Chapter Text
Most people in Konoha knew Iruka, it was hard not to when he seemed to be everywhere, be it shaping the young shinobi minds with the will of fire, putting in his places to jounins who tried to play rank on him even though he had way more experience than them, helping to gossip women in the files room assort the millions of scrolls and trying to keep up with the established system, planning new classes, helping the least illuminated ones in his class reach the goals they had to fulfill for class, giving advice to new or aspiring teachers (even ones from other villages), being the Hokage´s spoiled child (more than his own kids), working on a new seal, or just spending what little free he had with Naruto, in Ichiraku Ramen.
Because that was another thing, most people thought that he had just gotten closer to nature after the Mizuki incident, but what only certain close friends (and a noisy-Silver haired stalker) knew was that it went wayyy before that, sure when he was a kid, he had hated the nine tails Jinchuriki as everyone else in the village, but there was a little event that changes all that.
It was about a year after the Kyubii had destroyed Konoha, the funds of the village were scarce thanks to so many shinobis being killed in the event, and those who were alive were ran to the bone in back-to-back missions to try to keep the village's income, so that lead to the academy to not have any shinobi as teachers, giving priority to the advanced students so they could go to the chunin exams and become get higher rank missions that could help with the villages economy.
The thing was that Iruka was one of the unlucky ones who wasn´t grace with a teacher, of course, he still had classes a few times a week with whatever teacher was available but most of the learning had to be done by themselves, and honestly, they time was mostly spent helping with fixing over the village. If you add a rebellious, new orphan, with next to no income, a lot of free time, and a need to be noticed by someone it was simply a recipe for disaster.
Keeping that in mind, it was easy to guess that Kid-Iruka spent his “free” time either making dumb things to try to impress other kids, pranking people in the village, or his recent favorite pranking the anbus. He still did useful things like learning everything he could about seals, but he did that mostly so he could use them in his pranks.
It was one of those lazy, he had classes where they learned nothing because he the sensei, had just come from missions so he was battered and almost falling sleep. After that he joined Kotetsu and Izumo in helping build another building close to the school. It was nearly 6:00 pm when he ended at 7:00 in his apartment he was having a little recap of his previous pranks and noticed that the only building that he hadn’t pranked was the orphanage.
It was a revelation to him, sure he hadn’t spent enough time there, just a month after the Kyubii but it was enough time to learn to hate it, it was always crowded, full of crying kids, and the adults in charge weren’t particularly caring much less for traumatized orphans.
So, he took it upon his hands to make justice for all the poor orphans (and why not? make them laugh a bit) so he took his best paint, glue, feathers, farts, and dancing seals, put his shoes on, and step into action.
When he got to the orphanage, he couldn’t avoid being disappointed, sure he was only 11 years old but even he could appreciate the art that was that structure. Big, spacious, divided into areas that could be enjoyed by kids of several ages if only they were well used.
But oh well, nothing to do about it.
So, he jumped into action, first, he disabled the protection seals, which wasn’t hard considering that were super basic ones, which didn’t make sense, knowing this building was housing the Jinchuriki which was considered a weapon it should be better guarded.
Then he got into the building through a window and started planting seals it was actually a pretty easy plan, he placed fart seals into the seats he knew were only going to be occupied by the care-takers and directors, then located their rooms and placed paint seals in their bathrooms, glue, and feather seals in their doors, and for the last touch, he added a weird talk and sneeze seal in their clothes.
Pretty pleased with his work, he was about to go out and find a good tree where he could wait and enjoy the show in the morning, but a distant crying and whimpering called his attention, at first he didn’t make much of it. I mean it´s an orphanage of course is going to have babies.
He was about to jump out of another window, but the crying persisted it should have been attended by now by one of the caretakers I mean they weren’t supposed to leave babies crying.
But that road of thinking also took him to realize that if the caretaker woke up the commotion would probably wake everyone else, and the prank wouldn´t be as satisfying as in the morning. So he better fixed the little inconvenience, I mean how hard it can be?
So he followed his curiosity and reached a room. It was nothing close to what a nursery should be, it was more like a small room away from the others and which just had a small bed like the ones kids slept in and a small nightstand with some diapers and bottles in the top.
The baby couldn´t have more that 6-7 months, he had blond frail looking hair, sun-kissed skin that looked gloomy thanks to the sweat, and a red face that was starting to look purple. He wasn’t even in a crib just surrounded by some pillows. The baby wasn’t cute by any means, he honestly looked a bit grosed, but he was still a baby so he supposed he was still cute in a way.
The baby then turned his face and that´s where he saw them… three whiskers in each cheek.
He was the Jinchurikii, he was the one that killed his parents and because of he now didn’t have a home, he had to constantly seek a job to try and make ends meet.
But he was still a ninja, I mean he was still in the academy, this was just a baby it could be so easy to just grab a kunai and get revenge, he felt his fingers twitch for the kunai he kept in bag.
He knew he wouldn’t be blamed; he could even be considered a hero, and if he did end up in jail, they probably won't give him more than a few months, he didn’t have anything to lose anyway.
He was just raising the hand with the kunai, when he felt it, a little hand grabbing a finger from his other hand, and the baby seemed to hiccup a few times before continue to cry. That´s when he realized.
“What I’m I doing?!”
He dropped the kunai, but when he went to step back and his finger got released from the light grip, the baby seemed to cry louder.
It was a heart-breaking crying, as if he just wasn’t prepared to let go that bit of human contact. He himself has felt and cried like that in the nights following his parents’ deaths, when no one seemed to notice him.
That raised the questions, how long has it been since Naruto was last hugged? Kissed? Since someone played with him or simply the last time, he felt human heat? He was just a baby and the few times was in touch with one they always seemed to be in contact with someone, but with him being hated by the whole village it probably wasn’t the same for Naruto.
If you thought about it he at least got to enjoy his parents and being taken care of as a baby, but Naruto hadn’t even meet his parents since the Yondaime gave his life to seal the Kyubii again.
It was so unfair, he made a step forward again and grabbed the small hand and the baby seemed to calm down a bit, and that´s when he felt it.
"Uhg, what´s that smell?"
Then he looked down and saw what might be the culprit a white-yellow turning diaper. He hadn’t ever changed a diaper before, but he saw one of his mom´s friends do it and it seemed easy.
Why not do it? It might make the baby stop crying, give him some human contact and best of all keep the prank safe.
Also, it seemed that no one else was going to do it, because he had been in this room for at least 30 minutes and no one had shown up yet.
So he took one of the diapers from the nightstand and got closer to the baby, he went to open the diaper and….
That´s when it all went to hell, the smell was awful with a mix of both poop and pee, Iruka had no experience but it looked like he hadn’t been changed in the whole day, the baby´s tights and privates looked red, and irritated among all the waste.
No surprise he was crying, he would cry if it was him, with all that he looked everywhere for something to clean the baby with, and in one of the nightstand drawers he found a little towel so he supposed it´d have to do.
He then got out of the room and looked for a bath to get some water, when found one he looked under the sink and found a little bucket that they used to stop the droplets from falling to the floor from plumbs he grabbed that gave it a little wash and filled it with water, and toke it back to the room with a bit of soap.
Of course, the baby was still in the bed, but all moving and twitching having left the diaper open had made it spread all over the covers, and the baby´s body.
“Ah C´mon!”
“….”
“Ok, Naruto you have to work with me because I have absolutely no idea what to do” The baby just kept crying so Iruka with a sight just carefully lifted him, and took away the diaper, the sheet was stained anyway so he just moved him to a cleaner part and started to clean his parts with the wet little towel, then he spread a bit of soap and finally got him dried with another part of the sheet.
“Look, I know this is gross but I couldn’t find anything else and the main objective right now is to get you cleaned”
The baby just seemed to whimper a bit now, with the cold water having soothed a bit of the rash and his irritated skin.
Just when Iruka, had spread the new diaper to put it on, that´s when the baby decided to pee, and being so close a little bit of bit fell on his face.
…..
That´s when he heard it, the sound that would change his life forever, the baby´s laugh, at first he was so surprised he didn´t pay attention to it, so mad for all his effort just going down the drain.
But when he looked up, and saw that little toothless face, and the little sound of a small laugh coming from an even smaller body, he simply fell In love. He wanted to keep hearing that little sound. With renewed confidence we got the wet towel again, cleaned the pee, and finally closed the new diaper. The baby finally calmed down. That´s when Iruka took him in his arms and the baby just cooed.
"You know, once you´re clean and not crying your lungs out you´re pretty cute"
The baby just cooed happy to be in someone´s arms and being paid attention to.
"Huh, I can´t really stay right now because hell is going to break loose and it would be too easy for them to find out who did it if they saw me here but I´ll come back again tomorrow, ok? And I´ll see if I can get enough to buy you a few things, I don't really know what babies need buy maybe some clothes and new sheets?"
The baby just cooed again, starting to fall asleep while listening to this person´s heartbeats.
Iruka just waited a few more minutes before lowering him to the bed, he slowly took out the soiled sheets and placed some pillows on the baby´s side to make sure he wouldn't fall from the bed, and jumped out of the window.
Following his plan he found a good tree and waited for the chaos to start, being honest it was good seeing all the caretakers and directors running like headless chickens but what truly made his night were the memories of a certain blond blue-eyed baby. He promised himself he would be back tomorrow to visit his new little friend.
Very few people knew this story, and you could say that the rest is history as they say. Iruka started visiting Naruto every night sometimes bringing him stuff and other times just spending time with the baby. He would like to say that he changed from day and became a better person but in reality, it was a cause-effect situation. Since he was really tired from visiting his little friend at night his pranks did diminished but that didn't mean he had better teachers or that he didn't have to work to be able to live.
But time fixes everything as they say, so as the months passed the war beginner to settle a bit so more teachers were available, he finally swallowed his pride and started to share a small apartment with his friends Kotetsu and Izuna so they shared expenses making easier to save a little money, and some things started appearing in Naruto's room he didn't know where they came from and he doubted they came from the people in the orphanage but they were useful and Naruto liked the toys so he let it slip, also the Hokage starting having little meetings with him at least once a month so they mostly just drank tea and talked but sometimes he gave him new scrolls about seals or taught him some of the ones he had created, he never mentioned Naruto but he had a gut that he already knew.
All in all things were starting to look good and Iruka was changing people´s perceptions from the village´s prankster to one of the village´s goody two shoes.