It was the day of the final round. Sasuke had a few last minute things to work on with his Chidori, so he met up with Kakashi while Shanan and Naruto went ahead to the tournament.

Naruto would be fighting Shanan's teammate, Neji in the first battle and Sasuke would be fighting Gaara from the Sand Village in the last battle. Which made Shanan really nervous. He was the same guy that put Lee in the hospital by crushing his arm and leg and then showing up to try to kill Naruto when he was in the hospital. He was completely insane, to say the very least.

Shanan was having some pretty intense headaches, but it wasn't the worst she had had, so she felt well enough to go and watch the guys fight.

Naruto and Neji's fight was really great and it was the first time she had seen Naruto push so hard to do so well. And Neji was a very formidable foe, he trained almost constantly. Shanan had been upset with him when she found out about his and Hinata's fight, but she was really proud of Hinata for standing up to him and fighting.

And learning about Neji's past made her feel really sad for him too. Neither of them had ever gone into a lot of detail about the way the Hyuga clan worked and Shanan had felt bad for not asking about their family more. Neji did end up in the hospital after his and Naruto's fight, though, so Shanan made plans to go and see him soon.

Sasuke didn't really feel like he had needed to train his Chidori anymore. He mostly agreed to a few final touches because he knew he wouldn't get much alone time with his Sensei once the exams were over and they were all back to doing regular missions. And he had been meaning to speak with him.

"Kakashi Sensei," he started a bit nervously as they were making their way to the tournament, "I wanted to talk to you about- about your bond with Shanan."

Kakashi chuckled a little as he looked sideways at Sasuke, "Is that so? What about it?" he asked nonchalantly.

"Yeah," he said, a bit irritated at Kakashi's dismissiveness. "I'm finally planning on asking her to be my girlfriend and well... I really don't want you to train her again, she has her own Sensei that can teach her things."

Kakashi sighed and stopped to look Sasuke in the eye, man to man. "Look, Shanan is very important to me and so are you, and... you've really, truly got the wrong idea here. I can assure you Shanan does not have a crush on me or anything like that, we're just kindred spirits and good friends. You have no reason to be jealous." He smiled and shook his head as they started walking again. "Besides, I've been wondering when you were going to ask her out. I can tell you're both quite fond of one another. And, personally, I think the two of you will make a great pair," he assured him.

Sasuke suddenly felt a little silly for feeling jealous about it, but he was glad he spoke up anyway. He'd been planning on officially asking Shanan out for a few weeks now, but he wanted to make it special and he also wanted to get that conversation with Kakashi out of the way.

They finally arrived at the tournament and were almost late. Luckily, Lord Hokage allowed them to extend the wait time because everyone there wanted to see Sasuke's fight.

Shanan moved as close as she could to watch him fight, which just so happened to be near Sakura and Ino, two of Sasuke's biggest admirers. Sakura was used to being ignored by now, poor girl, but Ino was none too pleased when Sasuke smiled and waved at Shanan alone.

It wasn't long before their fight had finally started. Sasuke seemed faster than Shanan had remembered and was making very good use of his Chidori, but she could definitely sense the rage and hatred coming from Gaara... He seemed almost inhuman and she was very concerned about both his mental stability and Sasuke's safety.

At least until she blacked out...