2020: Yay! Chapter 3 is going to be KakaAnko. The idea is from my onee-chama. It's going to be short, though. And slightly sentimental.

Disclaimer: 2020 owns nothing. Nope. Nada. Zip, zilch, zero. Goose egg. Mmm... eggs.

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Synthetic Heartbeats~Always

Third Love: KakaAnko. Heartbeats Echo In An Empty Room

Three empty chairs stood around a small table. At one time, the chairs had held three young ninja-to-be, laughing, joking with each other. The room had been warm and friendly, full of happiness. Sometimes rivalry and animosity, but only the kind that came of true friendship. Kakashi sighed... the chairs had once held his students.

One by one, they had left. First Sasuke, lured by a promise of power, had left to join forces with Orochimaru. Naruto, after a failed rescue attempt, had left to travel with Jiraiya. And Sakura, not wanting to be a burden anymore, had begged to be an apprentice to Tsunade. Kakashi looked towards the dark ceiling. It gets quite lonely when one has nothing to do... he sighed.

There was a knocking on the door. Rising and walking towards the door, he wondered who it could be. No one ever came by. Asuma and Kurenai were always busy with each other, and Kakashi did all her could to avoid Gai on a regular basis. Other than those three, no one had any reason to visit him. Opening the door, he was surprised to see Anko. The purple-haired woman stood on his front step, shifting nervously in her white trenchcoat.

"Hey, Kakashi," she said.

"Afternoon, Anko."

Anko shifted again and bit her lip. Kakashi raised an eyebrow. This was quite out of character for her. "Ah, so..." she began. "You havn't been out much in a while... and I thought maybe we could go get something to eat."

Kakashi looked at the calendar, and when he did, his eyes popped open. That long? Turning back to Anko, he said, "Sure, why not?"

Anko smiled. "Alright! We can go to the Amaguriama..." She happily led Kakashi through the streets of Konoha to her favorite restaraunt. Once there, and after ordering, they sat down on one of the benches outside of the shop. They were passed by several genin- Lee and Tenten walked by, holding hands, seeming quite happy. Chouji ran past, chased by Ino, who was yelling something about 'eating all my diet pills!!!' Kiba walked by with his dog, with Hinata by his side. Kakashi sighed.

"What's wrong?" Kakashi turned to see Anko looking at him with a worried expression.

"It's... nothing."

"I'll bet you miss your genin."

He looked up, shocked. "What makes you say that?"

Anko shrugged. "Well, it's just that I've heard some of the senseis say that your students become like your kids. And, I mean, I've never had kids, or students either... but when I was little, I had a pet cat, and she was like my baby- I had her until I was fifteen." Here she choked a little. "That's when she... died. For a long time I acted like you are- five or six months, maybe? But then I realized, there's so much more I could be doing. You can never fly high if you always feel down. So stop feeling so down- they're all exactly where they want to be, anyway. Just think- neither of them would have been able to become what they now are without all the training you gave them. Feel proud, Kakashi- your kids are all grown up." An uncomfortable silence filled the air after Anko's speech.

Finally, Kakashi stood. Holding out his hand to the woman, he said, "Come on, Anko. Let's see if Tsunade has a mission for us- just you and me."

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2020: I told you it would be short!!! Next time, um... I don't know. Let me drink some coffee and think about it- who needs controlled substances when you have coffee, am I right?

Taking requests because I simply have writer's block.