"Alright it's week two of training, how are you feeling my adorable little genin?" Kakashi asked strolling onto the training ground half an hour late. He left them enough time to stretch and get themselves in gear for the day, hopefully it gave them the slight rest they were probably begging for. He forgot how children work, does thirty minutes of rest fix a week of rough training?
"Sore," Sakura answered for the group, Naruto and even Sasuke just nodding their agreement. They were flopped on the ground and Kakashi wanted to laugh because they were finally in unity for once, which was the perfect start for their week of team building.
"What are we doing?" Naruto asked not looking up from his position lying on the ground.
Kakashi walked over to the group announcing, "You'll be training together, we'll start with sparring-" He was interrupted by a slight snort from Sasuke's direction. "Do you have a comment, Sasuke?" Kakashi asked deliberately keeping his tone light because if he didn't he was probably going to scare them. He was willing to give his all to take care of these kids, and he knew they couldn't understand where he was coming from, but looking at them he saw ghosts of his past and having them spit in his face was a quick route to fury.
"You actually expect me to spar with these two?" Sasuke asked. He sat up and looked at the two who Kakashi spent his time working with. Kakashi still hadn't managed to beat the arrogance out of him, some of that fell on the teachers and villagers who constantly praised him. The boy was above average, but his inflated ego was unwarranted which Kakashi already tried to tell him.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Naruto demanded. Jumping to his feet and glaring at Sasuke with all the righteous indignation a twelve year old could dredge up. Kakashi didn't entirely blame him, but it was his job to discipline Sasuke, if Naruto kept picking fights things wouldn't get better.
"It means there's a reason you were dead last in all our classes," Sasuke got to his own feet matching Naruto's gaze. Of course he had to escalate the argument, rude comments weren't enough.
All of the confidence and work he'd put into Sakura was apparently useless when she timidly agreed with Sasuke, "Maybe he's right Naruto."
Kakashi could feel his temper growing and before he allowed this childish argument to keep going he decided to step in. "Shut up you little brats! Do you honestly think I care about what you want or what you think is best? Sasuke you're stuck-up and have let the village's hype get into your big head. Naruto if you can't keep yourself together for two minutes to hold a civil conversation, why would anyone in the village listen to you? Sakura, clearly you're content being as useless as everyone thinks, I spent a week training you and your confidence falls apart the moment Sasuke says a word. You're my students, whether any of us like it or not, and you'll listen to what I tell you. Unlike you, I have your best interests in mind. If you want to quit being a ninja go ahead, I promised to pass you and I did. If you feel like leaving nothing is stopping you," he said his voice rising as he spoke, but it dropped to just above a whisper when he finished, "but if you stay you'll follow my rules, now make a choice."
The three ninja stared at him wide eyed before eventually nodding their heads and staying in place. He didn't want to yell at them, but he honestly could have said much worse. He knew enough about them to really push them, but he never wanted to have to resort to that.
After the tension had begun to fade Kakashi spoke again, "You'll be having one-on-one sparring matches, the member who isn't fighting will be studying both fighters. At the end of the spar they will give them notes, and then take their turn facing the victor of the match. This will allow you to familiarize each other with your skills and get used to giving and receiving advice from your teammates without feeling put-off. No ninjutsu or genjutsu."
He watched to make sure none of them made any unnecessary comments and aside from Naruto making some exclamation about showing his skills they stayed blissfully quiet.
"Sasuke you'll be facing Sakura first. Naruto has been doing training very similar to this that required him to improve his analytical skills and get used to studying technique in battle so he'll show you how it's done. Sasuke I want you to remain largely on the defensive for the time being, although both your teammates have shown marked improvements a week isn't a long time and you had quite a head start on them." Sasuke thankfully didn't argue or try to make a point. He simply walked to the center of the training ground with Sakura following him, they put space between them and got into position.
"Go," Kakashi said and Sakura launched herself forward fueled by chakra at a speed that clearly Sasuke wasn't expecting, but he still blocked her punch which also seemed much heavier than he was expecting. Kakashi could see a small frown on his face, likely because he wasn't Sakura to be able to do much, but Kakashi drilled the importance of fighting seriously despite how an opponent looked. For example a child version of Kakashi still packed a punch and so did the pink haired girl attacking Sasuke with the ferocity of someone who was tired of being looked down on.
Their spar continued, but despite Sakura showing her newly improved skills he could see she was slowing down and couldn't match Sasuke's fluidity. At the same moment he made that mental note, she leapt backwards and lobbed some kunai at Sasuke who easily deflecting them. Kakashi saw what she was doing, she stopped the flow of chakra to her hands and feet and was buying time to catch her breath by pinning Sasuke with weapons. She was taking advantage of the fact that he was supposed to fight defensively and couldn't chase her down to strike. She knew if she completely pulled back for a breather he'd call it her loss so she was prolonging the battle without wasting as much energy. This was one of the few situations where something like this would actually be viable, but it was clever nonetheless. It didn't give her a long respite, but it technically worked.
Once she ran out of weapons he called out, "Sasuke you can start attacking." He charged at her and though she infused herself with chakra again she couldn't keep up, though she made a valiant effort and held him off for a time before he overwhelmed her. Kakashi called the match when she was on the ground with a kunai to her throat, "Sasuke is the winner, I'm very impressed with both of you," he turned to Naruto and asked, "Can you give us your assessment, Naruto?"
"Sakura was awesome, but what was she doing?" Naruto asked looking at her curiously when nobody answered he elaborated "She was moving weird?" His statement came out as something closer to a question. Sasuke might have grasped what Sakura was doing partway through the battle, but Naruto didn't pay much attention in school so the finer aspects of chakra control were probably not known to him. Kakashi was however impressed that from a distance he was still able to see the distinction between the possibility that Sakura was able to naturally faster than he expected vs a specific force aiding her.
"Sakura would you like to explain?" Kakashi asked though it wasn't really a request.
"Naruto what I was doing was channeling chakra to my hands and feet to make up for the fact that I'm slower and weaker than Sasuke-kun," Sakura told him and seeing his lack of comprehension she explained further, "You know what chakra is correct? Rather than gathering it to use a jutsu I focused it on my hands and feet to make them stronger." Naruto seemed to get it to an extent so she asked, "How did you realize it?"
Naruto paused to gather his thoughts, "Your body was moving slowly compared to how you ran, like you didn't move your legs as fast as you were running because your steps were super long, like hopping or something, and you don't have enough muscle to push Sasuke back so easily. Plus when he attacked you were slow at blocking compared to when you tried to put distance to dodge."
"Very astute, Naruto," Kakashi praised him and at seeing Naruto's slight incomprehension he clarified, "you were very clever. Do you have any suggestions for Sakura?"
"A lot of her fighting was charging right at him, she didn't try anything that wasn't like direct," Naruto shrugged and added, "she should vary her attacks."
"Sakura, your response?" Kakashi asked hoping they could start this off on a positive note and not have her rebel against having Naruto correct her. He'd drilled into her head the importance of improvement and relying on teammates, this would be her first test.
"Since I'm moving fast than my body reacts I need to reorient myself each time I stop, which means either I charge without stopping limiting my finer movement or I end up taking pauses to switch to a more controlled style. The other issue is that since I'm constantly expending chakra I need to go on the offensive as quickly as possible to end the fight. Ideally I'll have enough control over my chakra to summon it only on contact, rather than have to keep it active at all times from all my limbs and eventually my conditioning will improve to the point where it isn't necessary. But yes you pretty much nailed what I should change," Sakura was calm when she explained and Naruto nodded. Sasuke watched the exchange with forced indifference and Kakashi had to resist calling him out on it.
Hopefully they'd pick up on how to begin working together as they learned about fighting each other.
After three days Kakashi figured that was enough time for them to get familiar with each other's fighting styles, he knew they were getting restless because they wanted change things up and finally start learning more jutsu. Aside from the academy basics Sasuke knew a few fire jutsu and Naruto could utilize shadow clones. They were finishing their stretching and doing the mandatory weapons check he'd gotten them in the habit of doing, when he announced his presence.
"Alright kiddos, I'm sure you've all been looking forward to learning ninjutsu right?" He asked. Naruto violently shot up and though the other two were more reserved they both were clearly interested in moving on to something new. Kakashi was aware that learning ninjutsu tended to be one of the more exciting things for young ninja, he'd been one a long time ago. He frowned as if something just came to mind, "Oh wait I suppose it's about time we start doing missions."
"Are we ready to do missions?" Sakura asked. Clearly she expected the missions would require far more skill than they actually did, considering they'd only be doing D-rank missions.
"Of course, this training wasn't for nothing," Sasuke answered confidently, though knowing him he'd likely considered himself ready from day one.
"Great, so you can weed gardens instead of learning jutsu," Kakashi announced cheerfully, "I was looking through the D-ranks and that was one of the ones that stood out for me."
"No, way," Naruto practically yelled and apparently his teammates agree with him voicing their own protests which he waved off.
He cocked his head, "If you're that averse to doing missions, can you think of someway to complete the missions while leaving yourself enough time to train?"
After only a few moments of silence Sakura seemed to come to a conclusion, "Naruto can use his shadow clones, right?"
"Well I suppose, but Naruto can't go by himself can he? What happens if someone notices?" Kakashi asked raising his eyebrow.
"You can have two transform into me and Sakura, you can handle that right?" Sasuke asked glancing towards Naruto. Kakashi was pleased for two reasons, the first was that they were quickly coming up with a plan and the second was that they were relying on each other
"I'm Naruto Uzumaki, future Hokage, do you really think that would be a challenge for me?" Naruto asked puffing up.
"I don't think you want me to answer," Sasuke replied in a flat tone.
Kakashi knew it was too good to last, but he was pleasantly surprised when Sakura spoke up. "Sasuke-kun, be quiet," Sakura admonished him lightly, "Naruto we're counting on you."
"Totally, I've got this Sakura-chan." Naruto seemed just as surprised as Kakashi and overjoyed that Sakura was taking his side for once. Sakura's slightly guilty look revealed that she was just realizing how poorly she treated Naruto for him to be so pleased by her small show of support. Hopefully that would encourage her to be more accepting of him; Sasuke looked slightly surprised that Sakura told him off, however gently, but he didn't seem particularly upset by it.
"Alright guys that's a good plan, but I can't fully accept it," Kakashi spoke just before Naruto could summon any clones.
"Why?" Naruto sounded slightly petulant realizing how he sounded he corrected himself in a more neutral tone asking, "What's the problem?"
"You'll need to write mission reports and I don't want your experience with mission reports to come from second hand knowledge from shadow clones, this'll be important when you face serious missions and you need to write reports. So I propose an alternate plan, you three will serve as team leaders for three separate teams, transformed shadow clones will work as the members not currently with you. This means while Sasuke is team leader and does a mission with the shadow clones, you two will train with me and he will write the mission report. Each time a mission is complete the team leader switches and the other two train with me."
"Then what's the point?" Sakura asked, "In the end we'll all be doing one mission each and If we all just do a mission together we could probably get it done quicker which would leave us enough time for training."
"You're absolute correct Sakura, but most teams do one or two missions per week, I plan to do one everyday and this is the best way to cut down on time lost between missions. You'll each have two days as leader and the final day of the week, you have a break from training to do a mission as a complete team," Kakashi explained, "I can drill the idea of teamwork into you as much as I want, but you do need to have some actual experience working together."
"Still why should we do extra work if the other teams are doing fewer missions?" Sasuke asked.
Kakashi considered trying to appeal to the desire to be seen in a positive light that all three had at their core. Naruto was desperate to be accepted, Sakura had a major inferiority complex, and Sasuke felt the need to live up to the Uchiha name which manifested in his pride. However he opted to be a bit more direct and honest in his reasoning because they deserved that much after all the hard work they'd been doing. "The first day we met I told you that I was essentially forced to allow you to be genin, which was true. However, once I met you and accepted you I bargained with the Hokage that as long as you yield results he and the council will stay out of our business. Which means they'll leave us alone if we do well by completing missions and showing results. I want them to have as little involvement as possible because they don't actually care about any of you," Kakashi revealed his little demand from the Hokage and they all read the subtext that he cared about them even if the people supposed to be in charge didn't.
"Now that we have that out of the way, we can finish missions without having to pause our training. Obviously this will only work for D rank missions which are essentially just chores anything higher than that will require full attention, but we won't be doing those until I deem you ready and you aren't," Kakashi explained, if the shadow clones played this right the team would essentially complete missions without any worry.
Once the genin nodded he spoke again, "Before I teach you new jutsu we're going to practice chakra control which Sakura mentioned the other day. Thanks to her training and natural ability she's far more equipt for this than either of you so I expect Sakura to fly through this exercise. All you need to do is get to the top of one of these trees without using your hands, I'll demonstrate." He walked up the nearest tree with ease which shocked the young genin, he wasn't sure if he was ever so easily excited as a child, but seeing them impressed with him was always rewarding. "If you complete this, I have another test for you. After that we'll begin learning new jutsu and trust me I have plenty to teach you." He tossed each genin a kunai to mark their progress and indicated a tree for them to scale.
"How many jutsu do you know?" Naruto asked squaring himself up for a run at the tree Kakashi dictated as his.
"I've copied over 1,000 jutsu, I'm known as the Copy Ninja Kakashi," Kakashi wasn't lying, it was the truth his moniker was fairly widespread.
"Really?" Sasuke asked pausing before his dash allowing his surprise to show rather than trying his usual routine of masking it, which never really worked around ninja trained to read minor details about their surroundings.
"Sensei are you really well known? You make it sound like a famous title, The Copy Ninja Kakashi," Sakura looked at him curiously while Naruto was busy declaring he'd learn all 1,000 jutsu and become Hokage, it was as endearing as it was distracting.
"I'm known in all five countries and am one of the most recognizable ninjas in Konoha, I'm not saying this to act cool or show off, but you can trust that I know enough to help you figure out what works for you," Kakashi replied, he wouldn't admit it, but he actually was bragging a little bit in front of his genin. "If you want to learn any of those jutsu, you need to get to the top of the tree. Send chakra to your feet, keep it at a stable level with the right amount of power and you should walk up without too much trouble. Just try once, I want to see your attempt and I'll offer guidance if you fail."
Sakura was up the tree in one shot looking down at the two boys sprawled on the ground and Kakashi was hoping this would give her a bit of confidence and the boys would take her more seriously when they were forced to stare up at her from their place on the ground.
"Congratulations Sakura, of course I was expecting this. In fact you were so good I've decided that you'll be in charge of teaching the boys and I'll have absolutely no arguments. You'll fail or succeed as a group on this one. Stay here until everyone can get up that tree or someone faints from exhaustion."
"Yes sensei," the genin responded and yes he could really get used to them just agreeing with him.
"Sakura, I'm sure sitting here ordering the boys around will eventually get boring so I'm giving you a little something to do with your time," he brought out a scroll and from it burst a small book. "This is a book on basic genjutsu, it wouldn't have been available to academy students so I'm fairly sure you haven't read it. The book includes theory and a few basic genjutsu, although for the time being I plan to start each of your training with ninjutsu, I think with your abilities learning about the basics of genjutsu is appropriate. However, I must stress that I don't want you trying anything without me to supervise, this is just for studying."
"Thank you Kakashi-sensei," she thanked him as she took the book from his hands.
"I expect you to behave because if you don't I have plenty of punishments saved up," he spoke as if he wasn't threatening them, "Good luck and have fun," Kakashi threw over his shoulder as he disappeared. He left a shadow clone in a nearby tree to watch over them while he planned out their lessons in the near future.
A/N
Chapter 2 is complete please let me know what you think.
Next chapter training continues, but there are some emotional scenes.