Title: Never Threaten a Ninja with Chocolate
Theme: Chocolate
Pairing: IruKaka/KakaIru
Genre: Romance
Rating: G
Word Count: 1,537
Summary: Iruka-centric. Iruka is contemplating Valentine's—and the result of mixing young pre-genin with chocolate—when he's interrupted by Kakashi, coming in through his window like usual.
Disclaimer: If I owned Willy Wonka's and Kakashi and Iruka...I would make chocolate ninjas, so we could all have a nice...interrupted by fangirl daydream
Beta'd by frosteeflakes!
Iruka leaned back on his couch, staring at the crack in the ceiling paint that stretched from his kitchen and continued across to his living room. He wasn't even thinking about the crack. Really. His mind floated elsewhere ever since he glanced at the calendar that morning. It was almost that time of year.
There were warning signs, of course. He had heard Sakura chatting with Ino about chocolate. Iruka winced, he hadn't really been eavesdropping...right? His ears were just really good at hearing noises around him…that were in the distance…being whispered privately. Ahem. They were ninja; of course nothing said in the middle of a street would be private! Their talk had absolutely nothing to do with his extraordinary weakness for chocolate. Especially white chocolate, not that he was admitting it or anything, no sir.
'Maybe I should make some chocolate for the pre-genin for Valentine's...' He quickly threw a kunai into that thought bubble as it hovered delicately around his head. There was a fire jutsu's chance under water that he would willingly put up with a pack of hyperactive, rabid children (with training weapons!) on a sugar high. "I could always threaten them with a test…"
"Maa, Iruka-sensei, it's not nice to threaten little children. Didn't the Third teach you anything?"
Iruka barely contained his surprise and just barely managed to stop himself from flinching. Cautiously, he cracked open one of his does eyes and peered over his shoulder toward his now-open window where a certain obnoxious silver-haired jounin crouched, his eye curved into an oblivious but happy crescent. He waved the man in, who slid inside easily with a cat-like grace and perched on the arm of the couch. "I don't feel like teaching potentially dangerous concepts and forms to hellions-in-training that just happen to be on a sugar high because of a holiday."
"Make them wait until after school. Their parents can deal with the brats then." Iruka smirked and shook his head hopelessly at the slight hostility in the older man's voice. He didn't remark at the sudden change of heart.
"Do you know how many children will be giving me puppy-dog eyes during the whole day with hopes of eating their sweets?" Iruka groaned, "I might be able to fend them off for a little while, and maybe even resist if it was just a few of them, but Konohamaru has definitely learned more than that perverted jutsu from Naruto."
"Would it make you feel better if someone got you chocolates too?" Iruka's doe eyes snapped up to the dark gray eye that twinkled at him, filled with mirth.
"Very funny, Kakashi-sensei." He stood and stretched slowly, ignoring the cold breeze that came in from the window and slid up his shirt. Two steps brought him to the window so he could close it and a few more brought him into his poor excuse for a kitchen.
Kakashi appeared beside him in an instant, preventing him from opening his refrigerator door. "We both know how your cooking turns out. Let me take you to lunch…my treat." His eye smiled for him since his face hid under his usual navy-mask.
Iruka blushed, knowing that Kakashi didn't really mean anything by it. He should be mad at the jounin for insulting his cooking...or lack of it. He sighed resignedly and nodded, "Where to?"
The potentially ominous shadows that surfaced on the man's mask gave Iruka a hint to the wide and devious grin that lay beneath it, "Ichiraku's. We can rub it in to Naruto that we had his favorite ramen while he was out training with Jiraiya."
Iruka smiled. It wasn't chocolate, but ramen was pretty close in his book (both weren't healthy for you but still amazingly yummy). "Sounds great." He smiled at the copy nin, oblivious that he melted the evil look in the other's smile.
"Then let's go." Kakashi grabbed his wrist and began to drag him out the door. Iruka barely had time to shove his feet into his sandals and grab his hitai-ate on his way out.
"What's the rush?" Iruka pried his wrist away from the jounin's hand with some difficulty, since he could tell that the man's attention was elsewhere.
"Hmm?" Kakashi glanced back at Iruka with a questioning look in his eye, before shifting his gaze and letting his shoulders ease into their usual slump. He shoved his hands in his pockets dejectedly. "Oh, sorry Iruka-sensei...I'm just...hungry."
"If you were so hungry then why did you come by my house?" Iruka barely kept up with his companion's brisk and long strides, and had to hurry a little faster every time they passed one of the female members of Konoha.
"Maa, maybe I just wanted to talk to you? We are friends, aren't we?"
Iruka's face clouded minutely, "Yes." That single word was drawn out, speaking volumes of confusion as he did so. He didn't think Kakashi was lying outright, but he wasn't telling the whole truth either. He quickly dismissed the dilemma when a familiar scent wrapped around his nostrils. Chocolate. No, not just any chocolate. This was heavenly chocolate. White chocolate.
Iruka stopped walking to get his bearings, and to find out where that wondrous chocolate aroma was coming from. He began to follow his nose, leaving a clueless jounin in his wake.
It didn't take long for his nose to lead his to a small food stand that had little chocolates out on display. His eyes glazing over in sheer ecstasy, Iruka smiled fondly at all of the tiny pieces of confectionery bliss. Chocolate of all colors and styles had been made into miniature weapons. He saw all types of kunai and throwing stars, along with katanas and kama and so many more.
"Maybe I could...get these for my class. But only if they behave all day." He started to look over the smallest ones and thought of every child individually, wondering which sweet each kid would enjoy.
"Iruka-sensei, it's not good to threaten children with candy. It's even worse to threaten young ninja with it." The wisdom was quickly forgotten as both men let their eyes wander over the sugary paradise before them. The silvery head lowered next to his and he turned toward Iruka in a cheerful eye-smile.
Iruka smirked, "And here I thought I was going to have to buy you a piece as well, if you were going to help me that is. I guess I'll just..." He let his sentence drift off as he watched an inner battle play out in the older nin's eye.
"I'll help." The answer was quick and made Iruka bite back a somewhat smug smile. He watched the jounin's single eye scan through the chocolates until it froze on a simple dark chocolate kunai. "And I'll take that one as payment."
Iruka spent the next half hour picking out chocolates for students, friends and co-workers with Kakashi. They decided to return to Iruka's apartment with the chocolate before it would surely melt. They were at the door when Iruka remembered their forgotten mission to eat at Ichiraku's. "So, Kakashi-sensei, did your plan work?"
"Plan? What plan?" Iruka grinned at the stunned look in the older man's eye.
"Your plan. It was effective, wasn't it? You wouldn't have used me otherwise." Iruka set down the chocolates on the tiny counter carefully and leaned back, his arms crossed over his chest in a very teacherly manner.
"Maa...sensei, I don't know what your—"
"Yes you do. You used my company today to fend off a good portion of the female populace of Konoha." Iruka gave him a long look as if to dare the other man to deny it. "I would have to be blind not to notice them hovering around you."
Kakashi slumped, but Iruka was sure that he saw a minute smile form beneath the dark fabric that covered part of the man's face. "You got me." He headed toward the window he had entered by over an hour ago, "I'll take my leave then."
Iruka picked up the dark chocolate kunai Kakashi had picked out and briskly walked over to the jounin. He grabbed the man's wrist and placed it in his hand. "Happy Valentine's, Kakashi-sensei." The chuunin smiled, a faint blush staining his cheeks.
"Y-yeah," Kakashi stared at him for a long moment, still crouched on the window sill. Iruka watched the mask twitch and he knew the older man was smirking at him. "Happy Single's Awareness Day, Iruka-sensei." He gave the teacher a two-fingered salute and disappeared from sight in a puff of smoke.
Iruka shut the window slowly with a small smile dancing across his lips when something hit him. "Wait...I just gave him chocolate, didn't I?" Kakashi had tricked him into actually giving it to him! Iruka slid down the wall to his knees, the blush that had meekly faded had returned, now in full force. "I...he better take his own advice and give me some for White Day. No one threatens a teacher with chocolate."