"I never turn down food," Ryouma said. He thought that came out pretty casual. "A shinobi avails himself of provisions and rest when the opportunity offers, in preparation for action to come. Always liked that Rule." He handed Raidou a mostly-clean towel. "Normal-Kakashi levels of rude, or something more?"

Raidou dried his hands and flipped the towel back. "Rude enough to warrant a long sprint. Kid needs to drag his head out of his ass."

"No arguments there," Ryouma said.

Except...

He bunched the towel up and tossed it on the counter. "He can be pretty decent, when he wants to be. I mean, rude's still his default, no question about it. I'm still trying to decide if it's a defense mechanism or if he just enjoys pissing people off. Could be both, I guess. Just..."

Raidou snorted. "He's defending against the wrong people."

Maybe. Ryouma thought of Kakashi at the first ANBU trial, the sardonic drawl on insults that stung without drawing blood, the hesitation just before he'd turned down Ayane's offer to join them for a drink. Kind of weird. Mostly rude. He'd wanted to join them, or at least thought about it, before he shied away.

They'd talked at the third Trial, but not much since then. Well, there'd been that uncomfortable interlude in Team Six's office on the first morning, when Kakashi wanted to know how someone who looked as dumb as Ryouma did could create a jutsu without stealing other people's work from scrolls, but that just went back on the Mostly rude side of things. Kakashi'd gone back to mostly silent and stand-offish for the last four days of training and wall-duty, and Ryouma—had been distracted, really, by the newness of a team and the unsettling memories of his captain.

Maybe the newness of the team was throwing Kakashi, too. Everyone and their grandmother in Konoha knew what'd happened to his last team, and that he'd worked mostly solo since then, or with Yondaime-sama or a few other high-level jounin on one-off assignments. He hadn't been forced into close company with strangers for an extended, indefinite period of time since—well, probably since he'd left the Academy. And if you weren't very good with people to begin with, and the fierce and bloody-handed team you'd been psyching yourself up for turned out to be mostly too-early training sessions and boxes of ration bars under the lieutenant's desk, wrapped up in awkward banter and (hilarious) jokes...

Ryouma scratched uncomfortably at the side of his jaw. "He started off with Yondaime-sama and an Uchiha and a medical genius, and it still ended badly. Can't really blame him for thinking we won't measure up."

Though you could resent the hell out of it anyway.