Ok, new story! It always so exciting. So think of this chapter as a pilot chapter. Let me know what you think!

I hope you enjoy. Based on how the reviews go i'll try to have the next chapter out soon ^_^.

Chapter One

It had been three day since the Chunin Exams and since the failed attack on Konoha. Subaku no Gaara sat in a stark white hospital room with Termari at his bedside. Having been in better shape upon arrival, she had been discharged along with Kankruo after a brief check over. Gaara however, had arrived with complete chakra depletion, severely torn chakra pathways, several broken bones, and not to mention, a gaping hole in his shoulder, courtesy of Uchiha Sasuke. After a very nervous doctor had healed his shoulder, uncomfortable under the stoic 16 year old's cold gaze, he had been prescribed bed rest and all hospital staff had thereafter ignored him. Although ignored would not be the right word. Doctors and nurses would rush by the door, fearfully glancing in the window of the room trying to catch a glimpse of the monster within, but scared of the consequences. They most likely thought that if he caught them staring he would kill them. It was not a far leap for the average Suna citizen's imagination to make, seeing as the boy in the bed had killed numerous people just for looking at him the wrong way.

Temari had come alone to check on him today since Kankuro was out on a mission. Why she was checking up on him, Temari had no idea. Being in the same room as her homicidal young brother still made her uneasy. But none of the nurses were paying him any mind, and he had been in bad condition, so the oldest Subaku took on the responsibility she would rather not have.

Since the death of the Kakzekage, Suna had been in chaos. Neighboring countries had decided to take advantage of the confusion and attack Suna's borders, making it necessary to deploy all forces in defense. Missions were given out left and right, no shinobi fit for duty was allowed down time. Temari herself had just arrived back from a mission that morning, and was scheduled to leave again in an hour or so. Almost all medical ninja had been deployed to the field as well, leaving only a small number to tend to the growing number of wounded arriving at the hospital. Meaning that the available medics spared no time to treat the one they all considered a monster.

"I'm sure it'll be just a few more days," Temari said irritably. "I don't know what their waiting for anyways, it's not like they're doing much to treat you." Realizing she had spoken out loud she glanced at Gaara nervously, almost sure the sound of her voice would set him off. He was staring passively at the wall. It was strange to say that he had been almost subdued since they had left Konhoha, and it was honestly putting Temari on edge.

The attitudes of the medics infuriated her though. Sure she understood that almost nobody was brave enough to be in a room with Gaara, let alone an injured Gaara, but still. This was ridiculous, she wanted to leave damnit! And as far as she could tell Gaara wasn't getting any closer to leaving by them moving at a snail's pace.

Even though Gaara had been in the hospital for a few days, he didn't seem to mind. Which was odd, in a creepy, set your teeth on edge sort of way. When they first brought him in she had been half expecting him to kill anyone who came near him, or leave promptly. But he had cooperated, didn't even glare at anyone.

"He hasn't even glared at me since the chunnin exams," She thought. Gaara certainly had been acting strange since the exams, or a strange as Gaara could be. It had started with him apologizing to her and Kankuro after his fight with the Uzumaki kid. Temari was sure she almost had a heart attack at his statement. It was weird, and Kankuro clearly shared her sentiment, judging by the confused look he had sent her over the top of their prone brother's head.

Kankuro claimed it was just because Gaara 'didn't have the energy', whatever that meant. She scoffed internally.

Despite the past infractions between her and her brother, and the village for that matter, Termari couldn't help but hope Gaara's new subdued personality was here to stay.

"Where are those damn medics?" She muttered looking towards the door. She had called them like an hour ago hoping to get someone to shed some light on Gaara's hospital situation.

Gaara meanwhile shifted his gaze out the window overlooking the village.

Temari sighed, wondering what he could possibly be thinking.

Truthfully Gaara was thinking along the same lines as Temari, about his new attitude. Since the chunnin exams and his fight with Uzumaki Naruto, Gaara didn't feel the same. Since hearing of Naruto's bond and witnessing his strength, Gaara couldn't help the desire that grew within him. The desire to change, to form bonds, and to feel what it was like to fight for someone; to protect someone. It was a feeling he vaguely remembered wanting during his childhood, before he had decided to protect only himself, and live only for the death and destruction of all the rest.

When he had apologized to his siblings he could feel their shoulders holding his weight and bearing him to safety. He felt as if these two people were the ones whom it would be easiest to form bonds with. He didn't know where to start. He could feel Temari's eyes on him and ignored the strong urge to glare at her and intimidate her. He didn't like people staring at him. The stares usually only held hatred or fear.

As Temari sat by his bed with her arms crossed under her breast, foot tapping impatiently, Gaara contemplated conversation. He wondered if words between him and his sister would ever flow as smoothly between them as they did her and Kankuro. Although smooth maybe wasn't the right word given how often the two would get into screaming matches over trivial matters.

Gaara felt the urge to sigh, and continued staring out the window, giving no sign that he had heard his sister speak.

"Gaara," Temari said hesitantly, "are you feeling any better?"

"hn" Despite the fact that she had asked a question she still tensed slightly when he made the uncommunicative noise.

Taking that as an initiative to continue with a little more confidence "Well I bet you would feel a lot better if those goddamn medics would just do their jobs" She said pointedly. Feeling uncomfortable she quickly made an excuse, "I'm gonna go find one of those lazy ass's and give them a piece of my mind." She stated, finally rising out of her chair and strolling briskly towards the door.

Gaara almost felt sorry for whichever medic his sister decided to let loose on. He'd seen her rage at Kankuro and had developed a healthy level of fear for his older sister. Though she never directed her sisterly rage towards him due to the unhealthy amount of fear she had for him.

Just as Temari was reaching for the door it burst open, and if not for her shinobi reflexes would have broken her nose. Three nurses and a doctor rushed into the room all surrounding a stretcher upon which lay an emancipated young girl.

Temari backed towards Gaara's bed to give them more room, curiosity about the proceedings overshadowing her previous intentions. The doctors worked furiously over the girl, yelling orders to the nurses while their hand were aglow with green healing chakra.

"Get me that syringe!"

"Scaple!"

"We need more sedative in here!"

There was a lot of blood, even as the medics closed numerous wounds the larger gaping ones were still leaking the red life fluid, rapidly depleting the nameless girl's chances of survival. An oxygen mask was placed over her face as her lungs stuttered, too weak to function on their own.

The nurses and doctors worked seemingly unaware of just who was in the room, too caught up on their work to care. It was a good thing too, seeing as many of them would freeze like prey under the gaze of a predator, and neglect the poor girl on the stretcher.

The boy they were all afraid of had turned curiously towards the commotion as well. He could smell the blood from his side of the room, and it nearly overwhelmed him. Shukaku was in his head howling and tearing at his restrains, trying to get closer to the tantalizing aroma, to spill more of the sweet red nectar that made them feel so alive. Gaara clutched his head as a sharp ripping sensation tore through it. He fought for control over the beast not giving in to his wishes as he had so many times before. He did not want to kill this girl, or add to the growing pool of blood with that of the doctors as the demon was telling him too.

His ever present sand flexed and writhed as if some sort of animal rudely awakened. It twitched in the direction of the oblivious doctors and nurses. Grimacing Gaara tried calling it back, but it was torn between his will and the will of the demon within.

Termari turned abruptly towards her brother, all too aware of what was going on. Gaara was losing control; it was the same grimace she had seen many times. Those times usually leading to someone's death. She gulped loudly before gathering her courage and shinobi training.

"Gaara, Gaara, its ok, please calm down." she said, almost frantically, as her hands fluttered in the air around her brother's form, afraid to touch him lest she set him off on a rampage. Her muscles were tense ready to spring away if necessary.

Vaguely Gaara heard his sisters attempt to calm him and focused on that. She was concerned and if he gave in to the blood lust she would most likely get killed as well. With stifling self-control he forced himself to breathe through his mouth. It was only a little better than breathing though his nose, although not so overwhelming, he could taste the blood saturated air instead of smell it. It helped though, and in a few minutes Gaara had regained control over his sand and his breathing.

"Temari." he said shortly, halting her fluttering hands.

She leaned over "Are you ok?"

"hn" she took that as a sort of yes. She let out a sigh of relief, that could have been bad. But Gaara had controlled himself. She looked down on him in puzzlement. Why would he do that? He had never tried to control himself before, killing whenever the urge struck.

Glancing in the direction of the commotion, she was surprised to see that the girl had been bandaged and connected to all the standard machines in the short while she had been occupied with Gaara.

Addressing the only doctor left in the room she asked loudly "Why is she in here?"

The doctor, who apparently just remembered what room he was in, straightened up coldly, "That is not public information." he stated.

"Fine, but what I was asking is why is she in the same room as Gaara?" He should have his own room given how unstable he was, plus being the late Kazekage's children warranted having their own hospital rooms when necessary.

"With our current situation there are not enough rooms to go around. Plus from what I hear she may be a possibly liability, and therefor kept under careful watch along with it" he said, eying Gaara pointedly.

Gaara did not respond in any way, instead he stared emotionlessly out the window, still recuperating from his internal bout with Shukaku. He of course heard the contempt in the man's voice and felt the pointed look. He also felt his sand stir as his desire to make this man suffer rose slightly. That however was deemed unnecessary by Temari whose chakra had flared considerably at the man's comment.

"Get Out," she stated, threateningly as the man visibly paled under the flare of her chakra.

"Yes Temari-san." he said bending at the waist in a stiff bow, before all but running from the room.

Anger still simmering Temari turned towards Gaara, "I'm gonna go get this sorted out," she said to him before heading towards the door muttering under her breath, "goddamn idiots, gonna go kill them myself."

Gaara watched his sister go before turning his eyes to the young girl in the bed next to his. She looked around his age, slim, with numerous bruises covering her body, along with many lengths of sterile white bandages. Her light blond hair had been choppily cut off by the medics as they had to heal the numerous wounds to her head. He vaguely wondered what had happened to her. She had obviously been attacked, but she did not look like a kunoichi, her muscles were lacking the hard edge to them that accompanied female ninja. She had obviously been beaten and cut, for what purpose he did not know, perhaps captured by enemies running amuck at Suna's borders since the Kazakage's death.

Deciding he really didn't care too much, Gaara returned to his most common past time, staring out the window as the sun lazily set over the horizon.

Temari returned a short while later, frustratingly informing him that the 'dumb ass doctors' as she deemed them, would not remove the girl because of a direct order for her to be watched. They obviously thought that the best place to watch her was in the same vicinity of someone they already had under close ANBU surveillance.

Temari left after a while hesitantly saying that she would stop in again.

After she had left Gaara allowed himself a moment of satisfaction that came with knowing his sister would be coming back to check up on him. Neither of his sibling had done that before, preferring to keep their distance.

Nothing had changed except for Gaara's apology, but maybe that was the first step to forming bonds with these people that were no longer lumps of flesh in his eyes.

Thanks for taking the time to read! Let me know what you think. It can only get better with constructive comment/criticisms.