Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, blah blah..

Falling In Love

"You will be… going back?" she asked, hesitantly.

"Yes," he replied. "My leave of absence ends in a few days' time. Next week, I will have to return to my duties." They were walking together along one of the town's quiet streets, hand-in-hand. He was taking her shopping for a particular item that she wanted to get. It had been surprisingly difficult to find a replacement for Kaganu, so Ibiki had continued to serve as a seeing guide for Rei. But today her steps were slow.

"And what are those duties, exactly?" she asked. Ibiki winced inwardly. He had avoided telling her this throughout the entire six weeks. A graceful and charming diplomat such as she was didn't need to know about the "alternative" methods of information-gathering. The harsh realities of torture and interrogation which formed the core of his daily life would be out-of-place in her refined, cultured world.

"I… serve as the leader of the Torture and Interrogation Squad in my village, Rei-san," he said with a heavy heart, prepared for the loosening of the small hand in his that would indicate shock and disgust. Instead, he found that hand gripping his even tighter.

"If you thought that would surprise me, Morino Ibiki, you're still not a very good reader of people yet," she said, with a glimmer of amusement in her voice. "I've known about what you do ever since we first met. I just wanted to find out if you could find it in yourself to tell me about it."

Ibiki had to admit that he was surprised. "How did you find out? No one outside of Konoha's villagers is supposed to know about my job. It compromises our security."

"You're right… no one outside of Konoha's villagers knows about it," she twinkled merrily. "What does that mean, I wonder?"

"Are you a kunoichi on a mission under deep cover?" Ibiki asked suspiciously. If she was, she was good. She had fooled him completely into thinking she was a harmless diplomat.

Rei gave a tinkly laugh. "No, no… I'm not a ninja. They wouldn't let me study in the Academy because of my eyes. I went through training in the Fire Country's diplomatic service instead. So I really am a diplomat. But I come from a shinobi family in Konoha. That's how I knew about you."

"I see," Ibiki mused. What she said had the ring of truth to it. Plus, she didn't have the brittle-hard killing aura that enveloped most ninja of her age. Ibiki could usually sense it, no matter how well it was hidden, but Rei completely lacked any experience in the art of warfare. Her hands were clean, unlike his.

"Then, Morino Ibiki, Head of ANBU's Torture and Interrogation Squad, will you be… glad… to get back to your duties?" Rei asked lightly. Ibiki thought he detected an undercurrent of something in her voice, but she was too skilled a diplomat to let him decipher what it was. He considered her question.

"No," he said, surprised. He had thought that coming here would have been boring and dull – just a way to escape from the madness that had enveloped him in Konoha – but instead he had found the last few weeks to have been the most enjoyable he had ever had. There was a sense of peace, of fulfilment, of contentment that he had found lacking in his previous life. In fact, he found himself dreading the return to Konoha. His hand would feel empty.

That realisation shocked Ibiki to the core. He knew what it was. He had always known, in some way. But a shinobi of his experience had many layers hidden in his personality, and he was able to avoid paying attention to those layers that were screaming out the cause of his reluctance to return. Until now.

"What is it?" Rei asked. Ibiki arose out of his reverie to find that he had stopped walking, and his grip on Rei's hand was painfully tight. He turned to look at her face. How could he not have realised sooner? Her eyes, large and brown, looked up with concern at him, even though they could not see. All he ever wanted – all the things he never knew he had wanted – were found in those eyes, and the soul behind them.

"I have justexperienced something that I never knew existed," he whispered, half to himself. But Rei's sensitive ears had picked up his words, and her expression had somehow changed. Ibiki, watching her face, could suddenly read the emotions that she had been so careful to hide behind her inscrutable diplomat's mask. And he understood.

"Rei," he said gently, covering her hand with his other. "There is a question I want to ask of you." His voice started to tremble for the first time in his life, and he knew that his own emotions were flowing out through it. All the better. "Can you hear it, Rei? Can you hear and understand the question I'm trying to ask you?"

Her ears, sharp as his own when it came to detecting the nuances of each person's tone of voice, grew slightly pink as she blushed. She half-turned away from him for a second, drawing her hand out of his grasp, and Ibiki knew what true fear meant. But then, her blushing features came back to face his, and her tiny hand crept into his open palms again.

"I gave my hand to you a long time ago, Morino Ibiki," she said simply.