The current exercise Kakashi had Sasuke doing was trying to mold lightning chakra in his hands while simultaneously dodging strikes from Kakashi just to keep him multitasking. Sasuke hadn't reached the point where he could actively use the lightning nature, but Kakashi knew he was getting closer and regardless the types of training Kakashi was using would help improve Sasuke's chakra control and battle readiness.
Kakashi was watching closely and could see Sasuke was reaching the point where he couldn't continue, but just as Kakashi was about to call training to a close Sasuke gained a burst of speed and his chakra flared up. Instantly Kakashi could see the mark on Sasuke's neck begin to light up and despite Sasuke's second wind he ended things before it could spread further.
Although the curse mark could useful in theory it ended up overtaking Sasuke and rendering him useless when he was no longer able to ignore the crippling pain or when he lost control, beyond that Kakashi never wanted him to rely on something that came from Orochimaru. From what he understood there was nothing positive that could come out of it. Kakashi forced Sasuke to sit and focus on ending the connection with the curse mark.
It gave him a moment to think while Sasuke was trying to calm himself and repress the curse mark. Overall training Sasuke was going fairly well, as always he was a quick learner and physically he was developing well. Improving his physical abilities to the point where he could outmaneuver Gaara was the most important in Kakashi's mind because without that he would be extremely vulnerable. Learning lightning style would give him a wider skill set to utilize and from that hopefully he'd be able to learn the chidori as his final touch which in Kakashi's mind was going to be his best shot at winning.
They had two main issues they were facing the first was simply that one month might be long enough to learn everything he needed thanks to his natural ability, but in terms of stamina he likely wouldn't be ready to apply them in a drawn out battle. Kakashi was sure that Lee spent an inordinate amount of time working to reach the point he was at and they didn't have that time. Sasuke's chakra reserves were impressive especially for his age, but using the chidori more than a few times was going to drain it quickly especially if he was also using his other techniques in battle.
Kakashi tried to set a rule that he didn't use his own lightning blade more than four times a day because it required him to use his sharingan at the same time, but he admittedly didn't always follow his own rule. He'd probably suggest half of that for Sasuke because the younger boy wasted more chakra using the technique and wasn't aware of his limits or more likely blatantly ignored them which was why they were facing their current problem.
Sasuke refused to do anything less than push himself as hard as he could which at times was impressive, but that singlemindedness occasionally led him to unconsciously reaching for the power of the curse mark when he was running out of steam. The first time it happened was a few days into training and Kakashi immediately stopped everything and forced Sasuke to calm himself until the mark receded. Now that he could see it happening again he knew he needed to do a bit more than just trying to help him once it happened.
This called for a slightly more proactive approach so he made the executive decision to bring in some outside help. He was going to reach out to the only person who could understand what he was dealing with, Anko. Kakashi was friendly enough with her to feel comfortable approaching her and he knew she had an interest in Sasuke after seeing him in the chuunin exam.
"Alright Sasuke, I think tomorrow is going to be a rest day," Kakashi announced once the boy stood up making his tone relaxed and making sure he sounded offhanded.
Immediately Sasuke jumped to his feet and tried to shut down any of Kakashi's concerns, "I have this under control, you don't need to stop."
"No, no it's alright I don't want to tire you out. I've already decided no training tomorrow instead you'll be sparring with someone," Kakashi waved off his argument.
He saw Sasuke pause for a moment before replying in a slightly confused voice, "Do you actually know what a rest day is?" Kakashi hid his smile underneath his mask looking at Sasuke's expression. His little team members were so cute some times.
"Oh, would you like to head home and nap tomorrow instead?" Kakashi asked him teasing the boy because he knew exactly what his answer would be.
Sasuke quickly backtracked, "Ah no, I'm good with your version of a rest day. Who am I fighting?"
"Anko, you might remember her as one of the proctors of the exam. I think you guys have some things in common and it'll be very beneficial," Kakashi suggested not knowing if she'd directly introduced herself.
"The crazy lady?" Sasuke asked clearly skeptical.
"Don't worry she doesn't bite," he paused before continuing, "well not allies anyway." Kakashi realized that probably wasn't the most comforting statement and considering the look on Sasuke's face he was right. "Well, see you tomorrow at training grounds one, make sure you're well rested," he said quickly and left without waiting for a response.
Sasuke wasn't sure what to expect from Anko so he just made sure he prepared as best he could. Since it was the first week most of what Sasuke had been learning was the basics and starting points of where everything was going so he didn't have many new things to put into action not that he was complaining about a fight to break up the repetitiveness of training.
He arrived before either of the adults and followed the orders that Kakashi always set forward, to spend some time warming up if he hadn't arrived yet. As Sasuke was moving through some katas and breathing he heard a female voice speak up, "It's very diligent of you to be preparing yourself for me, I'm honored." He turned to see Anko casually stepping out of the tree line on the edge of the training grounds. He hadn't noticed her approach at all, but he'd expect nothing less from a ninja that Kakashi saw fit to involve in his preparation for the exams.
Kakashi himself managed to appear moments after Anko and thanked the woman for attending, "Anko I appreciate you making time to do this, especially on such short notice."
"How could I refuse?" she asked. "Now, how are we doing this?" She was obviously unconcerned about facing Sasuke, just making him want to prove himself more. He knew basically nothing about her skillset or style, but she likely didn't face that issue. He figured the proctors at the very least had information about the leaf genin and the Uchiha clan wasn't exactly unknown. One thing that worked in his favor against her and eventually Gaara was that his preliminary fight didn't reveal too much considering how he was forced to end it quickly.
"Try to have some fun and don't kill him," Kakashi said gesturing for them to begin with almost no warning.
Anko was kind enough to wait a few seconds before making her move. Without needing a visible hand sign snakes brown snakes burst out of her sleeve and descended on him. Sasuke was able to jump back quickly and dodge the initial assault, but he quickly realized that didn't solve the problem. When he didn't see the snakes after the dust cleared he thought they disappeared until he saw holes meaning they dug underground.
He flew through some hand signs and used a jutsu Kakashi taught him to heat the air around him, the Burning Air jutsu. He activated his sharingan as the coldblooded snakes that burst out of the ground and died from the heat before they could bind him. "So we're playing with fire then," Anko said with a smile and with the sharingan he was able to see she was using the Dragon Fire Technique which he countered with his own.
Before the flames had dispersed he heard rather than saw something coming behind him he didn't know if it was more snakes, but he drew a kunai and twisted backwards to strike. The kunai was blocked by Anko's own and she used the opening to punch him, he moved out of the way with her fist just clipping his jaw. He swore he saw a mark on her neck, but this wasn't the time so he launched into a taijutsu assault utilizing his kunai to keep her from using any other jutsu. It worked, but he could tell he wasn't getting anywhere with this method so he leapt backwards and used the Ash Pile Burning technique to fill the area with gunpowder and set it aflame with a Grand Fireball.
The resulting explosion scorched the area and he barely managed to escape without getting caught in it. Anko's body broke into a collection of snakes and when he turned backwards he saw Anko standing in the same position she'd been in when the fight started meaning he'd spent his time fighting with a clone while she likely went underground.
"Nice warm up, let's get serious," she called to him smirking as she cracked her knuckles.
Rather than get annoyed at her apparent lack of seriousness he felt himself getting fired up, "Alright, let's do this." He got into a defensive position and waited for her to make the first move. Clearly she had more maneuverability and charging at her without seeing what was coming could be a waste.
In a similar, but more extreme, fashion to her first attack swarms of snakes burst out of both of her sleeves and flew towards Sasuke, why she was choosing to use a technique she knew would fail was beyond Sasuke, but before they reached him he caught something with his sharingan that made him pause. Inside the snakes' mouths were explosive tags, he stopped mid hand sign and ran directly towards the snakes using his sharingan to track the snakes movements and dodge them despite their numbers. He dropped into a slide at the last moment as he moved closer to Anko. As they went over his head he grabbed two kunai and cut across their bodies preventing them from coming after him. Without stopping he threw the kunai at Anko and followed up by charging at her with chakra flowing to his hands and feet.
His increased speed let him throw a punch towards her face which she avoided by leaning out of the way, but he saw the surprise on her face when her skin started turning pink and she felt the heat surrounding his fist. A simple variant of the Burning Air jutsu which Kakashi mentioned was a good reference for using the chidori because it required focused elemental chakra around the hands.
"Nice," Anko praised him before bringing up an earth wall to block his next strike and immediately using a jutsu to send the wall flying at him. He dove out of the way and the fight continued. Sasuke was being run around the battle field as her attacks grew quicker and more difficult to doge, a blast of fire containing kunai forced him to flip backwards and finally opened him to getting caught in the jaws of a snake made of stone that grew out of the ground.
Rather than let himself get dragged to the ground and captured he used an explosive tag to break himself free, certainly leaving himself with some bruises from the force. The battle seemed to continue in that fashion with him getting pushed further and further on the defensive.
Eventually Sasuke realized that while Anko wasn't really trying to beat him, at least not outright. She was simply going to drag the fight out until he couldn't go on, it was a tactic that relied on her experience and it was working. She was able to capitalize on the fact that she was much better at controlling the flow of battle and had spent years on these training grounds, allowing her to minimize waste and forcing him to do the opposite.
He was running out of chakra and knew that he wouldn't be able to maintain his sharingan much longer. He felt himself pulling on his chakra to keep fighting and at a certain point the almost familiar dark chakra began to leak into his reserves and granting him extra power. The beginning of pain pulsed and Anko immediately stopped the fight to give him time to gather himself. He hated how Orochimaru was managing to harm him and stop his progress without having to take an active role. The mark was a weight holding him back.
He deactivated his sharingan and forced the curse mark to recede with the help of the Kakashi's seal before it incapacitated him, but each time it seemed to grow harder. When he saw Anko's hand on her neck he was further convinced that she had a curse mark as well.
"I suppose you've realized it by now?" Anko asked and Sasuke nodded without needing clarification. "That's part of the reason I was so interested in meeting you, Orochimaru was my old teacher and I was the first person to survive being given the curse mark of heaven, the same one you've cursed with."
That might explain her fascination with snakes, but he quickly shook that thought away and focused on something far more important. "How likely is someone to die from this mark?" Sasuke asked unconsciously reaching up to touch the now inactive mark.
"There were ten of us in the first batch who were given that curse mark and I was the only survivor, I don't know about the survival rates of the other curse marks," Anko said as if she had slowly faded into her thoughts and was speaking to herself.
"How many are there?" Sasuke asked with an uncomfortable interest in what had been forced upon him.
"I don't know much, just that the heaven mark is one of the most powerful and there are multiple. Orochimaru left not long after I was cursed so I never learned about the marks," Anko replied coming back to herself. Her voice hardened when she spoke again, "What I do know is that every time you use that mark you are using his chakra and it will poison your mind. You're doing a good job pushing it back, but that will get harder and harder so you need to reach the point where it doesn't activate at all. After a while I was able to repress the mark to the point it became completely inactive which is what we want for you as well. With Orochimaru's return he forcibly reactivated it so I'm where you are working to completely repress it."
"It happens when I'm low on chakra, I'm not doing it on purpose" Sasuke defended himself because it was true he didn't try to do it and always made an effort to stop when it started. Kakashi told him the seal's effectiveness was based on Sasuke's will and Sasuke was resolute so this shouldn't be a problem.
"I'm not accusing you, but you need to control your chakra and recognize when you're approaching the point where it will be activating. You're good at pushing it back once it activates, but you won't be able to pause in a real battle plus once you can't sustain it you end up experiencing extreme chakra exhaustion and pain to the point of being unable to function. There are a few meditative exercises I used to do that helped me better recognize it and block the mark from activating without needing to stop. I'll help you out," Anko spoke in a far warmer tone than anything he'd previously heard from her.
"Alright thanks," Sasuke wasn't sure how to respond he always felt awkward in situations that required his thanks unless he knew the person well.
"Plus I'll teach you anything else you want, you're fun and I've never really gotten to train anyone," Anko's slightly sadistic smile appeared.
"Those snake jutsu are they from summoning?" Sasuke asked having been chased by enough snakes to be intrigued by the possibilities.
"You interested?" She asked with a grin.
"I think it'd be worthwhile to learn, right?" He looked at Kakashi who seemed to be thinking.
Kakashi finally responded, "I want you to wait until after the exams are over, but if you're sure you want to form a contract with snakes and Anko is willing to help you then I have no complaints and as long as you let me know ahead of time I'm fine with you training with her. In return I want you to be more honest about when you need to stop so we don't reach the point where you accidentally activate the mark again."
It was still only afternoon by the time Sasuke had run through the meditations that Anko taught him and he wasn't sure where to go from there.
"Now, you can rest, for real. I'll buy you some food to celebrate surviving Anko," Kakashi said and gestured for Sasuke to follow him as he walked back to the village after thanking Anko once more. Sasuke didn't bother arguing and deep down didn't want to.
"Alright slowly transform the chakra and I want you to match my intensity," Kakashi said summoning up chakra to his hands and holding them out to Sasuke. He watched as Sasuke slowly focused his chakra and reached his hands out placing them on top of Kakashi's. "Now transform it and hold is," Kakashi ordered and he allowed the nature transformation to take place along Sasuke's guiding him.
It wasn't the manifestation of lightning chakra that was chidori, but it was a reliable transformation of chakra that Kakashi could feel. "Go through the signs I taught you," Kakashi gave him the next step and the two of them went through a few signs before Kakashi called out, "now release it." In a flash of light both of them sent out blasts of lightning. It was a fairly simple technique, but now that Kakashi was assured that Sasuke could use lightning nature jutsu, he could focus on actually learning the chidori.
Normally it'd be a cause for celebration, but Kakashi was bothered by their uninvited guest. He didn't want to distract Sasuke while they were in the middle of practice, but now that they were taking a pause he called out, "If you were going to try spying, you should do a better job masking your killing intent."
Sasuke's head whipped to where the sand village boy, Gaara stepped into the open. Gaara gave a grunt, but didn't actually say anything he just stared in a way that just screamed there was something wrong in his head.
"What do you want?" Sasuke asked managing to quickly gather himself after his surprise.
"I needed to see," Gaara growled and trailed off. His eyes were unwaveringly focused on Sasuke in a way that couldn't be anything other than unnerving.
"See what?" Sasuke bit back clearly not in the mood to be distracted or possibly dissected, based on Gaara's gaze.
"My prey," he said as if he was hungry only confirming Kakashi's thoughts on the boy.
There were a few breaths of silence before Sasuke's anger seemed to rise. "Why are you so focused on me?" He asked his body slowly moving into a position where he could defend himself if a fight broke out.
"You're eyes tell me you know what true loneliness feels like..."
Sasuke felt himself tense at Gaara's words and hated how he related to those words, "...furthermore you know that solitude is the worst pain in the world." Sasuke knew solitude, he knew what it was like to sit alone in a home absolutely sure the smell of blood was still lingering. He knew what it was like to wake up alone hoping that there'd be someone and the throb in his chest when there wasn't. He knew what it was like to walk the streets without a hand holding his own, without words being spoken to him, having only the whispers and stares of strangers for company. Yes, he knew loneliness all too well.
Gaara continued, "You have the same eyes as me, eyes filled with hatred and death that long for strength. Your eyes tell me how badly you wish to kill the one that put you through the horror that is loneliness." Sasuke's mind was filled with thoughts of the destruction that ended his innocence and woke him up to the darkness in the world. When he lost everything and all of it stemmed from one person, the person who caused him to want to become stronger. His goal, his target, his most hated enemy, his brother.
A disturbing smile grew on Gaara's face, "Yes, that look-"
Anything further was cut off by Kakashi, "I don't particularly care what you think about Sasuke and how you came to those conclusions, but you don't know him. Sasuke's inner self isn't something that can be identified by someone like you and more importantly he isn't alone. Beyond that why are you even here?"
Kakashi was correct that he wasn't alone, but it didn't mean he didn't still feel the pain of loneliness and maybe that was something that he didn't or couldn't understand. Still his words brought to mind his team and for the moment allow him to chase away the picture of a bloody Itachi that had take root in his mind.
"Only a fight to the death can assure the victor of the meaning of his existence," Gaara spoke again switching back to his scratchy monotone, "I know you wish for the same thing deep down."
"So you wish for a death match, that's obvious at this point. Now I believe we're done," Kakashi said a tone of finality cutting off further conversation with a hard look in his eye directed at Gaara.
Gaara's expression didn't shift so Sasuke didn't know if he had more to say, but the other boy eventually settled by saying, "I'll enjoy killing you, Sasuke Uchiha."
His exit was accompanied by Kakashi's warning tone, "Be careful Gaara, you don't know Sasuke as well as you think you do."
He walked off without another word and Sasuke couldn't relax until he was out of sight because the other boy was right in many regards. Still he never wanted to reach the point where he just seemed empty inside like that boy, living only for death. Sasuke needed to kill his brother that was a goal that wasn't going to shift, but he didn't need to descend into madness to do so.
Flushing Gaara's words from his mind was only possible due to the difficult training that required all his attention. He simply didn't have the time to worry about it and he could only hope that held true once he was alone in the night. He didn't need to spend his night haunted by the echoes of the other boy's words playing alongside the vision of the bloodied streets he walked.
Kakashi knew that Gaara's words were weighing on Sasuke, even the next day he could tell that Sasuke was conflicted and it wasn't something that Kakashi could fix for him. Gaara might not truly know Sasuke, but Kakashi knew those words were enough to have brought up memories for the younger ninja. He could feel his own struggles start to come to the surface of his mind listening to him, but Kakashi was too old to let the words of a disturbed boy stop him.
All he could do for now was prepare and if Sasuke came to him for help he'd do his best. Dealing with trauma was not his expertise at all, he still dealt with nightmares and could spend hours apologizing to graves if he still had the time. Simply working with his team was some twisted type of therapy as he was constantly barraged with memories from a group of children that emulated his past in so many ways. By helping them he was convinced he was helping himself to some degree and hoped that wasn't just wishful thinking or selfishness.
Still, both he and Sasuke needed to stop focusing on the past and look towards the future, in this case his future training and fight. Things were coming together as they approached the finals. As time passed Sasuke was able to get his body and lightning nature to the point where he could finally learn the chidori. Time was running out, but if they continued at the speed at which Sasuke had been learning Kakashi was convinced they'd make it in time.
Not allowing either of them to waste time he finally announced, "Today we'll be practicing the chidori for real. Your physical training will continue, but now all chakra and jutsu training will be directly focused on the chidori. Can you handle it?" Kakashi asked.
Sasuke gave the first smile that Kakashi had seen in a while and said, "I've been waiting."
A/N
Did I upload a chapter in less than a week? Yes, I did because this was easy to write hopefully the next two similar chapters will be as easy for me. In return this was one of my shorter chapters. My chapter range from 3,500 words to 6,000 words this was around 4,500 not including this A/N.
Alright that was a large portion of Sasuke's training that we missed thanks to manga/show focusing on Naruto. I did put my own spin on the canon Gaara and Sasuke meeting, but the rest was obviously out of nowhere. I didn't include everything Sasuke was learning because that'll show up in his future battles so I always leave at least a few things unknown. Plus I put in a character I like very much, Anko. She'll pop up again if Sasuke chooses to take up snakes as his summons. Which were my favorite summoning type on the show, but I was always confused by how subservient most snakes were considering how many were summoned and died in techniques.
Anyway I'll do a chapter like this for Naruto and Sakura. After that I might do one more training chapter that jumps between the three on their final days and thoughts leading up to the fights because as you saw I didn't go into the chidori training. Please leave a comment if you have any thoughts issues or even suggestions that I might look into. Or just favorite and follow the story if you're interested in more.
Thanks for reading.