Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of it's characters.

PRESENT - Konoha

Kakashi stood in the shower letting the water drip down his body as he leaned against the tiled wall. After twenty minutes his fingers grew pruny and he finally stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel about his waist.

He headed back into the living room of his apartment and saw a figure sitting on the couch, despite his lack of undress he headed further into the living room shaking water droplets from his hair "What do you want, Sasuke?"

The man shifted in his seat his black eyes following his former sensei's movements as the older man passed him and headed towards a dresser drawer and opened it rifling through it for clothing before turning to Sasuke and raising an eyebrow "If you don't want a show I'd suggest you'd turn around."

"Since when have you been of the modest type Kakashi-sensei?" Sasuke queried but turned around anyways "So do you wear that thing even in the shower?" Sasuke called over to him as he pulled on his pants and black undershirt, the Uchiha was talking about the white cloth that he'd wrapped around his face. He didn't usually-he preferred to walk around his apartment without the face mask but he'd sensed another's presence in his apartment even in the shower and had wrapped the cloth around his face. He pulled his black mask over his face and ran the towel that had formerly been around his waist over his hair, drying it as he walked back over to the couch and tossed himself down onto it.

"So now will you tell me what you're doing here? I thought you were on a mission." Kakashi asked as Sasuke turned back around and took a seat in a nearby armchair.

"I just got back early this morning and the idiot put me on guard duty." the idiot being Naruto, Kakashi guessed with confidence. So it seemed the Hokage thought he needed a guard-that or a babysitter to make sure Kakashi didn't do anything reckless. Huh, the older man thought, it seems Hinata and Ino have broken their silence on the true extent of their relationship. That would complicate things.

"So I take it you've heard?"

"Yeah."

"Everything?"

"Yeah." Sasuke was being as monosyllabic as ever. Kakashi shifted in his seat and leaned forwards resting his chin on his hand "So how do you feel about that, Sasuke?" he was feeling dangerous and pissing off Sasuke seemed like a good enough idea. "You and Sakura were a thing for a loong time and then, poof, nothing. And then it seems like your sensei and she have a thing. I would be pissed too." Kakashi watched emotion flicker over the Uchiha's face before it slackened again.

"You're trying to make me angry Kakashi, Naruto was right-you are fucked up over this." The Uchiha leaned forwards until he was level with his former sensei "You should know better than anyone that we tried, Sakura and I. When all that shit went down a few years ago? Afterwards? It was just to two of us and it was great-for a time. But we found that we just couldn't get past the shit we experienced and did to each other when I wasn't entirely sane. You know she would have nightmares about it? Terrifying ones that seemed to continue even when she was awake," Kakashi flinched "I would try to help her but I was a part of these nightmares which made it worse and in the end, we crumbled. You probably remember it too-we couldn't even be in the same room for weeks and slowly it started to get better, you helped her and Ino and Hinata too. I couldn't and I resigned myself to it."

Kakashi looked away from the grown man sitting a crossed from him guiltily, it had been juvenile to try to poke at his weak points it was something his younger self would have done. Was Sakura experiencing this at that moment? Was his past self being rude or even cruel? At what point in time was he-snarky angry at the world seventeen? Or the seventeen year old who was world weary and ready to end it all?

Sasuke's voice brought him back out of his morbid thoughts "So yeah. I'm your watchdog to make sure you're not going to do anything stupid."

"But will you really? Because how I see it if I see a way to save Sakura i'm going to take it and the way I see it is i've got years of experience on you and I can very well take you down."

"Heh," Sasuke chuckled before leaning back in his seat "I wouldn't have it any other way old man."

PAST - Konoha, Secret Safehouse

Sakura

Sakura lay on the tatami floor staring up at the ceiling, it'd been three days since she'd been transported back to the past. She'd spent those days avoiding her surly housemate and trying to find a way to rid herself of the crippling boredom. She'd train outside-but was only allowed into the yard if Kakashi was out there watching her, something he'd pointed out several times just to annoy her.

There were no books, no television or anything of the like. She'd even been taking an inordinate amount of baths because that seemed to be the only thing she could do.

It was early morning and Sakura had been up since dawn-a habit she'd picked up as a medical ninja and she'd been staring at the ceiling for the past hour. She finally sat up to glare at the white haired boy sitting at the table reading a book which she suspected was Icha Icha Paradise but hadn't had the courage to ask. She'd read one of the books once when she was fourteen-having snuck it from Kakashi's apartment without him knowing-and it'd made her blush to no end. It probably wouldn't now that she was older and more… experienced… but she was a little surprised that even a young Kakashi still had the same reading habits.

"So. Are we just going to sit here until someone from the future figures out how to bring me back?" Sakura asked.

"Yep." Kakashi replied not looking at her, annoyance at the kid sparked and she stood.

"Can't we just go into town? I mean the odds of me running into my four year old self are really slim and if there are two eyes looking out the odds are practically none." Sakura moved to the table and sat in front of him, giving him her best puppy dog eyes.

"No." he said turning the page and Sakura glared at him before pouting.

"Please? Can you at least ask Sarutobi-sama? I'm going insane here!" Sakura grabbed his shoulder and shook him, ignoring the shiver that went through her body-she'd known about it having felt it the last time she touched the older Kakashi but she was a little surprised the shock was still there with the younger Kakashi.

The Kakashi in question sighed and closed the book "If I ask will you leave me alone about it?" Sakura nodded vigorously and the boy stood and headed over to the door "Guy will be watching you again." he said and he was gone.

Kakashi

Kakashi left the Hokage's office twenty minutes later a little surprised, the hokage hadn't had any problems with letting Sakura out one to the town for a little while. The old man must be becoming batty, Kakashi thought as he descended the steps to the safehouse. The man's only stipulation was that she be accompanied by Kakashi and a few of his chosen shinobi.

Making his way a crossed the grass to the house he jumped onto the wooden porch and opened the sliding paper door, Sakura was sitting at the table with Guy laughing as the other teen was making ridiculous gestures-obviously in the throes of one of his favorite stories. Kakashi watched her face turn towards his and suddenly her smile was aimed towards his face, it was like being punched in the stomach. She hadn't smiled at him before, usually she would look at him as if she wanted to say something and then she would get a cloudy look on her face and turn away.

Ignoring the feeling in the pit of his stomach he headed further into the room ignoring Guy's greeting "Sarutobi says we can go." he said sitting cross legged a crossed from Sakura.

Sakura, seeming to have remembered where she was, squirmed slightly in her seat "Thank you for asking, when will we be leaving?"

"An hour." he replied gruffly before turning to Guy who was practically jumping up and down in his seat "I assume Sarutobi wants you going too, we're supposed to meet the others who he chose for guard duty or whatever upstairs in the main hall in one hour." with that he stood and went to his room.

Sakura

An hour later they stood in the main hall in the Hokage's compound waiting for the rest of their group to arrive, Sakura ran a sweaty palm on her black pants wondering if the people who would be in their group were people who she knew in the future.

Kakashi and Guy stood in front of her, Guy chattering to her and Kakashi standing silently next to him. Kakashi had changed into a jonin outfit, something that she was more accustomed to seeing than the grey ANBU uniform-she'd nearly teared up at seeing him in it but had been able to hold them back when she realized that he looked different in it. His shoulder's were more slender and he carried himself sharper in them whereas his older self had tended to slacken his shoulders more. Telling herself this made it easier to see the outfit.

"Oi! Kakashi!" a voice from behind Kakashi and Guy called and the two turned. Sakura tried to see over their shoulders but was unable to so she decided to peer around Guy to look at the pair who greeted them. With a little shock Sakura realized that the pair were none other than Kurenai and Asuma, they looked younger-Asuma had a toothpick in his mouth and Kurenai was still just as pretty with a winding braid swung over one shoulder.

"Asuma. Kurenai." Kakashi stated blandly.

"Long time no see," Asuma came up to them and grinned at Kakashi "We hardly ever see you anymore."

"ANBU keeps me busy." Sakura jumped with surprise, they knew Kakashi was ANBU?

Kurenai exchanged a worried look with Asuma "We've missed you." she said carefully.

"Yeah." Kakashi said "Anyways, we've got to head out."

"Who are we guarding? Dad's been so hush hush the past couple of days-it's annoying." Asume groaned.

"Sakura." Kakashi said turning to look at her "Come introduce yourself." Kakashi and Guy split apart giving Kurenai and Asuma a good look at her.

"Hello," she said waving "I'm Sakura."

"Cute!" Asuma exclaimed giving Kakashi a thumbs up before gasping as the sharp elbow of Kurenai was jabbed into his side. Kurenai smiled at her, it was odd feeling realizing that at that moment she was older than one of her old senseis. She and the other girls had idolized Kurenai because she had been beautiful and dangerous.

"So who are you to be guarded so closely by Konoha's Copy Cat Ninja?" Asuma asked, his friendly eyes becoming sharp as he examined Sakura closely.

"An ambassador from another country." Kakashi lied smoothly stepping in front of Sakura.

"Uh-huh." Asuma mused, his voice clearly saying that he didn't believe a word of it-he and Kakashi locked eyes and Sakura could practically grab the tension out of the air and swing it around.

"We should get going." Guy said stepping between the two and breaking the eye contact.

"Yes we should, this should be an easy assignment-plus I've have my eye on a pretty scarf and this is the perfect chance to buy it." Kurenai followed Guy's suit and linked her arm through Sakura's and gave her a friendly wink and the group headed out with Sakura's thoughts trying to take in everything that was happening.

Author's Note:

I was (thankfully) able to sit and write this chapter out all at once. I tend to get distracted super easily so it was a blessing to do so. Anywho I'm moving the plot right a long (ish) and everything should start to pick up at least on the older!Kakashi's end in the next couple of chapters. I have no clue how many chapters this fic will be but hopefully less than twenty. Also, yes I do ship SS & NH they are my OTP's but I do enjoy other ships and I enjoy writing for other ships, it keeps things interesting. Also the only way that I would accept SS not becoming canon would be if they tried and couldn't get over their past issues and ended it rather amicably. Anyways that has nothing to do with the main pairing in this fic but I just wanted to explain it a little bit.

There will be more information on the gang that was prevalent in the past and is causing issues in the future and why they are targeting Kakashi in question.

Anywho,

Please read & review!

-LittleMoonLover-