We'll see how even the updates stay once convention season really kicks in.

"She knew carrying him would kill her," Temari said. "Our father chose to help her along."

Temari'd woken Sakura from an uneasy mid-afternoon nap in an empty hospital room and offered to buy her lunch. Their time together, she figured, was as good a point as any to broach the subject of the siblings' family life.

Sakura might still be deciding between the threat of a possible terrible future and the relationship she'd craved for years, but Temari—who had only the most fleeting memories of her own mother—had already made her decision.

She led Sakura to see Gaara again, knowing her youngest brother was an exclamation point for her not-so-subtle argument. Today the redhead had taken up with a team of builders; together, Temari and Sakura watched him help test foundations, lift stone blocks with sand, and steady walls. Easily half the workers there were head and shoulders taller than him.

"You said your father hated him for being out of control," Sakura said. "Do you think he'd be proud of him if he saw him now?"

"I think our father would be amazed to know Gaara wasn't killing people."

A few of the workers were around him, pointing to diagrams, smiling at their newest helper. The watching kunoichi both knew this would be the fastest and safest build they'd probably ever have.

"In a way," Temari said thoughtfully, "he saved another woman, somewhere. With all the trouble he caused, our father never got around to finding another wife."

It was a terrible thing to say, and they both knew it.

"He seems to have . . . adjusted fairly well, at least?" Sakura finally offered.

Temari shook her head. "Outwardly."

There were rumors that he was the one responsible for the deaths of however many condemned prisoners, but no one could prove those either way. There were also rumors Temari knew to be true, that occasionally he would lock himself in his quarters and not come out until he could do so without being a risk to those around him. But as long as Gaara remained aware of his limits—and careful enough to clean up his messes—she wouldn't mind.

The blonde sighed. "He's still damaged. He hides it well, and he's exceptional when it comes to his duties, but with everything he's been through it'd be stupid to expect him to just . . . dust himself off and be okay. I think it'd be more than a little unfair for us to expect that of him."

Sakura had no response. They watched until the walls were a sufficient height and the crew broke for lunch as well. As Gaara turned to leave, a kunoichi around Sakura's age approached him, saying something they couldn't hear. He walked away as if she didn't exist. Sakura winced, ashamed for the girl even as she recognized an echo of her own behavior. She hated to think she'd ever acted that way towards Sasuke.

"Yeah," Temari said, seeing her flinch and misinterpreting the reasons. "He still hasn't really shown much interest in girls, either."

"Is it just these ones? Or . . ."

Temari hesitated, then let it all out. "I don't know. I know he's talked to a few, spent time with some here and there, but he never really seems interested in starting anything. Our medics said at one point that it might be a side effect of the possession technique, that he might even be sterile. No one really wanted the force the issue with him and he never cared enough to get tested." She shrugged. "If I decide I want to be an aunt, I can wait for Kankurou to settle down. Gaara . . . He can do his own thing. It'd be awful of me to push something like that on him."

She used the last sentences like nails, building a wall for Sakura to shield herself behind, building a platform on which the younger girl could stand strong. Temari watched the Leaf-nin's expression, searching for any hint of offense, any indication that she'd overstepped. None came.

He'd caught sight of them by that point, though, and it didn't seem right to have him be their topic of conversation when he was present. If Sakura seemed a little quieter, a little more reserved than usual, he didn't mention it.

He remembered her tears, her fear; Sakura remembered him silent and solid—then his sudden rage from the previous afternoon. Temari considered her only memories of her own mother: an impression of weariness, a hand on Temari's shoulder, a rounded belly and Kankurou in her arms—and then screaming, medics rushing past, and Yashamaru carrying them away from the room where the Fourth Kazekage pinned his wife down and Chiyo began the sealing technique. She took a deep breath and sent a silent plea to whatever was listening that Sakura's final choice wouldn't be a terrible mistake.

ooo

Sakura made it almost four hours that night. This time the dream was of him, mid-transformation, from their fight in the woods six years before. Sand pinned her to a tree like it had in her nightmares for months after the actual event; slowly, he approached to finish her. But this time Gaara leaned close, the knuckles of his clawed hand tenderly brushing against her cheek. "I can protect you," he rasped—

And she was awake, bolt upright and shuddering.

She started towards the window again, but hesitated. After that dream, she wasn't sure Gaara was the person she wanted to see.

But as she looked over the moon-paled rooftops he appeared, a dark spot on his corner from the previous night, low in a hunter's crouch. And she knew he'd been circling, waiting.

She watched him, dismayed—she wasn't sure she wanted this much attention from the siblings, wasn't sure how to handle Temari's faux-casual family stories, and definitely didn't want to feel like Gaara was stalking her. He watched her in return, stone-still, waiting for her to make the first move.

I can protect you—

"Sakura."

Temari stood in the doorway, her hair messed and down. Sakura blushed guiltily—she knew a ninja who'd spent any serious time in the field wouldn't sleep through someone having thrashing, panicky nightmares, let alone wandering around opening windows. "Sorry," she muttered sheepishly.

"Don't worry," Temari said. "Just take the door this time, 'kay? You let all the heat out last night."

It wasn't quite chasing her out, but it did the trick. Sakura grabbed her blanket along with her change of clothes—in the rush to leave Leaf, she hadn't packed for the cold of Sand's nights—nodded and held up a finger to the watcher outside (Yes, one minute) and headed out the bedroom door in search of a place to dress.

Temari walked to the window after the Leaf-nin left and looked up to where Gaara watched. She wouldn't have thought Sakura would find comfort in the one who'd once tried to kill her; she wouldn't have thought Gaara would take quite so personal an interest in Sakura's state. She wasn't sure what to make of it.

She closed her eyes and inclined her head to him—Take care of her. He nodded back and shifted from a crouch to a squat—a wordless switch from "I'm hunting" to "I'm waiting." Then his attention was on the ground as Sakura made it outside, and he was gone.