Epilogue
Once they had packed Nanase and her fan off with Zetsu and disposed of the remaining Awagami, the leader sent them to Lightning on another assignment. The run was quiet. Peaceful. Normal, like before.
Until Kisame said thoughtfully, "You know, I wonder if Zabuza-kun isn't on to something..."
Itachi had no need of the sharingan to know that he was going to regret asking, and yet he asked, "How so?"
"It would be fun to have our own student, wouldn't it? Shouldn't be too hard to find someone, either. There's always kids like that around any of the -"
"We are not stealing a child."
"It's not stealing if no one else wants them," Kisame pointed out, as if that were a reasonable thing to say about children. "Most of them probably won't have bloodline abilities, but you never know. And decent training can do a lot. Just think about it - you could teach them that trick with the shuriken you like showing off with, I can teach them how to handle Samehada... Oh, I'm not too bad at sewing, so I can make them a coat, if the leader doesn't mind including -"
"Absolutely not."
"You're so boring sometimes, Itachi-san."
The silence returned for a couple of minutes, but the mere mention of Zabuza had brought a nagging question to the front of Itachi's mind. It was likely nothing important; still, after the last few days, better to be clear than not. "What did Zabuza mean by 'whatever it is you two have going on'? Is it possible that he knows about Akatsuki?"
"Hm? Oh, I doubt that," said Kisame. "With what he's been up to, I don't think he would have heard about it at all. No - with these coats and the rings and all, he probably just thinks we're a couple."
Itachi nearly crashed into a tree.
Author's Note: Sasuke, going through Itachi's memories 5 years later: what the fUCK
I hope you enjoyed this rather silly ride!