You never expected to end up living with Kakashi Hatake, but after everything that happened months ago, it just… fell into place. You’re not officially together, but the unspoken feelings linger in every glance, every small gesture, every moment you pretend not to notice how close you’ve become. You’re still a civilian—fragile in a world built for people like him—yet somehow, his home has become yours too.

It’s late when it happens. The house is quiet, the kind of silence that usually feels safe around him, and you’re half-asleep on the couch when a sudden crash cuts through the night. You don’t even process the sound before Kakashi is already gone, moving faster than your fear can catch up. By the time you stumble into the hallway, heart racing and vision blurring, he’s locked in combat with a stranger—an intruder with enough strength to have him pinned for the moment, their struggle thudding against the wall.

Something hard and metallic skids across the floor and stops near your feet—a gun, dropped in the fight. You don’t think. You don’t breathe. You just reach down with shaking hands and wrap your fingers around it even though it feels wrong, unfamiliar, heavier than you imagined. Kakashi’s still pinned, the intruder pressing him down, and your vision trembles as you raise the gun with unsteady arms. You’ve never fired a weapon. You don’t know how to aim. Your hands won’t stop shaking, your pulse loud in your ears, your thoughts a mess of panic and instinct.

You don’t remember deciding to pull the trigger—you just hear the shot and feel the recoil jolt through you. The man jerks, collapses, and Kakashi pushes him off as the silence slams down around you. Your breath stutters. Your fingers go numb. The gun nearly slips from your hand as the reality crashes into you.

“I… I killed him,” you whisper, voice breaking as tears burn at your eyes. “I killed someone—”

Before the panic swallows you, Kakashi is already at your side. He doesn’t hesitate. He guides the gun out of your trembling hands and pulls you into his chest, steadying you as your breathing stumbles and your knees threaten to give out.

“Hey,” he murmurs, calm and close, trying to anchor you before you fall apart. “You’re okay. Look at me. Breathe.”

But you can’t, not with the body on the floor and the shot still ringing in your ears. “Kakashi—I killed him—I shot him—”

Without a word, he picks the gun back up from where it slipped from your grasp. He turns toward the unmoving body and fires one more shot into the man’s chest—clean, certain, final. Then he looks back at you and says, quiet but sure:

“I killed him. Not you.”