#those gay bastards | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

depressedhatakekakashi · 3 months ago

Text

Since When?

Words: 2,262

Prompt: Eight Gates

He couldn’t believe his eyes.

Certain he was dreaming; Gai took a minute to pinch his arm. To do so he’d had to avoid a punch directed at his face from the enemy, but that hadn’t proven to be a difficult task. Although there were at least twenty of them, the enemies were basic jonin at best.

When he didn’t wake up Gai tried again, this time pinching his cheek and twisting his fingers, so a sharp pain radiated from the point he’d pinched all the way back to his ear.

Still, he didn’t wake up, which meant this wasn’t a dream.

“What the hell!?” Everything around him came to a stop. The enemy shinobi stood there, glancing between each other as they tried to assess the situation. In front of him, Kakashi stood with one arm wrapped around one enemy’s neck in a choke hold, and his other hand gripping the front of another enemy’s uniform holding him mid air.

Had Gai not interrupted he was certain Kakashi was about to chuck the enemy dangling with his feet kicking wildly in the air. As it was, though, his rival simply stood there staring at him with a board expression.

“Something wrong?” he asked as if the two of them were sitting calmly at the dango shop enjoying a sweet treat instead of standing in the middle of a battlefield with enemy shinobi surrounding them.

“You!” Pointing at his rival, he narrowed his eyes. “I saw that! You just opened the first gate!”

The calm facade almost broke. For a split-second Gai saw a look of panic shooting through Kakashi’s eyes, but before it could really settle in, he’d gathered his emotions back under his control and stuffed them down.

Just as he always did when he didn’t want to be caught having feelings, which was eighty percent of the time he was awake.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“don’t lie to me!” Seeing one of his opponents charging toward him, Gai threw a punch at just the right time, clocking him in the jaw so that he stumbled backwards with a groan and collapsed into an unconscious heap right in front of his friends. “You think I don’t know what opening the gates looks like? I have been teaching Lee about them for two years now, I know every little facial expression made when it comes to unlocking one of the gates, and that was the first gate!”

“We’re in the middle of a fight,” as if making a point, Kakashi moved the shinobi he was still holding mid air in front of him and promptly dropped him to the ground before delivering a hard kick to the face. “Why are you paying attention to the facial expressions I’m making?”

“Why are you opening the first gate?” Gai fired back, pointing at the shinobi who had just gone limp under Kakashi’s arm. “When did you even learn it? You hate the gates!”

Kakashi learning the gates wasn’t the upsetting part for him. It hurt a little to know his rival had kept this ability hidden from him, and there was a very slight injury to his pride knowing that even the thing he excelled at Kakashi could seemingly do without issue.

“Stop that,” Kakashi scolded, his arm releasing its victim so that he fell to the ground unconscious beside his friend who’d just been knocked out a few seconds before him. “The gates are yours. I can’t open that many and even if I wanted to learn, which I don’t,” he clarified with a hard look as if he was trying to stamp out any doubts Gai might have about his words. “I wouldn’t be able to learn as many as you. The eight gates are still your thing.”

“Except they’re not,” crossing his arms over his chest he huffed. Deep down he wanted to stomp his feet and whine about Kakashi stealing his thing, but that would be childish and silly. Not only was it not just his thing, but Kakashi was known for that.

Even before gaining the Sharingan and officially being recognized as the ‘copy ninja’ his eternal rival had gained a reputation inside of Konoha of watching people practice their jutsu’s and learning it on his own just from copying their hand signs.

“Do you really think I could open the eighth gate if I wanted to?” Kakashi asked, his eyes focused on Gai but glancing every few seconds to the shinobi still standing around them watching them with cautious eyes. “Even if I could, what good would they do me?”

“Well-“

“No,” he stopped Gai with a firm look. “Really think about it. At base level you’re twice as physically strong as me.” At that, Gai pointed at the two unconscious bodies laying at Kakashi’s feet. “I said you were stronger, not that I was weak.”

“The eight gates improve your physical strength and speed,” Gai reminded him. “Enemies that you’re strangling under your arm right now would be taken down twice as quick.”

“And my body would hurt more,” Kakashi fired back, a firm reminder of all the pressure his body already existed under. Sometimes Gai made the mistake of forgetting just how much pain Kakashi was in every day.

Not always physical pain, but exhaustion. The pain of fighting to keep moving when his body just wanted to crumble in place.

He held himself so well, fighting with ease and always putting on a show of being well put together, that even Gai could forget sometimes what kind of pressure his body was under with the sharingan.

“Still,” averting his eyes, he thought about it. If Kakashi could learn to open the first gate what was stopping him, really, from learning others? If he wanted, could he learn to open all eight gates?

If he could, what was the point of someone like Gai existing with his skills when someone like Kakashi could learn them as well?

“Stop it,” lifting his eyes off the ground he met Kakashi’s gaze and immediately felt the overwhelming pressure behind those deep black eyes. “I can’t learn the eight gates Gai. It takes a genius in hard work to learn them.”

“you’re a genius-“

“In tactics and Ninjitsu,” Kakashi fired back. “In hard work…well I’m certainly not lacking but I’m also not you.”

“Me?”

“Look at this,” using his head to gesture to the shinobi standing around them, each of them eying them as if they were preparing to attack, but none of them moving an inch. “Do you think it’s just me they’re afraid of?”

“Well…no,” his pride swelled when he met one of the enemy shinobi’s eyes and he took a cautious step back, creating a bit more space between him and Gai.

“And why do you think they’re afraid of you?”

“That’s easy,” a smile, triumphant and proud, stretched across his lips. “I can beat them without breaking a sweat.”

“We’re standing right here.”

“Shh,” glaring at the one who’d dared to speak, Kakashi raised an eyebrow. “Real shinobi are speaking right now.”

“Kakashi!”

“If they can land a punch on you then I’ll give them some respect.”

Taking the challenge, one of the shinobi crouched down and burst forward, his hand diving into his weapon’s pouch and coming out with a kunai. Before he could even think of attacking, though, Gai rushed forward and slammed his arm right into the man’s stomach.

His opponent hit the ground with a hard thud and immediately turned onto his side as every bit of food he’d eaten in the last day came flooding out of his mouth.

“See? Respect has not been earned.”

He wanted to scold Kakashi for being an arrogant little prick, but it was hard when that arrogance was so damn sexy.

“When did you learn?” he asked, returning to the topic that had caused him to start this conversation in the first place.

“About…” tilting his head back, Kakashi thought for a moment. Meanwhile, the rest of their opponents examined the situation in front of them. Four of their allies now lay on the ground either unconscious, cradling a broken and blood jaw, or puking their guts out. “when we were fifteen I think. During that time I was benched from missions for chakra exhaustion.”

“Which time?” Gai pressed, remembering well that Kakashi had been benched from missions five times that year, though never for enough time to fully recover.

“Before your birthday,” he answered with a playful smile, as if that adorable smile of his would wash away all of the anger Gai felt boiling up inside of him. “Remember when I asked you about the first gate?”

Thinking about it, he frowned when the memory popped into his head. he’d been training in field C when Kakashi approached him asking about the gates and how to open them. If he’d known back, then just what Kakashi wanted to do with that information he would have-

Actually, he wouldn’t have changed a thing and knowing that was even more annoying to him than finding out Kakashi knew how to open any of the gates.

If he’d known Kakashi wanted to learn the gates, he would have supported it fully. Possibly even tried to push for Kakashi to learn more, because if Kakashi got even stronger it would raise the bar that he had to reach for to become as strong as his eternal rival.

Instead, he’d unknowingly aided Kakashi in learning how to open the first gate on his own. Provided him with detailed explanations about how to do it, and even more details about what exactly he was searching for when reaching into the depths of his chakra networks in search of the gates.

“But you hate the gates. You’re always getting on my case about using them unnecessarily.”

“Not the first two,” Kakashi corrected him. “I get on your case about using the third gate and up if you don’t need to. That’s when you start hurting your body needlessly.”

Thinking about it, Gai found that Kakashi was right.

Whenever he used the first or second gate his rival had kept his opinion to himself. If he used the third gate or up he’d always receive a lecture about taking better care of his body and not being so reckless.

So Kakashi clearly didn’t hate all the gates.

“So do you know both the first two gates?”

“I can open them,” Kakashi confirmed. “And before you get your ego bruised by that, it took me three years to learn to properly open the first gate, and three months for the second one.”

“is that because you had so many missions to do all the time?”

“…Partially,” he admitted. “But my point still stands. It wasn’t an easy task. Don’t go thinking I just learned this in a day. I learn Ninjutsu faster than I learned to open any of the gates.”

Gai couldn’t help but let his pride swell at that. If the gates were difficult for Kakashi, a genius, to learn, then it was even more of an accomplishment that he had succeeded in learning all of them.

Him and Kakashi shared a skill, but it was one skill he would always surpass his eternal rival in.

“In that case,” finally he redirected his attention to the rest of their enemies. The shinobi who were still, stupidly enough, standing around watching them. “What do you say to the two of us opening the second gate and seeing who can take down more enemies? We’re tied at two a piece right now.”

“We also still need that scroll,” Kakashi reminded him while stretching his arms up above his head, preparing for the moment when he’d strike. “One point for whoever gets the most shinobi, one for whoever finds the scroll?”

“That could end us up in a tie.”

“Mmm, true,” examining the shinobi in front of them, Kakashi let out a small, amused huff. “Alright, one point for whoever takes down the most, one for whoever finds the scroll, and one for whoever does the coolest take down. Deal?”

“Deal!”

Taking that as their warning, the rest of their opponents made one of two choices. 10 of them charged forward, kunai and fists coming up to protect them as they charged toward Kakashi and Gai. The other six turned tail and ran for it.

“I’ve got the runners!” Kakashi called out before closing his eyes. Echoing his rival, Gai shut his own eyes and concentrated. He reached deep into his chakra network, stopping at the second gate.

“Gate of healing…” he began, Kakashi’s voice joining his at the last word. “Release!”

Chakra burst around him, the healing energy soothing his aches and recharged his energy reserves. Feeling lighter than ever, Gai opened his eyes and smirked when he saw his opponents now just a few steps in front of them. All of them looked terrified, as if they were facing death head on.

Luckily for them, Gai didn’t need to kill them to win his competition.

In his peripherals he saw Kakashi charging straight past the enemy shinobi heading toward him. It was obvious his focus was on retrieving the scroll which would no doubt be on one of the shinobi now running away from them, so Gai focused on the other two targets.

Taking down all the shinobi currently charging toward him so that he won a point for the most taken down and doing so with the coolest move he could come up with.

#Gaiweek2024 #Gai Week 2024 #Kakagai #Kakashi is a brat #and An arrogent bastard #and Gai loves both those things about him #even if he’s also a rude butt

18 notes · View notes