'Yeah, right. I'd jump off this cliff before I let 'Tobi' kill me.'
Unbeknowst to him, Tobi was sitting on his along the edge of the cliff staring down at him boredly. It was taking far too long for romantic man to make it up the mountain. Granted he was doing it bare handed, and he was nothing like Kakashi who could do this sort of thing in his sleep, but it was still annoying.
'At this rate Deidara-senpai will be miles and miles away from Tobi.'
Tobi didn't know what to do. He wanted to be a good boy, but he also wanted to get this over with quickly. He let out another sigh and fell back on the ground behind him, feet still dangling over the edge. He yelled down to the man hanging from the sheer drop.
"HEY! Romantic man..."
"Kisame!"
Tobi sat up and stared down at him curiously. The strange guy was glaring up at him, probably concentrating on climbing.
"What?"
Kisame shook his head and kept climbing.
"My name is Kisame, not romantic man!"
"Oh."
Tobi leaned back again waiting patiently for the man once more. Until his ADHD set in and he remembered the question he was gonna ask the man.
"Hey! Romantic man!"
"My na...You know..I don't even care. WHAT?!"
"Tobi wants to let you know there's more rope up here. I can throw it down and you can climb up faster."
Kisame froze where he was and looked up completely lost in this step in thinking. Weren't they trying to kill him? Was this some kind of trap?
"Yeah...Wanna tell me why? I mean if you're waiting around to kill me, what's the point of helping me up the cliff?"
"It's not like Tobi wants to kill you. It's my job, you're trying to take the princess, and that will make Deidara-senpai unhappy. So, Tobi will make sure you don't so Deidara will stay happy. Maybe he'll even reward Tobi for being a good boy!"
Kisame didn't know whether to be seriously annoyed or feel a little bad for the kid. His head drooped slightly.
"Yeah. I'm sure he will."
Tobi's eyes brighted behind his mask as he heard the half sincere statment.
"You think?"
"Yeah, but that doesn't explain why you want to help me up."
Tobi rolled his eyes as if this was the most obvious thing in the world.
"If I help Romantic man up the cliff I can beat you faster and get back to Deidara-senpai and Kakashi faster."
Somehow, after talking to Tobi for even this long, that made perfect sense to the blue boy as well. Smirking he raised one hand and waved to Tobi.
"Fine. Throw down the stupid rope. Put I'll tell you this, if you let go I'll still climb up there and kick your ass."
Tobi did a quick jump for joy before throwing the rest of the rope down to the man. He griped his end hard, and made sure that it wouldn't slip before calling down to the other man to start climbing up it. Kisame said a silent prayer before taking hold of it and quickly pulling himself up. Tobi had to hold on tight. He hadn't really expected the other man to be as heavy as he was. Taking even a small step back from the edge was an effort. Finally the other man pulled himself over and away from the edge before both of them plopped down exhausted. Kisame made to stand up and fight, but Tobi stopped him.
"N...No...Tired. Wa...Wait a second."
The man looked ready to fight anyway, but nodded and sat back on the ground. Both just stared at each other for a second, trying their hardest to catch their breath. Tobi, as always, was the first to speak. He pointed an accusing finger at Kisame.
"Whew! Romantic man is heavy!"
Kisame rolled his eyes and pulled his sword off of his back.
"Not me. The sword adds fifty pounds."
"Wow, you have a big sword! Gotta be hard to carry it! Hey do you have a long tounge. You know the kind that can wrap around your neck, or a cross dressing fetish?"
Kisame just stared at him, not saying anything. If he could see Tobi's face he'd know that the boy was being totally serious, course he couldn't so that was lost on the shark swordsman.
"I'm sorry. I think I got some crazy in my ear. I think you said something about a tounge and cross dressing?"
Tobi shook his head sadly. Obviously this wasn't who he was looking for.
"Yeah. Tobi's been searching for the man in the dress with the tounge for a long time. He killed Tobi's father and mother and then had his slave boy burn down Tobi's and Deidara's village. Said it was because Tobi's father wouldn't teach him a technique he wanted to know. Even though Deidara-senpai doesn't say it, Tobi knows that he blames Tobi. So I'll make it up to Deidara-senpai. He'll kill the man for him and that'll make Deidara-senpai think Tobi is a good boy."
Kisame barely picked up on any of that. He did get that Tobi was trying to make something up to a 'Deidara-senpai'. He'd just assume it was the chick with the blonde hair that had cut the rope earlier. Something about the description sounded familar, but he let it go. Rolling his shoulders Kisame got to his feet. Tobi wasn't too far behind, the sad atmosphere around him dissipated immediately.
"So, you're ready to fight now?"
Kisame gave a toothy smirk and raised his sword ready to go.
"Something like that."
Tobi nodded and waited patiently for Kisame to attack. Not wanting to waste any advantage he was given the shark boy ran at him bringing down his sword hard. He felt a little bad as he watched the sword pass easily through the other's middle with almost no resistance. Kisame frowned and looked at the ground before putting his sword away and starting to look for where the other two had run off with his Itachi.
"Wow. That was cool. Lot faster than I thought you'd be able to swing something that big."
Kisame turned around shocked, and only jumped out of the ways only a few seconds before a fire ball was sent at him. He was up and running as soon as he was safe. A string of fire was coming from Tobi's mouth, straight at him. He tucked and rolled as the last bit of flame died away. Tobi fell back on his butt and ran a hand along his forehead.
"Whew! It's hard holding you're breath that long. Really difficult. That was cool though! You looked like a super hero!"
Kisame looked at him and he waved it off chuckling slightly.
'Maybe crazy is contagious.'
"Yeah. What I wanna know is how you managed to survive that blow through the shoulder."
Tobi shrugged and stood back up ready to go again. Kisame figuring that it wasn't that important anyway, shrugged it off and ran at the boy again. Tobi blew another fireball his way. This time instead of dodging Kisame used his sword to block the flames slightly as he continued running towards Tobi. When it got to hot he jumped up into the air and brought down the sword towards his masked face. Tobi shimmered and then was nowhere. Kisame's sword connected with the ground hard, jarring him slightly. He looked up trying to see where Tobi'd gone to, only to come face to face with the bottom of Tobi's foot. He was sent flying. He skipped along the ground a short distance, coming to rest along the edge of the cliff. Kisame didn't realize how close he actually was. He rolled over slightly. His eyes widened as he started over the edge.
'Fuck!'
He reached up for something to grip onto, but was just a little too far down. He was sure he was gonna die, until he felt something snag his arm. Tobi was holding onto his arm and waved at him, a smile could be seen even through the mask.
"Sorry. Tobi didn't mean to kick you that far."
Kisame shook his head as if this sort of thing happened all the time.
"No problem. Help me up?"
Tobi pulled hard and together they once more made it up to safety. This time they pulled their fight a little further away from the danger zone. Kisame raised an eyebrow as a silent request to continue. Tobi nodded and got ready for round two. The swords man looked behind Tobi and saw his weapon still stuck in the ground. If he could get to it, there wouldn't be too many problems...or maybe...
"Hey, Tobi. Can you grab my sword for me?"
Tobi looked behind him then back at Kisame.
"Yes! Tobi will get Romantic man's sword, then we can continue fighting and Tobi can prove he's a good boy."
Tobi walked over and reached for the sword. Spikes came out of it's hilt and stuck hard into Tobi's hand. He jerked back his hand quickly and yelled. Kisame had made his way over to the masked boy by this time. He elbowed the kid in the back of the head. Tobi went to his knees easily. Kisame frowned down at Tobi feeling even worst than he did after the first blow he'd made.
"But...but..Tobi's a good..."
"Sorry."
Kisame brought down the hilt of his sword hard on Top of Tobi's head, knocking him out. Crouching down next to him, he ruffled the black hair that was visible.
"Can't have you following me. Might try and stop me from saving Itachi-hime. Can't have that."
Making sure the guy was truly out of it this time. Kisame shouldered his weapon and started in the only direction they could've gone.
````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````` Haku sat up suddenly just as Zabuza began to go on with the story. The older man looked at him, like he'd lost his mind.
"What's the matter now?"
Haku stood up and stretched.
"Just realized. Haven't taken a bath in a while. Think we can continue this in the tub?"
The totally innocent look on Haku's face was wasted on Zabuza as he thought of all the things he'd like to do in a bathtub that DID NOT involve reading.
"Oh, yeah. We can do one or two other, 'things' while we're there as well."
Haku giggled as he grabbed the book as Zabuza hauled him over his shoulder and made their way to a nice hot bubble bath.