"GOOD MORNING, ITACHI-SAAAAAN!"

Itachi yelled and fell out of his bed. He groaned and looked up. It was almost pitch black. All he could see was a large silhouette standing next to him.

"Kisame?" He mumbled groggily. He sat up and looked around. "How did you get in here? I thought I locked the door." He yawned and rubbed his eyes.

"Oh, I picked the lock." Kisame answered with a shrug.

Itachi rolled his eyes and crawled back into his bed. Was everyone besides him in the Akatsuki insane? "Say, Kisame, what was it that we were discussing yesterday? Possibly something to do with personal space…?" He glanced at the digital clock on his bedside table. His eyesight wasn't all that good, but he could still vaguely make out the small red numbers glowing in the darkness. "Kisame, why the hell did you wake me at 4:16?"

"Well, we're heading out today, remember? We're supposed to be doing…recon or something!" Itachi could tell Kisame was grinning happily. "Don't you want to get up so we can get an early start?"

"It's 4 freaking 16 in the morning!"

"So we'll get an extra early start!" Kisame answered. "Now come on! Let's go get breakfast before Deidara uses all the pancake mix!" He grabbed Itachi's arm and pulled him up. "And I'm not letting you skip breakfast today. It's very unhealthy." He continued dragging Itachi to the door. "So you want chocolate chip pancakes, or—"

Itachi pulled his arm away. "I'm not hungry." He answered, trudging back toward his bed. "Wake me up at a reasonable hour." He flopped back onto the bed.

Suddenly he was hoisted into the air. "Itachi-san, we're leaving in an hour! Let's go!" Kisame said.

Itachi started hitting Kisame. "Fine! I'll get up!" He shouted. "Leggo!" He began squirming. "Damn it, Kisame, I still in my underwear! I need to get dressed!"

Kisame dropped him. He started stammering. "Oh, I-I didn't…err…sorry. Just…get dressed, and…" He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "…um…yeah…" He quickly walked out and closed the door.

Itachi sighed and stood up. The longer he was in this organization, the stranger it became. Everything from the missions to the people. He started grabbing things off his dresser and stuffing them into a small bag. They'd be gone anywhere between a day to a month. Might as well start packing…

(Meanwhile)

In a wide field, a young woman sat up and opened her eyes. Her head throbbed painfully. She reached up and pressed her hand to her forehead. When she pulled away, her hand was slick with blood.

She stood up, swaying from the loss of blood. Where am I? She wondered. She stumbled forward, trying to focus her eyes.

Bloody corpses littered the field, staining the ground a sickening reddish-black. Flowers were sticking out through the mass of corpses, also stained a bloody red. She looked at them, stumbling to the ground. Then she glanced down. Her clothes were soaked in blood. How much of it was hers, she wondered. Her body had gone numb. She stumbled through the massacre. Did she know any of these people? Why were they here?

She stopped at a face she recognized. A bloody, broken body lying on the ground… She'd been traveling with this man, she remembered that much. What was his name? Did it even matter anymore? He was dead. He'd lived up to his usefulness…

What? She shook her head. No, that's not right. It can't be. Usefulness? This man died protecting me.

Protecting from what? She looked around at the lifeless bodies staring up at her. She shut her eyes and tried to remember. She found snippets of thoughts floating through her mind, useless fragmented ideas. They'd finally found her. She wasn't safe. She had to leave. They were tracking her.

But who were they? How did they track her? What was going on? She rubbed her head. Everything was so fuzzy. What was happening? Where was she?

More importantly than that, who was she…?

Protruding from a nearby body was her sword. She walked over and yanked it out. The blood on it was still red, not dry. Some blood spurted from the body onto her bare feet. She sighed and put the bloody sword in the sheath on her waist. She needed to leave before anyone saw her.

She began to stumble away. Then her eyes caught the young man she'd been traveling with. She paused. She wished she'd bothered to learn his name.

She sighed and picked up his body.

Hours later she finished burying him. She carved a cross into the tree she buried him beneath. "Goodbye." She murmured quietly, dropping a single bloody wildflower onto the mound of dirt. "Goodbye, my nameless friend…" She turned.

A man appeared behind her and held a kunai to her throat. "Don't move." He hissed. She stiffened. There was no way for her to be able to fight this man off in her current condition.

She glanced back at the man. "And who might you be?" She asked calmly. He wasn't 'them'. Somehow she could just tell. Even so, she could tell this man was evil. So that wasn't much of a consolidation.

The man laughed slightly. "I guess I shouldn't bother asking you that, right?" She blinked. Who was she? She began raking her brain. Who…?

He stepped forward and smashed his fist into the side of her head. She fell to the ground. Before she blacked out, she caught a glimpse of the red cloud on his clothing. And a name echoed through her head. Her name.

Martel.