Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

Inner Sakura talking

Sakura talking to inner

Jounin Battle and Training

"It's over." Kakashis' voice cut through the tension in the air, so thick you could almost touch it. Naruto immediately started to cheer, but Sakura kept her eyes locked on Zabuzas' frame, her instincts, aswell as her knowledge of mist ninjas' methods, screaming at her that something else was going to happen.

"He he he. You don't get it do you?" She could see Kakashi tense at the missing nins' words and laughter. "There is no way you can defeat me with your monkey-like imitations. Hehe, but that was impressive of you. At that time you had already copied my water clone jutsu, you had your clone say those words to attract my attention, while the real you stayed in the mist and watched. Nice plan. But, I'm also not that easy!"

Suddenly he was behind Kakashi, the person that he had been holding a kunai to the throat of turning out to be yet another clone. Zabuza swung his sword, but Kakashi managed to crouch in time for it to just go over his head, before the mist nin kicked the other man, sending him flying into the lake.

Sakura watched the jounin struggle to get up and out of the water. It seemed as though he was having much nore trouble than he should have...almost like the water itself was trying to keep him down.

"Hehe, fool." Zabuza appeared behing Kakashi once again. "Water Prison no Jutsu!"

The water around Kakashi rose up, trapping him within a large globe, Sakuras' eyes widened and she immediately started to strategise as to how to get him out. She recognised the jutsu and knew that Kakashi was unlikely to be able to get out of it on his own, but to get him out they would need to get Zabuza to take his left arm out of the water since that was what was sustaining the jutsu.

"Now Kakashi, we can finish things later. First I'll take care of them. Water Clone no Jutsu. Hehe, wearing those headbands and acting like ninjas, a real ninja is someone who has survived numerous brushes with death. Only when your good enough to be listed in my handbook can you call yourself real ninja. Your not ninja."

From within the water prison Kakashi began to yell. "Just take Tazuna and run! You have no chance of beating him. As long as he's keeping me trapped in this prison he can't move! The water clone can't go very far from his body, just run away now!"

Zabuzas' clone disappeared as his real body laughed. It reappeared infront of Naruto, sending a kick towards his chest. Moving as fast as she possibly could Sakura managed to catch it in time and, using her chakra enhanced strength flung him backwards towards the lake, although he managed to flip over in time to land neatly on the surface.

"Kakashi-sensei, while I appreciate the sentiment, do you really think he would let us get away? While the clone can't go too far, he's still faster than us, so running away would be pointless. Our only chance to get away from him is to make him let you out of your prison. Wouldn't you agree boys?"

As she said that she glanced at each of them, letting them know she had a plan and with a few small gestures that to anyone who didn't know her well wouldn't pay any attention to telling them what it was. In return she got a smirk from Sasuke and a 'yes Sakura-chan!' from Naruto. She smiled.

"Tazuna-san, could you please stand back for a little while?" The man made a slight grunt of acknowledgement and she heard his footsteps moving backwards.

"Hehe, trying to be brave little girly? Still playing ninja? It's not going to work you know." Zabuza's clone ran forward, his sword in his hand, either missing or ignoring Sakuras' smirk and clenched fist. For him that was a big mistake.

Sakura counted down the metres as he came closer. 10...8...6...4...NOW. She slammed her fist, with as much chakra as she could spare into the ground infront of her, directing it so neither her boys or Tazuna would experience more than a medium quake. The ground cracked apart, leaving a huge fissure and creating a large wave on the lake. The clone was on the ground, covered in scratches and half buried by rock, obviously not having expected Sakura to possess such strength, but after only a moment he got up again. At the same moment the two boys ran forward, Naruto creating a huge amount of shadow clones that surrounded the mising-nin, while Sasuke pelted him with kunai and shuuriken.

Naturally Zabuza managed to dodge the weapons and defeat the clones relatively easily, but that was what they had been betting on, so it didn't really damage their plans...although it might have damaged the boys pride a little at how easy it was for him. He slammed the end of his sword into what appeared to be the real Naruto, sending him flying backwards. As he soared through the air he threw a demon shuuriken, which was several times bigger than a normal one to Sasuke, who caught it and jumped into the air, throwing the shuuriken towards the clone, who, from Sasukes angle was in line with the real thing.

"Hehe, a shuuriken won't work against me!" The clone appeared surprised when the shuuriken flew by the clone harmlessly. "But, I see your aiming for the real me. That's not going to work!"

He caught the shuuriken in his free hand, before his eyes widened as he realised ther was another on hidden in the shadow of the first. Zabuza attempted to jump up so it would fly under him, but found his legs stuck in one of Sakuras' water jutsus, preventing him from moving his legs. As he realised this he ducked instead and the shuuriken went overtop of him. While that would have put him out of danger the genin had one last trick up their sleaves. Just as Zabuza started laughing the second shuuriken was surrounded by a cloud of smoke and transformed back into the real Naruto, who threw a kunai at the mist nin from behind. In order to dodge it Zabuza had to take his arm out of the water prison which he did, negating the jutsu and freeing Kakashi.

Sakura allowed herself a little smirk. "Got you." she whispered. Then her eyes went wide as she realised what Zabuza was about to do. Enraged by what had just happened the nin was going to throw the shuuriken he had caught at Naruto, and considering Narutos' skill level he wouldn't be able to dodge.

Thankfully her worries were for nothing as before he got the chance to send it flying a dripping wet, and looking seriously angry, Kakashi blocked him. She winced, yes it stopped him, but surely there were easier ways to have stopped that strike, and ways that wouldn't have involved him cutting his hand. Sakura was going to have enough to heal between the lot of them and she wasn't particularly happy about him adding unnecessary injuries to the stilll-growing list.

"Great plan you three, you really have grown up."

"Hehe, I got distracted and released the jutsu." All three genin glared at him, as if.

"Wrong! You didn't just release it. You were forced to release it. I'll tell you I don't fall for the same jutsu twice. What will you do?"

Neither nin did anything for a moment, but the at the same time they jumped apart in opposite directions and slamming their hands together in the same seal.

Realising that they were most likely doing some sort of water jutsu, and that Naruto was still lying in the water, Sakura quickly ran forward, staying out of the adult ninjas line of sight as she waded into the water. They were still making seals, the same ones at the same time. Naruto didn't seem to be aware of the danger he was in and was instead watching the two with intrest...or he was until Sakura grabbed him by the back of his jumpsuit, put her hand over his mouth to stop him from drawing attention to them and started dragging him backwards as fast as she could.

She just managed to get the two of them out of the lake when two voices rang out.

"Water Dragon no Jutsu!"

Out of the water two dragons rose, one by each of the ninjas' feet, and hurled towards eachother clashing in the middle and destroying them both. The water dropped causing a huge wave outwards that soaked all three genin aswell as Tazuna. In the middle of the lake Kakashi blocked Zabuzas' sword with his kunai, and they were both pushed backwards before they both started makings the same seals for a jutsu once again, but this time instead of releasing the jutsu at the same time Kakashi released his jutsu before Zabuza had the chance.

The resulting explosion of water caught Zabuza up slamming him into a large tree. That was when Sakura felt the other chakra move and three senbon buried themselves in Zabuzas' neck, seemingly killing him.

"Hehe, your right, he's dead." The others directed their attention towards the tree where a person who seemed to be about the boys age sat wearing a white mask with a swirl on it. Sakura however kept her eyes fixed on Zabuza. Something was wrong with what just happened, a senbon wasn't able to kill a person unless it pierced one of a small amount of organs in the body, the exception to that being poison, but he 'died' to fast for it to have been that, there wasn't any time for it to get into the blood stream.

Kakashi quickly checked Zabuzas' pulse before confirming that he was dead. Her eyes narrowed. That was next to impossible, so what exactly did the boy do?

"Thank you very much." The boy said, bowing slightly from his perch on the tree branch. "I have been searching for the opportunity to kill Zabuza for a long time."

"That mask...your a hunter-nin."

He inclined his head towards Kakashi. "Impressive, you are correct."

"Eh, hunter-nin?" Sakura closed her eyes and sighed. Honestly did Naruto pay attention to anything in the academy, she hadn't been but she was sure that would have come up in the ciriculum.

The boy replied anyway. "Yes. It is my duty to hunt down missing-nin. I'm a part of the mists hunter-nin team."

"WHAT THE HELL! WHO ARE YOU?!"

"Don't worry Naruto, he's not our enemy."

I wouldn't be so sure of that Kakashi, don't judge the guy just yet.

You do realise that he can't hear you inner?

What's your point?

Sigh

"I'M NOT ASKING THAT! That Zabuza...THAT Zabuza was KILLED! A guy that strong...was killed by a KID! A kid not much different from ME! We look stupid! HOW CAN I UNDERSTAND THAT?!"

"Well...I know how you feel." Kakashi stated consolingly as he walked up to them and ruffled Narutos' hair. "But that's reality. In this world there exist kids that are younger than you, but stronger than me...Sakuras' getting rather close to that standard herself if you paid attention."

All three genin paused at his roundabout compliment to Sakuras' skills.

"Um...Thanks I guess. But I don't think I'm as good as your suggesting...Why are you two agreeing with him?" The last statement was made to her two teammates both of whom had started nodding.

Just then their attention was redirected to the 'hunter-nin' who teleported himself to the ground next to Zabuza.

"Your battle is now over. I must now dispose of this body since it hides many secrets. Farewell." And then he made a seal and disappeared.

"Eh! He's gone!"

Really? I didn't notice.

No need to be mean.

Kakashi sighed and turned back to them, pulling his hitai-ite back over his sharingan eye as he did so.

"Haa, now we have to get Tazuna-san back home. Lets go."

The man in question started thanking them profusely and offering them a room in his home to rest in. Before they could start walking however Kakashi fell forward in a dead faint.

"EH! Kakashi-sensei what's wrong?! Are you okay?! Is there any-"

"Calm down Naruto, he's probably just exhausted. It was afterall a hard fight." Sakura walked over to their unconcious sensei and used her chakra-enhanced strength to lift him. "He should be alright after a bit of rest. Lets get going now kay?"

"Okay Sakura-chan."

It was two days before Kakashi woke were at Tazunas' house in the town, Sakura having carried the unconcious jounin the whole way. Despite having woken up however he was definately not fully healed, and probably wouldn't be able to move without assistance for four days mininum. Currently they were sitting in one of the rooms talking about what was going to happen next.

"Well we defeated that strong of a ninja this time, we should be safe for a while." Tazuna stated.

"Who was that masked kid though?"

Kakashi sighed slightly and began to explain. "That's the mask worn by the Hidden Mist hunter-nin assasination team. They are also known as Body Erasers. Their duty is to completely destroy the body without a trace. A ninjas' body has within it secrets of the villages ninjutsu, information on chakra types, herbs, and other things that will reveal information about the village. For example if I dies the secrets of the sharingan could be revealed. You have to be careful that other villages won't steal your jutsu. A ninjas' body can reveal important information. So, by killing and disposing of missing-nin that have abandoned their village, the hunter-nins are preventing the leakage of this information. They are specialists who guard the villages' secrets."

"But that boy wasn't a hunter-nin was he? If he was he wouldn't have aimed for Zabuzas' neck, and the points he hit were such that he would be put into a state of temporary death." Everyone jerked around to look at Sakura.

"Correct. Body Erasers generally dispose of the body right there. He took the body with him, and combined with what Sakura just said about the points that were hit - and I'm going to trust her on that since her medical knowledge is much better than mine - it's almost certain that Zabuza is alive." Ignoring the way some people (Naruto and Tazuna) were freaking out he continued. "And since it's likely that he will try again you three need to recieve training. But obviously this is just training until I get better, you guys aren't going to be able to kill him without me."

"If Zabuzas' alive he could attack us at any moment. We need to protect Tazuna instead of training." Sasuke stated bluntly.

"Not quite Sasuke, after being put into a temporary death state it should take a while to recover. Sakura, since you know the most about this topic would you mind giving us an estimate?"

The girl in question nodded. "Well the temporary death, combined with the injuries and chakra exhaustion he recieved from his fight with Kakashi...normally I would say that it would take between a week and ten days, but the boy who saved him obviously knows how things effect the body and probably knows what herbs to use to spped up his recovery, and those herb are quite common around here. Also considering the part of Zabuzas' personality I've seen he isn't likely to want to stay in bed for that long. So most likely we have between four days minimum, a week at the most."

"Good, that gives us a bit of time to work with."

And that was how half an hour later they found themselves standing in the middle of a forest where the training was going to occur. Kakashi stood infront of the other three leaning on the crutches that Tsunami, Tazunas' daughter, had found for him.

"Okay, now we will start the training. But before that I want to talk about the shinobi ability, chakra."

"What's chakra?" Naruto just had to ask, resulting in him having a lump on his head and a quick lecture from Sakura about the importance of listning along with a explanation on what chakra was.

"Um, I didn't exactly understand that complicated explanation," Sakura let out a heavy sigh, "but isn't it something you learn with your body?"

"The dobe is right, we can already use jutsu."

"Nope!" Sakura was getting the feeling that Kakashi was enjoying this. "You boys aren't using chakra properly."

"WHAT!" Naruto recieved another lump on his head. Briefly he wondered when his teammate had gotten so violent.

"Well...to put it simply, you boys are not using it effectively. Even if you are able to release a high amount of chakra if you can't control it properly then it will result in the jutsu being weak or not work at all. And by wasting energy you won't be able to fight as long or as hard. This is a weakness. So I'm going to teach you to control it. Through very thorough training."

"What are we doing?" The Uchiha asked in a bored tone, obviously thinking this would be a waste of time.

"Hmm? Climbing trees!"

"CLIMBING TREES!"

"Yup! But this isn't normal tree climbing, you'll do it without using your hands. Sakura would you demonstrate?"

The pinkette smiled and walked over to the closest tree before climbing it with ease. When she got to one of the middle branches she walked along it upsidedown before flipping off it and landing beside her teammates who had both been paying close attention.

"You understand now? Gather chakra in the bottom of your feet and start climbing. This is something that needs you to be able to use chakra well. Now listen closely. The main point of this training is first to teach you to control chakra, to bring the proper amount to the proper area. As I said earlier this is an important aspect of using jutsu, this is something even skilled ninja have trouble with. The amount of chakra must be exact, to little and you won't stick to the tree, too much and you'll be forced away from it. And since the feet are said to be the most difficult part of the body to mold chakra in, theoretically if you master this you should be able to perform any jutsu. The second thing is to develop the stamina needed to control chakra properly. Depending on the jutsu, doing so can be very difficult. And a ninja will usually be gathering chakra during battle and moving, making control even more difficult. Well me talking all day isn't going to accomplish anything, this is something you need to learn through action."

He threw a kunai infront of each of the boys. "Use these to mark how high up you get. Then try to get higher than that mark the next time. You boys won't be good enough to just walk up the tree at first so try running at it to gain some momentum. Got it?"

"This training is nothing to me! I could do it before breakfast!"

Will he even deflate that ego?

It is possible inner, we did it on our first try.

So? Neither of them will, they don't have enough patience or attention to detail. On the plus side it might deflate those egos, a little bit at least.

"Why don't you stop bragging and go pick a tree."

As the boys did as they were told Sakura looked at Kakashi.

"Sensei, what will I be doing?"

"Well Sakura, how would you like to learn some ninjutsu?"

She smiled.