They were staring at each other, matching icy glare for icy glare, clenched determined jaw for clenched determined jaw, snarl for snarl.

"You really expect me to just go running out there without any cover at all?"

"You're twelve inches tall, how much cover do you need?"

"All I can get, they eat dogs in this town, I can smell them roasting."

Kakashi sighed. He couldn't believe that he was arguing with his own damn dog. Half an hour's conversation with Gep had allowed him to pick out enough dialect words to determine that the kid must have been born in Cloud country. He didn't remember any large towns nearby, and it had to be near the coast. So Kakashi was fairly confident that he'd narrowed his search for Gep's home village to a sparsely populated area along the northern tip of Cloud. That explained why he was trying to stealth the unstealthiest human being he'd ever met aboard a small freighter.

"Look Pakkun. Just let me know when it's all clear. No one would want to eat you, you're far too tough and much too sour."

"Yeah well, if I end up in a cooking pot because of this you can add bitter to that list."

The little dog trotted around the corner and out of sight, neck stiff and head held high, while the two men waited behind a heap of rotting discarded crates and cargo nets. A shadow crossed them as a sailor walked towards the ship, his footsteps retreating across the wooden boards until they had been swallowed by the steady sloshing of the ocean. The freighter continued to creak eerily at its mooring at the other end of the quay. Shouts were exchanged from ship to shore. A cluster of gulls arrived, wheeling and swooping overhead and filling the air with theirshrieking yulks.

Two urgent barks punctuated the waterfront sounds.

"Now!"

Kakashi grabbed the younger man's hand and raced across the dock and onto the ship. He pulled him into a doorway and clamped a hand over his mouth to deaden his noisy breathing as two sailors approached from opposite directions. Words were mumbled as they passed and continued on their way. Kakashi waited for a long minute before peering back the way they'd come. One of the sailors from the ship was now headed towards the port along the sun-bleached boards of the quay. Others staggered aboard under heavy loads of supplies or hurried on last minute errands. He relaxed.

"So do we, er, hide in a lifeboat?" Gep whispered in his ear.

"You can if you like. I'm going to find an empty cabin."

The copy nin thrust his hands deep into his pockets and made his way towards a steep metal stairway. A ship this age would have accommodation for double the men needed to run it these days. Mechanisation had taken a lot of the grunt work out of being a common seaman. And the least attractive cabins this late in the year would be the ones furthest from the heat of the engines.

Two hours later a jolt marked the release of the towline and the old steamer thrummed into action as it headed towards Cloud Country under its own power. Gep sat hunched on a bed in the unused dusty cabin, looking pale and drawn. Kakashi reached into his pack and tossed him a handful of Konoha's very best ration bars. Which also happened to be it's very worst.

"Relax Kid. We've got a good two days before we make landfall on Cloud."

The youth picked up a bar and looked at it uneasily before putting it back with the others and pushing them aside. "It's not that. It's just… well I don't feel so good. This ship rolls around a lot more than The Mermaid, and I never was too good at sea."

Kakashi stretched out on the other stained sheetless bed. He took an orange book out of his pack and opened it, focussing the light from the dirty porthole onto the page. A seasick pirate. Now he had officially heard everything.

Oooooooooooooooooo

Iruka was not looking forward to another four days in Yoko's company. It was true that he was relieved to some extent, to have found out that she and not he, was the source of the tension between them. But it didn't make any real difference. The tension was still there and he still had to deal with it. He thought back wistfully to the way their journey had started. The easy chatter between them and their pleasure in each other's company. Just when had that all changed? The night at the Shinto shrine seemed to be the obvious choice. Could the spirit of the she-wolf still linger there, and had something in the place's atmosphere triggered instincts that she'd inherited from her wolf ancestor?

If so there was no way he could take her back through those mountains and past the shrine again, he'd be a total wreck by the time he got home as it was. There had to be another way.

There was. Waterfall Country had a small coastline at its northern edge. So as Kakashi was settling in for his trip around the Cloud Country coast from the south, Iruka and Yoko were negotiating to charter a fishing boat to take them around the same coast from the north.

Iruka followed Yoko onto the boat she'd hired, the Flying Fish. An overoptimistic name for such an old tub, in his opinion. But it seemed sound and sturdy, and it had recently been brightened up with a fresh coat of blue paint. It had a crew of four. Strong silent men, quite different to the other fishermen and women who were greeting each other, chatting around the boats, and haggling in the fish market. They almost seemed more like shinobi than fishermen, and he found their presence reassuring. The most he'd ever been at sea was the short trip to Wolf Island, now he'd be surrounded by water for at least three straight days.

Yoko, however, was in her element. By the time they cast off there'd been a complete role reversal between them. They stood together on the deck as she explained the different colours of the water, various kinds of waves, how to recognise the currents and the winds. She was the sensei and he was the student. As Iruka watched her enthusiastically pointing out a particular riffling of the surface, flushed from the cool wind and dampened with sea spray, some of the tension diffused. Slowly, very slowly, some of pleasure he'd enjoyed during their first day together started to return. By the time the time they said goodnight and settled into the two best cabins aboard, he felt he might just make it through the next few days after all.

Ooooooooooooooooooooo

Kakashi held Gep by the shoulders as he leaned into the wind over the rail. When the quiet moans from the other side of the room had taken on the same resigned hopeless tone as Asuma with a hangover, he'd decided to act. He hadn't spent much time at sea himself, other than some island hopping here and there. Fire country had no coast and the ocean had no particular appeal to him. It was just one more treeless desert, but wet instead of dry. So he really had no experience with seasickness. But in the back of his brain he remembered hearing that fresh air was supposed to help.

It was getting dark and the wind was picking up, which of course was why the damn boat was rolling around so much. Maybe he could just lash the kid to the rail and go back inside where it was relatively warm.

"I think I'm ok now. Let's go back, I'm freezing."

Well that was something he could agree with. "You sure?"

Kakashi cracked open the door and peered into the interior, lit by naked bulbs strung at intervals across the ceiling. His hair caught the light as he leaned forward, like white flames. Gep's eyes shone in the darkness. Kakshi just caught the breathy words.

"You're my hero."

"No kid. You have something I want, I'm just paying your price."

"Every hero I ever dreamt up looked like you."

"Kakashi sighed. "Yeah well, a lot of people go for the hair and light skin. It's nothing special, just different, gets their attention."

'The Boss has white hair."

Suddenly Kakashi realised the implications in what the kid was saying. He'd just been doing his job, completing a mission with his team all those years ago. Didn't he have enough guilt to wallow in already without being responsible for an innocent kid getting caught up with cutthroat pirates?

"You can't judge a person by the colour of his hair. It's what's in someone's heart that counts, and you know that from the things he does, not how he looks."

Gep realised that Kakashi had vanished through the door without him noticing. He hurried to follow and found the copy-nin back in their cabin lounging on a bed.

He closed the door behind him but didn't make a move away from it. "You're right. The Boss is just a brute, a killer."

"I'm a killer too."

The young man shook his head making his loose hair swing around his face. "You aren't like him, I can tell. You took me outside to make me feel better. He never did anything like that." Pink blush darkened his narrow cheekbones. "If you want to… you know…do it. I… I'd like it. I like you…" he looked up, biting his lip, "a lot."

Gep's didn't see the ninja move, but he could feel him pulling his hair to the top of his head with both hands from behind, forming a loose bushy ponytail. He held his breath while Kakashi turned him around and looked into his brown eyes, expression unreadable. And he waited, for what seemed an eternity, for Kakashi to kiss him. But when he did it was in the centre of his forehead, through the mask.

They stood in silence as Gep closed his eyes tight and pressed his lips together. A shudder passed through his body. Immediately Kakashi removed his hands letting the hair fall back into a shaggy mane.

"Sorry kid, it's a sweet offer but you're just not my type."

Gep turned away, covering his face with one hand. "Right, I forgot. You like them pretty."

Kakashi wanted to tell him that he was pretty, in his own way, just not the right way. The words stuck in his throat.

"Go to bed, let's get some sleep."

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Iruka woke up suddenly, it was dark, very dark. The only light was a diffuse reflection from the lights on the ship's rail that turned the porthole of his cabin into a circle of grey against the black. The engines seemed much louder in the quiet of the night, throbbing in his ears almost painfully, like the start of a migraine.

He felt the presence in the room before he saw it. "Who's there?"

A lean white form approached from the corner of the room. It sat on the bed beside him.

"Kakashi? How? …What are you doing here?"

Iruka's scalp prickled, something about this situation was frighteningly familiar. In the back of his mind there was the threat of suffocation and words whispered by a demon. He reached out with chakra, searching for a threat, but found nothing but raw lust in the other's intent. Despite every instinct his pulse quickened in response.

"I thought you'd be more pleased to see me."

The familiar words brought a rush of emotion. "Oh God Kakashi I am. I am soo glad to see you. I've missed you so much, you have no idea."

He sat up and pulled his lover towards him, then closed his eyes and snaked trembling fingers through fluffy white hair. Right now it didn't matter how. Kakashi was there, that was what mattered, the only thing that mattered. He let his fingers slide over soft skin, softer even than in his memory. Then cupped a breast in each hand as he leaned in to…

BREASTS!

He teleported to the far side of the room, almost overshooting and ending up in the ocean. Thank god it was cold enough for him to be wearing sweats to sleep, instead of just boxers.

"Yoko! Wha… what are you doing in here?"

"You didn't seem to mind a moment ago."

"I thought you were someone else, I was still half asleep. I'm sorry."

"I'm not. Lucky someone."

He felt her close the distance between them and kept his eyes glued shut, inches from the wall. The skin prickled across his cheeks.

"Are you trying to seduce me?"

She took another step closer. He could feel her breath stirring the hair that hung down over the back of his neck and the heat of her body behind him. It was as if Kakshi standing there, about to nip his shoulder and run his tongue along the cut between the muscles of his back and his neck. He resisted the urge to lean back.

"Would that be so horrible?"

"I… I'd have thought it was obvious, I'm already attached."

Yoko reached for his upper arm, a surprisingly strong grip. He felt the press of her fingertips into his flesh. "But not married."

"No, that's not possible." His blush had spread and deepened to vibrant pink.

"So she's a married woman?"

"Oh no, neither of us are married, I would never… I really don't want to discuss it. Just please… please go."

Yoko released her grip. She might as well. It wouldn't work if he wasn't willing. "You know where to find me if you change your mind. Just the other side of this door."

Iruka waited until he heard the latch click shut before opening his eyes and slowly making his way back to the narrow bunk. Two more days. Whatever Tsunade was being paid for this it wasn't enough.

Yoko closed the door behind her and sank to the floor, whispering to the empty room.

"You saw? I just don't understand why I can't take him. This is the third time I've failed in three days, no one is that strong."

A voice answered in her head. "Bring him back here. In your own territory he'll be weaker and you'll be stronger. We'll worry about covering our tracks later… if we still need to."

Ooooooooooooooooooo

Two nights and a day later the freighter put in to a modest harbour to offload some farming equipment. No one noticed the two men who slipped ashore and mingled with the crowd in the fish market. They arrived to an unexpected tension in the air, the kind Kakashi associated with political instability… and war. He fine-tuned his senses. Why should Cloud be so on edge, particularly this far from Kumo and the Capital?

Almost immediately he picked up a familiar presence, as a fine mist rolled in from the ocean, filling the market place with cool moisture. The fog seemed unusually red, must the reddish dust stirred up by the crowd. Kakashi stopped short. Iruka? It couldn't be. He pulled his mask down an inch and inhaled deeply, then pulled it up again as he almost gagged. Blood, earth and something else that made his heart quicken, yes… Iruka. There was a slight blurring of his senses into a feeling of not quite reality, the mix of danger and desire was familiar, but he couldn't pinpoint how. He stood still trying to track its source.

Then he saw what was making the crowd so anxious. Cloaked ninjas in painted masks. Hunters. Two that he could see, possibly more. He was too far from the ship to get back on board without being seen, even without taking Gep into account. And no doubt the hunters were here to stop their targets from boarding ships.

One of the hunters turned towards him, not good. The copy nin stood frozen for a moment with indecision. Every part of him longed to track down that tantalising hint, even while the logical part of his brain explained the distorting effects of wishful thinking. Most likely he'd just picked up a scent from someone who used Iruka's shampoo.

He touched Gep's shoulder. "Stay here, act naturally." Then slipped out of sight underground.

Tracking the trackers from underneath, he waited until they had gone a safe distance. He hoped Konoha's hunters were better than these, they didn't pick up on his presence at all. But right now he wouldn't complain. He found Gep where he'd left him, ashen faced, trembling. The youth shoved a flier into his hand. It showed two Cloud ninjas, standard file photographs obviously, a man and a woman.

"They're looking for them."

"Know them kid?"

Gep seemed too stunned to register any emotion other than fear. "Not the guy, but the woman's Aya, my cousin Aya. She's like my big sister, we grew up together. She's the only one from my village to make it as a ninja, unless there's been someone since…" all the colour drained from his face. "They're here to kill her right? I've gotta get home and find out what's going on."

Kakashi only needed a single glimpse of the paper to recognise both faces. The last time he'd seen them they'd been white and bloodless. Floating in a lake, deep in a cavern, hundreds of miles away.

Suddenly Geb was gone, racing ahead. "Hey I know that guy, he came to my village a couple of times. Hey wait up, stop!"

He had no choice but to chase after the youth, who was bearing down on a tall man in a floppy leather hat and flapping leather cape. He cut off the man while Gep closed the distance from behind. The kid was fast and surprisingly graceful when running.

"Excuse me, are you familiar with Stonebridge Village, I understand it's not too far from here."

The man eyed Kakashi with open suspicion.

"Ninja right? Folks round here don't have much love for ninjas. Their 'so called' secret war and the taxes to pay for it left us all a lot worse off. Anyway I already told them I don't know nothing about that girl from Stonebridge what went missing."

"Really? Told who?"

"That weirdo in the mask. One of the other weirdos, in the white masks. Said she was supposed to go some place in Wind Country, with that ninja husband of hers. He wanted to know if anyone had heard them talking about Hidden Sound. Told him I'd never heard of Hidden Sound, whatever that may be."

Suddenly Kakashi was paying full attention. So the missing nins were suspected of defecting to Sound. Interesting.

"We just need directions to Stonebridge Village. I take it you know where it is."

"Yeah sure. Flyspeck of a place, easy to miss, but I've got a couple of customers there."

He pulled a large knife from under his cloak. "I sell farming tools. Just got a new delivery, got some of these too if you're interested. Chef's knives, imported from France."

The copy nin had the knife in his hand before they saw him move. The steel was excellent quality and it had a decent edge, but the balance was wrong for a weapon.

He pointed it towards the stranger in an offhand but vaguely menacing way. "So, Stonebridge Village?"

The merchant bobbed his head in a clumsy bow. "Er yes, sure. I'll draw a map."

The copy nin's eye curved upwards, but it was still cold enough to freeze lava. "Thanks, appreciate it."

Kakashi tilted the knife against the light. "Try sharpening them at a flatter angle, say twenty degrees instead of thirty-five. You'll get a twenty percent better cut and they'll stay sharp longer."

He flipped the knife in the air so that it spun in half a dozen lazy circles, opened his hand to catch it, and handed it back by the blade. Leaving his hand outstretched for the map.

"Come on kid, you'll be home before you know it."

Oooooooooooooooooooo

The day passed very very slowly. Iruka stayed in his cabin, watching the sun creep higher at a pace to test even a ninja's patience. By the time it was too high for him to see from his little window, he had built up enough resolve to face Yoko again. He was still shaken and embarrassed from his 'encounter' with her the previous night, but he had a job to do and he was a Konoha shinobi, he would do it.

Yoko walked over to him, as he emerged from his self-imposed confinement blinking in the bright sunlight (had she been waiting?) and put her hand on his arm. The exact place on his upper arm that she'd grabbed during the night. It made his skin crawl.

"I'm sorry I made you uncomfortable Sensei." She let go and dipped her head stiffly. "I was wrong, please forgive me. I promise I won't do anything like it again." Her eyes flashed to meet his, "unless you make the first move, that is."

Iruka felt relief wash over him. The release of tension almost made him laugh out loud. "Thank you Princess. You didn't have to apologise, but I appreciate it more than you can imagine. You are very beautiful, and if things were different I'd be very flattered. But as I said, I'm already involved with someone, and I'm loyal."

Yoko patted his arm again, this time it felt friendly and normal.

"I can tell." She couldn't help feeling jealous of this woman he cared so much for, and that he was clearly anxious to rush home to. "I hope she deserves you."

Iruka felt blood rushing to his cheeks. It would be too embarrassing to both of them to try to explain his situation now. "I'm the weak one, the one who's unworthy."

So that was his problem. Relationships between jounin and chuunin were frowned on in most of the hidden villages, but not forbidden. The woman probably wanted to keep the affair quiet for her own political reasons, the selfish bitch.

Time still passed slowly with nothing to do but watch the water and the sky, but the boat seemed to be picking up the slack. Plowing through the water at an impressive clip. So Iruka was more than a little anxious when he felt its powerful motor drop to about half speed early the following morning. He left breakfast half eaten in his cabin and went to investigate.

Yoko turned from talking to two of the sailors. She had pretty much taken command as soon as she had come aboard. It seemed a little odd, but then she was the one paying. And she certainly seemed to know what she was doing.

"There must be seaweed caught around the propeller blades. We'll have to anchor up so that the men can free it. It shouldn't take very long. There's a little harbour in a few miles, we can go ashore for lunch while they're fixing it."

Well if she was going ashore he had no choice but to follow. He bowed and went back to load up on his weapons.

The 'little' harbour was not, in fact, so very little. There was a significant fishing fleet, dozens of pleasure boats and even a decent sized freighter offloading cargo. It was also very crowded, must be market day, or some local festival coming up. But it didn't seem very festive, the atmosphere felt tense and uncomfortable. He started to scan the crowd, looking for the source of the tension, and saw something completely unexpected, a tuft of silver hair. Hair belonging to someone taller than the others in the crowd, walking away. Lazy, lackadaisical, unmistakable. Just the hair by itself had more attitude than everyone else in the marketplace put together. Only one person in the world had hair like that.

Yoko had picked up on the mood of the crowd too, and she didn't like it. Then she saw what was causing it. Hunter nins, really bad news. She was with a foreign shinobi, and he was sure to be armed to the teeth, they all were. They'd be questioned for hours if he was picked up, she might even lose him completely if he wasn't willing to lie. After everything she'd been through that was unacceptable. She silently called two of the men from the boat.

Then she picked up a flare in Iruka's chakra. Shit! Hunters wouldn't miss that. She caught a single word whispered under his breath. "Kakashi."

So that was his problem, that bitch was here too, what foul luck. She couldn't let them meet. Two birds with one stone, she filled the area with blood mist. The reddish fog billowed for a moment then started to fade. So that was failing her too, she needed more blood. A quick gesture caused her men to move into position behind her.

Iruka sensed the movement, he turned and saw the fishermen from the boat. When had they come out here?

"Sensei we have to go."

"Of course, whenever you're ready."

As they turned back towards the fishing boat her smile was a little too intense. Two days, then he'd be hers. She knew that she was looking forward to it much more than she should.

Oooooooooooooooooooooooo

A.N. I know I'm wicked (guilty blush). So they're off on their separate ways again. I just liked the idea of them getting close enough in the crowd to smell each other, but not getting the chance to do anything about it.