Chapter 5
‘They hate you. They all know what you are.’ Shukaku screams as Gaara tries to buy something from a frightened looking shopkeeper. The man is wary, hands shaking as he hands Gaara his items.
Usually he wouldn't even bother doing this. He knows how the village feels about him. At this point, he's a monster. A weapon. Temari says he's wrong, but Gaara isn't sure he can believe her just yet. She and Kankuro have been so nice to him lately that he isn't sure what’s real or not.
He wants to be more than a weapon. That's the thing. And to do that he thinks that maybe he should try and interact with the village. Do his own shopping and wander around when he can. Maybe talk to some people if he's feeling brave enough (though he feels like that will take a while, he's not very good at the whole conversation thing yet, and they still despise him).
It could work, or it could be like last time. When he was a child and trying to make friends only to be shunned and heckled. He can control his power better now at least. Hopefully that changes things.
The shopkeeper eyes him, terrified. Gaara tries to be as pleasant as possible, even though he's clumsy and awkward in his interaction with the villager. He thanks the man, takes the pastries and goes on his way, ignoring the sand spirit taunting him, the whispers and the stares. He grips the bag in his hands, willing himself not to crush the pastries.
He buys four. One for himself, Temari and Kankuro, and one for Baki.
His siblings smile, surprised and happy when he clumsily offers the snacks to them while Baki looks at him with big eyes and gently thanks him, looking touched at the gesture, and he starts to feel like maybe the stress of the social interaction with the shopkeeper was worth it.
~~~~
He gets his first letter from Naruto that afternoon.
His handwriting is in scribbles, messier and messier as it goes on. Like he'd gotten more and more excited as he wrote, talking about his teacher's antics and his new jutsus. Gaara feels...better after reading it. He can almost hear Naruto’s voice rattling off every sentence. It's comforting, like he can hear his voice.
The last paragraph is what really makes his heart stutter though.
I hope you're okay, I miss you lots. I'm gonna force Pervy Sage to take me to Suna at some point, and maybe you can show me around! You can meet Pervy Sage too, he's annoying and weird but he's okay I guess. I’m not sure you’d like him though, he’s kinda a lot and he says weird stuff. Anyways I was thinking about what you said when we fought in the forest, and I hope you're not too lonely. If you are just tell me and I'll be there as soon as I can! It's about time for another date I think.
Below it there's a rushed little stick drawing of them holding hands. Gaara hangs it on his bedroom wall. No one has ever drawn him a picture before.
~~~~
Gaara takes a few days to write back simply because he isn't sure what to say, and when he does write back it’s short, and he still isn’t entirely sure what Naruto would even be interested in even hearing about. He's never had a friend before, and while he finds himself comfortable with Naruto, he still isn't sure what to say. He writes a short letter about his doctor’s visits and his siblings, and how he has to start going on missions again soon. He doesn’t reread it, but he sends it and hopes he’s doing this whole friendship thing correctly.
It can be oddly hard communicating with Naruto sometimes. It’s easier than everyone else simply because the blond boy understands him like no one else can, but Naruto is still so far ahead of him in everything that Gaara finds himself at a loss for what to say. Would Naruto even want to hear about things like Gaara’s daily life and such? The boy is training with one of the Sannin, surely whatever Gaara has to say can’t be exciting in the least.
And then there’s something else.
There are some things that--no matter how similar they are--Gaara would never tell Naruto. Like how sometimes he wonders if he should just rid the world of both himself and Shukaku.
He thinks about that a lot.
It would be hard, what with his sand shield that stops any attack against him, but he could find a way, he's sure. Only two people in Suna would be--at least--mildly upset that he's gone, but they'd get over it, and maybe it would be for the greater good. His very presence is a threat.
That, plus Gaara's in pain, more often than not.
It’s not about Gaara feeling sorry for himself, it’s more about what’s best for them all. He even regards this decision with a distance that makes it pretty easy to contemplate. Why be here if he doesn’t necessarily want to be, and can’t even find a reason to stay? It’s...logic.
He's in that odd limbo between reasons for living. Before he lived to do what he wanted. He lived to kill and curse the entire world that dealt him this crap hand in life, and he was content to do just that. He cherished his own life above others because...well, no one else cherished him so he may as well. But now he doesn't want that anymore, and so if he doesn't have his previous objective then why is he alive? He hasn't found anything else yet, and his recent plans are still new enough that they’re shaky and not even fully formed, so he doesn’t even really have that.
If he did it, he'd be serious about it.
Gaara doesn't like to fail, so he'd find the most efficient way possible and end it for good. Naruto would be upset he guesses, but the boy has other friends, and Gaara is not foolish enough to overestimate his importance to anybody, much less someone who is fast on the track of becoming the hero of the shinobi world.
Naruto would be fine. He'd get over it.
Temari and Kankuro would be fine as well.
Why is he still here?
He spends the entire night weighing his options. By morning he's still alive, but he doesn't feel any better about it. He doesn’t feel any particular way about it.
Gaara just... is.
~~~~
Gaara is slowly getting used to the meals he's given, though he still tends to throw up more often than he'd like.
He has to be weighed at the doctor's office next month, and his siblings waste no time trying to stuff him with food until then. Kankuro walks up to him and drops a bean pastry in his lap when he's sitting at the table drinking some water, staring into space. Temari puts glasses of juice in his hands whenever she finds him.
Kankuro hands him an apple when he finds Gaara in the sand pits again, and Temari gives him a bag of cherries she bought at the market.
He feels like he's eating all the time. Gaara doesn't really like it. The fruits are too sweet and he's unused to the flavors of some foods that they buy from vendors. He likes Kankuro's cooking better.
One day he does draw the line though, and doesn't come out of his room, telling them he has a stomach ache. It's not a lie, he does.
"You have to eat." Temari tells him through the door. Gaara says nothing, curled in on himself on his bed.
"At least a glass of water?" Kankuro asks.
Gaara doesn't move. He supposes he can be a bit difficult for one day, after everything.
~~~
Two days later the Sand is attacked by cloud ninja the same day Gaara has his checkup and is told that he's already progressing better than he was.
Gaara first instinct is to ignore it and let the others take care of it. Conflict isn’t really his area anymore really anyway. Plus, if they needed their ultimate weapon he would be dragged out there soon enough anyway, by some elder that feared him as much as hated him. Gaara would rather not get involved before he needed to be.
But he hears the shouts of jonin from the village entrance despite being so far away, and he senses neither Temari or Kankuro’s chakra throughout the house, and he finds himself worried by that. Did they run off to help? Where are they? Why did they not tell him they were leaving? Did they know he would run after them? There are times when Kankuro and Temari are sent to deal with a threat without Gaara, since the council fears Shukaku being released. Is this another one of those times? Are they hurt?
If this goes badly or invaders get too far into the village being as strong as they are, Temari or Kankuro could be in danger or...they could even die. They could be killed in battle and if Gaara did nothing...then…
Then that means he’d have let his siblings die when he could have done something.
That little boy who wasn’t afraid of him could die as well. And what about Baki? The man is most definitely fighting right now, seeing as he’s a jonin.
Gaara finds himself moving away from the sand pits behind the mansion and toward the entrance of the village before he can think himself out of it.
Before he can think about it, he's running.
~~~
The entrance to the village is a mess of a battlefield, but the intruders are either dead or captured by Suna shinobi, and the only threat are the other intruders that they know are moving across the desert to ambush them in a second wave of attacks.
Gaara feels the stares, but he only skids to a stop long enough to hear of the rest of the enemies making their way to them, and to see Kankuro--injured and kneeling with Temari by his side, bleeding from his shoulder and looking pale--and Temari before he runs off again without a thought.
Kankuro is already hurt. If more of those shinobi showed up--
Gaara ignores the commands and screams of his superiors and dashes off into the desert.
He can’t let them reach the entrance.
~~~
Gaara comes to in the middle of the desert, about a half a day away from home, his skin blistering from laying in the heat and coarseness of the sand on his skin without his shield. The sun burns at his skin, and he wakes, parched and in pain, eyes immediately blinded. On his back on the burning sand--the heat seeping through his clothes--he sits up, trying to blink some moisture into his eyes, his mouth dry and his head pounding. He’s low on chakra.
He doesn’t look at the bodies he’s left in his wake as Shukaku settles back, bloodlust sated for now. Gaara remembers bits of the commotion, the pain of releasing Shukaku and the screams of his enemies as he tore them apart and threw them about. At least he’d moved at least a little ways away form the carnage before sealing Shukaku back and collapsing in exhaustion.
He doesn't move for a moment, gathering his strength to make the journey back.
A canteen is shoved in his face. The boy jumps, having no idea anyone was even there. He’s so disoriented he didn’t even notice anyone else’s presence.
"Drink some." Baki orders, and Gaara does. He takes the metal canister with shaking fingers, gulping down the water before looking up at Baki.
The man is breathing heavy and sweating, eyes on Gaara, roaming like he’s looking for injuries. He has a head scarf and a small bag of apples in his handsas well.
Did Baki come all the way out here to retrieve him? Did he run all the way out here, after him?
“I’m fine.” Gaara offers, still somewhat confused by Baki’s presence.
Baki nods, “How do you feel?”
Gaara finishes the water, “Dizzy.”
“...You took them out. The Cloud ninja. Before they could reach the village.”
The man drapes the cloth around Gaara's head, the wind picking up and the headscarf keeping the sand from pelting Gaara’s blistering skin any more than it already has.
Baki really ran out here after a battle, during a sandstorm just to make sure Gaara was okay? The redhead doesn’t understand. Why would he do such a thing? What if Gaara was still in his partial transformation? What if he was dangerous?
Did Baki just...not care?
Baki hands him an apple, makes sure Gaara eats it, and then surprises the worn out child by lifting him onto his back, prompting Gaara to wrap blistered arms around Baki’s neck to steady himself. He makes a noise of alarm, and his sensei turns to peer back at him.
“Situated?” he asks, like this is normal for them, like they do this all the time.
Gaara nods slowly.
The boy is asleep within ten minutes. Baki is sure not to jostle him, knowing how rare sleep ever comes to the child.
Gaara is able to sleep peacefully for a few hours, and not even Shukaku disturbs him.
~~~~
The villagers watch as a sand jonin walks through the streets, with that terror of a boy on his back, sleeping soundly, though his skin is peeling and scabbing in places.
“They say he ran into the desert and released the Shukaku to stop the remaining intruders.” Someone says, eyes on the boy.
“He did?”
“ That boy?”
“I heard that too.”
~~~~~~
Kankuro insists on putting salve on the already healing blisters on his little brother’s arms, face and neck before he hands the task off to Temari so he can put the kettle over the fire for their leader, who sits slumped in an armchair after carrying their little brother for miles.
Kankuro winces at the pain radiating from his bandaged shoulder as he hands Baki a mug of tea.
“We didn’t tell him because we hoped he’d stay in the mansion.” Temari says, gingerly wrapping bandages around Gaara’s already healing hands, “We didn’t want him running out there.”
“He secluded himself in the desert to transform and stop the intruders from reaching the village.” Baki tells him, tiredly, “Who knows how many lives he’s saved.”
Temari looks at Gaara, then back at Baki, surprised.
“He did what?” Kankuro snaps.
Gaara stirs, eyes opening a fraction and landing on his siblings, “Temari? Kankur-”
“You could have died!” Kankuro cries, “Don’t you ever--”
“I think he’s got it, Kankuro.” Baki says, calming the other boy. Kankuro settles down, though he still doesn’t look happy in the least.
“How are you feeling?” Temari asks.
Gaara blinks, looking at the bandage she wraps around his blistered wrist, “Thirsty. Are you and Kankuro okay?”
Kankuro returns, handing him a cup of water.
Temari nods, “We’re fine. Are you?”
Gaara nods.
“Good.” she sighs, relieved, “You even got some sleep, so that’s good too.”
Gaara nods again.
“You can’t run off like that.” Kankuro says, “You gave us a heart attack.”
Gaara sits up and sips at the water, looking between Baki and his older brother.
“You two disappeared too.” Gaara reasons. Kankuro frowns.
“We’re older.” Kankuro says, and that’s all he gives in way of an explanation. Gaara looks at him, debating challenging his brother’s overprotectiveness before he decides he’s too drained to do so right now. Gaara just shrugs and drinks his water, thanking Temari when she finishes wrapping his arms.
~~~~
By morning Gaara’s blisters are mostly healed--though still tender--and he’s told by both Kankuro and Temari that he still has a pretty serious red hue from sunburn, but he feels better.