Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. I'm tired of explaining why.


Administration of Love

"I see," Tsunade said. She struggled to hide a grin at the fuming ninja standing before her. On normal days, Ibiki wasn't in a very good mood anyway. Today, his mood could be described as one of the lower pits of Hell. Gai's battered body, which had been dragged into her office by the offended shinobi, gave ample testimony to that. Even now, he was emitting a continual chain of soft groans as he struggled to remain on two feet.

"Well, the poster campaign was a bit excessive, I would say," she agreed affably, smiling at them both. "After all, we can't post pictures of one of our top Jounin all over Konoha. What would our clients say?"

"Exactly my point, Hokage-sama," the scarred man's deep voice rumbled. "He has –"

"But even though the method may not have been the best, his motive was noble, though," she cut him off. Ibiki's face started to darken with suspicion. "Gai's right, Ibiki. You've been alone for far too long. If you wait any further, I may have to find another person to be my Torture and Interrogation captain."

The scowl on Ibiki's face defied description. Tsunade smiled openly at him now.

"I hereby order you to take 2 months' leave, in order to find a suitable wife for yourself."

"Hokage-sama, I must protest –"

"Just do it, Ibiki," she cut him off again. "Your job is one of the most dangerous, psychologically-speaking. If you don't have happier influences in the form of family, you may eventually become too unbalanced to sustain this role. It'll be good for you." She grinned even further. "Trust me on this."

He had no choice. "I…will obey your orders, Hokage-sama," he ground out through gritted teeth. Gai was elated – in an exhausted-looking way.

"Good!" Her smile was so transparently self-satisfied and mischievous, it was annoying to watch. "I'll tell Izumo and Kotetsu to help you in your search. They have access to all the information in our ninja database. Maybe they will be able to offer some assistance. Go and see them afterwards."

Ibiki made a last, desperate attempt. "May I ask who you are going to assign to my position during my leave of absence?" he asked, hoping that she wouldn't have anyone in mind, and hence cancel his leave. Duty was duty, after all, and his job was an important one.

She studied him, then let her eyes flicker over to Gai. Her face brightened even further. "I have an idea."

Ibiki barely restrained himself from slamming the door behind him as he dragged Maito Gai out of the Hokage's office. Snarling, he gripped the younger man's suit and spun him to face his wrathful countenance. "This is all your fault, Maito. When I get through with this, I'm going to make sure that you wish you had never been born" he hissed.

The fuzzy-eyebrowed man winced slightly. Then, the thought of painfully-sacrificing himself for such a noble cause apparently started to cheer him up. Within moments, Maito Gai was back to his usual personality and determined to repay his 'debt'. Ibiki watched it all happening and groaned inwardly.

"Ha ha! Don't worry, Morino Ibiki! I'm sure that a wife such as the one that we will find you will be able to change your anger into joy! You will no longer wish to kill me if I can bring you to the greatest happiness that is known to mankind!" Gai flashed him a smile through all the bruises. Everyone in the vicinity of the Hokage's office stared.

Muttering under his breath, Ibiki dragged the over-enthusiastic ninja to the administrative complex where Kotetsu and Izumo worked. He threw open the door to the complex with a bang. Normally, he would never be so demonstrative of his emotions. But today's events had pushed him past the limits of his endurance. Izumo looked up, unsurprised at his appearance.

"Ah, Ibiki! I heard from Hokage-sama that you're looking for a wife now," he said, as nonchalantly as he could. Ibiki merely growled and nodded. Once. Sharply. Gai, of course, disengaged himself from the other man's grip and started to explain the situation – at full volume and enthusiasm – to the entire population of the admin building. Most of them already knew, having seen the posters on the way to work. Several chuckled, while other tried to hide their smiles with varying degrees of success.

Kotetsu looked up from where he and several Kage Bunshins were quickly filling out forms in quadruplicate. "So how can we help you, Ibiki?"

Ibiki paused for a moment. He had never really given the whole marriage question much thought before. Most of it had been attempts to avoid marriage. "Just find me a kunoichi that I can live with," he said, reluctantly. Further explosions of mirth were heard. Even Gai smirked at him. "What!" he roared, annoyed.

"That's … um… not exactly the way you go about looking for a match," Izumo commented, grinning. He beckoned to a corner which held the most up-to-date computer that the admin department had gotten. "Come on, I'll walk you through the process."

Ibiki then spent the next three hours being grilled by Gai, Izumo and Kotetsu about his likes, dislikes – be more specific, please! – interests, hobbies, and life habits. At the end of it all, he breathed a sigh of relief. And he thought that his interrogation methods were a bit intense. Intense! He snorted. He should have just sent his victims over to the Admin building. They could do a far better job of working over a subject than he could. He brightened slightly. If nothing else, this experience had already given him a chance to learn some new ways of interrogating people. Even professionals could learn from amateurs sometimes.

"Well, that's the last of it," Kotetsu said, as he pressed the Enter key. "I've input all of your data into our Matchmaker v.4.0 program and started a search through the kunoichi database. Soon we should be able to get a list of all the girls in this village who share similar interests to yours."

Izumo sent a doubtful look at Ibiki. "Are you sure you like pets? You never struck me as the animal-loving type."

"They're good for practicing torture methods on," Ibiki answered absently, his eyes focused on the progress bar being displayed on the monitor. "There's a shortage of human corpses – and besides, it was forbidden to experiment on humans after what Orochimaru did." Izumo smacked his forehead.

The computer beeped. All four ninja leaned in closer to view the results.

"Hmm… not bad. 4 likely matches, with probabilities of 72, 80, 86 and 94," Kotetsu translated. "Wow, a 94! That's extremely rare. Most likely, that person would be your soulmate. Let's see who it is." He pressed a few more buttons to bring up the ninja's profile.

"At last, Ibiki! With the help of modern technology and your fellow shinobi, your hidden dreams will be fulfilled at last, and you shall find your soulmate!" Ibiki stretched out an arm to prevent a teary-eyed Gai from hugging him.

The profile of the 94 match came up. Everyone stared in shock. Ibiki's head was whirling. Was THAT why I had been given leave? Is there an ulterior motive to this?

"There… there must be some mistake…" Izumo stammered. "Maybe you forgot to enter some variable, or set a limit or something, Kotetsu…" His voice trailed off as the others nodded in mute agreement.

The door banged open behind them, startling them all out of their stunned disbelief. Tsunade strode into the room, spotted the group of male ninja huddled over the computer, and walked over to them.

"Ahh… at last, all that paperwork's done!" she stretched her arms and massaged them as she neared. "Ibiki! I came to check up on how your search for a wife was progressing." She waited for a response, but got irritated when they all stood gape-mouthed, eyes flickering between her and the screen. She stood on tip-toe and peered at the profile displayed on the computer's monitor.

"Hey!" she demanded. "Why are you guys looking at my picture?"