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⚠️ Content Warning ⚠️
This chapter contains scenes of violence and graphic imagery that some readers may find disturbing. Reader discretion is advised.
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Temari sat apart from it all.
Her fan lay across her knees, useless and heavy, the fabric still torn from where the scorpion's claw had grazed it. She couldn't bring herself to move. Couldn't bring herself to look too closely at the bodies scattered around them.
Every scream seemed to claw at her from the inside, but she couldn't answer them. She hadn't been able to answer anything not in the fight, not now. She never felt so useless and powerless.
She had given orders.
She had swung her fan until her arms burned.
And it hadn't mattered.
The scorpion had shrugged off her gales as if they were nothing, sand scattering but its carapace unbroken.
On the other hand, Isan, Shira, and Daiana, orphans. People who had a different start than her, without any privileges, without any benefits or resources.
They had done more where she failed, stood strong and faced the adversities where she faltered.
Even now, in the aftermath, Daiana was proving to be more useful than her, she was saving lives while Temari felt even more useless, realizing with a sick twist in her stomach that there was nothing she could do.
Her stomach tightened into a knot, a massive headache pounding at her skull, tears pressing at the corners of her eyes. If it weren't for the three of them, she would have already failed this test, or be dead.
She dug her nails into her palms until blood beaded, her chest tight. Around her, the sounds of death filled the desert, rasping breaths, broken sobs, the wet gargle of someone drowning in their own blood.
By the time Daiana collapsed forward, her chakra guttering out entirely, half the wounded were already dead.
The sand drank their blood in dark patches, their bodies cooling in the desert sun. The stink of poison and charred flesh lingered in the dry wind.
Shira still breathed, shallow and ragged, his muscles twitching with every pulse of pain that slipped past her healing. Isan still sweated, his fever burning, but his heartbeat was steady enough to cling to.
She had saved them in exchange for the lives of others.
The looks from the surviving trainees cut deeper than any blade. They didn't blame her, not out loud. Some even helped, dragging bodies to her, carrying the wounded to shade.
Everything was present in their eyes while they gazed at her. She turned away before they could see her tears.
The hours stretched like days.
The desert sun burned overhead, merciless, until its descent bled orange across the dunes. Flies had already found the corpses. They swarmed, buzzing in a thick, maddening drone that stuck to sweat-dampened skin. The surviving trainees swatted uselessly, too exhausted to care.
Night slowly came and cooled the desert, bringing initially a cool and sweet sensation.
The desert cooled with a vengeance, wind slicing through sweat-stained clothes and chilling blood that had soaked the sand. Some of the dead were dragged aside, stacked in quiet heaps that no one had the strength to bury. Their faces stared blankly at the stars.
Daiana was sitting beside Shira, her hands red to the wrists, crusted with blood that wasn't hers. She didn't even try to wipe it away.
Her body was shaking in small, broken sobs as she fought exhaustion that was attempting to drag her to sleep.
Temari, on the other side, forced herself to stand with her legs trembling.
She looked at the remaining trainees, their eyes hollow and movements sluggish. If she couldn't save lives like Daiana, then she could at least go out and search and scavenge for resources.
With that in mind and steeling her resolve, she slipped her fan onto her back and walked into the dunes.
The desert was silent except for her breaths and the crunch of her sandals. Every step felt heavy, but she welcomed the weight, it was better to carry something other than shame.
She scavenged. Small things at first: scraps of cloth from dead bodies, gourds half-full of water, a pouch of herbs spilled from someone's broken pack. She stuffed it all into her sash until she nearly staggered under the load.
When another trainee joined her, a gaunt boy with sand sticking to dried blood on his cheeks, they didn't speak.
They simply gathered what they could. Soon, more followed. A grim little procession combing the desert for anything of use.
While a few broke away to return to Daiana with the small bundle of herbs and scraps of cloth they had managed to scavenge, the rest of the group pressed further into the desert, scouring the horizon with hollow eyes.
Their movements were sluggish, sand dragging at their feet, lips cracked and bleeding from thirst. Each step felt like it carried the weight of finality, until they collided against each other.
Temari was standing still looking far into a direction, just as the rest were about to ask what was wrong, they also began to hear it.
It was faint at first, but gradually they could hear it better.
Temari felt like her heart was beating so violently it was drowing out her breath. For a moment she thought she was delirious, that the desert had finally broken her.
The lot of them staggered toward it, half-running, half-crawling, desperation clawing their way forward. Soon they came up to it, something close to a miracle.