Disclaimer – If I owned Naruto, there would be a swimsuit issue.

Spoilers – This contains spoilers for the anime and manga. I am not sure of the exact chapters and episode numbers, but it is well beyond what Cartoon network is showing. It is also beyond what is released by VIZ in English manga. Specifically Chapter 172

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Water Runs Red – Chapter 23

Iruka held the sleeping Kakashi, letting himself also drift into a light sleep. The jônin needed his sleep and Iruka was not going to risk moving and waking the man up. He had about two hours before he had to start getting ready to see Tsunade so a little rest would be a good idea anyways.

He watched his sleeping lover's face. The face that was hidden from so much of the world was lying there in his arms. Kakashi looked perfect. Not perfect in some romance novel way, the man was human after all. He needed to shave, but Iruka didn't mind the scratchiness of the stubble. He had a few old scars that were visible, nothing out of the ordinary for a shinobi. The feature that Iruka couldn't stop staring at was the man's lips. They were perfect. The slight crookedness of a nose that was broken one too many times only accented the perfection of those well-kissed lips. The little cut on one side where Iruka had bit too hard only made them more perfect.

He smiled as he snuggled into Kakashi. When the clock hit eleven, he didn't want to get out from under the comforter he had pulled over them. He knew he'd have to; he needed to grab a shower before gong and seeing the Hokage. If it were Ibiki, just lounging around the man's office, yawning, and stretching with a satisfied look on his face would be appropriate torture for making him get out of this bed. For the Hokage, he'd have to be a little nicer. Carefully, he got out of bed. He knew it would wake up Kakashi; those jônin had no ability to sleep through anything.

When the man woke up, Iruka kissed him on the forehead, "I have a meeting with the Hokage in a bit, and I need to grab a shower." When Kakashi just nodded and relaxed again in the bed, Iruka walked over to the bathroom. After his shower, he stepped out and rubbed the towel across the bathroom mirror. He took an inventory of how badly the jônin had marked him up. The bites and marks were already a deep purple color, showing distinctly against his tan skin. If his were this dark, he didn't want to think about how well what he did to Kakashi would stand out against that pale skin..

As he towel dried his hair and made a mental note to stash a hairdryer in Kakashi's bathroom, he tried to think of how best to show off his marks. He was going to meet the Hokage under his position in Ibiki's organization. He wasn't going as schoolteacher chuunin Umino Iruka; he was going as 'Faith', covert operative. The Hokage would have been given his covert file. The missions Ibiki sent them on were never recorded in their normal files, thus they couldn't be used as proof of ability for jônin level. They also were much harder to decipher since the reports only ever referred to people by their code names. In fact, unless one of the other three slipped, which was unlikely, the Hokage wouldn't even know who was coming to meet her.

He dumped out the contents of his pack in the bathroom so he could decide what to wear. He didn't want to go home when he probably had appropriate clothes somewhere in the bag. He set aside a bottle of sake he had bought while in wave. That would make a nice present for the Hokage. He quickly decided what he was going to wear and pulled on the clothes. He spent some time adjusting everything. He had on a pair of low waisted khaki cargo pants with the top of the grey camo print boxers just showing above the waist. He pulled on some brown boots and then slipped into a loose button-up white shirt. He stretched and looked at the time; he should be summoned in the next ten minutes.

He walked back into the bedroom with the bottle of sake. Kakashi was in bed still, but his one eye was open. "You're dressed up."

Iruka nodded, "Yeah, Have the meeting with the Hokage in a few. Can I get you anything before I go?"

Kakashi sat up, "You really do work for Ibiki."

"hmm?" Iruka sat down on the bed to lean over and kiss his lips.

"This has to fall under torture, dressing like that and then leaving."

"I'll be back though."

Kakashi reached out a finger and traced along Iruka's collarbone, "Sorry about this. I didn't mean to mark you up like that."

Iruka just kissed him, "It's fine. It actually helps me anyways. Makes it more believable that I can do my job. Besides, don't apologize until you get a look at yourself in the mirror."

Kakashi wrapped his arms around Iruka's shoulders and pulled him down onto the bed. In a low, husky voice he whispered, "Oh, attacking a jônin. Maybe you won't be able to escape in time for your meeting."

Iruka laughed as he found himself pinned under Kakashi. "Oh like those marks are going to hurt your reputation anyways. Do you want me to break the plumbing so that you are 'forced' to go use the ANBU showers?"

Kakashi chuckled as he kissed Iruka's neck, "I was thinking something more public like those baths Jiraiya always is spying on."

"Behave." Iruka stretched, exposing more of his neck to Kakashi, "Remember, I'm a little innocent chuunin school-teacher to most of this village. Wouldn't want them to think you're a big bad jônin preying on the innocent."

Kakashi laughed, "I don't seem to remember me being the one initiating things."

Iruka ran a hand over Kakashi's chest, "Maybe we can correct that after my meeting?" Iruka frowned, "I'm being summoned." With that, he stood up and looked down at Kakashi, "How do I look?"

"Like I shouldn't let you out of my bedroom."

"I was more going for just being ravished by my jônin boyfriend, but I think that's close enough." With a quick kiss to Kakashi's forehead, he climbed out the window and made his way to the administrative building.

Iruka flew across the rooftops, by the time he reached the administrative building his chakra was expertly concealed. When he was trying to be stealthy was probably the only time he was grateful for his low chakra levels. He landed on the small ledge outside the window of the Hokage's office. Tsunade was sitting inside with the lights on. He tapped on the window with the top of the sake bottle.

If Tsunade was surprised, she didn't show it. She raised an eyebrow and walked over to let him in. As he slipped into the room, he held out the sake bottle, "I believe someone once said something about 'Beware Shinobi bearing gifts'?"

"Faith, I presume?"

He smiled and handed over the Sake as he slipped his shirt off his shoulders to show the tattoo on his shoulder blade. Once she saw it, he then slipped the shirt back on and bowed to her, "Tsunade-sama, it is an honor to meet with you."

She smiled, "Perhaps you should say 'again'?"

He laughed, "Well, yes. I did at least have the grace to bring you a present for healing my--" He paused for the appropriate word, "Kakashi-san."

She gestured towards the seat across from her desk as she pulled out two cups and started pouring. Iruka raised an eyebrow at her pouring of the sake, but didn't say anything as she continued, "Your file shows you just got back to the village this morning, and you brought a sound missing-nin and helped Ibiki with the interrogation all before coming to the hospital this afternoon."

"When Genma reported to Ibiki that you had returned, I thought it would be prudent to check on Kakashi-san's condition. From your reaction earlier, I assume you are not so closed minded as to have a problem with that?" He smirked and sipped his sake, "Or a little drinking on the job if rumors are to be believed."

She put her sake down and arched her fingers together, "It is midnight and of course this meeting never officially happened. Shizune isn't here, thus I have a little freedom. As for my 'open-mindedness' I am happy to see the Hatake brat happy. He was always too serious when I knew him. However, shinobi do not make it a habit to telegraph their relationships, especially ones that villagers might … misunderstand"

"It is difficult to keep a secret in a village full of ninja. In my experience keeping things secrete doesn't work, it's why it is a well known fact amongst certain segments of the ninja population that Destiny, Salvation and I have the horrible habit of sneaking out and coming back wasted. There is even a rumor that Ibiki tends to 'talk' to us about it." He smirked, "The best I've ever managed in this place is keeping the details quiet. If you request it, I will be discrete with details concerning 'the Hatake brat'."

She nodded, "Ninja tend to be more accepting anyways, I was more thinking public behavior. Just keep it respectable."

He sipped at his drink again, "I can keep my public behavior perfect, his on the other hand …"

She grinned, "Oh the reading Jiraiya's books and his perpetual lateness?" When Iruka seemed surprised at that she grinned, "I've been gone for a long time, but I have not been completely cut off from the village."

"Which brings us to the reason you are speaking to covert-ops before the jônin. Your information about Konoha is either out of date or second hand" She seemed surprised that he had come to a conclusion from such little information, "A leader can not efficiently organize what she does not yet understand and it will take time to learn the nuances of the village. Even your assistant has been gone for a long time and is in the same position as you in regards to currant knowledge."

She nodded, "I have the files on all the shinobi of the village and have started to go through them."

Iruka nodded, "But the files only have so much information and don't give you a good idea of the character of the people. That explains why you'd meet with the ANBU captains first. Meeting with us second would imply you wanted to gain information, and gain it quickly."

She nodded, "My thought was to take on one or two of the advisors to the third since they would be acquainted with everything."

"They won't be able to tell you the information you need. His advisors were mostly account and diplomatic in nature. They knew little about the shinobi of the village. The third took care of that himself." He smiled, "If you wanted a recommendation from me, I would think grabbing two chuunin from the mission room and administrative offices would make the most sense. Except for Anko, the other three of us are Chuunin. Izumo and Kotetsu would be the best choices for being assistants. There is a lot of paper work to go with the job, and both of them are well known for being desk ninja."

"Desk ninja?" She sipped her sake with a raised eyebrow.

"A term of 'endearment' for us shinobi who are really just not suited for missions and thus have ended up at various administrative positions." He smiled since she knew how untrue that was since she had their covert reports in front of her.

She smiled, "So who exactly are you Iruka-sensei. I'd rather hear it from you than digging through your file, since I am sure there is nothing in there to come close to explaining why someone who is presumably an academy teacher is in a covert branch of the T&I and covered in bite marks that I assume came from the Hatake brat."

He laughed, "I didn't think you had everyone's dental records in front of you." He didn't deny where the bite marks had come from either. "Umino Iruka, Chuunin, current assignment Academy teacher and missions desk. 12 A rank missions, 74 B and a smattering of C and D. Chuunin of little notice by most. In reality, Code name Faith, assigned to the academy to keep track of the students affected by the demon fox attack. Also with the rest of my Genin team plus one, a non-standard covert unit working directly under Ibiki."

She nodded, "Ibiki explained that you had discovered a plot to attack the Kazekage, unfortunately we thought it would happen once he got here at the chuunin exam but it happened on the way here. Your unit also determined that there were strange troop movements between sound and sand and that they were being done in the tightest of security. I know the third disliked using your … services, but it seems to be a necessity."

"It is also necessary, as I am sure you can understand, that our work be kept in the strictest of confidence. That is the reason for separate files on us, just like a hunter nin would have. If our identities got out, we would be even more vulnerable from enemies."

She nodded, "I understand most of the time you are unarmed."

He nodded, "I can here with the same weapons at my disposal as I would have on a typical mission."

She raised an eyebrow, "And what weapons would those be?"

He moved the lip piercing with his tongue, "Poison." He turned the piercing in his navel, "Antidote. If it wasn't for surprise, we'd be dead." He paused, "Plus, our activities would not be approved of by the majority of the shinobi in the village and it is better if such things remain quiet."

"Interesting. Can I see?" She reached out a hand as she took the offered pieces of metal. "Very interesting. A tasteless poison, very concentrated. The other contains a double dose of the antidote. If you don't get the anti… ahh, I see, you take the first dose ahead of time." She frowned, "That's dangerous though, taking so many antidotes and exposing yourself to so much poison."

He nodded, "I know, we keep a list of what each of us can't use anymore."

Her eyes widened, "You do this often enough that you have a 'do not use' list?"

He nodded, "We've been at this for almost ten years."

She frowned, "How old were you when you started?"

"It was just after we were all arrested, I think we were all fifteen."

A/N Shameless plug for my one-shot 'that one night'

"Arrested?"

"Little party became a big party and a certain Sennin got a little pissed at us and sicced the ANBU on us. But that's how we came to the attention of Torture and Interrogation."

"I am going to personally go over the chemicals you are using in your missions."

"If it would make you feel better, but we are using the best chemicals the ANBU have. We also have full access to the ANBU's medics. Obviously if we went to the normal hospital our patient reports would show some interesting things after missions."

She took another sip of her Sake, "That's at least good. You know you look a lot like your mother."

He smiled, "That's why I knew to bring sake to this. She always spoke kindly of you for how you supported her bid for jônin."

"They were trying to keep her away from it on technicalities. Saying she didn't have enough field experience."

"The 10A rank requirement is rather strict."

"But a two year duration S class should more than offset that."

Iruka refilled both glasses, "I doubt you brought me here to reminisce about the S-rank mission I was born on. Too bad that one doesn't go on my record as completing a mission."

Tsunade frowned, "That mission was very well thought out, I don't know if something similar can work for our problem with sound. The sand situation seems to be resolving without such measures."

He nodded, "Sound is more paranoid than Rock ever was. If I were trying to get information from Sound, I would go about it from the other side."

"The other side?"

"Take operatives who could blend in as being from wave and have them infiltrate from the thunder side instead of the fire side. Orochimaru can only have so many forces, and it would make sense to have developed some sort of alliance with thunder. The sound nin participating in the last chuunin exam did not attack any of the nin from the village hidden in the clouds after all. Sneaking through thunder country isn't too hard."

"I want all the files about previous missions to thunder on my desk tomorrow at 3pm." She then smiled, "You should get some rest. I gave the others the same instructions. Get some sleep; you'll be receiving a message that your meeting with me will be at 3pm tomorrow. I'm using the pretense of talking to everyone that mans the mission desk. I'll make sure the Hatake brat isn't requested too early either, now go make sure that idiot is resting."

He stood up and smiled, "Yes Hokage-sama." He bowed with exaggerated formality and left the way he came.

-------------------- Notes ------------------------

Please review, I would love to know what people are thinking of this. Updates should be back on their every other day or so schedule. I still plan to have this done by the end of the month. Sorry this update was late, I did get the final arc of this story set in place though…