I do not own NARUTO

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"Are you sure?" Sakura asked as Temari helped her hobble through the threshold of her home. Chiyo had managed to repair the tendon in her foot since Sakura's quick actions staved off any permanent damage, but until she could rebuild the strength of the healed tissue, she had to wear a light brace and it gave her quite the limp.

"Of course," Temari said, brushing off the worry on Sakura's face. She helped her over to the couch, kicking any extra shoes or thrown clothing out of the way so she didn't trip, and gave her a kind smile after she successfully sat down. "You'll be just fine. It's either here or the hospital, and I figured you'd rather have a real bed."

Sakura shrugged and nodded. "I suppose. I just don't want to impose at all."

"Oh! Please," Temari seemed to scold in her direction. "Stop that, it was my idea anyway."

Sakura thinned her lips, watching as Temari scurried about to quickly tidy up their living room. There was no real need, Sakura knew they were all busy people who probably spent very little time here. A cluttered house was a lived-in house, it made it more so a home. "Still," she said, trying to quickly catch Temari's attention as she swooped in to straighten the shoes by the door. "I can't help but feel like a bit of a burden."

Kankuro, who had returned from his scouting to find Gaara and Temari practically in fits with the council, laughed from where he sat next to Sakura on the couch. "Nonsense," he chuckled. "It's nothing, trust me. Babysitting you will a breeze comparatively."

Sakura quirked an eyebrow, a little put off by his choice of words. "Compared to what, exactly?"

He shrugged in response. "Babysitting Gaara. At least I can assume that you'll actually listen." Temari stifled a chuckle, it was true after all. They had been assigned to keep watch over him or keep him in line before and it…it never seemed to go their way.

Sakura sighed, shaking her head. "I hardly think he needs babysitting. But speaking of, where is Gaara?"

Temari plopped down on the chair next to the couch and flipped open her thick folder of reports. All of this paperwork happened to be about Sakura, it always required extra documents when pertaining to foreigners, and Sakura – feeling a little bad for piling on to her work load – offered to help as much as she could. "He didn't want to take any chances so he left straight for the lookout posts on the wall. He took that vine that snagged you and is using that to track any signature that matches it."

"He can do that?" Sakura asked, taking some simple report sheets and filing in things like dates and times and settings of the events.

Temari nodded, almost rolling her eyes as she did so. "No joke, the guy's like a bloodhound." She shrugged after that, her eyes falling back to the papers on her lap. "But you probably knew that. It's not just anyone that can follow a chakra trail after it's dead, or react quick enough to keep you within the city walls."

Sakura looked down to her foot, to the indignant brace holding it stiff and tight. She pursed her lips, thinking over Temari's words and her own experiences. If it hadn't been for Gaara's successful grab, she would have been miles away in no time flat, then she really would have been in trouble. She had been hoping that he would stop at home, so she could have a chance to better thank him for his quick actions. But, it seemed as though she would have to wait.

"How was the hospital?" Kankuro asked, taking a glance to the brace around Sakura's ankle as he did so.

"All right, I suppose," Sakura answered. "Though, Lady Chiyo was not happy to see me under the circumstances, or so soon." She tapped her heel against the ground, the only thing she could really do with it since the brace refused to let it move an inch. "But, as long as I don't mess with it too much, and go back for a checkup before I leave, I should retain full motor function. Still, it was a close call."

Kankuro nodded, looking over to Temari for a moment to find her brow pulled together in worry. She had clearly invested a little more in Sakura than she had probably intended, and in doing such, gave herself the perfect position to take all of this personally. She was a friend of the poor girl now and had brought her into their home in an attempt to keep her safe. He had expected something like this, after all that guilt, all that worrying, it would have been hard to keep herself from caring on a personal level. Far from Sakura's knowledge, Temari wasn't one to offer sanctuary in her personal space, that's what their government took care of, and being accepted through their front door would have been enough to turn heads all the way down the street. But he kept silent on the matter, not wanting to add any more weight onto the situation.

It seemed Sakura felt bad enough as it was.

He looked out the window, tuning out the sounds of his sister and their guest as his eyes found the high walls of their city. It was getting dark over the desert, and somewhere out there, Gaara was bunkering down for a night on watch.

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Dusk.

Gaara had always liked this time of day. So serene, so tranquil and…beautiful. It was one of the few things that he had always thought was beautiful, even in his darkest of days. The sun, no longer a harsh white and blinding in its glare, had sunk lower in the horizon, those rays of light cutting through the lower atmosphere and turning golden and soft.

The way this reflected on the sand always caused a moment of pause within him. After all, the desert was his home and to him, as well as his people, it was indeed beautiful. The sands shown like a sea of gold, molten and shimmering in the warm glow of the setting sun. It was at this time, and again after the sun raced around the earth to rise once more in the east, that the desert showed its true colors. The gradient sky grew darker as it reached from the horizon, a smooth scale from the golden sun to dark purple skies with little specks of stars and planets twinkling through the remaining light. There were no trees to break the landscape, no mountains to border the sky and, in its own right, the simplistic beauty of the desert – like the elegance and poise of a dignified woman – was enough to melt even the coldest of souls.

In moments like this, Gaara often wondered if maybe he had indeed been in love his whole life, a clandestine affair with a sense of peace that wasn't meant for him but was just too naïve to put a name to the feeling. There weren't many times he could recall where he had been able to touch beauty, of any sort, but the desert, his desert; bewitching and mysterious as she was, never shunned him. Somewhere inside of him, somewhere deep and quiet, he had always thought that one day, maybe even decades from now, he would just walk into those timeless dunes and never come back again.

He'd be okay with that.

But such fantasies of peaceful seclusion were only clouding his mind. He couldn't think of leaving civilization behind for the promises of the open desert, he had a job to do. The scene in the distance, the earth's curve swallowing up the sun, was beautiful, but it was also distracting. He had his senses in the sand, feeling the way the ground hushed and quieted after the soldiers and scouts returned to the city for the night.

Gaara had moved away from the city, intent on stopping anything suspicious in its tracks before ever breaking the city limits. He was alone out here, not a soul for miles and miles around, and he hoped it stayed that way. With this enemy of Sakura's being capable of such evasiveness, Gaara hadn't taken anyone with him and it was as much for his own sake as it was for theirs. This way, should he fail to detect any threat, no one would be caught in the middle because of his lack of action. If this stranger did come, however, Gaara would be alone with them. No one around to see him fight, to see him kill another person, no matter how wicked they may be. He would only trust his siblings out here with him, but they were needed with the city, with Sakura, and he figured it was better this way.

Earlier, before he had started off for the endless waves of sand, he had taken his gourd and used the sand within to shred that vine. In a sense, that personal stash that always followed him could drink in the energy of the signature, and it had an uncanny memory. Even when Gaara overlooked or didn't notice, that sand always did.

So now, with the echoes of that signature still rattling around, fresh in his memory, he watched the sands for anything that reflected the energy. Though he didn't wish for Sakura to be in any danger, he couldn't ignore the way his body twitched with the sense of an impending battle. Whoever was out there – biding their time, waiting for the opportune moment to strike – they were going to have to get though Gaara first. The monster in his head purred in delight, the promise of spilled blood stirring it to attention, and Gaara felt no need to try and subdue the creature. This was an enemy, after all, and there was no need for leniency with the likes of them.

Soon…

Yes, that was right. He didn't know how, or why, but he knew that voice was right. He could feel the anticipation start to prickle on his skin, tingle in his blood, and rather than fight it off, he let that beast sharpen his eyes, his hearing, all of his senses.

There weren't many that knew this was how the beast affected him on a day to day basis, but when it chose to, and when Gaara allowed, it could turn his senses into something almost…inhuman. His world came in sharp and crisp, the horizon wasn't so fuzzy, the air held much more than just dry sand in its scent, and he could faintly hear the way that grain tumbled over grain as he shifted his weight on the sand. A chirp in the distance snapped his eyes to attention, it was only a lonely cricket out from the sand to enjoy the cool air, though it stood out like a siren compared to the quiet dunes around him. Gaara took a breath, steadying himself and resting his heart rate, settling his nerves and quieting his mind. The sand below him stirred, shifting across the dunes in wide waves, like ripples over a shallow shoreline. The dune hollowed out below him, and as the sand rose, sweeping up and swirling in the air, he dissipated into the flurry. The sand settled back down into the dune and he became one with the land around him.

This would to him well. Hiding in plain sight like this always fooled the naked eye, and down here, with the quiet rumbles of tumbling sand and the deep moans of shifting dunes, it was like the land spoke to him in their own secret language. It would tell him when his target came.

He just had to be patient.

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It was dark, at least, it had been. But now, after lying there, tossing and turning in an attempt to rest, Sakura had adjusted to the darkness in the quiet room, and now the pale moonlight that slipped through the window illuminated the small guest room. It was a dull and soft glow, turning everything a curious shade of blue. She had gone to bed a while ago, what felt to be hours even though she knew that it wasn't, and had been trying to sleep ever since. But…how could she?

This was not her home, this was not her bed, there was no little weight curled up by her feet where her clumsy tabby would always sleep, and unlike her many missions containing nights spent in the woods, there was no pressing need for a quick rest before getting back on the trail. Try and relax, Temari had said. Don't worry about a thing. How the hell was she supposed to do that? She couldn't trick herself into that quick and deep fall from consciousness to lights out, not with this soft mattress contouring to her every curve. So unlike that stiff hospital bed. The blankets she had pulled over her, soft and lightweight but with just enough to keep one warm on these summer nights in the desert, didn't scratch at her skin like the wool cloaks and throws that they carried in the field, and something about these comforts she had been given only seemed to keep her senses buzzing.

This was a strange place, and more so than that, it was a strange home. Sakura laid on her back, staring at the ceiling and thinking about the house she had walked in to. It was an odd thought, to know that in one of these rooms the mighty Kazekage had laid his head. Even stranger was to think that he had been married, sharing a bed with his wife, who he must have fallen for at some point, been in love with at some point. So in love as to have three children. In this house, she had walked with a belly swollen with new life on three separate occasions. In this house, she had sat in some chair and taught Temari to read, watched Kankuro struggle to properly drink from a cup, and pondered the many years she thought she would have with her youngest son.

But also, within the walls of this house, a family had grieved. A daughter had fought to stay strong, a son had watched with bewildered confusion as mommy vanished, and a father – a husband – damned himself to a life rotting in regret. These halls had lost the echo of motherly feet, the kitchen had lost the scent of cookies and early breakfasts, the chair in the living room wasn't for reading anymore, it wasn't for stories or laughter anymore. The light had left this place. And in the absence of that light, the house creaked and moaned its mournful lament in the night, the howling wind of the desert echoing through the empty halls like specters.

How could she sleep here? There were so many secrets that these walls held, some she knew while others were meant to stay buried, it was like they were brimming with scandalous truth. They had seen so much, seen the way a family had been built, how it had been broken down, how it had almost been destroyed.

Her own home was still warm, it still smelled like cookies and pancakes, it still echoed with her mother's laugh and her father's curses as he struggled to be a handyman. This harsh comparison, this sense of being torn between two polar opposites, it made her heart ache, a deep and throbbing ache that seemed to touch her soul. Temari had gotten a taste of what Sakura had been blessed with, Kankuro had been too young to understand, but Gaara had never even known. He never had the chance to know. And it had been him they had blamed for that. Like Naruto, he had been shunned and scorned because of what others had done to him, because of what others had made him into. A helpless child, a mere baby, given the burden of unimaginable power and untamable destruction. What had they expected?

Sakura scowled, hearing a creak in the room down the hall, and turned her mind from her melancholy ramblings. She sat up, throwing the covers off her legs and giving her scalp a good scratch, tossing her hair around as she did. Looking out the window, to where the wind moaned and howled, invisible in the night, she craned her neck to try and see the stars. She wasn't going to be getting sleep anytime soon, this alien world was hard to familiarize herself with, and such relaxation would only continue to evade her. Plus, how could she quiet her mind when she knew that Gaara was out there, just waiting to come across her attacker? It was impossible not to think of him, he had gone off on his own and his family insisted it was fine, that he did this all the time, but she couldn't shake the worry. He was out there because of her, after all, and that always weighted her shoulders with guilt.

She looked down at her brace and pondered how it might challenge her to take a shower with it on. It was stiff, but the material itself was strong and this allowed it to wrap around her foot while taking up minimal space. Tight as all hell, but easily managed by herself as long as she didn't trip and cause a panic in the house.

She got off the bed, careful not to thump the floor too hard with her brace, and peaked her head out the door. The hallway was dark, no lights from under any doors, and she slowly made her way down the hall. The bathroom door creaked a little as she opened it and she tried to shut it as quickly and as quietly as she could. Once inside, she felt the wall for the light switch and yelped a bit when the lights flashed on. Rubbing her eyes, a little annoyed with herself over staring at the light when she flicked the switch, she tried to blink away the stars. It was a large bathroom. With a big counter, two sinks, and a bigger tub than her own at home. She rather quickly decided against a shower and opted for a bath. She could just keep her foot out of the water that way.

She turned the knob for the water and the tub began to fill. It steamed after a moment, pumping out hot water and fogging up the mirrors. Her sleeping shorts slipped to the floor, followed by the tank top that Temari had lent her. With a folded towel beneath her, she sat on the side of the tub waiting for the water to fill, staring at her foot again. She could have had it a lot worse, and she'd been telling herself that all day, it was only because of Gaara that she had managed so far out here. She was grateful – immensely so – and she now understood why Naruto had given him so much of that blind faith of his.

She smiled a little as she stared at her foot, thinking of how pleased Naruto was going to be when he finally got to Suna. He would demand to hear everything, probably wouldn't even give her a moment of peace, but he would be happy to know how Gaara had helped her, how he had tried to make things right between them. Hell, he had saved her life. Maybe this would even change Sasuke's opinion of him, maybe he would learn to trust their allies again. That would be good. They needed more trust. Sasuke needed more trust.

The tub filled and she stopped the water. Slipping beneath the surface, she let herself sink into the hot water, sighing in pleasant content as she laid back and soaked herself. She resigned herself to the therapy of the water, trying to shut off her thoughts and just relax. Like Temari had told her to.

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