"Even though at night I still cry,

Even though it's been so long I,

I in an instant would give up the life I have for you,

So stay by my side from now until the end,

Although I know that there's really nothing left,"

-Deep Coma, Aruvn

I bit off the leg of a fried lizard on a stick, looking up at the tarp hanging over us. Someone had cut a circle through the middle to let steam out, but it wasn't drawn on like some of the others.

The stick went up through its body and came out where the head should've been.

A wood pole wedged in the sand helped to keep the tarp up and Yahiko leaned against it, holding a bowl close to his face. He shoveled spinach, garlic, beef, and pieces of shrimp into his mouth with a spoon.

The lizard was too salty, but it wasn't bad.

"What's that taste like?" I asked him.

"Couldn't tell you," he said, eating another spoonful before he swallowed the last one. "I don't taste it at all."

I bit off the other leg. "You'll choke."

"Then I die with a full stomach," he managed.

"You two aren't from around here, are you?" a balding man behind a big pot half-filled with spinach stew asked, raising his voice to be heard over the small crowd holding sticks with fried iguana's or wrapped bread patties.

Yahiko swallowed with effort. "Nope! We came down from Stone. Uncle sent us to find a book on herbal medicine in Sunagakure," he said. "We already checked the bookstore, but it's got nothing of interest. You wouldn't happen to know where we could find one, would you?"

Under a tarp across the road from us, a woman with bronze skin tended to a grill.

"I see," the man said, slowly stirring the stew. "I'm afraid I don't, but I'll ask around. Doesn't seem like he prepared you very well though."

"Well," Yahiko drawled. "He said we'd be fine if we used our chakra. I shouldn't have listened, because he doesn't know anything about it, but I did, and that's on me."

The man laughed at that, and I couldn't tell if it was real or not. "Why's this uncle need medical knowledge all the way from Sunagakure, anyway? Don't they have bookstores in Rock Country?"

"Civilian-run, yeah. He was hoping that since I had ninja training, I could buy one that'd help him more than the books back home," Yahiko said, rubbing the back of his head. "He wouldn't normally, but it's supposed to be safer since the war is over."

I ate the rest of the lizard. "I don't think uncle would like it if he knew you were telling people we don't know all about him."

Yahiko paused and tilted his head at me, lowering the bowl slightly.

"I'm just trying to be friendly," the man said mildly, eyes on the stew. "It's not every day that we have tourists who spook horses and treat windows like their personal play-things. Some might think it odd, or rude."

"She's usually ruder," Yahiko told him, then lifted the bowl to his mouth and drank the broth at the bottom.

He didn't respond, and only took the bowl back when Yahiko handed it over. He left the pot to put it in a bag behind him filled with dirty dishes. "Good luck finding what you're looking for," he said, dismissing us.

"Ah, thanks. And thanks for the meal," Yahiko said, lifting his hand in a wave as he turned away.

I twirled my stick between my fingers as I caught up to him.

"Who knew my little sister had a subtle mode?" he asked, quiet enough that I strained to hear him over sounds of orders being placed, laughter, and the other conversations around us. "You learn something new every day."

"If it wasn't for me, we would've been caught at the palace," I pointed out, equally quiet.

He made a noise that disagreed. "I think it was more the threat of Hidan being sick. It would scare me into letting you go."

I made the same sound back at him, and he smiled.

"Why did you tell him so much?"

He shrugged. "Mostly so we have an excuse. I don't happen to think we're suddenly going to follow all social rules perfectly from now on, or that we won't meet another animal that you won't try to touch."

"What made him believe you?" I asked, absently sucking juices off the stick.

He laced his hands behind his head. "Can't be sure he did, but I will say that I still look the same as I did when I was sixteen, and you should know all about how easy it is to manipulate someone if they see you as a kid."

I only hummed. "And if we wore our cloaks?"

"I would've come up with something different," he answered, even quieter. "Something closer to the truth, but just off enough not to be traced back to the village."

鏡

Yahiko stopped and shaded his eyes as he squinted up at the sun.

"How long do you think we've been walking?" he asked.

Sana had loaned him and me insulated wrapping and leather canteens before we left. Mine was tied opposite of my weapons pouch, and his was knotted through a loop in his belt at his front.

She'd 'loaned' them because it meant we had to live to give them back.

The wrappings around my feet saved me from having to use as much chakra as a barrier. The inner parts of them were covered in interlocking rhombus-shaped seals that absorbed heat.

I watched the air curl and shimmer around us and wished suddenly that it would rain. And then I smiled ironically at myself.

"Three hours, you think? Four?" he asked. "The sun looks lower, but I haven't checked since Hyozan."

"Three and a half or so," I answered, but that he'd stopped at all told me how he felt, despite everything but his face being covered, because we could walk and talk.

"You didn't look," he said, glancing down.

"If you didn't check where the sun was after we left, looking now won't tell us how much it moved," I said back. I knelt and shoved a cloth-covered hand down into the sand, wedging my arm in as far as I could.

Yahiko paused. "I'm not sure I want to know what you're doing."

"You won't say you need a break, so I'm making you take one," I said, and made half-signs with my other hand. Tiger. Hare. Boar. Ram. Dog. Ox. Snake.

Yahiko let out a startled laugh as I poured chakra into the sand, down and down until it eventually reached dry, hard-packed earth and soaked into it.

"And here I thought I was doing a pretty good job hiding it," he said.

I focused on the sand, feeling it lift around my hand and slide away as I burned chakra, forcing enough earth up to rumble into a wall. It curved over me, wide enough to block the sun, and hit the sand next to Yahiko.

"Mildly impressive," he said, rubbing his chin as he looked at it. "But how would it force me to take a break?"

I pulled my arm out of the sand. The feeling of too-hot skin lingered, but it wasn't unbearable. "It took a lot of chakra," I told him, sitting back. "Too much, for most people."

He blinked once. "Why do I feel like I'm being guilted into taking a break?"

"Is it working?"

Yahiko sighed loudly but ducked under and sat heavily against the wall opposite of me. I pretended not to notice a flash of a grimace.

"We could've stopped before," I told him.

He tilted his head back. "Could've," he agreed. "But I thought if I did, I wouldn't be able to stand again. Still do. I was hoping to find our missing missing-nin first, and then I could make a nice puddle and lay in it until it dried up."

"What'll you do if he's not friendly?" I asked.

"What'll I do?" he asked back, cracking his eyes open. "You casually used enough chakra to put most people out of commission and you're worried about me?"

"It was only around half," I told him, and he shook with laughter.

"Of course," he said, grinning. "But, actually, if this goes how I want it to, the way I am now won't really matter. I still have something I want to test out, after all."

I looked out at the desert. "Would you tell me what it is, if I asked?"

"I'm not sure how it'll happen, but when it does, you'll have to trust me," he said in answer.

"If we find him."

His grin widened. "Oh, we have to find him. I ragged on Nagato for coming back empty-handed way too much to let him turn that around on me."

I hummed, watching distant hills of sand waver and shift in the heat. "What do you think he's like?"

"If he's anything like I heard Hidan was, I'll be lucky if he lets me talk at all," he answered, lacing his hands behind his head. "But what I mostly hope is that he doesn't know as many curse words."

I smiled, but it didn't last.

I pulled my legs up and leaned my chin on my knees. "Do you know any stories, Yahiko?"

He was silent. He didn't tease me for missing Naga or deflect because he didn't know the same ones. "I only know one," he said after a few seconds. "It's a long one about a sly fox, a timid slug, a paper angel, and a scary wolf—"

I smiled again.

"—and how, in another life, they conquered the world together. Still want to hear it?"

I crawled over to him and sat against the wall beside him. "Tell me."

画像

"It'll be dark soon," I said, looking at the sky.

I couldn't help but notice how much more of it I could see without trees or bits of old skyscrapers in the way. The sky was orange in the distance, but still bright blue above me.

If the desert had one thing over Fire or Rain, it was this.

Yahiko ruffled my hair and I instinctively ducked away from him. He didn't even look down.

"Since the main road runs northeast and we shouldn't run into anyone, I might actually be able to sleep out here without waking up every other minute," he said, pretending not to hear my hiss.

I only hissed at him because of how bad he felt, and he knew it.

"I didn't think the sand would get cooler, but we might not even need an earth wall," he continued, trying not to smile.

I absently smoothed down wild strands. "I'll leave you in the sun next time," I decided.

He slowly shook his head. "So mean, little sister—" he stopped, and then I saw them too.

Tracks like something had dragged through the sand ahead of us.

Yahiko's eyes widened, and then he grinned.

.

.

.

I tilted my head at the hunched shape ahead of us, stiff-looking, wearing something that looked more like a big coat than a cloak. It dragged sand behind him.

He didn't lift his feet as he moved and I looked at the dark spikes of hair sticking up around his head.

Yahiko stopped mid-range from Sasori and I remembered that the bingo book said it was better to die than to be captured by him.

Maybe I should've felt cautious about that, should've felt something about him being the same rank that Minato used to be, but I didn't.

When was the last time I felt afraid? Shido Valley?

"A friend told me you're Sasori of the Red Sand," Yahiko happily called out to him.

The shape paused. I watched him turn slightly to stare back at us.

Maybe because I didn't care about his rank, or how scared Sana's clients were of him.

"You have a lot of nerve following me," Sasori said, his voice just as slow and dragging. Killing Intent rolled off him like a low wave, splashing up against my ankles and surrounding me.

I didn't move, but it didn't feel like he was really trying either.

Yahiko shook his head. "I'm not someone overconfident enough to think they can take you in a fight, and I didn't come here to try. My friend also told me that if I wanted you to do a job, I should use your real name."

Sasori stared at him in disbelief, and I thought that maybe, maybe I wasn't scared because being S-ranked meant less since Hidan told me he'd been B-rank before he went back to Yugakure.

If I saw an updated bingo book, he'd probably be S there, too. How else would they label him after what he'd done?

"If you knew anything about anything, you'd know that you don't come to me with vague, audacious offers like I'm someone you picked out of the first page of a bingo book," Sasori said, irritated. "You're wasting my time."

"Ah, you're right. I don't know how hiring missing-nin works. The name's Yahiko, by the way. But back home they call me the Taiyokage of Amegakure," he said, lacing his hands behind his head. "My offer is that, if you agree to become a shinobi of Amegakure, I'll give you a place to stay free of hunter-nin, and a village that won't care about your entry in any bingo book—"

"You must take me for a fool," Sasori cut him off. Sand sprayed around him as a metal tail shot out of the back of his coat.

I raised my right hand, but Yahiko shook his head at me.

I paused, and thought of what he'd told me before.

He didn't move as the kunai-shaped point hit his shoulder (he only turned a little, enough that it missed his chest). He didn't feel any better than he did earlier, I knew, but he hadn't even tried to avoid it.

He grunted, sliding as he was pushed back, but his feet didn't leave the ground.

I dropped my hand, looking at Sasori, and saw that his eyes were slightly wider.

Is this what you wanted, Yahiko?

Yahiko held the tail from piercing him deeper with shaking hands, smearing blood on the edges, but he kept his gaze on Sasori. "What I do know," he continued. "Is that being a missing-nin means having no allies and no home. Other countries see you as nothing more than a mercenary they'd never acknowledge for doing all their dirty work."

He smiled a little at himself, "Having a home might not be that important, but I know I could never abandon mine, no matter how hard I tried."

Sasori retracted his tail and Yahiko stumbled forward, catching his breath. Sasori seemed to wait for something, but Yahiko stayed on his feet, glancing at his bloodied hands.

"How... are you still standing?" Sasori finally asked.

Yahiko only laughed, full of pain. "I meant what I said before. Most Kage I know don't go down easy."

Sasori watched him for a little longer. "You should be dead," he said.

Yahiko pulled a roll of bandages out of his pouch and started wrapping his fingers. "Agree to come to Amegakure, and I'll tell you everything you want to know about how and why."

Sasori stared at him as if looking at him for the first time. "You're not Hanzo the Salamander, and no one with self-respect would call him a Kage."

I sat, crossed my legs, and watched them.

"I couldn't be Hanzo. He's too busy being dead," Yahiko said lightly, using his teeth to rip the wrap as he moved onto his other hand. "And as for your second point, I happen to know an entire village that would disagree with you."

Sasori didn't respond. It made me wonder if he heard the rumors about us, too.

"If I thought everyone would take that news well, I wouldn't be here," Yahiko told him. "All I've ever wanted is to protect my home, and I can't. Not with the number of ninja the war left us with. That's why recruiting just anyone isn't enough, and this friend told me that if missing-nin recognize your disguise, they don't come near you."

"Yet here you are, with the nerve to think I care about the state-of-affairs in Amegakure," Sasori retorted. "Why should I waste my time going all the way there when I can just make you talk here and now?"

I hummed at that. "Make him?" I repeated, musing. "You can try."

His eyes flicked to me. "Can you back up that confidence in battle?" he asked, and I felt his Killing Intent like a pair of hands around my throat.

It reminded me a little of Amegakure.

It was the hazy memory of a salamander swallowing Konoha-nin whole, screaming and screaming but unable to move. It was the way Hanzo looked at me the first time we met, when I stepped in front of my brother, like I was a stain on his shirt.

I saw an afterimage of a tail wrapping around my throat and lifting me, kicking, yelling, off my feet, and squeezing until I couldn't breathe, but I didn't move.

It made me wonder why he thought an Ame-nin would be affected by a little Killing Intent.

I ducked my head, and then I laughed at him.

Sasori's eyes went wider.

"Ignore her," Yahiko said, but he didn't seem very affected either. "To answer your question, you could do that. But if you did, let's say, capture me and torture me until I told you everything, I still wouldn't be able to give you samples of what makes me immune, because it doesn't come from me. Walking away from this with information you can't recreate sounds like a much bigger waste of time to me, but what do I know?"

Sasori eyed me again, but I only smiled.

Yahiko shrugged. "I'd be dead or worse, but you'd still be a missing-nin," he said, shaking his head mock helplessly. "It must be a real pain to work on puppets when you have to move them all the time if someone even thinks near where you're hiding them."

Sasori's gaze flicked to him. "You're a fool."

Yahiko laughed, then lifted his hand in a wave as he turned around. "When you come to Amegakure, ask for Yahiko of the Akatsuki. We're a little cautious about foreigners right now, so don't take it personally if you're not treated well."

I stood and waved too. "See you later, Sasori."

He watched us walk away.

.

.

.

"He might've come if you kept talking," I pointed out later, after sundown.

Yahiko had his eyes closed as he walked. "Yeah, but I'm going to pass out soon, and it'd be way less convincing if I let him see that."

I looked at him for a long second, but he didn't lose his grin. "You knew he'd interrupt you?"

"Ehh. Kind of. I knew it'd happen, eventually, but I thought he'd use a puppet first before he tried to poison me—" he dropped to his knees, arms suddenly limp as he tipped forward and hit the sand.

I turned back, but he wouldn't have looked so happy if he were about to die.

"And I thought when he did, he'd use a poisoned kunai, or shuriken," he managed, forcing his arms to work and push at the sand until he flopped on his back.

I bent down next to him, and it was only up close that I saw how swollen his veins looked. Purple lines crept up his neck and across his cheek, tinting the skin around it a lighter purple.

"Emon's poison?" I asked.

His eyes were half open. "If I knew his poison was this potent or it would be stopped before it spread—" he tried to gesture at his chest and gave up halfway. "—I would've moved the barrier around my lungs instead of released it."

"And if Emon couldn't make an antidote to his poison?" I asked.

He raised a shaking hand and flicked my knee. "Summons that naturally make poison and have been for longer than you or I have been alive, against one made by people? I thought I had pretty good odds," he said, his smile faint.

"Next time I do something reckless, you can't say anything," I told him.

"I wanted to avoid a lecture," he murmured, eyes closing even as his smile widened. "Joji-sensei's the best, but he's intense. All the time. Doesn't know how to turn it off."

I watched his fingers twitch and thought to mention that I'd never heard him call Joji-sensei the best, but his words were starting to slur, so I didn't.

"I wanted to stitch my shoulder before I passed out, but I don't think I..." he trailed off, quiet for a few seconds before he forced his eyes open to look at me. "I don't care if it scars, Oka."

I looked at his shoulder, but the blood there didn't look fresh. "You should've told me it hadn't closed before."

"It did, but then I fell," he said, and gave me a weak grin. "You've watched Nagato do it at least a dozen times, right? Worse that'll happen is you get a little poisoned, and you're already immune."

I didn't think that meant anything, though I also didn't think he left me with a choice.

I hummed noncommittally, looking at his weapons pouch, because he carried wire and I didn't. "Will you wake up before sunrise?"

He didn't answer, and I realized he'd fallen asleep with his eyes open.

I looked at him for another second, then I pushed his eyes closed and unhooked his pouch.

.

.

.

Sasori guided Hiruko forward, seeing an almost endless stretch of sand through the eyes of his puppet, but his thoughts were on the Ame-nin that interrupted him.

He couldn't stop thinking about the girl that laughed off his Killing Intent like it was the funniest joke she'd ever heard; she couldn't be older than thirteen or fourteen.

When was the last time someone had laughed at him? He was well acquainted with dawning horror, or the smugness of those who bought his services or thought he could be bought from killing them, but her response?

When was the last time someone had made him feel something that wasn't a brief flash of contempt or dislike? But he didn't have to like his clients to get a job done, so it never lasted.

Surprise was an emotion for children who didn't know better, or ninja who cared about comrades or friends or even themselves.

And yet he still felt it, still let it pull his mind back to the fool that grinned at him, and the girl who sat right in front of him.

Twice they'd surprised him, had managed to make him feel something for more than a few seconds, and it made another emotion crop up that he thought he'd discarded.

Curiosity.

Not the kind that followed inspiration, but a curiosity to find the truth in what the grinning fool told him, and to know what had changed so drastically about Amegakure.

He knew the temperament of Ame-nin, had seen up close how they fought like wounded animals (tired but wild and desperate to live), had tried so many times to recreate the looks they gave him when they came at him until he'd finally given up.

Never had they laughed at him like a Kiri-nin.

Sasori stopped Hiruko, so lost in thought that he hadn't noticed the distant walls of Sunagakure until he was closer than he'd like to be.

It was almost sunrise.

A/N: 鏡 - Mirror, 画像 - Image

Yahiko ate Ndole, specifically.