Published: 09/18/08 at 1:15 AM

Disclaimer: We do not profit from this. We only get to borrow the beastliness.

Authors' notes: Ba dum bum. Enjoy!

Prologue:

Fugaku watched the little girl tinker with his son's shuriken. Her pale, nimble fingers spun the dangerous metal stars and flicked them across the dark grain of the polished wood desk. The complicated bun that bobbed at the back of the little girl's neck was the color of the pale roses that grew that guarded the eastern border of the Uchiha District…the sole border that backed up to the civilian neighborhoods.

A small cough retrieved the Uchiha patriarch from his solemn contemplation. His onyx eyes withdrew from the small window on the other side of the courtyard and landed sharply on the document before him. The confident strokes of black on the creamy parchment were numerous and bore the grace of a practiced hand. Only a few more strokes were needed to turn this elegant piece of paper into a pact that would bond people together for decades.

A breeze slipped into the courtyard and urged a paper lantern to sway congenially over the clan leader's head. Fugaku's eyes rose to the lantern—and to the red and white uchiha fan that adorned it. He sighed quietly as his renowned eyes struggled to see what lay in store for that symbol.

The breeze died, the lantern fell back into its normal position, and a fine brush dipped into ink that was as dark and obscure as the future itself. It took only a few seconds for the clan leader's hand to grace the page with his signature, and only a few moments more for the red haired man across from him to sign his own.

"Well, Uchiha-san" the red haired man said softly, "there we are."

His voice lacked the stern, icy authority of the Uchiha clan, but made up for it with a warm, tranquil wisdom that often accompanied the tones of the village's distinguished civilians. The civilian leaders, after all, had to have strength of their own to keep them strong before the warriors with whom they entrusted their lives.

Fugaku didn't respond immediately, but nodded swiftly in Haruno Soramichi's direction.

"It is done," he said as he extended his hand over the low table upon which the document lay.

Soramichi smiled and reached out to shake Fugaku's hand, but was startled when—instead of clasping his hand—Fugaku pressed a small chain into his palm. "Until the marriage, then," Fugaku said, and there was no mistaking the dismissal in the shinobi's voice.

The leader of the Haruno family smiled stiffly and rose to his feet. "Until then."

As Soramichi walked out of the pleasant courtyard at the heart of the Uchiha mansion, he glanced behind him. As he had expected, his daughter had flown out of the sliding door as soon as she had noticed her father beginning to depart from the strange home which she'd been forced to spend so much time in lately.

He smiled when he saw her but could not help but wish that she wouldn't be so eager to leave the courtyard in which she would someday be married.

But that wouldn't come to pass for many years. The red-haired, warm-hearted man still had many years with his little girl before he even had to give her the Uchiha crest which dangled from the delicate silver chain that was pooled in the depths of his robes' pockets.

Chapter One:

For a moment, crimson eyes narrowed and nearly followed the flash of pink that trailed behind the black ANBU mask. The rough stroke of a memory jostled the silent ninja's focus, but was quickly overcome. With a slow blink, Uchiha Itachi cast off the unwonted recollections and continued to monitor the battle that was dragging on below him. Pink-haired little girls did not concern him right now, but his madly laughing blue-skinned partner did: Kisame had underestimated the leaf ninja this time.

Dusk sent dark shadows creeping across the forest floor and up the gnarled tree trunks of Konoha no Sato's northern forest. The crescent moon hung poised over the darkening woods like a Damoclean sickle, but whether the blade would be stained with Konoha's blood or Akatsuki's blood had yet to be seen. Splintered tree trunks jutted into the half-darkness, barely illuminated by the orange glow of a distant sunset that pierced the thick forest. The trees were victims of a strategic maneuver gleefully executed by the towering figure at the center of the carnage.

This figure was grinning maniacally at the forest around him as his yellow eyes swept subtly across the scene around him. His massive blade rested on his shoulder, waiting for the battle to renew itself…or for its master to force the battle to start again despite any feelings of the opposing party

"I hope you haven't given up, Little Leaf," the mist nukenin taunted. "I haven't even broken a sweat."

Kisame's voice fell flat through the shadows and the wrecked vegetation. The blue-skinned ninja frowned at the heavy silence. At least the quiet guaranteed that the Kyuubi brat wasn't among the Konoha ANBU squad that he and his partner had come across. Kisame's lips twitched at the notion of the clueless blonde kid learning any sense of subtlety.

As Kisame reminisced, a strange shape was rapidly approaching his back. A slender shadow slid between the fallen tree trunks and twisted through the debris that littered the mossy ground. Nara Shikamaru crouched low behind a fallen tree, focusing on the deadly shadow that he was projecting across the dusk-darkened forest.

Hoshigake Kisame threw a cursory glance behind him and nearly saw the slinking shadow that was approaching his left leg, but his eyes snapped back around when the stoic voice of Hyuuga Neji from the trees ahead.

"Of course we haven't given up, you fool" Neji scoffed, warily poised for an attack on a narrow branch high above the shark ninja's head. "Why would anyone forfeit such an easy victory?" His haughty tone did not reveal that he was desperately hoping that the shark ninja had not seen the Nara genius's deadly shadow.

Kisame grinned even wider. "Because Konoha's Bingo Book has a "flee on sight" advisory for me and because…"

Kisame suddenly shot into the indigo sky, releasing a barrage of shuriken towards Shikamaru's hiding spot before he landed heavily on a jagged stump at the edge of the clearing.

"And because you are obviously outclassed, judging by that pitiful attempt at a diversion," Kisame finished.

He had barely finished speaking when a gloved fist collided with the back of his head and sent him barreling into the earth.

"I'd say that our diversion wasn't half bad," the attacker whispered as she emerged from the trees. She suddenly flew towards the mist ninja again, fist reared back for another attack.

Kisame rolled to the side and lunged away just before the young woman in the cat mask landed another gut-wrenching blow on his body. His eyes narrowed with excitement when he saw the young woman change tactics and fling a foot towards his face with deadly accuracy.

"This is more like it, Little Leaves," he jeered as he caught the oncoming appendage in an iron grip and tossed the young woman's body into the path of the ninja who had just run forward to assist his teammate.

Neji caught Sakura by the hips and roughly diverted the force of her landing to the ground beside him so that he could continue his dash towards the nukenin.

Sakura gasped as she hit the ground, silently cursing her teammate for not having the compassion to at least make sure that she had landed on her feet.

As she tumbled over the sparse patches of moss and grass, a cloud of dust rose around her.

In moments, she was back on her feet, but before she charged after Neji and Kisame once more, she caught sight of a few gleaming shuriken embedded in a far-off tree trunk…some of the projectiles Kisame had thrown earlier.

She quickly realized that Shikamaru had not rejoined the battle.

Her green eyes suddenly widened, and a certain Uchiha watching from across the clearing could see the terror that ran through her verdant irises despite the shadows cast on her eyes by the ANBU mask.

In three bounds, she was at the unconscious Nara's side, crouching over him in the shadow of his "protective" tree trunk. Her teeth ground against each other as she assessed the damage.

Within seconds, she had made a decision. Her pink hair flew violently when she ripped her mask off and placed two gloved fingers in her mouth.

A piercing whistle emerged from her lips, signaling retreat to her remaining conscious teammate. This was supposed to be a scouting mission only, not a mission worth losing one of the greatest ninja of the Rookie Nine over. When they got back to Konoha and got Shikamaru into the hospital, they could tell the Hokage that Hoshigake Kisame had been lurking at the outskirts of the Northern Forest. After all, it had only been Kisame. Neji would have noticed if the Uchiha prodigy had been hiding around here, right?

Sakura hefted the Nara genius to her shoulders and lunged into the darkness of the woods. Trees flew past her as she took a route through the forest that would take her past as many sentry outposts as possible, just in case Kisame was motivated enough to follow them into the village.

Minutes later, Neji caught up, falling heavily on each branch and panting heavily.

"I could have had him," he snapped as soon as he was within hearing distance.

"Not if his partner showed up." Sakura hissed, "Not if the battle dragged on for more than ten minutes. Not if that thing pulled another 'exploding water shockwave' out of his stupid little bag of tricks."

Neji said nothing, but ran faster so that he was a few yards ahead of Sakura and her injured baggage. "Well," He grumbled coldly, "He didn't seem interested in following us, at least."

"Good" Sakura said quietly, relieved that Neji was being somewhat reasonable.

If he hadn't been, it would have been a long night back in Konoha.

"That was disappointing." Kisame sighed, shouldering the Samehada in the firelight.

Itachi didn't respond, preferring to keep his attention focused on the flickering tongues of flame.

"I was hoping to get something of a workout in, considering the fact that you won't train with me, and those sand ninja were pathetic."

"You seem to have found the battle difficult enough," Itachi answered blandly.

For a moment, Kisame's mouth hung slightly open, but then he snapped it shut and rolled his eyes. "Oh, you're talking about the little girl with the big fist, Itachi-san."

Itachi nodded minutely at the flames.

"She just bruised me a little bit. She would've been down in seconds if I was actually fighting her. You saw how easily distracted she was, neh?"

Itachi said nothing, but his head tilted forward until his dark hair fell over his brilliant half-lidded crimson eyes which glittered with the reflection of the flames.

He sat up slowly and rested an elbow on a knee he'd propped up. "Pink," he said softly, with some degree of either awe or scorn.

Itachi's partner chuckled. "Pink," he said, "is not exactly a prudent choice of hair color for a shinobi. But hey, neither is blue…"

Kisame continued to talk with an absentee conversant as Itachi closed his eyes and revisited the memories he'd discarded earlier.

No, pink was not an appropriate color for stealth or murder, but the kunoichi they'd faced today had not originally been destined for either of those things.

She'd been a preordained liaison between shinobi and civilians, a preordained bride, and a designated peacekeeper.

As the comfortable gurgle of Kisame's voice went on, Itachi considered a trip to find out where exactly little Sakura Haruno's life had strayed from the path which would have intertwined her life with his.

"Hey, you know, we should probably keep an eye on that girl" Kisame drawled cautiously.

That comment caught Itachi's attention. He lifted his head and gave Kisame a look that to many would have said, "Shut up before you lose your head," but to Kisame meant, "Go on."

"She was the one who killed Sasori, right? Pink hair, leaf, right age…unless she has a twin--"

"No" Itachi replied softly, and the flames glimmering in his eyes suddenly seemed thoughtful.

Kisame was quietly amused by his young partner's interest…or at least by his state of non-ambivalence. He chuckled. "Definitely a 'person-of-interest', then. Perhaps we should thank her for getting that creep out of our hair, neh?"

"Perhaps" Itachi said, but he'd already made up his mind.

Today's chapter was brought to you by blue. Purple edited today. :)