He rubbed his temples, was it too much to ask for a solid night's sleep? Was it too much to ask for a break when he blew up everything that bastard wanted him to? Was it too much to ask? Apparently it was. So he stumbled out of bed, giving Leader a piece of his mind under his breath as he haphazardly pulled on his clothes. Cursing as he tripped on his cloak, fell and cracked his head on his work table only to open his eyes and stare disbelievingly at his clock. Three twenty two in the morning. Three twenty two in the fucking morning!
Why? Why couldn't it wait until later, when the sun was out? When he was awake and sane and didn't feel like killing someone? He sighed, it was too much to ask. Licking his dry lips, he ran a brush through his hair and blundered out the door to the common room. It was three twenty two in the morning and he didn't give a flying fuck what he looked like. He absentmindedly smiled, thinking how Hidan would react to hear him curse so fluently. Funny.
~O~
What wasn't funny was seeing a stranger unconscious on their couch, naked but for a large shirt he recognized as Kakuzu's. How did she get in? Why did she look so familiar? She had pink hair, wouldn't he remember someone who had such a stupid hair color? But more importantly why was she completely soaked? He made a mental note not to use that particular couch anymore, mildew had such a distasteful odor. And the Akatsuki was not a wet tee-shirt contest. He sniffed, there had better be a good reason for this, they had a reputation to uphold.
He looked around, no one seemed like they had any idea what was going on except Hidan and Kakuzu. Strange. Kakuzu looked incredulous and disturbed and Hidan had a weird combination of looking like he wanted to piss himself laughing and go hide under a rock. Definitely strange. And Leader, of course, looked unperturbed as always, the only indication that he wasn't was the way his eyebrows were slightly furrowed.
Ok, seriously was anybody going to explain? This was completely ridiculous!
"Would you two care to explain why you brought back a Konoha kunoichi when all your mission comprised of was bringing back information?"
Wait, what? Konoha? Oh my god! That's where I know her from, she's the one that killed Sasori no danna with that old bitch from Suna! What the fuck?! Why would they bring that here of all places? Were they fucking retarded? Her whole village was out for their blood, not to mention the fact she could break buildings with her fist alone. They also needed that village's jinchuuriki; what the bloody fuck were they thinking?! He instinctively bit all three of his lips before he lost it and tried to blow them up. Goddamnit! Why did they have to be immortal at a time like this!
"Ask Hidan, he's the one that wanted the cat in the first place."
"What the fuck! You are so full of crap! You liked that fucking cat too! Don't even start telling shit that it was all my fault!"
A cat? What did a cat have to do with the girl?
"What does a cat have to do with anything?"
Leave it to Leader to get straight to the point.
Kakuzu sighed, "Hidan found a cat on the border of fire and river country and kept it. We didn't know it was really a ninja, we didn't feel any chakra coming from it, suppressed or otherwise. We just thought it was lost pink cat." and then he mumbled, "Should have known something was wrong when we didn't find a reward for the stupid, pink thing."
He really didn't understand what it was with Kakuzu and money. Money didn't buy happiness, money didn't make people happy like art did. But he supposed that Kakuzu was just too ignorant to appreciate art.
"I may have found the fucker but you're the one that let me keep it."
"What? So now I'm your mother too? Grow up you little shit, you're not my problem."
"What was that stitch-ass? Don't make me laugh, like anybody would let you get close enough to have freak kids. You couldn't fucking pay someone."
Before he could even blink at how stupid this situation was Kakuzu had completely wrapped Hidan in stitches and was squeezing. He faintly registered someone laughing, Kisame probably, nothing made him happier than a battle."You fucker, don't tempt me to be serious and actually kill you. I'll..."
Before the situation could get bloody they all heard a pop, and then the foreign chakra signature was gone. What? How could she disappear like that after just a few moments? No one was that good! He turned around and stared, stunned, at the small pink kitten looking up at them owlishly. It sat up, yawned showing it's tiny pink tongue and then began to slowly lick it's tiny pink paw. What the fuck?! He was sure now that he would never see anything so bizarre again in his life.
~O~
"So what you are trying to say was that when you got back you gave the kitten a bath because it smelled weird. That when you got it wet it turned into a girl and you didn't know what to do so you clubbed her over the head. Is that right?" Everyone else had left, he didn't even know why he was still here. Listening to Hidan bitch was only entertaining for so long.
"That's what I fucking said already. Are you deaf or something?"
"Don't try my patience Hidan, I have no compunction in regards to making you suffer."
"Heh. But you can't kill me bitch, so in the end I win."
There was no doubt in his mind that Hidan was the craziest fuck out of all of them, a point proven by how he just laughed after Leader plunged his hand into his gut and pulled out a kidney, casually tossing it aside and primly wiping his hand on Hidan's cloak and gliding away with the cat in his hand. In some twisted way he was proud that he was just as terrifying to people as these guys were to him sometimes. It was only thin threads that kept them from outright killing each other after all, most members weren't very loyal and were only there for their own gain. Himself too he supposed, and he thought about his desire to kill Itachi, some people just went too far.
He honestly didn't understand anyone here, why were they here? What purpose did the Akatsuki provide these people. They were lonely, that was for sure, he knew for a fact that he was the only one who had willingly left his village for no other reason than that he had wanted to. Everyone else here had been forced to leave, or had left because others just didn't understand. He wasn't lonely, he had a purpose and the only reason he was still in the Akatsuki, besides that it had grown on him, was because Itachi was still stronger than he was, could still kill him. And he couldn't leave until that score could be settled or he died. Pretty stark, he knew, but he was a simple man at heart.
He watched half interested as Hidan lay panting on the floor, unconsciously holding the gaping hole in his side. Hidan was pretty attractive for a man, and the way the blood was so red against his white skin was interesting. The way his lips were slightly parted and his eyes closed with nebulous tears clinging to his lashes; it was so inspiring. Pain was always the most satisfying kind of inspiration, it was so absolute and simple, yet complicated, there were so many different kinds of pain. However he preferred the honest pain of emotionless blood. He really was a simple man at heart.
He pulled out a lump of clay from his hip bag and idly tossed it between his hands. What angle would be more aesthetically pleasing? Ah, there it is. He began to mold the clay in his hands, fingertips gently forming lines and shapes, creating a statue of Hidan, of Hidan's pain. It was beautiful really. Realistically portraying physical pain while also conveying the pain of the mind. Not bad if he did say so himself. He turned it back and forth in the light, adding something here, rubbing something smooth there, it was almost finished.
"You are a sick fuck, did you know that?"
"What, un?"
"You are a sick fuck."
"Never thought I'd hear that from you, yeah. What makes my art sick?"
"It's frickin grotesque. Here I am bleeding on the floor and you're shittin out some stupid statue."
"Hm, un. You know for someone whomurders people by killing their self for their god, you really know nothing about art, yeah." It was so close to being perfect, almost at the culmination of beauty.
Hidan sighed, "I never really thought about religion as art, I guess it could be similar. Hell if I know." He sat up gingerly touching his wound, it was almost sealed shut.
"Care to look un?" He held out the figurine, satisfied at the way it had come out.
"Fuck! You may be a pansy ass bastard but you sure know what you're doing. It looks just like me!"
"Thanks, yeah. Katsu!" The statue promptly exploding before it's beauty could be tarnished by time.
"Are you fucking insane?! You almost blew my goddamn hand off!"
He laughed. "Don't be so surprised, un. Anything's only beautiful when it's gone."
Hidan was tenderly rubbing his burned and bleeding hand. "That's true." He had never heard him sound so contemplative before, but he was tired and decided to think about it later. He was going to bed for the rest of the morning and that was final.
~O~
He really had no idea why Leader picked him for this. It really wasn't what he was good at, he was best with destruction and art, he had no talent whatsoever for gleaning information from people. He always got excited during the torment faze, explaining just how his little clay models really worked and before he knew it he had killed them before he could get the information. It was a shame, but sometimes he just didn't have any self control. Shouldn't Zetsu be the one doing this anyway? But then again he was the only one who looked like an actual human being, he smiled, little did anybody really know.
He entered the room, Akatsuki rarely took anybody to a base for interrogation, it was just too risky. Now, though, it was too risky to let the girl out. She now knew where this base was, had seen them all, and it was just too damn risky to let her go. So he was here to find out just how much she knew, why she was a cat, if she was a cat to find information on them, how she did it and to what degree she was actually aware while in said cat form.
To be perfectly honest, this whole situation was really bizarre and uncomfortable. The interrogation room was empty except the table on which the kitten was sitting. Next to it was a spray bottle of water, heavy leather straps with chakra suppressant seals sewn on one side, and a sort of hospital gown. He frowned, of course it would be too much to ask for her to transform with clothes on, of course. Why couldn't everything be less complicated?
He sighed and took out his hair and then put it all back up in a single ponytail. Wasn't any reason to be fancy where torment was involved; hopefully it wouldn't come to that but ninjas, especially female ninjas, didn't like being forced to do anything. They were all so difficult and full of themselves. Blowing them up with his art was especially fulfilling because they were all so sure they wouldn't die, that they were better, that their nobleness and sense of justice would keep them from dying. What a load of crap.
He would have to be quick though, he didn't know what she was capable of and some time had passed since she had taken Sasori no danna on. From what leader had told him there would be a popping noise, followed by a thick plume of smoke that resembled summoning smoke and then she would be human. He carefully regarded the abominably pink kitten, why pink? He smiled, why anything? He distractedly stroked it's little body, momentarily forgetting it was really a person, a dangerous person with unknown skills. But it was kind of cute, he could see why Hidan had kept it, he lazily wondered what blowing it up would feel like. No, Leader would be too extremely pissed for that, if he had wanted it dead it would have been dead already.
So instead he grabbed the straps in one hand and the spray bottle in the other and prepared himself for a fight.
