Prompt Twelve: Maybe Tardiness and Open-Pervertedness isn't so Bad…

Kakashi Hatake. Even in his sixties, he was still living the life of a shinobi. Oh, he'd retired from being Hokage long before this point, but that didn't mean he gave up his shinobi livelihood cold turkey. High-ranking missions and Kakashi Hatake went together like bread and butter; he just couldn't stop.

Except now, well… he kinda could. Kakashi was no Third Hokage by any stretch of the imagination, but even he had his limits. He was well into his sixties. Old age was kicking in. High-ranking missions had lost much of their luster… as much as he was loath to admit it. His body simply couldn't take them with as much frequency or as much vigor. There was no way he was going to take on another Genin Squad; he had more than enough teenage drama/angst for one lifetime – being on Team Minato and then leading Team Seven later on kinda had that effect.

So Kakashi Hatake had been set to retire at long last. After roughly sixty years of service to the village, he was somewhat deserving of it.

And then the Ninth Hokage had to pull a fast one on him…

"Kakashi-senpai, I can understand how you feel, I really do…" Sarada Uchiha innocently remarked with doe eyes. "But I need you to one last itty-bitty mission for me. Then you can have your well-earned retirement."

Kakashi actually eye-smiled at Sarada's sales' pitch. For one, she used the 'senpai' honorific, which is about the most formal he allowed her to be with him. No 'Lord Sixth' or 'Master Kakashi' for him. … Even if the last one was tempting. Two, he could tell Sarada was downplaying the mission. Sarada would never take this tone if he would actually enjoy the mission. Which meant it was something he would really, really hate… but would be ultimately necessary for the betterment of the village.

"Alright, Sarada-chan. But if it's your last attempt at making me take another Genin team, just know I'm gonna fail 'em flat-out." He involuntarily shivered at the Cheshire grin she was now sporting.

"Wonderful! Because it's not that at all! You'll probably think it's much, much worse!" Sarada let a small cackle loose.

And that was when Kakashi knew… his last mission would be Hell.

Kakashi left the Hokage Tower about half an hour later with a defeated air about him. A proverbial storm cloud was hanging over his head. His final mission, no choice in the matter, was be a substitute Instructor at the Academy for the second semester of that year. And Lady Ninth just had to rub salt in the wound by threatening his precious collection of Master Jiraiya's literature if he pulled any of his usual gimmicks. Y'know, showing up several hours late, flashing his Icha Icha book in front of the class… He could have none of that.

Obviously this left Kakashi feeling very, very hollow and morose. Aside from honoring Obito's legacy, those "gimmicks" as Lady Ninth so callously put them, they were how he stood out. Those were how he stood out. Without them, he was just another average Joe of a shinobi… At least that's how Kakashi looked at it.

No, Lady Ninth said he had to be professional about this. Teach and look happy while doing it. But how was he supposed to be happy without his usual brand of Kakashi-ness? Kakashi basically had a whole week to stew in this horrid situation before he had to substitute for the lucky bastard that skewered his leg on a katana on his last mission. A shame that Kakashi couldn't meet with a similar tragic accident, because Sarada-chan said he had to do it regardless of the state he was in.

Kakashi bemoaned his lot in life for about fifteen minutes before stumbling across something that he could work with. Then he was eye-smiling and gleeful again. Tell him to stop being himself, would they? Well, he'd show them…

- Eight days later… -

Sarada Uchiha was bored as she skimmed through the paperwork, cheek leaning into her palm as she flipped a document over. She could see why her predecessor, the Eighth Hokage, was so willing to hand over the title so soon after 'finally' getting it (Konohamaru just had to succeed Naruto). They were still in an unprecedented era of peace. That basically confined Hokage duties to a pencil-pushing desk-monkey job; at least back in Master Naruto and her father's day, there was some action to get away from the Kami-awful paperwork now and again, but Sarada didn't even have that. The closest she got to any 'action' was some merchants and nobles fraying on her last nerves; so even if she did snap, they couldn't fight back and offer her satisfaction.

Sarada wanted something… anything to liven up her day.

"Lady Hokage!" Shizune burst into the room, panting. She was now around the age Tsunade was back when she was Hokage. And she was still. helping. out. Hokages. "It's horrible! The Academy is out of control!"

Despite the circumstances, Sarada brightened right up. She was positively glowing.

"Really?! Is someone trying to go Missing-Nin and holding the kids hostage?!"

"Worse," Shizune shook her head. "The children are all ganging up on Kakashi and trying to kill him."

… And now Sarada had a deadpan expression.

"What." Sarada sighed as she palmed her face. This had better not be about Kakashi's porn, or so help her…

"Come quickly! We need to get the kids back under control!"

"Right, right… What set them off, anyway?"

"… I don't really know, Lady Hokage, I haven't personally been over there yet…"

Kakashi eye-smiled and rubbed his hands together mischievously. He appeared normal on the first day to fool everyone into thinking that he would be playing along with their little game… That he would be 'normal' of all things. Boy, wouldn't they be surprised after today?

"When the whippoorwill whippers in the wind, the wind can whipper back, 'Oh, nice and chubby baby!'" Kakashi hummed gleefully to himself as he walked up to the Academy. So far so good. People were gawking – not just staring. His uniform seemed to be going over very well, if he did say so himself. Even with his trademark mask still in place, albeit painted over for this glorious occasion. Once inside the Academy and in front of his classroom's door, he took a firm hold of the handle, turned it, and threw the door open and mustered a sugary sweet morning greeting. "Good morning, my children!"

Kakashi had to pause as he entered the room, because a really ominous feeling sent goosebumps up and down his back. He didn't know why, though; he was just here to mess with these brats' minds. Nothing personal. The lesson plan would stay on-track.

Kakashi's confidence was disrupted with a single, panicked word.

"CLOWN!" A boy in the back shrieked.

Now, if this was the extent of the reaction to Kakashi's getup, Kakashi would have gotten his costume off, apologized to the clearly terrified boy, and tried to start class. Alas, it was not just the boy. The whole class stood up – the whole class – and started hurling real metal kunai and shuriken at the silver-haired, nearly retired Jonin. Kakashi dodged them all no problem, but his troubles did not stop there. When the initial barrage failed to do anything, the… delightful… children started throwing random stuff. Stuff that Kakashi continued to dodge, mind you, but it was becoming harder to reason the more they kept this up…

A kid got a lucky shot and hit Kakashi square in the face with a bulky textbook. Kakashi stumbled back and forth a little and held up a pointer finger. He was seeing stars.

"I wish books were soft and mushy…"

Okay, so maybe he was still trying to put on a clown act… just a little. What can he say? It was fun annoying the youth. ... He really, really should've known better, though.

"GET 'IM!" A cute and adorable spritely kunoichi-hopeful roared not-so-adorably. The class of twenty nine eight-year-olds took that as their cue to charge and tackle the silver-haired Jonin.

Kakashi effortlessly dodged the attempted dogpile, and he was even smart enough to back out of the room warily. What he should have done, however, was go home via shunshin and change out of his clown getup. Unfortunately, Kakashi was a bit lost with the extreme negative reaction to his clown prank, and he wasn't thinking too clearly. He didn't recognize that his delightful class of little devils had made a call to action, so to speak, as the adjacent classrooms had heard the first exclamation quite clearly, despite the walls being soundproof. This brought on more yells about 'evil clowns', and furthermore brought the whole damn Academy on him.

Well… minus the teachers, who were just as confused as Kakashi. Not even the great Kakashi Hatake could dodge so many youths with their Flying Tackles of Doom. Eventually he was tackled to the ground, and then dragged outside by an impressive number of students, where he was then tied to a post for practicing kunai throws. It didn't take long for Kakashi to realize they had been smart enough to put Chakra Suppressors on him, so he wouldn't be shunshining out of this problematic situation anytime soon.

And wouldn't you know it. The brats weren't using normal Academy kunai. They looked to be fresh kunai from the real forges for Genin and above. The worst part was the papers attached to those kunai… even without a Sharingan eye, Kakashi could tell those were explosive tags. Or as he heard the children chant, "Splody Paper".

"Would it be too late to say I'm… sorry?" Kakashi pleaded with a high pitched voice. He was tied up good, real good. Damned if those brats didn't know how to tie a knot… "Please no booms…"

"Bye-bye, Mister Clown!" The boy from earlier grinned and was the first to throw his Splody Kunai. Kakashi whimpered as the other children followed suit, and the tags were set to detonate.

This was gonna hurt.

"Oh, no! We're too late!" Shizune cried as several explosions could be seen and heard from even out in front of the Academy. When she and Sarada managed to get over to the training posts, it was to see basically the whole student body mumbling and muttering amongst themselves, dissatisfied that their "Splody Paper" was defective or something. Because there, tied to one of the posts, was Kakashi Hatake. Black and singed all over, his clown getup torn in places, and his hair had a tiny ember or two in it. His mask was gone, obviously. So it wasn't a surprise to see him coughing out black smoke. "O-Oh… Th-Thank goodness you're okay…"

"I… would beg to differ…" Kakashi wheezed. Despite the damage done to him, the damn ropes were unaffected. Meaning he was still tied securely to the post… The old Hatake looked up at the Ninth Hokage with pleading eyes. "Please let me retire…"

Sarada seemed to mull it over for a few moments before smirking and shaking her head.

"Nope. I want you to teach in that getup every day this semester. That's what you get for setting off a student body with one of the worst cases of Clownophobia not seen in decades."

Kakashi bawled and beat the back of his head against the post repeatedly. He could already imagine what else these brats might try to kill him with…

Author's Note: If you couldn't tell, this was pretty much inspired by the Animaniacs… Kakashi, you poor sod. These are shinobi-hopefuls, of course they're not gonna be intimidated or scared of normal stuff. Now clowns, that's something to be scared of for cute little Academy cadets…

A clown is my friend. A clown is not a giant spider. A clown will not bite me and throw me in the basement. XD