I really disappeared for a hot minute there, didn't I? Well I'm back for real now. Sometimes shit just all goes wrong in life y'know?

You just gotta get back up and keep going anyway.

A box of ten young cats sat in a bedroom of the home of four women, and those women each had a wide variety of opinions on said cats.

Megan, holding a bag of cat food and a stack of styrofoam bowls, just wanted to feed the poor things. "They're all probably starving," she insisted.

"The majority of them are also assholes and they might need to be separated," Dawn said. She was interested in maybe keeping at the most two or three of them, but nowhere near interested in fostering all ten.

Autumn, who would like to keep one but wouldn't put up a fuss if they were just taken to a shelter, crouched down to peer into the box. "Some of them are total love bugs," she pointed out. She reached in and immediately the cat with the orange spots on his face jumped up to rub against her hand. "It's just the silvery one that's an asshole." As if to prove her point, the silver cat hissed and swatted at her, making her quickly pull away.

And Crysta, always a point of chaos in life and wholeheartedly believing they could handle keeping all ten cats, scoffed. "Then put the fucker in timeout. He can eat alone."

"Good luck getting him away from the others, he'll probably take your whole arm with you," Autumn said.

That made Dawn and Crysta share a look. They didn't say anything, but as two harbingers of chaos, they both understood. "I'll try getting him," Crysta said confidently. "I've been through worse, I can survive some cat scratches." As expected, the silver cat hissed and yowled when Crysta crouched down. She made it out that she was looking for an angle to successfully reach in for him, distracting him from Dawn going around the box to a position behind him. The other cats were watching her, and some growled in warning when she slowly reached for the silver cat, but he didn't react in time; Dawn successfully scruffed him and lifted up the frozen cat.

"There we go," Dawn said. "He's not so tough now." He growled, but it was all he could do. "I'll keep him in my room, there's not a lot I have that he can destroy or get into."

As Dawn took the cat away, Autumn and Crysta took turns carefully removing the other cats one at a time while Megan poured them each their own bowl of food. Once all nine cats were out, the girls stepped back to give them space‒then watched as the cats only sniffed or stared in distaste at the food before them. "I thought a few of them would be picky," Autumn said, "not all of them."

"Maybe they're stressed," Megan said, wanting nothing more than to just scoop them all into her arms and shower them in love.

"Or they're ungrateful little bastards," Crysta joked.

"Whatever it is, if we can't get them to eat, we have to take them to the shelter quicker than we thought," Autumn said. Then, as if the word shelter was a trigger word, the ginger cat gave a low meow and one by one the cats gave their food a try. The three girls shared a look. "Let's just go try to see if the other cat will eat," Autumn told Megan, and Crysta stayed behind in her room to keep an eye on the other nine.

Hidan wasn't necessarily a raging, swearing maniac all the time. He could be pleasant (in his own special Hidan sort of way) when he wanted to be. However, when he was pissed off, he was the type to just go off for as long as his anger lasted, depending on the extent to which he was mad. Being stuck as a cat and literally being put in time out, for example, was enough to have him fuming all day.

He rejected the food they gave him. He refused to let anyone get close to him. He swore and yelled when they managed to get close anyway and put him in his own box full of towels, and it pissed him off even more that they couldn't understand him saying that he would rather piss on their carpet.

Even when his adrenaline began dying away and his anger was burning out, Hidan just wanted to be difficult for the sake of being difficult. That was just hard to pull off from a box. In reality, though, he couldn't even remember the last time he had time to himself for this long. If he weren't stuck as a cat with a bunch of girls fawning over him, he'd probably be living up the silence. No leader bitching at him to calm down, no Kakuzu berating him and calling him an idiot, no listening to his fellow Akatsuki members' annoying conversations.

Then, in a stroke of intelligence, Hidan realized he could use this all to his advantage. As fun as it was to cause mayhem and annoy the hell out of these girls, he could live it up a little bit. People fucking worshipped their pets, and if he got on their good side, he could be like royalty while enjoying his silence.

When that ginger girl (Dawn, if he remembered correctly) cautiously placed the bowl of food and a bowl of water in the box with him, Hidan played innocent. He leaned in and pressed his forehead against her hand. He wasn't exactly sure what cats did to show affection, but he felt like he had the gist of it.

"Oh, now you want to be nice?" she said irritably. Hidan felt his ears flatten back (the things reacted to his emotions on impulse, similar to how his tail practically had a mind of its own) but he didn't give up just yet. He looked up at her and meowed (in reality he just said a not-as-aggressive "Fuck you") and tried again, rubbing his head against her hand. He heard her sigh in defeat, then she relented and pet his head.

"That's right, bitch, love me," Hidan said victoriously. Even when she eventually got back up and left him again, Hidan was smug for the rest of the day. He would have these girls wrapped around his finger in no time.

It eventually grew dark, and from his box he heard Dawn getting into her bed. He considered meowing all night until she took him out, but that either would take too long or result in him getting moved to somewhere in solitude. Then it occurred to him to try something that he should've attempted hours ago. He was a cat for Jashin's sake, and they were known for being able to jump.

It took a few tries, but Hidan eventually was able to get a grip on the top of the box, hauling himself over and landing on the floor with a quiet thump. He surveyed his surroundings, then immediately went for the bed, using his claws to dig into the blanket dangling low enough for him to reach and began to climb. He made it this far, so he decided he'd go straight for the kill.

Hidan made his resting place right on Dawn's chest.

His action did startle her, and she said something along the lines of him needing a bigger box, but Hidan wasn't even paying attention. "You're like the titty queen," he said to her in awe. She shook her head, and much to his delight she seemed to decide to leave him where he was on his cushioned throne.

"If you attack me or wake me up at all I swear I'm shutting you in that fucking box with tape," she muttered, petting him, and Hidan knew he would be on his best behavior. Her fingers brushed against his pendant, and she felt around it. Hidan had been wearing it the entire time, but his fur was long and stringy, hiding it mostly from sight. He had been surprised he still had it on in this form, but he was relieved; it was almost comforting to still be able to feel it, even if it got caught in his fur. Dawn found the triangular charm and studied it through the darkness. "Shit, it's been a while but I remember what this is," she said, and it caught Hidan's attention.

The woman smiled in amusement, and he waited for her to mention Jashinism, but instead she said something that had him on edge: "In retrospect, maybe Hidan was always a good name for you."

Even when she eventually fell asleep, Hidan was still studying her through the darkness. He tried thinking back, tried thinking if he actually should know this girl or if there was any possible way she should know who he is, but nothing came to mind. As far as he knew, the only way she would know him was because of his reputation. He had slaughtered a good amount of his village after all, all for the sake of Jashinism. So the pendant, his silver fur, and his aggressive attitude added up to something that could be chalked up to a weird coincidence. It was nothing to necessarily be alarmed about.

Hidan let himself relax, and let himself enjoy his time with where he was sleeping.

Pein studied "Tobi" carefully through the darkness. After a brief survey of the girl's room, the leader had asked if there was anything worth noting, and after a brief pause he got the answer in the typical high-pitched voice, "Her bed is super comfortable!"

"She also has quite a lot of stuffed animals," Zetsu's white half added lightheartedly. Pein knew then there was nothing for them to see in Megan's room. He and Konan (making up the four cats that Megan had kept with her that night) had tried simultaneously activating the Astral Projection Jutsu to contact the others, but to no avail.

"It would be ridiculous seeing projections of cats anyway," Zetsu's black half grumbled. He had positioned himself on the windowsill, perched over Megan's sleeping form, plotting something in that strange mind of his. On the bed, Tobi was curled against the girl's side, seemingly asleep.

But Pein knew that Madara was listening.

"It's a wonder you're able to move at all," Konan said.

Pein could agree. He couldn't wrap his head around the fact that he was able to maintain connection to his "real" body and yet couldn't decipher where the Deva Path was even located at the moment. He had briefly considered switching to one of the other Paths of Pain to try locating the Akatsuki's whereabouts, but Konan quickly reminded him that he may not be able to reconnect with the Deva Path with how strangely their chakra was behaving, so the idea was filed in the back of his mind as an absolute last resort.

"It feels just as taxing now as it is to maintain control of all six," he admitted silently. Through the darkness, he could see Konan's tail swishing. She had become cold and closed off like he did through the years, but in his mind's eye he could still imagine the fear in her expression that she would have whenever she looked at him. "No matter," he said, "because so long as I'm in control now, I will make sure I maintain it until we escape."

Tobi suddenly stretched. "You almost make it sound like a prison break, Leader-sama," he said, voice chipper and wide awake as ever.

Pein didn't fail to notice that he was being especially cautious using his Tobi persona, even here in privacy.

"This is a prison," Zetsu's black half growled. Then his white half added, cryptically, "I think we can think of a worse prison than this."

"Prison or not," the leader of the Akatsuki said, feeling the weight of a Sharingan on him, "we will do whatever it takes to break out of these forms and return home."

Fun fact: The cover art was made by irl Megan. That girl is so amazingly talented and I was so happy when she offered to make a cover for me.

I was known for disappearing at random in the past, but I'll try to not make a habit out of it, because chapter three is already outlined. I just needed a bit of a break. For a sneak preview: more development of the girls, more cat shenanigans, and maybe some more foreshadowing thrown in before we get our Akatsuki back as humans. This story has a long way to go, and I have too much planned to let it go to waste.

See you next week.