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Chapter one

"A wish left unguarded will probably be stolen"

This story is dedicated to the letter ! And the number #, and to Fire for being so effing awesome. TELL ME IF YOU"RE ALIVE, MON! AN: Everybody who hasn't, go read Destiny's Child. It Roxxorz the boxxorz.

"Speech"

'thought'

sound effects

Telepathy

- scene changes, now with 100 less silly crap (Rating changed to M)

"Oof!" Ranma landed in a tree with a bang and a crack, and of course a shout of "Oof!"

"What the? Hey... My voice!" Ranma wondered at his sudden high pitched tone, not altogether unlike his girl form. But something was wrong. Perhaps it was the distinct lack of breasts and the fact that he was only six years old.

"Shit! Six years old? What did that old gargoyle do to me, anyway?" Ranma exclaimed, remembering.

"You will not evade my capture so easily, Crazy Uncle Jiro!" "Or something like that," the newly pre-teen reminisced.

'Geez, I wonder what the heck she was on,' he thought to himself, 'Now to get my bearings straight.' Ranma had a lot of experience at locating his position on the planet using only the stars and the angle of the sun. After all, a lot of traveling by Akane-Air or the Ryoga Express, and soon you will learn to stop wondering where you have landed and do something about it.

"..." Ranma stopped looking up at the starlit sky.

"None of these constellations make any sense!" Ranma finally shouted. "This can't be Earth!"

He began to run, past the trees, past the occasional buildings, he did not even pause to the rivers and obstacles in his way. He was lost, alone, and regressed, in a land he did not recognize, could not accept He ran past where the trees gave way to hills and sparse grass, where the grass gave way to rocks, and where the rocks became... sand...

-

"Huh, huh," Ranma panted, finally out of breath after running for an entire day at top speed, "It's no use. I still don't know where I am, and this place is a lot more forbidding than the forest I was in a day ago." A wall of rock and molded sand was before him, and in the dim, fading light he could see guards patrolling the top near a massive gate, marked with what looked, to him, like what someone who spoke English and not Japanese would call a giant, hollow letter "I". He walked closer, hoping it was a city in which he might be able to rest, a refuge against the winds that blew, he noticed, fletched with specks of sand and rock that began to grate against even his once powerful frame.

"Halt! Who are you who attempts to enter the village at night?" A guard at the top asked as Ranma, shivering, came near. 'It's getting colder, as it nears night. What a desert this is!' Ranma thought as he prepared a response.

"I, I am just looking for a warm place to spend the night, sir," Ranma responded, pretending to be the innocent child he appeared.

"Bah! You do not reach the Hidden Village of the Sand before night has fallen at least once on foot! I deny you your entrance, and you should be more careful with your pathetic trickery next time." The guard turned away, satisfied with leaving the gate shut, and Ranma grinned. 'Turning your back on someone you suspect to be dangerous? Tsk, tsk.'

Even with his depleted strength, Ranma was able to jump to the top of the gate. Before the guard had turned around again, Ranma was past him, leaving him embedded in the rock of the gate after using his head as a springboard into the night sky above the city.

-

Ranma was once again panting, hiding in an alleyway. "That... took... more out of me... than I expected..." He said to himself, cursing his young form.

"Hey, hey!" He heard a commotion from the mouth of the alley, and walked to the edge to look. A group of children, playing in the street as night fell, had accidentally kicked their only ball to the roof of a building. One of the smaller girls had even begun to cry.

"Damn it," Ranma spoke aloud, "I hate to reveal myself, but I can't stand to hear crying if I can do something about it." Walking into the open, he paused as the ball, with a slight crust of sand, began to descend as if of it's own power. It came to a rest in the arms of a small boy, who looked to be about four, who held it out to the others expectantly. That wasn't very strange to Ranma at all. 'So, he's telekinetic?'

What was strange to Ranma was the fact that all the other kids began to scream and run. "It's Gaara!" "Ahh, Gaara! Run!"

The kid with the ball began to look mad. "No! Stay! I just wanted to..." The sand around him began to swirl and then lashed out at the closest kid.

Ranma acted fast, despite his weakened state. He took the blow for the girl. "Wait, whoever you are!"

Gaara blinked. This kid didn't know who he was? That had never happened before.

"You should let them be!" Ranma said, strongly, and the other kids began to cheer him on.

"Huh? But they... are so mean..." Gaara began to clutch his chest and shiver.

"So let them be!" Ranma turned around and spat on the ground beside the child he had saved. "If that is there reaction to being helped then I don't know why you should give them that back in the first place!" Ranma said, pointing to the ball.

"What?" Gaara said, beginning to remove his hand from over his heart cautiously, letting the other hand hold the ball loosely.

"If you want," Ranma began, "I'll..." Ranma began to try and swallow his manly pride. 'I'm six! It's okay for a six year old to play kid games!'

Gaara thought to himself also. 'Is he scared of me as well?' His hand returned to his chest and he glared warily.

"I'll play ball with you!" Ranma finally answered.

Gaara, shocked, dropped his hand from his shirt and, for the first time, smiled.

-

"So, Gaara, you look happier than normal today." An attendant was helping Gaara put away his things to prepare to rest.

"Yashamaru. Today I... made a friend." Gaara smiled again, directing it at his uncle.

Yashamaru gasped, eyes wide, an action not lost on Gaara. "You, you did?" He managed to squeek out, before composing himself. Gaara's knife lay unused at his side. "Ahem. That's very good Gaara."

"Yashamaru. What does pain feel like?" Gaara asked, looking at Yashamaru closely.

Yashamaru took the knife from Gaara's holster and quickly, before Gaara could react, cut his own finger. "Ah..." He said softly.

"Gaara, pain is... it's hard to describe. It's hard to bear, it's something that is not easily ignored. It destroys the concentration and stability of those it affects." Yashamaru took his cut hand and showed it to Gaara. "There are two kinds of pain: Physical pain, and the pain of the heart. Physical pain can be healed easily, but there is only one medicine for pain of the heart."

"I think..." Gaara said, moving his hand over his heart, "It hurt here, for so long. But now... I feel less of a weight on my chest."

"There is only one medicine for pains of the heart," Yashamaru repeated, for emphasis, "Love, care, someone close to you can give you this and then your pain will become better."

Yashamaru thought of his sister, Gaara's mother, but could not think of a reason why Gaara would ever feel love like his for her, or even for anyone.

-

"Yashamaru, I would like your help. I hurt someone today, and I want to apologize. Help me find some ointment, for cuts."

Gaara thought of this as he walked through the darkened streets to where Ranma had been, where he had left him with the ball and a warm cloak so he would not be as cold.

"Ranma, how is your arm?" Gaara asked, tapping him lightly to wake him from his light sleep.

"Oh, Gaara. Heh heh, I'm all right!" Ranma flexed his arm, then cringed.

"Here, take this ointment. It should heal faster." Gaara then otherwise wordlessly handed him the ointment, his other hand slipping to the middle of his shirt.

"Gee, thanks!" Ranma said enthusiastically. "This stuff is really high quality," he continued with an appraising eye, "It's actually got some magic in it! Where'd you get this?" Ranma was overjoyed to be given a powerful healing gift. 'Who knows when this could come in handy?' He immediately spread a thin layer on the cut on his arm, sighing as he felt it take effect. 'Normally, this combined with my Ki healing ability would make this injury vanish in an instant. But I'm still weakened by my young age.'

Gaara lifted both arms and caught Ranma in a hug, taking a slight amount of care not to break the jar of healing ointment. When he began to cry, Ranma was worried, until he lifted his head to smile at Ranma. "Thank you, for accepting me."

Ranma held Gaara for a long time, the cold forgotten in the warmth of a new friendship cemented.

-

"Where do you think you're going, you kids!" A drunk accosted Ranma as Gaara led him back to his own place, deciding in the moment that any friend of his would not be staying in an alleyway with nothing but a torn cloak and thin silk clothing.

"Hey!" Ranma shouted back, and the man focused his eyes once more only to jump back in surprise.

"It's Gaara! Aaaah!" The man ran away, slipping and tripping drunkenly down the road in the opposite direction.

Ranma briefly turned around to watch. "Yeah, you better run!" His antics did a little to cheer Gaara up, and Gaara remembered Ranma's words from earlier in the day. 'If they run from me, it's their loss,' he thought, 'I only need one friend who doesn't care who I am to make me satisfied.' He turned to Ranma for a second.

"Hmm? Is anything wrong?" Ranma asked, suddenly worried and not joking at all.

Gaara turned back to the road ahead, smiling. "Not anymore."

-

AN: Not a yaoi. Don't you dare think that! Also, to give perspective, Ranma should be a bit taller than Gaara, he is about two years older, I reckon, by apparent age, not actual. I don't actually remember how old Gaara was at this point, so pretend it was always four, k?

-

Ranma jumped to the roof of the next building. "Here!" he yelled back down, "We can walk up here to avoid those losers!"

Gaara looked up for a second, before the sand as his feet coiled, and he began to lift until he was standing above Ranma's height at the top of the building. He stepped carefully down.

"Whoa..." Ranma said, impressed, as Gaara did not even worry about the words, "That was awesome!"

Gaara stood, basking in pride, before a whistling was heard behind him. Before the sand could even move to protect him, Ranma was already there, catching shuriken and kunai.

"Show yourself!" Ranma shouted, "Nobody attacks my friends!"

A veiled ninja stepped out from behind a chimney. "Hmm." He grunted, and let loose another volley of airborne steel, this one caught by the sand Gaara was concentrating on moving. Gaara gasped as he recognized a bandaged finger.

Ranma, himself, burst into action, his skill and power surprising the assassin. With a few well placed kicks, the man was sent flying back into the chimney, neck cracking against the wall.

"I... didn't mean to hurt him so bad..." Ranma whispered.

The man weakly took off his mask, confirming Gaara's fears.

"Yashamaru!" Gaara exclaimed, once more holding his heart in his hand, "Why?"

"It was... an order. But I could have refused. I hate you! Gaara, I have tried to think of you... as my sister's precious child... but she died... cursing this village. That sand protects out of love, but you have none! You killed her!" Yashamaru panted with the effort as he felt his life slipping away.

Ranma was shocked. "You killed her?" he asked Gaara, unbelieving.

Gaara cringed, sadly. "She died as I was born. My existance killed her!"

Ranma turned back to Yashamaru with renewed confidence. "How can you blame him for that? How?" He began to cry, slightly, at the horrible situation he found himself caught up in.

"Just... die..." A symbol on his chest became alight, and then exploded with a devastating force.

Ranma was unharmed inside a thin shell of sand connected to a thicker one in front of Gaara.

Gaara was stunned by the betrayal and the effects. 'The sand protects out of love...' he thought, and looked to his friend, untouched by the explosion.

-

AN: Please, flame me. I deserve nothing less. /sarcasm