The future's in the air.
I can feel it everywhere,
Blowing with the wind of change.
-"Wind of Change" by the Scorpions
The first sign something was wrong was when Naruto showed up at Shikamaru's door.
"Anosa, anosa," the breathless teen panted, "have you seen Gyuuniku anywhere? She was supposed to meet me for ramen."
Shikamaru blinked.
"Did you mean Sakana?"
"Yeah, her," Naruto said, grinning apologetically, "but I waited for half a day! And she never showed up and Ino and them said that they haven't seen Tonkatsu anywhere either,"
"I wouldn't be surprised, if you asked them that," said Shikamaru, sighing and putting on his shoes, "How troublesome. Where have you looked so far?"
As the door clicked shut and the mumbling outside grew fainter, a door in the back of the apartment silently slid open.
---
"Ohohohoho! Look how easily we've caught you, Your Highness, daughter of the Daimyo of Fire Country, Princess..."
"Hold on, the paper seems to be smudged. What is that? Princess..."
Sakana glared at her captors, craning their necks over a sheet of yellowing paper, as she squirmed against the rope that held her. The too-tight bonds, however helped dispel the last of whatever it was they had drugged her with.
"Princess Sakana Jessica Angelica Meili Alexandra van Takahashi, and don't you forget it!" Sakana said as she sat as tall as the bindings would allow her.
The open-mouthed silence that followed was not quite what she'd expected, but it would do. She could already see the next moments in her mind's eye, as her two captors fell face first to the ground, begging and groveling for her forgiveness, bathing her foot in myrrh and frankincense, and-
"Repeat that again, would you?"
She sighed and complied.
---
"That Sakana," said Naruto, "is up to something bad datte ba yo!"
"What makes you say that?" said Shikamaru, leaning against the wall of the warehouse they were in.
"It's just the way she makes everyone different," said Naruto, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial whisper, "even you, Shikamaru. When did you ever talk to women like that?"
"How troublesome," said Shikamaru, but a gleam in his eye, "So, what's your plan?"
"Listen closely," said Naruto, "we'll-"
---
Sasuke crouched on a concealed branch, studying the thatched hut below. It had been easy enough following the kidnappers—they had left an unbroken trail of clues from when they drugged her, bound her and carried her bodily through the woods, had a picnic involving ham sandwiches and candy bars, and ended up here. Wait, but what was he doing here? A little voice droned on and on about a princess locked up in the hut below, traumatized and-
Sasuke's finger brushed the kunai strapped to his right thigh in irritation.
Presently, two females walked out of the house, swathed in outfits in matching green and red. They were bickering something about different types of food. Sasuke yawned. He was bored, he was tired, his legs were cramping from crouching-
"Bored?" whispered a voice directly behind him and very close to his ear.
Sasuke leapt out of the tree, kunai already clenched in both hands, frantically searching for a target. If only he had the sharingan, never mind that he could see a black shape leaping-
"Care to play with us?" said another voice. He whirled around and saw the figure in red leering at him. It suddenly occurred to him that this was a rather stupid setup and that he'd—
"Why yes," said the one in green, grinning like a cat, "You have fallen into our trap."
Sasuke took a panicked step backwards, nonononotthatdirectionlookwhosthedobenow, and felt the earth tumble away beneath him. Before he could find a foothold to leap out and away, Sasuke found himself at the bottom of a rather deep pit. Further crumbling of the earth revealed steel spikes on every inch of the walls, angled up to meet him.
"Who are you?" he roared at the three figures now looking down at him.
"I am Dragon Roll," said the figure in green with a flourish of a fan.
"I am California Roll," said the one in red, throwing metallic confetti around her.
"And I'm Baked Alaska," said the third, dressed in an identical outfit but in blue, as doves burst out of the folds of his cape, scattering rose petals in their wake. Sasuke recognized his voice as the person behind him in the tree. This one would be dangerous.
"That's Alaskan Roll," said Dragon Roll bopping him in the back of the head. California Roll grabbed the back of his nape as he fell forward, preventing him from tumbling into the pit. Sasuke could feel his eye twitch.
"And we," they continued chorally, with an elbow each from Dragon Roll, Alaskan Roll quickly lighting sparklers behind the trio, "are the Sushi Syndicate!"
Sasuke had tuned them out by this point, deciding his time was better spent finding a way out of his predicament, so absorbed that when California Roll's robes caught on fire and had to be stomped out by the other two, he didn't even notice.
I guess I can finally reveal the joke at this point.
-Sakana, if you haven't seen it already, is Japanese for fish(which is why all of her descriptions have something to do with water). Naruto confuses this with gyuuniku, which is beef, and tonkatsu, which is fried pork.
-Dragon rolls, California rolls and Alaskan rolls are all American-invented sushi rolls. They are about as authentic Japanese food as the fortune cookie is Chinese cuisine.