AN: More Cold Style! Fun for the whole family (sarcastic). Anyway, thanks for more reviews! -dances- Those love suggestions are really good! Now I need to think up solutions for the ones without (ponders). Now for review questions: Sasuke's vengeance quest is probably over, at least placed on hold, I'm not sure whether I'll delve into it (actually...I might. Itachi's background stuff to be looked into. Note that Itachi plays a way bigger role in this that Sasuke, mainly because he's the boss, even though Sasuke's the object of many females' desires), but it's along the lines of Sasuke being convinced by a MASS of people to give Itachi a chance. Of course, we all know that it's HIGHLY unlikely that you'll give up a quest for vengeance so easily, considering that it's your entire clan that is being avenged, parents especially. So the reason I have for that is, it's taking too long for Sasuke to become stronger, and he is growing weary. With that in mind, and the pressure around him to get him to stop, plus Itachi going clean, he's halting his quest. There we go, an undeveloped reason. And that Sasori...how can someone so cute (awwwww...-pats his head-) be so evil? (was reading Naruto manga) Alright, no more rant.
Chapter 4: Rivalry of All Types
"Absolutely not." Gaara answered Sakura immediately. Sakura looked crestfallen.
"You didn't even give it a moment's thought!"
"Definitely not. There's no way you will convince me to do otherwise. This love you have for Sasuke is merely superficial."
"Gaara! Please! Asking you means I'm very desperate!"
"Then do what every other desperate person does: write me a letter. Whether I read it or not depends on my mood. Now if you don't mind, I have gar - I mean, I have work to go through." Gaara ended and disappeared into a cloud of sand, floating back into his room. Sakura stood there, dumbfounded. He rejected her plea for help. Sakura wouldn't have asked him unless she knew that he was good, and from what she read, he really was. She was going to get Gaara's help, whether he liked it or not. She was that desperate.
---
The smell of coffee was tempting Ino. Whoever had that cup was going to die. Or she could just go make herself one. She decided it was too much effort to go kill that person, and so she decided it was better to just go make one.
"Hey, Gaara, I'm going to the kitchen want anything, like coffee, tea, biscuits?" Ino asked. Then she noticed that Gaara was too entranced reading something on his computer screen to here her, not to mention, he was sipping what smelt to be really strong coffee from a Starbucks cup. The idea of Gaara actually walking into Starbucks and purchasing something was very surprising. Ino realised the origin of the aroma. Gaara's cup. But something was not right. She snatched it out his hand and sniffed it.
"This aroma is really overpowering!" she cried. Gaara smirked.
"Have a sip. I don't have any contagious diseases." he offered. Ino, afraid of what he might do if she refused (he had that devious look on his face, he might kill her) so she took a sip. And spat it out, scouring her tongue with her fingers.
"What the hell was that! It was so bloody strong! And I don't taste any sugar!"
"Precisely. You know what they say about coffee keeping you awake, well, I've drank it everyday now for most of my life...it doesn't work, so I ditched the sugar, bought the stronger stuff, still doesn't work. Moral of that story, coffee doesn't keep you awake. But it's a habit now, so I drink too much of it. Now will you allow me to return to my work?" Gaara explained. Ino returned Gaara his cup then backed away very slowly, before turning and walking briskly away from the strange youth. She never realised how much he spoke. It was a lot. Gaara turned back to the computer screen, and was about to start typing, when he felt the presence of a hated enemy. Gaara would have Sabakukyu-ed this person had he brought his gourd.
Now don't you wish you had your gourd...? Shukaku cackled smugly.
Shut up. I'll handle this myself, without any gourd.
"Deidara. What do you want?" Gaara spun his swivel chair around to face Deidara, who was about to smack a manila folder filled with design templates on Gaara's head. Deidara grinned sheepishly.
"Hey, got a few templates I want you to look at, and then once you choose some, we can make some designs for you to choose from, yeah." Deidara explained, nodding at the same time, his fair hair bouncing up and down. Gaara frowned.
"And to do that, you must attack my head?"
"Not really, but I thought it would be an ice-breaker. Wrong I was, though, yeah." Deidara pulled over Ino's swivel chair and sat down, then commenced opening his manila folder. He took out the sheets and handed them over to Gaara. "These are the basic templates for our magazine, we can't stray from these settings, else the whole magazine will be inconsistent and look messy, yeah. The ones I brought are the ones I thought would be easy for you letter and reply format. Also..." Deidara took out another sheet. It was a colour table. "These are the set colour schemes that the magazine uses. As I said before, we can only make minor teaks to the scheme, or it'll look out of place, yeah." Gaara looked at the templates and the colour chart. Nothing caught his eye. No wonder he never studied art or design. It was completely out of his league. Much as he hated to, he must ask Deidara for suggestions.
"Well, which would you think would look best?" Gaara asked coldly. Deidara grinned. The mouth on the palm his hand snickered and then resumed looking weird.
"Well, we would have to take into consideration your image and personality, as well as what appeals to the readers." Deidara looked through his templates "I would think that you would like a more simple design, less cluttering, decent number of images, yeah. I would go for template number 35. It's a minimalist design, see how the border consists only of a bold line, and a thin one, there's lots of space within columns, as well between images and text. Maximum of two images per page, and they're only medium in size. The header is of a decent size, the letters are simple, they're not bold, no underlining, no italics, the pen thickness is thin, and if you feel like it, there's also enough room for a subheading, yeah. How do you feel about this one? It's all up to you."
"Let's go with 35 then. I have no clue over anything related to design." Gaara answered. Deidara shrugged.
"Well, if you have any disagreements, say so, yeah. Now onto the colour scheme." Deidara took the colour chart. "While you seem to be a red and black type person, I don't think that a love advice page should be heavily covered in black. Black text for the bulk, white background for the entire page, with only special queries and replies in a borderless box with a red background. Bold border is red, thin will be black. "Love" will be red, "Style" will be grey. Your name will be black. Headings for each letter will be red, names in grey. How goes that, yeah?"
"As long as there's no pink, I'm happy." Gaara shuddered at the thought of pink. And what happened to pop into view at that very moment. A young female with pink hair, walk straight towards him, next to Ino. "Hell no." Deidara looked over to what Gaara was looking at.
"So which are you checking out, Sakura or Ino?" Deidara questioned mischievously.
"Heck, I work next to Ino, I'm already bored of her, I've only worked for two hours already." Two more till lunch break. Good. "Anyway, as if I'll check any of those two out when you can get hotter females at a random nightclub." Deidara shrugged.
"Whatever you say. Of course, I know that those two haven't dropped Sasuke from their hearts yet. Sakura makes heaps of trips here to visit us during her off hours. She knows everyone, so we know her life too, yeah. I think Jiraiya was thinking of writing a Mills and Boon based on her."
"That pervert." Gaara remarked. Deidara laughed.
"Damn straight." He turned to Ino and Sakura, who just reached them. Ino looked angry. Deidara put on his charming-angel expression. "Hark! I can see again, yeah! Ino-chan! Sakura-chan! Such beauty!" Gaara wanted to puke. Ino stamped her foot.
"Deidara! What are you doing in my chair!"
"I'm warming it for you. Now when you sit in it, my presence will always be with you, yeah" Deidara answered, his words filled with mock sugar. Ino grabbed his manila folder and smacked him with it repeatedly, until he grabbed it out of her hands.
"Well, I must go see Itachi, and then I have a date during lunch break. Sorry, girls, I'll radiate you with my aura next time, yeah." And he left before either Ino or Sakura could stab him with a sharp pen or a pair of scissors.
5 minutes later...top floor...
Deidara frowned. The top floor was completely empty.
"Where the hell is Itachi!"
---
Itachi walked along the pathway of a bustling street. It wasn't his fault he felt like some quality tiramisu, which the company cafe did not provide. He held the box in his right hand and checked his watch, which was on his left wrist. Five past eleven. He was meant to met Deidara at eleven. Deidara's gonna pretty pissed off...Itachi will just have to outdo him with violent shouting. He was too busy planning his evil speech that he didn't notice someone ran into and bounced off him and landed with a thud on the ground. Itachi frowned and looked at the bundle in front of him, rubbing her sore behind, as well as her head from the collision into Itachi's chest.
"Oi! Look where you were going!" he reprimanded harshly. The bundle swept her dark blue fringe from her white eyes and looked at him.
"I-I-I'm sorry..." Hinata apologised, and struggled to get up, without avail. It seemed that she injured her feet as she fell. She winced in pain. A crowd was beginning to gather. Itachi gulped nervously. They would think this was his doing, which in fact, it was. They would be expecting him to hold some form of responsibility.
"So, uh...you're that Hyuuga girl, the one who started working in the hospital, right?" Itachi asked, loudly to hide the nervousness from the gathering crowd.
"Y-y-yes..."
"Are you okay, miss? Did this red-eyed man hurt you?" came a voice from the crowd. Seems like they forgot who he was. Itachi was unimpressed. They all knew who is brother was, dammit.
"Should we call the Academy? He looks dangerous..."
"Don't worry! We'll protect you, miss!"
"I can't believe he dared hurt such a nice looking girl..."
"I know some really good law firms..." If this goes on anymore, Itachi might hurt someone. But then if anything happens to him, it'll tarnish the name of his clan, and his rising-star-brother, but worse of all, it'll tarnish the name of his company. Wait a sec...am I getting my priorities mixed up...? Stuff it, I must get out of this mess!
"She's fine!" Itachi cried to the crowd. He turned to Hinata. "Are you working at the moment?" He asked coldly, though his tone was softened.
"No..." She answered, and Itachi swept Hinata up into his arms, while being careful to not crush his cake in the process.
"Alright, you're coming with me! I will take responsibility of what happened!" He glared angrily at the crowd. "Happy?"
"Y-y-you can put me down...I can heal up these injurie-"
"Shut up! We're going!" Itachi stomped off, Hinata fearfully in his arms. She wouldn't want to know what will happen to her if she refused to come with him.
---
"Hmm...it seems this building got classier since I last visited...don't you think so, Kabuto?" A middle-aged man with long dark hair and pasty skin walked into W4eva head office, a silver haired twenty six year young man with circular rimmed glasses in tow. His sinister yellow eyes scanned the room.
"I would say so, Orochimaru-sama, but it makes no difference. It's the magazine that counts." his silver haired subordinate replied. Gaara, Shikamaru, Chouji, Ino and Sakura just exited the elevator (it was 1pm, lunch time) as they saw these two. They all frowned and cursed, all except Gaara. He was oblvious to the situation.
"Orochimaru is the head of a rival magazine company, Seduction." Shikamaru told Gaara. Gaara paused.
"Seduction...sounds better than W4eva." Gaara remarked. He received four death glares. "I'm stating the truth. W4eva is a very corny name."
"He makes various visits to piss us off. His magazine is the most bought magazine in Konoha." Chouji continued. "It's also sold in other countries."
"And Kabuto...?" Gaara pointed. Kabuto was looking rather smug.
"He's deputy editor and health expert, he's got a medical degree from Princeton. Orochimaru, unlike Itachi, prefers to be Editor." Ino answered. Shikamaru nodded.
"There's another reason they wanna kill each other too...Orochimaru wants Sasuke to be in his magazine, and only his magazine. Itachi doesn't allow it, not as a company head, but as a brother. Something about Orochimaru being a dangerous sleazy old man, or so Kisame said. Oh look, Kakashi-sensei, Kurenai-sensei and Shizune are here now..." Shikamaru pointed out.
"What are you doing here?" Kakashi asked the two visitors lazily.
"Just visiting. Is Itachi in?"
"No, but we are, yeah." Deidara stepped out, Sasori and Jiraiya behind him. Jiraiya frowned.
"Is it important business, Orochimaru? There's no way Itachi will let you have Sasuke, even if you grovel." Jiraiya warned dangerously. Orochimaru scoffed.
"He'll come to me, that boy." He laughed. "His brother's overprotective behaviour will be his downfall." Kabuto smirked at Shizune.
"How goes your work, Shizune-san? My thesis was recently accepted, I'm going to get my Ph.D, the graduation ceremony's in two weeks. Would you like to go? Or will you be too embarrassed to come?" Kabuto smirked. Shizune clenched her fists. Deidara waved off Kabuto's comment.
"You're one hundred years too early to be saying stuff like that, yeah. If I were so brilliant, I wouldn't be working at a magazine company." Deidara spat playfully. Sasori smirked.
"Especially, that Orochimaru, I heard he likes young men for dinner." Sasori winked. "Hint hint, nudge nudge."
"Oi, let's get outta here." Chouji suggested. They nodded, and then walked around, pretending not to notice. Only that Orochimaru noticed a certain redhead first.
"Ah, Sabaku no Gaara, I never knew you were the type to work in a magazine company." He said. Gaara turned his ice-cold pale green eyes onto Orochimaru.
"You better believe it." Gaara replied, his voice low and dangerous. His normal voice. "I'm their new Love Advice columnist." Orochimaru laughed. That was the funniest thing he heard all week.
"Are you joking? I never knew you as one to joke." Pause. Gaara made no changes to his stoic facial expression. Orochimaru froze. "You're...not joking...?"
"I don't joke." Was it really so hard to believe?
I can't believe it myself. Shukaku thought.
Quiet. Why must you always interrupt my flow of thought?
I make it my business to. Gaara decided to ignore Shukaku. Again.
"Well...erm...I'll be leaving...now..." Orochimaru said as he slowly backed away. As he reached the doors, he made a run for it, Kabuto following suit. Gaara was indifferent. He has lost count of how many people has slowly backed away from him nad ran for their lives. Although this run would be one of the few in which the person ran more in disbelief, which was becoming more frequent recently.
Suddenly, Itachi came bursting in...with a girl in his arms. People were beginning to think that they were hallucinating, or whether or not they missed their pills.
"Shizuneeeeeeee! Do something about this girl! Make sure she's completely and fully healed! I don't want anyone suing me!" Itachi shouted, heading straight to the infirmary. Seeing that no one moved (they were too shocked to), Itachi spun his head and shouted some more. "I'LL DOCK YOU PAY!" Shizune moved immediately. Sakura, Ino, Shikamaru and Chouji, seeing their friend was the poor victim in Itachi's arms, ran after them. Gaara didn't move, but followed after a brief moment. He found Itachi's sudden burst of paranoia to be highly entertaining. Hinata made quiet protests.
"I'm fine, I can heal myself, I won't sue you or anything, it was my fault..."
"Quiet! We do things my way!" Itachi demanded before placing her onto a bed in the infirmary. He turned to Shizune. "Now work your magic...you too, Sakura, seeing that you're here." Sakura had three reasons why she helped Hinata: Hinata was her friend, the fact that every person with an ailment must be a patient, friend or for, and that Itachi was Sasuke's older brother and being in his favour might pay off.
No less that a couple of minutes, and Hinata was healed up. It was only light injuries that were suffered, and Sakura and Shizune couldn't help but giggle and smirk at Itachi when he wasn't looking. Hinata was different though.
"Thanks, Sakura, Shizune-san." She turned to Itachi. "Th-thank you, Itachi-san." Then something happened which made anyone wish they had a camera for blackmail purposes. Itachi blushed.
"Just don't sue me...I aided you in your recovery. Yes I did."
A moment of silence passed between all in the infirmary. It was interrupted by Itachi telling them off for standing there looking baffled and stupid and to get back to work.
To be continued...with chapter 5...
AN: Bah...this chapter, I guess is another introductory one...with Orochimaru showing up, Gaara and Deidara finally working better together, and Itachi in a major pratfall...aww. Also, I will explain it in the coming chapter, but Hinata is also a medical nin and works at the hospital along with Sakura. Her Byakugan makes a fine aid, yes? Haha, Itachi almost go busted for hurting her...I chose her on purpose because she's got such a timid personality, and to see Itachi (almost) fall from grace because of a timid girl is amusing...alright, maybe it's not, but what the heck. More Sakura nagging Gaara in upcoming chapters. Also more pairings coming (obviously), where Gaara may/may not lay a finger in...Shikamaru x Temari is a definite for this fic...that's the pairing I like best in Naruto, oh the conflicting personalities! And we know Sasuke will get that random girl and Sakura will get all jealous (whether he stay with the random girl is in question)...Ino's my problem at the moment. I have all these possible guys to pair her up with...I probably won't do a KibaIno, as I'm currently doing one (I love Kiba X3)...oh well, worry about later. I haven't proofread this yet...so percentage of mistakes is high (as usual).