My Dobe

Team 7 was in low spirits as the headed towards their third and last D-rank mission for the day. Naruto was alternating between sulking that his 'Best Plan Yet' had turned out to be another failure and blushing bright scarlet every time he glanced over to his sensei. Who was sulking rather badly about the reprimand – and slap across the face – he got from his boyfriend and planning how to get back on his good side – and into bed – that night.

Iruka was not a happy man right at this moment, and to tell the truth Kakashi was more than a little scared of his dolphin. If he couldn't fix anything soon, it would be a long cold month on the couch for the perverted sensei – and quite possibly no beloved orange books.

As Kakashi sighed and sulked, Naruto blushed and sulked, and Sakura sulked (1) and pouted the missed chance to show off her new bikini and the fact she had to clean – Sasuke was torn between sulking and glaring at his oblivious sensei.

He had walked into a rather disturbing sight of his dobe naked – and female – under his perverted sensei who was grouping the teary boy-turned-girl's breasts while being reprimanded by Iruka. He would have burnt the perverted man to a crisp if Iruka hadn't gotten in first and showed everyone in the vicinity that he was a ninja.

Sasuke mused over whether or not he could get the normally quite gentle man to show him that rather interesting torture techniques he performed on Kakashi. He always knew there was a reason why even Anko and Ibiki were very polite to the gentle teacher and handed in all their reports on time whenever it was his turn with filing all the mission reports. Perhaps he should go buy the man a nice bouquet from the Yamaka Flower Shop, as a thank-you gift. He truly was his new hero.

As they neared a moderately sized house – it was nothing compared to the compounds he lived in – Sasuke looked over at his team-mates and sighed. This was going to be a long day.


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Mrs. Tanaka let the rather miserable bunch of ninjas she'd seen in awhile outside of the hospital she usually worked part-time in – now with her in her retirement – into her house – somewhat warily, as they looked like they may cause more damage – where she quickly explained what was to be done. She was in a rush as she was late to her class – where she was training some medic-nins – and explained that she hadn't had time to do anything around the house as she had been very busy the last couple of weeks with the training. After she made sure the team was alright and aware of what needed to be done, she left with barely a glance over her shoulder.

'What a weird bunch,' she thought to herself before hurrying to the hospital.

After she had left, the team dully allocated the jobs between them and went off to finish their last mission for the day – all preoccupied in their own thoughts.


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Naruto slowly made his way down the stairs that led to the basement. His job was to clean and organise the basement, something he thought wouldn't take long until he saw the state it was in.

'Holy mother of cow...' Naruto thought as he looked around in amazement at the battlefield the basement was. Scrolls and books of all sizes was strewn across the rather larger room. More scrolls were precariously falling off the shelving of the floor-to-ceiling bookcases that lined the walls.

Naruto never thought he would come across anything as messy as Iruka's apartment. Surprisingly for someone so calm and neat-looking, Iruka lived in a pigsty. (2) Naruto was very glad to get a place on his own, when the time came. One would think Naruto would be the messy one, but Naruto liked to keep things neat. Never one to receive much as a child, he kept very good care of all his possessions.

He sighed, today was just not his day. Two failed attempts at getting that teme's smirk wiped off his face, a wasted gift from Suko-baachan (3) and a rather embarrassing incident with Kakashi and Iruka – he would never see Iruka in the same light again, that man was just plain scary when angry – he was not feeling the best.

He set about his chore with a silent melancholy that was quite unusual for the boisterous child.

"YES!" Naruto yelled suddenly in triumph an hour later, jumping up from the pile he was shelving.

"No~," he deflated as the scrolls he spent the last hour stacking came falling down around him as he bumped the over-full bookcase. He carefully crawled out of the mountain of scrolls he was buried under, holding out his hand that was carrying the scroll he was so giddy over a moment before. Quickly checking to see if it was the same scroll, he continued on celebrating – somewhat quietly this time. He performed his customary 'Victory Dance' in silence – and somewhat cramped – before placing the scroll in a secure location and going back to the task at hand.

Finishing up in record time, Naruto grinned at his haphazard work before he sat down with the scroll once again in his possession and read the title.

"Child-no-Jutsu," Naruto read out loud, "Blah blah blah... used to turn other into a child... Awesome!!"

Naruto quickly looked at the seals and noticed to his immense satisfaction that they were a rather easy and non-complicated set to do.

'Rat, Tiger, Ram, Rat, Tiger, Dragon' (3)

He hurriedly memorized them before tucking the scroll back into the secure place and quickly formalized a plan as he made his way to the stairs leading up to the rest of the house.


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Kakashi spent most of the mission sulking and thinking. He let out another moan of frustration and slammed his fist against the wall – which surprisingly enough held.

'Definitely a ninja's house' Kakashi thought to himself absent-mindedly before moaning again. Enough was enough, he was going to make his Iruka understand. It was not his fault and was only a misconception. Just another one of Naruto's pranks gone wrong – on the wrong person. Iruka will definitely see reason – Kakashi was definitely not interested in his student.

Decision made, Kakashi walked to the hallway intent on finding Iruka and fixing the misconception only to freeze as he spotted Naruto making his way upstairs from the basement he was to clean. Normally his blond student wouldn't make him stop dead in his tracks, but after today and seeing that unmistakable grin on his face – no one would fault the man.

Naruto looked up to his sensei and they both blushed slightly. Kakashi with a slight panicked look, pointed to a doorway just down the hall before slowly backing up into the room he just left – eyes never leaving Naruto.

Naruto quirked an eyebrow at his sensei's odd behaviour before turning towards the door his sensei just pointed out, grinning manically. He stopped just inside the door and felt the urge to laugh like a maniac as he saw Sasuke washing dishes at the sink in what he had discovered to be the kitchen. Before he could give in to that urge, someone bumped into him from behind making him fall to the floor.

"Naruto! What are you doing laying about while we are working?" Sakura screeched at the blond as he slowly got up, rubbing his sore backside.

Sasuke turned around at the disturbing noise that was Sakura and raised an eyebrow at the dobe before turning around to finish scrubbing the last saucepan.

Naruto got up and looked at Sakura, an apology on the tip of his tongue.

"Here," she said thrusting the heavy box she was carrying at the blond, causing him to grunt at the unexpected weight of the load,

"You're taller. (5) You put that in the cupboard over there seeing you're doing nothing."

Naruto grunted – all forms of apologies gone – as Sakura turned towards Sasuke cooing and praising the teme and leaving him with the box. He turned towards the cupboard previously specified and nearly groaned when he saw that the only space left was on the top shelf – just a little too far out of his reach.

'Suck it up Naruto my man,' the voice in Naruto's head said to him – in what he disturbingly realised was Kiba's voice, 'You're not going to be Hokage if you baulk at small work like this.'


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"Sasuke-kun, did you want me to finish that pot while you take a break. You deserved it, you didn't have to wash up. Naruto could have done it for you," Sakura cooed sickeningly (6) causing Sasuke to flinch slightly.

Sasuke put the now clean saucepan with the others in the dish rack with hardly a 'Hmm' before turning to see Naruto struggling to put the box on the top shelf. Noticing the blond was going to fall any moment, he went up behind the boy. He reached up and pushed the box into place as Naruto, startled, fell back into his chest.

Sakura spluttered, undecided on whether to kill the blond for taking Sasuke's attention or weep for the lost opportunity that it could have been her with Sasuke's arms around her.

Naruto looked up to see Sasuke's face so close to his that he blushed and looked back down at the floor again. Sasuke grabbed the blond around his shoulders and straightened him slightly away from his chest.

"T-teme," Naruto stuttered still looking at the ground,

"I could have done that myself."

Sasuke snorted and stepped back from the boy who was in his arms just moments ago. He would grudgingly admit he liked the feel of the blond in his arms – they just seemed to fit in all the right places, so alike a jig-saw puzzle.

"Dobe, you were about to fall. Anyone else would have either asked for help or got something to stand on."

Naruto turned towards the stoic boy, his face red with embarrassment and rage.

"I don't need your help teme, I'm going to be Hokage one day. Believe it!" Naruto yelled.

"You're going to need a lot of training then, if you can't even beat me," Sasuke replied, a slight tic appeared under his right eye.

"Training?! I could beat your ass right now teme. I've learnt this new jutsu which is way more supreme than your fireball thingy." (7)

The tic under Sasuke's eye grew – he felt a headache coming on.

Sakura – put out that they were ignoring her – screeched in Sasuke's defence,

"MORON! YOU COULDN'T BEAT SASUKE EVEN WITH THIS SUPPOSED JUTSU!"

"Dobe, you learnt a new jutsu?" Sasuke asked curious as to what jutsu the blond ninja thought worthy enough to learn – and just when he found the time to learn it. He was slightly put out with the idea that his dobe was doing extra training without him.

The blond smirked at the other, both deciding to ignore their female team-mate in favour of their argument. He crossed his arms in front of his chest.

"Yep, and I could beat you with just this one jutsu," Naruto boasted with a grin.

Sasuke weighed the pros and cons before curiosity won out and he motioned for the blond boy to show him. Naruto's grin widened and he got into stance, ignoring Sakura's screeching.

'Rat, Tiger, Dragon, Rat, Tiger, Ram' (8)

A huge white cloud covered both boys and Sakura's scream finally alerted their sensei that whatever mischief Naruto was up to was in affect. The clouds disapperated showing Sasuke's surprised yet unharmed face. A wail brought the two team-mates attention to the ground where Naruto previously stood, their jaws dropping in shock.

It was this surprising sight that Kakshi walked into moments later.


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TBC

I do NOT own Naruto, I hadn't in the first couple of chapters, I don't in this chapter and it is highly unlikely I will in the next lot of chapters.

(1) See a pattern? Lol, beware the sulkiness...

(2) I think it would be amusing for Iruka to be quite messy at home. I find that Naruto, due to having so little as a child, would most probably take good care of his possessions. That and it's a crack up for me thinking about Naruto being all feed-up with Iruka's lack of organization that he would jump at the chance of getting a place on his own. Reminds me of myself – except it was the other way around for me and my mum.

(3) Suko-baachan was the one to give him the catnip for his prank in Chapter 2. She's my original character and will actually play a small role in this fic. She's great, I hope you will come to like her.

(4) I don't know the actual signs so just to save face, I just went ahead with the Chinese Zodiac. Works for me. If anyone knows the proper signs (just the names would be fine) I would be more than happy to edit it in.

(5) Actually, isn't Sakura just slightly taller than Naruto? I originally had this in mind when writing this.

(6) I know it doesn't look right but that is what my spell-check keeps telling me to put in there. If anyone would be so kind to tell me if it's right or not (if it's not I would appreciate knowing what the actual spelling is) I would be greatful and will fix it.

(7) It has a name, I know (actually I can't quite remember the full name – it's on the tip of my tongue) but I think it's funny how Naruto said it.

(8) The actual jutsu is 'Rat, Tiger, Ram, Rat, Tiger, Dragon' but he got the Ram and the Dragon mixed.