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Sasuke listened carefully, “It doesn’t sound too good does it?” he admitted when the blonde had finished.

“Well I was hoping maybe you could find some other possible explanation,” Naruto told him tiredly, “As suss as it sounds I really can’t believe that he could have done anything like this.”

“Maybe he knows who is behind it but doesn’t want to say anything,” the raven suggested lamely, “I mean he only said she would be, he couldn’t give any specifics which tends to suggest he knows why it is happening and can guess from that who will be the next victim.”

“That could be it,” the blonde said, not convinced.

Sasuke wrapped the smaller boy in his arms and kissed his forehead, “Anyway, until we’re sure it really wouldn’t be a good idea to focus on him too closely, we don’t want to get target fixation and ignore all other options.”

Naruto wrapped his arms around his boyfriend and rested his head on the pale shoulder, “What would I do without you?”

“Die a horribly painful ramen induced death?” the Uchiha suggested.

“Idiot,” the blonde laughed.


“Holy shit…” Iruka repeated.

“Yeah you’re not kidding,” Kakashi replied looking at him, “I am guessing we are both seeing the same thing.”

“That depends, does what you’re seeing resemble some sort of owl demon in any way?” the darker man asked weakly.

“If by resemble you mean look exactly like, then yes it does,” Kakashi pressed the play button and watched silently as an owl demon flew in through the window and grabbed the detective. The man tried to run and knocked his chair over and papers flew off his desk, obviously not what the man had been expecting when he decided to sacrifice himself for the sake of the case. The ninja watched in horror as the demon tightened its claws around the man’s neck until his face turned black and he stopped struggling, at which point it hooted happily and flew out the same way it had come in, carrying the body with it. Most amazingly it disappeared as soon as it was outside.

“Fucking idiot!” Kakashi cursed in a voice so low it was almost inaudible. Once more Iruka could feel the wild chakra coming in waves from his lover.

“Kakashi Hatake!” Iruka said in the same voice he used so effectively on his young students, the chakra stopped suddenly and the jounin looked up almost guiltily, “Stop that this instant. We are going to take this video and pick up the kids, go home, tell them what happened, and go to bed. They will be going crazy trying to work this out.”
The chunin grabbed the older man’s hand and dragged him past all of the confused looking officers. One man had the guts to give them a little whistle after they had passed but Iruka merely fixed him with a high powered glare before they made their way to Nico’s.


Sasuke and Naruto made their way back to the lounge room in time to see the last few minutes of the Two Towers. Apparently the others hadn’t even noticed their disappearance, well most of the others anyway, the young couple got a wink from Torya and Jules causing both boys to turn an extremely interesting shade of red.

Nico stood up to stretch to swap the DVDs over.

I’ve got something to put in you! I’ve got something to put in you! I’ve got something to put in you! At the gay bar! Gay bar! Gay bar!

There was a moment of silence in the room. Then Naruto, Sasuke, Sakura, Kae, Ria, Kani, Mikel and Jules burst out laughing. Diran and Ryo both blushed, Nico groaned and Torya smirked.

“I’ll get it,” Ria told them standing to get the door. She found two very red men on the doorstep.

Iruka was the first to recover, he cleared his throat and stepped forward holding out his hand, “Hello, I’m Iruka Umino.”

“Ah Iruka, nice to finally meet you, I’m Ria,” she shook his hand warmly and pulled him into a hug, “And this must be your husband.”

Iruka blushed as she released him, “Um actually-”

“Not yet,” Kakashi grinned stepping forward, “Kakashi Hatake, nice to meet you Ria, I have your daughter for maths.”

“Aahh nice to meet you Kakashi,” the woman pulled him into a quick hug also, “Come on in won’t you? You must be here for the children.”

“Mum!” Mikel complained loudly.

“Of course, sorry, you must here for the teenagers,” she turned to her youngest, “Better dear?” He nodded.
“This is Mikel, my youngest son, you know Nico of course, this is Kani,” she pointed to each of them, “And this is my oldest, Torya and his boyfriend Jules. Torya is the one who chose the doorbell, he can be slightly strange at times.”

“Mum!” Torya pouted mockingly, he turned to Jules, “You don’t think I’m strange do you?”

“Love, I know you,” he laughed kissing the boy lightly.

“Nobody understands me,” he sighed.

“Of course dear,” his mother said, she turned back to the teachers, “Do you know all the others?”

“Yes, I think everyone else is in our classes,” Kakashi hide a grin, as soon as the teachers had entered the room Sakura had dropped the Kandra kid’s hand. As if they didn’t already know.

“Would you like a hot drink? We were about to watch the Return of the King if you’d like to join us,” Ria invited.

“Oh we really-” Iruka began.

“I could really do with a coffee if it wouldn’t be too much trouble,” Kakashi grinned tiredly, “It’s been a long night.”

Iruka looked at him and raised an eyebrow.
“Would you like something too dear?” Ria asked pleasantly.

“Oh um tea would be nice thank you,” the younger teacher looked around as the woman made her way to the kitchen, “Where is Dan? I thought he was with the rest of you?”

Nico jumped up, “He wasn’t hurt was he? He wasn’t involved in the attack in any way right?”

Three of the teens started at her choice of words.
Iruka tried to soothe the blue haired girl, “Its ok Nico, we didn’t hear anything about Dan, he definitely was not attacked. It’s okay.” Unthinking he gathered the girl into his arms and rubbed her back gently, “If it makes you feel any better we can go drop by his house on the way home, just for you.”

“You don’t mind?” she looked up hopefully. Sasuke watched as Diran’s face flashed with anger.

“Of course not,” the young teacher smiled at her, “We’ll call you when we get home.”

“Well, what are you waiting for?” she pushed the brunette away, “Get going!”

“Yes as good as that sounds, I smell coffee,” Kakashi said dryly, “Tempting as the idea of falling asleep on the way home is.”

“Kashi don’t be silly,” as soon as the little nickname left his lips Iruka froze and turned bright red.

Kakashi grinned and Iruka looked mortified. Sasuke held back his chuckle only with years of practice with Naruto.
Speaking of the blonde, he walked up to the jounin with his arms crossed over his chest and glared.
“If you so much as touch Iruka I will burn all of your Icha Icha Paradises,” he growled lowly at the silver-haired teacher, “Do I make myself clear?”

Kakashi swallowed thinking of his book collection, “Perfectly.”

“Good,” Naruto fumed, Sasuke hid the grin threatening to break out across his face with smirk. He decided to pull his blonde away to watch the beginning of the third movie with the other teens.

“He wouldn’t really burn them would he?” Kakashi looked pleadingly at his boyfriend.

Iruka raised an eyebrow, “I don’t doubt it.”

“Would you like to come sit down?” Ria asked holding two mugs.

“I might go watch the start of the movie if that’s alright,” Kakashi said still deep in thought.

“Of course not, go right ahead,” she told him handing him one of the mugs, “Why don’t you come sit down in the kitchen and chat for a while Iruka?”

“Thank you,” he smiled gratefully, “That sounds nice.”
They sat at the kitchen table and Ria slid the bickie jar over to the man.

“How are you adjusting to looking after the ki- um teenagers?” the woman asked smiling, “From what I hear it’s quite a jump.”

“It wasn’t too bad,” Iruka smiled back, getting lost in his memories, “I’ve known the three of them since they were only little, I taught them long before Kakashi got his hands on them.”

“You and Naruto seem very close,” she said fondly, looking into the lounge room where the two sat wrapped up together.

“Yeah, he’s never had parents, I didn’t want him to grow up alone like I did. I see way too much of myself in him,” the young man’s expression was rueful, “I hope I’ve helped.”

“Oh your job is not over yet I’m sure,” Ria patted his hand, “It only gets harder from here. You’re going to have to be very patient; something I don’t think will be a problem for you. You will see a lot of things you won’t want to and you’re both going to hurt each other quite a bit without meaning to but things will definitely get better. It’s all worth it, however hard it may be to sit on the sidelines sometimes.” Her eyes moved to watch her eldest son whisper something to his boyfriend, “If you need any help with any of them just let me know, I’ll help you out in any way I can.”

“Thank you,” Iruka said simply.

“Are you ready to head off?” Kakashi asked hesitantly putting his hand on his boyfriend’s shoulder, glancing quickly towards the lounge room.

Iruka laughed, “Yeah we’d better go check on Dan before Nico explodes.”

Ria smiled fondly, “She’ll work it out eventually I’m sure. You might need to talk to Naruto about his protectiveness Iruka darling. We wouldn’t want to deprive your man of his books now would we?”