I do not own Naruto or any of the characters. If I did, a lot of things would have gone differently and the Akatsuki would still be alive. Anyway, Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.

'Senpai, senpai, senpai!' Tobi bounced excitedly up and down in front of the less than amused blonde.

'What?' Deidara groaned, wishing the annoying little fly would buzz off and leave him alone.

'I fought a bunch of Iwagakure ninja today, do you think the Leader will let me join now?'

'I doubt it,' Deidara replied, curtly. 'There aren't any openings, all the rings are taken. You'll have to wait for someone to die, hmn.'

'Aww! No fair! Everyone here's super strong, they're not gonna die for ages! What'll I do?' Tobi wailed.

Deidara was starting to get a headache, something that always ended up happening when Tobi started to annoy him. He scowled and closed his eyes, wanting nothing more than to make Tobi into a piece of his "artwork".

'And Zetsu-san's said-'

'Tobi!' Deidara snapped, massaging his temples in a vain attempt to rid himself of the dull aching pain in his head. 'I am going to give you to the count of three to shut up and go away before I blow you up, hmn!'

'Woah! Senpai, I was just-'

'One,' Deidara said, warningly.

'Hang on, I didn't-'

'Two,' Deidara continued, loudly. 'Don't make me get to three.'

The masked man finally took the hint and dashed away, hiding behind Kisame for protection in case the angry blonde decided to carry out his threat anyway. Deidara sighed and opened his eyes, sometimes he really wished that Zetsu would eat Tobi instead of seemingly encouraging his childish behaviour.

'You're in a bad mood today, Deidara,' Hidan smirked, 'had a row with Sasori again?'

'Shut up,' Deidara muttered, wearily.

He had argued with the irritating puppet-master he loved so much, but that wasn't the cause of his irritation; he was tired and his head hurt and he didn't need Tobi or Hidan or anyone else bothering him.

'Did I touch a nerve?' Hidan asked, his smirk widening as he tested how far he could push the Iwagakure ninja before he snapped at him like he'd done to Tobi. 'Kakuzu, I think Deidara-chan's upset.'

'I'm going to bed,' Deidara muttered, standing up and heading for the door.

Hidan, beleiving himself to be the reason for Deidara's sudden departure, snickered as the younger Akatsuki left the room and shut the door rather loudly behind himself.

The blonde bomber made his way to the room he and his partner shared, took off his Akatsuki robes, and climbed into bed. Sasori was going on some kind of recon mission tomorrow and Pein had decided that only Sasori needed to go, which meant that Deidara could sleep in and get rid of this tiredness without having to worry about incurring the wrath of his leader.

Deidara groaned and rolled over onto his side, he was finding it impossible to fall asleep despite how tired he felt. At some point, he heard Sasori come in and get into his own bed. Sasori, despite being a puppet, still needed to sleep in order to replenish his chakra, and the irritating thing was that he always managed to get to sleep quickly, no matter what was going on. Deidara felt like punching the red haired puppet maker for being so utterly infuriating, even when he was asleep.

All through the night, Deidara tossed and turned, restlessly; even when he had managed to slip into some form of sleep, it didn't last long before he was wide awake again, feeling even worse. His head still hurt and now the pain seemed to have spread to his arms and legs while his throat felt dry and sore. He groaned and rolled over onto his stomach, burrying his face in his pillow and hoping that when he woke up he would feel better.

When morning arrived, Deidara certainly did not feel better, his throat was now so painful that it hurt just to swallow and his muscles were aching as if he'd just blown himself up.

'Sasori?' he groaned, hoarsely.

The older Akatsuki was nowhere to be seen. Deidara, with a great effort, pushed himself up to look at the alarm clock. It was ten o'clock in the morning, which meant that Sasori was porbably long gone on his mission. Deidara sighed and flopped back down onto his bed, still feeling exhausted. He should probably get up and have some breakfast but he didn't feel hungry at all. In fact, the very thought of food made him feel sick.

Great, just my luck, he thought, wearily, I'm sick.

Feeling increasingly cold, Deidara pulled his blanket up to his chin and snuggled down into the warm bed, finally feeling like he might be able to get some decent sleep.

'My, my, my, Deidara, you don't look well at all.'

Deidara opened his eyes irritably as he was dragged back to reality. He's barely been asleep for five minutes and already he was forced to wake up. There was Zetsu, smiling in a deepy irksome way.

'Go away, hmn,' Deidara croaked, rolling over so that his back was to the strange plant-man.

He felt a hand against his forehead and immediately batted it away with his own.

'I thought I told you to go away, hmn!' he snapped, or at least tried to, it came out in the same weak croak as before.

'You're very hot, Deidara,' Zetsu said, now sounding more serious.

'Tell me something I don't know, hmn,' Deidara replied, coughing.

Zetsu brow furrowed and he put a hand to his mouth, podering the situation. It wasn't like the young blonde to get sick, especially not so suddenly, he was worried that it might be something serious and life-threatening.

'Deidara, how many fingers am I holding up?' he asked, holding up a hand.

'Three, now get lost before I blow you up, hmn,' Deidara grunted.

'Well, there's nothing wrong with your eyesight,' Zetsu said, slightly offended.