Author's Note: My first one-shot (and attempt at fanfiction, for that matter)! Yay. Dedicated to Ai-chan.

Disclaimer: Naruto and all related characters belong to Masashi Kishimoto. I own nothing, besides the idea.

The Art of Seduction

Hatake Kakashi flipped the pages of Icha Icha Paradise and tried to focus on his reading. I wonder how they're going to react, he mused. That day, he was supposed to meet his two male students at the bridge, Team Seven's usual hangout. He had been delaying the task the whole day, but now he supposed he had postponed their meeting long enough. Sighing, he tucked away his book into his Jounin vest and made his way towards the bridge.

Meanwhile…

"Ah, I wonder where Kakashi-sensei is," Naruto said impatiently, folding his arms behind his head. "He's always late, but this time beats the record…"

The Uchiha just snorted. Naruto was right; they had wasted nearly the whole day waiting there, but he wasn't just about to admit that to his best friend. "Quit complaining, dobe," he said instead, keeping his face blank. "He'll come when he wants to come."

Naruto sighed and went to lay in the grass. "I wonder what Sakura-chan is doing…"

Sasuke frowned; Sakura was probably at the hospital, making use of her time, unlike the pair of them who had been stuck there for the past several hours. Suddenly he had an idea. "Oi, dobe," he called out to the blonde. "Want to spar?"

Naruto jumped up immediately. "Let's go!" he said, excited. "I'll totally kick your ass."

Sasuke snorted and got up to face Naruto. Activating his Sharingan, he got into a defensive stance.

Without waiting for a sign to start, he heard Naruto yell, "KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!" Five copies of Naruto appeared, running towards the Uchiha. Sasuke took out a pair of shuriken and aimed at the doppelgangers, hitting one of them on the head and getting the other on the chest.

He heard swearing and turned just in time to see Naruto charging him with a kunai. He took out a kunai of his own and threw it, missing Naruto by inches.

Unbeknownst to either of them, their sensei watched with a small shake of the head from the trees. Deciding this was a good time to intervene, he jumped out in front of them. Naruto jumped up, startled; the Uchiha just narrowed his eyes and tossed the kunai aside.

"Quite a match you were having there," the Jounin said, scratching the back of his head nervously, and then seeing both of them glare at him, he quickly added, "Sorry kids, I, er, got caught up with some work—"

"Yeah, yeah!" Naruto said impatiently. "Cut the crap, sensei, and tell us what you called us here for!"

The teacher observed the two with a small smile; Sasuke glared at him and waited, while Naruto crossed his arms and frowned. "WELL?"

"Well," Kakashi said with an amused smirk on his face. "We've finally reached this point in our course. I thought that both of you were finally old enough for me to teach you a very special technique that will be useful in missions."

Naruto, with his usual eagerness to learn, immediately jumped up, all his irritation with his mentor forgotten. "A new technique? DATTEBAYO! Let's get started! I hope it's something cool—"

Sasuke let out a snort. "Shut up, dobe, you haven't even listened to what he's said yet."

Kakashi observed the two with amusement. Shaking his head, he decided to buy more time before he revealed their lesson of the day. "Well, before we start, I'm going to let you two take a guess at what we're going to be attempting today." He sat down and crossed his legs, and motioned for them to do the same.

"Genjutsu?" Sasuke said hopefully. Kakashi shook his head.

"Well I don't know why you won't just spit it out, sensei," Naruto said with gritted teeth. "We've wasted enough time already!"

The Jounin just shook his head in disbelief, amazed at the boy's impatience. "Alright, alright."

"Today…" the seconds ticked by like hours, both males waiting in anticipation, "I will be teaching you the art of…seduction."

There was a silence, both too stunned to speak. Naruto was the first one to recover. "NANDATTEBAYO! SEDUCTION? Sensei, this has to be some kind of sick joke—you've been spending too much time with Jiraiya again, haven't you?"

Kakashi raised a hand to silence him. "No, Naruto, I'm serious. All Jounin go through this course at one point or another, and both of you have come of age—"

"And why would I want to seduce my victims," Sasuke spoke up suddenly, his tone full of disgust at the word, "When I could just kill them?"

"Well, Sasuke," their sensei raised his eyebrows, "Sometimes the enemy just won't be that easy to defeat. And sometimes, you'll need to extract information from females, and the best way to get them to comply is by using their emotional nature against them."

The Uchiha rolled his eyes. "So what do you plan on teaching us, exactly?"

Their mentor smirked. This was where the interesting part began.

"That's enough for today, Sakura," Tsunade intervened, sensing the girl's fatigue. "You've done more than double your shift, you can go home and rest now."

"Just a little longer," the rosette pleaded. "I'll be fine, I've still got plenty of chakra left for the next hour or so."

The Hokage sighed at her stubbornness. "No, Sakura," she scolded. "You're just exhausting yourself and it'll take days to recover your chakra level to its full potential if you continue so. I'd probably have to replace you with someone else for the rest of the week if you keep exerting yourself."

She hated lying, but really, the girl was so damn hardheaded that it was hard to get her to listen. Tsunade didn't understand why she didn't take better care of herself; she looked dead on her feet, always trying to do more than she could manage.

Sakura frowned, but stopped her work. "Alright, shishou, if you say so."

She didn't want to take a week off. The girl was too devoted to her job.

The blonde patted her head. "Good girl."

"…Pay attention, Naruto," Kakashi said. "I said, the first step to charming a girl is to act confident."

Naruto snorted. "Sasuke's always acting tough, but I don't see him with a girlfriend!"

Sasuke rolled his eyes. "That's because I'm not interested in any of them, dobe."

"Whatever, teme. We all know you like Sakura-chan," the blonde teased, sticking his tongue out.

Sasuke froze. "What the hell did you just say, dobe? I don't see Sakura that way…"

Naruto cut him off before he could finish. "You're just afraid that she's not in love with you anymore!"

The raven-haired male just sighed, shaking his head; what was the point of arguing with him anyway? To himself, he admitted he did wonder if she still had feelings for him, but that didn't matter; it was only for curiosity's sake, right? It wasn't because he was interested in his pink-haired teammate that he wondered, no… He had grown attached to her, that much he knew; she was his friend since their genin years. She was the one who had accepted him back without hesitation after he had betrayed the village and rejected her. He had had to admit that she had changed and grown stronger. Her medical skills had been of use in their missions and she was no longer the helpless kunoichi she once had been. He found that he kind of admired her, but… no.

He wasn't in love with her. Was he? Even he could not truthfully answer that question anymore.

He was snapped out of his thoughts when Kakashi coughed. "Well, looks like your knowledge is going to be put to test. I see a girl coming. Remember: confidence, posture, compliments and showing off…"

"I'm not flirting with girls from the village," Sasuke said quickly. "You first, dobe."

Naruto stood up and chuckled to himself. "Alright! Let's see how this goes …"

Soon the silhouette approaching them was recognizable as Yamanaka Ino. Naruto flushed. "EH! I'm going to have to flirt with her? Aaah, I was hoping it would be Sakura-chan…" He pouted.

Kakashi pushed him forward. "You wouldn't want Sakura breaking your jaw. Now, go. Show me what you have learned." He smirked under his mask.

Ino was making a beeline for them now. Naruto stood up, straight-backed, and approached her. "Hey, hey! Ino… how's it going? You look awfully, um, skinny today."

Sasuke snorted, and she turned towards him, completely ignoring Naruto. "Oh, Sasuke-kun! Where's Sakura?" she asked, her eyes suddenly sparkling with a mischievous glint.

"Still at the hospital," Kakashi said, saving him the trouble of replying.

"Aah, that's too bad," she cooed. "I was hoping we could hang out today…"

"I could walk you there, if you want," Naruto blabbered, sensing Kakashi watching him and not wanting to lose his challenge, "I mean, uh…nevermind."

Ino rolled her eyes. "Well, you boys have fun. Ja ne!"

As soon as Ino was out of earshot, Kakashi chuckled. "Very creative, complimenting a girl on her fitness."

"Well, sensei, I heard girls hate being told they're fat, so…"

Sasuke spoke up. "You sucked ass. She didn't even look your way."

"HEY!" Naruto proclaimed, outraged, "As if you could do better! Let's see you charm a girl, eh teme! You suck at talking to people in general! Like hell you'll win!"

Sasuke hated their sensei to the deepest pits of hell for making him do this, but his pride was at stake, and he couldn't afford that. Reluctantly, he said, "Fine, dobe. Next girl that comes this way is mine."

Naruto whistled. "Oho! You're on!"

They waited half an hour and suddenly Kakashi spoke up, "Someone's coming."

Soon the girl approached close enough for them to recognize. Kakashi pursed his lips. Her pink hair was easily identifiable among the crowd.

Naruto glanced at Sasuke and smirked, still oblivious as to whom she was. "Here she comes, teme!"

Sasuke looked at Kakashi. "No."

Then Naruto saw her approach. "TEME'S GOING TO FLIRT WITH SAKURA-CHAN? NO WAY! SAKURA-CHAN'S MIN—Wait, this is going to be entertaining…"

He cackled evilly. "Well, teme, go do it. You said so! Or are you going to back down on your word?"

Sasuke moaned. What had he done to deserve this?

Sakura approached them, unaware of the sudden tension between the trio and all eyes resting on her. "Hey," she said cheerfully. "What were you guys up to, training again?"

Naruto coughed. "Y-Yeah, Sakura-chan. We gotta become stronger to pass the Jounin exam soon, you know! Hey Sakura-chan, teme wanted to tell you something."

Sasuke turned to glare at Naruto and looked at Kakashi with an expression clearly asking 'Do I have to?' Their sensei just raised his eyebrows.

Sighing, he turned towards her. "Sakura," he said, suddenly feeling very self-conscious.

"Yes, Sasuke?" she waited expectantly. The –kun suffix had been dropped a long time ago.

"I…uh…" he fumbled for the right words to say. Why was his face feeling hot all of a sudden? He reminded himself to beat the hell out of Naruto for forcing him into this.

Said idiot suddenly yelled out "CONFIDENCE, REMEMBER?" and burst into a fit of laughter. Even Kakashi chuckled at Sasuke's apparent lack for words.

She just raised her eyebrows at their outburst and waited expectantly.

Finally, a thought occurred to him and he started smirking.

"Sakura," he said huskily, getting closer and closer to her face.

Naruto gaped at the scene. "That wasn't part of the bet—"

But Sasuke ignored him and pressed his lips to a bewildered Sakura's.

"You're pretty when you blush."

A/N: Cheesy, I know, but oh well… Reviews, anyone?