Title: Introductions are always crucial.
Genre: Dark humour/ Comfort, if that can be…
Characters: HatakeKakashi, Umino Iruka
Rating: T, for violence and language.
Progress : Complete, One-shot.
Summary: How two completely different and incompatible men could stumble together, no one knew. Well, no one but the first of them.
Disclaimer: Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.
AN: My personal try at the 100 themes Challenge. As the title says, this short fiction stands for #1 Introduction.
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Introductions , as every shinobi still whole and alive knows, are always crucial.
The momentum before brain and reflexes engage is the difference in-between miracle and failure, shame and joy, grief and laughter.
One leaf shinobi was introduced to life with one constancy: distance. First, it had been the gap in-between his father and the crowd in the streets, than it grew and became the cold indifference in his mother's eyes as she walked away during the ungodly hours of that Tuesday morning. From the age gap in-between his team mates, the innocence of the children of his age, to the symbol on the forehead protector of his enemies, they all created a growing ravine that pushed Hatake Kakashi, and later on the Legendary Copy Ninja, away from everything.
Distance was his mantra, philosophy and burden. It also became his greatest asset when facing the hardship of a shinobi's existence.
He should have known distance was essential, always.
Also, he should have known better than to be careless and allow this one to slip away during something as crucial as an introduction.
However, just as his very own eyelash batted to shield his eye from a puff of warm air, he realised that he hadn't. The exhalation of the other's man breath stank of alcohol and tea, of all things, and he vaguely remembered that he was partly responsible of the current mess he was sprawled in. Asking to share a cup of tea with teachers of highly hazardous mental stability certainly hadn't been the brightest thing to do.
Trying to inebriate him out of his anal stiffness apparently wasn't one either, and he guessed the worst part was that, being a genius, he had managed to carry out this stupid, incoherent, fruitless half-arsed plan of his.
Kakashi had been introduced to many things that day. He discovered that not only could the fiery temper of the teacher be triggered with a deadly accuracy by anything bearing parental advisory, but that said "advisory" should have been worn by the man himself when he was truly angered and out of earshot of said "parental" figures. He also discovered that despite the plastic pellicle he had warped his newest Icha Icha Paradise volume into, said Icha Icha Paraside was not waterproof.
Or, at least, not fish tank proof.
He was also brought to recognise that, contrary to popular belief, Umino Iruka was not timid, nor easily impressionable, and nor did he have more than one pair of eyes. On a secondary note, some worthy detail, he also discovered that very spicy chili sauce could cause temporary blindness and high degrees of pain, and thus decided to add a small bottle of the substance to his current arsenal of weapons.
But, more importantly, upon that once blissfully boring Monday evening and squeezed in-between the back of a couch and the wall with an awfully sharp corner of the living room table poking way too close to his remaining eye and an equally sharp knee pinning him down on the dusty floorboards in his own apartment, he realised that this was the first time he was really introduced to Umino Iruka rather than the ever polite Iruka-sensei. There, the veteran shinobi and honorary member of Those whom Fate wants to Fuck With was forced to harshly regret his comfortable cocoon of distance he had spun during so many years.
His sharingan eye was starting to throb faintly from the extensive time he kept it open, but Kakashi remained unmoving, simply staring at the tanned chunin kneeling upon him. Iruka's hair was a wild tangled mess, sticking out in all directions from it's usual neat ponytail, and one of his eyes was squirmed shut firmly and still valiantly crying to clear the remainder of hot chilli pepper sauce he hadn't managed to wipe away, making him a wholly miserable and comical sight, but he was there. He was still there, after Kakashi shouted at him, yelled at him that he was a pathetic and worthless worm to this village. The damn insufferable brat remained even after an elite jounin tried to bodily throw him out of the window after he compared him to the White Fang.
And, not only was he there, but Iruka was close. Kakashi never asked for it, and never would have in his right mind, but when the drunk brunette's balance finally failed and he collapsed, Kakashi only opened his arms and pulled him tight against his chest.
Because, if he had indeed failed his introduction and made a miserable sore, bruised loser of himself, Iruka hadn't botched his. Iruka introduced himself as a strong, dependable, resilient, fiery mule who just won't shut up when he should, and Kakashi was swept off his feet.
When the chunin left at some ungodly early hour the following Tuesday, he didn't go too far either.