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Being a politician’s mate was not on Iruka’s top ten list of life goals.
Growing up under Sandaime’s tutelage had reined in his more immature compulsions, sure, but it had also made him realize that his capacity to tolerate immature bullshit extended only to people who had not yet reached maturity.
Iruka had no patience for the bullshit of politics, which was why he tried to stay away from the Konoha administrative complex during his parental leave. Ever since he and Kakashi and Tenzo had agreed to drop the ruse of monogamy in public, he tried to avoid any space where he might cross paths with a council elder.
Maybe that made him a coward. But he wanted to have the inevitable confrontation on his own terms. Terms that involved looking like a functional human being — one who got more than three hours of sleep a night and wore his own uniforms instead of Tenzo’s because he had time to do his own laundry. Which might be the case when his parental leave ended in a month but was not the case at present.
The only reason he’d come to the administrative complex today was to spend a nice lunch with his two mates and daughter. Kakashi, unwilling to endure the tedium of the annual ANBU budget meeting by himself, had dragged Tenzo along for “subject matter expertise.” The precious alone time Iruka normally got during Kohari’s morning nap had been spent preparing omurice bento for the three of them as a gesture of sympathy.
Perhaps a regrettable choice, in hindsight, because the meeting was already running late, and the delicious aroma from the three neatly wrapped boxes was now taunting him from the table in the sitting room where he and Kohari waited.
Iruka weighed the growing pit of hunger in his stomach against his greater love for the two jonin. “If they’re not here in fifteen minutes, I’m eating mine and giving the rest to Shikamaru-kun,” he told the baby.
Of course, when it came to food, Kohari had first priority, and it only took her ten minutes after arrival to start demanding it. At three months old, her feedings were still unpredictable and time-consuming, which was why Iruka had no chance to cover his chest when, barely five minutes in, Mitokado Homura slipped into the room and settled onto the couch across from him.
Outside of Kakashi’s inauguration, Iruka had only interacted with the council elders on two occasions, both of which had involved having his academic expertise undermined in public. Whatever opinions the older man held of Iruka behind his thin spectacles were a mystery, but recent events probably hadn’t improved them.
Iruka squashed the urge to pull his daughter closer or toss a blanket around her for modesty’s sake, opting instead to offer a polite nod as a tense quiet settled over the room, broken only by Kohari’s greedy suckling and the muffled voices from the adjacent conference room.
“Iruka-sensei. I apologise that it’s taken me this long to give you my formal congratulations.” His look was not unlike a parent reviewing a child’s disappointing grade report.
There was some formality Iruka was supposed to give here in return. May she prosper and kindle a Will of Fire or some such, but that was the opening line he used to give to new students on the first day of the Academy, so it probably wasn’t correct. He settled on a simple “Thank you” instead.
“Kohari. A unique name in Konoha history — but beautiful.”
It’s carved on the memorial stone. Iruka had to bite back the retort. Not to mention it was a syllable’s deviation from the given name of Homura’s co-counsellor. “My mother may have immigrated from Kiri, but she died a Konoha shinobi protecting Konoha ideals.” He tried to play off his irritation with a half-shrug on his unoccupied side. “I felt it was the best way to honour her.”
Homura nodded, though his eyes never left the baby. “Unique to the Hatake line, in any case.”
Unique was the only correct adjective to describe anything about Kakashi. “Yes, the Hokage had a great time choosing the spelling.” Iruka could still remember the way his brow twitched when he woke up from twenty hours of labour to see the kanji for Kohari written as “small flying carp” on the birth certificate. “He personally insisted on writing it in all the birth announcements. And in the family registry.”
Homura’s mouth tightened into a thin line. “The registry is, in fact, why I came to speak with you today.”
You don’t say. Iruka spared a moment to consider the specific way he would strangle Kakashi for forcing him to have this conversation alone. Seated on his chest, Iruka’s hands around his throat as Tenzo pinned his arms above his head—
“We’re having trouble legitimizing the addition,” the older man continued. “It’s required the second and third opinions of several archivists, as well as consultation of the Godaime and a few village family leaders.”
“Why?”
“It’s been quite a long time since we’ve seen a branch with three…individuals.”
Iruka couldn’t suppress the scoff this time. “How hard is it to read a line with three names on it?”
Fuck, he’d said that out loud.
Yet the older man responded with a thoughtful hum instead of rebuking the outburst. “The Godaime said something similar. But Iruka-sensei, I’m coming to you with this because I know you, more than most, understand the need for clarity on this matter because of the village’s interest in seeing these family lines continue.”
“With all due respect, I thought that’s what I was doing.” As though he wasn’t sitting in front of this man feeding an entirely new Hatake child that he’d birthed three months ago.
Exasperated, Homura removed his glasses to stare at Iruka directly. “With which progenitor, sensei?”
Iruka glanced down at Kohari, mostly because he needed someone to look at who wasn’t a source of ire, but she was blissfully enjoying her lunch. He wanted lunch, too, damn it.
Sudden amusement filled his chest until the laughter bubbled over, spilled out in uncontrollable bursts at the mental image of the village elders consulting people like Tsunade and Hyuga Hiashi and Aburame Shibi on who Iruka had fucked and whose sperm had won the race to knock him up first.
“I don’t know. Have you checked the birth certificate?” Talking about progenitors and bloodlines made Iruka want to rant about mitochondrial DNA and Umino heritage, but the bitter truth was that this was about the preservation of ninjutsu abilities far more powerful than anything his family carried. “I’ll remind you that regardless of her progenitor, her other father is someone in the Hatake family. A family that will now have Senju blood in it, too. Or is that not legitimate enough for the ‘archivists’?”
“Iruka-sensei.” Homura scowled. “You are so set on this unconventional path, but I’ll remind you that, as part of Konoha’s political leadership, it is our duty to ensure that the village and the families of its history thrive. That we remain committed to rebuilding their former glory.”
Iruka couldn’t give two shits about former glory — about people squabbling over bloodline purities and the ethical theories about who was “worthy” of carrying what ability. All while children — like Naruto, like Sasuke, like Iruka himself — suffered or died. And for what?
He didn’t want to raise his daughter in the shadow of her own heritage. He just wanted her to be happy. Loved. To feel encouraged and supported on her path to be whoever she wanted to be, even if that was never a shinobi.
Fingers of his free hand curled around his knee, and Iruka clutched Kohari close. “Duty and tradition would have you disinherit a child of the Hokage? What kind of message does that send to the rest of our people? To the orphans of war and the children of refugees we’ve taken in?” The argument seemed even more absurd now, when reduced to such blunt terms — something to be approached with the same patient, tactful precision he used to grade a child’s essay. To refocus logic without shame, even when it may be deserved. “I have faith that seasoned elders such as yourself would not let something like that happen because of a semantic interpretation in a family register.”
Homura’s face was carefully blank.
“I think Konoha has aspirations that are far larger than its former ways.” Iruka inclined his head toward the sitting room window. “But I know tradition is important. Which is why I want to use Kohari’s okuizome as an opportunity for diplomatic exchange on how we can better support children throughout the Five Nations. I’ve actually been working on proposal letters to send out to the other kage fairly soon.”
He did not, in fact, have any such proposals prepared. Honestly, he had forgotten the okuizome — the traditional 100-day ceremony — was even a thing people with newborns did until all this talk of formalities reminded him. But Iruka never had figured out how to fully coordinate his brain and his mouth when he was pissed off.
The very suggestion of this impromptu exchange appeared to baffle the older man. “You’re aware such a proposal would first have to be reviewed by the council?”
Iruka nodded. “It seems unthinkable that we would serve food frivolously at my child’s 100-day celebration when there are children in this village and abroad who don’t know where their next meal will come from. Working with the other kage to design a program that can support kids in need would be in natural alignment with our goal is to cultivate peace. I can think of no better way to honour my family and our village.”
Do you want me to send out a missive to every village about our happy family arrangement? Kakashi had once asked. It was an offhand remark meant to assuage Iruka and Tenzo’s anxieties, but there was no doubt he would do it at a moment’s notice.
Except he wouldn’t have to. Iruka was apparently going to do it for him. Because Sandaime hadn’t tamed all of Iruka’s petty immaturity — merely taught him how to channel it more effectively. And the imagined look on the elder councilman’s face at the sight of a humanitarian proposal inspired by Konoha’s most unconventional family would evoke enough petty satisfaction to sustain Iruka for years.
The petty satisfaction, in reality, lasted until he got home and realized he had no clue how to draft a policy proposal.
Nor did he have any clue when he’d find the time to write one between caring for Kohari, transitioning into his new role in the Academy’s administration, and strangling the life out of his silver-haired mate.
“If you do not stop trying to grope me while I’m researching,” Iruka growled, “you’re going to be the first Hokage to wear a chastity belt.” He swatted Kakashi’s hand away as it tried to dive into the pile of scrolls on Iruka’s lap, sending a half dozen clattering to the floor from where they were seated on the couch.
“You can’t prove that.” Kakashi pulled his mask down with a smirk and pressed himself so far into the omega’s personal space that Iruka could feel the man’s heart beating against his arm. “Senju Tobirama was a known accessoriser.”
“Pretty sure that accessory rumour is from one of Jiraiya’s novels,” Tenzo said. He was perched on the other side of the couch, sketching another architectural plan and blissfully tolerant of the scrolls piling up around him. Iruka opened his mouth to ask how he knew that, but Tenzo was swift with expert redirection. “Why in the world did you subject yourself to this, Iruka?”
“I don’t know. I think I blacked out,” Iruka said. “I was just minding my own business, feeding my child, and the next thing I knew, I was doing humanitarian politics.”
Tenzo gave a sympathetic nod. “It happens.”
Kakashi was regarding him with the same hunger and awe normally reserved for a rare volume of literary smut still in the shrink wrap. “I’ve never been more turned on by foreign policy.”
“I didn’t even get to eat my fucking lunch,” Iruka whined. Because as soon as Homura left, he’d immediately panicked and abandoned the food, hurrying with Kohari straight for Tsunade’s office. Except she was at a medical conference with Sakura and wouldn’t be back until next week.
That was fine. Maybe he could talk to Shizune. Or Shikamaru. Maybe he could set up a temporary living space in the Hokage’s file room, whiling away his precious free time going through policy records until his eyes bled. Or maybe he could just spend the next week having a silent meltdown while Kakashi tried to crawl into his pants and Tenzo gave him pity cuddles.
Kakashi was not even attempting to hide his erection, which pressed insistently against Iruka’s hip. “Trifling political games with council elders may become my new fetish, I fear.”
“Gross.”
The copy-nin wagged a finger. “We don’t kink shame in this house.”
He hauled Iruka into his lap, then, causing the chuunin to yelp as the deluge of scrolls and books scattered across the floor. Thank fuck Kohari had gone down for bedtime earlier that night and was too deeply asleep to be disturbed.
Back pressed to Kakashi’s chest, Iruka could feel the cock, stiff and urgent against his ass, warm even through two layers of clothing. The room spiked with a mixture of clove and cedarwood, a curious nuance that had Iruka eyeing Tenzo suspiciously. The other jonin’s pupils were blown wide, nostrils flaring as he keyed on to some subtle scent he could detect because of his earth chakra’s deep connection to his developing alpha senses.
Tenzo set his sketchbook aside and tried to readjust his position, but the scrolls could no longer hide the tent in his pants. Despite Iruka’s annoyance, the persistent smell of alpha in the room made him want to pull Tenzo’s thickening cock out of his fly and wrap lips around it, swirling his tongue around the foreskin and teasing drops of precome out of the slit.
Kakashi was already starting to yank Iruka’s pants down and unfasten his own fly. But Tenzo’s gaze was oddly distant in response to Iruka’s questioning glance.
“Is there a reason you’re being weird?”
The jonin’s face had turned the colour of autumn maple. “It’s not— It’s just—” His nostrils flared again. “You smell so—”
“So good.” Kakashi’s agreement was a puff of breath in his ear. “You’re a force of nature, baby.” The last barrier between his cock and Iruka’s wet heat was a pair of faded green briefs that were yanked aside to make way for the slick head that dragged across Iruka’s ass in desperation to slide home.
The way they were both regarding him — with such reverence, eyes dark with desire — evoked a feeling similar to one from this morning. One he hadn’t been able to name in the heat of outrage at Homura’s unsubtle accusation. Something floating and electric and abundant. In that moment, when he’d been seated before that petty councilman, swaddled child at his breast, and laughed at the man’s toothless bluster, he’d felt powerful.
Iruka’s hand dropped to hover over his abdomen where the warmth was building like a chakra bloom. His mind circled back to the word Homura had used, progenitor, conjured an image of himself as progenitor of the village’s future leaders — because he would be the link connecting them all. The mate of two influential village shinobi would be a chuunin schoolteacher who valued compassion over power, who oversaw a community unhindered by borders or bloodlines or access to food, medicine and education.
It was gone in an instant, dissipated back to the same part of his amygdala that had birthed it, but it left in its place a pulsing desire, an aching need to be full.
Iruka leaned forward to free Tenzo from his slacks and taste the heat of his hardness while Kakashi pushed into him with a lewd groan. The older alpha grunted and thrust until the knot popped and semen spilled inside just as Tenzo’s come spurted into Iruka’s mouth.
He felt like a deity, a god of bounty, filled at both ends with their supplication until he was dripping with it.
“Don’t most political spouses host banquets or something?” Tsunade looked up from her review of Iruka’s proposal notes, all 117 pages of them, the last of which he’d finished a scant few hours before their meeting. They were seated on opposite sides of the desk in her office, hunched over papers, books, scrolls, and stray notes hastily torn and crumpled. “You could’ve just thrown your daughter a 100-day celebration like normal parents instead of,” she gestured to the mess.
“And have the village up in arms because it would waste precious taxpayer funds?” Iruka rubbed the scar across his nose in irritation. “That’ll get me on the Daimyo’s radar for sure.”
She waved a page of the proposal with a snort. “And you don’t think this will? Frankly, if word has gotten to him about your family arrangement, which it likely has, you’re already there.”
“Then I might as well make the most of it.”
Tsunade straightened and levelled Iruka with a sceptical glare over the document in hand. “You know, this goes far beyond donating to the orphanage or opening a public service facility in your child’s honour. You’re writing in here about food systems and housing and nutrition and education.” She ticked off each word on a manicured finger as she spoke. “What you’re proposing is the beginning stages of an international development effort. That’s certainly going to require a little attention.”
And a lot of effort. The addendum hung in the air unspoken. Tsunade’s years of experience and position on the Konoha Council made her an invaluable partner on this project, but she had retired from this life for a reason, and Iruka was asking a lot of her for his own personal cause.
“Yeah, well,” he told her. “I think I’m done worrying about attention. I could do a lot worse with it than helping families and improving international relations.”
The corners of the Godaime’s lips twitched upward. It felt like a call back to their former days, to the hours spent with her and Shizune sorting mission reports and outlining academic plans. Iruka had always known how to leverage her delight in playing the odds.
“We’re not getting this done before she’s 100 days old.”
“I know.” He reached for the first page of the proposal, where the heading Okuizome Plan for Sustainable Families drew a wistful smile. “120 days old will have to do.”
Tsunade barked out a laugh so loud it shook the jars of sake on the bookshelf next to her desk. “You’re a tough taskmaster, sensei.”
And yet, less than a month later, the Okuizome Plan, skimmed down to a brief 75 pages, was in the hands of the Hokage and his council. It became a proposal to engage representatives from each of the five hidden villages on ways to ensure a happier next generation by increasing international cooperation, creating funding opportunities to support affordable housing and education, and allowing shinobi and civilians to share resources for mutual benefit.
Iruka had never been more proud of his commitment to maximize productivity out of spite.
And so continued the evolution of Umino Iruka: parent, political spouse, assistant principal, polyamourist, international development champion, and unconventional path-taker.
He found that spending the better part of a year stewing in anxiety about their secret polyamourous relationship being exposed left him woefully unprepared for the dearth of fucks a village full of shinobi actually gave once they stopped hiding it.
Sure, a member of the Konoha Council of Elders had threatened to delegitimize his daughter’s heritage. But Iruka had always known the council had no grounds to disinherit the only heir to one of Konoha’s prestigious families. He hadn’t a mote of remorse for laughing in Mitokado Homura’s face all those weeks ago.
And sure, the stares he’d got on occasion were aggravating. The whispers, the giggles, the sidelong glances when any combination of the three of them were seen together in public or spending quality time with Kohari. But Konoha, at its core, was a village full of people who had walked the line of mortality and rebuilt from the ravages of war. The news that their Hokage now had two mates, while curious to most, was hardly strange to a village that grew and trained in groups of three.
And for those few who chose to regard Iruka as an adulterous omega — because, of course, they’d never deign to hurl the same accusations at alphas — well… he had better things to do than bother with the paltry, decaying opinions of dissenters who’d be dead before Kohari darkened an Academy door.
But the problem was that subverting expectations about nuclear family units turned out to be much easier than subverting expectations about reproduction and child rearing.
Going back to work after leave was the start of a new normal for the Hatake-Umino family. Kakashi’s job kept him no less busy, as expected. Becoming the Hokage’s husband meant that Tenzo no longer needed to keep up the appearance of being Iruka’s bodyguard, but going back to ANBU was hardly an option considering his family commitments and the fact that it was now impossible to maintain a low profile. When he offered to leave his career to take care of the baby, Iruka didn’t know whether to kiss him or punch him.
So they compromised: he re-joined the rotation of jonin, but Kakashi mostly assigned him to surveillance missions within the village. This, of course, left Iruka as the only one with a regular schedule and thus the primary responsible party for their child.
Iruka was thankful for the Academy’s daycare, which gave him the ability to schedule periodic breaks into his day to feed her, though he hadn’t figured out how to contain the guilt when it had to happen during a meeting. Or when work or proposal commitments made him the last parent for pick up. Or when he got left off of staff or project meetings if they occurred during times when people assumed he should be taking care of Kohari.
Occasionally he ran into Kurenai when missions forced her to leave Mirai at daycare, too. He wanted to commiserate with her, but complaining made him feel worse when he knew she was doing it because she had no other choice.
“I dread the day they send me on an overnight mission,” she told him, her red eyes heavy with fatigue. “I don’t want to be part of the omega statistic that drops out to become a full-time parent, but I might have to.”
“You know you can always leave her with us if you need to,” Iruka said.
She waved her hands quickly. “Oh no, Iruka-kun, that’s OK. You’ve got a newborn. That’s tough enough no matter how much help you have.”
An innocent statement. He knew she meant nothing by it, but it lanced him through the heart all the same. It was all he could do to smother the guilt, because Kurenai’s family was the kind he wanted to fight for as much as his own.
“It’s all right. I’ve got my pension. And Asuma’s,” she added quietly. “It’s just as well. My body isn’t the same after Mirai.”
Iruka knew that pain well. His body had changed in unexpected ways to give Kohari life — stretching his skin, swelling his chest, softening his belly, and shifting the bones in his pelvis. Some of those changes lingered far beyond birth. He could no longer sit for long periods of time without pain in his right thigh, and his abdominal muscles would never return to the level of core strength he’d cultivated before pregnancy.
The soreness in his chest never really went away, either. As Kohari neared the age of solids and needed fewer feedings, the unexpressed milk swelled his breasts until they were hot and painful. The periodic leaking at inopportune times meant he had to wear his flack jacket constantly to cover the embarrassing stains. Not to mention how much the letdown stung, every fucking time.
Kohari had become the center of his world, and he loved her more than he ever thought himself capable. But no one had really told him about the unpleasant aspects of reproduction. No one had told him that carrying a child would make him feel like a kashiwa mochi, an oak leaf cradling a delicious pastry. Everyone got excited about the mochi. No one gave the inedible leaf much thought once the mochi was unwrapped.
“That’s exactly it, Iruka-kun,” Kurenai said when he told her as much. “I never thought of it like that, but we really do become the wrappers for the next generation, don’t we?”
Yet, despite all that, Iruka found incredible strength in his role as progenitor. The children he could birth would be full of potential — carriers of coveted bloodline abilities and scions of village history. But most importantly, they would be loving carriers of the Will of Fire. Because Iruka would teach them to solve problems with empathy before fists; with wisdom before weapons. Shinobi or not, his children would be world changers.
And if he was going to play the role of political spouse, too, he was going to do it while fighting for the most pressing needs of his community. He didn’t want to wear a nice robe and smile at fancy parties — though that was not an inescapable part of his life now. Whether as a parent, teacher, political strategist, or leader, Umino Iruka’s goal had always been to bring knowledge, equity, and prosperity to future generations however he could.
Maybe that was true power.
But that true power wasn’t going to be worth much if he didn’t get at least half the hidden villages to sign onto preliminary discussions about the Okuizome Plan.
The Kazekage was a given, thankfully, and had sent back an agreement within a few weeks with as much enthusiasm as Sabaku no Gaara was capable.
The other three kage were a bit harder to gauge. The Raikage had a relatively warm relationship with Konoha, and Iruka was fond of Killer B, so he could hardly be blamed for the detour he took to Kakashi’s office on the way to the Academy every morning in hopes of seeing A the Unruly’s lightning seal among the messages.
He did not.
“People think I’m just a walking baby buffet, don’t they?” Iruka moaned to Tenzo a few weeks later, when he was finally between missions and could join Iruka on his lunch break. “I bet the rest of the world thinks it’s so quaint that the Hokage’s omega took a break from raising his heir to do some lesson plans and write a cute little political essay.”
The extra chair in Iruka’s office scraped across the floor when Tenzo moved it, loud enough to alert the classroom below to his visit. How the hell had they ever managed to keep a secret in this place?
Tenzo leaned an elbow onto the desk, his face in one hand and his other on Iruka’s cheek, warm from the box of pork buns he’d brought. “Quaint and buffet are not words that have ever been uttered about Umino Iruka.”
“I don’t know why I’m obsessing over this stupid project, like it’s going to convince the council to stop telling me to get off their lawn.”
“Because you worked hard on it,” Tenzo said. “And because you’re one of the few people here with a heart big enough to hold the whole world in it. I can see where Naruto gets it from.”
His eyes were dark like honeyed sap, reflecting back on his mate with a proud satisfaction so sweet it made Iruka want to puke.
Kakashi was working late that night, overseeing a weapons exchange with some Kiri-nin, but Tenzo was there to meet Iruka at daycare so they could pick Kohari up together. After the baby’s bedtime, he took Iruka to bed and fucked him from behind until the knot plugged him full and they collapsed in an embrace of shared breath and warm cuddles.
And in the morning, Iruka was surprised to receive a call for breakfast from Kakashi in the Konoha Grand Reception Room to meet Terumi Mei of Kirigakure.
“Umino-shi,” she chirped. Her omega scent was crisp like linens and fresh water and something familiar but long forgotten. More striking were her abalone eyes and the intricate twist of brown hair that assured her a height advantage in any room she entered. The waves on her light blue kimono swirled in the same patterns as the one his mother used to wear on holidays. “It’s nice to finally put a face with a name.”
Kneeling at the low dining table next to Kakashi, who had donned his formal robes, he felt woefully underdressed in his simple yukata. He bowed so low that his head nearly hit the lacquer wood. “The pleasure is mine, Mizukage-sama.”
Mei waived him off with a laugh. Next to him, Kakashi gave a sidelong wink and a grin beneath his mask. “Kakashi and I have been corresponding for a while about how and when to return kubikiribocho to its rightful home, but imagine my surprise when I got a letter the other week from Konoha, not from him, but from an Umino.”
Suddenly it made sense why Kakashi had been late last night. Why there were Kiri-nin here at all. Returning one of the Seven Swords of Mist was not something assigned as a common mission.
“You came here for the sword?” Iruka wondered.
“Among other things.” The curve of Mei’s lips belied a mixture of hope and regret. “Our village’s history is not a pleasant one, but our families and customs are still a thing of value. It was an excellent surprise to find that an Umino descendent was thriving so well.” Her face softened. “And advocating for peace.”
Iruka knew very little of his mother’s home country and family. When she escaped Kiri’s Bloody Mist and emigrated to Konoha, she dedicated most of her life to attaining citizenship and adopting the Fire Country’s culture because she had wanted to find a more peaceful shinobi path. But his father had not wanted her to lose her heritage and even offered to take her name when they married.
To think that string of choices had culminated in this moment, to know he had inadvertently been carrying on his mother’s legacy this whole time — Iruka’s stomach churned, and the tears burned his eyes before he could stop them.
Kakashi put a hand on his lower back to steady him, though his crescent-eyed smile never faded. “We have much to discuss, it seems.”
“I look forward to it,” Mei agreed.
Of course, this was the exact moment when Iruka’s stomach decided to rebel. All over their breakfast.