The Understanding

There was a common understanding amongst the younger members of the Sound Five that Kimimaro was a stuck-up bastard. There was no helping it, Jiroubou would argue. Kimimaro was older, even if only by a year, stronger than the rest of them combined, and being Lord Orochimaru's favourite definitely didn't help matters. In short, Kimimaro may have been their leader, but he certainly didn't act like their comrade. He rarely talked with any one of his teammates unless it was mission-related, and when he did, it was always short, curt, and condescending.

Kidoumaru, however, was willing to give his stony leader a chance, if only because he felt as though he owed at least this much to Lord Orochimaru. Therefore, as Lord Orochimaru had offered him acceptance and understanding, Kidoumaru had taken it upon himself to understand and accept Kimimaro. In his self-imposed mission, Kidoumaru would tolerate the pale boy's harsh criticisms and cruel insults and answer them as kindly as he could. He would often invite Kimimaro to a game of Shougi or a training session with the rest of the team. Despite the Kaguya's steady response on no's and leave me the hell alone and the rest of the team's not-so-well-concealed snickers and constant jibes, Kidoumaru was set on reaching the older boy.

Still, the spider-nin was anything but naïve and he knew when to give up. The day he gave up on Kimimaro was during one of their first important missions as the Sound Five.

It had been a surprisingly cool day of June when Lord Orochimaru had ordered them to assassinate one of the local lords who thought himself powerful enough to oppose the Snake Sannin. Despite his claims, however, the lord was not important enough to have a large guard, so no more than a few ninja would be protecting him.

What they had expected, as they penetrated the inner rooms of the lord's estate, were several chuunin and maybe a jounin or two. What they hadn't expected was an entire team of elite jounin from the Hidden Mist Village waiting for them just outside the room where the lord had presumably taken refuge. As it was, the battle had turned very bloody, very fast.

Kidoumaru soon found himself feverishly firing wave upon wave of arrows, only to have his projectiles intercepted by water-based clones, missing the real enemies entirely. Just as he was producing yet another arrow, relying on his powerful chakra-infused webs for protection against the clones, which would dissolve as soon as they got caught within them, a very real and subsequently very solid ninja rushed him from his left in an attempt to side-swipe the spider-nin. Kidoumaru deftly dodged the blow, instead being faced with several kunai, one of which made contact with his top right arm.

To Kidoumaru's left, Tayuya was doing her best with her flute, though she still couldn't summon more than one demon, and its movements were sluggish at best. Directing the colossal spirit with a skilful melody, Tayuya managed to injure her enemy, before she was forced into a hurried retreat by an array of weapons.

Jiroubou, for all his size and strength, was being pushed on the defensive by two Mist ninja, though every once in a while he would manage to land a blow on one of his opponents.

Sakon and Ukon were near the opposite wall of the vast chamber, separated and each facing an enemy. The twin-scowls on their faces reflected their situation, as they were both similarly outmatched by their opponents.

On a whole, most of the killing was being done by Kimimaro, who had already viciously dismembered one of his foes and was advancing upon a second one, all gore-covered and smirking.

It was at that precise moment that the lord chose to burst out of his safe-room, frightened out of his wits, literally, and accompanied by two more protesting ninja and a deafening crashing sound, in the not-so-far-off distance. It was clear that Lord Orochimaru's snakes had made their move upon the castle, destroying everything in their sight and leaving the target to the Sound Five. Upon seeing his enemies so close at hand, the small man, because he was decidedly rather diminutive, gave off a frightened squeak and froze in horror, mouth agape in an eerie imitation of a fish out of water.

Catching sight of the target, Kimimaro immediately abandoned his current enemy and, extending all the bones in his body into immaculate, but lethal spikes, charged at the still-frozen lord, slicing through anything and everything in his path. Unfortunately for Ukon, he happened to be one of those things.

Without a second's hesitation, Kimimaro flew right by his younger teammate, carving long gashes across his stomach and chest in an instant, before disposing of the two ninja protecting the lord in much the same way and finally impaling the target and finishing him off in one graceful and bloody spin of his body.

Once the assassination had been complete and they had somehow managed to escape the rest of the Mist ninja, who weren't really pursuing them anyway, they stopped near a deafening river under the cover of a thick brush for a quick rest and an assessment of the damages. Other than a few cuts and bruises, Ukon's were the only injuries worth noting. His clothes and hair were fast becoming caked with blood, splotches of it smeared across his pale face and hands, almost like some grotesquely-exaggerated war paint. As he lay there, propped against a tree trunk and wheezing with each breath, Sakon was fervently cleaning and bandaging his brother's wounds, while Jiroubou pressed soothing cold compresses to his feverish forehead. Even Tayuya was busying herself with retrieving more water, all the while cursing Ukon for being "such a god-damn pussy", though her heart didn't really seem all that into it. The injuries alone clearly weren't deep enough to have caused any internal damage, though without prompt medical attention, Ukon could easily die from exsanguination.

As Kidoumaru swiftly calculated the remaining distance to the Hidden Sound Village and the time it would take them to get there with an injured member, he stole a peek at Kimimaro. 'Cold and composed as ever. That bastard.' The older boy was currently a little distance away from the rest of the team, apparently staring off into space, though Kidoumaru could tell that he was keeping a look-out for the enemy.

In the end, they had made it back to the village in time for Ukon to receive treatment. It had taken a few hours and an extensive blood-transfusion for his condition to be deemed stable, though from that point on, Ukon definitely spent more time asleep in his brother's body than he had before.

Later, after everyone had had a chance to rest, a seething Sakon had cornered Kimimaro in the courtyard, glaring death at the older boy.

"What the fuck did you do that for, you bastard? You almost KILLED him!"

Initially, Kidoumaru had approached the pair to make sure a fight didn't break out. They didn't need another teammate in intensive care, after all. However, at Sakon's outburst, he too looked expectantly at the Kaguya prodigy, seeking an answer. Kimimaro just made some movement similar to a shrug and, stony-faced and apathetic as ever, replied:

"He got in my way." With that, he shoved past a gaping Sakon and continued on his path.

Watching Kimimaro walk away so nonchalantly, Kidoumaru finally understood him. He was their leader, but he sure as hell wasn't their comrade. And maybe Kidoumaru didn't exactly get along with his teammates. Maybe Tayuya's insults were really too harsh sometimes and maybe Jiroubou was too uptight and Sakon too smug and Ukon too reserved, but Kimimaro… well, maybe there was a reason they were called the Sound Five after all.

Author's note: Well, here's the second chapter. I hope you guys like it. Would you believe me if I said that I started writing it on the bus on my way to work? Well, I did. I'll try to write the next one soon, but I can't promise anything, because the only computers I have access to right now are in internet cafes, and I'm not sure I can save files on them.