Dolphin's Five 04

4/19/2008 -- 4552 words

Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam Wing (Bandai, et al.) or Naruto (Kishimoto).

AN: Wow...a year and a half for an update but here it is. This story has been AbeoUmbra approved - blame errors on her -whistles innocently-

'Thoughts'

-'Hand signs'-

Ten minutes later Duo blinked and glanced at Heero.

"Heya Hee-chan--"

"Duo!"

"Doesn't Iruka mean dolphin or something?" Completely unfazed by the death glare directed his way Duo grinned unrepentantly.

"Hn, Umino Iruka is loosely translated to mean 'sea dolphin'. I would suggest leaving him alone, Duo – he is not someone to be taken lightly." Cobalt eyes stare flatly into purple, absolutely no expectation of his advice being heeded present in his gaze.

"Aww…come on Hee-chan--"

"Baka."

"It wouldn't be like he's never heard it before – ACK!"

Turning, the ex-pilots witness a maniacally grinning chunin with his fist wrapped in the end of Duo's braid while said pilot was sprawled at his feet.

"If anyone calls me Dolphin I will happily level them with more Suiton jutsu than the Mizukage knows. Understood?" Iruka yanked the braid and took the resulting yelp as confirmation.

"Good boy."

Gingerly rubbing his scalp Duo pouted before standing. Aiming to distract, Quatre asked for the group, "How did you move so quickly?"

"It's called the Body Flicker technique. You'll learn about it and other jutsu at the Academy."

"Who says we're going to your Academy?" Wufei snapped rudely. He swallowed at the glare leveled at him and hastily adds, "-sensei."

Iruka's veteran Teacher Look left all five ex-pilots feeling like they missed the giant red X on the map. Sighing in disappointment Iruka slowly enunciated his response like one would to a group of slow five year olds. "I am the number one chunin level Academy sensei, hai?" The boys nod. "You are young, unknown, chakra rich children with no schooling, hai?" Annoyed protest but another glare has all five nodding simultaneously. "So, it is safe to assume that the Hokage palns on placing you into the Academy for training in the shinobi arts and, with my luck, you'll be assigned to the first five man cell since the last Shinobi War and I'll be stuck being your instructor when you obtain Genin status." The last part snarled, the chunin abruptly turned and bound toward Konoha, the pilots scrambling after him.

Twenty minutes later and the group finally reached Konohagakure's main gates. Duo whistled softly while Quatre openly gaped. The other three ex-terrorists remain silent until Heero spoke their collective thought, "It's a military base." Iruka stopped and looked back at them.

"It's a Hidden Village, home to Fire Country's shinobi and civilians. Currently the Village Hidden in the Leaves is the highest ranking of the Hidden Vilages, taking more assignments than Mist, Sand, Rock, or Cloud. This is not just a military base, this in the center of Fire's might." The chunin spoke solemnly but his words vibrated with pride. The masked shinobi assigned guard duty straightened up, their own pride in their Village sparked. Exchanging quick words with the guards, Iruka signaled the pilots to follow.

"IRUKA-SENSEI!"

-CRASH-

"Ah, hello Naruto-kun."

"Iruka-sensei! Those weird brats didn't hurt ya did they? Kakashi-sensei went to report to the Hokage. He gave us the rest of today and tomorrow off but be left me on the lookout for ya. Old Man Hokage wants to see ya about them," Naruto jerked his thumb towards the milling pilots. Amazingly, the hyperactive blond had said it all without stopping for air.

"Thank you Naruto-kun. Would you please show them to my house and stay until I get back?"

"If I gotta," Naruto grumbled, crossing his arms. Iruka gave the boys a Look before turning and running toward the tower.

Smirking, Naruto inhaled deeply and shouted after the chunin, "KAKASHI-SENSEI CALLED YOU DOLPHIN!"

A chill ran down the spines of all the Konoha residents. The civialians ran indoors like an invasion was coming while the shinobi swore and Flickered out of the path of the eerily calm chunin who was working his way through a long chain of hand signs for a powerful Suiton jutsu. It looked suspiciously like a high powered Suiton: Water Dragon Jutsu.

Smiling victoriously, Naruto motioned for the five teens to follow him down a side road. Duo grinning wildly, walked beside the snickering blond. "What did that Kakashi guy do to warrant that?" Duo loosely gestured in the direction Iruka went.

Rubbing the back of his head Naruto shrugged. "Kakashi-sensei really did call Iruka-sensei Dolphin but," here Naruto's grin turned predatory, "Iruka-sensei really needs a chance to let off some steam from having to deal with a classroom full of evil little brats six days a week. And really, who better than a lazy, perverted jounin who's chronically late and is generally everythin' Iruka-sensei can't stand in a teacher?"

The group turned right and Naruto casually ducked a thrown tomato without any sign of having noticed. Blinking in confusion the pilots look around at the surrounding people while Quatre ghosted through the surface emotions. Signalling the others silently he quickly signed his findings.

-'Fear. Hate.'-

-'Why?'-

-'Unknown. Too deep.'-

Heero grunted and leveled his strongest death glare at the civilians who all quickly remembered a previous engagement under the hostile glare of the intimidating young man.

"Thanks but ya don't need to do that. We're here."

The pilots snap their attention front and see a quaint little one story house with a small yard surrounding it and a picket fence to separate it from the neighboring properties. Naruto pulled a dolphin key ring from his pocket and swiftly undid the three different locks, shoved the door open, and walked inside. He called back for them to enter.

The boys kicked their shoes off in the entry way and stepped up into the main area. Naruto's glaring orange jacket hung on the rack above his sandals. Catching a glance of sunshine blond through a doorway on the right the boys head in and find Naruto lounging on a worn but well kept and comfy couch. The teens drifted around the room finding various places to sit.

"So, what do you lot wanna talk about? Or are ya just going to sit around and wait for Iruka-sensei to show up? Might take a while, those accident reports take forever to fill out and even longer to file the damn things."

Duo, never one to pass up an opportunity to chat, dived right in. "What's with the fruit earlier?"

"Fruit? Oh, the tomato. Mah, the civilians here are idiots that hold a grudge. Not that I completely blame 'em but you'd've figured they'd learn by now that I ain't the guy responsible." Naruto huffed, crossing his arms in front of his chest defensively.

"What'd ya do to them? Piss in their collective Cheerios for a month?"

"Duo, don't be crude," Quatre scolded the 02 pilot.

"Cheerios? Never mind. But no, nothin' like that. A few pranks here and there and they get their undies in permanent twist. It ain't like they didn't earn it. Honest, I'm dumb but I'm not that dumb. So, what are you guys doin' here? Heck, who are you guys anyways? I'm Naruto Uzumaki, and I'm going to be the next Hokage. Believe it!"

"By Nataku, another Maxwell," Wufei muttered under his breath just loud enough for Heero to hear. Said pilot nodded solemnly, already crafting plans to keep the two boys separated.

"Yo, Duo Maxwell! I run, I hide, but I never tell a lie! That's me in a nutshell."

"Hn, Heero Yuy."

"Chang Wufei."

"I am Quatre Raberba Winner. Pleased to meet you Naruto."

"Trowa Barton."

"Cool, so you gonna tell me why you're here? We kinda got hustled out of there after the Old Man showed up."

Four of the boys turned and mass glared at the braided talker. He, in turn, rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, worried sweat drops beading his forehead. Naruto grinned, internally pitying the new boy, he'd been on the receiving end of those types of glares the vast majority of his life. He had a feeling Duo would be getting more than glares when those boys were alone.

"Well…I might of accidentally messed up a rather, um, high level ninjutsu. I stress the 'accidentally' part. Really, how the hell was I supposed to know that the guys were goin' to come and interrupt me? Geez, figure you guys would've known better than to grab a guy when they're obviously in the middle of something!" Duo snapped the last part out and returned the earlier glare two fold to the others. Naruto was surprised to see all of them avoid eye contact.

"Eh, it couldn't of been that bad. You're still here ain't you? What were you tryin' to do?"

"You ever hear of the Hiraishin no jutsu? It's a type of offensive speed jutsu. Using two special types of seals, one on you and one on where you want to be, you can run so fast between the two points that you become just a blur of light. It was the last thing my sensei left for me to learn, ya know? I'm pretty sure I would of gotten it too but, yeah, we already explained that."

Naruto knew he had heard of the technique, he just couldn't remember where. His face pinched in concentration for a few moments before suddenly lighting up in a brilliant grin and snapping his fingers. "Oh, that was the Yondaime's special technique. Konoha's Yellow Flash. It made him really famous during the last Stone-Leaf war." Naruto nodded his head once in satisfaction. See, he wasn't a complete dobe, no matter what Sas-jerk said.

"So, ya came out of it alive. How exactly did ya wind up in the middle of our trainin' field?"

"How's that phrase go? 'Accident of fortunate events,' or something like that. Instead of killin' us in some random, hideous, extremely painful and gory mess, we just suffered a little…" Duo glanced at the guys.

"Temporal displacement," Trowa supplied.

"Yeah, what he said!" Duo grinned widely, completely at ease with such a huge life altering mistake. Naruto could feel the ill will directed towards Duo and unconsciously admired the ease he threw it off. Then he thought about what Trowa said.

"Eh? What the heck does 'tempermental deplacement' mean?"

"Temporal displacement. It is another way of saying we managed to do the impossible and time travel," Trowa explained.

"…Wow. Even I haven't pulled that one off. Kudos."

Wufei promptly face faulted off the arm chair.

"We have explained our situation Uzumaki, now would you explain about our current location."

"You're Heero, yeah? Call me Naruto, ya won't like it if ya keep callin' me Uzumaki."

Dark blue eyes glared at the threat but he didn't say anything, just gave a curt nod.

"I don't know how much the Old Man would want me to tell ya so I'll just hit the high points. Here is Konohagakure, the Village Hidden in the Leaves or Hidden Leaf Village. We're located inside Fire Country, one of the five great elemental countries. The daimyo takes care of the matters of Fire Country outside Leaf, the Hokage takes care of everythin' inside or related to the Village. That includes war treaties between other Hidden Villages and trade treaties with merchants.

"We're a shinobi village, a military complex but we're also a fully functionin' human settlement. Hidden Leaf can fully function if we're cut off for long enough to re-establish supply routes. Leaf civilians produce food, clothing, and other things like that.

"Leaf produces shinobi with an emphasis on teamwork. We start in cells as brats and we keep workin' in cells unless you become a specialized elite or ya get called to complete certain missions. We accept missions from civilians to governments - Fire, Snow or Wave. The Hokage goes through and chooses which missions Leaf will take and which ones will get chucked, decides the rank, and then lets the mission office hand 'em off at their discretion to the different squads.

"Leaf has some of the most infamous shinobi in the elemental countries, Copy-Cat, Itachi Uchiha, and the Professor are just some. Other than that, all shinobi tend to be well rounded with separate strengths and weaknesses but at least a basic understanding of everything else. Personally, I couldn't do a frickin' genjutsu if my life depended on it."

"That's a lot of information Naruto," Quatre murmured. The others nodded warily. Naruto was a confirmed and loyal ninja of the village. Either he was baiting a trap or there was a catch.

"Pfft, the Old Man won't let ya go. Security breach and all that stuff. Besides, that's all stuff that ya could find in books. That, and Iruka-sensei will make dang sure that that stuff's drilled into your skulls before ya get to anything interestin'."

The pilots gawked at the orange ninja's blunt statement. Quatre caught the eyes of his compatriots and nodded quick confirmation. Naruto was being completely sincere.

Naruto suddenly perked up, snapping his fingers. "Oh yeah. Iruka-sensei's always yellin' at me about being a good host. Ya want tea or somethin' to eat? Iruka-sensei has plenty of food considering how often he willingly feeds me." He sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. Quatre nodded in agreement uttering a soft, 'Thank you'.

Naruto shrugged it off before disappearing through the doorway and towards the kitchen. A moment later sounds erupted from the direction of the kitchen. The boys looked between each other before Wufei decided to speak their collective thoughts, "Either that boy is incredibly stupid or quite a bit smarter than he lets on. Also, that story about the civilians holding grudges from old pranks, he was either lying or only telling a very small part of an extremely large whole."

"The prank story was true but not the whole. Whatever the reason, it terrifies him," the empath stated.

"Either way, we are new here. He has no reason to trust us and we have no reason to pry into his business. Now, what about the information Naruto provided us with?" Trowa interjected to steer the conversation to what he thought was more important.

Duo fiddled with the end of his braid before venturing his thoughts. "We could've done a lot worse. These folks emphasize teamwork so we're unlikely to be separated. Their Hokage obviously has some compassion or we'd be dead instead of being invited into his Village. By Shinigami, they left us with one genin in a chunin's house. We could've done a whole helluvalot worse." The twiddling increased wrapping his braid between his fingers nervously.

"Hn, we could have also done better if you had not been experimenting with an unknown spell from one of the doctors," the scorn from Heero was almost dripping.

Duo glared hotly at Heero. Wufei snorted drawing the attention to him. "There is no point in attacking Maxwell. We are here and that is not going to change so we will do as we were trained – recon and adapt. We keep our eyes open concerning the civilians - if they are willing to attack one of their own for asinine reasons what are they willing to do to a group of foreigners? Finally, Yuy, we have had proof presented before our eyes, whether you like it or not, that these people are capable of wielding some type of supernatural energy. Nataku, Yuy, how do you explain how Maxwell brought us here? Also, the doctors are dead, leave them to whatever hellish plane of existence their souls have been sent to."

Purple eyes blinked, surprised at the vehement and thorough defense from the Chinese man. "Don't get any ideas Maxwell." Never mind, Wufei was only disoriented from the time travelling still.

"Oi! You lot done in there? Tea and food is done." The boys turned and blinked at each other. Did Naruto really just ask that?

"Yes, we're done in here Naruto-san."

Two Narutos entered the living room, one carrying a tea tray and the other a tray of food. Tea Naruto passed around the cups of green tea to everyone while food Naruto set the tray on the center table then dispelled. Duo gawked. "Did you just use a shadow clone for serving food?"

Naruto looked back at the braided boy flustered. 'How did he…,' then Naruto remembered. During their fight earlier Duo had generated kage bushin to help battle against Team 7. Of course the guy would know the energy requirements. Naruto just laughed nervously and nodded quickly.

"Cool, I don't have that much chakra in reserve so I can only use those in battle. It's awesome that you can use 'em outside battle," Duo quickly backpedaled at the genin's nervousness. No point alienating the friendly kid. He quietly sighed in relief at Naruto's genuine grin.

Naruto gracelessly plonked onto his butt with his tea by his knee and a cup of instant ramen in his hand. Conversation lagged afterwards sticking to light subjects until it ended entirely, everyone focusing on the surprisingly well cooked food. No wonder Naruto took so long in the kitchen.

--

Iruka returned a few hours later to a quiet house. He was already tired from a long and futile argument with the Hokage, mentally decapitating the perverted Cyclops, his earlier run in with Gai, and now he returned home to a quiet house. Naruto was supposedly inside with five strange boys and it was quiet. Iruka started forming one handed seals down by his thigh as he eased opened the front door.

"Naruto? I'm back. Are you here?"

The scarred-nin sighed in relief at the blond's loud reply.

"Hey Iruka-sensei! We're in the living room, there's food in the kitchen!"

Iruka slipped off his sandals before heading back to the kitchen. Stepping inside he grinned at the large bowl of gently steaming ramen on the table. Looking around he saw the remanents of a stir-fry and checking the fridge revealed the leftovers. 'Naruto has me pegged,' he thought with a gentle smile.

He grabbed the bowl and chopsticks then wandered to the living room. Wufei had the arm chair while Trowa and Quatre shared the loveseat, Heero sat on the floor with his back in a corner and the braided hellion lounged on the window seat. In a truly impressive display Naruto managed to cover the entire length of the couch with his small 4 foot 10 inch frame. Iruka kicked the back of the couch causing Naruto to grudgingly move to one side so Iruka could sit.

Naruto watched Iruka start inhaling the noodles almost as quickly as he did. "So, how bad was it?" Iruka stopped with the noodles mid-air and raised a brow in inquiry. The blond waved at the bowl of noodles. "I know ya sensei, ya don't inhale your ramen like me unless you've had a bad day. So?" The hovering noodles made their way to Iruka's mouth before he replied.

"I have been given leave from the Academy until further notice."

"What?! You're one of the best senseis in that effin' dump! You've always had one of the highest graduatin' classes and ya manage to regularly pass two or three cells each year! What's the Old Man thinkin'?" Naruto's vehement outburst dragged the gundam boys attention to the conversation.

Sighing , Iruka set down his bowl long enough to pull out his hair tie and relocate his hitai-ite to his upper arm. "Well, I can't teach at the Academy and take on a cell at the same time. As of right now you boys," Iruka looked at the ex-pilots intently, "are unofficially Team Iruka. For your sakes I hope we get along because we are going to be living, training, and working together for far into the foreseeable future."

The teens nodded in acceptance. "Don't ya need to be a jounin to take on a genin cell? And, they ain't even genin yet! How's that supposed to work?"

Iruka sighed and rubbed his temples. "I have been forcibly promoted to tokubetsu jounin and have been drafted for the next jounin exam in four months. Hokage-sama was very…insistent that I pass this time or else he will promote me regardless and I will not enjoy the consequences of forcing that action."

Naruto looked confused. "Don't tokubetsu jounin have to have a specialty?"

Iruka grinned and nodded. Naruto was smarter than it appeared when provided with the right environment. "Water jutsu and one handed seals."

Duo whistled softly. Prompted by the looks from his friends he elaborated. "One handed seals are dead useful but a bitch and a half to learn. If the Kage made him tokubetsu jounin rank based on one handed seals then Iruka's pretty damn good."

"Dang ya were plannin' to flunk so amazingly too. Oh but hey, that means I can teach ya the kage bushin technique!" Naruto's voice rose in his excitement.

Iruka, who had started eating again during Duo's explanation, set the now empty bowl onto the table. He reached over and ruffled the fluffy blond hair, amazed as always at the softness. "You can try Naruto but I don't have large chakra reserves."

Naruto grinned, "That's fine with me. Just think of what your opponent'll think of seein' two of ya sensei? They'll crap their pants in fear." The blond menace started snickering.

"What exactly is there to fear about Umino-san? Although he has proven to us he is well rounded in the basics he has shown no other truly frightening abilities," Wufei asked.

Iruka slapped his hand over Naruto's opening mouth and jerked him into a headlock. Giving a strained smile at the other boys he just shook his head. "I don't think you need to worry about that boys. Suffice to say that I preceeded Naruto and leave it at that." The boys could feel Naruto pouting behind the tokubetsu jounin's hand and looked at the duo warily. They were missing something very important here and the sense of impending doom was not reassuring.

"Now, is that everything for now? Since Naruto appears to have fed everyone I can show you boys to the guest room and let you sort out sleeping arrangements. If necessary one or two of you can sleep in the study. Naruto, are you going to be staying the night or returning to your apartment?"

Naruto looked up at Iruka, "Here if ya don't mind sensei. It's just been one of those days, ya know? I'll crash on the couch if ya don't mind."

Iruka smiled softly. "I wouldn't have offered if I did mind. I'll show the boys to their room then clear the dishes. When do you need to meet with your team tomorrow?"

"I don't. Kakashi-sensei gave us tomorrow off to, 'relax and assimilate information'. He's almost as bad as Shikamaru when it comes to bein' lazy!" Naruto huffed. Kakashi wasn't a great teacher when he was with them but all the days he took off and the regular three hour delay in the mornings did nothing to help. 'I'm amazed we actually lived through Wave, maybe we should start stagin' life an' death situations if we want Kakashi-sensei to teach us anythin'. Oh yeah!'

"Oi! Oi! Iruka-sensei! What did ya wind up doin' to Kakashi-sensei anyways? It looked like ya were windin' up for a Water Dragon earlier."

Before Iruka could divert the conversation he was pinned by six different intense stares. He laughed nervously. 'Damnit, I thought Naruto had forgotten.'

"I met Gai." Simple and to the point. Naruto gawked. "You met Uber Fuzzy Brows on the way?! Aww man…I was hopin' you'd rip Kakashi-sensei a new one. How'd ya get away this time?"

"Water Clone, Henge, and Water Transportation. Plus a discrete Water Shark Barrage," Iruka snickered, "ANBU got called to break up a riot when some of the women and kunoichi started attaking Gai-san for being a 'flashing pervert where the children can see'." The scarred-nin's voice raised to imitate a woman's falsetto causing Duo and Naruto to start laughing uproariously.

Grinning in reply Iruka clapped his hands for attention. "Alright boys, for understandable reasons I'm tired and I'd be amazed if you weren't. Naruto, we'll vacate the living room now, you know where the spare linens are. Heero, Duo, Trowa, Quatre, Wufei follow me to the guest room. I'll bring out the spare futon, you boys can grab the blanket and pillows. Settle in however you want, we'll buy the basic necessities tomorrow. If everything goes according to plan we'll be able to get you more by the end of the week."

Everyone nodded and set about doing as they were told. Naruto crashed on the couch after drawing the curtains closed and the gundam boys followed Iruka to the back of the house where the guest room was located across from the chunin's room. Heero grabbed the extra wide futon from the closet while Duo grabbed the corresponding blanket. The other three boys grabbed the necessary pillows as Iruka ducked into his room for a moment, returning with a stack of sweat pants and under shirts.

"Alright boys, bathroom is the door on the end. You can get a shower if you want or wait until morning, either is fine. If you'll change into these I can start your clothes washing over night so you'll have something clean to wear tomorrow. Unless you want to wear something of mine?"

Duo smiled. "Thanks a bunch for doin' all this Iruka-san," he said gratefully. He could feel the other pilots gawking at his back. Hey, he was fully capable of being polite when circumstances called for it. It was just that the vast majority of the time he ignored it.

"No problem boys. I'll see you in the morning."

Twenty minutes later the house was dark and everyone was asleep. The washing machine ran softly from the laundry closet in the kitchen. Wet dishes were lined up in the drainage rack. Naruto, wearing his spare dolphin nightcap he always left at Iruka's, futily tried to saw petrified wood in his sleep. Thankfully the gundam boys had slept through worse and Iruka was a veteran teacher.

Dancing cups of ramen littered the little Kyuubi container's dreams while the braided menace suffered disturbing images of perverted bushy black caterpillars flashing baby butterflies. Wufei would wake up in the morning with spectacular bruises scattered on his legs from Duo's desperate attempts to escape with his virtue intact.

Sorry for the delay in posting this but the muse suddenly woke up with a vengeance. Leave a review, I listen. Just ask the people over on A Persian's Tale: Scarred for Life. Or Steven Kodaly, he'll vouch for me.

This shouldn't actually annoy me but for some reason this story is special in that it's vagueness drives me mad. I can see into the short range but I have no idea what I want to do with the boys in the long term. Oh well, I know something will come up something. Other than that, I WILL be going back through the other chapters and revising them. I remember starting this story with the idea to try and keep it in the present tense. I know two people on this site that can pull it off successfully and I am NOT one of them. Plus, I'll be able to re-familiarize myself with the story.