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.:Prologue:.
The Akatsuki base was void of noise, unnaturally so. Uchiha Itachi scanned the room, his onyx-colored eyes drinking in every single detail, from the twitch on Hidan's pale face, to the glaringly obvious seals placed on the floor of the large, circular room, its grey walls looming in a ghostly manner over the eight members. The floor was a shade of brown, the color dull and muddy. It was utterly lifeless, perfectly right for what was about to happen in the next few minutes. Itachi felt a pang of guilt shoot through his now-numb heart. He didn't want to do this, but he had to. To protect his otouto, his little brother Sasuke. An unnoticeable, amused and wry twist came to his thin lips, the lower part of his chiseled face covered by the high-collared Akatsuki cloak. The things I do for you, little brother.
Pein (or Nagato, Itachi frowned) stepped into his line of sight. Immediately, as if a switch had been flicked on, the others stood stock still, rising from their slouched over positions or from the floor. Following him in a graceful manner came Konan, her blue hair in its usual knot, the delicate paper rose in place. She nodded at him, an oh-so-light quirk to her pink lips. He inclined his head in return. Next to him, Kisame's mouth twitched, fighting off a grin and a comment. Itachi was tempted to roll his eyes at his partner's immaturity, but thought better of it and decided to pay his fullest attention to the orange-haired man standing in front of them.
"I hope," started Pein in his deep and commanding voice, calm purple-ringed eyes staring them all down in a matter of seconds, "that you all know why we are here right now and why." Half of them nodded, having heard about it in person by the leader or Konan, his partner and second in charge. Deidara, Hidan and Tobi – the younger Uchiha forced his anger down; Madara knew, but Tobi didn't, and it was amusing to see him keep up the idiotic act – shook their heads in confusion and slight indignation, however.
"How did they get to know, un?" demanded Deidara, a trace of anger hidden in his voice, blue eyes narrowed into catlike slits. "Why weren't we informed as well, yeah?" He shot an annoyed glare at Itachi, the nearest one of the other members. Itachi dipped his head in response, looking as if he could care less about this, which he did.
Hidan nodded vigorously, his jaw muscle jumping rapidly. Tobi, in the meanwhile, was staring at the seals, looking every bit of the amazed little boy he was acting out. "Hell yeah, I want to know why the fuck we weren't told, and these bastards were!" yelled the Jashinist, shaking his fist obnoxiously.
Pein sighed, pinching the bridge of his pierced nose in mild annoyance. He impatiently gestured to Konan, who shook her head, and stepped ahead to explain to the three – or two, cut in Itachi's thought process.
"Pein and I were thinking about other methods of capturing the jinchuuriki and extracting their bijuu," began Konan in her soft yet strict voice, "and then, we thought about modifying the Summoning jutsu to actually send the user to the victim's location. It would be painfully easy to knock the person out if you appeared when … say, they were asleep. And then, to get back, they could use the technique again, focusing on any member in the base. All that the user needed to know would be the chakra signature, and I'm sure that you all know your target's signatures by now." Itachi raised an eyebrow at her in amusement and sarcasm. "The jutsu is complete, but all it needs is testing. That, is why we called you all here." Konan primly finished, an undertone of entertainment noticeable.
Deidara looked scandalized. "You mean we're guinea pigs, un?" he howled, nearly snapping his finger bones as he fisted his hands. His mouth hands struggled, the tongue poking out from the opening in the fisted hand. Deidara roughly curled his hand and shoved the tongue back in, an irate expression on his young face.
"What the fuck, Leader?" said Hidan loudly, moving forward, but silenced as Kisame suddenly burst into heavy, uncontrolled laughter. "What the fuck are you laughing at, fish-face?"
Sasori, previously hidden and unnoticed, smirked as he came into view. "You, of course; the guinea pigs, as the brat kindly dubbed yourselves as. Leader wouldn't use his most prized members first, after all."
Itachi smirked slightly at the looks of utter incredulity on their faces. Pein growled in irritation, bringing all the eyes on him at once. "Deidara, get in that sealing circle, now. Everyone else, get back."
Deidara, still clearly miffed but thankfully still smart enough to obey Pein, reluctantly shuffled into the intricate circle. Konan shot him an apologetic look as she moved to stand behind Pein, who was close, but not in range of the seals. "What now, un?" snapped the blonde, his arms crossed.
"You form the regular handsigns for a Summoning jutsu, but replace the monkey's seal with a hare. Focus all your chakra on … Itachi, let's say." Said Uchiha narrowed his eyes at this, mildly irked. How quaint. I am a test subject. "Try to teleport to him, and don't explode anything while you're at it, Kakuzu will throw a fit." Pein smirked.
The masked-nin with Christmas-colored eyes pursed his lips, vexed. Deidara, however, frowned. Art was a bang, and anyway, they had a lot of money and those couches were ugly. They needed to be replaced.
Sasori sighed. "Art is, and always will be, eternal, brat. I know what you're thinking. And hurry up. We haven't got all day."
"Art is a bang, un!" growled Deidara under his breath, looking at his almost fully covered feet as he formed the handsigns, taking extra care not to mess it up horribly, or mess it up at all. But his mind was still on Sasori, how the man annoyed him and how his Danna was wrong about art. Art was fleeting, like life, not eternal. It wouldn't be precious if it was eternal, it would be taken for granted. An explosion was swift, but it would be remembered, because it would be seen, then gone in the next second.
Deidara winced, biting his thumb, as he finished the last seal. Then, remembering Pein's warning, tried to steer all of his stubborn thoughts on the infuriating Uchiha standing away from him. One-half focused on Itachi, the other still bent on criticizing Sasori. His bright blue eyes widened in absolute horror and desperation as he felt a very violent tug at his navel, trying to push his chakra on Itachi's signature, but it was too late, and he had instinctively slammed his hand onto the ground, blood already leaking from being bitten a second ago. Shit. I'm so screwed, un!
A yell came from his right, sounding suspiciously similar to Hidan's voice."Holy fuck, Uchiha, Puppet boy! What the hell's happening to you?" And the terrified look on Konan's face was the last thing he saw before a loud explosion, rocking the ground violently, the vibrations going through his frozen body, reached his ears, his eyesight blurring and the world turning dark. He blacked out, landing on the floor with a loud thump, praying that he would remain intact and wake up the next day. Another explosion, before everything went silent.
Ahuze: Hello! This is a collaboration between Ahuze and Mystic Shadow Demon, a sort of alternate universe-like sequel to "Of Puppets and Love." You really might wanna read that first, even though there won't be any plotlines from that fanfiction in this. But, just recommending. Mystic is currently busy (sorta, I didn't do anything to her!) so I took it upon moiself to write the AN. Expect her to be there in the next chapter's AN. Please read and review, you don't know how much that means to us. :) Weekly updates, by the way. Most probably on Sundays. Yay! R&R! And hope you like.