My favourite scene from your fics has to be the scene in Ear to the Wall where Obito finds Kakashi having the panic attack in the woods just after they've been to the hospital. Where Obito finally gets the realisation that his teammate isn't actually indestructible, but is actually a scared and hurting child.
"Kakashi was good. Obito had already known that before he even officially met the other boy. Kakashi was a prodigy. He was talented, quick on the uptake, smart and resourceful and never had to be taught something twice before he mastered it and moved on—everything Obito wasn’t . Kakashi was the perfect ninja student.
Kakashi sobs something totally incoherent into Obito’s chest, and Obito feels his stomach roll queasily. How much of all that was actual innate talent, and how much was—?"
That part just resonates with me - Obito wondering just how much of Kakashi's skill is has been earned the hard way through obsessively overworking himself and not just some unearned gift bestowed on him. It reminds me so much about that line of Gai's in canon about being a "genius of hard work", and how he mentioned that "even the genius works just as hard" when watching Kakashi cliff-climbing onehanded.
It fits so well with Minato's observations earlier in the fic about having struggled to get the concept through Obito's thick skull that his teammate is human and doesn't deserve to be shoved on a pedestal and judged by inhumanly high standards. I loved that it shows just how much Obito cares about his teammates - even while he was prickly and jealous of Kakashi, he still admired him and cared about him.
You don’t know how emotional this ask made me?? Thank you?? I just… I want to print this out and frame it on my wall. I love you.
In writing EttW, a big thing that is important to me is Obito’s journey in realizing and coming to terms with the fact that his heroes are fallible. And for all that he’d never admit it to anyone, especially himself, he holds Kakashi in very high esteem despite being jealous and annoyed by him.
Thank you so much for your comment!! Please, have this extra that might hypothetically happen in the fic when Jiraiya finally gets his ass back to the village.
Ear to the Wall
- extra
“Stop,” Kakashi says, stamping his little eight year old foot on the ground. He gives Jiraiya his best rendition of the stink-eye, and is rewarded when the toad sannin turns to face him.
“What, brat?”
“You don’t have all the facts.”
Jiraiya raises a brow. “Which are?”
Kakashi glances over, to where Orochimaru is staring at him with a rather blank expression on his face. He finds that he hates that look on the man. It’s… incorrect.
He turns back to Jiraiya. “Orochimaru has never done anything wrong in his life, ever.”
Jiraiya’s jaw drops, and Orochimaru actually takes a small step back in surprise. Both men look just shy of gobsmacked.
Well, Jiraiya looks gobsmacked. Orochimaru would never.
Kakashi crosses his arms. “And I love him. So there.”
Tsunade presses her hands to her face and screeches like an actual banshee raised from mythos.
