There are a few changes to the story of Naruto that you need to be aware of for the story to make sense.

1. Itachi didn't wipe out the Uchiha clan. He still flees from the Leaf Village. This means Sasuke doesn't wish to kill his brother, merely surpass him.
2. The invasion of Leaf Village never occurs, so the Chunin Exams go unhindered. Relations with the Sand and Leaf Villages grow and they become strong allies.
3. Sasuke doesn't meet Orochimaru and recieve the curse mark.

News of the Kazekage's abduction spread quickly through the Leaf Village. Team Kakashi had been dispatched to help the Sand Village. After a cup of tea broke, Tsunade sent Team Guy as back up. All was going smoothly. Team Kakashi arrived and was sent to track down the Kazekage's kidnappers. They all knew it was a mysterious organization known as Akatsuki.

Pakkun was dispatched to lead Team Guy to the area of their enemies. "Based on the intelligence we've managed to gather on the Akatsuki, they are all S-rank missing ninja. Guys like that don't get together to do charity." said Kakashi as they neared their destination. He could tell they were close, and wanted his comrades to know what they were about to face.

Both teams arrive at about the same time and looked around. "Gaara is behind that stone." said Pakkun jumping off of Rock Lee's shoulder. "You're late Kakashi." says Guy, turning to look at his friend.

"Well, we ran into some trouble on the way here." Kakashi knelt down on the water's surface to rest briefly. "Naruto! Sakura!" yelled Lee running up and hugging Sakura. He always had a thing for her. She resisted at first, but wrapped her arms around him as best she could in an awkward embrace. She tried to suppress her embarrassment.

Sasuke seemed annoyed at being left out of the greeting, but he chose not to say anything since they both had trained together not that long ago. "Lee, it's so good to see you again, but shouldn't you be hugging Naruto?" Lee turned to Naruto, "I like the new clothes, they look good on you. We'll get Gaara out of here in no time." He quickly smiled and gave a thumbs up, "That's a promise."

Kakashi walked over to an elderly woman and put his hand on her shoulder. "This is the Sand Village's senior consultant, Chiyo." She gave a peace sign and smiled, "Nice to meet you."

"Now then, shall we do this Kakashi?" asked Guy, looking stone faced. "We'll let Sakura handle this one, she's been working on her strength ever since the Hokage started training her." Everyone moved out of the way as Sakura placed herself a moderate distance from the stone. She charged and punched the stone, but nothing happened. "Just wait for it." She started walking away as cracks appeared on the surface of the rock. It slowly crumbled leaving the cave entrance exposed.

The first to enter the cave was Team Guy, quickly followed by Team Kakashi. Instead of just the two members they were expecting, in front of them were 11 Akatsuki and Gaara. "Give us back Gaara!" yelled Naruto charging forward only to be stopped by Kakashi. Gaara walked forward and no one moved to stop him. Suddenly the cave disappeared and they were in a clearing in the forest.

"Places!" yelled Sasori in a high pitched voice. Akatsuki members rushed to various points in the clearing and pulled out scrolls. They formed a few hand seals and then slammed their hands onto the center of the unraveled scrolls, all in unison.

Everyone looked around in amazement at what was before them. It looked like a festival of sorts, but for what purpose? What were they planning to do to them? Naruto was the first to start exploring, but he was quickly followed.

A few clay birds circled around Naruto and started tugging at his clothes. They lead him to a stand where Deidara was. "Take a look at my wares. Everything is made out of clay and built to last." There were tons of small animals, he even made cookware. "And if you guys stick around until nightfall you'll get an amazing show. All I'm gonna say is, art is a blast!" Naruto picked up a small toad that looked like Gamakichi and bought it.

Sakura walked up to Kakuzu's stand and started browsing through all of the clothing. She took another look at Kakuzu and then back to the merchandise. She couldn't believe he made mostly women's clothing, he just didn't look the type. Kakuzu had a real knack for needlecraft, he seemed to be proficient in all forms of it. Tenten squealed and ran over to this one really intricate top. "Oh my god! I've been looking everywhere for a top like this. It will go perfectly with this one skirt I have." Kakuzu and Tenten continued talking about fashion for as long as Sakura was there, and would probably continue for a very long time. Sakura moved on, completely blown away.

Guy found his favorite attraction, the koi toss. "Do you remember me?" asked the man that was running the stand. "Should I?" Guy replied trying to remember who this person was. "I'll wait until you remember who I am." It took Guy several minutes but eventually he got an idea. "I think I remember a person like you. You were in the Leaf Village with Itachi, right?" He pondered on it even longer. "Kisame, that's it. Why are you running this stand?" Guy bought a box of ping-pong balls and started throwing them. "It took me a while to realize it, but I really love raising and catching fish. I felt lost after my time with the Mist Village, so I searched for my true purpose. That's when I discovered the Akatsuki, and my passion." Guy smiled as he threw his last ball into a fish bowl. "You take care of this fish, I've raised all of them myself."

Sasuke walked up to the only female in the organization. Before her were loads of origami. "Everything you see here is hardened by chakra. These shuriken are just as good as metal ones, but they are much lighter. They take some getting used to." He finally focused on her face and was taken aback. "Oh hello there, my name's Sasuke." They continued their chat and ended up standing incredibly close, occasionally touching each other.

Lee walked up to a large fenced in area, and Nagato quickly opened the gate and led him in. There was a large assortment of animals. "I run the petting zoo, I've always loved animals." There were about 50 different animals, and Lee pet each and every one of them.

Kakashi walked into a large scary looking house. The first thing he noticed was a man impaled on the wall at the top of some stairs. He ascended them and touched the blood that was running down the wall. "RAWR!" yells Hidan, scaring Kakashi who almost fell back down the steps. "Hahahahaha, this is the greatest thing ever." He's a bit of a sadistic bastard. Not only does he get off on pain, but also scaring others.

Neji walked up to a man who quickly pulled out a deck of cards. As he was shuffling them Neji noticed his eyes, "Are you Itachi? Sasuke talks about his amazing brother all the time, it's kind of annoying actually." "Pick a card." "Don't use your Sharingan." Itachi smiled and quickly deactivated them. Neji finally drew a card and took a mental note of it. Itachi shuffled the cards again, "Is this your card?" "No." "Damn, I thought I practiced enough. Ok, don't leave just yet." He started floating in the air, and began walking. Neji walked away, clearly unimpressed. "It's a lot better when you're not a ninja!"

Old lady Chiyo walked up to a masked man and noticed several trees. "I'm Obito, I make all of these trees and masks myself." Chiyo grabbed a swirl pattern mask and put it on, buying it. She then walked around and stumbled upon the haunted house. Kakashi burst out, looked at the old lady, and then placed his hands on her shoulders. "Don't go in there, you'll die of a heart attack!".

Now that everyone had looked at all the different stands they all moved to the large stage. Standing on it was Sasori, "Ok ladies and gents, lets get on to the main events." He summoned four puppets and then disappeared from view. Tsunade, Jiraiya, and Orochimaru were all on stage, but they looked much younger. Then there was that fourth guy that no one seemed to know, but he was on a salamander. That was the first one to talk, "You think you can take me on? I'm the great and powerful Hanzo, hoo-ah!" The four tangled in what was supposed to be combat, but looked more like a slap fest. "Oh no, I am defeated! I name you three the Sannin of the Leaf Village." Sasori then appeared and took a bow.

Next appeared a totally black man with tons of white people. "That's Zetsu, he's a mime." said Nagato to everyone. It was a very dramatic skit. They told the story of a mad scientist who experimented on people to learn the secret of bringing people back to life. He finally figured it out and brought all of his loved ones back to life. He quickly realized that they weren't how he remembered them, but because he loved them so much he wasn't able to kill them. They eventually got hungry and ate him. Shinobi arrived on the scene, ordered to kill the scientist, but realizing what had happened they killed the zombies instead. One shinobi walked up to the still living scientist and slit his throat, putting him out of his misery.

A fog quickly rolled in on the stage and lights flashed on and started spinning around. Everyone was met with the thunderous roar of heavy metal. Slowly walking out on the stage was a man dressed in all black with spikes coming off in different directions. "Put your hands together for 'Orochimaru and the Slaves'!" Out came the Sound Ninja Five and they played a total of six songs. Halfway through the set they activated their curse marks so that they could look like monsters. Now that they had finished, it was finally dark.

Everyone had seen enough and turned to Gaara. "What the hell is all of this?" He smiled and then pointed to the Akatsuki leader, "He'll explain it all." Nagato cleared his throat, "All of us were tired of our ninja lives and wanted to bring joy to the world."

Itachi was the next to speak. "I left the Leaf Village because I got in an argument with my father about wanting to be a wizard. He told me it was stupid, so we fought and I accidentally killed him. These guys took me in and helped me better myself."

Orochimaru jumped down from the stage and put his arm around Itachi. "I had to leave the Leaf Village because of my forbidden experiments. I then discovered my true passion was music. So I searched everywhere for people with musical talent. I finally found my band and bestowed upon them my curse mark so that they could turn into monsters. Pretty great right?"

Then everyone looked back to Nagato. "We kidnapped Gaara because we wanted to know what he thought of our little carnival. We were self-conscious and didn't want our first appearance to absolutely suck. We were planning on going to the Sand Village first anyway."

Kakashi pointed to Itachi and Kisame. "But three years ago you came to the Leaf Village for the Kyubi!" They laughed and started rubbing the backs of their heads. Kisame spoke for both of them, "We were actually there to gather intel on the Sannin. Sasori didn't know what Tsunade or Jiraiya looked like so we had to get pictures. We didn't want to reveal information about the carnival so we lied about wanting the Kyubi."

Nagato spoke up once again. "We were going to travel to the Leaf Village, Mist Village, Cloud Village, and Stone Village, all in that order. After the Sand Village of course. Then we were going to travel to far off lands. Of course we were going to bring along a large number of cooks so that the customers would have something to eat."

"So see, it was all just a big misunderstanding. You guys are going to love this last part." said Gaara, just as trails of fire were being left in the distance. "Behold my greatest work of art!" yelled Deidara. They all watched the fireworks show and immediately after the finale there was a gigantic explosion in the distance. A picture was formed from the fire, and it was of the world with two people holding hands in front of it. It was supposed to symbolize that the whole world needs to come together as friends, and stop fighting.

All the members of Akatsuki were finally gathered together, with Konan holding onto Sasuke. "So what did you all think of the carnival? Do you think other people would enjoy this every once and a while?" Naruto immediately spoke before everyone else, "As long as there's ramen." Everyone else also said yes and Sasuke and Konan kissed to celebrate.

So the idea for the Akatsuki being a traveling carnival came to me when I was trying to take a nap the one day. So I thought it was a really unique idea and told a friend about it and she said I should write a crackfic. So this is what became of that idea. I hope I made you smile or laugh. Reviews would be great appreciated. I might write some stories every now and then, but I made my account specifically so I could get this story out.