Disclaimer: Naruto is not mine, its Masashi Kishi-troll-motos.

This can take place in canon, but it started on the DoS forum as Haha21's Writing Prompt: "3. Anyone sneaking into the Inuzuka/Hatake households for puppies. Because fluffballs are always adorable. Even on bad days."

"The Abduction of Soft Paws"

Kakashi Hatake was being kept busy, having been asked to go and spar with Kotetsu and Izumo simultaneously, a bit of an exercise. He figured he would humor them, as the two of them wanted to improve their skills.

That was the set-up. They were the distraction. Perfect. If it wasn't for Kakashi's thorough preparation for the unexpected they would have had it done sooner. A one minute job turned into an hour-long excursion. They were really testing their time limit here.

Traps, traps and more traps. There were traps on the windows, keeping anyone from even looking in. The blinds had paper tags on them. There were curtains too, with seals that dropped Kunai on your head.

There were hidden mechanisms on the doors hinges, keeping people from opening them properly. Well, unless you wanted to trigger a small explosion.

He had traps on his refrigerator. That eggplant was definitely safe, if anyone came-a-calling. (No one was coming for that eggplant. The ninja was paranoid. It was the only thing in the fridge. One. Lone. Eggplant. With a BITE out of it.) There wasn't even any food in the (Trapped! TRAPPED!) Cupboards. Seriously.

How the hell did Kakashi ever get into his own apartment on a good day anyway? It was almost like he didn't really live there. (Theories abounded from years prior that he was like a monkey and just lived in the trees around Konoha, reading his books. That was usually where people went to find him, after all.) There was barely any furniture to speak of. Just a bedside table and headboard cubbyhole with a plant affectionately named Mr. Ukki, and a bed with shuriken print bedspread. Oh, and a few pictures on the walls, for color. If you liked cool colors, lots of blues and greys.

Nearly impossible to surpass traps aside, the goal was clear. They had to get inside. They were men on a mission. (Well, not a real mission but still... this was A-rank difficulty.)

Genma bit the senbon in his lips out of habit, hiccuping slightly. He was crouched uncomfortably, hands on his knees, watching as his partner worked furiously to remove the traps they'd stumbled into.

Raido grimaced and wiped sweat from his brow as he pulled apart another trap they had almost missed, built into the floor boards. It almost took his leg off. Neither man dared to move while the scarred man worked.

Oh, why were these two breaking in to Kakashi freaking Hatake's apartment? Well... they had a good reason... a fair excuse... Because... because Iruka was having a bad day.

And damn it all, those paws were fabled for being able to lighten any mood. It was all Hatake ever talked about at the bar, in such a fond manner they all believed it to be true. There was just no questioning it. The awe in the man's voice was enough to convince even the Hokage that such paws were feasibly a healing comfort. (She'd once asked him to go to the hospital to make a few ill children feel better. And. It. Worked.)

Bad mission? Relax with a puppy and soft paws. Soft, pink, paws. Able to lift any spirits. Surpassing any expectation.

He sometimes offered to summon his dog for them, but they were all, every last chunin and jounin, always too manly to accept. But then... Iruka-sensei. Friend of every Konoha ninja that passed through the mission room... they had to do Something to make him feel better! (And they just were not breaking down and ASKING. Easier and more acceptable to 'borrow' and then say 'sorry, man dunno what came over me.' Nope. Ninjas. Go figure.)

Trap taken care of, Raido signaled the all clear to move forward.

They tip-toed into the apartment, and saw him. Right there. Target sighted: code name: "Soft Paws." Snoozing on the bed. He didn't even wake when Genma gently picked him up, patting him on the head, as Genma was a trusted and familiar scent. He snuffled, and curled his nose into the man's flack jacket affectionately, those fabled paws twitching in his sleep as he dreamed.

Yes. 'Target acquired,' Genma signaled in the dark, arms cradling his charge delicately. Raido's scarred face split wide into a smile. Now he had to put all the traps back up. The smile fell from his face with a grimace. But...

Soft. Paws. Tiny little puppy paws. That translates to 'Happy' if all things go well.

Mission: "The abduction of soft paws." complete.

Yes. That was the only solution.

They may later admit to being a bit drunk about it, after a few sad rounds of beer with the depressed teacher. They couldn't even remember what set it off, and why he was depressed? Something about a student leaving for far too long.

Who could blame them? (Apparently the Anbu who uses wood style that tracked them down... because he saw two drunk idiots breaking into the jounin apartment complex, only to leave them tied up in wooden shackles with some knock-out tags on their foreheads, both dropped off on Anko's doorstep late at night...) Eh, details.

Suffice to say, they never made it to T + I, as there was really no reason to, with such high levels of absurdity at work. And honestly, it was for Iruka. Even Yamato couldn't blame them.

Anko, however, was a different matter. She cackled, demanding something in exchange for their freedom. Kotetsu and Izumo ended up paying the ransom.

In dango. For days.

She let them go, one at a time, when her demands were finally met.

.

.

...

Iruka stepped into his bedroom, hiccuping, and wandered over to the bed. He tossed his kunai holster on the bedside table, and simply plopped down to sleep. A gruff sounding Yelp startled him into jumping back up as he realized he had landed on something soft, and pointy in places. Looking down at his bed, he realized he had sat on Pakkun.

Pakkun frowned in the darkness. He didn't know how he had gotten here, either. He smelled Genma, alcohol, and a fair bit of stupidity at work.

Why was Pakkun on this bed? He raised his little doggy eyebrows in curiosity.

Squinting at the dog in the dark, the teacher leaned down and stared the dog in the eye.

The dog, sniffing him, intuitively knew something was wrong. He sighed and raised one of his tiny little paws in greeting. "Hey. Bad day?"

"Ah. Yes." his voice cracked a bit when the cause of his sadness came back to haunt him. He was really missing his favorite student, and worried over him obsessively.

"You want to touch my paw pad? This will make it all better!" the adorable little dog offered, waving said paw pad in front of the chunin's confused face.

Deciding 'What the hell, why not?' Iruka climbed into bed, with a puppy on his chest, content to pet the soft pink paw pads until sleep overtook them. It was the best dream he had had all week, and he awoke feeling much better afterwards.

He noticed when he awoke that Kakashi was sitting on his windowsill, silently reading a familiar orange book. The silver haired man looked down on him with a smiling eye.

"You could have just asked." The jounin said nonchalantly as Iruka looked up at him, blinking bleary-sleep-filled eyes through the glimmering sunshine filtering in behind Kakashi's back, as shadows of a waving tree branch danced up and down along the window.

"Woof." Pakkun grumbled, hiding his face in Iruka's pillow. Iruka gave him a grateful smile and smothered the puppy in a warm hug.

.

.

...

Author's Note: This is what I do when I'm procrastinating- I browse the forum and end up writing something other than what I intended to write. *sigh* But in this case, I kinda like it. Someone had asked for fluff. Does this count? (Goes back to writing the next chapter of 'Dreaming of Death Note' now...)