AN: Slightly crack-induced oneshot. Not crack-filled, crack-induced.

---

The sky harbored few clouds this day, and a certain newly appointed Jounin sat down in delight at his usual spot at Ichiraku. A bonus was given to all fresh Jounin, so he had plenty of money to splurge on ramen, and that he did.

°°°

Three hours later, Naruto emerged from the shop after having carefully stacked the 43 empty bowls in a pyramid and receiving a lecture from Teuchi-san afterwards on why it was so much better to arrange them in a cube. Deciding to take advantage of a newly gained privilege (being able to leave Konoha without needing a permit or anything), he strolled outside the village gates and headed down the dirt path.

°°°

Itachi glared at the little bastard from his hiding spot in the trees, skipping happily through the forest like that stupid chick from the story that wore the red hood and made a nice dinner for a random wolf. Akatsuki was done for; Pain had been doing his little victory dance after killing the old perverted Sannin and slipped on a rock, cracking his head, and with their leader gone the group dispersed. That was a while back.

He took a moment to count off the status of his acquaintances. Orochimaru didn't count, but he was glad to hear that otouoto had taken care of the damned snake. Deidara died five years ago, having blown himself up in a pathetic attempt in killing little otouoto. Sasori was killed by one of otouoto's groupies and some old hag from Suna. Tobi disappeared like the spiral-masked freak he was. Zetsu embraced his plant side and became a tree. A fucking tree, god damn it…Konan was either dead or MIA, because she hadn't been heard from after the attack on Amegakure. Hidan was still sleeping under a ton and a half of rocks, and Kakuzu had fought like a drunken elephant with an inferiority complex against Kakashi AND Kyuubi 2-on-1; it was no surprise that he died fast. Some Ame villagers had discovered Pain's corpse lying in the streets. And Kisame…though Itachi had grown to like him, the damned fish just had to go and get drunk. The result was Kisame mistaking his partner for a wooden training post. He'd swung Samehada in a gigantic arc (effectively shredding the heads of the bartender and two patrons, and smashing about $10,000 worth of liquor), and received a full-blast Tsukuyomi for his idiocy, as well as eighteen kunai in the gut. Itachi dragged his partner outside, and was surprised to see the bastard still breathing. Therefore, he calmly walked through the town to the bridge over the river (because all towns have a bridge over a river) and dumped the body into the flowing water.

°°°

Itachi had spent the past eight years trying to capture the little bastard, and it was purely for business.

Thing is, you can't really go after something for eight whole years and not grow even a teeny tiny bit obsessed with obtaining it. The sad thing was that Itachi's desire to beat the Jinchuuriki's face in and take his body to one of the creepy, gothic sacrificial sites that Pain apparently loved to stick his employees in had grown from a "capture it and we're done" level to a hyper, schizophrenic, insane level.

He giggled with glee and drooled on his nice black robe with pretty red clouds on it, but took no notice. After following Naruto's footsteps from a mission he quickly hid in the bushes and trees, remaining there for the past three months and planning sadistic thoughts inside his head. Hell, the original purpose was even forgotten to him; he just wanted to steal the kid and play with him like a 6-year-old with a toy truck.

Finally, somewhere in the Uchiha's mind, a rubber band snapped after three months of constant strain.

"…"

He looked at the person walking down the path.

"…"

He twitched.

"…"

He twitched some more.

"…"

His left eye was on an overdose of crack, and the right one was so drunk it was about to try and snort some rocks or something.

"…"

CRASH.

Uchiha Itachi, killer of his entire clan, S-rank nukenin capable of taking down even a Kage with enough effort, one of the deadliest people to have ever existed, was lying dead, facedown in a forest on the outskirts of Konoha.

Naruto brought the body to the hospital.

The iryo-nin who performed the autopsy wrote up the most hilarious death report to date.

Name: Uchiha Itachi

Age: 26 years

Cause of Death: Eyes appear to have twitched themselves out of subject's eye sockets. Brain malfunctioned shortly thereafter. Godaime-sama has translated malfunction message to "Itachi, god dammit, I told you to buy that bottle of depressants. You never listen."

FIN

---

AN: I could have written the ending better…but I didn't.