Disclaimer : Anything Naruto does not belong to me. I swear!

Pain flooded my sences and forced me out of the comfort of the bleak darkness that had claimed me after the explosion. I opened my eyes to find myself on my side, laying in sand. I groaned as I pushed myself up into a sitting position. I blinked a few times and looked around. THe restuarant was gone, so was the gas station across the street, and well, any semblence of habitaition. As I looked around, all I saw was sand. Miles and miles of it. I sat there for a few minutes and sheilded my eyes from the sun. It was hotter than hell out here!

"Great, I'm halucinating. Or I'm dreaming..." I said aloud and almost flinched. My voice sounded so loud. I pushed myself to my feet and brushed some sand from my jeans. Some of the sand was clumpy and red. Confused, I looked myself over and groaned. My jeans were torn around the knees, and beneath the torn fabric, I could see that my legs had cuts running from just below my knees, to just above them. Ever notice how you can cut yourself and not feel it untill you see the blood? Yeah, now my knees hurt so bad, I almost fell over. I bit my lower lip and tried to brush off as much sand as possible, while tring not to touch the noumours cuts. Didn't work out so well.

"Fuck! What the hell is going on?" I praticly screamed. I fell back on my rear end and instead of brushing off the sand, blew really hard on each knee. It helped, but only a little. I closed my eyes and tried to think of something else. One thing I learned from working in a kitchen for most of my life was, if you hurt yourself, think of something else, something happy and the pain lessens. I must have sat there, thinking of cheese cake and Smallville for close to fifteen minutes with my eyes closed before the pain finally was nothing more than a throb.

I looked around and tried to take stock of my situation. I was alone, in a dessert, no food, no water. I checked my pockets for anything. I came up with a crumpled twenty dollar bill, two quarters, a penny, and my pocket knife. Well, there was one thing I could use. I used the pocket knive to cut my jeans around the knees. I pulled the cut off portion down over my shoes and tossed them aside. It wasn't untill I was putting the knife away that I heard voices.

"Would it kill him to leave a note when he dissapears for hours?"

That was defiinatly a woman. Guess there's hope for me yet.

"You know how he is. He's Kazekage, he doesn't need to leave a note."

Male this time, but what the hell was a Kazekage? I pushed myself to my feet and tried to figure out where the voices were comming from.

"Kazekage or not, it's still common curtisouy to leave a note, Kankuro."

Who ever they were, they were in front of me, probably over the hill of sand. I started walking that way.

"Yeah well...hey, do you see that?"

I started walking faster, they probably spotted me. I looked up at the top of the sand hill, or was it a dune? Whatever, didn't matter now. I could faintly make out two people standing up there looking down in my direction. I stood there, unsure of what to do.

Both figures slid down the sand towards me and I continued to stand there.

"Who are you?" It was the female who's voice I had heard. She was a little taller than me, with blonde hair, pulled back in four pony tails.

"Who cares who she is, why is she out here, she's not from the village." It was the owner of the other voice. He was an odd one, he was dressed all in black and had purple markings all over his face. His hood vaguely reminded me of a cat.

"I ah..." I was at a loss for words. What should I say, a gas station exploded, knocked me out, and I woke up here? Yeah, right. I didn't even belive it myself, what would they think?

They both looked me over, and waited. Apparently they were waiting for an explination.

"What's a Kazekage?" It was the only thing that came to mind to say.

"definatly not from the Village." The girl said with a slight smirk, "The Kazekage is the leader of our village. What's your name?"

"Amanda."

"What village are you from, Amanda-san?" The guy in black asked.

"It's called Steger...but I don't think it's anywhere near here..." I said as I looked around. What was with the 'san' he added onto my name?

"Well, looks like we should do what we always do with newcomers." The girl said. Her companion nodded.

Great, they're going to kill me here and now. I backed up slightly and they both looked at me.

"We ain't gonna hurt you." The girl seemed to be reading my mind.

"Okay, well...I gave you my name, you guys have names?" For someone who was just bitching about common curtisiy, she wasn't expressing any.

"Oh, gomen, I'm Temari, and this is my brother, Kankuro." Temari said with a slight smile. She didn't look too much older than me, and it was hard to tell about her brother, Kankuro. The facepaint can really throw someone off.

"Okay, so what is it you're going to do with me?" I asked as I crossed my arms over my chest, and for the first time in the last hour or so, realized that I was missing my jacket. Not like I needed it in this heat anyways.

"Take you to the Kazekage." Kankuro said as he walked past me.

"But first, we have to find him, so you're going to have to come with." Temari said as she watched her brother walk away.

"Follow him?" I asked as i motioned to Kankuro. Temari nodded and gave me the ever famous 'after you' gesture.

I followed tall dark and slightly spooky for a little while in total silence before speaking.

"So what does this Kazekage person look like?" I asked Temari, who had, after a few minutes, started walking beside me, instead of behind me.

"Few inches shorter than Kankuro, blood red hair, and he had a huge gord strapped to his back, why?" She gave me one of those 'what's it to you?' looks.

"Well, you're looking for him, and three sets of eyes are better than two." I said with a shrug and sheilded my eyes from the sun once more.

She shrugged, "Sure."

It seemed like we had been walking forever when I spotted something a ways off to my right, it was round and almost the same color as the sand. I guess the only reason I even noticed it was the bit of red over it. I pointed it out to Temari and she smiled.

"There he is." She said as she poked Kankuro. He turned and nodded.

"Alright, go get him then." He said with a shrug.

She shook her head, "Not me, she spotted him." Temari said with a nod in my direction.

I looked at them, slightly confused, "So?"

"You spotted him, so go get him." Kankuro said as he pushed me gently in the direction of their leader.

"And say what exacly, 'Hi there, those people over there, the blonde and the guy who looks like a demonic cat, sent me to get you.' ? Yeah, like that will go over well. I don't even know who the hell he is." I said with my hands on my hips.

Temari smiled, "At least I'm not the only one who thinks he resembles a cat with that stupid hood."

Kankuro rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, "He's our brother, so go up there and tell him we're looking for him. Alright?"

I held my hands up in defeat, "Okay, okay."

I trudged up the sand dune that the pair's brother was apparently sitting on top of and tried not to fall on my face. I wasn't skilled in the department of sand walking.

As i neared the top i realized that I was right. He was sitting in the sand. He apparently had realized I was comming up to get him because the second I reached the top of the dune, he stood up.

"Who are you?" He asked without turning to face me.

"Um, your brother and sister sent me up here to get you." My voice quavered slightly and I realized that I was slightly afraid. I didn't know why, I just was.

He turned slightly and looked at me out of the corner of his eye, which i noticed was a startling aqua green. That was a color I hadn't seen unless someoen was wearing those colored contacts that were so popular in my high school years.

"You're not from around here." He said as he crossed his arms.

I nodded, "Yeah, I guess not. They're waiting for you back there." Sarcasm was leaking through with my slight fear. One of my greatest downfalls.

"Let them wait." He still hadn't turned to face me. I glanced over my shoulder to look at Temari and Kankuro, both of which seemed to be waiting pactiently.

"Look, I don't know your name, I don't even know where the hell I am, so can we go down there and then all three of you can explain how I ended up in a dessert?" I was growing impatient. Add that to the little ball of fear that was slowly growing in the pit of my stomach, and you would get a very irratible Amanda.

"Gaara."

"Excuse me?"

"My name is Gaara. Sit down before you fall down." He said as he seated himself once more in the sand.

I shrugged and sat down without hesitation, keeping in mind not to sit indian style like Gaara was now. That would just send a new wave of pain from my knees. I leaned forward and looked him over.

Other than the obsenely large gord strapped to his back, he seemed like a normal enough guy. He had on a burnt red colored trench style coat. It was buttoned down the front to his waist and then flared out, sorta like Neo's from the Matrix. He had on black pants and black sandles. The only distracting thing about him was the tattoo or marking or what ever it was, over his left eye. It was the color of blood and looked like one of those chinese symbols.

"Now answer my question, who are you?"

"My name is Amanda." My response was almost automatic. I don't know why, but I felt compeled to answer any question he asked me. I'm hardly ever that co-opertive.

"How did you come to meet my sister and brother?"

"Well, I woke up in the middle of the dessert, and they were looking for you and found me first." I said as I drew circles in the sand.

It was then that he turned his full attention to me and looked me over. It was also then that I became very aware of my current state. Cut off jean shorts, a black t-shirt with a red dragon on the front, and my short messy red hair.

I gave him a questioning look and he shrugged, "So you're not from around here. What is the name of your village?"

Here we go again, the whole village bit. Well, Steger wasn't all that big, so I guess it could be called a village, "I'm from Steger."

He continued to look at me for a few minutes before standing up and heading down the dune. I reaminded seated and watched him go. He only went a few feet before turning to look at me, "We should head back." And with that, he continued down to his brother and sister.

I stood up and followed as quickly as possible while remaining on my feet.

When we rejoined the brother and sister duo, Kankuro seemed slightly surprised to see me return, Temari on the other hand, smiled at me warmly.

"So she was telling the truth?" Kankuro asked Temari as we started walking back the way we had come.

"Apparntly, Gaara didn't kill her on site, so she must have. Either that, or..."

I glanced over my shoulder to see Temari wispering something in Kankuro's ear. I narrowed my eyes, "Hey! No secrets!" I was on the verge of pouting when Kankuro burst out laughing.

I was about ready to snap on the others when Gaara held up his hand, "Enough."

Kankuro stifled his laughter at once and Temari looked like she had suddenly lost interest in the whole situation, let alone the conversation.

I rolled my eyes and stuffed my hands in my pockets and followed the red head in silence.

After about an hour of walking in total silence, I could barely make out a a huge wall, about a mile or so off in the distance ahead of us. It was here that Gaara halted us.

"Amanda-san, you are to go with my sister to clean up and she will take you to the Main Building in the village. Do not speak with anyone other than her, and do not stop for any reason, understood?" He looked at me dead serious.

I nodded, "Okay."

He in turn nodded to Kankuro and Temari and they nodded back.

"I expect a full explination when I see you again." I opened my mouth to ask him what he ment, but he dissapeard. Not just vannished before my eyes, but dissolved into sand and was gone.

A/N: Hope I didn't loose anyone with that chapter. Please, R&R. I need feed back, positive or negative, makes no difference to me.