Questionable Loyalty

CHAPTER 20





When the classes finally ended late in the afternoon Iruka walked up to Kakashi who was still sitting at the tiny desk.



“Kakashi-san?” when the Jounin seemed not to hear him, he repeated louder “Kakashi-san?”



Finally the older man’s attention snapped back onto the Chuunin and he met his gaze. Iruka smiled apologetically:



“You must be bored out of your mind, listening to such basic information all day. And badly cramped too, having to sit here. I’ll bring you a more decent chair tomorrow, if you still want to come.”



Kakashi tried to say something but realized that his throat was too dry to speak. He swallowed several times and then tried again:



“Yes, that would be most kind of you.” He said hoarsely.



“Kakashi-san, are you okay?” Iruka asked “You seemed very distracted.” He smiled gently at him “Did you learn anything useful today?”



Kakashi forced himself to smile back amiably.



“Plenty of useful things. I am very grateful to you, Iruka-sensei.” He stood up and stretched his cramped legs and back “I’ll be going now. Thank you. I’ll come tomorrow morning for the next classes, okay?”



Iruka looked like he wanted to say something but thought better of it, because he only nodded.



“I’ll be waiting. Good day, Kakashi-san.”



While Kakashi walked back to his home he strived to maintain his usual gait and posture, to look lazy and half-asleep, disinterested in the world around him. When his front door closed behind him he sprang into action, wildly tugging at his clothes, trying to get them off as soon as possible. The Jounin uniform felt like it was burning his skin and he wanted it off, now. Finally, he dropped the pants, shirt and vest on the floor along with his underwear and almost ran into his bathroom, turning the shower on. He made the water as hot as he could stand it then slid under the scalding spray.



He wasn’t sure for how long he stayed there, the water beating over his scarred, reddened shoulders. Eventually he ended up sitting on the warmed tiles, curled up with his knees pulled to his chest and face buried in them, his wild hair flattened by the water. Because of the intense warmth he was slowly relaxing, but the shock was yet to wear off. For all these years, how could he possibly not notice all of this? How could he have been so compliant when children were thrown into the meatgrinder that was the Shinobi system? Was it because he had been one of those children too?



His thoughts turned to Minato-sensei. Had his teacher realized all of this? He had been one of the kindest people Kakashi had ever known in his life. Had he managed to realize the fundamental truth of their very existence before he had sacrificed both himself and his son to defend Konoha? Because Naruto was a sacrifice too, if of a different kind than Minato. Naruto. Kakashi didn’t want to think about the young man and what his fate was expected to be. Pein planned to use him in the same way the Hidden Villages used all their tools, if not worse. It wasn’t fair. But then again, there was nothing about life that was fair.



And what about Iruka? Did he have a full grasp of what he was doing? Of his own complicity with the system? While he had watched him, for a short moment, Kakashi had hated him, almost saw him as a monster, made even worse by the kindness of his character. Now that he thought about it though, he realized that Iruka was no more to blame than he himself. If it had taken Kakashi so very long to realize the wrongness of the situation – and he had done so with outside help – then it was no wonder that the Chuunin went along with it so happily. He was as brainwashed as the rest of them, and it wasn’t his fault.



At least that conclusion, Kakashi decided, would help him go back there tomorrow without feeling like he’d throw up when he walked into the building or make him want to rip Iruka’s head off.



In the mean time, the Chuunin was having a much better evening than Kakashi did. After a nice, warm dinner at the Ichikaru he had gone home, feeding the scraps he had saved from his bowl to the cat that lived on his street and more often than not slept on the outside of his windowsill. He had tried to take him in – because he had realized that it was a large, blue-gray tomcat with his left ear half-chewed off – but the animal had firmly refused and eluded his grasp. He was a free spirit, going where he wanted, when he wanted and using whatever way he wanted and some puny human wouldn’t get in his way. It didn’t stop him, of course, from mooching food from the stupid two-legged creature every time he got the opportunity. Occasionally he was even nice enough to rub against his legs in a purring thanks.



Iruka watched the cat walk off and then climb over the neighbours’ fence before he disappeared from view.



“You’re a lot like some people that I know.” He muttered under his nose to the empty street “You want a lot of things but give very little in return.”



It wasn’t fair to Kakashi, really, to compare him to the capricious animal – and besides, he was left with the impression that the Jounin was more of a dog person rather than a cat person. And besides, just because Iruka had seen him once in such a compromising position with another man didn’t mean that he’d spread his legs for any man who knew him. He wasn’t about to delude himself – he was in lust over the older man. He was constantly haunted by persistent fantasies about him, each kinkier and wilder than the previous one. Kakashi’s presence today in the classroom had been most distracting and the only thing had had helped Iruka focus was the fact that what he taught his students might save their lives one day.



However, now that he was alone in the privacy of his own home, the Chuunin was free to daydream as much as he wanted. He undressed and prepared himself a warm bath, then slid into it and relaxed. The mental image of Kakashi immediately emerged in his mind and he groaned softly in exasperation at himself. Well, now that it had happened already there would be no harm done to indulge himself a little.



Unfortunately, Iruka had seen very little of Kakashi’s body uncovered – the most of it being during the accident when he had spied on him. However, the picture remained branded in his mind and he saw it every time he closed his eyes – Kakashi’s slender but tightly packed with muscles body, a bared shoulder, the smooth, slick with sweat skin of his thighs, the moist lips shaping a perfect “O” in pleasure. Iruka bit his lip at the memory of that scene and his hand softly caressed the smooth skin of his own chest before slowly traveling further down.



He had never imagined that a man with personality like Kakashi would enjoy being fucked, dominated so much. Iruka had always imagined that he’d be mounting his partners from behind and rutting into them like an animal in heat. Most amusingly so, though, he had realized that it was the other way around.



As his hand wrapped around his already straining organ, Iruka wondered what did he feel like inside – soft, velvety? Warm? All wet and slippery from the lube? Or barely stretched with saliva, loving the sting of the penetration into his almost unprepared body? While Iruka certainly wasn’t the neighbourhood bicycle he had had his share of encounters and relationships with several different people over the years and he had an extensive enough idea to expect different tastes from different people. Mizuki, for example, had been the sado-masohistic type, while others had had a much tamer taste. The Chuunin didn’t mind either, as long as it didn’t cross over his own limits or didn’t leave his bored that he fell asleep.



Kakashi, if he would dare to judge from the single encounter he had seen, leaned towards Mizuki’s type. Iruka’s mind supplied delicious images of bending the Jounin over his kitchen table and pounding away into him while the older man whimpered at the onslaught, his muscled body tight with unrelieved tension. Or maybe there’d be time when he’d want it slower, gentler, on his back in the soft bed, his thighs wrapped around Iruka, mewling softly at the deep, slow thrusts, his eyes closed and face turned to one side, high cheeks flushed with arousal and long eye-lashes trembling against them.



There was something sweet in the second fantasy and Iruka held onto it, working his erection. Despite his attitude and flaws, the Jounin deserved more than being fucked roughly in a dirty alley, anyone deserved more than that.



“Sensei, more!” moaned dream Kakashi in his ear and Iruka came all over his hand, stifling his moan against his fist.



Afterwards, while he was cleaning himself and relaxing back onto the bed, he thought that Kakashi apparently affected him much more than he imagined. It was far too early to talk about any sort of emotional connection, but if it happened, Iruka was quite sure he wouldn’t mind all that much. After all, he hadn’t gone steady with anyone since Mizuki. Hopefully, Kakashi wouldn’t share the rest of his former lover’s penchants – like treason, for example.