Kakashi asks Iruka several questions to help him understand.
What is it like?
-Prologue-
"Iruka-sensei," Kakashi greeted, nearly giving the academy teacher a heart attack as he popped before him, upside down from a tree.
"Hatake-san! I would appreciate it if you would refrain from doing that again!" Iruka reprimanded after recovering slightly, his heart still pounding as he forced himself to relax his grip around the kunai in his fist.
"Good reflexes," Kakashi smiled, gesturing towards the kunai lodged firmly in the bark behind Kakashi's head. Iruka sighed in exasperation, thanking Kami-sama that none of his students were ever dumb enough to attempt what the jounin just did.
"What do you want?" Iruka asked, still prickly from being startled by the odd man before him.
"I would like to ask you for some help, Iruka-sensei," Kakashi said. Iruka waited for the man to continue, not knowing whether he shouldn't start planning an escape. "I hear that you are the best teacher at the academy, so I'd like to enlist your services to teach me a few things that I've been curious about."
"You?" Iruka asked disbelievingly, "But I'm a chuunin…"
"That is irrelevant," Kakashi said dismissively.
"Can't you just Sharingan someone?" Iruka asked reproachfully. It's not that he didn't want to help the jounin with whatever it was he had in mind. It's just that he was afraid for his life. The man didn't seem to have much of a grasp on other people's limits…or just sanity. Skill and power he had in abundance, but when it came down to being a normal human being, he seemed lacking – something that Iruka actually found attractive. But from far. Very, very far.
Kakashi's soft chuckle sent a shiver down the chuunin's spine, and he didn't know if it was from arousal or straight out fear. The man was attractive…in that can't-see-his-face kind of way, but if these 'things' that he needed help with was something that even somebody like Kakashi couldn't handle, Iruka highly doubted that he'd be able to.
"I've tried the Sharingan. It doesn't work," Kakashi said. Iruka sighed and considered whether he shouldn't just run away screaming. Then he remembered that he was dealing with Kakashi. Running would just be incredibly stupid and entirely pointless.
"Are you afraid of me?" Kakashi asked, noticing the nervous tension in the chuunin's body.
"No. I'm afraid of what you are capable of asking, and what I am incapable of doing," Iruka answered, hugging his arms around himself protectively as he glared reproachfully at the jounin still hanging upside down from the tree. The unmasked eye curved softly, a sign that the man was genuinely smiling.
"Don't worry, Iruka-kun. It's nothing dangerous," he said cheerfully.
"What's dangerous for me is probably just a one-against-fifty fight to you," muttered Iruka.
"Fighting one against fifty is dangerous for me too," Kakashi said, an amused tone registering in his voice.
"Now I know you're lying," Iruka grimaced before he sighed at the gentle laughter coming from the older, and also upside down man, "Alright, what is it?"
"Well, it recently occurred to me that there are a few things hindering me from being a fully capable shinobi, especially in terms of stealth, disguise and behavior," said Kakashi, finally dropping from the tree and landing gracefully on his feet before Iruka, "I am incapable of efficiently judging situations and possible reactions from an enemy because I have a very low understanding of human nature," he continued, walking towards the apartment district where Iruka lived as the teacher silently followed.
"You want me to teach you about human nature?" Iruka asked after the jounin paused expectantly.
"Pretty much," said Kakashi, "See? It's not dangerous."
"How would you propose I go about doing this? I teach ten year olds how to throw kunai and disguise themselves as wooden fences and rocks…not the philosophy behind human behaviorism," Iruka said doubtfully.
"You've had a…relatively normal life," Kakashi said carefully, "And you are good with people. You've experienced the sorts of things that make people what they are, and you understand what it is that turn people into who they become…I…also wish to understand…," he said, uncertain about how to word it.
"Even so, I have no idea how I'm supposed to teach this to you. I only understand any of it because of experience," Iruka said.
"I'm aware of this, and that is why I've come up with a system that should be effective in teaching me the gist of human behavior in a way that would be suitable for you," said Kakashi, sounding like he was shrugging, which he then did.
"Pray tell," Iruka said, mentally plotting a rout for escape in case any of the jounin's plans involved dissection.
"I'm going to ask you a series of questions, and I'd appreciate it if you could answer them to the best of your knowledge, experience and abilities. You can set up exercises, homework, or even field trips. It shouldn't be too different from what you do at the academy," Kakashi said, his head tilted very slightly to one side, as if he were silently saying 'would you please?'
Iruka suspected that the man knew exactly the effect that little head tilt would have on a teacher who dealt with small children daily. And he claims to not understand human nature, indeed!