A's Note:

3/30/2021

I was gonna delete this story around noon time. I logged in for the longest time, and clicked 'Manage Stories'. My cursor hovered on the 'Delete story' button. Then I thought to myself, I need to read this story one last time before letting go, like a metaphorical scene of Rose letting go of that sapphire necklace from the movie Titanic. I noticed there were 12 reviews and I thought huh, was it always 12 reviews? I checked and read the reviews left by a guest named Sarah. After, reading her review, I had to read the story again and boy did I feel like I was abandoning something precious. And in a way, I was if I was gonna go through with it. Rereading left a pleasant surprise and a self-hatred inside me. Like I was thinking this scene could've been written better or too much narrative you idiot of an author. There were times I hated shaping Hatsue this way, I hated this story, I hated not doing enough writing on characters I genuinely want to explore, basically, I had so much hate towards my own writing that it almost compelled me to delete this.

So to Sarah, it has been months since my last update, I thank you for leaving a review. You stopped me from deleting this story. Hatsue and Sasori's story needs to be written. I don't know why you clicked on this story or why you gave this a chance. But anyone who happens to read this needs to know, you're the reason why this story was not deleted.

We commit the sins again,

And our sons and daughters pay

When Sasori of the Red Sand walked past the gates of Suna, he felt the attention on him was quite different. It has been a year and a half since he last left on a mission and that mission turned into long, multiple missions, a promotion and back to missions that involved scouting and well, killing shinobis of Konoha and Iwa. Maybe it was the beige flak jacket on him that was a little bit bigger and shoulder padding that looked ridiculous on his 10 year old shoulders. The citizens smiled at him, some even waved at him, which made him feel peculiar. No one can blame the boy, for this odd treatment, he was used to being the grandson of Elder Chiyo. Now, he was treated like… a war hero? That made him pause in his steps.

"Excuse me, Sasori-kun?" a timid girly voice said.

He turned towards a girl who looked to be around his age. She blushed at him but the red head assumed it was due to the heat. He kept silent.

"Um, thank you for your efforts for Suna!" The brown haired girl bowed. "Please drop by at the Yashinoki (Palm) restaurant, I'll be there working every Tuesdays to Fridays."

He watched the girl run away flustered. Peculiar. Nevertheless, he needs to be on his way to the Kazekage and report. Then, catch a certain girl whose name means beginning of a painting.

The Kazekage took off his hat and placed it on the wooden desk; he then thumbed the yellow cloth chosen by his little student Hatsue. It has been a year since they have been estranged. Did he miss her? It wasn't wrong to say that. He missed the pitter patter of her feet when assisting him, or how she complained when he tested her chakra to get through his iron sand, or how to walk on clay walls of their building. His office had always been a little somber, but the girl would find ways to decorate it, like placing that flapjacks plant on his table, a succulent with flattened paddle leaves with rosy lined edges. It was a strange development, he admits he's fond of the child or that he'd get attached but first and foremost he is the leader of their village. He must do his duty, no matter how cruel it seemed. She was still young. She'd understand. Hatsue will see it his way.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

The Sandaime sighed, the work was never done, and sometimes he wished he was just a shinobi that studied the One Tailed's technique. A stroke of genius to create his Iron Sand. He picked up the hat and wore it again and then he let the person in.

"Sasori, reporting." The Kazekage stared at him in surprise; at the growth spurt he exhibited not just his rank promotion but physically. The boy shot up like cardon (a fast-growing cactus) and would have loved to tease his little student with this knowledge. The man felt a sense of loss because he couldn't. He takes the scrolls from the boy and skimmed it.

"I know this is a year late, but congratulations on your promotion."

The boy hesitated. "Thank you." Sasori then asked, schooling his face into a neutral expression. "Sandaime, I would like to request a break from my missions."

He eyed the red head carefully and felt pride in having a shinobi that accomplished in his reign as Kazekage. He nodded. It was indeed well deserved. The boy was still staring at him as if waiting for something. Ah, it clicked.

"She's not here. Unless required, she will not step into my office." He said; there was no need to clarify a name when they both know the boy was here for Hatsue. How surprising that a year and a half passed with only letters to go back and forth that they still maintained their friendship. Maybe now that her friend is back, she'll come around. Little did the strongest Kazekage know, he would be severely mistaken.

Why do adults tend to underestimate a child's ability to hold a grudge?

Walking out of the tower, Sasori contemplated whether to change clothes or head to Suna hospital first. Where was that fussy friend of his? Truth be told, he had this planned out, that when he returned from a mission, Hatsue would be waiting at Suna's gates for his arrival which she would have if she bothered replying to him. It would be a lie to say he wasn't nursing a grudge from Hatsue's silence. He kept sending letters and received no replies. Sure, he could blame it on the war, it's not like they were abundant of courier shinobis but surely, he would've received a reply like the first letters. It did cross his mind that maybe the courier died in the midst of the skirmishes. Stupid tree-huggers. He sent a letter to grandma Chiyo asking about Hatsue and to nag that stupid Hatsue to reply to his letters or else he'd smack a chisel to set her brain straight. He thought he was a bad friend. Turns out, Hatsue was worse.

The Kazekage and grandma Chiyo was weird too. As if they were hiding something. The Sandaime's words reinforced the idea that something happened while he was gone. Something happened to Hatsue. He knew that she was alive. Thriving even. Little Kango-hei. How did that happen? He heard talks that reached the barracks. That if this kept up, her medical prowess will catch up to Tsunade of Konoha. Soon, his village will have their very own Hatsue of Suna. He felt proud. Relieved too. All those fears she mentioned before the Chuunin exams were for naught. All she has to do is stay inside the village and wait for him to come home. Out of the battlefields and she's making a name for herself. Although, now that he thought about it, she would rather make a name for herself through paintings.

That was the second time today that a thought gave him pause.

The suffocating and heavy feeling came again. The boy worried. So, with a determined look in his face, he rushed to the hospital, barely registering his surroundings on the way. The medical-nin at the reception desk recognized him and asked what he needed.

"Hatsue, the Little Kango-hei. I need to speak to her."

"I'm sorry, if there is no emergency, she's not to entertain anyone other than patients." The medical-nin replied. Sasori of the Red Sand was indeed an individual of status but Hatsue is the Little Kangho-hei, a student of Elder Chiyo and the Sandaime.

He huffed. He wasn't one for waiting. His dislike of it further strengthened with the waiting game he suffered when sending his friend letters, only to have waited in vain.

Stupid Hatsue.

He could charge in there but he didn't have the patience to search the whole building. Sasori took his poisoned kunai out and slashed his left palm with it. The medical-nin shrieked and the boy looked at her with steely gray eyes.

"Oh no, I've been poisoned." He deadpanned. "It's an emergency. If untreated, I would die within hours."

The medical-nin looked at his palm, blood dripping and then back to his stoic face. She asked a fellow medical-nin to assist Sasori into the emergency room, with top priority in his tag. He felt a smug satisfaction in sending everyone in his way in a tizzy. He is Sasori of the Red Sand. A named shinobi. Need he say more?

After throwing the hospital into chaos and pissing a bunch of priority patients by bumping them down because of his name. The red head finally reunites with his friend who looked at him guiltily as she treated him with an antidote. Hatsue was wearing the standard Suna medical-nin outfit, a white jacket stamped with a red logo that meant doctor on the left of her chest, a white beret on her head and white pants. He took in the changes: her cheeks were starting to lose their baby fat, she grew tall too but not as much as him, her hair grew past her shoulders now. All that accompanied with the confidence of an accomplished medical-nin.

"Why did you slash yourself with your poisoned kunai?"

"Why did you stop writing back?" He rebutted.

The transformation from confident kunoichi to this girl in front of her was jarring. Her shoulders drooped and she hung her head low.

"I… was busy?" She was smiling, albeit fake.

"Scorpion poop." He cursed. Not really, he didn't want to absorb the grown soldiers' bad habits yet. Him remaining untainted ensures Hatsue untainted from vulgar cursing. The need to protect his friends' innocence doesn't stop him from fuming though. "You're busier than me? A shinobi out on the field? In a battlefield? Amidst war?"

"I-m.. sorry." The girl apologized. She wasn't one to withhold an apology when she knows she was in the wrong.

"Well?" He prodded.

"What?" She asked, wary while cleaning up the tools she used in administering the antidote and sterilizing them as she placed them in order on the medical cart.

"Your explanation." His left hand twitched, lain on his side, palm facing upwards.

Hatsue opened her mouth to say something, to explain but found her throat clogging up and tears threatened to come out of her eyes. Instead, she shook her head, "I can't."

"You owe me an explanation." He snarled at her. "What? You're too good to be my friend now? Little Kango-hei? Or maybe you forgot about me."

The last one hurt him most. He hated waiting, hated that he had to wait for weeks, for months for her reply, for waiting until he was home to be able to confront her.

"It's hard for me to say, Sasori." She fidgeted with the bandage as she attempts to wrap his wounded hand. He might have softened at her saying his name if he wasn't mad. "You've been gone and…"

"Oh, so you found some other friends to talk these things about?" He felt himself shook with anger. The boy had always been touchy of that subject. That she had other friends and children staked ownership on their friends like they do with their toys. Sasori was always possessive of her attention, it wasn't bad back then, it had been curbed. He was starting to understand the nuances of friendship until he got deployed and now, well…

"Do you hate me for making a name for myself by killing?" He scoffed, because he becomes terribly aware in that moment of her stance in violence and that fed to his insecurity. He was listing wild reasons now. "Not everyone can be a little Kango-hei and save lives as service to the village. Without us on the frontlines, you would have no lives to save."

He kept dangling the name she earned herself by saving lives. He hated how he had to know about her making a name for herself like everyone at the barracks. Like he wasn't special to her. Like he wasn't her friend. That was the thing about a child's grudge. When left attended, it ran deep like a ruin buried beneath the sand.

Hatsue remained silent just as she finished bandaging his hand. Sasori couldn't stop himself, he wanted to feel justified. He wanted to hurt Hatsue the same way she did when she stopped replying, when she made him wait. Even now, she made him wait for her explanation and he did not have the patience for it so he said,

"It's not like I forced you to be my friend." He still looked mad at her and also his disappointment at her shown through. "You were the one who wanted to be my friend. If you can't keep it, then you shouldn't have stupid!"

She flinched at the last word. She remembered him calling her stupid in their banters back then, there was no weight to the teasing, it was like a puppy nipping your fingers. But this time, him calling her stupid felt biting. Frankly, it hurt her.

His gray eyes finally left her as the boy stood up from the recliner. If Hatsue won't tell her, he'd ask grandma Chiyo, then after he knows what's wrong they can try to… whatever friends do after a fight.

Chiyo was excited upon the news her grandson has returned home. She asked her brother to celebrate Sasori's return later but for now she wanted to hug her little boy for coming back to her safely. She was setting the food she ordered, not forgetting the boy's favorite food: riceballs and cabbage. She heard the door open and saw her cute grandson, with his red hair and-

Not the usual drowsy expression. Anger.

"Chiyo-baa-san." He greeted.

"Sasori." She greeted back warmly and ushered him in from the door, guiding him towards the dining table. "I prepared your favorite food and Ebizo-jii-san will drop by later."

Sasori didn't sit though, and Chiyo felt she needed to address the apparent anger.

"What's wrong?"

"What happened to Hatsue?" He needed the answer now, tapping his foot. "What happened to her while I was gone? Why did she stop writing to me? I know it has something to do with the Kazekage but I don't know how that ties to her stopping her letters to me."

Oh.

Chiyo didn't know what to do. The Sandaime- She didn't know how to explain so she shook her head sadly.

Sasori scowled. He's had enough. "Stop hiding things from me! I'm not a child anymore."

Chiyo felt her heart twist in hearing that. No child is a soldier and yet her grandchild ,among many, stood in contrast. Shinobis are adults in their society, no matter how young.

"You kept hiding things from me, like how my parents were killed, so I kept waiting and waiting even though they died. You say you love your family, my parents, me but you kept hiding things for the village. But the village sent my parents to die." He wanted to shout, but felt more in control when speaking of long buried resentment in a moderate volume, and much more satisfying to see his grandma flinch at the acid of his words.

Chiyo grabbed her grandson's face and cradled it with her wrinkly hands. "No, Konoha killed your parents."

Everyone was fighting to get home.

He shook his head looking at her dead in the eye. "You would sacrifice anyone for your loyalty to Suna. Your son, my father. My mother. "

He stepped away from her.

Chiyo felt herself breaking inside. She felt herself shake. Her grandson hated her.

"Even me."

At this Chiyo, moved to embrace her grandson and say, "Not you. Not when I have lost my son. Never again."

Sasori moved away from her coldly. "You already have lost me, grandma Chiyo. Your legacy is built on your loyalty to Suna. Your legacy will end with a grandson who has no love for Suna."

The elder felt her age catching to her, ancient and withering away, more than ever at this moment and her knees buckled at the unseen weight, kneeling. "Sasori, you and Hatsue, I will forever live my life asking forgiveness. For what our village put you through. To everyone who lost someone. To children like you, robbed of innocence." She heaved a guttural sob. Her grandson despises her. "But what happened to Hatsue, only she can tell you. It is hers to tell."

Sasori walked towards his room and stopped, to say a consolation. "I resented many things that you have done, Chiyo-baa-san. But for birthing my father, for loving my parents and I, for taking me in, for saving Hatsue from the chuunin exams; I will always not be ungrateful for."

The old woman cried as she crumpled into a ball on the floor. The cruelty of his grandson's words was karma to her crimes.

All these years, her grandson hated her. For her sins.

Sasori would have started working on a puppet, now that he's here. He didn't. Instead, he climbed on his bed and lain down on the soft mattress, a luxurious comfort coming home from war. He glanced on Hatsue's paintings on the wall. He was back. So, he closed his eyes.

Yet, a house with no warmth is not home at all.

A's note:

Bro, this took a lot from me. This chapter is dedicated to Sarah.

Can you see it now? Sasori's redemption?

Also, I've always envisioned Hatsue and Sasori's scene. The argument scene. I mentioned I stopped writing. But I never stopped seeing Hatsue and Sasori interacting wherever I go. Chiyo and Sasori though was a surprise. Chiyo is a wildcard for me, I find it hard to characterize her frankly, I wanted her to be as vintage-like interesting as possible. Whenever I write Chiyo, it surprises me how the scene would flow. I don't know why but Chiyo just takes a lot out of me when writing and so does Sasori, especially in this chapter. I think if only Sasori had the chance to confront Chiyo earlier in canon, then he wouldn't have spiraled. Not leaving a review is letting this fanfic die.