Then the door to the shop opened and one of Akio-san's assistants allowed the first lot to enter. The numbers of those allowed in at one time were limited; since they were special guests they wouldn't have to wait too much longer to get in.

Hinata could tell, as she made her rounds serving cups of tea that Akio-san's latest work was going to be a huge success; everyone admired the light weight of the weapons and the added flexibility and speed that they would allow in battle.

Thankfully Akio-san had begun to relax and now the three girls did their best to make sure all those little details went as smoothly as possible. Hinata had the greatest skill in brewing tea so she was preparing a fresh pot when she heard another group entering the store; soon after, Tenten ran into the back room sparkling in excitement; "Hinata! You would not believe who is out there! Hatake-san, one of the greatest shinobi in the whole kingdom! Look!"

Sakura had come out with some clean teacups and joined the two peeking around the doorway. Browsing together was a pale man with silver hair, a darker skinned man, and a young man with black hair.

The three got a good look, but not being terribly familiar with the court they didn't know who they were, besides Hatake Kakashi of course.

Tenten whispered to the girls, "I've seen him before but never this close, the man is a legend!"

Sakura whispered back, "which one is he?"

"The one with the silver hair, I wonder who the others are though?" Tenten was desperately fighting the urge to ask the man for his autograph.

"Well then, why don't you go out and see if your sensei can introduce you to him, it looks like he is going to talk to him." Hinata said as she poured some fresh tea and prepared to go back into the shop.

Tenten, usually so brave, was surprisingly timid in this case, so Sakura grabbed her arm and led her out towards her sensei. They all knew that Tenten would only beat herself up later if she missed such a golden opportunity.

Gathered together the three girls approached the group, Sakura holding onto Tenten and Hinata following with her tray of tea.

Sasuke managed to tear his eyes away from the weapons around him long enough to wonder what the hell had happened to Naruto when he spotted a group of three girls approaching them.

His eyes unconsciously focused on a pink haired young woman with pale skin and jade green eyes. She was lovely to say the least, but what truly attracted him was the gentle humor in her eyes.

As they drew closer Akio-san took notice of them and quickly introduced the brown haired girl as his apprentice. It was rather unusual for a weapons smith to take a girl as his apprentice so they all gave her special notice.

Tenten gave a rare blush as she was suddenly subject to intense scrutiny by the men, but mainly she focused on Kakashi-san. She almost missed her sensei telling them that she could give a demonstration of the new weapons if they liked.

Kakashi-san was intrigued to say the least, and he most definitely wanted to see how these new weapons handled. Speaking to Akio, "I would like that very much, I'm sure we all would."

Smiling the man gently grabbed his blushing apprentice and led her to the courtyard. Hinata finished handing out her tea before returning to the kitchen.

Placing down her tray, she suddenly realized that someone had been waiting for her.

Once she realized that she wasn't alone in the small kitchen she forced herself not to react too quickly as it must only be one of Akio-san's customers. Turning her eyes became as wide as saucers as she came face to face with the object of her affections!

Naruto stifled a chuckled at the surprised look on the girl's face, it was obvious that she recognized him but as yet he didn't know if she really knew who he was and that was something he wanted to find out as soon as possible.

"I saw that you were the one serving the tea so I just thought I'd grab a cup from you." He saw her relax when he provided his oh so innocent reason to be following her and she silently poured him some tea.

Taking the cup of steaming green tea he nodded his thanks before taking a sip and declaring it the best cup of tea he'd ever had.

She blushed prettily at the compliment and before she could go he asked, "what is your name if I may ask?"

Very quietly, barely above a whisper she answered, "Hinata."

"That is a very pretty name." She blushed a bright red this time and he continued before she ran off, "my name is Naruto."

"Oh, very nice to meet you Naruto-san, a-are you h-here as a special guest?"

That settled it, he could tell that she wasn't aware of his true status, he knew that they had recognized Kakashi-sensei but when he saw them go over to his sensei he could tell from their body language that they weren't aware of Sasuke's status as he was always mobbed by girls that did.

He had the feeling that they only knew of his sensei due not only to his infamous abilities but also because this was a weapons shop and the owner's apprentice was well known on the street as a weapons mistress who could wield her master's wares better than most jounin.

Answering the girl he said, "Oh no, my master, Iruka-sensei, was invited by Hatake-san and my friend and I came along. I am glad I did, otherwise I would have waited a pretty long time in that line outside!"

Hinata was both ecstatic and terrified that Naruto was talking to her, she hoped to god that she wouldn't faint. She also hoped that she wasn't making a terrible impression. Naruto was talking to her in such a friendly way and she couldn't have hoped for more from him.

At that moment Sakura had entered the kitchen and saw one man who matched Hinata's description of her crush, as well as a very red Hinata. Putting two and two together she made her move.

"Hinata, who is your new friend?" she asked in an innocent voice.

Too mortified to speak, Naruto found himself answering for her. "I'm Naruto." He stated in a very warm voice.

Sakura took an instant liking to the young man; he had a very warm and friendly presence to him.

Naruto had no trouble in figuring out that this girl could either be his greatest ally or his worst enemy, depending on how he treated her friend.

As the two sized each other up Hinata did her best to compose herself.

Sakura could tell that her friend was overwhelmed and decided to ease the situation. "Well, I'm Haruno Sakura, my friend and I are helping out today so if you need anything else just let us know."

"I will, thank you so much Sakura-san, I'd better go before my friends come looking for me." And at that he made his way over to his two sensei and Sasuke-kun.

When he arrived he found them thoroughly absorbed and they were heading off to the shop's courtyard in order to see the new weapons in action as Tenten was about to make a demonstration.

While Naruto was heading off into the courtyard with his group Sakura was doing her very best to restore Hinata's peace of mind.

"He talked to me, he was so close!" Hinata said in a daze as Sakura led her to a chair and began to fan off her crimson face.

"Calm down Hinata you're as red as a beet! I don't know why he makes you so nervous he was just chatting right?"

Hinata nodded sporting a goofy smile. Sakura couldn't help but giggle at the sight.

"Well, I don't suppose he told you any more about himself than his name?"

The pink haired girl waited patiently as Hinata nodded slowly. "Well, what did he say?"

"S-sorry Sakura-chan, well he said that he was here with his master, a man named Iruka."

Sakura quickly gathered all the available facts. Hatake Kakashi was a well known warrior and elite instructor to the noble's children; though she had heard he was very picky and only had a few students. As for the man named Iruka, he must be the brown haired man with the peculiar scar that she had seen with Hatake-san.

Iruka seemed like a pleasant sort and she had noticed that Hatake-san seemed to be incapable of keeping his eyes off of him. *giggle* Now who was the dark haired boy? All the facts seemed to point to him being one of Hatake-san's rare students.

She did think that the boy had a similar demeanor to the silver haired shinobi. As for Iruka, his warm personality sure seemed to have rubbed off on Naruto-san as she could sense nothing but genuine friendliness from both of them.

She decided that she could allow him to become friendly with Hinata; though discretely supervised and coached of course. She had a good feeling about this.

She also had a funny feeling about the dark haired boy. She had noticed him checking her out but she hadn't been able to tell if she had given a good or negative reaction. All those shinobi who were emotionally stunted it really did annoy her sometimes.

"Come on Hinata it'll be time to send in the next batch soon." Getting her friend back on her feet Sakura hoped that Tenten's demonstration was going well.

Outside in the courtyard Tenten had an audience of about twenty but there was only two that she hoped to impress, her sensei and Hatake-san.

The audience was told to keep a safe distance and Tenten began. Flying up she twisted midair while throwing the new kunai and shuriken at the various targets placed around the courtyard. Not only were they all dead on target the lightened weight increased the speed to such a degree that the whole demonstration only lasted a few seconds.

When they were led out in the courtyard and the demonstration was set to begin Kakashi discretely exposed his sharingan eye so he could make the most of the situation.

He was able to memorize every move of the girl's swift movements and save the information for later. Taking into the speed and accuracy of her movements he could easily tell that she hadn't been a weapons apprentice all her life.

"Yo, Akio-san." Kakashi turned to Akio and asked, "How long has that girl been your apprentice?"

Akio wasn't sure how to take such a question, but answered it truthfully, "nearly five years."

Iruka-sensei was shocked as well, the girl had incredible talent. She would make one hell of a kunoichi.

Akio was starting to worry that having Tenten demonstrate in front of so many shinobi hadn't been such a good idea after all. Blinded by his pride in her talent it didn't even occur to him that perhaps one of his clients might try to make her their apprentice instead.

"You've taught her well" Kakashi replied quietly before retiring into the shop to make his purchases.

Iruka-sensei politely bowed to Akio-san before taking his leave as well, and as for Naruto and Sasuke both had vanished.