Greetings, This is a story for my husband, a teacher like Iruka sensei. Some of his experiences were my inspiration for this story.

I don't own Naruto but I wish I did.

oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo

" Ok class, you're dismissed." announced the sensei with a glance at the clock.

"If anyone has permission slips they didn't hand forward, this is your last chance." He yelled over the noise of chairs scraping and feet running out the door. One more piece of yellow paper fluttered onto his desk as a small girl with black pigtails ran after her classmates.

"Thank you Hanabi." He yelled after her. The exhausted teacher sank wearily down into the desk chair. He stared at the yellow papers sitting on the side of his desk. With the Hyuga girl, every one of the pre Genin students would be going on the field trip tomorrow. He didn't know whether to be pleased that the parents had felt comfortable enough to entrusted the teachers with their precious children or worn-out at the thought of watching thirty students overnight on a camping trip. 'Who thought up this cockamamie idea any way?' he asked himself. 'Oh yea, that would be Me.' was his chagrinned thought.

The brown haired teacher tidied his desk. He walked down the rows straightening chairs and picking up paper, getting ready to leave.

"Iruka Sensei." The teacher looked up to see one of the elementary teachers walk into the room with a note. She handed it to him with a smile.

"The Principal asked me to drop this off to you." "Are you ok? You look a little stressed." She asked with concern. Iruka was fond of Emi- Sama. She was an excellent addition to the school and infinitely patient with the mini-nins in her class.

"Oh, I'm just getting ready to do the overnight trip with the two classes. We've got thirty going this year."

Emi- Sama cringed. I'm so glad we don't do that with our age group. I wouldn't have any hair left."

"I may not by the time we're done." Iruka chuckled. He opened the note as he talked.

"OH CRAP" he moaned loudly. The other teacher jumped and looked at Iruka in astonishment.

"Kusushi- sensei's wife had her baby early. He can't chaperone the overnighter." "Poor woman, of all times for this to happen, Oh shit what am I gonna do?" Emi- Sama watched the sensei talk to himself in some small surprise. Iruka sensei never cursed. The well mannered teacher got loud sometimes but he was a stickler for manners and drummed them into his students too.

"Maybe there are some teachers left in the teacher's lounge that could help. Emi suggested.

"You're brilliant." Iruka beamed at her and quickly ran out the door. The halls were empty and unfortunately, so was the teacher's lounge when he got there. To make it worse, he had to report for duty at the mission's desk in half an hour. 'Crap,' maybe he could find someone from the people in the mission's office. It was worth a try anyway. The Chunin walked back to his classroom to gather up his work, and headed to the Hokage tower.

"Hey Iruka!" he was greeted by Kotetsu as he walked in the office. His partner in crime, Izumo was filing papers and waved at him. He remembered that he had worked for Kotetsu one weekend last month. Maybe he could get them to help him out.

"What's up, Iruka? You look a little stressed." Izumo asked as he joined the other Chunin at the desk.

"Kusushi san can't chaperone the field trip this weekend. His wife had their baby early." "What are you guys doing this weekend? His fellow Chunin looked at him in horror.

"Sorry Iruka, We've got guard duty all this weekend." answered Kotetsu.

"Yea, and for the first time I think I'm glad we do." said Izumo. "Why don't you ask some of the parents to chaperone? Didn't Inuzuka Tsume help you the one year?

"I would, but I don't really have time to contact anyone. Besides, I'm never asking a woman again. You guys were like a dog with a bone with the dating jokes. Izumo kept calling me 'Top Dog'. Kiba wanted to know why you called me that." Izumo chuckled at the memory.

"As for fathers, I'll just call Hyuga Hiashi up and see what he's doing this weekend. I bet he'd be a fun guy on a campout." The teacher grinned, his voice heavy with sarcasm.

"Man, Iruka, I don't know how you put up with those little ankle bitters the way you do." "

"Ah, they're not so bad, replied the teacher distractedly. "How did you end up with guard duty ALL weekend? Don't they rotate that?" "What'd you do to upset Tsunade- Sama this time?" he asked his friends with a smirk.

"What makes you think we upset the Hokage?" asked the shorter man.

"Well…" began the other Chunin simultaneously. They looked at each other sheepishly.

"To tell you the truth, we drank her sake." said Izumo in a rush. Iruka was flabbergasted.

"You did what?!!" he yelled. Several people turned to look at the teacher, and a flush covered his cheeks.

"Well it's like this," said Kotetsu. "She had just made us carry three filing cabinets worth of files up to her office." "You know it was kind of hot there a couple of days ago." "We were really thirsty after wards. There was a bottle of sake sitting on the table beside her desk."

"And there were some glasses there too." added his friend. "It was really good sake, I think it was a gift from the Rain ambassador." "It was really smooth going down."

"Yea, but then she walked back into the room. The Hokage can use some really colorful language when she's upset." Kotetsu assured him.

Iruka had to laugh. Trust him to have friends stupid enough to steal sake from Tsunade.

"You guys should be glad she only gave you guard duty." said a new voice. The Chunin turned to see Genma walk over to join the group. He flicked his senbon with his tongue. "If it was anybody else, she'd be taking body parts." he grinned at his friends.

"Actually, she threatened that" replied the Chunin. They crossed their legs at the remembered words.

More Jounin started entering the office. It was nearing the end of the day and many of the teams were returning and handing in their scrolls. Iruka racked his brains for some candidate to ask. As trained killers, most of the ninja wouldn't be caught dead around the younger children. They had little patience for the often loud and rambunctious mini-nin.

He saw Naruto and Kakashi walk in with Asuma and Kurenai's teams. That gave him an excellent idea. He excused himself to Genma and walked over to the group of Nin. The three Jounin looked up at him. It was unusual for the no nonsense Chunin to leave his post when the room was busy.

"Asuma do you have a minute?" he asked the older man. The group turned to him, causing his face to redden under their scrutiny.

"I have a favor to ask you, are you busy this weekend?" at the teacher's words, Kakashi's ears perked up. Iruka immediately saw his mistake.

"Stop right there, you pervert." He told the silver haired man.

"What?" said the Jounin, trying to sound innocent?

"Yea, "What" says the man who owns every volume of Itchi itchi." He was in full teacher alert immediately. "Don't give me that." He gave the perverted sensei the look that made children quake and grown men wish they were someplace else.

Asuma chuckled at the two. They were like a pit bull and a wildcat when the two friends got started. Asuma actually thought that a pit bull would have more sense than Kakashi did when he was provoking the younger man. Iruka in full sensei mode was a force to be reckoned with.

"What can I help you with, Iruka sensei? Asked Sarutobi san. Iruka brought his mind back to the matter at hand, ignoring the pouting Jounin beside him.

"This weekend is the camp over for the pre Genin. The teacher who was supposed to help me had a family emergency and can't come now. Konohomaru is one of the students. I thought you might like to chaperone and spent the night with him. If I can't find another adult, I'm going to have to cancel. That means a lot of paperwork I'd rather not go through if I didn't have to." The teacher explained a hopeful look on his face.

"Why didn't you ask me?" questioned the copynin. "I helped last time."

"Last time you sat with Tsume and talked about dogs, and then you started reading your porn in front of the kids until Tsume whacked you on the head." said his friend in exasperation. "I need a responsible adult."

Asuma listened to the two men bicker; he looked at Kurenai for approval since he was supposed to spend the weekend with her. At her silent nod he interrupted the argument.

"Alright, sounds like fun. What do I need and when should I be there?" said the Jounin.

"It starts at noon at the Nara's." Iruka nodded at Shikamaru. "They've graciously agreed to host us. We'll be camping by their lake. Shikaku, Chouza, and Inochi usually show up and help until dark." He said, mentioning Ino, Chouji and Shikamaru's parents. "I think they like to laugh at the pre Genin actually."

"Just bring your camping equipment. All the food and supplies are already taken care of. We'll be done at noon on Saturday." Instructed the teacher.

"Ah, that is so awesome, Iruka Sensei." Iruka turned his head to see a mop of blonde hair framing bright blue eyes dancing with excitement. "We had so much fun camping with you. Can we come too?"

"Sorry Naruto, This is for pre Genin only." He ruffled the blonde hair and smiled at his former student. As much as he loved Naruto he was secretly glad that he and Konohomaru would not be at the same campout. His nerves would never take the strain.

Naruto turned to Kiba, "Remember when Akamaru cornered that squirrel and we stuck it in the girl's tent." Iruka remembered. which was exactly why the older boys would not be coming.

"Besides" Iruka reminded Naruto. "You camp with Kakashi sensei all the time. You're coming back from a mission, right?"

"Oh" Naruto moaned. "Don't get me started, Iruka sensei. Wait until you hear what Baka- sensei did this time." The blonde began to rattle off every imagined insult the Jounin had dealt him on his mission.

Iruka turned amused eyes to his silver haired friend. The copy nin loved to provoke the hyperactive ninja just to see what colorful language he would come up with next. Iruka dutifully chastised the man, but it was amusing to get the hyper nin wound up. Brown eyes met one eye turned up in a smile.

"Tell you what, Naruto. Saturday afternoon we'll have Raman. I'm buying."

The figure in the orange jumpsuit latched onto Iruka, hopping up and down in excitement. Over the top of the spiky hair, Iruka felt dark eyes watching them. Iruka turned a small smile to the raven haired Uchiha. "Would you like to join us, Sasuke? We can always use company on our Ramen excursions." offered the kind hearted man.

"Yea teme, come with us." said the blonde excitedly. "Iruka sensei will believe me if you tell him too." "No thank you, Iruka sensei" was the quiet reply. Iruka supposed that was something. He usually got the 'patented Uchiha Glare.' At least a polite 'thank you' was an improvement.

Kakashi watched Iruka excuse himself and head back to the mission's desk. His team got in line to hand in their scrolls and he listened with idle curiosity as the boys of the three teams talked. He saw Naruto and Kiba talking excitedly to Chouji and Shino. Something about the attitude of the first two put the man on alert. He wouldn't put it past them to pull some pranks on the campers. He and his dogs might just have to show up at the campout too.

His mind at ease, Iruka finished his shift at the mission's desk and prepared to head home. Izumo and Kotetsu gave him some last minute grief about his fieldtrip for the next day.

"Look at it this way guys," Iruka smirked. "You'll be up all night on guard duty, but I'll be up all night with s'mores." "Chocolate covers a multitude of sins, gentlemen." They exchanged laughs as they exited the building for the night.

Iruka went to bed early that night. He treated this like the highest ranked mission. After all, when he left his bed the next morning it would be 36 stressful hours before he would see it again. Early in his teaching career he had tried to sleep on these trips, but had come to realize that that was impossible. It just depleted his strength to constantly be getting up and down. Beside, setting next to his sleeping students under the stars was one of the few precious moments of a trip like this.

They were so angelic when they were asleep, even Konohomaru.

oOo oOo oOo oOo oOo

A/n I don't think the little rug rats are as innocent as Iruka seems to think.

Review and tell me what you think. Chouza and Shikamaru were making dessert over the fire.