Title: Are You Ready?
Chapter: 5 – One Step Forward
Author: Killaurey
Rating: T
Word Count: 3622
Summary: AU. Sakura gives up on Kakashi as a teacher after Team 7 falls apart. Too bad fate, enemy ninja, and sheer bad luck have other plans.
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. Part 5 of ? Unbeta'd.
Notes: Since I've had several questions about pairings, I just want to clarify that there are NO pairings in this fic. None. There will be canon-level mentions of crushes and adults who are married in canon are still together and present but there are NO pairings for any of the main characters. I hope you all continue to enjoy the story as is and thank you all so much for reading!
The Memorial Stone is the most solidly reassuring thing he's found in this new time.
Kakashi had brooded until he'd realized that no one had said he couldn't go out and, well, the middle of the night isn't enough to stop him from going to visit his family.
The stone is a little older, a little grimmer, and there's a distressing number of names that have been added to it in the years that, however it happened, he's never lived, but it still feels like coming home in a way his apartment hadn't.
That probably means his problems have problems but he doesn't care. Kakashi doesn't talk aloud to his family, though as he stands there visiting, he does tell them all about what the other him (their him?) has done, what he's found himself in, and about the loss of his dogs.
He's a (more than) competent ninja without them but that's not the point. If he's to be stuck in a different time (genjutsu?) with a team of children (well, one, but also not the point) where nothing is quite familiar enough to him—then he wants his dogs.
His family listens to him, which is more of a comfort than anything else has been.
When he leaves the stone, dawn is kissing the horizon and making it blush pinks, golds, and oranges. The beauty of it is wasted on him but, despite his lack of sleep, he feels better. Steadier.
While he doesn't know what to do about his dogs yet, he does know what to do about Haruno.
It isn't everything he wants. But it's a start. He'll figure out the rest later.
Kakashi is on his second cup of coffee when Sakura knocks on his door, once, twice. He opens the door (a bit jittery from the caffeine and lack of sleep) before she can knock a third time.
She immediately lowers her hand, looking flustered and bites her lip.
"Come on in," he says, stepping back to let her do that. After a split-second of consideration, he waves her in and heads down the hallway himself, expecting her to follow him.
She does, after a moment, shutting and locking the door behind her, though what she murmurs under her breath as she does so… well, he probably isn't supposed to hear.
He isn't quite sure what to make of it either.
It's a complicated feeling being preferred by someone over your other self.
Kakashi shoves the urge for more introspection (all of it uncomfortable) away and looks at Haruno's hopeful but wary face as she takes a seat on his couch. He's got to tread carefully here. It bothers him that another him made such a mess of this.
He wants to fix it.
Not to prove that he can be a better teacher, though he can, but because Haruno is a Genin who needs a teacher and who, despite all her anger at the other him, still views him as that teacher even though Tsunade-sama has all but taken over that role. She wants him to be her sensei.
His feelings on that are decidedly mixed—in this world he's not fit to care for his dogs, much less a Genin as far as Kakashi is concerned—but his feelings don't really matter when compared to the look in his (his!) last remaining student's eyes.
If he fucks this up he'll never forgive himself.
"Do you have an itinerary for the day?" he asks her.
She shakes her head. "No," Haruno says. "I'm supposed to answer any questions you might have and remain in your presence in order to field other peoples' questions but… no."
Perfect.
He smiles, knowing it's visible through the mask. She seems just as discomforted by that as by anything else he's done. "Let's go find a training field then," Kakashi says, "and we'll see what you can do."
Her eyes stare up at him, wide and startled, like a wild rabbit, like he's spoken in some alien, incomprehensible tongue.
Kakashi discovers he can hate himself, his other self, a little more. "Come on," he says, keeping the loathing out of his voice with an effort. She'd take it personally when it's all directed at himself. What the hell had his other self been doing that she was so startled by this?
He knows the answer: nothing.
"What I can do?" she asks as he shoos her out of his apartment and locks the door and the ward jutsu up tightly. "You want to know that?"
"Of course," Kakashi says patiently as they head for the stairs. "Otherwise, how am I supposed to be a proper sensei if I don't even know what my student can do?"
Haruno doesn't have an answer for this. He suspects she's too startled with an unusual concept (a sensei who cares!) for her to find a response.
It's going to be a long day.
The sun beats down on them, hot and uncomfortable and making the dust and sweat they're both breathing in to be dreadfully uncomfortable.
More uncomfortable for Haruno than for him, Kakashi admits. Most of the sweat is hers. He's glad for the glare of the sun. It means his expression is harder to read-even through the mask, some expression bleeds through-and today is one of the days where he wants nothing to show.
Mostly because his heart has sunk somewhere down around his feet and he suspects that he's going to trip on it soon because there's no end to his other self's deficiencies in teaching Haruno. The day has proven to be ugly.
Haruno is sub-par.
Worse than that, she's a danger in the field. Her ability to sense enemies is below that of a Genin in his time (he wonders if that's the same across the board-has peace made them weaker?) and the only thing she has to compensate for her weaknesses is unusually fine chakra control and the beginning techniques of a medical ninja. Her foundations are solid; he knows from her records she was an excellent student at the Academy, if physically weak.
The neglect, then, had to have come after.
Kakashi wonders what he's going to tell her. He doesn't want to crush her fragile self-esteem. Despite himself, he likes her-she's a quick learner, she's obedient without being subservient, and even though she has to know she's not putting on a good show, she's giving it her all.
Like she's got something to prove, he realizes, as he parries a kick. The kick uses taijutsu that's more advanced than Haruno's got the foundations for and he suspects, if he asked, that the Yamanaka girl is probably the one that taught it to her. It's a solid, basic kick only a few notches above what is taught in the Academy.
He'd eat his mask if the Yamanaka girl doesn't know it.
He'd eat his hitae-ite if the Yamanaka girl isn't the one that's taught it to Haruno. It would explain both how she knows it and why she's not great at it if she learned it from another Genin.
"All right," he says. "That's enough."
Haruno stops attacking mid-punch and nearly collapses in on herself. Her face is red, her pink hair is in absolute disarray, her clothes are dirty and torn in some places, her chakra levels are very low, and her weapons are scattered around the field.
He looks much the same as he had when they got here.
Kakashi wonders if that's going to upset her. He hopes not. She's a Genin and he's a Jounin who has been in ANBU for the last few years. The difference in their abilities could be explained by that. But… he thinks she's too honest with herself to know that's all it is.
She rests her hands on her knees, breathing hard and not looking at him.
His heart twists inside his chest as he realizes that she knows she's not on a proper level for a Genin-especially not one that's been out of the Academy for more than a year. He's both grateful for that (it means he doesn't have to find a way to soften that blow) and pities her.
Neither of those emotions show. Haruno, he doubts, would take them well.
He takes a moment to organize his thoughts the way Minato-sensei would've done. He has to be truthful but not cruel. This isn't the case of someone slacking off, where cruelty would be warranted.
"Your effort is admirable," he starts with, both because it's true and because he wants her to know that he values that. She might be below where she should be but he sees nothing of a slacker in her. Haruno is trying her flat-out best to keep from being left behind. "Your chakra control is formidable for someone your age."
Another thing that's true.
"Your taijutsu need work," Kakashi settles on, feeling it's better than bluntly stating that she'd get herself killed in the field if she went out there so ill-prepared. "Your weapons skills need improvement as well and your jutsu repertoire requires expansion."
Haruno pulls herself upright, looking grim and resigned. It's clear that she thinks he's going to just give up on her again.
Once again, Kakashi is appalled with the actions of his other self. If he could, he'd smack himself around until he saw sense. No matter how little he wants to teach it doesn't change the fact that, once given a responsibility it should be seen through the best he is capable of—just like a mission, any mission.
"Have you any familiarity with genjutsu?" he asks, because while she's learning medical jutsu, he thinks her control is more suited to another field. Or maybe that's just his own bias. He misses Rin. He can't let that get in the way with teaching Haruno.
She looks startled.
He waits patiently for her to work through her surprise at being asked, feeling another fission of self-loathing for another him who didn't do his job.
"I know how to break them," she says diffidently, looking down like her answer is in some way unacceptable. "You-the other you, I mean-said I would do well with genjutsu thanks to my control."
"Where did you learn to break them?" Kakashi asks, doubting it was from him, with that reaction.
"I saw another shinobi use it during an attack," Haruno tells him, looking everywhere but at him.
For his part, he's impressed. Picking up any jutsu, even one so simple as a kai directed to dispel jutsu on the go is not an easy task.
"Well done," he says and means it. She flushes to the roots of her hair. "Would you be interested in learning more?"
Her eyes shine. "Yes, Kakashi-sensei. Yes!"
Kakashi wonders if Tsunade-sama will be put out with him for stealing her newest student. He figures that, if that happens, it is entirely fair. After all, Haruno was another him's student in the first place. He's just picking up the slack and doing it right this time around.
"Very well. But call me Hatake-sensei, please." His eye curves into a smile. She looks giddy-no, ecstatic to be acknowledged in such a manner as she bubbles that she will remember, definitely. "Tell me what you've learned about medical ninjutsu. Do you have ambitions of being a medical nin?"
Haruno deflates and shuffles her feet.
"Just tell me the truth," he says reassuringly. "No matter how you answer, I won't get mad." This requires more patience than training ANBU rookies but Kakashi feels that makes sense. And, in any case, a lot of this is his own fault.
He can put up with having to grit his teeth and wait to get a straight answer out of her.
"I don't know," Haruno admits. "I like learning and I like Tsunade-sama and I'm good at medical jutsu but…"
"Elaborate, Haruno," he says, keeping the bite out of his words. She needs him to be patient. He can do this.
Another Kakashi should have been the one to do this but he'll do it because it needs to be done.
"I don't know," she says, sounding frustrated. "I can't tell if I like learning it because she pays attention to me or because I like the subject! I know that if I can keep someone alive then, yes, it's good to know but I don't want to spend my life healing people!"
There's a long pause as Haruno breathes deeply and raggedly, looking like it's something shameful to have admitted to him. Kakashi doesn't think so, because he's never had an inclination to heal anyone, though he knows a few basic jutsu, just to keep himself alive on the field.
Haruno, though, looks like it's the end of the world.
"Tsunade-sama will not hate you for not loving her specialty as much as she does," Kakashi tells her calmly.
Haruno looks on the verge of tears. "But she'll be disappointed in me!"
"She'll cope," Kakashi says reassuringly. "There's very, very few ninja who choose healing as their vocation."
"But I'm good at it! Shouldn't I—Shouldn't I carry on with it, if I'm good at it? I could make a difference."
"There are many ways to make a difference, Sakura." She looks at him, startled, and he realizes that he's used her first name.
Kakashi pretends this doesn't alarm him on a deep level. Is he getting used to this world? Or is it just that he's getting used to dealing with Haruno? He likes her, Kakashi can admit that-it's not just that he feels guilty about what his older-self did, though that's part of it.
But he likes her, as a person, in her own, flawed ways. He wants her to succeed.
"You can make a difference in many ways," Kakashi repeats, this time without using her first name.
She looks tentative but willing to listen, almost hopeful, and he's glad for that. The destruction of her team and the lackluster training she's received haven't broken her spirit.
Kakashi can work with this. He knows he can. He even wants to.
It worries him, though, how she'll react when he leaves. Surely, he'll wind up leaving. The Hokage is looking into ways to send him home already. There's got to be a way to reverse whatever happened.
(What will happen to Sakura then?)
"How?" Sakura asks.
"That depends on what path you take," he says, and gestures with her to come with him. She falls into step with him, as they leave the training grounds, her clothes dirty and her face sweaty and her chakra low. Kakashi looks pristine.
But Sakura looks happy.
"Can you teach me about genjutsu?" Sakura doesn't look at him as she asks this.
"If you want me to," Kakashi says, shelving his thoughts about what might happen if he had to leave-to go back to his own time. "I can definitely teach you a fair bit, though I'm not as good at it as some. I'm primarily a ninjutsu specialist, though I'm well rounded for all of that."
Sakura nods. "Because of your eye."
Obito's eye. "Yes. Because of that."
"Do you think I'd be able to learn to be a ninja like you?" Sakura asks. "Someone who is strong all around?"
"I think," Kakashi says, "that you can become any sort of ninja you want to be, with the proper training."
He means it too.
Sakura seems to understand that because she lights up like a sunrise.
Sakura collapses on her bed, hours later, with a whimper of pain. Everything hurts. This Hatake-sensei, is a hard taskmaster.
She sort of loves him for it, even though her body doesn't.
"Ino," she says, without opening her eyes, "can you get me a glass of water and some painkillers?"
There's utter silence in the room and then the soft clink of a glass on her nightstand.
Sakura opens one eye, feeling creaky and old with the movement, and sees Ino standing over her, one hand holding the pills she'd asked for. "You already had that ready," Sakura accuses, forcing herself to sit up and grimacing at the dirt she's spread all over her blanket. "How long have you been lurking in my room?"
Ino grins at her, unrepentant and glorious as always. "Long enough," she says, "I saw you earlier with that man and thought it might be best if I took precautions."
"You were keeping tabs on my thoughts."
"Just enough to see when you'd get home," Ino admits. "And don't give me that look. You gave me permission to practice keeping tabs on your mind."
Sakura takes the pills, swallows them, and downs half her glass of water. "I know," she says, "but it's still weird whenever you actually do it."
"Stop whining," Ino says brightly, making Sakura grimace. "Tell me how your training went."
"Can I shower first?"
"No." Ino plops herself down on the bed, on a patch of blanket that's clean, and crosses her legs at the ankles. "You don't even want to stand until the painkillers kick in anyway, so don't give me that."
"I don't want to think about training," Sakura says grumpily. "I hurt in places I didn't know it was possible to hurt."
Ino, knowing her better than anyone has a right to, just smiles. Her smile, Sakura thinks, is a bit like that of a shark's only a shark was never nearly so glittery around the edges. "But...?"
Sakura smiles. "It's amazing," she burbles. "He's actually teaching me! And he's strict but I'm learning so much. Hatake-sensei doesn't like repeating himself, but he will if I don't understand and if I have a question he'll patiently help me work through it until I've got it down pat."
Because she can and because Ino is right there, Sakura wriggles over to throw her arms around her best friend, dirt and all.
Ino doesn't shove her off, which makes her happier. They'd been rivals for so long, but—she's missed Ino. Fiercely.
"I'm so happy," Sakura says dreamily. "I hurt everywhere and tomorrow is going to be worse because he's not going to go any easier on me and I'll be sore from the start but I'm learning! He's going to teach me genjutsu. He flat out told me I'm not very good."
"He what?" Ino yelps.
Sakura hurries on, her arms tightening around Ino, to keep her from storming off to yell at Hatake-sensei. "No, no!" Sakura says quickly. "It's okay. He said that to help me understand how we were going to make it better."
Ino eyes her suspiciously.
"It's true," Sakura insists. "Honest, Ino." She looks down, biting her lip, and fidgets.
Ino, being Ino, takes a moment to play with her hair. "What are you thinking?" she asks.
Taking heart from the fact that Ino doesn't sound like she's going to haul off and smack Hatake-sensei (it is a fact of Sakura's world that despite Hatake-sensei's greater skill and experience, Sakura believes that if it came to a fight about her, Ino would win; Ino has always won when she really wants something) Sakura rests her head against Ino's leg, knowing she's getting Ino even dirtier and not saying anything about it.
Ino doesn't tell her off about it either. Just toys with her hair and waits.
"He said," Sakura says carefully, "that it would be better if I had a team to train with."
Ino's fingers pause. "Like, join up with another three-man team?"
"No," Sakura replies, shaking her head slightly. "Someone else he can work with. He doesn't want to deal with the mess of paperwork that comes from combining an incomplete team with a complete. He sounded utterly disgusted at the idea."
No one has ever called Ino stupid when it comes to the important things. "He wants someone to switch over to your team." Ino's voice is carefully, utterly blank. It's a bit scary because Ino is someone who uses emotions rather than uses the lack of them to make a point.
Sakura makes herself look up at Ino, which is very intimidating when she suspects that Ino has figured out where this is going. "He asked me if I knew anyone who'd like real training," she says, her voice coming out wheedling and a bit meek. "I said I might."
You interested? drifts, unsaid but heard, between them.
Ino's eyebrows rise. "I see," she says dryly. "He doesn't want to deal with the paperwork for combining a team but he's willing to deal with the paperwork for a transfer?"
That's not a no. Sakura takes heart from that.
"It's only a few sheets," she says, still wheedling. "You'd have to sign in triplicate and it's probably a good idea if you get your parents' permission," despite being technically adult, in Konoha, upon becoming a full shinobi, at their age, parents could make things extremely difficult if they took it to the Hokage, "but..."
"I'll think about it," Ino says, with a note of finality to the words, and Sakura knows not to push. Ino will think about it. That's good enough. She revels in hope and clings a little more.
"Hatake-sensei says if you decide to join, to meet us at Training Area Seventeen," Sakura says.
"When?"
"Tomorrow, five in the morning."
Ino nods and they lapse into silence until Ino shoos her off to the shower.
When Sakura gets out of the shower, achy but clean, Ino is gone. Sakura dreams deeply that night of endless blue eyes, silver hair, and an expanse of hope more beautiful than any dawn on the horizon.