Disclaimer: Who knows; I might own Naruto...
Summery: A girl who looks strangely like Naruto appears in Konoha, and soon afterwards Naruto is whisked off on another training trip. What does this girl have to do with Naruto's past, and what is her connection to the Akatsuki?
Posted: 11/6
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A Three Ring Circus
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When the meeting finally ended, the Akatsuki ambled autonomously down to the kitchen. Much to Naruto's surprise, it wasn't full of ancient, outdated appliances. Instead, he was greeted by shiny, state of the art equipment. More specifically, there was a gigantic stove, a huge oven, two dishwashers, three refrigerators, a deep freeze, and coffee machines. An insane number of coffee machines.
The blond had to wonder it all powerful shinobi were not just weird but addicted to caffeine as well.
"Let me get this strait," Naruto began as he and Tobi scoured the kitchen for any unclaimed foot, "Every Sunday the Akatsuki has a meeting, eats dinner, then watches a movie?" Tobi nodded as he examined the back of a macaroni and cheese box. "Someone chooses what's for dinner, and who that is is chosen at random. And every time it's Satoshi's turn he chooses ramen." Tobi nodded again. "Then why is everyone eating whatever they want?"
Sure enough, Satoshi and Kaida were the only ones eating ramen. Itachi was surrounded by dango sticks and empty Pock boxes, Kisame was eating sushi, and Hidan and Daidara were fighting over the last baked potato. Kakuzu had stolen the other five potatoes and no one was about to challenge him for them. Ayame was venomously stabbing at her salad and Zetsu was eyeing every one else's food enviously; he had been forbidden to eat until no one else was around.
"That is because Miyaku-sama and Kaida-chan are eating all of the ramen."
"Oh." Once everyone finished, the group relocated to the game room. Not even given a chance to sit down, Satoshi yanked Naruto to the side.
"Hey, Naruto-kun, guess what?" the redhead whispered.
"What?" Naruto asked, not bothering with secrecy.
"I think we should spy on Kaida-chan!"
"...What good would that do? She'll kill us if we're caught, and we already know she's insane."
"No, not for that. I think if we follow her long enough we'll find out what she's hiding about your dad. There's got to be something she isn't telling us."
Naruto contemplated this. Kaida did seem to be concealing something. Maybe this would work. It just depended on how they executed the plan. If only... A dark shadow fell over the pair.
"What are you two idiots planning?" Naruto looked up to see a certain Uchiha towering over him, a bottle of black nail polish held delicately between pale fingers.
"Oh, nothing. We're just spying on my cousin," Satoshi replied offhandedly, peering over the couch the pair was crouched behind.
"And why are you spying on Baka-chan?"
"Because she knows something about Naruto-kun's dad that she's not telling us."
The dark haired shinobi scrutinized the two. Black eyes resting on the blond, he sighed in irritation. "If Baka-chan isn't telling you something, there's a reason. Kami knows she can't keep her mouth shut about most things. So don't spy on her; I'll be stuck cleaning up the mess."
Satoshi's eyes narrowed as the Uchiha walked away. "He knows!"
Naruto raised an eyebrow. "Really? I couldn't tell," he commented sarcastically.
"Oh, and Satoshi," Itachi called back, as if sensing his leaders continued plotting, "You do realize we're now completely out of ramen." The Akatsuki leader collapsed on the ground, sobbing. Rolling his eyes, the blond went to sit next to Kaida. Absentmindedly, he looked around the room. The three large sofas were arranged in a semicircle around an enormous TV, on either side of which rested two gigantic bookshelves jam-packed with movies, CDs and videogames.
Daidara, whose turn it was to choose the movie, stood on the left-hand side with Hidan, who didn't want to watch 'The Da Vinci Code' again. On the couch closest to the arguing pair sat Tobi. He chatting animatedly with Zetsu, who just sort of sat there, silently flipping through a flower catalogue. To his right, Kakuzu was going though what appeared to be a check book. Ayame, alone on the right-hand couch, occupied herself with shooting death glares at Satoshi, who had since moved his sulking to a corner. This left the center couch and Naruto's current predicament.
Itachi sat on Kaida's right, expertly adding new coats of polish to his toenails. And Naruto, well... He was stuck between two overly competitive shinobi as they battled it out in 'Super Smash Brothers Melee.'
He really hoped a movie was chosen soon.
"DIE, persimmon," Kaida snarled as she tapped away at the controller.
"I am not a PERSIMMON!" Kisame growled back, revealing extremely sharp, pointed teeth. As he initiated a particularly lethal combo, Kaida continued to play one-handed whilst attempting to swing a pillow into her opponent's face. Ducking just in time, the cushion flew over Naruto's head and into Kisame's shoulder. In retaliation, the shark man grabbed the closest thing to him, coincidentally a half filled soda can, and flung it at the obnoxious blond. Once again Naruto ducked just in time, but Kaida dodged as well and the projectile struck Itachi, spilling the carbonated beverage all over him. Standing up, the brown liquid dripped down to the crimson carpet. He glowered at the feuding pair, but they were too immersed in their game to notice.
"Hey, Itachi! Would you make some popcorn?" Hidan asked offhandedly when he was the Uchiha rise. Itachi fixed him with a Sharingan enforced glare. "Um...I...I'll go get the snacks!" Watching the silver haired shinobi scurry off, Itachi left to dispose of his soiled cloak.
Eyes fixed on the bottle of nail polish left behind, Naruto asked Kaida a question that had been bothering him all evening. "Why is Itachi always painting his nails? It seems sort of... girly."
To his surprise, Kisame replied instead. "Well duh it's girly! But it gives him something to do. He's already read and memorized almost every book in this place, so he doesn't have much left to do with his spare time."
Naruto's brow furrowed slightly. "Are there that many books?"
Kaida laughed this time. "There are a ton of books. You haven't seen the library yet; it's the largest in the shinobi continent." When Naruto asked no more questions, she once again engrossed herself with the match. Soon afterwards, Daidara stepped in front of the TV. "Hey! We're trying to play here!"
"Well I've chosen the movie, un!"
"Really? Which one?"
"Volcano!"
Itachi, who had just returned, grimaced slightly. "Why do we even own that movie?"
Kisame, absorbed in the game as well, shrugged. "No idea. It might have been free when I bought Shrek."
"Why did we keep it?"
Daidara frowned. "I don't see what the big deal is, un. Volcano isn't that bad. It's art, un!"
The pair shot him a disbelieving stare. "The acting sucks, the special effect are horrible, and the plot had a million and one holes in it. The original was bad enough, but the dub is just pathetic."
"You speak American?"
"It isn't American, it's English."
"I've got the food!" Hidan energetically announced as he returned, arms overflowing with popcorn, sodas, chips and every other junk food known to man kind. "So what are we watching?"
"Volcano," Kisame muttered unenthusiastically.
"Sounds destructive! I like it!"
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On Monday morning, Naruto was woken at 7 by the dreaded wakeup call. How a single alarm could project through solid rock still baffled him, yet somehow Satoshi's Barney clock woke everyone up. Stumbling into the kitchen, Naruto discovered two things: people really do eat Pocky for breakfast, and, like he suspected, everyone in the Akatsuki drank coffee.
Kisame, amazingly, was a member of the limited group who only drank one small mug of coffee. Decaf, in fact. Other's, such as Itachi, went through several pots of black coffee before they could piece together a coherent sentence.
Apparently Itachi informed Satoshi of his cousin's lack of sleep wear, because the Uchiha was now suck escorting the blond into town as well as having grocery shopping duty. Apparently the Akatsuki practically owned a town as well. A town with no drycleaners, which resulted in an almost week long trip to pick up the dry cleaning.
Ayame was not happy about having dry cleaning duty.
After breakfast, Naruto was forced to run all over the headquarters doing random chores before his training began at 9. His first lesson, water jutsu, was... interesting to say the least. For some reason, Satoshi ordered Hidan and Kakuzu to assist Kisame. It didn't even take five minutes for the pair to be arguing over something. In frustration, the shark man had drug Naruto off to the other training room, stating that no matter how much he resented having to teach a brat like him, he might as well make sure the job was done right. Over the next two weeks, his lessons passed in much the same way. Minus the instructors fighting, of course.
Water jutsu wasn't the only class Kisame taught him. Endurance lessons consisted of Naruto running laps until he fell over from exhaustion. Which, thanks to the Kyuubi, was rarely. After catching him reading Itchi Itchi Violence, Naruto bet Kisame that he could beat him in one move. Needless to say, Kisame fell hard for the Sexy no Jutsu. Now the unfortunate missing-nin was stuck teaching him sword fighting as well.
While ninjutsu and fire jutsu lessons with Itachi were awkward at first, they quickly became two of his favorites after it was divulged that Itachi had nothing personal against the blond. That, and Kaida threatened to castrate the pair if they didn't get along.
Naruto still wondered why he needed a ninjutsu class when he already had individual lessons on each element type. Never the less, Itachi was able to teach him a ridiculously wide range of jutsu thanks to the Sharingan. And despite the confirmation that he was completely incompetent when it came to fire jutsu, Naruto still gained some useful knowledge during those lessons.
"Your stance is still wrong," Itachi criticized in a monotone, not looking up form his nails.
In frustration Naruto whirled around, pointing accusingly at his instructor. "How do you know I'm doing Goukakyuu no Jutsu wrong if you aren't even watching?"
Sill not looking up, Itachi replied, "Because I can sense your feet moving."
"Huh?"
Slowly recapping his nail polish, the Uchiha strode over to Naruto and stopped next to him. Motioning down to his feet, one of which was slightly in front of the other, he explained. "When creating a giant fireball, you're not only required to do the right handseals; you must breathe correctly was well. This stance allows you to breathe extremely deeply without sacrificing stability; when you rise up and lean back while inhaling you have a foot to steady yourself."
Naruto frowned slightly. "But whenever Sasuke did it he stood normally."
Itachi chuckled slightly. "That's because he's preoccupied with taking in as much air as possible. I'm sure you've noticed that whenever he uses this technique he ends up rising onto his toes, which greatly decreases his balance. What do you think would happen if something hit him while he was like that?"
"Um... He'd stumble?"
"You're correct, but only partially. He would be forced to release the built up chakra-infused air. This air would most likely begin flaming in his throat."
"So... Sasuke's been doing it wrong this whole time?"
"Yes." Hearing this, Naruto burst out laughing. "I wouldn't get too carried away; you have yet to produce even a spark." Sulking, the blond resumed his training.
Itachi also taught Naruto history. He still found it bemusing that in two weeks he learned more about the past than in all his years at the academy. Naruto also had more lessons with Kakuzu and Hidan. Kakuzu worked with him on increasing his raw strength as well as teaching him math, which Naruto was amazed to learn he was decent at. His only other lesson with Hidan, which was intended to increase his intelligence, normally boiled down to two hours of playing Go, Chess, Go Fish, or BS. Why they played Go Fish and BS was beyond him, but he wasn't about to complain.
Unfortunately, Naruto only had one lesson with Tobi: speed. Even then it was only because the masked nin was unarguably the swiftest member of the Akatsuki. Despite this, Naruto saw him whenever he had lessons with Zetsu. He had to admit that genjutsu and meditation lessons weren't very productive, but that was due more to his brutal allergic reactions to Zetsu than anything else.
Lessons with Daidara weren't very productive, either. The other blond spent more time lecturing on the wonders of art than teaching earth jutsu, and he never stayed on subject when he was supposed to be teaching geography.
While he originally didn't know what to think of the blue haired kunoichi, Ayame was actually a very good teacher. Granted, he rarely had lessons on medical jutsu and his tracking classes were mostly at night when he was too tired to care one way or another. But the kunoichi was deadly with lightning jutsu.
Last but not least were Satoshi and Kaida. Despite his usual carefree attitude, the Akatsuki leader proved to be amazing at tactics, possibly even surpassing Shikamaru. Not only a ruthless schemer and plotter, Satoshi was a genius when it came to wind jutsu. And Kaida... Well, she was just herself. While she assisted her cousin with teaching wind jutsu, Naruto could only marvel at the fluidity of her movement and the sight of her behaving like a typical shinobi, somberly explaining the workings of a new technique. While she made it perfectly clear sealing was her forte, she was adept in other fields as well. Satoshi's statement that she wasn't make a good taijutsu instructor was correct, although the blond was nearly on par with Gai and Lee. She also proved to be an incredibly precise shot; during accuracy training she could hit a moving target from 50 feet away blindfolded. Granted, Kaida latter admitted to using chakra to guide her kunai, but that was a feat in and of itself. Which brings us to their bloodlimit.
While not truly a Kekkei Genkai, the extent of the Kazama clan's ability to mold chakra had yet to appear in anyone else. While lessons mostly consisted of molding chakra in bizarre and useless ways, Naruto was gradually learning ways to apply his newfound skill. According to Kaida, when molded the right way chakra enables you to see further, sense the positions of imperceptible obstacles, shield yourself, and move at breakneck speeds.
The last was by far both blonds' favorite, and the pair spent many an evening racing each other, competing to see who produced the most intense yellow flash.
Two weeks passed in a blur, and soon it was time for Naruto to experience yet another eccentric Akatsuki tradition: extremely lengthy and extravagant vacations.
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Man it took me forever to get this chapter up! I feel really bad about it, too. Laziness if fine, but this was procrastination and I can't stand being a procrastinator! Maybe I really was Shikamaru in a past life...
Once again, I'm really sorry about the lateness of this chapter. Thank you Othello101 and PirateCaptainBo for reviewing! It was greatly appreciated. And if anyone's wondering, a new chapter will be up on Friday. I'm starting typing it as soon as this chapter's posted.
Bayartai!
--- Evil Clone Number 7
ps: And that was Mongolian. We're studying Genghis Khan in World History right now.