Author's note: I apologize in advance for the shortness of this chapter. It was a lot longer in my notebook (10 and a half pages!) and suddenly when I typed it, it was only five and a bit! So I'm sorry. Hope you like it anyway!
Disclaimer: nope, don't own it, and have no intentions of buying it.
--Tamara

A modern gauntlet

Sasori arrived later more out of principle than anything. He disliked having Pein dictate his schedule, regardless of how very much he owed the orange haired boy, and he showed it as much as he could. He couldn't do much, but he tried. Being late was one way of showing it.

When he stepped into Pein's basement, he saw that he wasn't the last to arrive. Deidara still wasn't there, and Kisame looked to have just sat down. Sasori shot Pein a look as he sat, daring the older boy to say anything. Pein didn't, but Sasori got a glare which told him that his lateness would not be forgotten.

"Did you call him?"

Sasori nodded in answer to Konan's question.

"And will he come?"

Sasori shrugged. "It wouldn't surprise me if he came very late."

"Later than you, you mean?" Pein demanded, scowling.

Sasori shrugged again, not answering. Instead, he glanced around, examining the room. Pein and Konan were there, of course, seated on Pein's bed at the head of the sloppy half circle, carefully not touching each other. Hidan and Kakuzu sat on their left, avoiding each other just as carefully as the other two. Hidan's wrists sported new, painful looking lacerations, which Kakuzu's dare eyes continuously darted back to. From the unhappy slant of his mouth, Sasori guessed that the two had argued about Hidan's masochistic tendancies fairly recently. He shrugged slightly. It wasn't his problem.

Itachi and Kisame sat opposite Hidan and Kakuzu, not looking at each other, but not actively avoiding each other either. It was a refreshing change. Zetsu sat next to Kisame, his face slightly blank as he talked with Aki, the voice in his head.

Sasori looked around again, more carefully this time. "Where's…" he began, but a high, slightly squeaky voice interrupted him.

"Hi Sasori! Boy is Tobi glad to see you! Nobody's talking to anyone, and it makes Tobi sad. Oh, do you want some lemonade? Tobi made it himself! Nobody else has had any, and it makes Tobi sad. Do you want to try? Please?"

"…Tobi," Sasori finished, eyeing the newly emerged masked figure with disgust. "And no, I have no desire for that stuff you call lemonade. Get out of my personal space now."

Tobi retreated obediently and set down his tray of fluorescent yellow liquid. He plopped himself down next to Zetsu, who backed away without missing a beat in his internal conversation.

"Does that answer your question?" Konan asked, grinning slightly.

"It does."

Just then, the front door slammed shut, and an all too familiar voice called, "Hello? Is anybody there, yeah?"

Pein just looked at Sasori, who stood and headed for the stairs, wondering when he'd become Deidara's designated caretaker. As far as he could recall, he'd never actually been asked his opinion. Though he hadn't really expected to. At least it wasn't Tobi…

Deidara was standing in the living room, looking around with interest.

"Have you ever heard of a doorbell?" Sasori asked dryly, leaning against the doorframe leading into the room from the kitchen.

Deidara started. "Have you ever heard of announcing your presence, yeah?"

Sasori ignored this. "Come on. They're waiting." He headed back towards the stairs, not checking to see if Deidara was following. He descended the stairs slowly, hearing Deidara's footsteps behind him. Good. At least he wouldn't have to go back up to fetch the brat a secont time.

No one had moved downstairs, not even Tobi, though the latter was chattering incessantly about a new toy he'd gotten for his birthday. From the very little he heard, Sasori gathered that it was called a Bionacle, or something like that, and that it was green. Je also saw Hidan eyeing his twelve inch dagger longingly. Sasori reached out and decked Tobi. Hard. The eighth grader slumped slightly and, mercifully, shut up.

"Thank fucking God," Hidan growled, putting his knife away. "I thought the little shit would never shut the fuck up."

Pein glanced at him, then turned his eyes back to Sasori and Deidara. He jerked his head, and the two sat down. Sasori purposefully put Deidara next to the still silent Tobi.

Once they'd all settled themselves, Pein began to speak, giving Deidara his, "We are Big and Scary and we will Take Over The World" speech. Sasori, who had heard it before, spent his time examining Deidara's reactions. To his credit, the blond didn't seem to be completely taken in by Pein's words. That was good. Sasori admired Pein as a leader, and even occasionally liked him as a person, but his grasp of the bigger picture was often far too ambitious. But, at least he got them places, which was better than nothing at all.

Pein finally finished talking, and all eyes turned to Deidara, who clearly had no clue what came next. Sasori leaned over. "This is the part where you swear your loyalty to Pein and put yourself at his complete disposal," he hissed.

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Oh." Pause. "What if I don't want to, yeah?"

Sasori shrugged. "You don't really have a choice."

Deidara scowled and stood. "Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I don't want anything to do with you, yeah." He made his way towards the door and started to leave, but suddenly froze. Slowly, he turned to see Itachi gripping his collar bone, bored expression still perfectly in place.

"Let me go, yeah! This is assault!"

Pein stood and came to join them. For once, he looked like more than just an especially commanding sophomore. Sasori found himself glad that his suddenly icy stare was directed at Deidara, not him.

"You want to leave?"

Deidara managed a nod.

"You're sure?"

Another nod. Deidara didn't seem to be able to look away.

"Can you fight?"

That got a bigger reaction. "Of course, yeah."

"Then you will fight Itachi. If you win, you get to go. When you lose, you stay with us. Does that seem acceptable?"

Deidara looked at Itachi, sizing him up. Sasori knew what he was seeing: a slender boy of average height, with no visible muscles and deep bags under his eyes. He should have been an easy target. Deidara had no way of knowing that he wasn't. "I won't lose," he proclaimed. Itachi's expression didn't change visibly, but Sasori knew he was smiling. Itachi liked nothing better than proving himself better than someone else. Sasori could almost feel sorry for Deidara.

"We'll see about that," Pein said dryly, glancing at Konan.

She shrugged. "I would suggest you do it outside," she said. "I doubt Pein's parents would appreciate you two trashing their basement."

Itachi's eyes flicked towards her, then away. He said nothing, but all could see his disdain. She shrugged. "Suit yourselves, then." She sat back down on Pein's bed, tossing her blue hair out of the way as she did so. The others backed up, giving Itachi and Deidara room. Sasori ended up next to Zetsu, Tobi having been banished to a far corner.

"Any bets on who will win?" Zetsu murmured, watching as Pein explained the terms.

"Itachi."

Zetsu raised his eyebrows. "You think? Have you ever seen Deidara fight?"

"Have you?"

"No," Zetsu admitted. "But he looks like he knows what he's doing."

Sasori snorted. "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear you imply that Itachi can't handle this."

Zetsu sighed. "I suppose. You think Deidara's really worth it?"

"No. But Pein seems to want him for some unknown reason. It's not up to us to decide."

"I suppose not," Zetsu agreed. They shut up as Pein walked towards his bed, signaling for the fight to begin as he sat down next to Konan.

It was quickly very clear that Deidara was hopelessly outclassed. He was a decent fighter, if overly dependant on his kicks, but he just couldn't compare with Itachi, who had a fourth degree black belt in both karate and taekwondo. Deidara didn't even stand a chance.

Finally, after several minutes of watching the pathetically one-sided excuse for a fight, Sasori grimaced. This was beyond pointless. "Pein, stop them! It's clear that Itachi will win."

Pein glanced at Sasori and shook his head. "Neither of them would thank me for that. Besides, Itachi enjoys himself so little that it would be cruel to deprive him of this opportunity to have fun. Unless… do you want to take Deidara's place?"

Sasori shook his head.

"Well then." Pein turned back towards the fight, though Sasori could see him sneak glances at Konan when he thought she wasn't looking. He also saw her look back, and he knew they'd been kissing after they hung up that afternoon. He hoped they could contain their lustful urges until the others were gone.

"Stop staring at me like that, yeah!" Sasori's attention was drawn back to the fight. Deidara clumsily dodged one of Itachi's fists, then groaned as Itachi's other one rammed straight into his ribs. His reaction time was off, apparently. Not that Sasori blamed him. Greater fighters than Deidara, including both Hidan and Pein, had been thrown off by Itachi's crimson contacts. It was part of the reason the black haired boy wore them.

Still, Deidara managed to leap nimbly onto a nearby chair, digging frantically into his pocket as he did so. He came out with a lump of clay, which he began to sculpt at lightning speed. Sasori watched as his fingers darted deftly through the clay, wondering if the blond had completely lost his mind. Though, come to think of it, that would imply that he'd once had a mind to lose, which wasn't actually a guarantee.

In a surprisingly quick period of time, Deidara held a white clay owl in the palm of his hand. Sasori eyed it critically. It was a good sculpture, he decided, one that would last a good long while if properly fired. Though why Deidara had made it now, Sasori had no idea.

Deidara dug into the other pocket with his free hand and produced a match, which he lit swiftly. Sasori's eyes widened as he realized what Deidara had planned. He would indeed fire the thing, but in a completely different manner than Sasori had thought. Was the blond boy completely insane?! Sasori scrambled backwards until he hit the wall and turned to face it, crouching down and unconsciously assuming the tornado protection pose in an effort to protect himself from the explosion. (Author's note: for those of you who don't live in places with tornado drills, the tornado protection pose goes like this: kneel down facing the wall and put both hands over the back of your neck to protect it. It works even better if you're under a table. –Caroline.)

There was a deafening bang, accompanied by a blinding flash and a wave of scorching heat. Sasori felt himself slowly begin to roast, and, with a burst of intuition, he determined that he was both dead and already in Hell. No judgment to pass, no being turned back at the gates by a seven-foot tall angel clutching giant keys… nothing. Apparently his life had already booked him an express seat on the bus down. He cracked an eye open, wondering what Hell looked like. A lot like Pein's room, apparently. That was odd. He opened the other eye. Yes, amazingly like Pein's room, actually. Maybe he was wrong and he hadn't gotten to Hell yet. He sat up straighter, formulating what he would tell the avenging angel when… if he got there.

From somewhere behind him came the sound of coughing, which made him reevaluate his conclusion again. Surely dead people were immune to smoke. Apparently not. He sat up even straighter, which was a mistake. He breathed in a lungful of the stuff, and began coughing himself. Okay, that did it. He was definitely alive. Not even in Hell would they torture him like this. Of course, he might just die of asphyxiation and get there anyway…

"Get down!" Zetsu said hoarsely, coughing beside Sasori. Blindly, the redhead obeyed, finding relatively smoke-free air this close to the ground. He took a long, blissful breath, relieved that he'd stopped chocking. He might actually make it out of here alive after all.

Finally, the sprinklers came on, the smoke having finally reached the detectors. For several hellish moments, the water did nothing but weigh the smoke down, so that Sasori's clean air supply was once again cut short, but eventually things began to clear. Apparently someone had had the sense and the air to open a window.

It took what seemed to be an eternity for the smoke to clear completely and the sprinklers to shut off. They were all drenched, but no one even seemed to notice. When they could finally see again, Sasori saw Itachi and Deidara in the middle. Deidara lay slumped at Itachi's feet, and Itachi was regarding him with an expression that could have been either triumphant or disgusted or, knowing Itachi, both.

After a long, shocked silence, Konan, stilly lying on the bed, her hair fanned around her head, remarked dryly, "I knew you should have taken it outside."