Second chapter ahead! There are some references to events of "The Touch of a Nightmare" in the dialogues here, so it's helpful if you've read it...

Thaaaaaanx to Acerbitas for her beta-reading!

Cut through the Shell 2

Some days after that episode, Gaara finally brought up the question that had been brooding in him since the day Lee had talked to him. They were walking back home after dinner, the street empty and silent. Gaara had felt restless all that day.

"Why do you keep doing this?"

"This what?"

"This. Being with me, talking… this."

Lee looked at him, then down again at the street.

"If I was bothering you, you would say that to me, right?"

"That's not an answer." Gaara's voice sounded angry, and he breathed deeply to calm himself. He felt the sand in the gourd vibrating, a little, like it had never done in a while. Something was going to happen.

"I… just thought you may appreciate a bit of company. Maybe it is pretentious of me thinking you would have liked mine, but…"

"I don't need it."

"But you are not telling me to leave, right?"

No, and that was the point. He wasn't telling him to leave him alone; he kept going to watch him train and listen to him. He may have argued with himself that he was just trying to learn something more about people, and Rock Lee was a good object of observation. But he could watch everyone all the time, thanks to the sand eye, so that was not what was up.

Gaara stopped in the middle of the street, making Lee almost tumble over.

"I have almost killed you. Twice, actually."

That made Lee flinch, but then he returned the gaze firmly.

"I didn't forget."

"You should be much more fearful of me than anybody else. But you keep seeking me, trying to get at me in ways I don't like. You should know it's not wise to press me."

"I don't want to force you to react; I don't want to make you feel bad. I just…" Lee waved his bandaged hands at nothing. "Laugh at me if you want, but I just wish I could be something like a friend to you…or, if that's too pretentious of me, that I could be...helpful."

"Why?"

"I don't know! Does someone need a reason to do something like that?" the dark-haired boy exclaimed in an almost exasperated tone.

"Yes. If it's me, and it's you, I do believe so."

Gaara resumed walking, this time in the direction of their clearing. Probably thinking the argument was not ended yet, Lee followed.

When they arrived, Gaara pulled off the gourd, placing it near the rock where he always sat. The moon was half-full, waning, its light together with the stars enough to illuminate the place. Well, at least to their ninja-trained eyes. The shadow of the trunk stretched almost to their feet.

"What if your sensei would betray you?" Gaara asked suddenly. Lee, who was probably trying to figure out what to say, had shot his head up like he had been struck, dumbfounded.

"Eh? How? And what this got to do with…"

"Betrayed. Done something really wrong to you."

"That could never happen!" Lee said with passion, and met Gaara's eyes.

"If you believe that so much, when he'll do it you'll be crushed."

"But he won't! Look, don't say things like that, it's impossible, just like it's impossible that I would do something bad to him." The very thought seemed to trouble Lee deeply, and he was starting to get angry. Gaara found it quite amusing.

"Because you love him?"

"Of course! He's like family, and more, since I've never had one." Lee had stood up, looking bewildered at Gaara's smirking face.

"Your family…" Lee trailed off, suddenly seeming unsure. "You've got a family, too. Your siblings must care for you!"

"They just don't know what to do with me. Some time ago it was simple, they just had to fear me, like everyone else. Now things have gotten messed up".

"They don't have to fear you anymore and that makes things messed up?" Lee's face was puzzled.

Gaara looked away, angry. It had been so simple. He had been Gaara, he the container for something horrible and he could do everything he wanted, or almost. Killing…was just so easy and it could make people react with horror, fear, all the feelings he knew so well. Now he had chosen, after everything had happened, he had chosen not to lose control, to lose to himself, but the result had been just…terrible. He had lost even that way to feel about others. He refrained from doing anything that could cause harm to those around him, and that was making him become completely numb. It was so wrong…after all now he got someone to care for, to protect (a whole country damn it!). shouldn't have that mad him like other people? But it had not been so easy as he had first thought.

"You all are so complicated," Gaara muttered.

"Who?"

"People. The way you feel, you react…I don't get it, but I just behave like I do."

"You're a person too, and just as complicated!" said Lee. He lifted his hands, but he stopped, not knowing where to put them. Then his face got that determined look again and he put them over Gaara's shoulders.

The next moment he was flying across the clearing. His back hit a tree, hard. He stood up in less than a blink of an eye, and almost put himself into a fighting stance, instinct taking over. But he relaxed immediately and simply stood.

Gaara stared at him, the sand out of the gourd, slowly dancing around him.

Finally, Lee breathed out. "I'm sorry."

Gaara blinked in surprise. He thought that was going to end it, their strange companionship, and he was ready to just turn and walk away.

"I…it's like you said, I'm pushing you…but I didn't mean to."

The sand lowered, and Gaara pushed it back. It rippled, unsatisfied, but he forced it inside the gourd.

"It's me who started it."

"Yes, and you were right. If Gai-sensei would do something like that I just don't know what I'll do. But I do believe that's impossible, and maybe I'm a fool but… you said it, back after Kimimaru died. People are alone at the core, and they do even foolish or bad things for the sake of love, just to feel less alone. You're right, but I do believe that we can do something about that. Nobody can really understand others completely, but that's not enough to make them stop caring for them. So, nobody should be alone."

"Not even bad people?"

"I don't think you're bad". Lee stepped near but made no attempt to touch the other boy again. At least that he had learned. "And you're trying to change a bit, for the sake of your people, you told me that."

"I did?"

Lee smiled a bit. "Yes, you talk very little, but you say things that matter".

The red-haired boy frowned. He remembered explaining Lee the whole Kazekage thing, but he didn't…

"I think this is a great thing!" That earnest, light tone again. Like he really believed that… "I really do, you need so much force of will to do that… it's a thing to admire!"

Gaara shook his head, then turned to his gourd. Even the anger from before had disappeared, leaving the usual numbness.

"It's not going anywhere good."

Lee stared at Gaara as he put the jar on his shoulders, then he closed his eyes, fist clenching like he'd made a heavy decision.

"Maybe it's because of the sand! Ah, I mean…" Lee intercepted Gaara's irritated glare. Of course it was because of the sand… "I mean the Sand Armour! It… protects you always, from everything, so you said? Even, maybe, when you don't want it to…"

Gaara's mind was suddenly attacked by images: a kid falling and not getting his knee to bruise and bleed, like anybody else's would, And a kid with a knife in his hand, With someone, coming near and showing him what that blade could really do.

The sand moved, pressing against the cork.

"What do you think you know about that!" he exclaimed. That idiot didn't know where he was going, didn't know what could that get at. He had to leave now.

Lee looked steadily at him."I had thought about it".

"Really? You did?" Gaara's harsh laughter resounded between the trees. "And tell me, what conclusion have you come to, after thinking so hard!"

"Tell me, instead, why had you not killed me when you came in the hospital, after the fight?"

Gaara looked confused.

"They came to interfere…"

"It wasn't because of that! I was awake, I saw you".

Gaara didn't remember it. He remembered being enraged, and scared, because of what had happened during the match. He remembered him telling him to kill that fool who had dared hurt him. He had become so strong after that fight…his usual whispering and lamenting, a constant presence in Gaara's brain that he had learned to tune out with power of will, had turned into furious screaming…

He was now holding his head into his hands, like that time, but he was still in control. He had to be.

"Gaara…" Lee's voice sounded concerned, now, and Gaara just wanted to shout at him: "How the hell can you be worried about me, when you should think about your own safety, and run!"

"You… I thought that maybe you need someone to… I don't know, touch you with no harm intended…" Lee ran a hand through his hair "I'm no genius, I don't understand things so difficult. I can make it only so far trying to understand not being touched in a whole lifetime is… absurd. It's… it could make anyone completely crazy, and you still have a lot more to carry… I, you know, even if I had no right to do so, after we met the last time I asked Naruto-kun about the fight you two had, when… it all happened. He made quite a mess of the story, but what I got made me think that next time I'd meet with you I would try to…"

"Be helpful?"

Lee gave a small bitter laugh. "That sounds really pretentious, ne? And please, don't ask me why, 'cause there's no way I could explain that in words! It's… because I want to! Because I am so selfish I think maybe I can do it. People are well when they laugh and smile, or when they fight and cry and they find someone who supports them. You now are trying so hard, you are fighting against something so great… and I nobody ever said you were good at it! That at least I can understand!"

Lee quieted, and seemed to brace himself for what was going to happen now. He was surely thinking he had went too far.

Gaara closed his eyes. Too many things, too many words. He did not really mourn over the so simple world he had left, in which everything revolved around himself. But this… Vaguely, he realized the sand had calmed again, and that made him smirk. It really did not rule his life so much anymore…

"I was being touched. All the time." He raised an arm, putting the hand in front of Lee, and letting the Sand Armour shift over the skin, grains levitating in the air like an aura.

Lee's face was sad, but somehow Gaara didn't feel like he was pitying him. It was more…like regret.

Gaara closed his fist. "I had been touched by people. I felt them. That guy Uchiha, made me bleed. And before the first one to touch me had been you".

"That had been while fighting… I don't like the idea of me being first person who has touched you, but by hurting you."

"That would be unsavoury."

"Eh? No, I mean…"

"I listen to you, too. So you think I should let myself be touched?"

"Well…I don't think you should force it…"

"I could not, anyway."

They fell silent. Then Lee extended his hand, a bit awkward, like he was not sure of what he was doing, and waited. Gaara looked at it, his cold eyes almost white in the moonlight.

Seconds stretched on, until finally Gaara turned and walked away. He had gone all the way he could.

Lee waited there until the moon set, before finally going home.

End Chapter 2

So... what will happen next?

Thanx for reading! Review?