Black as Blood

XII

Iruka rubbed his forehead and sat back in his chair, fervently wishing for ibuprofen. The children were getting excited, almost too excited to control. One of the kunoichi senseis had suddenly gone into labour, leaving her class unattended. Those children had subsequently been shifted to the remaining classes, which in turn made the classes larger than one teacher could handle. Thus he was grateful when Naruto and Sasuke stopped by on some errand or another, probably for Kakashi considering Naruto carried a lunch box. Iruka knew the other teachers wouldn’t like it, and he’d probably get into serious trouble for it, but it was between having someone watching twenty-four kids as compared to forty-eight. So with smiles and false happiness he managed to get Sasuke into the vacated classroom and the scattered children back into the classroom with Sasuke, and told him all he had to do was watch the kids for another few hours.

Sasuke was incredulous, staring after Iruka’s back as he was left alone in an enclosed space with twenty-four little ankle biters, with Naruto waving with a grin that made Sasuke want to punch him. He turned to look at the children, recognizing none of them. They certainly were afraid, no doubt having been told about him by their wonderful parents. Sasuke gave a sigh and moved to stand before the desk, watching the kids with as much interest as they watched him. Finally, one little girl moved, standing up as though to ask a question. Sasuke raised an eyebrow; he’d never been asked to teach. Instead, she threw a wad of paper at him, which started an all out war. Sasuke heaved a sigh, lunged, and returned fire with the paper wads he caught, finally moving to stand before the girl who threw the first blow.

“I don’t appreciate being targeted.” Sasuke said in his best serious voice. The girl trembled under his dark gaze, looking close to crying. “I’m doing this as a favour to Iruka-sensei.”

“We don’t want a new teacher!”

“Who said I was going to teach you?” Sasuke asked. “I just was shoved in here to watch you. Watching is different than teaching,”

“No it’s not!” one little boy cried. “You’re here to teach us because our sensei got sick! She’s sick ‘cause it’s your fault!”

“Your sensei isn’t sick,” Sasuke replied, moving back to the teacher’s stage, rubbing his growing headache. So this is what Iruka felt every day when dealing with the little idiots? Sasuke had a whole new respect for Iruka.

“She isn’t…?”

“No. Haven’t they taught you anything about babies?”

Judging by the blank stares on their eight-year-old faces, no one had bothered to tell them their sensei had been about to have a baby. Sasuke sighed heavily and leaned against the desk, wondering how to explain to them something that should have been introduced already.

“Your sensei isn’t sick,” he began for lack of better words. “She’s going to have a baby. That’s why she had to leave early. Her baby was ready to be born.”

It was then an idea dawned on him, and he looked at the crumpled mess of paper wads that littered the floor and a few kids’ heads. The children were staring at him, some confused, some afraid, some apathetic. Sasuke moved around the desk and began to open the drawers, searching for pencils and crayons, dropping those on each child’s desk.

“You don’t want to learn from me, so I’m not going to teach you. That wasn’t what Iruka-sensei asked me to do. You think your sensei is sick, but she’s having a baby. So what I want you to do is to pick up this paper, and make her get well cards.”

“We’re not four.”

“No, you’re eight.” Sasuke replied, watching the children lean forward. “You’re almost old enough to become genin. Still, don’t you think your sensei would appreciate having hand-made cards from you while she’s resting in the hospital?”

That seemed enough to get the girls going and Sasuke had to start praising the girls on their forming masterpieces to get the boys to start working. Sasuke was sure he could get Iruka-sensei or someone else to deliver the cards, so long as his name was never mentioned. They’d find another substitute until their sensei came back to work and Sasuke could go back to his own life without worrying about his own wellbeing while he was involved with twenty-four little children. The kids were quiet until Sasuke mentioned they could talk so long as they didn’t yell, and the room erupted into chatter, the kids splitting into groups as they worked, and Sasuke just watched.

Iruka opened the door to the classroom expecting bodies, and he’d never mention the relief that flooded through him when he saw the kids crowded around Sasuke as he sat on the floor, surrounded by crumpled, coloured cards, folding them neatly as possible as the kids asked him questions that he did his best to answer.

“He’s good, isn’t he?” Tsunade asked Iruka, standing behind him, her head tilted. Iruka jumped a bit to find the Hokage behind him, her finger to her lips to call for silence. “I was looking for Naruto.”

“He’s watching my class for me,” Iruka replied. Tsunade nodded, looking over the chuunin’s shoulder to watch Sasuke deal with these eight-year-olds.

“The children seem to like him.” Tsunade said. “Perhaps… Well, I need to speak with Naruto. Send him over when you see him. I want you to test Sasuke. See if he’s competent enough to be a teacher.”

“Are you sure it’d be a good idea?”

“We need a substitute until Maru is ready to come back to work.”

Iruka looked at Tsunade, his face showing his worry. “The students like him, but I’m afraid of what their parents will say.”

Tsunade snorted as she turned to walk down the hall, waving her hand in a dismissal. Iruka sighed, shaking his head as he smiled. Sasuke did have a knack for dealing with children, Iruka knew, and had known since the incident in the forest with four of Iruka’s students. True that incident hadn’t been the best test of Sasuke’s skills at handling children, but it proved to Iruka that Sasuke was determined and capable enough to protect his students in the event something went awry. Any teacher needed to be able to handle unexpected events, whether they occur on a field trip or in the classroom. Iruka himself was proof of that. Too many times did his class erupt into chaos because someone had heard of the legendary Sexy no Jutsu, probably from Konohamaru, and tried it out on Iruka, year after year. By now, the brunette had built up immunity to it and shrugged it off, assigned detentions and extra homework and went on with his life of teaching the future of Konohagakure. Besides, he didn’t need children to freak him out by appearing to be a sexy, naked teenage girl. Kakashi did that just fine on his own. Iruka was never going to get over the fact that Kakashi had somehow copied the Sexy no Jutsu from Naruto and constantly tried it out on the poor teacher just to see how many buckets of blood could come from Iruka’s nose. It wasn’t a pretty sight afterward either, for Kakashi often sported a black eye for weeks after Iruka had finally washed the blood out of his uniform. It was a badge Kakashi wore proudly. Finally, Iruka knocked on the door and sheepishly smiled at Sasuke, simply because he knew that Sasuke had spotted him before he’d even made his presence known to the children. The kids started talking at once, excited and happy, shoving the neatly folded cards into the hapless sensei’s hands before running out the door toward home. Sasuke stood up then, head tilting toward Iruka, giving the chuunin a knowing smile.

“Sensei, huh?”

Iruka blushed as Sasuke gave a short laugh, his hand coming up to snag in his hair. “I don’t think I’d make a good teacher, Iruka-sensei.”

“I think you would. Come on,” Iruka said with a smile. “Let’s get Naruto and take him out for ramen. I’ll get my old books for you to read through and when you’re finished, we’ll see if you want to be a teacher or not.”

Sasuke only sighed and shook his head, following the chuunin to collect their blonde friend, Naruto very nearly close to strangling a few of the children by the time Iruka told them all to go home. Naruto took Sasuke’s hand in his own when Iruka wasn’t looking and kissed his fingertips; Sasuke blushed just a bit and swung his unoccupied hand, connecting with Naruto’s down-turned nose just as Iruka turned around again. The tussle was just getting fun – Naruto was winning – when Iruka hit them both with the erasers from the chalkboard. The three left laughing, and when Iruka told Naruto of his plans for Sasuke, the blonde did his best to convince his lover to take up the challenge.

It was a good thing, then, that Naruto and Sasuke stayed the night with Iruka and Kakashi, when the silver-haired jounin appeared just in time for dinner. When they returned to Naruto’s apartment in the morning, it seemed as if Kyuubi had been let loose on a quiet, one room tornado.

“What happened here…?”