Flashback--

Training Field 3, 2:13 P.M.

Three young Genin's stood in the middle of the training field, waiting for their Sensei to arrive. One student was annoying the other two by complaining about how late their Sensei was. The other two were trying to ignore their loud obnoxious teammate, but were having a difficult time seeing as he wouldn't shut up.

Suddenly, in the middle of one of the loud Genin's many rants, their Sensei appeared in a cloud of smoke. All three students looked over to where the smoke started to dissipate, surprised at their Sensei's sudden, and late, entrance.

"Yo. Konnichiwa." Their Sensei said to them with one arm raised, waving at them with a big smile on his face. The three students didn't know what to say when they saw him acting as if he wasn't late at all.

At least, the two that weren't loud didn't know how to respond. The other Genin knew exactly how to respond to their Sensei's nonchalant attitude.

"Sensei! Where have you been?! You're almost two hours late!" The loud Genin all but screamed at him. Their Sensei turned to face this loud mouthed ninja and his smile dropped immediately.

"Hm, you must be Naruto, correct?" Their Sensei asked him with a bored expression. The ninja broke out in a wide grin and nodded his head enthusiastically.

"Yep! That's me! You must be our new Sensei then, right?" Naruto asked him, wanting to find out their Sensei's name since he clearly already knew his. Their Sensei nodded his answer.

"Hai, hai. That would be me. You can call me Kakashi." He said, turning to look at the other two students now. "You must be Sasuke." Kakashi said, his gaze falling on the tense and cold hearted Uchiha. Sasuke only grunted his response, not really caring if Kakashi knew it was him or not.

Kakashi's gaze then shifted to the pink-haired beauty that was standing next to him. Her liveliness brightened up the dark aura that was emanating off of Sasuke.

Kakashi couldn't help but stare at her; he was captivated by her beauty. Her long pink locks fell to just the right height, not too far below her shoulders, and not too far above them. Her hair looked incredibly smooth and soft. He was almost tempted to reach out and feel it but he knew that he had to restrain himself.

He knew that it was probably wrong to think of her like he was, but he didn't care about that too much. They were several years apart in age and he was her Sensei, but he was willing to take the risk of getting caught to let her know how he felt about her. He knew that he had only just met her, but he also knew that it was love at first sight, and nothing was going to stand in the way of his feelings for her.

He shook those thoughts from his head and made himself focus on the task at hand: introducing himself to his students and getting to know them. He focused his gaze back on Sakura and a smile broke out on his face.

"And you must be Sakura." Kakashi stated as his smile grew even wider. Not that the three students could see it however, seeing as Kakashi never took off his mask. Sakura nodded her head and smiled back at Kakashi.

"Now that we have all met each other, it's time to get a little more acquainted." Kakashi said, turning to look at all three of his Genin. He had them all gather around the middle training post in the field and then made sure they were listening.

"We're going to do a little training exercise where you three have to grab these two bells from me. You will only have a certain amount of time to do it, and the person who doesn't get a bell has to go without lunch. Understand?" They all nodded their head in agreement and then scattered off into the forest to hide.

Several hours later, Naruto was the only one without a bell so he was forced to go without lunch. He was tied to the middle training post until lunchtime was over. After training had finished, Kakashi decided to give them one more piece of advice.

"All three of you worked very hard today. But the one thing that you all need to work on more is teamwork. You each worked wonderfully by yourselves but if you don't have good teamwork, you will never be able to complete any mission. By this time next week, I expect you to work together a lot more. Understand?" Kakashi told them. The three students all nodded and then were dismissed to go home and rest.

They won't remember a thing I told them, Kakashi sighed to himself.

End Flashback

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Four Years Later--

Saturday, Training Field 3, 4:35 P.M.

"Kaka-sensei! Kakashi-sensei!!" One student yelled to their teacher with obvious impatience, they had been trying to get his attention for several minutes now.

"Hm? Sorry, what?" Said teacher responded after his students finally stopped saying his name. All three students looked at him in surprise; their teacher had never zoned out on them like that before.

"We asked if our teamwork is any better from before! Pay attention, Kakashi-sensei!" The loud blond student decided to yell. Kakashi couldn't help but smile at his students antics. They had grown on him and he enjoyed their company now. They were fun and unique students to be around.

And one pink haired student had grown on him more than the others. He found himself staring at her more and more each day. He couldn't pull his eyes away from her beautiful face and he didn't really want to either.

Every time he saw her, he always wondered the same thing: Does she feel as I do? He had no more time to think on the subject for his students were becoming increasingly impatient.

"Hm, yes your teamwork is doing better but it can still be improved. Sasuke, you need to get more involved with what your team is doing." Sasuke went to interrupt Kakashi but he just put his hand up, silencing him.

"I know that you may not like working with them, but that doesn't matter. They are your team now and you will start working with them. Get over your petty differences. Understand?" Kakashi looked at him and saw his eyes go wide once Kakashi was done speaking. Sasuke nodded his head in understanding, not expecting Kakashi to have spoke out like that.

Naruto and Sakura stood there staring at Kakashi in surprise as well. Their teacher had never spoken that much at one time, and he had never been that assertive before either. They all thought that Kakashi was more of the silent teacher type and that he didn't have it in him to be assertive like that. Apparently, he did have it in him but he never wanted to show it until now. Kakashi then turned to look at Sakura and Naruto with a hidden smile that they couldn't see.

"Now, your teamwork together is perfect. There are a few flaws with it but nothing major that would really affect how you two fight. I want you two to keep working together to improve your teamwork even more." Kakashi told them and they both nodded at the same time. Kakashi then walked back over to the tree he was previously sitting under, and sat back down.

"Now, go and train together for a few more hours and then you may all go home." All three students nodded with a simultaneous 'Hai!' and went back to the center of the training field. Naruto and Sakura decided to train together at first and Kakashi was extremely happy about that.

Kakashi couldn't help but watch Sakura as she was moving around training with Naruto. Her body moved in a way that none before it have. Kakashi had seen many girls move their body before, but none even come close to how Sakura's was moving on the field.

Her body was twisting and turning in fluid motions that made it look like she was born for it. Her movements flowed together perfectly and she never missed a beat. Her skin started to shine with a thin line of sweat and Kakashi almost forgot to breathe as Sakura faced him after dodging one of Naruto's attacks.

Sakura's shirt had fallen open a little more than usual and a drop of sweat was rolling down her skin and into her cleavage. Kakashi's visible eye followed that one drop until it disappeared from his view. Kakashi took a deep breath and gulped as he quickly looked away and back down to his Icha Icha novel, feeling as though he needed a cold shower. Sakura didn't seem to notice her Sensei staring and continued to train with Naruto, turning her back to Kakashi.

Kakashi stood up and put his favourite book away in his back pocket as he walked over to his students. Naruto and Sakura didn't notice him walk up and kept training until they finally turned to the side and saw Kakashi standing there.

"What's wrong, Kakashi-sensei? Did we do good?" Sakura asked him. He closed his one visible eye as the memory of that one bead of sweat replayed in his mind, and he nodded to her.

"Hai. You two did very good. Training is done for today. You all worked really hard today so I'm giving you a few days off from training. We'll meet here in about a week. I have a mission I have to attend to during that time so you guys may train on your own if you wish." Kakashi told the three of them. He saw Naruto's face drop in disappointment but knew that that was to be expected. Naruto hated not training but at least he could train on his own until Kakashi got back.

"What kind of mission is it, Sensei?" His favourite pink-haired student asked him with honest curiosity.

"It's an A rank mission. Way to dangerous for you little kiddies." Kakashi said with a light chuckle. He saw all three of his students faces slowly get angry, which only made him smile more. Naruto, of course, was the first one to react to this remark.

"We're not 'little kiddies'! We're all 16 now so we're not young!" Naruto said almost yelling. He seemed to get a little too enthusiastic. Kakashi chuckled to himself again.

"I was only kidding, Naruto. But this mission is very dangerous. That is why I am the only one going. Well, me and several other Jounin as well. We will be back within a week though, so don't worry. Now, go on home and rest. No more questions." Kakashi told them, and they all nodded and left soon after. Kakashi stayed back in the training field for a little while to think about what had happened this afternoon.

Was Sakura leading me on earlier? Did she turn to face me on purpose or was it just a coincidence? Did she not notice that I was storing straight at her? How could she not notice? So many questions were floating around in Kakashi's head, none of which he could come up with an answer for. Kakashi went over and sat down underneath the same tree he was under earlier, and leaned his head back against the trunk, trying to sort out everything that was going on in his head.

No matter how much he thought about it, he still couldn't come up with an answer. Kakashi knew that something like this shouldn't be bothering him as much as it was, but he couldn't help but think about it. His mind was constantly filled with thought of his pink-haired student and he couldn't comprehend as to why. He had a feeling about why he was thinking about her, but he tried to believe that that wasn't the reason.

He knew if he developed feelings for her that were that deep, then he would be in big trouble for several reasons. One, relationships are not allowed between students and teachers. Two, the Hokage would have him stripped of his status and he would never be allowed to see Sakura again. Three, he doubted Sakura would even feel the same but after today, he was starting to rethink that. Four, it was just plain stupid to think that his own student would have those kinds of feelings for him, no matter if he had them for her or not. And five, he shouldn't even be having these kinds of feelings for his own student, let alone for someone who is several years younger than him.

Kakashi was already seen as a pervert because he is always reading his Icha Icha novels. He didn't need to be seen as more of a pervert because he was having feelings for someone who is 14 years younger than him. He knew that the whole village would banish him if he tried to act upon his feelings for Sakura. Kakashi knew that yet he still had the urge to tell Sakura how he felt to see if she felt the same way.

Why am I letting this get me so worked up? I need to stop thinking about this or else I'll end up doing something that I'll regret, Kakashi thought to himself as he stood up from under the tree. He had much more important things to worry about than this. Like his mission that he was supposed to be getting ready for. Kakashi shook these thoughts from his head one more time before leaving the training field and heading back to his house to pack up the necessary tools for his mission.

Kakashi walked into his house and immediately started to pack up several different ninja tools. He grabbed a handful of kunai, shuriken and food pills and put them into his bag. He also grabbed several summoning scrolls in case he would need his eight trustful ninja hounds. Kakashi sighed to himself as his pink-haired student once again occupied his thoughts.

Kakashi pushed the image of her face out of his mind and the left his house, heading for the front gates to meet the rest of the Jounin. As Kakashi got closer to the gates, he noticed that there were a lot more Jounin than he thought were going. He knew that Sarutobi Asuma, Yuuhi Kurenai, Shiranui Genma, Shizune, Maito Gai, and Hyuuga Neji were going. But he didn't realize that Nara Shikaku, Akimichi Chouza, Aburame Shibi, Yamanaka Inoichi were all going along with them, as well as several other Jounin that he didn't know too well.

Kakashi didn't think that this mission was actually going to be that dangerous but he saw that almost all of the Jounin in the village were going so it had to be pretty difficult. The only information Kakashi knew about this mission was that everyone was to track a missing nin from Kirigakure. No one, not even the Hokage, knew what this ninjas abilities were. No one knew a thing about him and yet, almost two dozen Jounin were being sent out to find and capture him.

Everyone had better be on their toes for this mission, Kakashi thought to himself as he arrived at the gates. Asuma, Gai and Genma all turned to look at him as he walked up and they all smiled.

"Yo." Asuma said, with a wave of his hand.

"Yo, Kakashi." Genma said, mimicking Asuma.

"Are you ready, Kakashi-san?! This is our first mission together in several years!!" Maito Gai yelled with a little too much enthusiasm. Kakashi could only wince in response to his cheerfulness.

"As always, your very enthusiastic about this aren't you?" Kakashi asked and Gai only nodded with a wide grin on his face as he decided to do 100 push-ups before they left for their mission. Kakashi sighed and shook his head at his best friend/rivals antics. Asuma and Genma decided to ignore Gai and walked over to Kakashi.

"So, are you ready? I hear this mission is going to be more dangerous than we thought." Asuma said.

"Hai, I'm always up for a challenge. We still don't know anything about our opponent, do we?" Kakashi asked them.

"Nope. No one knows anything. Everyone who gets close to this missing nin ends up dead or badly injured, to the point where they bleed out and die. No one has been able to bring back any information on him yet. So we have to be extremely careful around him." Genma explained to the both of them.

"Alright, is everybody ready?" Someone shouted above the noise of the curious Jounin's. Everyone immediately quieted down and turned to look at who was speaking, to see none other than Shizune.

"We're going to head out in just a few minutes. First, we have to set up the teams so that everyone knows what their part is in this mission." Shizune told them. After several minutes of sorting out who was going to be with who, everyone was prepared to go. Kakashi luckily got paired with Neji, Shizune and Genma on Team C. Team C's job was to swoop in and attack the missing ninja while the other teams distracted him. Kakashi and the rest of his team were going to be the last ones leaving the village, while the other teams tracked down the missing ninja and started to distract him.

As the other five teams left the village, bounding into the trees in front of him, Kakashi had two questions go through his mind.

Will I come out of this mission alive? Will I be able to see Sakura's face again?

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A/N:: Please review and let me know if you liked it so far or not! The mission that Kakashi is going on will be explained even more in the next chapter. I just touched on it a little bit in this one!