Joining the crack circle XDD Meet the newest pairing in the Naruto fandom ;) More info in the A/N below.
Characters: Naruto, Itachi, the Creator and a few other character mentioned
Warnings: Crack. Don't take it seriously for goodness sake. Spoilers for the latest chapters. Some yaoi hints.
I do not own Naruto. We all know to whom it belongs.
The Fox, the Weasel and the Obsessed Creator
The room is small and sparsely furnished – just a book case, which shelves are stuffed with books and some other barely identifiable stuff, and a low table – clearly stating that the place has not been designed for anyone's pleasure or comfort but for work rather. Even though there isn't that much furniture in the room, it seems rather cluttered – all of it being fault of tons of paper.
No matter where your glance will rest, the first thing you'll see will be paper. Small and large sheets, blank and lined, covered with hardly legible scribbles or barely recognizable shapes of human silhouettes... It's piling up on the floor leaving a narrow passage to the door only and skills of a dancer are required for everyone who wants to move freely among it and not to jostle anything by accident. There are large heaps of paper towering some smaller heaps and slowly getting covered with dust. There also is one massive pile of crumpled paper in the corner of the room, just behind the table, and even the table is covered with large sheets of white paper.
The whole room is sinking in darkness as the only source of the light is a little lamp standing on the table and giving just enough light to lighten the table, the sheets of paper on it and the man sitting cross-legged by the table.
The man's skin is rather pale, indicating that it has been quite a long time since the sun last touched it, and he seems somewhat weary, but his hand is moving firmly over a sheet of paper, drawing solid lines. The lines are slowly taking shapes of human silhouettes, faces and backgrounds catching the eye with their dynamics. The man keeps mumbling quietly, draws and sketches, crosses and screws up pieces of paper, clearly dissatisfied with the result. Lost in the creation process he is fully unaware of a pair of eyes watching him quietly from the deep shadows in the corner of the room.
Naruto is watching the man, the Creator, with a rather bored expression on his face. He's come here quite often for last few months, spending long hours on observing the man, the place and just waiting. Not that much has changed since he came here for the first time – the Creator is still sitting by the table and drawing. At the same time the piles of paper get bigger and bigger and with his every visit the place becomes more and more material, losing that ghostly and unreal look that welcomed him when he appeared here for the first time.
He yawns and looks around quickly noticing the changes that have been made since his last visit – two more piles of paper, a few sketches he hasn't seen before and a big poster of Sasuke on the wall. He winces seeing how much bare skin the new outfit of his ex-teammate exposes. "To think that they accuse me of a terrible fashion sense," he snorts, moves his eyes to the Creator and starts to ponder who else will appear here today.
Obviously, Naruto has never been the only visitor of the place. He smiles remembering the day on which Sakura appeared in the room. She was wandering around it for a while, took a peek at the Creator's table and... Naruto giggles at the thought. The man must have been working on some part of Jiraiya's researches or something similar, because Sakura's face immediately turned red. The girl frowned and tried to punch the Creator, but her fist just went through him, not making any harm to the man. Sakura blinked, looked at her hands and walked away mumbling something about old perverted men. She's never come back, but many others have come after her.
Some of them he has known in person – like Sai who appeared here once, just looked around and left. Like the blond-haired Akatsuki man who glanced at the paper and the drawings, smirked and declared that the man definitely had no idea what real art was. Then he left as well.
Some of them he never met before. Like a beautiful red-haired woman who started to curse after seeing something the Creator was drawing, declaring to kill him, revive him and kill him again and who was dragged out of the room by a blond-haired man who looked suspiciously similar to the Fourth Hokage. Naruto, however, couldn't be sure if his guess was correct as he appeared in the room too late to talk to them or to be even noticed by them. Later he took a look at the table and the drawing in order to figure out what had angered the woman, but he only saw a picture of himself crying in the place where the brothers had fought.
That's what it has been like – people appear here and go away and only few keep coming back. Actually, he also could leave the place and never come here again, but he doesn't, because he still hopes that one day Sasuke will appear.
"However, it could be that he has already been here, but left after discovering what I have..." he frowns at the thought and if that is the point then Naruto can't really blame Sasuke for the decision made.
The shadows behind him swirl, darken and take a shape of a human silhouette – an unmistakable sign that somebody is to appear in the room soon. Naruto glances back, despite himself hoping that maybe it is finally the one for whom he has been waiting, but the hope quickly fades when he recognizes the newcomer. The same pale skin and the eyes, but the face and the clothes are different – undoubtedly the Uchiha, but not the one being awaited. The man greets him with a nod and Naruto nods back.
For a longer while they both are standing in silence, watching the Creator. Then Naruto let himself get lost in his thoughts again.
Itachi is one of these few people that keep coming back and even though the Uchiha definitely doesn't talk a lot, Naruto couldn't complain about lack of entertainment when the man appears. The boy smiles remembering how once that strange, masked Akatsuki man suddenly materialized in the room, short after the fight between the brothers ended. He saw Naruto, took a step or two in the boy's direction, but then he noticed that Itachi also was in the room and froze. He was standing like that for a longer while – Naruto was ready to bet that the man's jaw dropped, but it wasn't something he could confirm without taking off the mask – and something happened. Itachi frowned, his eyes narrowed and their look hardened. Then he glared at the man and the man's aura changed. He only raised his hands, mumbled something that sounded like "Tobi is a good boy" and quickly disappeared. It seemed to Naruto that the man just ran away and maybe it was true after all, taking into consideration what Naruto found out some time later.
Once again his glance moves toward the Creator, and he shudders seeing the look on his face. In exactly the same way a man could look at the object of his hidden desire, devouring said object with his eyes.
"Oh man... he's worse than that perverted hermit..." he snorts. "At least he was drooling over women, not over the boy who still is not legal. Are you okay with that?" He glances at Itachi.
"Okay with what?" Itachi glances back, but his usual "neutral" expression doesn't change at all.
"THAT! He got rid of you in the story. He even managed to ruin your reputation by making you make the face. Not to mention about convincing half of the readers that you're batshit insane!" Naruto snaps and points his finger into the Creator's direction, but it doesn't escape his attention that Itachi does wince at the words. "All the fans keep joking that the title should be changed, because that bastard Sasuke gets most of the screen time. And now look at this man. Judging by the expression on his face your brother is going to lose some part of his clothes soon. AGAIN. He's your brother; don't you care what will happen to him?"
Itachi stiffens and glares.
"Oops, a bad shot," Naruto thinks, too late remembering Madara's tale and the truth it revealed. Actually Naruto did have some doubts at first, just after hearing the story. He even asked Itachi about his brother and all that protecting stuff, but the man only gave him a look and said, "People themselves choose what is true or not in their opinion, creating the reality they live in." Yet since that day he's appeared in this place more often and sometimes, when Itachi thinks that nobody looks at him, Naruto can see a worried look on his face.
"Sorry, forget it..." Naruto mumbles. "Now it's even worse than when Sasuke was with that creepy snake-man..."
"And what could I do in your opinion?" the quiet reply comes.
"Dunno, just... something. Didn't you get rid of that snake in the end?" Naruto looks expectantly at the Uchiha. "That's right... Can't you use that Mangekyou thing on him?"
"It won't work," Itachi remarks with a silent sigh.
"But..."
"There are no buts here."
"How can you be so sure of it if you haven't tried it at all?" Naruto pouts at first but then looks at Itachi suspiciously. "Or maybe you have...?"
Itachi doesn't answer, and Naruto can't help but giggle seeing how all of sudden the Uchiha averts his look and moves his attention to a piece of crumpled paper he's holding in his hand.
"Oh man..." is the only comment Naruto can make.
"Is there really nothing we can do about it?" he asks Itachi after a while.
"Quite the contrary," the answer comes and the Uchiha turns his glance to Naruto and lets the piece of paper fall. "Even creators themselves underestimate the power of their imagination."
"Um... What?!" Naruto stares at him trying to understand what Itachi has just said.
"It means that we can plan and wait patiently until the right time comes," Itachi explains and turns back, intending to leave the room. "But in order that we could get what we want I'll need your help."
Naruto glances at him blankly, but then his attention is drawn by something else. He looks at the paper that Itachi has dropped – a plain, white piece of paper with some scene from the manga badly sketched on it – and a wide grin breaks his face.
"Gottcha..." he exclaims making his way towards Itachi. "Let's make some noise!"
They both enter the shadows and disappear, leaving the room behind.
In the room, the Creator, completely unaware of the revenge plan plotted by his own characters, stretches himself and looks at the sheet of paper in front of him.
"Perfect..." he whispers admiring the effect of his work – firm, solid lines (a bit curvy but not too much – just enough to stress the beauty of the body), the fine line of the uncovered shoulders and the muscles gently marked on the paper (just enough to be noticed and no to make the character to look like a body-builder). He takes a critical look at the face framed with dark, spiky hair and these deep eyes and nods to himself, more than satisfied with the result. "Definitely perfect."
For a short while he lets himself to move his fingers over that perfect body drawn on the paper before he takes the drawing and puts it carefully in the portfolio to protect it from any potential damages. A silent sigh of disappointment escapes his lips when the finished piece of art is covered from his eyes.
Then he takes another piece of paper and a smile appears on his face.
"And now let's think how to plan the next arc so that Sasuke could appear in it again," he murmurs and his eyes gleam with a strange, almost scary light.
THE END
A/N: Did you got the hints with the title? :P
The crack circle was started by industrialgirl1 with her story, Love Made of Ink. Then satalex her picture. And then Shaitanah wrote her story, Meet the Maker. Mine isn't even half as good as the other stories.