Previously:

"Hm? What's up with you guys?" Kakashi asked as he looked back down at his students, feeling the tension in the air. "You seem eager today."

"We're eager, alright!!" Naruto and Sakura said enthusiastically as they both clenched their hands into fists, totally pumped up.

"Hmph." Sasuke said with a smirk.

'You guys… I know how you feel, but can't you be a little more subtle…?' April wondered with a wry smile, sweat-dropping. It was way too obvious that they were up to something.

"Oh, that's nice." Kakashi said with a smile as he stepped forward to lead the way. These kids had such honest faces… He could tell exactly what they were thinking.

"I've finally found you…" A mysterious ninja hiding amongst the leaves of the treetops said ominously, narrowing his eyes at the silver-haired jōnin. "… Hatake Kakashi!"

Chapter 32: Gotta See!

"Kakashi… You're out of luck to have met me here." The mysterious ninja said as he watched the silver-haired jōnin lead his team away from the safety of the village. "I'll get you back for my long-standing grudge."

"Bro, what's this 'grudge' you're talking about?" One of his subordinates asked.

WHAM!

The mysterious ninja gave his subordinate a good whack on the head for interrupting his dramatic monologue.

"You idiot! Have you forgotten!?" He snapped incredulously. "I'll never forget. It happened in the spring, three years ago…"

«« Flashback ««

"Nooo!!" A pretty young woman cried as she ran up the hill from the two strange ninjas who were chasing her.

"There's no need to be frightened." One of them called after her.

"Our bro said that he has something to talk to you about." The other added.

"Bro!?" The girl asked as she stopped and spun around to face them, surprised.

SQUEEEAK!

The pulley rigged up to the tree on the edge of the cliff behind her squealed and creaked as their bro ascended into view under the light of the full moon, standing on a rope swing with a red rose in his mouth. The boss ninja removed the rose from his lips and pointed it at her.

"I love you." He told his woman coolly(?) with a wink. "Will you marry me?" He proposed suavely.

"Bro, you're so cool!!" His two cronies swooned with heart-shaped eyes and slight nosebleed.

"No." The girl said, totally creeped out by all the random weirdness.

"There's no need to be embarrassed." The boss said. "Just be honest and embrace me—Ah!!" He screamed at the end as he lost his balance and face planted in the dirt, instantly losing any semblance of dignity he might have had.

"NO." The girl said emphatically.

"It's all right. I may look like this, but I have money." Bro reassured her, twirling the rose in his hands and turning it into gold colds with a sleight of hand.

"I said NO!" She yelled, starting to get fed up. Who was this guy anyway?

"What? Do you think you can decline my proposal in this situa-tiooon!!?" He demanded, howling in pain as the swing swung back forward and hit him in the back of the head, knocking him into her.

"NO means NO!!" She shrieked angrily, kicking him away.

"Geez, I even set up such a romantic scene for you…" He grumbled.

"NO means NO!!!" She repeated shrilly.

"How about you stop it right about there?" A bush suggested calmly with smooth, manly voice.

"Huh?" Bro said, furrowing his brow as they all glanced at that bush.

"Tada." A silver-haired leaf ninja said with a straight face as he poked his head up out of the bush, holding a book that said 'Make-Out Violence' on the front. He couldn't enjoy his book with them shouting like that. "Look, she doesn't want to, and no matter how I look at the situation, you're being dumped." He stated coolly, trying to be the voice of reason.

"Uh-huh!" The girl said, nodding her head in agreement. Finally, someone who could read the situation!

"You sure have guts there!" Bro snapped angrily, jumping back onto his feet. "Who do you think I am!?" He asked, striking a dramatic pose, as he pointed his finger at the unwanted intruder. "Are you picking a fight with me knowing that we're the famous Moyanin Three?" As he spoke, his two subordinates moved into position behind him, forming the characters for 'Mo' and 'Ya' with their bodies.

"Moyanin?" The silver-haired ninja asked calmly, looking bored. "Never heard of them."

"You don't know of the Moyanin!?" Bro said incredulously as the three if them held their ridiculous poses.

"Making fools out of us, you…!" The subordinate forming 'Mo' growled angrily.

"Bastard, who the hell are you?" The one forming 'Ya' demanded.

"My name isn't really worth mentioning…" The silver-haired ninja said humbly as he stepped out of the bush, still reading his book. "But I'm Kakashi Hatake."

"Then why bother mentioning it all!?" They snapped simultaneously.

"Hey, you!" Mo shouted.

"We'll make you regret this!" Ya threatened.

"You interrupted my love!" Bro yelled with righteous fury.

"Love?" Kakashi asked, finally lowering his book. "Don't you mean 'stalking'?" He asked with a brilliant shit-eating grin.

"Shut up!!" Bro shouted, stomping his foot. "Let's get him, guys!!" He ordered Mo and Ya.

"Yeah!" The agreed readily.

"4, 3, 2, 1!" Bro counted down.

"Hustle! Hustle!" All three of them shouted, imitating prizefighter Ogawa Masaya, as they all did a weird little hip thrust before charging to attack.

WHACK! WHAM! BANG!

One embarrassingly short fight later, the Moyanin Three found themselves trussed up in the rope for the swing, dangling precariously over the edge of the cliff.

"Hold on!! Please! Someone! Someone please help!!" Bro shouted nervously.

"I'll walk you home." Kakashi told the girl, offering her his arm, while he held his book in the other hand, still reading.

"Hey, don't be talking!"

"Yay!" The girl said with heart-shaped eyes, completely smitten with her handsome savior.

"Hey!!" Bro shouted indignantly as they walked away together. "You're not leaving me, are you!?"

«« End Flashback ««

"Well, that's how it was." Bro finished proudly, standing akimbo.

"Don't brag when you lost!" Mo and Ya snapped.

"So, this is revenge for what happened three years ago?" Ya asked as they returned to their positions at his side.

"You, bro, who has become stronger with the past few years, are going to fight him head on!" Mo said excitedly. As expected of their leader! "Ow!" He grunted in pain as Bro hit him on the head again.

"Idiot! Who'd do something that dangerous?" Bro snapped incredulously, surprising them. "If we're going to do this, let's do it secretly from the shadows." He said with a devious laugh and a smirk.

"That's… kind of dirty…" Mo and ya whispered, sweat-dropping.

"AHOU! AHOU!" A crow cried as it flew overhead.

"Welcome! Welcome!" The matron of the Tomiya Inn greeted Kakashi's team enthusiastically when they decided to stop there for the night. The Moyanin Three snickered ominously as they watched.

"Woah-ho!" Naruto exclaimed as he and the others entered their room and found that the table had already been decked out from corner to corner with an extravagant meal.

"It's a real sushi boat!!" April said excitedly with shining eyes. She had only ever seen those in pictures and anime before!

"Amazing~!" Sakura gushed.

"Hmph." Sasuke said, playing it cool

"It looks delicious!" Naruto said, drooling. He was itching to dig in.

"It's so grand." Kakashi remarked with a smile. They all quickly took their seats at the table, with April and Naruto on one side, Sasuke and Sakura on the other, and Kakashi at the head of the table as the adult.

"Take your time." The matron said as she exited the room, shutting the doors behind her. "Hihihi… Eat up, Kakashi." Bro said deviously, switching back to his regular voice as he removed his mask. 'For this meal shall be your last!' He thought to himself. 'I've poisoned that food with an odorless, tasteless drug I've created that will give you hiccups forever! Take your hiccups and die in pain!! That's the kind of death you deserve!'

"?" April said, glancing around as she felt an odd shiver run up her spin. Was that killing intent she sensed just now…? She shook her head. Nah, it couldn't be. Not on a D-rank mission like this… She was probably just on edge because of how tense everyone else was. They were all watching Kakashi-sensei like hawks, waiting for him to make the first move. However, staring at the lavish food on the table, Kakashi couldn't help but feel something was off. Wasn't this too much service for a small group like theirs? It's not like he had paid extra up front… Plus he could have sworn he felt killing intent for a moment… or maybe that was just his students? They almost all of them were glaring pretty intensely at him. None of them had even touched the food yet.

"Hm? Is something wrong?" He asked them. "You're not eating."

"Oh, not really. Why don't you eat, Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura said a bit nervously.

"Oh, I'm on a diet right now, so…" He said, trailing off when saw the look of blatant disbelief on April's face. It was such an obvious lie.

'So, that's how it is.' Naruto thought, frowning, also not buying it. 'No matter what, I'm going to see your face!' He thought determinedly, reaching for the teapot.

'This is bad… Sensei's too suspicious. At this rate, no one will get to eat…' April thought, furrowing her brow for a moment before plastering on a smile. "Well, I guess I'll start then." She said as she reached for her chopsticks. "Itadakimasu…" Her eyes widened as one of those horrible moments where you feel like you're watching a train wreck in slow motion occurred when Naruto suddenly threw the pot of boiling tea at Kakashi-sensei's face.

"Oh no, my hand slipped…!" He said as the teapot flew past her stunned face.

'H-Hold on… Isn't that… going too far…!?' She thought, horrified at the possibility of the painful damage the boiling liquid might inflict if it actually hit its target. Just as she was thinking this, the lid slipped and some of the hot tea started spiraling out of the opening towards her as it sailed through the air towards Kakashi. In the instant that happened, Kakashi narrowed his eyes and immediately used his superior reflexes to flip the table up, catching the spray flying towards her face and stopping the dangerous teapot in its tracks at the cost of their meal. April stared at the carnage in front of her with wide eyes, shocked. The only thing still sticking to the table was the octopus, and even that fell to the floor when the suction cups gave out after a moment of awkward silence had passed as they all stared at the ruined dishes scattered all over the floor.

"GAAAAHHH!!" Naruto yelled, clutching his head as he realized what had just happened.

"What have you done!?" Sakura demanded angrily, feeling like she was ready to pull her hair out.

'M-My sushi boat…!!!' April cried internally as she let her chopsticks fall from her hand, devastated. Wasn't there a better way!?

"Oh, sorry, I just unintentionally…" Kakashi apologized with a wry smile, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Don't 'unintentionally' me!!!" Sakura and Naruto shouted angrily, fuming. Sasuke glared at their teacher, for once in full agreement with his teammates.

"Look at what you did!!" Naruto snapped, pointing at the dejected April, who was sitting in her own little corner of woe. "Eating from a real sushi boat has been on her bucket list for forever!!"

"Ah…" Kakashi said, sweat-dropping. Now he felt kind of bad, but if he hadn't done something… He glanced sideways at the tatami mats, where he could see the sliver of a suspicious purple stain forming around the edge of one of the spilled sauces. If he hadn't done something about that food, it probably would have been her last meal…

'Ah, the food…' The Moyanin Three thought woefully, shedding tears as they watched through the peepholes that they had poked into the rice paper doors to spy on them. 'What a cruel thing…' They sighed, hanging their heads in defeat.

"Hey, what should we do now?" Sakura asked the boys while Kakashi was distracted with trying to comfort April over the loss of the sushi boat.

"Relax." Sasuke said. "I have an idea."

"What idea?" Sakura and Naruto asked curiously.

"Hmph." Sasuke smirked.

CLUNK.

The sound of the bottom of the bamboo sōzu hitting the stone as it emptied in the garden could be heard in the onsen.

"I see… Strangely enough, you've thought this idea through, Sasuke." Naruto said as the boys kept their heads low in the water. "You'd usually take your mask off when you take a bath, right?"

"Just be quiet, you moron." Sasuke said. He didn't want Kakashi to overhear them. Meanwhile, the Moyanin Three, who were hiding behind a large rock next to the hot springs, were enacting a plan of their own.

"Heheheh… Kakashi, you'll die here." Bro said lowly with a sinister chuckle as he pulled out a blow dart. "This blow dart contains another poison I created that makes you laugh forever." Mo and Ya cast a dubious glance at the skinny tube, wondering where he had been hiding it since they were all butt-naked… Did their bro just pull that out of his ass? "You'll die laughing. That death suits you best."

"Aw, I wanted to see too…" April said with a sigh as the girls tried to relax next door in the women's bath.

"But it's the men's hot springs…" Sakura said, pouting. "But, I want to see! Moh…" She sank into the water, blowing bubbles. "Say, April-chan… Why do you like Kakashi-sensei?" She asked abruptly.

"!!" April flinched, completely caught off-guard. "I-Is it that obvious…?" She asked a little nervously as her cheeks flushed slightly from embarrassment and the heat of the bath.

'Hmm… April-chan's kind of cute when she's feeling shy.' Sakura thought objectively. "Well, I doubt the boys have picked up on it… But seriously, why? He's old and perverted! I don't understand your taste in men." The corner of April's mouth twitched.

'The feeling's mutual…' She thought. April didn't understand Sakura's infatuation with Sasuke at all. He had a nice face, but most of the time he was just a jerk. "He's not old! Sensei's in his twenties." She said defensively. They were only twelve years apart… That was only three or four years more than the age gap between her own parents had been. "And besides, all men are perverts." She stated calmly.

"No, they aren't!" Sakura argued. "Sasuke-kun would never—"

"All of them." April insisted firmly in a tone that left no room for argument. It was an inescapable fact of life that she had learned at an early age after discovering her father's December 2004 issue of Playboy magazine with Denise Richards on the cover when she was four while hunting for Christmas presents in her parent's room. "Well, to be fair, women are too, to some extent…"

"Okay, now you're going too far." Sakura told her, backing away. Women were perverts? As if! That was a guy thing!

"Well, think about it. There'd be no such thing as 'physical attraction' if we weren't. There's nothing to be ashamed of. It's just a natural part of being human. It's only a bad thing when it's taken too far and becomes a nuisance to others…"

"I can't hear you! I'm not listening!!" Sakura said anxiously with her hands clamped tightly over her ears in an attempt to block her out, spiraling into a serious case of denial. No way! She didn't want to think about it! That would mean Sasuke-kun was just like Naruto…!!

"Achoo!!" They heard Naruto sneeze in the neighboring bath, as if he knew they were talking/thinking about him. "Are you ready yet, Kakashi-sensei?" He called, starting to get impatient. Why was he sneezing in a hot bath? Was it the steam?

"Yeah, I'll be right there." Kakashi answered.

"!" Both girls gasped, suddenly snapping to attention. This was the moment they had all been waiting for! 'I want to see!' They thought, scrambling over to the wooden fence dividing the two baths in the hopes of catching a glimpse of Kakashi's face. Neither of the girls wanted to be left out. Even if she wasn't romantically interested in him like April, Sakura still wanted to know…

"He's coming!" Naruto whispered excitedly as they heard the sound of the door of the inner wash and changing room open.

"Alright!" Bro said, getting ready to take aim and blow his poisonous dart.

"Oh, I can't see anything!" Sakura complained as she and April pressed their faces up against the fence, trying to peek between the cracks, but the wood was fitted too close together for that.

"Me neither!" April said, frowning.

"That's it, desperate times call for desperate measures!" April said determinedly with a serious gleam in her eye as she pulled out the kunai she had been hiding in her towel, just in case.

"!" Sakura gasped in surprise. Was she going to make a peephole!? "You can't do that!"

"Why not?" April asked furrowing her brow in confusion. "I'll make it really small, so it doesn't stand out." It's not like anyone would know it was them. They had the whole bath to themselves at the moment.

"No! I mean, peeking through a gap in the fence is one thing, but making an actual peephole… What exactly are you planning to look at!?" Sakura asked, blushing furiously.

"Sensei's face." April said straightly without a hint of hesitation. "… What are you getting so worked up about, Sakura-chan? They're all wearing towels too, aren't they?" That should cover about as much as swimsuit, right? She didn't see what the big deal was.

"Eh? Ah, well…" Sakura said, turning an even deeper shade of red as an image of Sasuke in just a towel popped into her head.

"Sorry to make you wait. I'm coming in now." They heard Kakashi tell the boys as he stepped into the hot bath. The boys were on edge as they waited to catch a glimpse of their teacher without his mask as he moved closer through the steam. "Just for a little bit, thought." He said with a smile as he came into view, wearing a towel over the bottom half of his face.

"GAH!!" Naruto and Sasuke both face-faulted into the water. "Why did it turn out like this?" They gurgled miserably.

'Now!' Bro thought, shooting the blow dart at his enemy.

"What's wrong?" Kakashi asked them. "Oh well, I guess I'll get in now." He said, lowering himself into the bath with perfect timing to avoid being hit by the dart flying at him through the steam. Instead, it flew right over the top of Kakashi's head and nailed an innocent little frog right between the eyes. The poor frog collapsed to the ground in a fit of weird squeaking sounds. "Hm?" Kakashi said, glancing in the direction the dart had come.

"!" The Moyanins quickly ducked behind the rock to avoid being seen.

'What the hell!?' Bro thought incredulously. Just how lucky could this guy get!?

"Damn! What's going on in there?" April asked, pressing up against the fence again. Did they miss the big moment? Why did it sound like someone was murdering a squeak toy in there? "What happened? I want to see!"

"Okay, fine! Do it!" Sakura whispered urgently, letting her curiosity get the better of her. April didn't need to be told twice. She gripped the kunai in her hand, ready to strike, when they heard the voices of other women, and the door to the washroom opened. April quickly tucked the kunai back inside her towel as she and Sakura jumped back into bath, trying to look as casual as possible as several older women came out to join them. The two girls exchanged a glance and sighed. They had just lost their chance…