Chapter 13 - A father's duty - pt 2

[Author]:this chapter was edited by [Swalih] Please comment what you think of the edition and if you need to improve anything, it will help you a lot.

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"What do you think you are doing?" Sakumo heard a voice from the door, it seemed neither happy nor sad, rather, it was quite monotonous. He instantly recognized that voice.

"What are you doing here Eiji? Didn't I tell you to go to sleep?" Sakumo asked as sternly as he could. He didn't want Eiji to see him committing suicide after all.

"For what? For you to kill yourself?" Questioning his father, Eiji continued in a monotonous and emotionless voice.

Sakumo tried to interject, but no words left his mouth, he really felt ashamed of himself.

"Weren't you going to kill yourself? I saw what you were going to do. Go on, DO IT!" Eiji's voice exploded with bȧrėly contained anger.

Sakumo cringed at the tone. His throat felt dry as breathing itself became a labourous task. He looked down at the floor, intense grief coursing in him, He had failed the mission, his village, his friends, and now his son was openly berating him. He didn't want to live with this guilt and defamation anymore and with this pressure the white fang of konoha finally broke.

But Eiji continued, not giving Sakumo any chance to recover, "weren't you going to kill yourself? Why don't you do that in front of your son? Wouldn't it be the same thing? Why don't you say anything?"

Sakumo wanted to answer his son, but  everything he said was true, he had decided to take his own life today. He opened his mouth to answer but soon closed, he had no dignity to refute his son who caught him in the act.

"Are you going to kill yourself because of comments on your mission? Defamation? Because your friends are talking behind your back?" Eiji bombarded him with several questions. Each of them hitting him like hot iron.

"Or is it because of your wife?" For the first time, he looked into his son's eyes and it didn't seem to have any emotion, it was as if he didn't even know him.

Sakumo closed his eyes. He could not have overcome his wife, he still loved her with every fiber of his being, but she was not the only reason, it was just one of the reasons.

"You are pathetic, the incredible White Fang breaking under pressure from some civilians, how laughable is that, and here I thought suicide is only for cowards, seems that will put you among them" Eiji ruthlessly broke him with his words.

Sakumo fell on his knees in shame, His son was right, he broke down and wanted to take his own life.

"Aren't you going to kill yourself? Did you ever thought about what will happen to me and Kakashi? Where we were going to live? In the orphanage? Maybe fall into the hands of someone rotten? To be used as spėrm material? After all, we are the son of the famous White Fang!" He exclaimed mockingly.

"What is a father's duty?" Eiji questioned the man in front of him.

The room was silent for a few minutes until finally, sakumo opened his mouth to speak, his throat felt even more dry. "Taking care of my children, protecting them from dangers, teaching them the values ​​of life, daily life, lunches …. "

"And what do you think a village is?" Eiji again questioned the man.

And for the first time in his life Sakumo was silent when hearing that question.

Seeing this, Eiji answered the question,"The village is not a place, but the people residing there. That means you ARE the village. Your death will not make anything in the village easier. You may be viewed by them as a traitor because of your mistakes, but the real traitors are those who end up committing suicide because of this. They are the ones who failed themselves, and in turn the village."

"The village is good and all, but it is just a place. A father's duty is to die for his children NEVER in the village, a home can be rebuilt, life cannot. You must be alive to take care of people." Eiji finished speaking and looked at his father, wanting a response.

Although Sakumo doesn't agree with what his son said, he also didn't think he was wrong. An ounce of judgment descended on sakumo and he thought. 'What was I going to do? How were my children going to grow 'Eiji noticed a slight change in his father's expression but still continued.

"Kakashi idolizes you from the bottom of your being. You are irreplaceable for him, probably for your whole life, imagine when he found out that his own father took his life at home because he didn't follow the rules?"

"He would probably shut himself off to everything and everyone, He would train like crazy to participate in the war as if his life was disposable hoping to obtain an honorable death on the battlefield, That the rules are more important than the lives of his companions, something totally against what he wanted to be and what you represented to him. " The more he heard, the more terrified he became.

"He wants to be like you, an incredible Shinobi, someone who risks his life to bring his friends home, who has the courage to fail on a mission just so that his friends can return to their families alive"

After sometime, Sakumo spoke and there was nothing but sadness. "It's true. But I failed everyone, the village, my friends, the Hokage … I don't deserve to be a ninja anymore" He said that.

"Do you know what I heard from some people?" Eiji finally smiled at his father.

"White Fang brought my dad home."

"Thanks to him I can see my dad again"

"White Fang is the best"

Sakumo did not believe what he heard from his son, nobody ever told him that.

"You are the greatest hero that this village could have, father. You brought people back to their homes, they did not speak to you. But their children said that they are grateful to you. You let them live with their parents a little longer, one more day, and here you are, taking your life".

'What was I going to do?' Sakumo no longer noticed his grip on the knife loosening and it fell to the floor.

"Didn't you notice something strange? How did all these civilians know about a classified mission? Why did you think everyone in the village knew about this, why didn't you think that there might be somebody pulling strings in the shadow?"

"That's true?" Sakumo never suspected that his son would tell him a lie. But he needed to confirm, anger grew in him, if what Eiji said was true it must mean that someone,  possibly Danzo, was the reason why this all happened. 

"Every word of everything I said, you are an idiot" Smiled Eiji.

Sakumo approached his son and hugged him, he regretted what he was going to do today and some tears fell from his face.'

'Danzo, you will pay with every fiber of your being' Sakumo was no fool, he knew where these dirty and sneaky games came from, and he almost succeeded, if not for his son.

"Life is not about how strong you are, or how much you are beaten or how much you suffer, life is about how much you can take without giving up and how many times you will get up and try again, Life is about what you're going to do about it after you get up again,"Eiji said, remembering a line from a certain movie.

"Hahaha, you're too young to say such a thing to me brat" Sakumo wiped away his tears and smiled as he messed up his son's hair, he felt refreshed and needed something like that. Someone would pay for this, and that someone would be Danzo.

"Are you still going to kill yourself? I don't want to go to an orphanage, you know?" Mocked Eiji, he needed to make sure he wasn't going to do it again behind his back.

"Not going… I'm sorry, Eiji, please… don't tell Kakashi about this, I feel so much better now, thanks." He wouldn't know what to do with Kakashi if he knew that. He know felt much better now as if a weight was lifted off him.

"I'm going to sleep with you today, so you don't do anything stupid," Eiji said firmly.

"All right." Sakumo complied.

Another arm-haired figure appeared in the middle of the room and asked curiously, "What are you doing here? Aren't we going to sleep?" Kakashi noticed a knife on the floor.

"Kashi-ni, I was asking Dad to sleep with us tonight, what do you think?"

"Do what you want, I don't care, baka.." Kakashi crossed his arms and pouted.