Early the next morning, Maia hurriedly rushed out of the hideout with Kabuto before Kakashi could come looking for her.
"I'll come back to visit soon! I promise." She hugged him tightly. He seemed to still be slightly uncomfortable with embraces, but his guard was quickly falling.
"I hope you do. By the way, we're changing hideouts within the month. More and more people have been trying to find us, so several new ones are being built to keep us hidden. I'll give you our location when we leave." She nodded and summoned her white dove.
"I'll miss you!" She waved as the bird took off. He waved back, shielding his eyes from the morning light.
It was eight in the morning when she arrived back. Kakashi would have certainly gone to be memorial stone by now and had time to look for her afterwards. She wanted to lie and tell him she had been on a short mission, but hadn't gotten her fake excuse from the elders. She would have to think of something else. She landed near Kakashi's housing complex and ran to his door. Luckily, he answered.
"Mai! Where in the world have you been? I looked everywhere for you." He hugged her.
"I'm so sorry! I was training all day and I- I guess I just wore myself out. I fell asleep in the grass and woke up just a bit ago. I'm still exhausted!" He looked at her dress. It had several dirt marks on it.
"Well it certainly looks like you've been training hard." Maia silently thanked her previous self for using the head hunter jutsu on Sasuke. She explained how she was off to her house to take a shower and might be free later in the day. "I hope you will be. I've missed you." He kissed her good morning and they said their farewells.
'Whew.. that was a close one...' Maia thought. 'I can't believe how many lies I have to tell in order to find the truth. It's just my luck that my only family member is the right hand man of the sennin who tried to destroy the village.'
Kakashi POV: How could I have missed her? I searched every training field in the village. I suppose she could have gone off on her own into the woods. But still… training to the point of exhaustion and falling asleep outside is more like Naruto, not Maia. Is she really training that hard?
The woman finally arrived home, and as expected, a letter in parchment was waiting for her on her bed.
Meet me in Tanzaku Town at Three O'clock. Don't be late.
–Itachi U.
Tanzaku town. That was a fair ways into the leaf village, in a populated area. Before, they had met in highly secluded areas to avoid any risks. Had he gone crazy? She gathered her things and ate a hurried meal before heading out.
At the Elder's quarters
"Itachi scheduled a meeting with me. Do I have permission to leave in secret?"
"Of course. Did he give you any indication of what message he wanted to send you?" She shook her head no. "Well in that case, we'll have you marked off as on a mission. If that's all you needed, then you may go." Maia turned to leave. In the hallway, she came face to face with someone she did not expect.
Danzo. She attempted to walk past him with a quick apology, but she didn't get off that easy.
"Wait just a minute. I would like a word with you." She grimaced to herself, and then turned to him with a guarded expression. He walked towards her. Maia felt her gut glench. For some reason she couldn't stand the energy of the white robed man. It disgusted her.
"There's a certain quality in you that I like." Maia tensed immediately. What in the world was he getting at? "You keep secrets hidden well, girl. Outside in the world, you live your life as a ninja of the leaf. But in your heart and in your mind, you have hidden truths that we here have done everything to hide. I'm sure you know of what I speak." Her eyes went to the door of the elders quarters.
"Well, judging by the way those two whisper to each other when I talk to them, it seems as if I'm not the only one keeping secrets." He chuckled.
"You have a wit about you too. I'm sure your quick thinking would also come of use." Maia was having enough of his games.
"What is it that you want?"
"I have no doubt the secret you carry must weigh you down. When one does not live in their truth, they live in a darkness. One might even say, you are living one giant secret?" His eyes bore into her hard. She tried to match his gaze, but his insight made her falter. His discerning eyes picked it up right away.
"I consider it a great privilege to carry his secret with me. And I do it for the safety of the village I call my home."
"The secrets you keep, the darkness in your heart and in your mind, you would make a wonderful addition to Root. I would pay you handsomely if you were to work directly under my contro-"
"I'm not interested." Maia's eyes were stern again. There was no way she would tie herself up in any more people's schemes, and especially not with this man. She whispered to ensure no one would hear a word. "You were the one who gave the orders to exterminate an entire clan. You are the reason Itachi spends his life in agony. You might have done it for the Leaf but I will never trust you. Good day." With that, Maia quickly walked off, headed to Tanzaku town. He watched her as she left.
'I was correct.' He thought. 'There are more secrets she is hiding. I mustn't let her off of my radar.'
This time of year, the town was quiet and relatively peaceful. Maia arrived outside of the entrance right on time. As she landed, a crow dropped a second scroll in her hand.
One kilometer down the road. I'm waiting. -IU
Maia hurried down the road to find him. There he was, standing in plain sight wearing full Akatsuki attire. She walked over to him and noticed the only thing he removed was his headband.
"Itachi, why on Earth did we meet here? You already appeared in Konoha. This is a main road and your cloak will-"
"I thought we could have tea." The woman inwardly facepalmed. How could he possibly be so careless? "Let's take a walk."
They walked down the road she came down in silence for a moment, but Itachi had pressing things to say.
"I saw you fought with Sasuke."
"I did. He's gotten quite good in a short amount of time." Maia tried to be encouraging. "We seem to grow at the same rate."
"You were too risky." She immediately knew what he was referring to. She had guessed right. Her hinting to Sasuke before their fight about going against the sharingan had probably given him half a heart attack." Her head sank, ashamed.
"I'm sorry if I worried you. I covered it up easily though." He gave a small nod. They walked in silence for another moment. He was the kind of person who preferred it that way. He seemed to be thinking about something in particular.
"You buried him in the ground." Maia had no idea what to say to the seemingly casual observation. Indeed she had buried him in the ground. She had drugged her mentor's brother, buried him in the ground so only his head was free, laughed, and called him the name of a vegetable all in the span of a minute. And his elder brother had watched it all.
'Itachi must think I'm out of my mind!' Would interacting with the eldest Uchiha never cease to make her feel so truly inadequate? Luckily, his expression was unchanged. In fact, he seemed to be noticeably more at ease.
"You did a good job. I was able to see how he's progressed and then to plan ahead. You were very clever as well. I had never thought of that method to defeat someone with sharingan." She shrugged. He might have lost the fight, but it would have been much closer if she hadn't picked such a cowardly technique.
"I resorted to trickery. It would never have ended the fight unless I hadn't used words also."
"You were wise and that taught him a lesson. Words can shape a battle, and be the ultimate deciding factor." She gave him a small smile.
"I suppose so." He continued to walk in silence and in thought.
"Still, I shouldn't have to warn you that even so much as hinting at our contact is forbidden if you want me to continue to mentor you. Carelessness has a high cost." Her eyebrows furrowed.
"Says you, who is marching into a leaf village city undisguised and in the light of day." He knew her tone wasn't attacking, and her comments had no effect on his behavior.
They had almost approached the city entrance. Finally, he decided to clarify a small aspect of yesterday's fight that had caught his interest.
"The cover you used after mentioning your experience fighting with the sharingan… had that also been a lie?" She was lost for a moment.
"Hm?"
"You are in a relationship with Kakashi Hatake?" Maia was taken aback. The notion that Itachi had even taken any notice of that cover was a surprise. She had always seen him as almost above the idea of relationships itself. As if he had transcended them. Of course there was a large chance he had no personal interest in her love life, but the fact that he even cared enough to mention it somehow made him seem more human.
"Oh… yes I told the truth." She wanted to shrink. He contemplated her answer.
"He's quite a few years older, isn't he?" She gave him a strange look. His eyes had the littlest glimmer in them. Was he…. Amused?
"Of all people to imply that age has to correspond to maturity it had to be you!" He allowed himself a small smirk. That was the first time in many years that anyone had won against him in an argument.
They approached the city entrance. Maia scrutinized the raven haired Akatsuki ninja for any signs of satisfaction or disappointment in her relationship but none arose, even in his energy field. He truly was above it, or at the very least not interested, she concluded, and everything was normal.
'The speed at which she was able to come up with a lie to tell Sasuke and a strategy to win against his sharingan was impressive. The woman has a quick wit, both in battle and with me."
Itachi and Maia sat down at a little tea shop similarly designed to Ichiraku. It was located just off the main road. Maia looked down the road to her left, and to the right over his shoulder. People were walking up and down the road going about their day. And the two ninja were completely exposed.
"I can't believe this. How can you be here?" she whispered to him. The man who ran the tea shop came through the kitchen door.
"Hello, and what can I get you?" Itachi answered.
"Two cups of tea please, and an order of sweet dumplings." Maia tried to hide her interest. He had a sweet tooth? He was becoming more human by the minute now. While they waited, he stretched out for a moment. "I have a document for you to deliver to the elders, but in the main time, I wanted to give you some genjutsu practice." Maia nodded, gladly.
"I'm sure you've learned the basics, but I would like to review them with you." Itachi explained how an important way to realize if you have been put under a genjutsu is to identify if anything in ones surroundings is abnormal. "I want you to put your head in your hands as if you are tired. This will prevent those walking past us from becoming suspicious. Meanwhile, I will put you and the shopkeeper into a harmless genjutsu. Alright?" Maia nodded and got into position.
He activated his sharingan but instead of feeling the foggy sensation in her brain that lower level genjutsu caused, she felt nothing. She looked up. Itachi's eyes were crimson.
"In the event you are put into a genjutsu, one common way to detect it is to be mindful of your surroundings. When a caster creates an illusion in order to trick or hurt you, most commonly they will try to keep a large majority of the layout the same and only distort a small part. However, the illusion is often imperfect. I want you to look around and detect any differences in your surroundings."
Maia looked around. She surveyed the landscape and found nothing. People still walked past and it seemed the same time of day. Then she noticed that while before there had been a particularly large tree behind the road, it had shrunk. She continued to point out the few differences she saw. Once she got started, she easily got the hang of it. After only a short while he released the genjutsu and gave a small smile.
"You're very observant. It would have taken most chuunin much longer. It's important that you continue to be that mindful while on missions. It could save your life."
She smiled back. It was nice to see him with his guard let down more than it had been in the past.
"Maybe the reason why I was able to find them so quickly was because I had been on edge with you being here in the light of day. I had been observing our surroundings from the beginning." The kitchen door opened and the owner came forth, unaware that he had probably been standing frozen just a moment ago. He handed them their order and Itachi reached into his cloak. "Wait, let me-" He gave her a warning glance, quickly putting his hand over the money pouch in her hands.
"The organization's manager of finances, Kazuku, just collected a bounty of 40,000,000 ryo, split equally. This is nothing. Let me take care of it." Maia gave him a look, but set her money pouch aside. It felt bad to have him buy tea for her, and to be drinking off of the money made from killing someone. As they sipped their tea, Maia realized that a large amount of a ninja's money was directly or indirectly made off of killing. Itachi halfheartedly ate two of the sweet dumplings. He looked over at her and offered the stick up to her.
"Have you ever had these?" Maia shook her head.
"Anko Mitarashi and I go out for dumplings all the time, but oddly enough I haven't."
"Here, try it." Maia eyed one, but the thought that they were eating from the money of a people hunter still sickened her.
"It's okay, I'm not that hungry." He took the stick away and placed the remaining one on the plate. He didn't want to force her to try anything she didn't want to. They sipped their tea.
"I found information on Hashirama's curse." The kunoichi's eyes went wide and she tilted herself towards him.
"What is it?" He sat hunched over with his chin resting on his clasped hands, remenicent of what Sasuke used to look like when he was deep in thought.
"I wasn't able to find much. Something that sounded like a curse was briefly mentioned in a memoir written by Lord First himself. As I assume you must have learned, Hashirama was raised in the age of warring clans. He fought against the Uchiha countless times and had more experience than anyone in fighting against the clan's leader, Uchiha Madara. As I read through the documents, Lord First recounted the years when he built the leaf village and the discoveries he made after many clans were united under one banner. Near the end of his recollections, his language grew vague. He met a woman who instructed him to keep a secret, a secret that would mean the survival of a number of people. He took interest in this secret and held the woman's wishes in high regard."
"What was the secret, Itachi?" The blonde haired kunoichi was at the edge of her seat. He shook his head..
"The secret was never explained in the memoir." Maia's heart sank. "But he did mention this. On the last pages of the document, he wrote vaguely of a bloodline where the light meets the darkness. He had explicitly expressed to those of the highest authority in the village and to their sucessors his wish to "protect a certain group where light meets dark from all who have Uchiha blood running through their veins." Maia's eyebrows furrowed.
"It didn't say anything else did it?"
"No, and it appears as if that was the last document ever written by Lord First. It was dated a week before his passing." They sat in silence, thinking everything over. This was useful information, but it was incomplete.
"It doesn't make sense… if the curse was simply his wish to protect people, then how are you not physically able to kill me?"
"Do you believe in ghosts?" Itachi gave a small crooked smile.
"Yes." She immediately responded. "But even an illogical explanation like that wasn't good enough. There was little chance that the ghost of the first Hokage was lurking around solely to protect her from Uchiha hands. She supposed to herself that this must be why they came up with the term 'curse.' It was as if one of his last wishes had lived on and taken physical form even after his death. Then she thought of how he mentioned a number of people. "Kabuto! Should I tell him?" He shook his head almost before she finished, way ahead of her thought process.
"We don't know what kind of group Hashirama was referring to. There's a chance it wasn't a family. Telling him might effect how he treats Sasuke and he might even tell Orochimaru and use the knowledge to manipulate one of us. Furthermore, there is always a chance I will need to break into their hideout if Orochimaru does attempt to steal Sasuke's body before he is strong enough to resist him. If the curse applies to Kabuto, I need him to believe he is vulnerable against me." Maia scowled. It felt wrong to side with Itachi over Kabuto and keep information from him. But all the same, keeping this secret from her brother would do more good than harm in the long run, especially while the information was incomplete. Itachi seemed to immediately guess her next thoughts. "You were thinking of telling him once you found more to the secret, weren't you?" Maia shifted her eyes away from him quickly.
"No I wasn't-" There was no use lying to him.
"Don't forget, while you are in contact with your brother out of free will, you are working for me because you have little choice. If you want me to continue being your mentor, then you must do as I say." Maia nodded.
"I won't tell anyone…" He nodded and sipped his tea while she continued to mull over the details of Hashirama's last writing. "Thank you for finding that information, Itachi-sama." He nodded again.
"I told you before, I needed to know the reason I wasn't able to kill you." She smiled weakly. The knowledge that the group she had been with had presumably been under threat of the Uchiha in the past made her feel feint. Were any of them still alive?
"You seem to like history, don't you?" He gave a half smile again.
"It's important to study the past in order to understand the present and foresee the future. I used to research the history of ninja and of the leaf village in my leisure when I was young." Maia smiled, quietly thankful that he had shared something about himself. He pointed the stick with one last dumpling towards her once more. "Try it. You'll feel better." She gave a small smile, and caved in.
He silently watched her nibble a small piece off and raise her eyebrows, turning to him. He allowed himself a small smirk.
"It's delicious! Why haven't I had this sooner?"
"Well now you know." Itachi finished the last of his tea and sighed. "You know, you did complete the exercise I gave you very well, but there was one important thing you missed… and you're still missing it." Maia finished the food and looked at him questioningly, but he simply stared at her back waiting. Had the lesson never actually ended?
"What am I missing?"
"Think back on what lesson you taught Sasuke. You led Sasuke to believe a lie by playing a part and putting on a show. You distracted him from noticing the details, which ultimately lead to your victory." Maia thought about this. What was he getting at?
She thought all the way back to the beginning of the lesson, and even further back to the minute they met up. What detail had gone unnoticed? The birds still chirped peacefully as families walked together down the road laughing happily. The sky was turning a light shade of orangey red to the west as evening came.
"Wait a minute. We couldn't have been in town longer than an hour. It can't be evening yet." His sharingan had long since been deactivated. His onyx eyes seemed to bore into her.
"Look harder. Look into the things you've taken for granted." Maia scowled again and rested her head in her hand, thinking. This lesson was more difficult than she thought. And Itachi had been so much more carefree today, it seemed odd that he was putting so much stress on her now. What was off? Why was it so hard for her to think? Her brain felt foggy. Wait a minute… her brain felt foggy?
"Don't tell me!" She grabbed her money pouch off the table and ripped it open. It was empty. This was definitely a genjutsu. That's why he had been so very quick to prevent her from opening it to pay. It was common for those little details to be off. But if genjutsu was still involved, then why were his eyes not red?
"We're not in Tanzaku Town!"
Her head was swimming. The last thing she saw was his small slanted smile, and then in an instant she was brought back to her senses.
They were sitting on a bench side by side, outside the town. The sun was high in the sky, and from what she could tell, only a minute had passed. He sat calmly next to her, but not nearly as lighthearted as he had been in the genjutsu. He still seemed so weighed down by life.
"No way… the entire thing was an illusion?" Itachi turned towards her.
"I would never be so light-hearted." She mentally took note.
"You taught me how to pick out differences while I thought I was inside the town. Was I in a genjutsu inside a genjutsu?"
"No. It was a single genjutsu. I just altered the details as we went along, including the color of my eyes. That way you would believe that one part of the meeting was within genjutsu, and one was not." Maia nodded, thoroughly impressed. It took a huge amount of skill to construct a genjutsu so complex and intricate. He was truly a master of illusion casting.
"How did I get here?"
"I cast the genjutsu as you hurried to meet me. Then I brought you here. 'Did he carry me?' She thought, but dared not ask. The fact he was so easily able to capture her in her own head and trick her made her feel inferior again. It had taken her so long to figure out his trick. She felt like an idiot. He must have been able to intuit her feelings.
"You're very bright. Not many would have been able to jump to the conclusion that the entire hour we spent together had been an illusion. They would have credited it to some other jutsu. However, your critical thinking needs improvement. That is what you must work on." Maia nodded.
"I will." Itachi pulled a scroll out of his cloak and handed it to her.
"Until now, the organization has been moving from place to place gathering members and intel. Now, we have found several locations that will be our gathering places when the sealing of tailed beasts begins. This is a complete list of the organization's members as well as several of our locations. I'm warning the elders and Danzo to not take any action until the Akatsuki's plans are set into motion. There isn't anything they could say to the Fifth Hokage that would explain the arrival of this intel, because Jirayah is the only one investigating us. The organization's leadership is secretive, so there is no way members such as myself can predict when plans will be set into motion. I only give them this information so that they can have an advantage when the time comes." Maia nodded again.
"I'll deliver it at once." Itachi thanked her.
"I have to go, but I will send for you again soon. Continue everything as you have done thus far." Then he gave her his slanted smile, for real this time. "Maybe next time, we'll go have tea without the use of genjutsu." Maia grinned, slightly surprised at the real invitation.
"I'd like that." He bid her farewell, and made a hand sign. Then he vanished.
The blonde haired kunoichi sat there, on the bench, taking in the most eventful minute long lesson of her life. The birds chirped above as the sun shined down, and she realized she had her entire evening left to be with Kakashi. But more than that, she wondered where she stood with Itachi.
It seemed clear that he wasn't just her colleague and mentor now. He had really smiled at her. And inside her mind, he had spent time with her.
Itachi was quite possibly her friend.
