A/N: Hey everyone. I'm here with a new story that Ive been writing then rewriting then scraping and writing again. After almost six months of many rough drafts, I finally have a first chapter I love. And I'm sorry for the lack of updates, I've had such terrible writer's block, have been a bit overly stressed, and have had absolutely no inspiration for months. Eventually I will get out another chapter of Male Gender but I have no idea when and I deeply apologize for that. So, without further ado, onto the story.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or the characters, however I do own the plot and ideas.

Chapter One

The concept of 'squad' was simple; there was the squad leader then three others who had to work together seamlessly to get the mission done. You put aside any and all differences, settled any disputes immediately, and had to stay calm, especially as the leader. Now there were also the three-man teams, led by a jounin who was two ranks above them and much more experienced. After graduation from the ninja academy, students were put into three-man units, expected to be trained efficiently and hoping that they eventually became chunin.

The jounin was basically responsible for their genin teams until they ranked up, and even then most teams still kept close bonds and worked together often. Being a genin squad leader was stressful, with three pre-teen's lives in your care to protect and train to become good enough ninjas to not die on missions when their backs were turned. However, while sometimes being rewarding, it was also a lot of work and responsibility that some simply couldn't handle. And the death of any of them was hard enough that some genin squad leaders quit, the guilt consuming them whole.

"Team Eight will be led by Yuhi, Kurenai," the Third Hokage said, nodding towards the woman who bowed her head in respect, her red eyes glinting.

"Team Ten will be led by Sarutobi, Asuma," the Third's son nodded with a slight bow as well, his cigarette in his mouth moving as he quirked a confident smile.

"And lastly, Team Seven will be led by Haruno, Sakura," the pinkette stared at him in surprise, but nodded minutely anyway. She had wondered why she was called to this meeting.

"Alright, that's all of the teams this year. Everyone is dismissed,"

The jounins in the room nodded and turned, leaving quickly to go to their assigned teams. Sakura, however, stayed behind in slight shock. Once the door closed behind the last person, Sakura walked up to the desk that the Hokage sat behind. He glanced up at her and interlaced his fingers, simply staring at her before nodding, allowing her to speak. She frowned.

"Why would you assign me to lead a team, Hokage-sama? I haven't been in active duty for four years; I've been working in the hospital. I don't think I'm qualified to teach a genin team,"

The Hokage smiled, "You are qualified, Sakura. More than qualified actually. Working in the hospital has eased your terrors significantly. I think you can handle a team,"

Sakura pursed her lips but had to nod. She bit back all the doubts on her tongue and felt hundreds of words die in her throat. As a shinobi, she couldn't question a direct order from the Hokage unless it posed serious danger to her team, the village, or herself. This order wasn't one she could disobey, no matter how much she wanted to. Even though she hardly felt as if she could properly mold a genin team into reliable ninja without scarring them in some way.

Sakura herself was taught by one of the legendary Sannin, Tsunade, a person who was hot headed by nature and fueled that fury into her fighting spirit, though mostly her fists. Her training had been ruthless and it definitely left scars on Sakura, both mentally and physically. However, after Sakura was a competent medic-nin, she was able to heal the scars away with little issues. Sakura knew that her training wasn't any less ruthless, so she feared accidentally killing another genin.

They nodded to each other before Sakura left, frowning to herself once the door was closed behind her. She hadn't been in active duty for four years, and she hadn't tried her hand again at being a genin squad leader since the fifth team failed nearly five and a half years ago. She shook her head as she transported herself to the academy halls, wanting a moment to think to herself before facing the next generation of troubled souls.

As she walked the halls to the classroom where her new team was, she reminisced in the past. As an Academy student she was so shy and awkward, having a crush on the boy who rivaled her intelligence, but he married amongst his own clan and had a son named Shikamaru, who apparently was just as smart and lazy as his father. She never found anyone after that besides one of her close friends and old Anbu captain, Kakashi, actually. He was always late whenever he could be and was a genius in his own right. Plus, he really didn't seem the type to settle down, so she poured her heart and soul into her own work, like he did with his Anbu work. They were still friends and that's all that mattered to her.

After those two, her heart had never opened up to anyone else. She was a bit of a hopeless romantic and believed one had a certain person to be with for eternity. She was lucky enough to meet two who interested her, and so she settled with the content that her first love was happily married while the other was content whenever they met up, even if they didn't love her like she loved them. Goodness knows she was still head-over-heels for both of them, no matter how much she tried not to be. Though fortunately now she was able to hide that fact.

Sakura smiled to herself as she neared the classroom where three chakra signatures were, the only ones left in the building. She glanced at a clock on the wall as she passed it… she was late, not something she liked doing. Sighing in exasperation, she finally made it to the door. She noticed the chalkboard eraser and the powder still on it, stuck in the slightly opened doorway. Her eyes narrowed, but she kept her composure and emptied her expression. Sakura opened the door, letting the eraser fall right in front of her and land in front of her feet, covering her ninja boots in chalk dust.

She stepped over the eraser and looked at the three genin who stared at her. One was a blonde with blue eyes who was unknowingly the Fourth Hokage's son, Naruto. Naruto, the Nine-Tail's host that everyone feared or hated because he held the beast that had once rampaged, killing hundreds, wounding thousands, and demolishing buildings with a single swipe of his claws. She hummed at him then turned her gaze towards the other two who looked oddly similar. They could be mistaken for being related if she hadn't know better.

One was the last Uchiha kid, Sasuke. He was a newly orphaned kid with nothing left, cold-hearted supposedly, though she knew he wasn't entirely, just trying to act it more than anything, and the second best of his class. The other was the boy saved from the Root organization just a few months ago. He was the top of the class, very talented and very skilled, though he was emotionally stunted, due entirely to being in Root. They both had silky black hair cut semi-short, though Sasuke's naturally stuck up in the back and Sai's hair hung down as if gravity didn't want his hair to defy it in any way.

She nearly snorted at the trio, but then her thoughts caught up to her and she realized that they were unstable kids… the whole lot of them to one degree or another. Not that others weren't, but these three more so than any of their classmates. Why in the hell had the Hokage given her this team? Not to mention she had been their doctor for quite a few years now. Sasuke and Naruto nearly their entire lives: Naruto because other medics refused to admit him in the hospital in the first place, and Sasuke because Itachi had wanted her to be his family's go-to doctor after he'd witnessed her save their entire squad once on a mission gone horribly wrong. Sai had been put in her care almost as soon as he was saved from Root and was ready to start therapy for his emotional and mental state. They all needed a lot of work still and she'd been their personal medic/therapist for at least three months.

Her demeanor softened as their eyes all widened, having not expected her to be their new sensei. It was as they all walked up to her with familiarity loosening their aloof facades that she realized just what the Lord Hokage had been thinking. She was the person they all trusted; with the lot of them lacking emotional stability, a family, and basic knowledge on how to be good people, it meant she was going to have to help them with all three. She would be their teacher, their family, their doctor, and their pillar of support and trust. Her heart warmed at the very thought.

"You're going to be our new sensei?!" Naruto bellowed, his voice pitching higher in his adolescent disbelief.

Sakura nodded, "Yep. As of right now, instead of calling me Dr. Haruno, you all must call me Sensei,"

"Sensei sounds weird," Sai mused, eyebrows ever so slightly furrowed.

Sakura chuckled, "You'll get used to it. Follow me please, today will be for introductions,"

Sai looked completely puzzled, "But we already know you and each other,"

Sasuke rolled his eyes as he stuffed his hands in his pockets, "It's what everyone does the first day,"

Naruto huffed, annoyed as the three of them followed the pinkette out of the school and leisurely through the streets of Konoha, "I don't see the point. We already know each other and I thought you didn't like being the same as everyone else,"

Sakura's eyes widened slightly in surprise, "You actually are agreeing on something. That's new,"

To that Sasuke snorted, "Not when it just makes sense,"

Sakura refrained from rolling her eyes too and instead led them towards her usual training ground near the village wall. While it wasn't too large, the training ground was secluded and an open field that allowed her monstrous strength to shine without doing damage to the village. There were a few shallow craters where her earth style hadn't quite completely erased the damage done, but it had been enough so that nobody else complained. Not that many did considering she was the head of the hospital and a shinobi to be feared. Her sensei's name had paved the beginning of her path for her, but she had worked hard for her own reputation to equal then outshine her sensei's. Every moment of sweating tears and blood was worth it.

"Alright, sit down. For standard procedure you'll all tell me your names. After that I want you to tell me your greatest strength, greatest weakness, likes, dislikes, and plan for the future. I'll start," she said as she sat down in front of them, "My name is Sakura Haruno. My greatest strength is my ability to stay level headed in most situations. My greatest weakness would have to be that I tend to be hot headed and sometimes can't control my anger which ruins my ability to think clearly. I like helping people, I dislike people who hurt people out of spite, and my plan for the future is to help you three become extraordinary shinobi,"

Naruto sniffled, dramatically wiping a tear away at her last statement before his hand shot into the air, nearly decapitating Sasuke in the process, "Me next, me next, me next!"

Sasuke grunted as he jerked backwards, caught off guard by Naruto's hand flying up so quickly after he was almost literally crying, "Dobe! Watch where you're waving your hand!"

Naruto ignored him making Sasuke glare heatedly at him while Sai's lips twitched into a painful looking smile. Sakura shook her head.

"Go ahead, but be more careful of other's space,"

"Alright, alright," Naruto grumbled half-heartedly, "My name is Naruto Uzumaki! Dattebayo! My greatest strength is running for a long time,"

"Stamina," Sakura supplied.

"Yeah! My greatest weakness is controlling my catra,"

Sakura pressed the back of her hand to her lips in amusement, "Chakra,"

"Whatever!" Naruto quickly recovered, "I really like instant ramen, but what I like even more is the ramen from Ichiraku that Iruka treats me to sometimes! What I dislike is the three minutes after pouring the hot water in the instant ramen. And my plan for the future is to surpass the Hokage! I want to become the Hokage, that way everybody in the village will acknowledge my existence! Then they'll have to acknowledge that I'm somebody, somebody important. Believe it!"

Sakura smiled warmly, "I believe it, Naruto. I believe it. Sasuke, you're up,"

Sasuke sighed drearily, "My name is Sasuke Uchiha. I hate a lot of things and I don't particularly like anything. My greatest strength is ninjutsu. My greatest weakness is taijutsu. What I have is not a mere plan because I will make it a reality; I'm going to restore my clan and kill a certain someone,"

Sakura huffed out a breath of annoyance, "You Uchiha and your legendary Curse Of Hatred... Killing him is fine, but restoring your clan? How are you going to do that? You're only twelve for goodness sakes, I don't even think you know what that even means yet," she mumbled.

Sasuke glowered at her with a slight blush, "I know,"

Her brows raised, "Oh really now? Well good luck with that. Sai, you're next,"

Sai gave Sasuke an odd look before opening his mouth to speak, "My name is Sai. My greatest strength is ninjutsu, greatest weakness is genjutsu… I like to draw and paint. I dislike how hard it is to read people. My plan for the future, well, I don't have one,"

Sakura nodded, expecting it, "That's okay. You can figure it out as you go along. Alright, now that we've introduced ourselves, tomorrow meet me back here at seven in the morning sharp. Understand?"

They nodded.

"Bring standard weapons and prepare to fight with everything you've got. I will be testing you all to see if you are ready to become actual genin individually. Depending on how you do will determine if you all stay on this team or if you all fail. If one of you fails you all go back to the academy. After I decide if you become my new team, then we will work on team training and at the end of the day I will set up a training schedule for both teamwork and individual work. But for now, go home, eat well, rest well, and prepare yourselves for tomorrow,"

"Believe it!" Naruto yelled, pumping his fist in the air.

Sakura waved her hand as she stood, "Dismissed,"

The three boys stood up and made their way out of the training grounds. Once they were gone Sakura sighed wearily. They were going to be her new team, she could already tell. It would take awhile for them to get the concept of teamwork, but she had a feeling she could get it to stick. Right there she decided to change her usual test that she used to give. This time she would use a Kakashi tactic and already it had her smiling. Green eyes sparkling, Sakura departed to the market to buy a single bell, making her way back to the field to map out her plan. Since she wouldn't be able to set up her plan until tomorrow at six in the morning, she would map out the layout one last time for good measure. With a grin, the new sensei departed to the hospital to get in one more shift before she marked off her shifts indefinitely to train her future genin.