7. Rasengan

Upon returning from Tsurui, Kakashi's relationship with Aki probably looked the same as it did before their mission. If Kakashi were to list improvements between them, he likely couldn't name any. They still bickered. She still questioned him at every turn, but there was definitely something different between them. It wasn't closeness. Even respect seemed too flattering, but perhaps there was an understanding. They both knew there was something more in the other than was immediately apparent. It wasn't a typical dynamic, but Kakashi had never had normal relationships and he imagined she hadn't either. It was enough for them.

Similar to the way they fought before, Aki still came at Kakashi as if she were ready to kill him. If anything, she fought with less restraint knowing that he could defend himself, and she yelled at him more often for holding back. They went home sore and sweaty every evening, but it at least culminated in some improvements on her part. If he were honest, he had improved a bit too.

Two months had now passed with only one left to their trial period. He never mentioned it, and he wondered if she even remembered agreeing to it. Truth be told, he still wasn't sure if she would stay with him at the end of the three months, for she still surprised him on a daily basis with her odd opinions and volatile temper, and as he considered the tedious stress of his life in recent days, he wasn't sure if he wanted her to. She was a lot of work, after all.

If there were anything he could pride her in, it was that she was not a lazy student. Though she frequently defied him and ignored his advice, she tried everything at least once (or five times) to find the tricks that worked best for her. Luckily, she took to most things he showed her with relative ease and was fast to incorporate them in their sparring. Other jonin leaders probably had it harder in that regard.

It was late July when he discovered something she did not take to quickly. He would look back on it later on occasion with mixed feelings.

She was furious already when he arrived at the training grounds that day. He smiled as she seethed on large rock in the middle of the field.

"An hour late!" she snapped.

"Ah, sorry, sorry. There was a mishap with my toilet," he said, rubbing at his neck.

"Gross, I don't want to hear that shit!"

"Hey, watch your mouth."

"I'll watch it when you show up on time."

He found he couldn't argue with that. Sighing, he pulled out a small clear balloon from his pocket. She eyed it warily as he stretched it and pulled out a bottle of water to fill the balloon.

"I thought we'd switch it up today. I want to teach you an advanced technique," he said. She frowned as she accepted the balloon, now filled with water.

"Does it involve hitting you with this?"

"Maybe later. Today, you should just focus on moving the water."

She shook the balloon violently and handed it back to him with defiance. He scowled.

"No, you smart ass." Snatching it back from her, he held it out in his palm. She arched a brow as he focused his chakra entirely on the balloon. The water began to spin.

"The purpose of this exercise is to feel the movement of the water in the balloon." Her eyes were glued to the sloshing of the water. "In order to perform this jutsu, you'll need to have precise control over your chakra, rotating it in multiple directions at once. And then-"

She gasped as the balloon exploded, spraying them both with water.

"Once you can do this, we can move onto the next step," he concluded, pulling another balloon from his pocket. She had the decency to look surprised.

After he filled and handed off the second balloon, Aki was unusually quiet. Standing in the field with the balloon in hand, she focused entirely on her task, leaving Kakashi to do whatever he wanted. He chose to take her place on the rock with his well-worn copy of Icha Icha Paradise. Only the chirping of birds and the occasional grunt of frustration could be heard.

Hours passed, and the sun shifted over the field to high noon. Kakashi shut his book at the growling of his stomach. Aki still stood at the edge of the field, balloon in hand. Her forehead was coated in sweat.

"Take a break! Let's eat!" he shouted.

For a moment, she ignored him. Kakashi sighed as he watched her continue to spin the water in the balloon. He was about to shout again when she gasped and spun around. A victorious grin split across her face as she held out the balloon.

"Hah!" she cried, and chakra shot to her hand. The balloon exploded in a burst, spraying her face with water. Kakashi applauded as she posed triumphantly.

"What do you think of that!" she shouted.

"That was pretty fast," he acknowledged, standing. "Let's eat and then I'll show you the next step." She scowled as she joined him.

"You haven't done anything to earn lunch," she said.

"I worked up a bit of a sweat showing you the balloon trick." He wiggled his arm as if it were sore. She rolled her eyes and sat down in the grass with her bento, pointedly ignoring him. Kakashi did the same.

In the two months that they'd been a team, their eating habits had taken on a strange but easy routine. At the beginning, she'd been irked and bothered by his mask and had gone to great lengths to catch him eating without it. After several weeks of failed attempts, she had given up. Now, she ate with her head down, quick and silent. Kakashi appreciated the peace.

He was still fascinated by what she ate. As a ward of the Hokage, he had expected some beautiful and elaborate bentos, but she hadn't brought anything more extravagant than a croquette. The box itself was plain, and everything in it had a humble handmade feel, leading him to the conclusion that she prepared her meals herself.

"Where'd you learn how to cook?" he asked curiously. Aki's shoulders jerked with surprise as she looked up, mouth full of food. She swallowed it with what looked like a moderate amount of pain.

"What's it to you?" she sputtered.

"I'm just curious. You live alone, right?"

"Yeah, so?" He rolled his eyes.

"I'm not trying to pry. I had to learn how to cook for myself as a kid too. You have a book or something?" She looked slightly embarrassed and picked at her rolled omelette.

"Sandaime-sama's cook taught me," she said stiffly. Kakashi nodded.

"I see. That's good. I had to learn from a book." She shot him a narrow, wary glance.

"You lived alone?" Kakashi nodded thoughtfully, looking up at the sky.

"Both of my parents died before I graduated from the academy, so I had to learn how to cook and all that on my own." He looked down and saw her face was slightly flushed. He frowned. "What's wrong?" She shook her head and shoved the omelette in her mouth, avoiding his gaze. He watched her for a moment before turning back to the sky. She finished her lunch in silence.

Her last odd eating habit was her post-meal ritual. While she didn't seem to eat with any relish or pleasure, Aki always finished her meal down to the last grain of rice. After eating every bite, she wiped her bento clean with a small napkin and packed it away neatly with a handkerchief. For someone who clearly didn't care about the tidiness of her appearance, it was an unusual detail to care about.

"Okay, let's go! Next step!" she demanded, jumping to her feet. Kakashi sighed and stood, following her back to her spot under the tree she seemed to favor. He reached into his pocket and produced a rubber ball. She scowled as he held it out as he did the water balloon.

"Is this a real jutsu or are you messing with me?" she asked.

"It's real. Just follow me on this." Kakashi held it out and focused his chakra. The stiff rubber surface began to undulate as his chakra spun.

And then chakra focused in his other hand. In a series of lightning fast jabs, he pushed a surge of chakra into the spinning ball. Aki yelped as the rubber split and exploded. She gaped as the sound echoed through the field.

"Awesome," she breathed, face stretching into a grin. Kakashi pulled another ball from his pocket and handed it to her.

"Have at it." She snatched it eagerly and turned away, absorbed in the new trick. Instead of returning to the rock, Kakashi leaned against the opposite side of the tree as Aki dove into the second step.

The Rasengan was a challenging jutsu, even for experienced shinobi. It had taken Kakashi himself months to grasp the three steps, and even when he'd been able to manifest it, it'd transformed from his Lightning affinity into something else entirely, the Chidori. Minato had been unable to combine his Wind affinity with the Rasengan before he died, and he was a god among men. Aki's affinity was something he'd never seen before and he could not guess how it would affect her interpretation.

When she threw the ball hard at the back of his head an hour later, he reminded himself that she would have to get past the second step before he started thinking about Wood Rasengan.

"Kakashi!" she barked. "This ball is rigged!" Kakashi sighed, rubbing at the back of his head as he picked the ball up from the ground.

"It's not rigged. You're just not doing it right." Her dislike of his response was blatant.

"I did it exactly like you showed me!"

"Not exactly. You're rushing it." Kakashi held out the ball and started swirling his chakra within it again. Slowly, he brought chakra to his other hand. "The speed is something you'll need in battle, but you're just practicing right now. Take your time." He slowly pushed the chakra into the swirling ball and then repeated the movement at a steady pace. "See? You're not going to achieve that speed right away. Practice the control first and the speed will come after."

Aki gritted her teeth and brought her chakra to the ball again. Her forehead was coated in sweat, and he could see she had already expended much of her chakra. He wasn't sure which exhausted her more, the control or the patience. Her hands moved shakily as she pressed chakra into the swirling ball again and again, and he realized another problem.

"You've lost focus on the ball. You're not retaining the chakra there, so your additive movements aren't building it up," he pointed out.

She was furious with herself. Her hand was beginning to flail again as she lost her patience. More chakra was spilling from the ball, which she realized with a shout of frustration. Kakashi felt a huge surge of chakra from her moving hand as she desperately tried to push energy into the ball.

"Aki, relax."

She didn't hear him. There was an expression in her eyes he had never seen on her before. Her hands moved again, more frantic than before. She thrust another massive amount of chakra into the ball, but it proved too much for her. The spinning chakra released in a burst of energy. Kakashi winced and braced himself, but it hit her hard and sent her flying back. A few meters away, she landed on her back with a painful thud, the ball landing and rolling where she'd left. Struggling up to her feet, he saw her teeth grinding with exhaustion. He caught her by the arm before she could try again. Even her massive chakra store had a limit.

"That's enough. Let's try again another day."

Her mouth pulled wide, eyes glaring at her hands. Her shoulders trembled angrily as she struggled to accept her failure. He imagined that it was the first time she had been unable to accomplish a technique with relative ease.

"What am I missing?"

"You're not missing anything. It's a difficult technique, even for the most powerful shinobi. Even the Fourth Hokage was unable to master it completely," he said. She glared.

"Don't lie."

"I'm not lying. Who do you think I learned it from?"

Her mouth pulled into a straight line as she stared up at him. She seemed to be scanning over him again, assessing this new information. He wondered if he should have told her that from the beginning. Perhaps she would have respected him a bit more. It was odd that she revered the Hokage title but nothing beneath it, though he supposed her heritage contributed to the quiet respect.

"The Yondaime was your teacher," she realized aloud. To his surprise, her eyes narrowed. "If the Fourth Hokage wasn't even able to do it, why would you try to teach me?" He raised his brows.

"Are you saying you're not up to the challenge? I thought you wanted to be taken seriously." She growled, and he sighed. "Look, I wouldn't have taught you if I thought you couldn't do it, but it's not a technique you can learn overnight. You'll have to keep working at it."

"How long did it take you?"

"Nearly a year. Mine didn't come naturally either, and it ended up turning into a different technique because of my Lightning affinity. Don't rush through your jutsu practice just because you're not getting the exact results you're expecting. If you take your time to really understand it, you may surprise yourself."

"Can I see your alternative technique?"

"Maybe I'll show you another day," said Kakashi. Truth be told, he hadn't used the Chidori since Rin had died, and he certainly didn't want Aki to ever see it.

As she brushed herself off, Kakashi moved back and picked up the rubber ball from the ground. It was the same kind of ball Minato had used to teach him the Rasengan. The hard rubber in his hand brought back memories of the frustration he'd also felt in those first days. A year of training on one technique had seemed like an eternity to him back then. It only now felt like time was moving again.

He glanced back at his student. She'd caught her breath and was making her way to him. She winced a little, more from wounded pride than anything physical. Kakashi almost smiled. She didn't hide the frustration from her face.

"Be patient. It's a challenging jutsu, but it'll come with time."

"In a year?"

"Maybe. You accomplished much more today than I thought you would, so maybe less than that."

She nodded and seemed to accept this. He pocketed the ball.

"I can't keep it?" she asked.

"Knowing you, you'll try it out at home and blow up the entire building, so no, I think I'll hold onto it for now."

Her face twitched, and he realized she was trying figure out if she should scowl or smirk. He snorted under his breath and started back towards their things.

"Let's call it a day. Get some sleep and we'll pick it back up tomorrow."

For once, she didn't fight him. Her movements were sluggish as she picked up her bento, eyes in a daze. She had certainly given the day her all. He didn't offer to help her home as Minato had for Kakashi, but he imagined if he did, she'd reject the offer just as he had turned Minato away. They parted in the middle of the village as they always did, though he lingered a bit and glanced back to make sure her gait was steady. As he walked home, he thought about Aki cooking in her apartment alone, using the recipes the Hokage's cook had taught her.

He looked up into the sky. August, the hottest month of the year in Konoha, was in full swing. Summer wasn't over yet, but soon, the forests the First Hokage had grown through the Land of Fire would shift from green to yellow. When autumn came, his agreement with Aki would be over, and he still could not be sure how it would conclude.