Team 8

Chapter 18: A Dangerous Pursuit

Temari set as hard a pace as she could manage with Gaara as they tried to slip out of Konoha as quickly as possible. Just thinking about needing to slow down for Gaara had her suppressing hysterical laughter.

She'd never had what you could call a normal family life. Her father treated his children like his personal soldiers: lives to be expended furthering his ambitions. Just thinking about her mother's fate drove that point home. Neither of her brothers were anything close to normal, but it said a lot that she had a closer relationship to the one that wore more makeup than she did.

Her relationship with Gaara was normally built around fear. Fear of his anger. Fear of inciting his automatic defense to lash out. Fear of being hurt. Her first memory of him was that of a cute baby with strange eyes, but it wasn't until Gaara had killed her uncle that she really understood. The demon inside her brother ruled his existence. Only her loyalty as a Suna Kunoichi prevented her from actively hating her father for what he'd ordered Chiyo-sama to do to her brother - as well as to her mother.

But that fear had also brought with it a sense of confidence. Sabaku no Gaara was simply unstoppable. In every mission that her team had performed, he'd never even been scratched. As long as she and Kankuro stayed on Gaara's good side, they shared in that strength. With Gaara on their team, they were unbeatable.

Until Konoha.

The first sign came during the second exam, with the manhandling they'd received from a small horde of fearless clones that overran their ambush as they waited for unsuspecting genin near the tower. There were so many, and they came so fast that the blond one actually got his hands on Gaara before his sand lashed out and destroyed them all. She never thought she'd see anyone run their knuckles across his scalp like that. Even if he couldn't feel it through his Armor of Sand, the concept was simply ludicrous.

But it was more like a glimpse of things to come.

Her match had gone about as well as could be expected. She hadn't had to display any abilities someone couldn't guess from just seeing her battle-fan. Kankuro being the odd man out and not having to fight was just a stroke of luck.

Gaara's fight was actually the hardest. That weird kid in the green stretchy suit was incredibly fast, and for a while there Gaara hadn't been able to touch him. But eventually the kid had gotten winded and his sensei stopped the match before Gaara could kill him. That only made her brother angrier.

She hadn't paid too much attention to the kid whose clone had gone after Gaara outside. He did score the quickest victory in the preliminary matches. But at first, she'd just thought his opponent had been overrated or hurt. Now she wondered if her twinge of fear hadn't been caused by Gaara's lingering frustration.

She was almost looking forward to Gaara's first match in the finals, hoping a little bloodshed would calm him down before they needed to use his other half. It wasn't like it really mattered how many he killed – they'd just as likely die in the attack anyway. She was not going to question the Kazekage's decision to turn on Konoha, and calming Gaara down was something she considered a very good cause.

What she hadn't expected to see was her youngest brother getting beaten like an unwanted stepchild.

This Uzumaki kid had obviously done his homework during the preceding month. He'd handled that Hyuuga like he was nothing, and left him bleeding in the dirt. But she didn't expect to see someone ever fight Gaara so effectively. His attacks tied up most of Gaara's sand, making his automatic defense less and less effective. That swamp summoning jutsu had to have been jonin level, and, with all of the clones he had created, she wondered if he was a ringer inserted into the test to take Gaara out. Had Konoha ferreted out their treacherous alliance with Otogakure?