我愛羅


Sakura vs. Gaara


我愛羅


Gaara didn't look surprised; his face was stoic, cold, as the door opened to reveal Sakura. the room if one strained to listen… Until she couldn't bear it anymore and broke the silence to gain purchase on the situation.

"You have got to be kidding me," Sakura choked, eyebrows furrowed. Lo and behold, was Gaara, sitting in her living room.

When, with all her heart, she had been wishing, praying, that Sabaku no Gaara, her weird ass friend, would never be found. Not by anyone from Konoha. Sakura was Konoha.

It's been so long since she's seen Gaara. (Well, not that long, she last saw him show up at her training in the canyons.) But she hadn't expected to see him again, when the Chuunin Exams got cancelled.

Sakura made a conflicted, strangled noise. As fast as she could, she waved a hand at the walls of her house. The Silence Seals in her house activated, and she turned back to Gaara.

"Why are you here, Gaara? Why? You've got to hide. Why are you still in Konoha?"

Gaara must have seen the look on her face, or perhaps heard a certain inflection in her voice. He looked shocked for a moment, displaying a split second of vulnerability which she would've missed if she wasn't watching his face. His face transformed into rage. He grinned like a maniac at her.

A chill ran down Sakura's spine. Sakura shook that fear off.

Umm, Sakura. Ironically, Inner Sakura was the one voicing reason for once, telling Sakura to retreat— when in the past, it was the opposite. Sakura, maybe it's time to retreat? Gaara looks unhinged. He shouldn't even be in your house! This won't end well. Get out of here.

Inner, I'm legally supposed to turn him in to the Hokage, which is fucking messed up. But if I don't, I'm breaking the law.

Sakura, that's not what I'm talking about. LOOK AT HIM! He looks like he's about to attack you.

Fuck. Sakura reared her head, and saw an avalanche of golden sand flying straight toward her. SHIT!

Sakura jumped out of her way, with chakra propelled force. The massive amount of sand blew a giant hole through the doorframe, then took down the entire wall including the door. The entire front of her house was destroyed.

Are those Silence Seals still working? Sakura wondered as she activated her Sharingan, to cast a very fast environmental genjutsu; Sharingan genjutsu were stronger than regular genjutsus.

She quickly weaved a hand seal, and made it so that anyone outside of the location of her house would only see and hear nothing but a normal house looking in.

They wouldn't see the destroyed frontside of her house. Shinobi from outside would also not sense their chakra signatures. This environmental genjutsu resembled closer to a barrier ninjutsu than a genjutsu.

No one would see anything except a normal house.

Even though in reality, the entire frontside of Sakura's house was completely annihilated. Kami, the property damage, the construction costs. She expanded the genjutsu to the entire block. Everyone within it was asleep and would notice neither Sakura nor Gaara.

As she did that, more sand flew straight toward her.

Sakura jumped out of the way and the sands chased her, as she ran around the house. "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING? Gaara!" Sakura screamed as she ran around the living room.

The speed of the sand was incredible; each time that it was millimeters from clasping her, she barely avoided it. Sakura jumped out of the way, when the sands crushed the location she was at just a second prior.

The sand chased her in circles around the house. Occasionally, it would tear at her clothes, tear at her skin, causing bruises and scrapes, but she barely evaded getting grabbed.

At one point, a sand tentacle grabbed her ankle, and began crawling up her leg up to her thigh. .

Sakura charged Chidori directly to her leg, burning off both the sand and her pant leg.

Gaara looked visibly shaken, for he was about to Sand Coffin her entire body. A few seconds passed before he regained his senses, and sent more avalanches of sand toward her, as though enraged.

Sakura leapt out into the street, at the peripheral of her environmental genjutsu. Sakura glanced left and right. Running out of range of her sphere of genjutsu would instantly alert all authorities that Gaara was here, leading him to get arrested and turned in to Torture & Interrogation.

Sakura bit her lip, and growled. Damn it, why was she so kind? She was holding back for Gaara's sake, even hiding him from alerting the authorities, when Gaara was returning that favor by—

"Are you trying to kill me?! Your friend?!" Sakura shouted across the street, in the dead of the night. The cold winds blew and froze her sweat.

"Friend?" Gaara sneered deeply, speaking for the first time from the distance, as he advanced toward her. "What's that? A person to kill?

"Stop, Gaara." She swung her hand around, she clenched her fists, her thoughts and muscle memory flying too fast for her to keep up. "We don't have to fight. The Chuunin Exams are cancelled!"

That only seemed to enrage Gaara more. He sent ALL of his sand, at least the size of her house, straight toward her. That seemed impossible to dodge.

Sakura burst into tears and ran lightning through her entire body hoping to all the kami that this would work. As a last ditch effort she shut her eyes as the Sands pummeled into her body, their density like mountains, like hot ice. There was not enough time to dodge; not even shunshin because of the sheer amount of sand was like an amount that could fill an entire field.

When Sakura opened her eyes, she saw only darkness, and could not breathe. But she watched.

Lightning was actually a glowing element, that lit up the darkness before her.

Sakura watched as the lightning that encased her entire body, protected her from the sand that meant to encase her body; instead, the sand encased against the lightning, and was melting, before her eyes. She moved her lightning arm experimentally, and found that it burned a glittering pathway through the sand, like a light through the dark.

"Wow….." Sakura exhaled, before gaining an idea. She experimentally pushed herself through the sand that excased her. She succeeded, but there was even more sand, so she kept pushing. As it turns out, there was at least 50 meters of sand encasing around Sakura (which was why she couldn't dodge. He sent ALL his condensed, packed sand at her.)

So Sakura made a sluggish step, feeling as though she was striding across the bottom of the ocean, and made another sluggish step, and another step, and another step.. Until finally, she broke directly straight through all 20 meters of sand, until finally she broke out of the wall of sand into fresh air and into the open space.

Standing before her, with both his hands out, was Gaara, teal-colored panda eyes wide, looking as though he was seeing a ghost right now. This must be his strongest offensive jutsu, because he had no sand defense around him now, all his sand at the other side of where sakura was positioned. Which meant that Sakura can attack him NOW without any sand defense coming to his rescue, if she worked fast—

Wait, why were there tears streaks down his face? That didn't make sense, and it threw her off guard from knocking him out straight away.

"Careful now, Gaara, If I touch you," Sakura warned threateningly, huffing loudly for breath, the feeling of having just barely evaded death evident in her adrenaline-filled, furious voice. "You'll be electrocuted."

"H...How did you..?" A broken voice.

Was Gaara sniffling? Yet at the same time, he looked so angry.

"Impossible. Im-possi-ble!" As though angry at his vulnerability, Gaara suddenly made a pulling motion with both his hands, beginning to send the entire mountainous avalanche of sand back toward him— which would mean these sands would smash their way through Sakura (who was standing between Gaara and his Sand,) on its way back to its owner.

"Stop—"

"Sakura, what are you?"

I'm your friend—

"A monster, like me?" He flashed his teeth, as though excited at the prospect. "A monster, full of power, like me, absolutely worth it to kill. Your death will be a delicious, bloody victory, to prove and sate my hunger and purpose in life."

"You know what. Just go to sleep Gaara!" Inner Sakura channeled through her voice, a wild grin on Sakura's face too. Perhaps Inner Sakura was quite possessive of Sakura, was not a fan that Sakura almost died, because that meant that Inner Sakura herself would die as well.

As though out of control of her own limbs, Sakura shunshined in front of Gaara, lightning still surging through her body. But as though her real self was holding her back, she reduced the voltage of the lightning in her body. This would make her vulnerable, because at a lower voltage, the Sand that was now flying toward them, would absolutely crush her body.

But Sakura was faster— a split second faster than the Sand.

Gaara's eyes widened, as Sakura gripped each of Gaara's biceps, with each of her hands. Electricity surged through Gaara's body, enough to render him unconscious, but not enough to kill. She targeted the right nerves carefully.

Gaara's eyes shut, and he was fast asleep. Sakura turned off the lightning. The red-haired boy collapsed into Sakura's arms: he was even snoring quietly, his chest expanding and contracting gently.

And just at the last possible second too: all the sand that was out on the street, had retreated all the way back to them, and had been encircling the two of them. These tons of sands smashed against the floor; like dust powder, grains of sands floated naturally up to her face and skin before falling down again.

Sakura turned off the lightning on her body. Now that the threat was over, she felt extremely fatigued and chakra exhausted.

Sakura glanced around at the mess. The walls of her house were torn down, there was sand scattered all over her living room floor, and Gaara was unconscious, weighing on her arms, and she was so tired, too tired to hold upward a boy that was her age, and her weight.

(Even though Gaara was taller than her, his weight was lighter than usual without the sand and gourd on him. And unlike Sakura, due to his abilities, Gaara didn't exercise much, while Sakura had a musculature.)

Suddenly, a wave of anger coiled inside her. She felt the urge to punch Gaara's face in, for almost killing her and for destroying half of her house. Even though he had already experienced, what's most likely, the most jolting pain of his life, just now.

Disgusted, Sakura dropped Gaara to the ground into the softened sand; he didn't wake up. She then fell backwards on her butt into the sand, dry heaving.

After a few minutes of rest, Sakura crossed her legs, and surveyed the damage again. The sand was intact, and all within the house again. With some hand signs, she reduced the range of the environmental genjutsu and strengthened the silence seals, so that it encompassed just her house again.

Luckily, not too much damage was made outdoors. She could still salvage this.

Sakura reached over to Gaara, and lifted him up onto her back. Then, carrying him over her back and shoulder, she walked up the staircase, up to her room at the 2nd floor. She quickly shut the door behind her back, and surveyed the stuff in her room.

Her closet and bed, and bedside table, were in the room, along with pink wallpaper.

Okay, so her parents left her room intact, but emptied the rest of the house. That was kind of them, she thought sarcastically, as she heaved all the way over to her bed, and dropped Gaara on top of her bed. She pulled a blanket over his sleeping body. He looked so peaceful, sleeping like this, like a baby panda who hadn't just called her a Monster and tried to kill her.

She looked down at herself, and saw she was naked (turns out, running the most powerful lightning shield you possibly could, throughout your body would have fried all your clothes. It was a miracle Gaara didn't express any of the typical male shyness that pubescent boys were naturally supposed to (which shows how messed up he must've been. )

"Well, it's time for a bath," Sakura said blissfully, and walked over to her closet. She pulled out a set of clothes that were in Obito's old style; orange and blue.

Then, she walked over to her bathroom, turned on the sink, and washed her face. "I'm so glad that's over."

She turned on the shower, entered the shower, and started washing and scrubbing herself furiously with her shower brush. While the shower water was running over her, Sakura surveyed the damage done to her body. She had cuts and bruises all over her body, bleeding with a hundred cuts; the memory of Temari at Torture & Interrogation flashed through her mind.

Sakura used some chakra, and began healing each deep cut in her body, while cleaning herself with soap, and washing her pink hair with shampoo (her hair was down as her hairband was burned into nothingness too.) Sakura's goggles were still safe, because she sealed her important belongings such as her glasses, and goggles inside a lightning-proof scroll that Kakashi gave her.

She was due for a long bath. She hadn't showered under a real, warm shower for a long time. This was, after all, the first night she got home from training with Kakashi-sensei at the grand canyons.

"Damm…." she finally relaxed in her shower, under the warm water, tensions in her muscles loosening.

Suddenly, the hairs on her skin prickled.

She thought it was finally over; that she could save everything for tomorrow, politics and what to do with Gaara included.

She thought she was done. She had just got home from training, and now after this fight, she had no more chakra left. She was physically and mentally exhausted.

And yet… it wasn't over.

Sakura's eyes snapped open, Sharingan activated.

There had always been a reason for why Gaara never slept.

An extremely dense chakra, resembling a lake being stuffed inside a cup, came from her room just outside the bathroom. She felt, and saw through the walls, that gargantuan amount of sand-colored, ivory chakra, that she hadn't sensed earlier, that simply wasn't there before, coiling approximately where her bed should be, where Gaara was.

Quickly, Sakura shut off the water and grabbed a towel in the same motion, and hopped out of the bathtub. She dashed back into her room, slammed open the door, and saw Gaara unconscious, but mutated into a mini Shukaku, and rapidly growing bigger and bigger, just milliseconds from transforming into the full-blown 1-Tailed Beast.

"WHAT the— what IS HAPPENING TO YOU?" Sakura screamed, startled. She dropped the bath towel, shunshuned on top of Gaara's transmuted half-human body, which was hard as rock, grasped his discombobulated cheeks. The boy was still unconscious but he looked like a physical monster.

"Sharingan!" Sakura tried. "Mind Transfer Jutsu!" she heard Inner Sakura try, at the same time too, as a last ditch effort. Sakura didn't know which technique worked, but it seemed like she merged both techniques, and entered his brain with her consciousness.

Suddenly, Gaara's body transformed back into his normal, red-haired, young, human male form. Sakura collapsed on top of him, in the bed, unconscious as well.

The two of them laid there, on the bed, sleeping peacefully, as though nothing had happened. Both looking human, one redhead boy and one pink-haired girl (although she needed to put on some clothes.)

Any outsider, if they were able to look in the room, would see two kids sleeping peacefully, not realizing that the Battle had simply relocated from the physical realm of the real world, into Gaara's mindscape, where the Ichibi ran freely.

In the real world, it was two genin cuddling for warmth. In reality, it was exactly the opposite.


我愛羅


End of Chapter 84: Sakura Haruno vs. Gaara of Sunagakure


我愛羅


Author Note: Thanks for reading! Please leave comments/reviews, I enjoy reading them!