Chapter 1

Katiya (two days later, approximate time: 4:00 PM)

Katiya was taking a shortcut to her hotel from a library a few kilometers away. Walking down a side street, she came across the scene of a ghost town. How strange, she thought, at this time of day, with no sandstorm, it should be crowded with kids and people.

She moved down it warily, a hand on the strap of her knapsack that she carried everywhere. Sand had blown over all footsteps that were there a few days previously, and all of the windows nearby were shuttered, not a single soul in sight. The one window she saw curtained or shuttered or otherwise unblocked, was quickly closed by a elderly woman upon glancing up and to the side and mouthing something rapidly.

What's going on here? Katiya thought.

Katiya followed the gaze of the elderly woman before she closed the curtain of her window. There. It was the boy—the boy from before. The one with the red hair, Gaara. He was gazing rather dejectedly at the street below. But unlike before, there was no sign of violence on him. In appearance, he was just… a pure, young child.

Katiya stood there, considering her options before continuing down the street, thinking it too obvious for her to turn back—and that the little kid couldn't do much so far, and being so young. Katiya knew not to underestimate people based on age, being not a fifteen-year-old despite looking like one. But she did know, from personal experience, sometimes diffusion was safer and a more effective way to get rid of enemies rather than straight up battle.

Oftentimes, she found, being clever and using a decoy for robbers was the best policy. And if that didn't work, being trained as a shinobi certainly helped. I'll be fine, she thought. She walked on, glancing up at the red headed boy as she passed. She made out an expression of—hope? or longing? on his face.

The boy was lonely, she realized with a start. It was an expression she found on her face often back when she was younger. She paused in the street, looking at him. She waved, nervously at first.

He waved back at her, a sad smile on his face. And then she moved on, a small sad smile on her face. She may have changed her clothes to match Suna's more neutral tones, and was dressed in whites and greys, but she was still an outsider. And an outsider that didn't know nor understand the enigma of the red-haired boy named after a "love monster".

Little did she know that small gesture caught the attention of the ANBU tailing her, and to an indirect extent, the Kazekage.

…

After passing out of the deserted street, Katiya found herself in a tea shop a few hours later, wanting a little something to calm her nerves for the second time that week. Who is that boy? she wondered. She took her tea from the waitress with a curt nod. Why is he… like that? What happened to him?

She glanced at her tea, steaming in its white cup. Looking at the waitress, and then the owner, she swirled it nervously. What is this feeling—like something's not right? She looked around the shop. It was half full, of both shinobi and civilians alike. Both of whom drank their tea without checking for poisons. Thinking it too soon for anyone to know about her presence or the fact that she was an outsider, she took a sip. What am I missing?

A few hours later, she was both still alive and still conscious. But no closer to having her questions answered.

Yashamaru (approximate time: 6:20 PM)

Yashamaru hated his job sometimes. He became a healer. A healer. He never asked to become the Lord Kazekage's right hand; he never asked to become the head of Suna's Assassination and Bodyguard Unit or ANBU. He missed the peaceful days, when he and his sister, Karura, could watch the sunset after dinner or complain about Suna's falling budget and two-faced daimyo. He missed the days before she got married to the Kazekage and missed the days when she was still alive.

Yashamaru stood on the rooftop of a building facing a tea shop door. Of all the things the Kazekage made him do, keeping an eye on a fifteen-year-old girl drinking tea was not one of the best ones. Nor is "keeping an eye on Gaara", he mentally added.

Of course, it was out of concern for their village safety, but this girl had no records, and it was the Kazekage's fault, what happened to Gaara. The girl had no registered shinobi number, she had no place in any "bingo books"—the only thing they had on her was a misdemeanor for stealing Specialty Scrolls from a library in Takigakure—which was hardly a real crime.

With a sigh and the appearance of the next ANBU member sent to keep an eye on her, he left with a Body Flicker Jutsu to report to the Kazekage.

…

"Well?" the Kazekage demanded.

Yashamaru stood from his bow. "She has made no move against Suna, but has shown little fear of your son, Lord Kazekage. However, I believe this is due to her position as an outsider and will quickly change."

Yashamaru swallowed. His tone was flat, analytical, as an ANBU member's voice should be. But beneath the tone lay a man who dreamt of strangling the Kazekage for all he made him do, and all he forced Gaara into.

The Kazekage, oblivious to the hidden thought, simply looked out to the distance. "Continue to monitor the girl, Yashamaru. Alert me if there's any development, and try to… foster this relationship between her and my son, if you could. She may prove useful to our cause."

"Yes sir." Yashamaru bowed again, like the servant he was, before shuffling out.

Katiya (one week later, approximate time: 8:00 AM)

Katiya exited the hotel with her possessions all on her back, a small knapsack crammed with Storage Scrolls. (Because honestly, what self-serving shinobi lugged anything with them in full-form?) She was wearing her favorite teal qipao-style vest. It made her stand out, but she decided that that's what she wanted to do that day.

She then headed out to the place she had last sent the red-head, the place she saw him have a sort of mental breakdown. She didn't know what'd she do once she was there, but she knew she ought to try something. The last interaction with him from the distance—the loneliness in his eyes called to her. Maybe he isn't as bad as everyone makes him out to be.

Maybe lessons to help him control his chakra, she thought. That'll have to help for sure. The poor kid looked like he needed a friend, and she needed someone to get her acclimated to Suna. It was a win-win deal. Katiya knew danger when she saw one, and she knew uncontrolled when she saw it, but Gaara? He was a mixture of both, and not exactly an even one.

I'm sure I'll be fine, Katiya told herself, you haven't gotten injured in years. Think if it as some excitement in your life... Yeah, sure… Some excitement. (Note for sarcasm.) Some excitement that may just kill you.

…

Katiya climbed the steps to the rooftop playground. Too late to go back now

… (approximate time: 8:35 AM)

Gaara looked at the young woman most of us would recognize to be of Asian descent sitting in his swing with wide-eyed surprise. "Hello."

"Hello."

He hadn't seen her before. She wasn't dressed like the locals, either. A white bag was strapped to her back in a one-shouldered grip, and the teal of her vest was instantly what caught his attention. No one wore that bright of a color in Suna. You just didn't. The rest of her attire, however, appeared to be pretty shinobi standard clothing. Black cinched slacks and leg pouch, black shinobi open-toed sandals, and bandage wraps that adorned her black fingerless gloves on her arms and hands, respectively. So a shinobi, then.

"You're not from around here, are you," Gaara said after a moment of silence.

"No, I'm not." She answered simply. She took in the boy across her like he did to her. She couldn't see much of his clothes under his beige, nearly white poncho, but she could tell that he wasn't attending any formal shinobi academy. There was no pouch strapped to his leg, nor a hip pouch, from what she could see. Temporarily ignoring the intensity the rimmed-eye effect his eyes generated, she bet that he was privately tutored.

Katiya leaned forward a subtle hint to look closer at his eyes after a moment. The black rings around his eyes caught attention. They stood out against his pale skin, and drew her into his slate green eyes more than his blood red hair and lack of eyebrows did, but didn't have the appearance of eyeliner. Yet Katiya didn't know of any Sunagakure clans that had black rimmed-eyes as a clan marking, at least not all the time.

Strange, she thought.

The boy tightened his grip on his worn teddy bear, shifting a bit nervously. "I'm Gaara," he said, without bowing as was the common custom throughout the Elemental Nations. He's young, and probably related to someone of power—, she thought, —someone who wouldn't get penalized by some other shinobi or something for that. Or they were really terrified of him and let it slide...

"Katiya." She responded, lowering the intensity of her own gaze. She knew her name would draw attention; it was quite uncommon, but she supposed it didn't hurt to use it… Nor was it too far a leap compared to some of the other names she encountered or heard on her travels.

"That's a strange name."

"So is 'Gaara'," she said, smiling now, hearing him talk about the very thing on her mind. He wasn't so scary. She stood up from the swing before kneeling in front of him, to tap a light poke to his forehead with her index finger.

Some sand shifted in the background, but Katiya was not thrown back, or missing an arm after the gesture. He blinked, surprised. The number of people that had dared to touch him could have been counted on one hand.

But Katiya didn't see anything wrong with the boy in front of her, besides his eyes and the breakdown she remembered. So she resolved not to treat him as a threat, yet, but as an ally. Warily, respectfully, but far from hostile. If anything, she had a certain amount of pity for the boy.

She smiled.

Gaara smiled back. He supposed she was right. A name pronounced "gah-rah"—with a translation to mean "self-love-demon" as some of us might know—was certainly a strange name.

Gaara (one month later, approximate time: 3:15 PM)

Gaara pushed his sand forward, in the giant mass of a glob. Katiya did the same with her glob of water, brought with her from the Land of Waterfalls in a Storage Scroll.

Gaara could tell that his control didn't match his new friend's. But either way, it was a fun game. Both of them were attempting to push the other element-formed glob out of the circle they were in. Gaara wasn't used to making shapes with his sand. Usually, the giant tendrils were enough to satisfy (or terrify) everyone. Because unlike Katiya's assumptions, no trainer or tutor besides Yashamaru dared near him.

Gaara's sand lump kept falling apart under Katiya's pressurized water, to the delight of them both, showering them with sprinkles of gritty confetti. He had a problem keeping the mass together, really, the little particles were less… sticky and coherent than her water and the water weighed it down if he did as she suggested and used it to stick his sand together.

He had the chakra to manipulate the sand long-term, but not the focus. (Although, sleeplessness may have had something or a lot to do with it.) Gaara simply never intentionally used his sand before, usually he just let it do it's own thing and prayed no one got hurt when it was being used. Only when he was scared or angry could the sand move with his intentions. But Katiya simply took his sand as one of Gaara's appeals, and was happy to show him to use happy memories to guide the sand. Ones with Yashamaru, or his new ones of him and Katiya, usually, since he had no others.

Round, and around, and around their elemental globs went. Neither used hand signs after Katiya's initial ones to impart chakra into her water, so it was like doing a dance with giant circling masses of elements. It was fun, more fun than Gaara had experienced… ever.

He had a friend. And she wasn't afraid of him.

Yashamaru (approximate time: 3:15 PM)

Yashamaru watched the pair with a mixture of apprehension and happiness. Happiness, because Gaara, with his newfound company, was happy. Truly happy. Apprehension, because of how quickly it could all come crashing down.

Yashamaru had followed his Kazekage's orders and taken the liberty to clean everything about Jinchuriki, demons, or anything that might scare or alert the girl about Gaara's true nature from the libraries. Guilt churned in his gut. She was bound to find out somehow, or from someone. Her talks with Gaara had already revealed much about Suna and himself, Yashamaru knew.

But all the same, the Kazekage's orders were the Kazekage's orders. And being a member of the ANBU, he had no choice but to obey. So he watched on, a mixture of sadness and perhaps fear. At the risks he knew Katiya was taking, and the risks they—he and the Kazekage were taking by playing this game of theirs.

Katiya (approximate time: 5:55 PM)

Gaara's other self still made her nervous, but she hadn't seen much of him since they'd started talking, or playing with each other. She supposed it had something to do with the fact that his sand was emotionally controlled, and the boy was happy around her, but it still didn't answer why he could control sand (barely) with barely any chakra release.

She, after all, had to pour her chakra into her water just to manipulate it.

But, she took his lack of control over his sand to be tied to his loneliness, since she somehow balanced him out. Talking to him helped. He seemed much more comfortable around her, and it was the fact that she could see how profoundly that affected him that kept her coming back.

...

To be honest, Katiya found Gaara's control to be about average for his age, and power to be quite large. But Katiya didn't find anything to be terrified of. He was just (un)naturally powerful for his age. She'd seen a lot of terrifying characters at her age, and she knew the difference. Gaara was still just a kid.

They'd been playing games like this for weeks now, and Katiya was beginning to become at home in the village. They gave the both of them something to focus on, and something to bond over.

She held her water up with her chakra, the liquid glistening in the afternoon sun. She was naturally fire-affinitied from her father and the values he gave her, but did spend some time in Takigakure, stealing scrolls and eyeing other shinobi as they manipulated their own water. She was a quick study, even if it was difficult to say the least, learning a new affinity (sort of) on her own without tutoring.

If anything, their "game" was to the benefit of both of their abilities. Her water nature growth, and his chakra control.

Next stop: Wind Nature Release, or wind-style jutsu, at least. Since I am in the Land of Wind, Katiya smiled.

They stood like that, on the roof, deep in concentration playing their game until the sun began to set, and the wind kicked up. The wind started to degrade Gaara's sand-forms (the ones he purposely made, anyways), and what was gritty confetti became needle-like, although Gaara's automatic sand-shield prevented anything from harming him (to Katiya's detriment).

Silently, Katiya wondered who would put a playground on the roof in Suna, when sandstorms on the ground were dangerous enough. The wind began to get too strong, so they stopped their game to walk to the lower ground.

Some time later of attempting to walk Gaara home in the storm, the man she saw earlier that month approached from the street. He must have gotten worried… or just got off of work, judging by the clothing, Katiya guessed upon noticing him. That's that guy… his father or guardian, that guy.

Gaara ran up to him, leaving her. "Yashamaru!"

Katiya patiently remolded her water (that she was using to make a water shield much like Gaara would do with his sand) into a singular spherical globe before tucking it back into her scroll with a smokey "pop". She watched Gaara run up to his uncle shortly after, finally matching the name to the face.

"Uncle Yashamaru, come and meet my new friend!"

The one apparently called Yashamaru walked up to her, quite a few centimeters taller than her. He was dressed in the standard Suna-nin uniform (tan armored vest and a long sleeved shirt with what would appear to us similar to a white shemagh or ghutra over his head, covering the back of his neck) but nothing to mark him as anything more than the average jonin.

He gave her a small polite bow. "Hello."

Katiya did the same. "Hello."

Yashamaru didn't say much after that, simply allowing Gaara to explain to him her story, which she had told Gaara earlier. She didn't tell Gaara all of it, exactly, but it was definitely a story. Meanwhile, Katiya kept trying to read him, but couldn't come up with much. There was something off about him and that fact, but she didn't know what, so decided to let it go.

"So… the Land of Waves, right?" Yashamaru finally asked.

"Well, I was born in the Land of Waves, but I guess you can say I was trained in Takigakure… I… took a ship there to learn water-style after my dad died." Katiya said simply. It was several years ago, his death, long before the Uchiha Massacre, so she said it without the sting such matters tended to have.

Yashamaru looked upon her sympathetically. Death was a common part of the shinobi lifestyle, but that didn't soften the pain. It never did.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Yashamaru said good naturedly, with a closed-eyed smile, his chin-length hair flapping in the wind.

Yashamaru (approximate time: 6:05 PM)

Yashamaru had to alert the Lord Kazekage of the development. Both as a shinobi, and Lord Rasa's brother-in-law. Yashamaru knew Lord Rasa would be… elated. (Note the tint of sarcasm.) Seeing it a "good opportunity" to get to know her and her stance about Gaara among the possibility of an ally for the Kazekage's plans, he invited the girl, Katiya, back to his apartment in the sand-colored pueblo-like building.

Because the Kazekage would find out about the girl eventually, damning him anyways if he were to attempt to hide or protect her from a fate she'd have no say in.

"Have you had a chance to taste Suna's specialty cuisines yet?" Yashamaru asked, entering the house.

"Heh. No, not yet. I just got here a few months ago, and I thought it best to check out the poisons of this place first before I accidentally killed myself. Mostly I've been snacking on my own stuff only," Katiya joked.

Yashamaru smiled at the remark. A shinobi, indeed.

"So… chunin?" Yashamaru asked.

"Uhh… technically, no?… I never went to any academies… the Land of Waves doesn't exactly have one, so I'm still below genin-level, I guess. But I did do some self-study, hanging around with all the genin in Takigakure," she responded.

"Hmm," Yashamaru hummed. Self-study, huh. No one can have such chakra control with "self-study" and no sensei. Yashamaru knew a few genin that attempted to "self study" without any guidance using wind-style jutsu. The results were various degrees of irreparable and accidental damage to several buildings around Suna. The buildings in question had to be deconstructed and remade.

"Yeah. But my parents, when they were still around, trained me when they could," Katiya added, seeing the look of inquiry on Yashamaru's face.

Yashamaru nodded, satisfied at the moment. "I don't suppose you're staying for long, are you?"

Katiya paused. She had to be careful about her response. She didn't need a repeat of the Takigakure incident, and she was talking to a possibly high-ranking shinobi. "I don't know. I've been travelling a lot since… " she trailed off. "Since becoming an orphan" was implied.

Yashamaru gave a pensive nod. Gaara looked between his uncle and newfound friend. "Why don't you stay with us?" Gaara chirped.

Katiya started at Gaara's innocent question, before looking to Yashamaru, who nodded in agreement with the proposition. Yashamaru felt sick to his stomach internally, knowing full well the young girl—just slightly older than the Kazekage's own daughter, by appearance—was going to be used for manipulation and who-knows-what.

"Maybe… " she said. "The hotels here aren't too bad…"

Gaara grabbed her arm. "Please? Please? … You're the first friend I've had," Gaara added quietly.

Katiya shifted her gaze back to Yashamaru. She was clearly considering her options. Yashamaru gave her a tense smile. The Kazekage would wonder what would make the girl not want to stay here if I make any move to keep her out… but please, please say no…

"Why not?" she said at last, thinking Gaara's uncle couldn't be too bad a man to be raising a son single-handedly.

Yashamaru gave her a wide, slightly forced, smile. Katiya, the girl, didn't notice the tension. A friend for Gaara, and maybe a new ally out of one Katiya Shiratori for the Lord Kazekage, he thought morosely. Lord Kazekage would be… pleased.

Yashamaru had to inform him immediately of the development and her new stay in his household, or his head would be on the line. A tug of apprehension in his gut.