Updates might go slowly after this chapter, I have a ton of school work I need to take care of and finals are coming up soon. I'll do my best though.
A new day.
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In their safe house at the edge of the village of Konoha the Akutenshi were just beginning to wake up for their day to day life. Since it was a Saturday Iruka didn't have classes but he had an early mission desk duty and Kakashi had a meeting with the Hokage among other minor things.
The day started out normally enough for Iruka. He managed to kill another alarm clock by throwing a kunai at it and had the usual fight between his logical self, who told him to get his ass out of bed and go to work, and his personal self, who grumbled fuck it I was up late yesterday saving the village and I deserve a break. As always his logical self won and Iruka reluctantly crawled out of bed and headed for his salvation, the coffee machine. If Iruka ever found the person who invented mornings he'd use several creative methods to make the person wish they'd never been born, and Iruka could be very creative.
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Kakashi on the other hand was having a rather strange morning. Contrary to popular belief Kakashi was a morning person, one of those annoying once who didn't even need coffee to wake up and greet the world with a cheery attitude... not that Kakashi ever did that in the mornings, he was to busy greeting the dead to acknowledge the living. People just always assumed he slept in because he always showed up late.
This morning was vastly different however. Kakashi was trying his best to keep on sleeping even though it was an hour since his usual start of the day, it was being made difficult by tiny fingers poking him repeatedly and a small voice whining.
"Doggie... Doggie, I'm hungry"
'Don't open your eyes, what ever you do just don't open your eyes. If you don't see them their not there.' Kakashi fought a losing battle with his brain to forget the bright blue puppy dog eyes that had tormented him during the night and made it nearly impossible for him to get any sleep. He'd had a rather tiring night and it hadn't had anything to do with his mission, it had been much worse.
At 4 am, an hour after they got home and Kakashi had just managed to fall asleep, he was woken up by a small hand on his shoulder shaking him awake. When he opened his eyes the first thing he saw were those clear blue eyes looking at him pleadingly and a small voice asking for a glass of water. When Kakashi finally managed to get his mouth to refuse he was already standing in the kitchen with a glass of water and no clue as to why on earth he couldn't say no to the kid.
At 5 something am Kakashi woke up to some frantic tugging on his arm and a desperate little voice asking where the bathroom was, little blue eyes looking at him in obvious discomfort and again before Kakashi knew it he was standing outside the bathroom door staring at his hand who just a moment ago had been holding a much smaller one down the hall.
At about 6 am Kakashi had been woken up by a kick in the stomach and a punch in the face. Naruto was having a nightmare kicking and flailing his arms everywhere to fight off some unseen terror. After waking him up Kakashi had spent about 15 minutes soothing the hurt and fright out of those eyes.
Kakashi finally moved but to Naruto's frustration he only stuck his head under the pillow. 'It's 7 am, Iruka should be up..I wonder if he's had his coffee...Well it's worth a try'
"Naruto" He stuck his head a bit from underneath his cover. "go to the kitchen and ask Iruka to give you something"
"Iruka?"
"Kuroneko, his name's Iruka."
Kakashi listened to the sound of little feet running down the hall. Now that was a sound that he would never have imagined hearing in the base house, or the house in general as such. Before the house had become Akutenshi's base of operations it had belonged to him, still did legally. It had been in his family for generations but he hadn't lived in it for a long time before he and Iruka moved in there a few years ago.
It had been the most perfect location for their base, the house had been abandoned for a long time so people didn't pay much attention to it. It was in a nearly empty part of town so any noises or activity would be less noticed. Had big walls surrounding the lawn so people couldn't see what was going on inside the house or the yard. And most importantly Kakashi owned it so if anyone ever found out they were hanging out there no one would think twice about it.
Kakashi hadn't liked the idea at first, the house held too many bad memories, he couldn't say he'd had a happy childhood there. But by hearing those little footsteps echoing down the hall, remembering the tiny frame cuddled next to his during the night and seeing those sapphire blue eyes filled with so much life despite all the hardship they had seen Kakashi couldn't help but think that maybe the house would finally see brighter days. He didn't know why but it made him happy in an odd way. With that happy thought in his mind Kakashi stuck his head under the pillow again and pulled the blanket over his head too, maybe if they couldn't see him he wasn't there.
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Iruka's sleep filled mind was staring at a little blob of something that was at the moment jumping up and down in front of him. He was standing barefoot in the kitchen dressed only in loose pajama pants, his hair half way out of yesterdays ponytail which he had forgotten to remove before going to sleep.
Before he got interrupted by this new phenomenon in his kitchen he had been holding his ramen bowl and staring at the coffee machine cursing it to work faster. He couldn't really figure out what this new thing in his kitchen was apart from the fact that it had distinctive yellow and blue colors mixed into the whole blur, it was demanding food and Iruka had a feeling somewhere in the back of his mind that he should dislike this jumping blob of energy. But since Iruka hadn't had his coffee, or soldier pills in case of missions, his brilliant mind hadn't turned on and Iruka did the first thing his groggy braincells told him to do. He handed the little blob his untouched ramen bowl and kept waiting for the coffee machine to finish making his first fix for the day. Now Iruka was a very skilled ninja. If needed or in danger he could go from asleep to fully alert in a fracture of a second but when at home or on an easy mission Iruka's brain usually decided to sleep in.
Finally Iruka was gulping down the first love of his life, coffee, and getting ready to slurp down the second love of his life.. except he soon realized he'd given the second love of his life to a little blob... that he could now clearly recognize as a little blond brat. After a quick search in the kitchen he also realized that the ramen bowl the kid had inhaled had been the last one.
Iruka's mental dialog of curses was interrupted by a small hand pulling on his pajama pants and completely stopped when he looked down into the child's eyes. He decided to act nice to the kid seeing as how he would be raising and training him from then on but he couldn't help his own eyes hardening when he saw the whisker marks underneath the boy's eyes.
"Yes" Iruka managed to bite out almost nicely.
"Iruka, can I have more of what ever that was?"
"Uh.. What? Ramen.. you've never had ramen before?" Iruka just looked at Naruto with amazement, how could someone never have had ramen before.
"No Jijii wanted me to eat rabbit food but I don't like that, I like this ramen though can I have some more?"
"I'm sorry I don't have any more.. just ask Kakashi to give you some when you go out later."
"Kakashi?"
"Yeah, Doggie or what ever you call him.. Where is he anyway?"
"He didn't want to wake up, he said you should feed me"
"Right of course he did" Iruka grumbled. "Alright I'll take you out to my favorite ramen stand in a little bit, how does that sound.. I just have to get ready and take care of something first."
Iruka definitely didn't know why he had said that. He tried to tell himself that it was probably just because he had been planning on going there anyway since the kid had eaten his breakfast and it would probably annoy Kakashi, plus he was assigned to take care of the kid and taking care of him meant feeding him so it was perfectly explainable. It definitely didn't have anything to do with those bright cheery blue eyes looking at him pleadingly.
He did know however that he didn't like how his morning was turning out and decided to take it out on the cause of his newfound problems.
Which is why Kakashi woke up a few minutes later to cold water being thrown over him and Iruka shouting that he should.
"Get the fuck up and do your fucking duty since you wanted the little hellion so much in the first place."
'Yep definitely hasn't had enough coffee'
Kakashi's reply was cut short when said hellion jumped into his lap screaming.
"We're going out for ramen!"
Kakashi fell back down on his now soaked futon and pillow with a deep groan.
"Not you too." 'I hate ramen.'
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When Kakashi jumped into the Hokage's office through one of the windows 20 minutes later Sarutobi was sitting on his couch, puffing his pipe and looking intently on the pictures of the 4 hokages that hung on the wall, either that or he was just deep in though Kakashi couldn't tell which. The Hokage showed no signs of noticing his entry but Kakashi knew better.
The Third had the strange habit of acting surprised when ever someone burst into his office or came unannounced when he could clearly sense them coming a mile away, he wasn't the Hokage for nothing. Kakashi supposed he did it to make the people who came to see him more comfortable, no one likes sneaking in somewhere and getting a "Ah there you are." or bursting in and getting a "Oh welcome, what can I do for you." That's not how it goes. People expect a "Oh I didn't see you come in." And a "What is the meaning of this!"
But just to play along Kakashi cleared his throat before he walked over to the Hokage and sat down in a chair on the other side of the coffee table. The Hokage as usual seemed to snap out of his staring and focused on Kakashi.
"Ah Kakashi, I wasn't expecting you so early, everything alright?"
"I had a hard night and a strange morning, thought I'd take care of this thing before my day gets any worse."
"I see, Naruto give you any trouble?" If Kakashi didn't know better he could have sworn the Hokage was smirking around his pipe... but then again Kakashi knew him quite well and it wouldn't surprise him if he was.
"Nothing I couldn't handle." Kakashi retorted stubbornly.
"Well of that I am sure, but I'll give you one advice all the same. Don't give Naruto a lot of water during the night, a few sips is more than enough if he's thirsty, any more than that and he'll have to use the bathroom and all that restlessness during the night comes out in his sleep."
Kakashi had the uncomfortable feeling the Hokage had been watching him sleep in his crystal ball but surely the Hokage was above using it to spy so closely on his ninjas.
"Well since you are here there are some things we need to discuss. I've been thinking about this very thoroughly this morning and I've made some decisions on what we are going to do regarding Naruto." Sarutobi put his pipe away, stood up and beckoned Kakashi to follow him to his desk. When they were both seated again he handed the younger man some papers and documents.
"This is everything you and Iruka will need in order to take care of Naruto. There will be two serious changes in both of your lives with this responsibility and I want you to listen before you object." Sarutobi waited for Kakashi's little nod of acceptance before he continued.
"First of all I know that you were the one to ask to look after Naruto but I have decided to give full legal guardian ship of him to Iruka." At this Kakashi's head snapped up from the papers a look of utter surprise in his one visible eye but he didn't say anything so Sarutobi continued on.
"One reason for this is because of your ranks, Iruka is a chuunin and an academy teacher so he will be in the village almost all the time and you as a jounin will have to go out on missions. The council will want someone who can keep an eye on the kid at all times and would never accept you as a full guardian. You will how ever be given the mission to protect the kid so no one will find it weird for you to be seen with him on a regular basis. You and Iruka can also make it public that you are friends if you want to, it won't jeopardize your cover at this point since you will basically be working together officially as Kakashi and Iruka now. The second reason why I am doing this is for Iruka. I know he doesn't like Naruto at this time but I believe that he will learn to care for the boy eventually. Iruka takes his responsibilities very seriously and I think that by giving him full legal guardianship of Naruto it will push him to take even better care of him than he otherwise would."
"I think I have to agree with you on that one." Kakashi stated. "I think Iruka has decided to treat Naruto the best he can but I don't know how far that reaches, give him legal guardianship over him and Iruka would even bite your head off if you looked at the kid wrong.. I've seen him in protective mode over his students and it's scarier than seeing him on duty." If they ever had to refer to Akutenshi work when they were not in uniform and using their own names they would simply refer to it as duty, they could never be too careful in a village full of ninjas.
"Good we agree then. The second big change is that I am pulling you out of Anbu. You will mainly be responsible for Naruto's physical training and I believe it will take a lot of time and energy to do so and since I can't very well make you stop being you or having you drop your other duties it was the best course to take. Iruka will then mainly be responsible for teaching Naruto and as such he doesn't have to leave Anbu but he can if he so chooses."
"I see, if you think that is for the best then I won't argue with you on this."
Sarutobi smiled. "Your being awfully agreeable today."
"Well like I said, it's been a strange day so far. But I'm not the one you have to worry about in this I think. I will do anything it takes in order to look after Naruto.. I don't know what my friend will do about it though.. not in this case."
"He'll learn, just give him time. The two of them are together now aren't they?"
"Yeah.. Iruka had the brilliant idea to introduce him to ramen, they were headed to Ichiraku's when I left."
"Ah I take it young Naruto liked it, he was forever complaining about the food I was feeding him."
"I think it's going to be hard to get him to eat anything else ever again."
"Well, that's one thing they'll have in common then."
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Iruka was indeed making his way to Ichiraku's ramen stand with Naruto following close behind, although the way there seemed longer than it did every other day he'd been there. Iruka was getting uncomfortable stares from a few people but it was nothing compared to what he saw them doing to the kid. People would glare daggers at him, verbally abuse him, spit on him and every now and then Iruka could hear the kid falling down after either being pushed or tripped to the ground.
Now Iruka had decided to treat the kid somewhat nicely since he was pretty much stuck with him but he'd told himself he didn't much care what other people did to the brat. He was having an inner struggle with himself over it at the moment though. On one hand he still felt the same about the boy, he could still clearly see the signs of the demon who killed his parents in him. But on the other hand he was just a kid, and he went through this apparently every day and never did anything to stand up for himself.
When they finally made it to the ramen stand Iruka was oddly relieved that Teuchi, the owner, cheerfully served them their ramen. Iruka had tried to shop a little at the market and had been quite pissed off when most of the stall owners refused to sell him anything because he was with the boy. He didn't know if he was angrier over the fact that he wasn't able to buy food because he was with the brat or at the stall owners for refusing to sell him because of the boy.
Iruka was seriously getting a headache from all this turmoil going on inside his head and when his ramen arrived he poked at it uninterestingly for a while. Because of this he was able to see the other patron at the place stand up and get ready to leave, no doubt offended by the company. But before the man made his way out of the stall he leaned over and spit into Naruto's bowl. And that was it, Iruka didn't quite know what to do but he knew he had to do something, Naruto just defeatedly pushed his bowl away like he had just decided he wasn't hungry anymore and nothing had happened. But to Iruka's immense surprise before he could do anything Teuchi grabbed Naruto's bowl and hurled it at the mans head.
"Don't ever show your face in my stall again!" He shouted at the stunned guy who bolted as soon as the shock wore off. After the man was gone Teuchi turned to Naruto with a big smile on his face.
"Now look what I've done, I seem to have spilled your bowl. How about I give you a nice bowl of miso ramen to make up for that one hmm?"
Naruto could only nod his head numbly, that was the second person in only one day to stand up for him.
When Naruto was busy slurping down his new bowl Iruka leaned over the counter to talk to the older man. The guy had lost his only son in the Kyuubi attack and to see him do something like this for Naruto made Iruka's inner thoughts go into turmoil again.
"Do you know who that kid is?" He asked the stall owner when he walked by.
Teuchi stopped and looked at the little boy. "Yeah, I know who he is."
"Then why? How can you treat him so nicely?"
The old man looked at Iruka with a knowing glint in his eyes. " You know I used to be like that man. It was a lot easier to hate and blame someone for the death of my son than to deal with the hurt of losing him. And then I saw the boy and I tried to keep hating him, tried to see him only as the.. burden he carries but soon found that it was utterly useless. All I kept seeing was the Fourth coming in here almost every single day beaming with joy because he was about to be a father, talking about how he couldn't wait to teach his child everything he knew, not about the way of the ninja but about life, said he couldn't wait until he would be old enough for him to bring him to my stall to get his first bowl of ramen." Teuchi looked hard at Iruka before he continued.
"And do you know what I see when I look at that boy now. I see a little child who has a burden that no one should rightfully carry. I see a child who because of that burden gets shunned, beaten and mistreated every day of his life when in fact people should be helping him. I see a little boy not so much unlike the boy you used to be when you were younger, all alone in the world just waiting for someone to acknowledge them for who they really are." With that said Teuchi left Iruka and walked out back to unload some crates.
Iruka was speechless, he hated to admit it but he was beginning to think he was wrong about the kid, he still had mixed emotions about him but Teuchi was at least right about one thing, the kid sure could use some help dealing with the villagers.
"Naruto" Iruka began hesitantly. The boy stopped inhaling his food and looked at him.
"Why don't you ever stand up for yourself, the Hokage said you were strong enough to be chuunin now and you still do nothing when they beat you."
Naruto looked down at his bowl again like it held all the answers.
"I know I shouldn't know this but I know why they don't like me. They call me a monster because of what I have inside of me. I don't know if they are right and having Kyuu in me makes me a monster or not, but a monster to me is someone who picks on someone weaker than they are just because they can. If I defend myself or avoid their beatings they just get madder and if I would fight back and actually hurt someone they would see me as even more of a monster. But I don't want to hurt anyone. I believe that the monsters who attack me can become good people if they try, if I can believe that then maybe that means I can become a good person too, so maybe I won't always be a monster. I want to become a great ninja like you and Kakashi so I can protect this village too." Naruto looked at Iruka with bright determination shining in his eyes.
"I want to be like Jijii and my dad, I want to become Hokage so I can look after the village they love and loved so much."
"Naruto.. you're not a monster." And Iruka realized when he said those words that he was actually beginning to believe them himself. Iruka hated to admit it but this little boy sitting next to him, whisker marks and all, was actually just that.. a little boy.. and Iruka was having a hard time imagining him as anything else.
When the two of them had finished their breakfast they made their way to the Hokage tower where Iruka would drop Naruto off with Kakashi before he began his shift at the mission office. The way to the tower seemed infinitely shorter than the way to the ramen stand. Iruka's mind was clear and for the first time in a long time he felt like a burden was lifted of his shoulders. In his hand was another much smaller one and Iruka didn't care about the glares they got this time, he simply gave his best glare back and kept on walking.
It wasn't much but it was a start.
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Reviews are not needed but always appreciated. Thank you for reading.
