Author's Note: I am sorry. I know I shouldn't be writing more stories, but I have to! I am really in love with this idea! I really hope that you all like it! Please let me know what you think! I am open to pairings, straight or yaoi, I'm not particular. Let me know! Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I own nothing!
Warnings: Language, OOCness and un-beta'd.
Word Count: 5,918
It's a dark, warm night. The moon is full and shines overhead, menacingly. Mockingly. It's so close tot he middle of the night, when all the world should be sleeping. There is a shift in the trees that goes against the winds.
Something rushes through the forest, keeping close to the ground in order to move faster and out of the direct moonlight in order to hide from those that pursue it. The shadow pauses under a large tree, using the shadow cast by the lushes, full branches to offer some protection while it scans the area. Red eyes, shimmering with tears, blink quickly in order to send them away so that they can see without trouble.
There is a tremble in the small hand, the hand of a child, that it has to clench in order to still. Sharp, pained breaths from a stitch formed in the side, fill the otherwise quiet night air. The forest is quiet. The shape stains it's hearing to the sound of something large being dragged across the forest floor and the tell-tale hiss of a snake as it hunts for prey.
The child presses his back against the strong bark of the tree behind him, bringing up a hand to his side, trying to sooth the ache there. He has been running for hours and the sweat that has built up on his neck and back, trapped under a simple breast plate of armor.
"Are you alright, Itachi?" a voice whispers.
The boy spins toward the voice to see a shadow stepping out of darkness, a fully grown man wearing a swirly orange mask and all black clothes.
"Madara..." the boy whispers, staring into the single eye socket where the red spinning wheel of death resided, his own eyes narrowing a bit. "Why are you here?"
"To protect my investment," Madara whispers, half heartedly glancing toward the way that the boy - Itachi - had come from, sensing what the young boy could not. The ANBU hunting him were closing in quickly and the boy had already been running for so long it wasn't likely that he would be able to keep this up all the way to the border.
"Do not worry, Itachi," the man turns back toward the boy, walking closer to him. His words are like poison to the young boy, making him shiver in fear and unease. "I will ensure you make it out of here alive. After all, we are family."
The boy doesn't respond, not knowing what to say, he was exhausted and in pain both physically and emotionally. He has been through an ordeal that he's never going to recover from.
Itachi just watched as the ANBU surrounded them, Madara turned tauntingly toward them, letting out a little snicker as they moved toward him first, sensing correctly that he was the bigger threat. They didn't stand a chance. Within moments, it was just the two Uchiha surrounded by five dead ANBU, Madara easily able to dispatch them before turning toward Itachi and stepping aside.
"After you," Madara says, making an arm gesture to the path behind him.
Broken and helpless, the boy obeyed, pushing his shoulders back and making his chin level, the boy races past, knowing he has to get out of the Land of Fire before they run into more Leaf Shinobi. He sends a small, pained farewell to his little brother, whom he will never get to hold in his arms again or see smile at him anymore. It was all over.
Itachi Uchiha was now a rogue. But one day, one day it would all be worth it when Itachi saw his beloved little brother again. All the pain and anguish he feels now, and will in the future, will all be worth it.
Itachi opens his eyes, looking around the forest for a moment, trying to get his bearings. It has been three years since he killed his family and forsaken any chance of happiness back in Konoha. He had joined the Akatsuki to watch Madara, but since having joined, Madara disappeared. Itachi knows that the slimy Uchiha was still around though, watching from the shadows. He's always watching, it seems.
"Itachi?" Kisame says, looking over at the black haired sixteen year old, newly made partners. He tilts his head curiously.
Itachi lets his eyes slip closed for a moment, trying to slow down his steadily beating heart. He takes a deep breath before opening his eyes and standing up.
"Are you ready to depart?" Itachi asks quietly, physically tired, even though he spent the last couple of hours resting while Kisame has been keeping watch. Kisame nods, pushing himself to his feet, brining his arms up over his head to stretch his long blue limbs before picking up his wrapped blade that was leaning up against a nearby tree before settling it onto his back.
Itachi stood up slowly, feeling a hundred years old rather than sixteen, rolling his joints around uncomfortably stiff from all this time sleeping outside, but alas, it is the life that he has chose, so he will not complain.
Itachi was straightening out his cloak when the hair on the back of his neck stood on end and he swiftly steps out of the way of a sword strike, surprised that someone had managed to sneak this close to him without him noticing. Itachi turns to look at the strange, decked out in a form of armor that was unlike anything Itachi had ever seen before.
"Woah," Kisame says somewhere behind Itachi, "hello there."
Itachi glances over his shoulder at Kisame to see another man, dressed completely identical to the one attacking Itachi. The teenager turns toward his opponent, stepping out of the way of the next trike, grabbing out his own kunai, brining it up to block the next attack, eyes widening in surprise as the blade easily slices right through the kunai.
Sharingan red eyes widen in surprise before he sends it away, forcing himself to stay focused. He threw the handle away, it's useless to him now. That sword was definitely sharper than he originally gave it credit for. He brings up his leg swiftly and kicks the man hard in the chest sending him flying away into the forest, hitting a nearby tree hard before he hit the ground and stopped moving.
Itachi turns just in time to see Kisame's opponent being crushed under the sheer weight of the Samehada as Kisame brought it down upon his head. Spikes shoot out of the wrapping of the sword, impaling the strange man before he falls unmoving. His back had let out a loud crack and Itachi knew he killed him. He became very aware of the throbbing in the bottom of his foot. That armor was tougher than it looked.
Itachi walks over to him, kneeling down next to the armored man, tilting his head to the side. "I have never seen armor like this," Itachi admits as Kisame puts Samehada back onto his back. "Have you?" Itachi asks, looking up at the older man. Kisame was definitely more worldly than he was.
Kisame shakes his head, kneeling down next to him. "Awfully ballsy of him and his friend to attack us out of the blue like that."
Itachi reaches up to pull the mask off of the man's head, but is unable to remove it. After a few moments of trying to maneuver it off, Itachi finally got the latches on the sides and pushes them out of place so that the mask can be removed, revealing the face of a man Itachi has never seen before. Blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth with scars all over his face. The man had simple, short brown hair and now unseeing brown eyes.
"Do you recognize him?" Kisame asks.
Itachi shook his head. "No."
"Oh," Kisame says, leaning down and picking up some kind of strange device, tinkering with it for a moment. A screen projected out a few inches from the devise showing a single red dot slightly off center. "What's this?"
Itachi stood up, looking down at the screen, not understanding either. He shrugs his shoulders before leaning down again and picking up the blade the other man had, similar to the one that Itachi fought. Itachi studies it curious for a moment before offering it to the kenjutsu specialist.
"I have never seen this kind of blade before, but I am no swordsmen," Itachi says.
Kisame stuffs the device in his pocket and grabs the sword from Itachi taking a moment to examine the blade with a critical eye.
"Huh," Kisame says. "I have never seen this kind of blade either. There doesn't appear to be anything special about the blade. It almost appears as though it was mass produced rather than made by a single smith. There is flaws in the carving that a smith would have noticed. And this metal..." he runs the pad of his thumb along the blade, watching as it sliced through his skin, a bit of blood slipping out between the crack. "I have never seen this type of metal before."
Itachi raises his eyebrows in surprise. "Really?" A type of metal used for a sword that someone like Kisame had never seen before? Now that was something.
"There is something weird about this man," Kisame says.
"Yes..." Itachi agrees, looking down at the man's face. "There is something odd..."
"Should we bring him to Sasori, you think?" Kisame asks, giving the sword another curious glance.
Itachi's eyes flicker toward the forest. "Yes," he says, standing up. "But first we have to take care of some more guests." Both men turn their attention toward the forest as the sun peaks over the horizon, revealing shadows of more men in that strange armor slinking out of the forest toward them.
"I'm surprised by how close you were," Kisame says, walking up to the small, hunched over figure of Sasori of the Red Sand. His companion, Kakuzu of Taki, doesn't even spare them a glance, too busy sitting on a rock a few feet away, counting away at the paper bills in his hands. Itachi stares at him for a moment before looking back over at Sasori.
The masked man stares up at them. "You look like hell," Sasori says, looking at Kisame's tattered cloak and then over to Itachi who no longer had his. "What happened?"
"We met some strangers in the forest," Kisame explains. "They had the balls to attack us out of nowhere. First there was two of them, and then there was seven more. They weren't overly impressive, though. They have strange weapons and muskets unlike anything I've ever seen that hurts like hell when they hit you," he gestures toward a terrible burn on his arm before continuing, "but there is something about them that's just strange. Take a look at them, would you?"
Itachi pulls out his sealing scroll, summoning out one of the bodies. Then he stood back as Kisame pealed off the rest of his scorched cloak as Sasori climbed out of the puppet, stoic brown eyes stared down at the body as he began to tamper with the body, figuring out how the clips of the armor worked and removed the pieces from him before holding his hand over the man's body, hand glowing green.
Itachi plays around with some of the man's things, trying to figure out how they worked. The muskets were interesting to him, seeing as they didn't shoot off pellets of metal like regular muskets do, and they are small, compact and made completely of metal. Instead of the pellets, it shoots off some kind of super-heated magma blasts of sorts. But leaves nothing behind other than burns.
But there is other things. There is small, metal balls of different colors, but Itachi didn't know what they were for, so he sets them aside slowly. There is all sorts of different devices but Itachi didn't understand what any of them were.
"This man isn't human," Sasori says, turning to look at Itachi and Kisame. Kakuzu pauses in his counting, interested in Sasori's words.
"Really?" Kisame asks, blue eyebrow raised.
"Yes," Sasori says, red hair blowing in the breeze a bit. "He's organs and bone structure are very similar, but he's built more like a ninja. He has enlarged lungs and highly protected organs, denser bones and tougher skin, but he's not a shinobi. His chakra levels are as low as a civilian's, and he's far too heavy to be a shinobi. He's taller than an average shinobi, too and there is no sign of physical kekki genkai. Other than the physical aspects, I don't think he's a shinobi, but he definitely is a warrior of some sort."
"Perhaps," Kakuzu says, standing up, "we should speak with the Boss. We are close to Ame."
No one had any argument. Itachi sealed everything back up before they headed off toward Ame, with Kakuzu in the lead.
It was one of the rare times, in Ame, in which it was not raining, but it was still very dark and hard to see, even in the middle of the evening when it should be pretty bright out. Ame was, by far, the most industrialized place that Itachi had ever been and was in awe at it's splendors, even if he said nothing and did not show it on his face. When they made it to the largest building in the city, they found the boss, usually shrouded in a haze of black with rainbow sheens from their rings, is a man in the same cloak as they, with wild orange hair and man piercings adorning his face and ears.
His crazy, ringed eyes raise to them as they approach.
"What is it?" He asked, voice deep and commanding.
Itachi listens quietly as Kisame explains again about their strange attackers, weapons and tactics, and then to Sasori explaining their physiology. The boss just sat in the lobby in silence, not so much as blinking as they spoke, waiting until they finished before he even moved again. This time, to look around the empty lobby, simple, clean but lit up compared to the outside.
"Interesting..." the boss says.
His ringed eyes flicker up to the ceiling as he swiftly moves to his feet, walking quickly to the door as an explosion goes off in the city.
"Pein!" Konan appears in the doorway, brown eyes wide. "There is some kind of strange floating object in the sky, firing missiles down at the village."
"My lord!" An Ame ninja appears next to her, bowing deeply. "Strange men have infiltrated the city!"
"Konan," Pein says, looking over at the blue haired woman. She nods, reading his eyes before leaving with the ninja to coordinated a defensive while Pein follows them out. "Akatsuki," he addresses them without even turning to look at them, "protect Ame!"
Having no choice but to obey, the two teams head out into the city, running into more of the strange men in armor, now firing upon civilians and ninja alike. And as Konan said, Itachi could barely see something half hiding in the thick black clouds above them. It was strange as once again, Itachi could not sense these people before him. He was not a powerful sensor in any sense of the word, but he did have strong enough senses to be able to pick up on someone sneaking up on them, especially this many, but these people somehow eluded him.
Itachi pauses to see Pein floating in the sky above him, hands raised high over his head as an orb of light goes flying up into the machine in the sky, going inside of it. A moment later, Itachi could hear Pein shout, "Planetary devastation!" and he about fell to his feet at the pressure that barreled down on him. He wasn't the only one, though. Everyone fell to their hands and knees. The civilians crumbles without pause, the shinobi staggered and fell over and the men in armor dropped to their knees before looking up in awe as the machine began to crunch and pull in on itself, imploding in a loud screech and grinding noise that persisted as glass blasted out of the machine and rained down on them.
Itachi watched in a mixture of awe and horror as the machine in the sky was crushed. It was only when the roofs of the tallest buildings around started to get pulled up toward the metal ball that Itachi realized it was some sort of bubble of energy that super compressed whatever was inside. His sharingan was having a hell of a time understanding what it was seeing through all of the chakra in the air.
Once some of the roof of the nearest building rips off and goes flying into the chakra bubble, Pein lowers his hands and the energy begins to ebb away, the metal ball falling down just outside the city with a loud explosion. All of the strange men in armor just stared up at the sky as if they couldn't believe it. Or maybe they were surprised. Itachi couldn't tell because he couldn't see any of their actual body other than the armor.
"Best not waste any more time!" Kisame says, swinging Samehada around before charging at the closest man, catching him off guard before he's easily cut down. And the battle continued.
Itachi watched, half in awe, and half in horror after all of the stragglers were rounded up, and brought to the boss. Pein stood before a row of men without the helmets on their heads, all with short dark hair and eyes and many battle scars, glared up at Pein as he walked in front of them. It was a struggle to get the four men that kneel before Pein even now. They fought tooth and nail and it wasn't until Itachi captured them in genjutsu that they managed to bring them to the Akatsuki leader.
"Who are you?" Pein asks, glaring down at them. "Why have you attacked Ame?"
None of them respond. They just glare up at him, hardened warriors that were not afraid of death. Their eyes shone with resolve. They would say nothing to him. They were not afraid of him.
Pein blinks slowly. "It is of no consequence whether you speak or not," he says simply before walking over to the one closest to Itachi, pausing for a split second before reaching out and putting a hand on the man's head. Pein's eyes adopt this far away look for a moment before he pulls this blue energy from the man's head and absorbs it into his body, much to everyone's surprise and horror.
Pein blinks a few times quickly. He stares off as if seeing something that wasn't there, as his eyes widen. He looks down at the other two with menacing KI leaking out of him. The men stare back at him as if he was a devil that revealed it's true form; horns, flames as a halo, pointy tail, red skin and malice to match. Pein brings up his hand, a black rob sliding out of his sleeve and into his hand. He uses it to quickly kill them.
"Boss?" Kisame says, raising an eyebrow at the man's entire shift in demeanor. There was a chilling presence about him before but now he was downright glacial. He did something to that man, pulling whatever that blue energy - was it chakra? - out of the man in front of him and into himself which Itachi didn't even know was possible, or what he even did, but it changed his entire demeanor, so whatever it was, couldn't have been good.
Itachi doesn't know much about the Akatsuki leader, and he would never claim to, but something about this entire thing seemed very off. Like it shouldn't have worked out this way.
Pein turns around and walks into the building behind him, waving his hand for them to follow after. Itachi takes up the rear as the five Akatsuki, including Konan, who was standing off in the side, follow Pein inside.
"What's up, boss?" Kakuzu asks once they enter the lobby.
Pein turns to look at them. "Conquerors," Pein says, a strange look on his face. "They are conquerors."
Itachi frowns at that, not understanding. "What does that mean? They are here to conquer Ame?"
"Not just," Pein mumbles, shaking his head. "Go, I need you all to go and gather more allies."
"What is this about, Pein?" Konan asks, stepping closer.
"Go, now," Pein snaps, glaring at the four other Akatsuki before turning his gaze to Konan. "Come, Konan, we have to begin suring up Ame's defenses."
Itachi, lost on what exactly was asked of them, was dragged out of the building and now into the pouring rain by Kisame. The tall, blue man shakes his head when Itachi looked up at him curiously.
"What is wrong with him?" Itachi asks, finally, as they exit Ame and into the rice patty fields that surround it. Rice patties being the only things that can really grow in Ame with all of the rain. They walk carefully to avoid falling into them. "What did he mean?" Itachi really felt like a child right now. So much was happening that he didn't understand, that he didn't know how to feel about. There was this overwhelming feeling bubbling up in his stomach that was leaving him anxious. Usually Itachi was a very calm and collective personality, but there is just something going on right now that is making him too anxious to be able to hide it very well. It's not something that he's having an easy time trying to reign in.
"Not sure," Kisame says, rolling his shoulders back.
"Something is definitely off," Sasori says, dragging the heavy puppet he's inside of across the sloppy, wet mud. "Pein is acting very suspicious."
"Conquerors," Kakuzu says, glaring ahead of them. "And they aren't just here to conquer Ame?"
"How did he know that?" Kisame asks, glancing over Sasori's head, easily to the man in the lead, the oldest of them.
"No clue," Kakuzu says slowly.
"It was that jutsu," Itachi says. They exit the rice patty field, beyond the rain, just in time for Ame to be lit up behind them. All for men spin around to see Ame crumbling to the ground. Not one, not two, not three, but four of those giant air machines, like the one crushed by Pein, hover over Ame, dropping bombs down on Ame, relentlessly.
All four of them just stood there, watching in horror and disbelief.
Itachi feels a pinch on his hand. He looks down to see The ring on his hand shivering madly before exploding into tiny pieces and falling to the mud. They just stood there, watching as Ame is turned to rumble without moving. Itachi, for one, was in complete shock. He didn't really know Pein, and it wasn't about the Akatsuki and where they were going to go from there, it was about the fact that he was watching an entire village being razed.
"Is... Pein dead?" Kisame asks, rubbing his hand, tiny eyes blown as wide as they can. "Shit."
"Yes." Itachi took a small step closer, feeling compelled to go tot heir rescue when someone wraps their hand around his wrist, holding him in place. Itachi didn't even turn to see who it was that did that.
Itachi turns sharply, recognizing the voice. Madara walks over to them slowly, like a cat, something in his hand. Zetsu stands off at the side, a foot away, shifting from one foot to the other.
"Madara," Itachi says, red eye wide.
"Madara?" Kisame and Kakuzu say at the same time, eyes wide.
"Pein is dead," Madara says, rolling the two small, orbs in his hand around a bit before they spin away into nothing. "I had to practically rip the Rinnegan from his head. Pein was just a body, but it's gone. Nagato would never survive now that Konan is dead too. I just sped up the process."
"That was you?" Itachi asks, looking over at the bombardment of Ame to see that it's finally slowed down.
Madara shakes his head. "No, that," he nods toward Ame, "wasn't me. I'm not sure who those people are. But we will have to gather the rest of the Akatsuki. There has been a change of plans."
Itachi doesn't respond. He turns his eyes back toward Ame, thinking, lost in the idea of how many people were now dead because of these strange people.
"Come on, Itachi," Kisame says, tugging at his wrist, having been the one to stop him earlier. "Let's go."
Having no where else to go, and knowing that answers may lie with Madara, Itachi followed after the black haired man, hands curling into fists.
Something is growling loudly.
Itachi groans, feeling as if his head was on fire. His vision was doubled and spinning and he feels like he's going to throw up. He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, trying to calm the pain in his head and the insanity that's going on with his eyes. He shakes his head, and while it hurts, it helps clear up his vision a bit. Itachi looks down to see that he's just in a pair of simple white... shorts? Underwear? They were form fitting, but a bit longer than regular boxers.
How did he get here? What happened?
The last thing Itachi remembers was going to the next town over, going to a small shop just for a bit stop so that Madara could tell them what was what, when Kisame had cut in, curious, asking Itachi why those men suddenly attacked Ame, of all places! It took Itachi a moment of consideration before he said, really without thinking, "Maybe they were tracking their guys."
There was split second where Itachi and Kisame stared at one another, before Itachi realized that he was still in possession of the scroll in which those men were being held, right as something rolled into the room at their feet. It went off, blinding them first, before another one sent a pulse through the building which Itachi blacked out for.
So, they kidnapped him?
Itachi hears the growling again, this time accompanied by a strange crunching and wet noise. Itachi turns his attention to a cage next to him. Like his own, it had ten foot tall bars that were a glowing yellow color. It was about seven by ten feet in size, like his. But thankfully unlike his, there was some kind of large, hairy creature chewing on what looks to be human bones, crunching them in it's massive jaws.
Itachi blinks very slowly, deciding that his vision was as clear as it was going to get with this massive headache behind his forehead throbbing in tandem with his heart beat. Whatever this hairy monstrosity was, it wasn't something Itachi had ever seen before.
Itachi stands up slowly, body aching from sitting on the cold, hard metal floor for however long he's been out before walking over to the edge of the cage, studying the yellow energy coursing through it. His sharingan couldn't tell him what it was, which was a bit alarming, but he knew that if he touched it, it would bite back hard.
He hears the sound of metal clanking against metal and around the corner one of the men in armor appears, he stops in front of Itachi's cage and looks in at him, tilting his head.
The man says something, in a language Itachi didn't understand, his voice raspy and strange to Itachi's ear, shifting his strange musket toward Itachi in a thinly veiled threat of violence.
Itachi stares at the musket for a moment before looking up into the dark space where the man's eyes were hidden, and he casts a genjutsu. The man jerks hard, fighting back almost immediately, which was surprising but Itachi gain enough control to trick the man into shooting his door lock, making the entire cage sputter before the yellow light goes out. Itachi swings the door open and attacks.
Itachi wrestles the small musket from the man before brining it to a small weak point in the armor before pulling the trigger, as he had seen the men do many times before. A shot went off and the man let out a yell of pain. Itachi pulled the trigger again and the next one silenced the man. Itachi looks down at the musket, disgusted with it, before he dropped it at his feet before scrounging around on the man's person, finding one of their swords. That he takes along with the orbs that he originally disregarded.
They kind of looked like smoke bombs, but they were more than that, it seems.
Knowing he had to be sneaky about it, Itachi began to systematically clean up the strange place he was in. Every man that he came across in that strange armor he assassinated. He put all of his ANBU training to good use and began cleaning up the place until he made it to this room with all of these strange blue tanks. There was two sides, one side with a bunch of tanks and the other, on the other side of the room, was filled with large... rectangular panels? Itachi couldn't really get a good look at them before something moving caught his attention.
A robot makes it's way over to him, beeping at him. It had a glowing light on it's face and it hovered off the ground without any legs, but dozens of arms.
"What?" Itachi asks wearily, not sensing any danger from the strange machine.
It makes more beeping noises before a light shines from it's blue eye and scans his body. Itachi steps back, worried it'll strike out against him, before it whirls, displeased. A compartment on it's chest opens up and cup with a small tablet and a cup of what appeared to be water appears. It floats closer and offers it to him. Itachi stares at it for a moment in debate. He didn't know what it was but there was something in the back of his mind that urged him to take it. He needed to take it.
So he did, cautiously. He sniffed the substance. Water. It had no fragrance. And he took the single pill, waiting a moment to see if he would start feeling sick or as if he was poisoned, but in fact, almost immediately he began to feel better. His headache had been bothering him for a while and even though he was able to ignore it, at least he was able to finally rid himself of it.
"Medicine," Itachi says to the machine. "Are you like a doctor?"
The machine beeps and clicks at him.
"It is," a voice behind him says. Itachi spins around, blade swinging to see the spines around Zetsu's head close up tight to protect him from the blade. Thankfully Itachi caught himself before hitting his Akatsuki ally.
"Zetsu!" Itachi says, surprised. "Where are we? What's going on?"
"You and the rest of the Akatsuki were kidnapped by those same men that destroyed Ame," Zetsu says, the spine spreading apart again so that they can speak. "How do you feel, Itachi? That machine is the doctor of this place."
"I'm fine," the sixteen year old says dismissively. "Where are we? Where is the others?"
"Not here," Zetsu says. "I only boarded this ship because it was where Obito was. It seems like they were able to block out his Kamui abilities, that he was too dazed to be able to use them, but they were conducting experiments on him. Imagine their surprise when pieces of him started growing back. They thought he was a monster and so they chopped him up and sent him tot he incinerator, I think."
Itachi stares at Zetsu blankly. "Who? What? Who's Obito? What's Kamui? How was this person growing back pieces of himself?"
Zetsu looks around for a moment, as if the answers to Itachi's questions were floating in the air around his head, before looking over at Itachi. "Huh, I suppose it doesn't even matter, at this point. But, good news, I managed to save Master Madara's Rinnegan eyes." He holds up what was without a doubt an eye, ringed, and a carbon copy of Pein's eye.
"Rinnegan?" Itachi asks, staring down at the eye in confusion. Then, he looks up at Zetsu. "Wait, what about Madara?"
"Huh," Zetsu says. "I can't imagine he'll be too pleased about this. If we can even figure out how to get home..?" He shakes his head. "For now, Itachi, I need something from you that only you can help me with."
Itachi stares at the white, black and green plant-like man, mistrusting. "What?"
"I managed to fuse the two eyes together, but I don't have anywhere to put them safely," Zetsu says. "I'll need you to hold onto them for me, and Master Madara, for the time being."
"What?" Itachi stares at the other Akatsuki member in confusion.
There is a beeping noise behind him and something sharp sticks Itachi in the side. Itachi turns toward the machine as it pulls a needle out and floats away. Itachi's world sways.
"What are you doing?" Itachi asks, stumbling a bit. He grabs onto the nearby table, which is surprisingly tall and empty, and metallic. Like an operating table. Had it always been there? Itachi's body was going numb.
"I am doing nothing," Zetsu says. "Obito has known for a while that you are sick. That machine must have been able to see it when it scanned you. I think it's going to fix you now, but while it does, I'm going to have you hold onto Master Madara's eye for me." Zetsu helps pull Itachi onto the table, despite the young boy's sloppy attempts at pushing him away.
Once Itachi is laying on the table, staring up at the bright light overhead, feeling drowsy, Zetsu hovers over him, using one hand to hold up his left eyelid, and then using the other to put the eye against his own.
"Don't worry, Itachi," Zetsu says. "I will protect you if any more of your captors come. But I think you did a good job cleaning up. I don't think there is many left. It shouldn't be hard to dispatch them. Once you are all better we will find a way to get home."
"Where are we..?" Itachi slurs, eyes rolling into the back of his head.
"We... are not on Gaia anymore," Zetsu says.
Everything blacks out.