Hi! This is just an author's note! This is not my first story, I did write before, but this is the first story I ever published. I'd like to get some advice from other writers!

Disclaimer: Sakura, Gaara, Temari, Kankurou, and these poor Sound nin belong to Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto

The original idea belongs to delicateblood, check her out on dA (she did the picture, so I guess the idea's her)

###

The fight was heating up. The three ninjas from the Village Hidden in Sound were taking over slowly, step by step. Seemed like they just wanted to do it slowly and painfully. The odds were against Sakura. Bleeding badly, she took another step backwards to Sasuke and Naruto, standing in a defense stance. No, she won't give up! If anything, she would protect her unconscious teammates until her last breath. It was time to prove that she wasn't useless after all. With all the last strength she had, Sakura lunged forward, blocking the enemy kunoichi's path.

###

Gaara sprung onto the next tree, moving as swiftly as ever. He was getting ahead of his siblings. His brother and sister were clever enough to leave him alone for now. The tension was still in the air and all three of them could feel it, even though the place of murder was long left behind. Neither of them talked about it, though Kankuro and Temari did exchange weird looks with each other. The young Sabaku sighed, mentally, of course. Didn't they understand that he was in charge of the mission? He may be the youngest, but they should at least treat him with respect. He paused. Maybe he should 'remind' them what he was capable of. Or not. Maybe not for now, at least.

Gaara stopped. He could smell the scent of blood in the air and faint sound of ongoing battle had reached his ears. Turning his head back the way he had come from, he briefly debated on what to do next. Kankuro and Temari were at least a mile behind — he was traveling quickly while they had a more cautious step. Should he wait for them? No. They won't be able to come in time and Gaara wasn't feeling like talking to them right now. Besides, he was in the murderous mood and a fight was just what he needed. He quickly changed course and started moving towards the battle.

He definitely wasn't expecting whatever was coming at him.

###

Sakura was wearing up now. Her chakra level was low, and the odds were REALLY against her. Right now the girl was on all fours, trying to get up. Maybe she should give up. The pain was bad and she wondered if she could even take it. But then, her Inner started scolding her with words that would be to rude to be put here and pinkette felt very ashamed. Though it changed to surprise when she suddenly saw a redheaded boy from the Sand Village.

The next moment he disappeared. Trying to get herself together, she realized that he simply was moving too fast for her eyes, and lying on the ground some more, she realized that nobody was attacking her. That was weird. Then, suddenly, the shock from previous hit was gone, and she was able to focus properly.

The boy was protectively standing in front of her. Sakura wondered how she didn't notice him before. His sand was doing crazy things to the Sound shinobi, as they were beaten, teared up, and bleeding. Trying to stand up, Sakura suddenly saw some of the sand fly over to her, and braced herself for a hit. It never came. Instead, the material became as soft as a pillow, and even helped her sit up, pushing her back forward and staying there. Young kunoichi felt genuinely surprised.

###

The first thing that came to Gaara's mind when he finally arrived at the battlefield was that there were only three shinobi to fight. Then he noticed a girl with the most unusual hair color in front of a tree tunnel. Looking inside, he noticed that blond kid with whiskers (what was his name again? Maruto?) and Sasuke. Smirking, he decided that the black haired ninja wasn't as good as he thought. But then, this small girl was stronger than the both of them, or… maybe they survived an attack from something bigger while she was hiding?

Pushing the thought in the back of his head, he focused once again on the girl. Previously she had her head down, now she turned his head in his direction. Gaara froze, unable to move. Her pink hair arced through the air, like blood in water, as her bright green eyes glanced at him.

"Pretty."

It took him a moment to register that the word was been punched out of him. Quickly regaining control of himself, he jumped in front of her, facing the other three attackers. They had a weird look of surprise on their faces. He let all of his previous fury and annoyance at them, slashing and tearing.

The mysterious kunoichi behind him tried to stand up, and Gaara's sand instinctively reached to help her. She covered from it, scared. Then she looked at the other shinobi with a mixture of fear and shock on her face. Gaara felt his sand obeying toward the pinkette. Somehow, she convinced him to release them without even saying a word.

With that, he relaxed the sand grip around the attackers and not-so-gently threw them at the ground. They'll have a few broken bones, but will live. The ninja looked at him fearfully, probably thinking this was another trap. Nothing came. The leader, still cautious, lowered his stroll on the ground and took off with his injured teammates trailing after him as the sand picked it up and placed it in Gaara's hand.

###

Sakura was paralyzed. No creature had ever be deserved to be killed like that. When she felt pity towards them, they were instantly released. After the Sound ninjas were completely out of sight, the redhead turned to her. Her Inner made a remark that he was still handsome even though he had dark circles around his eyes and in overall looked creepy.

Sakura was very nervous, even though her face was trying its best not to show it. Little did she know, that right now, the Sand ninja felt the same thing. She decided to break the awkward silence.

"Th-thanks…for saving m-me," She stuttered out, standing up. "I-I'm Sakura. Sakura Haruno."

"Hn." Was all he answered. Sakura frowned. Why did everyone suddenly started acting like Sasuke?

Suddenly he took a step towards her and Sakura instinctively took a step backwards. He was now walking towards her and she from him. The situation might have been funny, if only Sakura wasn't so scared.

Her back slammed into a tree. The pinkette realized that she had missed the entrance to the tree and now had nowhere to go. He had cornered her. She slowly slid down, until she was seated on the ground and braced herself.

"Gaara." She was definitely not expecting this. The stranger was now squatting in front of her, their faces only a few inches away. She could definitely feel the heat rushing to her cheeks.

"Huh?" She asked, confused.

"Sabaku no Gaara," He simply replied, and Sakura registered that he was telling her his name. Her eyes widened in surprise as he continued. "Here. Take this." He was holding a scroll, right in front of her face. It was the stroll of sky, just like the one they lost to Orochimaru. Sakura could also see that he was blushing lightly, now. Her previous fright had instantly disappeared. Her Inner was now screaming in her head, babbling away about how cute he was. Sakura was doing her best to ignore it.

"Hey, and I thought you weren't talking at all!" She teased nervously. Gaara's face decided to switch from "light embarrassment" to "tomato red hell". It quite matched his hair.

"Just take it!" The redhead huffed loudly, clearly annoyed that she was making fun of him. Then, suddenly, he turned his head back, eyes narrowing. Sakura could hear faint calls of some people, most likely his teammates. He shoved the scroll into her hands and was about to stand up, when stopped. Quickly sitting down again, he looked her straight in the eye and said, "Don't tell anyone about this. You never met me. Tell your teammates that you got the scroll by yourself or lie. Just don't mention me."

"Don't worry, I won't." Sakura promised, her cheeks still light pink. She then hesitated, and muttered "Thanks again," Gaara only nodded

Sounds of groans from the tree alerted her. Seemed like her team was finally waking up. They stood up at the same time. She wanted to thank him properly but there wasn't time. And she probably won't see him in the village again so there goes her idea of inviting on a lunch or something. "I need to go…" Sakura managed to mumble.

"Me too," Gaara said quietly. Then he froze in shock. He felt lips brush his face as Sakura gave him a peck on cheek. It was light and quick, but that was enough to turn him completely red, ears, neck, and whole face. He might have stood there for a whole day, trying to remember his name. Throwing last glance towards the retreating back of the pinkette as she hurried to help her teammates, the Sand genin was snapped back to reality as the voice of his siblings came closer.

"Gaara! We know you're somewhere here! COME OUT! We still have enough space to cover and Temari's getting impatient! GAARA!"

The said boy quickly jumped in the direction of the voices, memories of the kiss still playing in his mind over and over again. Poor boy couldn't get it out of his mind as he jumped from branch to branch.

Big mistake.

"Gaara…?" Kankuro's face suddenly appeared in front of him, peeking out of the leaves. Great. He had his mind wrapped around the kiss and now they had found him. Now the only thing left to do was to hope they won't notice anything.

Temari's face peeked out, right beside Kankuro's, "There you ar—…Gaara? Are you blushing…?"

Sigh.