Chapter 1
Gaara reminded himself of his blood pressure, and smiled warmly.
"Of course I would be interested in hearing your concerns," he recited. The performance was truly of Kazekage standards. Polite, efficient, and utterly emotionless.
"Well. This has certainly been building for some time now. At first, we thought nothing of it, but, well again, it seems…"
The small, average looking man before him felt the sudden overpowering urge to be somewhere else. Make that anywhere else. The Kazekage's expression hadn't changed. It was still the blank, pensive slight-curl-of-the-lip expression that he had practically invented. In fact, he looked almost concerned.
"Are you feeling alright, Mr…."
"Yuu sir, and no. Perhaps I should sit down-"
"Please, don't overexert yourself," Gaara said, with a smile that was only one in theory, given the rest of his face seemed not to move a millimeter. "As I'm sure you're well aware, the council's opinions and perspectives are valued very highly by this administration. I'm sure we can continue this conversation another time."
"Ah but, well…"
Yuu made to protest, but Gaara was already on his way to the door, opening it with the calm, assured confidence that Yuu would walk out of it.
"We'll try to book you in sometime on Thursday next month. That's perfectly fine, isn't it?"
"Ahem, well, next month? I mean, we've only just started this one, so that's a minimum of over twenty days…"
"Goodbye, Mr. Yuu."
The small man slumped in defeat, and began his defeated tredge out the door. He'd told himself this time, he would be sure to get off at least the first three of the council's main concerns. Now he'd have to explain to them that he'd felt queasy, again.
He briefly considered the possibility that the chain of queasy periods had not been coincidence, but manipulation, but brushed it aside. The Kazekage's… well, not warm, but certainly inviting expression hovered in his mind.
No. It was probably something in his breakfast. Perhaps he ought to visit his doctor again. Make sure this wasn't abnormal.
Behind his desk, Gaara allowed himself a small sigh of relief.
"Eventually they'll learn to send someone more insistent," he muttered, in a tone only a few people could recognize as glum.
"Today's not that day though, is it?"
Temari and Kankuro, siblings of the Kazekage, hopped in through the window.
"Yeah. I'm surprised you were able to stall them so long, let alone put up with their antics. Those old fossils probably still consider puppetry to be modern technology," Kankuro said, with a much less restrained expression.
"Oh, don't be so harsh. They were our best Shinobi, at one time anyway. They've contributed a lot to this village," Temari retorted.
"Enough about them. What does the rest of my day look like," said Gaara. He was calmly, slowly, meticulously rubbing his forehead in attempt to rid himself of his headache.
Temari glanced down at her clipboard, and winced in sympathy.
"You have that walk through the academy to look forward to this afternoon," she pointed out with forced enthusiasm.
Gaara loved children. He loved seeing them smile, laugh, and play as though the world didn't matter to them, or its problems. He considered them, in many ways, to be his greatest achievement as Kazekage.
That did not mean, that after several hours of sanity-questioning, mindlessly boring technicalities, he would be in the mood to listen to the high-pitched cries of children for an extended period of time.
Gaara summoned up his pensive, slightly smiling expression again, ignoring the feeling of another small piece of his soul chipping away to be destroyed in the name of running a village.
"Send them in."
"Is that the last of them," Gaara muttered, signing the final paper on his desk, and allowing it to land neatly on his stack in perfect alignment.
"Almost. You've got some letters to sort through. We've already weeded out all the fan mail, except from those people you know. Perhaps this will cheer you up."
"Perhaps," Gaara said, taking the small heap of letters from Temari. He allowed his eyes to roll over each of them, not paying much attention to the words, until a few of them began to stick out.
...here in Konoha, and now they're telling me that you've become the Kazekage! You bastard, getting to the position before me, but I'll still win. I'll be the best Hokage there ever was, and you'd better believe it!"
"Anyway, I was wondering if you'd be willing to come stop by and let me introduce you to the gang again. It's been a while, but I'm sure they'll all forgive you for being angry and murderous, and almost crippling Rock Lee, and almost destroying the village, and that stuff. I'm not sure how long I've got before we set out to look for Sasuke, but until then, I hope you'll come visit!
Signed,
Future Hokage, Uzumaki Naruto
Gaara slumped back in his chair, a genuine smile on his face. It felt almost unnatural, like his face hadn't been properly lubricated before it had tried to move.
"Some things don't change," he muttered, amused.
Temari was astonished to see Gaara hop to his feet with… dare she think it… passion.
"I'm going to be out of town for a few days," he said, opening the window and stepping out, a cloud of sand forming below his feet. "You can manage my duties until then, right?"
"YOU'RE TAKING A VACATION?!"
And then the cloud carried him off towards his apartment, his mind already considering what things he should pack for his trip.
Back in the Kazekage Office, Temari's clipboard hit the floor with a faint crack sound.
"Oh god… How am I supposed to explain this! No. Wait. Get it together. I can handle this for just a few days, right?"
She glanced at the towering stack of paperwork on the desk.
"...Fuck."
Obito Uchiha, or as he was now known, Tobi, had a great deal of pride in himself. He did not consider this to be misplaced. As history had shown, his ability to plan ahead, see long-term implications, and account for an ungodly number of details spoke highly of his intelligence, or at least his insanity.
He took another bite of his self-packed sandwich, leaning back on the Sunagakure rooftop and simply enjoying the heat. The village, while being visually in essence little more than a study in different shades of brown, did have a certain charm to it.
Then, his eyes peering up at the clouds, he saw Akatsuki's target fly off into the distance on a sand cloud with a suitcase in hand, like some sort of magical nanny.
Obito Uchiha fell back against the rooftop, twitching and jerking occasionally, unconscious from the dangerous combination of heat stroke, good old-fashioned insanity, complete shock, and mild latent brain damage caused by concussion via giant boulder.
Little did he know, his plans were about to hit the metaphorical fan.
Day turned into night.
"...And look, I'm not saying Madara Uchiha is gay," Deidara began. "But that whole thing with Hashirama? You can't tell me there wasn't something going on there. And now this whole league of practically male-exclusive missing nin, not that I judge him or anything…"
How the hell did this conversation even begin? Sasori found himself wondering. As far as conversations went, he had contributed a total of eight words over the past hour, and somehow they had managed to cover Itachi's potential cancer, whether the Pein bodies could have intercourse, and why the Icha Icha fanbase was full of lunatics.
But this? There were limits.
"I'm fairly certain that a nigh-immortal, decades old Uchiha did not form Akatsuki because of his sexual preferences," Sasori finally pointed out, ending his thirty minute silence.
"But… I mean, have you seen the guy?" Deidara asked. "Tell me you aren't seeing the thirteen year old girl in there. No man safe in his sexuality would bend their hips like that. It just shouldn't happen."
"This conversation should not be happening."
"Oh. Trying to avoid the subject are you? You know I'm right." Deidara leaned back, looking more smug than the real Madara Uchiha on a good day.
"We're approaching the village. Shut your mouths."
Even this couldn't curb the demolition expert's satisfaction. In fact, the smile didn't leave his face throughout the entire infiltration. It was painfully easy for them to make their way to the Kazekage's Office, where a light continued to burn.
"Alright. How are we going to do this?" Deidara whispered.
"I'll hit him with poison. If he manages to avoid it, feel free to use any means necessary to bring him down."
"Any means?" Deidara asked with glee.
"Don't get over excited. The poison works with surprising frequency."
The pair of S-Ranks crept up, until they were just perched before the window leading into the Kazekage's office. There was a figure there, bent over a stack of papers with a pen in hand.
With viper-like speed, Sasori flipped open the window with his tail, and hit the figure with a spurt of purple gas. It immediately slumped forward.
"Wow. I did not expect that to work." Deidara whispered. Sasori nodded sagely.
"Poison is underrated."
He turned over the figure with his tail, only to find a young woman where the Demon Host was supposed to be. Her face was serenely relaxed in unconsciousness.
"What? We got the wrong person?" Deidara said.
"I wonder what it is that compels you to point out the glaringly obvious."
"But, I mean, she was at the desk," Deidara continued, unperturbed. "That's like, sacrilege. Kages don't use doubles. They're already the strongest in the village anyway."
"Perhaps this one is a little more crafty."
"Probably has to be, poor guy. He's basically the only S-Rank in the entire country. Konoha's got, what? Fifteen?"
After a couple more minutes of bickering, the pair decided the best course of action would be to investigate the Kazekage's house. They also took Temari with them, because, as Sasori had pointed out,
"If we're really dealing with a man this dangerous, it's always good to have a back-up plan."
This is how the two S-Ranks found themselves standing in Gaara's private quarters, Temari's limp body carried along inside one of Sasori's puppets.
"Where the hell is this guy! Our intel said he hasn't left the village in three years! What's going on? Poker night?"
"This is certainly troubling," rumbled Sasori. His large wooden eyebrows were scrunched in thought. "I suppose, it is possible our intelligence was compromised."
"But then, why would security be so lax? If they were expecting us, wouldn't there be like, triple the guards or something? Fucking Shinobi mind games. This is why I hated Orochimaru you know."
"Everyone hated Orochimaru."
"Well, yeah. Actually, on that topic, don't you think it's a little strange that he tends to want the bodies of young boys more than-"
"We are not discussing this right now."
"And Itachi? The guy could be a model. It's no wonder Orochimaru made a move on him. I mean, those eyelashes."
Sasori carefully managed the strong desire to strangle his fellow Akatsuki partner. Perhaps he could ask Pein for a shift in organization. Itachi probably didn't have to put up with any of this shit from Kisame.
Maybe Kakuzu would be willing to switch with Deidara. He seemed reasonably professional, at least, when not on a murderous rampage.
Several miles away, on an undisclosed patch of forest,
"...Look, I'm not saying Sasori's asexual, but you have to admit it's a little weird that the only woman he spent any significant time around was his grandmother. Even someone like him would have to have some sort of needs, right? Unless..."
How did this conversation even start? Itachi wondered. Kisame had many respectable qualities. Control, strength, self discipline, but after the first hour or so of mindless walking, he turned into an unstoppable chatterbox. It was enough to make the man consider whether his partner's lust for battle was merely a symptom of his apparent ADHD.
The Uchiha couldn't remember contributing more than the occasional word to the conversation, but somehow they had managed to cover the newly-released spoilers for the next Icha Icha Novel, the potential merits of Jashinism, and how the human body could be replicated with a material as inflexible as wood, against all probability.
Perhaps he could ask Pein for a mission that didn't involve day-long treks through the wilderness. Then again, all their missions seemed to include these as a given.
He wondered if any of the other Akatsuki members would be willing to trade partners.
Maybe Kakuzu. He seemed reasonable, when not in a homicidal rage.
"So what are we going to do?" Deidara asked.
"Leave. Gather intelligence. Find out what's going on," Sasori replied curtly. The puppet containing Temari began to shudder and creak. "We've got a strategic asset. We just have wait for the right moment to strike."
"Fine. I was getting bored of this village anyway. I didn't even get to show anyone my art."
The pair and the floating puppet trailing behind them disappeared over Sunagakure's wall. In the bedroom directly parallel to Gaara's own, Kankuro continued his blissful sleep, snoring loudly.
Meanwhile, on a rooftop, Obito Uchiha shook himself awake, brushing away the crowd of birds that had accumulated. He slipped his mask on immediately, head whipping back and forth.
"That could have been a disaster," he muttered, re-adjusting his orange swirl mask. "I'd better get back to Headquarters and tell them to call off the mission."
With the shimmering of a warp between dimensions, Tobi stepped into Kamui, and become disconnected from the world.
Meanwhile, Deidara and Sasori flew off across the desert, on their way to the nearest terminal for accessing his vast spy network.
"So, on the topic of Orochimaru-"
"No."
Gaara descended towards Konoha's front gate with a smile on his face, and his neatly packed suitcase in hand. Sand travel really was convenient. It had gotten a bit tiring, standing up for such a long period, but that had been the extent of his discomfort.
And the escape from work and beautiful scenery the trip had provided, more than made up for this irritation.
He touched down before reaching the gate, so as not to inspire fear with his appearance. Simply enjoying the pleasant, surprisingly cool afternoon, Gaara approached the front gate with the barest hints of a smile on his face.
"Name, Village, and reason of visit?" the guard asked, pen and paper at the ready. He was not a particularly young looking man, and like many shinobi, he had a scar on his face. A single scratch, cutting across his left cheek.
"Gaara. Suna. Just visiting," the young Kazekage replied pleasantly. The guard quirked an eyebrow.
"It's just Gaara? No surname?"
"Some people call me Sabaku no Gaara, but I don't don't know whether it can be considered a surname. Never checked at least."
"Uh-huh," the older man said, scrabbling something. "What do you mean 'just visiting', though? Foreign Shinobi don't just visit other villages."
"I suppose you could say I'm on vacation," Gaara admitted.
"Vacation? Here?" the guard asked, clearly surprised and confused. "In a Hidden Village?"
"I don't really know any other places, and I wouldn't want to cause a diplomatic incident," the redhead admitted. "I was asked here by a friend though, so it seemed like a safe venture."
"I see... " the Leaf shinobi said slowly. "However, I'm afraid that it's not a valid reason to access the village without doing some security checks, and-"
"Gaara! You actually came!" a loud voice called from behind Konoha's gates. "What's with the hold-up?"
A massive moving piece of orange came into Gaara's awareness. After that, his eyes began to take in arms, legs, and a head of sun-bleached blond hair.
"Naruto?" He murmured, mostly to himself.
"It's been so long!" the blond grinned as he walked closer. "Glad that you could make it! Now come on, there's a lot I'll have to catch you up on now that you're back. You haven't even met Sai yet!"
"Naruto. This man hasn't been cleared. Even if he is from an allied village, we need to confirm that-"
"Are you kidding? Don't you know who he is?"
"One of your friends?"
"No! Well, yes. But he is also the Kazekage!"
"He is the-" The guard's reality shattered. "That's an even more important reason to screen him! What if something were to happen while he is in Konoha? It could create a diplomatic incident!"
"I'll be with him the whole time. It's no problem, right?"
Naruto dragged Gaara away by the arm before the man even had a chance to retort. The sensation was peculiar, Gaara reflected, in that Naruto's arm had not been immediately removed from his body violently via sand cloud, as despite being Kazekage, it had been a long time since anyone had actually touched him physically.
Perhaps he was getting soft. It wasn't particularly painful in any case.
"I'm not paid enough for this," the Chunin grumbled, hoping this wouldn't come back to bite him in the ass somehow.
After a brief stop to leave the Kazekage's luggage at Naruto's house after much insistence from his friend, Gaara found himself dragged along a winding, nonsensical path through the village. Apparently, Naruto wanted to take him sightseeing around Konoha, never stopping to talk for the whole time and giving quite a tour.
Gaara politely refrained from pointing out that he had already seen most of this section of the village, he had been present for over a month after all, but he chose instead to simply enjoy the company, and endless stream of words spilling out of Naruto's mouth.
"And that big red building over there, is the tower! There's the Hokage's office-which one day will be my office, of course-and archives and other boring stuff!"
"I was just wondering what its purpose was for," Gaara muttered. Naruto entirely missed the sarcasm.
"Really? Anyway, you still have to see the best place in the village!"
"The training grounds?"
"Even better! You'll see!" Naruto exclaimed, pushing Gaara along the road as if to make him go faster.
Eventually, they reached what appeared to be their destination. A small, few-seat Ramen Stand surrounded by one of the strangest assortment of Shinobi that Gaara had ever seen. And he was a Kage, so that was something.
"Naruto!" someone called from the establishment, but Gaara wasn't able to see who between all the chattering people seated there. "There's almost no place, hurry up!"
In a blur, Gaara found himself shoved on a seat besides his fellow jinchuuriki. He had no idea how it had happened, one second they were on the other side of the road, the next they were surrounded by people eating ramen.
"Old man, two large miso ramen for starters, and keep it coming!" Naruto yelled cheerfully. "And two for my friend here!"
With Naruto having taken care of his order without even consulting him, Gaara was then introduced to the group. Two of the people were instantly recognizable. The green spandex and bowler cut combo immediately gripped attention. Painfully.
The last time he had seen the pair of them in the same place, he was trying to kill the younger one, Rock Lee (who was now boasting about something 'youthful', whatever that meant) to satiate the bloodlust of the creature sealed inside him.
Deciding that those were not things wise to dwell on, he observed the rest of the assembled group.
He was introduced to two Hyuugas, their white eyes immediately making them recognizable. Hinata and Neji, both looking very unsure how to react to being invited to eat at a nine-seat Ramen Stand with a group of twelve.
There was a boy with a massive dog, Kiba, which did make Gaara a little curious. Large animals weren't exactly common in the desert. Well, other than him.
Another man, Shino, on a guess, had a horrifically scarring skin disease and had compensated by covering up as much of his body as possible through a combination of hood, high collar, and black glasses. That, or he was attempting to preserve what appeared to be a very pale complexion.
On the topic of pale complexion, the young teen, Sai, currently in a headlock at the hands of Sakura, had one of the strangest skin colors Gaara had ever seen, with hardly a hint of color anywhere. It gave the teen the appearance of a slightly-faded picture of a person, rather than a living one. The black and white clothing style only accentuated this perception.
There was a young woman with a blond ponytail, Ino, another with a pair of brown buns, Tenten, and a particularly rotund man in armor. Chouji's roundness was accentuated by the slim, bored looking person next to him, who's thin eyes and slouched posture made him look very unhappy about his current location, and its lack of an available bed.
Thinking about it, Gaara was sure that he had already met him. When he had tried to kill Lee. Once again, he brushed off those thoughts.
And finally, there was the mysterious masked teacher of Naruto, smiling, if his eye was to be any judge, and engrossed in a small orange book. The cover illustration showed a pair of girls, hugging enthusiastically, on the beach in bikinis.
Gaara wondered idly if Konoha had always been this strange, and he'd simply been too insane and self-obsessed to notice before.
Silence hung in the air after Naruto finished his introductions. Nobody seemed quite sure what to say to one of the five most powerful people in the world.
"I didn't know you were expecting me," the Kazekage said, attempting to break the silence. Well, almost silence. The pale one was choking, but apparently not resisting his headlock.
"Oh, that!" Naruto snapped his fingers. "I used a Shadow Clone to bring everyone here while you were getting the tour. They're all super excited to see you, right guys?"
The responses were… varied. Most of them seemed to be sizing him up, in one way or another. This was to be expected given his position. Naruto beamed, oblivious. Sakura gave him what could technically be considered a smile, although it was a bit strained, given her maintained choke hold.
Sai muttered something that sounded vaguely like "dick-waffle". The choke tightened, and Sakura's smile became even more menacing.
"YOSH! It is extremely refreshing to see you again, Gaara of Sunagakure! I have not had the opportunity to properly thank you for your help with our mission to retrieve Sasuke Uchiha!" Lee punctuated his statement with a thumbs up, inspiring a sudden burst of tears from his teacher.
Shikamaru winced at the volume. Gaara wasn't quite sure how to react, so he fell back on the relatively safe act of nodding. Politely.
"But… despite your great advances, which are not to be undervalued! But rather, that is…"
Gaara's eyebrows would have raised if he had any.
"Yes?"
Rock Lee looked on the verge of tears. His large, round, eyes were practically drowning. His eyelids were like flimsy dams, and Gaara was met with the painful certainly that the waterfalls were inevitably following.
"You are even less youthful than when we first met!"
Gaara once again wondered why, now in a compassionate embrace by the sobbing Lee, his assailant was not a pile of red mush.
"I… What does that mean, exactly?" The Kazekage asked.
"Your passion, and youthful will to move and exert yourself in powerful movement is practically extinguished! Why…"
Lee frowned, which slightly changed the angle of the tears spilling out of his eyes in a steady stream. He patted Gaara on the back, then chest, then arms.
"Sensei! It is even worse than I thought! It feels as though he hasn't exerted his flames of youth in years!"
Gaara tried, and failed, to remember a time during his reign as Kazekage when he had moved faster than a slow walk.
He had gotten tired out a bit, once, after walking around the village, and then discovered his ability to travel by standing on a patch of sand, and allowing it to propel him forward, and even into the air. In retrospect, that had probably been the day his already minimal cardio had died, alone and forgotten.
"Sensei, tell me you aren't thinking what I think you're thinking," Neji muttered, burying his face in one of his hands. The other was extended out, and Tenten was currently burying her own face in it.
"THIS MUST BE REMEDIED!" Gai shouted, raising his fist to the sky. His voice boomed over the street, but already used to the Green Beast, its inhabitants failed to respond.
"I appreciate the offer, but it's not necessary," he said calmly as he took an involuntary step back.
"EVEN WILL TO IGNITE YOUR FLAMES IS DIMINISHED. WE WILL SAVE YOU FROM YOURSELF, OH YOUTHFUL KAZEKAGE. TOGETHER, OUR FLAMES SHALL ILLUMINATE THE WORLD!"
With his declaration made, Gai and his student leapt together in a massive embrace, tears streaming from both their eyes.
"GAI SENSEI!"
"LEE!"
And now they were shouting each other's names. Gaara's ears pricked up. Were those… waves, he could hear? The image of a brilliant sunset filled his mind, inexplicably. He instinctively found himself trying to dispel a genjutsu. The image persisted.
"GAI SENSEI!"
"LEE!"
"GAI SENSEI!"
"Dick waffle," Sai cut in, just before sailing into the sky from a brutally strong uppercut.
"STOP INSULTING THE KAZEKAGE!"
"LEE!"
"GAI SENSEI!"
"Naruto?" Gaara asked, hoping to hear his opinion on this strange display.
The other jinchuuriki looked at Gaara with a helpless shrug. "They are the best at Taijutsu in the village. I'm sure it'd be helpful, if you want to do it."
Gaara, faced with the prospect of physical exercise, thought of his desk. Thought of the paperwork. Thought of the meetings. Thought of the experience of sitting in a chair, day after day, for hours on end, without anything to maintain spirits.
And then, Gaara reflected, compared to the hell of running a village, a little exercise was nothing. Maybe one or two quick reps of pushups, a little lifting. It might even be enjoyable. Besides he was only in town for a couple of days. This was a great opportunity.
Really. How hard could it be?
Kankuro rubbed his eyes as he kept moving towards Gaara's (now Temari's) office. He had gotten a terrible night's sleep, and was only moving through the familiar rooms and hallways thanks to well-ingrained instincts. How his brother managed to not sleep at all and still be functional, he had no idea.
Finally, he arrived in front of the Kazekage's office door. Knocking a few times, he hoped to judge his sister's mood by whatever answer he got. Lately, Temari had been very stressed about the village's state, after Gaara's sudden departure. No answer arrived though, so he slowly opened the door.
He was expecting to either find his sister too focused on some document or asleep on the desk after a late-night paperwork session, (something that Gaara never seemed to be bothered with), but much to his surprise, the room was empty.
No stressed Temari, no office drones shuffling papers in front of her, no documents on the desk, besides a single piece of paper. Getting closer, he picked up and read it aloud.
"I decided to take a vacation, so I'll not be around for a while. Going to the spa and other girly stuff. See you soon," he grumbled. It wasn't until several seconds had passed that he realized what it meant, and the paper fell from his fingertips.
"I… I'm finally in charge?" he asked to the empty room.
