EBS: Chapter One, Part One

Note: All Naruto characters and places belong to Masashi Kishimoto, except for my own original characters, who are doomed to belong to me. Other writers will either be credited in the author's comments and/or within the story.

Subaku No Gaara walked silently between his siblings as they headed towards the entrance to their village. Their presence went unnoticed in the still slumbering village as they moved through the rows of plain, sand-coloured dwellings and shops like shadows.

The desert wind was playful today, tugging at Gaara's simple brown poncho and sent ripples through his blood red hair. Although he showed no expression at the touch of the wind, he found it to be enjoyable, almost soothing. His pale blue eyes were unreadable, as always.

His arms hung loosely by his sides, lacking the bear which he usually carried around. His uncle Yashamaru had politely asked for his bear today so he could wash it. It seemed a little odd to Gaara that his uncle would be silly enough to think the bear would stay clean in a place where sand found its way into every place imaginable.

After thinking about it for a moment, he decided his uncle just wanted to clean off the red stains that teddy and himself had acquired yesterday after another 'accident'. He let out an almost inaudible sound that might have passed as a sigh, and continued to stare at the ground in front of him.

Temari, on the left, glanced at her youngest brother, thinking he'd said something, but then realised it was only a sigh. She sighed inwardly herself and tucked a stray piece of hair back behind her ear. Looking up ahead for their sensei, she hoped they weren't going to be late. Baki-sensei had a strong sense of punctuality and discipline, which was fine if you could deal with doing things his way.

She sighed out loud this time in irritation as a bunch of her blonde hair came loose. Again.

Kankurou glanced at her and shook his head. "If it bothers you that much, you should just cut it all off. It'll save you time in the morning when you spend hours getting ready."

The comment earned him an evil look from his older sister. "At least I've got the decency to look respectable for these guests. You on the other hand, look like something the cat dragged in out of the garbage."

Kankurou simply grunted indifferently, irritating her further. In between them, Gaara seemed to pay no attention to his siblings bickering, remaining a silent figure walking in the middle.

Watching him as they reached the entrance, Kankurou felt a ping of disappointment at himself. While Gaara was too young to understand, he and Temari both knew perfectly well that Gaara's 'accidents' were a result of the monstrous demon that dwelled inside him. Both siblings were warned of the dangers of angering Gaara, but given time, he might understand that it was more useful not to kill his siblings or teacher. At least, that was what Baki said they were hoping for.

But is there anything wrong with trying to be nice to him? Kankurou wondered as he yawned loudly and rubbed grit from his eyes. He then noticed Gaara raising his head ever-so slightly towards the noise. Smiling at his younger brother, he whispered, "Being near Temari makes me want to fall asleep, she drones on so much."
He was pleased to see a tiny smile from Gaara, who replied softly, "But it's too hard to fall asleep when she's shouting all the time."

Kankurou chuckled and Gaara's smile grew a little, but both of them were silenced by a questioning look from Temari. Whatever question she had went unvoiced as they reached the outer wall of Suna.

Baki was standing to attention, watching the horizon for signs of their guests. As they moved to stand next to him, they greeted him with a firm, "Good morning, Baki-sensei", who merely nodded in return. Other than the two sentries at either end of the wall, there were five other shinobi waiting on various parts of the wall, none of them above chunnin level.

Kankurou sat down cross-legged against the wall, ignoring Temari's look of disproval, and patted the ground next to him, indicating Gaara should sit. Gaara hesitantly did so.

The sun was midway above the horizon before they saw anything. Kankurou was dozing, Gaara was swirling sand absently in his hands, and Temari and Baki were standing upright.

"I can see dust rising out there." Temari announced loudly, waking Kankurou from his slumber. The boys stood up and moved forward to where the others were standing. The dust cloud quickly changed from a speck in the distance to a very large group of animals moving very fast towards them.

"What on earth is that man doing?" Baki muttered to himself, signalling to the other shinobi. "What's going on out there?"

Squinting against the glare of the rising sun, one of the gennin shouted back, "I think the horses are stampeding!"

Cursing loudly, Baki ordered for those on the inside to be ready and secure the gates. Everyone moved up to the top of the wall, and watched the herd of about fifty horses thundered towards them across the desert floor. The walls of the valley were echoing the deafening noise, and the ground beneath their feet shook. As they got closer, they could hear the yells of the ten or so riders that were trying to halt the herd.

Gaara sensed there was something wrong moments before the earth near the edge where he was standing gave way with a loud crack and groan. Before he could move he found himself plummeting towards the ground with rock and sand swirling about him. In his mind a voice was yelling at him to do something, but fear overwhelmed his senses. He felt someone grab his waist a few metres from the ground and they tumbled away from the rubble onto the soft sand and straight in front of the stampeding herd.

Kankurou landed safely to the side of the entrance while Gaara rolled straight in front of the entrance. He had managed to pull Gaara out of the fall, but lost his hold on his brother when a stray rock knocked him hard on the head. Fighting back the nausea and dizziness, he screamed at Gaara to move, but the red-head seemed paralysed with fear. Kankurou slipped into unconsciousness as Baki reached him and dragged him to safety.

More rock fell down and Gaara threw his hands up to shield himself and caused sand to fly up suddenly to his aid. The sudden movement caused the leader of the herd to swerve away from him, along with the rest of the horses. Slowly, Gaara lowered his arms and the wall of sand protecting him fell away.

One of the riders, seemingly no older than him, appeared suddenly in front of him on a pale golden horse with their hand outstretched. "Get on! I need your help. I'll explain as we go!"

Never before in his short life had he been told to do something in such direct terms by a complete stranger, let alone someone no older than he was. In an instant, a dozen questions flashed into his mind that he should be asking before even thinking about considering doing anything. The rider's stormy grey-blue eyes flashed intently behind the handkerchief that covered the lower half of their face.

Some force his young mind couldn't comprehend made the decision for him. He took hold of the outstretched hand and found himself gripping the rider tightly around the waist.

With a yell they took off after the herd. Both horse and rider were soaked with sweat but Gaara took no notice as he marvelled at the power of the creature he sat upon. The rider shifted his position slightly and the horse changed course, heading towards the tip of the small half-circular valley where the herd would head eventually. It might have taken minutes but to Gaara it seemed to take moments. They slowed to a walk at the tip and the rider began speaking in a very brisk manner for a six year old. "You know that trick you did with the sand just then?"

"Y-yes?" Gaara was surprised to find his voice shaking with some form of elated fear.

"Well, as you can see, the herd is facing the wrong direction and will no doubt continue to run away from the entrance now that they got a scare from it. If you could block off all possible access except for a straight route back to the village entrance, we'd be saving ourselves a lot of time and man power."

Gaara thought about the way the sand acted upon how he was feeling and nodded firmly. "I can do it, I think"

The rider grinned behind the cloth mask and said enthusiastically, "Well, there's no time like the present. Let's go!"

Gaara looked over and was startled to see the herd was almost upon them. He pictured the image of a wall that was just shorter than him so he could see what was happening, and raised his hands. Sand rose from the desert, and to his surprise, the horses shielded away and turned back towards the entrance.

"We're going to lead them into Suna, so start making a wide enough path on either side of us!" The rider yelled over the noise.

"Okay!"

Gaara felt something pass between horse and rider and the horse let out a sudden burst of speed that brought them in front of the herd. They continued to charge back towards Suna with Gaara's sand walls forcing the horses to slow down and spread out. Even so, as they raced down the narrow corridor, the sound of two hundred hooves hitting the earth as one made a thunderous noise. They led the herd past a stunned group of onlookers, who had arisen to see what all the commotion was about, and moved aside to allow the herd to move past them into the holding pen that had been set aside for them.

Within a few minutes, the last horse was inside and they milled around quietly, as if nothing had ever happened. They all jumped as a deep, accented voice cut through the air, "Now why couldn't you dumb beasties act like that before?"