, even as Kakashi dips down and breathes into his ear, “That’ll have be next time. Right now, I'm going to take you. Then when you’ve recovered, I'm going to take you again, and again, until you feel me in you every time you move for the next week. And if we get horny on the way home, I’ll put you up against a tree and take you there. I'm not letting you go, Obito, not for anything.”
Too much of that damned porn, Obito thinks desperately. Entirely too much porn if the bastard thinks that some dirty talk-
The fingers slide out, twisting as they go, and Obito swears fiercely at Kakashi, right up until the feel of something bigger pressing against his entrance steals even that much cognitive function. Kakashi pushes into him, one hand linked with his again, the other anchoring him to the bed, and Obito sinks his teeth into Kakashi's shoulder. Kakashi's cock is hot and hard, sliding into him with agonizing slowness, and Obito thrashes against Kakashi's grip, wanting to shove himself down and just take the damned thing, because it’s good, great, amazing, but he wants more.
Finally, fucking finally Kakashi sinks in to the hilt, but then he stops and doesn’t move.
“Good?” breathes, feathering kisses over Obito's lips, even as he braces his elbow next to Obito's shoulder, hand twisting firmly into Obito's dark hair and setting sparks dancing behind his eyes.
Obito growls in answer, clamping down as hard as he can with his inner muscles. Kakashi gasps and curses, hips jerking forward automatically, and Obito cries out, arching his back.
“Move, move, move,” he chants, clawing at Kakashi's stupid unmoving back, and the man apparently takes him at his word. He pulls back, withdrawing almost completely, and then rocks forward, sliding deep and hard. Obito cries out, riding the thrusts, rising to meet them and urging Kakashi on faster and harder because he’s never in his life wanted anyone as much as he wants this man, quirks and bad habits and porn collection and all. He drags Kakashi's head down, kisses him desperately as he tries to convey I'm yours I'm yours you're mine and you're never getting rid of me with lips and tongue and teeth. Kakashi moans, low and deep, and hitches his hips, cock dragging right over his prostate and making Obito drop his head back with a shout as pleasure glances like lightning through his body.
“Kakashi, yes!” he cries, even as Kakashi's mouth finds his again. “Harder, damn it, do that again!”
Kakashi laughs at him, winded and flushed and beautiful, and gasps out, “Your wish is my command.” He changes the rhythm of his thrusts, drags back, slides forward, and Obito's world goes up in sparks of red and blinding white. He gasps and tenses, even as Kakashi repeats the move, and it’s too much. The pleasure swells and crests and crashes over him, and he comes with Kakashi's name broken and breathless on his lips.
Kakashi gasps, moans, and bites down on his bared throat, riding out his orgasm in three hard thrusts before he’s coming too, hot and wet inside Obito's overstimulated body. He collapses over him, muscles giving way, and he buries his face in Obito's hair, panting. Silence settles over the room, sweet and sated, and Obito trembles with the most glorious aftershocks he’s ever felt, every limb turned to water.
With a gentle kiss to his jaw, Kakashi levers himself up on one elbow and slowly pulls out. Obito groans at the drag of flesh over nerves that are still buzzing and opens his eye, trying to catch his breath.
“Alright?” Kakashi asks with some concern. Obito can only manage a nod, but he smiles up at the man. It’s probably dazed and adoring and entirely besotted, but Obito can't really bring himself to care.
Apparently, Kakashi doesn’t mind either, because he leans forward and kisses Obito again, soft and gentle, and then scrounges a shirt from the floor to clean them up with. Obito lets him without argument, and a moment later, Kakashi settles next to him on the bed, fingers combing gently through Obito's long hair.
“I think you’ve got a hair fetish,” Obito manages to say after another moment, raising an amused brow at the Copy-Nin.
“Only for yours,” Kakashi admits shamelessly, lifting a few dark strands to his lips. He wraps them around his fingers, even as he drops back against the pillows and reaches out with his free hand, tugging Obito against his side.
Obito lets his head rest against Kakashi's shoulder, enjoying the closeness, and then, while his brain is half-dazed with sated exhaustion and he can't overthink the words, he murmurs, “I love you so much more than I ever loved the other Kakashi. He was…a possibility. A hope. You're very, very much the reality.”
Beneath his cheek, he can feel Kakashi's breath catch, and then lips brush over his forehead in a careful caress. “I'm glad,” Kakashi whispers back, “because I love you, too.”
Obito smiles, even as the gold-edged darkness of sleep washes over him.
That night, and for so very many of the nights after, his dreams are very sweet.
(The company is nice, too, and Obito basks in it whenever he’s able, because it’s Kakashi and they're friends and it’s everything that Obito has ever really wanted out of life.)
Obito isn't entirely certain whose idea it was that he live with Kakashi, but whoever it was, he’d like to thank them from the bottom of his heart. Here, with a Kakashi who is a friend and a companion and a cheerful, easygoing roommate, it’s easy to look at his choice to leave his own world as a good one, because with Konoha whole and Kakashi always firmly next to him, he can look forward instead of back. He still mourns, of course, and knows that a part of him always will, just like the part that mourns his clan and Itachi and the sweet, cheerful child that Sasuke once was, but he can focus on the good instead of the grief, the joy of a new, peaceful life instead of a lost world devastated by Orochimaru and Oto.
He’s lounging on the couch, reading-not one of Kakashi's beloved Icha Icha, because regardless of how rotted Kakashi's brain has obviously become from all that sappy, cheesy porn, Obito has standards, damn it-when a knock on the door echoes through the apartment. Obito looks up, because Kakashi is out, and few people ever visit him at his apartment anyway. Moreover, those who do generally come in through the window without waiting for Kakashi (who has become lazy, which, just, geez) to open the door for them.
The knock comes again and, curious, Obito marks his place and gets up, crossing quickly to the door and pulling it open.
“Yes?” he asks politely, but even that single syllable catches painfully in his throat when he sees the young man standing there.
Uchiha Sasuke looks back at him, blank-faced in the way that means he’s feeling something but hiding it, and asks, “May I come in?”
Thrown, mentally in turmoil, and very certain that he isn't hiding it half as well as Sasuke is, Obito steps back, wordlessly swinging the door open in invitation. Sasuke takes it, stepping in, and Obito stares at the tall young man he last saw burning Konoha to the ground, killing shinobi as quickly as they could face him. From what Kakashi has said, this Sasuke was able to lock Orochimaru away in his subconscious, all but dead, but Obito can't bring himself to feel glad.
After all, this Sasuke made the same choices that his did, became an avenger regardless of his team and sensei, and Obito hates it with all the passion his tired heart-too used to hate, after what Orochimaru did to his village-can still muster.
The silence in the room is thick and awkward, but Obito doesn’t know what to do to break it. He clenches his hands into fists, uncertain, and decides to wait for Sasuke to make the first move. After all, this Sasuke is a stranger to him, as he is to Sasuke-‘dead’ before this boy was born, and then an enemy of Konoha, wanting only to destroy it.
At length, just as Obito is about to start fidgeting, Sasuke breathes out, long and steady and too quiet to be a sigh, and then says, “Naruto told me that you…raised me. The other me. After Itachi…”
(In Obito's world, it was Madara who helped wipe out the Uchiha clan, and regardless of what trauma his self in this world might have faced, Obito can't imagine helping with something like that.)
“Yes,” he answers, because there's not really anything else he can say. “I…don’t think I did a very good job, though. I never knew my parents, and I had no idea how to deal with someone who had known and then lost theirs. We were pretty much strangers, the first time we met-I wasn’t really a proper Uchiha, and I didn’t even live in the compound, so I’d only ever seen you in passing.”
Sasuke looks down, and Obito watches his hands clench into fists, relax, and tighten again-about as much a sign of nervousness and hesitance as the younger man will ever willingly show. “I'm…grateful,” he says slowly, like the words are being dragged from him. “I don’t know what my other self was like, but having another relative when I was growing up…it would have been…nice.”
Unable to help himself, even in the tense atmosphere, Obito chuckles and raises a hand, letting it rest on top of his cousin’s bowed head. “I never had a little brother,” he offers gently, “and I know you already had an older brother you adored, but I’d like to think that I was at least that crazy uncle no one ever talks about. You have the potential to be amazing, Sasuke, not just as a shinobi, but as a person. In my world, you never got to fulfil that, but I think here, you’ve got a pretty good chance if you just keep at it. The Uchiha clan has had plenty of good shinobi; now we need some good people to balance it out.”
Sasuke doesn’t bat his hand away even when Obito lightly ruffles his hair, which for him is the same as grateful acceptance, and Obito smiles at him. “I was about to make some lunch,” he offers. “If you aren’t scared of catching Kakashi's perversion by staying in the apartment a little longer, I’d be more than happy to cook for two.”
Sasuke casts a quick glance at the shelf full of lurid orange books and immediately blanches. “The Korean Barbeque is open,” he says, and for Sasuke, that tone is the next best thing to desperate. “My treat. Let’s leave. Now.”
Obito laughs and lets his cousin all but drag him out of the apartment. Whatever Sasuke has done, whatever crimes he’s committed or wrong choices he’s made, the boy is family. As far as Obito is concerned, he’s got little enough as that as it is. Maybe this time, in this world, there's a chance for them to be everything the term ‘family’ implies.
Kakashi glances at his watch as he meanders down the street, casually checking out merchant stalls as he waits for the necessary two hours to pass. Conceivably, it’s no longer necessary, what with Obito alive and well and cooking dinner for him each night, but fifteen years of habit is a hard thing to break, and Kakashi still gets a kick out of driving people nuts-a personality flaw, perhaps, but all of the elite shinobi have them, and at least Kakashi isn't running around dressed in brilliant green spandex. Things could be much worse.
Kakashi buys some dango and whiles away another twenty minutes before he judges he’s sufficiently late. Tucking his hands into his pockets, he wanders towards the Hokage Tower and his meeting. Idly, he wonders what Obito is doing today. Probably training, as he has been for the last few days since his chakra suppression seals came off, in an effort to get back into shape after his stay at the hospital. Kakashi's accompanied him a few times and seen just how competent Obito has become, and it’s impressive. He still favors fire, his elemental affinity, but he’s created a handful of his own jutsus that are quite impressive, and his command of his Mangekyo is even better than this world’s Obito-likely because this Obito hasn’t augmented his strength with mokuton or a Rinnegan eye.
(Every time they face each other across the training field, as friends in a spar rather than enemies on the battlefield, Kakashi feels his heart twist and flip, and maybe he’s never really considered romance before, but this Obito makes him want it. But Obito hasn’t said or done anything, regardless of his confession of love that day in the hospital, and Kakashi feels maybe perhaps possibly a little impatient and confused; Obito had said that he had never approached that Kakashi [not his, because that Kakashi doesn’t deserve that kind of title] because he wanted at least a basis of friendship between them. Well, they're friends now, aren’t they?)
He takes to the roofs with an easy leap and picks up his pace a little before aiming for the Hokage’s window and leaping across the distance. It’s open-Naruto learned the hard way to always keep it open, after three shinobi in a row hit the glass face-first-and Kakashi settles on the sill, mouth already open and spilling, “Maa, maa, sorry I'm late. A little old lady needed help across the street, and then she-”
Then he realizes who else in the office and promptly chokes on his tongue.
Obito looks somewhere between delighted, horrified, and just plain flabbergasted. His mouth is hanging open, good eye wide as he stares. Across the desk, Naruto is laughing his ass off, and Shikamaru looks entirely amused where he’s slouching in the corner.
Deciding that, just this once, he can leave an excuse unfinished, Kakashi slides off the windowsill and slinks into position in front of the Hokage’s desk, hoping beyond hope that his mask hides the flush creeping up his cheeks. He casts a fairly sheepish glance at Obito, who’s still staring, and then glares at his former student.
“You wanted to see me, Hokage-sama?” he asks with all the tattered remnants of his dignity that he can gather around himself.
Naruto, the rude, ungrateful brat, manages to choke back his laughter long enough to wave a mission scroll at Kakashi and Obito and gasp out, “A-rank, kidnapping ring, Wave,” and then goes back to chortling.
Obito pulls himself together and snags the scroll, quickly committing it to memory before passing it on to Kakashi. Kakashi scans it. It’s thankfully straightforward: a kidnapping ring operating out of Wave, taking children for ransom, orders to eliminate the members and free the hostages. There aren’t any catches that Kakashi can see, even if he feels a bit wary after his last mission to wave.
Apparently, Shikamaru sees that, or anticipated it, because he offers, “I sent a chuunin to check it out. As far as we can tell everything checks out, and the kidnappers are bandits without formal training. It should be easy enough; the only reason it’s A-rank is because of the hostages. Kakashi, you’ve got the lead, but we figured it would be good for Uchiha-san to get back into the swing of things, as he’s been out of the hospital for a month now.”
Kakashi nods, rerolling the scroll and tucking it away. He inclines his head to the snickering Hokage and heads for the window, Obito half a step behind him as they head back to the apartment to get their packs.
Unfortunately, for two shinobi of their level, crossing the rooftops doesn’t require any concentration at all, and they're only a few blocks from the Tower when Obito glances over at Kakashi and arches an eyebrow. “Little old lady?” he asks with badly smothered humor.
Kakashi keeps his eyes fixed firmly ahead of him and curses his inclination for lateness to this of all meetings. “Yes,” he says archly. “If you can get away with it, I thought I might as well. Problems?”
Obito just shakes his head, laughing a little. “Nope,” he says cheerfully. “But you know, I broke that habit years ago. Something about good shinobi never being three hours late to everything?”
Kakashi is hardly going to tell him that it started when he kept losing track of time visiting the Memorial Stone for this man in particular, and then the habit evolved from there. He just keeps his mouth shut and braces himself for the way Obito will doubtless hold this over his head forever.
Thankfully, Obito lets it drop, and they slide through the apartment window one after another, separating to grab prepared packs and double-check weapons. Less than ten minutes later, they're back out on the rooftops and heading for the gates.
They find where the kidnappers are holing up easily enough, because even a ninja would have a hard time concealing their trail from a tracker of Kakashi's level, and these men are definitely not ninja. It’s a cave by the sea, narrow in the front and widening out into a large open space a little ways in. Kakashi signals a halt, hidden in the shadows of the forest, and Obito drops down onto the next branch over. These aren’t Fire Country trees, vast and sturdy, but they're good enough for brief concealment.
“Ideas?” Obito asks softly, eyes fixed on the cave. Shinobi eyes can easily pick out the man concealed in the shadows of a large boulder, though a civilian would doubtless miss him. Still, caves carry sound, and the land leading up to the cliff face is pretty much entirely barren, so they’ll have to be careful on their approach.
Kakashi checks the position of the sun. “Night is safest,” he decides. “Take out the guard, slip inside, and kill the rest as quickly as we can, before one of them can raise the alarm. They're not expecting us, so the hostages should be out of the way.”
Obito nods. “I’ll go first, use Kamui to make myself intangible in case there are any traps. You’ll cover me?”
That doesn’t bear acknowledging; of course Kakashi is going to watch Obito's back. He’s got bad memories of missions in caves, and even the fact that they're facing simple bandits isn't helping ease his mind. Instead, he fixes his eyes on the cave mouth and says, “Get some sleep. I’ll wake you at dusk.”
Perhaps it’s entirely predictable that Obito rolls his eyes at that. “You'll wake me at three,” he tells Kakashi, tone not leaving any room for argument. “Then you can rest and I’ll wake you at dusk.” With that, he leaps to a higher branch and settles with his back against the tree, eye closing and breathing evening out. Like any experienced shinobi, he knows to take advantage of any downtime he gets.
Kakashi stares at him for a long moment before smiling in spite of himself. He settles himself more comfortably and lets his awareness spread, watching for unexpected visitors and keeping track of the men who emerge. At least ten, maybe as many as fifteen, he thinks. Easy enough for two former ANBU operatives. Obito's completely recovered and back in shape, so hopefully nothing will go too drastically wrong.
And, in the beginning, nothing does. They take the guards-two of them at night, rather than one-without fuss, and Obito slips into the cave with Kakashi just far enough behind to avoid any possible traps. There's only one, however, and it’s simple enough to sidestep. One more guard on the inside of the passage, but Kakashi gives Obito the signal to engage and the bandit dies before he can so much as notice their shadows. Kakashi leaps into the cave, half a beat behind his teammate, and they catch the twelve men around the fire completely unaware. Four of them are dead before they can draw their weapons, and three more follow shortly after.
Even if he’d been told to show mercy, Kakashi wouldn’t, because these men target children, and even for shinobi, there are some things that are entirely unacceptable. The larger villages all make it a point, with few exceptions, to deny assassination contracts for children, and even kidnappings are carefully scrutinized for motive. For all that shinobi children never stay children for long, the Hidden Villages value their young.
Obito clearly feels the same, because he takes just as many heads as Kakashi, darting back towards the secondary room where the hostages are being kept. The guard there sees him coming and swears, ducking back into the other room-likely going for a hostage, Kakashi thinks darkly, even as he catches a rusty, dull-bladed sword on his kunai. The bandit snarls in his face, and without hesitation, Kakashi rams a second kunai through his heart. He falls, the last beyond Obito's current opponent, and Kakashi-
A rumble shakes the cavern, followed by the shriek and crash of tumbling stone, and Kakashi's heart and mind both freeze in numb terror.
No, he thinks, and then, Obito.
Obito, who still hasn’t spoken of love, even after a month, and Kakashi hasn’t brought it up because he’s a damned coward who’s wasting his second chance, and if this is the end of that chance Kakashi will never, ever be able to forgive himself. He won't be able to bear it, not again, not when he knows what a friend Obito can be, what the closeness of a best friend is like with the possibility for more, and-
A little girl darts out of the passage, smudged with dust and dirt and trailing a rough rope around one ankle, a younger boy in her arms, and like a dam giving way, more children flood out, not one of them a day over twelve. Kakashi absently wishes for another bandit alive, just so he can kill him slowly, but dismisses that and calls to the girl, “Wait in here. Don’t leave, they could have backup coming.”
He doesn’t wait to see if they obey, but leaps for the other room, heart in his throat and mind whirling, because he can't-
The choking dust stirs, and a figure in a dirt-streaked shinobi uniform stumbles forward, almost directly into Kakashi's arms. Automatically, Kakashi grabs his shoulder to keep him upright, and Obito favors him with a crooked grin, clearly aware of just why Kakashi's face has been leeched of all color.
“Sorry,” he apologizes. “There was another guard back there as well. I had to bury them both before they could go for the kids, but I guess my Doton jutsus still need work.”
Kakashi feels like punching him. Or, barring that, pinning him to the blasted stone and kissing him senseless. Instead, he settles for a heavy, slightly shaky sigh and leans forward, clanking their hitai-ate together. “Bastard,” he mutters, and Obito just smiles at him.
“Shinobi-san,” the first girl says timidly, and they both turn to look at her.
Obito steps around Kakashi and goes to her, putting a hand on her matted, filthy hair and smiling down at her. “Come on,” he orders gently. “Let’s get you back to your families. I'm sure they're missing you very much right now.”
The girl beams up at him, entirely uncaring of the bodies all around her. Kakashi wonders at the resilience of children, even as he leans down to scoop a wavering younger boy onto his back. “Off we go,” he says, injecting a note of cheer into his voice. “It’s a bit of a walk, so if you want to hitch a ride, just ask.”
Perhaps predictably, riding ninja-back is the newest big thing, and they all want to try. Kakashi ends up creating a few shadow clones to split the burden, and he’s altogether so relieved to be leaving the damned cave that he doesn’t even tease Obito about his inability to make a long-lasting, stable kage bunshin.
(Well. Doesn’t tease him much.)
The innkeeper’s daughter is among those rescued, and the man is insistent about offering them a room for the night. Since it’s a two-day trip back to Konoha, even moving quickly, Kakashi agrees, and Obito is entirely grateful. Regardless of the front he puts up for his partner, caves still manage to freak him the hell out, and he plans to spend a good, solid hour in the bath, scrubbing the cave-dirt out of his skin.
Thankfully, there's plenty of hot water, and Obito emerges from the bathroom feeling like an entirely new person, slightly pruney but altogether refreshed. Kakashi, who beat him to the bath (by way of cheating, rather than seniority), is lounging on his bed with that ridiculous orange book, already mostly dry. Obito grins at him as he collapses on his own bed and rolls onto his back, crossing his arms behind his head and closing his eye.
“A good day’s work,” he says happily, thinking of the jubilant children and their overjoyed parents. Wave is still a poor country, and while a handful of families were able to scrape up enough money for a ransom, the majority of them weren’t. It’s times like this that Obito enjoys being a shinobi the most, because tools or not, they can do good. They can do a lot of good.
There's silence from the other bed, not even the rustle of a page turning, and Obito is just about to roll over and ask what’s wrong when something heavy-a hundred and fifty pounds, give or take-pins him to the mattress, strong fingers closing around his wrists and trapping them above his head one-handed. He tenses automatically, fighting down the instinct to activate Kamui and go intangible, and instead carefully opens his eye to stare up at the face hovering over him. Kakashi's hair is loose, for once obeying gravity as it falls around his face, and his hitai-ate is off. Obito looks into his own eye (more or less) set into another face, and wonders at the intense expression there.
“Kakashi?” he asks warily, because he’s behaved himself, he’s kept them firmly as friends and hasn’t allowed himself to think of anything more. Just friends is more than enough, even if it’s not everything he’s ever wanted, but he’s already gotten his second chance at a decent life and he refuses to be greedy.
But when Kakashi looks at him like that, the same way he did in the cave, it’s really fucking hard not to want more.
Kakashi stares right back at him, dark grey eye and blood-red eye both unreadable, and then reaches up with his free hand and carefully tugs down his mask. Obito doesn’t even have time to suck in a breath-because this is something he’s never seen before, not in his world, not even after a month of living together, but Kakashi is gorgeous-before Kakashi's mouth is slanting over his like a firebrand, hot and hungry and perfect. Obito whimpers into the kiss as that hand skims down his side, tracing and teasing, and he arches up against Kakashi, who’s lean and limber but has a good two inches and more than twenty-five pounds on Obito.
“I'm tired of waiting,” Kakashi says as they separate, holding Obito's gaze without a hint of hesitation. “So I'm taking this step for you. That’s enough solid ground already, I think.”
Obito recalls his words to Kakashi in the hospital, his first day awake. We…never really managed to become friends, and I didn’t want to do anything without at least a bit of solid ground between us, so…I just never said anything. And Kakashi remembers that. He’s been thinking about it, if that look is anything to go by. Obito feels something lurch in his stomach, anticipation or worry or joy or elation, or maybe all of them mixed together. He catches his breath and then tugs gently on his captured hands.
“Let me touch you,” he whispers, and Kakashi's eyes go dark and hungry.
“Strip,” he orders hoarsely, sitting back on his heels and dragging his shirt up over his head. Obito does the same as quickly as he can, because Kakashi is lean and pale and perfectly muscled, every daydream he’s ever had brought to life and wildly improved upon. He strips off his shirt and wriggles out of his pants, a move that makes Kakashi growl and shove his own pants down with little finesse. Then Kakashi is on him again, one hand twisting in Obito's long hair and tugging sharply. It makes Obito arch his back, and Kakashi steals the cry right from his lips.
“Fuck,” Kakashi whispers, words warm and humid against his cheek. “How did I never see how hot you are?”
“Willful blindness,” Obito gasps back even as he grins, raking his short nails down Kakashi's back and adoring the way he arches and twists.
Kakashi chuckles at that, settling his weight fully over Obito and pressing down, mouthing along his throat in burning nips and soothing licks until Obito keens and twines their legs together, pulling the Copy-Nin even closer. Kakashi growls low in his throat, darkly predatory, and as Obito's hands settle, one on his shoulder and the other twined in his silver hair, he reaches down to grasp their cocks in one large, deft hand. Obito cries out, shuddering at the touch even as Kakashi pressed him into the bed with fierce, breathlessly hungry kisses.
Two tortuously slow pulls of Kakashi's hand and then those fingers are dipping lower, spreading Obito's thighs a touch more and sliding down to circle around his entrance, making him gasp. Kakashi swallows the sound, and then breathes against his lips, “Have you done this before?”
Obito manages a shaky chuckle, opening the eye he doesn’t remember closing and arching a brow at the man above him. “I'm hardly an untouched virgin, Kakashi,” he says with amusement. “I'm just about your age, after all.”
Kakashi kisses him again, but this time it’s harder, harsher, like Kakashi is going to eat him from the mouth down then come back for seconds. The fingers press down, just barely sliding inside of him, and the rough drag of dry skin makes him buck and cry out.
“Doesn’t matter,” Kakashi tells him, pulling back. He slides off, leaving Obito aching and cold, but he’s back with a jar of salve in hand before Obito can do more than gasp. He rolls on top of Obito again, capturing one hand and lacing their fingers together before he leans down for another kiss. This one is calmer than the last, easier, but just as hungry. They break apart, breathless and panting, and Kakashi stares down at him with his unmasked face, expression unyielding. “Doesn’t matter,” he repeats, “because this-” a tip of his head takes in the two of them, the bed, the heated air between them “-is permanent. I'm not going to give it up, Obito. Not again. Not ever.”
Obito has to laugh at that. He laughs and rolls his eyes and pulls Kakashi down until they're chest-to-chest, bodies entirely aligned. “Like I’d let you,” he says cheerfully, looping his arms around Kakashi's shoulders. “A really stubborn burr, remember?” Then he untangles their legs, slinging one of his over Kakashi's hip and dragging his nails over the back of Kakashi's neck. “Now, I believe we were in the middle of something?”
A slick finger sliding inside of him steals his breath, even as Kakashi takes another kiss. “Mm,” Kakashi agrees lazily. “We were, weren’t we?” The first finger is joined by another and Obito arches into the touch, biting back a loud cry as they spread and stretch, dragging over deliciously sensitive nerves and sending shivers of pleasure up his spine.
“Kakashi,” he gasps, “either move or I'm going to flip us over and ride you ‘till your brain melts.”
Kakashi goes very, very still, pupils dilating even more as he sucks in a lungful of air. “Was that supposed to be a deterrent?” he asks, voice gone hoarse and low. Then there’s another finger pushing inside of him, and Obito can't hold back his keen this time, even as Kakashi dips down and breathes into his ear, “That’ll have be next time. Right now, I'm going to take you. Then when you’ve recovered, I'm going to take you again, and again, until you feel me in you every time you move for the next week. And if we get horny on the way home, I’ll put you up against a tree and take you there. I'm not letting you go, Obito, not for anything.”
Too much of that damned porn, Obito thinks desperately. Entirely too much porn if the bastard thinks that some dirty talk-
The fingers slide out, twisting as they go, and Obito swears fiercely at Kakashi, right up until the feel of something bigger pressing against his entrance steals even that much cognitive function. Kakashi pushes into him, one hand linked with his again, the other anchoring him to the bed, and Obito sinks his teeth into Kakashi's shoulder. Kakashi's cock is hot and hard, sliding into him with agonizing slowness, and Obito thrashes against Kakashi's grip, wanting to shove himself down and just take the damned thing, because it’s good, great, amazing, but he wants more.
Finally, fucking finally Kakashi sinks in to the hilt, but then he stops and doesn’t move.
“Good?” breathes, feathering kisses over Obito's lips, even as he braces his elbow next to Obito's shoulder, hand twisting firmly into Obito's dark hair and setting sparks dancing behind his eyes.
Obito growls in answer, clamping down as hard as he can with his inner muscles. Kakashi gasps and curses, hips jerking forward automatically, and Obito cries out, arching his back.
“Move, move, move,” he chants, clawing at Kakashi's stupid unmoving back, and the man apparently takes him at his word. He pulls back, withdrawing almost completely, and then rocks forward, sliding deep and hard. Obito cries out, riding the thrusts, rising to meet them and urging Kakashi on faster and harder because he’s never in his life wanted anyone as much as he wants this man, quirks and bad habits and porn collection and all. He drags Kakashi's head down, kisses him desperately as he tries to convey I'm yours I'm yours you're mine and you're never getting rid of me with lips and tongue and teeth. Kakashi moans, low and deep, and hitches his hips, cock dragging right over his prostate and making Obito drop his head back with a shout as pleasure glances like lightning through his body.
“Kakashi, yes!” he cries, even as Kakashi's mouth finds his again. “Harder, damn it, do that again!”
Kakashi laughs at him, winded and flushed and beautiful, and gasps out, “Your wish is my command.” He changes the rhythm of his thrusts, drags back, slides forward, and Obito's world goes up in sparks of red and blinding white. He gasps and tenses, even as Kakashi repeats the move, and it’s too much. The pleasure swells and crests and crashes over him, and he comes with Kakashi's name broken and breathless on his lips.
Kakashi gasps, moans, and bites down on his bared throat, riding out his orgasm in three hard thrusts before he’s coming too, hot and wet inside Obito's overstimulated body. He collapses over him, muscles giving way, and he buries his face in Obito's hair, panting. Silence settles over the room, sweet and sated, and Obito trembles with the most glorious aftershocks he’s ever felt, every limb turned to water.
With a gentle kiss to his jaw, Kakashi levers himself up on one elbow and slowly pulls out. Obito groans at the drag of flesh over nerves that are still buzzing and opens his eye, trying to catch his breath.
“Alright?” Kakashi asks with some concern. Obito can only manage a nod, but he smiles up at the man. It’s probably dazed and adoring and entirely besotted, but Obito can't really bring himself to care.
Apparently, Kakashi doesn’t mind either, because he leans forward and kisses Obito again, soft and gentle, and then scrounges a shirt from the floor to clean them up with. Obito lets him without argument, and a moment later, Kakashi settles next to him on the bed, fingers combing gently through Obito's long hair.
“I think you’ve got a hair fetish,” Obito manages to say after another moment, raising an amused brow at the Copy-Nin.
“Only for yours,” Kakashi admits shamelessly, lifting a few dark strands to his lips. He wraps them around his fingers, even as he drops back against the pillows and reaches out with his free hand, tugging Obito against his side.
Obito lets his head rest against Kakashi's shoulder, enjoying the closeness, and then, while his brain is half-dazed with sated exhaustion and he can't overthink the words, he murmurs, “I love you so much more than I ever loved the other Kakashi. He was…a possibility. A hope. You're very, very much the reality.”
Beneath his cheek, he can feel Kakashi's breath catch, and then lips brush over his forehead in a careful caress. “I'm glad,” Kakashi whispers back, “because I love you, too.”
Obito smiles, even as the gold-edged darkness of sleep washes over him.
That night, and for so very many of the nights after, his dreams are very sweet.