Disclaimer: I own nothing

Chapter 13: Storms

Months Later (April)…

Autumn had finally relaxed into a normal lifestyle. She would get up, get dressed, and go to school on weekdays, and on weekends, she would sleep late and watch cartoons. Itachi must've been wrong when he said that her high chakra levels were part of a bloodline, because now all seemed fine. Ever since she left, she was able to sleep regularly, and her chakra levels seemed fine too. She still practiced ninjutsu in her spare time, but that was only if she was bored. She was close to becoming a taijutsu master too. It was because of her former lessons that she was so good at it.

Life was nice, and school was... school. Apparently the leaders of the group formerly know as 'The Obsessionists' had started watching Naruto and thought it was a good idea to change their name to 'Konoha'. Annabel, the group's main leader, had become unusually interested in matchmaking lately, and she had even tried to make Autumn go on a date with J.J. of all people! Yes, things were finally back to normal.

May had become more social, and had (finally) started to make more friends within the group. In the time that Autumn had been gone, everyone had seemed to forget about Halloween, and her popularity had gone down, so no one had really noticed her absence. Not including her teachers. They of course noticed. All of her homework had been delivered to her house, meaning that she couldn't go back to school until her month's worth of homework was finished.

"Fall!" Autumn turned around to see May running toward her. It was Thursday afternoon, and school had ended for the day. The two friends were having a sleepover on the vacationing floor of Autumn's house. It was the night of the full moon again, and since then, Autumn never liked spending it alone. She remembered the days after she had come home. Her jutsu had accidentally transported the whole room into her house. It took weeks before she could put everything away. While in the process, Autumn had taken the liberty to examine some of the scrolls. The open one that she had found on the table seemed familiar enough. They had used the jutsu in an episode once, even though they didn't show the scroll. It was used to bring the dead back to life. It still required a sacrifice, but that was okay, Autumn wasn't planning to use it anyway. Another one was for the body transfer jutsu. Ew. The other ones were mostly medical jutsus, probably Kabuto's.

"Oh, it's just you..."

"Well of course! Were you expecting someone else?" May crossed her arms.

"N-no, it's just... nevermind." Autumn started to walk home with May trailing close behind. In May's opinion, there was something wrong with her. But, then again, having to do a month's worth of homework, plus the two months she hadn't left her house, all that together was probably enough to form some kind of mental issue. She'd just have to learn to live with it.

"So what are you going to do over the summer?" May asked, out of the blue.

"What?"

"Well, summer is right around the corner,"

"I'm guessing that to you 'right around the corner', extends to over two months ahead?"

"About two years actually, but yeah!" Autumn sighed, how could this girl be so happy? They soon came to the entrance of the tunnels.

"I was thinking about buying a few new books, and finishing some work that I've never got around to doing..."

"That's it?"

"Pretty much…"

"Well that's lame,"

"I guess..." Now it was May's turn to sigh,

"C'mon Fall, you have to have something good planned!" It was at that exact moment that the answer came and hit Autumn like a rock.

"OUCH!" In fact, it was a rock. A rather small one, but it still hurt.

"Who's there!?" May yelled, turning around. They were far enough in the tunnels that it was dark, and no one had bothered to light the lanterns yet. As May continued to yell, Autumn felt along the ground for the rock that hit her. She found it not too far away from where she had been standing. Reaching out to pick it up, she found that it wasn't just a rock, but there was paper around it.

"May?"

"What!?"

"Shut. Up."

"..." Autumn retrieved the paper, and threw the rock into the darkness. As soon as she heard the satisfying sound of another person in pain, she grabbed May's arm and left.

"What was that all about?" May asked once they were out of the tunnels.

"I don't know, but we'll soon find out. Look at this!" Autumn showed her the note.

"Ooh! It's paper! But how is that going to help us?" Autumn sweat-dropped. The only thing that seemed to concern her more than the giant bruise that was sure to form on the back of her head was May's brain. She had meant every word that she had just said, and that scared her.

"... You're my best friend, right?" Autumn asked,

"Best friends!"

"Good, then as your best friend, it's my job to give you advice,"

"And?"

"And, as your best friend, I highly suggest that you get a cat-scan."

"..." The two continued to walk in silence. When they got to the house, Autumn finally showed May the note.

"YAY!" May cheered, that was enough for both of them to keep busy that coming summer!

"Why are you cheering? You never doing anything besides watch!"

"So?" The note was a challenge from Autumn's childhood rival, Joey. She was supposed to gather a team, and they'd go all out this summer. They were going to play any kind of sport that could come out of Joey's demented mind, and if her team won, they had bragging right for the entire year.

"So, there's no point in you going. To beat the basket head, I'll need a team that's actually willing to work." Even though they were friends, May had this problem with not being helpful. It seemed as if for some reason, no matter who she was working with, she would just quit before it even started.

"Meanie..."

"Deal with it, come on." The two walked into the house, and climbed the countless number of stairs until they got to the vacation room. This would be where they would wait and spend the night until Autumn was once again reassured with the break of dawn.

-Rumble...-

-Crash!!-

-BOOM!!-

-ROAR!-

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!"

It was a dark and stormy night, Autumn was standing bravely by the window. While instead her friend, May, was hiding, not as bravely, under her sleeping bag.

"Could you please stop screaming?" Autumn pleaded. This had been going on for most of the night, and they still had to go to school in the morning.

-CRASH, BOOM, ROAR!!-

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" May screamed again. Why did this have to happen on a school night?

-BANG!!-

"AAAHHH-"

"SHUT UP!!" That was it, Autumn had finally lost her patience. This girl was fourteen for pete's sake! There was no good excuse for her to be afraid of a little storm. (I'm saying this, and yet...) It was past midnight, and Autumn still hadn't gotten a minute of sleep! Of course Autumn wasn't affected that much, see as she was used to such, but when she was an insomniac, she spent her nights in complete silence. And this was as far from that as you could get. May suddenly froze, it was probably because she had never been yelled at by Autumn before.

"A-autumn..."

"What did I just say?"

"B-b-b-but..."

"Just stay in your little corner, and everything will get better," May finally stopped whimpering, and pointed in Autumn's general direction.

"What?" Autumn asked, turning around. Behind her were ten very familiar figures, all standing in the shadows. As soon as a flash of lightning briefly illuminated the looks on their faces, she automatically realized that she was is a whole lot of trouble. Now in front of her, stood the akatsuki. All dripping wet, and all of them looked very unhappy (Not including Itachi 'cuz he's awesome like that).

Autumn, despite the seriousness of her current situation, burst out laughing.

"... and what, is so funny?" Pein asked, glaring at her.

-CRASH!!-

May, who was still terrified, let out a small squeal, and hid back in her sleeping bag. Sadly for her, that small squeal was just enough to get her noticed.

The akatsuki briefly glanced at the poor girl in the corner, before they moved. Itachi picked up Autumn, from where she was still laughing on the floor, and left the room. The rest of the akatsuki followed, but Pein took one final glance at May, and left.

"Ooooowwwwww..." Autumn whined.

The once joyful sound of laughter had been quickly replaced by the sound of some poor unfortunate person groaning in pain. If anyone from the outside world could have heard if over the storm, surely they would've come to help said person, but of course, they lived in an old house in the agricultural district, with no neighbors, and a huge storm raging outside. No one would hear them scream.

"Where have you been?" Pein asked, sternly.

"I could ask you all that same thing. I haven't seen any of you since I was kidnapped (again) by the 'Evil Assistant Point-Dexter of Doom', and taken to the 'evil underground brothel' and forced to join the 'harem of no return'." Itachi raised an eyebrow, but kept silent.

"I suppose that by 'Point-Dexter', you mean Kabuto…" Sasori said, walking forward toward Autumn.

"No, I'm talking about the other evil silver-haired freak that works for Orochimaru, and has been stalking me for the past two years." She responded, cheekily. Sasori glared at her, and raised his hand threateningly. As a response, Autumn let her aura flare dangerously, which matched the mood since a huge crash of thunder roared at the same time. Sasori's glare hardened, but he backed off.

"I see that I'll have to give you another lesson in respect, shoujo." Autumn squeaked, something in his voice told her that he wasn't kidding. Her chakra's signal retreated into her body, and she backed herself into a corner. She saw Itachi whisper something to Pein, hopefully in her defense, and felt his powerful chakra slowly retreat as hers did.

"Your punishment can wait, you said you were kidnapped by Kabuto?" Autumn nodded,

"Yes..."

"Tell us the whole story. What happened after Itachi and Konan left?"

"Two days after they left, I heard Kabuto going door to door... looking for me," Pein cut her off,

"How do you know that it was you he was searching for?"

"... He described the person as an average size girl with brown hair, and matching eyes, he said she was wearing unusual clothes, and had a mood swings." A few people muttered in agreement. Pein nodded for her to go on,

"When he came to my room, he knew it was me when I didn't answer. He had a clone placed outside of the room, so I couldn't escape, and he was going to break the door down. I threw a leftover kunai at the clone, but it caught it,"

"So that's when you were captured." It was more of a statement than a question.

"No, someone threw a kunai at the clone's back, and told me to jump," She was purposefully going to leave out her trip to Konoha.

"Did you see who?"

"No, the smoke from the clone masked their face, all I know is that they caught me, and told me to run. I ran far enough as the border, before Kabuto caught up with me,"

"I see. If you spent that much time in Orochimaru's lair, then there's no need for any further torture. You will once again be in the care of Itachi. Our world isn't safe for you right now. You are both dismissed." Autumn and Itachi nodded, and left.

-ROAR!!-

"What's wrong? Why are you guys here?" Autumn asked Itachi as they were climbing the stairs.

"It's Leader-sama,"

"Please tell me he's not thinking about killing me again!" She whined, last time, someone got hurt.

"..."

"He is isn't he?"

"..."

"What do I have to risk my life for this time?"

"..." Itachi's lack of answering was starting to piss her off. Autumn stopped in the middle of the stairs in protest,

"Tell me!"

"In the past five months that you've had the sharingan, has it improved any?" She stared at him. She had never really cared, and she had no use for it after she left, so...

"I'm not sure, why?"

"Show me,"

"What?"

"Activate your sharingan," Autumn, not sure of what was going on, did as she was told. Itachi examined it for a bit, then nodded,

"You've been training." He confirmed.

"Eh? What does that have to do with anything?"

"I'll explain everything to you later, until then, don't you have a guest to tend to?" Autumn gasped, she had forgotten all about May! Itachi watched as his charge hurried up the stairs. If his calculations were correct, then because of this girl the timeline of his world had changed completely. If he was to achieve his goal, she needed to be as strong as possible.

Their time was running out.