Chapter 2: Same Old Impulses 1/4

Disclaimer: I do not own either Harry Potter (rightfully owned by J.K Rowling) or Naruto (rightfully owned by Masashi Kishimoto) nor do I make any money out of this fiction. I will also add that any sections or phrases in this chapter that bear resemblance to works by either author or from movies based on works of said authors is recreated in the same spirit of free usage and is not for profit.

A/N: I was really pleased to find that, despite my concerns, people have been writing reviews for the last chapter of Silent Humanity as well as the first chapter of Hidden Inhumanity. I had been afraid people would simply review the last addition, especially since they were published simultaneously. Lovely surprise. As, of course, was the content of those reviews. They always inspire and flatter, so thank you again.

Stop what you're doing and spend a moment to appreciate the awesome cover art that was donated. I got a few offers to do some cover art (which was so very generous) and the person who got in first was Spiral of Destiny, with whom I have been acquainted on this site for a while now and has drawn fanart for me before. Spiral of Destiny was unbelievably generous with their time and efforts, and beyond considerate of my wishes. So I wanted to express my ongoing appreciation of that effort and generosity.

I also wanted to mention that I happened across some fanart I didn't know about on another site which was a wonderful surprise.

Before I let you get on with the chapter, I have to confess to a continuity error, having said that Gaara was fifteen in last couple of chapters of SH when he was really fourteen at the end of that school year. It was spotted by an alert reviewer, whom I am grateful to. Apologies for the mistake.

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(Last Time)

He was just setting his book down when he heard a scream in the distance, probably on the other side of the camp, but still loud and shrill enough to cut through the lulling parties. The scream was followed by the sounds of an explosion and more screaming.

It was a sound he was intimately familiar with, the sounds of battle! And Shukaku was laughing.

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The screams were even louder outside of the tent and were growing exponentially as the campers fleeing the battle joined in the cacophony. Gaara looked around, trying to pinpoint where the noise was originating from, but with the size of the tents all around him and the crowds rushing about in every direction, all he could surmise was that the damage was being done quite a distance away.

Out of the Weasley tent came the slew of redheads packed in, as well as Harry and Hermione, all looking equally alarmed. Sirius, Remus and Arthur had still been out when it kicked off and were nowhere to be seen.

"It'll be the Irish." Bill Weasley alleged, having overcome his initial shock and looked ready to return to whatever game he had been playing inside.

Molly looked less sure.

"It's not the Irish!" Arthur said, running back into the area, all of his inebriated jollity now dispelled.

Sirius and Remus were following close behind him, both of their wands drawn.

"What's going on?" Molly demanded, pushing her way to the front of the children.

"It's a raid. Someone's attacking in the Eastern sector, causing all sorts of damage." Sirius said. Gaara was beginning to suspect that there was a potion to remove alcohol from ones blood.

"Who?!" Molly was looking even more worried than Ginny.

"We don't know yet, but they might be…they're wearing black robes and…well… We're going to go back out and help. Aurors haven't arrived yet." Sirius was looking around at the gathered children, but only stopped after his eyes had darted over Harry and then spotted Gaara coming from the other tent.

"Go and wait in the woods until the Ministry shows up." Arthur said.

"Or until we come and get you." Sirius commanded them.

"You want us to run and hide in the woods while you're going to fight who-knows-how-many wizards?! Surely you can't be serious?!" Hermione yelled.

Sirius turned to her, his face devoid of the usual warmth he displayed around Harry and his friends, and he said, "I am Sirius, and don't call me Shirley."

Remus face-palmed.

A particularly loud explosion went off in the distance and broke the reverie; Sirius made eye contact with his favourite recalcitrant foreigner and said one last thing, "Gaara, stay with Harry."

The men turned and ran in the direction of the attack and that gave the group the signal to get running.

The Weasleys all tried to stick together, but like the walk to the stadium, it soon became impossible to stay in one group amongst the panicked masses all surging around them. Gaara heeded Sirius' words and stayed next to Harry even after being separated from Ron and Hermione.

At one point, as they reached the woods, Harry tripped over something, or possibly someone, and Gaara had to dive back and help him to his feet before the Boy-Who-Lived was trampled to death. He pulled the black haired civilian onwards, not noticing the pair of glasses that had slipped off of Harry's nose and were already being smashed into the forest dirt. From then he kept one hand on Harry's shoulder (despite his innate aversion to any physical contact) and guided him into the dark woods until the mass of people thinned out and the noise settled.

With the half-moon obscured by clouds and the trees, and his glasses long gone, Harry was almost totally blind as he stumbled after the blur of red (or possibly brown, in this light). The uneven ground he was being dragged across was a nightmare to navigate as he was.

Gaara could have stopped where they were, set Harry against a tree and rested until someone found them, but he didn't have time to wait like that. He pulled Harry as quickly as he could, all over the forest looking for a Weasley or two. If he had more sand, he would have simply carried Harry as he went. He would have been half tempted to put Harry on his back and run like that, but for the fact that he despised physical proximity and he doubted the Gryffindor would take kindly to it either.

Finally, in the quiet of the woods, he heard someone yelling, "Harry! Gaara!"

Gaara pulled Harry along until they were upon the majority of the Weasley clan, all huddled close together with Ginny in the middle (she did not look too happy with this penguin-esque arrangement).

"Oh, dears!" Molly exclaimed when she spotted them. "Harry, what happened to your glasses? Oh, and your clothes, you're a mess!" She started to brush the dirt from his clothes and then cupped his face in her hands so she could get a better look.

When she deemed he was injury-free, she moved on to Gaara, who didn't look the least ruffled, and was not out of breath, which didn't stop her checking him over.

"I'm going back." Gaara said.

"What?!" About four Weasleys and a Granger shouted in response.

"Draco was in the camp. And the others may need help." He was a trained fighter, after all. It seemed only natural.

"Gaara, dear, you can't go back out there. I'm sure Draco will be absolutely fine. And you have to leave the fighting to the adults. They'll be back soon, you'll see." Molly had just said something similar to all of her eager sons who wanted to prove their bravery.

It was terribly similar to when Bill, Charlie and Percy were much younger, during the war, and they asked when Arthur would be back and she had to tell them 'They'll be back soon, you'll see.'

Ron butted his way to the front, "Malfoy's probably in on it, anyway. Leave him to it."

Gaara spared him a glance, having considered the possibility that Malfoy (Lucius) might well be involved, but he knew for a fact that even if Draco had been dragged into a conflict like this, he was not ready for battle.

Real children tended not to be.

He ducked under Molly's hand that had reached for his shoulder, and then ran back the way he had come. He heard one or two of the larger gingers try to give chase and a number of shouts ring out, but with the darkness, the uneven terrain and his superior speed, Gaara had little trouble evading his pursuers.

He darted around the clusters of scared World Cup attendees huddled around the woods, and soon enough he was back out in the relatively bright campgrounds, still illuminated by the bonfires and mounted torches burning about the place. He could see in one direction the glow of a larger fire and assumed that was where the attack was taking place.

He wished he had let Sirius show him where the 'fancy area' of the camp was as he was now left with little choice but to run towards the biggest tents he could see and hope they were in that general direction. He was gratified to see that as he ran the tents were indeed getting to be much nicer, cleaner and more expensive looking.

As he cut through the clusters of tents, he absently jumped up and kicked a looter in the head and continued without breaking his pace. He reached what looked to be an actual fence running along a very nice and neat looking area of the camp ground, filled with the best tents yet. He skirted around the perimeter and soon he reached the gateway to the premium area.

Gaara was not particularly surprised to see that it was guarded by a pair of wizards, though it was a little startling to see that not only were they wearing black cloaks, like the attackers, but they were also wearing silver masks. He had read a number of recently published wizarding history books, and that apparel could only mean one thing: Death Eaters.

Sadly it also meant that Lucius almost certainly was involved in whatever was happening, but hopefully the man had enough sense to leave Draco out of it. Since there were guards posted here, perhaps that was a sign that there were people here that might need to be protected. Although, from who or what, Gaara could not fathom.

Knowing Lucius and the sort of people that had been invited to the Malfoy Christmas party, these two were most likely just here to keep out looters.

Gaara didn't want to waste time here, so he slowed his pace and walked the last few meters to the break in the fence. He could have jumped over the barrier, but knowing the magicians of this country, they likely would have warded off such an entrance. Plus, if these two grunts wanted to pick a fight, Skukaku's chakra would only be too happy to oblige.

The pair had their wands drawn already, and they levelled them at Gaara when they (belatedly) noticed him walking towards them. He didn't move to stop them or even pay them heed, instead he continued walking until he was between them and their wands.

He couldn't see their faces beneath their masks, but he assumed they were silently debating with themselves whether he was a threat worth attacking/denying access to their area, or perhaps they were trying to work out if they had seen him at the Malfoy party.

In any case, they evidently had decided he was not a threat warranting expulsion so they dropped their wands once he had passed and turned back to the outside.

Gaara worried after the imminent threat had passed, whether he would now have to spend all night searching every tent for his friend. There were dozens upon dozens, perhaps even a hundred of the lavish tents spread out in the wall-off area, and it wasn't like the Malfoy family were so vain as to put their initials on the front of their…

Oh, wait, there it is!

It was hard to imagine a more fitting tent for Lucius and Draco to share, with the dark green fabric and the sparkling, embroidered silver 'M' on the tent flap. Sat outside, there were a pair of ornate wooden stools overlooking a modest fire, held in what appeared to be a large copper pan.

Lucius had obviously never entered a shop without feeling the compulsion to buy something.

With no door on which to knock, Gaara walked straight into the tent and was immensely relieved to find a bored Draco sat with his back to the entrance (a bad habit), hunched over what appeared to be a chess set.

Gaara walked up behind him and looked over his shoulder.

"Your queen will be taken in three moves."

"Ah!" Draco almost jumped into the free standing chess set, instead merely bumping his knee and landing back in his chair. "Gaara, what are you doing here?!"

"Making sure you are unharmed." Now that he had, he wished he had kept his presence hidden so he could leave without an explanation.

"But- I mean, rather… what about the… you know…?" Clearly Draco knew something about the attack happening at that moment, but Gaara had no desire to force the flustered boy to disclose. Really, the exact reasons or circumstances did not matter. As long as Draco himself, and maybe Narcissa, weren't out there, Gaara only had to keep an eye out not to kill or seriously injure one Death Eater. Although Gaara wouldn't lose any (more) sleep if Lucius did get a little hurt, he knew it would devastate Draco.

"My father… has just stepped out." Draco had finally conjured up a feeble excuse.

"I will try not to hurt him. I am going to help Sirius and Remus. Stay here." It would have been nice if he did not have to order his friend around like this, but Draco was nowhere near ready for the battlefield (and certainly not ready to face his father on that field).

"Wait, no, just leave it. Wait here, they'll be gone soon."

Gaara looked back at him, gave him a wave, and left. He ran after he exited the tent, in case Draco had any notion of following. He continued running until he was almost upon the exit of the posh area, where the two guards were still posted.

They looked back at him, but either because he hadn't been any trouble before, or because he was a child, they continued to ignore him as he was leaving. He called out his sand and had it club both men on the back of their hooded necks, knocking them out for a good few hours, as he ran past.

The sounds were more localised now, whatever sort of property damage was being caused earlier was now restricted to collateral damage in the fight. He could see colourful lights in the distance so he ran straight for them, calling his sand out and around him, ready for any stray spells that might come his way. He hopped over any tents in his way this time, sure of his destination and desperate to arrive there without a second wasted. Remus and Sirius were competent duellers, they had assured (boasted to) him on numerous occasions, but they were also feeble civilians in his eyes. He wasn't going to leave them for a second longer on the battlefield than he had to.

They may have been adults but Gaara was a warrior, and a human weapon.

Gaara ignored the part of himself that was telling him to slow down and stay calm, that this frenzy to get there was because of Shukaku's chakra. His sand was swirling around him as he ran and he would need all of the chakra he could get his hands on if he was going to help with so little coming from his tiny gourd. It was pure luck that Gaara had thought to bring his old pouch with him, reasoning that his kunai might come in handy with the camping, or so that was the excuse he had given Sirius. Really he just felt vulnerable without his full gourd on his back.

Sirius would never have understood. 'What could possibly go wrong at a Quidditch match..?'

The answer was colourful, Gaara noted, as he watched his first wizarding battle.

The two groups were distinct and stood opposite one another, around a dozen on each side, hurling spells across a no-man's-land of burned tents and a single downed fighter, not wearing the black robes of a Death Eater. Most of the spells impacted on invisible barriers, all except the bright green ones sent out by the black-robed fighters, which their opponents seemed to dodge

From the direction Gaara had approached, he was now perpendicular to both groups, and had the perfect view to both the fight and to the individual groups. They were all so caught up in flicking their wands and sending out the colourful magics at each other that no one had noticed Gaara's arrival to the side.

Gaara did not think twice about reaching into his pouch and flinging a kunai into the crowd of Death Eaters. He had aimed at the shortest one, knowing for sure that it wasn't Lucius, expecting it to get intercepted or dodged and for the distraction to help Sirius and Remus, amongst the opposing combatants, press their advantage.

Instead, the black throwing knife flew at the Death Eaters and sunk into his neck, shocking those immediately around him as he made an aborted gesture to reach for his throat before he collapsed dead, the blood having gushed out in a great spurt.

The spell volleys simmered down as both groups looked to see who had attacked, and with a muggle weapon no less, only to find a boy who looked like he couldn't be more than thirteen-years old standing there.

To Lucius this was a problem. He had wanted to add the boy to the Dark Lord's forces but if he died now it would come to nothing. Plus Draco would never forgive him. But there was no way to protect the foolish child without revealing his identity.

Meanwhile, Sirius had yelled at the top of his lungs for Gaara to hide, or to run away, or to come to him. Gaara wasn't entirely sure what Sirius wanted him to do, although he would later admit it probably wasn't ignoring those orders and slowly walking towards the Death Eaters.

He didn't have enough sand to effectively neutralise them all at a distance, so he would need to get closer to them.

The groups of black-cloaked attackers had been too shocked by the sudden, brutal murder in front of them by a teenager that it took those first few steps for them to recover and start to cast at the redhead too.

The bursts of light flew at Gaara but even with his minimal sand his automatic defence swatted the crippling and possibly deadly curses out of the air like stray pigeons. His pace was slow as he approached, and he paused for a second and looked around for something try and convert to sand. It would take forever to tunnel deep enough to find bedrock in this field, so his only hope was to use whatever rocks were lying around. He was in luck as metres away there was a large rock by a fireside, someone having been using it as a seat before all of the panicking started.

He had underestimated the damage these curses would do to his sand supply. Each time they attacked, his shield was getting a little smaller. The magic was blasting the sand particles beyond his ability to control them.

He sent what little sand he could spare to the boulder, but with his flimsy shield thinner than ever, Gaara had to halt his approach and begin dodging the curses being sent at him.

One of the Death Eaters focussing on Gaara had grown impatient and sent one of the nasty green curses at him. Gaara had seen the other wizards' reaction to that curse and called all of his available sand to block it.

The shockwave knocked him off of his feet and the sand, the half that hadn't been vaporised by the spell, fell to the floor motionless. It took Gaara a moment recognise that the chakra in his sand was gone. It took another moment for him to somersault backwards to avoid the next curse, purple this time, that struck the grass where he had been prone.

Lucius had been focussed on fighting back Black and Lupin, letting the satisfaction he would gain from their deaths fuel him, when he saw the green flash of the Killing Curse flare and dissipate, leaving Gaara on the ground. He clenched his teeth, and wondered how he would explain this to Draco. Maybe he could claim the one who killed Gaara had been tortured to death. Draco would never find out any different. He would be sad for a little time until his other friends filled the void. Still it was a shame, the strange boy might have been useful to the…

Oh, he was still alive. Jolly good.

"Don't kill the boy, just keep him away. It's almost time for the signal." Lucius said as evenly as he could.

"What's the signal?" One of them replied, barely blocking a stunner aimed at his face.

Lucius didn't want to admit that he didn't know what the signal was, that he was out of the loop in not only his job but even within his own people. In fact, he felt as if he had been the last of the old guard to be informed of this raid.

It was humiliating.

At least the lower ranks still expected him to have all the answers. He still had their respect, and pretty soon he would be back on top.

No matter what foolish plan Cornelius had cooked up, and seemed insistent that even Lucius not be told, that man would be out of office within the next three or four years, at best. In the meantime, Lucius would marshal support and collect his allies, ready for the moment to give Fudge the boot.

Lucius snapped back to the present moment when his shield charm was blasted apart by combined pair of hexes from two of the do-gooders stopping them all from leaving. He was about the cast the Killing Curse at them, when his attention was drawn back to the single-man front to his right.

Gaara had been acrobatically dodging and even retreating a few steps to keep away from the spells that were aimed at him. His sand was almost done with the boulder, so he just needed to buy a few more seconds.

It pained him to use it here since he had so few with him, and it would cost him the kunai it was attached to, but Kankuro had always told him not to be stingy with weapons if he was going to use them. So he reached back into his pouch again and threw the kunai at the Death Eaters collected fifteen feet away.

The two that were facing him had seen it coming and erected their shield again, but instead of the metal bouncing off of their magical protections, when it hit the timer on the exploding tag ran out and it ignited.

The two that had cast the shield had definitely not seen the huge fireball coming, nor the concussive force of a bombarda maxima. They had their turn being thrown onto their backs, Gaara noted with satisfaction.

Gaara took the distraction as an opportunity to call back all of the sand he had access to from the crush rock. It amounted to less than his full gourds worth, even with the recovered mini-gourd's remains and the majority of the ground-up boulder.

Gaara had identified which of the men was probably Lucius, since he thought he heard a disguised voice command the others not to kill him (which he appreciated, even if it didn't extend to Sirius and Remus, and if it was foolhardy to go easy on an enemy). It was easier now that he didn't have to worry about killing the wrong person accidentally.

That easement was a godsend since Gaara's demon-induced headache was raging on worse than ever and he was now having to consciously restrict the flow of Shukaku's chakra into his own system for fear of losing whatever tenuous grip on control he had.

All of this battle was not only exciting the demon but Gaara's own bloodlust was rearing its ugly head as well.

He started on the offensive again, drawing the focus of a third Death Eater, who were all alternating between flinging non-lethal hexes and curses at him and shielding themselves against the sand tendrils that broke again and again on their barriers. It was a stalemate until one of the eight other Death Eaters, facing eleven or twelve campers, was pressured into desperation.

One of them, coincidentally the youngest of the raiders, had enough of this and fired off a nasty deep blue curse at Remus Lupin, known werewolf. Whether pure luck or skilled marksmanship, no one would ever know, but the curse managed to strike Lupin on the upper arm and send him spinning to the floor. The other fighters on the light side covered while Sirius checked on his oldest living friend, but Remus was already unconscious and his arm badly burned and discoloured.

"Remus! Remus! Hang on!" Sirius yelled, rolling Lupin onto his back and trying in vain to wake him up.

Gaara watched, eyes wide, stunned, as spells continued to slam into the protective sand curled around him. His eyes were stuck on the sight of Sirius trying to wake Remus. On Remus lying motionless on the grass.

On the smoking, blackened burn on Remus' upper arm.

"Stupid mutt!" The attacker yelled at the top of his voice. He revelled in his victory and fired off a few more quick spells towards Sirius Black, known blood traitor, but none of them made it through the wall of wizards still fighting.

The Death Eaters firing at Gaara had noticed their opponent's catatonia but his sand defence was still blocking them. They weren't allowed to kill him, so they focussed instead of killing time until the signal came. It couldn't be long now.

Gaara couldn't take his eyes off of Remus. Was he dead? He couldn't see his chest move in the dim light of the nearby fires. If he was dead…

"Bloody mongrel!" The attacker shouted again, while Sirius, who had set Remus down well behind their line, was returning to the fight.

This was supposed to be a peaceful world, where their wars didn't create weapons like Gaara or child-Shinobi, a world without killing…

And now that fool was laughing!

Gaara finally snapped out of his trance and turned to the man who had killed Remus. He commanded the sand to crawl along the grass in the gloom, under the barriers and invisible to his enemies. It trickled along the ground and started to latch onto the young Death Eater's shoes and the bottom of the black robes. More and more snuck under the barrier and the Death Eater with a death wish kept laughing and taunting until his feet wouldn't move.