Becoming a Missing Nin can change a person. Kisame himself learned that quickly when he left his own village, and inwardly, he always believed that he was likely one of the luckier members of his shattered previous organization. For one thing, he had been recruited into a new group before he had to come to terms with some of the harsher effects of the Missing Nin lifestyle. From what he'd seen in others, they weren't pretty (for God's sake, look at Orochimaru!). But nevertheless, even under the somewhat-security of the Akatsuki cloak, some changes were inevitable. They had to learn to never hold anything as truth until given solid proof. Just as well, they need to learn how to keep their names and identities quiet until the last possible moment (though considering Kisame's level of uniqueness, he had a harder time with that than most). And most importantly, they learned to turn themselves off from developing any kind of specific attachment to other people. The latter rule was encouraged in most shinobi villages anyway; especially in the Bloody Mist, where at least half of one's comrades were killed upon the very first day of his shinobi career. Living there as long as he had – and better, being on a team specifically meant to kill in violent, if vaguely discreet ways – had done its job in jading him. But there were still times when Kisame couldn't completely conform to the indifference rule.
He couldn't help it. He liked kids.
So when he stayed out of the fight when he reached the attack site where Zabuza, unaware that his backup weapon had been confiscated, was carrying out his own mission, he didn't have an excuse. The group being attacked consisted of five: the civilian bridge builder that Zabuza had been hired to eliminate, three obviously inexperienced Genin (he could see them shaking from his position), and their single Jounin instructor. Since Kisame had come to the site with the intention of removing the bandage-wearing, arrogant son of a bitch's jaw bone with his teeth, it might have been more practical for him to jump into the fight right away. It would have been kinder, definitely, because by the time he arrived the one Jounin (who Kisame recognized as the infamous Copy Nin, from his old days working for the Mist) was already out of the fight. Zabuza was holding him in a hydro prison in the middle of the clearing's lake, possibly waiting for him to suffocate, or perhaps keeping him alive to toy with the younger ninja before ending the fight with the water clone he had stationed on the shore. Either way, it was clear that no one was going to be defeating Zabuza anytime soon.
But then again, as Kisame had already mentioned, being a Missing Nin did go a long way to hardening one's sense of compassion.
But he knew that that was an empty excuse, completely contradicting the confession he already made just a few minutes ago. Yes, he did like kids, and yes, he was probably going to stop Zabuza before he mercilessly slaughtered the three children below, but the reason he hadn't done so yet was because not ten minutes after Kisame got there, one of the Genin stepped forward. First there had been a loud blonde who was already shouting and making a perfect ass of himself, which was probably why Kisame hadn't taken the other two into account until the very moment that the team's other boy came forward to try to shift the situation for their benefit. Unfortunately (and unsurprisingly) the boy's attack failed (since he apparently forgot that the odds were that of a Genin against a seasoned exiled ninja). The boy's blonde teammate gasped loud enough to be heard by every shinobi present, which could also be said about anything else the orange-clad miscreant did. Soft spot or no, Kisame was tempted to wait until after the blonde was killed out of pity to what cruel, painful death might wait in the future for a ninja that had not mastered the art of silence.
But that was off point. The thing that made Kisame suddenly decide he wanted to stay on the sidelines and observe the fight rather than join it was that when the darker of the two Genin came running forward in his failed attack, Kisame got his first good look at him. Then Zabuza's clone (it was all the boy could reach; he hadn't even learned to walk on water yet) lifted him up by the throat, and there was a moment when something jumped out at the shark nin from the thin, haughty nose and the particular way the hair parted away from the unscratched forehead protector that was oddly familiar.
The clone threw the boy aside, sending him crashing to the ground at his teammate's feet. His teammates gasped. The original Zabuza's eyes took on a superior look that suggested there was a smirk under his bandages.
After a moment the boy got up. Glared.
Oh. That's who he reminded him of.
Kisame wrinkled his forehead in confusion once he drew up a mental picture of the partner he had spent the last couple of years with and confirmed that there was an alarming, very clearly family resemblance between the two. While their conversations over the years had been on the brief-but-very-gradually-becoming-frequent side, Kisame clearly remembered bringing up the subject of why each of them had left their home countries. True, Itachi had given him only the barest details in response, but that was alright. Any Leaf shinobi found drunk as far as the Snow Country was more than happy to give a surprisingly inventive tale of the Uchiha massacre if there was another bottle of free sake involved. But nevertheless, from the conversation with Itachi, the words "I killed my family" had most definitely been used. So maybe it wasn't the same as "My whole family" or "My entire family," but that had been assumed. Itachi was not one to leave loose ends.
Shaking his head slightly in dismissal, Kisame forcefully put the question aside until later. Itachi was hard enough to figure out when he was present.
Kisame brought his attention back to the fight going on below. The idiotic blonde was still mindlessly wasting energy on Zabuza's clone while the real one watched from the middle of the lake. He did have to admit that the kid was determined. But also sloppy. And overwhelmingly loud. The dark haired boy that looked so much like Itachi was off to one side, favoring the shoulder that had impacted first when he was thrown. He could have either been recovering from the fall earlier or trying to think of ways to throw himself at the clone again. Kisame noted that there was no Sharingan on the replica of his partner, which was probably the biggest difference (Itachi would have had Zabuza writhing in pain at the bottom of the lake by now). Kisame noted the third team member for the sake of not being caught off guard by another sudden appearance in the battle. She was a pretty little pink haired thing that was probably showing the greatest amount of sense out of the whole team by being the only one to actually stay with their client, and Zabuza's only perspective target. She couldn't do anything to fend him off of course, but at least she was trying to create an illusion of protection for the old man.
The dark haired boy caught something thrown to him by one of the many clones the blonde had made of himself. There was a half second pause and then, black bangs falling forward as if to damage his sight, he re-entered the fight, and Kisame was able to see the long blades of a shuriken for a moment, before the boy pulled back his arm and sent the weapon forward in a prefect, Itachi-worthy Shadow Windmill. Not that Itachi used weapons too often. The Uchiha was, after all, recruited for the sake of his eyes before anything else (though that wasn't a fact to be repeated to the before-mentioned's face; even in their own organization offending that vanity queen was not done lightly).
The attack worked. From his position, Kisame was able to see another shuriken hidden in the shadow of the first. But he couldn't deny that he had no idea of how it got there when the Itachi-mini had clearly thrown only one, until the moment that it poofed into the spiky haired blonde Genin.
Okay, so maybe he would save the kid before Zabuza killed him. That stunt earned it...
But even as Kisame was deciding how much damage would still be allowed to the Genin, the blonde whipped out and threw one of his own weapons directly at the bandaged ninja. Zabuza, having caught the original shuriken for the sake of protecting himself, and with his other hand busy holding the hydro prison intact, had to let go of something or accept a rather painful gash.
He chose the wrong something.
The Copy Nin was freed.
The odds changed. Not to the point of a sure victory, but at least to a fighting chance now that someone who did know how to use the Sharingan was back on the field. Which very shortly became just as good as a sure victory. Kisame was inwardly a little disappointed at how easily Zabuza was taken in by the Sharingan as soon as the Copy Nin was out of his prison. Of course, that was coming from someone who had spent almost four years straight traveling with a master of the ability, and capable of grasping some of the basics of how the ability worked.
After completing that thought, Kisame was immediately hit by disappointment again, this time for the fact that now it looked as if he wasn't going to be given the chance to dismantle his old teammate at all. Though the humiliation of being brought back to their village by a mere Genin team and their instructor wouldn't be great for the ego of the Zabuza he remembered, especially with a certain blonde proudly boasting all the way...
Kisame watched Zabuza's water dragon attack fail when used against an identical one performed by the Copy Nin. The effect of the two bodies of water clashing created a massive tidal wave that somehow only seemed to swallow up Zabuza while Kakashi went off into the trees. His location was noted a few minutes later when the current forced the bandaged ninja against a tree trunk, and two well aimed kunai shot into his arms, pinning him there. Kakashi hopped onto the branch above the Missing Nin, which Kisame noted ironically, was only a few feet away from where he himself was hiding, but the Jounin's detection abilities weren't exactly the most important matter at the moment.
"How...? Can you tell the future...?"
Kisame nearly shuddered at the pitiful tone in his ex-comrade's voice. He was close enough to hear their conversation over the rushing water.
"Yes. You are going to die."
Kisame shifted a little for a better view, but nearly slammed himself back into the tree when the prediction proved correct. Though probably not quite in the way that the Copy Nin had "foreseen," he was sure. Out of nowhere, two long slender needles shot into the neck of the Mist's one time Demon. By the way Zabuza's body slumped, face frozen with a convincing expression of shock and pain in place, the needles might have really severed his jugular vein. It was so sudden, so clean.
Kisame didn't believe it for a moment.
Though, admittedly, he might have. If he hadn't been specifically told about those kinds of attacks before accepting his current mission. The unease that entered his mind at that moment had nothing to do with the death of his ex-teammate, but more reasonably, went along the lines of, "What the hell Itachi-san!"
He looked up from his perch, already knowing what he would find if he looked in the right direction. He might have already been spotted by the painfully large and naive eyes of Zabuza's "tool." The Copy Nin turned his attention to finding the bandage-wearer's killer, too, as did his team. The blonde was the first to speak.
"Who the hell are you!"
He was standing just across from them, up in a tree directly level with Kisame. The mask was in place, keeping the shark nin from knowing whether he had been spotted. He assumed he was for caution reasons.
Kisame didn't need to listen for the answer to the blonde's question. Unless Zabuza had somehow managed to train twins to live and die for him, there was no doubt about whether the boy standing across from him with the red and white mask was the exact one that he left with Itachi less than an hour ago.
Rather than doing something stupid like trying to retake the boy in front of a group that very nearly killed his ex-comrade, Kisame decided to take the safer, and at that moment more pressing route first. He needed to find Itachi. After all, allowing a target to simply walk away was not characteristic for the cool, collected, and occasionally very cruel seventeen-year-old.
Not to mention it made things one hell of a lot more difficult now. If that masked kid had any sense at all he would tell his "Zabuza-san" about their presence now. Sparing one more glance, Kisame silently left the battle site, intending to track down his partner and find out just how exactly the second strongest member of Akatsuki could be overpowered by a bound and unarmed fifteen year old girl-boy.
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Itachi hadn't moved since the boy ran off into the forest, not stopping as he hastily strapped his mask back into place. Dazedly, the Uchiha remained kneeling until the sound of crunching leaves went away and the boy's chakra faded out of reach of his senses. When he finally did force himself to stand, a sudden head rush threatened to send him back to the ground, despite the Uchiha clan's legendary composure. He regained balance though, by taking a step back and leaning against one of the many trees. He felt dizzy.
He had just helped a target escape. That fact didn't need sinking in, it was right at the forefront of his mind. Along with the fact that he had broken one of the most basic of all shinobi rules: never let emotions mingle with duty. And damnit, he was an Uchiha! He didn't have bloody emotions that couldn't be well shrouded, if not controlled. Had his father ever shown unwarranted compassion on a mission? Shisui? At this rate he would end up as much an embarrassment as that one cousin with the yellow glasses that died before he even reached Jounin status!
Pushing himself away from the tree, Itachi matter-of-factly clamped down on his thoughts as he always did when they threatened to distract him from the present. His hands automatically went to brush leaves off his uniform and straighten his cloak. Outwardly, he showed no sign of distress. Inwardly, he attempted to retrace his thoughts but gave it up when his head began to ache, and wearily closed them away for later. The sensible part of him that was still functioning told him that whether he was currently on mental-clean-up or not, his former captive had just run off, and was more than likely going to regroup and come back (if he was half competent on the fact that one needed to eliminate enemies right away if they wanted to live past the age of twenty in their profession).
He needed to move. Now.
Besides…Kisame would be coming back soon. And if the shark nin and their target had both gone in the direction he thought they did, and were seeking out the same person he thought they were, it was only a matter of minutes before the first of the two noticed that Itachi had just needlessly made their mission a whole lot more difficult.
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It goes without saying that all ninja villages try to encourage a survival-of-the-fittest attitude in their shinobi. The only exception might be the Hidden Village of the Leaf, which during its time of peace grew to encourage fellowships and alliances more than any other village. On the opposite hand, no village rejected the idea of risking their neck for comrades more than the Mist.
The Hidden Village of the Mist not only thought that their shinobi could live and thrive solely off of their own abilities, but they viewed the civilians with the same live-or-die-on-your-own-strength principle. As a result, the Mist had one of the largest percentages of desolate families, and the fewest amount of charities to help them (a statistic that the Mizukage neither flinched away from, nor encouraged mentioning). Non-nins in the Hidden Village of the Mist weren't exactly the kage's first concern. The council there was far more focused on raising their ninja to be the most efficient killers possible, as other countries were quickly able to deduce from their Academy exams, where students were basically put into a room with weapons and told to go nuts.
The Mist, obviously, wasn't known for being careful with resources either.
Kisame himself had gone through the infamous exam the year before the Academy reformed, which was possibly just as well for all the merit his family hung on it (his father alone might have waged war on the schools if they changed it a year sooner). Unlike other villages, the Mist didn't pair its students up depending on grades, so that the highest scoring student was set up to fight the lowest scoring. It would be pointless, the council reasoned, because the outcome would be clear before the match even began. Instead, the students were matched up alphabetically, A fighting Z, and so on. And it just so happened that in Kisame's family, he had his opposite letter living in the room next to his. Ping.
Every family, Kisame was sure, had its troubles. Kisame guessed, during the years he began to understand the rules that waited to take either him or his brother out of existence at the end of their Academy days, that the rift in his family had likely been around from long before he was born. How it began, and what dictated the rules between family interactions, he was never sure. His parents had been subjected to an arranged marriage, and though Kisame and his brother were supposed to be the generation that bound their two families together, the exact terms of the union were never fully explained. He was told by one of his aunts that it had been meant to resolve a land feud of some kind between the Hoshigaki clan and the family that lived there before them. But his mother's family, if they still lived in the Water Country after the marriage, never visited. A fact that seemed odd for a peace-forming union. His father's family, in turn, regarded his mother with what seemed to be a not unnoticeably cold courtesy, which Kisame had also come to wonder about when he grew older. But as a child, the future exiled nin assumed that the difference between him and his twin had made all the difference between binding the family and continuing the division.
Unlike what their family had doubtlessly expected when they found out that the head of their clan was to have twin sons, Ping and Kisame had been born fraternal twins rather than identical. Kisame was the older by a matter of minutes. He inherited the family's customary appearance that so matched their family emblem, complete with blue-gray skin and fully-functional gills. His mother might have been horrified during the fifteen minutes before she bore her second son. Ping was as different from the Hoshigaki as was possible for a blood relation. His hair was smooth and black, normal for Water Country-born people, his complexion pale, eyes large. No trace of blue. No gills. Before his umbilical cord was cut, it was clear that Ping was his mother's son. Maybe that was why Kisame and Ping were named with the letters directly opposite of each other, because no matter how he tried to credit his family, Kisame could see no way that his mother and father, both respectable Jounin raised in the Mist, could have not known about the pairing system for the final exam. He only wondered which one had named them.
Growing up, it didn't take long for the lines to establish themselves between the shark nin and his average-looking brother. People will always chose what is known to them over what is different. Ping was liked better at school by teachers and students, while just the opposite was done at home with their family. Their mother even was no exception. Kisame would only realize that there were lines that did not need to be spoken regarding who was allowed to approach their mother first, who was allowed to touch her, and who was supposed to wait quietly until he was acknowledged. Like the school teachers and students, she stuck to her own kind.
Years later, Kisame supposed that might have been part of the reason why he was never squeamish about the idea of working with someone who unflinchingly murdered his family. In his own case, he had known from an absurdly early age that he was either going to murder his brother, or be murdered by him. The "land feud" between their mother's family and their father's might have been officially ended before they were conceived, but Kisame knew, and he was sure Ping knew, that it was going to end with them.
Of course, there were other children whose names started with the letters K or P. If either of them had tried, they probably could have changed their match up. Their parents might have protested, but once a complaint was made, there was no doubt in Kisame's mind that the teachers would have requested, pled, done something to alter it. But neither of them said anything. Whether Ping had any inclination to do so, Kisame didn't know. And he never asked the brother that he hardly spoke to, who was accepted so easily into any group, and whose grades were far below his own because he had never had their father pushing him to the point of exhaustion. When Kisame held a kunai into his smaller brother's gut, Ping looked up at him with their mother's cold, large eyes and quietly wheezed out his last breath, that on his more thoughtful nights, Kisame could almost convince himself contained the words, "You win." And then the black water eyes had closed. Afterward, Kisame couldn't remember if he pushed the body away or if it had slid to the ground on its own.
Mourning for Ping lasted only as long as was absolutely necessary for a shinobi family. There was an official period of mourning in the Mist that was set right after the Academy exams, probably suggested by one of the kinder council members, where the whole village was told to mourn the loss of half of the year's class. Some families continued mourning for weeks afterwards. The shark clan didn't.
Not long after Ping's death, Kisame's mother passed away too, while he was away on his first outside mission. Though when he got back, he highly doubted that the precise, graceful woman that he and his brother had occasionally trained with as children had tripped and "accidentally" stabbed herself with a kunai, he didn't say anything. By that time, he hadn't spoken to her since his exam.
He began staying away from home as much as he could after that. He encouraged his sensei to get as many long term missions as possible (which he learned from one of his short conversations with Itachi, was much easier than in the Leaf, where Genin were assigned to simple chore-like missions during their first year; the idea of Itachi mucking out a stable still made him laugh). And when they weren't able to leave the village, he trained.
In the Mist, where snowfall takes up over seventy percent of the year, and rainfall the other thirty, there are two ways an advancing shinobi can train. The first was to go to the training grounds and work until they passed out and then spend weeks in the local hospital recovering from frost bite and a severe cold (because a determined ninja would stay out that long), or they could go to the training building. As had already been mentioned, the Mizukage in the Mist had only one obsession: raise strong shinobi. And to do that in his cold climate, he discovered, there needed to be a place inside that the shinobi could go to train without the risk of getting sick. Thus, he ordered the construction of a three story building specifically for that purpose. The building was to be heated, stocked with weapons, medic kits, and other minor provisions often used on missions. Then, on a more chilling level, there was the one spacious room that was built for the purpose of housing the Academy's exit exam. It was right next door to the Genin locker room. The Kage apparently had a sick sense of humor.
The distribution of keys was also specifically noted. Jounins, of course, had a key to every room in the building. Chuunin had a key to the front door. And Genin, well, they should build up an immunity to the cold, shouldn't they? In most cases, Genin were only able to get into the building with their sensei's permission. Most cases, being Kisame's wording because, well, since he spent so much time training his father sort of "gave" Kisame a set of keys one morning after he came home late the night before and carelessly left his key ring on the bathroom counter.
Kisame just had to remind himself to be careful going in and out at odd hours. He didn't doubt that someone had to have noticed him, but he was certain that the Jounin or Chuunin that did simply didn't care enough to say anything, because really, who cared if a Genin spent a few extra hours training? All the more likely he'd become a Chuunin soon and have his own key anyway.
But years later, when Kisame was feeling thoughtful like he did when he finally let himself think about Ping, and maybe a little drunk, he supposed that in the long run, that set of keys did affect every shinobi who came in and out of that building.
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Exactly two hours, forty-five minutes, and fifteen seconds later, Itachi had relocated. Because deep down he was still aware of the fact that he had been born and raised (to an extent) in a forest climate, and because it was the most practical way to travel through dense forest, Itachi moved over the ground rather than on it, not allowing even the driest of leaves to stir as he went from branch to branch. As soon as he felt sure that his direction and movement could not be tracked and thus bring any unwanted company after him, he had begun thinking about where to go from where he was now. The most logical action would be to find his partner and formulate a plan to re-capture their target. Though the only problem with that was that he would have to explain just how he managed to lose him in the first place.
A sensible voice told him that the responsible thing to do would be to simply admit to letting the boy go. It would save him the trouble of making up a story and keep Kisame from using that cheeky smirk in the future, the one that Kisame wore after finding the note and capturing their target while Itachi dazedly watched.
But then there was another part that had to point out that the responsible thing would have been to not get intimidated by some fifteen year old drag queen's looks and let him go in the first place. He was Uchiha Itachi, after all! As far as looks went, he knew he had nothing to fear. Even if that boy with the mask had gotten more of a reaction out of Kisame than he had in years.
But that was off the current subject. He had to find Kisame before he could undo his mistake. As long as the mission was carried out successfully, there was always the chance that the right Do-Not-Question-Me glare would keep this incident from conversation. But even if he did catch the false hunter nin again, if his partner was killed by that bandage-wearing freak and his apprentice, there was a good chance that Itachi would be made to regret it even more so at home base. For one, after dragging his partner's lifeless blue corpse back to home base, he would have to explain himself to the boss. Or worse: he could be reassigned to Orochimaru.
Itachi inwardly winced at that thought.
Re-taking their masked target would be harder now that they no longer had the element of surprise, but far from impossible. Maybe they wouldn't be able to pull the mission off without running into Momochi Zabuza; Kisame might be unhappy about that, but it was still far from undoable. The hardest part would probably be getting the boy back to the Mist alive. From the pathetic display before, it seemed that the unfortunate creature was dedicated to his partner. That was a fairly big mistake to be made by shinobi.
Another subconscious voice popped up in the back of his head to snicker Hypocrite, and then disappear without so much as a "poof!"
As Itachi continued to move, he scanned the area around him more thoroughly with his eyes than his chakra senses. Though he did occasionally sense small spurts of it, the chakra trails that he detected were not strong enough to be identified. He didn't exactly expect to recognize Kisame's signature at random with that method; the shark nin was not an idiot. If Kisame were out and looking for Itachi as well, he knew that the shark nin would hide his own chakra well enough so not to attract enemy attention. But, as the Leaf's ANBU told him the day he joined their ranks, if one is consciously attacked, he shows his chakra. Whether it can be hidden or not does not matter, it simply is not a good idea to waste the effort. So, Itachi went on looking.
...Until he caught one sudden strong wave of chakra when he paused on a branch for a spilt second. The source came from behind him. He pretended that he didn't notice. He continued going onward through the trees, taking careful notice of the person following him. The person was approaching him quickly, probably traveling in the canopy rather than on the ground like he was. Itachi inwardly looked at the frank presence behind him, and wondered if the owner had any common sense in his head at all. There was no attempt to hide the chakra, no subtle hint in the stranger's approach at all. In fact, it became steadily more obvious until Itachi got to the point where he could hear the loud clash of wooden sandals hitting against bark, when it occurred to him that the presence behind him possibly wanted to be spotted.
He stopped after completing the jump he was in the process of making when this realization dawned on him. The chakra source that he had only recently been acquainted with came bounding after him. The clash of the boy's sandals kept coming. Such loud footwear, Itachi knew, could only mean that the wearer was either incredibly confident or unreasonably stupid. He wasn't sure which one he would credit to the person who landed on a branch across from him in a flutter of loose clothing. His target's mask was off, revealing the soft face beneath to the shady forest light. The dark eyes sought his out before the boy's balance had even been established, and Itachi thought that maybe he could credit the boy with one thing, and that was…he could confuse the fucking hell out of anything that moved! What kind of a ninja seeks out someone as intent on taking him captive as a hunter nin? Or worse, considering the fact that Itachi had no intention of disposing of a wayward shinobi, but planned on taking the boy alive and turning him over to one furious Mist councilman?
Neither of the missing nin blinked as they stared at each other, one standing tall in a red and black cloak while the one across from his straightened the over-sized folds of his jacket. When he was done, the differences in the positions of their separate branches was just enough to almost make it so they were able to stand level with one another.
Itachi didn't move, ready to attack as he was.
Haku smiled.
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Because of the little amount of concern that people showed to the homeless when he was a kid, as a teenager Kisame showed little, if any, acknowledgement for those that were known to haunt the alleyways and light fires in old trashcans at night. As a child in the Mist, one learned not to look below chin level. For children this does of course result in many nasty falls in winter when puddles turn into slippery ice on the sidewalks, but by following the rule there's no reason to see the pitiful bodies curled up into balls against the sides of buildings. It was said that you could recognize a foreigner from a local in the Water Country depending on how they walk down the street. Someone from the Leaf or even the Sand would glance down to step around the ragged urchins, while a local citizen, shinobi or not, would walk on as if there was nothing there. The only people, in fact, that show any acknowledgement of them at all are the Genin teams that the Mizukage assigns to clear the frozen corpses off the street before decay sets in.
Of course, Kisame only found out about that last part during his first winter as a Genin. The mission was carried out at night, when the streets were the least crowded, with other Genin teams that were assigned the same job. No one spoke during it. What happened to the bodies after they were turned over to their instructors, Kisame didn't find out until he reached the status of Jounin, and even then, he preferred not to take on those types of missions if he could avoid them. That was why in one of the coldest cities in the Water Country, children abruptly lost their love of snow after reaching the age of twelve.
When he was fourteen, snowfall was uncommonly high, even for the Mist's standards. If it started falling when he was in the training building, he would try to wait it out for two reasons. One was simply that he preferred not to walk home in the middle of a storm. The other had something to do with the Chuunin who would occasionally slip into the Genins' locker room to tell stories about how the homeless could be driven mad by hunger and cold to the point of attacking shinobi walking down the streets alone at night. Though it was stupid to think that one feeble bum could take down even the slowest of Genin, one had to admit that if enough desperate people tried, the sheer numbers would be overpowering.
Some nights, the snowfall would outlast him and he would be forced to go outside or risk being spotted by the late-goers who preferred to train at night. It was on one of those nights that he stepped out into the snow, keys in hand to lock the door behind him - it was a safety measure that his sensei had once explain. The idea was to keep unauthorized people out. Namely Genin who didn't have permission to be in the building. He was just extracting the key and turning to go when he stopped with his hand still reaching toward the door.
The homeless generally stayed away from parts of the village frequented by shinobi. It was all too well known that no help would be offered to them. But that night, the third consecutive night of snowfall in one week, Kisame abruptly found himself being studied by a black pair of eyes as aloof and cold as the ice flakes falling around them.
The owner of the eyes was huddled into a gap between the butcher's and the carpenter's shop, knees pulled up to his chest and arms tightly wrapped around them to conserve warmth. Kisame couldn't see most of the urchin's face because he was pressing his mouth and nose against his knees to keep them from freezing in the wind, but his eyes stared warily out all the same from beneath the cover of choppy black bangs. When he noticed that Kisame was returning it, the thinner boy didn't blink. He met Kisame's eyes as if to stare him down even as his arms strained to tighten his hold on himself. Kisame could guess why this boy wasn't dead yet. As he stepped away from the building and toward the street (he needed to cross it to get home), the boy's eyes narrowed into a glare, and Kisame decided that if he were to attack the urchin, as pitiful shape as he was in, the boy would fight back whole heartedly.
As he got closer, and the wind, no longer blocked by the training building, finally sank into Kisame's clothes, he felt the weight of the keys in his hand. The boy's clothes were thinner than his own. Not ragged, as what he'd seen on others, but definitely worn down to threads. Also, he could see that his shirt was clearly meant for summer weather. What kind of idiot wears short sleeves during a Water Country winter?
The boy was younger than him, Kisame realized when he reached the sidewalk. It was hard to guess his age with the boy huddled as he was, but Kisame was sure that the pitiful creature was smaller than he was. Thinner. Though the size of the boy's hands and feet suggested that the litheness of his form was due to malnutrition rather than from any error in his genes.
A little voice in the back of his head, conscious of society's views, told him that he was being stupid. The Mizukage said that the homeless were homeless for a reason, and that if they were meant to be any other way then they would be able to work for it on their own. But even as he moved to step around the homeless boy, the black eyes held his, and held him to his resolve. Later, he would try to decide for himself if he was thrown into a smothered, supposedly dead sense of compassion or if, more likely, it was because the urchin was around the same age and size as Ping when he died. But during that one moment when he was walking pass the unflinching stare, he didn't falter. He just opened his fist and let the keys drop to the snow-covered ground.
The snow cushioned the keys' fall, the still descending flakes threatening to cover them as quickly as they landed, but Kisame had no doubt that those watchful eyes had seen where they landed. He didn't doubt either that as soon as he turned the corner the boy would spring forward and dig through the snow for them. Even with the stubborn pride that would have had the frail body throwing himself against a trained shinobi at the most vague indication of disgust.
Kisame never saw the stick-thin urchin boy on the streets again. He never bothered to look. The day after the storm, when Kisame had gone out to the training building at his usual hour and mentally told himself not to be surprised that his keys weren't waiting on the stairs for him, he overheard one of the other Genin commenting that someone had broken into his locker and stolen his spare cloak. Weeks later, his sensei casually mentioned that the Mizukage had just rejected the idea of having the training building gassed; it seemed that someone was complaining about rats stealing from the rations supply room.
And years later, yet another trivial thought would come up on his list of memories that would always haunt him. That, without thinking, he had given the Silent Killer of the Mist the keys to the shinobi world without considering anything more than how small his arms were.
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Itachi kept his face impassive as the smaller Missing Nin that should have been running in the opposite direction smiled pleasantly at him. After a moment, when it became clear that the Uchiha was not going to break the silence, the boy timidly offered, "Hello."
Itachi lifted an eyebrow in acknowledgement of the greeting, but said nothing. He considered trying to use his Sharingan to distract the smaller boy and recapture him. But the boy simply continued to stare at Itachi, until curiosity finally made him say stiffly, "You were following me."
The boy shifted on his perch a bit, and Itachi was sure that his expression became more sheepish as he responded. "Gomen..." His head bowed forward for a moment, and Itachi decided that he wasn't even going to start on the absurdity of apologizing to one's enemy. Still he waited for more of an explanation. If the boy had a death wish after begging for his freedom, Itachi certainly wanted to know why. A reprimanding voice reminded him to be cautious, despite how unthreatening the person across from him looked. He had been dodging hunter nins since he was thirteen, after all. Silently, he reached out for any traces of the illusive chakra he felt faintly before while looking for Kisame. He got nothing.
The formerly masked boy sat down quietly on his branch, as if guessing what Itachi was doing and patiently waiting for the other ninja to finish so he could focus on him instead. Itachi caught the large eyes traveling over his face and pointedly looked back. The pale face turned faintly pink and bowed again. There was another soft spoken, "Gomen."
The professional part of Itachi (which actually was a pretty large part, given his lack of life outside work) rolled its eyes and told him matter-of-factly that the "responsible" thing to do right now would be to grab the boy and be on his way. How easy would it be right now, with the boy staring up at him so openly and for all appearances completely ignorant of his Sharingan? But then the contradicting thought pointed at the same fact and announced cautiously, This isn't right. It was too easy.No one who had been deceiving the Mist's ANBU since the age of twelve could survive being that stupid, he told himself. For God's sake, the boy had come after him alone.
The boy looked up, catching Itachi's suspicious glare. Itachi thought he saw the boy's hand twitch, and suspected an attack, but then instead:
"What's your partner's name?"
Itachi's other eyebrow went up for a moment before his image forced him to drag both back into their proper place. The boy didn't so much as blink. He stared back at the Sharingan user pleasantly as if he had just asked about the weather, and not a half-shark man who had earlier that day stormed off muttering that he was going to kill his partner…Alright, so maybe "stormed off" was too extreme of wording, but that didn't take away from the fact that he had, quietly, stated that he intended to do harm to the boy's "Zabuza-san."
In a low voice, Itachi countered with, "Why do you want to know?"
There was a pause, and Itachi thought perhaps that the boy had sincerely been hoping for the actual answer. The boy's face was naturally smooth, but Itachi could see the delicate jaw clench several times before the soft voice finally blurted out, as conscientiously as the question before, "Because you're like me."
And Itachi stared back blankly less for the sake of his limited reactions, than for the fact that he didn't bloody agree.
Silence returned again, up until the boy realized that the bright red eyes were carefully moving over his face once, twice, then, "G-Gomen...!" one pale hand, baring perfectly filed and painted nails, gestured sheepishly towards the not so masculine features of the other boy's face. "I did not mean it that way."
Mind tracing back to the other most memorable detail from earlier that morning, Itachi said impassively but clearly in case this was an issue with the younger shinobi, "I'm not a tool."
"No," the boy agreed. For a moment Itachi thought that perhaps he was going to apologize again, but he was disappointed. Instead, his target moved his head back a little so that his hair moved out of his face, and said in a voice that was once more warm and sociable, "but you belong to him."
At Itachi's continuing blank look, the boy shifted yet again, moving his legs either to find a more comfortable position, or for the sake of saying 'I know you're not going to answer, but I'll pretend I don't.' When he looked back up, he was smiling politely. "I saw you before," the boy said when he finally stopped moving. Itachi had the faint idea that his target would have made an excellent politician with his never faltering manners. "When he was checking me. I saw you looking at him."
"That..." Itachi started to glare impulsively, then his memory kicked in with a perfect recollection of what happened in what order, and his facial muscles paused. One eye on the expectant face, Itachi's mind put together that yes, his paranoia had been right and the boy had been perfectly awake and capable of processing his surroundings when he had thought he was, and then that there had also been a twenty minute period where the boy had been conscious and watching...the boy might have been awake from the very moment he was laid down in the clearing, before his hands were tied, perfectly capable of attack or escape…
Itachi blinked his eyes, then looked back at where the boy was currently watching him with that same calm demeanor that was very much like his own, save that it was meant to inspire ease in the people around him rather than fear. Then he noticed a change that had occurred during his momentary lapse.
Once the change had been discovered, he didn't waste time. His hand moved immediately to his weapons holster, and if the brown eyes across from him noticed, they didn't show any indication until a kunai buried itself in the tree bark that had been behind the boy's head. The pale figure on the tree opposite Itachi dodged the first kunai easily, but missed the second until it hit squarely into its shoulder. The water clone gasped in well acted pain, and then splattered down to the forest floor to form a dark puddle amidst the dried leaves. The abandoned branch where the clone had been standing swayed dejectedly across from the Sharingan user.
Itachi waited a moment, closing his eyes to concentrate on the signature he had learned that morning.
"You couldn't play along?"
Red eyes opened. Itachi looked up. One of the sandals that were either ridiculous or cocky was dangling above his head. He traced it up to the owner and bestowed the That-Wasn't-Amusing glare that Kisame often earned during traveling on the smaller missing nin.
"Uh...Gomen." The third apology in one meeting, but Itachi was beginning to suspect that the apologetic tone wasn't as sincere as the owner made it sound. "I wasn't sure if you wouldn't attack if I came closer on my own."
Itachi noted that the boy made no attempt to come down to his branch. Having lost his advantageous position, the ex-Leaf nin finally allowed himself to move into a more comfortable one. His legs were beginning to ache from staying in the same crouching position, anyway. Itachi moved to sit with his back against the tree's trunk and his head angled upward to watch his target. In the back of his mind, he thought that it was going to be annoying picking the bits of bark out of his hair before bed, but he set that thought aside. Both hands were left free, one resting lightly over his weapons holster in silent warning to the doe-eyed creature above.
As he had before, the boy waited patiently for Itachi to settle himself. Then, the moment the older ninja glanced upward, the boy blurted, "Is he precious to you?"
"He's my partner," Itachi responded readily. He made sure that his voice sounded neutral. The possibility that the boy might have created water clones before seeking him out hadn't occurred to him, much less the thought that he would have been able to maintain them as far anyway from a water source as they were at that moment. Inwardly he scolded himself for making another great mistake for a shinobi: never underestimate your enemy.
"I look at Zabuza-san that way," the boy said. "When he goes out sometimes, and I know he won't be back until morning."
Itachi raised an eyebrow. He didn't like where this was heading. Briefly, he wondered how difficult it would be to catch the other Missing Nin's body if he sent him into a state of unconsciousness, but set the idea aside for the moment. Water clones, he told himself. Be more cautious. To the boy, he simply said, "How does that prove anything?"
The smooth face looked surprised. "Because," the girlish creature said softly, "Zabuza-san never looks that way back."
Itachi didn't say anything. He waited for the boy to say whatever it was that was making his jaw twitch as if his mouth was trying to juggle the words before speaking them. "In four years…" three words out, there were still more that Itachi could see the other's tongue striving to balance, "he hasn't noticed." A pause. Brown eyes looked imploringly down, "Does your partner notice you?"
Itachi felt his shoulders stiffen. His mind clicked into place what the questions were getting at. And then, somehow he lost eye contact. He didn't know why. He'd stared people down before, but somehow he found himself looking at the worn spot on his pant leg. The one right above the knee. From above came:
"He doesn't have any idea, does he?"
The sounds of birds far off could be heard, a strange mix of squawking seagulls from the beach and the tiny, twittering sparrows that inhabited the forest. Itachi raised his eyes up to meet the brown ones again.
'You're like me.'
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After becoming a Genin, Kisame quickly forgot what life was like at the Academy. He heard things occasionally. Small things that other people knew from parents who taught there, or siblings who were still completing their formal education. Kisame easily shrugged any news on Academy students off. He'd rather train. What did he care if his teammate's sister was nervous about exams? He didn't know his teammate's sister, and the most that it would affect him would be that if she failed, he would have to cover for the older sister more than usual while she grieved.
Much to his teammate's distress, it just so happened that they had a mission that would take them to the warmer reaches of their island country that would have them leaving on the day of the exam. Momentarily, he thought about the agony his teammate must have felt when they walked out the gates, but it was ignorable. She was the type that tended to stay in the background. After they left the village, Kisame tried not to think about the Academy and its future half slaughtered class, or whether the little girl he heard about would be among the survivors. That was until three days later, when a messenger caught up with them and announced that all shinobi had been temporarily ordered back to the village. Then, suddenly the Academy exams meant a lot.
Though there had been no official order about keeping information from lower ranking ninja at the time, their sensei had had the messenger tell him what happened out of earshot. Looking back, Kisame guessed that must have been for the sake of his teammate. But she found out anyway when they returned to their village. Too many people were talking about it for them to get passed the main gates without hearing the words "massacre" and "academy" linked together. For the first time in his shinobi career, Kisame saw higher ranking ninja at a loss. The Mizukage was gathering the Jounin to him. Genin teams were dismissed and left in confusion, for the most part being as uninformed by their superiors as Kisame's own team. His teammate started running home almost immediately after their teacher told them they could go. Kisame started walking. Not home exactly, he told himself. He just let his feet wander.
He knew that was a lie, though. He told himself he was wandering, but really he knew exactly where he was going: the training building.
The building was closed up when he got their, security tape wrapped thickly enough around the premises to be seen at the end of the street. He told himself not to be surprise. What else could he have expected?
Kisame walked up to the building, and not for the first time, wished he still had his keys. He looked down at the lock that despite its simplicity, managed to keep the building unbreached. There was no jutsu around it, nor any complicated gears. The only thing that kept the small thing from being picked was the advanced alarm system that it was attached to, which was widely advertised around the village. And that was very, very complicated. At least, to a fourteen year old Genin.
He waited by the door, not because he thought he could get in anytime soon, but because he didn't think he would be able to get in at all and didn't know where else to go. The majority of his own family were likely to be called in for whatever meeting the Mizukage was holding. For a second, he started to wonder if his teammate had been able to find anyone at her house, but then he heard something. Footsteps. Fast ones.
Kisame stayed still, back leaned against the wall, as the training building's front door was unceremoniously thrown open and one very disgruntled Chuunin ran out. He lifted an eyebrow as the man ran down the steps to the nearest trash can, where he doubled over and proceeded to empty the contents of his stomach into the supporting container.
A moment later, calmer footsteps also came echoing down the hall. An older man exited the building a few moments later, walking across the street without making a move to indicate noticing the blue faced teenager still seated on the steps. When he reached the spot where his partner was still vomiting, the gray haired Chuunin said somberly, "Come on, we have to finish our report."
"Can't we finish it by memory!" the smaller one answer back, face still turned into the trash can so that his voice had to echo out of it to reach the other Chuunin's ears.
Kisame didn't care about listening any further. He slipped stealthily around to the door, the gray-blue color of his skin apparently disguise enough against the stone of the building. Inside the training building the temperature was freezing. Kisame thought to himself that it might have been the first time in the building's history that the heaters were shut off, allowing the cold outside to seep in. There were weapons left on the floor and half eaten forms of junk food left out on the counters as if the last people inside had left in a sudden hurry. Yet there was no poison on the air, and no sign of a threat or struggle having taken place before evacuation.
He found himself walking slowly through the building, as he would have on a mission rather than in a place where he spent the bulk of his time off duty. Routine led him down the hallway, towards the Genin locker room, where he would usually go first before training, and also because the design of the building was twisted that way, toward the room that only a few days ago had been the scene of the Academy exams. As he went, he saw other doors left unlocked and left gaping open along the hall as they never would have been on a normal day. More evidence of a sudden departure, but none that indicated a cause.
There was something almost stifling about the hallway without the sounds of clashing metal and the particular smack that only came when skin hit harshly against skin. It seemed too big. Though not to the extent that would eat at a mid-level ninja. Kisame didn't understand what had upset the first Chuunin, but that was before he came to that door.
Despite his slow and careful approach, Kisame couldn't make himself go farther in when he looked to his right and saw the open doorway before him, leading into the pure murky blackness of a room that had no natural source of light. He was only a few steps away from the locker room; he remembered hearing other boys talking before he left, claiming that if they listened closely on the test day, they could hear the matches going on in the other room. Kisame wondered if he would see toppled chairs and left behind bags of chips by the wall nearest the test room if he went inside and looked.
But that wasn't what he had come to see. There were footprints coming out of the exam room, darkish brown in color so that they almost appeared black in the dim light of the hallway. Looking downward and staring back the way he came, Kisame counted eight steps before they passed in front of a window, which in turn looked into a lounge that he knew from earlier days was occupied by the same two Jounin every morning until noon. Then the footsteps stopped, and two long, skidding streaks took their place, as if someone had been dragged on until the color source was either scraped off their feet, or one of the Jounin had hefted the person up and carried him the rest of the way out to keep him from struggling.
Looking back into the darkened room, Kisame's nose wrinkled at the stench coming out of it, confirming his suspicions that no one other than the two Chuunin he had seen earlier had come in or out of it in days. That included for the sake of cleaning up the debris of the exam. Kisame couldn't remember if anyone had rushed in to survey the damage inside the room after his own test. He remembered when he had been led inside with his brother and the rest of their class, knowing that it would be hours before the door was unlocked and that only half of the people led in would be able to walk out. He also remembered, with nightmarish clarity, that not all of the killings had gone as quickly as his. The matches between the sharp students and the not so sharp had been easy, but then there were others. The graceful, almost astounding fights between genius students who had somehow been paired together, and then the messy, bloody ones between students whose hearts were clearly not in the killing, but couldn't leave until it was done.
He remembered too, leaving the room afterward. How his eyes had foolishly strayed again and again to the ground, observing the multitude of gleaming red marks that were left behind by his classmates' sandals. It seemed strange that they could leave so many marks when their numbers had just been reduced by half. Later he supposed that he had been in shock. But it had clearly imprinted into his mind what the floor was supposed to look like after the exam. It was supposed to be nearly dyed with the patterns of a hundred overlapping footprints. But here, in the present, there was only one set. Eight steps, four per foot before the streaks began. And then after that there was nothing.
Kisame shivered. He turned back towards the door and took one step closer. The odor of blood and decay was overwhelming with his face turned directly toward it. Reaching out with a blue hand, Kisame took hold of the door and turned it back towards its frame, both blocking off the source of the smell, and allowing him to examine the lock on the outside. He looked over the front of the door carefully, trying to spot scratches around the handle, or smell the grease that might have been applied to loosen the gears of the lock. It was a feeble hope...
"Find anything?"
Kisame spun around quickly, nearly throwing the door back into its earlier place while doing so. When he was an elite Jounin, he would look back on how easily he was snuck up upon and shake his head sadly.
His teacher was standing behind him, leaning casually against the wall and watching him with his mouth in a grim line. Kisame straightened up and told himself not to glare at the higher ranking shinobi. He shook his head in answer to his sensei's question.
There was a half staged sigh in response. "Pity. We're having trouble discovering how he got in." At Kisame's questioning look, the older man raised an eyebrow. "You haven't heard the story? There was a massacre here the day we left. It appears a civilian boy is responsible for it. Witnesses saw him come out alone. Scrawny guy. Could be put together with sticks."
Kisame didn't say anything. His sensei continued to watch him carefully.
"We think he might have gone inside," the older man indicated the room behind his student with a bob of his chin, "the night before. The Academy teachers certainly didn't see him slip in with their classes when they brought them in." His teacher gave Kisame a look that made him wonder if he was expected to say something in response, but he didn't do so. "It's odd, isn't it?" the older man went on, "In the one part of the village where shinobi are supposed to be constantly on their guard, not one of them remembers seeing a dirty faced boy walk in off the street. It's making a lot of the council members nervous."
Pause.
"None of the alarms went off either," he added.
Kisame agreed quietly, trying not to look behind him at the door. Yes, it was strange. Almost embarrassing. Someone should have seen him.
He hoped he didn't look guilty.
Finally the older man gave up. Kisame was relieved. "Just so you know," he said, and then let the subject close. The Jounin pushed off the wall and indicated back down the hallway, again with his chin. "You shouldn't be in here. We're still investigating."
"Hai," Kisame said slowly. Then added, "I'll just be a minute." His teacher, who had already turned away, glanced back at him over his shoulder. "There's something I need to get."
Another sigh. "Make it quick. I can't explain to the investigators why there's a Genin on their crime scene."
Kisame bowed his head to his teacher, then turned around and hurried into the rookie locker room. Vaguely he acknowledged that his earlier suspicion had been true. There were chips and things left behind by teenage boys eager to hear the sounds of a fight on the other side of the tile-plated wall. He didn't spare it more than a glance though. He went directly to his own locker, the third one to the end in the back row.
He told himself not to be surprised when he opened the small cabinet and saw a shining ring of keys hanging from the hook usually meant for a towel. He stared at them quietly for a moment, unmoving and trying to coax himself to breathe.
He decided not to take the keys out of the locker when he finally went out to meet his teacher. He knew that if he did, he would start counting them before he even got out of the godforsaken snow, and if his sensei didn't notice them and take them away, he would have to know if his suspicion was correct. That he would find one key missing, one that might even at that moment be crusting over in a drying puddle of blood down the hall.
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Kisame came back to the present easily. Or rather, he took the one part of his awareness away from reminiscing and returned it to what the rest of his mind was focused on. Being a shinobi in any village meant developing a sense of split-mindedness. It was one of the basics that were drilled into children from the very beginning of their schooling. Especially in the Mist, after a civilian street rat had mysteriously waltzed his way into a building filled with every status of shinobi from ANBU to over-eager Genin.
Kisame hopped onto a particularly sturdy looking tree branch to catch his breath. He could have sworn that he had been all over this island twice by now without spotting a trace of Itachi. Despite having a memory filled with examples of his partner's competence, Kisame couldn't help it: he was getting worried. There were no signs of a struggle back where he had left him with their captive earlier. The only indication that anyone had been there at all were the scattered remaining needles of what had once been the pile he made of their target's weapons. It would seem that the kid had taken off in a hurry to get back to his beloved "guardian," which had very likely been what saved Zabuza's unworthy life.
Kisame shook his head. As much as he disliked it, Zabuza probably knew that he was on the island by now. Which did not do much to support the idea of resting when he was currently separated from his partner. Getting up, Kisame prepared to launch into another hour of springing from tree to tree, when his awareness suddenly picked up a chakra source.
Kisame took a moment, not trying to identify it, but rather trying to explain it. The signature was obviously Itachi, after all the time he'd spent with the prim and proper younger ninja it would have been impossible for him not to recognize it. What made him hesitate was the fact that it had come up so bluntly. It wasn't particularly close to where he was, but it was obvious. Like a candle suddenly light in a room without windows in the middle of a very, very cloudy night. Anyone could read it.
Frowning but needing to find his partner soon, Kisame started toward it. It wasn't like Itachi to be so careless. Particularly when they were in danger of jeopardizing their mission. Which brought him back to the reason he'd gone looking for the Uchiha in the first place…
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Yo! Look, an update! I'm not dead!
Guess what everyone? I found out only after writing out the rough draft of this chapter that there aren't exactly a lot of Japanese names starting with the letter P...So why don't we all just pretend that Kisame's mommy was Chinese, instead? And also, I'm sorry about the use of original characters in this chapter. Normally I'm very clear about thinking that original characters should stay in original fiction, but I couldn't exactly find a lot of background information on Kisame. I hope nobody got too annoyed.
And one more thing. SInce i know how easy it is for bad granmar to ruin a story for the reader, I am seeking a beta to help me catch all my mistakes before I post them online. If any would be willing to help me out, please contact me, 'kay? I swear I'll try to update more often!
And now for the reveiw responces!
Vicious-Loner: Thanks for reading the chapter all the way through. I wonder how many people just up and quit beforethey figured out that that wasn't an OC? (I know that I probably would have stopped reading somewhere in that). I hope that this chapter was an acceptable second.
Merani: YES, HE IS! Don't worry. There shall be no KisaHaku in this story. Mainly because KisaIta is my life. If there was an avatar of KisaIta, I would so bare it child.
Hiza-chan: Glad you loved it. Here's more.
Smoking Panda: Hello again. I'm sorry to say that there was no school girl referances in this chapter, though someone did give me a very interesting suggestion involving a cheerleader castume and a set of fluffy pompoms. Any ideas on how I can work that into the story?
Kodoku: I hope that I didn't run you off will all the back stroy on Kisame in this chapter. i figured the guy deserved a little time in the limelight, right? And aslo, well, I don't know about you, but I certainly wouldn't want to be the one that told Itachi about the birds and the bees. Gee...I wonder what poor Sasuke did when he reached that age...Anyway, I especailly enjoyed receiving your review. I love getting sucked into fanfiction, and it thrills me to hear that I'm providing the same kind of experance for others. Please review me again. I'd do a puppy face, except this is a computer.
minn yun: Miss me? I'm sorry to say that I lack the artistic ablity to draw the comic you mentioned. I tried to track it down so I could see it for myself, but unfortunately it didn't work (it sounded interesting). Especailly if it roped in a new KisaIta fan! There are so few of us out there...I liekd reading you analization of my chapter too. Unfortunately, I already had the title "Weaknesses" from posting on another site. But the title does have potental. I'll try and see if I can use it later on, ne?
Depressed Mizuki: Yay! I'd hug you if I could! I was ridiculously nervous about being too vague on Haku's identy. I even used his name in this chapter even though I haven't written with Kisame or Itachi learning it yet. And in responce to your rant...Eh, everyone shudders at the sight of their old work (I just looked back at the last chapter the other night. I think I might have started choking with embarassment at the last section).I hope that you found this chapter alright, it didn't get as much attention as the last one. But anyway...Good luck on increasing the lengths of your chapters. And thanks for being the first person to review LOOK AT ME!
Okay. That's all for now. Suggestions and currections are welcome.
