Kakashi thought he actually WAS lost for a good ten seconds. But no, he was where he was supposed to be. It was apparently just his team that was gone. Hmm. He moved to a comfortable tree branch, debating whether to take a nap. He had wanted to sleep in but had gotten up out of bed because -

Well, sleeping in meant staying with Iruka. If Kakashi had stayed there, he would have ended up snuggling, which would have lead to sex. Now, as far as Kakashi was concerned, this was a good way to start the day, but he’d had a feeling that Iruka might LIKE getting to class on time, though WHY was simply beyond Kakashi’s reasoning. Besides, him getting there one to five hours late taught them patience and allowed him to have a large, lazy breakfast - something he enjoyed.

He started reading, slightly curious as to where the team had gotten off too. Perhaps they’d all gotten drunk as well. The night of the sensei party was a favorite for the students to cut loose as well, but their hangovers should be better by now and they seemed fine yesterday. Though, to be fair, yesterday he’d spent more energy thinking of things like dead slugs and recasting Heiwa. So he might have missed a few things, but there hadn’t been any mention of a party planned or past.

Kakashi flipped a page and tipped his head to one side. Wonder if he really can do that. He smiled, thinking about that. It would be fun to find out.

"Look, he’s never less then half an hour late, right?"

Kakashi tilted his head. It was Naruto and the others.

"Well, yeah, but won’t he get mad?" Sakura said, following. Inner Sakura was annoyed - Why the hell didn’t we do this earlier!?

"Only if he finds out."

"Where’s Sasuke?" If I find out you’ve done something... - Inner Sakura cracked her knuckles.

"Ummm - no idea? Beside, come on! I bet it’s one of those ‘read between the lines’ shinobi things. He’d be disappointed if he knew you only started showing up late in the last two weeks." Naruto reasoned excuse-o-matic going full tilt. "I bet he expects this of us."

Kakashi blinked, trying to decide whether or not he was proud of them. After a moment’s consideration, he decided he wasn’t. While it was actually acceptable to him that they do something like that, the fact they’d gotten caught was NOT good. The fact that they were discussing how often they’d done it was also a point against them. It wasn’t very stealthy. Hmm. If they’d been able to do this without being caught he might have been amused. But this was just sad. They barely scanned the area when they walked in. He could kill them both without breaking a sweat. HIGHLY disappointing.

Tucking the book carefully away, he slunk along the tree branch, directly over Naruto’s head. Naruto remained blissfully unaware of the fact Kakashi was debating on landing on him.

"Just because you’ve gotten away with it for a month -" You lucky prick!

"You tagged on pretty quick when I didn’t get busted." Naruto pointed out, lacing his fingers behind his head. Kakashi pulled the book back out. "You’re just as happy to sleep in as me."

"I get up at the same time. I just get to clean up more, you lazy thing." I love my snooze button so very much.

"Yeah, but you still like it. Let’s face it, we finally found the upside to having such a tardy bast - OW!" Naruto’s word were cut off as the spine edge of Icha Icha Paridisu smashed between his eyes with enough force to fell a small elephant. Naruto was knocked nearly all the way over in a flip, landing on his head. He blinked up, book open over his face, but before his eyes could refocus enough to read it, the book was lifted. Sakura blinked. Inner Sakura was busy hexing Naruto with every black magic she’d ever heard of. Both inner and outer Sakura agreed they were very, very screwed. "Good morning sensei! It’s nice to see you early." Why the hell did you have to be on time today, you crummy bastard?

Kakashi re-marked his page and quietly put his book away, opting for a long, uncomfortable silence instead of a lecture of some sort.

Naruto was rubbing his head and cursing but shut up when he recognized the feet next to his head. Sakura started to fidget after a bit. Kakashi stared at them quietly for at least ten minutes, thinking.

Naruto was about to write it off as the most disturbing time ever, until Kakashi started to smile. It was a slow smile, but it was creepy as it actually affected the shape of the mask, as his eye became an ominous crescent.

"Well then, since we’re all here early," Kakashi kept smiling, " except Sasuke, whom I shall check on momentarily - we should get a few extra chores out of the way. Come on." He turned and walked deeper into the forest, far too cheerfully.

"This can’t be good." Naruto said quietly, following. Then he grinned to himself. Heh! At least Sasuke’s going to be in MORE trouble. That was kind of comforting.

~*~*~*~

Kakashi left them staring at the smelly, hideous pool of muck they had been told to turn into a meadow. The air was sweet with the decay of dead growth, there were large, nasty F-14 type bugs buzzing around in heavy clouds, and the sun seemed to reach the ground in enfeebled beams. Naruto sullenly looked at his pail and rake.

"We need this done when?" He asked, hoping he’d heard wrong. Sasuke had SOO better be facing worse punishment than this!

"It gets done when it gets done. We just can’t leave till then." Sakura said, eye twitching. Oh god, the smell! She picked up the bucket, and then set it back down. "How - How do we start?"

Naruto cracked his knuckles. "Clearing out all the squishy stuff, I guess. Want to clean out muck or gather all the dead wood?"

"Dead wood." Not that it was the easier task. There seemed to be a tree or two in the viscous muck, but still!

"Okay then!" Naruto grinned. "Kage bunshin no jutsu!" A small herd of Narutos chucked their jackets in a pile and attacked, grabbing buckets and diving in. "Okay everyone, we’ll dump the sludge in the river! It’s only a mile away!"

Sakura blinked. All of the clones had the same odd, reddish mark on their neck. Weird.

~*~*~*~

By now Sasuke was as close to being frantic. He was nearly an hour late at this point, and was currently rummaging through the large pile of stuff that had gotten tossed onto the floor in a pile at some point last night. Dammit! Dammit! What the hell was he thinking - doing that? Or, rather, not thinking. If he’d been thinking even a little he would have made sure that it had happened at HIS house where he could find stuff. Now he just really, really needed the forehead protector. He had everything else, or was liberally ‘borrowing’ it from this house’s owner. But, he only had ONE of those!

"Crap! Crap! Crap!" He didn’t realize he was chanting it by now. "Fucking dobe! When I find it, I’m going to use it to tie your stupid blonde ass up and - crap! Crap! Crap!"

Kakashi sat in the window and watched, wondering what was in the water in this crazy village. Sasuke was actually too far out of it to notice the light in the room had changed with his presence. And he was shirtless, revealing at least ten large bite-mark/hickeys across his back alone. Along with scratches. A road map of an interesting night to be sure, though they were healing. What was even more interesting though, was where Sasuke seemed to think his head band was, mainly somewhere under Naruto’s bed along with what had to be six months worth of slightly stale clothes and ramen stockpiles.

"And then I’m going to -" You can put whatever you like here, I’m sure you’re more creative than me. "And then -" Put something else here but make sure it’s worse. "With a hairbrush!"

Kakashi blinked and wondered if Sasuke was another closeted Icha Icha Paradisu reader. After a moment he coughed quietly. Sasuke stiffened, whirling and attacking automatically.

Kakashi leaned back a little and watched the kunai go past. "That was a lousy throw. You’ll need to practice it."

Sasuke swallowed. "Good morning Sensei."

"And here I thought you just wanted to be late like the others." Kakashi said slowly, looking around. "Is this what you’re looking for? It was in the tree." He held the protector out.

"Yes." Sasuke took it back quietly, putting it on. "Ummm - I had my shirt -" He kicked the pile and saw a flash of blue, reached down and grabbed it, pulling it up and over. "What’s today’s mission?"

"You have bite marks on your arms."

Sasuke blushed to color of the cover of Kakashi’s book, and then got redder. "Umm -"

"Bandage them up." Kakashi advised, climbing back out the window gracefully. "Naruto and Sakura are clearing out a pond in the woods, you’ll go help." He paused a moment. "And do I have to listen to you fight more or less now?"

"North or south?" It wasn’t a great attempted to avoid the question, but he wasn’t one hundred percent sure himself yet.

"You’ll find it." Kakashi said.

Sasuke dug out Naruto’s bandages and started to wrap his arms. "Dobe, I swear I’m going to put a bite mark in the MIDDLE of your forehead!"

~*~*~*~

Teaching class standing up had been fairly easy really. He just kept thinking of reasons to write on the board once they got in from the field. After he’d gone home and changed, he could go over the field again and pick up all the spare kunai that had missed their marks totally. Right now though, just not being on his feet for a moment was pleasant.

Iruka was lying on top of his desk, feet using the ledge of the chalkboard as a rest. It had been the easiest way he could think of to not rip anything, though he decided he’d better get up and go home soon to make it back before lunch was over. Lunch. He wasn’t even remotely hungry, and his pants felt like a girdle. Or maybe it was just the slight unease he’d felt all day, though he couldn’t put his finger on the reason why. Confronting that train of thought would require, at the least, the ability to sit down.

He started to shift to let his feet drop as he lifted his head, popping him back up, but there was sudden blur and a hand was on his chest, pushing him down. Iruka made a semi squawk, starting to kick himself into a twist that would get him off the desk into a crouch, then realized who it was and stopped. He put his feet back on the ledge, dropped his head back to stare up at Kakashi, who’d taken his hand back. "May I help you?"

Kakashi tried not to laugh. Iruka looked silly. Cute, slightly prissy and very suggestive in those pants but silly too. "I didn’t think I was that rough."

"Wha- ah - no!" Iruka blushed. "It’s not that. That’s fine - it’s, these stupid pants." He crossed his arms behind his head. "I’m scared if I do anything the seams will all tear and they’ll just spilt in the back."

Kakashi nearly pointed out the convenience of that, but didn’t on the off chance it’d offend Iruka more than just make him blush again. "You were the one who left your pants on the bed."

"You took them off. You could have put them somewhere else." Iruka said as Kakashi leaned over the desk to look down at him. "You’re making me uncomfortable." He said after a moment, staring up.

"From the way you're lying there, I doubt what I do is going to make you any less uncomfortable."

"The fact I’m lying this way is your fault."

"You said it wasn’t that though."

"Okay, it’s a little of that, but that’s not bad, really. I’ve been hurt worse. Not usually there."

"Not usually? As in, it happens rarely?" An eyebrow arched. "Hmm. See, now I’m jealous."

"That’s not what I meant!" Iruka protested.

Kakashi just grinned. "Aren’t you glad you did it though, Ruru-kun? You seemed to be glad."

"I - wait! Ruru-kun? NO!" Iruka eyes widened. "You are NOT slapping me with some stupid little nickname that you’ll be calling me in pu-"

"There’s no one around to hear us, and I wasn’t going to call you it in public." He expression didn’t change exactly but the slight infliction on ‘us’ made Iruka nervous. Kakashi lifted his head, looking at the door. "You’d better hurry if you want to change clothes. Your little brats are going to be back soon," he added, dropping a pair of pants onto Iruka's face. Iruka didn’t move at first, leaving them there. Presumably he’d commandeered them from Iruka’s house. Iruka found himself trying to remember the last time he’d cleaned it well enough for company and felt embarrassed.

After a moment, Kakashi gave up on Iruka coming back out from under there and shifted them himself to expose a pinker than normal and slightly dazed expression.

"Thank you," Iruka said finally, feeling his head whirl around in a fluster. Dammit, wasn’t the confusion supposed to go AWAY after the fact? This was worse than just having the crush. At least then he'd had hope. He wasn’t sure what he had now but it seemed to be twisting his stomach and redecorating it with ulcers. It seemed vaguely unfair that Kakashi seemed so blandly calm about it while he felt parts of his mind give in to fretting. What did you call what they had anyway? Relationship seemed too strong a word. Did you call it a relationship if it started off with two encounters involving altered mental states? Iruka wasn’t sure.

At least that was what Iruka thought was making him feel odd. That and the urge to reach up and grab that stupid mask. He was still kicking himself for not getting so much as ONE decent look at the other man’s face. He could probably draw other areas of Kakashi’s anatomy with fantastically pornographic detail. But his face? Maybe he could draw that smile, the way the teeth gleamed in the half-light and how they worked with the shine of his eyes to look so very, very hungry. But a floating Cheshire smile and eyes wasn’t really a face, now was it?

Kakashi watched Iruka through the mesh of his lashes, who’d taken to staring at the ceiling while trying to formulate a question. Considering the situation, Kakashi decided that any form of the most likely questions was going to require more time and space to answer properly. So he left.

Iruka blinked, leaning his head back and watching Kakashi set a hand on the windowsill and hop over. That didn’t help anything in his head or stomach. Heeey! Don’t I rate a goodbye? Great. Iruka thought about it, looking at the pants. Those had been thoughtful though. Huh. He got to his feet in a springy motion and changed in the nearest windows less room he could find, folding the too tight pants back up and putting them in the dead bottom of his pack when he got back to the room. Then he sat down, setting his forehead against the table, glad for a chance for his spine to de-compress. He pushed down a little with his head and neck and felt a series of popping explosions down his back. Felt nice.

He stayed like that till he heard his class returning down the hall. He stood up, stretched once and went to the door to open it. Or, he started to reach out with his hand to open the door went an alarm went off in his head. Not a ‘take out a weapon or you’re toast’ intent to kill alarm, more of a ‘Whoa! Hey! Person!’ type alarm that made his head whip around right into a kiss.

Iruka’s eyes widened and he made a noise best described as a ‘meep’. Perhaps that wasn’t the best response, as Kakashi seemed to find the noise both highly endearing and a good opportunity to flick his tongue against the other mans teeth.

To be fair, Kakashi had actually intended for it to be more of a peck (the tongue didn’t disqualify it by his standards). He’d expected Iruka to squawk, maybe hit him, and hopefully kiss him back. He hadn’t expected Iruka to not only kiss him back, but to semi turn and grab the front of his vest, pulling him in. He had the presence of mind to slap his hand against the door to hold it shut and cheerfully pressed Iruka to the wall.

They were lucky it was a very LONG hall the kiddies had to traverse or the entire next generation of shinobi might have received some rather bizarre trauma to take home with their essays. As it was, by the time the little midgets were attempting to kick the door un-‘stuck’, Iruka had come up for air and they were more or less lapping at each other. The door rattled slightly as one adventurous squirt tried to push it. Iruka blushed furiously. Kakashi just grinned, that broad wicked grin Iruka had been thinking about, could recognize against his lips, and leaned forward to kiss his neck. "And I thought that I’d be the one who had to exercise control." He nuzzled lightly. "I came back because I’d forgot to say good-bye. And to get my pants."

"I - ah - was going to drop those off later - ah!" Iruka titled his head slightly, still blushing. "I need to let them in."

"Mm. Good. Do that then." Kakashi bit his ear once and backed up, turning away towards the window while the other hand put the mask back automatically. "Looking forward to it." He released the door and left just as a small human canon ball hit it, blowing it inward like a typhoon.

And so the class continued normally, more or less. The children did think it odd however that Iruka-sensei, who had been writing on the board all morning, was now apparently glued into his chair, but no one thought enough of it to remember once they were dismissed.

Once the last one was gone, Iruka groaned, dropped his head back to the desk and cursed quietly. Broad daylight in a well-lit room and he STILL didn’t have a clue about what he looked like under the mask. That was just sad. His lips twitched after a bit. Be sure to do that. An actually more or less straight request from an un-jutsu-ed, sober Kakashi. Well, in a way. Whatever, it works. He reasoned to himself. You would have had to go back later for your clothes anyway. Now you get to knock instead of trying to rush around and escape somehow.

~*~*~*~

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