Tobi…?
(Zetsu is walking through a cragged area. He is following the scent of blood, hoping to find lunch. He comes across a caved-in cave with a strong stench of blood. He starts moving boulders and uncovers a dead one-eyed boy, about 13, half buried in boulders.)
Zetsu: Ahhh! Lunch!
(Zetsu reaches to begin his meal, but decides to check the dead boy's pulse instead, just to make sure he is dead (fresh blood is gross.) He couldn't feel any pulse, but just as he was about to remove his hand, a faint pulse appeared. The pulse started growing more define.)
Zetsu: Aaaah. The boulders must have hit him in just the right ways, not only making him unconscious, but stimulating just the right pressure points- stopping his pulse and heart beat and leaving the body to live off its supply of chakra. Well, there goes lunch.
(Zetsu takes the boy to his apartment in the Hidden Grass Village. There he nurses the boy's wounds and allows him to recuperate.)
Boy (beginning to wake up): Where am I?
Zetsu: Aaaah! You're awake, huh? You're in my apartment, Hidden Grass Village.
(The boy tries to get out of bed, but can't find the strength)
Zetsu: Don't try to get up. You were out there bleeding for hours. You haven't rekindled your blood supply, yet.
Boy: Who are you?
Zetsu: I am Zetsu, from the Village of Those Who Hide in the Grass. I am a jounin. Who are you?
Boy (thinking): I don't know.
(Zetsu goes over to a table. He starts digging through some torn, ripped, crinkled, and heavily damaged paper. Then he goes over to another table and looks at fragments of something that was once made of metal.)
Zetsu: First of all, it's pretty clear you have amnesia. It's a medical condition; it's when you can't remember anything. Second, I was looking through what's left of your hitai-ate headband and your documents, but they're to heavily destroyed to make much out. However, I looked at the fragments of paper with your name on it, and I think your name is something like "Obit" or "Tobi", but it looks torn off.
Boy (thinking): Then I am Tobi, from the Hidden Grass Village.
Zetsu: "Tobi", eh?! Ha Ha Ha!! Well, nice to meet'cha Tobi!
(After that, Zetsu entered Tobi into the ninja academy (due to Hidden Grass law, stating he must in order to be a Grass ninja), but he quickly graduated. Tobi was now officially a ninja of the Hidden Grass Village. The two shared an almost father-and-son relationship)
(About two years later)
Zetsu: Tobi, I need to go away for awhile and I can't bring you with me this time.
Tobi (bummed that Zetsu won't be going to his promotion ceremony)What? Why?
Zetsu: I need to go on a mission, and I don't want you getting hurt. This is my friend's son Deidara, from the Hidden Rock Village. I want you to watch him while I'm away. His father Mahiru was killed awhile back.
(About three days later)
Deidara (through one of his mouth-hands): Why did I end up on a hand, why?! Do you know where this guy's hands have been? He's a plumber! I'm talking sewers! Have you ever tasted a sewer?! It's disgusting!! Yeah!!!
Tobi and Deidara together: Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
(Then a messenger bird flew through the window, dropped Deidara a letter, and flew back out.)
Tobi (reading the letter): Hey, Zetsu's back!
Deidara: Yeah!
Tobi: (reading a second letter)Wait, it says he failed the mission.
(Over the next two years Zetsu became shunned and discriminated for failing the mission, which was apparently important. The government actually went so far as to limit the places in the village he could go and a demotion to chunin. One day Zetsu had had enough, and made a decision.)
Zetsu: Tobi, we're becoming nukenin!
Tobi (shocked)Zetsu, think about this! Where will we go? What will we do?
Zetsu: We can stay at Deidara's for the time being.
Tobi: Zetsu think! If we dessert, oinin and bounty hunters will be after us! I don't want to live a life on the run, and neither should you!
Zetsu: I'm deserting with, or without, you! You're seventeen; you can live on your own now!
(After hearing that, Tobi couldn't say no, so he became a nukenin with Zetsu. In time, Deidara also deserted with them.
Approximately four years after Zetsu and Tobi deserted and two after Deidara had. The three were walking through a forest path heading to the Village Hidden in the Sand to stay at Sasori's hideout, one of Deidara's nukenin friends. Then they noticed they were being followed by shadowy figures. Soon they were surrounded.)
Zetsu: Akatsuki!!
Akatsuki leader: Join us; we could use men of your talents.
Zetsu: I've heard of you! You're all nukenin who go around causing trouble, steeling top secret village secrets, and shove your weight around! No way am I joining you!!
Zetsu (reconsidering): Actually, why not, I could exact revenge on the Hidden Grass village for… everything. All right, I'll join you.
Deidara: If you'll take me I'll join, too, if Zetsu is. Yeah.
Tobi: I'll join whatever Zetsu joins.
Akatsuki leader (trying to think of an excuse)Sorry, we only need two men.
Red-headed akatsuki member: Deidara, welcome to akatsuki. We will be your escort to your new hideout.
Deidara (spreading his arms apart for a hug) Sasori!!! All right!! Yeah!!
Akatsuki leader: Orochimaru, Kisame! Get these gentlemen their new cloaks!
White-skinned member (bowing in respect) Yes, Leader
Shark-like-looking member (putting little effort into bowing)Shore.
(Although it was a time for reunion for Sasori and Deidara, Tobi felt he had been disgraced. Tobi felt even more disgraced weeks afterwards when they let a child named Itachi Uchiha in! However, Itachi's surname did sound oddly familiar. When Orochimaru left akatsuki soon afterwards Tobi thought that Leader would let him join, but Orochimaru took his ring with him, and you need a ring to be a member.)
(Five years later. Tobi learned that Sasori had fallen in battle, and Deidara most likely did, too. Tobi was hired by Zetsu to go look for their rings and corpses.)
Tobi (finding Sasori's ring, sitting on a boulder)Got it! Got it, Zetsu! With this I can become a member of Akatsuki too, right? There is an opening now…
Zetsu: You idiot…you don't really think you can join so easily so easily, do you? Oh come on…we can let him in. Tobi is a good boy.
Tobi (flipping the ring like a coin, and failing to catch it): Oops!
Tobi (finding Deidara's arm near the ring): Eh? Looks like Deidara was taken out too. The cause of death was defiantly a bomb explosion, Zetsu. I wonder if bits of him fell down around here.
Voice: Get your hands of that, idiot!
(It was Deidara)
Tobi: Ah! You're alive!
Zetsu: What happened with the jinchuuriki?
Deidara: Hey, my part is over…yeah.
Tobi: Ha ha…you just barely made it, eh, Deidara. You're okay…aren't you?
Deidara: Tobi…I only let things go three times…next time you say something, I'll set you a cause of death…yeah.
Tobi: Hm, most likely death by explosion.
Deidara: That's…three times.
(Deidara leaps at Tobi, knocking him to the ground, and jokingly strangles him with his feet)
Deidara: Death by asphyxiation…yeah!
Tobi (in his mind) Neither of these guys knows that over the last few years, I found out that I have the sharingan eye, just like Itachi! Or that for the last few years Itachi had been giving me lessons on how to master it, and that, as of four years ago; I have mastered the mangekyo sharingan!
Zetsu: All right, we've had our fun. Now I need to get Sasori's ring back to Leader, so if you would be so kind…
Tobi: If you want it back you will have to take me along, too!!
Zetsu: No! Leader doesn't seem interested in you, so stop annoying him!
Deidara: Come on, if Leader really hated him he would have put out a hit out on him. Let's bring him along, yeah?
Zetsu: All, right. Maybe he'll change his mind. Just don't give your hopes up.
(Back at the akatsuki base in the Land of the River, Tobi is going through an interrogation for why he will not hand over the ring of Sasori over to Leader. Tobi is desperately trying to turn it into a job interview, and running out of ideas of how to go about doing that.)
Leader: Tobi, tell me why you had to be escorted by two akatsuki members to insure that their ring was not… lost… in any way?!
Zetsu: (to Leader) Wait, Leader. (To Tobi) Tobi, where did you put Sasori's ring? Please don't tell me you lost it.
Tobi: Ummm…no…uhhh…Deidara's palm ate it?
Deidara: Yeah. Wait, no it didn't!
Tobi (finding it in his shirt) Let me join!
Leader: Tell me what I want to know!!
Tobi: Because I want to join Akatsuki! Now let me join!!
Leader: Who will vouch for you this time, Zetsu and Deidara again?
Tobi (sheepishly) Itachi…
Leader (to Itachi)Well, Itachi?
Itachi (not wanting to answer)Well… Zetsu, do you have anything new to say?
Zetsu: No. Tobi is talented at fire jutsu, but he won't take of that darned mask to do anything!
Leader: See, Tobi? You're not cut out to be an Akatsuki operative. You're a no-talent.
Itachi: Actually, Tobi has sharingan.
Everyone but Itachi and Tobi: Whaaaaaat?!!!!
Itachi: Tobi has sharingan. It may be an implant; I can't be certain for sure, since there is only one, though it may not be the case since he only has one eye to begin with. But it's a sharingan, though, for sure, mangekyo, too.
(Everyone is amazed)
Zetsu (surprised)When did that happen?
Tobi: Four and a half years ago I found out I had a sharingan eye. I asked Itachi to teach me how to use it. Itachi taught me how to unleash its potential, and it quickly became a mangekyo sharingan half a year later. It was Itachi's and my secret, I told no one.
Itachi: The process of its maturing had already begun, having two out of the three tamoe that a fully matured sharingan has. After some quick tutoring sessions the sharingan quickly matured, and then became a mangekyo sharingan.
Leader: Can I see this alleged sharingan?
Tobi (threateningly)On you?! I hate using it!
Leader (giving in)Tobi, we need another man. You have a ring. It is said, from very reliable sources, that you are talented at fire jutsu and you have a mangekyo sharingan. If all this is true…, Kisame, fetch Tobi has new cloak.
Tobi (speechless)What?!! Thank you, sir! I won't let you down!
Leader: You better not! But tell me, why do want to be a member of Akatsuki?
Tobi: Well, Sir, because I have amnesia. I would like to find out about myself. Akatsuki will allow me make that goal easier to achieve. It will be easier to obtain the documents by stealing them, then by just browsing through archive after archive.
Leader: Tobi, we are a terrorist group, not a band of private-eyes. We do steal documents from-time-to-time, but it is not a major concern-AND-WHERE-IS-HIS-CLOAK,-KISAME?!!!!
Kisame (scrambling)Sorry, Leader!
Leader: Tell you what. You can hunt down your documents, in your spare time, which is usually plentiful. And your right, it will be easier to obtain those documents when you are a member of Akatsuki, than if you tried to get them on your own. Here is your cloak, and you will be partnered with Deidara. Also, your first mission…
Tobi: Ooh, yes!
Leader: …is to find him.
Tobi (looking for Deidara, and finding him hanging from the ceiling): Hey,Mr. Deidara! You're upside-down again! It's been a while since you've done that.
Deidara: Uhh…yeah…Tobi?
Tobi: Huh?
Deidara: Yeah…you're the one on the ceiling.
Tobi (falling): Oh, crap! Chakra to the feet, chakra to the feet!
Deidara (walking away as Tobi hits the floor)Even for Tobi, that's pretty pathetic. Yeah.
(A few days later, Tobi was given his first real assignment with his new partner; going after a water biju.
Deidara and Tobi are coming up on the biju; Deidara riding a giant clay bird and Tobi walking on the water's surface via a water jutsu.)
Tobi: Whoa, it's like a big turtle or something…that's the three-tails? It looks strong…Deidara, I'm counting on you to handle it!
Deidara: Tobi, you're officially an Akatsuki member so…you gotta do yourself!
Tobi (noticing something very unsettling): But… whaa!! Aaaaahhhh!! It's after me!!
Tobi (to Deidara): Since this thing's a water-type, shouldn't Kisame be on this job?! They obviously picked to wrong guy!!!
Deidara: He's pathetic…yeah.
Tobi (still being chased): Uwwaaaaa!!
(Deidara forms a bomb in the form of a fish. He drops it in the water. It swims near three-tails and explodes and sends Tobi flying.)
Tobi: Uwa!
(A little bit later, they have subdued the beast. Deidara is towing it through the water with two giant clay birds, including the one he's riding))
Tobi (standing on the belly of beast): Yes!! Deidara, did you see my jutsu!? It was a one-hit K.O.! Leaving a new member such as me with this huge task is something to be commemorated!
Deidara: I did it, didn't I!? No…my exploding dolls were the ones that created art. It's all thanks to my art! Yeah! You forget I helped you out! You didn't do it alone! If you're a member of Akatsuki, being cool means not being such a big mouth. In a word, cool equals art. Anyway in the passionate instant when you begin to feel the cool feelings of art…
Tobi (interrupting): Deidara, you seem to be the big-mouth right now…ha ha ha!
(And to that, Tobi earned a small explosion)
Tobi: I said I was joking… owwwww!
(A little while later)
Deidara: Now Tobi! Don't get too cocky! The three-tails didn't have a jinchuuriki so it's weak. It didn't have enough smarts to control its own strength.
Tobi (laying down)…
Deidara:…
Tobi:…
Deidara: Hey Tobi, I didn't mean you had to take it literally. At least say something.
Tobi: snore
(And that too earned Tobi a small explosion)
Tobi: Nooooo!!!
Deidara: Tobi you imbecile! How's that for a wake-up call!
(A few months later, after a failed attempt to brake into the records building in the Hidden Leaf Village)
Deidara (running from oinin)Yeah…tell me again… why did we have to brake into Konoha's record building?
Tobi (running from oinin, too): Because it's the biggest village in the world. It was bound to have something!
Deidara (panting)I think we lost them (the oinin). Yeah!
Tobi (eyeing a monument that has a familiar name on it): You go an ahead. I'll follow behind to make sure they're truly gone, and not setting a trap.
Deidara: All right…yeah.
Tobi (reading the stone): "Obito Uchiha"… why does that name sound so familiar?
(Behind bushes a jonin from the Hidden Leave Village is spying on Tobi. The jonin went to visit that vary same monument)
Jonin (to himself): An akatsuki member! What is he doing at the KIA memorial?
Tobi (to himself): "Obito Uchiha"! Who was he?!
Jonin (to Tobi) He was a dear friend of mine, who was killed in a cave-in in the Grass Country.
Tobi: Who are you?
Jonin: I am Kakashi Hatake, from the Village Hidden in the Leaves.
Tobi: Ah, yes. Kakashi Hatake. When I was a chunin back at the Hidden Grass Village, I owned a copy of our village's bingo book- the list of our village's most powerful enemies. It had quite the extensive write-on you and your acquired sharingan, though…but you don't appear to be anything worth the paper.
(In a flash, Tobi felt the hard blow of a well-placed punch on his face and before a new it he was on the ground with a kunai to his throat.)
Kakashi: I take it that you have a bad habit of underestimating your opponents, or rather, had. Prepare to die. But it won't be with sharingan; some imitation of some other shinobi's tricks. No…I'm going to use my own jutsu!
(Kakashi held out his hand, and chakra focused in his hand so densely, it could be seen.)
Kakashi: Raikiri!
(Before Kakashi threw his raikiri, Tobi could feel the broken bits of his porcelain mask slide off his face. The raikiri then, simply, dissolved.)
Kakashi (looking stunned)That name sounds familiar… because you are Obito!
Tobi (confused and stunned)What?
Zetsu (far off): Tobi! Tobi! Where are you!!
Tobi (to Kakashi)Zetsu! Kakashi, hide!
Kakashi (to Tobi)Why?
Tobi (to Kakashi)Just hide!
(Kakashi takes Tobi's advice and jumps behind the bushes where he hid before. Not a moment later Zetsu come walking back, looking for Tobi)
Zetsu: Tobi! Deidara sent me. I heard someone's voice. You were fighting, weren't you?
Tobi: Don't worry, he's dead. I threw his body in the bushes, (pointes in the opposite direction of where Kakashi is)
(Zetsu goes walking in that direction)
Tobi: Where are you going?
Zetsu: Dinner.
Tobi: We can go to the Curry of Life shop when we get back.
Zetsu: Yeah… b-but…
Tobi: Cannibalism is a filthy habit, Mr. Zetsu, and you know it! Find cleaner habits, like ikebana or something!
(The two walk away, with Zetsu sulking)
(The next day Tobi found himself alone at the gate of the Hidden Leaf Village)
Tobi (to himself): Okay, Tobi. You need to talk to Kakashi, he knew your name! You need to find out more!!
(Tobi used an exploding note to blow a hole in the gate large enough for him to fit. Then he sprinted for the records building. He found that he was being chased. Next thing he knew he was crashing through the door (and coffee table) of the hokage's office with several people on his back.)
Lady Hokage: Scream!
Tobi (on the floor, reaching out for her)Lady Hokage! I need to talk to you!
One of the guys on Tobi's back: Why would an akatsuki member such as you want to talk to Lady Hokage!?
Lady Hokage (as the men were dragging Tobi to his feet)Let him speak!
Tobi (with several guys gripping his arms): Lady Hoakge! I have reason to believe that you can help me discover who I really am!
Lady Hokage: What do you mean? Or do you have amnesia?
Tobi: Yes, I do, me' lady.
Lady Hokage (to the men)Very well, let him go.
Lady Hokage (mumbling to Tobi)Just, don't be any trouble.
(Some time later the two were walking down the hall of the records building)
Lady Hokage: Ah, here we are. This is the room with the archives of Kakashi's team and classmates. Are you sure you were a friend of his.
(The two enter a chamber full of scrolls)
Tobi: Yes. He said I was an "Obito Uchiha".
Lady Hokage: Obito!? Now that you have an idea who you are, I might be able to heal your amnesia! You should have said something sooner!
Tobi: I'm sorry. I didn't think it was of any consequence.
Lady Hokage: That's alright. Just lie down, and don't move.
(Tobi cleared of a table covered in scrolls, and used a large scroll as a pillow. He then watched as Lady Hokage lowered her hands over his face, shining blue in a strange chakra. All of his memories came flooding back.)
Intermission
