God Damn It, Kyuubi!

Reunion and introductions

Two years ago, Naruto could only dream of having a family.

Hated by the village. Neglected by his own godfather. Growing with only the love and support from two different parental figures—the distant grandfather who was so busy ruling Konoha and could only spend little moments with him, and the teacher who is more of a father to him than anyone could ever be. Had to live begging for scraps of love and attention from kind-hearted civilians like old man Ichiraku and Ayame-nee.

It used to be a child's hopeless dream—to have a family.

Shikamaru was the nicest out of all his academy peers, but Naruto knew that he couldn't (and wouldn't) contest Chouji to be Shikamaru's brother. Chouji owned that special place in Shikamaru's heart like how Iruka owned the spot of world's best father in Naruto's heart.

Out of all of his peers, Sasuke was the only one he could find some branch to relate with.

Then, Team 7 was announced.

And despite all the grumbling and heated rivalry... deep down, Naruto was happy.

When he joined Team 7, he had hopes and dreams to form a somewhat working family relationship with his teammates. He paid his most attention to his team. It wasn't something that he consciously did, but now with literally all the time in the world and nothing else to do, Naruto had time to reflect on his past.

Back then, he had a hopeful wish to gain a friend and a brother in Sasuke. His crush on Sakura grew throughout the few happy months until the Chuunin Exam, fuelling his childhood dream of having a wife that would build a family with him.

Throughout those peaceful months before shit went down, he had hoped to form some sort of bond with his jounin-sensei too.

(Probably not like how Iruka was to him—because no one could ever contest that special spot Iruka owned in his heart—but an older brother didn't sound so bad. After all, he used to envy seeing Sasuke and Itachi back before the whole massacre went down.)

He wanted Kakashi as a family member too.

It almost seemed impossible back then.

Kakashi was impossible to approach. He gave off the vibes that he hated his genins, only 'caring' for them because they were assigned under his care. He didn't show that he cared, acting more like a soldier obliging the Hokage's order to train his team rather than being a genuine caring teacher like any other jounin-sensei.

Kakashi was distant, so far out of reach despite literally being by their side throughout their pre-teen's chaotic years.

It didn't matter how much Naruto pulled stupid shenanigans to invoke some kind of reaction from Kakashi, nothing ever worked. Heck, even Sasuke showed some reactions back then. The only moments that Sasuke acted like a normal curious kid instead of his usual emo vendetta-driven brat behaviour were when they were out trying to unmask Kakashi.

Despite their shenanigans, Kakashi remained an unreachable enigma to them.

Close, yet so far out of reach.

Things changed when Kyuubi literally trapped Team 7 inside Kakashi's mind.

No more shields. The distance no longer existed.

Kakashi was laid raw to them. The pain of his well-hidden past, the constant anxiety for the people that he cared about and the fear for his future—each and every single one of the things that Kakashi has tried to hide from them back then were laid out bare to the rest of Team 7.

Kurama might have thought that he fucked up by accidentally causing this whole chaos.

Naruto personally thought of it as a blessing in disguise.