(Four Weeks Later)

Kakashi wasn't always as late as he wanted his students to believe. Sure he was usually extremely late no matter what but he would often arrive some time before he revealed himself. He'd always found that people revealed more about themselves when they thought they weren't being observed. Some might call it creepy but he had been watching people for so long without their being aware of it nothing about it seemed remotely odd to him. Frankly he was confused as to why some people objected to it.

As he observed his three cute little students he tried to see how they had grown since they had first become a team. Naruto for one showed both the least and perhaps the most growth. When he first joined the team the boy was both an idiot and a failure as a Shinobi. Now he was still an idiot but he was thinking and acting more like a Shinobi a little bit each day.

The Naruto who had charged a Jounin head on with no plan and with the certainty that guts alone would somehow let him win was thankfully gone. While his taijutsu and genjutsu were still terrible and he had not gained any jutsu beyond Kage Bushin he was starting to think as a ninja. He was starting to use strategy in his fights, using his Kage Bushin to probe for weaknesses and coming up with a plan to exploit those weaknesses in unexpected ways. He was surprisingly good at setting traps with his Kage Bushin and leading people into them. Now if the kid would start growing a brain that worked outside the heat of battle Kakashi would start feeling like he was doing a pretty good job.

Sasuke as far as Kakashi was concerned had experienced the least growth. Oh he had grown steadily in skill in practically all ninja disciplines be they trap making, tracking, stealth, taijutsu and so forth. What Kakashi considered 'growth' however involved fixing your worst weaknesses before going back and working on your obvious strengths. Having a glaring weakness will end you no matter how many high level skills and jutsus you have.

Though he had gotten better at it Sasuke still thought himself better than his teammates. Kakashi knew from personal experience that sort of attitude damaged team dynamics and could very well end up threatening missions and endangering lives. He was also impatient and tried way too much to be 'perfect' and 'hard' the way he thought he had to be so he could have his revenge. The problem was he was so hard a well-placed blow would shatter him. One resounding crushing of his ego and the boy was liable to have some kind of mental break. Kakashi almost sighed at the thought of having to pick up the pieces when that happened.

The most surprising change of all had been Sakura who in his book definitely got the award for most improved. She'd gone from obsessed fangirl playing at ninja to a Kunoichi devoted to her training who only occasionally gave the Uchiha puppy eyes. He examined her and noted the small but significant changes she had made in her appearance recently. Her long hair had been tied back in a no nonsense ponytail and her forehead protector now rested around her neck. The other significant change were the white bandages now covering her skin from fist to elbows. That was easily recognized as Guy's influence and was a necessary precaution for the first years of Goken training to protect your hands when training by punching a log.

Sakura had been the most successful in seeing underneath the underneath and had taken the advice she'd discerned from him and run with it. Her physical strength was now near that of the boys though being a girl it would probably never be at the same level. Her endurance had also grown by leaps and bounds and it went without saying her taijutsu had as well. Maybe it was time to see how much effort she had put into his other suggestions as well.

Well he supposed he had kept them waiting long enough. With a thought and an effort of chakra he appeared in front of them in a swirl of leaves.

Naruto jumped to his feet and pointed a finger at him, "YOU'RE LATE!"

Honestly he'd done the same thing every day for months. Kakashi wasn't sure whether to be impressed or take it as another sign of mental deficits.

"Well, you see there was this puppy hanging from a window sill and he didn't have a collar so-"

"LIAR!"

"Ok ok fine. It wasn't a puppy, it was an old lady's tanuki stuck in a tree so… it took a few hours."

Naruto was steaming, Sasuke looked faintly disgusted and Sakura was giving him the folded arms and raised eyebrow routine. Just another day with his cute little Genin.

"We haven't done any all out full contact spars for a while. Naruto, spar with Sakura. And don't hold any techniques back," he ordered.

"Huh?" said Naruto, "But I can't do that to Sakura-chan, I'll end up hurting her," he complained.

Kakashi filed away that Naruto's survival instincts must not be very good because he missed the furious glare Sakura sent in his direction.

"I mean why don't we just do taijutsu spars like we usually do? We haven't done one of those in a long time either," continued Naruto. The look Sakura was giving him now would have frozen glaciers and still the boy didn't notice anything was wrong. He'd really have to shape him up on situational awareness if the boy wanted to live a long life and keep his ability to have kids.

"What do you think Sakura? Do you think you need Naruto to give you a handicap?" Kakashi asked lazily.

A smile crept on Sakura's face that was anything but reassuring. "Oh I think I'll be just fine Kakashi-sensei," she said in forced sweet tones. Naruto had finally turned to look at her and started to realize something was wrong.

"Uh, Sakura-chan I just wanted to make sure you don't get hurt," he continued nervously not realizing he was digging his own grave even deeper.

"Just fight her all out if you have any respect for her you idiot. You're insulting her pride as a ninja," said Sasuke.

Realization finally dawned on his face and he turned to Sakura with an apologetic and frightened expression, "Oh, I didn't mean it like that! You're a great ninja really! I'm just not a big fan of hitting girls, and well, uh…"

Kakashi decided to have mercy on him and interrupted him before he could continue to rack up the number of bruises Sakura was likely to try to leave on him. "Naruto, that's enough. You will follow orders. Both of you get on the field."

They both walked into position Naruto looking nervous and Sakura looking angry. Kakashi noted that even her anger had changed since she first joined the team. At first it had always been an explosion of yelling and fists flying. Now her anger was more controlled, cold and calculated. Kakashi wondered what had brought about that particular change.

"Begin," he said.

Sakura didn't wait. She rushed Naruto in a direct way that screamed Guy's style of Goken. Naruto was caught flat footed as a fist caught him in the solar plexus, another cracked his jaw and a final kick to the chest sent him sprawling to the ground.

Naruto scrambled to his feet and backed away to get some space between them and Sakura allowed it. She put her hands on her hips and raised an eyebrow that said 'are you feeling stupid yet?' The raised eyebrow was sort of becoming her thing.

Naruto gave her a smile that was half apologetic and half determined. "Well I guess I should have taken you seriously from the start huh? Sorry about that," he said, raising his hands into a familiar cross shape, "But don't say I didn't warn you. Kage Bushin no Jutsu!"

Four Kage Bushin popped into existence. Kakashi was always a tiny bit jealous when he saw that although he would never admit it. Creating four Kage Bushin simultaneously would probably leave him with chakra exhaustion. Naruto didn't even feel the strain. The amount of chakra that Naruto had even without using the Kyuubi was absolutely unreal.

Sakura got into the Goken stance and made a come hither motion with her hand. Apparently Naruto was now taking this a bit more seriously since they fanned to come at Sakura from different directions all at once.

Instead of waiting for them to converge on her Sakura dashed towards the Kage Bushin that seemed to be just a little bit further away from the others. The Kage Bushin took a swing at Sakura as soon as she was close enough. Unfortunately for Naruto his taijutsu was still terrible and that translated to his Kage Bushin as well. Sakura parried the blow easily with one hand and with the other drove her fist into his chest. The Kage Bushin fell back for a long second before it popped into white smoke.

Sakura's strength had always been her brain and she used that in this situation. She danced away from one Kage Bushin reaching for her and positioned herself so when the others turned to go after they got in each other's way. Sakura wasted no time in their clumsy scuffle to land a kick in one's stomach and a punishing punch to one's ribs. Both of the clones stumbled for a moment before popping into smoke.

The final clone and the original Naruto finally regrouped and charged Sakura at once. With the flic of her wrist she sent a shiruken at one of them forcing it to dodge while turning to fight the other Naruto. With a punch to the face the last clone popped into smoke.

"That was dangerous Sakura-chan! That shiruken could have hit me for real. We were really close," Naruto protested sounding half outraged and half like he was whining.

"You heard Kakashi-sensei Naruto. I'm taking this seriously. I'm sure he'll step in if he needs to. Come at me with everything you've got or I'm not going to forgive you," she said her gaze and voice resolute.

Naruto seemed conflicted for a moment before resolution slowly came over his eyes. "Ok no more holding back. I'm doing this 'cuz you asked me to."

"I wouldn't have it any other way," she said with a hint of a smile and getting into her Goken stance.

"Kage Bushin no Jutsu!"

This time twenty clones appeared all around Naruto. This time when they attacked her in numbers Sakura couldn't handle them nearly as well as she had the first group. She had to keep moving trying to stay ahead of the group of blondes and not let herself get surrounded. Sakura managed to pop the occasional clone here or there but she was also taking a good deal of damage, getting hit by a lot of glancing strikes she couldn't quite block or avoid.

To Kakashi's eye it looked like only a matter of time before she was overwhelmed. She had been doing quite well but he hadn't expected her to be able to win against Naruto. If she had finished him off when she'd had the advantage that would have been one thing but this type of fight did not at all play to her strengths. The only reason Sasuke was able to keep up with that kind of assault was that he had some jutsu that could kill a large number of clones in one go. Even a lot of Chunnin would have trouble winning against the blonde horde.

Still something was strange. Sakura kept losing more and more ground and taking damage but she didn't always retreat towards the most obvious and easiest path. It was almost as if she were maneuvering towards something.

"Ah, so that's what you're doing," he muttered a little impressed despite himself.

Kakashi saw the recognition in her eyes when her target finally got close enough and then her suicidal charge straight into the pack of clones.

"Konoha Senpuu!" she shouted, doing one of the signature flying spin kicks of the Goken style. The heel of her foot connected against the head of Naruto, the real Naruto, and sent him flying. He landed in a boneless heap on the ground. All the remaining clones just stared disbelievingly for half a second before popping out of existence.

Kakashi went over to check on Naruto while Sakura put her hands on her thighs and tried to catch her breath. Naruto was fine and would probably only be out for a few minutes.

"How did you know that was the real him?" he asked her.

"I kept track of him from the beginning of the fight," she said still breathing hard.

Kakashi nodded. That's what he'd thought it was. The Jounin eyed his only female student and considered what he had seen.

Her taijutsu form wasn't terrible, certainly it was looking really good for a Genin. The form on that Konoha Senpuu could have been a lot better however. In fact it had been barely passable. However it had been passable and that was not easy to do with only five weeks of training. It looked like his little Kunoichi had some talent in taijutsu.

More important in his mind was the strategy she had used to beat Naruto. She had maneuvered the flood of clones while taking punishment in hopes of creating an opening to attack the one she'd kept track of as the original. To have the presence of mind to keep track of one blonde in a sea of blondes while taking punishment and giving ground had been well done.

Of course they had both screwed up in the end and failed to follow his instructions. The reason Naruto lost is because he kept not taking his opponent seriously even after he said he was going to. Naruto is smart enough to replace his real self with his clones a couple of times precisely so no one is ever sure who the real Naruto is. That he didn't bother to do that in this case means he got sloppy and deserved a kick in the head.

Sakura on the other hand would have been better off backing away a distance and throwing ranged weapons to thin the mass of clones. Kakashi guessed she had been worried about potentially hurting her teammate which he could appreciate but she had still been instructed to go 'all out'. Actually if Sakura was smart she would have finished the fight when she first knocked him down in the first second of the match. Instead they were brawling like street fighters and not thinking or acting at all like ninja.

His little genin still had a long ways to go. It was moments like this that made him wonder if he'd been a little hasty in recommending them for the Chunnin exams so soon.

Kakashi glanced down and saw that Naruto was coming around.

"Yo. How you feeling?"

Naruto sat up slowly holding his head. "Ugh. What happened?"

"Hmm I wonder. You up for continuing your training?"

At the word 'training' Naruto shook his head and cleared the last of the cobwebs away. "Yeah I'm ready. But what happened…?" he asked then looked at Sakura. Suddenly it came back to him.

"Oh, ouch," he said rubbing his head, "good one Sakura-chan. You've gotten a lot better at taijutsu."

"Well of course," she replied in mock self-importance, but you could tell she was pleased.

"All right cut the chatter. Naruto and Sasuke you're up."

"Heh. I'm not going to start easy on you, bastard."

"Says the one who got dropped by a girl," replied Sasuke. Sakura bristled a little at that comment.

"Now now stop wasting time and get started. Sakura come stand over here."

Kakashi watched as the spar between Naruto and Sasuke started with half an eye but he wasn't all that interested. Though he didn't have them go at each other with all their abilities very often he'd seen the two of them go at it often enough on their own. Most of the time those spars ended with Sasuke the victor and Naruto a little more singed than before.

Instead he turned his attention to Sakura who'd come to stand next to him. He pulled out his latest book Icha Icha Team Dynamics and pretended to read it while he addressed her.

"Sakura."

"Hmm? Yes Sensei?"

"Ever make any progress on those other things?"

She looked at him until realization dawned on her features. Then without moving she transformed into a copy of him doing a passable impersonation of his lazy slouch. A second later she canceled then technique.

Then as she stood there two bushin flickered to life on either side of her. She made them bow dramatically before dispelling.

The third and final time she did have to use hand seals. Two hand seals later and Kakashi felt her replace herself with a log that held her image for a second before shimmering away. A moment later Sakura performed Kawarimi again and returned to her original position.

"Kawarimi uses more hand seals so it's been harder to get them down to zero," she said sounding a bit apologetic, "but I'll get it though. I also mastered water walking with no problems."

Kakashi hummed a noncommittal sound and kept his eye on his book. He could tell his non answer had irritated Sakura but she kept her silence. As the two boys battled it out rather loudly he contemplated what to do with his pink haired student.

Progressing as far as she had with the three basics did not take any talent but it did take a lot of repetitive, thankless hard work. He was not surprised that she hadn't quite gotten Kawarimi down since it took five seals instead of three like the others but he was pretty sure she would get it before long. Since she had been the only one of his students to actually listen and act diligently on what he'd told her maybe she deserved a reward.

"Sakura, follow me," he said heading deeper into the woods.

"Huh? What about those two?"

"They'll be fine."

Sakura had followed Kakashi-sensei into the woods a ways out of sight from her two teammates. She was burning with curiosity as to what this was about but kept her silence. Sensei probably wouldn't tell her until he was ready anyway.

Kakashi put his book away with some visible reluctance and turned to her. "Watch closely and keep an eye on that tree over there," he said motioning to one about fifty feet away. Kakashi made the Ram real in a deliberate fashion and channeled his chakra. To Sakura's eyes he seemed to disappear from sight and a fraction of a second later he reappeared by the tree he'd indicated.

"Whoa," said Sakura a little bit impressed.

"That," said Kakashi as he walked back to her, "is Shunshin no Jutsu. It's a D-Ranked skill that allows one to move at incredible speeds for a short distance in a straight line. Advanced users can fudge the straight line rule a little but generally that's how it works. Now make the Ram seal," he told her.

Sakura obeyed quickly even though she was extremely surprised that he was suddenly teaching her a new jutsu. As far as she knew he hadn't taught anyone else on her team any new jutsu yet.

"Right. Now you need to channel chakra to every muscle of your body and 'tag' your destination with chakra similar to how you would tag a log for Kawarimi…"

Kakashi drilled her on the skill until she had the general idea of how it was done even if she wasn't executing it very well. That was apparently good enough for Kakashi since he declared it was time to head back in case two idiots had decided to hurt themselves.

Still he did give her a useful short lecture on the skill as they walked back to the clearing.

"Shunsin no Jutsu is a common skill but if you don't train it hard it's of little use for anything except impressing impressionable Genin and civilians. However there have been some incredibly strong ninja who have made Shunshin no Jutsu the entire backbone of their fighting style so you get out of it what you put into it. Until you can drop the Ram seal and can use it quickly in any of the ten directions don't even attempt to use it in combat."

Sakura just nodded, her mind already whirling and coming up with possible uses for her new skill.

"By the way," he said almost as an afterthought, "don't teach that skill to any of your teammates. Consider that an order."

(Hours Later)

Sakura was once again sitting in the small park behind the hospital as had been her routine for the past month. She stood off to the side as much out of the way as she could and drilled Kawarimi over and over in an effort to drop those last two hand signs. Though she was really excited to start working on her new jutsu she knew the smart thing to do would be to finish mastering Kawarimi before spending time and chakra on something else. There was no guarantee that if she started working on the Shunshin no Jutsu now she would have improved enough for it to be of any use by the time the exams started in two weeks.

Sakura was looking forward to the exams but not for the reasons other people might think. It seemed everyone they talked to loved to try and scare them by telling them how at least a few Genin always died in every exam. As much as she hated to think about it Sakura needed to be around more death. Hanging around the hospital had just barely been taking the edge off.

Deaths in the section of the hospital that was in her 'range' were fairly rare and sporadic. It didn't help that she didn't dare spend more than a couple of hours a day there. As it was someone would probably just think she had an odd choice of a training spots but if it became more than that she risked people noticing and asking questions.

Maybe after the exam she could see about getting a job at the hospital to give her a legitimate reason to be inside. She was actually surprised she hadn't thought of that sooner. After the exams she would look into maybe getting some medic training. If she was smack in the middle of the hospital for long hours she would probably be able to absorb all the death she needed.

It needed to happen soon though. Over the past month she had experimented and meditated to try and find out more about her Hunger. It turned out that stress made the Hunger worse and more difficult to keep in control. She was also sure that if the Hunger got bad enough the 'door' in her mind would open and what she had started thinking of as 'Evil Sakura' would come out. Except she had deduced 'Evil Sakura' wasn't really another person or personality. It was just her with a shocking lack of any moral filters. Somehow the pinkette found that even more terrifying.

Sakura wasn't sure how close she had come over the last month to going over the edge but she had the feeling she had come terrifyingly close at least twice. Once when she had not felt a death for four days and she was sure she was at her limit. Another time had happened last week when her Hunger had been strong and Kakashi-sensei had caught her in the Hell Viewing Genjutsu again. She had realized what it was and broken the genjutsu in time but it had been a close call.

Now Sakura was on her third day without feeling a death and the Hunger was getting extremely bad. Part of the reason she had begun training obsessively was because it distracted her from that gnawing feeling that was present inside almost twenty four-seven. It helped a lot but at some point no matter how much training she did it just wasn't enough. If she didn't feel a death today or tomorrow she was going to be in some serious trouble.

Sakura stayed practicing for as long as she dared before giving up and leaving the park in disappointment. She just had to last until after the Chunnin exam. If she could just keep her secret that long then everything would be ok.

ANBU Rat readjusted himself slightly on his perch concealed on the roof of Konoha Hospital. For all that ANBU were considered the elite of the elite a fair portion of the time they were assigned more mundane duties like observing or guarding key personnel or structures around the village. It was a needed break from the assassinations and high stress assignments that comprised ANBU's missions outside the village but that didn't change the fact that in village assignments tended to be extremely boring.

Last week Rat had been one of the few ANBU assigned to observe the hospital. Even though it had been three weeks before the Chunnin exams the chain of command had been worried that even that early on enemy villages would start sending infiltrators if they had plans to do anything during the exam. Thus ANBU had been the deployed to keep an eye on the comings and goings of people in areas of strategic importance. Konoha Hospital just happened to be one such area.

Rat observed the pink haired girl in the park behind the hospital from where he was hidden. Every day he had been on duty had been the same. At roughly the same time each day the girl would come, spend two or three hours practicing some ninja skill or the other and then she would leave.

A less paranoid person would have thought it a strange quirk of a girl and not given it too much thought but ANBU were paranoid by both training and nature. Why did she always come to the same place? Why near the hospital? Was there a significance to the times she chose? Why would a Genin not choose to train at the training grounds like everyone else?

Rat had debated about whether to report it or not. On the one hand she could hardly be getting any sensitive information by spending time behind the hospital practicing jutsu every day. On the other they were supposed to report anything suspicious or out of the ordinary. Though probably ultimately harmless the pink haired girl's actions counted as both.

He would have to report it. The only problem now would be getting the girl's name so she could put it on his report. Rat tried not to feel too guilty knowing the kid would probably get dragged down to T&I and asked some pointed questions by some very scary people.

Rat felt a presence land next to him. Glancing over he saw it was Raven who was scheduled to relieve him.

"Isn't she a little young for you?" teased Raven as he saw the other operative looking at the pink headed girl who was now walking away.

"Just wondering who she is. She's been hanging around the hospital way too much and I'm going to have to report it. Pain in the ass I'm going to have to follow her around and find out who she is before I can write my report and finally get off duty."

"No need to do that, I know who she is. She's one of Hatake's brats," said Raven.

Rat looked at him in surprise. "She's a student of the Copy-Nin? Are you sure?"

"Hundred percent. I saw her in his team when they had me keeping track of the Kyuubi kid. Not too many kids with that color hair running around."

"Huh."

That was actually perfect. Rat had been feeling a little guilty about being the one who got the kid dragged off to T&I. Hatake had been an ANBU captain and he was sure he could take care of this. He just had to let the man know and he'd figure out if his student was doing anything seditious… or more likely she was just being a dumb kid and he would straighten her out real quick.

ANBU Rat wasn't the only one who had noticed Sakura's repeated visits. In fact there was another highly skilled man who had noticed Sakura's activities from the hospital windows almost from the very beginning.

"Oh thank you dear, that feels much better," said the elderly woman who had just had her sprained wrist healed by a skilled med nin.

"It's no problem at all Satsa-san. I'm just glad I could be of help," said the man with a friendly warm smile he always wore for his patients.

As the woman left the room the man glanced towards the window catching one last glimpse of the pink haired girl as she rounded a corner. He adjusted his glasses as he thought about the girl's strange behavior. It had been clear to him from the beginning that she was nervous about being noticed and possibly thought she was doing something wrong. A minor puzzle but he made it his job to be thorough so he had spent the effort to find out who she was.

Imagine his surprise when he learned she was the teammate of both the Kyuubi container and of the last Uchiha. His sharp mind wondered how he could use this. It seemed like she had something to hide. Perhaps he could use that to his advantage? And she was the teammate of those two and the student of the Copy-Nin. Maybe she had some interesting secrets of her own.

Suspicious visits to the hospital sounded so ominous in a report. There was nothing solid to go on but the man's instincts told him there was something there he could potentially use to his advantage. Opportunities tended to crop up in the oddest places.

And Yakushi Kabuto never missed an opportunity.

AN: The ten directions are something from Chinese martial arts. The ten directions are front, back, left, right, the four diagonals plus up and down. Kakashi is saying she needs to be able to Shunshin quickly in any direction without hand seals for it to be useful in battle.

Let me know what you think. Good, bad or ugly I'm willing to hear all of it. Hope you enjoyed. Thanks for reading!

Next Time: "Aiko-san," asked Kakashi, "do you have any idea why your daughter would have been spending time by the hospital?"

Look forward to it!