Ramen Maker 5000
Author: Hoshiki
Disclaimer: These characters belong to Kishimoto-sensei ©. The fanfiction belongs to me.
Warning: Yaoi; don't like, don't embarrass yourself by making off-key, off-handed remarks. Seriously. Flips page of Icha-Icha Paradise over
Fandom: Naruto (manga-verse)
Pairing: Kakashi x Iruka, Naruto x Sasuke
Summary: A good teacher is skilled in every way – physically, mentally, and also gastronomically. Kakashi and Iruka embark on a challenge to make the perfect bowl of ramen.
Note: Once again, pointless humor. However this isn't as horrific or funny as what I had in store for them all. Looks like even I'm capable of going soft.
"YOU'RE LATE!"
"I was walking along the path as usual when suddenly a giant snake fell from a tree and I had to fight it to save an old lady who was nearby…"
"LIAR!"
Kakashi scratched the back of his head, his one visible eye crinkling up as he smiled lazily behind his mask. "Well, that doesn't matter. You'll still get your training, right?"
Sakura and Naruto opened their mouths in unison before they were interrupted.
"Right!" Kakashi effectively answered for them at his own question. "We'll be headed to a new clearing where we'll be developing your chakra and your dodging skills. Don't be slow, now."
"You're the one who's always slow!" Naruto grumbled.
"Being fashionably late for something isn't the same as being slow," Kakashi corrected him. The blond and pink duo raised an eyebrow each.
"Oh? What's this about being fashionably late now?"
"I don't know. I overheard Gai-sensei mention that that was what I was, so I guess I'd just use that as an excuse now," he grinned. "Isn't that great?"
"Uh, whatever," Sakura muttered, a little disoriented by Kakashi's half-veiled lie-truth… whatever it was. It confused them, and threw them off-track, but nonetheless it worked, and Kakashi found himself mentally congratulating himself.
The practice was relaxed that day. Kakashi had drawn a line in front of a large tree and made the three gather pebbles and stones. When they were back with them, he placed them all by his feet and motioned to Sakura to stand behind the line, about two meters away from him.
"As I mentioned before, we'll be training you on your chakra. You need, once again, to control the flow of it to your feet to enable this time, speed. I'll be hurling these pebbles, stones and jagged rocks at you and you'll have to dodge them."
"AT THIS RANGE?"
"Only the weak speak loudly," Kakashi reminded the two. "And Sakura, since you're the best at performing with chakra, I'd chosen you to show the others how it's done. That's why you're the first."
Sakura flushed; delighted at the praise she was given.
"Right, now focus the chakra to your feet. Nod when you're ready."
After a short while Sakura nodded, and the intensive training began. Her control of chakra was perfect, and she wasn't easily distracted by Kakashi's sometimes embarrassing or off-handed remarks to make her lose her cool; therefore Sakura underwent about two hours of stone-pelting totally unscratched.
Sasuke lost his cool and got three hits – one on his right arm, two on his shin.
Then came Naruto's turn. He performed alright at the first leg of it, but he was distracted when Kakashi began to whistle; and most of all, Kakashi seemed to really enjoy chucking stones in the general direction of his head. In fact, the silver-haired Jounin had directed five shots in a row at his head. Naruto fumed and shouted at his mentor. "Stupid pervert sensei! Why're you chucking stones at my head! You didn't do that to the two of them!"
"Not my fault you're short," Kakashi shrugged.
"WHAT?"
"Never mind," Kakashi waved him off. He chucked another stone at the blond, who yelped and dived to his left as the thing whizzed past.
"Bastard!"
Kakashi suddenly froze, staring up at the tree. "Look out… snake."
"LIAR!" Naruto glared at him.
A few moments passed with Kakashi still staring fixedly.
The silence was deafening.
Naruto turned his head slowly to look behind him when…
WHOOMP!
A large rock hit him at the back of his head. "NNNGGUUUUAAAAHGH!"
"Gotcha!" Kakashi chortled with glee. "Never trust the words of your enemy, concerned as they may seem."
Naruto took no notice, rolling around on the grass while clutching his head. From the corner of his eye he saw Sasuke's lips twitch into a beginning of a smile and his face went red. "YOU BASTARD PERVERT!"
"Class dismissed!" Kakashi disappeared into thin air.
When things had calmed down a little, Sakura grinned at Naruto. "Stupid idiot… why'd you fall for Kakashi-sensei's trick like that? He's a no good liar!"
"But he's a damned good actor," Naruto said, still rubbing at the gigantic bruise on his head. "That twisted bastard. Why the hell does he get a rise at torturing us like this?"
"The eraser was your idea, Naruto," Sakura shook her head. "Maybe he's just getting back at you. Anyway, I'll be leaving now… hey, Sasuke-kun, wanna get a bite?"
"Hn," came the dark-haired youth's polite declination.
Defeated, Sakura started on her way back towards her home. They'd been training since six that morning till two, including the time wasted on their pointless wait for their laid-back pervert of a teacher to turn up. When she was out of sight, Sasuke turned to Naruto.
"Dunce," he chided, but his tone wasn't as cold as he usually sounded. "Does it hurt?"
"OF COURSE IT DOES!" Naruto snarled. He still felt the sting of humiliation at the pit of his stomach. Sasuke has smiled at his plight! That little Uchiha bastard!
Sasuke signed. "How can I help?"
Naruto froze, wide-eyed. Was Sasuke offering… help?
"If you don't want my help, fine," Sasuke muttered angrily at seeing Naruto's shocked look, his face flushing slightly. He knew he was usually cold and unresponsive, even to the stage of unkindness, but wasn't he the one who readily accepted those needles on his neck for Naruto during their first mission together? Why didn't he understand? That he could be kind, but it was just a bit hard for him to express it differently?
As he continued angsting silently, the blond sat up to gaze at his dark-haired friend. "Hey, Sasuke."
"What is it?"
"If you wanna help, buy me a bowl of ramen."
The Ichiraku was crowded that afternoon.
It was the annual Ramen festival, also the main reason why Kakashi had dismissed his students to early. Usually he'd continue torturing them mindlessly in their lessons between missions, but today called for an early dismissal. For he, Hatake Kakashi, was about to take part in the annual ramen-making contest, and hopefully declare himself Champion Ramen-Maker after his humiliating defeat by Maito Gai… well, actually he didn't give a damn, but Gai had kept mentioning that teachers should be good in many aspects, including that of culinary skills, Kakashi just couldn't back down from that challenge.
Besides, he found it interesting.
A new contestant had appeared. Iruka-sensei of the Konoha Ninja Academy was going to compete. Last year said teacher hadn't turned up because he had lost track of time grading papers, but this time he wouldn't be missing it for the world, apparently because he'd "promised Naruto-kun that I'd make him some really good ramen for a week if I won, and he kept reminding me so I couldn't forget it."
After checking out his new competition… or more namely, his new competitor's behind, Kakashi sauntered into the ring casually, hand in pocket and porn book in the other. Some of his supporters gave a cheer at the runner up of last year's competition. You see, Kakashi had been the coolest ramen-maker there was. His Karrei no Ramen took the cake at exotic fare, while Maito Gai's simplistic, healthy skill made the ramen green and tasty; he called it Spinach Deluxe no Ramen. As that year some old health-freaks had been crowned as judges, Gai had won, but by only a narrow one point.
Stupid old woman bitch judge. Just because Kakashi had ducked to save himself from the hideous heart-shaped Chu-kiss she had blew towards him, she'd given him a zero point at the last leg, thus causing him to fail at attaining ramen-making glory.
But this time it was different. The judges were randomly chosen, and Naruto, professional ramen-consumer of the village was chosen as an honored guest and judge taster who'd be giving comments on the taste to influence the other judges in their decision. Kakashi knew that no matter how badly or how evilly he had tortured the blond, Naruto would always be faithful to his taste buds and never take sides; he was the ultimate professional judge there.
Basically, he had two people to impress with his new skills. Iruka-sensei, and the problem student #1 loudmouth, Naruto.
Shouldn't be too hard. Kakashi was confident of himself. He wasn't that worried about Gai, because he knew that Naruto hated vegetables and healthy food in general.
Later, though, he found out that there was another competitor. It was Sasuke. Nuts! Sasuke would be able to check out his competition with his Sharingan and create better Jutsus to counter his moves; that boy was a genius. He was also an orphan and a bachelor so his cooking skills would dramatically have increased throughout the years. Sasuke was rarely seen eating out, and therefore Kakashi came to the conclusion that he must have been practicing over a stove for years.
But he was more surprised over anything else as to why Sasuke had decided to take part in such a public event as this, in full view of his stalkers who were, by the by, going to be stalking him more now that he's about to show everyone that he could cook.
"Why'd you join?" Kakashi asked, his one eye taking on a curious look.
"I… uh…" Sasuke went red in his face. "It's none of your business."
"I see." And he had left it at that.
It was three o'clock. The competition was about to begin. Hayate made his way up the stage to give the opening speech and to introduce the competitors one by one.
"Umm… good afternoon everyone. (Cough) Today is the Ramen Festival of Konoha, and we see (cough, cough) that everyone in the village is present this year. There are also some from other villages (cough) who'd, umm, decided to join in the excitement."
He went on to introduce Gai, who was "(cough) Champion of last year's event, the mighty (cough, cough, hack) Beautiful Energetic Green Beast Ramen-Maker," whereby Gai flashed his blinding smile at everyone, striking his Nice-Guy pose and saying words of encouragement to others. "I'm not talented," he had roared, "but hard work made all the ramen I made absolutely delicious – hard work could make even the taste bud-less cook a professional one!"
Then came Kakashi, the runner-up, who "amazed us all with his (cough, cough) Jutsus and exotic ramen styles. We all remember his (cough) great Karrei no Ramen who took our breaths away," in which during the sampling Hayate had miraculously stopped coughing for ten minutes, much to everyone's wonder. Kakashi winked lazily at the audience, causing a cheer to erupt from mostly the Genin batch, saying how cool Kakashi-sensei was.
When it came to Iruka's turn to be introduced, the whole bunch of schoolchildren who had turned up yelled "GOOD LUCK SENSEI" on top of their lungs. Even Konohamaru and his bratty gang had turned up with flags and banners with stick drawings of what represented Iruka-sensei… a stick drawing of a person with a ponytail more or less hit the mark with accuracy.
"Oh, is that you, Iruka?" the Hokage laughed. "Konohamaru, why isn't Iruka-sensei wearing any clothes?"
"H…Hokage-sama!"
Naruto decided to save his favorite teacher from his plight. "Everyone bathes naked in an onsen! In fact I've seen Iruka-sensei naked millions of times!"
Iruka fought the urge to instinctively hide himself in a hole somewhere.
"He's really cool when he's naked! Stop laughing at him already! He's not skinny! In fact he's really big!"
Iruka pulled his green flak jacket over his whole face to hide his embarrassment, his ponytail the only thing visible on his head.
When the laughter didn't die down, Hayate wisely coughed loudly and introduced Sasuke to the crowd. Iruka forgotten, to his relief, the girls began to scream and squeal and jump around hugging one another, creating a din. Sasuke, however, was feeling miffed as he glared at his fans. Naruto's praising Iruka didn't help one bit. He didn't like the fact that Naruto had seen Iruka-sensei naked and made a good comment while ignoring him when the two of them had bathed together before. Sasuke's cold look bore holes into the puzzled ex-teacher's head. But hah! Naruto had accidentally kissed Sasuke before! It was Iruka one Sasuke two, counting the time Naruto tried to kill Haku for "killing" him.
Life was good.
That thought ghosted a small satisfied smile on Sasuke's lips, and the girls went wild once more.
"Umm… so we should (cough) begin now…"
The preliminaries were boring as the main four wasted their weaker opponents at the instant ramen rounds. Things only got heated up at the dramatic fight between Gai and his legendary rival, Hatake Kakashi, Copy-nin and Exotic Ramen Master of the Konoha, and the rivalry between the still-puzzled-at-his-ex-student's-coldness Iruka and the dark-haired boy who made surprisingly good ramen. Now, it was the battle of the Jutsus. Of the four, only two would compete in the last leg and snatch the honorary title of Champion Ramen Maker.
The round began with Gai vs. Kakashi.
"Haiyah! Salad Cutting no Jutsu!" Gai was making a new dish, called Exquisite Garden Salad Ramen, the dish that would ultimately combine the fine, fresh tastes of garden cheer with the contemporary soft suppleness of freshly boiled green spinach ramen. As he used his Jutsu, the tomatoes, lettuce and carrots that were in the air moments ago fell arranged neatly on top of the bowl of steaming ramen. Gai banged his fist into a pot of soup which came flying out and splashing over the contents of the bowl before him, heating up the vegetables evenly and soaking into the healthy green ramen.
Kakashi was just as spectacular in his Tomuyamukun no Ramen making skills. Roasting the chili paste on a pan with his right hand and performing Fillet no Jutsu to fillet the fish, Shell no Jutsu to remove the shrimp's shell with the other, both using a flow of chakra and at one go; the threw the paste over his head and it fell neatly into the soup that was boiling. Dealing with the squid with the Clean Cut, a Taijutsu technique, it jumped off his knife and into the soup with the chili paste, fish and shrimp, fish sauce and random other exotic ingredients. The heat searing the solid ingredients to a just-nice cooked condition, Kakashi, kicked the strainer into the pot and fished it out with the ramen strain in the other pot, and both sides fell into the bowl – ramen first, then the soup, then the ingredients lined neatly by the sides. He quickly garnished it with sliced red chilies and set the chopsticks by the side.
Needless to say, thanks to Naruto's screwing up his nose at the veggies, Kakashi won Gai at a big margin.
Round two then started, with the Chuunin teacher making something simple and delicious, his homemade Niku no Ramen. There were no frills involved, just simple and deft cooking with speed Jutsus, with love and hard work poured into it. Although Naruto had tasted it on many occasions, he could never get enough of that ramen. The judges too, were in favor of it.
Sasuke's dish was also surprisingly good. But what made it more stunning was the fact that Sasuke called it Heartbreak no Ramen, a ramen that held so much pain of heartbreak that it would make the tester cry. The secret was cut onions left uncooked by the sides for garnishing, that it stung eyes and made them cry. The taste wasn't too bad either. His Jutsus had also amazed them. But Iruka had been declared the winner of the two by a very small margin of two points, because the chakra that Sasuke had used lingered on for a moment in the ramen and had seized at one of the weaker judges' throat, causing him to gag.
The final round came, and everyone held their breaths. This was it.
Kakashi's presentation came very well. He had put on a puff hat at the beginning of the tournament, smiling, as he dragged a big oven into view. Everyone had stared at him. Using his Copy-nin powers, Kakashi had swiftly sliced the mushrooms, olives, pineapples, and tomatoes with Gai's Salad Cutting no Jutsu and chopped at the meat with another hand. Leaving the ramen to boil in a pot of water with a bit of salt for one minute, he began to knead and shape dough into a round disk. Frying tomato sauce, puree, chopped garlic and the sliced vegetables and meat, he spread the sauce round into the disk and lastly the drained ramen over it all and kicked the large tray that was containing it into the oven, slamming it shut. Then, Kakashi sat down to read Icha-Icha Paradise while waiting for his dish to be ready. The oven gave a "ding!" and Kakashi whisked it out. There it was, the ingenious Pizza no Ramen.
Not to be defeated, Iruka had a new surprise for them all. He started to make batter out of stiff smashed potato, and with extreme heat chakra fried them in shapes of small heart shaped bowls. At the other side, ramen was being cooked in a delicious-smelling herbal soup. As soon as the little potato bowls were golden brown he took them out of the oil, drained them as he did the same for the ramen with his other hand. Piling the little bowls into a basket sitting on a tray, he arrayed the steaming ramen over them and sprinkled it with chopped pieces of meat and leek. The four bowls looked a little like a four-leaved clover. By each bowl around the basket the placed small bowls of his soup, and finally stopped as the last pair of chopsticks were placed. There it was, Four-Leaved Clover of Konoha no Ramen. Sasuke stared. No wonder he had lost! Iruka-sensei was a closet genius in culinary Jutsus!
The judges had a hard time deciding on which dish to choose as the winner. In the end Naruto's love for junk food won over, and they declared Pizza no Ramen the winner. Kakashi was crowned Champion Ramen Maker for that year.
His eyes crinkled up in good cheer as he scratched the back of his neck. With his puff hat still on, that looked oddly adorable.
Gai clapped him loudly on the back. "Kakashi! My great rival! You are now able to defeat me! I shall, however, be training super hard next year!" He struck a Nice-Guy pose, flipped his hair to one side and smiled brilliantly at Iruka. "And you, lovely Iruka-sensei! I adore your skills! Let me kiss your hand, and be off!"
Iruka dodged from the green-clad man, causing him to blindly grab at Sasuke's instead and he kissed it with a loud smack of his lips. "I'll be off now! Fare you well, Kakashi, Iruka-sensei, Sasuke-kun!" With that, he vanished into the night, leaving behind him a swirl of leaves.
Sasuke sank to his knees, ashen-faced, his mouth opening and closing wordlessly rather like a goldfish's.
As Iruka had lost, he didn't need to cook for Naruto for a week like he had promised. The schoolteacher had made his way home that night after thanking everyone for his runner-up position, and he ruffled Naruto's hair goodnight.
He was about to go to bed when he heard a loud tap on his window.
Iruka promptly jumped up. He was relieved to see that it was only Kakashi outside and not some attacker. "Kakashi-sensei? How may I help you?"
"Well, you could try something for me," the silver-haired Jounin smiled. "Here, try this."
He shoved a steaming bowl of ramen under Iruka's nose.
"Ah… okay… would you like to come in?" he asked politely.
"Sure," he clambered in and popped himself onto the other's bed casually. Iruka blushed faintly before helping himself to the ramen. It tasted really good… really warm… and he could feel a very affectionate and inviting chakra in the strands of ramen. The decorative full boiled eggs had been cut into heart-shaped slices, and the soup was tinted slightly pink by a little beet.
"This is…?"
"Well, heh. You see, I may have won the title of Champion Ramen Maker, but…" he paused.
"Yes?"
"But what I really wanted was to be declared Champion of Iruka's heart, which I suppose I'll have to work at since things don't come all at once. This is the Rabu no Ramen. It's one of my secret dishes and I hope that I can make this for you every night from now on."
—END—
Sunday, May 29, 2005, 6:16 PM
Hoshi: This wasn't very funny, I planned more or less to amaze with the creative Ramen Making Jutsus, but it didn't work out either. And man, what a corny ending. I wonder how's Naruto and Sasuke's ending, eh?