And now... I bring to you: my second Naruto fanfic! This is the one I'm working on parallel to the oneshots about the Uchiha brothers... I'm a little stuck at the moment, but there are two or three chapters after this one which I have already typed.
I think the AU-ish parts of this story will quickly become apparent... I changed their ages a bit (not that much of an age difference between them; the gang's ages range from 12 to 15 years), plus I made Sasuke a much younger brother to Itachi than he actually is (he's 5 in this one). But hey, this is fiction, after all ;)
Anyway; I hope you enjoy this story...!
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. I think my brother would die of shame if I did.
The sun had risen to a perfect summer's day in Konohagakure. It was one of those days that were considered to have been wasted if they were spent indoors.
When the doorbell rang at the Uchiha household, Mikoto called from the kitchen:
"Itachi, dear, could you get it?"
The only answer she got was the pounding sound of feet hurrying downstairs. Barely a minute after the doorbell had been rung, Itachi Uchiha opened the door with a duffle bag over his shoulder and sunglasses perched on his head.
"Yo, dude! Ready?"
"You bet!"
"Good; let's roll!"
A now complete group of ten was just about to do exactly that when one of them got called back:
"Itachi?"
In unison, they groaned, then the one in question asked wearily: "Yes, mom?"
Leave it to parents to keep you from getting out of the house on time…
"I want to clean the house today – all of it – so I want you to take Sasuke along," Mikoto told him, sticking her head out of the kitchen.
While his friends exchanged shifty glances, Itachi whirled around and exclaimed indignantly: "But mom –"
Apparently, this wasn't the first argument like that, for Mikoto cut him off sternly: "No buts, young man! You shall do as you were told!"
"But the guys all came, I wanna hang out with them –"
"You can still do that! Now don't make me repeat myself!" One could tell that Mikoto was fed up with all that protest.
"Make me!" Itachi dared her, crossing his arms stubbornly, his sunglasses becoming askew when he stuck up his nose. Ah, the joys of a rush of teenage hormones!
Mikoto fully stepped out of the kitchen, all of her usual kindness swept away from her features. Outside, the gang retreated a step, as if they could sense that an angry Uchiha mother was bad, bad news.
"Itachi Uchiha, you will take your brother with you, or else you will be grounded!"
"Big deal," Itachi muttered, mentally already planning his escape, like he had done often before.
But his mother wasn't finished yet:
"And I will put you on a very strict dango diet!"
His friends gasped collectively, and Itachi gawked at her for a second before positively howling: "Noooooo! Anything but that!" He may be a strong-headed person with close to no weaknesses, but miss out on dango?! No way! That had the same effects as forbidding Naruto to eat ramen (which he already did, despite his very young age). It spelled D-I-S-A-S-T-E-R.
"The choice is yours," Mikoto said firmly, calmly meeting his pleading gaze. Noticing this, Itachi ruefully drew the conclusion that he had forgotten how to go all puppy-eyed on her. Darn it.
Letting his shoulders sag in defeat, he dropped his bag and slouched upstairs, muttering curses about "cruel, inhumane punishments".
"And don't forget to look after him properly!" she reminded him, her face alight once more with her usual kindness. Before she went back into the kitchen, she smiled at the waiting gang. "Have fun, boys," she said sweetly.
The others sweatdropped at this sudden change in attitude. "We will, Mrs. Uchiha."
Ten minutes later, a slightly grumpy-looking Itachi came back, this time carrying two duffle bags. Beside him, a five-year-old practically skipped, all bouncy with excitement.
"Remember to behave, Sasuke, honey!" Mikoto addressed the youngster as they passed the kitchen.
"Yes, mama!" he assured her happily, and a few seconds later, they had walked through the door, which Itachi closed behind them.
There was an almost embarrassing, silent moment as the two parties regarded each other: on one side, Itachi's assembled gang of best friends, most of them from foreign villages, and on the other hand, Itachi daring anybody to say something with those glares of his that said a thousand words, and Sasuke, who was beaming like mad.
When nothing was said for almost ten seconds, the little one decided to take matters into his own hands: "Hi! I'm Sasuke, who are you?" he asked cheerfully, extending his hand to the person who stood closest to him – which happened to be Kisame, Itachi's closest friend of the gang.
Of course, Sasuke didn't know exactly who they were; he knew that his brother had friends, yet they had never been in their house, so he had never met them before. Furthermore, Itachi had no pictures of them in his room as he shielded his private life very carefully, particularly from the eyes of his stern father. The gang, on the other hand, may have never met Sasuke in person before, but they had seen pictures of the boy: Itachi always carried at least one in his wallet. And his brother was mentioned rather frequently when he told stories of all kinds.
Kisame gave the boy a short taste of his shark-teethed smile and briefly shook his hand. "I am Kisame."
"Hi Kisame!" Sasuke said politely. His cuteness made just about any adult and even most people of Itachi's age coo with adornment, but Itachi's friends were way different: they were known as "freaky folk" and weren't affected in the same way by certain things, including the cuteness of certain little kids.
"Let's get this over with quickly, okay?" Itachi remarked briskly and proceeded to introduce Sasuke to his friends in the fast-and-simple way: "These are Hidan, Pein, Konan, Kakuzu, Tobi, Deidara, Sasori and Zetsu." Of course, this all went way too fast for Sasuke, but Itachi wanted to get going, and he had faith in his comrades that they would be friendly enough to repeat their names in case his sibling would ask.
"So, this is the brat…" Pein muttered, regarding Sasuke as if he were a cockroach. Itachi shot him a brief glare – even though he usually put on a "tough" act in front of his friends, he did care for Sasuke very much and didn't like hearing him being called nasty names.
"Let's go already, un!" the blond, Deidara, prompted them impatiently.
"Right. Let's go," Itachi agreed instantly, hurrying Sasuke along and thus temporarily ending potential conversations or even arguments.
"Candy great! Now we're supposed to be marshmallow babysitters?!" Hidan grumbled as they walked off.
"So it seems. Unless you'd like to convince Mrs. Uchiha to spare us of that fate," Konan replied flatly.
Hidan remained silent. He may be hot-tempered, but after having gotten a taste of what Mikoto Uchiha could be like when someone argued with her, even he decided to take the situation as it was. Nobody who was right in their mind would object to someone who was fully willing to put Itachi on a dango diet…! However, that didn't keep him from uttering a prayer to Jashin, asking for whatever power he needed to get through the ordeal.
x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x
It turned out that it was the first time that Sasuke went to the public pool. His eyes were sparkling with excitement, yet he always stayed at Itachi's side, one hand clinging to the trouser leg of the elder's shorts.
"These prices are horrific! Is everybody in Konoha rich or something?!" Kakuzu spluttered as they stood just before the entrance booth to purchase tickets.
"This is not expensive," Itachi pointed out, rooting around in his duffle bag, his face almost not visible anymore as he searched for his wallet. Sasuke watched this action with wide eyes.
"Rip-off…" Kakuzu insisted, glaring at the cashier, who was watching the bathing people wistfully.
"Can we get going already, un?!" Deidara was itching to get into the water.
"Go ahead; my wallet is running from me," Itachi grumbled, his mind cursing nonstop as he continued his search – now his face disappeared in the duffle bag.
"Is there no age limitation so we could leave the brat behind anyway?" Pein wondered as most of them approached the cashier.
"He's not bothering you, so there's no need to be so mean," Konan reprimanded him.
"You mean you'd hang out with him?" Pein looked horrified at the very thought.
His blue-haired girlfriend shrugged indifferently. "No, that's not what I meant. I'm not willing to interact with him. I'm just telling you this for your own good; I doubt that Itachi will overhear your insults forever."
"Hn," Pein grumbled and paid for their tickets. When it was Zetsu's turn for the latest, the cashier freaked out for good. Seeing an extra mouth on each of Deidara's palms didn't exactly help him recover, either.
"Itachi…" Kisame fidgeted as he waited for his friend.
A muffled voice said something, but the fish-like boy couldn't understand a word.
"Aniki…?" Sasuke wondered and tugged at his brother's trouser leg.
"What?!" Itachi almost snapped, his face suddenly reappearing. He hated his wallet when it was stubborn in times like these.
Sasuke immediately switched to the sad, guilty puppy-eyes as he stared at the elder, whose right eyebrow was twitching restlessly in his stressed state. Kisame cleared his throat and inched closer to his friend, then whispered into his ear:
"Why don't you just stuff the kid into the sack and have him find the wallet for you…?"
He shut up when a menacing glare was directed to him.
"Hey, we'll go change and find a good spot if you don't catch up to us, okay?" Tobi called back to them. Like Sasuke earlier, he was bouncy with excitement. His friends all agreed that he was hyperactive but unwilling to admit that.
"Will we find them?" Sasuke asked, cocking his head.
"We're sherbet accompanied by a guy with a chocolate Venus flytrap on his pizza head! What do you think?!" Hidan asked irritably, having heard the youngster's comment and dutifully ignoring Zetsu's displeased pout at this not nice, but very accurate description of him.
Sasuke shrugged innocently, and the foul-mouthed religious fanatic stormed off before he would sacrifice him to Jashin on the spot. Even if that would mean paying for a new entrance ticket, which consequentially would lead to a nervous breakdown on Kakuzu's part.
Several seemingly endless minutes later, Itachi had finally found his prized wallet, though only after having emptied almost all the contents of his duffle bag. With a totally messed-up hairdo and breathing like a rhinoceros with asthma to calm down again, he paid for himself and Sasuke, and when Kisame had gotten his ticket too, they were finally at the pool. Particularly Itachi was beginning to wonder if he would survive this afternoon if his luck would remain as crappy as it had been so far. Two minutes later, he also wondered the same about Sasuke as Hidan attempted to exit the locker room in the nude…
I'd be very happy to hear what you think! So if you could spare the time, please review...
On a final note: I'd like to thank Art is a bang XD for letting me use her technqiue considering Hidan's swear words! It's so much fun to do that... :)