Unexpected
Tsunade's POV
Genma gave me and Shizune a brief tour of the Hokage tower, telling us where various things were stored and who we could ask for what. "Well, that's pretty much it. If you need anything else just ask one of the mission room workers who look like they know what they're doing." I merely raised one of my eyebrows at his comment- which had been accompanied by a smirk- before shooing him out with a dismissive hand wave. Two hours later found Shizune checking the hospitals facilities while I drowned in a pile of paperwork.
"... However, if said shinobi's mental stability were to decline steps to avoid possible defection would be taken in respects to their current ranking and ability. Furthermore..." I tossed one of the council scrolls to the side of the room. Kami, I forgot how much I hate council-es; the language of elders who all had a permanent stick up their asses. Most of the paperwork was introductory and preliminary crap that I had to deal with before I could actually do anything that resembled Hokage work. I leafed through a pamphlet that explained the more 'trusted' mission room workers. Aka, the ones that had high security access, worked in the background, and more or less kept Konoha stable. My minions, I smirked slightly at the term. A quick look back at the piles of paperwork currently consuming all floor space in the room saw my smirk replaced by a grimace. Hmm, priorities; one: find some sake. Two: do something about this mess. I walked the short distance from my office, figuring I could find someone there who knew the whereabouts of something alcoholic. Instead, I was amused to find some puffed up Jounin- who I recognized as an ex- ANBU member- getting chewed out for an apparently horrible mission report by a brunet chunin.
"The only thing written on here is 'The mission was boring.' Now please stop wasting my time and re-do it." The big Jounins complaints were cut off as the brunet threw a senbon towards the doorway; near where I was currently standing. She ended up pinning a mission report to the wall, snatching it out of a nins hands. I think Genma had said his name was Aobi- or something like that. "Aoba, if I can see lipstick smeared across your mission report from all the way over here, then you should know it's not acceptable." Both Jounin scurried away from the demonic brunet as she settled back in her seat, leafing through some papers and jotting down a few notes. Well, she looks like she knows what she's doing. The brunet looked up as I walked towards her. "Ah, Hokage-sama. Is there anything I can do for you."
She was smiling pleasantly so I returned it with one of my own. "Yes. Miss-..." I trailed off, waiting for her to fill in the blank. The smile on the brunets face faltered noticeably and one of the other shinobi working in the mission room fell over cackling.
The brunet shot a glare towards and nin currently trying to crawl back into their chair. "Shut up, Kotetsu." She then turned her attention back to me "Umino. Iruka Umino. And," she seemed hesitant to say anything else but continued her thought anyway, "I'm a guy."
Shit. Well that explained both of their- er- interesting reactions.
"Sorry about that Iruka-san. Genma said that if I needed any help I could ask you guys..." I trailed off, not really knowing if I should be asking help froma guy that I just mistook for a girl. He seemed to brighten noticeably at the prospect of the subject moving away from his questionable gender.
"Quite alright. What do you need help with, Hokage-sama?"
A brief glance down at the paperwork on the desk in front of the brunet showed neat and orderly work. Maybe this Iruka could help me with the flood of crap the council dumped on me. "Are you any good with paperwork?"
"Very."
Another half hour later resulted in a large portion of the mess being on it's way to it's respective destinations. The rest was organized and sorted into manageable piles.
"I can breath!" I was wilting in my chair and in desperate need of some sake but at least now there was a light at the end of the tunnel. Picking up a document from one of the closer piles I brought my head down to meet with my desk. Ow.
"Hokage-sama?" Iruka asked worriedly.
"I never asked, what's you security level clearance?" The question was hesitant; I didn't really want to know the answer, because- preliminary or not- some of this stuff was above for level six and seven security access only.[1]
"Oh, is that all? Officially it's a six, but I'm really at a seven. That's just off the records, though." I dropped the glass of water I had just picked up. Not even paying attention as glass shards and water droplets cascaded over the edge of my desk. Some catching the light; sparkling brilliantly as they continued their decent.
"You're kidding, right?" I don't bother waiting for an answer seeing as I had just had an epiphany. "Wait, you're the one the council mentioned, right? They never gave me a name so I wasn't really sure who it was."
"That's me; the councils personal gopher." His tone reflected sarcasm but the smile on his face showed he wasn't really bent out of shape about it."
"Okay, so tell me a bit about yourself gopher-san." I desperately needed a break and this seemed as good an excuse as any.
He chuckled slightly at the nick name while settling on the floor, his back against the wall opposite me. "Well, I'm an academy teacher, the mission room is just a part time thing. I'm officially a chunin but that's just a cover. I'm also an active member of ANBU, I specialize in assassination, infiltration, traps, T & I, and anything that explodes. I have over a quarter of the information from the Gyre[2] memorized. Mostly information on ANBU and our resident clans, past and present. I'm the unofficial guardian of Naruto Uzmaki. Oh, and I'm blind."
"Damn." Well that's a lot to take in. Wait; blind? "If you're blind then how did you sort all these?" I gestured to the papers that were piled in order of priority, also alphabetically.
"I picked up a few tricks along the way." He gave me a grin that I had labeled as Naruto's 'fox grin,' and scooched to the side as the door cracked open. Shizune poked her head in and looked slightly taken aback by the general neatness in the room. "Ah, Shizune. This is Iruka, Iruka, Shizune. Shizune, Iruka." Iruka stood to greet her, offering out his hand.
"Iruka-san, pleasure." she smiled and took Iruka's offered hand, shifting Tonton in her arms.
"The pleasure is mine Shizune-san. Tonton-san." He also greeted the small pig resting lazily in Shizune's arms.
"Oh, have you met Tonton before?" Shizune asked curiously.
Rubbing the back of his head sheepishly, Iruka replied. "Well, Iwashi came running through the mission room, with her latched onto his arm, screaming something about Tonton biting him for trying to pet her..." He trailed off and I stifled a laugh as Shizune got one of those 'Oh, that's what happened' looks on her face.
"Well, I really should get back to the mission room before someone lights the fan on fire again. Everything alright here Hokage-sama?"
"Yes, thank you for all your help Iruka." I watched as the chunin disappeared out the door, a smile now on my face. Maybe this job wouldn't be as bad as I thought.
~Finis~
AN:
1) I just made up my own security level chart-thingy. It's probably not accurate but here it is.
Civilian/ Pre- Genin – 0
Pre- Genin/ Genin – 1
Chunin – 2
Higher level Chunin/ Jounin – 3
Tokubetsu Jounin/ ABNU – 4
Mission room nin (some)/ABNU captains/Special case nins – 5
Archive Keepers – 6
Hokage/ Council – 7
2) I also came up with names for the Konoha archives. Being:
Play-ground – Lowest level of security
Maze – Middle level of security
Gyre – Highest security in Kohona
Hope you enjoyed. I love Iruka and think he is secretly behind most the happenings in Konoha. Please Review!