Me: Hey Pein, would you like to give them the disclaimer?
Pein: You don't own me.
Me: Thank you Pein for your... unique disclaimer.
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Part 3 - "I would only ask it of you"
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Konan woke first, of course, stirring slowly from a very deep and restful sleep. But then again, anything softer than rocky ground meant a longer sleep than usual. She hadn't even moved from her spot on his chest, and she could again hear his heart beating a steady pace as he slept. For some odd reason she liked listening, just having a moment of peace to focus on something repetitive. When he was asleep, he didn't frown or shove his eyebrows together in a scowl, he was simply relaxed. She wished that somehow he could always be so calm, but knew that it wasn't possible.
She felt him tense as he woke suddenly and glanced at her. Once in a while he would wake that way, alert and ready; and still, every time it startled her. But he soon remembered where they were, and he relaxed again, looking at her blankly. Strangely, he felt somewhat affectionate towards her, watching the way she looked at him so curiously, wondering what she was thinking. Why did he care? Something about the frailty of the both of them brought out a suppressed urge to take anything he could get, even if it was just a glance or a hint of a smile. He wanted as much as she was willing to give him, and this longing, this unstoppable passionate fire, threatened to overwhelm him. Anything this strong would have forced him to its will had he not been so strong willed to begin with. Instead, he satisfied this craving by just touching her cheek, and her smile filled some of that gap.
Though he would have liked to stay there a while longer, they needed to start back home before anyone else woke up. It would be better to leave without a trace. She seemed to know what he was thinking, and got up first, then they both put everything in the room back in its former place, leaving no sign they had ever been there. Really, she would have loved to stay long enough for a nice hot bath, but she would have to wait until they made it back to the base. As stealthy as one would expect, the two snuck out into the light rain without a sound, leaving the house behind in only minutes. They finally put their cloaks back on, glad for the protection they offered from this rain.
The wind had finally died to but a whisper on their faces, and even the rain refused to sting them any longer. At long last the path was clear enough to make reasonable distance, and before long they had made it out of the rain country completely, seeing the sun shine down on their faces for the first time in weeks. The remainder of the rain storm misted down into the grass, and the angle of the sun created a large arched rainbow over the glowing hills. Only a few more miles to their hideout in the country of grass, one place the other countries paid little attention to. Fortunately they were never even spotted by border guards or even citizens. Thanks to his odd sense of direction, Pein could always find the path of least resistance. Soon the endless fields of grass gave way to what looked like little more than an old fallen tree, large and ancient. But of course they knew it was much more than that, and with a touch of his chakra, the base of the enormous stump slid aside to let them both enter.
Inside, only Kisame was there waiting, and he nodded as they passed by. But Pein stopped, and looked across to the older man. "Where's Itachi?"
Kisame shrugged, but grinned. "Had to do something to his younger brother, from what I could tell. Didn't tell me anything specific, except that he might take a while."
"Oh..." Was Itachi going to kill that boy once and for all this time? Seriously, why did he toy around like that? "Alright. Thanks." He nodded and left to the next room, Kisame staring after him as he left. What was up with Leader? Why the heck was he so polite? Normally if he heard about Itachi going off and doing this sort of thing on his own, he would have been completely irritated and would have demanded to know why he wasn't doing his missions. Then he would have asked why Kisame was here basically doing nothing. But for some reason, Leader didn't care, and he and Konan left him to gawk as they retreated into the back rooms. Soon after, Tobi came prancing through the hideout, his mask still covered with blue paint from last week's prank, and he skipped right up to Kisame and waved.
"Kisame-san! Eh? Where did Itachi go?"
Kisame frowned. Didn't anyone care what HE was up to? "He went after his brother. Leader was just in asking the same thing. Don't know where he is."
Tobi was strangely quiet for a second, then he nodded eagerly. "Then Tobi will talk to Leader! Byeeeeee Kisame-san! 3" He turned and skipped off to where Pein and Konan were both resting in the back lounge are, then returned to a completely serious pose as he talked to them. "Itachi is finally going to try to regain his full sight I assume?"
Pein thought for a moment. "I have no idea. What do you mean?"
"If his brother did indeed awaken the Mangekyou Sharingan, then by taking his eyes, he will gain permament use of the Mangekyou Sharingan. I never thought he would follow my example so soon, but... already he's getting blind. He must be desperate."
"He what? Mm... anything else you want to tell me about?" He stared up at this person he knew as Uchiha Madara with a slight frown. True, he didn't want to anger the man, but really, he should have told him about this sooner.
Madara shrugged and scratched the back of his head thoughtfully. "No, but... it would be a good idea if we could get the use of the Kyuubi before Itachi gets the idea to do the same. I wouldn't put it past him to search for the Jinchuuriki on his own if he gained that kind of power. I only hope he doesn't make the same mistakes that I did." He paused and removed his mask, scratching away the blue paint with a kunai. He looked terrible without his mask, to be completely honest. Over the many years he had accumulated all kinds of battle scars, one of them taking his left eye completely out of use. But his right eye still shone maniacally from the depths of his face, gleaming even in the darkness.
Although Pein was so accustomed to his own form of mutilation, he still couldn't stomach looking upon this man's face, even after all this time. He turned away until all of the blue paint had been scraped away and he replaced his mask. Then Pein nodded and turned back to him. "It's a terrible price, I know it as well as you do." His own Rin'negan both glimmered yellow, and he remembered all too well how he had gained them. "And what will you do while this is going on?"
"Not sure. I barely escaped from that pack of Konoha nin last time. I don't think I can go back there without encountering them again."
"I can't do that right now. We can't even capture a Jinchuuriki right now, we don't even have enough members to use the ritual anymore! I know you told us to capture him, but you're the only one that can control him at this point. I'll try to recruit more members in the meantime, but even then this is taking too long."
"Then I suggest you hurry. We can't let Itachi think that he can do this by himself." He nodded once more to them and left, reverting to carefree Tobi as soon as he was out the door. How the heck did he DO that so easily?
Konan sighed, but nodded. "He's right. Itachi has such a lust for power, if he gained the permanent Mangekyou, he may even become too much for us to handle. Then again, maybe his brother hasn't awakened the Mangekyou yet."
"That's possible. He seemed to want to do things his way instead of what his brother wanted him to do. Right now that's all we can hope for. We don't even know where he is, so we can't exactly stop him. Even that Ninetails boy has left without much of a trace. For the moment, all we can do is recruit some members and regain control."
"Mm... I wonder if Zetsu could be persuaded to find a few."
"If he managed to find Madara like that...! Of all the people to find out there... Yeah, I would definitely ask him to look."
"He should be back soon from his scouting, right?"
He nodded. "Right. But right now, I wouldn't mind some good food and a decent sleep..."
She smirked and stood up, suddenly excited. "Good idea! Oh, I really want to make grilled calamari, but don't tell Kisame!" She winked and rushed in the direction of the kitchen, leaving him to stare in confusion. Since when was she so joyful? Maybe she caught some of Madara's Tobi joy. He shook his head and sighed, then went into a different hall to the bathroom, needing a bath more desperately than food.
The water was almost too hot, but after being in the cold and wet of the rain country, he badly needed to warm up for a very long time. Just when he was about done, he could hear Konan hollering from all the way in the kitchen. "PEIN-SAMA! I made calamari for you too!" Only a second later, and he heard Kisame's return shout. "CALAMARI? Konan-sama, WHY do you do this every time I'm around??" Pein sighed but laughed to himself, then finished up, dressing in some fresh clothes he had taken in with him. He then entered the main area where Kisame was staring at the wall, looking almost green with disgust as Konan tried her calamari. She grinned and offered him a plate.
"Here, Pein-sama, it's much better this time."
He took it cautiously along with the chopsticks on the plate. It BETTER be much better this time... Fortunately, it was almost perfect, thank goodness. "Hey, it IS much better this time. What did you do differently?"
"I made a teriyaki glaze instead of that weird citrus kind. It would go great with some sashimi."
Kisame groaned and stood up. "That does it!" He grimaced and retreated into his room.
For some reason, Pein burst out laughing. It wasn't his usual light chuckle, it was a full blown fit of laughter. She stared at him with a wide eyed gaze, and realized she had never seen this before. But he just thought this was ridiculous, and at the same time he felt sorry for Kisame too. He took another bite of the calamari, trying to eat something, but finding it hard to stuff anything past this hilarity. Finally, he had calmed down enough to finish the last of his food, and saw that Konan was still staring. "What?"
"You... you were laughing!"
He shrugged, and nodded. "I couldn't help it. Once you started talking about glazes and sashimi, this picture of Kisame on a fish stick just-- it just popped into my mind, and I couldn't-" He smirked and held back a chuckle. "I couldn't stop laughing."
She put her hand over her mouth to hold back her own laugh. "Oh now you got me thinking about it too!" And vividly in her mind, there was poor Kisame the fishy-stick, and she also burst out laughing, nearly dropping her plate. "Poor guy, I don't know why I want to make calamari every time I see him, but I better not anymore!"
He winked at her. "Nah, maybe we can ask him to come around more often so you can think of more recipes."
She choked back another laugh and smacked his shoulder. "That's terrible!"
Just then, Zetsu phased through the floor of the hideout, and approached with a very worried look. "Pein-sama, you're not going to like what I found."
Pein's smile quickly drained off his face. "No, I bet not. Itachi?"
"HOW DID YOU GUESS? I found him, but he's in terrible shape. HE WILL PROBABLY DIE."
He nodded, somewhat already expecting this. But then he noticed that Zetsu was also injured, though he had made it a priority to report in. "How long do you think he has?"
"Hours, maybe a day. Less if he's lucky, he's in horrible pain. I WOULDN'T GIVE HIM LONGER THAN DUSK."
"...we should tell Kisame. He'd want to know."
Konan stepped out first in front of them. "No, better let me do it." She left the room and Zetsu also left to retrieve Itachi, leaving Pein to think about this alone. So he had failed, and was dying. And Zetsu was badly injured. So few of them left...! How could anything get done at this rate?
Zetsu returned first, carrying Itachi, the poor man bleeding all over the stone floor. No, it didn't look like Itachi would last very long at all. He wouldn't even make it through the night. His eyes were completely gone, and the rest of his body slashed beyond any healing. Even the greatest medical ninja could do nothing for him now. Konan and Kisame entered next, prepared for the worst, and this was indeed the worst. Kisame instantly came to Itachi's side, knowing that he was beyond help.
"Itachi-san! What happened?"
Itachi coughed, more blood hitting the floor, barely able to speak. "I told him about the secret about the Mangekyou Sharingan... and he... took my eyes... said he had no problem with... stealing from me instead... of killing a friend."
Pein was instantly on edge. "You mean HE now has the permanent Mangekyou?"
"He does... I... I'm not going to live, am I?"
Kisame was the only one who could tell him the truth. "No, Itachi-san."
He took that surprisingly well. "He was supposed to be my second... but I suppose... he was finally able to... get his revenge. Kisame?"
"Hm? What is it?"
"Please finish me off. I'm... I'm just going to suffer anyway. I... don't want anyone else to do it."
Kisame thought about this for a second, and nodded. "You really want me to... don't you?"
Itachi managed a small smile. "I wouldn't have asked... if I didn't."
Kisame paused for a moment, then looked up at the rest of them. But they all knew that it was the truth. It would be far kinder to put him out of his misery. "Alright, I'll do it. Just leave us alone for a minute alright?" He picked Itachi up and took him outside for one last moment before the end. Pein watched with increasing sorrow, knowing how hard this was for him to do. Apart from himself and Konan, those two had been the only Akatsuki pair that had remotely respected each other on a personal level, and they had probably even become close friends. None of them even spoke while he was out there, and when he returned, he didn't speak. And in that silence, six became only five.
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Next time: What will become of Kisame now that his only friend in the world is gone? What will become of the Akatsuki? And what about Pein and Konan? Will they ever realize what they are to each other? Be sure to read the next chapter!