Impact

May 14, 2012

Read carefully and you might find something for the future.

"Talking"

'Thinking'

Flashback

Demon and higher beings

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, plain and simple

Chapter 2: A New Proposal

A week had passed since Mamoru started teaching and so far he's had two headaches, the first being the angry parents coming into his office, demanding his apology for punishing their children for doing nothing wrong.

Flashback

The jounin had his glasses on while he was looking over the different papers.

'It's kind of sloppy but there is some improvement, not much though,' he thought to himself as he looked over Naruto's previous quiz.

It was then that the door was opened and a bunch of angry adults walked in.

Mamoru looked at the adults, figuring why they were there but decided to ask anyway, "Yes, how may I help you today?"

One pompous man said to him, "Yeah, you can. You gave our children detention for no good reason."

"That is all in a matter of perspective, sir," Mamoru replied with a calm tone. "What all of you see as not a good reason, I see as a prime reason. I also notice that there are only civilians here. Well at least some parents exercise good judgment."

"Civilians, we may be, but quite a few of us are on the council, so you better watch what you say," the same man replied, his tone getting even more arrogant, if that was possible.

"And exactly what is that supposed to mean to me?" Mamoru asked, clearly not liking the tone he was hearing.

"It means you are treading on thin ice, you'd better shape up or you might be losing your license as a shinobi," the man replied, clearly thinking he had won this battle.

"Yes, that threat would certainly make me feel nervous if it weren't empty," the red-haired jounin told them in his calm tone.

"You dare challenge our authority!" the man demanded, finally losing his temper.

"I'm not challenging anything, because the civilian council only has the authority to bring up issues involving civilian manned establishments. This is an academy to train children to become shinobi, and they are taught by experienced shinobi who know the hardships of being in the field. The only person within this village that has the authority to make any kind of disciplinary action towards me or any other teacher in this establishment for any reason is the Hokage. I was given the choice to be put in charge of this class, and therefore am in charge of setting the proper rules and regulations. If shinobi hopefuls don't follow proper procedures, they have to be punished accordingly, no exceptions. I didn't punish all the students, only the ones who showed amusement at another's misfortune and before any of you start spouting out crap about how it was just Naruto. The first thing I will point out is that a few of you wouldn't be here if it was your child that was laughed at. Most, if not all of you wouldn't be here if the child laughed at was from one of the more prominent shinobi clans like the Hyuuga or the Uchiha, both of which the head of each clan has a child. What makes Uzumaki Naruto any different from any other child in my class?" Mamoru finished his long explanation with a question.

"That boy is a demon," the pompous man replied.

"Ah," a few of the people agreed.

"Is that how you see him? I find that strange, mostly because he has been burdened since the day he was born," Mamoru replied to them. "According to your logic, because he houses a demon within him that must make him one. Are the Aburame insects because they house them within their bodies? Are the Inuzuka dogs because they spend close to their entire lives with their canine companions?"

None of the people could answer.

"The answer is no," Mamoru told them. "So what makes this situation any different? Is it just because Kyuubi is sealed within him, is it because he didn't choose for this burden to be placed upon him or is it just because he's an orphan? Maybe you people should try to open your eyes a little and see the boy for who he is and not who you perceive him to be. Jinchuuriki have it hard enough as it is; Naruto even more so with no family. Don't make him out to be a monster, or he may just become one," the jounin finished as he put his glasses back on and started looking over the papers once more.

Most of the people could only look down in shame as they realized what he was saying was true. Some of them, however, just started to get angry, but knew they couldn't do anything about it.

"One final question, why are you all still in my office?" Mamoru told them without looking from the papers.

That said the people started filing out the pompous member of said group glaring at him as he left.

"This isn't over," he muttered to himself as he stepped out the door.

"Of course not, over would imply something had begun," Mamoru replied, knowing that the man wouldn't hear him.

End Flashback

Mamoru had an amused smile on his face as he thought, 'Glad I thought to give the Hokage fair warning.' Mamoru's second headache seemed to be a recurring one. Naruto had been improving as far as his grades go, but it wasn't by much, which Mamoru found confusing considering the boy was able to pick up on each symbol quicker than what most his age would be able to do. 'He's not lazy, I see him training often enough. And the sessions are enough to say he has the basics down very well so what could the problem be?' He pulled out a book he had been reading, and opened it to the marked page. 'Well I can't dwell on it constantly, it'll just cause problems, best to relax a little,' he thought as he unhooked his glasses and put them on. Mamoru blinked twice and then closed his book, set it down, took his glasses of and hooked them back on his shirt as he put his hand on his chin, 'It's certainly possible, and it would explain the other problems with his grades, uncommon as it is for someone so young. It's cheap if I'm wrong, so why not.' Mamoru then stood up and left his apartment to go to the drug store.

The next morning...

Mamoru approached the classroom and slid open the door. Most of the class was conversing until the jounin stepped into the room, then everyone started moving towards their seats. "Don't mind me, class doesn't start for at least another ten minutes," Mamoru told them as he looked at Naruto. "Uzumaki-san, would you accompany me for a bit?" the red-haired jounin asked.

Naruto, excited he was picked out of everyone, walked over to his teacher. When they both stepped into his office Naruto asked impatiently, "Is there anything that only I could do that you need me for?"

"Not exactly, I'm just trying to help you with your academic performance," he answered as he pulled a case for a pair of glasses out. He then put on his own pair and pulled out a slip of paper and wrote on it. He handed the paper to Naruto along with the case. "I want you to read aloud what is written on that piece of paper," he instructed to the boy.

Naruto tried holding sideways, far away, close and he also squinted as he tried to make out the words. The only word he could really say was, "Megane."

"That's enough, now open the case and put on what's inside," Mamoru instructed to the blonde boy.

Naruto nodded and opened the case, inside were a pair of glasses his size. Naruto put the glasses on.

"Now try reading the page, and tell me what you read," Mamoru told him.

"I am wearing a pair of reading glasses," Naruto read out to him.

"It seems you and I have something in common," the jounin said as he took his glasses off. "My theory paid off as well, that was really causing me a headache when you weren't improving as much as you should have given how quickly you were taking in the information."

"Do I have to wear these all the time?" Naruto asked, curiously. He didn't want people to make fun of him any more than usual.

"You don't have to worry about that. Like you just read, those are reading glasses, you only need to wear them when you're reading or writing something right in front of your face, like on paper or in a book. You didn't have any problems reading stuff off of the board, so you can take them off right now," Mamoru told Naruto as he led the boy back into the classroom.

Naruto nodded as he took his new pair of glasses off and hooked them on his shirt collar like his sensei.

Mamoru noticed this and could honestly say that he was flattered, 'It seems he respects me a bit.'

Two months later...

Mamoru was walking to the academy while lost in thought. It had been some time since he started teaching the class and he could say that Naruto's progress astounded him. It only took a month for Naruto to reach the top of the class as far as academics, and he's been able to keep that spot so far. Mamoru would love to take this kind of credit, but there was no way that Naruto could have learned as fast as he did unless he was a genius himself.

'It's too bad I'm not his permanent teacher, I would love see how he progresses throughout these years,' Mamoru thought in regret as he stepping into the building. A few minutes later and he was approaching the classroom door. He opened the door and the students, who were conversing, looked at him and started to move to their respective seats. "Ohayo, students."

"Ohayo, sensei," everyone replied.

"Very good, it seems respect has been learned these past two months," Mamoru told them. "I regret to inform you that after today, I probably won't be your instructor anymore, Umino-san has made a full recovery and is approved to return tomorrow."

Some of the students surprised him by looking down, like they were going to miss him.

"I will, however, be holding some after school study sessions for those who wish to broaden their horizons in this dangerous occupation, Umino-san will have the information for those who are interested," Mamoru finished as he started the lessons for that day.

The next day...

"Here are the results for the last test the students," Mamoru gave the grade sheet to Iruka. The instructor had a chuunin flak jacket, tanned skin, a line scar across the bridge of his nose and his hair up in a ponytail.

The chuunin looked at them and at the top of the list was Naruto's name, "Inoue-san, are you sure you were completely thorough with your grading?"

"I'm one hundred percent positive there were no mistakes made. If you still have doubts, give out a pop quiz and see who passes. Hell, you can collect them yourself just to be sure," Mamoru advised.

"I'll do that," Iruka replied. Although it had been two months, he had gotten to know Naruto, and making top of the class as far as academics just didn't seem to fit his persona. 'Although I didn't know he couldn't read so not knowing other things might not be so farfetched.'

Mamoru left to see the Hokage.

Iruka left his office and walked into the classroom.

The students immediately quieted down when they saw the instructor, two months may have been a while, but Mamoru certainly showed taught them serious respect to the teacher.

"Welcome back, Iruka-sensei," Naruto said to him.

Iruka looked at Naruto and could say he was surprised by his change of style. He still wore his usual white shirt, but he wore what looked like a black mini lab coat over it. 'He seems to respect Mamoru a great deal,' Iruka thought to himself as he noticed the glasses hanging on his collar. 'More so than he should.' He shook his thoughts out of his head as he spoke to the class, "Okay then, today we'll be having a small quiz to see if everyone was able to keep up with their studies while I was out."

There were quite a few groans, though not as many as the chuunin would have expected.

Surprisingly enough, Naruto seemed far from worried; he even looked a little excited.

'Let's see if it isn't him just putting up a front,' Iruka thought as he opened his desk drawer and found sets of tests already set up for him to pass out. He saw a note paper-clipped to the front.

I thought that you might be skeptical so I wrote this up.

- Mamoru

'And you still prepare for the worst,' Iruka thought as he pulled out the tests. He handed them to the front student and said, "Take one test and pass the rest down. And show your work for the math problems."

The students all followed his instructions.

"You have an hour to complete this test," the scarred chuunin said as he pulled out a timer, set the time and placed it in his desk. "And the test starts now," he said pushing the button on top of the timer, starting the test.

A few curious things he took note of were as such. Sakura didn't look nervous, she even looked a bit confident. Sasuke didn't look annoyed, like this was a waste of time. Kiba looked like he was confident that he would pass. In fact all the students looked confident that they would pass this class. Shikamaru even started doing the work.

Another thing he took note of was that Naruto had put on the glasses that were hooked onto the collar of his shirt. 'Either Naruto is taking this respect thing a little too far, or he might actually need those glasses,' the tanned man thought to himself.

Iruka decided to take the test on his own to see how rusty he had gotten and started doing the work. After about ten minutes he heard paper movement and looked up. He saw Naruto had flipped his paper over and was taking off his glasses.

'Naruto must be really confident if he could finish he work in ten minutes, and since he finished first, he can't be accused of cheating,' Iruka thought as he looked down at his own test and continued working.

After about eight minutes another paper being moved was heard. Iruka looked up and saw that Sakura had just finished her test. 'I can't say I'm surprised but she did it faster than I recall she usually did and Naruto still beat her.' Then another paper was heard, and Iruka looked up to see Shino had finished this time, 'If these three have perfect scores in that amount of time, then it would seem that Mamoru knows what he's doing.'

Twenty minutes passed by and Iruka had just finished his test, and when he finished he looked in the drawer the tests were in and found an answer key. He then looked it over and saw no mistakes on it and used it to compare with his test. Five minutes later and he was done grading his own test. '92%, a little rusty, but not bad, all things considered.'

Another twenty minutes passed and the timer went off. "Alright, everyone who hasn't finished, turn your papers over and leave the classroom, I'll be collecting them now. Mizuki will take you outside to test your physical improvement for these past two months," Iruka told them.

Another chuunin stepped into the room, this one had shoulder-length silver hair and a bandana-like hitae-ate worn on his forehead, he was around Iruka's height and had a pale complexion.

"Nothing more than an evaluation, Mizuki, we don't want a fight to break out," Iruka told him.

"Hai, hai," Mizuki waved him off as he motioned for the students to follow him.

After two hours the students walked back into the classroom.

"Your marks on the test are posted in the back, what surprises me is that no one failed," Iruka told them.

Mizuki heard this and looked at the results, the fact that no one failed wasn't as much of a shocker to him as who made the highest score. The chuunin walked to Iruka and asked him so the students couldn't overhear him, "Are you sure that those grades are accurate?"

"There is no way those results aren't completely accurate, because Sakura and Shino were the two that had the highest academic marks two months ago," the tanned chuunin explained to his colleague. "Naruto couldn't have cheated because I popped this quiz out of nowhere and he was the first person to finish, taking ten minutes," Iruka finished his explanation.

"Well, then that means that Naruto will most likely be the top of the class until he graduates, because he just barely beat Sasuke, Kiba and Hinata in the physical evaluation, that being said, nobody failed that part either," Mizuki told him.

"Okay, I'm convinced," Iruka told Mizuki.

"What are you convinced about?" Mizuki asked.

"I'm completely convinced that we have absolutely no idea what we are doing as teachers of this academy," Iruka said to him. "Mamoru-san, on the very first day, set quite a few students straight as far as morals and even figured out that Naruto had a problem reading. What's even more, within a week he figured out that Naruto needed glasses to read. Naruto might not have had many teachers before, but none of them, myself and you included were able to figure that out."

"Well I can't say much about Naruto, but you weren't doing half bad with the other students," Mizuki said, trying to cheer him up a little.

"Maybe, but I feel that I should have tried harder to help Naruto out," Iruka said with slumped shoulders.

"Hey, no one bats a thousand," Mizuki said to him.

Iruka just gave Mizuki an odd look, "And what is that supposed to mean?"

"I'm not sure, Tsubaki told me that once when a mission went south," Mizuki replied with a smirk.

Iruka could only chuckle.

After school was out Iruka walked over to the Hokage's office.

Mamoru was still with the village leader.

"Ah, Iruka, is there something I can help you with?" Hiruzen asked curiously.

"Actually, I wanted to speak with Mamoru-san, I was going to ask his whereabouts but this makes it easier," Iruka admitted, scratching the back of his head.

"No problem, Umino-san, Hokage-sama and I were just trying to see if there were any classes I could take over permanently," Mamoru said as he walked over to the chuunin.

"That's actually a matter I wish to discuss," Iruka said with a great deal of respect. "I wish for you to take over as the main teacher of the class."

Mamoru raised an eyebrow, "May I ask why?"

"The students improved under your tutelage, Naruto more so than anyone. Not one of them failed in the academic or physical portions of the tests that we gave out, even if you wrote one of them," Iruka told him.

"As much as I would love to, I can't," Mamoru replied, surprising Iruka and Hiruzen.

"Why not? The students respect you, you brought up their abilities and even made what people thought as a dead last student to the top of the class," Iruka argued.

"Because I honestly don't care for any of the students," Mamoru told Iruka bluntly. "I just like the idea of bringing out the hidden potential of those that people believe can't be counted on in the future. More or less, seeing someone that I personally taught succeed because of my teaching just feels good."

Iruka and Hiruzen could only look at Mamoru in shock at his confession.

The Hokage just shook his head as he chuckled, "Why am I surprised by your words? You've always been a tad smug, it's one of the main reasons that you ended up in some of the worst type of missions, those that seemed impossible. You weren't a man of miracles but you always did manage to come out alive, scarred but alive, and a tad more humble."

"You can say that again," Mamoru replied to him, completely unfazed.

"And you're not surprised," Hiruzen stated.

"Even so, you can't deny your worth as a teacher, given how well you did with these students," Iruka interjected, still trying to convince him.

"In that case, how about a compromise," Hiruzen said to them in something of a sly tone.

"And what exactly did you have in mind, Hokage-sama?" Mamoru asked, curious about his tone himself.

"Mamoru will become the main instructor for the class and Iruka, you will become his assistant, and something along the lines of a pupil," the aged Hokage suggested to the two shinobi.

"That actually doesn't sound like a bad idea, Iruka can learn one of the main reasons of why I'm a horrible influence on the children, and I get to keep on experimenting with their development," Mamoru said with a smirk.

Iruka looked almost horrified at another of Mamoru's confessions.

Hiruzen just shook his head, "Yet again, I just can't help but be surprised despite the fact that I expected this as one of the outcomes."

End of Chapter...

Another chapter ended and now the new teacher, despite his abilities of teaching has just revealed that he appears to be borderline insane.