Iruka walked to class the net morning with a renewed sense of determination. He would not let Kakashi get under his skin. He'd worked successfully with troubled children, headstrong children, geniuses, and annoying, stuck-up comrades. What was Kakashi but all of these challenges rolled into one eight year old body? What Iruka had to remember was that he was the adult here. He was the mature one, the one with the wisdom and perspective of age. He was the teacher, and even if he had nothing to teach Kakashi about the shinobi arts, he could teach him a few things about working as a team and trusting a comrade. He was also the one in charge of the classroom and the mission.
Iruka arrived at the schoolyard to find Kakashi waiting for him by the door. "Good morning, Kuwa. You're up early this morning." Iruka smiled pleasantly and gave Kakashi a little wave while he opened the door.
"I wanted to talk to you before class."
"OK, sure, come on in and close the door" Iruka said, ignoring the lack of return greeting from the boy and instead smiling even wider. "What's on your mind."
"I don't need to be in your class."
Hadn't they gone over this already? "Kaka-"
"Kuwa," Kakashi corrected.
"Kuwa," Iruka amended, "I know you don't think you need the course-"
"I know I don't need it. Listen to me Iruka-sensei," Kakashi went on, "I payed attention to everything you said in class yesterday. There were only three things you said that I didn't already know, and I wrote them all down. This morning when I woke up I tested myself to see if I remembered them all, and I did. I also constructed a class seating chart from memory. Here, look, I think you'll find I've gotten most of the names. There were a few I wasn't introduced to or you didn't call on so I had to describe them, but they're all in the right seat."
Iruka held up his hand, trying to slow the normally taciturn boy's speech and make out what he was actually trying to say. "Ok, Ok, but what are you trying to prove here?"
"I'm trying to prove that I don't need to be in your class." Kakashi said, exasperated. "I tried to tell Tsunade-sensei this before, but she wouldn't listen. I remember attending the Academy for real, and I remember the lessons. I remember things that happened yesterday and the day before, and the day before that, so I am able to form new memories. I still don't remember my last mission, except for a little bit of the trip back to Konoha, and I still don't remember how I injured my eye, but I remember everything else."
"You injured your eye?" Iruka sat up, leaning to peer into Kakashi's eyes as he remembered Sakura's instructions to monitor the Sharingan for any signs of activity.
"Before." Kakshi explained, rolling said eyes. "That's why they're two different colors. Tsunade wouldn't tell me how, I think she's waiting to see if I remember on my own, but I did some reading. Severe inflammation can cause the iris to turn a darker color. So I must have had an injury or an infection at some point that I don't remember." Kakashi's brow furrowed. "First I thought it might have happened on the last mission and that's why I didn't remember, but Tsunade and Sakura acted like they were hiding something. I remember Sakura checking it a lot on the way back from the mission, and it was one of the first things Tsunade looked at, but they kept saying it looked fine and never did any treatments. And it doesn't hurt. That makes me think the injury happened before this mission."
"I see. Uh, what were the things I mentioned that you didn't already know?" Iruka asked, as curious to find out what he had taught the village's top ninjutsu specialist as he was eager to steer the conversation away from Tsunade and what she might be hiding.
"One, that we would be having a quiz today. Two, that there is a teacher at the Academy named Ayumu. He must have started after I graduated. And three, there is a ramen stand called Ichiraku's that supposedly has the best ramen in the village. What part of town is it in? Is it new?"
Iruka sighed, remembering that one of yesterday's lessons had gotten a little sidetracked and the topic of raman had come up. Glancing at the clock, Iruka saw his way out of the conversation."Look, class is going to start in ten minutes, so why don't we both get ready and we can talk about this later."
"But I-"
Iruka held up his hand in a silencing motion "I know you don't think you need to be here, but Tsunade thinks you do. Maybe she's just taking extra precautions, but she only wants to make sure you're safe. For all we know, the seal could have an ongoing effect, causing you to forget more and more things as time goes on."
Kakashi shook his head, "No, that's not happening. Tsunade even said the seal is stable. I'm not forgetting more. I just have a blank spot in my memory of this mission. If she wanted to assess my abilities, I could take a daily test-"
"And then what? Tsunade's not going to clear you for missions."
"I could train," Kakashi answered immediately. "Really train, not the simple exercises you do here. Maybe with Gai if they don't want me using ninjutsu or genjutsu. Taijutsu only. No chakra at all if that's what they want. Until Minato-sensei gets back from his mission. He'll probably be able to remove the seal, and if not he can watch my training and figure out if I can go on missions again with my team."
"Bring it up to Tsunade when you have your meeting with her at the end of the week." Iruka knew he was passing the buck, and he could tell by the look on Kakashi's face that he knew it too, but it was all he could do. Kakashi didn't need to be in this class. He wasn't forgetting more or regressing in any way. His argument made sense, if you didn't take into account that the Gai Kakashi was looking to train with was now an adult with a team of his own to train and that all of the people Kakashi thought would help him once they got back from their missions were actually dead. There was no logical way to argue against it without giving away too much of the truth. Even at this age, Kakashi was too much a ninja to simply accept things as they were told to him.
Kakashi met Iruka's eyes with a level stare. "You have a daily meeting with Tsunade. You could talk to her about it today."
"My meeting with Tsunade is to report on your condition. I will report to her what I observe. She is already aware of your concerns." Iruka said, hating how cold and impersonal he sounded, but not willing to give the boy false hope. He also wasn't going to try to win Kakashi's favor by letting him think that Iruka was siding with him against Tsunade. As easy as it would be to paint Tsunade as unreasonable and overprotective, Iruka knew it wouldn't be fair.
"Why won't you talk to her for me? She won't see me early unless I'm injured or the seal changes."
"Because I'm not in the habit of questioning my orders!" Iruka snapped, regretting it instantly as he saw Kakashi's face shut down. Iruka cursed himself and his short temper. Of all the things to say...
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. You make good points, but Tsunade knows more about this kind of thing than either of us."
That got no response from Kakashi, who was now staring at the floor.
"Class is starting in a few minutes. Let's just try to get through it, OK? I'll be sure to reiterate your concerns to Tsunade as well as report on your performance in class."
Iruka went to unlock the classroom door while Kakashi went quietly to take his seat, staring out the window as he bell rang and the other kids started filing in.
Iruka tried to shrug off his tension as the classroom filled with the noise and bustle of rowdy children finishing their conversations as they took their seats. He heard a "What's up with him?" as one of the students looked at Kakashi and saw another student shrug in response. Iruka assumed Kakashi would spend some time brooding over their conversation and was prepared give him his space for the rest of the morning. He was pleasantly surprised when he saw Kakashi raise his hand to participate in the class discussion, chiding himself once again for thinking of Kakashi as a normal eight year old. When Iruka called on him to answer a simple question about chakra affinities, Kakashi gave a lengthy and detailed explanation of various theories behind chakra building and molding, as well as how genetics lead to different countries having a preponderance of one affinity over another.
"Ah, thank you, Kuwa, that was very informative." Iruka said when Kakashi had finished, ignoring the muttered "Show off" from the one of the other students.
After that, Kakashi's hand went up for every question, forcing Iruka to call on him when no one else volunteered. By the third time, the class groaned out loud at the sound of his name and the more dramatic students slumped over their desks in exaggerated boredom while Kakashi spoke.
Thinking he should put an end to this, Iruka decided to move on to the morning's lecture. Turning to pull his chart of chakra pathways down over the blackboard, he announced that the next lesson would be on making simple clones. Facing the class once again after securing the chart in place, Iruka stopped short. His class looked like they were posing for a picture, each student sitting up at attention, hands folded neatly on heir desks, innocent expressions on their face. All save one. Kakashi scowled at the class and gave Iruka an "I-told-you-so" look, his desk covered in little white spots that could only be spitballs. Iruka sighed and decided to let it go, starting his lecture and being sure to face the class at all times.
Kakashi raised his hand twice to ask questions that would have been welcome in an advanced discussion, but Iruka knew that he already knew the answers and was just trying to make a point. When he raised his hand the third time Iruka tried to keep the frustration out of his voice as he explained, with as much patience as he could muster, that while he could see that Kuwa's previous tutor had explained the concepts behind a clone jutsu very thoroughly, it was new material to the rest of the class, so if he would please refrain from asking questions about anything other than elementary technique, he would appreciate it, and would be happy to answer any advanced questions after class.
When the lunch bell rang, Iruka heaved a sigh of relief. Once the class room was empty, he cleaned the spitballs off of Kakashi's desk as well as a few strays that had landed on the desk next to it. He felt a small swell of pride at the number of them, as well as the accuracy. Their must have been some sniper attacks during the lecture, meaning the class must have worked together to distract him from the launcher. No wonder there had been so many questions.
Of course, all of them working together to make such a coordinated attack on one student wasn't a good thing. This could quickly escalate if Iruka didn't put a stop to it. He'd have to be more alert this afternoon. Looking out the window to make sure nothing was going on in the schoolyard, he saw Kakashi sitting by himself under a tree, not eating and not particularly paying attention to what his classmates were doing, Not surprisingly, all of the other students were bunched into smaller groups, none of them looking at their new classmate. Iruka could practically feel the chill of their collective cold shoulder, but he decided to leave the lunch monitors to their jobs and sat down to eat his own lunch.
After lunch, Iruka gave the class their quiz, a simple ten question test, each question requiring two to three simple sentences. When Kakashi asked for more paper, saying Iruka didn't leave enough space for him to answer the questions properly, Iruka told him to look at it as an exercise in being brief and concise. Kakashi responded by writing all of his answers in field shorthand.
Finally the day ended, Iruka never having been so glad to hear the final bell. He called out to Kakashi as he packed up his things for the day. "Kuwa, a word after class, please."
Kakashi nodded and sat back down, waiting at his desk until the rest of the students left the room, one of them calling out "teacher's pet!" before darting out the door. Iruka got up to lock the door, not wanting to be interrupted, then turned to face Kakashi. They stared at each other across the room before Iruka spoke. "I know what you're up to, but it's not making you very popular with the other students."
Kakashi met Iruka's gaze. "Popularity isn't one of my mission objectives."
"Well, you're not doing a very good job of keeping a low profile. All you've done is draw attention to yourself."
"I was just following orders. Without question. I joined in class activities so you could monitor my condition and report my progress to Tsunade. Putting an experienced and gifted chuunin in a pre-genin class is going to attract attention. If the objective of keeping a low profile is in direct conflict with the objective of monitoring my condition, then maybe the mission parameters need to be reviewed."
"Or maybe you can just sit in your seat and keep quiet and not draw attention to yourself unless something is wrong!" Iruka yelled, tired of being trapped in a battle of wills with an eight year old.
Kakashi shrugged."Maybe."
Iruka subdued the urge to strangle him. "Good. Then I'll see you tomorrow. Good-bye, Kuwa."
"Goodbye, Iruka-sensei."
Iruka watched him go, then sank down in his chair, putting his head in his hands as he realized that once again Kakashi had gotten the better of him. He was going to have to have a serious talk with Tsunade about this.
He gathered his things and was just locking the classroom door when he heard the sudden commotion from outside. Children shouting and yelling, cheering for something. Iruka ran to the front door of the school just in time to see Kakashi punch one of his students in the face, while narrowly avoiding a kick from another. There were two boys and one girl ganging up on him, the rest of the class cheering them on. Kakashi ducked another kick, answering with a leg sweep that took down the attacker, but as he came up the girl caught him in the face with a right hook.
"Stop it!" Iruka yelled as he ran toward the fight. "Stop it right now!"
Kakashi got one more kick in, hitting the girl square in the stomach while one of the boys moved to grab his arms from behind. Iruka grabbed the boy and threw him to the ground, then grabbed Kakashi and the other boy by their hair, making both of them scream in protest as he forced them down to their knees.
"What is going on here? Is this how you treat your comrades?" Iruka was answered by a lot of yelling and finger pointing, each child talking over the rest until he couldn't stand it anymore.
"Stop it!" He hollered, bringing instant silence to the cacophony of shrill little voices. "We'll discuss your punishment tomorrow in class! All of you go home and think about your role in this. You four, you're coming with me to the school nurse, and then maybe we'll discuss some additional punishment for you."
Iruka slowly let up on his grip in the children's hair, watching as they climbed to their feet, both rubbing their heads angrily. Iruka went to where the girl still lay on the ground, catching her breath after having the wind knocked out of her. He picked her up and put her on her feet, then helped up the boy he had thrown, and gathered them together, a shaking, miserable collection of eight year olds if he ever say w one.
"Is anyone seriously hurt?"
They all shook their heads, none wanting to admit that they had taken any good hits.
"Well, we'll go down to the nurse and have her check for sure" "Iruka said, glancing at the red mark next to Kakashi's left eye that was sure to be a bruise in the morning. The Sharingan eye. Of course it would be the Sharingan eye.
"All right, let's go" he said, giving the closest student a little shove in the direction of the school, following behind as his scruffy, sulking students made their way down the hall to the school medic.
Sakura had been assigned as school nurse while Kakashi was enrolled in Iruka's class. It was an easy mission for her and gave her a well deserved break, while putting someone familiar with Kakashi and the Sharingan on site in case of emergencies. When Iruka walked in he found her siting at the nurse's desk with her feet up, a bag of cookies by her side, reading a novel.
"Iruka-sensei!What brings you here?" Sakura asked, a barely perceptible note in her voice asking if everything was OK.
Iruka gave an infinitesimal shake of his head before answering "I'm afraid a few of my students had a little scuffle after class. I'd like you to look at them before I send them home."
Sakura was on her feet in an instant, wiping cookie crumbs from her apron. "Of course", she said, all business as she peered behind Iruka to survey the damage. "Who's first?"
"Why don't you take Kuwa first, while I talk to these three."
"OK. Kuwa-kun, right this way please!" Sakura reached past Iruka to grab Kakashi's hand, practically yanking him into the office and closing the door.
Iruka was just turning to lecture the other students when the door yanked back open and Sakura stuck her head out "Actually, Iruka-sensei, could I see you a moment?"
Iruka's stomach lurched. Something must be wrong. Something must have happened to the eye. Shit! All he had to do was keep an eight year old safe and he couldn't manage it for two whole days!
Sakura reached out and grabbed his arm, dragging him into the office with her. "Sorry, Iruka-sensei, you looked a little...pre-occupied. I just thought it would be better if we were all in here together."
'Oh, uh, Right. Of course. Good idea."
"Now, Kuwa-kun, let's take a look, shall we?"
"No."
"No? Why not? It won't hurt." Sakura stated sweetly.
"Because Tsunade said she would see me if I was injured or sick. Well, now I'm injured."
"Kakashi-" Sakura began
"Kuwa." Kakashi corrected.
"Kakashi" Sakura insisted, a familiar impatience creeping into er voice, "Tsunade placed me here in the school specifically to treat you if you were injured. You have to at least let me triage you."
"No"
Sakura;s eyebrow twitched right before she grabbed the boy and plunked him down on the exam table. "Sit still and look straight ahead" She barked, grabbing a light off the counter.
Kakashi sighed deeply but did as he was told, flinching slightly as Sakura raised a hand toward his face.
"Sorry," she murmured. "I just need to hold it open. I won't touch anything else, and if it hurts you can tell me to stop."
Iruka tried not to fidget as he stood behind her, watching over her shoulder as she held a round lens in front of Kakashi's eye and made him look up, then down, left and then right. Finally, she sat back and smiled.
"It's OK, Kuwa-kun. It'll be bruised tomorrow and a little tender, but otherwise fine. Are you hurt anywhere else?"
Kakashi shook his head, then looked Sakura in the eyes. "Why are you so worried about that eye?"
"Because someone just punched it." Sakura replied lightly, then bent to start writing her exam notes in "Kuwa's" chart.
"Besides that," Kakashi persisted. "If there was nothing special about that eye, I wouldn't have had to come here after a little after school fight, and you and Tsunade and Iruka-sensei wouldn't be worrying about it so much."
Sakura straightened and met Kakashi's gaze. "School policy has changed since you graduated. Every injury comes to the school nurse, no matter how minor. As for your eye, yes, you did injure it at one point. As a result that eye will always be delicate and you should tell a medic, preferable Tsunade-sama or me, if you have any trouble with it. OK?"
Kakashi absorbed that for a second, maybe surprised at getting such a straightforward answer, then nodded slowly. "Was it...Did the injury occur on the mission?"
Sakura shook her head. "No, it wasn't on your most recent mission. That's all I can tell you right now. I'm sorry."
Kakashi nodded again and hopped off the table. "Thank you, Sakura-sensei."
"You're welcome!" Sakura smiled brightly. "Come see me anytime, but try not to get in any more fights, OK?"
Kakashi made a non-committal noise and started toward the door. Iruka opened it to find one of the Hokage's messengers standing outside waiting for him. With a sense of dread, he took the proffered note, reading it while Sakura shuffled the next student in. Iruka nodded and handed the paper back to the messenger. Turning to the two remaining children in the hallway, Iruka told them he had to go to an emergency meeting in the mission room, but he would be thinking about their punishment in the meantime.
When Iruka arrived at the mission room, Tsunade and Kakashi were already there, Tsunade pacing impatiently, Kakashi standing calmly and staring out the window.
"Tsunade-Sama" Iruka bowed low as he entered the room.
"Iruka-sensei, I give you one simple job-"
"I know, I know, I'll be more careful. I should have seen that the students were getting ready to gang up on him. It's all my fault."
"I know it is! And you!" Tsunade turned her anger to the little boy standing in front of her. To his credit, Kakashi only flinched a little bit. "Since when do you not know how an undercover mission works?"
"I stayed undercover."
"You were involved in a brawl in front of your entire class and whoever was walking down the street"
"But I didn't win. I let them hit me enough to think I was almost as bad as taijutsu as they are, and I only hit them enough to make them think twice about coming after me again." Kakashi gave Iruka a look. "By the way sensei, maybe you should spend more class time on taijutsu and physical conditioning."
Tsunade stopped her pacing. "Stop it now, brat! From now on you will behave as you would on any undercover mission. No more willful mis-interpretation of mission parameters."
"Yes, Tsunade-sensei."
"Good. Now get out. I want to talk to Iruka-sensei alone."
Kakashi turned and headed toward the door, giving Iruka a meaningful glance as he passed.
Iruka heard the door close behind him. "Tsunade-sama_"
"Shut up. I already know what you're going to say. I kept you here for two reasons. One, Kakashi can think you're pleading his case and might give you a break tommorrow. Two, because I wanted to tell you that I think we're making progress on the breaking the seal."
"Really? That's great! How much longer do you think it will be?"
"I'm not sure. The shinobi in custody had little knowledge of the seal, but by probing his memories Inoichi was able to watch the other ninja place it. He was able to show us a rough sketch of the original scroll as well as tell us where the casting ninja came from. It's given us a lot to work with. We're not there yet, but I think I see a light at the end of the tunnel."
"Well, that is good news. In the meantime..." Iruka started hopefully.
"In the meantime you'll conduct class as usual, with Kakashi as one of your students."
"Yes, Hokage-sama" Iruka sighed, making to leave.
"Iruka-sensei!
"Yes, Hokage-sama?" Iruka turned, snapping to attention.
"Control your class."
"Yes, Hokage-sama."