Chapter 1 – Explosions, Boredom And Sake
"Ah, nothing like some nice hot sake to lighten my mood" she said, thinking out loud, while trying to find the most comfortable place to lay down on her rooftop. Odd place to sit and drink sake, it may be, but she liked it nevertheless. It was a nice view as well. If you consider a nice view being, trees, trees and more trees.
What a god damn boring day. I can't even think of a time today where I wasn't bored, she thought to herself while drinking the hot sake, and letting the effects of the warmth and alcohol set in as quickly as they please.
She knew that she got up first thing and did lots of kata, and taijutsu combo training, and some target practice will kunai, shuriken and senbon, just for the sake of it. She recalled an earlier mental note that she was almost out of rice after making some onigiri for lunch after she had showered.
This sort of day was completely normal, but though she knew that some shinobi had incredibly exhilarating lives, full of blood, death and adrenalin, she didn't really have the same sort of thing. Most of the time she just attempted to forget all that blood and death with alcohol. She had seen enough of the assassin life, and only wanted to block it out now.
It seems that she spoke too soon about being bored, because moments after finishing that thought, an unfamiliar tingle of chakra lingered in her heightened shinobi senses.
She picked up and shook the bottle before she moved, only to not hear the familiar swishing sound of liquid inside a bottle. She half shrugged and sighed, knowing that the empty bottle was no one's doing but her own.
She got up and didn't sway at all, thanks to her shinobi grace, and jumped down from the rooftop, with the now empty bottle in hand, and went inside and made a b-line for her bedroom where she knew she left her katana, Hakujou, sitting peacefully in its stand beside her bed.
The tingle of chakra got stronger, then disappeared completely when they were about half a mile away. She scoffed internally at their late reaction or just complete incompetence. She had already felt their chakra minutes ago. She picked up her katana from its stand, and strode nonchalantly outside, as if she was just going for a casual stroll, instead of taking care of a few hunter nin.
Barely anything phased her any more, even for shinobi standards. She had seen, heard and even smelt so many weird and wonderful things that nothing really surprised her any more. Most of the time she was laid-back and casual about practically everything.
She continued to walk until she was about a bit more than a quarter mile away from her house. No one had attacked her yet, so she thought that it was safe to assume that they probably hadn't moved since they masked their chakra or they'd just stopped moving when she came into sight.
So, she sat right down, in the middle of the very small clearing she had stopped in, and waited. Waited for the slightest sound, like a twig to snap, a leaf to crunch, or that all too familiar whiz of a kunai, or the slight change in the air when a genjustu was cast. She waited with a cold and indifferent expression on her face, and simply waited and thought about what kind of approach these guys were going to take.
That was, until she heard the sound of a kunai being thrown, and simply moved her head backward to dodge it, then calmly looked in the direction it was thrown from.
"Today would be nice gentleman. I'm pretty busy and I don't want any more distractions, yeah." she said rather conversationally, and fought to hide the malicious smirk that was wanting to form on her face and she mentally prepared herself for battle.
Silence.
She didn't even bother to fling a kunai in the direction the other one had come at her before. Although, knowing her luck, it's not like she'd get a lucky shot and either incapacitate or kill the guy, let alone get anywhere near him. It's not that she didn't have the talent to find out exactly where he was, and chuck a few shuriken his way before he could blink, but she just wasn't bothered today. She simply sat, cross-legged, looking completely bored with the situation.
Though she was glad for the moderate change in pace, hunter nin weren't exactly a thing to get complacent with. Even though she looked bored, she was on her guard and every tiny sound threatened to cause her to send out all the jutsu in her arsenal in every direction.
Three kunai flew at her from different directions. She seemed to flicker, and appeared again only metres away, standing up and ready to draw her katana, but not so much as to look completely guarded. Snickering mentally, she decided to make a move. They were testing her patience. She decided she wasn't going to need her katana, and instead just sat it up against the tree she was standing next to.
One of them finally appeared behind her and attempted to make a kick aimed at her head. She ducked lazily, and threw her flat hand out, and with her physical strength, she hit the shinobi's sternum and smirked deviously when she watched the shinobi's rag-doll-like body go flying back into the tree a few feet behind him and not move again. The other two shinobi came out from where they were hiding and threw as many punches and kicks as they could handle at her, none of which made any headway. She just stood there, bored, blocking or dodging whatever they were doing, and occasionally bothering to throw a few punches or kicks of her own, most of which hit with enough force to send whichever shinobi they hit a few feet back, before they jumped right back into it after recovering.
She thought that it was a bit lame for them to not use any weapons, but clearly they were hunters, not ANBU, who always had a ninjato strapped to their shoulders. It was sometimes difficult to claim bounties from the Bingo Book if you had mutilated someone's face or identifiable features so using weapons to try and take down your target wasn't unheard of.
After toying with them for a few minutes, she decided to call it quits, and started using her chakra control to start using her enormous physical strength to start taking out these guys in one blow. One of them was recovering after getting a foot to the ribs, which were most likely broken, or at least cracked, while the other started swinging a kick aimed for her side. As soon as she read his move it was all over for him.
She lifted her leg up to jam his kick with her own leg, and shot out a blast of chakra with the impact and the shinobi stumbled back, clutching at his leg and panting frantically. The opportunity was there, and she made a split second decision to finish him. One chakra infused punch later, the shinobi landed on the ground several feet away with a thud, and a crushed skull to boot. Slowly turning back to her other opponent, who stood still, quite shocked at what just happened, she allowed the corners of her mouth to twist upwards in a shadow of a smirk, then took advantage of his shock to swing a quick chakra laced kick to his head. When the dust settled, so to speak, she looked around like nothing had happened until she heard a very weak, strangled and hoarse voice to her left.
"Kage Oni, we shouldn't...have expected...any less from...you."
"Damn straight. Ended up being your downfall, yeah. I assume the Tsuchikage sent you?" the 'Kage Oni' said after a passing glance at his hitai-ate, with nonchalance and a slight hint of distaste when it came to mentioning the Tsuchikage.
"I guess that...I should be glad. Dying while fighting...someone of your calibre...however easy it...seemed for you." the Iwa shinobi choked out feebly.
"You should. Not many shinobi get to die by the hand of an enemy such as myself." she drawled, rather smugly at that.
She stilled when the Iwa shinobi's hand went into a pocket and brought out a stack of explosive tags and looked up at her with an evil smirk.
Fuck! Was the only thought on her mind before she started sprinting away with as much chakra as she could use backing her up.
#
Deidara was thoroughly bored. Not to mention annoyed. He hoped that Tobi was going to come back and tell him that this place was clear soon, or he would be immensely pissed off, and try to kill him for the third time that day.
"Deidara-senpai! The hideout is clear!" Tobi said popping out of the ground head first, and proceeding to jump about stupidly in excitement.
"Alright, Tobi. Just shut the fuck up and go inside, yeah. I've had enough of your shit for one day." Deidara spat as he strolled around the hideout to find the closest bedroom.
They were in an Akatsuki hideout in some country that Deidara didn't know, or didn't bother to find out the name of. If he wanted to do that he'd probably have to ask Tobi, which was not happening any time soon. Not like Tobi would know anyway. As soon as he opened his mouth to inhale so he could speak Deidara probably would have already sent an explosive at him. Speaking of that, he really felt like blowing some things up. The hideout was miles and miles away from being close to any village or main road, one of the main reasons why it was a hideout used by the Akatsuki, so he figured it would be okay to let of some small-ish explosions to let off some steam.
He opened the door to the room he had claimed, and sighed silently in relief to see or hear Tobi nowhere in sight. He quickly crept outside and walked a few hundred feet away before making sure there was no one, shinobi or civilian alike, around before he started creating his art. For about two hours, Deidara blew up trees, rocks and mostly anything else he could find before he decided to sit down a have a break for a few minutes. That was the case, before he heard a shrill cry...
"DEIDARA-SENPAI!"
"Ugh." he groaned, overjoyed at getting annoyed again, just after he had calmed down. "What is it Tobi?" he said, not bothering to hide his rapidly increasing frustration.
"Tobi got some dinner from a village about an hour away. Does Deidara-senpai want some?" Tobi said rather excitedly, shifting his weight between his feet as if he just wanted to run around in circles for the next few hours for no reason.
"No Tobi, I don't want anything to eat even though we've been travelling to get here most of the day and haven't eaten anything all day." Deidara said sarcastically while glaring at his 'ridiculous excuse for a partner' as he described it the other day after Tobi had pissed him off by nearly knocking him out of a tree after he slipped when they were travelling at night in the rain.
"Oh..."
Tobi looked absolutely crestfallen. Well, as crestfallen as he could with that orange swirling mask on. It was like his whole life had come down to this one moment, and it had crumbled at his feet. Deidara turned away from him and started towards the house cursing quietly before quite loudly and angrily telling Tobi that he was an idiot and of course he wanted something to eat, which seemed to set him back to shifting his weight between his feet happily and following Deidara into the house.
A few hours later, Deidara grumbled to Tobi that he was going to bed and strolled off towards the room he was staying in for the time being. It was then that he allowed his thoughts to wander. He could have sworn that he had heard the familiar sound of a faraway explosion when they were a few miles away from the hideout. No surprise that an explosion, no matter what sort could catch his interest. He wondered what was blown up, and more importantly who blew it up. And now he was feeling like blowing stuff up again. He shook his head and huffed quietly in amusement. He really was mad like she always said.
He took off his cloak and began to empty the pockets so he could clean and sharpen some of his weapons tomorrow, but got distracted when his fingers felt cold metal that wasn't a kunai or shuriken. He pulled his hand out of the pocket, still grasping onto the object.
It was a necklace that had a thin but sturdy and strong chain, with a pendant dangling gently off it that was the kanji for shadow. He was still pissed that he didn't get to give to her that day. But then again, if he did give it to her, he wouldn't really have anything to physically remember her by.
"Sokkenai Hitori" he said quietly while holding the necklace and looking at the pendant intently. He sat down on his bed, completely forgetting the previous task. He stripped off down to mesh undershirt and pants then laid down on the old, dusty, yet oddly cosy bed.
He thought about her into the late hours of the night. Was she still alive? If so, where did she go after that day? What did she do? Try as he might, he wouldn't be able to try and convince himself that he didn't care about her. It had been nearly 13 years ago when he first met her, and it had been nearly 9 years since they were separated.
He laid there and soon enough, the thoughts of her happy smiles and grey eyes eventually lulling him to sleep.