Isago left yesterday. Sasori's birthday had been two days before.
He's still so weak. All of his work and planning mean little when faced with his impending Academy enlistment. Speaking of which, he needs to talk to his guardians about registering for the Academy as soon as possible. He can't do anything if he doesn't become genin first, and that is impossible without joining the Academy and graduating. Sasori can no longer afford to take a back seat and expect to come out undamaged. The only way to keep himself together is to get strong enough to protect those that are precious to him.
"Starting today...the kid's gloves will have to come off." He says to no one particular in the empty quietness of his room from his position curled up on his futon. Sasori hasn't left his room for the past few days. While he's not self-destructive enough to refuse meals, he needs time to himself. Time to think and plan his next actions carefully because Sasori knows that he's maneuvering through a minefield at this point.
He has twenty-four hours in a day. Seven days a week. It is currently the eleventh of November. The spring registration for the Academy is the tenth of February, he has exactly ninety-one days to prepare and he's going to make the best of it.
As a child, he can probably get away with eight hours of sleep per day, that leaves him sixteen hours to do everything else. Sasori knows that he'll have to subtract time for meals, but he should still have about fourteen hours a day to work with. Fourteen hours of training sounds doable, he can balance the amount of theory work and physical training to make sure he doesn't collapse from exhaustion.
Which leaves him to assess his strengths and weaknesses, he's decent at fuinjutsu and has a lot of knowledge on the theory of puppets. He doesn't have any actual experience in wielding them or making them, but that can be easily remedied. Sasori can make explosive tags, scratch that, he's very good at making explosive tags. He can also make some barrier seals, storage seals, and a large variety of seal traps His chakra control is decent, but it can be so much better.
His physical attributes are completely shit.
No endurance or strength, his agility and speed are the only things he has going for him due to Harue-sensei's target practice sessions. He also has his flexibility and that's because he started doing stretches with help from Chiyo on a whim.
So what Sasori needs to fix are his stamina and speed, maybe he can get his great-uncle to teach him some kata. He'll have to multitask somewhere and he can probably fit in chakra control with exercising. Multitasking would be very helpful for when he has to control multiple puppets at once.
Sasori can go for a run in the morning after stretching and work on his chakra control as well as expanding his reserves by using up almost all of his chakra while running. It helps that using chakra to enhance his speed can make him more efficient at it. He'll eat breakfast once he gets back from exhausting his chakra reserves and then he'll spend the next few hours reading up on poisons, strategy, and whatever he can get his hands on that'll be useful. Perhaps there are some books in the Library on psychology? Somewhere during all that he'll take a break for lunch and then practice his fuinjutsu some, hopefully, there are books on it in the Library so he can learn to make more than just storage seals, explosive tags, and basic barriers.
He sighs, hugging his knees closer to his body,
"I'll have to convince Grandma or Jii-sama to teach me how to make chakra strings. Or...I can figure out how to do it myself."
Sasori has a few theories on how to make chakra strings and with his semi-sentient chakra, he's pretty sure he can do it.
"I just hope I don't burn out, that'll be a setback I don't have the time for."
And now? Now would be a great time to start, no time like the present. He pushes himself off his futon and shakily stands. A deep breath later, he ignores the disarray that he had left his room in and steps out into the hallway.
Almost immediately, he hears his grandmother conversing loudly with his great-uncle. Curious, he pads down the hallway closer to the sound of their voices. It makes his job easier, he had intended to find one of them to teach him Taijutsu.
"He's been like this for the past two days! Always in his room and refusing to come out." Chiyo's frantic voice echoes down the hall, "He won't tell me why he's like this."
Sasori winces, he doesn't like causing other people to worry about him. He'll have to make it up to his grandmother later. Despite how they disagree over certain matters, she still has his best interests at heart.
Ebizō's speaks slowly. "Perhaps...Sasori-kun has remembered something better left forgotten?"
"You don't mean...his parents?" Chiyo responds, horrified, "You don't mean to say he'll...revert back to how he was before his amnesia?"
Sasori decides to nip this unfortunate conversation at the bud and opens the door loudly,
"Grandma, Jii-sama, I need one of you to teach me taijutsu."
They both turn to him in surprise,
"Ah, so you have finally ventured out of your room at last, Sasori-kun"
"Sasori!" Chiyo hurries to embrace him, his eyebrow twitches at her loud tone but decides that it's no use trying to convince her to stop hugging him so much, "What happened? We were so worried!"
"Isago got deployed to the front with Konoha."
His grandmother pulls back to examine him with alarm,
"I...did not know you two were so close."
Isago had visited the Compound once or twice much to the joy of Chiyo because Sasori had finally made a friend. Other than that, they spent most of their rendezvous in Training Ground thirteen.
"He's my best friend."
Ebizō coughs, changing the topic to something less depressing,
"What is this about taijutsu? I thought I'd satisfied your incessant need to learn new techniques with chakra control exercises."
Sasori waves a flippant hand,
"I got those down after the first couple of days, give me more credit. Isago had been keeping me busy by dragging me around Suna so I didn't have time for learning anything new."
At the reminder of his friend's absence, Sasori's expression closes off a little,
"Which is why I want to learn taijutsu because I'm enrolling in the Academy come February."
"Well, I suppose we can have you start a little early, you'll just be ahead of your peers in the Academy. It doesn't hurt to be prepared." Ebizō considers his great nephew's request slowly.
Chiyo is less agreeable,
"Ebizō! He has years to prepare, he'll learn it along with his peers eventually anyway! He might even make some more friends while he's at it."
The "make those friends to replace Isago when he comes back in a scroll for corpses" isn't mentioned but it hangs heavy in the air. Sasori scowls, he's not going to the Academy to make friends, much less ones to replace Isago who will not be coming back dead, thank you very much. If he has his way, he'll graduate in less than a year. He needs to graduate in less than a year.
Ebizō gives him a knowing look.
"Ane-ue, Sasori-kun is a curious boy. It wouldn't hurt to start him on the basics, besides, he has nothing else to do all day."
Chiyo however, isn't one to go down without a fight,
"Sasori should be enjoying his childhood! He's five! He can spend more time out of the Compound getting to know more people his age!"
"Number one, human interaction is overrated. Number two, I hate the sun. Number three, everything else is boring anyway." Sasori interjects before the argument can escalate further.
Chiyo pins him with a look,
"Are you absolutely sure?"
He sighs tiredly, it's always like this,
"Yes, Grandma. You know I'm not normal by any means."
"If you are sure...then…" Chiyo trails off uncertainly.
Sasori knows that if he wants to convince her, now would be a good time to drive his final point home,
"If I'm stronger, I can survive better in the future."
"Sasori…" Chiyo tries to reason with him.
"It's fine, Grandma." He says, a lie to cover up his true intentions.
"Very well, we can start you on the standard taijutsu style Suna teaches." His great-uncle finishes the discussion, "You will start tomorrow."
Sasori beams,
"Yes, Jii-sama!"
Ebizō is the one that sighs this time,
"No need for formalities, Sasori-kun."
"Never!" He laughs, running out of the room to further his plans.
I refuse to be left behind.
"Patience, Sasori-kun," Ebizō admonishes, readjusting his footwork, "You will never get it right by rushing."
"Of course, Jii-sama." Sasori pants tiredly, they've been at this for two hours now and his limbs are shaking. The only reason why his great-uncle hasn't forced him to stop yet is probably due to Ebizō's curiosity of how determined he is.
He's very determined. As such, Sasori reaches for his chakra, circulating it through his body and hoping that it will do something about his fatigue. It doesn't quite understand what he's requesting, but tentatively augments his muscles for more strength.
Useful, but not what he wanted, being stronger does not get rid of the pain.
Fix me.
The chakra withdraws back to his core, confused, before reaching out again and trying to knit the tiny tears in his muscles back together. It finds that simply gluing the tears closed isn't permanent, so it simply hovers angrily, frustrated at being unable to complete his request. Then the chakra reaches for the muscle cells altering them and duplicating to fill in the spaces. It increases the number of fibers while making them thinner, pulling on the other parts of him for building materials.
Sasori stops his movement to stare at an arm while the skin writhes from the alterations happening within.
This was maybe a bad idea.
Still unfinished, the chakra sends him a request for more 'building materials' as taking more from him would do more harm than good.
What have I done?
"What's wrong, Sasori-kun?"
He looks up and smiles,
"Nothing, Jii-sama."
I'll feed you later.
The chakra gives a happy bounce.
He's hungry again, he's always hungry these days. Sasori sighs around a mouthful of food, it's not his fault really. Sure, maybe he shouldn't be using so much chakra so quickly and then force his body to pump out more, but it's not causing any problems so it's fine. He's not attempting forbidden jutsus either, the chakra he's using is spent on augmenting his speed when he goes out for his daily laps around the village.
And...when it decides to upgrade his body for random reasons.
Okay, fine. Sasori tripped off of a cliff from exhaustion, but it was a small cliff and his chakra fixed him up afterward so his torn clothes were the only issue. The fractures he got all over his body and the pain were quickly amended. He didn't ask for it to completely rework his bones, although the newfound durability is much appreciated.
He's fine.
Alright, I know this chapter is a bit late. I just arrived at camp yesterday and I'm posting this during my lunch break. I will try to post more chapters, but I will definitely not have any time to write any new ones.
I'll be back near the end of this month.
Meanwhile, cheers!
Mizu