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SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS! SPOILERS!
Did I get that across? THERE ARE SPOILERS FOR AS RECENT AS NARUTO 537!!!!
Okay. Got that? They’re fairly minor, but they’re there. We warned? Good.
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“Oh God… oh fuck you feel so good…. Nngh…” Kotetsu grunted, his eyes sliding closed again as he pumped into the snug heat surrounding him. His hands tightened on the other man’s hips and he moaned, “Fuck, Zumo, you’re so tight…”
He heard an answering grunt from Zumo’s throat and he bent closer, biting down on the shoulder under him, knowing how much the other man liked it. “Oh fuck yes… Harder, faster, damn…” Izumo moaned and Kotetsu responded, picking up his speed and putting more force behind his thrusts.
Kotetsu wrapped an arm around Izumo’s waist and pushed his hand away from his cock. He wrapped his own fist around it and started stroking. “I’m so… fuck, so close…” he whispered into Izumo’s ear, trying to match his hand to the rhythm of his hips.
“God yes, come, Tetsu… fuck, I’m close, too.” Another loud groan from Izumo as he tilted his head back, laying it against Tetsu’s shoulder. “Mmm… God, Tetsu,” he whispered and turned to drop a kiss on Tetsu’s cheek.
Kotetsu turned his head, his lips meeting the other man’s. They broke apart, Izumo let out another series of grunts and then Tetsu felt the shudders in the body below him as Zumo’s orgasm hit. “Oh God, I’m…. coming… TETSU!” Izumo shouted.
Kotetsu sat bolt upright in bed, his heart racing, face coated in sweat and his cock rock hard. He looked around the room while he tried to catch his breath and remember where he was.
Alone. In his own bed.
Right. Izumo was in the room next to his, asleep in his own bed. Completely oblivious to the dream Kotetsu just had and the things that had caused it.
He flopped onto his back, trying to ignore the raging erection he had. He stared at the ceiling and sighed. This was the third night in a row he’d awakened like this. He’d been having dreams about his friend for a long time— that was nothing new.
But it was only in the last few days that they started to be this erotic.
He sighed again and untangled his legs from the sheets, rolling onto his side. He stared at the wall between his and Zumo’s rooms, trying to figure out, yet again, why they’d gotten so explicit. What had happened just a few days ago to make it this bad?
He did now; he knew why he had these dreams, he understood that very well.
He was thoroughly, unequivocally and… hopelessly in love with his best friend.
He didn’t know when it happened, couldn’t point to a single day and say “there, that’s when I fell in love.” But he could point to the day he realized it.
They’d been on their way home, finally, from the war. They’d survived. They were beaten, bloody and a mess, but they were alive, and together. And Kotetsu had looked over at his friend as they walked through the gates of Konoha and it had hit him like a punch in the stomach.
Because, of course, while they were alive, there were plenty of bodies going through those gates who were on stretchers and covered. There were plenty of their comrades who hadn’t made it. Konoha would end up having to put up another Memorial Stone to hold all of the new names.
But Izumo wasn’t on a stretcher. He was dirty and tired, just like Kotetsu was. Black and blue in places, covered in blood that was both his and not his and looking, in general, the worse for wear.
But he was alive.
And it had hit Kotetsu in that moment that there had been a very real chance that they wouldn’t survive. He realized right then that the scariest part of that thought wasn’t the idea that they both may have died in the battle against Kakazu or the subsequent fights. No, the scariest thought had been the thought of what would have happened if he’d survived and Izumo hadn’t.
So as they walked through the gates of the ruined village and made their way toward the rows of tents still serving as housing for the ninja, he’d caught a glimpse of the tired expression on Izumo’s face. As they found their own tent and cleaned up and settled in to finally rest he saw the bruises and scrapes that were a reminder that he was alive. And it had really come home to Kotetsu that they’d both survived and that’s when it had hit him just how he’d felt.
The buildings were back up, housing constructed, new Hokage tower now built. And in all that time, he hadn’t managed to tell Izumo what he’d realized. He hadn’t said a word to his friend about his newfound knowledge. He had kept his feelings to himself.
He had good reason. Thankfully, it wasn’t because Izumo didn’t like men. That wasn’t an issue, he very much did. Izumo was also very well aware of the fact that Kotetsu was also into men. No confusion there, either.
Nope. The biggest problem was that his best friend thought himself to be in love. With someone else.
“Thought” was the operative word in Kotetsu’s opinion. The person Izumo was in love with had no clue and, by all appearances, didn’t return the feelings. And Kotetsu held onto that idea with everything he could.
He sighed once more and again rolled onto his back. No, none of this had changed in the last few days, this wasn’t different. The dreams he’d had the last three nights hadn’t been caused by that kind of thing – the thought of his feelings for Izumo or the realizations of it. His dreams had always been sexy, yes, at least since they’d been older, usually involving the two of them being naked, but he’d always awakened long before they got as bad as tonight’s had been – or last night’s or the night before that.
He gave up trying to figure it out and fighting his body and slid his boxers down past his hips. His eyes drifted closed when he wrapped his hand around his cock and started stroking it slowly. He’d been right on the cusp of orgasm in his dream and apparently, his body was still very close.
He gritted his teeth, taking a fistful of the sheets in his hand and twisting them, all in an attempt to hold in his sounds. Quiet grunts and moans leaked through, anyway, as his fist flew over his hard length, bring him even closer to coming. His mind filled in the pictures of what he’d imagined Izumo would look like in the middle of orgasm, something he’d wondered about for quite a long time. He imagined that chocolate eye closed, head thrown back, face twisted. He squeezed his eyes tight, then, as his climax tore through him and he bit his tongue hard to keep from shouting out Izumo’s name.
When he finally calmed down, he cleaned himself up with his boxers and rolled one more time onto his side, staring at the wall to his friend’s room. He pulled the blanket back over him and glanced over at the clock. Two in the morning. He had a feeling it was going to take him a long time to get to sleep.
He was right.
He slammed a hand onto the alarm clock and rolled over, trying to ignore it for a few more minutes. He pulled the blanket tighter around himself and buried his face in his pillow. The last time he could remember checking the clock was just before four. It was six.
He sighed and burrowed in a little more. They were due at the Hokage’s office in an hour, though it irked him more than a little that they had to be there long before she was. But it wasn’t so bad yet. They were painting that day, so they were still mostly working on reconstruction, though it was just shy of completely done.
He wasn’t sure if he was happy about that or not. With the construction complete, regular missions would start back up but everything he’d seen and heard so far indicated he and Izumo would go right back to being desk jockeys. And though they saw plenty of fighting during the war and wasn’t positive he wanted to go right back to killing, he wasn’t sure he wanted to just go back to shuffling papers and sitting in the gate booth, either.
He snuggled in a bit more and closed his eyes. His mind went back to the dream he’d been having the night before. He groaned a little, not really wanting to start thinking about all of that again and giving himself another problem. He was just about to give up and get up anyway, when his door was opened.
“Testu! Get up! We don’t want to be late!” Kotetsu heard footsteps that stopped abruptly. “Tetsu? Why are you naked?”
“I took my boxers off last night.” He waved a hand toward where they were laying in a ball on the floor. “What’s the big deal? You’ve seen my ass before.” Kotetsu grumbled, feeling rather ungracious.
“Uh, nothing.” He said smacking Tetsu’s ass. “Just get up. We don’t want to be late. Don’t forget to wear civvies.”
Kotetsu grunted in reply and listened to his friend’s retreating footsteps. When he heard the door close, he rolled onto his side and rubbed his hand over the spot Izumo had smacked him, trying damned near desperately to not think of Izumo’s hand on him, even in that small way. He glared at the closed door then sighed.
He managed to let go of most of his grumpiness after a very strong cup of Izumo’s coffee and a morning of painting. They finished the majority of what was left by lunchtime and they stood back, looking around at the new room.
Kotetsu motioned with the roller in his hand. “I think it looks good. Just a little bit here and there.”
Izumo nodded. “Yup. I’m not looking forward to moving the furniture in, but I guess Konoha’s back in business.” He pointed with his paintbrush and wrapped an arm around his friend. “Do you think she’ll like the swirl?” He asked with a smirk.
“Well, if she doesn’t, we can always hang the Fire Country flag over it,” Kotetsu replied wrapping his arm around Zumo’s shoulder.
“That’s true. Okay, how about lunch?” He asked, then grinned when he let his hand drop and squeezed Kotetsu’s ass.
He didn’t know why that hit him wrong, but it just did. They’d been doing things like that to each other for years, so it shouldn’t have bothered him. But for some reason right then, it hit him very wrong and made him want to punch something. Instead, he just stepped out of Izumo’s arm. “Go ahead, I’ll clean up here. I’ve got an errand to run, anyway.”
Izumo blinked at him in surprise. “Tetsu? Of course, I’ll help clean up. Then we can go to lunch together, like we always do.”
“No, I don’t mind. Like I said, I’ve got stuff to do. You go ahead.” Kotetsu nodded to emphasize his point but Izumo just shook his head.
“No. I won’t leave you to clean up. And we can get lunch while you do whatever you need to do. Ichiraku’s is open again.” So saying, he picked up the paint trays and started the process of putting things back together and away.
Kotetsu tried not to sigh, but guessed based on the look his friend gave him, that he didn’t manage too well. He shrugged it off and they worked in silence as they poured paint back in buckets, gathered brushes and rollers and washed everything up.
When they’d finally finished and had everything back in the proper places, they started out of the building. They passed Genma and Raidou on their way down the steps. “Hey, guys,” Genma greeted them, senbon firmly in place between his teeth.
“Hi Genma-san, Raidou-san,” Izumo said, smiling up at the other men, his eyes firmly on the taller of the two. Kotetsu swallowed the growl at the blush on Izumo’s visible cheek.
Raidou didn’t say anything as usual, just nodded at them with his typical half smile on his face. Kotetsu managed a quiet, “Hi.”
“Missions starting back up soon. You guys going to be sent out?” Genma asked, his eyes darting from Tetsu to Zumo and back.
“Don’t know yet, but it sounds like she’s going to keep us as her errand boys again,” Kotetsu said, unable to hold in the bitterness completely.
Genma frowned, the senbon moving to the other side of his mouth. “That’s not cool. You guys did a lot during the war; I’d think that would have earned you more missions. I wouldn’t count on anything yet, though. And, you know,” he said with a shrug, “Maybe she just has a soft spot for you two and doesn’t want you in danger.”
Kotetsu snorted and Izumo laughed. “Right.” Izumo said between chuckles. “Next you’re going to tell us she thinks of us like her sons.”
“I wouldn’t go that far, but I’d bet she does care about you. You’ve been working directly for her for how many years?” Genma asked.
Izumo blinked. “Geez, I don’t know. Um…” he paused and looked at Kotetsu.
“Uh… four years?” Kotetsu asked. “Something like that.”
“See? Maybe she does just want to keep you close.” Genma offered, his senbon clicking against his teeth.
“Right.” Izumo snickered. “Anyway, we’ll see you around, we’re on our way to lunch.” He waved at Genma and smiled up at Raidou again before continuing down the steps.
Kotetsu gave a half hearted wave at them and followed his friend. He had to make up a trip to the store while they were out because he didn’t really have an errand; he’d just been trying to get out of lunch with Izumo. It was getting harder and harder to be around him all the time and that only helped to piss him off more. Especially when, like now, they ran into the one person his best friend would rather be around than him.
Raidou.
He was solid muscle, had a very nice, tight ass and Kotetsu knew Izumo had plenty below the waist. He unashamedly looked any chance he got.
He shook his head at himself, picked up hair gel for his spikes that he didn’t really need and half-listened to Izumo’s chatter about the Hokage and whether she really did worry about them. He managed to nod and make appropriate noises well enough because Izumo didn’t seem too concerned. For the hell of it, he stopped and added a box of condoms to his hair gel, which finally succeeded in shutting his friend up.
“Tetsu? What do you need those for?” Izumo asked, blinking.
Kotetsu glanced at his friend. “The Krooked Kunai is reopening this weekend,” he said with a shrug. “Don’t know who I might see there.”
Izumo blinked at him, but just frowned in silence.
Kotetsu knew he didn’t really need them. They were shinobi. They were healed and kept healthy by the best medical personnel in the Five Great Shinobi Nations. They didn’t get disease in general, much less sexually transmitted diseases and if by some chance something did manage to sneak in above the common cold or basic flu, it was quashed immediately.
But picking them up got the point across.
Most shinobi only used them for two reasons. One was if they actually participated in heterosexual sex and might, possibly, need to worry about pregnancy. The other was if they were having sex outside of the ninja corps. Because, though they were clean, the civilians had no such restrictions on their health.
Either way, the idea that he might need some would leave his friend with a big fat question. Would he consider sex with a woman? Would he pick up a civilian? Kotetsu knew he wouldn’t, but he was in a bad enough mood to want to make his friend wonder.
He had no idea how he got through the rest of the day. When they got home, he retreated into his room and ignored his friend, not even coming out for dinner, which was very unusual. He loved Zumo’s cooking and rarely missed it, unless he was sick or not home. He knew he was being ridiculous, avoiding him like that, but after the sleepless night and the long day, he was in no mood for company, especially his best friend.
He knew he couldn’t keep this up. He had to find a way to either put his feelings away or confront Izumo with them, but he had no idea how to approach it. He’d never felt like that before, so he had no way of dealing with it. The only thing he knew to do was bury them, which obviously wasn’t working.
They spent two days moving furniture, helping the Hokage set up her new office and finally get settled in. She set them to organizing paperwork almost immediately, much to their chagrin, but they, of course, didn’t question it. An order was an order.
Finally, the mission desk reopened and normal missions started to pour in. Both Kotetsu and Izumo, along with Iruka and Genma were buried under the resulting paperwork for the next couple of days. When things were eventually organized, the jounin were the first to be sent out. Genma was pulled from the office quickly and given a mission with Raidou and those two were gone in no time.
Iruka, Kotetsu and Izumo grumbled at the added work. They dragged in a few genin to help, and that eased things a little. The missions trickled down to the chuunin and they got sent out next, almost all of them heading out except, of course, the desk jockeys.
All of this was compounded by the fact that Kotetsu still wasn’t sleeping well and succeeded in putting him in an even worse mood. Errand boy, furniture mover, paper-pusher. That was all he felt like he was good for and by Friday afternoon his mood had hit rock bottom. No one, not even Izumo, would go near him. He snapped at everyone dropping off a report, and even Iruka, who took shit from no one – not even ANBU, handled him as if he were an explosive tag.
So, when Raidou and Genma came in to turn in the report from their mission, Iruka heard the growl from the spiky-haired man and stood up quickly, stepping around the desk to intercept them. The room fell into silence when he said in a low voice, “I’ll take your report, Rai.”
Raidou raised an eyebrow and his eyes moved from Kotetsu’s thundercloud face to Izumo’s apprehensive one to the worried teacher. “Uh, sure.” He handed the paper to Iruka and nodded toward Izumo, who blushed, causing another growl from Kotetsu.
Genma watched the whole thing in a sort of detached fascination. He had a feeling he knew what was going on here, but kept his own counsel since he had his own issues with the situation. He suppressed a sigh when Raidou stepped around Iruka and approached the desk, anyway. “Hi, Izumo.” He cleared his throat a little nervously and leaned against the counter.
Izumo flushed and stuttered out a nearly imperceptible “H-hi.”
Raidou smiled then, causing Izumo’s cheeks to brighten even more. “You know the Kunai is re-opening tonight,” he started, his voice quiet, trying in vain to keep the conversation just between them.
Izumo nodded, then forced out, “Yes, I’d heard that.” He shot a glance at Kotetsu, the image of the condoms his friend had purchased earlier in the week floating in his head.
“I was wondering if you might want to go with me, you know… for drinks or… something.”
The word something hung in the air briefly and just about every person in the room had images pop into their heads of what that was. Ebisu, the consummate pervert, was probably closest to the mark, though from the sounds of Kotetsu’s quiet growl, he probably had a fairly good guess, too. Genma’s sigh transmitted his ideas on the subject. Iruka closed his eyes and wondered how much work it was going to be to rebuild the brand new mission office and redo all of the paperwork.
“Um, y-yes. I’d like that,” Izumo managed, his face still red. His lips spread into a nervous attempt at a smile when Raidou gave his own version of a grin.
“Good. I’ll pick you up at eight.” Raidou stood up from the counter.
“Okay. Um, s-see you then,” Izumo said and swallowed around his dry throat, shooting another glance to the side at the subsequent noise Kotetsu made.
“Okay. See you,” Raidou nodded either ignoring Kotetsu or oblivious to the tension emanating from the chuunin and turned back to Genma, who was watching the whole thing with an unreadable expression of his own. “Gotta go, Gen, got things to do before tonight. I’ll catch you later,” he said and dropped a hand on his friend’s shoulder as he left.
Iruka watched the big man’s back as he left then glanced at Genma, who hadn’t moved, expression still guarded. His eyes shifted to Kotetsu who practically vibrated with emotion and finally looked to Izumo, who was still stunned. Iruka seemed to be the only one who really understood all of what was going on. He started counting and got to five before the mission office exploded in chaos.
Everyone started talking at once. The two genin teams in the room chattered to each other about why it had gone so quiet and what the big deal was and who the big man was and why the other one was blushing and so on. Izumo stuttered through an attempt at speech to Kotetsu who was avoiding looking at him and, instead, was watching Genma. Genma, meanwhile, was chewing hard on his senbon, the noise of the clicking from it almost as loud as the chattering of the genin teams.
Out of all of it, Hyuuga Neji’s team was the loudest. He gritted his teeth, eyes squeezed shut, eyebrow twitching and vein in his temple pulsing. “Out. Now,” he grunted at his students. When they didn’t move, staring at him in quiet awe, he lifted Aoi and tucked her under his arm, put his foot in Sho’s behind, grabbed Jun by his collar and unceremoniously dragged them all from the room.
Konahamaru, Udon and Moegi stood to the side against the wall, trying desperately to look inconspicuous and failing. Ebisu’s expression couldn’t be seen behind his sunglasses, but his face looked quite a bit paler than usual. He turned and pointed in silence at the door. The three genin left fast enough for Iruka to feel the breeze from their departure.
Kotetsu stood up, then, shoving his chair back with a clatter and stalked around the desk and up to Genma. Gen blinked down at him in surprise. “Want to go tonight?” Kotetsu asked and Genma nodded, senbon bobbing.
“Yeah, that, um, sounds good. Uh, eight?” Genma asked and Kotetsu nodded shortly.
“I’ll pick you up then,” he said, and, glancing at Iruka and patently ignoring his best friend, stormed through the doorway in the back of the room toward the other offices.
Iruka blinked at Genma who threw up a hand in a stunted attempt at a careless wave and took his own leave. The teacher turned to the last person in the room - the still-stunned chuunin left at the desk. Izumo glanced up at him and shook his head, shrugging as if to say, “I have no idea.”