Note: the prompt for this one was: "Can you press pause on being an asshole for a second?" i just really love me some sakura and hidan shenanigans, as made obvious by my most recent chapter of how long is forever? i might just do more with this idea.

Before the man in front of her could do anything, Sakura just put a hand up in his face and said, "Can you press pause on being an asshole for a second?" She turned to her tiny slug summon and said, "Please continue, Kasumi-san."

While she listened patiently to the breathy voice report on the mundanities of the border patrol, the man was fidgeting, looking as if the silence was just about to kill him. Once Kasumi disappeared in a puff of smoke, he threw his hands up in the air. "Finally! Fucking gross things, shouldn't be allowed indoors."

Sakura sighed and pressed the cool glass of her beer to her forehead. "What do you want, Hidan?"

The immortal man had dug himself out of the Nara forest while all of Konoha's troops had been busy with the Fourth Shinobi War and disappeared for half a decade. His new sacrifices to Jashin had popped up on the radar several months ago, but because they were always missing-nin, no one in any government had cared all that much. All the daimyo were just happy they didn't have to pay out bounties and the kages were cautiously optimistic that he would just keep getting rid of their village outcasts.

Shikamaru, on the other hand, had to be officially bound to Konoha so he wouldn't pull a Naruto.

"Can't a guy approach a woman at a bar without being fuckin' interrogated?" He sat down next to her without invitation and signaled to the bartender.

Sakura frowned. "A single question is not an interrogation. Asshole."

He grinned at her. "Now you're speaking my language, beautiful." Hidan took a swig of his whiskey as Sakura wrinkled her nose. "What, too much of a lady to appreciate a man who can hold his liquor?"

She rolled her eyes and swiveled in the stool, leaning her elbows back against the bar. "You don't guzzle that kind of whiskey. It's wasted on something like you."

Hidan shrugged and drained the rest of his glass. "Something? Ouch, sweetheart."

Sakura's first run in with Hidan had ended with him killing her mission target as a sacrifice after she had diligently tracked the man for two weeks. She took out her frustration on his too pretty face with her fists and left him broken and bleeding, his scythe pierced through his kneecap like a macabre flag. He hadn't stopped dogging her steps since.

She sighed. "I'm really not in the mood for your face right now, Hidan."

He straightened out of his lazy slouch and his red eyes took on a dangerous glint. "Somebody I need to kill for you, gorgeous? You know I will."

Sakura nursed her beer and contemplated taking Hidan up on his offer. Her current mission was more tedious than difficult, acting as a part-time bodyguard for a Fire Country nobleman during his activities at the spring festival. She had taken it on as a favor to Kakashi, who had given had a tired look when he handed the mission scroll over, saying "I apologize in advance, Sakura-chan."

Once she met Ikeda Terumasa, she understood. The man was belligerent and hateful of shinobi, sneering at everything from her small stature ("I'm more likely to protect her.") to her name ("A pink haired Sakura? Your parents must have been very dull people."). After the festival was over, she might just come back and murder him herself.

After a long silence, she just shrugged. "I don't need anyone to kill people for me."

He smiled, his white teeth glinting in the dim bar lighting. "Don't I know it. That's why you really need to give me and you a chance, sweetheart."

Sakura rolled her eyes, wondering when he would get tired of this game. "I'm not going to sleep with you, Hidan."

He pouted at her, a frankly terrifying look on such a big man who still refused to wear a shirt in public. "But why? You're hot, I'm hot. What doesn't work?"

She snorted into her beer, amused despite herself. "With logic like that, it's a wonder you pull any woman at all."

Hidan looked insulted. "I can get other women just fine. You're the only hold out." He leered at her as the bartender poured him another two fingers of whiskey. "It's a real turn on."

She flapped a hand at him dismissively. "Tell me about your week so I don't have to think about mine." Once he stopped with the ridiculous pick up lines, Hidan was pretty decent drinking company. It just wasn't something she was about to share with her friends back home.

"Jashin-sama received three pledges." Hidan licked his lips. "One of them was exquisitely fuckin' bloody."

Sakura was far too used to his antics to respond with anything but, "Anyone I know?"

He shrugged. "I grabbed them in the middle of a little pow-wow about killin' some old lady. I didn't stop to ask for their names."

She fluttered a hand on her chest. "You saved an old woman from certain death? What a hero!"

Hidan scowled and petulantly picked up his glass, sipping it pointedly in her direction. "Don't joke about that shit. Jashin-sama doesn't need heroes, just sacrifices."

Sakura poked him in the chest. "You're practically a saint these days, only killing people who have bounties."

Hidan grunted and caught her hand before she could add more finger shaped bruises. "The more blood a sacrifice has shed himself, the more blood Jashin-sama gets when theirs is spilt."

She laughed and tugged her hand out of his grasp. "Whatever you say, jerk. I still think you've gone soft." Sakura waved her beer at him. "It's a good look for you."

"Yeah?" Hidan raised his eyebrows at her and smirked. "That somethin' you like, sweetheart? I can be cuddly for you."

She made a face at him. "God, that's a disturbing thought. A blood soaked teddy bear."

He threw an arm around her shoulders, ignoring the way she sighed in resignation. "You and me, beautiful. No one could stop us."