Chapter 12
Mareo was a man in his 50s, a ninja training failure who only just about managed to run his own small shop selling whatever he happened to be able to get his hands on. He had come across many odd and interesting items throughout his years, most he sold for a decent price, some he just couldn't get rid of no matter the price. However, there were a select few that he kept himself. These were stored safely in a secret part of his house, in other words, they were shoved under a floorboard in his bedroom. One of the items he had kept was a scroll. He knew it was a ninja scroll and he knew it was important. This particular scroll he aimed to keep until he found a ninja who seemed suitable. The man had no idea what the scroll was actually for, he had, after all, been a complete failure during ninja training in every possible way, but he did know a strong ninja when he saw one.
So, while he sat there in his bedroom entirely unaware of his front door being opened and two suspicious men entering and making their way up the stairs, he chuckled to himself about the high price he had managed to extract from an unwitting customer that day. To his credit though, he did notice them when there was a soft bang in the hallway just outside his door. He stiffened in his seat as two voices came gently through the door.
"Baka, brat. You will have alerted him to our presence."
"Ahhh, what's he gunna do? He's an old man. We can take him, un."
Deidara strolled into the room, now dressed in his usual Akatsuki attire, and smirked chillingly at the man. "Hey, un. Give us the scroll and... I'll kill you."
"W-W-what? I- I don't know what you're talking about!" Mareo, recognising the blatant threat, wriggled in his chair as if he was desperate to be able to get away from the two missing-nin but hadn't realised that he would need to leave his chair to do so.
Hiruko swished his tail threateningly.
"You know exactly what scroll we mean, un. You know, pretty writing... important contents... hidden somewhere in here maybe?" The blond continued, smiling as if it were all a game.
"I'll kill him." Hiruko growled. The man's eyes widened and a small mew of fear left his throat. Deidara turned quickly to his partner.
"No! I will! But after he gives us the scroll. I promised." The bomber turned back to the man. "Being killed by me will be much nicer than by him. It'll be quick if it's me, and painful if it's him." The blond shrugged. "Either way though, you're gunna die, un. So you might as well just hand that scroll over and make our job easier, yeah?"
"Deidara..." Hiruko growled threateningly. "You're annoying me." Hiruko's tail slashed out and sliced a thin line across the man's throat, releasing ribbons of blood to snake down his neck. Mareo clutched at his throat in shock, thanking the heavens that the missing-nin hadn't cut him deeper... until the word 'poison' was mentioned.
"Woah! Was that necessary? How long until your poison takes effect? If he dies to quickly he wont tell us where it is!"
Sasori ignored the brat as Hirukos tail pulled away from the man and flipped up the floorboard closest to the bed.
"The floorboard was loose and his eyes kept flicking to it. It's in there."
Deidara walked to the floor board and peered inside, rummaging through the contents as the man watched on in horror, his vision already fading in and out because of the poison.
"Unn... danna... it's not here."
"What?" The scorpion turned his tail on the man again, knocking him onto the floor and placing the point against his throat again. "Where is it?"
"I-I sold it! To a woman in the land of snow! Please give me the antidote!"
"What woman? Did she give a name? What did she look like?"
"N...no name. She had blue hair. Long. A tattoo on her cheek...it said...it said... "
Hiruko sliced through the mans neck again, severing head from body, as Sasori held back a impatient groan.
"Hey! I said I'd kill him! Stop stealing my kills!"
"Shut up, brat."
Deidara glared with annoyance. "We didn't even get to find out enough about her. Why did you do that?"
"Lust."
"Whattt? Lust? You're horny? Now? You're such a pervert sometimes..." Deidara was baffled. Blood and pain could turn the blond on but... this wasn't exactly the kind of scene he'd imagine would work on himself, let alone the stoic red head.
"No, baka. Her tattoo says Lust. I know who she is. There's no point wasting time here, let's go"
"Shouldn't we clean up, un?"
"No. Let him rot. No one will miss him."
Deidara grinned. Sasori seemed annoyed just thinking about this odd lady. 'This should be fun!'
"Hey hey danna? Who is she? She sounds interesting!" Deidara had become very excited as he almost skipped towards the stairs.
"She's not. She's annoying. As are you, so shut up." They were descending the stairs now, heading towards the front door. Deidara continued to ask loads of questions, probably partly just because he wanted to annoy Sasori in order to make him talk more. The scorpion did his best to try to ignore the blond, sensing that something didn't feel right.
"Shut up, Deidara. Something's not right."
"What, un? You really don't like her do you?." Deidara opened the door to leave, ignoring the warning... only to come face to face with a wall of sand.
'Sand. Damn, it's that guy' Sasori growled, how could they have not sensed him? He knew something was wrong but hadn't expected this.
Deidara cursed. "Un! It's that Kazekage! I'll blow our way out!"
"No! Wait! They'll be expecting us. We don't need a fight right now, we need to escape."
"But I beat him last time! I'll just do it again!" The blond was eager for a fight.
"Silence, brat. That doesn't matter. We need to get to the land of snow. The boy means nothing right now." Sasori surveyed the floor of the house, ignoring his partner's further complaints.
"We can probably dig our way out. As long as we do it quickly they'll think we're still in here." The puppet master summoned Fukuko, his newest puppet.
"Her? Let me guess, she's a fucking drill as well as a combat puppet, mm?"
"You could say that..." Sasori smirked while inside Hiruko. Fukuko separated and 6 blades shot out from the underside of her torso. The torso then began to spin, the blades fanning out around her at first, but then moving to point down till their tips met, very much like a drill.
The bomber watched as the puppets torso began drilling, only mildly surprised that he was right. He knew he hadn't seen everything to Fukuko when she had been "tested" against him.
"How far are you going to dig, un? Wont it collapse if we go too far?" The blond sat down cross legged on the floor, creating some clay bomb just in case.
"Mm, it's a possibility. I'll prop the tunnel up with limbs if I need to. We wont be going far anyway. The tunnel will end a few streets over, just enough for us to climb out and walk a distance unnoticed until we can fly away."
"Ah. That's a good idea, un." Deidara mused over how useful the master and his puppets could be.
A few minutes later the tunnel was ready.
The elder of the two Akatsuki members went first, crawling through the small tunnel with ease. The blond followed shortly after, pleased that so far no one had noticed their suspicious silence. 'I guess they just assume we haven't noticed yet, un. Fools'
Deidara breathed in the fresh air as they successfully made their escape, flying swiftly away over the outskirts of Sunagakure. The sand nin had noticed their flight but it was far too late for them to do anything. Who knew it would be so easy?
"Danna, where are we going now, mm?"
"She lives in the land of snow. It will be easy to find her."
"Why?"
"Is her tattoo not enough of a hint? She's not exactly the inconspicuous type"
"mmm"
Deidara settled down on the clay bird, already beginning to daydream about being stuck in the cold land of snow with his danna... 'Danna might not get cold but I do. I wonder if he'd let me...' The blond grinned to himself while the puppet master remained oblivious and started clearing sand out of Hiruko.
