A/n: Ahhh, I'm sorry! I meant to post this yesterday, but the internet mysteriously kicked the bucket. Really, it was like--pop--the computer's off--pop--the computer's on, and then I (wait forever for it to turn on and all, but then I) open Internet Explorer and it FAILS. Stupid...oh well. At least I got to my dA fans before that...

Okay. Chapter two...er, one. Yeah, that's right. Cause one was a prologue. Okay. Chapter one...oh yes, a timeline shall be provided here:

DRF I (and yes, that's the abbreviation): whenever, really. Theoretically, it's pre-Shippuden, but the timeline is pretty much irrelevant to the show's plot.
DRF I epilogue: a month or two after the end of the rest of it
DRF II prologue: nine months after DRF I
DRF II: three years after the beginning of DRF I

Yeah. So...it's DRF Shippuden : 3

So...I think that's all I have to say. Except that I've been in a really good mood (despite being overworked) because people have been reading my other fanfiction. It gives me this nice warm fuzzy feeling inside...and someone--nay, TWO people--offered to Beta-read for me! Yay for having a Beta-reader!...and I still don't know exactly what that means I have to do...eheh...

By the way...this still has virtually no actual plot. It's a concept, definitely, albeit one of less originality, but in the end, I have no plot. So, there's nothing planned really going on, so it deviates from that one-chapter-almost-always-is-the-next-day-at-breakfast-or-otherwise-in-the-morning. Most chapters do take place in the morning, but they're not all in procession.

And yeah, no more listing of the fans. Because that really was troublesome.

And I'm still calling Konan Kai. Because...just because. Because I technically can.

Disclaimer: Masashi Kishimoto might be mean to Akatsuki, but he still owns them, and all I can do about it is write a fanfiction in which Akatsuki leads happier lives. Well...maybe Pein doesn't live such a happier life. But at least it's a longer life.

Pein was struck by a very random thought, and he dropped the newspaper to look around at the rest of Akatsuki, no longer caring about how obvious his sectional choice was because he was currently skimming through the Real Estate section out of sheer boredom. Left to right, he looked intensely at each and every one of them; Hidan, Kakuzu, Zetsu, Kisame, Itachi, Tobi, Deidara, Sasori, and, of course, Kai. He brought his hands in front of his face; they were more calloused that before, but not much, because life had been pretty good to him, all things considered, and he hadn't worked much since that day.

Deidara noticed his leader's motion, and he made a noncommittal noise and asked, "Otou-sama? Is something wrong?"

Pein smiled slightly. "Three years."

"What?" Deidara asked incredulously. "Uhh…Leader-otousama? Are you feeling well?"

"Of course I am," Pein answered, still smiling tiredly. "We've been a family for three years today. How could I not be?"

Akatsuki blinked collectively. It was almost interesting—each and every member was perfectly synchronized, each eye opening and closing at the exact same moment—nay, it was highly interesting, or it would be to anyone who could be amused more easily than Pein, and Tobi did indeed giggle after that split-second.

"Three years ago," Pein went on, "Tobi was on the table…"

Tobi barked a panicked laughter, leaning in on the table and waving his arms at Pein. "L-l-Leader-otousama, w-we all know what happened, do we r-really need to talk about it more?"

Deidara laughed out loud and slammed his hand onto Tobi's back three times, the masked man's breath escaping in small yelps with each contact. "Come on, Otouto, why'd ya do it if you'd wish nobody would talk about it?"

Tobi laughed awkwardly and more than slightly insanely and leaned back in his chair, slouching as he ruffled his hair. "W-well, you see…" He laughed a little more. "Ehhh…well, come on, it works, right?" he asked, gesturing with what seemed to be an exaggerated shrug.

"Oh, yeah, totally," Hidan agreed sarcastically. "I mean, I'm so fucking obviously the very escence of every other person's fucking grandmother!"

More awkward laughter from behind the spiral mask preceded Tobi's strained reply. "I-it made more sense at the time…"

Hidan laughed genuinely. "Yeah, I know, and you did a pretty good job for such a strained timeframe, Tobi-chan!"

Hidan…was smiling…genuinely…Pein felt the lower half of his eye twitch, and he most certainly noticed Tobi shuddering. Pein smiled somewhat and asked, "Regretting our previous actions, are we now, Tobi-chan? I thought we raised you better than that…"

Itachi notably exhaled before coming to Tobi's rescue. "No offense, but you seem to be horrible parents, considering how Sasori-san and Deidara-san came out."

"Hey!" Deidara protested, the arm that he hadn't used to pat Tobi's back currently being wrapped around Sasori's shoulder. "We're not that screwed up!"

Sasori opened his mouth for a second before closing it again and shaking his head.

Pein nodded. "Yes, I suppose that's a point. Maybe it's because we were never really involved in your lives until a few years ago…"

"I'm not screwed up, damn it!" Deidara protested, still not letting go of Sasori. "Just because I like the same gender doesn't mean—"

"Keep in mind, Deidara," Itachi reminded him, "according to the family order, you do not like the same gender, but you do like your brother."

Deidara paused to ponder this before relaxing and admitting, "True…"

Pein smiled faintly again, but there was something else that he realized: he'd hardly sent anyone out on missions at all since they became family. That may have been their only saving grace, the only reason that they hadn't been found and killed or crowned and worshiped, or whatever else their fate as attempted conquerors of the world would bring them. Thinking about it, he realized that, really, there had barely been one mission a month, and that was always done by a single team, so nobody really had been getting out much.

And maybe that was part of why they accepted this family idea so well. After all, they had three years to adapt, and three years can go a lot faster when there's a lot less running about, risking your life to scrape up enough money to conquer the world at the same time that it kept alive a "family" of ten. Maybe they accepted it too well. Maybe it was because they had taken advantage of Akatsuki being a gathering point, and they had forgotten their purposes, they might need a reminder.

Maybe it was time to send everyone out on missions again…

A/n again: By the way, when Deidara refers to Tobi as Otouto, that's Japanese for little brother. I feel so smart that I actually know it.

Everyone's out on missions. Except Pein declared them after breakfast, so you'll never get the details. Until next chapter.

Preview: Pein begins to regret a rearranging of the teams in Akatsuki when Tobi brings home an unnexpected...well, Pein hopes that they're just visiting.

Special: Offspring: Hey, remember Kai's vacation way back when? Technically, it was over about...two years and two months ago? Something like that. Too bad, I have no confidence in writing about little children, so I'm stretching it. Her offspring is instead something more like three-four years old, rather than two-three.
I had a lot of comflict about exactly how that was going to come out. Between gender and names and Mary-Sue-ness and a whole bunch of other minor conflicts, I was kind of reluctant to bring that into the story. Because I was totally confused as to what to do.
So, now's the time that I somehow miraculously spontaneously get over not liking being blunt and saying that she had twins of opposing genders. As in one boy and one girl.
Oh so Mary-Sue, I know. And when you consider another addition in here, I'm sure that plenty of people will stop reading it. But, really, I just needed the gender variation.
And I suddenly had a random thought of maybe making this a trilogy, and in the third we somehow wind up becoming aware of Sasuke and Sakura having a child...not that I'm too much of a fan of SasuSaku (more of a SasuNaru kind of person, really), I just love the idea of turturing Sasuke by giving him a pink-haired son.