[Log] Old Habits Die Hard [Backdated] [1/3]
Characters: Kankuro, Anko, and Gaara
Date: Thursday, February 21st
Location: Anko's apartment in Celo
Rating: PG-15 (YES, "15")
Warnings/Notes: Language, Violence, Blood
Summary: Anko and Kankuro get an unexpected visitor, and the Sabaku brothers reunite.
[OOC: Okay, since the explanation log isn't up yet, I'm just going to go ahead and give you a quick detailed description of Gaara's condition at the moment. His left hand is broken ((I'm thinking something along the lines of, maybe a couple of days before showing up at Anko's - while he was still in the whole 'spiraling into madness' state -, a couple of Arma or Arceos found him. They had been looking for him before, so this explains their hostility now. Like a cornered animal, he decided to flee, but not before one of the officers managed to get a handcuff around his left hand. When this happened, the man jerked Gaara towards him, battering-thing in hand, bent on knocking Gaara unconscious. Gaara moved out of the way just in time, but his hand was caught in the crossfire, and was... well... broken from the impact.))
He has a nasty bruise all along the right side of his body - spreading from upper thigh to the top part of his ribcage. ((A hard fall.)) There's an old knife wound cut from the top part of his right thigh, to about the middle of his chest (This was from back in August.). For the most past, he's just really bloody, and really bruised. He's extremely thin now, and sickly looking. Malnourished, and all that. And he'll probably be prone to throwing up a lot ((Nasty, yes. XD )), because... well, long story short, he tried to starve himself, but his own survival instincts wouldn't let him do it, so he ended up attacking rats and eating them raw.... So he'll have all these gross bacteria and viruses floating around his system thanks to the sickly rats... Yeah... ((Gaara is sooo going to jump out of DC and bitch-slap me. XD ))
Umm, other thing is he'll be much more mentally unstable than usual. And I'm thinking soon after the romp with Anko, he'll pass out from the strain on his body, and fall into some kind of fever or something (So he'll mumble stuff in his sleep. XD ).
Okay, wow that was long. Onto the log! ]
Damn, that stung. Gaara fished inside his pants pocket for the nearly-forgotten apartment key, his hand pressing clumsily against the bruised and battered skin of his upper thigh. He coughed, specks of blood staining the door he leaned his forehead on, mocking his weakness when he gathered enough strength to open his eyes. He might have clenched his free hand into a fist, had it not been broken. As it were, he settled for grinding his teeth together, forcing the irritated growl in the back of his throat from escaping his lips.
He was running on pure, bloody instincts now, his mind too worn to piece together a coherent thought, let alone argue against returning to the one place he had been trying to avoid for months. Anko. Though he cringed at the thought of anchoring himself down to such a bond once again, his mind kept chanting the same words over and over in his head: Safe, safe, safe.
The red-head pushed the key into the lock, wincing when the only thing supporting his body - the door - creaked open, unheeding of the man leaning falteringly on it. It was dark inside - most people didn't stay up to such ungodly hours as these -, but Gaara knew the layout of her apartment like the back of his hand. He could navigate these rooms with his eyes clos-
His hand flew out, clinging to the doorway of her kitchen, as he stumbled across a pair of discarded pants. A low hiss escaped his throat at the sudden, jolting movement, and he glared down at the offending pants as if his gaze could burn a hole through them. He paused a few more moments before stepping through the threshold and into the violet-eyed woman's kitchen.
He needed something to drink, and if Anko was anything like he remembered, she would definitely have something very strong - and very alcoholic -, in here somewhere.
The difference between night time in Cena and night time in Celo, was really quite drastic, especially once you had reacquainted yourself with the constant noise that never quieted, regardless of the hour.
The quiet was almost reminiscent of those early nights back in Ceno honestly, the somber silence a mixed creation of those trying to re-create what was forever lost to them whether by choice or deed and those who crept around trying to stay away from the watchful eye of their government.
Either way it was difficult for Anko to try and relax after her mind had gotten used to the soothing sounds of chaos. Sleeping was of course out of the question but she could at least normally manage to relax and just exist there in Kankurou's arms. Lying there listening to the occasional mumble that filter out of whatever dreams he was experiencing, gently tracing a finger over his features as she committed them to her memory, the fine lines of his lips, the now-smoothed scowl lines that were non-existent in this peaceful state, the sleep-mussed hair she would toy with around her finger. Perhaps if Kankurou knew how she amused herself while he gave into his body's demands, he wouldn't have been so adamant about her staying there whether she managed to sleep or not after he caught her on her last little midnight stroll.
The first noise that reached her ears, much like the faint sound of a door creaking had Anko assuming it was just her mind playing tricks on her, creating noise just for the sake of noise to break up the silence.
The second more distinct noise of someone moving around in her apartment had Anko's heart slamming in her chest as she silently slid out from Kankurou's tight hold, cursing herself all the while for not reacting on instinct with the first supposed noise. Quickly tugging on Kankurou's shirt to cover her nudity, Anko snatched out the knife hidden underneath the edge of the mattress before stalking silently out into the living room. Her eyes could easily make out a single form, also noting that the front door had been re-sealed, signifying that this intruder wasn't expecting company.
Easy enough.
And here she'd been hoping for a challenge at least for her troubles.
Gently sitting the knife on the arm of her chair, Anko stealthily made her way closer to where the intruder stood. Mentally calculating the taller height and the body's build, Anko launched herself at the intruder.
Had Gaara been in full control of his facilities, he might have heard the faint sound of shuffling coming from the other room. Had his mind been fully functional, he would have realized that Anko had always been a seasoned fighter, and his sudden appearance after such a long absence would be less than opportune.
As it were, the red-head was having enough trouble finding a bottle of booze, his body aching in protest with every unnecessary movement he made.
That's why, when a heavy weight knocked into him from behind, instead of being tensed and ready for the impact, Gaara was thrown unceremoniously onto the hard kitchen floor.
His mind froze in shock - the pain of his bruised right side landing fully against solid linoleum overrode his senses -, but his body moved from natural instinct. These attacks had become almost familiar to him now - one couldn't live with Anko for several weeks without coming out unscathed in some form or fashion -, and so he seemed to move by kinetic memory, his mind blocking out the pain for now. As soon as she was settled above him, Gaara twisted his body towards the left. He remembered how she always seemed to favor her right side, and this little quirk was quite a disadvantage when trying to hold someone down. In a split second he had reversed their positions - Gaara on top, his knees straddling her waist, his right forearm pushing down against her chest for extra leverage.
He didn't stop long enough to think of saying something; didn't have enough mental capacity at the moment to string together a coherent sentence that might get her to stop. He could feel the strain of such quick movements already taking their toll on his tired body. His mind was slowly beginning to unfreeze, and every nerve ending within him screamed in protest, making the red-head wince.
For a moment Anko cursed the fact she had been affected by a sudden fit of decency. The hindering excess fabric only made it harder for her to try to squirm away from the sudden pin she found herself in, the familiar movements prickling something in her memory but nothing immediately jumped out at her as she was running on sheer instinct to defend her territory. The ripe smell of blood, both fresh and aged, hit her nose, alerting her to the fact that this intruder was injured and gave her one more point in her favor. One hand firmly gripped onto the wrist at her shoulder, the other haltingly felt out the dampness of fresh blood or the stiffened cloth of the dried, finally settling on a point near the intruder's right hip. Fingernails digging harshly into the older wound, Anko waited for the sudden redistribution of the other person's hold, the pressure from her chest gone as the person above her tried to dislodge her grip on his thigh. Taking advantage of the moment, Anko snapped her hips to the side, rolling them over once again but this time she released him and she kept moving with the momentum, rolling once more so that she could twist herself into a crouch a little distance away, wiping away the blood that her nails had redrawn on Kankurou's shirt without a thought, waiting to see what this person's next move would be.
Unfortunately, patience was never one of Anko's virtues. Her positioning made it easy for her to shove off the floor to tackle the person once again, one hand going for the throat, her other hand again going for the one place she was sure would pull a reaction, nails digging into his precious man-bits threateningly.
"Give me one damned reason why I shouldn't kill you right now..." she hissed, finally focusing in on his face in an attempt to make out the person's features.
There were nights where he slept like a dead person, sometimes even bordering to that point when he exhausted most of his own body's resources of energy. But after the night where he discovered Anko roaming the streets of Cena and killing people, the butt of many jokes of turning "psycho" that he would throw at her nowadays, completely turned him into a lighter sleeper. Or rather, he tried to be one.
Which made it all the more ironic when the urge to heed nature's call (damned coffee) finally woke him up, his own senses completely ignorant of anything else that was going on in the apartment at that time. The lack of a shirt and Anko next to him didn't even register in his mind (and he wondered why it was she was that skilled in slipping out during the nights unnoticed) as he rolled out of the bed and felt his way out of the room to go to the bathroom in the hallway.
He hadn't expected her to claw at his already injured thigh, but then again, he hadn't expected her to jump him, either. The pain of her fingernails digging into already aching skin was pure agony, and he released her without a second thought. By the time his mind was clear enough to once again register his surroundings, Gaara had turned around just enough to face Anko. Before he could register the position of her body and the tenseness of her muscles, she launched at him again, pinning him to the ground with relative ease. He could smell the blood - his blood - staining her shirt, could feel her lithe strength focusing on keeping him down, could-
When her hand slid between his legs and clutched at a very sensitive place, he froze.
Coherent thought fought with all its might to surface from the foggy haze his mind was currently in. He was in so much pain already, and adding this to the tally seemed almost superfluous. Her angry hiss went unheard, the only thing going through his head was escape. Leaning back until he was flush against the floor, Gaara paused for a moment - took a deep, laborious breath -, then surged forward, slamming his head into Anko's with all of his might.
Anko made the mistake of leaning closer in an attempt to hear whatever whispered response could be managed through her grip on the intruder's throat when suddenly sparks exploded in front of her eyes, a sharp throbbing pain following close behind from the surprise impact, the force of the headbutt nearly unseating her completely. Instinctively her hands reacted, tightening their hold in an attempt to hold on to her position, but the sudden adrenaline rush left her lightheaded as well and she released her grip to roll off to the side, hands protectively covering her face with an agonized groan.
Mother fucker but that hurt...
Damn, that hurt. Gaara released a shaky, painful groan, twisting to his uninjured side and bringing his right hand up to rub at his throat. There would definitely be bruises come morning... on both accounts. Clenching his eyes closed, he ground his teeth together and tried to force down the urge to black out.
"Fuck," he growled out weakly, the rasp in his voice reminding him all the more of that drink he never quite got to.
The tripping of his feet over a stray power cord and the sound of a voice in the dark made Kankurou freeze for a brief second before stumbling into a wall, invoking a sharp hiss of pain from his part. Only now did his mind start to realize that his chest was bare and that there was the absence of warmth at his side when he woke up, making him straighten up, a hand holding his head. Braving the dark, he moved through the hallway that led to the other rooms, the direction where the sound had came from.
Smashing into another wall, Kankurou cursed again, louder this time as his hand blindly searched for the light switch on the wall. He finally found the switch and flicked it upwards, turning on all the lights in the room that the hallway led out to.
"Fuckin' brigh'," he muttered to himself as his arms shielded his eyes for the moment, but failed to block out the fight that had taken place in the same room, making Kankurou freeze again and rub his eyes furiously.
There was Anko on the floor, with her face in her hands and then there was a stranger--a guy by the looks of the more angular body--which made Kankurou immediately forget the blinding pain his eyes suffered as his arms fell down by his side; his legs immediately carrying him towards Anko, kneeling down next to her with a face full of surprise and a mouth filled with unpleasantries galore.
"Anko, wha' th' fuck happened?" He demanded, his hands still by his side as he quickly looked all over her for any injuries, the blood on the shirt she wore having set off every alarm in his mind.
The violent bursts of light from the impact had only begun to subside when another blinding light flooded what her fingers couldn't shield. Bleary violet eyes slowly blinked open, waiting for her vision to clear up and the blurry haze to dissipate before she even wanted to think about moving again, somehow sensing the other body a few away to be in a similar state and knowing there was no rush to.
A dark blur suddenly blocked the the glaring light of the over-head kitchen bulb and Anko slowly focused in on worried green eyes. Feeling the slickness of her split lip beneath her palm, Anko groaned again, curling in towards where Kankurou knelt, feeling like such an idiot for being caught off guard like that.
She should have brought the damned knife with her and just shanked the bastard from the get go.
"Fuckin' bastar'...heard noises an' got up t'check," she mumbled, bracing herself with one hand on Kankurou's knee so that she could manage to sit herself up. Blinking furiously against the lingering splotches to her vision, Anko testily swiped at her busted lip and bleeding nose, scowling at the red staining her hand before wiping it on Kankurou's shirt, staining it further. She had opened her mouth to continue her story when she finally caught a good glimpse of the 'intruder' and the words died in her throat.
He was a great deal thinner then she had last remembered, but now in the yellowed light of the kitchen the matted red hair and pale skin were unmistakable.
"Holy fuck...Gaara?"
He was still trying to force away the nausea rising to the surface when the glaringly bright kitchen lights flickered on. The pain which split his skull was sharp and precise, like someone had taken a knife to his brain and jabbed at the vital organ. Cringing at this new brightness, Gaara regulated his breathing by taking deep breaths through the nose, so focused on this task that he barely heard the words of an oddly familiar voice ring through his head. The sound of his name made his eyes snap back open, and he found himself staring straight into the shocked face of his former roommate.
A sharp rebuke was on his tongue - It sure as hell took you long enough to figure that one out -, when his eyes flickered upward and caused all breath to leave his lungs.
Kankuro.
He stared for a moment, eyes roving along the contours of his brother's form, drinking in the features - so like their father's -, the sleep-moused hair, the worried look that was directed towards Anko.
He stared for a moment more, his eyes wide - frightened, almost, like an animal trapped -, unable to understand what he was seeing, believing it to be a hallucination - he had hit his head too hard, for sure -, yet wholly unready to tear his shocked gaze away from the other.
Kankuro.
The brother he had always despised, the one who had been just as afraid of him as Temari, and their father, and everyone else he came in contact with. The person who despised Gaara for what he was - who saw nothing but the monster inside, the demon who's rage was often released in unchecked fury. The sibling who he hadn't seen since his banishment to Cena five years ago. The one who shouldn't be alive; who he hated, and who hated him.
The red-head blinked, trying to rid himself of this mirage. He had just managed to claw himself out of that dark pit of insanity he had fallen in not too long ago. It wasn't unreasonable that he would still be seeing things, right? His chest burned, and it took him a moment to realize he had stopped breathing. Gaara opened his mouth, sucking as much air inside his diaphragm as he could manage in one, half-strangled gasp. This wasn't real, he kept telling himself over and over again. Kankuro wasn't there, sitting in front of him, hovering over Anko in an oddly protective manner. Kankuro wasn't staring at the red-head like he was just as shocked to see Gaara, as Gaara was to see him. Kankuro wasn't-
Gaara reached out his hand, inching slowly, hesitantly, across the cold linoleum floor, bringing it closer and closer towards the hem of Kankuro's pants. The red-head let his gaze drop, staring at his hand like it was some foreign appendage moving of its own free will. His fingers were stretched out, straining towards the source of his mental struggle, faltering, yet so very determined...
There. A light touch. A single brush of skin against fabric.
But it was real. And it was tangible.
Drawing his hand away as if he had been burned, Gaara propped up on his good side, leaned his head against the floor, and retched.
Even with Anko bleeding at the moment, Kankurou's head whipped around at her words directed towards the other person on the floor, completely forgetting everything at the moment and just focused on the name and the load of memories stuck behind that one name. There was a lot of emotions currently playing on his face, none of them leaning towards the positive spectrum except for the mute surprise. Caked with dirt and cobwebs, the memories of his brother slowly floated up in his mind, making Kankurou's eyes widen with something that he would never want anyone to see.
Fear.
A childhood remnant and instant reaction whenever he heard his brother's name being whispered within the hallways and corridors of that house. Whenever there was another hushed rumor passing along the servants that Gaara had done something that was bordering towards an unspeakable again.
Things didn't get better as Kankurou watched Gaara's hand creep out in a slow fashion, just like the effect of a poison that he created daily, flinching involuntarily when the fabric shifted lightly against his skin. When the finger was suddenly drawn away, Kankurou fell back, his ass painfully seated against the solid floor, forgetting that Anko was holding onto his knee for support. The retching sounds of his brother reached Kankurou's ears, making him snap back into reality and finally shrouding his face with another longtime emotion.
Hate.
"Wha' th' fuck is he doin' 'ere..," he breathed out in one shaky breath, asking the question to no one in particular but then hoping that the response would be, "he's not real". Eyes finally returned to Anko, the familiar image of her figure and hair color registering sluggishly in his mind and making the hate and anger grow worse as he now finally realized where all the blood and slowly coloring bruises had come from.
"Fuckin' lil' shit!" he yelled, all the anger, hate, and surprise releasing all at once in those three words as he lunged forward, throwing himself at Gaara. The brother that scared the living daylights out of him because Kankurou never understood him or his ways. The brother that never really bothered to try and live with them and try to make light of "ordinary". The brother that was only part of the equation to the sum of where Temari and Kankurou was today.
As if the sight of the battered red head curled up on her kitchen floor wasn't nearly enough of a shock, the two different (albeit similarly violent) reactions definitely would have been.
Anko had just started to lean forward towards Gaara, hoping to pull him back and prop him up away from his stomach's purging before he would have the opportunity to collapse into the muck when she felt the tell-tale shifting of Kankurou's body beneath her hand only a split second before the violent explosion that left Anko scrambling to put herself directly between the two brothers to stop him from doing anymore damage to the obviously ailing Gaara.
"Dammit stop...please...Kankurou..." she pleaded, her hands slickly grasping at his biceps trying to neutralize the worst threat of the moment before anything else could happen. "I didn't know who it was and I attacked him first, it's not all my blood...just calm the fuck down ok? Just...you sit here and don't freakin' move. And you..." she snapped her head to the side to toss an oddly concerned glare to the youngest of the trio, "You should fuckin' know better then to just sneak in here like that! You should have said something rather then letting me fuckin' attack you you damned idiot! You were already fuckin' hurt when you came in here and you didn't stop me when you know how I work....just ARGH!"
The shock was quickly being replaced by her own legendary temper, not giving a damn that it was reaching out to burn the both of them when it should have been focused more at herself for not recognize the now glaringly obvious hints that she had missed, the familiarity the 'intruder' had handled her movements should have made her pause but she had just barreled on as usual. Taking a deep breath in an attempt to settle her nerves, Anko finally loosened her hold on Kankurou's arms, the tension running through his muscles not abating in the slightest but at least he wasn't fighting against her hold anymore. In an after-thought, Anko tugged down the sleeve of her borrowed shirt to wipe away any blood lingering on her face, wincing as the coarse material grated against the sore skin. Holding the sleeve up to stem the now sluggish flow from her nose, Anko turned to view Gaara fully, taking in the sad state of the brat, wincing at the visibly damp spot of cloth where she had re-opened whatever lay underneath, the matching bloody face his last effort had given him along with a host of other cuts and bruises, topping off with one particularly mangled looking hand.
Her body reacted automatically to the sad sight, moving forward with the intention to try and start piecing her old roommate back together but Anko had to stop and remind herself that it wasn't that simple anymore.
"'Kurou...I need to go clean this up..." she said softly, silently willing him to stop glaring murderously at his younger brother and focus in on her for a moment. Just because he held some sort of immunity against this thing that she had, there was no guarantee that Gaara shared the same privilege and it wasn't something she was willing to risk, especially not with him in this weakened state. "You don't need to do anything, just...don't even look at each other alright?"
He blamed the pain racking his body for that last reaction. Denial was a sweet, luxurious thing, sometimes.
Of course, when his idiot brother started talking over his head like he wasn't even there, Gaara started to get annoyed. It had been like that when he was younger - His father, standing in the kitchen with all the sand sibs, ignoring the blood-soaked red-head right in front of him. "What has Gaara done this time?" The question was directed towards the other siblings, the sane ones. And little Gaara had clenched his fists, angry that his existence was being ignored. Oh well. He would just have to try harder next time...
This sudden, unwanted memory was broken by Anko's string of angry words. Pushing away from the vomit, Gaara clenched his teeth and forced himself into a sitting position, eyes trained on Anko the entire time - refusing to acknowledge his brother's existence for the moment. The blinding pain of this simple movement showed on his face, made it impossible to hear what Anko said next, but he refused to remain lying in such a vulnerable position in front of these two.
When she lifted up suddenly and stalked out of the room, Gaara was forced to turn his attention back to his brother - a ghost of the past. Piercing jade eyes met piercing jade eyes, the glares creepily similar. The red-head remained in that position - unable to move further -, trying his hardest to glare away this cleverly produced mirage in front of him.
Despite Anko's words before she left the room, it seemed that all the brothers could do was look at each other reproachfully.
After Anko had stopped him and verbally knocked some sense into him, Kankurou was left sitting on the floor, his eyes returning Gaara's own stare. They were almost mirror-images of each other, save for the self-inflicted tattooing on Gaara's brow and the redder hair. Even now, Kankurou had no idea where the red hair gene ran in the family and was almost convinced at times that this "kid" wasn't even his brother. But Temari made sure to beat it into his mind at times, that Gaara was no one else but their brother. And things would always stay like that, no matter how stubborn Kankurou would be in the future.
And inside, he believed he was rightly justified for having jumped to that conclusion of how Anko got hurt in the first place. He had seen things when they were smaller, situations and executions that even littered his nightmares until now. You just don't forget these things of the past, no matter how hard you try to ignore them.
The still stewing anger inside of him was only briefly replaced by jealousy by Anko's own tenderness and concern towards Gaara. If she hadn't told him earlier that they had a previous relationship as roommates, Kankurou would've already pulled a quick one on Gaara, leaving more room for chaos. And he did play with the idea of actually being nice, or at least civil because he didn't do "nice" to some people, but not when Gaara decided to come barrelling in during one of the down-times in Kankurou's life. The whole ordeal with Anko and the virus and that she really didn't need anything else more to deal with was Kankurou's own excuse for being impolite and almost to a point that was just brutal.
Eyes finally broke the long staring contest, which brought a brief stab of pain to his own pride and ego, as Kankurou looked towards the hallway to see if Anko was fine. Or to just look away from those damn haunting eyes.
It took a few moments longer then expected, scrubbing carefully at her face and hands to remove every trace of blood from her skin and to don a clean, proper outfit rather then a hastily thrown on t-shirt but Anko worked quickly and silently, listening out for any noise that may hint that her clearly distinct orders had be ignored. Grabbing her first aid kit she hurried back out to where she had left the brothers, meeting Kankurou's eyes with a small smile as she rounded the corner to see him watching out for her.
The heated tension lingered heavy on the air, leaving Anko to wonder again why she had hoped this day would have eventually come to pass.
She handed off a washcloth to Kankurou as she passed by, something to wipe off from where she had held him back while she stepped over the rancid mess in the middle of the floor, eventually coming to kneel down beside the still glaring redhead. The first aid kid hit the floor with a clatter and Anko snapped her fingers obnoxiously mere centimeters from the brat's nose.
"Enough of that shit already. You're lucky you're already as beat up as you are or else I wouldn't feel as bad as I do for that little tumble and I'd still be mopping the floor with your ass, brat. Now what in the fuck happened to you?"
Date: Thursday, February 21st
Location: Anko's apartment in Celo
Rating: PG-15 (YES, "15")
Warnings/Notes: Language, Violence, Blood
Summary: Anko and Kankuro get an unexpected visitor, and the Sabaku brothers reunite.
[OOC: Okay, since the explanation log isn't up yet, I'm just going to go ahead and give you a quick detailed description of Gaara's condition at the moment. His left hand is broken ((I'm thinking something along the lines of, maybe a couple of days before showing up at Anko's - while he was still in the whole 'spiraling into madness' state -, a couple of Arma or Arceos found him. They had been looking for him before, so this explains their hostility now. Like a cornered animal, he decided to flee, but not before one of the officers managed to get a handcuff around his left hand. When this happened, the man jerked Gaara towards him, battering-thing in hand, bent on knocking Gaara unconscious. Gaara moved out of the way just in time, but his hand was caught in the crossfire, and was... well... broken from the impact.))
He has a nasty bruise all along the right side of his body - spreading from upper thigh to the top part of his ribcage. ((A hard fall.)) There's an old knife wound cut from the top part of his right thigh, to about the middle of his chest (This was from back in August.). For the most past, he's just really bloody, and really bruised. He's extremely thin now, and sickly looking. Malnourished, and all that. And he'll probably be prone to throwing up a lot ((Nasty, yes. XD )), because... well, long story short, he tried to starve himself, but his own survival instincts wouldn't let him do it, so he ended up attacking rats and eating them raw.... So he'll have all these gross bacteria and viruses floating around his system thanks to the sickly rats... Yeah... ((Gaara is sooo going to jump out of DC and bitch-slap me. XD ))
Umm, other thing is he'll be much more mentally unstable than usual. And I'm thinking soon after the romp with Anko, he'll pass out from the strain on his body, and fall into some kind of fever or something (So he'll mumble stuff in his sleep. XD ).
Okay, wow that was long. Onto the log! ]
Damn, that stung. Gaara fished inside his pants pocket for the nearly-forgotten apartment key, his hand pressing clumsily against the bruised and battered skin of his upper thigh. He coughed, specks of blood staining the door he leaned his forehead on, mocking his weakness when he gathered enough strength to open his eyes. He might have clenched his free hand into a fist, had it not been broken. As it were, he settled for grinding his teeth together, forcing the irritated growl in the back of his throat from escaping his lips.
He was running on pure, bloody instincts now, his mind too worn to piece together a coherent thought, let alone argue against returning to the one place he had been trying to avoid for months. Anko. Though he cringed at the thought of anchoring himself down to such a bond once again, his mind kept chanting the same words over and over in his head: Safe, safe, safe.
The red-head pushed the key into the lock, wincing when the only thing supporting his body - the door - creaked open, unheeding of the man leaning falteringly on it. It was dark inside - most people didn't stay up to such ungodly hours as these -, but Gaara knew the layout of her apartment like the back of his hand. He could navigate these rooms with his eyes clos-
His hand flew out, clinging to the doorway of her kitchen, as he stumbled across a pair of discarded pants. A low hiss escaped his throat at the sudden, jolting movement, and he glared down at the offending pants as if his gaze could burn a hole through them. He paused a few more moments before stepping through the threshold and into the violet-eyed woman's kitchen.
He needed something to drink, and if Anko was anything like he remembered, she would definitely have something very strong - and very alcoholic -, in here somewhere.
The difference between night time in Cena and night time in Celo, was really quite drastic, especially once you had reacquainted yourself with the constant noise that never quieted, regardless of the hour.
The quiet was almost reminiscent of those early nights back in Ceno honestly, the somber silence a mixed creation of those trying to re-create what was forever lost to them whether by choice or deed and those who crept around trying to stay away from the watchful eye of their government.
Either way it was difficult for Anko to try and relax after her mind had gotten used to the soothing sounds of chaos. Sleeping was of course out of the question but she could at least normally manage to relax and just exist there in Kankurou's arms. Lying there listening to the occasional mumble that filter out of whatever dreams he was experiencing, gently tracing a finger over his features as she committed them to her memory, the fine lines of his lips, the now-smoothed scowl lines that were non-existent in this peaceful state, the sleep-mussed hair she would toy with around her finger. Perhaps if Kankurou knew how she amused herself while he gave into his body's demands, he wouldn't have been so adamant about her staying there whether she managed to sleep or not after he caught her on her last little midnight stroll.
The first noise that reached her ears, much like the faint sound of a door creaking had Anko assuming it was just her mind playing tricks on her, creating noise just for the sake of noise to break up the silence.
The second more distinct noise of someone moving around in her apartment had Anko's heart slamming in her chest as she silently slid out from Kankurou's tight hold, cursing herself all the while for not reacting on instinct with the first supposed noise. Quickly tugging on Kankurou's shirt to cover her nudity, Anko snatched out the knife hidden underneath the edge of the mattress before stalking silently out into the living room. Her eyes could easily make out a single form, also noting that the front door had been re-sealed, signifying that this intruder wasn't expecting company.
Easy enough.
And here she'd been hoping for a challenge at least for her troubles.
Gently sitting the knife on the arm of her chair, Anko stealthily made her way closer to where the intruder stood. Mentally calculating the taller height and the body's build, Anko launched herself at the intruder.
Had Gaara been in full control of his facilities, he might have heard the faint sound of shuffling coming from the other room. Had his mind been fully functional, he would have realized that Anko had always been a seasoned fighter, and his sudden appearance after such a long absence would be less than opportune.
As it were, the red-head was having enough trouble finding a bottle of booze, his body aching in protest with every unnecessary movement he made.
That's why, when a heavy weight knocked into him from behind, instead of being tensed and ready for the impact, Gaara was thrown unceremoniously onto the hard kitchen floor.
His mind froze in shock - the pain of his bruised right side landing fully against solid linoleum overrode his senses -, but his body moved from natural instinct. These attacks had become almost familiar to him now - one couldn't live with Anko for several weeks without coming out unscathed in some form or fashion -, and so he seemed to move by kinetic memory, his mind blocking out the pain for now. As soon as she was settled above him, Gaara twisted his body towards the left. He remembered how she always seemed to favor her right side, and this little quirk was quite a disadvantage when trying to hold someone down. In a split second he had reversed their positions - Gaara on top, his knees straddling her waist, his right forearm pushing down against her chest for extra leverage.
He didn't stop long enough to think of saying something; didn't have enough mental capacity at the moment to string together a coherent sentence that might get her to stop. He could feel the strain of such quick movements already taking their toll on his tired body. His mind was slowly beginning to unfreeze, and every nerve ending within him screamed in protest, making the red-head wince.
For a moment Anko cursed the fact she had been affected by a sudden fit of decency. The hindering excess fabric only made it harder for her to try to squirm away from the sudden pin she found herself in, the familiar movements prickling something in her memory but nothing immediately jumped out at her as she was running on sheer instinct to defend her territory. The ripe smell of blood, both fresh and aged, hit her nose, alerting her to the fact that this intruder was injured and gave her one more point in her favor. One hand firmly gripped onto the wrist at her shoulder, the other haltingly felt out the dampness of fresh blood or the stiffened cloth of the dried, finally settling on a point near the intruder's right hip. Fingernails digging harshly into the older wound, Anko waited for the sudden redistribution of the other person's hold, the pressure from her chest gone as the person above her tried to dislodge her grip on his thigh. Taking advantage of the moment, Anko snapped her hips to the side, rolling them over once again but this time she released him and she kept moving with the momentum, rolling once more so that she could twist herself into a crouch a little distance away, wiping away the blood that her nails had redrawn on Kankurou's shirt without a thought, waiting to see what this person's next move would be.
Unfortunately, patience was never one of Anko's virtues. Her positioning made it easy for her to shove off the floor to tackle the person once again, one hand going for the throat, her other hand again going for the one place she was sure would pull a reaction, nails digging into his precious man-bits threateningly.
"Give me one damned reason why I shouldn't kill you right now..." she hissed, finally focusing in on his face in an attempt to make out the person's features.
There were nights where he slept like a dead person, sometimes even bordering to that point when he exhausted most of his own body's resources of energy. But after the night where he discovered Anko roaming the streets of Cena and killing people, the butt of many jokes of turning "psycho" that he would throw at her nowadays, completely turned him into a lighter sleeper. Or rather, he tried to be one.
Which made it all the more ironic when the urge to heed nature's call (damned coffee) finally woke him up, his own senses completely ignorant of anything else that was going on in the apartment at that time. The lack of a shirt and Anko next to him didn't even register in his mind (and he wondered why it was she was that skilled in slipping out during the nights unnoticed) as he rolled out of the bed and felt his way out of the room to go to the bathroom in the hallway.
He hadn't expected her to claw at his already injured thigh, but then again, he hadn't expected her to jump him, either. The pain of her fingernails digging into already aching skin was pure agony, and he released her without a second thought. By the time his mind was clear enough to once again register his surroundings, Gaara had turned around just enough to face Anko. Before he could register the position of her body and the tenseness of her muscles, she launched at him again, pinning him to the ground with relative ease. He could smell the blood - his blood - staining her shirt, could feel her lithe strength focusing on keeping him down, could-
When her hand slid between his legs and clutched at a very sensitive place, he froze.
Coherent thought fought with all its might to surface from the foggy haze his mind was currently in. He was in so much pain already, and adding this to the tally seemed almost superfluous. Her angry hiss went unheard, the only thing going through his head was escape. Leaning back until he was flush against the floor, Gaara paused for a moment - took a deep, laborious breath -, then surged forward, slamming his head into Anko's with all of his might.
Anko made the mistake of leaning closer in an attempt to hear whatever whispered response could be managed through her grip on the intruder's throat when suddenly sparks exploded in front of her eyes, a sharp throbbing pain following close behind from the surprise impact, the force of the headbutt nearly unseating her completely. Instinctively her hands reacted, tightening their hold in an attempt to hold on to her position, but the sudden adrenaline rush left her lightheaded as well and she released her grip to roll off to the side, hands protectively covering her face with an agonized groan.
Mother fucker but that hurt...
Damn, that hurt. Gaara released a shaky, painful groan, twisting to his uninjured side and bringing his right hand up to rub at his throat. There would definitely be bruises come morning... on both accounts. Clenching his eyes closed, he ground his teeth together and tried to force down the urge to black out.
"Fuck," he growled out weakly, the rasp in his voice reminding him all the more of that drink he never quite got to.
The tripping of his feet over a stray power cord and the sound of a voice in the dark made Kankurou freeze for a brief second before stumbling into a wall, invoking a sharp hiss of pain from his part. Only now did his mind start to realize that his chest was bare and that there was the absence of warmth at his side when he woke up, making him straighten up, a hand holding his head. Braving the dark, he moved through the hallway that led to the other rooms, the direction where the sound had came from.
Smashing into another wall, Kankurou cursed again, louder this time as his hand blindly searched for the light switch on the wall. He finally found the switch and flicked it upwards, turning on all the lights in the room that the hallway led out to.
"Fuckin' brigh'," he muttered to himself as his arms shielded his eyes for the moment, but failed to block out the fight that had taken place in the same room, making Kankurou freeze again and rub his eyes furiously.
There was Anko on the floor, with her face in her hands and then there was a stranger--a guy by the looks of the more angular body--which made Kankurou immediately forget the blinding pain his eyes suffered as his arms fell down by his side; his legs immediately carrying him towards Anko, kneeling down next to her with a face full of surprise and a mouth filled with unpleasantries galore.
"Anko, wha' th' fuck happened?" He demanded, his hands still by his side as he quickly looked all over her for any injuries, the blood on the shirt she wore having set off every alarm in his mind.
The violent bursts of light from the impact had only begun to subside when another blinding light flooded what her fingers couldn't shield. Bleary violet eyes slowly blinked open, waiting for her vision to clear up and the blurry haze to dissipate before she even wanted to think about moving again, somehow sensing the other body a few away to be in a similar state and knowing there was no rush to.
A dark blur suddenly blocked the the glaring light of the over-head kitchen bulb and Anko slowly focused in on worried green eyes. Feeling the slickness of her split lip beneath her palm, Anko groaned again, curling in towards where Kankurou knelt, feeling like such an idiot for being caught off guard like that.
She should have brought the damned knife with her and just shanked the bastard from the get go.
"Fuckin' bastar'...heard noises an' got up t'check," she mumbled, bracing herself with one hand on Kankurou's knee so that she could manage to sit herself up. Blinking furiously against the lingering splotches to her vision, Anko testily swiped at her busted lip and bleeding nose, scowling at the red staining her hand before wiping it on Kankurou's shirt, staining it further. She had opened her mouth to continue her story when she finally caught a good glimpse of the 'intruder' and the words died in her throat.
He was a great deal thinner then she had last remembered, but now in the yellowed light of the kitchen the matted red hair and pale skin were unmistakable.
"Holy fuck...Gaara?"
He was still trying to force away the nausea rising to the surface when the glaringly bright kitchen lights flickered on. The pain which split his skull was sharp and precise, like someone had taken a knife to his brain and jabbed at the vital organ. Cringing at this new brightness, Gaara regulated his breathing by taking deep breaths through the nose, so focused on this task that he barely heard the words of an oddly familiar voice ring through his head. The sound of his name made his eyes snap back open, and he found himself staring straight into the shocked face of his former roommate.
A sharp rebuke was on his tongue - It sure as hell took you long enough to figure that one out -, when his eyes flickered upward and caused all breath to leave his lungs.
Kankuro.
He stared for a moment, eyes roving along the contours of his brother's form, drinking in the features - so like their father's -, the sleep-moused hair, the worried look that was directed towards Anko.
He stared for a moment more, his eyes wide - frightened, almost, like an animal trapped -, unable to understand what he was seeing, believing it to be a hallucination - he had hit his head too hard, for sure -, yet wholly unready to tear his shocked gaze away from the other.
Kankuro.
The brother he had always despised, the one who had been just as afraid of him as Temari, and their father, and everyone else he came in contact with. The person who despised Gaara for what he was - who saw nothing but the monster inside, the demon who's rage was often released in unchecked fury. The sibling who he hadn't seen since his banishment to Cena five years ago. The one who shouldn't be alive; who he hated, and who hated him.
The red-head blinked, trying to rid himself of this mirage. He had just managed to claw himself out of that dark pit of insanity he had fallen in not too long ago. It wasn't unreasonable that he would still be seeing things, right? His chest burned, and it took him a moment to realize he had stopped breathing. Gaara opened his mouth, sucking as much air inside his diaphragm as he could manage in one, half-strangled gasp. This wasn't real, he kept telling himself over and over again. Kankuro wasn't there, sitting in front of him, hovering over Anko in an oddly protective manner. Kankuro wasn't staring at the red-head like he was just as shocked to see Gaara, as Gaara was to see him. Kankuro wasn't-
Gaara reached out his hand, inching slowly, hesitantly, across the cold linoleum floor, bringing it closer and closer towards the hem of Kankuro's pants. The red-head let his gaze drop, staring at his hand like it was some foreign appendage moving of its own free will. His fingers were stretched out, straining towards the source of his mental struggle, faltering, yet so very determined...
There. A light touch. A single brush of skin against fabric.
But it was real. And it was tangible.
Drawing his hand away as if he had been burned, Gaara propped up on his good side, leaned his head against the floor, and retched.
Even with Anko bleeding at the moment, Kankurou's head whipped around at her words directed towards the other person on the floor, completely forgetting everything at the moment and just focused on the name and the load of memories stuck behind that one name. There was a lot of emotions currently playing on his face, none of them leaning towards the positive spectrum except for the mute surprise. Caked with dirt and cobwebs, the memories of his brother slowly floated up in his mind, making Kankurou's eyes widen with something that he would never want anyone to see.
Fear.
A childhood remnant and instant reaction whenever he heard his brother's name being whispered within the hallways and corridors of that house. Whenever there was another hushed rumor passing along the servants that Gaara had done something that was bordering towards an unspeakable again.
Things didn't get better as Kankurou watched Gaara's hand creep out in a slow fashion, just like the effect of a poison that he created daily, flinching involuntarily when the fabric shifted lightly against his skin. When the finger was suddenly drawn away, Kankurou fell back, his ass painfully seated against the solid floor, forgetting that Anko was holding onto his knee for support. The retching sounds of his brother reached Kankurou's ears, making him snap back into reality and finally shrouding his face with another longtime emotion.
Hate.
"Wha' th' fuck is he doin' 'ere..," he breathed out in one shaky breath, asking the question to no one in particular but then hoping that the response would be, "he's not real". Eyes finally returned to Anko, the familiar image of her figure and hair color registering sluggishly in his mind and making the hate and anger grow worse as he now finally realized where all the blood and slowly coloring bruises had come from.
"Fuckin' lil' shit!" he yelled, all the anger, hate, and surprise releasing all at once in those three words as he lunged forward, throwing himself at Gaara. The brother that scared the living daylights out of him because Kankurou never understood him or his ways. The brother that never really bothered to try and live with them and try to make light of "ordinary". The brother that was only part of the equation to the sum of where Temari and Kankurou was today.
As if the sight of the battered red head curled up on her kitchen floor wasn't nearly enough of a shock, the two different (albeit similarly violent) reactions definitely would have been.
Anko had just started to lean forward towards Gaara, hoping to pull him back and prop him up away from his stomach's purging before he would have the opportunity to collapse into the muck when she felt the tell-tale shifting of Kankurou's body beneath her hand only a split second before the violent explosion that left Anko scrambling to put herself directly between the two brothers to stop him from doing anymore damage to the obviously ailing Gaara.
"Dammit stop...please...Kankurou..." she pleaded, her hands slickly grasping at his biceps trying to neutralize the worst threat of the moment before anything else could happen. "I didn't know who it was and I attacked him first, it's not all my blood...just calm the fuck down ok? Just...you sit here and don't freakin' move. And you..." she snapped her head to the side to toss an oddly concerned glare to the youngest of the trio, "You should fuckin' know better then to just sneak in here like that! You should have said something rather then letting me fuckin' attack you you damned idiot! You were already fuckin' hurt when you came in here and you didn't stop me when you know how I work....just ARGH!"
The shock was quickly being replaced by her own legendary temper, not giving a damn that it was reaching out to burn the both of them when it should have been focused more at herself for not recognize the now glaringly obvious hints that she had missed, the familiarity the 'intruder' had handled her movements should have made her pause but she had just barreled on as usual. Taking a deep breath in an attempt to settle her nerves, Anko finally loosened her hold on Kankurou's arms, the tension running through his muscles not abating in the slightest but at least he wasn't fighting against her hold anymore. In an after-thought, Anko tugged down the sleeve of her borrowed shirt to wipe away any blood lingering on her face, wincing as the coarse material grated against the sore skin. Holding the sleeve up to stem the now sluggish flow from her nose, Anko turned to view Gaara fully, taking in the sad state of the brat, wincing at the visibly damp spot of cloth where she had re-opened whatever lay underneath, the matching bloody face his last effort had given him along with a host of other cuts and bruises, topping off with one particularly mangled looking hand.
Her body reacted automatically to the sad sight, moving forward with the intention to try and start piecing her old roommate back together but Anko had to stop and remind herself that it wasn't that simple anymore.
"'Kurou...I need to go clean this up..." she said softly, silently willing him to stop glaring murderously at his younger brother and focus in on her for a moment. Just because he held some sort of immunity against this thing that she had, there was no guarantee that Gaara shared the same privilege and it wasn't something she was willing to risk, especially not with him in this weakened state. "You don't need to do anything, just...don't even look at each other alright?"
He blamed the pain racking his body for that last reaction. Denial was a sweet, luxurious thing, sometimes.
Of course, when his idiot brother started talking over his head like he wasn't even there, Gaara started to get annoyed. It had been like that when he was younger - His father, standing in the kitchen with all the sand sibs, ignoring the blood-soaked red-head right in front of him. "What has Gaara done this time?" The question was directed towards the other siblings, the sane ones. And little Gaara had clenched his fists, angry that his existence was being ignored. Oh well. He would just have to try harder next time...
This sudden, unwanted memory was broken by Anko's string of angry words. Pushing away from the vomit, Gaara clenched his teeth and forced himself into a sitting position, eyes trained on Anko the entire time - refusing to acknowledge his brother's existence for the moment. The blinding pain of this simple movement showed on his face, made it impossible to hear what Anko said next, but he refused to remain lying in such a vulnerable position in front of these two.
When she lifted up suddenly and stalked out of the room, Gaara was forced to turn his attention back to his brother - a ghost of the past. Piercing jade eyes met piercing jade eyes, the glares creepily similar. The red-head remained in that position - unable to move further -, trying his hardest to glare away this cleverly produced mirage in front of him.
Despite Anko's words before she left the room, it seemed that all the brothers could do was look at each other reproachfully.
After Anko had stopped him and verbally knocked some sense into him, Kankurou was left sitting on the floor, his eyes returning Gaara's own stare. They were almost mirror-images of each other, save for the self-inflicted tattooing on Gaara's brow and the redder hair. Even now, Kankurou had no idea where the red hair gene ran in the family and was almost convinced at times that this "kid" wasn't even his brother. But Temari made sure to beat it into his mind at times, that Gaara was no one else but their brother. And things would always stay like that, no matter how stubborn Kankurou would be in the future.
And inside, he believed he was rightly justified for having jumped to that conclusion of how Anko got hurt in the first place. He had seen things when they were smaller, situations and executions that even littered his nightmares until now. You just don't forget these things of the past, no matter how hard you try to ignore them.
The still stewing anger inside of him was only briefly replaced by jealousy by Anko's own tenderness and concern towards Gaara. If she hadn't told him earlier that they had a previous relationship as roommates, Kankurou would've already pulled a quick one on Gaara, leaving more room for chaos. And he did play with the idea of actually being nice, or at least civil because he didn't do "nice" to some people, but not when Gaara decided to come barrelling in during one of the down-times in Kankurou's life. The whole ordeal with Anko and the virus and that she really didn't need anything else more to deal with was Kankurou's own excuse for being impolite and almost to a point that was just brutal.
Eyes finally broke the long staring contest, which brought a brief stab of pain to his own pride and ego, as Kankurou looked towards the hallway to see if Anko was fine. Or to just look away from those damn haunting eyes.
It took a few moments longer then expected, scrubbing carefully at her face and hands to remove every trace of blood from her skin and to don a clean, proper outfit rather then a hastily thrown on t-shirt but Anko worked quickly and silently, listening out for any noise that may hint that her clearly distinct orders had be ignored. Grabbing her first aid kit she hurried back out to where she had left the brothers, meeting Kankurou's eyes with a small smile as she rounded the corner to see him watching out for her.
The heated tension lingered heavy on the air, leaving Anko to wonder again why she had hoped this day would have eventually come to pass.
She handed off a washcloth to Kankurou as she passed by, something to wipe off from where she had held him back while she stepped over the rancid mess in the middle of the floor, eventually coming to kneel down beside the still glaring redhead. The first aid kid hit the floor with a clatter and Anko snapped her fingers obnoxiously mere centimeters from the brat's nose.
"Enough of that shit already. You're lucky you're already as beat up as you are or else I wouldn't feel as bad as I do for that little tumble and I'd still be mopping the floor with your ass, brat. Now what in the fuck happened to you?"