Chapter 23 - "I'm in the mood to help you dude"

Disclaimer: Nothing is mine, even the prompt.

AN: Don't take this too seriously. I don't.

Beta'd by Scarletdewdrops.

... ... ...

How did my life suddenly get filled with so many children?

I'm really not sure, but I definitely blame Blondie.

… … …

Like any other day, Harry was sitting in his shop, writing.

Like most days, but not all, Konohamaru was there as well. The kid was doing some of his homework, apparently, and felt very at ease in Harry's shop.

At least that was his excuse.

Harry figured it was actually because that trainer of his refused to come to Harry's shop.

Either way, despite the fact that Naruto was now off doing ninja stuff with his team, Harry had inherited a new kid to watch over during the day.

"It's a curse, isn't it?" He muttered aloud, tapping the end of his pen against his notebook.

"What is, Genie-nii-chan?" Konohamaru looked up from where he was sprawled on the floor.

"Eh, nothing." Harry set down his work and leaned forward. "No one is going to come into my shop with you taking up all the walking space, you know."

"No one comes into your shop anyway, most of your work is contracted."

Damn brat had a point.

But to completely contradict him, the door to the shop opened with a jingle of bells.

Now that was a familiar feeling.

Bright green eyes met with pale green and Harry smiled. "Hello, can I help you?"

The redhead, and wow that was really red, blinked extremely slowly. Over the kid's left shoulder hovered Death. "...no." The kid didn't leave the doorway, despite his single word (monosyllabic answer?). He just maintained super creepy eye contact with Harry.

Konohamaru looked between the two, eyes bouncing back and forth.

"Did you want me to fix that giant bottle on your back?" Harry offered, his smile still in place.

Once more the kid blinked slowly. The move really accentuated the giant bags under his eyes. "...No."

"Well this is a repair shop, so I can fix those tiny cracks in it if you want."

"...It's not… Broken."

'But something certainly is,' thought Harry, eyes glancing at Death for half a heartbeat.

HIS MARK IS WEAK. BUT I HAVE BEEN DRAWN TO HIM MANY TIMES.

'Ahhh,' Harry's thoughts followed what Death was saying. 'That's why he reeks of blood.'

"Genie-nii-chan?" Konohamaru finally got to his feet, scrambling to hide behind Harry-even though Harry wasn't much taller than the kid. The Hokage's grandson was scared, though.

"Well," Harry put a protective arm around Konohamaru, trying to soothe him without even thinking about the action, "I can help you then. I've been known to fix people as well as things." The wizard allowed his smile to fully reach his eyes then. "Come on, I'm in the mood to help you, dude."

"I…" The child, for he couldn't be much older than Naruto if that, paced his words. "... am not broken."

"You're just a child, what do you know?" Harry threw the comment back just to see what would happen.

Pale green eyes narrowed at Harry. Sand began to pour out of the giant jug on the kid's back.

"That can't be good," muttered Harry, watching to see what he would do next. When nothing happened, he added louder, "I can help you." Once more, Harry's eyes flicked to Death. "Actually, could you wait for a second?" Harry held up a finger to his customer and turned to Konohamaru. "I'm going to send you to the Hokage, okay? I'll be fine." With that, Harry tapped Konohamaru's goggles and the kid disappeared in a swirl.

Ahh, portkeys. So nice.

That done, Harry turned back to the redhead. Taking an experimental step forward, he watched as the sand swirled up to meet his feet, trapping him so he couldn't go closer.

"What's your name?" Harry began conversationally, glancing back up to the kid who most likely … yeah, most likely.

"... Gaara." It was like saying the name took a lot of effort. Gaara even winced, eyes narrowed against the pain.

"It's hard, isn't it?" Harry tilted his head, tugging at the sand that was beginning to climb up his legs. He maintained eye contact though, green clashing with green. "It has too much influence on someone so young."

This time Gaara glared. Pretty impressive for just a little tyke. "What would you know?"

"Oh, more than you think."

The sand increased in pressure. Harry could feel how it made the bones in his legs creak.

Gaara stretched out his hand finally and the sand reached Harry's waist.

"You know nothing," Gaara began only to be interrupted by Harry.

"My name is Harry, not Jon Snow."

For a second everything stopped as Gaara allowed the confusion to overwhelm him. Then he winced, eyes narrowed harshly. "Mother says … Mother says… You…" Gaara gripped his hair with his other hand and the one that seemed to be controlling the sand slowly curled into a fist. The sand reached Harry's shoulders now. "You will prove my existence. If I kill you, Mother says… then my existence… it will be … yes!"

Gaara began to cackle maniacally. Harry watched calmly as the sand covered him completely.

As Gaara crushed Harry within in his Dessert Coffin, several things happened at once.

One: Harry died a spectacularly messy death, casting blood all over his glorious shop.

Two: Harry came back to life, standing just in front of Death.

Three: Harry had to magic clothes onto himself. Annoying!

Four: Harry ran a hand through his hair, still short after the burning death the other day but longer now after dying again, and then pulled out his wand.

"My turn," he jabbed the wand into the back of Gaara's head, casting his spell at point-blank range. "Sleep."

And the kid collapsed in on himself, crumbling to the ground in a heap.

"Well, this is a mess," Harry looked around at all the sand and blood in his shop. "Should I use magic, or get a D-rank?" He tapped his chin with his wand before looking over his shoulder at Death.

IT MAY BE GOOD EVIDENCE TO SHOW TO THE HOKAGE.

Death offered the suggestion, its voice the wails of the dying. Harry grimaced. He hated it when Death sounded like that.

"Evidence?"

THE BOY IS UNSTABLE. HE NEEDS HELP. YOU DID SAY THAT YOU REPAIR PEOPLE.

"You've gotten quite snarky over time."

ALL YOUR INFLUENCE, MASTER.

"Yeah yeah, shut it." Harry levitated Gaara into the back room and quickly transfigured a cot out of a chair and set him down to sleep. That spell he had cast should have been powerful enough to make even the Kyuubi drowsy, so against whatever was inside Gaara, well. It should be fast asleep as well.

As luck would have it, Harry didn't need to send for the Hokage because an ANBU showed up not long after Harry had finished writing his note.

"Oh. It's you, Paddington." Harry stepped around a large puddle of blood and smiled up at the tall bear masked ANBU.

"Hokage-sama sent us to make sure you were okay because Konohamaru-kun was worried…" ANBU Bear looked at the mess and then at Harry, who was clearly fine. "What happened?"

"I died."

ANBU Bear almost performed a prat-fall, but he was too much of an experienced shinobi for that.

"Anyway, I'm better now, so could you have Lord Hokage come here? I've got to talk to him about something and I'd rather not move my murderer from where he's sleeping." Harry used his thumb to gesture over his shoulder.

It took a moment, but ANBU Bear nodded and left the shop quickly. Harry went into the back of his shop and took the bottle from Gaara's back. Couldn't be comfortable to sleep with it on…

Then he magicked him up a stuffed animal, tucking the boy's arms around it.

Oh yeah, that was super fucking cute.

… … …

It took Sarutobi about 15 minutes to arrive at Harry's shop. When Konohamaru had popped into his office, the boy had run to him and confessed his fear for Harry. Unable to leave his office at that moment, Sarutobi sent an ANBU that was familiar with Harry's caprices.

But when ANBU Bear returned with what did not seem like good tidings, Sarutobi prepared to leave immediately.

Harry's connection to Naruto made him far too valuable to be harmed, especially if it was due to negligence on their part in regards to security.

The site of Harry's shop was shocking. That amount of blood should only mean that someone had died there, but Harry was sitting on his counter in the Lotus position, once more writing in his notebook.

"Oh. Lord Hokage." Harry closed his notebook around his pen and slid down from the counter. His feet landed in a puddle of blood. "Ew, gross. It's starting to congeal." He shook out his foot and stepped to the side where it was clear, spelling his feet clean before touching the ground. "Anyway, nice to see you, Lord Hokage. Welcome to my shop."

"Harry-san… What happened?" Sarutobi scanned the shop with keen eyes, not leaving the doorway.

"Oh, I died. Rather, I was killed. Some kind of jutsu." Slim shoulders rose and fell in a careless shrug. "He covered me in sand and then: smoosh! I died." Another shrug. "He's back there, a kid. Red hair, green eyes. Some," Harry pointed at his forehead, opposite of his scar which was a lot more prominent with his short hair, "Mark on his forehead. I think it said 'love' but you know how I am with my writing."

Sarutobi did know. Harry mostly wrote in hiragana, though he was slowly getting better with the other forms.

"Love," Sarutobi thought aloud, glancing past Harry to where he had gestured the murderer was. The Hokage was struck by the cute image of a young red-haired child curled up with a stuffed purple toy. What was even more striking was that he recognized that face. "That's the son of the Kazekage."

"Wind Shadow?" Harry furrowed his brow, the words coming out in English, then shook his head. Ah, it was like Hokage. Right. Got it. He gestured with a finger and flashed a smile at Sarutobi. "Kazekage." He pointed to his head. "I get it now."

The Hokage looked at Harry for a long moment then looked at the floor of the shop. "Is there a reason you haven't cleaned up?"

Once more, Harry had a blinding smile on his face. "I thought you'd want to see it, as evidence!" Then his smile slowly fell, "Was I wrong?"

"No," Sarutobi shook his head and then looked from his white robes to the red blood. "I have seen enough, though. As you are fine, there isn't much I can do on a …" Almost at a loss for words, the Hokage merely gestured. "What do you plan on doing with the child?" A change of subject? Okay.

Harry hummed, spinning on his foot so he could look back to where the child was sleeping. "Let him rest, for one. I don't think he's slept in a very long time." He leaned on his counter, tilted head on his hands. "His seal is very… not good."

"Explain."

A long, harsh sigh left the Master of Death as he stood back up. A quick snap of the fingers cleaned up his shop and he motioned Sarutobi to follow him.

Once they were both inside the small back room with Gaara, Harry settled onto a random box that he had back there, leaving the only other chair for Sarutobi to sit on. "His seal, much like Naruto's, is a Death seal. But this boy's… is severely flawed. The sacrifice was deemed not enough…" His eyes had turned an eerie share of green as he looked at Gaara but was clearly looking at... something else too.

Sarutobi tried to figure out what Harry could be looking at and assumed it was merely the sealing matrix? But how he could see and access it without actually touching the boy?

"Because it was not enough," Harry continued before Sarutobi could voice his questions, "...it...is...weak." The genie's eyes fluttered rapidly before turning to look at the Hokage, "Because it is weak, the… thing inside of him has far too much control. I can see that without even needing the context of our conversation."

"Conversation?" Sharp, old eyes looked towards Harry. "What did he say?"

Harry waved a dismissive hand. "Oh, that Mother said killing me would prove his existence, blahblahblah. I imagine if Naruto's seal wasn't nearly as good as it is, he'd probably be a lot like this boy." The child in question actually snuffled quietly then, nuzzling his head into the stuffed toy. Harry flicked another sleeping spell at him, just to be certain. He SHOULDN'T be waking, but … better safe than sorry.

It was Sarutobi's turn to hum in thought. "I can't, legally, allow you to work on or change his seal. That would be a logistics nightmare. Especially seeing as how it may change his chances during the Chuunin exams. Legally, I can do nothing."

"Legally," Harry repeated that single word, hearing what the Hokage was saying loud and clear.

The leader of Konoha rose to his feet. "I have faith in your abilities, even without having you tested." The white robes were dusted off and he turned to Harry. "Speaking of, the Sealing Master I spoke to you about before should be here… soon, if he isn't already. He is supposed to report to me, but…" Sarutobi trailed off, then chuckled. "He's as eccentric as any shinobi of this village."

The wizard narrowed his eyes. "Better or worse than Gai?"

"Depends," Sarutobi turned to leave the room, saying this last bit over his shoulder. "Have you read Icha-Icha?"

Harry's entire face fell, mouth dropped open in horror.

Sarutobi left, chuckling to himself. Oh, the look on Harry's face would bring him delight for the rest of the day.

… … …

Death materialized behind Harry as he held a hand over the sleeping boy. An array of seals rose into the air and Harry poked at it with his wand. He switched his wand between his hands and poked again, feeling something shift a bit and Gaara winced.

"Oops."

DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING MASTER?

"Maybe," muttered Harry in reply, using his wand to shift part of the seal to another part. Gaara relaxed and the corner of Harry's mouth twitched. "Considering there is no magic here, this thing reacts rather well to it."

Death didn't say anything, but his presence was probably explanation enough.

A soft hum left the wizard and he tilted his head to look at the sealing matrix from a few different angles. Another part of it was shifted with a poke of his wand… and Gaara relaxed even more. "I think…" Harry mumbled, drawing something with his wand and pushing it into a third part of the seal. That seemed to work really well, the whole thing flashing.

THE SACRIFICE, MASTER.

"What?"

THIS SEAL. IT NEEDS A SACRIFICE.

Harry turned to look at Death and then back to the Seal. "This seal is yours. Or, to you. Done with you in mind? Whatever. I'm your fucking Master, I should be able to circumvent that part."

THERE ARE OTHER KINDS OF SACRIFICES MASTER. A BLOOD SACRIFICE DOESN'T REQUIRE DEATH. A BLOOD SACRIFICE FROM YOU WOULD BE DEEMED ENOUGH.

There were a few beats of silence before clarity rang like a bell. "Oohhh…" Harry nodded and used his wand to carve something into the palm of his hand. For a moment, Harry floundered, then he put his wand between his teeth and raised the boy's shirt just enough that he could press the bloody sigil to his belly, over where the original seal was.

Another flash, this one much bigger than the last, shot through the shop. It nearly blinded the customers who had just wandered inside.

"Woah, what was that?" asked a teenaged voice.

"...Don't know…" Came the decided feminine response. This was followed up with. "Gaara?... GAARA! What are you doing to him?!"

And then Harry had a knife at his throat. Harry pulled both of his hands away from Gaara's body and after spitting out his wand, and catching it with his non-bloody hand, he shot a disarming smile at the girl. "Hello, how can I help you?"

"Tell me what you did to my brother!?" The blond girl, with hair that was even more ridiculous than Naruto's, demanded.

"I fixed him," Harry said in a beautiful deadpan. "This is a repair shop. I fix things."

"Gaara isn't a thing," the other voice offered.

Whatever Harry was going to say, and his mouth was open to say SOMETHING, was completely lost and instead out came, "What the fuck is wrong with your face?"

The paint wearing (and he refused to call it makeup, no self-respecting makeup artist would wear THAT) teen pouted-Harry refused to believe it was anything other than a pout, these fucking children-and pointed his own sharp, pointy thing at Harry. "Nevermind that, Gaara isn't a thing, and he-..."

"Yeah, you can't even attempt to say that; he was VERY broken," countered Harry, nodding his head. "I know what I'm talking about. I know seals." And death, he didn't bother adding. It was, of course, the latter that made him more of an expert on how to fix the sleeping jinchuuriki.

"Kankuro… Gaara's… sleeping?" The girl observed, seeming to stumble even as she stood perfectly still and her threatening knife didn't falter.

"Oh shit," The boy, apparently Kankuro?, muttered, "We're all gonna die."

Harry looked incredulous. "We're not gonna die. I refuse to die again so soon. We're perfectly safe."

"You don't know what he can do!" Kankuro said, actually pointing at the redhead.

"I know perfectly well what he can do, he does shit with sand. He did it earlier, it's fine, don't worry. I used a…whaddya call it..." Harry waved a hand, trying to remember the world. "Jutsu or whatever. Not to mention I fixed that atrocious seal. His furry little problem won't be a problem anymore." Was Harry's smirk a little smug? Yeah. Yeah, it was. He had reason to be.

The girl and Kankuro stared at Harry as if he had two heads. The genie looked to make sure he didn't, then went back to their staring contest. He would win this one, too.

Hah! The boy blinked. Harry was great at staring contests.

"Did he really just call the ichibi a 'furry little problem'?" Kankuro asked sotto voce.

The girl nodded a few times, finally tearing her eyes away from Harry to take a closer look at her brother. "He's really… okay?" She took a step closer, pressing a finger to the kanji on Gaara's forehead.

Harry nodded a few times. "I was in the mood to help him. Plus, I'm a great repairman."

Kankuro spoke up then, gently pounding his fist into the palm of his other hand as he remembered something. "That's why I came by. I have several things that are broken. How soon could you fix them?" He had already slipped away his knife and pulled out a storage scroll.

Slim shoulders rose in a shrug. "Depends on the items, but a few days at max."

"Could you have just one of them done by tomorrow so I could check out the quality of your work?" He held out the scroll to Harry, who took it delicately… and then shifted how he held it, pinching it between two fingers. "... what?"

"What is this horrid thing!? You call this a storage scroll!? It's barbaric!"

Kankuro shared a look with the blond girl, who returned it with a 'what do you want me to do, you crazy person?' look, shrugging at the same time. At least, that's what Harry figured that look meant. Maybe it was just, 'I'm hungry, hurry up.'

Reading faces wasn't exactly his specialty. If he used magic, then…

"What's… wrong with it?" ventured Kankuro, unsure if he really wanted to know the answer.

Finally twisting his wand away into the nether where he kept it, Harry shooed the two from his backroom so Gaara could continue to sleep. Then he tossed the storage scroll that Kankuro gave him onto his counter and poked at it with a dainty little finger. "This thing. Has absolutely no elegance."

"It's a storage scroll," the girl spoke up, "It doesn't need to have elegance. It just needs to hold things."

Harry gave her a flat look. "But it can have elegance. Here, take a look at one of my scrolls." He snatched one out from under the counter and laid it next to Kankuro's on the counter so it was easy to compare them, one on top, one on the bottom.

Both of them opened their eyes wide, able to spot the difference even though they weren't trained in fuuinjutsu. Harry's was just that much more elegant. Like a boss.

"Oh wow," Kankuro muttered. "How much can yours hold?"

"Hmmm," hummed the genie, poking at Kankuro's scroll again. "At least double."

The teen's paint lined eyes went wide. "Double?" he whispered in awe.

"At least," affirmed Harry with a smirk.

"Kankuro," the girl snapped, giving him a sharp look, then she immediately flipped the charm on and turned to Harry with a smile. "Excuse me, but could we please take our brother?" Her voice even took on a sing-song tone.

Gross.

Harry leaned away and shuddered.

"No, he's sleeping. Let him sleep. I'll talk to him when he wakes up," he turned back to Kankuro, "Now what do you want me to fix?"

The teen bit his thumb and swiped it over one of the seals and out popped… a pile of mess. What the fuck was this?

"Are all the pieces here?" asked Harry as he prodded at the pile with his finger.

"Yeah."

"Okay," He swept it onto his own scroll and sealed it away. "Come back tomorrow. You can have your brother and your … thingy then!" Harry stood then and started to shove them out of his shop.

"Hey! Wait! You can't do this!" The girl who never gave her name (and how rude was that?) tried to say. Harry wasn't listening.

"Bye!" He shouted and then snapped his fingers, effectively booting them out of the shop and halfway across Konoha, much in the style of Team Rocket blasting off. "There," he wiped off his hands, "Now that the rubbish is taken out…" he returned to the scroll and quickly fixed Kankuro's thingy.

Oh. So it was a puppet. Cool.

… … …

His normal shop hours were long over when Gaara finally woke. The boy slowly returned to the land of the conscious, snuffling into the stuffed toy Harry'd made for him-some type of purple raccoon the genie had a vague memory of from… somewhere-and then the boy was instantly awake.

Once more, Harry found himself encased in sand, though only up to the neck and it wasn't as strong as before. Not that it didn't have strength, but if Harry wanted to, he would be able to break out.

"Good morning. Or evening, I should say," greeted Harry, forcing a hand to break through the sand and wave to the boy. "My name is Harry. I fixed you."

"I-..." Gaara paused, tilting his head as if he was trying to listen to something. Then his entire body relaxed and the sand filtered away from Harry and back towards the bottle that was next to the cot he'd made for Gaara to sleep on. "I can't hear Mother anymore."

"Do you mean the big mean voice in your head that doesn't sound like a woman at all? Yeah, like I said. I fixed you."

"I was…." Harry could tell Gaara wanted to argue, but the boy was also clearly confused. "I wasn't broken." He finally got out.

"True, you weren't," agreed Harry, brushing leftover sand off of his clothes and stepping up to the boy-finally, someone properly shorter than him- and put a hand on his head. "But your seal was. I fixed that."

"My seal?" Gaara was disoriented, probably from the lack of a screaming monster in his head. Harry could understand. He could remember, even after all this time, what it felt like after What's-his-face had come back. And the silence after he died.

Harry nodded and ruffled that red hair. "Your siblings, I think, at least the blond. Maybe? You know, she was never quite clear… Anyway, those kids who know you won't be back until tomorrow. Want to come to mine and have dinner? Or do you want to sleep more?"

Gaara's eyes went wide and he stared up at Harry. "Sleep?" As if that single word, that normal part of human functionality, was a completely foreign concept.

"Yeah, food then sleep. Wait here." Harry shuffled Gaara back over to the cot in his backroom and then poofed away, sans glitter. He didn't want to clean it up after all. It took about 30 minutes, but he returned with several large bags of takeaway food.

While he had been gone, Gaara had sat back down and pulled the stuffed raccoon into his lap.

"Is this yours?" Gaara asked, his voice soft and lost.

"Nope, yours." Harry dumped his bags onto the counter and started to take things out. "You must be starving. Maybe. I'd assume so. Blondie always is."

Before Gaara could fully process the fact that he'd been given a stuffed purple raccoon of all things as a gift, a tray-where had that come from?-was shoved under his nose. On it was a bowl of ramen, a bunch of sticks of dango, some sticks with meat, and a box full of sushi rolls.

"Here. Eat. I've got 3 more bowls of ramen if you're still hungry after all of this." Harry waited until Gaara had a hold of the tray and then went to grab his own tray of food. After, he took a seat on the chair opposite the cot and sat down to eat. Sadly, Harry's feet dangled a bit.

Carefully balancing the tray, Gaara began to eat some of the dango. This entire moment was surreal to him. He was pretty sure he had killed this man earlier, and now he was feeding him and giving him gifts? It was hard to make sense of, especially without Mother constantly yelling at him what to do… But it was good, as well. Having a clear head was… nice.

The toy was nice too. It was two different shades of purple and had a heart-shaped lightbulb on its white belly for some reason. Not at all like the image of Mother he constantly had in his head.

The pair ate together silently for several minutes. When the tray was cleared Gaara whispered his request for the other bowls of ramen, which Harry went to get for him, stacking all three on the shelf behind Gaara's cot.

Once Gaara had eaten his fill, he set the tray on the cot then curled his legs underneath him. Then, he grabbed the stuffed animal and hugged it tightly. "Thank you." This time the boy barely spoke above a whisper.

"Why?" Harry asked after a moment of thought. "I told you when you first came in that I fix things. I suppose you came to the right place." That was said with a laugh.

Gaara didn't share the laugh, instead, he shook his head. "No… I came here because… Mother could smell you. Feel you?" He tilted his head as he changed his words, but shrugged. "She knew you were … special. And wanted me to destroy you." The boy finally looked up, locking his gaze with Harry. "I hurt you."

Harry waved it off. "Only for a moment. I've felt worse."

The sand nin's face said it all. "I crushed you with my sand."

"And?"

"And you've had worse?"

"Uh-huh."

They stared at each other for a moment. "I could show you," offered Harry, "but I think the Hokage may get mad at me if I perform that spell on you…"

"Spell?"

"Jutsu," he corrected himself, once more waving off the comment. "Same thing. Anyway, that pain was much worse than being crushed." Probably because of the whole 'dying' thing that took away the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to.

It was obvious that Gaara didn't believe him, but the child ninja let the subject drop begrudgingly. "My head is so silent…" He muttered without realizing it as he let his thoughts wander.

"I know what that's like," Harry laughed again. "There's some confusion about what to do with yourself since half your concentration isn't busy with impulse control, but it's a good thing. Now, did you want me to fix your jar? Bowl? No, pot? Jug? What the fuck is this thing?" He poked at Gaara's giant bottle of sand with his foot.

Gaara looked from it to Harry, letting a little feeling of confusion show on his face. "It's a gourd."

Harry was still for a minute and then slapped his hand to his forehead. "Fucking gourd, I knew that. Gourd, gods, why didn't I think of that?" Harry was shaking his head at himself. "Anyway, do you want me to fix it? It's full of cracks. I fixed your friend's puppet earlier." He motioned out the door where the creepy fucking thing was sitting on the counter.

"Friend?" Gaara rose to his feet to go look at the puppet. "Ah. Kuroneko." He looked closely at the puppet. He remembered watching his brother break this. It was Kankuro's favorite because of the cat ears. Then he returned to the room and sat down. "My gourd is not broken." And that was the end of that subject.

Harry stared, then shrugged, and went about cleaning up. Since the subject was over, he had nothing else to say. Gaara too was silent and just stared at the toy in his lap.

Eventually, the jinchuuriki fell back asleep naturally, his body so desperately in need of it that he couldn't fight it. Harry went back into the back of the shop and adjusted the boy so he could be more comfortable and then spelled the room and shop so Gaara would remain like that until Harry returned in the morning.

Then the genie finally went home to deal with a yelling Naruto who was so excited that 'he was going to prove his worth and beat the chuunin exams' or something. Harry wasn't listening much. How would he beat an exam, anyway? Aren't tests generally pass/fail, or graded? Must be a ninja thing.

… … …

The next morning, Harry beat everyone else to the shop only because he could apparate directly inside. As he broke the wards inside the room he left Gaara in, the ninja started to stir awake but did that cute thing where he snuffled and buried his face in his stuffed animal.

Harry just about melted into a pile of cuteness goo.

Instead, he snapped a photo and tucked the camera way into his tiny pocket dimension and then pulled out some muffins from that same place. He could share. If he wanted to.

There was a knock at the door as the wards around the shop recognized that Harry was there and 'opened' it for business. The bell above the door rang next and in came the blond first, followed by Kankuro.

"Woah, holy shit! That's amazing!" He was practically shouting-why didn't shinobi have volume control?-and then he beat the blond to the counter to pick up his puppet. He spun it around and then did something with his hands and the puppet started to move around on its own.

Harry tilted his head and blinked. Well, that was different. Using chakra to make a puppet move? Kind of awesome. His hand twitched a little bit, having set the muffins down, and he stepped forward unconsciously. The words were on the tip of his tongue. He wanted to know how to do that-but then Gaara was there in the doorway to Harry's backroom, gourd (HAH he remembered) on his back, and both of his arms wrapped around the raccoon.

The blond's eyes went wide. "G-gaara…" She stuttered. Her eyes were dilated and Harry was confused. Was she afraid of this little adorable red-head?

This was all kinds of wrong.

"Wait," Harry held up his hand and froze the girl in place. It didn't help with her fear. The teen, Kankuro, was also frozen, as was the puppet mid-step. "Wait, wait, wait a fucking minute," he said with every spell, ignoring how Gaara narrowed his eyes and the sand was pouring from the gourd. "Is she afraid of you?" Harry pointed to the girl, staring at Gaara.

The nin blinked, his sand going as still as the two teens. "Yes," replied Gaara, as if it was simple. Normal. Expected.

Harry had to pause to swallow back a moment of irrational rage. "You're a child."

"I'm a shinobi."

"Still a child. And I think your sister—?!"

"I kill people."

"And!?"

Gaara allowed confusion to sweep over him, arms tightening around the toy. "I've threatened to kill her. She has seen me kill several people. Innocent and guilty. For no reason other than I wanted to-"

"You mean the creature inside of you pushed you to do it," interrupted the wizard. "That's tantamount to possession, and where I'm from that leaves you exempt from the crimes. It's not you who did it."

"It was my jutsu. I did it. I am a killer. All shinobi are."

Harry sighed in disgust, rolling his eyes towards the ceiling as he tried to breath in patience. "Whatever. It's not right that she's scared of you." He pointed to make his… point.

The red-headed ninja actually shrugged. The little asshole.

With a wave of his hand, Harry removed the spells he'd cast on the teens, who resumed where they had left off-the boy gushing over his puppet, and the girl taking a step back in fright.

"Hello, Temari," Gaara spoke plainly, with no inflection to his words, as he had been since yesterday. Harry left the red-head to deal with his sister and went to talk to the boy.

"This is amazing, how did you fix it so well? It was shattered! I never thought I'd see this puppet whole again!" The boy was gushing. Harry laughed at him. "How did you do it?"

"Magic," Harry deadpanned. "Since it was something so small, the price is cheap." And he passed over the bill he'd written up the night before.

Kankuro nodded, the price was fair, and then dug into his pouch for some money that he then passed over.

"Pleasure doing business with you. Goodbye now." Harry smiled in a way that barely reached his eyes, glancing over to the girl and Gaara once more. Kankuro followed his gaze and sighed.

"Temari. Let's go. Gaara, ar- wait, is that a tanuki?"

"Yes," replied Gaara's blank voice. "Maybe. It's mine. Harry-san gave it to me."

Kankuro mouthed the word 'san' and Harry got a huge grin on his face. "That's right, I did. It's yours now, you adorable little child." He ruffled that red hair and then gently pushed them out the door.

Temari was shocked that Harry was still alive after touching Gaara like that. Harry just grinned at her.

"Come back again later, if you want, Bright Heart." Harry's eyes looked to the lightbulb heart on the fucking Care Bear raccoon he'd made for Gaara and then to the boy's tattoo on his forehead. Then finally settled on Gaara's green eyes, already less ringed from having gotten so much sleep.

"Bright heart…" whispered Gaara before offering Harry the tiniest of smiles. Then he turned to his siblings and dropped it, walking out the door.

Temari and Kankuro were so confused.

"But I wanted him to fix more of my puppets…" Kankuro muttered, following behind his younger brother. Temari smacked him upside the head.

Harry rolled his eyes at the whiner and shut the door. He had shit to do. Like, figure out when the hell his books were being released.

… … …

AN: Yeah. Care Bear. Its name is Bright Heart Raccoon. Beta suggested it, and I loved it. I mean, just picture it? I'm dying. SO cute.