Title: The Art of Substitution

Author: ninzor

Content Rating: PG

Summary: When Team 7 and Team Gai are instructed to serve as substitute teachers at a non-ninja elementary school, chaos is sure to be ensued.

A/N: This story is entirely a work of fiction that came from my feeble brain.

The Art of Substitution

Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura, Rock Lee, Hyuuga Neji, and Tenten all stood in a stiff row, facing the headmaster of Sunny Green Hill Prep School. Their mission was to be substitute teachers for this school.

"Let's see…" the headmaster, Mr. Bob said, thumbing through some files. "I will now direct you to your classrooms."

The six ninjas nodded, slightly dreading what was to become of them.

"All of you will be teaching 3rd grade children, in case you didn't know."

"We did know," Neji said impatiently.

Ignoring him, the headmaster began reading from a list.

"Uzumaki Naruto. You will be teaching History in Room 1.

Uchiha Sasuke. You will be teaching Science in Room 2.

Haruno Sakura. You will be teaching Language Arts in Room 3.

Hyuuga Neji. You will be teaching Math in Room 4.

Tenten. You will be teaching Art in Room 5.

And…Rock Lee. You will be teaching P.E. in the gym, which is Room 6.

Does everyone understand?"

"Yes, sir!" everyone said, before all walking off to their assigned classrooms.

-----x-----

Naruto walked confidently into Room 1. "I can do anything!" he told himself. "Teaching a bunch of kids can't be all that hard."

As he entered the classroom, he was greeted by a troop of screaming children. They were loud. Very loud. And very monkey-like.

"Settle down, kids!" Naruto said in his best teacher voice. "My name is Mr. Uzumaki. I'm your teacher for the time being. BELIEVE IT!"

A child raised her hand.

"Yes?"

The child fluffed her hair. "Mr. What?" she asked.

"U-ZU-MA-KI." Naruto said loudly. "Yeesh, you really are a bunch of stupid children."

"How do you spell that?"

Naruto looked like he was about to burst. "Never mind!" he said in an annoyed voice. "Just call me Mr. U." He looked around the room. He had no idea where to start. "This is a history class," he told himself. "So I need to teach them about people, right? So I will teach them about the coolest guy who ever lived."

"Listen up, kids!" Naruto yelled. "Today we're going to learn about the coolest guy who ever lived. There will be a test, and if you fail, you get a detention!" He paused to let the children digest this information before continuing.

"Who do you think the coolest guy who ever lived is?"

At once, children started naming random people.

"P. Diddy?"

"No."

"George Washington?"

"No."

"Robert Hooke?"

"No."

"Julia Roberts?"

"No."

"George Clooney?"

"No."

"Tinky Winky?"

"NO!" Naruto yelled. "Today, class, I'm going to teach you all about the coolest guy on earth. His name was Uzumaki Naruto…."

-----x-----

"I hate kids. This is going to be torture," Sasuke thought to himself as he pulled open the door.

"Yo."

"Hello," the children, who were sitting obediently, chimed.

"Um, your teacher isn't here today," Sasuke said. "So, um, today I'll be teaching you. My name is Sasuke – I mean, Mr. Uchiha. OK?" He picked up a piece of chalk and wrote his name on the board in large white letters.

"Okay," the children chimed.

"So, uh, first….let's call roll, okay?" he said, picking up a roster from the front desk.

"Amy?"

"Here."

"Bob?"

"Here."

"Joe?"

"Here."

"Johnny?"

"Here."

"Mary Sue?"

"Here."

"Uh," Sasuke said. "This is pretty tiresome, so let's assume everyone's here, okay?" He quickly checked "present" on the roster for every child.

"So, um, what are you supposed to be learning?" he asked.

A boy raised his hand.

"Um, yeah. You."

"Fire safety, Mr. Uchiha," he said.

"Oh," Sasuke replied. "Um, is that really science?"

"Yes."

"Oh." He thought for a moment. Then quickly performing several hand seals, he then ignited a giant fireball, setting the room on fire.

Promptly, children began screaming.

"Don't panic," Sasuke said, brandishing a fire extinguisher. "Just do what you were taught to do in this situation!"

The fire alarm rang.

Half a second later, the principal burst in, looking furious.

"Oops."

-----x-----

"This might be fun," Sakura said cheerfully, walking to Room 3. As she walked past Room 2, she thought she smelled smoke, but she decided to ignore it and walk on. She opened the door and peered inside. Children were acting quite unruly.

"Settle down, children," Sakura said as kindly as she could. "Please take your seats."

She walked to the front of the classroom. As soon as all of the children sat down, she began to talk.

"I'm Ms. Haruno. I'm the substitute teacher for nows. Any questions?"

"One boy raised his hand."

"Yes?"

"Why is your hair pink?" he asked.

"Oh, uh, my hair?" Sakura said. She really didn't know how to answer this question. "Um, you'll learn about it in science, she said airily, quickly dismissing the topic. "So what are we supposed to start with?"

A chubby girl with blonde pigtails said, "We're supposed to get our new spelling words for the week."

"Oh. Okay," Sakura said with a shrug. "Let's start with that, then." She picked up a stack of lined paper and passed it out. She then picked up the spelling words list. "Please write down the words I tell you."

"What if we spell them wrong?" a boy asked.

"Um, I'll spell the, for you. Are you guys ready?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Number one. Apple. A-P-P-L-E. Number two. Bugle. B-U-G-L-E. Number three. Crap (?) Uh, C-R-A-P. Number four. Diamond. D-I-A-M-O-N-D. Number five. Eggplant. E-G-G-P-L-A-N-T.

She read and spelled out 5 more words, making ten.

"What else to Language Arts teachers do?" she thought. She glanced towards the bookshelf. "Let's read a book and answer some questions about it, alright?" she said. Sakura walked to the bookshelf and took out a book. It was called "To Kill a Mockingbird." It was probably too hard for the kids to read, but Sakura consoled herself, knowing that they could probably learn some vocabulary words.

-----x-----

"Hmph," Neji said to himself, surveying the room of kids. "This is definitely a room full of losers."

"Your teacher isn't here today," Neji announced. "So I will teach you math today. My name is Mr. Hyuuga." He wrote it on the board.

"What to do first?" he thought. "Isn't math like counting and stuff?" he asked himself.

"I need a volunteer. Ah, yes. You over there." He pointed at a porky boy who was chewing gum. "Spit that out," he said.

"And you two," he said, using his Byakugan to see through a desk. "Stop passing notes."

When the fellow waddled up to the front, Neji said, "Watch closely, children. Can you count the pokes?"

He immediately began poking the chubby child at a rapid speed. When he was done, unfortunately, the child had to be sent to the nurse's office.

"Did anyone count it?"

He called on several people.

"1 poke?"

"No."

"100 pokes?"

"No."

"20 pokes?"

"NO."

Neji sighed. "You children are too coarse. No amount of teaching can change that, because it is your fate. And once your fate has been decided, it cannot be changed. Because I, Hyuuga Neji, said so…."

"Oh," he said, realizing he had been rambling again. "Um, anyways. There were 64 pokes. Remember that now."

-----x-----

Tenten peeked into Room 5, slightly afraid of the oncoming task. Much to her surprise, most of the children were sitting down.

"Good afternoon, kids." She said hopefully. She kicked herself when she realized it was still morning.

"Um…..well….just cal me Teacher, okay?" she said a little sheepishly.

"So, what do you guys do?" She called on a boy named Hubert-Henry.

"First we have free drawing time for 10 minutes," he said. "Then, the teacher gives us a special assignment."

"Okay. Then it's free drawing time, I guess." Tenten said. "I'll tell you when ten minutes is up. She set a timer for ten minutes.

"What should I assign them?" she thought to herself. After a long time of thinking, the idea struck her just as the timer rang, startling her.

"Um, free drawing time is now over,' she announced. "Let's go around the room and share what we drew, okay? We'll start with….you." She pointed at a random kid. Children promptly started stating what their pictures were of.

"A bunny."

"A liger."

"A flower."

"A rainbow."

"A car."

"A pencil."

"My mommy."

"An airplane."

"An apple."

"You, teacher!"

"Um, very nice," Tenten said after everyone had shared. "Now, let's get on with the day's activity, shall we? Today, you will earn the concept of shading and drawing geometric angles."

She dumped several weapons onto the front desk, including a couple of shuriken, some kunai, a knife, a sickle, and a sledge hammer.

"Draw these as realistically as you can, okay?" she said.

"Teacher, we're not allowed to have weapons at school."

"Never mind the rules," Tenten said irritably. "Today is different." She sighed. It was going to be a long day.

-----x-----

Lee skipped into the gym, to be greeted by children sitting on gym mats. "Hi!" he said. "My name is Rock Lee, Konoha's beautiful green beast!" He then began striking some strange poses, which wierded his students out. "You can call me Mr. Lee," he said cheerfully. "Oh, you children are all bursting with the power of youth," he gushed in delight. "Now! There's not a second to waste! We must make as much of our youthfulness as we can!"

The children stared at him like he was some spandex-wearing freak. Which he was, in a certain way.

"300 push-ups, everyone!" Lee yelled, blowing a shiny silver tin whistle.

"1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2! 1, 2!" he cried, doing the push-ups with his students. He was done in about a minute, but his students were still in their 10's and 20's.

"What? I'm already done!" Lee said. "Well, anyways, let's forget that and do something else."

There was a long sigh of relief. "100 laps around the training ground!"

There was a long wail of despair and a "What training grounds?"

"Gym, training grounds, whatever," Lee said, dismissing it with a wave of his hand. "Ready? Okay! Start!" He began blowing his whistle again.

"Faster!"

"With more enthusiasm!"

"Put all your youthfulness into it!"

He cheered his students on proudly as they suffered a long and back-breaking P.E. class.

-----x-----

Soon, the recess bell rang. The talk of the playground mainly consisted of how weird the new substitutes from Konoha were. –TO BE CONTINUED-