Author/Artist: Hiko Mokushi / plural_entity.
Pairing: Sabaku no Gaara x Haruno Sakura.
Community/Fandom: 30_kisses/Naruto.
Theme: #2 — news; letter.
Rating: PG-13, for language.
Disclaimer: Kishimoto-sensei owns, of course.
Author Notes: Glad to see I could get some GaaSaku fans to like me. (= I just wanna be popularrr. *whine* Ah well. Popularity is overrated. For the few of you who deign to give reviews, I give lots of love and cookies. GaaSaku romance must be taken slowly. (Except smut. That needs to be taken fast.) Thus, as a series of connected one-shots, it will take a while to get to the actual kissing. Or hand-holding. Or staring into each other's eyes. Sorry if I bore anybody with my metaphoric dawdling.
I'll probably update on mondays. These seem to come easier than my other stuff. Not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
They were somewhere on the outskirts of Suna.
It was close enough inland of the border that the days were long and blisteringly hot, to the point that between the hours of ten and four, when the sun was hottest, everyone stayed in their tents. Thankfully, they were far enough away from the main portion of the desert that what little sandstorms cropped up were easily dealt with by merely closing the flap of your tent and getting some extra rest.
Their small squadron had been settled there near a month, and truth be told, it was little squadron. Sixteen permanently-placed ninja and four runners that came and went; ten from both Suna and Konoha. Sixteen hot, sweaty, miserable ninja, who did nothing more than sit around and wait for letters.
Sakura had never hated the desert more. And she'd actually liked the desert the few times she'd been there.
The heat made her irritable, the other eighteen men made her irritable, the sand made her irritable. The only thing in the godforsaken camp in the middle of nowhere that didn't make her irritable was the Kazekage's sister, Temari.
Stuck out here, in the middle of nowhere, she felt useless. Technically, their little outpost was important in the grand scheme of things. Gaara and Naruto had certainly been right. There were tiny revolts occurring all over the countries. They were small and painfully insignificant, but little bits and pieces of Orochimaru's minions—fueled by the finally-ended Akatsuki activities—were cropping up everywhere. Abandoned experiments, forgotten lovers, and even some misplaced worshippers and the ninja lands were in a somewhat organized chaos. Once seen to, the uprisings could easily be controlled and sufficiently stamped out—it just took a little while to get there.
Konoha and Suna were leading the way for a full-scale ninja alliance, and both Kages were at the forefront. Considering the fact that both Villages were minus their leaders, the Kages had—nearly unwillingly—left their Villages in the hands of their Elders. With the promise that they would receive full reports on how the Villages were doing in return for reports on their mission status. And Sakura was stuck, smack dab in the middle of it—a post office.
"I swear on Gaara's life, if one of them so much as looks at me the wrong way again, they're going to get a kiss from my fan."
Sakura glanced up from the medical book in her lap as Temari snapped the tent flap closed, and chuckled, raising an eyebrow. "Which one was it this time? Enishi or Keigo?" There were only four tents to their little home away from home: the four runners had one, the seven Konoha ninja had a tent and the seven Suna ninja had a tent. And then, just because they were the only two women amongst the men, Temari and Sakura had their own tent all to themselves. In the beginning, it had caused a bit of a commotion until Naruto and Gaara had had their say. Now, the men just leered.
"I don't know," the woman replied, leaning over a small porcelain bowl at one side of the tent. She dipped her hands in and lifted some water to her face, soothing the wind-burned skin. "I don't match faces with names, they're all just animals. How long did they say it'd be before we got to go back to some form of civilization?"
"Well, Naruto said in his last letter that they were going to be late, but I think the Kazekage should be arriving on time." Sakura stretched her arms over her head as she leaned back on her cot, thin tank top ghosting over the skin of her belly. She lifted it higher, tucking it about her bindings so that her stomach and spine cooled. "Maybe we should think about not walking around half naked. We do sort of ask for it."
Temari pulled her top off and stood in the middle of the tent in just her bindings, wiping sweat off her shoulders and the small of her back. "Fuck them." She rolled her shoulders, dipping the corner of the handkerchief into the water and wiping at her neck. She sighed and closed her eyes. "They should understand that as two women, we are not merely objects to be ogled. If Gaara were here, he would make sure they stopped looking..."
"If the Kazekage were here, they wouldn't have looked in the first place." Sakura chuckled, imagining both sets of shinobi running scared from the Sand's great leader and his vicious, icy glare. "But then again, we probably wouldn't be so hot. He could just glare at us and we'd be shivering."
"He's not so bad. Once you get to know him." The other woman laid down on her cot across the room, hands pillowing her head as she stared at the ceiling. Sakura glanced over at her, expression curious. "I mean, when we were younger, yeah. But after Naruto, he really turned around. Back then, not a day went by that I wasn't scared of him. Sometimes, when he looked at me, I honestly feared for my very life. I thought he was the devil incarnate, brought about by my mother's bloody death and my father's fierce hatred for everything kind and gentle. He was the personification of both of their enmity—for Suna and for each other. He'd look at me and I'd wonder if it was the end." She chuckled, but it sounded sort of hollow, and Sakura wondered how their conversation had taken such a fierce turn. "I remember praying that he'd remember I was his older sister in the end and at least, he'd make it quick."
Sakura bit her lip. "That's horrible, Temari."
Temari closed her eyes. "I know." She licked her cracked lips and sighed again. "I know. It's true. But now... After you and Chiyo-sama brought him back to life, he hugged me. For the first time in his entire life. I wasn't sure he even knew what a hug was. But he just clung to me. For once, he could actually sleep, but he couldn't. He'd wake in a cold sweat after under an hour. He'd scream and thrash. He attacked people. The nightmares just got to him. The medics tried everything from merely wasting his chakra supply completely—which took forever, by the way—to sleep aids, to full on tranquilizers, narcotics, even alcohol." She turned her head slightly to glance at the pink-haired woman and smirked. "Gaara's the same drunk as he is sober—he just blinks more."
"Nothing worked?" asked Sakura. She couldn't find it in her to be horrified. The idea of Suna's once-great monster unable to sleep because of a few nightmares was almost mind-boggling, but she'd believe anything nowadays. He'd played lead in a few nasty ones of her own.
The woman shrugged. "After a while, we just left him alone. He lived for fifteen years without sleep, he could go a few more while we figured something out. We'd ask if he'd tried sleeping every so often, but he wouldn't answer. Eventually, we just gave up. I've seen him sleep once, though. Truly sleep. It happens every once in a while." She smiled. "He looks so peaceful. As though his life never happened."
"The markings around his eyes were from the insomnia, if he can sleep, shouldn't those go away?" She pursed her lips.
"I don't know. He doesn't get as much sleep as he should, so maybe not. Maybe they're permanently there. Not that anybody cares. The girls in Suna say they make him look more dashing."
"He certainly does have a following." Sakura giggled at the thought. She'd thought she and Ino were bad when they were younger; they had nothing on the young girls that stalked the Kazekage. "The Kazekage should be back in few days. They'll rest around and then we can head somewhere. Naruto and Kakashi and the rest of them can meet us there. Somewhere with fresh water and not well water, and air conditioning and proper showers."
Temari sighed. "And real food," she added. "We're closer to Suna than Konoha, if you could stand any more of the desert."
"As long as you have showers." Sakura's stomach growled. She closed her eyes and she rubbed her fingers along her exposed belly. "And real food."
to be continued...
