Title: How to Train Your Pet

Author: LadySable (LiveJournal)/StoryBard(here)

Pairings: Gaara and Naruto

Rating: T

WARNINGS: This will have heterosexuality and homosexuality. If either offend you, this is not the story for you.

Disclaimer: All characters are properties of Masashi Kishimoto. I do not make money from this fan made work.

Summary: AU/AR Gaara adopts a pet unlike any other, not realizing that their pasts are more intertwined than he originally thought.

Chapter 2: A Common Hobby


Gaara was wrenched awake by something that felt like a 200 pound punching bag. A puff of air left his body, as he felt the punching bag land around his stomach. He looked down at the punching bag that attacked, only to see that it was a grinning, blond haired man.

He was ready to interrogate him, but remembered that he had adopted him. Or something. "What are you doing?"

"Well," the man dragged the word out, his deep blue eyes sparkling. "Since I'm your pet, I'm supposed to do 'pet-like' things, right? A normal pet tends to wake their master in the morning. Besides, what could be better to see in the morning than a grinning face?"

Gaara looked at him. Not only did he adopt a pet, he'd adopted a clown of a pet. He could handle it. He'd be at work for the majority of the week, anyway.

Knowing that he could survive a week of this in comparison to Temari bugging him for the rest of the month about a pet, he jerked himself out of the pet's grasp, and kicked him out of bed. He looked at his alarm clock, and growled in irritation. It was five thirty in the morning. He could have gotten thirty more minutes of sleep.

He turned on the pet, and hissed, "Pets aren't allowed on my bed, especially not at five thirty in the morning, when I could use every minute of sleep I can get."

Ignoring the blond's fearful face, he went to get ready for work. "What was he doing up at five thirty in the morning?" he asked himself when he was in the shower, the cascading water drowning out his question.

Having extra time, he was able to make a pot of tea, and ate cereal in front of the pet who looked at him as if he were a monster. It wasn't until Gaara grabbed his keys, and was exiting the apartment that he told the pet, "You could have eaten with me."

He smirked at Pet's furious indignation, and closed the door, feeling better that he was able to get back at the man.


"Hey, is your cell phone on silence or something? 'Cause Temari keeps calling me, saying that she can't get to you."

Gaara glanced up from the article he was working on. Kankuro was leaning over, blocking the light that was shining on it, a slightly concerned look touching his face.

"She keeps asking if you've gotten the pet like she asked, or if she needs to pick up a puppy for you," Kankuro rubbed his hands together. "This isn't another one of her schemes is it?"

Gaara nodded slightly, then stated, "You can tell Temari that, yes, I have gotten a pet, and that if she has enough free time at work, she should spend it working, not bothering you at work."

Kankuro shrugged, "I don't mind. The entertainment section is full of rookies who haven't written any articles for me to look at. I wish Yamato was still here, at least he could write an interesting article. You could practically see the ballerinas dancing or the music moving when he wrote. These rookies got nothing on him, and their articles are boring."

"Then maybe you should make up for their boring articles by writing your own," Gaara gritted out.

"Maybe," Kankuro looked up. Then innocently asked, "So what kind of pet is it?"

"It's a normal, regular pet," Gaara stated, making sure he was clear. A misunderstanding like last night was the last thing he wanted.

"What other kind of pet is there?" Kankuro asked, a genuinely curious look in his eyes.

"Not the kind of pet, I want," Gaara mumbled inaudibly. "Don't you have work to do?"

Kankuro tapped his finger on his chin, "Work, or bugging my little brother? What a tough decision."

Gaara, pushed his chair back, ready to forcibly make his brother leave, when Baki entered his office and said, "Kankuro, stop messing around with Gaara, and get to work."

Gaara glared at Kankuro as the older brother tilted his head, whistling softly as he removed himself from the red head's presence.

"Baki," Gaara said wearily, slowly sitting back down.

"No. No excuses. I know you've been trying hard these last few years to be more sociable, and I understand, I really do."

Gaara glared at him, "Do you? Do you really understand what I'm going through? Do you know how hard it is to deal with people?"

Baki gave him a wide smile, "Why do you think I became a reporter? People are hard to deal with, but if you ever want to be a better reporter than you are now, you're going to have to learn to deal with them, and you can start by not letting Kankuro get a rise out of you." The smile was wiped away, "Kankuro's enjoying the fact that he can get a rise out of you. Before, anything Temari or Kankuro did wouldn't budge you, let alone irritate you. He's taking advantage of it because he doesn't know how long it'll last."

Gaara turned his head away from him, his hands clenched in tight fists. Baki sighed, and said, "Just get to work, I'll try to keep Kankuro from causing you too many problems."As he was leaving Baki mumbled, "This is why siblings should never work in the same place." Gaara shot him a scowl even though the door had already closed.

He was tapping his pencil on the desk while skimming an article when his office phone rang.

"Gaara!" An older voice rumbled through the receiver. "Come to my office."

"Yes, sir," Gaara said, getting up, and heading over to the editor-in-chief's office. He was older than Baki, and most workers just called him the Veteran. Gaara didn't particularly like the veteran, yet there was a mutual, if not spoken of, respect between them.

"There's a basement flooding in the old Baptist church on Hill Crest Street. Go check it out, see if you can get a good story out of it. If it doesn't garner much, give your notes to a rookie."

Gaara nodded, and there was a tinge of relief in his voice when he said, "Yes, sir."

A flooding? No problem, anything to get out of the now deathly claustrophobic building.


The flooding turned out to be a better story than expected. It wasn't just the fact that it had clearly been vandalism. There was a message sprayed on the church door in the shape of a red cloud, reminiscent of the gang activity going on in Konoha more than thirty years earlier.

He returned to the office, and showed what he found to the veteran. The editor-in-chief had looked over the notes, quotes, and pictures that Gaara had gotten, and looked expectantly at him.

"Are you going to follow in your father's footsteps?" the older man had asked him.

The red head gave the veteran a blank smirk, "I don't plan to be murdered, but, yes, I'd like to take this on."

"Then I'll give it to you. Just don't tell anyone how much information you have, that's what killed your father."

As he headed home the red head looked up at the darkening sky, carefully holding the folder that held the information about the church to his chest.

He wasn't doing this case for his father, there was little respect between them. However, there was a small part of him that hoped that maybe this would prove that his existence wasn't a complete waste. That if he could do something that even his father couldn't, then he would never have to ponder why he was still alive.

Yet, even more than that, there was a fierce excitement surging through his body. He would be working on a case that was interesting, that had some meaning to more than just a few citizens in their town. Even more than proving his own existence, that gave him a fierce determination to get any information he possible could about the Bloody Cloud gang.

The first documented crime that unerringly pointed to the Bloody Cloud gang happened thirty years ago. They were a long living gang, and there were still rumors that they were around. Now, Gaara had proof from the door on the church that the Bloody Cloud gang was making a come-back. No other local gang was brave enough to take on their symbol for fear that they still had members around, and that they'd wake up with a bullet in their gut.

Yet, twenty years ago, something had happened. There was a huge gang war in a decent part of Konoha, why they were there no one asked, but it seemed that two major leaders of the group were attacked. For roughly ten years after that, the Bloody Cloud gang laid low. The only things that said that they were still around was silent murders with their symbol on the door of the house to indicate that it was them, or small acts of vandalism that were either blamed on them or was their doing. However, they stopped openly declaring war on the other gangs in the area like they used to.

Eight years after the gang war the Bloody Cloud gang attacked the Uchiha complex, a closed off area that consisted of only close relatives to the Uchiha family. It was a bloody massacre. The only reason it was pinned on the Bloody Cloud gang was that on the gates to the complex was a huge bloody cloud and it wasn't made of paint like it usually was.

The police interviewed the Last of the Uchiha, Uchiha Sasuke, who was the only member found alive in the complex. They found out that he had witnessed some of the murder, and he was sent to child therapy for a few months, but then he was okayed by the therapist. The only thing he had really added to the case was that his older brother had been a part of the killing, and shot his own mother and father in front of his little brother.

Konoha was devastated by this blow. The Uchiha's had been a huge part of the police force. The whole city thought that the Bloody Cloud gang was going to do an all-out attack on Kohoha, but they retreated back into the quiet shadows again.

After the massacre, Gaara's father suddenly became obsessed with reporting about the Bloody Cloud gang. He would work long hours, then, when he did come home, he would retreat into his study and lock himself in. One night, Gaara had walked past his father's study. The door had been open a crack, and he had peered in. His father was talking to himself, leaning over his desk, and scribbling fast and hard, his face glistening in the light of the lone lantern. Gaara quickly left, his father's eyes weren't focused.

Then one day, he suddenly became a loving father. He would cuddle Temari and Kankuro while watching a movie. He tried to read them to sleep, but they had outgrown needing a bed time story. He would take them shopping, buying Temari and Kankuro whatever they wanted, and sometimes letting Gaara pick something out, but only when Temari or Kankuro pointed out that he was there. Gaara had been suspicious of his father that week. After so long of neglect, and then turning a 180, there had to be something going on. Something he wanted from them.

They didn't know that their father would be dead by the end of the week.

It had been an unfortunate accident, the police told them. It wasn't for another two years that Gaara realized that 'unfortunate accident' meant that his father had probably been murdered. It wasn't until he finally scoured all the old news clippings that he found out that his father had been murdered. His father had gotten too close to the truth.

The red head twitched when a streetlight suddenly poured light down on him. The sky was an inky black, twilight long gone. Recovering from the break in his thoughts, Gaara made a mental check list to possibly interview the Last of the Uchiha. There could be some vital information for his article that only he would have.

Heading up the stairs that lead to his apartment, Gaara tried to remember if he left his lights on when he'd left the apartment. If he hadn't, then there was an intruder in his home, a reckless intruder at that.

He cautiously jiggled the doorknob: unlocked. He always locked his door. He reached into his pocket, ready to dial the police, when the door burst open. Gaara stumbled out of the way, barely managing to keep the folder safe. He wasn't in the clear, though, as a large form burst out with the door, and its target seemed to be him.

The attacker barely had his arms wrapped around the red head, when Gaara grabbed his bearings, and ducked under and out of the way of the arms. The other man stumbled, as he was using enough force to knock down two people, and rolled to the ground.

Gaara watched in horror as the figure was about to go down the stairs.

The attacker quickly tucked himself in a ball, and, using the momentum from the attack, rolled to his feet, precariously balancing on the edge of the step. He grabbed the railing stopping his momentum, and stumbled back a few steps away from the stairs, landing on his bottom in front of Gaara.

The attacker leaned his head back, and looked up at the red head, an adrenaline incited grin on his face, his eyes were dancing wildly. He looked far too happy for being so close to dying.

"That was fun! We should do it again tomorrow, it'd be great practice for me!" Pet said cheerfully.

Gaara glared at him, and hissed, "You could have died, and you think it's a game? I could have been charged for murder!"

"But I didn't," he pointed out with his finger.

Gaara scowled, turned, and entered the apartment. His fingers lingered on the lock, seriously considering locking the nuisance outside, but removed them before he could be seduced by that temptation.

He set the folder on the kitchen table, peering curiously at the papers that were strewn across the other side of the table. He was normally much neater than that, and he would never leave important documentation out for someone to see. That someone being the pet that was coming through the door.

"Ah!" the blond cried out. "Don't look at those!"

"'Martial Arts Scholarship'?" Gaara murmured, reading the title of the paper he was currently looking at before the blond yanked it out of his hand. He watched as the pet frantically gathered up the papers on the table, stopping him just before he grabbed Gaara's folder in his hurry.

The blond looked down embarrassed at being caught. "It's just a stupid thing I was thinking about today, creating a scholarship," he said offhandedly, setting the papers in a pile next to the folder.

"Scholarships aren't stupid. Rather, if someone's willing to work for something and gain something out of it, it's a good thing," Gaara told him, slightly curious at the fact that the blond was thinking about something that didn't involve 'the moment,' which was where he had originally thought the blond's thinking track ran continuously.

"Yeah," the blond mumbled, looking down at the floor, not meeting Gaara's eyes. "I just can't seem to figure it out, though."

"Well, you obviously need money to supply a scholarship, and the biggest problem is that you don't have that kind of money," the red head pointed out, opening a cabinet underneath the kitchen sink.

"I'll have money, that's not a problem," the blond lazily said. "The problem is, is that I can't figure out how to make the scholarship hard enough that not everyone can get it, but I don't want to make it so hard that it requires special equipment that kids in poverty can't get."

"You can't just blow off the fact that you do need money to make a scholarship," Gaara said, looking up at the blond incredulously, before grabbing the tin watering can from out of the cabinet.

"I don't mean to sound like a rich boy, but I am gaining a huge inheritance in about a few months, so I really don't think money's a problem."

"That makes you sound like a rich boy," Gaara murmured, opening the glass door next to the kitchen table that lead to a small balcony. The blond followed him, so Gaara continued, "Besides, if you're gaining such a huge inheritance in a few months, then why on earth are you pretending to be my pet?" Gaara looked over at the blond suspiciously, something wasn't adding up.

The blond gave a nervous grin, "That's because I sort of wandered here by accident. I didn't take anything with me, so while I have some money, not as much as my inheritance, I'm technically broke until I get it."

Gaara paused, tipping the watering can back away from the Christmas cactus, and turned to the blond, "How on earth did you wander all the way from Konoha without realizing that you had ended up in Suna? You know that there's at least forty-five miles between here and there. How did you not notice?"

The blond looked away, and said, "I don't want to talk about it."

"That's not going to cut it," Gaara hissed. "Either you tell me now, or I'm going to call the police because you're looking dead suspicious to me."

The red head took a step back at the heated glare the blond sent him, then the blond slumped like a puppet released from its strings. The blond turned and gazed out at the city below him, before quietly saying, "My friend, no, my brother and I got into a really bad argument. I left our apartment because I didn't really understand most of it, and I had to sort it out for myself. I just got to walking, not thinking about where my feet were taking me." Gaara watched him for a second, and then went back to watering his cacti. "Next thing I knew, this guy I bumped into was throwing me into the dumpster," the blond turned and the grin he shot him shown in the dark. "Then I met you, and all was right in the world."

Gaara paused, and glared at him, detecting the amusement in his voice. The red head opened his mouth, but was interrupted, "So, why do you grow plants? You don't seem like the kind of guy to have a green thumb."

Gaara closed his mouth, and looked at him. The wide blue eyes silently pleading that he drop the subject. "It fulfills a need I have," he answered shortly. "I like them better than most people."

"Yeah? Well, unlike plants, most people don't shut up long enough for you to get a word in."

"Look who's calling the kettle black," Gaara murmured to the cactus next to him. He kept his eye on the blond, smirking slightly as the blond turned indignantly.

"I heard that!" He stabbed a finger in the red head's direction, before lowering it, and asking, cautiously, "So what need do they fill for you? I know the plants I grew when I was little helped make my life seem less," he paused, trying to come up with the right word, "empty."

"How could your life be empty? You're the opposite of anti-social," the red head stared at the blond cynically. He was the kind of guy people flocked like flies to honey.

The man gave him a blank smile, then turned to watch the city scape below.

Gaara watched the blond's profile, before turning back to his cacti, and saying, "I'm the same, I suppose. They make it feel less empty, but they also give me something to look forward to each day."

"They'll always be there, even if no one else is," the other man murmured. "I really like your view from here."

"Hmm?" Gaara looked up from watering, and followed the other man's gaze out into the sea of lights.

"It's so inspiring, you know. Seeing all those lights flickering on and off. People are alive and moving." A gust of wind blew through, and the blond's hair whipped back, his face clearly showing his awe and amazement. "They're like stars on earth."

"Stars that are easily snuffed out," Gaara quietly retaliated, taking in the city lights. "Unlike real stars that last for millions of years. Like the sun," Gaara looked up at the blond's hair, hair that could rival the sun's glory.

The blond tilted his head and glanced up looking for real stars, frowning at the cloud coverage and city lights that wouldn't let him see them. He turned to Gaara with a grin, "Well, they might last for millions of years, but I'm sure it would get boring up there. Besides, what's easily snuff out, you treasure all the more. Stars are fascinating, but I'm sure only a few people on this earth truly treasure them."

"My sister treasures the stars," Gaara murmured quietly. "She says they remind her of our mother."

"'Remind her'?" Pet trailed off, then place his hand on Gaara's shoulder. "I'm sorry."

The red head shrugged off the hand, "Don't be, she died in childbirth, I never knew her."

The other man nodded somberly. Then shouted over the railing, "One day, all these stars will recognize me. I will become the greatest dojo head this world has ever seen!"

"That's what the scholarship was for," Gaara said. "No wonder you're not worried about money, if you're inheriting a dojo."

The blond turned to him sheepishly, "No, I'm not inheriting a dojo. My godmother owns it, and she says that she's not going to write it in her will to give it to me until I prove myself to her." Pet scowled, "Besides, if I'm lucky at all, I might get it without debts attached."

"What kind of debts?"

"My godmother likes to gamble, even though she's known as the Biggest Sucker. The only times she ever wins is when something bad's about to happen, so she keeps gambling. I guess it's so she can reassure herself," Pet fiddled with a necklace around his neck, and glanced across the city in the direction Konoha should be.

"That seems like rotten luck. To win only when something terrible is going to happen." Gaara eyed the necklace curiously before dismissing it, and finished watering the last of the cacti. He looked down one more time, noticing the mailboxes for his apartment. "I forgot to get the mail."

"Don't worry about it, I picked it up for you like a good pet," the blond shot him a cheesy grin. "The whole incident almost got me put in jail, though."

"How so?"

"Well, your neighbor, Shino, he saw me entering your house, and interrogated me." The blond let out a loud laugh, "He didn't believe me when I said I was your friend, but he believed me when I said I was your newly adopted pet." Gaara blanched. Out of all of his neighbors, Shino was the best. He didn't bug the red head, and he left him in peace. He didn't want him to think he was some sort of nymphomaniac.

"By the way, is he some sort of bug specialist or something? Cause when he interrogated me, he was carrying a couple of cages with bugs in it, and for some weird reason, there were a bunch of bugs just attached to him." Pet shook its head, "When I first saw him, quite frankly, he scared me, but he's an interesting fellow."

Gaara nodded in confirmation, then turned to leave the balcony.

"So what's for dinner?" the blond asked him as they entered the apartment.

"Same thing as last night, I haven't been able to go shopping," Gaara murmured, placing the watering can underneath the sink, and turning to the next cabinet to get out a pot.

"Yes! If you keep making ramen, you might have to kick me out to make me leave your house of ramen goodness," the blond said smiling as he sat at the kitchen table.

"You'd seriously be the easiest person to kidnap," the red head said, shaking his head. "All they would have to do is offer to take you out to ramen, and then they'd have you."

"As long as I get my ramen, I'd probably even participate in my kidnapping," the blond grinned cheekily at him before turning to his stack of papers, fussing with them.

"Why are you making the scholarship?" the red head asked, slightly curious as to why a well off man would even care to help those in poverty.

"I want to help a poor kid out, like I was helped when I was little. If it weren't for my godmother, I'd probably be worse off than I am now, or even dead," the blond gave him a wide smile, as if his death had little meaning to him.

"Why would you be worse off?" Gaara stirred the ramen in the pot, trying to ignore his own gurgling stomach. He rarely ate dinner, but it seemed that if he was cooking dinner for the blond, he could make some for himself.

"Oh, you know how things are as a kid," the blond slightly chuckled. Then asked, "What's in this folder? You were protecting it like it was worth more than your life."

Gaara turned quickly, the blond was lifting up the edge of the folder. "Don't touch it!" he snapped. "That has some very important, confidential information that the police do not want distributed around right now. If I see you so much as touching it again, you will leave," he hissed.

The blond raised up his arms to ward of his verbal attack, and said, "Okay, okay."

Gaara gave him one last suspicious glare, before turning to the ramen, and tilting it into a bowl on the counter. He gingerly picked it up, and placed it in front of the blond, who dug into it without further ado.

The red head rinsed out the pot before adding more water to make his own dinner, slightly curious as to why ramen was so great that the blond would be willing to participate in his own kidnapping for it.

He looked over at the blond, his brow furrowed, and said, "You live in Konoha right?"

"Mmm hmm," the blond hummed around the noodles in his mouth.

"You wouldn't happen to know the Last of the Uchiha, would you?" He startled as he heard a loud bang.

The blond had set his ramen bowl onto the kitchen table a little too hard, and he looked at it as if he would apologize to the bowl, before turning and giving Gaara a huge smile, "Do I? He's my closest friend!" Then he paused, "You're talking about Sasuke, right?" Gaara nodded, then watched as the man's shoulders drooped. "I mean, I think he's still my friend."

So Sasuke was the one Pet got into an argument with. "He must really mean something if you were able to walk all the way to Suna without realizing it," Gaara said, inquiring about their friendship.

"Yeah, he was one of my first bonds, and was the first person I made a connection to," the blond said offhandedly before finishing off the noodles. "Done! I'm heading to bed, night!"

Gaara stared blankly at the seat the blond had just vacated. He must have hit a sore spot for the blond. Then his gaze moved to the folder on the table, wondering if he cared that he had hit the sore spot.


A/N: Thank you for reading!