A/N: Oh yay! Thank you guys! MadnessLover, I'm very sorry, I was typing my thank yous up at 4 am… you get your cookies! Anyways, Dragonheart0000, I had some slight writer's block with that last chapter, and my computer decided to get all retarded on me and my life too. But I'll try and update more often! I just figured you guys would want longer chapters…

Disclaimer: Me no own, you no sue. Simple, ne? I do, however, own Maerin and any other OCs that appear (for the sake of the story). Oh, and the plot too…

Chapter 6: First Night

Sasuke stabbed moodily at his potatoes. Naruto seemed to understand why the guy was so upset, "Missing Sakura already?"

"Stay out of this baka."

Harry seemed a little more at ease with them now, "The girl with pink hair?"

Naruto gave him a huge grin and a look that told him he was going to tell him a big secret, "Yeah! Sasuke here's been dating Sakura for a while now!"

Internally, Hermione groaned. On the outside, she retained her calm demeanor, "Dating?"

Nodding vigorously, Naruto replied with, "Uh huh!"

"None of you go after my sister," Gaara ground out.

"Temari?" Harry asked levelly, he elbowed Ron hard in the stomach, jerking him away from starring dreamily at said person.

"…"

"Gaara here doesn't talk much. He's given death glares to everyone who's given Temari lovey eyes. Though he doesn't seem to mind Shikamaru that much," Naruto commented, jerking his thumb in the direction of the Ravenclaw table.

Anxious to learn more, Hermione asked, "And what about the others?"

"Neji's the one with the unbelievably long brown hair; Shikamaru's the lazy baka beside him. Then we've got Temari, who's obviously got a thing for Shikamaru," he paused, then, "Then we have Hinata, she can be so shy around people, but she's got a good heart. She's Neji's cousin.

"Finally ya got Sasuke here," he slapped the Uchiha heartily on the back, causing him to almost choke on his food. Sasuke shot Naruto a death glare, "He's got his problems, but he's a good guy overall. And I'm Naruto!" he pointed his thumb at his chest.

"The loud knuckle head," Sasuke added.

"Hey!" Naruto punched him playfully on the arm. "I ain't the knuckle head! You're the one who made Maerin-sensei so worried and angry!"

Sasuke was silent at that. Gaara watched the exchange with mild amusement.

Dinner continued with the uncomfortable silence. Once the dinner plates were cleared of food, Dumbledore once again stood for his speech.

"Once again we find ourselves brought together under the roof of Hogwarts," he cast his eyes about the hall. "I see many old faces, and many new ones. And I hope that by the end of this year we have all learned something new and are closer then we were at the beginning.

"As I have mentioned before, Professors Maerin Uchiha and Kakashi Hatake will be teaching practical-" the door of the hall slammed open.

Naruto whispered, "Late as usual."

A tall man stood at the entrance, he wore a strange outfit. A pair of baggy navy sweat pants, with bandages wrapped snuggly around his shins; and a navy sweatshirt, with an odd looking olive green vest. His hands were in his pockets, and he wore a facemask covering the lower half of his face, a headband with a strange symbol engraved on metal was pulled over his left eye. Wild, white hair completed the look.

He cast his eye around, and then gave what seemed to be a smile, you couldn't really tell because you couldn't see his mouth; took his hand out of his pocket, and tipped it in a wave, simply stating, "Yo."

The entire hall starred at him in confusion.

Naruto jumped out of his chair, "Kakashi-sensei, you're late! Later then usual."

Kakashi smiled at him, "I got a little lost on the way down."

Everyone sweat dropped.

Crossing his arms, Naruto sat back down, in a bit of a huff, "… stupid Kakashi-sensei."

Dumbledore beamed, spreading his arms wide, he intoned, "May I give you Professor Hatake, the other instructor of our practical defense course."

People applauded half-heartedly. The teacher was kind of weird.

"Professor Hatake is also joining us from the Japanese Imperial Institute of Mana, as well as Professor Uchiha," Kakashi reached the staff table, he stood beside Maerin's chair, an arm resting on the back, "Do either of you have something to add?

Maerin nodded and stood up, "Students, thank you for the warm welcome," she paused, "I would also like to say that it would be proper if you all came to class attired for physical activity." She took her seat again.

Dumbledore resumed, "Welcome. It will be noted the forest in the grounds is forbidden to all students. Secondly, the full list of items banned in the corridors is posted on the outside or Mr. Filch's office for those who wish to check. First years and newcomers, please follow your house's prefects to your common rooms."

There was a loud scraping as students filed out of their seats and poured out. Hermione waved over the first years while Ron turned his attention to Naruto, Sasuke, and Gaara.

"Follow me," Ron beckoned. "Harry you come to. You don't know the password!"

"Fine, fine."

Trailing behind the two wizards, Naruto commented, "This place is so big! I think I'll get lost!"

"Then just follow those two," Sasuke commented dryly, he indicated Harry and Ron. Naruto glared at him.

"And what about you? You're going to sneak off to see Sakura the first chance you get!" Naruto accused.

Gaara interrupted their argument with a flat, "We're there."

Ron spoke the password, "Chidori."

"That'll be easy to remember. It's Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei's signature jutsu," Naruto commented.

Harry, who had heard this, ventured, "What did you just say Naruto?"

Rubbing his head, "Eh, sorry Harry. I was just commenting on the password! I'm so used to speaking my native language that I might sometimes slip back into it! Eh heh, heh…"

"Oh, alright… think you could teach me?" Harry asked as they gathered in the common room.

"Maybe, it's harder then it looks."

"It's getting late," Gaara commented. "You can teach Harry later. For now, let's get some rest."

The troop filed up the stairs, splitting as they went. Gaara and Sasuke were in a different dormitory, but Naruto was in the same one as Harry and Ron.

Neville and Dean were already in there.

They greeted each other.

"Hey Harry," Naruto ventured.

"Yeah?"

"If I wrote out some words and their meanings on a piece of paper, do you think you could study from that?"

"Uh, yeah I'll try."

"What's Harry trying to learn?" Neville asked absently, placing his new plant on his night stand.

"Japanese," Naruto replied, that was his language's name in this world.

Neville starred at them like they were crazy, "That's going to be hard! I mean, they use different characters to write!"

"I'm just going to learn to speak it," Harry responded.

Naruto dug through his trunk, "Hmm… aha!" He pulled out two framed photographs. He placed them delicately on his nightstand, and then looked at them.

"What's that?" Harry asked, coming over.

Naruto continued to look at them, and replied, "Back home we were divided up into teams for our defense classes. Sakura, Sasuke, and I were on Team 7.

"We should be getting to bed now. I don't want Sasuke or Gaara snapped my head off because I'm grumpy from lack of sleep!"

The other boys agreed and they dressed in their pajamas and went to sleep.

Okay! Yes it's rushed. I'm leaving tomorrow, and I didn't want to leave you guys without an update, so I hurriedly wrote out this chapter and am publishing it! Anywho... I'm working on a one-shot, and I'm hoping that I can either finish it tonight and publish it, or publish it when I get back. I'm only going away for the weekend, today's Thursday, and I'll be back on Sunday night. So I hope you can all survive until then.

Also, once this story is finished, I'm planning on finishing up as many as my others as I can. Then I'm going to start on some new ones. Alright? Sorry, no sequel unless I can finish at least one of my other stories...

Another sidenote, I want to thank you all for making this story my most popular! The high review count really made my day! I can't believe so many people love this story... thanks...

Sorry, no thank yous for this chapter. But I promise I'll thank you all properly in chapter seven! I'm going to try and get that one out as soon as I get back. And I'll email Kris the chapters from then on.

Thank you all!

Signing off.