The Uchiha advanced slowly, ignoring Iruka and spoke to Kakashi who was sitting, weakened from using his jutsu, twenty yards away under the tree.

"Kakashi-Sensei. I was wondering how I could get you back here and now I see you've come of your own accord."

The voice was familiar, but deeper and harder than he remembered. The face was familiar too, although it had changed from the pretty face of a boy to the startlingly handsome face of a young man.

"Sasuke?"

There was almost the ghost of a smile on the stoic features.

"Yes. After everything my brother has taken from me the least he can do is lend me his name. He's well known by some of the… rougher elements of society, makes it easy to get recruits."

He snarled at the two dozen or so thugs still left standing, flicking his wrist towards them. "Get back, all of you. Before they hurt any more of you idiots, you're no use to me injured."

Iruka was shocked by his anger. As a boy he'd been sullen but had never seemed vicious. "What are you doing here Sasuke, what do you want?"

Sasuke turned towards him glaring. That anger was now directed at him. But Iruka stood his ground, they were surrounded by water, his element. He flashed through seals as fast as he could, staring at Sasuke's feet, carefully avoiding his eyes.

As Iruka's water snake rose from the soggy ground another rose to meet it. They entwined, rearing off the ground like vines finding support in each other's soft bodies, tightened into a single column, then shattered into a spray of water. Iruka started to make more seals, thinking and working his fingers as fast as he could. But before he'd finished the first of them he felt a strong hand on his wrist, holding it still it with no more effort than a child would need to stop a kitten.

"Iruka-sensei, you can't beat me. Don't you know that I can see what you're doing before you do it?"

Then Iruka was frozen in the spin of black on red. For all the hundreds of times he had stared into the depths of a sharigan eye, this was the very first time their power had been used against him. And he was completely helpless against it.

"Leave him Sasuke." Kakashi growled from the shade of the tree. "It's me you want isn't it? Although I can't think why."

The red eyes dulled to dark brown as Sasuke clenched his fist then opened his fingers letting Iruka's hand fall down by his side, the bright red lines left by his grip clearly visible on the teacher's brown skin. Then he grabbed his former teacher by the shoulder, dragged him to where Kakashi was sitting and shoved him down next to him.

"Isn't it obvious Kakashi-sensei, I want your jutsus. A thousand of them, or how many more are there now? I need their power to surpass my brother and defeat him. I only have one more year before Orochimaru comes to collect his… debt. There's no time for me to copy enough of my own. I knew that if I let the rumours spread then they'd send you here eventually, to find out what Itachi is doing in this stinking swamp."

"You deliberately arranged to overload my sharigan to knock me out, so that you could copy my jutsus."

"Exactly, I should be able to copy them all in a couple of weeks. It's different you see with two eyes, and when you have the blood to control them. But I will need your cooperation."

Kakashi spoke gently but firmly, like the older friend and concerned sensei he had once been. "Sasuke, you can't do this, you must come back with us. The seal can be removed and there are other ways to deal with Itachi. I'll give any jutsu to a loyal Konoha shinobi, I gave you my chidori the best of them. But I'll die before I let a traitor take them."

Sasuke snorted. "Yes I know you would die, of course I can still take them. A trick I learned from Orochimaru, taking jutsus from the dead and sealing them in balls. Hidden stone supplies me with a steady supply with their spies. They make useful incentives for my er… army, when they don't blow themselves up with them. But sealing a thousand jutsus in chakra balls? I know you won't give in to torture either. That's why I've decided it's good that you have Iruka-sensei with you, it solves my biggest problem. There are a lot of violent bloodthirsty thugs in these marshes. Not many women, and they're tougher than the men anyway. Iruka-sensei is a very attractive man, if you like that kind of thing."

Iruka looked up at him, eyes shining in fear and disbelief. "You wouldn't do that Sasuke, I've known you since you were a child."

The familiar, yet unfamiliar, mask-like face didn't change. "Yes known, but you don't know me now. I've sold my soul and given away my future to an evil monster for the sake of my vengeance. Do you still think there are things I won't do?"

Kakashi spoke calmly but Iruka could feel the hand on his arm quivering with fear. "This isn't you Sasuke! The curse seal has poisoned your soul but it's not to late, we can still help you."

The Uchiha laughed. Neither of them had ever heard him laugh in the years they'd known him. And if he had, this wasn't the laugh they would have expected to hear. It wasn't human. But when he spoke the despair in his voice hinted that there might still be humanity, far enough underneath.

"You have no idea how much too late it is. The curse poison is my soul now. That's all that's left of me, poison and vengeance." He paused then continued coldly. "I'll give you a while to think it over." Bending close to the two men he whispered, a quiet hiss without the slightest trace of emotion. "Iruka-sensei, I'm sure you won't get badly hurt. Kakashi-sensei won't hold out for long when he sees that I mean it."

He stood up and laughed, the same inhuman laugh, so wrong for his handsome young face. "Don't bother trying to escape, I'll be watching." His eyes flashed from brown back to red, swirling wildly. Then, with a dismissive wave to his underlings, he turned and walked away.

The nearest group closed in on the pair on the ground. One of them, a fat bald man with blue and red demons tattooed on his head and face, crouched low. He crawled along the ground like an animal, grunting and laughing, until he was just inches from Iruka. Then he stuck out his tongue to full length, grinning obscenely, and slowly swiped it up the length of the teacher's face. Kakashi's hand shot out and grabbed his arm. Also tattooed, Iruka noted distantly, before hearing it snap. The man screamed, staggered to his feet, and ran off into the heart of the swamp. Turning back to hurl curses and profanities as he went.

"You shouldn't have done that." Iruka whispered. "There's no point making them mad."

The copy nin put his arms around the man huddled next to him, his voice a low growl. "I won't let this scum touch you Iruka. I'll see what I can do to create a distraction, if you can get to the water you can escape."

The other man flashed him an angry look. "How many times do I have to tell you? I'm damn well not going anywhere without you. I'm a Konoha shinobi not a helpless wimp. We'll get out of this together."

Kakashi pulled up his headband and tugged down his mask. Staring intently at Iruka's terrified determined face. Then he kissed him, ignoring the laughter and hoots of the men and women stamping their feet in delight and shouting obscene suggestions. They held the kiss for a long time.

Eventually Iruka pulled the mask back up and the headband back down. "You have to keep this covered, it's not safe."

He leaned a little closer, whispering. "You can't let him take you. You told me that in the cave. Sasuke is one thing but you can't risk Orochimaru getting your jutsus as well as the sharigans. Gather your strength and when they come to take me use your speed to get as far away as you can. Then just rest and wait, I'll escape somehow. I'll find you. I promise."

Kakashi held him tighter. "But Iruka…"

The teacher shook his head. "It's the only way to protect me, both of us. Sasuke won't do anything to me if you're not here, there's no point."

Kakashi nodded then leaned back against the tree, holding Iruka's hand on his lap.

When he opened his eyes again Sasuke was standing over him. "So Kakashi-sensei, have you made your decision?"

The copy nin looked grim. "You already know my answer."

Sasuke dropped an orange book onto his lap. "In that case you'll regret leaving this here before. Everyone has found it very amusing, but it may have given them some unfortunate ideas."

He grabbed Iruka's ponytail to pull him to his feet then held him by an arm. And at that moment Kakashi disappeared.

"Dammit! Get after him!" Sasuke ordered throwing Iruka aside. "And don't lose him this time." He stood staring into the marsh, sharigans swirling but activated too late to help him, as his followers scrambled to attention and scurried off in all directions.

Iruka took the opportunity to make it most of the way to the lake, but before he could reach the water's edge Sasuke was standing in his way. Without a moment's hesitation he leapt straight at him and plunged them both into the water.

He had expected pain, burning pain, but there wasn't any. Kakashi's leaves, wet-me-not leaves he'd called them. Were they keeping the water away from his sores? But Sasuke didn't have leaves over his eyes. In the harsh stinging mineral water the Uchiha wouldn't be able to open his eyes, so he wouldn't be able to use his sharigans. That was what Iruka had been counting on. Of course he couldn't open his eyes either but he didn't need eyes to find his way in the water. Water was his element. Avoiding Sasuke's wildly kicking legs, he pulled him deep below the surface then, darting through the water like a fish, wove a web of chakra around him. A ball of delicate energy containing a sphere of water. Water that was completely under his control, meaning that inside the sphere Sasuke was also under his control.

Iruka took a breath from the surface then went back to guard the man rolling on the bottom of the lake. Three minutes, if he could keep him down there for three minutes Sasuke would lose consciousness. Then he could pull him back to the surface and escape. He would find Kakshi and be safe, Kakashi would be safe. It must be nearly three minutes already. He was probing for the position of the ball when a burst of energy half stunned him. Instinctively he jutsued to the surface. In time to see Sasuke's chidori shooting into the sky and Sasake climbing unsteadily out of the lake.

The swirling red sharigans turned towards him, holding him in their hypnotic glare. He was dimly aware of more chakra being molded somewhere below them.

"I'm sorry Iruka-sensei, I really didn't want you to get hurt but I must avenge my clan. I cannot let anything stop me and now you are getting in my way."

Then with a high pitched shriek that startled every bird and animal for miles, the light exploded in Sasuke's hands and for the second time in a few minutes Iruka caught the edge of a chidori blast. When the ringing in his ears had stopped he stumbled his way out of the water and went over to where Sasuke was lying on the ground. He felt for a pulse in his neck.

"Is he dead?"

It was Kakashi's voice.

Iruka looked around. The dead and injured outlaws had all been moved but there was still one body propped against the same tree they'd sat under earlier.

"Kakashi?"

A hand waved lazily. "Yo."

Still staggering from the blast, he ran to the tree and knelt down beside him. Grinning so hard that his face ached. "But Kakashi, what are you doing here"

The copy nin was grinning just as wide. "I came back as soon as I could. You wouldn't go anywhere without me, did you really expect me to go without you?"

Iruka's head was reeling, from the two blasts, from the shock, from surprise, from everything. "Was that your chidori?"

Kakashi shook his head. "I just got off a little blast, all I had and now I'm completely wasted again. But it was enough to explode his before it was properly formed." His expression became grim. "So is he dead?"

This time Iruka shook his head. "Just unconscious."

The older man's expression became grimmer still. "You know what we have to do Iruka."

The other's eyes went wide and he sucked in a gasp. "But Kakashi, that's Susuke. He isn't really bad you said so yourself, it's just the curse that's poisoned him. We can still save him."

Kakashi held Iruka's face in his hands and looked into his eyes. "He's a missing nin Iruka. We can take him back or we can kill him." He waited a moment for it to sink in. "Can you carry both of us?"

Iruka looked down. His answer was barely audible. "No."

Kakashi lifted his chin forcing him to make eye contact again. "Do you want to take him and leave me?"

Iruka shook his head again, unable to speak. There were tears leaking out of the corners of his eyes."

"Then take me over there and give me your sword."

Iruka's heart felt like lead in his chest as he eased Kakashi into a standing position. He was hooking an arm over his wet shoulder to takethe weight when they saw Sasuke lift himself onto one elbow and vanish.

"Dammit. He copied my jutsu, the one I used to get away before."

Iruka couldn't hold back a weak smile. "But now we have another chance. If we can stop Orochimaru before…"

Kakashi brushed the tears from Iruka's cheeks with the back of his hand. "Yes there's hope. But I wonder where his safest place is."

Then he allowed himself to sink back down to the ground and lean into the tree. "Now I'm going to sleep."

"Here?"

"It's the only place no one will look for us."

Iruka nodded and sat beside him. He kept watch for a while then he fell asleep too.

When Kakashi woke up there was someone standing over him, but this time it wasn't Sasuke. It was a woman wearing a headband inscribed with an hourglass, a Sand nin. One of a group of six.

"Umino-san." She said, startling Iruka awake. "We found dead Stone warriors in the desert, then we received a message on a carrier hawk saying that you didn't return home. We've been searching for you."

She bowed to Kakashi. "Hatake-sama? We heard the noise and saw the light. Was that the famous chidori?"

Kakashi was carried back to Konoha on a litter with Iruka walking beside him. It took two days but gave him time to recover most of his strength. After a long debriefing they were home, bathed, relaxed, fed, and lying on their bed.

Kakshi rolled onto his side and looked at Iruka possessively. "Now finally I have you where I can do what I've been longing to do for days."

Iruka blushed fiercely. "Kakashi, are you sure you're ready. It hasn't been a full week yet and you haven't been resting the way you should, you pushed yourself past your limit over and over..."

"I'm sure, come closer."

Iruka closed the gap between them to about a foot.

Kakashi shook his head. "Closer than that."

Iruka moved to within two inches.

Kakashi licked the tip of his index finger and traced it over Iruka's lower lip making his mouth fall open by half an inch. He did the same with his upper lip, his scar, and along his collarbone. Lingering to place a kiss in the little notch at the base of his throat. Iruka closed his eyes and swallowed. He could feel Kakashi's hot breath on his face and the closeness of his skin. He tilted his head back into the pillow and his tongue found its way to between his lips, leaving him panting softly. Kakashi was on top of him, one knee on either side. He teased Iruka's tongue with the tip of his own as he brushed his fingertips over dark hair, in long languid strokes. Iruka slitted his eyes open just enough to catch a glimpse of something in his hand.

"Now Iruka-sensei I'm going to comb the tangles out of your hair."

The End.

Oooooooooooooooooooo

A brief note from the storyteller.

Well folks, it's been fun. But I just started a new story and it's going to be long. A novel and it's not about our lovely pair, it has no ninjas at all so you won't see it here. Because I like to finish what I start I'll be gone a very long time. Maybe forever, but then again those muses can be pesky little buggers.

Thanks to the loyal readers who've read and reviewed regularly, we both know who you all are but due to new rules I'm not allowed to name names. And to others who've dropped a thoughtful review when they felt the urge. (Although I will risk a note to dk-joy, good luck with your education. It's what makes us human.)

So enjoy the Kakashi Iruka stories I've written if they're to your taste. If not, read something else or write your own.

Tampopo.