Author's Note: Hey! I want to take everyone for the kind and helpful reviews so far, I greatly look forward to them every Monday :)

Disclaimer: Own Naruto, I do not. Also, use typical sentence structure, I do not.


I sat down under the oak tree facing the sports field, Ino and Tenten standing on either side of me. I acted as if I didn't notice the girls staring at me as they walked by.

"Dude, okay, seriously what's up, why are they all staring at you? Did you kill someone?" Ino looked down at me. My phone buzzed in my pocket and I rolled my eyes, pulling it out.

xSparklesx: Whose that chick that Deidara gave a ride to this morning? I saw her talking to Itachi during lunch once too. What's going on!?

2Hot4School: Who was she? I've never seen her before! I don't want to have another rival that I need to beat.

Gama14: You must know something about that girl right? I don't think I like her.

There were a few similar messages lined up on my comments. I hung my head and passed my phone to Ino, who quickly read and then passed it to Tenten.

"He's how you got here this morning? How the hell did you manage that?" Another girl walked by, and gave me the stink eye. Ino glared her down and ran her finger across her throat and held up a fist. The girl seemed startled and walked away quickly. Ino looked down at me. "I got your back."

"Gee. Thanks." I ran my fingers through my hair. My phone buzzed again. "What now?" I yelled. It had been going off all morning. I held the power button down until it shut off.

"Really, what happened?" Ino prodded. I patted the spots on either side of me, gesturing for the two of them to sit.

"My alarm clocked stopped working, and Rui didn't check to see if I was up because she spent he entire night trying to meet her deadline for work. Eventually I woke up on my own and I figured I had at least a little bit of time to take a shower. So then I ran to the train station. Then you called and told me I missed it. So I'm running and I get to the intersection on Main Street and the crosswalk turns red. Then Deidara shows up, asking if I want to hop on the back of his bike-"

"You got to school riding tandem on a bicycle? That's still pretty lame." Ino was picking at her nails

"No, shut up, it was a motorbike." I corrected her.

"Oh, that's kind of sexy."

"That's not the point!"

"But you agree?" She smirked.

"Oh would you shut up!" I continued my story. "Anyway, so I'm sitting on the back, no helmet, nothing, cause according to him the police don't patrol around there anyway. So we ride past the school, and everyone stares. Everyone. Almost instantly I started getting posts on my blog asking about me. That's not even the weird part either. Yesterday after lunch, I tried talking to him and we started arguing and I ended up calling him an asshole and just leaving. It's like he thought me insulting him was a compliment." Tenten had migrated over to Ino's side and they both stared at me wide-eyed as I laughed hysterically for a few seconds.

"You okay?" Tenten patted me on the back.

"I'm not okay! I don't know what I'm doing!" I pushed myself out from the tree and laid on my back. "I don't want people to know I exist."

"Maybe it was because you didn't act like everyone else and tried to impress him." Tenten added. Ino started talking.

"We could have told you this was going to happen. There's no way you can be friends with any of them without people noticing. It was going to happen sooner or later. Be careful how you handle it. You don't want to make enemies with the wrong crowd" Ino had no pity for me. "Let's just eat, if we're late for gym Guy-sensei is going to go off on another spiel about youth and how we're wasting it." We shoveled our food down our throats and made our way to the gym. I held my bag to my chest as I walked into the locker room, whispers erupting around me. I breathed deeply, ignoring them as I changed into my clothes and walked out into the gym. I spent the whole class standing around, watching girls try and point nonchalantly towards me. Well, I'm ready to go home.


Good Evening Ladies

It has recently been brought to my attention that an unrecognized female has been spotted hanging around Itachi and Deidara lately. I've asked around, and carefully observed, and this is what I've learned about her.

Name: Akihana Ito

Class: 2-B

Height: 160 cm

Other: From what I've gathered, she is not a member of any after school clubs and there is very little information about her. I don't know her connection with the rest of the Akatsuki.

Hopefully that's enough to get them off my back. I shut the lid on my laptop and slid it under my bed. I pulled the cover up tight around me. The sports festival is tomorrow. I can't say I'm not a tiny bit excited.


"Are you excited?" I looked over at Tenten as I tied the headband emblazoned with the words 'fighting spirit' across my forehead.

"Hell yeah I'm excited. We're gonna kick some third-year ass!" Tenten tied an identical headband across her forehead.

"You guys are getting way too into this, it's just a sports festival." Ino looked unimpressed and flicked her ponytail off her shoulder.

"Nonsense! Not only is this a great opportunity to kick butt," I lowered my voice, "it's also a great opportunity to get some more information."

"You've been doing this for like the past three weeks, honestly, I thought this was going to be a onetime deal. I can't believe you've stuck with it this long."

"Well you better believe it, I'm not giving up."

"Come on Ino, give her some credit, just imagine if she put this much effort into her homework," Tenten joked.

"Gee, thanks, I see the confidence you guys have in me." The two of them laughed. "Come on Tenten, we're gonna be late for the race. Ino, you better cheer us on."

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry," Ino smirked and walked off in the other direction, probably to find Sakura and Hinata. Tenten and I made out way to the track field where we were given some rope to tie our legs together. I scanned the spectators and quickly found Sakura, Ino, and Hinata. They all gave me an encouraging smile as I waved at them. I looked around some more, and after a while was able to pick Itachi out of the group. I'm surprised he actually showed up. I waved calmly towards him, and he gave a polite nod in return. Tenten and I rested our arms on each others shoulders and walked up to the starting line. There were six other teams competing, two first year teams, two second year teams, and finally two third year teams. Actually, we're missing a third year team.

"Hey Aki, check those two out." I looked over my shoulder. and started snickering.

"I can't believe they suckered me into this stupid thing, yeah." Deidara had his foot tied up with Tobi's and the two of them were struggling to make it to the starting line. I looked around, the only empty spot was directly next to us. I groaned. Great, all we need is for them to trip us.

"Come on Deidara-senpai, it'll be fun!" Tobi was clearly excited. Despite his eagerness, he was still clumsy.

"Let's just get this over with so I can head back. Hidan's going to eat all of my chips." They finally stumbled their way over to the starting line. I could clearly see the annoyance on Deidara's face. I nudged him.

"Hey, don't look so pissed off, your face might freeze like that." I smirked. He scowled even more.

"Yeah yeah, mind your own business, Bambi." Guy-sensei walked to the edge of the track and looked at a stop watch as he held up a bright red starting pistol.

"On your marks, get set." Bang! The pistol sounded and Tenten and I took off. We spent every day after school the past week practicing for this race, I'll be damned if we don't win.

"Come on! No, that's not your left dammit!" I heard Deidara arguing with Tobi behind us, and couldn't help but laugh. That's what he gets for whining. Tenten and I just barely managed to inch ahead of the third-year team in front of us before crossing the finish line in first. We did a quick victory dance before sitting down and untying our laces. I watched as Deidara and Tobi crossed the finish line next to us. At least they beat one team. Last place finishers were a pair of first-year girls who were too busy giggling at short, blonde, and mildly attractive over there to even pay attention to what was going on. Not much of an achievement though. I looked at Deidara out of the corner of my eyes as he walked by and stuck my tongue out at him. I was lightly punched on the shoulder. I can just imagine the sour look he has on his face. Tenten and I got up and dusted ourselves off. The play wasn't for several more hours, and I still had 2 more hours to kill before the folk dance. I looked around. Everyone had gone their separate ways.

"I suppose I could go buy some food at one of the carts or something." I said aloud to no one in particular. I patted my pocket, looking for my coin purse. Dammit. I must have left it on my desk. I walked through the track field towards the side entrance of the school. I pulled on the door and walked into the hallway. It was silent, save for the slight murmurs coming from a vacant classroom. It must be a club or something. As I reached the stairs, I hear footsteps coming from my right. I ignored them as I was about to start up the stairs, but was stopped by a sharp yank on the back of my t-shirt.

"Where do you think you're going, Akihana Ito?" I whipped my head around. A girl I didn't recognize, probably a third year, was staring down at me, hate in her eyes. She had tightly coiled icy blonde ringlets, fierce blue eyes, and porcelain smooth skin. She rested her hand on her hips and waited for an answer. I swallowed hard, a lump forming in my throat. She definitely wasn't here for a sewing circle. I flashed my eyes left and right, looking to see if there was anyone else around.

"To my classroom?" I replied meekly. I wasn't much of the fighting type, and I was far too frail to take her on, despite the fact that she didn't look very strong herself.

"I don't think so." She wrapped her fingers tightly around my wrist, and yanked me in the direction of a classroom. "You think you can just hog him all to yourself, don't you?"

"I don't know what you're talking about!" I nearly shouted. My voice squeaked, and I tried to wrestle my arm free from her grip.

"What, you think the whole school doesn't know about your little ride the other day? Or where you spend your lunches?" I looked down and saw a large pair of scissors tucked into the waist band of her skirt. I reflexively reached up to grab my hair. She noticed. "You won't have to worry about that in a little bit." She smirked. I heard a door behind me open and two sets of foot steps. The girl holding my hand froze, and loosened her grip slightly.

"That's enough Amami." I knew I recognized the voice, but in my panicked state, I couldn't remember the face it belonged to. She quickly let go of my wrist and smoothed her skirt awkwardly.

"Oh, I wasn't going to—really I swear-"

"Save it, yeah." I stood there, dumbfounded. She nervously walked off, and out of the building. I shook my head quickly before turning around to face my saviors. Deidara and Itachi were standing there, watching Amami walk out of the door. Itachi eyed my wrist, red where Amami had gripped it tightly.

"Are you okay, Akihana?" I opened my mouth to respond.

"Oh she's fine, yeah."

"I didn't ask you." Itachi didn't even turn towards him. I struggled to find words.

"Uh yeah, I think I'm all set. I was just going to grab my wallet to get something to eat, and then-"

"She showed up, hm."

"I was almost shanked!" I shouted.

"Oh don't be melodramatic, yeah. She wasn't going to shank you."

"Whatever!" I started towards the stairs and only then noticed an open door with Hidan and Sasori standing in it, observing. I turned back towards Itachi, opening my mouth to ask exactly what was happening.

"Akihana, you can join us if you'd like." Itachi said coolly. I pondered my options, I could go into a classroom and hide, or I could wander around looking for my wallet and possibly be shanked. I nodded quickly and followed them into the classroom. The shades were drawn, and a movie I didn't recognize was playing on a white-screen pulled down in front of the chalkboard. I looked to the back and saw Kisame sitting next to a laptop hooked into the projector. He and Tobi were the only ones paying attention. Gathered around a large folding table, Kakuzu was playing what looked to be poker with Hidan and Sasori. Pushed up again the far wall under the windows was a ratty looking couch. What's going on here?

"Bambi, this is uh, the gang, yeah." He briefly named everyone, but it was nothing I didn't already know. I turned my head towards Deidara and watched as he took a seat at the makeshift poker table, picking up his hand. In the center was a small pile of coins. I turned towards Itachi, hoping for some answers. He closed the door, and on the back of it hung a homemade flag, black with a stylized red cloud outlined in white. Itachi took a seat and started reading a book. I stood there awkwardly before taking a seat equidistant from everyone else. I sat there uncomfortably at first, but my attention was quickly caught by the movie, which I will admit, was pretty funny. Itachi looked up from his book while I was mid-giggle.

"You're free to come by when you want. It's fairly full during lunch and after school." I was confused for a moment by the offer. So, that's why he likes the music room. It was definitely loud in here.

"Oh, uh, are you sure?" I imagined he was just trying to be polite.

"Yes. I don't believe anyone else has any concerns about it." Itachi looked around. No one said anything, though Tobi gave me an eager thumbs up. "To be frank, Amami isn't the only one you should be worrying about. The less time you spend wandering about, the better off you'll be." I swallowed hard.

"I guess I can do that then." I sat there awkwardly. It seemed like a fair trade off, a near-shanking for infiltration.