Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Saving the Hopeless ❯ Chapter 1

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
Saving the Hopeless
Author: Dagger Stiletto
Pairing: GaaraxNaruto
Warnings: The entire thing is OOC; angst, abuse, yaoi, language, fluff, still deciding whether there will be any smut
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto nor any of the characters mentioned except for the random thugs I decided to put in there. This is why it’s called a fanfiction.

Saving the Hopeless
~*~Age 4~*~
They were visiting the neighboring village, which they had just made an alliance with. Their father had told them to go explore as long as they had an ANBU present with them. Temari went Towards the shops with her ANBU while Kankuro headed for the arcades. Gaara held the hand on his uncle and wandered wherever his feet took him.

After half-an-hour of aimless sightseeing, Gaara’s inner entity, Shukaku the Tanuki Bijuu, started directing him on a totally different path. Yashimaru, his uncle, became alert with the new direction and kept a careful eye on the chibi redhead was taking him.

Eventually, they came to the top of a hill, where the Tanuki quieted. The hilled overlooked most of the village below. The sky was turning orange and red with a sunset. At the very top of the hill stood a lone tree; hanging from the sturdiest branch was a handmade swing made of two ropes identical in length and a board that was six inches wide and two feet wide.

What really caught the redhead’s attention was the blonde boy sitting on the swing, head bowed and the toes of his bared, scabbed feet dangling half a foot off the ground.

“Who is that, ojisan?” Gaara asked in his quiet voice.

“I don’t know, chibi, why don’t you ask him?” Yashimaru suggested. He released the redhead’s hand and patted his head encouragingly.

Gaara hesitantly stepped forward and moved to stand in front of the blonde, who appeared to be around his own age. “My name’s Gaara,” he said softly, hoping that the blonde wouldn’t disregard him. “What’s your name?”

The blonde looked up. His face was grubby with dirt and tear tracks, hair tangled, strikingly blue eyes wide in astonishment. As if in a trance, he reached a skinny finger out to touch Gaara’s cheekbone. Gaara blinked in surprise but did not move away. The boy opened his mouth to speak

“Naruto! You filthy, disgusting fiend, get away from Gaara-kun before you corrupt him!” An angry villager came charging over and jerked Gaara away from the startled blonde.

Naruto screamed as the villager picked him up and threw his tiny body into the trunk of the tree. He proceeded to kick the boy into oblivion while he lay brokenly on the ground.

“Ojisan, make his stop!” Gaara begged, sobbing uncontrollably at the sight of the inexplicable cruelty befalling the blonde chibi.

Instantly, Yashimaru knocked the man out with a brutal blow to the head. He contemptuously kicked the body aside and crouched down in front of the blonde boy. When he tried to touch the boy, he jumped up and ran past both of them, fleeing in a pained, broken run. Gaara watched him go sadly as his uncle wiped his tearstained face.

“At least we know his name, chibi,” the man murmured.

“Naruto,” Gaara and Shukaku said in unison.

~*~Age 10~*~
His family had decided to go to the October festival in Konoha. Gaara only hoped he would see the blonde again. Even though they had visited several times after that first time, he had not seen even a glimpse of that blonde. Shukaku tried many times to lead him in the right direction, but he never had enough time to succeed.

Although his sister and brother were enjoying themselves immensely, he found no interest in the overly loud festivities. He was an outcast due to the bijuu in his being, as well as the dark rings around his eyes, lack of body hairincluding eyebrowsthe love kanji branded into his left temple, and his ability to manipulate the sand that resided in his gourd. And as an outcast, as well as the fact that Shukaku continued to get more and more irritated, he stayed outside the crowd.

A flash above him in the corner of his right eye caught his attention. He turned his eerie turquoise eyes up. His heart leapt when he saw the blonde from five years ago crouching at the peak of a house’s roof. Elated, he made his way across the overcrowded street to leap to the roof, landing beside the blonde.

Naruto was small even fro his age, skinny from malnutrition, and dirty from more than likely living on the streets. His hair in horrid tangles halfway down his back. The sapphire eyes were wild and haunted, depressed as they watched the festivities below. He shivered in the cold air, the threadbare, garishly orange jumpsuit clothing him doing nothing to protect him against the chill.

The aforementioned blue eyes turned slowly to gaze at the redhead.

“Konnichiwa, Naruto-kun,” Gaara said quietly. “Do you remember me?”

Blue eyes stared unblinkingly before the blonde head dipped once in affirmation.

“Do you remember my name?” the redhead pressed.

“Gaara,” came the quiet reply.

A rare smile split across the redhead’s face. “Why do you not join the festivities?”

Naruto involuntarily cringed, confusing Gaara. “They are celebrating the sealing of Kyuubi,” he murmured softly. His voice was pained, eyes tormented.

“Who is Kyuubi?”

“The nine-tailed fox demon that once terrorized their village….but they forget exactly why she did so.” A delicate hand came up to clutch at his heart, as if it distressed him.

“Their hunters killed her kits….all five of them…. And they skinned her mate for his pelt….” His tortured eyes rose to look at Gaara, imploring him to believe and understand him when no one even took the time to listen to him.

Gaara reached out and gently touched his shoulder, trying to comfort a deep agony he knew he could never touch. Shukaku growled angrily in response to what they’d been told.

Naruto’s eyes widened in shock, coming up to gaze straight into turquoise. He mouthed the word bijuu and touched Gaara over his heart with two, trembling fingertips. “You have bijuu, too?” he inquired breathlessly.

Gaara nodded. “He is Shukaku the Tanuki.”

“Why was he sealed?”

“He was too dangerous. He had lost sanity due to an unexplained phenomenon. He killed anything and everything for no reason.”

“Why you?”

“Because I am the Kazekage’s son and deemed the most powerful of our village, even at my age.” For some reason, the usually quiet and antisocial redhead found to hardship in speaking with the blonde jinchuuriki before him.

“Is he still….unstable?”

“No. It seems that being within the mind and body of a child has balanced out his synapses and mentality so that he no longer craves bloodshed and the taking of lives, though he is temperamental at times.”

Naruto frowned. “You do not speak like a child.”

“That is Shukaku’s fault,” Gaara replied with humor.

Suddenly, Naruto sprang to his feet. “I must go, Gaara-san,” he uttered hastily. “They have realized my presence.” And in the next few moments, he was gone.

~*~Age 13~*~
“Oh, lookanother jinchuuriki freak,” said a large, cruel looking boy. His buddies, eight strong, jeered in agreement as they surrounded Gaara.

He’s strayed from his teammateshis siblings and a boy named Rock Leeduring a mission in Mist. It seemed that the people here didn’t exactly appreciate those who contained demons. Somehow these same boys had managed to divest him on his sand, and the collar around his throat kept him from using anything but taijutsu, which he was not very skilled in yet.

Shukaku, needless to say, wasn’t very pleased with the situation, practically tearing at the insides of his consciousness to get out and attack.

“Why should we do with him, Hoss?” asked one of the boys.

Hoss, the leader, sneered. “Beat ’im till he’s dead.”

“Oh really?” a mysterious voice came out of nowhere, startling everyone there. “We’ll see how that works out for ya.”

“Who the hell?” Because he could finish, a blur of black, blue, and silver dropped down from the sky, brutally coming down on the largest of the boys, feet balancing on wide shoulders.

Gaara watched wide-eyed astonishment as the impact of the hit made the victim drop. The figure was dressed in black and blue ninja attired, the silver actually glints of kunai and shuriken strapped to him in strategic areas, a black mask covering the entire face except the stunning blue eyes. Before the body slumped completely, he’d leaped gracefully to a different head, kicking hard at the boy beside it before dropping to the ground. He fought gracefully and swiftly, not giving the others much time to react. He laughed delightfully when the last three actually put up a fight, but they all went down in less than four minutes.

Then the masked shinobi whirled to face Gaara, who stared in admiration. He leaned forward, close to the redhead’s face. He tore the mask off abruptly, giving a flash of gold, short, spiky hair before soft lips pressed daintily on stunned pale ones. Naruto gave a laugh, bouncing back. Grinning brightly, he winked saucily, giving the impression of an imp.

Finally, while Gaara remained breathless and flabbergasted, the blonde pulled his mask on, concealing his face and hair once more. “See ya around, Gaara,” he chimed, and with that, he was gone.

~*~Age 16~*~
“Welcome, Kazekage-sama,” Tsunade, the new Hokage of Konoha of three years, greeted Gaara. “To what do we owe the pleasure of such an unexpected visit?”

“I would like to visit with Naruto,” Gaara replied.

“Oh? Is there a special reason?”

“I wish to propose that he come to Suna with me,” he answered bluntly.

“Is there a particular reason why you wish to do so?”

“I am displeased with the way this village has treated him….” He paused and gained all his composure. “I would also like to ask him to be my mate.”

Tsunade’s hazel eyes widened comically. “Well, um, uh…. Who mates anymore?”

“Not many. Jinchuuriki, however, find the need to mate almost irresistible, especially with bijuu as strong as Shukaku and Kyuubi. It would seem that Shukaku has involuntarily mated with the Kitsune.”

Tsunade was quiet. Then she sighed. “We had to lock Naruto up.”

Gaara’s eyes went wide and angry. “What!!

“He was forced to kill a former teammate, and his mind has deteriorated henceforth. I had no choice but to have him detained and contained. Once he has calmed and regained the ability to understand human language, you may be permitted to see him. Until that time, no one but I is permitted in his sell. I am terribly sorry.”

~*~One Year Later~*~
Gaara rushed to Naruto’s cell, heart pounding so loud that he was sure that the ANBU standing at the door could hear him. He cared not. All that mattered was that he see the young blonde he and Shukaku had ached for. Four days ago, he had received a letter stating Naruto’s breakthrough and that said blonde had asked to see the red-haired jinchuuriki.

He burst through the door without preamble and without finesse he usually conveyed in every little thing he did. He saw the blonde sprawled out in the bed, skinny and scarred with dark rings under his cloudy gaze. He was dressed in white, threadbare clothed that didn’t suit him at all. There was a chakra suppressor around his throat, connected to a chain that restrained him so he was unable to leave the bed.

Shukaku roared at the way Naruot and Kyuubi had been treated.

Naruto’s eyes turned to Gaara, and then a small smile spread over his tired face. “Ohayo, Gaara-san,” the blonde murmured softly. “It’s about time I got to see you. Tsunade said that you wanted to discuss something with me at the beginning of this little….tryst.”

Gaara nodded and came over to sit close. He touched the blonde’s hand, and their fingers unconsciously curled around each other. “Yes…. I did. I wanted to ask if you would like to come home with me to Suna.”

Naruto’s delicate brows furrowed slightly. “Why…?”

“Because I don’t like the way you’re treated here…. I don’t like the way you were forced to grow, and I don’t like that you’re constantly forced to endure torture you should be protected from. You are a good ninja, but to me, it seems that you don’t enjoy hurting others. If you were to come with me, you wouldn’t have to worry about it. You could do whatever you wanted to….” Gaara paused and swallowed hard, increasing his hold on Naruto’s. “I also want you to be my mate.”

Naruto’s eyes widened in disbelief. He touched the redhead over the heart, and Shukaku cooed and purred happily, sending the message to the Kyuubi inside the blonde. Naruto then smiled and nodded. He sat up and pressed his lips to Gaara, much like he had in Mist, but this time, Gaara pressed back, returning the kiss. The kiss was synchronizedboth of them knew what the other wanted. Their tongues met outside their mouths, licking and twisting in midair before Naruto brought Gaara’s inside his mouth, telling Gaara that he was content with being uke.

Over the next few weeks, Gaara overlooked the care that Naruto received, making sure he had proper clothes to wear, comfortable surroundings, and healthy food. He made sure that he was given the best of accommodations, and he watched happily as he filled out in all the right places. After three weeks of that constant caremuch to the villagers’ displeasureGaara took Naruto back to Suna with him without much difficulty or protestations from the Hokage.

They were married a month after their return to the Sand Village. Seven months after, due to the different biochemical qualities having a female bijuu inside a male body did to Naruto’s body, Naruto gave birth to triplets. The eldest, by half an hour, was a little boy named Seiji with red hair and blue eyes and whisker marks. The middle, younger by ten minutes and older by nineteen, was another boy named Minato with blonde hair, turquoise eyes, and a naturally darker skin tone. The last was a little girl they called Naruko, who had red, curly hair, a black love kanji on her forehead, and green eyes.

~*~The End~*~

Dagger: Retarded and stupid and weak, and I really think I could’ve done better. Review and flame all you want.