---flashback---
"Take her! I'm begging you! Take her!"
The thunder sounded and the rain echoed. It was a horrible sound. Everything sounded worse. It was like black clouds were raining pain and misery on his head. He could hear the commotion of the dirty women walking around, desperate for a good time with anybody.
He wanted to kill them all. Slice them to pieces for turning his home up-side-down. But he refrained from that because of the two-year-old baby girl in his arms and the nearly six-year-old boy at his side as he walked. He had to get them out of the village and into some other villages to be safe. He was going to turn them into true ninjas. This was not going to be their home, not while he was in charge of them.
"Dad?"
"Yes?" he responded, pushing through the crowds, holding the boy's hand.
"Where are you taking me?"
He stopped, his red eyes stinging slightly. "You're going to find a better life than this. You and your sister. Is that okay, Kabuto?"
"But I want to go with her!"
"You will, some day, just not today. There's a man outside the gates, I want you to stay with him and his family. It's a big village. You'll make some friends, eventually." He touched Kabuto on the head and smiled. "Some day soon, Hoshiko will find you. She's always found you and I. She'll find you some time in the future. Just pray for it."
Suddenly, an explosion went off and people by the gates screamed and chaos ensued. He lost Kabuto in the flood of oncoming people. He held to the girl in his arms. His head protector glinted in the light of the next flash of lightning. He held fast to the girl when a man stumbled passed with a skinned arm and burned skin. This was no place for children and he felt his heart knotting. Was it going to be like this for his blood daughter? Or worse?
Kabuto was his step-son. He wasn't related, not to Hoshiko's father, but he was still a son. Kabuto had a mother and father out there somewhere, probably looking for him. But she had left Kabuto on his step-father's doorstep with his one-week-old sister in the pouring rain.
With a deep breath, he turned away and dashed for the forest. He was being followed. The faster he ran the worse it got. The more he hoped he could hold her longer, spend time understanding her. Watching her grow into a fine young woman. But he couldn't. His baby was going to be a ninja in some unknown land that he assumed would train her well. No chances of yelling at her for doing something wrong. No chances of watching her walk for the first time. He was going to miss out for her safety. Ah, that pain was never going to fade.
He broke into the clearing. It was sand everywhere beyond the stones. He was almost there!
The ninjas were still behind him. He touched his head protector around his neck. It was time to leave the Rain behind and become something else. His daughter was leaving behind the Rain and trading it for the Sand. He took off his Rosary and strung it around her neck. After a few moments of saying his goodbyes while she could see him, he scooped her up and made the last dash for the sand.
He could see ninjas coming across the sand plains and this was where Hoshiko would be found. He'd lay her here and let her be found by the approaching ninjas. Forming a dome over her so she would be protected from the sun, he waited. She was still awake and she reached up to him. His heart broke. She was his baby. Leaning down, he kissed her forehead and tears fell as he withdrew and she just giggled. For the first time, she smiled. His heat didn't sink at first, but it floated away, to a happier place. The war was ending, the Nations were settling, but there was the aftermath of war that would ravage her life.
"Hoshiko, my star girl. Heh, I hope you survive. No, I pray to see you again, my star girl. I want to see you again, live that long, okay? Live long enough to kill us both. Be the one to kill your brother and I." He touched her cheek and dashed off.
Just about twenty feet away, he heard an explosion, like a paper bomb barrage went off. The Sand and Rain ninja were fighting and it was deathly close to Hoshiko. When they began to push the Rain back, the cries of the baby made him run away. She was alive.
---end---
Hidan sat up so fast he felt sweat fly off his face. Looking down, his hands shook. This wasn't happening.
It couldn't be happening.
Kabuto had told him that Hoshiko's name had vanished in the records for Sunagakure. Why was he dreaming of that day?
"No! Get back!"
Hidan looked up and his eyes widened. Gaara was dangling from a sand claw just a bit away from Hidan. He was almost unconscious, but he saw Hidan and pulled himself back up.
"Hey! Hoshiko! Wolfe! Hurry, please! If you fight much longer, you're going to die like this!"
"Just keep moving! There should be a caravan ahead somewhere! It's coming from the Rain! Go!"
That voice. It sounded like it could've been a female Hidan. It was strange, but Hidan scooted back so he was near Kakuzu. They were hidden behind some trees. Hidan watched as a girl with gray hair and a broken mask was slammed into the tree near them. Her hair came lose and she stood up, quickly maneuvering away. A black rosary came out from under her arm protector and the circle and triangle became clear.
She brought her hand up and then back. A long scathe-like weapon appeared and she swung it around and down. It sliced open one of the pursuing ninja's arms. The scythe was black and silver with two blades and a broken-off chain. She turned away and stopped.
Hidan was standing up. His eyes were wide and he desperately hoped it was true, that it was her. "Are you....?
"I know you." She was quiet, but something said she was scared to ask. Courage seemed to grip her and she lifted off her mask. "Are you.... my...."
"Hoshiko?" Hidan asked, his throat clogged. "You're alive?"
"Kabuto said.... five years ago, Kabuto told me.... you were.... gone."
It was like a rock wall hit him while he was running. Five years ago, Kabuto was unstable and unsure of himself. Hidan had seen it. Kabuto had lost his will to be anything but insanely correct about everything. He had then been asked, by Hidan, to look for Hoshiko. Had it been before then?
"Hidan, do you know this girl?" Kakuzu asked.
"Know her?" Hidan looked back at Kakuzu. "I helped make her. I helped raise her for a time."
---Gaara---
He finally collapsed. He couldn't run anymore. His leg was killing him. Tangling his fingers in his red hair, Gaara tried to hold onto his sanity and not scream for another blast to knock him down for good. He'd had enough with running. He was done.
"Gaara!"
He was shocked. Hardly had he heard Hoshiko call his name and just his name. Looking up, across the river, he saw Hoshiko. She was stumbling, like something was wrong. Behind her came two sinister figures Gaara thought he'd never see again.
Hidan and Kakuzu were walking idly behind her. At first, they looked like they'd kill, but then, it dawned on Gaara, that Hoshiko had Hidan's weapon. Perhaps she'd tamed them down a bit. Gaara couldn't get up, so he waited. When she came to the river's edge, it dawned on Gaara that Hoshiko couldn't swim. She'd never like water and Gaara saw her predicament. She waded in anyways and then dove in. At first, she didn't come up, but then Gaara noticed the water was acting strange. The closer she got, the easier it was to tell.
She had dug Hidan's weapon into the stones and was slowly crawling towards the other end.
But Gaara saw something else as well; sand. Sand was coming out of Hoshiko's lips. She was dying, but she still managed to get across and to Gaara's side.
"Hoshiko, stop pushing yourself. It's okay!" Gaara got up and Hoshiko smiled and fell into his arms. She coughed and blood came out. "Hoshiko!"
"Gaara, can I ask you something?"
Gaara sank back onto the smooth, make-shift, stone seat. "I'm listening."
"Don't laugh." She reached up and touched his cheek. Her hands were cold from the water, but affection and warmth spread from the feeling. "Can you hold me for a little bit? Please, Gaara?"
He didn't say anything, he just moved his other arm and pulled her closer. "Yes." Her body curled up against his chest and Gaara felt human, for the first time. It was so odd, how she could easily make him wait and how she always made him realize just how human he'd always been.
"Thank you," she whispered and closed her eyes.
