Disclaimer

I do not own Naruto.

Summary

Life is hard for a chunin like Iruka. Grading tests, not killing students and sending ninja out on missions to their deaths. It's even harder when he has to take care of a jounin turned three year old chibi.

Sequel to Plastic Ponies.

Author's Notes

Be proud of me, I did well! I got a chapter out in only two weeks, I finished my midterms, I got a job and I am now on a competitive horseback riding team. How do I manage all of this, you ask?

No clue. But now you know that if I don't post it means I died from being too "involved" on campus.

----------

Iruka glared at the child sitting across from him, stabbing his chopsticks into his breakfast of ramen. Of course, Naruto was the reason they had been able to get the brat out of the closet, so it made sense to let the blonde pick where they were going to eat breakfast. The chunin glanced over at the rest of Team Seven, smiling at the three before looking back at their teacher. The frown came back.

"You better eat, Kakashi-kun. If you don't, you're going to be hungry later on." Iruka said, sighing when the little boy continued to poke at his food and ignore his surroundings.

He hated to admit it, but Kakashi was adorable right now, with his face propped up on one hand as the other stirred the bowl of noodles in front of him. The mask covering his lower face and the headband made Iruka smile, as if Kakashi had been caught playing ninja dress-up.

"Hey, Iruka-sensei?" A yell from a few feet away tore Iruka out of his musings back to his favorite student, "Where are we going?"

"Well, I have to go back to Jiraiya's to get my sandals," Iruka noted that there was no longer a gleeful cry of joy from Kakashi when he said the sanin's name, "And then Kakashi-kun said that he would have a training battle with Gai this morning."

"Oh, can we watch, Iruka-sensei?" Sakura said, placing her finished bowl to the side of Naruto's huge tower, "I want to see how Kakashi-sensei fought when he was little."

Naruto agreed with a whoop of joy and Sasuke gave a small smirk, meaning he was also ecstatic at the opportunity to learn more about a possible way to beat their sensei. Iruka nodded and turned back around to see another empty bowl of ramen next to the pile, a pair of chopsticks folded neatly on top.

Smiling to himself, Iruka stood up and stretched, waiting for the rest of his 'students' to follow. Walking down the road, hands stuffed into his pockets, Iruka listened with half an ear as the children chatted amongst themselves behind him, a large percentage of his attention focused on greeting the people, mostly mothers and other students, who came up to him to say hello.

"Shut up!"

Spinning around at the violence in the voice, Iruka watched in shock as Naruto forcibly held Kakashi back, while Sakura and Sasuke looked at Anko with confused expressions. The little boy quickly rolled into a ball, kicked his feet out and caught Naruto on the shin, causing the boy to let him go with a wince. Before anyone could stop him, a kunai was in Kakashi's hand and he was throwing it with deadly accuracy towards the kunoichi.

Jumping back, Anko quickly blocked with her own weapon, but dropped it and shook her hands as the reverberations traveled up her arm. A crowd was gathering, wondering what could cause such a commotion this early in the morning. Before they could come to any conclusions, a log was in the place where one Mitarashi Anko had been, and a hand was clamped around the wrist of a fuming child.

"Man, if I knew he was going to flip I would have brushed up a little more on my survival exercises." Anko said cheerfully from a tree, grinning down at the teenagers and the chunin who currently had his hands full with a struggling child.

"I'm going to kill you!" Kakashi screamed; his little lungs were probably on fire from the volume of his voice. "I'm going to rip out your-" Iruka quickly clamped a hand over the boy's mouth, a bit shocked at the livid look he got from the child. The teacher didn't think it was possible for the much anger to be in a child that young.

"Naruto, what did Anko say?" Iruka asked while ignoring the pinpricks of pain he had in his hand from Kakashi biting him. It seemed that Kakashi still knew how to bite through his mask.

Naruto shrugged, looking more confused. "I don't get it. All she said was that Kakashi-sensei looked a lot like his dad." Kakashi struggled harder after Naruto finished talking, his single eye somehow narrowing even more.

Anko continued to laugh, perched out on a limb. His eyes snapping onto her, Iruka changed his stance so that he could easily hold Kakashi with one hand, meaning he had his arm wrapped around the boy's head and had his smaller body shoved against his side. "Anko, you had better explain."

"She doesn't have to." Everyone, including the spectators, turned to stare as Jiraiya come out from the fold, a pad of paper in his hand as he edited 'notes', the term used very loosely. "I'll explain it all, after we get to my house." He looked at the crowd of civilians, "Go on, shoo!" He waved them away with his hand.

The man turned back to the small group and glared at Anko once, smirking in self-satisfaction when the woman gave an 'eep' and teleported with a poof of smoke. His gaze then settled on the child shoved against Iruka, a flash of pain seemed to flash through his eyes but it was quickly covered by his normal, lecherous smile. "Hello, this looks like someone I know. Strange." He said while winking at Naruto when the teenager was about to burst into a comment. "Iruka-sensei, do I know who this is?"

"Jiraiya-san, I really don't see what this is going to do." Iruka said; ignoring the pain he was getting in his abdomen from the little hellion digging his elbow in between his ribs.

"Trust me. He'll be fine." Jiraiya said, a grin tugging at his weathered lips.

"Now come here, Kashi-kun." Jiraiya then cooed softly, crouching on the ground so that he could look at the boy. The jounin struggled for a moment, an animal caught in a trap, before he collapsed against Iruka's hip. The sanin looked up at Iruka and nodded, "You can let him go, Iruka-sensei. I don't think he's going to run, and if he does, I'm pretty sure we can catch him."

Releasing his hands slowly, afraid the boy was going to suddenly bolt; Iruka almost flinched at the speed in which Kakashi ran towards the older man. Team Seven did flinch, falling over themselves. Apparently they didn't know their teacher could move that fast, he was quite laid back with them most of the time, very different from the bundle of emotional energy that the jounin currently was.

Slamming into Jiraiya's chest, Kakashi would have bounced right back off if it weren't for the bear-like arms that wrapped around the small body. Mumbling softly to the boy, the man stood up from the ground, cradling the body against his own. "Let's get going. I have a feeling that Kashi-kun will be a little calmer after a cup of tea."

"I hate tea…" Was muttered from the smaller figure and Jiraiya laughed, ruffling the bush of grey hair affectionately.

And for a single moment, Iruka felt jealous.

----------

Sitting at a table, everyone with a cup filled with some sort of tea, except Kakashi who had water, Jiraiya beamed as he signed something on a piece of paper with a flourish. "Well now that that's done, I can finally get onto the important stuff."

"We've been sitting here for over an hour, pervert!" Naruto howled, only to be hit by Sakura and Sasuke at the same time. His glass tipped over onto the surface, a trail of liquid trailing itself over the wood.

Kakashi followed the river of tea for a moment with his eyes, showing unnecessary concentration, before placing a napkin strategically at the end of the table. The jounin then rested his head on his crossed arms, continuing to follow the trickle, his feet firmly on the ground as he crouched to be even with the low table.

He scowled darkly when Sakura took a different napkin and wiped up the mess without a second thought.

"See, you shouldn't have done that."

"What?"

"Now he's going to-" The clink of a cup falling over, this time Iruka's, accompanied by a muffled yell at the child, "Try to redo it. Damn strategy lessons." Jiraiya said wearily, resting his head on his hand to watch the intense concentration of the small child.

Team Seven watched as their teacher resumed his crouched position, his single eye watching the liquid begin its journey across the table. Iruka growled in his throat as he reached for the teapot, hoping to actually finish a cup of tea before Kakashi ruthlessly stole his cup for use in his experiments.

"Don't do that." Kakashi said quietly, glancing up to catch Iruka's gaze and then returning to his tea watching.

The chunin shrugged slightly, it was strange how easily Kakashi changed moods, and grabbed the next available cup, which happened to be Kakashi's. Expecting to boy to yell, he was quite surprised when an eyeball rolled to look at his hand, dismissed the brunette's actions, and turned back to the more 'interesting' river of tea.

"Kakashi-sensei's a little weird…" Naruto grumbled, sipping his tea and giving a grimace when he tasted the liquid. He really didn't like tea. "Oi, Jiraiya, you said you were going to tell us about Kakashi-sensei-" Using the only piece of sense in his being, Naruto wisely stopped when Kakashi sat up and glared at him.

"Idiot." The child murmured before standing and picking up Iruka's cup that he had tipped over, placing it upright and wandering into the kitchen.

"He has a point." Sasuke said blandly, smirking at the blonde when he began to sputter. He leaned over and pecked Naruto on the cheek, settling back into his seat with a genuine smile, though small, on his lips. "But you're my idiot."

Naruto nodded dumbly, crawling around the table to settle himself into Sasuke's lap. He nuzzled under the other teenager's chin before allowing himself to collapse bonelessly into the Uchiha's embrace. A little sigh left his lips when Sasuke tightened his hold on him, resting his head on top of the blonde hair.

Iruka was battling with himself, should he stop the two or allow their young love to flourish?

Sakura was literally battling with herself. Her inner half wanted to scream in glee and watch every moment, her outer was trying to resist pulling them apart and proclaiming that Sasuke was hers!

Jiraiya was taking notes.

…Pervert.

Clicking his pen shut, the sanin stretched in a self-satisfied way and leaned backwards. "I'm sure you all want to know a little bit about Kakashi, since I have a feeling that everything you know about him wouldn't be able to fill a chapter in a book." He glanced at the students and laughed at their dumbfound expressions, "Come now, did you really think Kakashi would share his past with you three?"

Jiraiya chortled, crossing his arms over his stomach. "Even Iruka here doesn't know anything about Kakashi, and he's only a couple years younger, right sensei?" He glanced at the man sitting next to him, noticing how the chunin was keeping track of the small jounin even though he wasn't in the room, using his chakra to follow Kakashi wandering around the kitchen.

The scary thing was, Kakashi probably knew he was being watched, and he could most likely point out exactly who was doing the tracking.

"Let's see, I'm sure you all know about Kakashi being a genius, yes?" Nods all around, "He became a chunin at around six, sometime after his father…died. He hasn't quite gotten over his death yet, at least, that's what I could gather from his reaction…" Only Iruka grimly nodded in understanding this time. "Let me just say that when Kakashi was little, his main purpose in life was to be the best ninja and with the kid's calculating mind and his drive to succeed, the Hokage was forced to agree when he passed his academy final."

Sakura frowned, ignoring the couple next to her who were now rubbing noses. "But he's our teacher. I mean I know he was an ANBU, but 'the best ninja?' That sounds a little of a stretch from Kakashi-sensei." She shrugged, "Most of the time he's reading that stupid book and slouching around, trying to do the least work possible."

"It's not stupid." Jiraiya said, snapping his notebook closed and clutching it close to his chest like an offended schoolgirl. "Besides, the Kakashi you knew is different from the Kakashi you have right now. I would say he's about six right now… Already a chunin and on the fast pace to becoming a jounin."

"Cool, Kakashi-sensei was awesome!" Naruto proclaimed loudly, earning a glare from Sasuke, since he yelled into the Uchiha's ear.

"Wait, are you saying he's getting older?" Iruka asked, ignoring the blonde, his hands griping the table's smooth surface. "Tsunade didn't say anything about that."

"She probably didn't know." Running his hands through his long hair, Jiraiya looked towards the kitchen. "Kashi-kun, you can come out now."

The little boy walked out from the room and promptly glared at Iruka, sitting down next to him. "I don't need to be looked after." He said quietly, venom evident. Without waiting for an answer Kakashi turned to Jiraiya, "I want to go home. He has a cat."

The sanin laughed and stood up from the table, nodding for the others to do likewise. "Too bad, Kashi-kun. I'm sure Iruka can get someone to look after his cat. And besides, cats are cleaner than those dogs you have." He grinned when the jounin, who was now currently a chunin, stomped out the door, leaving behind his team and his guardian.

"Hope you have fun, Iruka." Jiraiya said happily as he shoved the team out of his house, winking at the flustered chunin as he handed him his pair of sandals. As he was about to close the door, shutting the four outside to search for Kakashi who had disappeared, he poked his head out and waved at the brunette sensei. "Just wait until he hits puberty." And then he slammed the door shut.

----------

"You have to do it."

"No."

"Kakashi-kun, think of it as training."

"Don't call me kun."

"Fine, fine, but you still need to see Gai."

"I train alone."

"You can tell that to him when you meet him."

"He won't listen."

"He might. Come on Kakashi, why don't you want to see Gai?"

"…His eyebrows are weird."

Iruka rubbed a finger lightly over his scarred nose, wondering who he made angry to deserve this. Team Seven had left him to run and get seats for the match, since there was surely going to be a crowd to watch the two rivals battle, and the chunin was beginning to wish that they had stayed just to help him convince their teacher to come with him. Currently he was standing upside down on his ceiling, glaring at Tootsie who was sitting comfortably in Iruka's lap.

"Kakashi, you have to go meet Gai or else he will go and find you. He only wants a training match." Iruka growled at the boy, absentmindedly petting the ball of cat. "Will it help to tell you that I will get rid of Tootsie-chan if you win?"

The boy crossed his arms and stared at the feline again, who yawned in his general direction,. His hair lifted from his face, since he was upside down, to show the baby fat still clinging to his cheeks. "Stupid cat."

"I'll take that as a yes." Iruka sighed, standing and dusting off his pants, ignoring the hiss he received from Tootsie at his sudden movement. "Let's get going. We don't want to keep Gai waiting." He walked out his house, closing the door and locking it behind him, pausing for a moment to wait for Kakashi to teleport next to him in a cloud of smoke.

The chunin walked down the street quietly, wondering what he could say to the child next to him. Because that is what Kakashi was in his eyes, still a child, even though he was technically the same rank as him. He turned when he heard Kakashi mutter something, blinking when three Kakashi's came into his line of sight.

"I hope you aren't trying to run away." He said, tiredly, wondering how worse his day could get.

Kakashi snorted, brushing past his watcher, "Chakra control. The more doppelgangers I keep, the stronger I get. And you're a teacher."

Deciding it was time to put the brat back into his place, Iruka did the only thing he knew would embarrass the aloof boy. He grabbed the real Kakashi's hand, this took a moment since all of the copies were very good, and started to drag him behind as he walked to the park.

Struggling silently for a moment, and scowling the entire time, the smaller chunin allowed himself a huge sigh.

"Now, now, Kakashi-kun." Iruka said, stressing the last part. "We don't want to be late to see Gai. He seemed so excited to see you last night."

Kakashi glared at the pony-tailed man's back, jerking his hand to see if the chunin had lightened his grip. He hadn't. Damn. "I don't want to see him. He's not even my rank yet and all he does is yell!"

Shaking his head at the petulant tone coming from in back of him, Iruka thought about what was just said, 'So, Kakashi doesn't remember anything from when he was younger. But he's getting older, and everyone else seems fine with that! They're not even worried that Kakashi might not grow up, or keep growing…Why do I have the feeling that I'm out of a giant loop?'

"Iruka-sensei! You made it!" Naruto yelled happily, running over to his senseis with Sasuke tagging along, making less noise as usual. "We had to get here really early because Lee was telling everyone about the fight so everyone was coming, and we wanted to get good seats, so we had to fight for a couple of spots and Sakura almost flashed the crowd because someone grabbed her dress, and she turned so red that-"

Naruto stopped to draw in a huge breath but was stopped from continuing when Sasuke hit him on the head, a small smirk rising to his pale features. "Shut up, dobe."

The blonde grinned sheepishly before glancing back at Iruka and his charge. "Gai-sensei has been here since five, thinking up a fool-proof way to beat Kakashi-sensei." He grinned at his younger teacher, pointing with both hands, "You're going to get beat up!" He said happily, laughing and skipping off into the group of onlookers, leaving behind Sasuke who slouched in a pose similar to an older Kakashi's, before he turned and walked seamlessly into a clump of people passing.

Iruka shrugged at the strange behavior of his two students before looking down at the bush of grey hair. A reluctant smile tugged at his lips when he noticed that Kakashi had been stealthily moving closer to him as more people came to watch the event. Currently he was almost hugging Iruka's leg, his small hand still holding the older chunin's hand even though Iruka had forgotten about gripping tightly.

He was suddenly taken over by his teacher's instincts. Crouching down low so that he was level with Kakashi he ran his hair through the tangled ruff of grey on the boy's head. "You're going to do fine. I promise, Kakashi-kun."

It seemed Iruka's voice was meant to break the spell.

Kakashi jerked away from Iruka, pulling his hand out and crossing it in front of his chest. He scowled up at the older man and stepped into the crowd, walking, presumably, towards the empty circle in the middle.

The brunette sensei sighed and wove his way near his students, hoping they didn't see the exchange. 'Kakashi was even stranger when he was little.' Iruka thought to himself, dodging a paper kunai that was aimed at someone on the other end of the throng of people. 'I guess I get to see how strange he really was. Joy…'

His eyes rested on the slight frame standing directly in the middle of the circle created by the multitude, back straight, looking bored but defenses firmly in place. 'Kakashi really is a perfect ninja…' Iruka smiled when the boy promptly sneezed, a scuffle in the front of the crowd was kicking up dirt, and the ninja was replaced, for a quick moment, with a six year old.

"Eternal rival! You have come to witness your own downfall!" A large, personality filled, most likely Gai, voice was suddenly heard, causing most of the horde to stop in their betting to look for the source of such melodic youthfulness.

The entire crowd watched in awe as Gai performed Pose #103 flawlessly before he did a front flip off of the telephone pole he had been standing on. A few brave souls clapped but were quickly silenced by their neighbors. It was bad enough they were watching the fight between rivals; they didn't need to encourage the Green Beast anymore than he already was.

"And this was how you shall fail!" And with that, Gai, jounin of Konohagakue, the village of the hidden leaf, hurled a pack of gum at the grey haired six-year old.

The challenge had been made.

----------

End Notes

What is up with that Gai? He is so youthful! Mmm, I'm tired from work.

Review! The more you review, the quicker I write because it shows you guys actually want to read what happens. So, yeah…

REVIEW.