Store Competition

Disclaimer: This is a purely fan-made piece that is using the world and characters from Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto and is made entirely for enjoyment. No financial gain has been made in the making of this piece

Summary: Iruka's store has its annual competition and he finds himself shackled with Kakashi for it

Author's Note: Written for BobbyTeenager. Alternate universe, possible out-of characterness, and random illogicalness

Constructive Criticism is always welcomed

Published: 8 February 2009

Rating: T

Iruka sipped his root beer and waited to see what this year's company competition would be. He had high hopes for this one because Kotetsu and Izumo had signed up to be in charge of that part of the company's meeting and they always made things interesting.

Also, once the competition started, he could get away from his Evil Incarnate Boss, Kakashi.

He could feel the bastard's eyes watching him, waiting for yet another chance to harass Iruka. Because of the jerk, he had given up his kohl and tight jeans at work. It just was not worth the effort of dealing with the asshole and his muttering about policy.

He still hadn't figured out why Kakashi had it out for him or what he had done to make the man go after him so ruthlessly, but it seemed that everyone else knew. Kotetsu would snigger, Izumo would roll his eyes, Anko would call him a thick-headed Captain Oblivious, and Ibiki would just stare at him and say 'I think that it's rather obvious'. Genma and Raidou weren't any help, either. Kurenai would only pat his shoulder while Asuma would hand him the employee handbook, saying maybe things would make more sense if he review a policy or two, specifically the ones about the company's take on relationships.

"Okay, it's time to prove who's competent and who isn't!" Anko yelled over the crowd and Iruka felt a sense of dread settle in his stomach. Anko was in on the competition planning? Goddamn it. All of his hopes for a fun, pleasant competition flew out the window; Anko was a bulldozer and she would have flattened any good ideas from Kotetsu and Izumo.

Plus, she would have found a way to make things less than family friendly.

"We've set up a course for everyone here that will test you in the core principles of the store!" Anko bellowed, ignoring the fact that the space was quiet.

"Tests in cashiering, customer service, reshelving, zoning, and of course—"

"Your speed and accuracy will be factored in." Kotetsu finished Izumo's sentence.

"Everything will be judged by Anko, Kotetsu, me, and Tsunade," Izumo said. "Managers will be participating as well, and the prize for placing will be a gift certificate, as well as an extra ten percent off of your employee discount for the next month for first place"—an excited murmur ran through the crowd at this—"And that will be in effect over Employee Discount Days, as well."

"Think about it folks—you could win an extra ten percent off the forty percent they have during Discount Days! Imagine what you could save on your holiday shopping!" Kotetsu added gleefully, clearly loving the effect his words were having.

Iruka felt his eyes glaze a little at the prospect. The gift cards—usually generous—would be enough to drive the competition, but the promise at an extra discount over the company's generous holiday policy? He wondered how many bodies and ruined books he was going to have to clean up after all was said and done.

Still, an extra ten percent…

"You'll be working in pairs—pre-selected, so don't even think about it, Sarutobi!" Anko's loud voice brought Iruka back to reality. He watched as the bearded man give the boisterous woman a nasty look, but made no more attempts to grab Kurenai as a partner. "And to not only represent the bonds of teamwork and dedication that we share with our co-workers, but to stop any one team from cheating or having one person do all the work…" With a flourish, she grabbed a hand from both Izumo and Kotetsu and before they could react, she had handcuffed them together. "..You'll be stuck to your partner until the whole thing's over!"

Where the hell did she come up with these ideas?

Not that Iruka ever wanted to really know, but really. Handcuffs? That's what the money was being spend on? Whatever was wrong with giving a few of the part-timers more hours or getting handicapped-accessible doors?

"And before you worrywarts"—here she glared at Iruka—"start yammering on about misplaced funds and crap like that, all of these are mine."

"Too much information!" Someone yelled over the groans and scandalised yelps.

"Shut up or I'm gonna keep the first place prize for myself!" The group fell silent instantly. "Good. Now, here are the teams!"

Kurenai didn't look thrilled when she ended up with Gai (who was loudly announcing how Youthful and Brilliant the competition was) and Asuma appeared to be just as excited at the prospect at being Tsume's partner.

As the pool of possible partners dwindled, Iruka began to worry. His hopes for being attached to someone he liked and was good were vanishing rapidly. Crap, at this rate, he was going to end up with—

"And Iruka and Kakashi!"

Iruka stared at his former friends, ignoring the cries of 'no fair!' and 'why even have a competition if you're just gonna put those two together?!' He couldn't believe that they had just done this to him. How could they! Genius or not, Kakashi was going to make his life miserable. The man hated him, and now they had to spend the next hour or so cuffed to each other?

Iruka imagined hell would be something like this.

He stared at his wrist forlornly. Maybe he could claim the root beer had made him sick...?

Kakashi gave him a nasty look when he didn't start running towards their checklist.

"I saw Kotetsu in the Children's section and the Hobbies/Craft section earlier and Izumo futzing around in Newsstand," Iruka said by way of explanation, "and I'm pretty sure I saw Anko sulking in from Sexuality section. I can almost guarantee those will be the sections that people will have to recover."

"And you think you'll be special enough to get them, don't you."

"Well, I certainly don't think we're going to be lucky enough to get something like Bestsellers or Fiction," Iruka observed, pointedly trying to ignore Kakashi's snarky tone and trying to see what their list said. Sure enough, they were slotted to recover Sexuality and Children's. Sexuality wouldn't have been anything more than an extreme annoyance if he had been paired with anyone other than Kakashi (he didn't care how well the jerk knew the section; the bastard was always making comments that made Iruka's ears bleed) and he normally would have been thrilled to have Children's, but Kakashi had a tremendous dislike of children and all things children-related.

"Do you think you'll be able to handle the register part without your usual inability to count getting in the way?" Kakashi's indolent voice broke Iruka from his thoughts as he started dragging the younger man towards the front of the store.

Iruka swallowed (with difficulty) his nasty response. "Maybe you'd like to do the money handling part," he offered blandly instead, "seeing as you tend try to avoid actually talking to the customer?"

A single grey eye shot him a dirty look. "Fine, you can do that part. But don't think you can get away with not mentioning the card, like you have with the last two secret shops."

Iruka grit his teeth, but didn't get a chance to say anything because they had reached the front of the store. Determinedly, he pasted a smile on his face. Knowing Anko, she'd probably dock them points because Iruka was something like unnecessarily or inappropriately cheerful, but he figured losing points would be better than losing his job. He was dangerously close to strangling someone, and that someone wore an eye patch and was currently cuffed to Iruka's left hand.

Kakashi seemed to go out of his way to make the rest of the competition miserable. He kept reading sections from Icha Icha aloud while Iruka tried to straighten the shelves. He wouldn't touch anything with Elmo, Dora, Harry Potter, Clique girls, Hannah Montana, Edward Cullens, or a markdown sticker on it, grumbling loudly as Iruka dragged him back—again—to put said things back in Children's. He wouldn't pick up the 'phone' when it started to 'ring' and he mocked Iruka when he tried to help the 'customers'. He stood too close to Iruka, deliberately changed his pace so Iruka was always rushing to keep his arm attached or crashing into the jerk, and he gave Iruka pitying looks when Iruka had to scan something to see where it would go. It wasn't fair that Kakashi had photographic memory and Iruka didn't.

He almost snarled at Izumo when he shoved the checklist at him. His former friend wisely kept his mouth shut.

He stuck his wrist out impatiently when Izumo made no move to remove the damn handcuffs.

His co-worker looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Anko's the only one who's got keys," he mumbled. "And I don't think right now's a good time to bother her."

Iruka decided—carpool or no—that Izumo and Kotetsu were walking home tonight.

Growling. he dragged his evil boss over to a table and tried to sit as far away as he could and still have his arm attached to his body. Unfortunately, Kakashi couldn't take a hint and sat WAY too close. He then proceeded to point out everything Iruka had done wrong.

Just when it had gotten to the point where Iruka was convinced no jury in the universe could—or would—find him guilty of murder, Kakashi shut his big, fat mouth. The lack of abuse was unexpected, but greatly welcomed. He didn't have to worry about losing his job over killing Kakashi!

Kakashi cleared his throat and Iruka ignored it. He didn't care if his Boss from Hell was uncomfortable with the lack of interaction between them; in fact, the less interaction between the two of them, the better. Any more belittlement or disparagement and Iruka was going to snap.

"How's book two of Journal of a Dumb Sissy been doing?"

Iruka eyed the other man. "Diary of a Wimpy Kid," he corrected warily. "And it's the third in the series."

"Right, The Camel's Back."

"The Last Straw. It's been doing fine." He tried to keep the suspicious out of his voice. Kakashi was seeming genuine and pretending that he was a normal human who really was interested in Children's books; what was he up to now?

"How's that other book been doing? The one about the kid? Who has a sword? With magic?"

"You're going to have to be more specific." Was Kakashi actually making an attempt to be nice to Iruka? Was he trying not to be the biggest dickwad ever?

Kakashi awkwardly scratched the back of his head. "The one with the monsters?" It was obvious that the man was putting forwards some effort to have a conversation, but to what end, Iruka couldn't figure it out. This was the first time since he had started working here that his manager had ever made even the smallest attempt to not to be a bastard.

He was spared any more awkwardness by Anko loudly announcing the scores were in. Third place went to Chouza and Ibiki, and then another bombshell was dropped. "There's a tie for second place," Anko bellowed, "so we have to have a tie-breaker to see who comes in first and who doesn't!"

Iruka found himself being dragged to the front by Kakashi to face Gai and Kurenai. The woman caught his eye and rolled hers in sympathy. Both of them could see their partners gearing up for whatever challenge Anko had thought up for them.

"You have to kiss your partner," she declared and a wave of sniggers followed it.

"I have a boyfriend!" Kurenai protested loudly.

"I do Not think that this an Honourable Way to end such a Noble Competition, especially with People having Wonderful and Established Relationships—"

"BOYFRIEND, Anko! NOT dildo attached to cardboard cut-out!"

"Fuck this," Iruka muttered. He was sick of Anko and her games. He was tired of being attached to Kakashi. He was annoyed at the free entertainment at his expense.

He reached up, grabbed the back of Kakashi's head, and mashed their mouths together viciously. He let go, and glared at the suddenly-silent Anko. "We won. Give us the damn prizes and unlock us."

She recovered faster than the rest of the room did. "Well, well, Iruka! You dog! I never knew you had it in—"

Iruka seized the front of her shirt and yanked. "Unlock. Me. NOW."

She meekly did so.

Iruka stormed passed Kakashi, who still looked stunned and hadn't moved since Iruka had taken the situation into his own hands. Nobody said anything to him as he returned to his seat and he knew the next week or so, his co-workers would be tiptoeing around him.

He glared at the front of the room and decided Anko would be the first to feel his wrath. Gift certificate and extra ten percent or not, she had orchestrated a good part of this mess and thus would be the first to fall.

He had the feeling that she was going to be on the porn-in-the-bathroom cleanup crew a lot in the future.

x Fin x