A/N: Awesome turnout for last chapter! That's the kinda thing that makes me wanna update a lot haha. Romance tends to get you guys going, so it's not surprising.

Either way, I am so sorry for the long delay on this chapter. This was supposed to come out a day or two ago, but I was really tired, and just wanted to chill for a bit.

Hope y'all can forgive me. This chapter will be very dark.

Time for Chapter 33

Enjoy!


The line between necessity and gluttony was a fine one.

To sate oneself with what was needed or required was an uninteresting and painfully common phenomenon. Each and every person, no matter how mundane, had personal needs. Some of which they kept hidden. Be it medication, a niche interest, or some kind of private ritual, there was always a need at the core of these things. There was nothing intrinsically wrong with feeding this silent beast should it be a condition for stability. However, stepping too far into a need nearly always resulted in addiction. In overindulgence. In gluttony.

In the case of Gaara of the Sand, he had crossed that line a decade ago. In fact, he could scarcely remember a time before his nightly excursions. They had become an ingrained part of his daily routine. His process as a person. As such, the fact that he was on foreign soil made no difference to him. He simply did as he always had. Just as he always did back in Sunagakure, he left his dwelling at ten o'clock sharp, just after the night had truly fallen to blackness.

He had no specific target in mind. Not like most who did what he liked to do did. The result was the same, no matter the gender, status, orientation, or age of the person he chose. Such details meant nothing to Gaara. He was indiscriminate. He had preferences in other realms, but such things had no place in his current aim. As he strolled through the quiet streets of Konoha, his gourd strapped to his back, his eyes drifted from one cluster of homes to another. Light was streaming out from numerous windows, and even a few porch lamps were on, but no people could be found outside their homes.

Though he briefly considered trying his luck letting himself in, he quickly decided against it. For as little as he cared about the law, and despite how rarely its long arm had touched him throughout his life, he knew all too well that the playing field was a touch different outside of the desert. His actions could come back to bite him, far more so than usual. With this in mind, Gaara kept walking, showing the families and tenants in the vicinity a mercy they would never truly appreciate.

He was unbothered. It mattered little. A village the size of Konoha was bound to leave a few stragglers scampering about at night. Human nature dictated that stupidity was a guarantee with a large enough control group. All he needed was a bit of patience, and Gaara of the Sand was nothing if not methodical. He had once waited eight entire months simply to build rapport and trust with an academy professor. He had grown bored of the instruction, and despite his heritage, he had lacked the power to remove himself from the classes.

That was, until he left the instructor in six separate pieces strewn across the village. A scavenger hunt had ensued by the authorities to find each part of him for evidence. In the end, the blame was placed on the Headmaster of the Academy, as Gaara had planted the late professor's head under her floorboards. The result was several months off from schooling, as the academy was shut down temporarily in wake of the tragedy. In short, Gaara had gotten what he wanted.

That had been the tipping point. He had certainly killed before then, but it had always been out of a desire to quell the beast that lived within him, the voice in his head. He had been a mere seven years of age when he had murdered his teacher, and he had not looked back since. He killed for sport. It roused a spark in him that nothing else could. A rush he couldn't live without. He was a hopeless addict, and he liked it that way.

Alone with his barest instincts, Gaara trekked on. He could feel a presence nearby. A weak one. Somebody with little to defend themselves with. A civilian, most likely. Though he would have taken anybody, the lack of a struggle was an attractive perk. Honing in on the frail signature, Gaara picked up the pace at which he was walking. The hunt was on, and if he had it his way, it would be brief. Rounding a corner, he quickly found himself in something of a town square, with a wide open space covered by asphalt.

Standing roughly in the center of it was a young woman. She was wearing a fairly expensive-looking dress, was carrying a handbag, and wore jewelry around her neck. She was elegantly dressed, but despite her outward polish, she was clearly intoxicated. Each step she took was accompanied by a slight wobble, and her eyes were slightly glazed over. In short, she was even more vulnerable than Gaara had initially expected. Smirking to himself, the redhead stepped out into the light of one of the streetlamps rimming the square.

Despite her clear drunkenness, the woman immediately turned her head in his direction at the sound of his sandals against the ground. Keeping his silence, Gaara allowed her to analyze him as best her hazy mind could muster. He kept his eyes firmly fixed on hers. If she had any sense peeking out from the sea of alcohol in his system, she would see the predatory hunger in his blank irises. Unfortunately, she failed his unspoken test.

Not detecting the imminent danger she was in, the woman began to walk away toward the leftmost street with little haste. She was clearly uncomfortable with being watched, but there was no urgency to her movement. Shaking his head with a dark chuckle, Gaara began trailing her from twenty feet behind. Following her down the street she had chosen, Gaara gradually closed the gap between them. The closer he drew, the more quickly the woman walked. It appeared that, even while intoxicated, enough prompting had activated her fight-or-flight response. She had chosen the latter.

When Gaara was finally within eight feet of her, the woman broke out into an awkward run. The redhead made no move to do the same. He was far faster than she was, and his senses were sharper by a mile. He needn't rush. He could savor the chase for as long as he pleased. As the woman scampered away, she tripped over herself nearly immediately. Falling to her hands and knees, Gaara took the opportunity to flex his comparative muscle.

Vanishing from his previous position without even a gust of wind to accompany him, Gaara silently appeared in front of the fallen woman. She immediately scooted back away from him, but her back soon hit the wall of a building. Slowly walking her down, the redhead knelt down to be level with her once he was close enough to box her in.

"Nice night, don't you think?" he asked. It was purely rhetorical. Visibly shaking, the woman remained tongue-tied for a number of seconds before finally finding her voice.

"Who are you?" she choked out. Gaara raised an eyebrow and leaned forward to invade her personal space just a bit more.

"Just a tourist looking for a souvenir or two." he said darkly. The woman's breathing then began to become erratic. Her chest heaved in and out, her eyes widened, and her hands grasped at the dirt on the ground. At such a close distance, she could feel his intentions all too vividly.

"G-Get away from me." she stammered, rising to her feet with all the steadiness of a baby deer. Gaara rose along with her. He was a bit taller than she was, and built significantly stronger even beyond the difference in their lifestyles. Remaining motionless, Gaara allowed her to slip away again, following her with his eyes as she attempted to escape her fate. She then made an utterly predictable mistake.

'Why do they always trap themselves?' Gaara wondered to himself. The woman had turned into an alleyway, and based upon the fact that he could no longer hear her footsteps, she had hit a dead end. Shaking his head, mildly disappointed by the stupidity of his chosen victim, Gaara made his way into the alley. As he had expected, the woman had cornered herself. There was a gate in the middle of the alleyway, and she was attempting to climb over it. As soon as Gaara entered the space, she fell off from the small amount of progress she had made.

"This just isn't your day." the redhead said, his tone mocking and patronizing. The woman pressed her back up against the gate and began to shake. She was utterly petrified, and Gaara could practically taste it. Stepping in close to her, Gaara's gourd began to leak sand, which soon started swirling around them.

"Please don't…" the woman shimpered, her eyes wide and filled with tears. Gaara stared right through her. She wasn't a person to him anymore. Only an object. A toy to be played with until it inevitably broke.

"Sorry, but I play for keeps." Gaara replied coldly, sand quickly enveloping her entire body up to her neck. Struggling fiercely, the woman was soon bound in place as Gaara tightened the grip of his sand.

"It's always young women, isn't it, freak?" she hissed fearfully. The redhead placed his hand on the gate to the left of her head and leaned on it. Her brittle words of defiance had not shaken him in the slightest.

"Oh, it has nothing to do with who you are, what you look like, any of that. It's nothing personal, really. You were just in the wrong place at the wrong time." he said, not a shred of empathy in his voice. He then stepped back again, extending out his left hand in front of himself. Though she had no way to know what exactly he was doing, the sand encasing her body gave the woman enough context for her drunken mind to deduce what was coming next.

"If it's n-not about who I am, then you could let me go and find somebody else. I swear I w-won't tell anybody." she reasoned, stuttering multiple times as the sand crept up around her neck and face. Gaara tilted his head off to one side.

"If you're thinking that way, then you're really no less of a 'freak' than I am." he shot back. Before the woman could say anything more, Gaara clamped his hand shut. She didn't even have the time to scream. Her body was crushed to pulp within a single second. She died instantly. As she was crushed, a hushed spray of blood flew in all directions, staining Gaara's face with specks of red. Licking his lips sadistically, Gaara smirked to himself.

'I think I saw a wedding ring on her left hand. How tragic.' he thought to himself with a slight chuckle. Before he could delve anymore into the primal feeling coursing through him, a shifting sound behind him caught Gaara's attention. Turning on his heel, the redhead was met by a pleasant surprise.

'My night just keeps getting better.'


Naruto felt his blood freeze in his veins at the sight before him. A week had passed since the conclusion of the preliminary round, and dinner at the Nara household had run late. He had been on his way back home. Along the way, he had heard the sounds of a commotion of sorts. While he normally would have minded his own business, as he was wont to do as a result of experience, his gut had told him to pursue what he was hearing. He had made a beeline with his ears as his guide.

The closer he had drawn, the more another of his five senses had become prominent in his tracking. His scent of smell. By the time he was within fifty feet of the alleyway in front of which he now stood, he had been able to smell the distinct odor of blood. While the smell had made him hesitate, he had forced himself to push through it. He was now coming to regret that decision. Standing in the alleyway, covered in blood that glistened in the moonlight, was Gaara. He had turned to face the blonde immediately upon Naruto's entry onto the scene.

"Imagine meeting you here." the Suna boy greeted him politely, an unsettling smile on his face. Naruto's eyes were having difficulty focusing on any one thing in the picture in front of him. Gaara himself was far from a pleasant sight, but the cocoon of blood-soaked sand dangling behind him was no better as an option. Eventually, he settled on the redhead.

"Why?" he growled as an opener. Gaara's eyes drifted back over to the mass of sand behind him, which quickly unraveled. As it did so, a mangled, unnaturally pale corpse flopped to the ground. It appeared to be a woman, but her age and features were completely distorted by the maiming she had endured before and during her death.

"I could give you any number of reasons, but it wouldn't make much of a difference to you, would it?" he replied calmly. The Jinchuuriki's hands curled into fists. He was far from composed. His instincts were screaming at him to run away. He was in severe jeopardy, and his body seemed to know it. Gaara radiated danger. Every inch of him was threatening.

"It wouldn't." he finally said, confirming the redhead's prior inquiry. Gaara wiped a few specks of blood from his forehead, testing them on his tongue with his index finger. Whether he was doing it for effect or not was up in the air, but the action was far from forced. It almost looked habitual.

"See, that's how it always is. Pointless questions, pointless answers. Though, fear does tend to dumb people down a bit." he mused. Naruto took a shaky step forward.

"Who said I was scared of you?" he countered, an unfortunate break in his voice right at the end. Gaara smirked and gestured to his entire body.

"Your racing heart, your breathing. All of you, really." he said with a shrug. The blonde clenched his jaw. Gaara felt entirely unthreatened by his presence. His demeanor hadn't shifted even a touch. Opting to take another route, Naruto forced himself to relax for the sake of faux confidence.

"You're not gonna be so calm when you get arrested for this." he said threateningly. Gaara laughed out loud at his feeble attempt at menace.

"And who's going to report me? You? Even if you did, do you really think they'd give you the time of day? You of all people?" he asked through his laughter. The blonde immediately prickled.

"Why the hell wouldn't they?" he snapped back. The redhead gave him a humorous look and retracted his sand from behind his back, allowing it to float around him like a bloody rain cloud.

"I don't know much about you, but if I had to guess, you aren't on the best of terms with the rest of this village." he began. Naruto's stomach dropped. Sensing his discomfort like the shark he was, the Suna boy did not hesitate in continuing.

"If you reported a murder, I'm guessing that you'd be the first name on their list of suspects, alibi or not. I think you know it, too." he said. The blonde attempted to counter, but found himself tongue-tied by Gaara's accuracy. The redhead said no more. He simply stared at Naruto. He was eating up his unease like a starving wolf.

"How would you know a damn thing about me?" the blonde demanded. Gaara's expression remained unchanged, one of calm amusement.

"I'm just speaking from experience." he said vaguely. Naruto swallowed nervously. There were multiple ways to interpret his words, but his gut told him that the explanation required him to look inward. When he did so, he came to a single dark conclusion.

"You're…" he began, his voice failing him as the realization hit him in the back of the head. Gaara's eyes then shifted. His blue irises took on a golden shade, with pupils in the shape of diamonds appearing in their center.

"A container. Just like you, Naruto." he said, finishing the blonde's through for him. Though the topic had been a touchy one for Naruto since the day he had learned of his status, he had still done a bit of research in his free time. At one time, there could be a maximum of nine Jinchuuriki, corresponding with the number of tailed beasts contained. The odds of two of them encountering one another at random were slim to none. And yet, there they stood, a statistical anomaly.

"Shocking, isn't it? I had the same reaction. I could feel you from across the desert when we first set out for Konoha. I've been holding my breath this entire time, just waiting for the right moment to put you in the ground." Gaara said, filling the space Naruto had left with his dumbfounded silence. The blonde struggled mightily to maintain eye contact.

"What do you even have against me, anyway?" he asked. His fellow Jinchuuriki stepped forward a few feet, causing Naruto to tense.

"When one apex predator finds another, it's only natural to be competitive, don't you think?" he reasoned. The blonde scowled at his words.

"I'm nothing like you." he said defiantly. The redhead walked closer still, his cold gaze firmly fixed on Naruto. There was something missing behind Gaara's eyes. A light that existed in even the most abrasive of people.

"Well, we're certainly a bit different, but you're closer to my wavelength than you'd ever admit to yourself." he said. Gaara then stopped advancing, standing right at the edge of Naruto's personal space. The blonde could hear his sand buzzing slightly, as though it were anxiously shaking with anticipation.

"Right now, you're feeling a single emotion. Fear." he said, a few grains of his sand grazing across Naruto's face and making him flinch.

"Not anger, not regret for the fact that you couldn't make it in time. What's on your mind is what I might do to you. What I might do to Satsuki. This woman means nothing to you." Gaara said, his golden eyes boring into the blonde's soul. He was absolutely oozing bloodlust, and Naruto was totally paralyzed. He could do little more than breath.

Gaara's sand then retreated back into the gourd on his back, leaving the air where it had once been smelling of stale iron. He stepped around Naruto, beginning to exit the alleyway. Before he could leave fully, Naruto found the strength to speak.

"How many people?" he asked rigidly. Gaara stopped walking, his back still turned to Naruto, who himself still faced the grotesque corpse the redhead had left in his wake.

"For your sake, I'll keep that to myself." he said simply before walking away. As his footsteps echoed into the night, growing fainter with each one, Naruto snapped out of his dread-induced trance. Free of the crippling numbness Gaara had elicited, the true horror of the scene of the crime crashed into him like a tidal wave. The smell, the blood, the crow now picking at her dead flesh, it was simply too much.

Covering his mouth, Naruto sprinted away from the alley, eventually dropping to his knees in the town square and vomiting on the asphalt. Practically hyperventilating, the Jinchuuriki took several moments to control his breathing. Once he was calm enough to think clearly, Naruto shakily stood up and stepped over the puddle of his own wretch. Acting largely on autopilot, he began walking home. He was overloaded, and being out in the open was only increasing his instability.

Along the path back to his apartment complex, Naruto's mind was a clouded haze of muddled negative feelings. Disgust, fear, shame, horror, it was all deeply ingrained into him now.

Even after he had made it all the way to his bed and locked his doors, Naruto couldn't find even a moment of sleep that night.


Satsuki suppressed a yawn as she made her way up a set of stairs. It was Sunday, half-past six in the evening. Her day had been rather relaxing, as it was the one day of the week on which she was permitted to rest. Even during the three days designated to Naruto for training with Kakashi, she was expected to do her own drilling. Despite not knowing exactly how he went about it, Satsuki was fairly sure her teacher was watching her on those days, making sure she did as she was supposed to. As such, she lacked the energy to do much of anything.

Beyond that, she had been without company most of the day. Shikamaru's father, Shikaku, had spirited his son away to the woods for their own brand of training, which left the Nara inaccessible. Naruto had not shown his face all day, despite having seemed in good spirits the night before at the dinner she and the blonde had attended with the Nara family. At present, the Uchiha girl was taking it upon herself to solve the mystery of his absence. Naruto was many things, but a recluse was not one of them.

Stepping out onto the second floor of the blonde's apartment complex, Satsuki glanced down the hallway. She was in search of door 236, as it was the label of her teammate's residence. It took her little time to find it, as it was only the fourth door down on the right side. Stepping up to it, the Uchiha girl rapped her knuckles on the wood several times. When no response came, she tried again. More silence.

"I know you're in there, dead-last." Satsuki called, not bothering to keep her voice down for the other tenants. Though she did not hear Naruto's voice in response, she did hear a shift within the apartment. A few moments later, the handle turned, which was then followed by the door opening. Standing beyond it was, predictably, Naruto. His appearance was concerning, to say the least.

His hair was disheveled and messy, there were circles under his eyes, and he appeared to be wearing exactly what he had been at the Nara household the previous night. Alongside how scruffy he looked, his reaction to her was odd as well. He simply said nothing. At his silence, Satsuki snapped her fingers in front of his face.

"Anybody home?" she joked. Naruto blinked and pulled his head back an inch. He then looked at her directly and rubbed his eyes.

"Sorry, I'm kinda out of it right now." he muttered. The Uchiha girl looked him up and down. He appeared steady enough, so sickness was out of the question, but he was certainly off kilter.

"Have you even showered since last night? You smell like sweat and ramen." she asked. Naruto shook his head tiredly and sighed.

"My night got pretty rough after I left Shikamaru's place. It's kinda bled into today." he admitted. Satsuki took a preliminary step into his apartment and leaned against his doorframe.

"Well, you're gonna have to be up early tomorrow. Your three days start at six tomorrow morning. You should at least try to pull yourself together." she said. The Jinchuuriki gave a slight nod and walked back into his home without bothering to close the door. He then flopped down on his couch. Now bordering on genuine concern, Satsuki stepped all the way inside his apartment and shut the door behind her.

Kicking off her sandals, as she sensed that she was in for something of a long conversation, the raven-haired girl made her way over to his kitchen and retrieved a chair from his table. She then brought it into his living room and set it down across from the couch. Sitting herself down, Satsuki folded her right leg over her left.

"What happened after you left the Nara's? You were fine when dinner ended." she asked. Naruto, who was lying on his side, slowly sat up straight. Once he was upright, he took a moment. He was clearly exhausted, and it was dulling his receptiveness.

"I ran into Gaara." he finally said. Satsuki internally winced. She herself had not spent any meaningful time in the presence of the boy from Suna, but everything about him was off putting. His presence alone was unsettling.

"Did he beat you up, or what?" the Uchiha girl pressed. Naruto tensed at the question. It had mostly been meant as a rhetorical lead, as the Jinchuuriki had no visible injuries or abrasions, but it seemed that recalling the events of the prior night was far from easy.

"You…really don't wanna know what happened. Trust me." he said quietly. Satsuki's expression morphed into one of puzzlement. Naruto was far from easily shaken. Both his past and present had toughened him. He was also smart enough to know that Satsuki herself was a long way from being weak-stomached.

"What did you see? Talk to me, Naruto." she urged him a tad more gently. The Jinchuuriki pursed his lips and drummed his fingers on his thigh pensively.

"I…walked in on him killing somebody. He crushed a woman to death with his sand." he revealed. Satsuki's eyes widened. If all were as it seemed, Gaara's natural aura of menace was far from artificial. It was a reflection of his inner self.

"Did you report it?" she asked. Mere seconds after posing the question, she put up a hand to silence any depressing response the Jinchuuriki had been preparing to give.

"Stupid question. Did you manage to get a reason out of him?" she reiterated. Naruto shook his head and lowered his eyes to the floor.

"He didn't say it outright, but he made it pretty clear that he killed her for the hell of it." he said. Satsuki ran through several mental routines to keep herself even and calm. One of them needed to be, and Naruto was well beyond that capability.

"Did he try to hurt you?" she asked. The blonde shook his head again, leaning back against the couch cushion.

"No, but he…told me something. Something I don't think he was lying about." he said vaguely. Satsuki motioned for him to continue, patiently allowing him to gather his thoughts.

"He told me that he was a Jinchuuriki. A demon's container, just like me." he said. At the revelation, Satsuki fought back a shudder threatening to ripple through her. She thought nothing less of Naruto for his status, and she assumed he knew as much, but reacting negatively to the concept itself risked changing his perception.

"And you're sure he wasn't screwing with you?" she asked. Naruto met her eyes and shifted in his seat.

"I felt his chakra. I'm not even a sensor type, and I could pick him up without having to think about it. It wasn't human. I know what that sort of power feels like." he said firmly. Satsuki unfolded her legs and set her right foot back on the floor.

"How strong was he?" she inquired. Both for her sake and possibly Naruto's, having some sort of reference for Gaara's level of approximate strength was useful. Naruto shuddered, with his frame shaking ever so slightly as he recalled the night prior.

"I couldn't tell for sure, but it was enough for him to freeze me up just by looking at me. He was still suppressed, too." the blonde said. Satsuki nodded. It wasn't exactly specific, but it suggested a number of things. Namely, that Gaara was likely a good deal more powerful than either of them at a baseline. It was a concerning truth to grapple with, but Satsuki quickly shelved the thought.

"He really put a scare in you, didn't he?" she asked softly. Naruto nodded reluctantly. Of the many emotions visible in his face and body language, one of the most prominent was frustration. He clearly despised having been overwhelmed without a fight. Alongside his bruised pride was an obvious degree of residual fear. He was a mess.

"Well, I'm gonna beat him senseless, so don't worry too much. I'll take care of it for you." she said with more confidence than she truly had. Her teammate took his time responding, fidgeting with his hands absently. Eventually, he gave her a forced smile.

"At least soften him up enough for me to finish off." he said in an attempt at his usual humor. Satsuki rolled her eyes and smirked. Thin and hollow as it was, Naruto was putting forth an honest effort to be himself.

"I don't lose much. Just to Sannin, or when I'm saving your ass." she said. Naruto yawned and ran a hand through his own messy hair.

"I made it even in the forest when I killed that big snake, actually." he corrected, a spark of his usual habits peaking through. His face then took on a look of surprised intrigue as he appeared to notice something.

"Earrings? Never thought of you as the jewelry type." he said skeptically. Satsuki's face heated up slightly. Indeed, she had tried on a pair of earrings she had bought many months ago that day. They were small, with a tiny, simple ornament hanging down from each of her earlobes.

"I'm allowed to try stuff sometimes." she shot back, suddenly feeling rather self-conscious. Naruto shrugged his shoulders and stood up from the couch to stretch.

"Wear 'em more. They look nice." he commented. He then trudged off toward his bedroom. Staring at his back as he walked away, Satsuki clasped her hands tightly together in her lap as her legs drew inward.

'Keep talking to me like that. You'll like where it gets you.' she silently projected to the Jinchuuriki. Doing a double-take at her own thoughts, Satsuki shook her head rapidly and slapped her cheeks lightly.

"No. Bad." she muttered to herself. She then rose and followed after her teammate. He had shut himself in his room. Not bothering to knock, Satsuki cracked the door open and peeked inside. The blonde had retreated under his covers and shut off the lights.

"Going to bed?" she asked. Naruto rolled over on the mattress to face her, giving a tired nod in response. Sleep deprivation had finally caught up with him, it seemed.

"Yeah, like you said, I don't get to sleep in tomorrow. I'm just gonna make up for lost time, I guess." he replied. The Uchiha girl gazed at him silently for a time.

"If you're worried about me getting hurt, don't be. I'll be just fine." she assured him. Naruto rolled back over in bed.

"I worry about everybody. Besides, I just have a bad feeling about him. I think he's dangerous." he said. Satsuki sighed and brushed back a strand of her hair.

"Even if he is, we'll be ready. Don't let him freak you out. That's what he wants." she said. The Jinchuuriki shrunk down into his sheets.

"I'll do my best." he said. Sensing that the conversation was drawing to its end, and that her cue to leave had been issued , Satsuki stepped back and began to close his bedroom door.

"Goodnight, Naruto." she said quietly, fully latching the door a moment later. Choosing not to linger any longer out of respect for his privacy, Satsuki quickly left his apartment. Once she was out in the hallway again, her expression hardened.

'I'll put him in a coma before he gets to him.'


A/N: Extremely M-rated chapter, both for gore, and for some of the subject matter in general. I tried to add in something sorta cute by the end, but even that was mostly just damage-control haha.

(Also, yes, you read it correctly. In this universe, Gaara is basically a serial killer)

Either way, this fic is about to surpass House of Glass, Jack's most popular and legacy-defining story in terms of reviews, and it's on its way with favorites and follows.

That's wild to me. Thank you all for the support since I picked this up. It's really meant a lot to me.

Leave me a review if you can :)

I love you all

Read and Review!