The council literally wouldn't allow Gaara to be trained in the village by me as he could prove to be a 'highly unstable disaster zone'. They were probably thinking about me more than Gaara for once judging from that description. All the same Takeo and I had to walk for about two days to reach a suitable oasis. Gaara didn't seem to mind the long walk. If anything, he seemed to enjoy not being glared at for days on end. Takeo on the other hand had not fared so well.
Takeo has always pretended to be tougher than he really is, but he had been acting like a bit of a wuss for the whole trip. All of those years stuck in an office must have gone to his head. He usually can't travel anywhere without a caravan thanks to his status now. He could barely stop himself from whining the second he left the village. You'd think it would be overly obvious that the sandstorms would get nasty or that sand was likely to scrape your feet if you walk in the desert for long periods of time. I can't think of anyone who wouldn't have laughed if they had seen Gaara trying to get Takeo to cheer up. The only crazier moment of the journey was when a scorpion crawled onto Takeo's foot. Thankfully it didn't sting him, but I think that was because his high pitched scream scared it off. At first Takeo had wanted to help me train Gaara, but it sure didn't take him long to leave after I told him I'd rather do it alone.
I already had all of the provisions I would need for a long while, so Takeo probably thinks I asked him to leave since he wasn't needed to help gather resources and he obviously wasn't getting anywhere with Gaara. He'd have a heart attack if I told him the real reason why I told him to go. After Gaara and I finished setting up camp, that reason finally arrived. Who ever thought Sasori would ever be late to anything?
After he prepares his own supplies (you would have thought he had stuffed his whole workshop under his cloak), Sasori finally explains his delay. "I got a new partner a few weeks ago. Nobody was sad to see the old one go, but this blonde brat is an ignorant blabbermouth!" I take it Sasori needs to learn a bit of control of his own. It's not like him to get quite so miffed, so his new partner must be another crazy one.
Next, I tell Gaara exactly how we will be training for the next few weeks. Our main goals are for Gaara to learn how to control his chakra and his emotions more efficiently. Chakra control should be the easy part. Sasori has to use his chakra very precisely thanks to his puppets and he's been using those since he was little. I think he might have actually been about the same age Gaara is now. What's even better is that Sasori said that Gaara won't need to have such sharpened skills to control his sand. Since the medium his chakra will be going into is highly maneuverable, Gaara only needs to know how to move sand in relatively undefined ways. He shouldn't need to form his sand into specific shapes for a while and by then he should have much better chakra control.
Gaara's emotional control is the more pressing and difficult issue. Takeo and I have both noticed that Shukaku gains more influence when Gaara gets upset. Getting Gaara to stay calm should make suppressing Shukaku's chakra much easier. The problem is that Gaara is extremely sensitive. A village full of hostile people will take him ages to adapt to completely. The villagers don't appear to be changing their attitudes in the least, so Sasori and I will have to teach Gaara a few methods to help him stay calm. Sasori, Takeo, and I all tend to be calm in battle, but none of us has much control once we get really mad. Hopefully Gaara has better luck there than we do.
Sasori and I agree that Gaara's chakra control should be dealt with first, so we decide to demonstrate our own in a sparing match. It has been years since I've been in a real fight, but I van still use wind jutsu pretty well. Sasori on the other hand seems to have learned a few new tricks. Not only can't I recognize many of his puppets, but his taijutsu has improved. That used to be his weakest point, but now he has managed to land a few quick blows on me.
Neither of us got very serious and the fight only lasted about five minutes, but Sasori and I still end up getting pretty sweaty. I had almost forgotten how exhausting it could get to spar with anyone. After we catch our breath, Sasori and I let Gaara show us what he can do with his sand. He's not even close to as quick as Takeo is with his gold dust, but he's still not half bad speed wise. His main problem is that he can't use much sand at once without it becoming hard to control. In fact, he can't even manipulate a mass of sand half his size all that well.
Sasori then demonstrates to Gaara exactly how he works his puppets. He pulls out one of his simpler ones and channels his chakra until it forms thin strings that can successfully move the puppet. He flexes the puppet's limbs for a moment, before he really kicks things up a notch. With a few quick twitches of his fingers, Sasori has the puppet rapidly fire off about a dozen of his weapons to land in a perfect circle around him. What a show off.
After that performance, Sasori tells Gaara to try moving a chunk of sand about his size all the way across the oasis without having it touch the ground. I can tell this is going to take a while. As soon as Gaara lets even a tiny grain of sand touch the ground, Sasori has him start over again. Gaara manages to get the sand a little further each time, but I can tell he's getting exhausted. It takes him about two hours to complete his task and by then he's pouring sweat and gasping for breath. And yet Sasori wonders why he never actually had any official students.
For the second portion of the day's training, Sasori and I teach Gaara various ways to manage his emotions. First we teach him how to meditate which should help him get himself at peace with his life. Then we teach him deep breathing exercises to help him calm down quicker. To get him to never give up on himself we have him look at his reflection in the pool of water towards the center of the oasis and say five good things about himself. The last thing we do is have Gaara draw us a picture of what he wants to happen thanks to his hard work. Even Sasori has to wipe a little tear out of his eye once he sees the picture- a little group sketch of Takeo, Sasori, me, Gaara's new cat, and all of my kids as one big happy family.
With that done, Sasori and I take shifts watching Gaara as the night goes on. Every day we will go through a similar routine. After breakfast, Gaara will work on chakra control with a new task to do every day. He'll have to learn how to use his sand in any way we can think of. Some of the tasks we have in mind include molding the sand into specific shapes, hitting targets with it, and even getting the sand to carry Gaara. After Gaara is successful, we'll eat lunch. Then we will go through similar emotional training exercises with a few added in if we can think of any other ones. After that we'll just have dinner and relaxing left. These next few weeks will be tiring for all three of us, but I am sure they will be worth it.