--- Acceptance ---

-- Chapter 3: Embarrassments--

- Ita/Saku-

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.


Konan rubbed her back in pain and got up. She glared at the rest of the Akatsuki for making fun of her, and angrily stormed out of the room. She saw Sakura standing there expectantly. She didn't say anything but, shoved past her shoulder and gestured her to follow her.

"Was it necessary for you to do that?" growled Sakura.

Konan turned around and glared at Sakura, "Was it necessary for you to punch me and embarrass me like that?!"

"Hey, it's your fault," said Sakura, amusement tinkling in her emerald eyes. "Just don't call me a bitch next time- and remember, none of you are my superiors. I may be your hostage but, treat me with respect because I will fight back."

Konan grinned, 'I like this girl. All tough and stubborn- maybe she ain't as bad as I thought at first.'

Sakura didn't notice Konan's expression and just continued looking around the whole Akatsuki base, well one of their many bases.

"Is it natural?" asked Konan silently, walking into another room.

Sakura arched an eye brow, "Is what natural?"

"The pink hair," said Konan as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Yeah," answered Sakura absentmindly, looking around the room.

"That's weird," said Konan, sitting on a bed. "Having pink hair is so...yuck."

"You act like having light blue hair ain't weird," said Sakura, rolling her eyes and sprawling her legs onto the couch.

Why was she talking to her anyway? She just punched her brutally into a wall. She didn't like her. She didn't have to act like they were friends now.

"How's Konoha like?" asked Konan, with a look of curiosity in her face, she had never been to Konoha before.

"I didn't answer Deidara when he asked me that question, I won't answer you," said Sakura harshly.

"Sheesh, calm down," said Konan. "I just asked you a damn question, don't gotta get all snappy."

"Why the hell are you acting like we're friends anyway?" asked Sakura. "I don't like you. Don't talk to me."

Konan rolled her eyes, "They weren't kidding when they said your as stubborn as a mule."

Sakura narrowed her eyes, 'Who's they?'

"Hn," was all Sakura said.

Konan's eyes narrowed, "Great, another Itachi!"

"Don't compare me to that bastard," said Sakura coldly.

"Why are you so cold anyway?" asked Konan. "Like come on, still in love with the Uchiha? Get over him, you're acting like a child."

Konan found herself pinned to the wall, air being lost from Sakura's tight grip around her throat. Sakura's eyes glared holes into Konan's eyes. Even though Konan wouldn't admit it, she was a bit scared of what the pinkette would do to her.

'Okay, she is as bad as I thought at first,' thought Konan.

"I am not in love with that egotistical, selfish bastard," hissed Sakura menacingly. "If you ever say that again, I swear I'll kill you."

"You're just in denial," smirked Konan. "What, you're gonna cry now?"

"I haven't cried in five years," snarled Sakura. "Not for Sasuke, not for my parents, not for anyone."

Sakura's grip around Konan's throat tightened, causing the smirk on Konan's face to disappear.

"Le-let go of m-me you damn bitch!" yelled Konan, trying to pry off Sakura's hands from her neck.

Whoops. She just made a huge mistake.

The Leader & Akatsuki

Deidara and Kisame stopped laughing and turned serious when they faced the leader.

"The girl will be staying with us for a while," said Pein, everyone's attention on him. "We will give her a week or two to think about joining us. If she continues to refuse, we will find a way to force her to join. I know how powerful she is, we'll make good use of her abilities. You are not to tell her that she's bait for the Kyuubi. Itachi, you are to keep your eye on her. You will have to find some way to make her heal those eyes. Though I have a feeling it will be hard, she's quite stubborn."

Itachi didn't say anything but, Pein knew that Itachi understood what he had to do.

"Can Tobi be friends with Sakura?" asked Tobi.

"Do whatever you guys want with her, as long as you don't give away any secret information," said Pein. "Don't tell her of our whereabouts either. I'm sure some of the Leaf Shinobi will be looking for her. Which is why we might have to move a few times."

"What about her chakra?" asked Kisame, was he suppose to continue drawing chakra from her?

"Right now, we can't trust her much," said Pein. "So you will continue to take away chakra from her. Itachi will be seeing how much she's grown to trust us a bit...if she ever does, then you will stop taking so much chakra. When she joins us, which is everyones' job to convince her to, then you will no longer need to take away her chakra."

"Tobi is hungry," said Tobi, rubbing his stomach. "Is dinner ready yet?"

Pein nodded his head.

-Bang-Boom-Crash-Cling- "AAAAAAAAAH!"

All of the Akatsuki members got up and left the room to see what the commotion was about.

"She must have called her a bitch again, yeah," said Deidara laughing a bit.

After walking down some halls, they saw a smashed wall, with Konan under all the sheet rock. Sakura was standing over her, glaring daggers. She didn't even look up when the other Akatsuki members arrived. Konan got up and rubbed her head, glaring at Sakura once again.

"I'm getting tired of this bullshit!" yelled Konan angrily. She just met the girl and already she's been punched into two walls!

Sakura didn't say anything and turned her head to look at the other Akatsuki members. The guy with a orange mask, that had one hole for his eye-Tobi, walked over to Sakura.

"Tobi is a good boy!" said Tobi, outstretching his hand for Sakura to take.

Sakura looked down at his hand and looked back up at him. She was going to shove his hand away and tell him to get lost but, for some reason...she couldn't manage to be mean to him.

'What's with this guy talking in third-person?'thought Sakura. 'It's like he's only five years old, and what the fuck is up with that mask? It looks like he cut it off a rotten tree and stuck it on his face. But, rotten trees are green...so did he paint it? Well, that could explain it...I mean this guy acts like he's five! It would be no surprise if he got finger paint from his closet and started painting the mask.'

Sakura took her hand out and shook Tobi's hand, "Sakura."

"Tobi think that Sakura-chan looks pretty," said Tobi sheepishly.

Deidara and Kisame looked at Sakura, wondering what her reaction to that would be. Would she punch him through a wall too?

'Hell yeah!'thought Deidara. 'Maybe she'll injure him brutally and we won't have to listen to the idiot, yeah!'

'Sakura-chan? Well, he's certainly friendlier than I thought Akatsuki members to be,' thought Sakura. 'And did he just say I'm pretty? That's kinda nice...'

"Thanks," was all Sakura said as she turned around to see a fist thrown her way.

A hand quickly blocked the punch, the arm belonging to Pein. He had stopped Konan's fist from making contact with Sakura's face. Which got a surprised gasp out of Konan.

"Konan stop," demanded Pein. "Kunoichi, you need to repair this wall and stop punching everyone."

"Konan was the one who broke it," mumbled Sakura.

"I wouldn't have broke it if you didn't punch me!" said Konan defensively.

"I wouldn't have punched you if you would have just listened to what I told you about five minutes ago," said Sakura hotly.

Konan's fist clenched as she glared at Sakura, "Argh! Can I kill her?!"

"Go ahead and try," challenged Sakura.

"Both of you, stop!" demanded Pein in an annoyed tone. "We're going to have dinner now. If you two don't shut the hell up, then I'll kill both of you."

Sakura was hungry, so she decided to shut up. Konan just huffed and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Where are Hidan and Kakuzu, yeah?" asked Deidara curisously as they made their way towards the kitchen.

"They still haven't returned from their mission," said Konan as they entered the kitchen and all sat around the table. Sakura once again, sat in the empty seat- between Itachi and Deidara.

A lady who was dressed like any ordinary woman from a village, started serving them food; almost in fright. Sakura could see the fright in the woman's eyes and almost felt bad.

'They must have forced her to work for them,'thought Sakura. 'They probably can't cook for their lives! They also must need a lady to clean and look out for them. Why the hell can't Konan do it? Ugh, that lazy tramp isn't good for anything! She should be the one serving the food, not some villager!'

She saw Kisame's face turn into different emotions and wondered why he looked so awkward and mad. Sakura looked down at all of their plates and saw fish. She shook her head and almost felt the need to laugh.

"Find something amusing, kunoichi," asked Kisame angrily.

Sakura smirked, "Other than your brother being your dinner? No not really."

Deidara chuckled and shook his head, 'I sure like this kunoichi.'

"Seriously, can I just kill her already?!" Kisame asked Pein angrily.

"I know right," put in Konan. "I'm tired of her smart mouth!"

"Haruno, you really need to get your act together," hissed Pein. "We will not hesitate in killing you."

"If that were true, you would have killed me a long time ago," muttered Sakura as she started eating her food.

They all just stayed silent and ate their food too.

After Dinner

Sakura was to be under Itachi's captivity. So there she was, laying down in his bed- bored to death. He had gone out to go talk to Pein. Maybe a mission...she wasn't sure, not that she cared. She heard the door open and sat up. She was surprised to see Deidara there. He flashed her a smile.

"Hey Sakura," greeted Deidara as he entered the room, bringing in a bag with him. "We left your other bag of extra clothes in the other base. We figured you wanted to take a shower so hopefully Konan's clothes will fit you. She didn't want to bring them up- nor lend them to you, considering the fact that you two don't get along too well. So I brought them for you."

Sakura took the bag from Deidara, "Thanks."

To Sakura's surprise, instead of leaving; Deidara sat on the bed, beside her. She arched a pink eye brow and looked at him.

"Need something?" asked Sakura coldly.

"You never did answer my question from before, yeah," grinned Deidara.

"Nor will I ever," bit out Sakura. "Get out."

"Why can't you tell me about how your life is in Konoha?" asked Deidara. "I'll tell you about how my life was in Stone, yeah."

"I don't give a damn about your life in Stone," hissed Sakura. "Now, get out before I make you get out."

Deidara quickly got up and waved his hands frantically in front of him, "No need for that, I'm leaving, yeah."

Sakura didn't say anything as Deidara left out the door. She opened up the bag and saw sweat pants and a tank top.

'At least it looks comfortable,'thought Sakura. 'Though, I need to wash my under garments. Where the heck is the bathroom?'

She opened one of the doors-- it was a closet. She opened up another door;

"Ahah, found it," said Sakura to herself as she walked into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. She made sure that it was locked as she set the bag down and stripped herself from all the clothes she was wearing; which took a while considering the fact that she was wearing her ninja attire. She turned the handle and made it so that the water was warm, not too hot, not too cold.

She stepped into the shower and let the water hit her body. After a while of getting her body used to the temperature of the water, she grabbed a bottle of shampoo and squeezed some onto her hand. She then scrubbed at her hair, getting rid of any dirt left there. While taking a shower, she let herself ponder onto other thoughts.

'How long will they keep me here?'wondered Sakura. 'I hope that they know that I will never change my mind about joining them. They must be keeping here for some other reason. I just have a feeling....I mean, wouldn't they have killed me already if they didn't need me for something important? Using my abilities in their organization shouldn't be too important to them. I wonder what they are planning...'

After getting rid of everything, Sakura grabbed one of the towels she found on the rack and wrapped it around her body. She got her under garments and started washing them.

'Ugh, washing them and then drying them...this will take forever!'thought Sakura. 'I won't ever get my ass out of the bathroom.'

Either way, she started washing her bra and underwear- it's the only thing she had at the moment...she would need to go out shopping for some with Konan. I mean, they did say she would be staying with them for a while, right? No matter how much those two hated each other, they were the only girls. So, they would have to put their differences aside at one point. While waiting for it to dry, she looked around the bathroom for a comb.

Smiling happily when she found one, she immediately started combing her hair. At least there would be things to preoccupy her in the bathroom while she waited for her under garments to dry. She looked at herself in the mirror, she sure has grown.

'I wonder how much Naruto grew over the last couple of years,' thought Sakura, sighing. 'It feels like I haven't seen him in forever. Now that I think about it....what business do I have in Konoha? I have no true friends there. I may have about five but, that's it. Either way, they are always sent on some missions. But still, that doesn't mean that I should join the Akatsuki or anything. Those few people are enough to make me want to be back in Konoha.'

After about another thirty minutes in the bathroom, Sakura thought her bra and underwear were dry enough so she slipped them on and slipped on the tank top and sweat pants that Konan had given her. Sakura growled when she saw that the tank top stopped right above her belly button.

'I'm going to kill her!'thought Sakura angrily. 'She did this on purpose!'

She put her dirty clothes in the bag and slammed the door of the bathroom open, also slamming the door once she left the room. She walked downstairs into the living room where she heard people talking and found Deidara, Kisame, Tobi, and Kakuzu talking. They stopped talking once they saw the pinkette enter the room. Kakuzu whistled and Sakura glared at him, making him shut up. Deidara looked her up and down.

"You're hot, yeah," said Deidara.

"Where the hell is Konan?!" asked Sakura dangerously, ignoring Deidara's comment, knowing that if she paid much attention to him- she would surely kill the poor guy.

"Looking for me, deary?" asked Konan with a smirk on her face as she appeared in the living room.

Sakura glared at her, "Couldn't you pick out a less revealing shirt?"

"I had that shirt from like three years ago, I grew out of it," said Konan. "I didn't think that it would fit you that short. You're going to sleep anyway, deal with it."

"What's the problem?" asked Kakuzu. "You look good. What's your name anyway?"

Sakura rolled her eyes and went back up the stairs, and into the room. Konan stayed in the living room, shaking her head and laughing.

"Why do you hate her so much anyway?" asked Kisame.

"She punched me two damn times," said Konan, turning serious. "Do you know how much that hurt?!"

"Of course he does," said Deidara. "He was the first one to experience it, yeah."

Kisame glared at Deidara, Deidara just shrugged with a grin plastered on his face.

"You called her a bitch, knowing she was going to punch you- so it's not right that you keep being mean to her," said Kisame. "I mean yeah, the girl is a demon but, she's going to be staying with us for a while; if not permanently. At least try to get along with her."

"Ugh, as if you know anything," scoffed Konan, walking up the stairs.

Deidara shook his head, "Why do girls fight so much, yeah?"

"Like they say, it's hard for girls to be friends with other girls but it's easy for guys to be friends with other guys," said Kisame. "Girls are just too...bitchy."

"That's kinda true," said Kakuzu.

With Sakura

She angrily entered the room, slamming the door as hard as she could behind her.

"Don't break the door," hissed a voice from inside the room.

Sakura was a bit surprised when she saw Itachi standing there. She was even more surprised when she saw him half-naked. He was standing there, in only sweat pants. Sakura felt her face turning red, and her palms turning sweaty. She saw his six-pack abs-- so muscular. His arms were all muscle, no fat. She felt her face getting redder and redder by the second.

'Pull yourself together, Sakura!'thought Sakura. 'So what if a hot S-class criminal is standing half-naked in the middle of the room. It's no big deal...Just ignore him. Ah! I haven't felt this embarrassed in years! What the hell... Damn he has so much muscles...he's sexy- ah! Okay, what's going on with my head?! Calm down, it's just Itachi. He's a bastard, just like his brother. I can calm myself down.'

Sakura took a deep breath and walked over to the bed, "Sorry, Konan just keeps getting me pissed."

Itachi didn't say anything as he got on the bed, Sakura's eyes widened when she saw him getting under the covers.

"If you're sleeping here, then where am I going to sleep?" asked Sakura.

Itachi looked over at the empty space on the bed- next to him. Sakura waved her hands in front of her.

"Nu-uh, I am not sleeping on the same bed as you," said Sakura. "Either you sleep in some other room or the floor but, I am not sleeping with you."

'Ugh, I make it sound so wrong!'thought Sakura. 'I'm just sleeping on the bed- beside him. Not actually doing anything...'

Itachi didn't say anything and just closed his eyes, trying to fall asleep. Sakura sighed, she felt like she was talking to herself. She layed down on the bed and went under the covers too, Itachi smirked when he felt her laying down next to him.

"Just for the record, if you so much as lay a finger on me- I'm going to murder you," said Sakura.

"Hn," was the only answer Sakura got from Itachi, she glared at his back.

'Stupid bastard,'thought Sakura, as she tried to fall asleep.

The Next Morning

Sakura felt like that was the best sleep she had, had in years! She didn't even feel like detaching herself from the warm teddy bear that she was holding onto. Instead, she cuddled in more with the teddy bear, hiding her head deeper into it's.....muscular chest?

'Teddy bear?' her eyes shot open.

Her face once again went red, as she found herself holding onto Itachi, looking at his bare chest, with one of his arms wrapped around her petite waist. He looked down at her and slightly smirked at her flushed face.

'She's just too amusing,' thought Itachi.

Sakura's eyes flared as she glared at him, "Didn't I tell you not to touch me!"

"You were the one to grab on to me first," started of Itachi- surprising Sakura that he could actually talk! Also making Sakura feel even more embarrassed. " I just needed to get myself into a more comfortable position."

Sakura didn't think that she could get any more embarrassed than she was right now. The sight just didn't look right- she was wearing a tank top that would be considered as more of a belly shirt than anything and sweat pants, and Itachi was half-naked, with his arm wrapped around her waist! She had her hands leaning on his chest. It just didn't look right, if anyone came in....they would have thought that the two had done something! Sakura didn't think that things could get even more worse than they already were. Of course, the world never did seem to be on her side. Sakura felt her whole world and dignity crashing down when the door slammed open.


A/N: Hey everyone, sorry that it took some time to update! =/

But, I got an extremely busy schedule now.

Especially since my birthday is coming up(March.6=]!), and I'm already doing preparations and stuff.

Well, I'll be updating my other stories and update this one as soon as I can.

I hope you liked the chapter, Please leave a Review!=]

-X Emerald Goddess Of The Night X-