Author's Note
The end of this chapter will mark the midpoint of this fiction. Estimated size upon completion: hopefully 400,000 words.
I would appreciate the option for right-oriented text instead of just center and left-oriented, but I'll take what I can get.
Chapter 50
Katiya* (time: 11:14:48, hr/min/sec)
She had passed by Tayuya's dead body entering the area. All was still well. She was expendable. They all were.
She arrived there just in time to watch a Jinchuriki catch a green-clad shinobi with a bowl cut—Rock Lee—with a cloud of sand as the latter flew back from his opponent's defense. The two apparently opponents turned allies. The Jinchuriki crossed his arms as per his customary battle position. And she watched as he narrowed his eyes at his apparent adversary—Kimimaro, her Oto-nin ally. Hair a limp bone-white, parted down the middle in a zig-zag—green impassive eyes rimmed with red clan markings—and as the Jinchuriki would find, a look of something to prove in the depths of the eye.
"Gaara!" she watched Lee realize surprisedly.
"'Gaara'—is that what they call you?" Kimimaro asked before countering with his bone-style jutsu.
She didn't want to intervene quite yet. It was nice—just to see Gaara battle someone. So… at peace with his own actions. He had been so happy too—during his last battle—during the Chunin Exams.
"Impulsive, aren't you," Gaara noted softly, his face inscrutably calm as his sand tendrils blocked flying finger joints dispatched by Kimimaro's jutsu. There was no taunt to the tone of voice, though the phrasing would make it appear to be. He turned to Rock Lee. "You're different. When you fought against me, you had much more agility and sharpness," Gaara said to him, so trusting in his automatic sand barrier to shield him should he be attacked while his eyes were averted from his opponent.
"I figured you would say that," Lee with the same slight staccato she remembered him to have in the brief moments they interacted. "I am not the kind of person who would hold a grudge—but even so—because of you, I've had a fairly tough time of it."
… I wonder why you haven't killed him yet, she would wonder as the Jinchuriki and the green one exchanged words. You wanted to, didn't you?
"… I owe Konoha. I owe Konoha a great debt," Gaara replied simply. "I'll handle this," Gaara told his ally, as if realizing Rock Lee's present state was his own fault.
"Do not let your guard down! He uses his bones to attack! He can launch them like you saw before and he is able to control them all at will!" Rock Lee warned. She watched as Gaara readied himself for battle.
"Sabaku no Gaara—rather a foolish name, isn't it? You're nothing without that sand of yours. Why else would you go through the trouble of lugging it around?" she heard Kimimaro ask from afar.
"But as long as I have it, I can do anything," Gaara told Kimimaro, "The only fool here is you. If I need more sand, I can easily use the earth I stand on to make more," Gaara informed him before attempting to cover Kimimaro in sand. If one can recall the time Gaara had made it rain blood, this was a less violent version of it.
It was then, she moved—the grass surrounding Kimimaro suddenly drying as Gaara was executing his jutsu—evacuated water from the grass seemingly levitating upwards before revolving around Kimimaro in a mini-cyclone, throwing Gaara's sand out of the former's vicinity after it had begun to pile. Gaara's eyes would widen, sensing a familiar chakra, though the one who emitted it didn't notice that, that apparent medic Body Flickering to a location to Gaara's rear from where she had been hiding in the nearby tree line.
It would have been stupid of her to not recognize the precursor to one of the Suna native's Sand Burials.
"So you came too," Kimimaro said to the appearance of his own ally.
Gaara slowly turned around. "Katiya…"
Gaara* (approximate time: 11:15 AM)
"You have to be careful with the Jinchuriki's 'Sand Coffins'," Katiya slowly told her ally, shifting her stance into a battle-ready one, ignoring the Jinchuriki. "I know you can heal and defend yourself by growing more bones, but the Sand Burials that come after have been known to crush even that."
She was masked with goggles over her eyes and her mouth covered with a balaclava—but Gaara still recognized her by her chakra.
Distorted, as it was.
It wasn't like before—not like the moment he felt a similarity in Sakura Haruno's chakra—the pinkette in the moment she defended Sasuke Uchiha. Defensive intent... What Gaara realized had been Katiya's defensive intent was gone and shifted. No longer did it feel as plain as common knowledge—a firm warning but truth that in nearing her fire, that fire would burn those she found enemy—but now, much more of a whisper. Like the smoke that came after a fire was extinguished.
A smoke so thick she did not know she entered a cave that never let out. Only walking on as long as she did because the cave's echoing calls told her there was a light at the end of its chasm. The cave, shelter from the air so smoke-filled. In the dark, the smoke could not be seen. Cursing at herself when the cave led her in circles, her fist to the coffin's sealed walls. She herself now the romantic reprieve from the more painful death from starvation of air.
"Others who mean a lot to me… I care more about them than I do myself… I will stop you, even if I have to kill…"
Killing intent.
Gaara, used to death, was not cowed. Yet pangs of sorrow still strummed in his chest. For he knew what he felt in her killing intent was what she felt of the world.
"It seems I underestimated you," the white haired one Gaara had attempted to catch in a Sand Burial said, interrupting Gaara's thoughts. "But that will be the last time I'll be caught in your sand."
But Gaara still hadn't been paying attention to his adversary's words, his eyes fixed on his adversaries themselves. "When I look at this guy, it reminds me of him," Gaara said quietly, out loud. Still lost in memory.
"Huh?" Rock Lee asked beside Gaara.
"Uchiha," Gaara clarified, his eyes fixed ahead. "His eyes. Sasuke had the same eyes this guy does. Seeking to prove the value of their own existence." Eyes like that…
They were like mine—Gaara thought before switching again to spoken word, "They're different from hers." Blank.
"—You know this person, Gaara?" Rock Lee asked beside him.
"She is my friend," Gaara replied, his eyes still not leaving hers—or where he assumed hers to be, buried under her tinted lenses. Katiya—what's happened to you—did I… ?
"Wait just a moment—I remember you—you are that sensei from Otogakure—the one in the wheelchair!" Lee realized, "Your name is 'Katsu', is it not? What is a friend of Gaara doing serving such evil villains? Friends should not be fighting friends!"
Gaara felt Katiya—Katsu's—chakra grow colder and more distant at that remark. "… You're going to have to forgive your companion—he's rather poorly socialized, being the Jinchuriki that he is. He doesn't quite know the correct terms to describe social relationships. We are nothing so close," Katiya said unemotionally. "He's nothing more to me than a stranger impeding my current mission."
Gaara's eyes widened incredibly as Shukaku writhed. "Nothing more than strangers related by blood," he felt about his siblings once.
"—Katiya, wait—!" Gaara exclaimed, reaching towards her only for Kimimaro to block the attempt.
"I will go after her!" Rock Lee told Gaara in response, rushing forwards. Katiya turned her staff into a whip, latching one of his ankles and tossing him away—Gaara grabbed with his sand to catch Rock Lee.
"Katiya!" Gaara exclaimed now. The two met eyes again—those lenses a barrier between their eyes truly meeting.
Katiya (time: ?)
She had no hope of winning against the Jinchuriki—not when the amount of water she could manipulate was so small compared to his.
But that was alright. She was expendable. They all were.
Gaara (approximate time: 11:25 AM)
Katiya broke the eye contact he knew they had shared first—looking downwards to the grass he was on. Now a smoke or mist that permeated out from her, her chakra. Singing that the air was suffocating. Another spike of water shot out of the ground. The gift of a swift and noble death by fire, more favorable than the prolonged suffering by the slow chill of life, her chakra said. But the eyes hidden behind her black tinted lenses. Blank.
Using his jutsu, he withdrew both himself and Rock Lee away from the attacking Oto-nin—and Katiya.
"I do not understand. Is her name not 'Katsu', Gaara?" Lee asked beside him.
Gaara didn't immediately reply, clutching his stomach where his demon seal was and keeping his eyes on his… adversaries. A Sand Burial would be so easy—burying them both—but Katiya… he didn't want—"No," Gaara replied. Is this how he feels, Naruto? To be facing Sasuke? "When I knew her, as a friend… her name was Katiya."
"Are you sure this is the same person? Why would a friend be defending such evil people?"
"Yes," Gaara replied. With certainty, to Lee's first question.
"Then why—?"
"… It was me," Gaara choked out, "It was my—"
"—Dance of the Bone Camellia—!"
—SaND CoF—he hesitated. "Hhhhfffttt," he breathed before compelling his sand to shield both himself and Lee. Gaara let out a growl of a breath under the shield, closing his eyes. It was my fault—Love—love youRseLf—LoVe—YoURsELf—LOvE oNLy yOuRsELF—I didn't—I couLdN'T—
"Gaara! Are you—?"
"Hhhffffttt…" Gaara replied, "I'm… fine," he rasped out. He felt the impact of pressurized water hitting it. The shield then shook as a bone drill sloughed through a watered down portion of it. "Hhhhnnnn…"
I cannot go on like this while still trying to… Shukaku. But Rock Lee… Katiya… I—No. This—this was all caused—I must not allow Shukaku to—
Gaara whipped his arm out, opening his eyes again, his sand following. Both Kimimaro and Katiya were thrown back. "Hhhffftt," Gaara breathed. A memory flashed in Gaara's mind—of a Sand Coffin he hadn't meant to make—if not for Shukaku—if not for his bloodlust-induced stupor. If not for him not wanting to even try…
Katiya—I'm—Gaara willed himself not to follow up with another blow of his own. "Katiya! Stop this—come back with me to Suna—!" Gaara cried out, his voice the closest we've ever heard it come to a plea.
"There are bad men here, Gaara, a lot of them. You know what that's like—you've seen them, or at least know they exist. Yashamaru's not strong to enough to stop all of them, which is why I have to go."
"—I won't allow anyone else to drive you away!"
The memory again—him intentionally—SanD CoFFiN—flashed through his mind again—I won't allow myself to drive you away!
(Not again.)
Katiya—!
Both Katiya and her apparent companion back-flipped in midair, landing on their feet. Her companion—skin lined with black chakra markings—from use of his Curse Mark of Earth's primary state—paused, giving her a look from the side as she responded. "But I have no business in Sunagakure," she replied calmly. Indifferently. Watching. "My home is in Oto... All the things you could possibly want at your disposal, you might like it as well. All the things you could possibly want to kill. You took such joy in it before."
Gaara looked to Rock Lee. The killing option sounded so appealing to Shukaku. "No," he replied firmly. Gaara snapped his gaze back to Katiya. "That wasn't joy, I've learned—Katiya, please—if you insist on continuing on this path, I will have no choice but to harm you—!"
But after everything—I don't—I don't want—
"Then so be it," she replied indifferently.
Katiya* (time: unknown)
"Go to Second State," she told Kimimaro, taking in the portions of her partner's body—parts with peeled skin from Gaara's Sand Burial. Though, the layer of bone beneath his skin spared him from the worst of the damage and he was already… healing. "The Jinchuriki appears to be destabilizing, and from the Chunin Exams, that would mean his demon self is soon to appear. If so, we cannot meet him in direct battle as we are," she told him.
Kimimaro nodded, taking her analysis to heart. She narrowed her eyes. Prickle. Using the curse mark would accelerate his death despite it giving him a chakra boost. Still, he complied. She knew he was sure to die. "There's a chance that you could change that," a memory echoed. But what's the point? She lost track of time, entering the battle. It must have meant she was having fun, this battle of theirs, right? A bruised grey hue spread from the black chakra lines on the surface of Kimimaro's skin, inky crescents of the curse mark's making encircling his face and turning his sclera black.
"Dance of the Clematis: Vine!" Kimimaro called, pulling his spine out for use as a whip.
She, on the other hand, Body Flickered into Gaara's closer vicinity in an attempt to bypass his defense with her speed. She had to kill him before he entered his demon state—or she knew he'd be the one killing her. Rock Lee intercepted her though, dodging Kimimaro and defending Gaara. Kimimaro was the one who engaged Gaara instead. The green Konoha-nin, though, quickly put… her… on the defensive with the speed of his attacks. Even as she began supplementing her own attacks with chakra scalpels.
"You wanted to kill this one before. I remember," she said at normal volume. Her, speaking to Gaara despite facing Rock Lee in battle. "What's changed since then? This one too boring for you now?"
"Gaara has a change of heart! Suna and Konoha are allies now—and friends do not harm friends!" Rock Lee responded for him, Gaara remaining silent.
"And did he not harm you?" she asked Rock Lee. In response, he wavered and that was all the response she needed.
In a judo-like motion, she used the momentum from her opponent's last punch to throw him. She jabbed her fist into the air, the water under her control becoming a jet stream aimed at him. A killing blow, a needle of water aimed for Lee's temple took shape.
Gaara* (approximate time: 11:35 AM)
—No! Gaara mentally exclaimed, a mental image of Katiya floating in his mind. A Sand Bullet—the same jutsu he used to take out attacking ANBU most recently—disrupted the path of her needle formed from water.
sAnD TsUNaMi—SaND TSuNAmi—SAND TSUNAMI—COME ON AND KILL—No!
"Katiya! You were a friend to me once before! Before I knew the meaning of the word, you were one of the few willing to save me from myself! Let me do the same for you! Please!"
"Please, you call yourselves friends and can't even address her by her proper name!" Kimimaro said from behind Gaara, mocking him.
"… He's right you know," she told Gaara herself now. Softly. Slowly. "I am not the same person as your 'Katiya' and who I am… compels me to emerge from my battles victorious…"
"But why?!" Gaara exclaimed. I understand—I understand now, you and Sasuke, Gaara told Naruto in his mind. "Why go all this way for Orochimaru when he's nothing more than a criminal?"
WoRtHLeSs, PaTheTiC—
Katiya's ally said something, answering why.
Her head bowed almost imperceptibly. Agreement. "Even if we die in battle… our existence… will live on in Lord Orochimaru's heart… forever!" Kimimaro had replied for them—PAWNS! Shukaku told him. So subsumed in someone else's ambition.
"... Orochimaru's brainwashed you well, you sad little pawns," he would end up saying.
Katiya* (time: un... )
She smiled to herself, at Gaara's last remark.
Kimimaro, angered apparently though, moved to attack. Thickets of bone spikes—the "brackens" of Kimimaro's "Bracken Dance" namesake—grew from the ground, spreading out in a radius from where Kimimaro was positioned. Many of them, more than two stories high.
"There's a chance that you could change"—but what's the point.
Sand floated past Katiya as Gaara elevated himself and Rock Lee using it. Kimimaro pulled himself out of the tallest mass of bone spike—having morphed his body through one to "teleport" to higher elevation where Gaara and Rock Lee were. She took a chakra-enhanced jump, hopping from the sides of angled bone spikes, grabbing onto the fastest growing one and hanging off of it. So subsumed in his lord's chakra, Kimimaro's sole desire was to die for his lord. And so she watched as he did, so happy in the fulfillment of his purpose.
What's the point?
All of his soft tissue would have had to temporarily become the bone in order for his ability to control it—to have "teleported" through his bone projection to higher elevation. But Kimimaro, with his disease, at that point lacked the ability to revert the soft tissue back. A bone drill poised for the kill—just beyond the outer reaches of Gaara's skin-contouring sand armor.
She narrowed her—jabbing—eyes, gathering her water back as Kimimaro died.
What's the point.
She punched the air, her water firing like a cannonball. Her water broke through the sand platform the Jinchuriki had been on, precariously above a bone death trap.
Gaara* (approximate time: 11:40 AM)
"Whoa—!" Rock Lee cried out.
Gaara—buRiaL—bUriAL—BUr—Gaara re-caught him midair. It had been a close call. He scanned the area.
"Gaara, what do we do now? There is no place to land—will you have enough chakra to keep this up?" Lee asked.
"If I need more sand, I can easily use the earth I stand on to make more."
"I will manage," Gaara replied. Intentionally… evenly. B-U-R-I-A-L! Gaara held up his arms in front of him, palm upwards, calling his sand in that direction. The ground began to rumble and the bone spikes of Kimimaro's last jutsu began to—become—BUriEd.
He watched as Katiya unfurled a scroll of water, still hanging from a bone "bracken". She molded it into an even longer pole for her to stand on, taller than the bone spikes around her. He stopped his jutsu after the sand he pulled up met his floating platform and buried the tallest bone bracken. Katiya meanwhile towered above the sand on her perch. Crouched on it like a bird of prey set to roost, silently observing. Gaara swallowed back the thick clotting sensation Shukaku put into his throat.
"The moment I land, the sand would bury me, wouldn't it," she said. Her voice didn't have the force of a yell and there was no telltale yowl or headache of Shukaku's that indicated there was a genjutsu at play. Yet despite the distance, her voice had carried to Gaara's ears. Via a NiNjuTsU, it must have been. A sOunD niNJuTsU. "I suppose I should be grateful I mind where I step," she said.
She leapt off her perch, forwards flipping, clearing the distance in a leap enhanced by chakra. A landing set to have her feet collide with his face. But before it could contact him, Gaara's automatic sand barrier—SMacK hER Aw—aside. Swept her aside. The water that had followed Katiya's hand from her perch whipped out behind her, attempting to hit him. HIT HER. hiT heR BACK—!
"HhffffttTt!" Gaara swung forwards with his sand—blocking and redirecting—attempting to grab Katiya instead. But where Gaara's sand tendrils reached, Katiya's water glanced and reflected—returning to aim at Gaara.
sTrAnGLE—Swirls—of sand and water.
It was just—HER—like all those years ago.
A serpentine stream of water, curling, whipping—a sand shield. sANd! Blocking, flicking it away. Three water spikes, consecutively from the ground. wE nEEd MoRE SaND! A smashing, smattering of sand, blocking. Water spears, from the front.
Swirls of sand and water, it was just like all those years ago. They began moving faster.
The sand that had gotten weighed out with water was sloughed off, Katiya's water spraying and splotting away. Whereas Gaara's movements were minimal, stiff and kept to his—CoMe ON!—chest, Katiya's became wilder, momentus swings from the hip and rapid—MovE FaStEr—FAsteR!—pivots. Gaara looked to Katiya's face at the shift in pace—her expression unreadable under the cloth and goggles.
—He was holding back to avoid hurting her—AbSoLUtELy PAtheTiC—JuST kiLL heR!—but he knew Katiya's chakra was waning—more severely and quicker than his own—she used to be the one holding back, to avoid hurting him, he knew—
KiLL hEr, kiLL heR, KILL HER!
—while each one of Katiya's blows appeared to be aimed to kill, with the blows' increased speed and severity, she was neglecting her own defense. YYYYrrraaaahhhhHHH! Her chakra bloomed enticingly now with the same… Claw-like. Pit-like. Void-like. Facsimile—iF yOU woN't hiT baCk—thEN juST leT mE tAke OVeR—of joy he felt before. The kind Shukaku gave him headaches over, he knew—LET mE—
"Isn't this fun?" she asked between blows. "You took such joy in this before."
—PLAY!—it was as close to the real thing she managed to get from her place of loneliness, the reason why she clung to it so fiercely. An item so cold it felt warm to those who touched it. A pain so deep it felt joyous to those who carved it. No, it's not joy, it's not joy—
(—Harming others before), Gaara felt her chakra projecting. "Glob dancing—" he heard his memory echoing. Gaara dodged an arcing talon of water and redirected it with a flourish of his sand. He reached out with his own chakra—It's not—
—It was never—But it was never—like this—before.
She seemed to have noticed—if not emotion endowed in his chakra as he battled her, then the hesitance he had in striking back. "What's wrong?" she asked. "I was thinking monsters like you live on the fight. I know you'd want to…"
SaNd… cOFFiN!
"Hfft—No!" Gaara yelled, doubling over and grabbing his stomach. He blocked her last water attack with a one-handed motion. He wasn't trying to pay attention to Shukaku—not the thoughts Shukaku would put into his head—or the chamber he'd be lured into—not at the moment—but he still felt Shukaku's presence. He wasn't trying to pay attention to it, but it was still there.
"I'm not that kind of person anymore!"
She tilted her head in a mockery of disbelief. "Shame," she said, not sounding at all shameful, "If one of us went out, in Oto, I'd have at least wanted their final moments to be enjoyable," she then told him.
"—Hhhffft—!" Gaara gasped as a blow came much too close to him. His sand barrier, reactive because he was ill-at-ease—flared. K—! Katiya was forced to withdraw back.
"No! It's not joy—it's not joy now—I know—I've learned—!" Gaara gasped out, apparently more anguished than Katiya herself. "It can't be joy if what you're sharing is suffering! All these—years—Katiya—you might have forgotten who you are but I haven't!" Gaara called out now, moving himself closer as he parted aside her water streams, attacks still raining down on him. Reaching, meanwhile. "I'm just going to have to show you!"
Nearing her, he wrapped his hand around her mask and pulled.
Katiya (time: un...)
Her eyes—searing—
She stumbled forwards. But only let out a breath in surprise. Not a yelp, not a gasp. Gaara reached to grab her hand, but she pivoted, stepping back. Gaara met her eyes. Burning. Blank. Her physical features of her face… all those years, though, unchanged. She staggered back. She shielded her eyes. Her eyes burned. The sun was too bright for her, she who wore her tinted goggles even underground. To hide her eyes, stop herself from seeing. Light. Pain. Too used to the darkness.
"Heuugh—!" Gaara breathed, Shukaku within him churning.
"What's wrong, little Jinchuriki?" she asked, her voice still in its methodical monotone despite her pain. Her eyes narrowed. Burning. She held her arms aloft for her water, and it quickly gathered back into her palms. "You said I was familiar to you, but why do you seem so shocked? You said I was familiar, but the shock in your body language says otherwise."
All those years, and she was still the same. There would be the sense that there was something unnatural to it all. That she should have aged, should have looked different—but it was all the same. Almost down to the last strand of hair, one could say.
Gaara narrowed his eyes, focusing on her carefully. No, not exactly the same. Not to him. Looking carefully, he could see there was something different in the way Katiya held her eyes. He could see. Having entered caverns once before. Shukaku's. She hadn't slept well for some time, the deprivation of it in her eyes though they were not marked with Gaara's unique black rings. A soft—chronic—pain-induced… tension. Even averting her eyes from the sun, they prickled and jabbed and burned, her eyes.
They were bloodshot, and she tried to blink the pain in them away.
"Gaara. My name is Gaara!" Gaara wheezed, not thinking to reply to the rest of her statement.
She shrugged, her arms wide. "So what? People—people are all the same... Who cares about what your name is?! They only interact with each other because they want something and what the hell would I want with you?!"
Her eyes were blown wide open, but still had that quiet blankness to them. "Then why, Katiya, why?" Gaara asked, gulping down… Trying to breathe evenly… He was trying. "He is using you, Katiya!" he called, referring to Orochimaru.
"You think I don't know that?" she asked rhetorically with an upward curl of the lips. "But what is that supposed to matter? People are all the same—! And only a fool walks in circles and expects it to lead someplace—it's why Kimimaro didn't mind dying for his lord's ever-reaching purpose—because what is death if not it's only escape!?" she asked joyously, joylessly.
Her eyes: one level weaker than her lord would have liked or she would have ripped them out for him personally. Her life: not valuable or she would have given it away just to escape it. Her questions: unanswered so she had come to her conclusions herself. It must have seemed so logical, to her. If every pathway led to looping roads so similar. For death to be a mercy.
Or was it that she was just too weak to do it? To do the deed herself?
"No!" Gaara exclaimed back, breathing heavily. "You can come back with me—you can come back!"
"And why would I want to do that?" she chuckled. "Lulled into safety, complacency, and then discarded before I know it. 'Friend'. You tried to kill me… I have plenty of 'friends' in Oto; what would I possibly want with you? Power? Knowledge…? Money?" she asked to see if the Jinchuriki would say yes to any of them.
He did not.
She smiled softly, getting the response she expected. "Lord Orochimaru, on the other hand, gave it to me. Gave it all to me." Some of us might remember the curse of the Sharingan, the prelude to the burning power of it. Pain. It was in her blood and she saw no reason or way to try to fight it. Was power not something to be loved? She closed her eyes and her voice became silky, caressing as if loving. "And I just decided… I never want to give it back…"
"With Lord Orochimaru, at least I know," she told him. "He'd never do anything unless it benefited himself—he never bothered with fake altruism. Because that's all it is from other people. In the end, all the same. You die all alone and everything… meaningless. People… they'll forever take and take and take unless they die…"
Tigers were solitary for survival. She opened her eyes.
An upwards jab of a chakra scalpel. "So die," she told him, ever so calmly.
Gaara* (approximate time: 11:50 AM)
Katiya (t—?)
Night, a moon glaring at him in the background—Rock Lee, who had withdrawn to a farther distance during the mudslinging—dove in front of Gaara, knocking him out of the way.
Yasha—Yashamaru—
An upwards jab of a chakra scalpel.
Boom.
tHiS iS wHAt yOu GEt—i ToLD YOu To—Gaara reached out with his sand at the same time an explosion—an explosion—? Lee winced as a red line was drawn over the back of his unitard.
"Now die!"
i TOLD yoU To kiLL hEr, KiLL heR, KILL HER, yoU LittLE—!
"Are you alright?" Rock Lee asked.
YYYYYrrrrrraaaahhhhHHH!!! Gaara grabbed his head with one hand and clawed with the other. The sand following—grasping. Katiya let out a bark of laughter. HHHAAAaa! HhhhaaAAAAH! HHhAah! Laughter—laughter—? ha-HA! The sand swaddled her, the sand in her vicinity beginning to sag, pulling her in. One can almost hear the echoes of another life path. "I will imprison you two hundred meters below the surface of the earth, imprisoned there until the end of—" sAnD CoFFiN, SaND COffiN—sHe BeTRaYED yoU, GAaRa.
Nothing had exploded—did it? SaND cOFFiN. sAnd CoffiN—SAND BuR—"The moment I land, the sand would bury me, wouldn't it," Katiya had said. Gaara flicked his eyes over to Lee, who was clutching his side to stop the bleeding. Nothing had exploded, did it.
Gaara tried to respond to Lee, "Y—" YYYrrrrraaaaHHH! The sand's grip tightened around—her—as Gaara fought with Shukaku.
Loneliness, you can only ever live… or die… with it, she would feel herself smile. She knew what the sand's crushing grip meant.
—sAnD BUriAL!
CoMe oN aNd KiLL HeR! It was what—coFFiN—it was what had happened before. Gaara breathed. No, no—Lee and I—sAnD cO—were enemies and still, he would defend me. It's true, she LeFt mE when she could not stay. Gaara's voice grew louder in his own mind. He loosened his grip. But I will not aBanDoN heR. I will not kill her! he told Shukaku in the chamber that was only in his mind. Firm, not strangling, he willed.
I will not kill her.
sHE TriEd tO kiLL YoU! tHaT ChAKrA ScaLPeL! eVeRYoNe'S tRiEd tO—Baki-sensei—a Blade of Wind Jutsu—chopping one of Ga—Shukaku's—limbs. cOMe On—Baki-sensei was a friend—a friend. He—Gaara—had thought they were enemies—but—"Friends do not harm friends!"
Nothing had exploded.
—Rock Lee. Baki. Naruto. He had harmed—but still—
"PeOpLE—! ThEY oNLy iNteRaCt wiTH eAcH oThER BeCauSe tHey WaNT SOmETHiNG! WaNT tO tAKe sOmEThiNg frOM yoU!"
Yashamaru, Rasa, Itachi… Lord Orochimaru… Kabuto…
ShE's goT A pOiNT!!
The sand swirled around Gaara's own body, as if the wind were to pick it up. He stretched his arm out, as if reaching—grasping—for a—Sand C—Katiya. She closed her eyes but the pain in them did not abate. It's alright, she would think. Her, without reason or way to try to fight it.
ANd yOU KnoW WHaT i WaNT?!?! I WANT—
Gaara closed his eyes.
—tO—
It was as if time slowed down
—kiLL—
He—Gaara—had harmed—but still—but still they had given him a chance—it couldn't be fake—he refused that it could be fake—as they helped him. Saved him. Because… he knew. That they had done it, knowing—
YYyRRrAAhhHHh!
—what it was like. To have gone through it themselves.
He. Gaara. Pushed aside—through?—Shukaku—as Shukaku writhed within him. Rock Lee, beside Gaara, startled at the swirling sands—the sand. "PeoPLe—! tHeY'LL FoReVEr TAke anD taKe And TAkE uNLesS tHEy diE!"
No! Gaara mentally exclaimed, pushing his sand away. Gathered around her with a familiar sort of pressure, the sand materialized itself. Not into a Sand Coffin, but into a person… whose grip was akin to one. There's others, Gaara thought to them. It's not fake because they know what it's like—
"That dark and lonely place."
She blinked—j-jab—in her only display of shock. Mentally locked up.
—I was like that before—but it's not the same. There are others—there are others. He clutched Katiya tightly, his gaze that same child-like innocence as it was all those years ago. The people who experienced pain and only wish to spread it… And the people who've experienced pain and want to make life so…
She had waved, and he had waved back. Years ago. The first day.
… so no one else has to go through the same.
Gaara remembered. The first day they met. Every day previous had been the same, the same, the same… But it hadn't been the same then. The look in her… eye. Katiya didn't look back at Gaara. Her eyes were not really seeing. Like a heartbeat, her eyes. Jabbing. Gaara remembered. He picked his hand up and… Lightly. Tapped. Her forehead with a finger. She blinked. She felt it. Her eyes throbbed. J-jab. J-jab. J-jab. A pulsating, a tugging. She turned to Gaara slowly.
"The only thing I ever wanted from anyone was companionship," he told her.
After everything, Katiya twitched. Her right arm. Upwards.
The same look of hope still there, in him. Cautious curiosity. Hers, back then. Hope. Though she was lost now. Her arm twitched. A hug. Gaara focused on his heart beat. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. He hugged her. And told himself to focus on his heart beat.
No, no… no, she thought to him.
YYYYrrraaaahhhhHHH! A spike of—anxiety—shot through Gaara's back.
It was in her blood… She bowed her head, as if ashamed, her right arm clawing into a fistful of cloth where she had been grasping Gaara's back. I killed—I killed—I've killed and will kill—
ShE WaNts tO kiLL yoU! Gaara felt his sand pick up and gather slightly into a form of a contouring sand shield. YoU HAVE to kiLL hEr! Shukaku yowled, sensing betrayal. But Gaara sensed regret. Killing intent for others did not feel that way. He knew, he knew. No, he told Shukaku, willing his sand not to kill.
"Only an idiot seeks the companionship of a murderer," she whispered to him. The sand picked up as she said that, wrapping itself around her hands. Trying to shield him. But he willed it not to push her away.
She clenched her other hand. He shook his head, hugging her tighter. What was a murderer to a monster? It was the same as him—with Shukaku—only for her, he knew she didn't have a Shukaku. It was just herself. But he knew that wouldn't have made the experience any better. He knew. And she. Had had the thought to stab him in the back. Gut him with a chakra scalpel. Kill him to run away.
He understood.
"The only thing I ever wanted from anyone was for them to be there with me as a friend even though I was born a monster," he replied, feeling a warm sensation over his chest. Ba-dum. Ba-dum. Ba-dum.
"It's the same, it's the same thing," she whispered as the sand shield flared again. "To use me as a 'companion' and discard me when I'm no longer useful."
It's what your father used me for, she thought to him.
iT's hoW eVerY JiNchUriKi iS usED, Gaara felt Shukaku scream to him.
"No… Companionship has to be shared in order to exist…" Gaara started. Talking to them both. "To have a companion, you have to be a companion… It isn't something that can be taken or stolen, and there's nothing foolish in sharing a resource that can't be expended."
"Katiya, you… were a friend to me once before…" Let me be the same for you…
Gaara sucked in a breath, "Those feelings can be shared. It's not called 'being used' when the relationship is mutual and nothing is discarded."
"But I made my choice already," she told him. To be a killer. "I can't go back," she whispered.
Gaara stretched an arm out to take Katiya's other hand—the left one that was pressed in the sand and clenched so tightly that its fingers must have turned grey. One couldn't help how they were born. Or the circumstances they had to live under. The past. He knew. He brushed off the sand covering it and pulled Katiya's fingers out one by one. Until he was able to hold her hand.
"Then we can learn to move forwards." Dust—from the floating grains of Gaara's automatic sand barrier still swirled about them—but focusing—it did not explode. "Let's go home, Katiya," Gaara told her.
There was a pause. Was there such a thing? As home? She felt as if the answer was—n—o—but would not be able to say—not finding the words to refute the Jinchuriki's.
"Sasuke," she would eventually remind him, head bowed, eyes averted. Fingers clenched tightly as if trying to impart her pain, still on the floor, her hand in his. He turned to the distance in the direction his mission-mate took off in.
Gaara tightened his own grip as if worried she'd disappear. "I have faith in Naruto," Gaara would eventually reply.