"Itachi. Itachi! C'mon, Itachi! It's time to get up, we have a mission!"
A rough voice and continuous poking awoke Uchiha Itachi from a dream.
He grumbled, wishing his dreams were real, before he punched the person the voice belonged to.
His fist made contact with Hoshigaki Kisame's palm, having no effect on the annoyingly tall shark/man hybrid.
Itachi finally opened his eyes and glared at Kisame with blood red eyes, sending shivers up the blue man's spine.
Itachi took no time in flinging Kisame's fist back at him and leaving his bed fully clothed.
Being prepared for missions at ungodly hours came with the job description and Itachi sometimes wondered if protecting Konohagakure was worth the pain of working in the Akatsuki.
His eyes returned to an onyx shade and he left the room with the blue skinned man, who had been dubbed his partner-in-crime since his last partner-in-crime had died (read: viciously murdered).
Itachi had no time to dabble in his thoughts as he and Kisame were being sent to capture the nine tails container, the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki, Uzumaki Naruto.
Itachi was slightly pissed he had to go back to Konoha to get the Kyuubi vessel, but he refused to show it.
It took a few hours to reach Konoha, but the eventuality was unexpected.
Itachi and Kisame used a jutsu that changed their appearance, a Henge, to infiltrate the large village.
The guards at the gate were given no notice of the illusionary technique and the partners in crime entered the village under the pretense of being wanderers from Takigakure, the Village Hidden in the Waterfall.
They took their time, looking for a short ten year old blond who was loud and was wearing an obnoxiously bright orange jumpsuit. It was a barely a few hours before anything caught Kisame's attention.
"Did you hear about what happened last night?" a random villager said as he passed nearby to Kisame. His companion, and apparent wife, gave a negative response, so he elaborated: "I overheard one of the shinobi near the Hokage's Tower talking about how they found the demon dead. Turns out, he'd jumped from the top of the Yondaime's head!"
The man's female companion gasped and silently cheered under her breath.
As the couple passed out of earshot, Kisame stared at their backs before walking off to find Itachi, who gave Kisame a nod of understanding upon hearing the little tidbit.
They both had the same questions running through their minds.
Who was the demon?
Why had he killed himself?
Was he the one that they were looking for?
None of the questions had answers they hoped for.
After some digging around and eavesdropping that lasted another day, Kisame returned to the inn that he and Itachi were staying in on the outskirts of Konoha.
Itachi looked up from the notebook he had been using to keep track of all the information they had acquired.
Kisame stood with his arms crossed as he stood in front of Itachi.
Itachi had to strain his neck to see Kisame's face, the man was already tall and Itachi being seated on the floor did not help the neck pain that came with being acquaintances with such a brutish man.
Kisame almost laughed at the raven's predicament, though he composed himself and sat himself down roughly in front of Itachi.
Kisame locked eyes with Itachi, a very dangerous action to do with an Uchiha.
"Good news!" Kisame exclaimed with a painful smile. "While you've been lounging around in here, I found the nine tails' jinchūriki. Bad news: the kid that committed suicide a few nights ago was the jinchūriki."
Itachi gently face palmed at the new information, information that was the opposite of what the other half of the pair had hoped for.
While he appeared annoyed, Itachi was truly thankful. The inability to currently access the Kyūbi no Kitsune meant that the Akatsuki's plan would take longer to accomplish, meaning Itachi had time to sabotage the Akatsuki before they collected all the Bijū.
Itachi looked up from behind his dark hair and gave Kisame a vicious look.
Kisame shuddered slightly, almost expecting the pale skinned man's eyes to turn into a bloody red concoction of death.
Itachi stood and stared down at the blue skinned man, making Kisame suddenly felt small, so small, compared to the Uchiha above him, despite being a good head taller than the aforementioned man.
"Due to these unforeseen circumstances, we will simply have to hope for the Kyuubi to reform with haste. In the meantime, I recommend we not bring any attention to ourselves and continue to hide, gather more information and then return to the hideout if no more information of interest is presented," Itachi said, his voice deep and amplified with authoritative responsibility.
The light from the corners of the the curtain-covered windows cast Itachi a harsh outline in Kisame's eyes, burning the image of the black cloak and red clouds forever in his memory.
Purple, rippled eyes pierced the shadows of the dry room. A pair of onyx eyes stared back, their owner doing a rather good job resisting the urge to direct Chakra to their eyes and glare at their superior with bloody red orbs of death.
Pein leaned forward, resting his elbow on his knee, his spiky orange hair giving very little contrast to the darkness around him.
Pein's purple eyes gave off a demeaning air towards Itachi, who gave no waver to his resolved stance or his blank stare. Pein nodded in understanding towards Itachi.
"Due to such unforeseen circumstances, you and Kisame will be off duty for a few weeks," Pein spoke with closed eyes, not needing to see if Itachi was paying attention. "After those weeks, if the Kyuubi no Kitsune has not regained any physical form, you shall both be reinstated on normal missions to assist with funding until the nine tails has reformed."
Pein waved Itachi off, taking no bother to even look at him. Itachi bowed deeply and swept out of the room in silence, leaving the God and his Angel alone once more.
Kisame slammed his fist down on the table. He glared at the empty space beside Itachi's head, his shark-like eyes narrowing to near invisibility.
Itachi had broken the news of their premature vacation and Kisame was extensively annoyed, knowing he wouldn't be able to relax over the little time they had away from work. Kisame suddenly stood, warranting no physical response from Itachi thanks to years of training to be an unflinching killer. Kisame exited the bare room, leaving his black and red cloak abandoned on the edge of Itachi's bed.
Itachi stared blankly at the slamming door as Kisame left from his field of vision. Once Itachi was sure Kisame had left, he stood as well and went to close the door that had cracked open when the older man had stormed out. Itachi sighed at the closed door and walked backwards towards his bed, ungracefully plopping himself down onto the stiff mattress. One thought crossed his mind.
Kakazu needed to invest in some better beds.
Itachi huffed and wrapped himself in the thin blankets, burying himself in a pile of clothing. Normally, he showed no emotion, but in his room, he let out a tired and victorious yell in to his pillow. He wouldn't be seen until the next morning, when Deidera would plant a bomb outside Sasori's door.
--
Deidera persistently kept pushing his pale blonde hair out of the way of his left eye, which was covered in a camera-like contraption. He gave himself a hum of approval as he held up a white clay model of a spider in the palm him hand. Now was the perfect time to prank Sasori, his partner in the Akatsuki. The clay spider would explode the moment when Deidera would manually activate his Chakra that flowed in the clay creature, making sure that Sasori got the brunt of the destructive power. Deidera made sure it was a simple C1 bomb, so it wouldn't do that much damage to the hideout, but would be effective against his usual target.
The moment the redhead, Sasori, opened his door, he knew he was being pranked, because the moment he opened his door, a white blob entered his vision and clouded his sight before exploding, covering his vision with grey. It didn't stop there, either. When Sasori managed to fan away the excess smoke (more out of habit than necessity), he was faced with three clay birds, all of which exploded consecutively, leaving a very unamused Sasori completely undamaged from the explosions that would've killed a regular human. Having been used to his partner's antics after years of working with him, the redhead just kept walking down the hallway, careful to not break the weakened door when he finally left his room. Instead of a peaceful walk to the kitchen, Sasori was faced with a swarm of tiny clay insects and the uncontrollable urge to dramatically sigh.
Needless to say, Sasori was no ordinary human, his body was a literal puppet. He had found a way of achieving immortality, by compressing everything that kept him alive, including his consciousness, into a cylinder which he was to insert the cylinder into a life sized puppet version of himself. The subsequent result of creating his own puppet body gave him immortality and an annoying immunity to the constant dangerous pranks his blond partner performed. This also meant that, everyday, right after he ate breakfast, he had to go back to his room to wipe all the ash from his humanoid face and occasionally remake and replace a limb or two after some larger bomb pranks.
Oh, the joys of being in the Akatsuki.