Title: Additions
Fandom: Naruto
Type: Multi-chapter story
Rated: PG13
Word Count: 3, 592
Summary: Three toddlers are found in an eerie forest by a pair of Akatsuki members. When they are brought to base, they are decided to be kept. Thus, begins the humorous journey of the S-rank criminals to raise the three children into beautiful killers. AU, kinda
A/N : God, this is the third time I'm writing the first chapter of this story again (Originally named 'Love Is Complicated'). Well for those who read Skirts & Shoes, Pants & Punches, you should know I'm already done with the latest chapter, it's just that my beta-reader, Nonumaru, hasn't been replying to my emails. I can't post it unless if it's beta-read. :/
This was originally a love story, but I've decided to change it into a heart-warming humor story instead. I hope it's funny, though. xD More comments are at the end of the chapter.
…
..
.
"Those who educate children are more to be honored than they who produce them; for these only gave them life, those the art of living well." - Aristotle
.
..
…
The sky was dark and the moon reflected the sun's rays in a glaring white light, glimmering beautifully on the rustling trees as they danced to the wind. Moonlight seeped through the branches and leaves and formed tiny patches of light on the path leading through the forest. Brown, fallen leaves crunched and turned to dust as the two men passing through subconsciously stepped on them.
An owl watched, with its big yellow eyes, as the duo in notorious Akatsuki cloaks made their way through the forest.
Kisame towered over his partner, carrying his huge, heavy and bandaged sword over his shoulder. His eyes frequently darted around to sense if there was a dangerous presence around them, and so far, there were none.
Itachi was quiet. His dark eyes stared at the path ahead of them and he did not show any signs of worry or caution. However, his calm demeanor belied his high awareness for anyone or anything that wasn't supposed to be near them.
The two men had just returned from a backbreaking mission and were eager to return to base. It would be tiring to use the usual route as it would take more energy than they currently had, so the two mentally agreed to take a shortcut.
The shortcut required them to go through a thick and quiet forest with no birds or animals except owls, crows and ravens. The eerie woods were infamous for its silent and random assassinations and it was rare for anybody to be walking along its path.
Although it would be advisable to run, the two men were tired and walked at a steady pace. Itachi, being a confident and skilled man, was sure they could easily escape an assassination attempt.
Kisame was eager to start a conversation, but after knowing his partner for some time, he knew speaking would prove no use, unless if it involved Pein or Akatsuki matters.
About ten minutes into walking, Itachi, who was a few steps further from his partner, stopped.
Noticing this, Kisame frowned and stopped walking as well, "What's wrong?"
The raven-haired man did not listen, nor did his expression change. They stayed still for another two minutes, until Kisame finally heard it.
"Laughter," The blue-haired man said, staring ahead of them as it was the direction from where the sounds were coming from, "Should we continue? What if those bastards are trying to distract us?"
"Which is why we should proceed with caution," Itachi simply replied, taking another step forward before the laughter came again. With hesitance, he started walking towards the sound whereas his partner eventually started following him.
After a while, they finally saw dark figures from afar.
Itachi could see them clearly, and although he was surprised, he didn't show it on his face. The two men stopped not so close to the figures and Kisame squinted, unable to identify the presence a few meters away from them as it was rather dark.
Laughter quickly changed into crying and the blue-skinned man finally realized what he was looking at.
"Holy shit," He breathed out, surprised, "Are those kids?"
Itachi ignored Kisame's question and continued walking, "Let's hurry and get back to base. We need to inform Leader-sama about our accomplishment as soon as possible. I also need to rest."
"I need to rest, too, but…" Kisame's sentence faded as they approached the youngsters, which he had counted to be at least three girls, "Are we just gonna leave them here?"
His partner did not reply. The three kids, located underneath a big, thick and shady tree by the shoulder of the path, stopped moving. The thickness of the tree's leaves blocked out any moonlight from seeping through, thus the men were unable to study the appearance of the girls hiding in the shadows.
One of them was sobbing.
Kisame initially thought Itachi was going to at least talk to the girls, but he was surprised when his partner simply walked past the youngsters.
He clamped a hand on the Uchiha heir's shoulder, "Hey, you aren't gonna just leave them here, are you?" Itachi stared at him, silent, and Kisame frowned, "I'm not as cold-hearted as you, you know. We should at least take the time to send them to their homes."
"We have no business with them," The stoic man coldly said, "It's their guardians' fault for being careless enough to have them wander into this deadly forest. I don't intend to waste any more of my energy or time, either."
"At least, let me talk to them," The tall man let go of Itachi's shoulder and turned towards the girls in the dark, "Hey there! Do you three know where you are?"
There was some silence before they received a reply.
"No, we don't," The voice belonged to a young girl, confirming the men's suspicions. Her voice was quiet but revealed some confidence, "Can you tell us where we are?"
"It's dangerous here," Kisame chuckled, comforted by the sound of a child, "Would you like to go home? I could take you back to your village."
"We don't know where we're from," This voice came from another girl.
The blue-skinned man raised an eyebrow and glanced at his partner. Itachi was already looking at Kisame, and he knew it was Itachi's way of saying, 'What…the…hell?'
"Okay, do you know which clan you girls are from?" Kisame asked next, hoping it would ring a bell to where they originated.
"No, sir," This other voice was incredibly soft and fragile.
Now, the two Akatsuki members were truly confused. How could three young children end up in a notorious forest far from any village?
Kisame was at a loss for words when he noticed movement in the dark. The three girls were approaching them. Eventually, they stepped out of the shadows and the moonlight kissed their skin and hair—revealing they looked no older than seven.
There were three girls. One of them was a blonde with piercing blue eyes. She looked up at Kisame, who towered over them like a building. "I'm Ino," She introduced herself with a small smile.
"I'm Sakura," The girl with unique features—pink hair and pale-green eyes—said next. She held the hand of her friend, who had purplish-black hair and gray eyes, "This is Hinata."
Itachi noticed trails of tears along Hinata's cheeks. It was her who was crying and sobbing. Apparently, she had stopped both actions but a single tear was rolling down her cheek and she still looked as though she was upset.
"Why is Hinata crying?" Kisame asked with a grin, putting down his massive sword and kneeling before patting the ravenette on the head, "Did somebody do something bad to you?"
"I-Ino…" She sputtered, burying her face in her hands. She tried to say something else, but they were incoherent and she eventually started crying and sobbing again.
"What did Ino do?" Kisame frowned slightly and glanced at Sakura, softly wrapping his arms around Hinata as she continued to cry. Hinata accepted his hug and cried on his shoulder.
"Ino accidentally kicked Hinata when we were playing," Sakura explained, glancing at her blonde friend.
"It was an accident, alright?" The azure-eyed girl defended herself.
"But you didn't say sorry yet," The pink-haired girl flashed a small smile.
Ino folded her arms, pouted and looked away as though she was too proud to apologize.
Sakura sighed and shook her head. Then, she looked up at Itachi, whose emotionless expression intrigued her. "Hi," She squeaked, noticing how handsome the stranger in front of her was, "I'm Sakura."
"I know that," For the first time in a long time, Itachi's lips tugged upwards, "Could you tell me how you ended up here? Just like my friend said, it's very dangerous to be here."
"Well…we woke up about twenty minutes ago," Sakura's lips formed an unsure frown as she scratched her head, "Ino, Hinata and I walked for a while before we decided to rest under this big tree. Then, we started playing and Ino accidentally kicked Hinata's leg."
"You don't remember where you're from or which clan you're from?" Kisame raised an eyebrow as Hinata started to calm down. She blushed as he released her from his embrace.
"Sorry…we don't really remember anything a lot about ourselves," Hinata mumbled, looking at her feet as she was too shy to respond to Kisame's puckish grin. She wiped her damp cheeks and continued, "But we remember each other and the fact we're best friends. That's why we started playing."
"How old are you?" Itachi asked.
"We're eight-years-old," Ino replied.
The two men made eye contact and exchanged unsure glances.
"How do you feel about coming home with us, then?" Kisame asked.
Ino frowned, "I don't think we're supposed to do that."
"Don't worry," The blue-haired man assured with a smirk, "We have a female friend back at home. Her name is Konan. She'll be happy to feed you girls," At this point, he patted Hinata's head and the grin returned to his face, "Besides, after crying, you must be really hungry, aren't you?"
The girls remained quiet and the humanoid shark glanced up at Itachi to seek his approval. Itachi stared at Kisame, then Sakura, then Ino, then Hinata, and back to Kisame. He sighed at the hope flickering the young girls' eyes. He knew they were as tired and as hungry as they were.
"Fine," Was all he managed to say.
…
..
.
"Anyone who does anything to help a child in his life is a hero to me." – Fred Rogers
.
..
…
Pein stared with disapproval in his ringed eyes as Kisame gently put three sleeping girls onto the sofa.
"The mission went well, Leader-sama," Itachi said, mantaining his stoic expression as he proceeded to walk towards his room to take a bath.
"That's good, but who are they?" Pein asked, his face neutral.
Kisame watched with amusement as Itachi stopped and stared at their leader. Both men were stolid and emotionless, so it was funny to the blue-haired man to see them talk to each other.
"Ask Kisame," Itachi proceeded to walk away as Deidara and Kakuzu walked into the living room of their base, connected to the kitchen.
Deidara didn't really react much when he saw the girls asleep on the sofa. He raised an eyebrow but didn't seem all too surprised as he walked past Pein and took a carton of milk from the fridge, "Who are those girls, yeah?"
As he drank from the carton, Kakuzu watched with contempt, both at the youngsters and Deidara. Kakuzu wanted to drink that milk, too. But he couldn't now. Deidara had contaminated it.
Just then, Konan walked in and widened her amber eyes when she saw the girls. "Oh my God," She said, shocked, "Where did they come from?"
"Found them at that forest," Kisame replied.
Deidara choked on his milk and stared at the blue-haired man incredulously. "Seriously? Even some of our member got killed there! What would three first-graders be doing in the middle of… that?"
"Don't ask me," The tall man shrugged, looking around only to realize Itachi had disappeared. He glanced at Konan, who was approaching the girls, "They don't know where they're from or what clan they belong in, so I decided to bring them here."
Konan kneeled down and put her hand on Sakura's forehead.
"Their names are Sakura, Ino and Hinata," Kisame informed her, sitting down on a small space on the sofa next to the girls. He put his hand on Hinata's hair—she had become his personal favorite, "Poor girls. Itachi wanted to leave them to die but I wasn't as cold-hearted."
Konan was silent for a while.
"Hinata just finished crying, so she must be starving," The azure-skinned man said, "Sakura and Ino should be quite hungry, too."
He pushed himself off the sofa and started walking away, his gigantic sword over his shoulder. Soon, he disappeared into the hallways leading to his room.
"Konan, I see no purpose in keeping them," Pein approached the blue-haired woman, a mug of coffee in hand.
"We're not going to keep them, we're going to raise them," Konan smiled, looking up at the pierced man, "I think it's a good idea to raise them into maginificent Akatsuki members. Not only that, we could add in more female members for once in a while."
"Konan, please, I don't want three children running around and spilling our precious milk and jumping on our beds," Pein massaged the bridge of his nose, "We have like…three babies already. Deidara, Hidan and Tobi are so hard to handle."
The beauty giggled and stood up just as the youngsters started to regain consciousness. "Don't be like that, Pein," She gave him a winsome smile, "Besides, let me be their mother. All you boys have to do is train them so they'll be skilled and worthy to be a part of the Akatsuki."
"You should know me well enough to know I disapprove of both ideas."
"I really want to raise them," Konan stuck with her choice before looking over her shoulder to glance at the now-conscious girls. They were looking around in wonder and the amber-eyed woman continued, "I'll finally have an aim in life, which is to watch them grow," She faced the leader and stared into his ringed orbs, "Give them a chance, Pein. Please."
Sasori walked into the base. He froze when he saw the three strangers but his emotionless expression remained the same. He turned on his heel and disappeared into the hallway.
Hidan entered and greeted Kakuzu with a few vulgar words. When he saw Deidara, the two immediately began to argue. Pein sighed, closed his eyes and took a sip of his coffee.
"You make the rules, Konan," He said after gulping down his drink, "Like you said, all we have to do is train them. Their basic needs are all on you."
"I've never heard a thing such as a guy being a mother," Konan giggled. As Pein walked towards the kitchen to put his empty cup in the sink and to break up the petty argument Deidara and Hidan were having, the blue-haired woman fell silent as she organized everything in her mind to ensure comfortable lives for the three girls.
"Excuse me," Something tugged on her sleeve and Konan looked down to see what had interrupted her from her train of thought. It was the blonde—otherwise known as Ino, and she stared at her with her big azure eyes, "Are you…Konan? Are you that lady that weird shark thingy told us about?"
A giggle escaped the beauty's lips as she patted Ino's head, "Yes, yes, I am, dear. Are you hungry?"
"Yeah, I am," Ino's face brightened, "Sakura and Hinata would like to eat, too."
Konan glanced over her shoulder and saw Pein had already broken up the ridiculous fight between the bomber and the Jashinist. "Okay, get your friends and follow me to the kitchen."
Soon, the three youngsters were eating cereal (for that was the only thing Konan could think of) around the dining table next to the kitchen. As Konan watched them eat, Hidan approached her and grimaced.
"Oh Jashin, why did we have to go get three fucking bitches as the latest addition to the organization?" Hidan cursed, walking away, "I thought Tobi was enough to satisfy your mother-ing needs."
Konan rolled her eyes and proceeded with her planning. Just a few seconds later she reached a conclusion and snapped her fingers. She exited the dining room and looked around the base for Pein, before learning he was at the sofa, reading a book.
"I've finally come up with a plan," She announced, plopping down next to him at the four-seater sofa, "Could you call all the members? Except Itachi and Kisame, that is."
Pein, slightly displeased he was interrupted from his reading, soon summoned all the members of the Akatsuki (except Itachi and Kisame) to the living room. The men crowded the living room with confused faces. For those who have not seen Sakura, Ino and Hinata, they had no idea for those girls were eating in the dining room.
"Okay, earlier tonight, our members found three little girls in…that forest," Konan said. Tobi jumped and looked as though he was going to ask a question, but the blue-haired woman quickly continued before he could say anything, "And I've decided to keep them. Their names are Sakura, Ino and Hinata. They've lost their memory and are only eight-years-old."
Hidan said a few bad words before Konan continued, "I'm going to be their mother, so that means I've got too much on my plate to train them to be worthy S-rank criminals. So, I've decided to divide you boys into different groups to train them."
The men exchanged glances. Konan (being the only woman in the organization) was a strange an unpredictable person so nobody knew what she had up her sleeve, "Pein, Sasori and Itachi will be assigned to train Sakura. Zetsu, Kakuzu and Deidara will be training Ino. Hinata is given to Hidan, Kisame and Tobi."
Muttering and groans came from the men as a sign of dissatisfaction. Konan smirked and folded her arms, "As you can see, I haven't paired you up with your original partners. The aim of this is not only to give the girls a variety of techniques and skills from different people, but to also make sure all of you get along and work together."
"I am so fucking lucky I didn't get paired up with Baby Alive over there," Hidan smirked.
Deidara glared at the silver-haired man, "It's Barbie, not Baby Alive, you fucking dumbass. And I'm neither of them."
"Barbie, Baby Alive, they both look like you to me," Hidan shrugged.
"Shut up," Kakuzu growled, for everyone knew this was the start to another stupid yet destructive argument, "Or I'll have to kill the both of you right now."
The two fell silent and looked away with groans.
Just then, Ino ran into the living room, giggling, and Sakura was behind her. Her pink hair was dripping with milk and bits of cereal were scattered on her hair and shoulders as she chased after the blonde.
"Ino!" She shrieked, catching up with her azure-eyed friend.
Hinata walked in just as the other two started running in circles. Her shirt was soaked and her hands were sticky with milk.
"Fuck, don't tell me they took all the milk," Kakuzu mumbled. Anger quietly flared inside him.
"Sorry…but the carton is empty…"Hinata apologetically said as she blushed, embarrassed her clothes were wet, "Ino's such a bully…she poured the milk over me and put Sakura's bowl upside down on her head."
Ino ran happily past the feet of the towering men, until someone caught her by the collar of her shirt. Kakuzu lifted her up and glared at the child, "Girl, you should know that as long as you are under my supervision, you will not goof off and waste our precious milk."
Pein, upon hearing the fact they had no more milk, moved into severe depression and released a dark miasma.
"I'll go take Sakura and Hinata to take a bath," Konan sighed as Ino stuck her tongue out at Kakuzu.
Kakuzu put down the blonde and she kicked him at the shin before running off to follow Konan. Silence fell upon the men—usually they would await orders from Pein to leave the base and go into their rooms.
However, noticing the depressing miasma he emitted, Zetsu spoke, "…I'm going back to my orchard."
With that, he disappeared.
One by one, the members left the living room, leaving Pein to mourn alone for the finishing of the milk.
…
..
.
"While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about." - Angela Schwindt
.
..
…
A/N : I'm writing this story when I'm free from writing Skirts & Shoes, Pants & Punches. Do review about what you think so far of this story and (if you're a fan of my earlier mentioned story) please tell me if I should continue and post the latest chapter without Nonumaru.
It's been a week since I've last sent my email to her. :/
Reviews = Love = Author's Inspiration = Faster Updates