I realized that when i write, I write series and not stories XD I hope i can eventually bring these tales to endings. I'm bad with endings XD R.E.R!
"Have you ever made a castle?" She asked brightly over to a boy. He shook his head watching as she sat in the sand. After a while she looked back to him pulling him to the ground beside her and moving in front of him.
"Push the sand and pour some water, then just shape it with your hands and poke the top like this and you get a castle. You can add all sorts of things too!" She said showing him her creation.
He motioned to imitate her pushing the sand together with a bit of water getting a slightly misshapen castle. She giggled.
"It does take some practice though." She said fixing his up.
"You like castles?" He asked her. She nodded face lighting in delight.
"I do! Really pretty ones with flags and lots of rooms and friends to play in it with." She said concentrating on her castle. Her expression faded at the mention of friends.
The boy stood and turned away from her walking into the distance leaving her sitting alone. She frowned returning to her castle sadly. A few moments passed, a hand held out before her and he'd returned. She took it.
"Where are we going?" She asked. They stopped before a massive castle made entirely of sand, decorated with various dessert objects carved neatly into multiple rooms and hallways.
"Your castle." He said. Her eyes watered and she hugged him tightly.
"I hope we stay friends forever….Gaara-kun" She said. Her words echoed over and over.
Her eyes fluttered open. She smiled knowing her dream had been a pleasant one, one she didn't really understand but still cherished regardless. She dressed thinking back on the boy she'd been talking to. She'd said his name, but what was it?
"Sakura!" Her father's call shook her from her thoughts and she rushed to him to begin the day.
Lately her mornings with team seven were becoming increasingly unbearable. Sasuke was serious and handsome as ever while Naruto was goofy and stupid. Yet, when they got thrown together the atmosphere became dark and tense. Their teamwork had been almost non-existent as of late.
Hot tears trailed down her face watching Sasuke's figure become smaller and smaller. He'd just insulted her in less than four words. 'Less than Naruto.' How the hell could she be regarded as even less than Naruto?!
Said boy called her name annoyingly behind her but was distracted by some children that had recently taken a fancy to following him around. She made her way over still sulking.
"…your girlfriend?" She heard the spiky haired boy in the front call. She instantly ended that thought punching Naruto through a wall for attempting to play it off as the truth.
She stormed off angrily when a last comment left the boys mouth crudely poking fun at her attitude then her forehead.
She turned robotically a look on her face that could kill with too much exposure and sprinted at the group.
They immediately took off in the opposite direction. Turning a corner Konohamaru crashed into a talk rather bulky looking man probably a good one or two years older than she and Naruto.
"Konohamaru!" Naruto called out loudly clenching his teeth beside her.
"That hurt brat." The older boy said.
'Shit, it's best if we just apologize!' She thought. "I'm sorry I was chasing him!"
"Oi! You let him go right now!" Naruto barged out and said. Sakura could only slap her forehead.
"Naruto you idiot!" Sakura said moving beside him.
The older man's gaze landed on Naruto and herself. He smiled an eerie and malicious sound.
Naruto instantly charged off to Konohamaru's rescue only to be tossed back on his butt.
He jumped back up tossing useless threats at the older boy. She could feel her patience wearing thin.
"Shut up idiot! Don't provoke him!" She said. She glanced at their headbands while keeping Naruto in a head lock.
'Shinobi from other villages?' She thought taking a glance at the girl behind the older boy. She seemed to not want any trouble warning her companion of such looking around a few times wearily.
"You annoy me. Impertinent tiny little brats." He said again. The situation was escalating quickly even after Sasuke had arrived to save Konohamaru.
"Kankuro. Stop. You are disgracing our village." A voice came from beside Sasuke. They searched for the owner and found a boy they hadn't noticed before.
"Excuse them." He said looking over them.
Sakura's heart nearly stopped. He was pale, with deep forsaken blued eyes that gazed straight threw them. Dark black rings orbited his eyes contrasting heavily with his paled skin. He was terrifying. Yet her heart throbbed painfully in her chest, the urge to run to him, and hugging close almost overwhelming her. Glancing at Sasuke's face, she nearly fainted seeing the faint shock on his face as the boy spoke.
But none of that really mattered at the moment. Her mind was throbbing painfully. Something about this boy was forcing memories she shouldn't have out of her mind. She'd lived in the village her entire life so how could she have known anyone from Suna? Let alone this terrifying man?
His eyes darted slowly to her, their gazes locking for a moment. She knew this feeling, gazing into his eyes, or at least her body did. But how? His head turned to Sasuke before he burst into sand that slithered to the ground and his form returned.
Sakura trembled slightly. The man had eyes deeper, darker, and more unsettling than any cave she'd ever been in. They They began to walk away and Sakura rushed forward slightly.
"Wait! You guys are Shinobi of the Sand right? What are you doing here?" She asked.
Gaara turned and stared straight at her, she couldn't tell if he'd recognized her from whatever strange bond they'd shared. His face was blank almost as though it didn't have the capacity to show emotions.
Somehow as Temari spoke she just barely registered her words as she continued her staring competition with Gaara.
"What's your name?" Sasuke asked jumping from the tree he was in.
He smirked tearing his eyes from Sakura to look back at Sasuke.
"Sabaku no Gaara." He responded. Something was stirring inside her. That name…
"Something's openin' in here!" She heard her inner say.
'Sabaku no Gaara.' She thought feeling the seal throb once more. But it didn't feel right, that wasn't who she knew him as.
"Gaara-kun?" She whispered. Her mind burned and she clutched at it falling behind everyone's animated discussions.
Her eyes squeezed shut as a small red headed boy's face appeared in her mind he smiled kindly at her as they chattered beneath a crescent moon.
The image faded soon after and left her to slump to her knees in relief. When she looked up again Gaara was gone.
Sakura found herself crushed beneath his hand, he'd begun his transformation into shukaku. It could only get worse from there. Sasuke had fallen and only Naruto was left to defend them both.
He fought desperately each time his attacks seeming more and more futile. They would need a miracle. She could feel the sand squeezing tighter.
It did not take long for her to fall unconscious. The sand continued to squeeze, but through every grain, the pains, sorrows and sufferings he'd experienced all alone, she could feel them all, see them all.
"You only need me. You only need to love me." She mumbled. Gaara turned to her hearing the words by chance.
"You? You were nowhere to be loved. You didn't exist any longer." Gaara forced out darkly squeezing her harshly.
"You left me, you lied to me, like everyone does, love is something better spared on yourself. It is not a power source, nor medication. It is a curse, a weakness." He roared out. He broke away from the sand holding her to continue with Naruto. She sunk deep into the ravines of her mind.
She landed before a seal standing beside her inner Sakura.
"What is this place?" She asked
"It's us. It is our mind. This is where I was born. This has been here since I came to be." Inner replied. Sakura approached it pulling at the tight seal. Each tug seemed to send a burning throb through her mind sending images of things she didn't understand, things that had never happened or people she'd never met.
"It hurts!" She mumbled. Inner looked at her outer self moving to the seal and taking firm grasp.
"Nothing that I didn't put here should be here Channaro!" Inner cried pulling at the seal until the paper bearing the seal mark tore releasing a flood of memories into Sakura's mind.
She screamed out clawing at her body as her mind was torn apart. Bits and pieces of memories flashed passed her eyelids of time she'd spent in Suna. It was incomplete as though improperly erased. Her training with her father returned clearly and her timely meeting with her father so many years ago.
She shot up panting from the pain. Naruto watched her, worried expressions on their faces from her screaming. She looked around.
Sasuke was watching her passively from the bed beside the window and Naruto was hovering over her face distorted in concern for her.
The three were in hospital beds and were bandaged and it seemed Naruto was waiting for lunch.
"Wh-Where is Gaara-kun?" Sakura asked voice shaky as her eyes darted about trying to lay eyes on him.
"Gaara? He's gone. We defeated him and he surrendered and returned to his village." Naruto said with a smile. She lowered her head clutching her hands together.
"Oh…" Sasuke watched her not offering anything of his own.
She sat back in her bed thinking back on what she'd seen. She recalled her dream that a while back about castles, he was the child she was speaking to? There was no way.
She remembered a time when she was younger, when these dreams of a boy made of sand often came to play with her, came more frequently and she woke with a start it always ended with her calling out his name reaching for him desperately, sand whipping about madly. Each time she'd sit up and have to wipe the tears away ferociously.
"I have to see him." She whispered.
I need to get better at updating but here you go ma'ams n sirs sorry for the wait hopefully this story still has followers :P