Author's Note

I am really sorry for those of you who have update notifications on… I do a lot of editing as I reread my stuff and find typos and potential plot holes. (I swear this thing's going to be a "Ship of Theseus" by the time this fiction is over… but hopefully it all works out.)

Chapter 18

Katiya (the next day, approximate time: 6:30 PM)

The day she arrived at Oto, she was given the standard welcome-to-the-village set: a package containing the key to her quarters, shinobi registration forms, the Oto hitai-ate, and the catalogs of gear. One for clothes, one for weapons.

Let's just say Katiya did not like the selection of gear available from Otogakure.

She found what passed for shinobi weaponry in Oto was survivable; much of the standard shinobi gear she used being disposable—the kunai, the senbon, the shuriken. It was the clothing catalog she despised. Unlike weaponry that could have been sold across village lines or to the black market (although there were "loyalist" weapons shops, which chose to or were paid to both supply and invent weapons for only one village), the clothing shops did no such thing. With the exception of universal attire like shinobi boots, gloves, or hitai-ate straps, which were sold even to civilians, everything was custom to a particular village and nation.

The Suna chunin-standard flak vest was tan, padded, pocketed over the abdomen, and featured both neck and shoulder guards. The Konoha chunin-standard flak vest was green, padded, pocketed over the chest, and had neck-guards but no shoulder guards. Kumo's, however, was black and white, and more flexible, asymmetric with geometric designs but lacked both neck and shoulder guards. All vastly different, despite being made of the exact same material: thick, reinforced cotton canvas woven like a gi.

But the Oto chunin-standard attire, despite being available to even genin, did not feature any flak vest. Instead, it featured a shapeless grey slitted short sleeved tunic that went down to the knees, black leggings that extended to the arch of the foot, and a matching black long sleeve that attached to a form fitting hood and mask. The only real armor provided was the scarf-like splotched neck guard.

Having been used to wearing her silk qipao-styled vest, which was technically civilian clothing despite being woven tightly and thickly enough to slow arrows, Katiya was not impressed. She felt downright naked in the Oto standard gear. So it found its place buried at the end of a "reserved clothing scroll". And she booked herself to assignment to the next mission out to the supply shops.

Author's Note

Feel free to search whether or not silk can actually slow or at least stop arrows—but I'm writing it as so… and fun fact, the underlayer of samurai armor tends to feature a thickly woven silk layer to a) yeah, slow arrows and b) make arrows easier to pull out as the silk itself is harder to tear than flesh (and less painful to tear, too…)

Also a note on the term "gi"—its use in this fiction is NOT how it would be used in Japanese—where the term "dogi" (meaning "training clothing") would be used for the same article(s) of clothing. However, since it's the term common for English, "gi" actually just meaning "clothing" like the "ki" in "kimono", I will be using the term "gi" to describe the thickly woven attire typical of a Japanese martial art that isn't necessarily taught by someone who actually speaks Japanese…

Temari (approximate time: 6:30 PM)

As time passed, Gaara's distance from the two other Sand Siblings increased, Gaara content to walk alone as he always did, and the rest of the team eager to get away. A mandated twenty-five meter distance had rapidly turned into thirty, then forty, then fifty. Then finally, more than a hundred meters—nearly two hundred, really, separated the siblings from their demon brother.

After nearly a day's worth of travel, the ANBU assassination they knew was coming struck. Faintly behind them, the scraping of metal and the clash of battle rang out.

They're all going to die. It won't work, Temari mentally whispered to herself. Temari bit her lip and continued walking forwards. One foot in front of the other.

"Are we just going to let him kill them?" Kankuro whispered furiously to the rest of them, still not daring to turn around.

The question went unanswered and the sound of battle dissolved into the sound of screams. Temari's gait shifted involuntarily at the noise, still audible despite the distance. A pause in her step, barely a fraction of a second long. One foot in front of the other.

Come on, Temari, be strong. That… That demon's going to be the savior Father always wanted. It's going to be our job to grab him by the reins and lead him there—you can't show fear of it. You can't show fear of him.

Temari grimaced. One foot in front of the other.

With trepidation and out of the corner of his eye, Baki looked behind them. Temari's heart pounded. But curiosity got the better of her, and willing her heart to still, her gaze soon followed her sensei's, and then so did Kankuro's. Their feet moved forwards, but their minds churned and frothed in circles.

Even from that distance, she could make out the glint of Gaara's teeth bared in a sadistic smile. The sand waterfall Gaara's moniker came from, splashing and spilling over the desert. Red peltered the desert after being sent up to the sky with the explosive power of Gaara's Sand Coffin.

The sound of screams gave way to the sound of silence.

What was Father thinking?! Temari thought with a clench of her teeth, Sending assassins after Gaara—that's only going to provoke him further!

Temari made a conscious effort not to run. One foot in front of the other.

Every assassin sent after Gaara will only end up dead. We can't do anything to save them. We can't do anything to risk his… wrath.

Temari looked at her brother—her other brother. His face was downturned, his eyes wide, most likely in realization of the same thought. Temari placed a hand on his shoulder but said nothing. Even if she wanted to do so, she didn't know what to say. What she could possibly say to ease his spirits.

The extended hand meant to reassure her brother was brushed off.

Gaara (approximate time: 6:30 PM)

Gaara's head pounded mercilessly in the moments before the ANBU attack—the moments when both he and Shukaku knew what was coming, but before any weapons were thrown or blows exchanged. Gaara stopped, waiting for them, letting his cowardly teammates travel farther and farther away.

Shukaku giggled, excitedly, within him. FiNaLLy! At LasT—BLOOD—BLOOD!

At laST, wE CaN taStE tHEiR BLoOd, the pair thought.

Finally, they would be able to indulge themselves. Finally, Gaara could appease his mother that birthed him out of a craving for blood, appease Shukaku who danced and laughed because of his craving for blood, and appease himself, who grinned in the knowledge that'd he be fulfilling the purpose he was created for—destroying yet another piece of humanity with those damned eyes—with his craving for blood.

An ANBU agent jumped out of the sand, swinging shuriken out behind him. Gaara didn't even bat an eye—his mother in the sand protecting her progeny, ensuring he'd fulfill his purpose. He and Shukaku rose up in unison, gathering up the sand into a fist to crush the agent.

The screams—tHE sCrEAmS. ThE ScrEaMs.

Bliss. Gaara's eyes were wide with the pleasure of hearing them. Shukaku laughed, a loud hearty cackle. They smiled. The desert twisted and rolled into a feverish pitch.

With the distraction of the ANBU attack, Gaara didn't feel the incessant pain in his chest—that pain from loneliness he always felt. With the promise of blood, Gaara didn't mind the sensation of his skin being scraped off because of the power the feeling of his purpose gave him.

Another agent launched explosion tags attached to kunai at him, and then another volley of kunai and shuriken, again directed to Gaara's back. Gaara—and Shukaku—they—smacked them away. The weapons clattered to the floor. Slowly, Gaara turned around to face the remaining two agents of the three-man ANBU squad and crossed his arms. He did not need them to deal with the two… weaklings who thought they had the strength to kill him.

The agents' eyes flared with cold anger at seeing him kill their precious teammate.

YeS. YEs. seE ThE AnGeR—ThE FuRy—iN ThEiR eyES. ThEiR ThirSt FoR ReVenGE. WaTcH It TurN tO DuST.

A low rumble escaped Gaara's throat. Watch them die.

Sand exploded from the ground, engulfing the remaining two shinobi. Their terrified screams gurgled away as sand filled their lungs and then crushed them with enough pressure to warp metal.

Blood-laced sand fell from the sky. Gaara inhaled deeply, breathing in the metallic scent that lingered around him. One can describe the expression on Gaara's stoic face as calm bliss. Bliss, from the knowledge that he was fulfilling his purpose—starting with the people that were like him—who sought life only to snuff it out—to take pleasure in the blood of their enemies.

Katiya (approximate time: 6:30 PM)

Katiya ran her hand over the dusty tomes in Oto's library, at least, the ones available to her in the non-restricted areas. The genin had no use for them, all of them so reliant on their "natural talent" and kekkei genkai, they never bothered to crack open a book. The library sat deserted. Abandoned. Unappreciated.

The torches on the walls flickered and flashed with every change in atmosphere. Shadows danced in every corner.

Katiya knew her selections were tracked by eyes like Kabuto—but she didn't worry too much. Besides demonstrating an interest in medical and fire-style ninjutsu, she didn't know what else there was to gleam about her being in the library. If anything, her frequent visits to the library helped her keep up her appearance as a mediocre no-talent, relying on books to keep her afloat while everyone else relied on their enhancements or aforementioned natural talent.

Katiya pulled a book down from the shelf to sit at a table. It was a book obviously taken or stolen from Kusagakure.

It was ironic—Katiya being there, in Oto. Living right under Orochimaru's nose with everything he desired: an inability to age and the Uchiha kekkei genkai, and yet Katiya was willing to trade them both if it meant she'd have a place to go home to. But she was no fool. She knew grabbing onto the tail of a snake in the hope it'd lead to her goal can very well lead to it biting her.

So she was not going to ever waltz in, flaunting either her relative immortality or her kekkei genkai for a "trade" for a home. She didn't know whether Kabuto was able to snag any genetic material the day he healed her, but she was riding on the lack of proper medical equipment to guarantee a "no"—meaning a higher chance of her being able to keep her inability to age and Uchiha kekkei genkai a secret (or just plain old keep them in general).

Because she knew she was dealing with a snake—which meant what she needed to do was keep her guard up, and make sure she knew when to let go of the snake's tail and run. And that meant not being a fool, not showing off, and not revealing anything more personal than necessary.

But that didn't change the fact that life could make it difficult.

Kankuro (approximate time: 9:00 PM)

They had stopped for the day, maybe fifteen kilometers or so ahead of schedule and so set up camp early. They treated themselves to plum-stuffed onigiri, which were still fresh after being packed the day before leaving Suna, and settled around a campfire.

Kankuro fiddled with the workings of his puppet nervously as Temari and his sensei finished their meals silently. Truly, there was nothing wrong and no update he could make to his puppet without his equipment stashed in his room back in Suna, but having the carved wood and hidden weapons under his fingertips assured him. Something he desperately needed after witnessing what happened that afternoon.

Even though several hours had passed, Kankuro couldn't get the images out of his head—his demon brother—Shukaku in full form—the bloodlust in his brother's eye.

Your brother's a monster.

He flipped his puppet—Karasu the Crow—onto its stomach to examine its back. Firelight reflected off of the wires under the panel Kankuro propped up. He ran his fingers along the wires, until he found the spare cartridge of poison he'd recently refilled.

"Don't worry, Karasu," Kankuro breathed, murmuring to his puppet, "Shrimpy guy like him won't hurt you."

Temari, who was sitting beside him, lifted a brow.

Kankuro narrowed his eyes at her, noticing the look. "Something the matter?" he asked loudly with a slightly sarcastic smile.

Something to lighten the mood—someone's gotta do it, Kankuro rationalized quietly in the back of his mind.

Temari's nose wrinkled, knowing her brother was teasing her—he knew exactly what she was raising a brow to. So instead of responding directly to the question, Temari lifted her face to where Gaara sat on a rock far from their fire, staring into open space in the darkness of the night.

"I don't like it," she said quietly, the light of the fire casting shadows over her face.

Kankuro followed her gaze, soberly. Back to thinking about Gaara, then.

"Neither do I, but what can we do about it?" he responded aloud.

"We're going to have to do something—you said it yourself, he can kill us in our sleep for all we know—look at him!" she yell-whispered with a scowl.

Gaara did not move, and seemingly did not blink. Kankuro grimaced, turning away from him.

"But what can we do about it?" Kankuro repeated. "Father assigned us to him, we have to deal with it."

Temari inhaled through her nose. "I say we call him over."

What?!

Kankuro yell-whispered back, "Temari, we're keeping him away so he won't kill us. What good is it if you call him over?!"

Temari flicked her gaze to her sensei. Her sensei narrowed his eyes but said nothing, aptly listening.

"Him being like that means he's more likely to kill us in our sleep," she whispered.

"How so?"

"Have you ever heard the quote 'Keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer?' Think about it, right now, we're just like the assassins to him—we're nothing—we have no… connection to him. We know it. What's stopping him from killing us?"

"What's stopping him from killing us when he's even closer to us?!"

"The fact that he'll know we're not trying to kill him—it draws a distinction between us and the assassins—he won't kill us because of that."

"Oh, right. He'll totally trust us, why didn't I think of that," Kankuro sarcastically whispered.

"It's not about trust—it's that he'll no longer see us as a threat… And then use that to ensure he won't kill us later if… an assassination attempt goes wrong."

Temari flicked her gaze over to her sensei. Baki gave her a nearly imperceptible nod.

Kankuro exhaled, closing the panel to his puppet with a snap.

You really want to bring the little—bring Gaara—closer?!

"Alright…" Kankuro reluctantly grumbled, humoring his sister for the moment.

Temari's grip on her iron fan tightened. "Look, I don't like it any better than you do, but if he's going to going on missions with us, we've got to learn how to live with him without looking over our shoulder every two seconds."

You really think Gaara's not going to attack us because of that?! Us being "closer?!" He nearly destroyed our entire village! A village he lives—grew up—in!

"And that means… treating him… like he's a member of the team…" she said, clearly nervous with the idea as well.

She really thinks this is the best way to do it, doesn't she, Kankuro mentally sighed, she's probably right, too...

Kankuro sucked in a breath, hearing his sister, but still having his own reservations. "Okay… How... 'bout we do it tomorrow, and… only… when we break camp… sound good, Baki-sensei?" Kankuro said haltingly, turning to his sensei. "We don't wanna be in the way of the assassination attempts when we're on the road, right?" he added nervously joking. Kankuro's thick puppeteer uniform clung to him, an anxious sweat like glue despite the chilling desert.

Temari met her sensei's eye. "Sensei?"

Baki turned to look at Gaara, who had not moved from his position, staring at their camp. He nodded after a moment of thought. Clearing his throat, he said, "Lord Kazekage stated that… the majority of the attempts on… Gaara's life will be away from Suna, prior to when we receive the client, to minimize any possible damage. However, since… he is to be your… teammate long term…"

Baki paused. The "if assassination fails" hung in the air, unsaid, but understood.

Baki continued, "I will allow you two to use your discretion on whether or not you wish to work with… Gaara closely… although I do agree that…" Baki cleared his throat again, "as with any other team, bonding with one's teammates often serves to minimize potential conflicts… and increase the average mental stability of the team."

You mean Gaara's mental stability. Great, Kankuro grimaced. The little runt better not try to kill me.

"Alright, but if this doesn't work out, I'm going to give you a big 'I told you so'," Kankuro said, turning to his sister.

If we survive that long.

Temari (approximate time: 9:10 PM)

Temari crawled into her tent and unrolled her bedroll. Unlike the Land of Fire, the Land of Wind's… temperament made sleeping bare, without a tent both impossible and downright dangerous. Temari slid her fan in beside her, making sure that if she had to go from sleeping to fighting, there was nothing to entangle her when she'd inevitably jump awake.

But she knew she wouldn't be able to sleep that day.

Not when she knew Gaara was sitting there, watching her, not even when Baki-sensei said he'd take the first watch.

Are you sure about this? Temari asked herself, peering through a slit in her tent's opening to glance at Gaara yet again. Sand blew across the desert with every passing wind gust, yet Gaara made no shield from the sand—content to watch it. Content to stand there, unmoving, unsleeping.

She turned away, hugging her knees.

He's what Father wanted, if we can control him—that's what he wants from us. We do the dirty work for him—make sure Gaara doesn't kill any clients, and does the work he's supposed to do. And to do that, we need to be closer to him. We need to be closer to him, so we can monitor him. So he won't go… off… We need to be there to actively mold him, manage him...

No matter how… uncomfortable it makes you feel.

You're the daughter of the Kazekage, she told herself, You're strong, powerful, and unafraid. You cannot be afraid. Not of your little brother, and not of anyone.

You have to do this. You have to be strong.

… It'll be just like… Father...on a bad day, Temari mentally whispered to herself. Just like that.

Temari covered herself in blankets, still feeling cold despite them. She sat in her tent, hugging herself and watching Gaara's shadow through the tent cloth. She would not sleep that day. She was a shinobi, and shinobi were strong. And a strong shinobi could go at least three days without sleep, without food or water, without complaint. A strong shinobi handled even the most difficult of missions without complaint. She could not complain. She had no right to.

Katiya (approximate time: 9:30 PM)

A young woman opened the heavy oak doors with a bang. She couldn't have been any older than seventeen. The torchlight flickered. What appeared to be her naturally purple hair was done up into a spiky bun. A long green vest that went to her knees sat open and atop a grey turtleneck top and a dark skirt that went to her mid-thigh, belted at the waist by a thick black leather strip. She sauntered over to Katiya's table as if she owned the place.

High ranking henchman? Katiya wondered absentmindedly, noting her presence and attitude while turning the page of her book.

"Well, well, well. Looks like the rumors were true. Four-Eyes' new lab assistant really is an egghead," the woman announced.

Katiya turned the page of her book again, nonchalantly, externally ignoring her.

The woman leaned over the table between them, eying Katiya's writing. She placed a gloved hand on her hip, and the other to her chin in a gesture of mock pensivity. "Hmmm… What was your name again? Tatami? Oh, no, wait, that's not right… I've got it… Kusottare, that's it, isn't it."

Katiya ignored her to "focus" on her writing. She was transcribing a few notes on a jutsu she particularly liked, but with half a mind, Katiya was trying to figure out a way to deal with… this woman. A woman who called her after a type of floormat and "shit head" without provocation, meaning she had beef with "Four-Eyes"—Kabuto, and that Katiya'd be dragged into whatever personal scuffle they had.

Great. Just great.

"Hey, did you hear me, Egghead?" she asked, leaning even closer to Katiya.

"I did. And it's Katsu, actually. But I wouldn't worry about pronunciation too much. Just a few more years of practice and you could say more complex names like 'Orochimaru' with ease. I hear he's more finicky about pronunciation than I am," Katiya said, deadpan despite the obvious sarcasm.

The woman sneered, "What do you know about Lord Orochimaru, Egghead? You've barely been here for, what, a month? I've been serving under Lord Orochimaru for over three years."

Katiya continued her writing, ignoring her once more.

She continued, "I don't even know why Four-Eyes would bring a no-talent like you into Oto. What can you do, besides sit there and read? All that reading in the world won't get you ready for combat."

Oh, I know. That's what nuisances like yourself are going to be for, Katiya mentally rebutted dryly.

"I tend not to question the judgement of my superiors unless they appear to be brain dead idiots like yourself," Katiya said, quietly but still quite audibly.

The woman's face twitched. She snatched the scroll of paper Katiya was writing on out from under her. A streak of ink marred the paper.

"What is it you're even working on that makes you think that you're so important?" she interrogated. The woman read the scroll aloud, "Fire Style: Demon Lantern Jutsu? What are you, a genin?"

Katiya leaned back in her chair. Her relaxed upper body hid her tensed up legs under the table, which were ready to jump out of her seat to avoid anything that might be incoming. And out of caution, she began draining the water from the staff next to her into her hands. "Orochimaru's rather invested in learning and making new jutsu. I figured I might as well do the same," she said evenly.

With a look of disgust, the woman threw the scroll of paper behind her, and then held her hand out to the side for a single-handed jutsu of some sort. With a flash of light, a crystalline snowflake with a radius twice the size that of a dinner plate took shape.

"Lord Orochimaru's not interested in your little genin basics—he's interested in proper, powerful jutsu like my Crystal Style: Giant Hexagonal Shuriken!"

"Crystal Style?" Katiya mentally repeated, I didn't know there was such a thing.

Katiya jumped out of her seat to stand, the force of the change throwing the seat backwards, ready for the attack. She held her hand up, a staff forming parallel to the floor held above her head to block the overhead arc of the oversized shuriken.

Well then, let's see what your "crystal-style" can do, then, shall we?

The two held the positions, Katiya blocking with a now eye-level horizontal staff block and the woman with an overhead pin downwards, at a standstill.

"Why don't I do Lord Orochimaru a little favor and provide him an extra body for his experiments? That'd be a nice gift for him, don't you think?" the woman smiled, jagged pink crystals starting to form on Katiya's staff.

Katiya eyed the crystals, which were actively growing into and around her staff. Katiya pushed more of her chakra into the staff, allowing her chakra on the surface of it to turn to a "wind blade". The air currents rubbed to and fro over the surface of her staff, the water that composed it turning choppy and turbulent. The crystals on her staff cracked and then broke, but Katiya noted how the overall water volume in her staff decreased as the pieces of crystal fell to the floor.

Her crystal-style feeds off of water.

"Maybe after I kill you, Lord Orochimaru will finally be convinced to stop letting no-talents like you into Oto and instead focus on the people with real power—LIKE ME!" the woman exclaimed, giddy with laughter.

The woman backflipped and then threw her shuriken. Katiya purposely made no move to dodge, wanting to see what her "powerful jutsu" could do. She did, however, block the shuriken so that it'd land on the floor rather than through her.

"Honestly, I'm surprised someone like you was even allowed to meet Lord Orochimaru!" the woman continued.

Kabuto must've seen something in me then… Yippee, Katiya thought sarcastically.

Crystals sprung from the shuriken and began to encase Katiya's lower legs. She vented her chakra, testing whether the crystal breakage on her staff was a result of her wind-style or not.

"Heh. Not so tough anymore, now are you?" she asked with a self-satisfied smirk.

Katiya increased the amount of chakra she was venting in her legs. The crystal's growth slowed marginally and she could still feel her legs, both good signs. She moved so that only one of her legs were going to be caught.

It's her presence, then. If she were gone, I could break out easily. It's the chakra ventage—I have to do it before the crystal starts growing into me—I'm not sure a thirty percent difference between me and pure water's enough to keep me from crystallizing either...

Katiya gathered the damp in the room up, pushing as much of it as she could to the ceiling to decrease the woman's fuel. It left only whatever moisture was on them—bodily fluids—and the water in Katiya's staff for the woman to manipulate.

Katiya threw her staff at the woman. She dodged.

"You missed! Seems like the quality of the new toys being brought in is going down!"

With a flick of her hand, Katiya's staff exploded into senbon—needles—and sent them towards the woman once more. The woman crystallized them, and then flung them back to Katiya, a result Katiya expected. With her leg stuck in the ground via the crystals, she couldn't dodge, but she didn't need to.

There was a reserve of water inside those crystal senbon—her chakra laced water, which she purposely condensed into the core of each senbon while the crystal grew on top of it, with the chakra within still active. When the woman relinquished control of the senbon and let momentum guide them to their target, Katiya swooped in and used her own chakra to gather the crystal senbon into a single arrow-like entity and send said entity into her crystal-covered legs.

The crystals covering her legs cracked, along with almost all of the crystal senbon. But it was the former Katiya cared most about. After that initial crack, Katiya needed only kick her leg out of the crystal mass, shattering the remains.

The woman stood agape. "How?! My crystal release is the strongest elemental release there is!"

Ignoring her once more, Katiya stepped away from what was her entrapment. With a downward smack of her hand, the water she had gathered (and slowly imbued with chakra) by the ceiling came down and encased the woman in a shifting snake-like prison.

"Looks like no matter how 'strong' your release is, you are still thwarted by stupidity," Katiya deadpanned. "That must be the reason why Kabuto thought I'd be a good addition to Oto… Guess he got tired of it."

Katiya moved to leave the room, drawing the leftover water into yet another staff.

The woman squirmed in the water's hold, unable to get out or crystallize it into a shatterable mass as long as the water remained turbulent due to the chakra running through it.

"Get back here! Let go of me you little—!"

SLAM.

Looks like I've still got it, Katiya breathed once outside the library doors.

She moved down the hall without looking back. She knew it was only a matter of time before the woman squirmed free because of chakra fading from the distance or lack of concentration or somehow thought her way out. But if it came down to it, Katiya found she wouldn't mind killing that woman—who was so eager to kill without remorse—if that woman ever came back to kill Katiya rather than simply toy with her as she did today.

Like Gaara was, that night? a little sing-song voice in the back of Katiya's head wondered. He didn't seem very "remorseful" for nearly destroying innocents either.

Fine. I'll give her a second chance, then, is that what you want? Katiya mentally sighed.

But you didn't give those ANBU or those innocent shinobi just doing their jobs a second chance, why should you give one to her? Or him for that matter? that negative part of questioned. Do you really have a home there, still?

Oh, shut up, Katiya thought, kicking the negative part of her aside.

Author's Note

Okay… I feel like the Kankuro-Temari relationships there's a bit out of character for the both of them… and a bit forced… And I have realized that had Kabuto seen Gaara's performance, he'd be more interested in Gaara than Katiya… but as we know, Oto's in the development stages right now; they're very weak, and so they want every shinobi they can scrounge up...

But anyways, if you are one of those people who actually like what I'm writing, to have read this far, a review or two would be great. Constructive criticism equals good, bashing equals bad… Because l do want the characters to have at least a few limbs in their canon characterizations.

Do note, after 11/something/2020, I lost my Hulu so I by extension lost my Naruto Shippuden watching ability… so I have no idea what happens after… like… Sakura tries to kill Sasuke… so hopefully not much changes on the Sand Sibling front after that…

(And also, I am only fluent in English, sarcasm, and Google Translate and only conversant in Chinese and Spanish… and Chinese is about as similar to Japanese as Spanish is to English… every now and then you find a similarity like "teléfono" meaning "telephone" but any other time, you've got words like "bolígrafo" meaning "pen" or "peligro" meaning "danger"... so… if you can correct my Japanese, that'd be much appreciated, those of you actually reading my work…)