A/n: Sorry, not quite the real next one, just some little one-shot stuff to entertain the world maybe once a week or so while I'm otherwise nonresponsive through November. (I feel quite certain that at least one person will see that I posted something that started with Dawn of the Red and assumed that the whole silent-until-December thing was a lie, and you didn't read the description because you were so excited (sorry to compare you to myself in a slightly less wise way), and I know that SOMEONE will need to read this before realizing that I'm not actually giving up on NaNo quite yet and I'm not posting the last in the series...yet)

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Spot on timeline: five months after DRF II

Disclaimer: If you're reading this story, you should know who belongs to me and who doesn't. I would be more interesting with this disclaimer were it not for time constraints.

-x-

Pein was bored. Again. That kind of emotion tended to rear its incredibly dull head when one was left to sit in bed and…sit in bed…with occasional help from one's spouse when one needed to use the restroom, because one needs help walking because one has four out of four limbs broken. Pein would probably be perfectly fine, seeing as he was a rather talented ninja who would normally be treated by a team of beautiful medically trained ninjas, but he was a criminal and he spent half his bored time wishing he'd recruited a medical ninja into Akatsuki. He made a mental note that maybe someday he'd send one of his children into some village or another to be trained as medical ninjas.

At least Sasori had some idea of how the human body worked. Hidan might label this knowledge as perversion, and indeed Sasori did seem to have those tendencies, but at least it also meant that there was someone who knew how to mend bones…if only in the slow, annoying shove-your-limb-in-a-cast-and-wait-around-for-six-months method.

Pein was bored. Again.

A knock on the door sent relief shooting through him like a robin shooting through a window. Pein answered in an uncharacteristically musical voice, "Come in!"

The door opened, and in stepped Ren. Pein's robin of relief just realized that the window was closed. Wham.

"Ojii-sama," Ren started monotonously. "Your children are bored and demand attention."

Pein groaned. "Why didn't they come up here themselves?"

"I have a clone making excuses," Ren answered. "I came to you because they're currently demanding the use of my knowledge and the education in the art of the doppelganger."

Pein sighed. "Yes, of course," he muttered. "Still determined to learn all that…" If the casts on his arms hadn't been so restraining, Pein would be rubbing his temples right now. "Just…" He wondered what he could have them do. "Have them pull weeds or something. Tell them they'll need to build endurance and patience before they can start learning that."

Ren nodded and left the room.

Being incredibly bored and slightly tired from his children, even if he didn't have to deal with them personally, Pein yawned and managed to fall asleep.

He didn't know how much time passed between then and when he next woke, but he was quite certain that it had everything to do with the irritated scream from somewhere indirectly below him. "Otou-chaaaaan!"

Pein recognized Tobi's voice calling back, "Ren-chan, what's wrong?"

Pein really wished he could go to the window. Thankfully, Kai had foreseen his wanting window views and set up a few mirrors to show him the scene below:

Tobi bolted out the door as Shikai fell over laughing and Haruka seemed torn between laughter and moral. Ren, meanwhile, stood, shivering with rage, her face almost as red as the tomatoes that Shikai evidently plastered her with.

Pein smiled to himself. His children would grow up to be fine shinobi.

-x-