Work Text:
Accusing a shinobi of being sneaky was equally smart as telling a fish to stop flapping its fins. It was part of their nature to sneak around, as well it was also known that without being sneaky many nins would have met their fates way sooner than they did. When that was taken into consideration, many games such as hide and seek had very different rules and outcomes between the offspring of shinobi and civilian parents, which usually led to many awkward moments on common playgrounds. Nonetheless, every rank agreed that becoming a fine shinobi required that one understood the concept of sneakiness and practiced it whenever the situation called for it.
It was also agreed that Uzumaki Naruto's definition of 'sneaky' was the only loud exception in the rule.
In that sense, it was understandable for the psych nins who were debating over the places for lunch to spot Umino-san heading down the street with the air of a man who was up to no good and not raise more than mildly entertained eyebrows at the sight. As they greeted the bypassing headmaster and discreetly analyzed his body language that tattled of something brewing in the man's mind, the nins on a break found themselves facing an opponent harder to satisfy than a growling stomach – curiosity.
If Umino-san was surprised to hear them heading to Ichiraku as well, the tokujo hid it well from the professional mind-mincers. In fact, the man seemed actually thrilled to have more company at lunch, which made some in the group exchange glances between them. It was commonly known that the headmaster rarely spent his breaks alone, so for the man to readily take on the offer of seven psych nins joining him was something that made a couple of them wonder if they could still take back what had been said without sounding like badly mannered ninnies.
There was a fine line between curiosity and suicidal idiocy, after all.
The look that they registered on Hatake-sama's masked face once their merry group entered the ramen stand and when Umino-san determinately steered his companions towards the counter that was surrounded with an aura accessible for fewer than nine persons made that one particular fact rather clear to them all.
Nevertheless, bearing their training in mind made it easier to withstand the sharp stare of their leader as all of the seven field psychiatrists primly took their seats in a neat row of stools on both sides of the lovers, some demurely picking up the menus, some toying with their chopsticks and most looking at everywhere else than the exchange of put-out looks and challenging glares that went on a moment before the shinobi couple in question settled for a truce and they all deemed the situation safe enough to start ordering the drinks and foods.
Fifty minutes later, once the clean-up crew had restricted the area surrounding what was left of Teuchi-san's stand and the witness reports had been taken by the ANBU squad to be delivered to the Internal Affairs Department along with one stunned missing nin who clearly had not seen it all coming, there sat two nins, a tokujo and his Hokage, on a creaky bench across the street from Ichiraku Ramen, silently watching how one section of the damaged roof gave in with an accusing groan. Their lunch company had taken it upon themselves to join the ANBU and deliver the shell-shocked rogue to Morino-san's care, an act which showed remarkable sneakiness in strategical retreat considering the estimated proportions of the hissy fit that the representative of the damage insurance team was most likely going to have within the next ten minutes.
As they watched the steadily increasing snapping between the harried-looking office nin and Teuchi-san with every destroyed item put down on the list, the dark-haired tokubetsu smoothed his frizzled ponytail and scooted closer to his partner, a sheepish smile skirting around the edges of his mouth as he murmured quietly: “I am ready to revise my theory, but I don't think Naruto will approve of us dating if this keeps on happening.”
The answering glint of humor in the gray eyes was enough to tell that the elite agreed with him, followed by a lazily drawled: “Maa. Just when I thought that you look rather fetching with those fishcakes in your hair.”
This time there was a visible struggle against the smirk that did its damnest to spread on Iruka's face. "Smooth bastard." Then, he reached for the other's dark mask.
While everyone was focused on watching yet another section of the damaged dining establishment collapse into a heap of concrete and wood, a quick kiss tasting of smoke that clung to their skins and burnt broth that covered their ruined clothes was shared between the two snickering men who sat on the small bench, neither of them giving a thought to the paperwork they were most likely requested to file in once more as their yet another disastrous ramen date came to an end.