Disclaimer: Naruto is the fruit of Kishimoto Masahi's labours. Not mine.
A/N: I've been wanting to do a funeral scene for a long time. Ever since I saw the episode where they had the Sandaime's funeral. I was going to do it Neji x Tenten all the way, but thought 'But how would everyone else be getting on?' Ta-daa! I got the idea for it to be Iruka's funeral from the Precious series by Silver Dragonfly.
ooooooo
The rain fell.
"-and he will be missed by all. His life was dedicated to enriching others-"
The speaker's voice cracked, and though he tried desperately to regain his composure, he could not bring himself to go on. The sixth Hokage bowed his head, not in the embarassment of not being able to finish the speech in front of his village, but to hide the tears that were flowing down his face.
Behind him, the memorial wept tears of rain, and water washed over the most recent addition to the engraved list of brave ninjas who have sacrificed themselves for the sake of the village.
Umino Iruka.
Naruto was not the only one crying. As he stepped down from the podium for the next speaker, he saw that all the present academy children were bawling. Certain members of the ANBU... Hyuuga Neji... Hyuuga Hinata... Aburame Shino... Tenten... they had to keep a desperate rein on their emotions.
Tenten held the hand of a weeping academy student, while another attached herself onto Hinata's leg, also crying. It was the hardest thing, keeping themselves from joining the children in their blubber-fest. The intensive training they had received to become part of the ANBU had taught them to hide emotion, but there had been no real tests to check their ability to do so. And now that there was, they both found it hard.
Neji held Tenten's other hand. Being her husband, of course Neji knew what she was feeling. He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze, all the while looking at the second speaker. The Godaime.
Tsunade felt like she was in debt to Iruka. He had taught one of the most successful generations Konoha has seen. Demons, bloodlines, clans. Loud mouths, pranksters, avengers, fangirls, slackers. She looked at the crowd attending the funeral, most of them chuunins and jounins from his classroom. Her eyes searched for certain individuals. The master strategist... a spy... a taijutsu specialist. Nara Shikamaru, Uchiha Sasuke, Rock Lee. A medic-nin, a vet, a recent addition to the staff, an examiner for the chuunin exams. Harouno Sakura, Inuzuka Kiba, Akimichi Chouji, and Yamanaka Ino. Not to mention four ANBU members. All of them role-model citizens. Perhaps all because of Iruka.
She finally began to speak.
"I- no, we. We owe so much to him." Tsunade was at a loss of words. She stepped down and joined Naruto in the front row.
People had started lining up to pay their last respects to their former sensei. A long line of black-clothed young adults, each carrying a white flower.
'Thank you, Iruka-sensei. Thank you.'
And the rain continued to fall.
