Sand Crossed (Naruto Fanfic)

Endings of War

The hot noon sun beat down on the heads of the three Anbu who lurked at the entrance of Suna, watching from the top of the building. A certain young man leaned against one of the walls, and continued to glare down at the group of people coming into Suna, while the other two continued to gossip. One of the men piped up, "Lord Rasa, you don't need to keep a continual watch on the refugees coming in. It's not as if any of them pose a threat."

The young man leaned forward, and his hands gripped the edge of the roof's railing. "It's not that simple. The people of Suna are antagonistic towards the refugees, and blame them for the loss of our farm lands on those returning. It doesn't help that many among the refugees have family ties to both villages."

"Lord Rasa, you really shouldn't think to hard about these things. If you do, you'll remember the real reason everyone is upset about loosing the war is because..."

"... A Shinobi from Konoha killed my brother and his wife, leaving my nephew an orphan, and then one of their own countered every single one of my mother's poisons. To add to the insult we have to withdraw from our farmlands for the time being all but a small population, thus cutting down on the production of food coming from this area. This isn't though the fault of the refugees. We're at peace now, and those with mixed blood ties are a product of another time of peace between our two villages."

"Seriously, Lord Rasa. You're not any fun anymore, since, well, the eldest son died."

Rasa turned his head to look at the man who was waving off his comments. "The Lord Kazekage has also charged us with making sure the refugees aren't mobbed as they come in, as well as making sure any medical needs are taken care of, as some of the refugees have been attacked by bandits. Suna has only one entrance, and..."

The other waved his hand. "You're missing the point. You're only like what, fourteen, and yet you're acting like an old geezer. This war went on for what, seven or eight years now, and you never saw battle like your brother did. Yet here you are..."

"Don't remind me." The young Anbu's hand's gripped the ledge tightly, but then pushed himself back when he heard angry muttering from below. His eyes caught sight of a group of refugees, and saw a few of those in the carts were injured. A woman with blond hair stood near the cart, but from where he was Rasa didn't have a good look at the person in question. He lifted his hand to motion for the others to move, and they followed him down to the ground.

From the corner of his eye, Rasa could see the people of Suna were upset, but for some reason none of the people acted upon their anger this time around. One of the older women leaned over to her friend. "What is one of the Legendary Sannin doing here? Particularly her?"

"She's here of all people? Why?" Rasa didn't say anything as he stepped forward, and watched as the injured were helped off the cart by other refugees.

...

"Wait, exactly when is this occurring?" Sarada pushed up her glasses again. "Why is Lady Tsunade involved in this story? I'm not quite understanding?"

"Does any of this really matter?" Metal Lee let out a sigh.

"I think Lady Tsunade being here makes the story more interesting." Inojin sat now straight up.

Baruto waved his hand. "Come on. Lady Tsunade is rather boring."

Ebizo let out a sigh. "Lady Tsunade's achievements are nothing to sneeze about."

"She retired because she was old."

"Did she?" The old man scratched the top of his head.

"That's what everyone says. She retired, and she wasn't yet in her sixties."

"I thought she retired so she could focus on teaching medical ninjitsu?" Shikadai folded his arms behind his head. "Seriously though, I can't blame her retiring while she can still enjoy napping under the sun, and watching the clouds go by."

"Exactly! My sister and I, Lady Chiyo would spend our time fishing, and yet my sister was still able to fight quite well."

"I also recollect she enjoyed playing dead on you." Gaara piped up. "Or was Baki mistaken?"

Ebizo's mouth opened, and his finger pointed into the air. For a moment the story teller remained sitting there in silence. A hand went to the back of his head. "Don't remind me. I honestly nearly had a heart attack every single time she did that. Anyways, Tsunade plays a very important role in this story, and I also doubt that you will be saying that she is boring by the time I'm done. Lady Chiyo as well. Myself, well, am I boring you now?"

"Of course not! This story is awesome!" Chocho munched on her snack, scattering crumbs everywhere.

"Ehh," Sarada let out a sigh. "Well, I wouldn't say that your story is boring. I'm rather disappointed though that you haven't gotten to the romance. I mean, you read a romance, and you expect the romance to occur like, sooner."

"Yeah, sooner!" The young Shinobi of the Akimichi clan quickly piped up. "But still awesome! More romance!"

Ebizo's mouth twitched, but the Kazekage spoke up. "I'm not quite understanding why you think a good romance needs to happen quickly. If you read the Icha Icha series..."

"Gaara!" Kankuro interrupted his younger brother by hitting him lightly on the head with the side of his hand, before quickly pulling him into an arm hold which allowed him to cover the young Kazekage's mouth. Shikadai's eyes widened as his cheeks suddenly flushed up. "Seriously, that series is not appropriate for kids." The puppet ninja quickly waved his hands at the kid. "Please ignore what the Lord Kazekage just said. He's rather naive about this subject. Still..."

Baruto folded his arms across his chest. "My father says the series is boring, as there isn't enough sex."

Shikadai though turned to look at his two uncles. "Please tell me Uncle Gaara's actually not read those books, Uncle Kankuro. Please?"

Kankuro felt his mouth suddenly twitch. "Oh, he read them, and he still hasn't got a clue."

A chuckle escaped Baruto's mouth, as Gaara pushed Kankuro's arm down. "The Kazekage's read porn novels."

"I suggest not calling that series porn in front of a female whose read the series." The Kazekage finished pushing Kankuro's arm away.

"Gaara, you're embarrassing our nephew. You need to apologize, even though I know you've not an idea what you've done wrong." Kankuro pushed on the back of the Kazekage's head so he was made to bow, and bowed himself.

Gaara blinked a couple of times. "Apologies Shikadai."

"I can't believe your uncle is that naive." Sarada said so that only Shikadai could hear.

Baruto chuckled. "You're never going to hear the end of this, you know."

The young Uchiha quickly turned to Ebizo. "Look, when is the romance going to begin?"

"You know, it was actually going to start really soon, but you had to interrupt."