Chapter Text
(I don't own any characters etc etc)
“I told you, we can’t say no,” Genma said, rolling his eyes. “Tsunade’s orders.”
“Fine, but remind me why this is happening today, of all days?” Kakashi asked as he walked with some friends.
“Because no one would show tomorrow,” Yamato said.
“But it’s stupid to have this tonight,” Kakashi protested, but the others shrugged. “It’s not even the right day…”
“Yeah, but if she threw an April Fool’s party on April Fool’s everyone would be pranked out, or worried about what was to come,” Yamato reminded him.
“Leading to her throwing the party tonight, March 31st,” Genma agreed.
“A novel idea!” Gai boomed. “Such a fun concept!”
Kakashi rolled his eye. “We could do something else tonight instead?”
The others shrugged again.
“It’s a Friday night, why not do this?” Yamato mused. “Plans are plans.”
“Worst things to do than drink and eat on her dime,” Genma agreed.
“You never know what the night has in store!” Gai cheered.
“Kill me now,” Kakashi sighed, but didn’t continue to argue as they walked, even if he wanted to. After all, the others had a point. Most people he knew would be there, so if he wanted other plans it would be on his own. Even his students had their own plans tonight, not that he really wanted to train them on a Friday night. And, this would be free…
The others talked about different things as they walked, with the copy nin not really paying attention. But as they entered, he groaned.
“No one told me it was a masquerade!”
Genma and Yamato stared at him, unimpressed.
“It was on all the invitations, rival,” Gai kindly said to him. “Everyone knew?”
“Everyone who wanted to come knew,” Asuma laughed, as he and Kurenai joined the line behind them to enter.
“It adds to the fun, and it’s something we don’t do often,” Kurenai added, smiling. “This will be nice! I can’t wait to see everyone’s masks, what people picked out!”
“People actually planned for this?” Kakashi asked, surprised, and the others nodded.
“We have matching masks,” Asuma said, as he and Kurenai held up half-face red ones.
“I made mine,” Yamato said, holding up one to cover his eye area, made out of wood, naturally.
“I’m just going to see what they have here,” Genma told them. “Since I was away for a mission I didn’t really have time.”
Gai nodded. “Same, my team has taken up so much of my time lately, so I am glad they will have options here!”
Kakashi shrugged. “I guess I’m prepared,” he mused, gesturing to his face.
“I think they’ll want a different mask,” Yamato suggested, but the other jonin shrugged.
“What’s it matter, we can just pick up chakra signatures and know who’s who anyway,” Kakashi mused.
The group advanced, and began to wear their masks or pick out ones available. Kakashi attempted to slip in the venue, but staff blocked him.
“Rules are rules,” a member of T&I said, nodding at a table of masks. “No one enters without one.”
“I have one on already,” Kakashi stated, but they shook their head.
“Grab a mask or get out,” they said, and Kakashi sighed. He didn’t feel like leaving now that he had come all this way, so he looked at the table.
There was a range of different shapes and colors, and his eyes fell on one type in particular. He grabbed a full face mask that had a neck and head cover to it before waving it at the T&I shinobi, who nodded.
Rolling his eye, Kakashi joined his friends, who had been waiting, their own masks all on. He sighed as he slipped the hooded mask up and over, adjusting his blue mask underneath it. It was familiar, like his ANBU mask had once been; it was also red and white as the other one was, but this one had red diagonal lines across the upper half instead of any on the cheeks.
He glanced around as they moved into the main event room. Nearly everyone had left vests at home, and so if one was in uniform, which most still were, there was a different uniformity about the place. And when that was combined with the masks, well, he had to admit that it all felt new and unique.
Kakashi frowned, there was clearly something at play here, since chakra signatures were nonexistent, and he had to give credit to whoever thought ahead like that. Glancing around some more, he quickly took off his gloves and pocketed them, as he felt it would give him away. Instead, now with his hair covered, he thought that he might look like anyone else.
“How fun!” Gai cheered, clearly giving away who he was underneath his green mask. “It’s almost a way to meet people differently!”
“I think everyone now knows who you are,” Kakashi teased, making the others laugh as they began to walk around.
“He’s got a point,” Yamato mused. “Perhaps I’ll meet someone new tonight…”
“Great, so this just became a singles mixer?” Kakashi sighed.
“No, there’s obviously actual couples here, and not everything is about romance,” Yamato argued. “Maybe I’ll make a new friend and trade you in,” he laughed.
“I’m going to go start with a drink,” Kakashi told the group, and Genma went with him while the others went a different way.
The two wandered to the bar and refreshment section, noting that there were a range of options. Some were very appealing - light, bright colors, nice aromas, appetizing appearances. Others….not so much.
“What do you think this is all about?” Kakashi asked Genma, who shook his head.
“No clue. There’s like eight punch bowls and at least one looks like sewer water,” Genma commented. “This has to be a joke, right?”
“They wouldn’t just serve crap like that,” the copy nin posed. “But…I don’t trust it.”
“Agreed. Let’s try what looks safe, then,” Genma suggested, and they moved to a bowl that looked like it held a champagne type drink, filling cups about halfway. However, after their first sip, they grimaced.
“That tastes like toothpaste,” Kakashi gagged.
“Let’s try another one,” Genma suggested, but the next one, something that looked and smelled like a pleasant citrus, tasted like prunes.
“I’m done,” Kakashi sighed. “I’ll risk dehydration tonight rather than keep trying.”
“Yeah, but people are actually eating and drinking…” Genma muttered. “I don’t know…”
They decided to linger and wait to see people’s reactions, swooping in once people didn’t gag or spit out whatever they had chosen, and soon carried several cups to a table with Yamato and other jonin.
The night continued and a bit later, Kakashi ventured to the tables again, choosing the same drink as last time, a light purple fizzy punch that had tasted like oranges. He sipped it as he moved away from the table but groaned - it now tasted like burnt rice, however possible that was!
Sighing, he placed his glass on a nearby empty table with others but paused as he passed someone drinking a large glass of the citrus punch as they perused the dessert table.
“You actually like that one?” Kakashi couldn’t help but ask.
“What?” the person, a man judging by their voice asked.
“The punch, it tastes like prune juice.”
The man looked at his glass and laughed. He was wearing a mask similar to Kakashi’s, in that it had a partial hood attached, with some dark hair poking out at the bottom. It covered almost all of the man’s face save for the mouth and chin, even covering the sides of his face to his jawline. But this man’s mask was dark blue, with dark blue glitter creating a design on the mask this way and that.
“It’s quite nice, actually,” the man simply said. “But not prunes, trust me.”
“I don’t,” Kakashi admitted, gesturing around. “I don’t trust anything here. Everything keeps changing. The drinks, the food, even the location of the bathrooms…”
The man laughed again. “That’s true, it’s part of the fun of tonight though.”
“You call this fun?”
“You don’t?” the man asked, but Kakashi shook his head. “Ah, you just need to look closer. Take, for instance, the drinks. They change, like you said, but there’s often a pattern. What looks least appealing is the tastiest, for drinks anyway. For the food, they all look nice but taste unlike their appearance.”
“I thought so, but then it changed again,” Kakashi told them, unimpressed.
“Well, we have to be kept on our toes,” the man teased. “So you never really know the system, right? Not for too long anyway, before it becomes randomized again.”
“Great,” Kakashi sighed sarcastically. “I think I’m going to head out early and get some regular, boring, unchanging food and drink on my way home.”
The man smiled but shook his head. “Don’t do that, I’ll help you out.”
“You know the system right now?”
“No, but I can reverse it.”
“What?” Kakashi asked, surprised.
“Sure, you just have to break the code, or however you’d like to call it,” the man told him. “Everything is really tasty. Follow me.”
Kakashi did just that, figuring he could not strike out any more tonight than letting someone else pick out food and drink for him, since everything already tasted terrible. This was unlike him, but what other option here did he have, as on his own he was guaranteed to fail one hundred percent?
The man led him to fill two glasses with a blue colored drink that smelled like a cleaning product, and Kakashi sighed skeptically but dutifully carried them as they returned to grab some food and desserts. They made their way to an empty table near one wall and sat down.
“Well?” Kakashi asked.
The man stretched his fingers before running through several hand seals, lightly but firmly slamming one hand on the table after.
“There you are,” he said. “I had to do a bit more since we had a few things to change.”
Kakashi looked at the table, but nothing looked different, and he shared as much.
“Well, try it, what do you have to lose?” the man said as he sipped his drink.
“Here goes nothing,” Kakashi sighed, turning away to sip his blue drink. As he brought it to his mask, he had to admit it no longer smelled as it had, and now was like…blueberry? Raspberry? A dark fruit, that was for sure. And it tasted much better, as well.
“I’m impressed,” Kakashi admitted as he turned back, earning a smile from the other masked man. “How did you figure it out?”
“I can’t reveal my secrets,” the man said, shaking his head as he began to eat.
“Hmm,” Kakashi mused, studying him. He was in shinobi blues, and in fit shape, but that was all Kakashi could observe. “What do you do for work?”
The man smiled again. “I work as a shinobi,” he said, as Kakashi snorted.
“Can you be more specific?”
“I could, but I won’t,” the man said, and Kakashi had to admit he was intrigued. It was freeing to talk to someone without expectations or former knowledge about them, everything hidden behind masks. Yes, he had this experience in his ANBU days, but this was for fun, not for work.
He continued to try to press the other man for information but learned nothing more. No name, age, neighborhood of residence, job, rank, anything.
“Do you know who I am?” Kakashi dared to ask, and the man shrugged.
“I might, I might not. Does it matter?”
Kakashi paused to think about it. “No,” he said, and decided that with the full mask and hood, how could anyone know who he was? There were others with similar height and body type, so nothing really stood out about him now.
The conversation moved on easily, comfortably, even, and eventually circled back to pranks.
“Want to have some fun?” the man asked after changing back their second round of drinks, to Kakashi’s delight.
“What did you have in mind?”
“I’ll be right back,” the man said, and Kakashi watched him leave and get a new drink, returning with it a moment later. He set it down and went through new hand seals that Kakashi couldn’t quite make out. As earlier, the drink didn’t change. The man also pulled out a small vial and showed it to him, though there was nothing surprising there.
“Do you trust me?”
“No, I just met you,” Kakashi said, frowning.
“Have you?”
“Haven’t I?”
“Either way…” the man said, but Kakashi shook his head.
“No.”
“Do you trust I won’t poison anyone and that it’s just a prank?”
“No,” Kakashi repeated.
“Fair,” the man sighed, putting it away. “I’ll leave it as it is already.” He stood and carried the glass towards the refreshment section, telling an event worker something.
The man returned, and Kakashi looked at him after watching the drink make its way to…
“Tsunade?” the copy nin asked in surprise. “You sent her a drink?”
“I did.”
“You’re trying to poison the hokage?”
The man shook his head. “Of course not! And certainly not with a witness,” he added, smiling.
“That’s serious treason,” Kakashi said, frowning slightly.
“Oh come on, it’s just a prank,” the man reminded him. “Literally everything here is approved by her, this is just payback.”
“Even so,” Kakashi warned.
“Fine, fine. Look, if she’s actually harmed, you can turn me in, okay? I’ll sit right here the whole time.”
“Deal,” Kakashi agreed, and the two turned back to watch Tsunade. She took time to finish her drink before moving to the new one, sipping it without being affected.
“So that went well,” Kakashi sarcastically commented to the other man, who smiled.
“Any good prank requires patience,” the man replied. “Keep watching.”
Kakashi did just that, and a moment later Tsunade took another sip from the glass, now sputtering and spitting it out.
“Who messed with my drink and why am I drinking squid ink?!” she shrieked, even though the liquid had not changed color.
The room erupted in laughter, including Kakashi and the other man.
“That’s amazing!” Kakashi cheered. “Let’s get some more people!”
“Now you trust me?” the other man laughed, and Kakashi nodded.
“Do I? This is the best part of the night!” Kakashi told him, seeing the man’s smile again and noting how nice it was.
And so, the two men set off. They turned Genma’s drink into a block of ice, and made Ebisu’s mask stick to his face, though Kakashi had no clue how that happened. Kurenai left her lipstick on the table and reapplied it after Kakashi’s new friend passed by it. Next thing they knew, she had kissed Asuma’s cheek, leaving a pair of bright red lips on him that would not come off. And overall, they made the blue punch stain people’s lips an actual shade of blue, something it had not done before. Not their teeth nor tongue, just their lips!
Kakashi found he was quite enjoying the night, especially now that he had good food and drink in him. He was having fun, the other man was good company, and it was all a pleasant surprise. He continued to try to learn who the other man was, but he received no information, and no one greeted either of them during the party as they sat or walked around it, so nothing was learned that way.
“Come on, seriously this time,” Kakashi began once they took a break from pranks. The other man was now drinking water, and had changed more punch for Kakashi. “Do you know who I am?”
“I do,” they admitted this time.
“And you won’t tell me?!”
The man shook their head. “This is more fun.”
“For who?”
“Me, admittedly,” the man said, grinning.
Kakashi sighed. “Well, what are you doing after this?” he asked.
“I have an overnight job tonight,” the man sighed. “I should leave soon, actually.”
“And what will you be doing for work tonight? Where will you go?”
“I’m not telling,” the man told him, shaking his head.
Kakashi frowned again but was interrupted by others joining the table they were sitting at and bringing them into general conversation regardless of who they were. He made a note to follow the other man when he left, to see where he went and then learn who he was, but Kakashi became distracted by the group and when he next looked over, the man was gone.
The jonin checked the time, seeing it was not yet quite midnight, but the man was nowhere to be seen, even with taking a lap around the room. And another lap, about twenty minutes later.
Kakashi eventually headed home, the party not having been nearly as much fun without the other man, and as he got into bed, thought about what he knew about the stranger. It was, he sadly realized, not much more than at the start of the night. Shinobi. Dark hair, but length not really known. Dark colored eyes, but the mask hid much of his face. Other than…other than his mouth and chin…
“And what a nice mouth and chin it was,” he sighed into the darkness. “How strange to see only part of a face, but then again, that’s what I do to everyone, so go figure.” Kakashi paused, thinking about it some more, and as he fell asleep, he thought about how the man pursed his lips when he was concentrating on his jutsu, tucking it away for him to think about when he woke up.
____
Across the village, Iruka smiled as he poured himself a cup of coffee to help him get through the night shift. He hadn’t had much to drink at the party, and plenty of water towards the end, so he was sober, albeit a bit tired.
Still, it had been fun to go and see who was there, in a sense, what pranks he could play. And he had a whole other day for more of them! Or at least the rest of that day, as it was technically after midnight on April first.
Smiling again, he looked at the blue mask he had worn all night before tucking it into a scroll to hide it and returned to work.