Sakura was roaming around the village, slouched with her hands in her pockets. Kakashi had just gone to find Sasuke to train him, while she was up against Gaara.

Speaking of Kakashi, after witnessing the horror of Sasuke being trained by Naruto, he had decided that he needed to train someone. And, if his cute little minions became Chunin, he couldn't pass down his bullshitting skills to anyone! What a tragedy!

So, he decided to find Sakura. He found her punching a tree.

Seeing as he would be teaching her bullshit, he hid behind the tree and spoke in a shrill voice, "Ow!"

Sakura jumped back, and then redoubled her efforts.

"Ow, ow, ow!"

"Naruto, I swear, if that's you-"

"You can hear me?"

Sakura frowned. "Of course I can."

"Please, young lady, save me! I have been turned into a tree by the mini-Kyuubi, Tora-"

"Sensei?"

Kakashi cursed and came out from behind the tree. "Ah, Sakura, it's good to see you. I was just planning to train you in Ninja Art: Kakashi!"

Sakura raised an eyebrow. "You mean bullshit?"

Kakashi deflated visibly. "Yes."

"Yay!"

Kakashi's eye twinkled.

Several hours later

"Sensei, isn't their any physical training to be done?"

Kakashi was probably grinning beneath that mask of his.

"But you see, if the art of bullshit is done correctly, physical prowess becomes unnecessary. But since you pointed it out, give me 200 pushups, soldier!"

"Aw!"

A week later

"Sensei, I understand how to take down Gaara, but what should I do about his demon?"

Kakashi smiled. "Well, Sakura, to fight one demon, you need an even greater one."

"But Naruto isn't on the list of allowed equipment."

Kakashi nodded. "That he is not. In fact, he has specifically been mentioned on the banned list of items, apart from his own match."

"Okay... Wait!" Sakura's eyes shone as she remembered something Kakashi had said. "You mean-"

"Exactly."

Exam Day

After Naruto's match ended, leaving Shikamaru shaking like a leaf, the proctor called down Gaara and Sakura.

Gaara came down with his patented frown. "I will kill you, and prove my existence!"

Sakura looked up from her book, her headband covering one eye. "Huh? Did you say something?"

Kakashi was crying with pride, his tears soaking his Icha Icha. Gai looked on, seeing how Kakashi's hip nature had been passed down to his student. He then had a thought. "Oh, Youthful God, Lee shall fall even more in love with her! Her hip nature will make his FIRES OF YOUTH burn brighter!"

He turned to Kakashi. "My youthful rival, how about a wedding?!"

Kakashi moved away a bit. "Gai, I'm sorry, but, uh, I'm straight."

"Oh no! Between your student and mine!"

Meanwhile, on the battle field.

"Hey, G-man, how about neither of us use our demons?"

As they had choreographed earlier, Kakashi let out a high-pitched shriek.

"What?! You have a demon with you? I never knew!"

Gaara narrowed his eyes. "You have no demon. I can sense it."

Sakura cocked her head to the side. "Really? Then what", she asked, opening her bag, "is this?" Out of the bag came an indignant "Miaow!"

Immediately, every single leaf ninja there froze in horror.

"No!"

"She wouldn't!"

"Mommy, I'm scared!"

Naturally, these whispers heavily unsettled Gaara. What actually pushed it from unsettlement to Oh my God it's terrifying HELP was when Shukaku gave an undignified screech that only Gaara could hear and retreated into the deepest recesses of his head, all the while yelling, "HELP! Make it go away, boy and I swear I'll do WHATEVER YOU ASK FOR NOW MAKE IT FUCKING GO AWAY PLEASE!"

Gaara stepped back, not knowing what was going to come out of the bag. Since it was a demon, could it be Matatabi? The two tailed beast? It had meowed, so it was obviously a cat of some sort-

What came out was a perfectly ordinary cat.

Gaara frowned. What could be so scary-

Every single leaf ninja, and every ninja who had ever taken a mission in the leaf, started hyperventilating. Several of them had post-traumatic flashbacks. One ninja gasped in horror, saying, "It's the Tora!"

Of course, that ninja was Kakashi, who had also gone around and near Gaara under several different transformation jutsu, and warned him, as a newcomer, about the legendary Tora, the monster that had once brought destruction upon the entire world, and had been stopped by the Sage of Six Paths himself. All lies, of course, designed to cause fear at the name Tora.

And, Sakura had shown the cat pictures of Gaara, and every time Tora growled at the picture or clawed at it, he would get a treat. The treat also had a lot of caffeine, enough to make even the ninja with the most self control act like Naruto hopped up on four tails of the Kyuubi chakra.

As such, Tora was growling, and Gaara was shivering.

"So, which tailed beast do you have, anyway? I know it's not the one tailed beast, because I have it here, and the Nine-tailed beast is also in Konoha."

"I, uh, I have the one-tailed beast."

"Nonsense. I have the one tailed beast right here."

"N-no, I have-"

"Look, Gaara, darling, don't argue with me on this, okay? As it stands, there are over a hundred ways of defeating you without even using Tora-"

"PROCTOR, I FORFEIT!"

"-none of which I know how to use."

There was a moment of silence.

"Did you-did you just trick me into forfeiting?"

Sakura smiled that cocky smile of Kakashi's. "Hmm? Yeah, I suppose I did."

Up in the viewers box, Naruto whispered to Sasuke, "Sakura-chan is badass, isn't she?"

Not daring to speak, Sasuke just nodded.

Back on the stadium, Gaara screamed. Shukaku would have picked that moment to take over, but one angry "Mrow!" made him back down again.

Meanwhile, Gai had been going on and on about the wedding. What kind of flowers would be there, what sort of decorations, whether they could have a Chocolate Fountain of Youth or not, and the like.

"So, what say you, my rival Kakashi?!"

Kakashi just looked at him with a serene eye-smile.

"Hmm? Did you say something?"