DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Naruto. But I would probably strangle myself to death in joy if I did. :)

Dedicated to: Jennifer. Because she's just cool like that.

"So...This is where we're...training?'" I asked my multi-colored senpai, Zetsu, tilting my head to the side. We were in the middle of the lake outside of the base. I really only wondered why we were on the lake because there weren't any obstacles or ways to set up practice dummies.

"Not exactly, Seikuu." Zetsu's nicer side replied, grinning a twisted smile. "You see, your 'training' is a bit different than what you would expect. Leader-sama believes you don't seem to get along well with Tobi here, and that you really need to prove you're up to working with us. Tobi included"

"Tobi is a good boy. Tobi likes Seikuu-san. But Seikuu-san hates Tobi." Tobi agreed, nodding his head. I folded me arms, sending a death glare over at him in response.

"Listen, I'm going to place you in another country. You won't know where you are, but I expect you to find your way back successfully within three days. You won't be more than 700 miles away, to make it a bit simpler. You both have to get back alive." Zetsu's light side emphasized, staring directly at me. Then his darker side spoke. "Understand? Killing Tobi isn't an option."

"If you say so, Zetsu-san." I answered, shrugging off the nagging feeling of wanting to punch something very hard to the back of my very violent mind.

"But-But Tobi is...Afraid of being left alone with...Seikuu-san..." Tobi innocently muttered, acting very timid and edging carefully away from me. I shrugged it off. Tobi was way too happy and polite to want to join a group such as the Akatsuki. I really had to think about his motives for joining such an infamous group.

"That's the point of this exercise, Tobi. So you won't be afraid of her." Zetsu's nice side persisted. He seemed a little more impatient to get us out of the way now that we'd asked so many questions.

"Now, I'll see you two later."

Before I had time to react, everything went black.

"Seikuu! Seikuu-san!!" Tobi's voice sang. It was faint, but I could hear him. Something pointy was poking my face, and I swatted it away. I opened my eyes and found Tobi leaning over me, orange swirly mask and all. "Yay! I got you to wake up!"

"Yeah..." I sighed angrily, standing up and observing the surroundings. Tobi and I were in a vast, open plain of hard rock and dirt, basically. Nothing around but brown. "Well, we're in one of two places. Suna, or Iwa. I'm guessing Suna, but Zetsu-san wouldn't have put me in the country I had come from. What do you think, Tobi-san?"

I turned to face where I thought Tobi was, but there was no one in sight. I was about to call out his name, but I didn't have to.

"Seikuu-san!! Look what I found!'

Yup, Tobi had found a rock. But oh no, it wasn't just a rock...

It was a shiny rock.

"Look! I've never seen anything like it before! When I hold it up to the sun..." Tobi trailed off, jumping around and spazzing every time the rock reflected the bright sunlight somewhere. I didn't really find it all that interesting, so...I decided to get rid of it.

"Tobi. Let me see it." I said imperatively. It wasn't a question. I glared at Tobi in way I knew he would understand. He nodded slowly and handed me the shiny rock. I held it out in the palm of my hand, and gave it a long, hard stare. Then, with a quick, miniscule puff of smoke, it had vanished.

"WOAH!! That was AMAZING!!" Tobi cried, jumping up and down again. Sighing, I just gave up at trying to make him miserable. Whatever I did seemed to affect him in a good way anyway. Then I began to feel the after effects of my jutsu. I struggled to hold myself up and silently cursed. I thought I had finally gotten it under control.

"Seikuu-san? Are you okay?" Tobi asked after a moment of silence. I struggled to hold my eyes open.

"Yeah, I...think so..." I replied unsteadily. I staggered a moment, thinking that I shouldn't have even tried.

My jutsu is sort of like a bloodline limit. The workers from the place they kept me in said I had some kind of DNA mutation that had never occurred in anyone before. I guess that's where my jutsu comes from. The only thing is, is that it drains my chakra very quickly. I thought I had mastered it, practicing so much. I guess not.

I began to stand upright again, but I guess my body had had it.

The last thing I saw was Tobi's bright orange mask.

When I came to, the last thing I wanted to do was to get out of bed. It was so nice, warm, comfortable...And it smelled good.

Wait a second...Bed?

My eyes shot open and I found myself in a dimly lit room. Tobi was sitting in a chair across the room with his hands folded across his lap. His chair was angled at me, and his body was slouched forward lazily. Looking out the window, I saw it was nighttime. I guess that's why it was so dark.

"Tobi?" I asked, sitting up slowly. He didn't seem to notice I was awake. "Tobi? Hellooo? Where are we?"

Then I heard a faint grunt and something that sounded like snoring. He must have been asleep. I pushed the covers off of me and stood up; looking around what looked like a cheap hotel room. And there, on the nightstand was a card.

I tilted my head and picked it up. The cover read "Get Well Soon." Flipping it open, there was a short note from Tobi.

Dear Seikuu-san,

Sorry for bothering you so much. I hope you wake up soon so we can get back to the headquarters.

Tobi

I closed the card, and a small smile found itself on my lips for the first time in quite a while. Tobi was such an idiot. I wasn't even sick. He just bought me a card and carried me here...What a weirdo. Maybe that was why I hated him so much. He'll be kind to someone as terrible and brutal as me. No, I don't even think it was that.

I think it was because this was the first time someone showed that they actually cared what happened to me. Hey, it was just a card, but he wouldn't have bought it if he didn't mean it. And that's also what bothered me.

"What an idiot." I mumbled to myself, putting the card back on the table. Glancing over at Tobi, I saw him grumbling something incoherent, and shifting in the chair.

I smiled again.

I woke up to the sound of a monotone alarm filling my ears.

"Nnn...Only five more minutes..." I heard a voice mumble. I felt some shifting on the bed, and then something warm snake around my waist. It felt kind of like an arm...Whoa, wait...ARM?!

"AGHH!!" I screeched, rolling of the side of the bed and hitting my head on the nightstand. But that pain didn't matter at the moment. I quickly hopped back up and took a fighting stance. "I'll give you 10 seconds to run. 10, 9, 8, 7-"

"Seikuu-san, uh..." The lump under the covers shifted, and I found none other than...

"TOBI?!" I yelled furiously, lunging for the boy and pinning him to the bed, my hands around his neck. "What. did. you. do. to. me?!"

"Nothing!! Tobi is a good boy! Tobi would never take advantage of a teammate!!" Tobi wailed, waving his hands frantically, not even struggling to get out of my death-grip. I lowered my face mere inches from his, and hissed, "For my sake, not yours..." before releasing him and hopping off the bed. Looking down at myself to make sure Tobi was telling the truth, I saw no change in anything I was wearing. My kimono-shirt was perfectly tied, and my shorts were still on. Shoes too. Well, I guess I could trust Tobi for now. Well, more I i had /i to, really.

"Hurry and get your mask on so we can go..." I muttered, folding my arms and tapping my foot as Tobi lazily got out of bed. Tobi grunted in response and shoved on his orange mask, running his fingers through his hair before nodding to say he was ready to go.

I stepped out of the hotel to find that we were in a large town, with huge stone buildings and few trees. I thought quickly about what we should do. How would we figure out where we were?

"Tobi-san, do you have any idea where we are?" I asked him. If he had brought me here, surely he would have asked someone.

"We are on Nagi Island, just south of Kirigakure." Tobi replied smartly. Well, I guess I do have to give him credit. He tries, at least.

"Are you kidding me?!" I shouted angrily, causing a group of people to look my way. We would be lucky to make it back to the River Country within a week, much less...four days was it we have now? "This is impossible!! What was Zetsu-san thinking?! We have to leave now, Tobi-san!!!"

"Uhh...Seikuu-san?" Tobi meekly asked in a soft voice.

"What?" I snapped, turning around only to find what he was talking about. A whole line of shinobi was in fighting stance standing right behind me and Tobi. "Oh, hell no."

"You are the subject 'Seikuu' of Sunagakure, correct?" One of the shinobi asked gruffly, stepping forward from the rest of the group. No doubt he was the leader.

"'Subject'? I'm offended." I replied with no intention of giving them an answer. Although, that basically gave me away anyway.

"Heh. Let's just say that this won't be the best day of your life." The leader chuckled, holding up an array of projectile weapons. The other six shinobi with him did the same.

"Uh, Seikuu-san, shouldn't we run now?" Tobi whispered, hiding behind me in fear.

"On the count of three. One...two..."

"Attack!!" The leader shouted.

"THREE!!!"

Before I knew it, Tobi and I had sprinted right in between the unsuspecting shinobi, dodging kunai and shuriken that were coming from all directions. I was pretty sure that we were dead, but somehow all of the weapons managed to barely miss us. Yet the whole time, I had this kind of rush of excitement. Either it was the fact that we could die at any second, or that Tobi's thinly-gloved hand held mine the entire time...Ha, but that couldn't be it, could it?

After endless running and one nasty confrontation, Tobi and I had managed to escape with merely a few scratches and a couple of bruises, and we had made it to a port city, that was a bonus. The only way back to the River Country was over the ocean. But we would definitely need to buy and pack some thing to eat before we left. And fast.

"Hey, Tobi-san..." I started, turning to him. Turns out that he had collapsed onto the ground in defeat, and was panting quickly. He must've been worn out from me practically dragging him for around 20 kilometers.

"Tobi...Tobi needs...water." He gasped, crawling up to me and clinging on to my leg. I felt my face heat up and I quickly shook Tobi off, scowling the whole time through. I wordlessly pulled out a mini-water bottle out from my scroll pouch and threw it at Tobi, whom caught it and gulped down the whole thing in 5 seconds. "Ahh...Tobi's okay now!"

"Great...Now can we get supplies?" I grumbled, folding my arms and staring down at Tobi. He nodded and stood up, dusting himself off before looking around for a shop.

"Oooh! Seikuu-san, what about that one?" Tobi asked excitedly, jumping up and down and pulling me over to a candy store.

"No." I replied curtly, sending out immense hate-waves at the store. I had some baaad memories of candy from staying at that research facility. They would give it to me every time I made something disappear, and eventually the candy made me so hyper I erased the whole group of people working there. They were...extremely afraid of me after that.

"Haha! Seikuu-san, look!" Tobi's voice snapped me out of my thoughts. I looked up to find him holding a huge, swirly lollipop. "Can I have it? Please, please, please?"

"Ehhh, Sure...If it'll shut you up." I muttered, pulling out the money it took to buy the lollipop and handing it to Tobi. He squealed in delight and ran up to the counter, picking up something else I couldn't see on the way. He came back happily stuffing his lollipop in his weapons' pouch, holding a box of Pocky out to me. I raised an eyebrow.

"What's this for?" I asked hesitantly, poking the red box suspiciously.

"It's to eat!! I thought you looked kind of hungry..." Tobi replied, eyeing my stomach. Almost as if it had heard him, my stomach let out a loud growl.

"Umm...Thanks." I muttered, snatching the Pocky and opening it, shoving a whole stick in my mouth hungrily. "Well..." I painfully swallowed. "I think some real food would be more useful...Let's just grab a whole thing of onigiri and get out of here before more of those other shinobi show up."

"Tobi will get them! He's a good boy, he won't spend all of Seikuu-san's money." Tobi piped up, bowing in respect before walking in a nearby shop. I didn't protest and just watched him go inside. It almost made me laugh, watching him try to converse with the cashier, whom had a terrible accent. I could barely understand the guy myself. Tobi then finally just handed the guy a bill, and the cashier handed him back change. It almost seemed like Tobi was mad for a minute there. That was a little...weird to imagine.

"Seikuu-san? Why are you smiling?" Tobi asked slowly, backing up a step.

"Huh?" I asked. I had been smiling? "..Oh. Well, what's the problem? You've never seen a person smile before?"

"No, it's just...I've never seen you smile before, Seikuu-san..." Tobi murmured, poking his fingers together nervously.

"And what's wrong with that?" I asked defensively. I could feel my sanity slipping away. Why did my face keep heating up? Why was my heart going crazy? There was definitely something wrong with me.

"Nothing...Tobi just thinks Seikuu-san is pretty when she smiles..." Tobi practically whispered. I felt the blood drain from my face.

"Wh-Why would you...Nevermind. L-let's just...get going." I quickly snapped, grabbing the bag of onigiri Tobi was holding and shoving it in my pouch, which now looked on the verge of bursting at the seams. Hopefully it'd last the rest of the trip.

"Hai." Tobi said, staring at me a moment timidly before turning towards the ocean, which we would have to travel across. It was a stretch from here. Because, apparently the shinobi villages had been warned about my...eh...escape, so there was definitely no possibility of getting a ship. We'd have to run 200 miles over the ocean until we reached land. It would take two days to get to the River Country. I inwardly groaned at the thought.

"Okay, let's get out of here..." I mumbled, stepping onto the water and immediately using my chakra to myself out of the water. Tobi did the same, and eventually, we were at the point where there was nothing else in sight but the ocean, and all of the boats were behind us. By this point, it was practically nighttime. I was getting tired, but I couldn't let that slow me down. I was going to run all night, no matter what.

"S-Seikuu-san...Tobi is tired..." Tobi gasped, slowing down a bit.

"Get over it." I replied, not even bothering to look back at him.

"But...I'm hungry and my feet hurt!!" Tobi whined again. Man, was he trying to get on my nerves? I abruptly stopped and on impulse, Tobi did too.

"Look at my face." I instructed, pointing at my nose with a blank expression. Tobi tilted his head in confusion. "Does it look like I care?"

"Ummm...No?" Tobi answered in fear of being beaten severely. I would never do that in such a situation, but the thought sounded really good at the moment...

"Good. Let's keep going." I snapped, turning back to the extremely distant horizon. This...was definitely going to take a while.

"Oh...We...finally...made it." I huffed, practically hyperventilating as Tobi and I slowly trudged up to shore. It had been another day and a half of running. Lucky me, Tobi had kept his mouth shut the whole time and I could gripe to myself in peace.

"Tobi doesn't feel so good." Tobi murmured, bending over and holding his stomach. I backed up a step uneasily. Truthfully, I felt terrible too, but that was mainly because I lived off of rice balls and ran like my life depended on it for two days straight. Across water, nonetheless.

"Yeah, well, neither does Seikuu." I grumbled back, grabbing Tobi's collar and pulling him up to a standing position, ignoring the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. If we didn't get rest soon, I probably would get sick anyway. "Come on, we have to keep going. We only have a few hours left."

"Right...Sorry..." Tobi responded hoarsely, staggering after me as we began to run again. I couldn't take much more of this. Placing us so far off...It was like he expected us to fail...Ha, but that would be kind of pointless, wouldn't it?

"So, do you know the exact location of the Headquarters, Tobi? I didn't pay much attention on the way there the first time, so I really have no idea where it is..." I asked. Yeah, I had kind of started running without thinking. My fatigue was definitely catching up with me.

"Uhh, I think it's towards the center. An hour or two and we're there." Tobi replied. I think if he had been feeling better, his tone would have sounded a bit more happier rather than like he was gargling some kind of really nasty mouthwash. And just like that, Tobi was on the ground, and soon after there was vomit inside his mask. Of course, this really helped me feel better. I ended up vomiting too.

"Ugh...Lovely." I groaned, wiping the corners of my mouth with distaste. Tobi hadn't gotten up from the ground and was almost whimpering as he took of his mask and practically threw up again at the sight of it. I personally felt sorry for him. Sure, a mask covered your identity and looked really cool, but the fact the any bodily function of the face that happens goes into that mask makes the decision questionable.

"I told you I didn't feel good." Tobi muttered, falling over in defeat.

"Hey, get up." I nudged Tobi with my foot. Turns out, he had fainted. "Great...You're just trying to make this hard, aren't you...?"

After five minutes of endless heaving, I finally managed to get Tobi's unbelievably heavy carcass on my back, with his arms dangling over my shoulders and his maskless face was softly pressing against my cheek.

"Geez...What's wrong with me...?" I murmured, failing terribly at suppressing the dark blush that crossed my face.

"To...Tobi...G-Get up..." I muttered, shaking Tobi's fainted form on the ground roughly. After carrying him around 25 miles, I was definitely slipping in my ability to go on. Plus, Tobi was a lot heavier than I had thought he would be. I guess that was just a bonus.

"Nnn..." Tobi groaned, rolling over onto his back to look up at me. "I'm sorry you had to carry me so far...I think..." Tobi shakily stood up. "..that I'm okay now..."

"It's about time..." I muttered in response, falling forward onto the ground and resting my head against the cool grass. I was absolutely wiped out. "I think that the base is somewhere around here. I wasn't too sure because you wouldn't wake up so I could ask you."

"Tobi is sorry..." Tobi muttered, rubbing his eyes and holding out a hand for me to take. My vision blurred in and out of focus, and I thought that for a second that I was going to faint too. I shook my head and took Tobi's hand, collapsing before I got all the way up. Tobi caught me and nearly fell himself, but steadied out and held me tightly close to him. I blushed heavily and shakily looked up at Tobi. There was a long silence where we just stared, and my head started spinning.

"Seikuu-san..." I heard Tobi say softly. "Y-You found it..."

"Wh-Huh?' I asked, stumbling as I stood all the way up, even more clumsily than before.

"The base! It's right here..." Tobi replied, putting his hand on a large rock. The rock suddenly twisted to form a cave-ish type entrance where I remember walking through to get to the door that led into the main room of the Akatsuki headquarters. Deidara trudged out, muttering something about 'not wanting to go', and then he saw us.

"Tobi, Seikuu-chan! Geez, talk about timing..." Deidara grumbled, stopping a moment of scowling to raise an eyebrow at me, and then Tobi. "Why are you two so pale, un?"

"Huh? We're not pale!! This is our natural skin color..." Tobi began, folding his arms.

And that instant, I fell to the ground on my side, my vision blurring to the point where I could barely see, and my face breaking into a cold sweat. I shivered slightly and curled up, feeling terrible and cold all of a sudden.

"Seikuu-san?!" Tobi cried, kneeling down to get a closer look at me.

"I told you she looked pale..." Deidara muttered, kneeling down also. I felt his hand on my forehead, and it was like ice to my burning forehead. I groaned and clutched my stomach, feeling as worse as I ever had before. "Yeah, she has a high fever, un. Tobi, pick her up and bring her inside."

"But-" Tobi began, afraid I would get mad. But I couldn't exactly say much or see too well at the moment.

"Now, Tobi." Deidara sighed, turning towards the entrance to the base and walking in without waiting for me or Tobi.

"You wouldn't mind, right?" Tobi asked slowly and carefully, poking my cheek. I angrily swatted it away and mumbled a "Yes." in response, before he effortlessly scooped me up and followed after Deidara, too prancey-dancey for my liking. I was already sick at my stomach, and his skip-walking didn't help much.

"Sit her on the couch, un." Deidara said, pulling out a thermometer from the bathroom and bringing it over to me once Tobi had sat me down, plopping down in the chair next to mine. He handed me the thermometer to put in my mouth, and a minute later, I pulled it out, practically falling off the couch. 104 degrees Fahrenheit. Yeah, I was definitely sick. Deidara sighed and took the thermometer from me, taking it to the sink and throwing it in for someone else to wash.

"Listen, un. I have to leave on a mission with Sasori-danna, so I can't help you two for now. I should be back in a few days. Tobi, give Seikuu-chan some pain killers and a glass of water, and make sure her fever doesn't get any higher." Deidara instructed, putting on his Akatsuki hat and stepping out the door before either me or Tobi had any time to respond. There was a small silence, and Tobi hopped up, walking to the bathroom and grabbing the bottle of pain killers Deidara had suggested and filled a glass full of tap water, not saying a word the whole time.

"Here." He said, holding the glass for me to take, which I did. He then opened the top of the bottle of painkillers and paused a moment, his eyes widening and his face paling to an extremely pasty white.

"Tobi?" I asked quietly, sitting up with concern.

"UGGGGGHHH!!!!" He groaned, dropping the entire bottle of pills, causing them to spill all over the floor as he ran to the bathroom. I heard a sickening splattering noise, and then I felt that water I had just drank starting to bubble to the surface...

Immediately, I bolted to the bathroom after Tobi, but slipped on the pills he had spilled all over the floor, and the throw up came soon after.

"Seikuu-chan...!" Tobi muttered, evidently obligated to help me on Deidara's orders. He stood up, but then clutched at his mouth and hurled in the sink on his way out, unable to hold it back short enough to help me. I struggled to get up, but stumbled on more of the pills and fell face first onto the ground, one of the many pills sticking to my face as I lifted my head up. This was definitely going to be a long week.

Around three days later, Tobi and I were still absolutely miserable. No one was there to take care of us, so I was forced to try and clean up all of our puke that didn't make it to the toilet, trash can, or sink. And that was an unbelievable amount. After the first day by ourselves, I had just completely given up.

And Tobi? Well, he was just about as useless as I was. The only thing he got out of bed for was to throw up somewhere, or to eat when he couldn't take the hunger any more. I rarely saw him come out of his room that he shared with Zetsu when they both were here. I, luckily, didn't have to share a room with anyone, so I got to lay in nauseating agony in peace. I only prayed for the time that Deidara would be back to save Tobi and I from this dark abyss.

It was only four in the morning, and I had barely slept through the night. I hadn't seen Tobi in a while, so I was pretty worried about him. After around five more minutes of just laying there, I heard a familiar voice, probably just outside of the hideout's walls. Then another voice responded, and I heard the door open.

"DEAR GOD."

Yup. Good old Deidara was finally back.

A/N: Welp, that's all for now. :) Hope it was worth the wait!! I'm going to put up the rest of the story right now, just to get it out for everyone. Sorry it took me so long!

Love, OxS