A/N: Umm... Hi? I'm still alive. I hope you like this chapter.

As the sea calls 15

"You have a week of respite before you are back on mission roster. Use it well."

Those words rang in Kairi's mind as she dodged another attack from Temari. She twisted between the air currents, hand catching onto empty air and then springing her onto opposite direction from pseudo handstand. It had taken a bit but Kairi had figured how to use Shunpo from her hands as well. It hadn't been a priority before a she needed hands for her fan, other weapons and jutsu. But maneuverability was a forte she needed to capitalize on as much as she could.

Speed was good but there were many who could be faster than her. The Uchihas of various kind came to mind.

Strength was something Kairi still needed to work on and even then, she doubted she'd ever be a physical powerhouse – be it with chakra-augmentation or not.

Ninjutsu was coming along well but Kairi was mainly wind-focused. Not to mention her chakra pools were only above average.

Fuuinjutsu? Oh, she wished. It would be very handy to know more about sealing arts but it wasn't something easily learnt in Suna. Most knowledge there went to different sort of preservation and pest control seals and some storage seals. All villages knew some sealing. Naturally, otherwise moving their bijuus from host to another would be impossible.

So Kairi decided to work on agility and unpredictability. The Third Tsuchikage could levitate thanks to his gravity-based earth techniques but to Kairi's knowledge, it only allowed slow turns and worked high-speed better on straight lines.

Shunpo – and whatever variations she could come up with – was Kairi's answer to that. If perfected, her ability to move and dodge would be exponential. It was already good, as she had noticed during the invasion. But it needed to be more.

It was like you were onboard a local train and you have your ticket where there's an announcement: "Station X. Last station before Zone C." And you come to the realization that you have a ticket for Zone AB but not one reaching for Zone C. And there was a conductor coming to check those tickets.

This was like so. Kairi had finally reached the canon events; the metaphorical Station X. Konoha Crush had been the first major milestone and showed the stakes of this world. It disrupted the almost thirteen-year-old status quo that had taken place after the last war. In three years Akatsuki would make their move. The time in between was a mystery but she couldn't count on major opponents staying quiet or things being calm just because nothing had been shown in the original manga.

Kairi had AB ticket. She needed disembark from the train and get Zone BC ticket next and eventually one for Zone D.

That's why Kairi had enlisted help from Temari and Kankurou. They'd been caught and outclassed in the forest and then witnessed the fight between Gaara and Naruto. They wanted and needed to get better as well. They might not know the entire scope of future threats but being the children of the late Kazekage and siblings with Gaara, made them understand threats directed at them on personal level.

They took turns on teaming up on each other or having free for all. Sometimes Gaara joined them as well, learning how to use his sand consciously and non-lethally.

It was great. Kairi couldn't remember when was the last time she'd exerted herself this much during training. Maybe during preparations for the chuunin exams in Suna three years ago, when she still was in a team with Koto and Yomi. After that she'd stagnated for a while in the wake of her father's death.

(There was no body. Only summons telling Kairi and Akane that Kaito was dead, his name having been erased from the list of active summoners.)

Kairi still had trained and gotten stronger. But on slower pace. Her teams had rotated and she had failed in the next two exams. Getting assigned to Natsuhiko had been a relief. They partnered up for missions and Kairi began existing in the present day again…

And then came the invitation to Konoha chuunin exams and Kairi realized the events of the story had arrived. New preparations begun, Kairi signed the summoning contract, Hara Jyari and Nagaya Souseki were assigned to form a team with her under Natsuhiko's tutelage…

Kairi was given a mission to complete. She did it with dedication, guile and excitement thrumming under her skin. She got close to her fellow spy and got burnt for that. She was captured and interrogated… but she survived. Kairi came home, was rewarded with new rank and promise of future missions.

She would not allow herself to fail. With the name she took on, Kairi had a lot to live up to.

Kankurou was getting better at aiming the projectiles his puppets shot. Puppets were interesting choice of weapon in the way that while the user was mainly stagnant, the puppet acted as a heavy hitter, projectile launcher, poison spreader or trap maw. But it also formed two targets to be aimed at. With Kairi's speed, she could easily get between him and whichever puppet he was using and aim directly at Kankurou. So he needed to eliminate reaction time in protecting himself… and start learning to use multiple puppets at the same time.

Temari had wider range with her attacks and could transition easier to closer range battling than Kankurou as she could use her tessen with only one hand as well or even as a club like Kairi did with Kogonhi. She was very ninjutsu heavy fighter and though she had plenty of strength needed to wield her tessen, her taijutsu was lacking. But she could keep Kairi further away so she had technical advantage most of the time.

They also knew how to work together which made the challenge better. Kairi had plenty of attacks to dodge and weave through.

And it was during mid fight again that she'd figured out the natural way of using Shunpo through her hands.

Temari let out a surprised sound what Kairi sprung above her head and was lifting her tessen to blow the other girl away… but Kairi curled into a ball, gathering momentum for falling and the uncoiled with Kogonhi held in her hands.

Kairi struck the ground just behind Temari with folded Kogonhi and when the other girl was jumped back, she flipped the fan open.

"Fuuton: Fuusajin no jutsu!"
(Wind Release: Dust Wind Technique)

Sand and dust scattered around. It made for a cover, it dug into the joints of Kankurou's puppet. Kairi went for another attack but wild swipe from Temari's tessen forced her to retreat. Instead Kairi switched targets for the puppet. She rose to the air, over the dust cloud in which she could see the dark shapes of her opponents.

And she struck.

The time Kairi wasn't actively training, she was trying to decipher the storage scroll she'd acquired from Konoha. It was technically simple… but not. The function was same than Suna's storage seals but the root how it was constructed differed. Kairi had not specialized in sealing previously. And her calligraphy was not consistent enough for drawing seals. All of her explosion tags were mass produced and bought in bulk, something that had eaten a lot of her money prior the exams and why she'd been grateful for Reika's delivery. Hmm… maybe Kairi should send her a message telling she was still alive and safely back in the village.

The difficulty in having relatives in another country, especially when you both were shinobi, was that you couldn't really meet up with them. Suna and Iwa weren't actively hostile with each other currently but unless Kairi and Reika managed to get missions on the same area at the same time, they could only rely on letters as a way to keep contact. And even then those were vague in the fear of interception by either enemies or allies.

Reika also had fox summons – of sort. The thing was, there was the main Fox summon contract that was a pretty big thing. Like Toad summon big with the way of clout and prestige. It was very hard to get hands on and according to what Kairi had learnt from Shimon, their boss summons answered directly to the Kyuubi no Kurama. Like how cat summons' boss Nekomata answered to the Nibi no Matatabi. Or would if the jinchuuriki didn't exist. The main foxes – red foxes – summons had pretty much gone into seclusion after Kyuubi was sealed for the first time and thus there hadn't been summoners for them in the past fifty years or so. Naruto could probably make contract with them once befriending Kyuubi but… currently impossible and Toads took over that niche in him.

Anyhow, there were then sort of regional foxes. Sub-contracts that were easier to obtain if you had compatibility. Fennec foxes for Kaze no Kuni, arctic foxes for Yuki no Kuni, gray foxes for Hi no Kuni, Blandford foxes for Kaminari, corsac foxes for Tsuchi… And many, many others. In general, the different fox species liked dry areas so their contracts concentrated on places with sand, grasslands, mountains… Mizu and former Uzushio were probably completely void of those contracts.

Reika had contract with Tibetan sand foxes and according to her, they were great help to her with planting her explosives and otherwise assisting with her earth style techniques. They were a bit grouchy – very unlike Kairi's excitable summons – but reliable. And they facilitated correspondence between the cousins.

"Hello, my fellow traveler.

How have you been? Thank you for the delivery few weeks ago, it was much appreciated. I enjoyed hospitality of our uncle's house and returned home few days ago. Some concerns have been expressed over me getting bad influences from local hermits but I doubt their necessity. Also, I finally got a new vest! Granny threw it at my head when I stepped from the door and told me I was definitely my father's daughter.

Speaking of my visit to uncle's house, I might've found another traveler. Or at least a surprise whose presence has caused changes. She is a smart kid, I played a round of Hanafuda with her team. Her influence has calmed our cousin and relaxed Izuna's son. With great intrigue, I await to see how this will change the history we know and love.

It probably should scare me. Realizing what is in the future and how things will be more unpredictable. How this isn't only something to slog through and assume we'll be fine. But it's all contrary for me. I'm excited. This is actually happening. I'm awake. I can predict things but I can't rely on them. Our life is real.

Have you heard anything from your brother yet? It has been a while since he ran away from home. Is he alright? Has he fallen in with bad crowd? As his birthday was a mere month ago and we share the birth year, I worry…"

Kairi lifted her brush from the scroll and bit into the end of it. Deidara was a difficult case to consider. He was a cousin. And they were indeed the same age, with mere weeks of difference. Reika loved him dearly. Loved even after he did a runner years ago. It had been a messy situation. Aunt Danae had died on a mission. Deidara had faced pressure from his mentor, the Third Tsuchikage, and his tendency to form his explosives into statues and in general use them non-traditionally was facing critique, consternation and ridicule from other shinobi. Reika and Arashi had tried to support the boy but in the end Deidara had fled after stealing a kinjutsu scroll.

He hadn't kept contact but Reika had been able to track his movements through rumor and deed until he'd basically dropped off the map. That suggested recruitment by Akatsuki but the girls weren't certain.

Deidara was… he would be a bad guy for Naruto and Gaara and other people in the sphere of influence of the 'good guys'. But he was also family. He was temperamental, sarcastic, funny, eager to please and impress people he deemed important. He was competitive and dramatic. The few times Kairi had met him face to face had been filled with tension that was released through destructive spars and then bickering and finally turning their attention to people around them and critiquing their clothes, behavior, making ridiculous assumptions and then leading them to conspiracy theories. Casual trash talk in the other words.

He was a peer. They were from different villages but there was just something that clicked with them. Yes, Kairi shared a connection with Koto and Yomi that had been forged through academy and missions and training. Reika was close because they shared a similar situation with the case of reincarnation. But with Deidara it had been instantaneous. They were on the scale that never stood still but never hit the ground as they ran from side to side and traded blows – be they physical or verbal.

Kairi couldn't help but wonder if it was the sort of balance Naruto and Sasuke had but less like polar opposites gravitating around each other.

When Kairi had been in Konoha and doing her mission, she'd entertained the idea of having something similar clicking with Kabuto in the absence of Deidara. But in the end, it had been the façade Kairi had scratched at no matter how aware she'd been of it. Poking senbon at each other but then Kairi got too close and got stabbed in the jugular for it. It would be interesting to see what would come from that relationship… once Kairi got the chance to punch Kabuto a time or two. That experience though had highlighted to Kairi how much she missed Deidara and wanted to know where he was. Maybe even spar again…

"… I hope you and your father are well. Mother and I are doing fine and soon I'll be able to leave the village again. Hopefully we can meet again someday.

Yours,

The wave reaching the desert winds"

Kairi ended the message and rolled up the scroll. She'd summon Shanna tomorrow to deliver it.

She was dodging sand. Gaara's sand. It was everywhere. And Kairi was anywhere. Gaara – like Kankurou – was a stagnant fighter. It was a habit born from years of sand automatically defending him either as an armor or as a shield. Lee was the first one to score a direct attack on him. Sasuke was the second, and they both had used speed to do it. True they were augmented by the overwhelming Lotus Techniques and Chidori but speed had been the key to make those attacks reach Gaara.

In Suna, Kairi was the fastest shinobi of their generation. And with the way she was going, she could become the fastest. Which made her the perfect opponent for Gaara to go against and start to become an active fighter. To become creative and proactive rather than reactive.

The spar had a different rhythm than with Kankurou and Temari. Only one opponent but the pace wasn't slower exactly. Previously Kairi had dictated which of her opponents attacked depending on where she was situated but here there were no distractions or obstructions. Only sand and wind, Gaara and Kairi. Of the same elemental nature and thus all the tricks that they brought to the fight had to be in technique and anything that wasn't alike.

Tendrils of sand chased Kairi across the field. She ducked and dived, threw kunai at Gaara for distraction, tried to cut the tendrils with a wire loop (fail, they only reformed again). A couple of times Kairi managed to slip within the range of the sand and deliver a taijutsu sequence at the younger boy, forcing him to dodge some but then calling sand to drive her away. And Kairi voluntarily retreated. Gaara may not aim for killing or maiming his opponents anymore within the walls of Suna but… memories were a strong thing. Kairi still sometimes got a phantom sensation to her arm from the time when her bones had been broken. It had been…

Traumatizing. Maybe. For little Kairi all of nine years old with memories barely adjusted in the past years… She had blocked most of it out. But she remembered Akane's terrified and worried visage when she woke up in the hospital. Kaito hadn't been in the village but once back and informed of the incident, he hovered around Kairi and took to extensively teaching her whenever he was in the village. Not long after that the frequent assassination attempts begun, the roars of Shukaku and omnious hissing of sand filling the cool desert nights. Kairi prayed and prayed that her father wouldn't be included to the next one.

She hadn't allowed herself to become scared of sand. She kept her distance from Gaara and chanted in her mind that only six years, five years, three, one left until the tanuki boy would meet the fox boy. Again, the chuunin exams had been the first time with frequent contact with Gaara and then Kairi had kept her terror tightly tucked away and refused to let it affect her actions, no matter how ill-thought and impulsive they were. Gaara actually remembering her name after all those years had probably bolstered her trust on the uncertain fact that the boy wouldn't kill her in any of the interractions.

The spar came to close, with Kairi's chakra-sharpened hair stick poised at the nape of Gaara's neck while his sand was encircling her torso and throat. Kairi bit down the instinctive terror but couldn't quite contain a shiver that the sensation caused her. She did not like being trapped. It wasn't the sand that scared her but the possibility of being crushed. Not claustrophobia, because Kairi could easily tuck herself hiding in some tight spots but… Gaara's sand when she was nine, Reika's stories from the war, that damned scroll from Kabuto…

Kairi swallowed and cut the chakra flow from her hair stick. A breath later, the sand slid away.

"Thank you for the spar, Kairi." Gaara said, his face impassive but not cold. He was still confused from Naruto knocking sense into him. People still kept distance from him. Things were changing but it was slow-going.

"You're welcome, Gaara…-chan." A little acknowledgement. Kairi tucked her hair stick away and offered her now empty hand to the boy. And he took it. His hand was warm. There was little roughness from sand sticking to his dry palms (was he even using his armor now?) but he was warm and real and so very human.

He smiled and Kairi brought her other hand to cradle his. Gaara was just… so small. He was shorter than Kairi, thinner, physically weaker, emotionally fragile. But there was strength too. In his will, in his chakra, in his ambition to change.

He would be so great.

"I was surprised yet glad that you remembered me after all those years." Kairi spoke quietly.

"…You were one of the many I hurt. But you were the first that approached me voluntarily and afterwards didn't act hatefully." Gaara replied equally quietly, like sharing a secret.

"I barely even saw you after. My parents… they didn't let me out of their sight." Aside from school but Gaara wasn't in school. He was personally tutored by his father in ninja arts deemed acceptable. So lonely…

"Still, we didn't see each other until at the gates for departure to Konoha. And you didn't act like you carried a grudge. When you spoke to me, you were always calm. You were scared but you didn't act on it and…"

"It meant a lot especially when your siblings were skittish around you." Kairi finished the thought.

"Yes."

"Gaara, can I hug you?" It was a huge leap forward. Risky a bit. But this boy's last physical contacts had been Sasuke hitting him with Chidori and Naruto headbutting him.

The red-head's eyes widened in surprise but Kairi waited patiently. Not expecting anything, not hurrying him or retracting the offer immediately.

"Please…" The voice was small. This was the boy who tried to cut his wrist in an effort to feel pain. Whose last benign touch was from Yashamaru whose betrayal and death cut deeper than any other subsequent attach orchestrated by the Kazekage.

Kairi stepped forward and carefully draped her arms around the boy's back and shoulders, giving him enough time the back out and even when she guided with one hand for Gaara to lean on her shoulder, she kept the hold gentle.

"It's okay. You are growing still and discovering yourself. I'm sure with time, others will see that too."

Time of growth. For everyone. Kairi included.

A/N: So... This chapter was interesting to write. Mainly because while important, I really don't care for mandatory training sequences... or ahve brain space for figuring out nitty-gritty mechanics for Kairi to figure out.

The Fox summons thing is a nod for The Lives Worth Living by cywsaphyre and Backslide by blackkat who both have great time-travel fics with Naruto having fox summons.

I need to start refining Kairi's skillset. I realized that I have not decided a secondary element for her to learn at all... any suggestions and why? Not fire though... nor earth necessarily.

Replies to reviews (for those to whom I didn't reply back then ie Sep, 2019 onwards):

-SuperVegitoFAN: (chapter 4)
I'm nice to know it amused you. It was a nice side-note for me to add considering the irony of the situation.
Ooh, that is interesting to know. Desu pareedo. I can see that. Always learn something new. XD

-Guest: (chapter 14)
Thank you. I'm glad that you like my concept. I try to continue writing this story, but as you can guess form the lateness of this update, it might take some time...

-Guest: (chapter 9)
This was a bit of a filler chapter but in the next one we'll see more about Suna's own situation with Kairi interracting with the adminstration and going back to mission roster. The first mission will be a bit of a bomb...

-olgalia2007:
(chapter 1) Thank you very much! I'm always very excited to hear that people like specifically Kairi and the story choices I give her.
(chapter 9) I've lot the comparison chart I made of Konoha 12 and Sand sibs, with Kairi too... but I don't think that's too unbelievable. Kankurou and Temari were already chuunin rank when coming to the exams and if not for the invasion plans, they probably would've been promoted. And once time-skip is over, they are both jounin. Kairi is strong yes, but her range flunktuates between close-mid-range to long-range while T and K are primarily long-range fighters. The scale is scewed as you can see from this chapter that Kairi could keep up with them both at the same time because she could dictate the pace of the fight. But yeah, Kairi is probably closer to being a tokujo. (but I don't want to give her the immediate promotion that happened to Shikako) Kairi will meet Naruto actually pretty soon! And Deidara eventually.

-Random: (chapter 1)
I got a Naruto fic called Tanigakure no Sato. I've dumped into that one all of my OCs I ever created. It's a bit embarrasing for me to read after so long. I like the concept I was building but some of the plots go too smooth and some of the characters are too young because I've wanted them to be on certain age range. And then I got Konoha SI-OC Senju Kaede who had Mokuton in the fic Twelve Flowers of Hanafuda.

()

That's it for now. Let's see when I'll write the next chapter.

btw... I've heard some stuff saying that FFN might go under in a few years as there aren't really staff updates or anything... I'm not sure, that's just hearsay from second hand sources... but just in case I remind you that I have AO3 account under the same username where this fic is posted. With art! And family tree!