Shukaku was bored and Gaara was doing paperwork.

The tailed beast was just about ready to die from the exasperating arrangement. After all, he was stuck inside an emotionally (not to mention vertically) stunted brat who himself was stuck with a job he was far too young to have, it being the most boring and time-consuming thing in the world.

Paperwork.

He growled at the scorn Fate had put upon him. Freaking witch; she was just as bad as his host body's mother had been. He didn't let Gaara hear that part though. Living inside someone some one and a half decade you'd think you'd learn a thing or two. But that didn't really matter right now.

Shukaku was bored. And he didn't give one flying (desert bug?) about Suna's economic and political status.

"Hey kid," he cut into Gaara's line of thought. "I want ice cream."

Okay, maybe not the best idea he could come up with, but at such short notice, it would suffice. Anyway, he wanted to see how far he could push the kid into the idea. The Kazekage finished his paper and scrapped it before answering him.

"We live in a desert, Shukaku. We don't have ice cream."

No turning back now.

"I want ice cream."

Gaara almost rolled his eyes.

"No," he said, reading on to next page.

It said something about a bunch of D-Class missions some genin brats managed to mess up. Shukaku gnashed his fangs, miffed that he was ignored, and thought of new ways to provoke his host body.

"Konoha has ice cream," he decided to say.

"So?"

"You could send for some. Let Kyuubi's boy do it. You haven't seen him in a while."

Again, "So?"

The tanuki resisted a whining screech. Teenagers.

This moment of defeated silence seemed to have reinforced the kage's cool. He reached across the table for the next scrolls of mission reports. Shukaku growled and let out the most high-pitched shriek he could muster. Pathetically or not, he was not going to let the kid get the last laugh. Not once in fifteen years had that scream failed him.

Gaara's fingers twitched an inch away from the pile of scrolls on the table.

"Ice cream…" the Kazekage seethed, "is a luxury Suna can live without."

"You seriously want me to make you fetch me ice cream?"

"You don't even eat."

"I do too eat. I eat what you eat. And I want eat ice cream. NOW!"

The redhead winced. Shukaku cackled over the small victory; he was going having his way, no matter how ridiculous the wish. Any method would suffice, as long as he could free himself of the boredom. And his host body knew this all too well. The kid was stupid enough to defy him with his stubbornness.

"I said no," Gaara said, raising his monotone of a voice. "And if I don't finish this work today, you're never going to get your ice cream."

Silence. The fifteen-year-old was about to heave a sigh of relief when something clicked in the mind of the demon that plagued his life.

"So you'll get the ice cream when you're done?"

Shukaku's grin couldn't get any wider. All the color (at least what was left of it in the first place) left the kazekage's face.

"You said it yourself, kid. No ice cream till you finish."

Gaara swallowed hard, and Shukaku snickered at the disarray the boy's thoughts had plunged into as he tried to compose a good comeback.

"Don't twist my words–"

Around, he would have said if the tanuki had ever given him the chance. But Shukaku knew all too well that he had won this round.

"Then stop talking and start working brat!" he shrieked with a great cackle. "Work! Work! Work! Work! Work!"

Gaara grabbed two fistfuls of hair and banged his head on the table, nearly in tears. Shukaku merely laughed, continuing with his chanting. After all, results were what he needed.

He found a way out of his boredom. Gaara was going to finish his paperwork. And he was going to get his ice cream. (Gaara was going to thank him for that later, he was sure.) Whoever said wishes couldn't be flexible?