I'm sorry about the long wait between updates once again. This chapter is longer than usual though, so I hope it'll at least make up for the delay a bit. (smile)
And because you didn't leave an email address for me to reply your review,
To Senna-chan: Yeah, Kakashi makes a quite an old man, doesn't he? (grin) I'm glad you liked it.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
For as long as he could remember, Kakashi had always enjoyed mornings. There was something about the soft, peaceful glow of dawn that neither the heated bustle of day nor the faded shadows of night could quite match up to.
But by the tenth day since their arrival, Kakashi was starting to seriously dislike mornings.
Or perhaps, there just wasn't a lot about Takigakure mornings to like, he thought sourly as he sat in bed, propped up against the adjacent wall, twirling a kunai absently with one hand. The weapon was a comforting weight and the rhythmic thump of the well-worn handle against his palm was a pleasant distraction. Still, his eye was sullen and hooded as he watched the weak, grayish light seep in between the blinds to crawl across the floor of Iruka's side of the room.
It had snowed during the night, tapering off into rain that beat an irregular staccato against the window pane. There was a faint creak somewhere above as the aged timber of the old building protested the weight of the freshly fallen snow.
Kakashi glowered, his fingers gave an involuntary twitch of irritation at the incessant noise and he almost nicked himself on the kunai. He cursed, focusing instead on the calming, repetitive motions of spinning the kunai in his hand to take the edge of his frustration.
In all fairness, he wasn't annoyed with their living arrangements. The apartment they had moved into may be small and rundown, but it was at least warm and nicely suited for their purpose. Old and falling apart with disrepair, the apartment building was not favored by the general populace unless they were too poor to afford to live elsewhere. There were only a few elderly couples living one floor above and an old lady at the far end of the corridor, all of whom seldom left their apartments.
Situated in one of the more deserted districts, their movements were less likely to be observed by some unwitting passer-by. It provided the normalcy they needed to maintain their cover, at the same time, gave them the freedom and privacy to carry out their work.
Iruka had chosen well.
Naturally, they caused a bit of a stir the first day they moved in. Curious and eager for gossip, their elderly neighbors descended on their doorstep, armed with homemade cakes and well-intentioned concern. They soaked up their story easily, nodding and fussing like doting grandparents and went away filled with nothing but sympathy for that sweet young man and his ailing father.
Hidden in their room under the pretense of being gravely injured, Kakashi had listened as Iruka politely offered them tea, graciously accepted their well-wishes, and cheerfully fed them lies.
It was chilling to hear the way Iruka's voice expertly softened with a hint of sad inflection as he spoke of the terrible accident that had injured his father. It had shocked him to hear how artfully the chunin manipulated the visitors, effortlessly striking that perfect tone of filial devotion designed to ensnare the trust of his kind, unsuspecting audience. The chunin's performance was flawless, readily drawing forth gentle murmurs of comfort and compassion, leaving their visitors completely charmed by the well-executed charade of warm sincerity.
It made Kakashi sick to the gut.
Tsunade was right; Iruka had a way with people. But to hear him speak so easily, smooth lies and stories slipping glibly off his tongue as he wove his deception with professional ease…it just felt so wrong.
It was such a far cry from the earnest and often exasperatingly innocent schoolteacher, so different from the kind, generous man he knew, it made him nauseous to think that perhaps the good-hearted man was actually a pretense.
And perhaps he had never known the real Iruka after all…
Then, Iruka had come into the room with a sad sort of emptiness in his eyes. The chunin gave him a questioning look when he saw him crouched behind the bedroom door, listening in on the conversations.
What had been going through his mind must have shown on his face, unmistakable even though he still wore his mask. Between one heartbeat and the next, the emptiness turned to hurt; Iruka closed his eyes and looked away.
Kakashi startled, rising to his feet in a hurry, his chest constricting. For the first time, he fully realized what the chunin had meant when he said going undercover was never easy, finally understood with painful clarity just how much spywork took out of Iruka.
His heart was leaden with guilt, to have doubted, to have judged Iruka like this; when the chunin was never so harsh with him.
There's the job and there's the person, as Iruka had told him once after he had completed a particularly bloody mission. He may be an assassin by profession but he lived his life as Kakashi, Iruka had said, smiling as he pressed a kiss to his bruised knuckles, and it was enough that Kakashi was a good person.
He had never admitted to Iruka before, but those simple words that night had touched him more than he could ever imagine. They lingered in his mind, in his heart and he basked in the warm feeling of something inside him healing when he hadn't even noticed the hurt he carried.
Now the tables were turned and it was his turn to repay the kindness, but he was making a spectacular mess of it. Trying not to seem too flustered, he strove to salvage the situation anyway, awkwardly mumbling something about 'the job and the person'. In retrospect, he must have made no sense because Iruka gave him a thoroughly confounded look.
But the chunin must have understood the sentiment, if not the meaning, of his words.
For he smiled, face lighting up with a look of relief, straightening as though a weight had lifted off his shoulders. It caught Kakashi by surprise that his opinion of the chunin mattered so much to the man. Bowing his thanks, Iruka's dark eyes had glimmered briefly with an emotion the jounin could not name but made his heart beat a little faster all the same.
Yet, in the end, that was the only thing he could do for Iruka.
Kakashi frowned, feeling the frustration in him rising once more. Raking a hand through his hair, his gaze slid to the spill of light from the bathroom door, listening to the splash of water against the sink as he tried his best not to feel angry at his teammate.
The tap squeaked close and Iruka emerged a moment later with a towel slung over one shoulder, smoothing a hand along his freshly shaven jaw. Stoically ignoring Kakashi's wrathful glare, he pulled the towel and his t-shirt off, dropping them both onto his bed. Selecting a shirt from the closet, he stubbornly refused to glance at him, although he must be fully aware of the jounin's resentment directed at him.
Of course he was aware. Kakashi's eye narrowed as he gave the kunai in his hand a particularly viscous spin. After all, they had been doing this every morning for the past ten days.
In impassive silence, Iruka dressed himself, straightening his collar and smoothing the cuffs of the crisp blue shirt over his wrists before buttoning up the shirt. Kakashi watched him in equally grim silence, although he couldn't help but feel a touch of admiration for his teammate.
It didn't matter if he was to assume the guise of a ruffian or a nobleman, Iruka always took meticulous care to look the part. Nothing fancy like wigs or fake noses as Kakashi had thought disguises to be, but the chunin always incorporated small details and clever little touches that somehow made him turn out looking exactly right.
Today, he was a sharply dressed bureaucrat, exuding authority and holding enough clearance for some of the highest security archives. It had been painstaking work filtering the gossips of the lower-ranked chunin, carefully learning the way things were run in Takigakure, snooping around for the information they needed; all the while suffering the strain of being discovered.
And Iruka refused to let him help with any of it.
Or rather, he could not help with any of it.
Kakashi pressed his lips together into a grim line beneath his mask, bitter and angry although he was knew most of that anger was with himself.
Iruka ignored his murderous intent, busying himself with unfolding a pair of glasses from a slim black case, slipping the delicate wire frame onto his face. The tight line of his jaw was the only indication he was bothered by his teammate's dark mood.
But as he stood in front of the mirror to drag a comb through his hair, he caught Kakashi's eye in the reflection and frowned.
"Stop that."
"Stop what?" He tilted his head a little to the side in perfect innocence. The kunai in his hand spun soundlessly.
"I don't have time for this." Iruka growled. One eye twitched in badly concealed irritation and he finished putting up his hair with a harsh tug at his ponytail. Whirling around, he stood glaring at Kakashi. "Stop sulking!"
"I'm not sulking." He drawled pleasantly and beamed. "I'm just wondering if you'll let me go with you today."
Iruka groaned. "We've been over this many times already, Kakashi."
"Indulge me, sensei."
"You can't come with me. You can't even leave this apartment, because you're too well-known." Drawing a deep breath, the chunin tried to rehash their old argument with a reasonable tone. "Think about it…the hair, the mask, the Sharingan for goodness sake!"
The kunai snapped to an abrupt stop as he clenched his fist.
"Then tell me what the hell am I here for!" Kakashi spat out, voice low and dangerous with anger.
Iruka sighed and folded his arms, pressing one hand to his forehead.
The chunin looked tired. The silver framed glasses made him look stern and scholarly, they made the sparkle in his intelligent eyes even more brilliant and keen, but they couldn't hide the shadows of fatigue under his eyes.
For all the assistance from Intel, they quickly found out that the codes Ibiki supplied were only good enough for the relatively unimportant records. As Iruka delved deeper into the archives for clues about the attack on the academy, the security became tighter. The codes failed, the encryption became more guarded and complex. Written in obscure Waterfall dialects and held together in an intricate, incomprehensible web of cross-references, the records Iruka managed to duplicate and bring back kept the weary chunin up most of the night, working at the cipher and translating the documents.
It pained Kakashi and put him on edge knowing that he could do absolutely nothing to help.
He could not brave the dangers for Iruka and go out gathering information. He knew too little of cryptology to be anything but a hindrance to the chunin when deciphering the codes.
He was basically useless on this mission.
In the last few years, he had always run missions as team leader or went on solo assignments. He was always the one who made decisions, the one in control of the mission, constantly in the thick of action.
Now he could only wait. Wait and worry, the inactivity was wearing him down.
That's why he hated playing back-up. How could he protect his teammate when he was not with him? How could he keep Iruka safe when he had no idea what the chunin risked to get them the information they need?
It made him restless, filled with a terrible helpless frustration, caged in by the walls around him day after day until he thought he would surely go mad.
Iruka's gaze softened with understanding. "I'm sorry, Kakashi." He said quietly, expression sympathetic but firm. "I know this is hard on you, but we're both important to this mission. You can't do my job for me, no more than I can help with your duties."
"My duties?" His voice was heavy with sarcasm. "Bring your body back to Konoha when you're dead, hm?"
"Kakashi…" The chunin looked stricken. He sighed and shook his head.
"You were right, you know." He smiled when Kakashi raised a quizzical brow. "That night by the fire? You were right to say you don't care what happens to me because your job here is not to protect me."
Looking him directly in the eye, Iruka went on seriously. "You're here to protect the information. My job is to find the information and get it to you." He shrugged matter-of-factly. "You're stronger, far more skilled, have a better chance of escape. I'm dispensable. If I can't get away, as long as you can, as long as you can escape with the information back to the village, nothing else matters."
The words wrapped like an icy fist around his heart and Kakashi suddenly found he could not breathe for he recognized the cold truth in them.
Swallowing hard, he looked away so that Iruka would not see the anguish in his eye.
"I get it. Don't lecture me." He muttered irritably, the sudden anxiety making his voice harsh and almost snide. "Save it for when you actually find something useful for me to protect."
It was almost routine now, the same old lines they always spoke when they argued over their roles in this mission, but this particular retort still managed to hit a nerve with Iruka.
"I'm working on it alright?" Iruka snapped. Pulling on his coat, he strode angrily to the window. With one hand resting against the window, he paused for a moment, turning back to glare at him, brown eyes filled with indignance and injured pride.
"We're teammates, partners. Just as I trust you to get away with the information when I find it, can't you trust me to do my job?" He ground out heatedly, voice shaking a little with emotion. "I may only be a chunin, but I know what I'm doing."
"I will not be a liability, I will not jeopardize the mission and I will find what we came for."
With that, he pushed the window open and disappeared into the freezing rain.
Kakashi stared morosely at the spot where Iruka last stood. Then, he got up and crossed the room to close the window. Leaning against the wall beside the window, he stood for a long moment watching the rain trace small streams that diverged and come together as it trickled down the glass. The world outside was a grey, watery blur.
Closing his eyes, he leaned his forehead against the cool window pane and took a calming breath. The prolonged confinement to the apartment had addled his mind. That must be the reason the words all came out wrong, that what he said never sounded like what he meant; that must be why he always ended up making Iruka upset when the chunin was already under so much stress.
With a sigh, he sat himself down at the desk, absently tidying up the scraps of paper covered with symbols and Iruka's scribbles, setting the empty mug with coffee stains over them to weight them down.
He couldn't do much to help Iruka, he thought grimly as he slipped the earpiece of the radio transceiver into place and turned the device on. But what he could do, he would do it with his best efforts.
There was a brief burst of static, then the sound of rain and chatter of the crowd, their voices distant and indistinct. Iruka was walking through the streets then, the sound of the chunin's breathing mingled with the other noises, regular and comforting.
Kakashi bit his lip, adjusting the mouthpiece nervously, wondering what he should say.
Iruka spoke first, very quietly. "Hey, you there?"
"Yeah." Kakashi relaxed a little. The chunin didn't sound as angry as he did before he left.
There was a pause. "Look, sorry about just now. I was out of line…"
He winced, feeling ashamed. "Forget about that, I'm sorry I brought it up. Focus and stay alert. You don't want to be messing up now." He chided gently.
A disbelieving huff and he could just imagine Iruka rolling his eyes along with the long-suffering sigh.
"Yes Captain, whatever you say." There was a smile in the chunin's voice. "But when I get back, I'm going to-"
He broke off, then in a decidedly louder voice, he heard Iruka greet someone. "Ah, good morning!"
Kakashi rolled his eyes and endured the couple of minutes as Iruka exchanged pleasantries with someone, pen and paper poised in hand as he listened in on the conversation for anything useful.
It was dangerous for Iruka to wear a wire, but the chunin reasoned that they needed to keep in radio contact in case he was discovered and wanted to relay any information he might find immediately.
The idea of such a possibility chilled Kakashi right down to his marrow.
But he had agreed, grudgingly, although for an entirely different reason. It was reassuring to hear Iruka's voice, knowing that he was fine even though he could not be with him. The build-in tracer showed him the rough coordinates of the chunin and the little red light moving across the screen calmed him with the knowledge that he could go to Iruka's aid should his teammate encounter any trouble.
The little red light made an abrupt ninety degrees turn and started moving south.
"You'll try the south wing first then?" He followed the path of the light, doodling on the paper to make a vague sketch of the layout of the building.
"Yes." Iruka sounded a bit tense and Kakashi knew he was nearing the sentries guarding some entrance or other.
"What I read last night suggest it's the likeliest place." He sighed wearily. "This place is huge, it'll take a while."
"But I will definitely find it, okay?" He added peevishly.
Their earlier quarrel was forgiven but clearly not forgotten.
"Yes, sensei." He smiled ruefully.
Cradling the little monitor in both hands as he listened to the chunin speak with confident authority to the guards, his smile faded to a worried frown.
It wasn't that he was afraid Iruka wouldn't succeed.
He was just terrified Iruka would try to succeed…at all costs.
Several hours later, Iruka still had not found anything useful. There were long periods of time where neither of them spoke as the chunin tried to find his way around the maze of the administrative building, mingling with the administrative staff; the crowd making any communication too risky. There were even longer stretches of silence as Iruka searched the shelves of the archives for the right document and translating the texts took up most of his concentration.
Kakashi kept an ear out for the chunin's activities as he puttered around the house, half-heartedly making some lunch for himself and lazing in bed re-reading his favorite passages from Icha Icha Paradise.
It was late afternoon when he heard a soft but distinct exclamation.
"Oh."
The chunin's tone was thoughtful and a little excited.
Instantly, Kakashi sat up, eyes flashing to the monitor. The little red light was somewhere east of this morning's position. "Iruka?"
"I think this might be it."
"Good." Suddenly, he couldn't help but break into a grin. The long wait was over, they could finally leave this god-forsaken place and head home. "Come back. I'll get ready for us to leave the moment you get here."
"Wait." There was a low mumble which he knew meant Iruka was translating the scroll. Then, his teammate bit off a curse, anxious and angry. "This is not all of it, there's a second part."
"Find it."
"I know, genius." He heard paper fluttering through the receiver as the chunin thumbed through his notebook of codes, then another curse. "Damn! The code's different again. I need time to decipher it."
"Then make a copy and come back."
"No, just give me a moment, I can do this. The second part should be close by. I just need to decipher this to know exactly where it is."
"It's too risky to stay in one spot that long, you idiot!"
"Quiet and let me work!" There was faint scratching as Iruka started writing furiously.
All of a sudden, the scratching stopped and his breath went very, very still.
"Someone's coming."
"What?" Kakashi's eyes went wide with alarm. A sharp thrill of fear ran down his spine. He pressed the earpiece harder against his ear, turning up the volume to catch his teammate's low voice. "Get out of there, Iruka!"
"Can't." The schoolteacher sounded breathless and frightened. "They're blocking the only exit."
"Then jutsu yourself out of there!"
"No, it'll blow our cover. We need to come back here tomorrow to look for that last scroll."
Kakashi growled at his partner's stubbornness. "If they catch you, it'll all be over!" He barked into the mouthpiece of the transceiver, voice harsh with terror, trying to use the one thing that might convince the chunin. "Don't jeopardize the mission!"
"I won't, damn it! Just let me think for a minute…"
Everything was happening too fast, spinning out of control. His heart was pounding so loudly in his ears, he could barely hear Iruka's whispered replies.
Taking a deep breath to calm himself, Kakashi realized he was gripping the edge of the table so hard, his fingertips were white. Forcing himself to relax his grip, he shut his emotions away and slipped with practiced ease into the composure he always had when dealing with crisis in the field.
His eyes darted to the monitor, matching Iruka's relative position to the mental map he had made of the administrative building. "Okay, hold your position. Try to stall them, I'm on my way."
"Don't! Don't you dare!" Iruka hissed vehemently. There was a slight rattling sound and he could hear the chunin moving around. "They haven't discovered me yet but if you come here, our cover will definitely be blown."
"But-"
"I have a plan, okay?" He was panting a bit, quick and nervous but his voice was filled with steely determination. "Everything will be fine. Trust me, please."
Kakashi bit his lip, then said solemnly. "Fine. Tell me what to do."
"Okay, the first part of the record mentioned the explosive tags planted in the academy but said it was to serve as a distraction." Iruka's voice was brisk and business-like. "They left something else in the village, something huge…"
The chunin swallowed audibly. "…something that would kill us all."
Kakashi's blood turned to ice. "What is it?"
"I don't know, that's why we need the second part of the record."
There was a brief pause as though Iruka was bracing himself for what he was about to say next. "Listen, I think I should be fine. But if I'm not back in five hours, leave immediately and take what I told you back to Tsunade-sama."
"No! Iruka!"
"The village is in danger. Go warn them. I'm dispensable, don't come after me."
"I-"
"Have you been listening to a word I've said these past ten days?" The chunin's voice was seething with fury and urgency, trying to make him understand.
"You are here to protect the information, so do your damn job!"
Kakashi clutched the earpiece close like a lifeline, holding onto the sound of Iruka's voice as though it was the chunin himself.
He didn't want to let go, he never want to let go.
But he knew what he must do.
There was lump choking his throat but somehow he managed to speak past it, expressing his agreement in a clear, emotionless tone. "I understand."
"Right." Iruka sniffed, his voice suddenly trembling. For a moment, there was nothing but the soft whisper of the chunin's breathing and the sound of his own heartbeat.
"Kakashi, I…" Iruka hesitated.
There was a world of emotion in the silence and he suddenly found himself desperate to hear what the chunin wanted to say, yet terrified to hear what it was that made Iruka's voice tremble like that.
It sounded too much like goodbye. It reminded him too much of that bright spring morning when Iruka's voice had also brimmed with emotion like this as he held him close, before his beloved had been taken from his life.
But whatever it was he wanted to say, Iruka must have decided against it. There was forced brightness when he spoke next. "I…I'll see you in a bit, okay?"
Without waiting for his answer, the radio crackled and went dead. The little red light blinked once and went out.
And then, there was only silence.
