Back in Suna, Sakura leaned over Taiyo's cot, reaching for the roll of bandages on the other side. Wordlessly, he picked it up and handed it to her, avoiding her gaze. The journey back to Suna had been relatively uneventful, everyone's heart a little too heavy to speak after witnessing the cave in.
Taiyo had initially declined anyone's help or offer of food, medicine, or proper desert garb. But by the time they had arrived at Suna, the poor, pale man was so sunburnt that he resembled a lobster more than a human.
Unable to avoid it now, he had allowed Sakura to heal him, expressing obvious relief when her chakra flooded into his system, easing and soothing the burns on his skin.
Gaara stood beside Taiyo's cot on the opposite side of Sakura, watching as she wrapped bandages around the worst burns on his arms. He frowned disapprovingly, tapping his toe impatiently.
"Are you feeling better now, Taiyo-san?" Sakura asked and she unraveled the bandages.
Taiyo merely shrugged in response. He had hardly spoken at all since they had retrieved him from the catacombs. It was understandable that he would be upset after having his home cave in and everyone he knows die. But something about his behavior was off-putting.
"Are you ready to talk about what happened yet?" Gaara asked him
Taiyo glared up at the young Kazekage. "What is there to talk about?"
"You know more about that mysterious chakra than you let on," Gaara accused. "We've done you a service by allowing you to stay here, so I expect you to be accommodating in return."
Taiyo's scowled deepened. "You are the reason my home has been destroyed," he said through clenched teeth. "You two," he said, passing a glare to Sakura before looking back to Gaara, "have wreaked havoc, killing our Goddess, poking around in business that isn't yours. I owe you nothing."
Gaara's face darkened, his eyes becoming slit like as he glared at Taiyo. Sakura could see flecks of sand hovering around the opening of his gourd – a telltale sign that he was displeased. Even the most inexperienced civilian would have been able to feel the pure anger that radiated off the Kazekage.
"The cave in was not our doing, Taiyo," Gaara said calmly.
"You don't know that," Taiyo retorted.
Sakura looked to Gaara's face to see his reaction to that. It was true – they didn't know the cause of the cave in.
"Regardless," Gaara said, "our intentions were to help you like we promised to. Even if there had been no cave in, your people would not have survived without our help. It's a miracle they survived as long as they did anyway."
"I refuse to help you arrogant Fireheads," Taiyo replied.
Sakura, seeing that this was going south quickly, decided to change up tactics.
"Taiyo-sama," she said, her tone as appeasing as she could make it, "We never meant you any harm. We cannot apologize enough for the suffering you've had to go through. You certainly didn't deserve any of it. The only reason Gaara-sama wants this information so badly is because it could help him protect his own people. Surely you can understand that, right?"
Too afraid to glance over at Gaara to see what he thought of her little speech, Sakura kept her eyes focused on Taiyo's.
She was surprised to see Taiyo's expression soften somewhat. "Sarabi-chan likes you," he said to her. "You're a lot like her in some ways." Sakura smiled at that, because that seemed like something Taiyo would appreciate. "But I still don't trust you. Either of you."
Sakura didn't know how to answer that. She understood why he would be hesitant to trust her, but she had hoped for Sarabi's sake that he would at least be willing to answer a few of their questions. She looked to Gaara to see what he wanted to do next.
Gaara seemed to accept that he wouldn't be getting any useful information from Taiyo today. "Fine," he said, his expression cold and very similar to the one she had first seen on him before the chuunin exams. "Perhaps Sarabi will know something useful."
"Leave Sarabi out of this," Taiyo said fiercely. "She's just a girl."
"Hey, now," Sakura said sassily, "Gaara-sama and I are the same age as Sarabi. She's not an idiot."
"You and I both know Sarabi is more than just a girl," Gaara said, crossing his arms over his broad chest. "The monolith's chakra was inside her. She used it. It helped her manipulate sand the way that I do."
Taiyo pressed his lips together. Sakura could see his jaw clenched tightly and a purple vein on his forehead throbbing. "Stay away from Sarabi," he warned.
"Come on, Sakura," Gaara said, glancing sideways at her. "Let's go find Sarabi."
Sakura nodded obediently, but she didn't feel like Gaara' behavior was conducive to getting what they wanted from Taiyo. Sakura liked to think she knew a thing or two about men like Taiyo, and men like Taiyo often had extreme pride. She was well aware that stroking his ego would likely be a much better way to get what they wanted, but Gaara was also one of those prideful men so she couldn't just explain that to him.
So instead, she followed him out into the hallway.
"Wait a second!" Taiyo called after them, wincing as he tried to stand up, stretching the sensitive skin across his back that was still healing.
"You stay here, Taiyo-sama," Sakura said, turning back to smile at him again. "I will come back to check on your burns later today."
Taiyo scowled, but sank back down into his cot, unable to do much else. Sakura quickly followed Gaara out into the hall, watching as he slammed the door behind them. To their left stood a jonin at attention. He bowed low to Gaara.
"Make sure he doesn't leave this room," Gaara said to the jonin. "I want him under constant surveillance."
The jonin nodded curtly and Gaara began to leave, his stride purposeful as he made his way back toward his office.
"Are you sure that's a good idea, Gaara-sama?" she asked, rushing to catch up with him. "He already distrusts us."
"And I distrust him," Gaara said coolly. "Until I can get to the bottom of this, I have to treat him like a threat."
"I don't think that's the best way to get what you want from him," she argued.
Gaara stopped. Sakura stopped beside him. "Then what do you suggest, Sakura?"
"Well you could start by not being so grumpy," she huffed. "You catch more flies with honey than vinegar."
"Honey," he echoed. "Well, you're sweet like honey, so maybe you should be the one to question him."
"That's an excellent idea, Kazekage-sama," she said agreeably.
"I was being sarcastic."
She shoved him roughly, causing him to stumble. He allowed it – laughed, even, as he righted himself. "I don't know why you're so mean to me, Kazekage-sama," she said.
"Stop calling me that," he said, giving her a stern glare. "You can question him if you want to. I want to be present, though."
"He won't like that," she argued. "Maybe you should eavesdrop from an undisclosed location."
Gaara grunted in agreement.
Sakura spent the rest of the afternoon holed up in one of Gaara's private studies with Shikamaru and Temari. She watched as the two pored over a collection of scrolls and files, wishing there was something more she could do to help.
Instead, she drummed her fingers idly on the wooden railing of the balcony, gazing at the sandy streets below. Shikamaru had made large strides in decoding the message from the first monolith. With Temari's help, he had been able to put together small pieces of the history of the sand beast, though the fragments were somewhat difficult to understand.
Sakura paid close attention while Shikamaru had explained it to her, but she still felt a little confused about the whole thing. The mysterious chakra belonged to the sand beast, who appeared to be more sentient than they had previously believed. The beast was able to manipulate its chakra, sending it outside of its own body and into the monoliths.
"I suspect the monoliths were built by the same people who built the catacombs," Shikamaru postulated. "This monolith seems to be some sort of homage to the beast, a sign of respect and worship."
That was certainly believable, Sakura thought. Even Taiyo and Sarabi, who knew relatively little about the beast and its chakra, seemed to show reverence toward the sand beast that had so nearly killed them.
The only problem now was that no one had any clue how the chakra could still exist when the beast was definitely dead. How had Sarabi been able to use it? And how had Gaara's powers been stripped from him like that? Gaara was right to be concerned about such a thing.
But unfortunately, now they were at a dead end. So while Gaara was off somewhere trying to pull what information he could from Sarabi, Sakura stayed with Shikamaru and Temari, waiting for her opportunity to get more information from Taiyo. It was unfair, really. Sakura was finished with her portion of the mission, and though she felt somewhat invested in the whole situation, she still wished she were back at home in Konoha with Naruto and Ino.
Although, she thought, the interesting turn of events with Gaara was a welcome distraction from her homesickness. Never had she imagined that she would actually kiss Gaara on this little excursion. Granted, there had been some extenuating circumstances. Even though she felt it was probably a bad idea to have done it, she couldn't bring herself to regret it. How could she have possibly picked a better person to give her first kiss to?
She might have felt a little guilty for thinking a kiss from him was a trophy she won if it wasn't the case that Gaara seemed to take the whole thing in stride.
She shook those thoughts from her head, wishing she could make sense of everything that was happening. There was just too much to be confused about right now and all Sakura really wanted was a nice quiet nap. Or a walk. Or a bath. Or anything other than being stuck in the study with Temari and Shikamaru while they awkwardly avoided making googly eyes at one another.
She glanced back at the desk behind her where Temari and Shikamaru both had their heads buried beneath a mountain of scrolls. Not wanting to waste the opportunity, Sakura slipped through the sliding door and out onto the balcony. She wasn't helping anyway – they wouldn't even notice she was gone.
A gentle, warm breeze fanned across her face and Sakura inhaled deeply, taking in the desert's scent, the food stalls down below that were now preparing for the dinner rush.
Sakura leapt deftly down off of the balcony and onto the road below, following her nose to the market stalls. With only a few days left in Suna (hopefully), Sakura figured she'd enjoy as much of the desert's cuisine as she could while she was still here.
She found a ramen stall, and though her preference would have been something more culturally unique to Suna, she found a sudden nostalgia for her teammate's favorite food and copped a squat on the nearest stool and ordered the largest bowl of ramen on the menu.
She chowed down in silence, listening and observing the people on the street around her. Other than the beigeness of it all, Suna's street was so remarkably similar to Konoha's that Sakura felt right at home amongst the Suna citizens. She smiled as she chewed her food, her spirits a little higher as she watched a little boy struggle to keep his mother's pace as she flitted through he market stalls.
Out of the corner of her eye she caught a familiar face and turned to look. Across the street from her, watching from the balcony of a nearby building was Hideki. His eyes were set purposefully on her, but there was amusement quirking up the corners of his lips. She jerked her head toward the stool next to hers, her eyes glittering. She had forgotten all about the Kazekage's protective order over her.
At first, Hideki seemed determined to stay on the balcony. He gave her a quick shake of his head, gazing off over the village's wall to the desert beyond. But after another moment, another minute of staring at one another, he relented and leapt down from the balcony to join her in the ramen stand.
"If watching me is as boring as being me, then I imagine you've had quite a dry afternoon, Hideki-san," she said as a more appropriately sized bowl of ramen was placed in front of him.
"You've been very agreeable today so far, Sakura-san," he said sternly, though there seemed to be less hostility than usual in his demeanor. "I'm having such a lovely day. Please don't ruin it."
"For your sake I'll try to stay out of trouble," she said with a chuckle.
They sat in companionable silence while they ate, an easy coexistence if friendship was too strong a term. She knew the poor shinobi was only doing his job – he never intended to get in her way.
"I'm sorry I haven't spoken to Gaara-sama yet about your orders," she said to him. "I had almost forgotten. I'll talk to him the next time I see him."
Hideki gave her a disapproving look. "Don't waste your breath, Sakura-san," he said. "It is clear he will not change his mind."
Sakura raised a curious brow. "Oh?" she challenged. "What makes you think I can't change his mind?"
Hideki rolled his eyes. "Even if it weren't painfully obvious that there is something going on between you two, I saw him kiss you earlier today," he answered. "Temari-san already suspects it, so it's pointless to try to hide it – if you were even trying to. Like I said, I saw him kiss you."
"Oh, that?" Sakura asked, waving her hand dismissively. "Just a brotherly peck."
"What a coincidence that the only foreign shinobi ever be assigned a guard also happens to be the only person Gaara-sama gives 'brotherly pecks' to," Hideki said dryly.
"To be fair, there has been only one brotherly peck," she argued. She really should have known that Hideki would have seen them. Gaara should have known, too, yet he had been the one to kiss her. So really it was all his fault and she would have to remember to tell him that next time she saw him.
"I don't need to know all the sordid details, Sakura-san."
"There aren't any sordid details, Hideki-san," she retorted. "I know it might be hard for you to believe, but there really isn't anything going on between me and Gaara."
Hideki paused, holding his chopsticks a few inches from his mouth to give her an incredulous look.
"I mean Gaara-sama," she amended quickly.
"If that were true," he said through his mouthful of ramen, "then he wouldn't have assigned me to protect you and he wouldn't have kissed you. But you don't have to worry, Sakura-san, your secret is safe with me. After all, it was Gaara-sama who gave me this mission and I would never betray his trust."
Sakura narrowed her eyes, not quite sure she trusted him herself yet. "So you're not going to tell Temari-san?"
Hideki laughed. "Only if I had a death wish."
Sakura smiled at that and leaned forward, resting on her elbows. At least there was some comfort in knowing that Hideki wasn't going to spill her secret to Gaara's sister.
A commotion in the street behind them made both of them turn their heads to look. They found Gaara and Sarabi ambling along the street, each bearing a warm grin as they greeted the civilians who approached. Sakura smiled as she watched him shake hands and exchange pleasantries with his people. He seemed so natural, so in his element that Sakura would hardly have believed the man had been a social outcast at any point in his life.
She caught his gaze through the crowd, holding it for a minute as her smile widened. It truly did feel nice to see him so happy and so at home. He smiled back and placed a hand on Sarabi's back, pointing her in Sakura's direction. Sarabi looked over to wear Sakura and Hideki were sitting and smiled.
"I shouldn't be here with you," Hideki said, watching as Gaara and Sarabi approached the ramen stand. "I'm supposed to be watching you from a careful, unnoticed distance."
"Unnoticed?" Sakura nearly shrieked. "That's ridiculous – I'm a shinobi. Does he think I won't notice if I'm being tailed? Anyway, he's already seen you, so just stay put."
Hideki grumbled something under his breath, but Sakura pretended not to hear, rising from her stool to greet Sarabi as she approached.
"Sarabi," she said, giving the young girl an encouraging smile. "How are you feeling? Are you hungry?"
Sarabi smiled, though Sakura could see that it didn't reach her eyes. Naturally she should be sunken deep into depression by now, but through some miraculous twist of fate, she seemed to be coping with her loss quite well.
"I'm feeling great, Sakura," she answered brightly. "Gaara-sama took me out to the desert and showed me all the cool things I can do with the sand."
Sakura blinked in surprise, letting her gaze drift over to said Kazekage. Gaara merely shrugged in response to her raised brow and took a seat on the other side of Hideki and ordered a bowl of ramen for himself.
"That's great, Sarabi," Sakura said. She certainly had some questions now, but they could wait until they were no longer in public. Besides, it was nice to enjoy a hot meal with the friends she had made while she was here. There was no need to ruin it with depressing shinobi talk.
Sarabi took the seat beside Sakura and began to eye Sakura's half eaten bowl. With an amused grin, Sakura slid the bowl along the counter until it was in front of Sarabi. "Eat up," she said. "The only other place you can get ramen as good as this is in Konoha."
"That's debatable," Gaara said dryly.
Sakura sent him a wry glare of Hideki's lap. "Oh, come on now, Gaara-sama," she said. "You and I both know that Konoha has better cuisine, better views, and just all around better shinobi."
Hideki and Gaara both frowned, but Sakura heard Sarabi giggle behind her.
"I'll concede on the views," Gaara said, "but you're dead wrong about the other two."
"Well, Gaara-sama, I think I'll have to argue with you there," Hideki said, prompting a raised brow from the Kazekage. "The view from the highest guard tower is pretty spectacular."
Sakura shook her head because there was no way a view of the desert could be half as good as a view of the forest or anything else in Konoha.
"Really?" Sarabi asked, leaning over the counter to get a better look at Hideki. "What's it like up there?"
Hideki smiled and looked off toward the guard tower in question. "It's amazing," he began. "You can see the entirety of the desert on one side, like a big sandy ocean. The dunes look so mesmerizing from so high up. And on the other side, you can see the whole village, all the people, the colorful tents of the market stalls. It's truly a magnificent sight."
"I should like to see that," Sarabi replied. Hideki glanced over at her and Sakura was amused to see a faint blush on his cheeks.
"Oh, Hideki-san, why don't you take Sarabi up there and show her?" Sakura suggested, unable to contain the playful glint in her eye.
"Oh I would love that!" Sarabi exclaimed. "You don't mind, do you, Hideki-san?"
"Well, I…"
Hideki glanced over at Gaara because both he and Sakura knew that he should be well hidden and watching after Sakura instead of enjoying a meal with her or taking Sarabi up to the guard tower. Gaara, however, had his eyes focused on Sakura, staring at her with murderously narrowed eyes.
"I'm not sure that's a good idea," Hideki said when he saw the look on Gaara's face.
"Oh," Sarabi said, her face falling dramatically. "Well, that's okay. I understand."
"Come on, Hideki-san," Sakura urged, trying her best to keep the grin off her face. "Sarabi really wants to see it. And you're not doing anything important right now, are you? What's the harm in taking her to the guard tower?"
It was now Hideki's turn to narrow his eyes, his lips pulled into a frown as he glared at Sakura. She could see the retort already poised on his tongue, but Gaara saved him before he could speak.
"It's okay, Hideki," Gaara said. "You may take her to the guard tower if you wish. And you may take the rest of the night off."
Hideki looked surprised, but he immediately stood up and bowed low to the Kazekage. "Thank you, Kazekage-sama," he said, his voice filled with reverence and gratefulness. He stood and turned to Sakura, fixing her with a mildly disapproving look before he turned to Sarabi and extended his hand. Sarabi leapt up and latched onto his hand, eager to see the guard tower.
Sakura watched them walk away, feeling a little bit like a matchmaker and a little bit like she had managed to pull one over on the esteemed Kazekage.
"He told you about his orders," Gaara said tersely once the two of them were out of earshot.
"Not quite," Sakura said. "It was Temari who told me."
"Why must you be so difficult?"
"I'm difficult?" she demanded. "Why should you assign a fulltime guard to a kunoichi? You think I can't handle myself?"
"It's for my own peace of mind, Sakura," he said with a voice that was far too weary. "I'd like to send you back to Konoha in one piece."
"What about Shikamaru?" she continued. "Why doesn't he get a guard?"
"Shikamaru hasn't shown the same propensity for trouble that you have," he answered. "Besides, what kind of trouble could he get into behind a desk and some scrolls?"
"He could be fucking your sister right now for all you know," she retorted.
"Fair point, I'll have a guard instated for him tomorrow morning," he replied.
Sakura giggled, feeling a little bit like she had just won, even though she knew she didn't. "Did you get any answers from Sarabi?" she asked, changing the subject before she started to argue with him for real about Hideki guarding her.
"Sort of," he answered. "This is pure speculation, but from what she described to me, it seems a lot like she's possessed by that sand beast in the same way Naruto and I were jinchuurikis."
"What do you mean?"
"The beast's chakra is separate from her own," Gaara answered. "She has her own unique signature, but the one that we felt before was the beast, the mysterious chakra. And after discussing it with her, it seemed that in the time I was unable to manipulate sand, Sarabi has no memory. Something was happening to her while we were trapped and she can't remember what it was."
"Do you think Taiyo knows more about it?" she asked.
Gaara nodded. "I believe he does," he said. "Tomorrow I want you to help me find out what he knows."
"Of course, Gaara-sama."
He gave her a look – one she couldn't read. His eyes flitted to the opposite side of the counter where the cook stood, idly adding ingredients to the pot on the stove. He probably wasn't paying any attention to them, but they had no way of knowing.
"Uhh, Gaara-sama?" Sakura began. "You know that thing Temari-san was concerned about before?"
Gaara furrowed his brow, but after a moment her nodded.
"Well I think Hideki-san is worried about that, too," she said. "He saw something at Turtle Rock that made him… concerned."
"I see," Gaara said pragmatically.
"You don't seem surprised."
Gaara shook his head. "Not now, Sakura."
She frowned, giving him her most petulant look. For a brief moment he seemed almost amused, but the stony way he clenched his jaw told her he was anything but amused.
Sakura opened her mouth to speak again, to argue or plead her case or really just keep the topic of conversation going. She wasn't going to let him weasel out of an explanation.
But before she could say anything else, he took his lower lip between his teeth and sighed. Sakura blinked, surprised to see such an expression on the usually stoic man's face.
"Come on," he said, jerking his head toward the palace. "We can continue this conversation in my office."
AN: I am so sorry this chapter is late! I was so busy yesterday I just completely forgot to upload it. But I'll upload next week's chapter a day early to make up for it.
And on an unrelated note, as you may have noticed in this chapter, the plot and central conflict are both very Suna-centric, so it's difficult to write about it from Sakura's perspective. This is one of the reasons I decided to write the sequel from Gaara's perspective. But now that I'm thinking about it, if I end the story at chapter 22 like I had planned, this story will leave too much unresolved. Instead, I'm going to just continue this story as if it were one, so that's why the number of chapters has changed. Just note that at chapter 22, there will be a time jump and a perspective shift. Hopefully you guys will like that better. I think I'm a little more confident writing a male protagonist.
PS, I really hate FF, but I post the same chapters on Ao3 where posting this chapter worked perfectly the first time, so read over there if you can.
