Whatever It Takes

Chapter Thirty-Five

Suigetsu blinked as he was pushed onto a soft bed.

Sai then handed him a large canvas, practically shoving it into his hands. It was white. There was absolutely nothing painted on it. Although Sai had spent hours showing him several of his paintings, it had finally dwindled to nothing but scraps of art that he was still debating on. Now that there was nothing to see, and Suigetsu wanted to leave, but Sai insisted that he stay. He wanted to show him one last thing it seemed. "What is it?" Suigetsu asked, knowing that the question sounded stupid even though he knew that it was a canvas.

But it was blank.

Sai smiled, finding the confusion in Suigetsu's eyes to be endearing. "That is what you are to me right now, but I want to paint you as I get to know you" Sai softly said, "I want to paint the Suigetsu that you are within…" Sai smiled, reaching his hand to softly caress Suigetsu's jaw, and his eyes twinkled wickedly, "I want to unravel you in every way possible, Suigetsu," he looked his eyes up and down Suigetsu's body, suggesting with them what he wanted.

Suigetsu was dumbstruck, and stared at the raven haired man with slight awe. Shaking himself from the odd yet seductive hold, he shook his head and placed the canvas in the bed, "Yeah right, get a life," he scoffed, slapping Sai's hand away from his face. He then stood up and left, leaving a wide eyed Sai behind.

Sai couldn't believe it.

He had just tried to seduce Suigetsu but it seemed like the man was not falling for it. He had never had anyone- besides Sasuke- that disregarded his advances so easily. Anyone else would be tripping over themselves to be in his bed, to be under him, craving for his love. He thought he could get an easy lay, but it seemed like he was going to have to work for it.

Not that he minded. Sai loved a proper challenge.

One way or another he was going to bed Suigetsu now, and then later he is going to make Sasuke fall in love with him. He's going to marry Sasuke and make Suigetsu his lover on the side. It all worked out so perfectly. And what was life, if it was not all fun and risks. Sai was too young to be tied down to only one person. He knew what he wanted and he was going to go for it all the way-even if he lost to someone- he highly doubted that he would though.

There was Itachi who was probably going to stand in his way, but even he seemed to be very aloof and not all that charming when it came to the prince. In fact, he didn't even seem all that interested.

That was why, the next day, while Kabuto was talking to Sasuke- or reading him something- no one was sure what the man was doing- Sai decided to place in motion his plan of seduction. The problem was that Suigetsu and Sasuke were sitting next to each other, and that really left much to be desired when it came to his focus.

Who was sexier?

Who was hoter?

Who was the one that really needed more convincing to fall for him?

While he was thinking this up, Sasuke and Suigetsu stood up from the table and decided that breakfast was over for them. They needed to go talk. Sai sighed, well maybe next time, he decided. Although he failed to notice that Itachi was keeping a close eye on him.

"So, how is it going?" Sasuke asked, looking at his friend expectantly. Suigetsu pursed his lips and shook his head. Sasuke frowned at this.

"It's not the same Sasuke, besides, I think he likes you better. He'll probably just try to use me to get to you since everyone now knows that we are close friends," Suigetsu said, looking very dejected. Sasuke rolled his eyes. "He tried to be romantic an all, but it was just so fake,"

"Come on Suigetsu, I'm sure you can make Sai fall in love with you," Sasuke insisted.

"But can I make myself fall for him?" Suigetsu asked and Sasuke shook his head.

"No," Sasuke sighed, "I guess not. But, what can we do now?" Sasuke asked.

"I'm not sure Sasuke," Suigetsu sighed. Both of them looked at each other worriedly. Sasuke was about to suggest something, when both of them saw Kisame walking down the hall, and towards the kitchen. Suigetsu flinched and looked away when Kisame glanced their way. Sasuke gave him a look, making Kisame look back before him and walked into the kitchen.

Although he wondered what those two were up to now.

Meanwhile, back in the eating area, Sai was just finished eating when he was approached by Neji. "I know you are trying to pull something," the long haired brunet seethed, "I can see it in your eyes, the way you were looking at Sasuke." He spat. He didn't care that everyone else was there looking at them. But he was not about to let someone else beat him. Sasuke was his, and no one else's.

Sai chuckled. "Why Hyuuga, you seem rather green with envy- or is that your age showing?" he quirked an eyebrow at him. Neji bared his teeth and wanted to punch him, but that was when the kitchen doors opened and that was when Kisame came into the dining area.

"All right you suitors, get up and let's get you all ready to have some fun time with Sasuke" he chuckled. Today he was in charge of seeing that everyone behaved themselves around Sasuke. Tsunade was going to be there as well, of course. She was not letting Sasuke out of her sight around these men for even a second. Looking around he could see that there was already a dispute going on about who was going to win Sasuke. No wonder the young prince and Suigetsu were already running away to hide, and make this day a pain.

Looking at everyone, Kisame led them all to the living room, where today they were going to work on arts and crafts to gift Sasuke with. Kisame could already see the displeased look on Itachi's face, but he was looking forward to seeing what he was going to make for the prince. Itachi was not the only one though; Kabuto and Neji both looked perplexed at the activity. The only one that looked like they were in their element was Sai. Tsunade then walked in and looked around, immediately frowning when she didn't see Sasuke. "Kisame, where is he?" she asked, her eyes sharp.

Kisame shrugged, "I don't know,"

"Well then, don't just stand there, go look for him!" she barked. Kisame nodded his head fast and dashed off to look for Sasuke. He looked all around, starting at the boy's room, Itachi's room, all of downstairs, the servants quarters, even the gardens, and training area, but there was no sign of Sasuke. Kisame finally made it back to the living room and gave Tsunade a look that said he was still trying to look for the young prince, and walked directly to Itachi. Everyone turned their heads when Kisame whispered something low in Itachi's ear that none of them heard.

Itachi turned to Kisame and said something that no one heard, and then the man was back to working on his crafts. Kisame nodded his head rapidly and tried to run as fast as he could to leave, but he was stopped by Tsunade once he reached the door. "Can I help you with anything Tsunade?" he asked, flashing her a toothy grin.

"What did you just ask Itachi?" She harshly whispered, her eyes darting to glare at any curious gaze that was on them. She noticed a few, and grabbed Kisame's arm, pulling him just outside the door.

Now, Kisame thought about lying and saying that he asked Itachi something odd like where his tooth brush was- but let's face it. It would be that much more priceless to tell her the truth. "I asked him where Sasuke was," he whispered in a low voice, not wanting anyone else to hear.

"Why would you ask Itachi where Sasuke is?" She seethed, now looking pissed.

"Well, who else would know Sasuke better than Itachi?" Kisame rolled his eyes, and shook his head. He then turned to walk away while Tsunade was left stunned by his response.

"Wait, where did Itachi said he would be?" she asked, curiosity evident in her eyes. Kisame's own eyes filled with something mocking and she nearly scowled at him. The shark like man grinned and then responded.

"The Gazebo," he laughed and left. Tsunade blinked. There was a gazebo here?

While she wanted to follow Kisame to see if Itachi was right, she left back into the living room to keep an eye on all the men. It was starting to get boring having to keep them in line, but she was not going to relent.

When she went back inside she glared at Itachi, not sure if she was disliking him, finding him interesting, or liking him more by the minute.

Everyone else though was doing their arts in craft, but were completely distracted by how Itachi looked so out of place doing this kind of thing. Arts and craft even seemed like something normal someone like Prince Neji would do, but Itachi looked like this was way out of his league. And the thing that he was making- it was hard to even grasp how he was creating a bunch of little things.

They were not even going to ask how Itachi managed to fold the papers into different kinds of flowers.

It's such a girly thing, Sai thought to himself, But I have to admit, he makes it look gorgeous... just who is this guy…

"KEEP WORKING!" Tsunade suddenly snapped when he noticed that everyone else was staring at Itachi. Everyone flinched and went back to working. At this point they were too scared to even consider looking at Itachi again, or even glance up for that matter.

A few minutes later, Kisame came in with a reluctant Sasuke and Suigetsu.

Tsunade quickly had Sasuke sit away from everyone else. Suigetsu kept his head low, and kept himself close to Sasuke, unhappy with the fact that Kisame was there in the room. Now that Sasuke was here, she started rushing everyone to be done with their little arts and craft gifts that they had made for Sasuke.

Itachi was really starting to find the things that they were doing sort of embarrassing.

That had nothing to do with the self-satisfied look that usually took on Tsunade's face when they had to go and present things to Sasuke. Either way, Neji was always the first one to volunteer to present his gifts. Neji had gone all out in some sort of Origami figures. 'I made this for you, for good luck,' Neji said, "and to represent a sort of prosperity in whomever you choose for your union in marriage,"

Sasuke didn't even reach to get what Neji was holding out to him. "That's nice,' was all he said, and went from looking at the paper bird to Neji whom wasn't sure what to do now. So he just set the bird down in the table in front of the raven haired prince, before taking his seat.

Kabuto was up next, looking like he wanted to get this over and done with. He placed a flat piece of paper on Sasuke's lap. The raven prince frowned and reached for the drawing, looking at it with an unreadable expression on his face. Suigetsu looked surprised by the image as well. Tsunade cleared her throat, and reached for the drawing, snatching it out of Sasuke's hands.

She blushed.

Sasuke clapped his hands, "Funny," he said.

Kabuto huffed, feeling slightly mocked as he went back to his seat.

"What was that about?" Neji harshly whispered at Kabuto who just glared at him.

"None of your concern" The man hissed in return, and went back to sitting self righteously.

"Sai, your next!" Tsunade hissed, giving Itachi a look. She was saving him for lost for reasons only known to her. Sai smiled as he stood up and walked over to Sasuke. He handed him his creation of a cardboard cut out of a dragon. It wasn't so bad.

"Thanks," was all Sasuke was able to say. Although he was not sure what he was going to do with it. Sai went back to sit down.

"Itachi, your last," Tsunade ordered.

Itachi stood up, and took his folded flowers with him. He handed them to Sasuke, almost looking like a bouquet of roses. Sasuke looked them over. He didn't know what to do with these either. Itachi didn't even wait for Sasuke to say anything, he simply return to his seat.

"Alright, now that you have all given Sasuke something, maybe it's time to sit down and chat for a while," Tsunade said, "But before we get to that, I must establish the rules on what can be said or asked, or anything, knowing all of you," She sighed. Sasuke tuned her out as he noticed that there was a neatly folded piece of paper in between the twistable 'stems' of the flowers. He slowly pulled it out, and opened it.

Unfold every flower

That was all that it said. Sasuke was a bit confused as he looked up towards Itachi, but his lover was not looking at him. Sasuke placed the small note away, and turned to Suigetsu. "Can you make sure these get to my room?" he softly asked.

Suigetsu nodded his head, glad to be given something to do and leave the room. It was starting to feel claustrophobic with Kisame here. "Sure, and the rest trash?" Suigetsu asked.

Sasuke nodded. "Trash," he agreed.

Suigetsu stood up then and took the 'gifts' with him. He stopped by Sasuke's room first to leave the flowers in Sasuke's desk. Then he headed into the servants quarters. He searched for a trash bin until he found one that was overstocked. But either way, he threw everything away in there. Just as he was about to leave, he noticed that Deidara was sitting outside, muttering to himself.

"Hey Deidara, what are you doing?" Suigetsu asked. The blond man flinched.

"There…there's something Sasuke asked of me," Deidara said, "But I don't know if I should do it or not,"

"What is that?" Suigetsu asked. Deidara brought out a bottle of laxatives. "And what does he want you to do with this?" Suigetsu asked, perplexed as to what Sasuke had in mind. The blond sighed, shaking his head.

"That's just it; I'm supposed to place this in the plate of Kabuto, but…" Deidara frowned, "It's not like me to destroy a perfect dish by making someone sick with it."

"Well, you could always think of it as the perfect masterpiece in where you made someone feel fantastically sick" Suigetsu offered.

"Yeah and then there's Sasori," Deidara lowered his head. "He told me that I have to stop becoming involved with these kinds of pranks." Now Suigetsu knew why he looked so torn. Deidara would love to pull a prank, especially one that he could get away with. But Sasori was going to make him regret it. Snatching the bottle of Laxatives from Deidara, Suigetsu gave him a mischievous look.

"Don't worry about it then, I'll take care of it when the time comes," Suigetsu then waved at Deidara and ran off. The blond groaned. That was not what he had in mind, but he supposed it would work. Sighing he decided to return back to the kitchen to start getting lunch ready for tonight.

"What beautiful weather we are having," Neji was the only one talking and he was boring everyone out of their mind. Tsunade had not tried to interfere at all, seeing as she had promised them this time with Sasuke. But she could already see that they were not comfortable with her being there. Tough, they were going to have to put up with it if they wanted to date Sasuke at all. Her eyes glanced at Sasuke and then at Itachi.

While Sasuke kept sneaking glances at Itachi, it seemed like Itachi had no problem just staring at Sasuke head on. He was probably the only one looking at Sasuke. If it weren't for the fact that Sasuke seemed shy every time he looked up at noted that Itachi was still looking at him, she was sure that they were flirting in their own kind of way. She wouldn't put it past them if they were flirting.

"Not to mention that it has been sunnier than usual. It would really be a shame to waste the whole day away," Neji continued.

"This is boring," Sasuke suddenly said, getting to his feet. Tsunade shot him a glare. "I'm going to go now," he made a beeline towards the door.

Tsunade stopped him by grabbing one of his arms, "Wait a minute, you can't just decide when to go,"

"Yes I can," Sasuke hissed, pulling his arm free from her grasp. "I can do whatever I want."

"Sasuke" She said, but the raven just waved her off, and rushed out the door before she could even think about stopping him again. All he had been thinking about was what Itachi could have meant by unfolding the flowers. His own curiosity was burning him. He ran back to his room, and locked the door behind himself.

Tsunade sighed, and looked at everyone else. "You are all to stay here until lunch, and Kisame will be watching you," she sternly said, before leaving the room herself. She still was not sure what she was going to do. It didn't seem like Sasuke was interested in anyone except Itachi.

Maybe if she set up a play date with everyone and excluded Itachi it might give her a better grasp as to what Sasuke would decide. Given, Sasuke could just say that he chose Itachi from everyone here, but not enough courting had gone on for Minato to give the go ahead. The king wanted to make sure that Sasuke was absolutely sure and would have no regrets in who he chose.

Frowning a bit, she made a decision.

She would set up dates, and Minato would see Sasuke interact with the person individually. It had to be a controlled environment, even if they left Sasuke alone with a suitor. With that decision in mind, she ran to find Kushina to see what she thought of the idea.

Sasuke on the other hand had already grabbed the flowers and sat in his bed, pulling open each flower, making sure that he didn't rip it. There were eight flowers. Each flower had a number in the order he would open them. The first one opened to reveal his name and Itachi's name, drawn with a heart around them. Sasuke shook his head. Itachi could be cheesy. It was really odd in a way, especially since even though it didn't seem like much just to see that Itachi had done that, made him feel warm inside.

The next one just had one word written on it. I. Sasuke moved onto the other flower, and blushed. Love. Of course, he could see where this was going. You. Sasuke sighed. He wished he could tell Itachi that he loved him as well. He was done with playing games. He just wanted to be able to decide on his own, and he wanted his uncle to stop controlling everything. He had already waited all this time. He didn't think that he could wait anymore.

Yawning, Sasuke reached for the next flower, number five, Will. Sasuke tilted his head, and moved to open the other one. You. Six…two more to go…Anticipation laced itself in Sasuke's being and his fingers shook as he tried his best to open the next flower. Marry me?…Seven. Sasuke's breath caught, and tears started to well up in his eyes.

Why was he feeling so freaking emotional? This wasn't normal. But he couldn't stop reading the words over and over again. Will You Marry me? Itachi had asked him to marry him! He had asked him. Sasuke couldn't stop staring. His fingers traced the words as he felt his heart nearly explode out of his chest from the emotions that were welling in deep inside of him.

God, there were so many things that he kept thinking. Specially one that made him feel a bit of guilt.

The last flower, Sasuke quickly opened it. Ripping through it and not caring anymore, he needed to know what was inside. His breath caught once he saw what there was. Inside he found a Silver Chrome Style Ring. He grabbed it into his own hand, placing it on his pal.

He stared at it for the longest.

Neji sighed to himself, glancing from Sai, to Kabuto, and finally to Itachi. He could not help but feel as though none of these men were competition to him, but he was also feeling like he was not getting any younger. He needed things to start moving. And he needed to make things go in his favor. He needed to find a way to make Sasuke his. No matter what!

After all, he already had started the planning. He would win this little competition thing. After that, he and Sasuke got married, he would immediately rip his clothes off, and show him who he belonged to. Show him that there was no one other than him that would ever matter to him. He was going to have to mark himself on Sasuke to make sure that the boy understood where his place was, and then later on, he was sure that he would make Sasuke be so desperately and hopelessly in love with him. So much that all he would ever depend on is him- only his approval- and only his presence.

He was going to make sure that Sasuke never came to see his cousin Naruto, and he would also keep him away from the king. If he kept letting them come around him, they would keep curving to him and trying to do as Sasuke asked. He wouldn't let Sasuke get his way any longer. The boy needed discipline, and he was going to be the one to dispatch it.

But first, they had to get married. He was already sure that this time was his time, and he already had everything at his palace being planned. He planned for the wedding to be at his home castle, so that everyone would be in his ruling grounds. That would make it much easier to establish himself on Sasuke.

But first, above everything else- Neji's eyes glinted dangerously- He had to get rid of the competition.

Omo, sorry once again for taking so long to update again, school and internship really I had little time to even write. Not to mention that this winter has been hectic. But no worries. ^^ Next chapter should come faster.