(A/N: Okay, here's the next chapter. I know what you're thinking: "Finally! It's been much longer than three weeks!" but I have yet to have time to sit and actually think about this story, much less type any of it. As sad as that is, it's the truth. I had AP testing last week, last Thursday AND Friday, so it was really rough. I was so brain-dead that I couldn't even think straight. I had stuff planned all weekend long that had nothing to do with school, computers, or anything like that. Before the tests, I had studying and last minute work to finish up, so it's just been a rough while. I'm now preparing for my final week of school, so wish me luck on all my final exams. I realized that if I didn't get this typed up today, I would never get it done. :/ Thank you all so much for your patience and willingness to wait for my updates!

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

Mysterious Captivation: Chapter 26

Kisame approached the door just as dawn was beginning to break. He knocked, careful not to dislodge the girl who was resting on his back.

When no one answered the door, he knocked again, this time slightly louder. The door swung inward just as he raised his hand once more.

"Please forgive my hesitance to answer the door. Lately there have been reports of Akatsuki in the area, so you can understand my reluctance to open my home to strangers."

Kisame frowned slightly, but quickly smoothed his expression. "Certainly, sir. My sister and I were just hoping for some shelter from the cold and the elements. We've been traveling for a long time, and this is the first building we have come across for several kilometers."

The man at the door, considerably shorter than Kisame, attempted to see the young woman who was draped across the visitor's back. "You two don't look very much alike."

The formerly blue-skinned man let out a soft bark of laughter. "We're told that often," he said, gently jostling the disguised Hyuuga on his back. When she began to stir, he spoke softly near her ear. "We're here, sis,"

She blearily opened her almond shaped eyes, squinting in the light of the newly risen sun. She made a small noise of acceptance through her sleep-fogged mind, then blinked several more times.

She lifted her head. "Are we going to be resting here today?" She inquired in a slightly rough voice.

Kisame turned his gaze toward the man who was still standing in the doorway and raised an eyebrow at him.

Turning an examining eye to the pair, that man was silent for a moment, then spoke. "You may stay, but only if you answer me these questions: Why are you travelling, and why did you continue to travel through the night?"

"We are headed toward Suna, where our father's business relocated. He went ahead of us to make a place for us, then he sent for us. I wanted to get there as quickly as possible, so I insisted that we travel through the night. I'd honestly rather not stay out in the open where we can freeze or be attacked."

The man in the doorway nodded, backing away from the door frame to allow them inside.

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Hiashi watched as his supplier opened the door to his mansion. He saw him exchange several sentences with the two disguised Akatsuki members, then back away from the frame to allow them into his house.

Vaguely, the Hyuuga wondered if Hinata had connected the dots between his presence and that man's home. Though she had never met the supplier, Hiashi wondered if she knew who he was to the Hyuugas anyway.

"Shikamaru-san, they've already met up with Takamoro-san. The Hyuuga's supplier will be dead before he eats breakfast, and there's nothing we can do about it!" The Hyuuga Clan leader growled angrily.

The Hyuuga watched as the Nara's steps never faltered. "We'll just have to move even faster, then. Maybe we should use our chakra."

"How will we fight them if we use all of our spare chakra?" The Hyuuga head asked. He opened his mouth to say more, but was interrupted.

"How are we going to fight them and prevent a death if we can't even get to them before they flee, Hyuuga-san? We don't have much of a choice. If nothing else, we can always use a soldier pill just before we arrive." His logical thinking was foolproof, and Hiashi finally realized just how disturbed he had been that he'd seen his daughter acting so friendly with the Akatsuki.

"Okay," He relented, and the two Konoha ninja sped forward.

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"Oh, Takamoro-san, thank you so much for offering me and my sister some breakfast," Kisame said, glancing over his shoulder at the young woman, then to the man whom he was addressing. "I think she will take you up on the offer, but I would rather just rest. Is there anywhere I could sleep?" He asked, punctuating his question with a jaw-popping yawn.

"Of course!" The Hyuuga's supplier, Takamoro, said, motioning to a servant who had been waiting unseen in the entry way of the large home. "My servant will show you to a room where you can rest."

Kisame bent down, placing Hinata on the ground and patting her head. "I'll be back downstairs later, okay? Don't worry about waiting for me to eat, go on and enjoy Takamoro-san's hospitality." He turned back to the older man, saying, "Thank you very much. I don't know what we would have done without you," before he took to the stairs behind the servant.

Kisame caught the Hyuuga girl's eye, telling her without words that her job would be to kill the man without drawing attention to herself or him. When she incrementally nodded her head and he knew he was understood, he turned back around to follow the Hyuuga who was leading him to his room.

Upon arriving, Kisame swiftly moved to incapacitate the man, then placed him in the bed where Kisame would have been resting. He made it look as though he was the man in the bed, just in case the Hyuuga were allowed to use their Byakugan within the household.

That taken care of, he shut the door as he left, taking on the form of the downed Hyuuga. To be on the safe side, he still stayed out of sight of the other servants as much as possible. He didn't want to get caught before the mission could end, after all.

He quickly made his way down to the dining room, where he was almost certain that Hinata had been led. Though he didn't know its exact location, he had asked his guide for the general area and been given directions.

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How am I going to do this? Hinata asked herself as she followed the man with the broad back into the small dining room. The two stood just inside the door way to converse.

"Now, then, Miss. What can my servants get you to eat? We have anything you could possibly want, so all you need to do is request it," Takamoro said, gesturing to another Hyuuga man stationed in the corner of the room. He gestured for her to sit at the low table in the center of the otherwise empty room as he closed the sliding door behind the two of them. The tatami mats that were located on the ground at each plate seemed to be of very high quality, as was the wood with which the table was built.

Rather than moving to sit as he directed, Hinata spoke. "May I ask why there are so many people from the Hyuuga clan here? I thought they were a proud clan of Konoha; why are you calling them your servants?" The ex-Hyuuga heiress questioned, stalling while she tried to call up the nerve to kill the man.

"I give their clan a huge discount in my prices in exchange for ten Hyuuga branch members to use as servants for the length of their lives. Unless one of them is called away or there is an issue with my pricing, I never have any other contact with the Hidden Villages," the man smirked, then repeated his question about breakfast, clearly ending the conversation.

Hinata hesitated for a moment, then proceeded to ask another question, rather than answer the one that had been posed. "Are they all trained as ninja?" She made sure to keep her voice light, curious, and almost child-like in its innocence.

"No. I specifically wanted ten untrained men to act as my servants. This way, I never have to worry about them turning on me and murdering me in my sleep. Why so curious, girlie?"

Thinking fast, Hinata came up with an excuse. She frowned, looking vaguely disappointed, before speaking. "Well, I've always loved ninjas. My mother used to tell me stories about them, and I've always dreamt of meeting one. I thought maybe I'd finally get the chance," she smoothly lied, using her skills that she had learned from Itachi.

"Ah, I see. They are fascinating people, aren't they? Although, you probably don't want to meet one, because that would mean you were either their target, or in the wrong place at the wrong time. Ninja are very intimidating when you meet them face to face. I think it best that they stay figments of your imagination, rather than having them meet you," he admitted, and Hinata wondered if he was trying to impress her.

Hinata allowed her face to fall even more in mock-disappointment. "Oh," she uttered. "Oh well, then."

She looked up as she saw a hand enter her line of vision to get her attention. When she merely stared at it, he awkwardly allowed it to fall back to his side and spoke. "Would you like to sit and eat, now?"

She nodded her head, but paused to tell him what she would be ordering for breakfast. "I think I would like some onigiri for breakfast, if it's not too much trouble."

Takamoro motioned for his servant to leave the room to prepare the food she had asked for, then moved to lead Hinata to a spot directly beside his at the table.

Taking a deep breath, and knowing that once she made this move, she would truly be Akatsuki for the rest of her life with no chance of turning back (idly, Hinata thought that it should bother her more, but realized that she was perfectly fine with never being able to leave Akatsuki), Hinata swiftly gathered chakra into her palm.

In the next second, her palm connected with the man's back, right where his heart was beneath his ribcage. His breathing hitched for a moment, and he began coughing. He fell to his knees, choking on his own blood and attempting to draw air into his lungs.

Hinata turned away from his betrayed expression, watching as the disguised Kisame entered through the sliding doors behind her. "I did it," she stated unnecessarily. "Should I draw my chakra back out of his heart, or make them believe that one of the Hyuuga did it?" She said, her voice void of all feeling.

Inside, however, a piece of her was dying. It was the same every time she killed. Though she had never killed in cold blood before, she eventually would have had to do so even if she had stayed in Konoha. She took a glance at her hands, then raised her eyes to meet her partners'.

"I can't say that it really matters. You said your father and another Konoha ninja know we were here, so there's no reason to waste time covering our tracks. We should probably swipe some food from the kitchens, then leave here as fast as we can. We need to put some distance between us and this place before your father catches up."

Hinata nodded, and the two stealthily made their way to follow that plan of action. Along the way, the Hyuuga girl relayed the information she had learned about the Hyuuga servants to her partner in crime.

They checked the kitchen, making sure that the Hyuuga servant had already left for the dining area before entering. He had, so the two stepped through the machinery and searched out the pantry.

Finding it, Kisame took off his backpack to fill it with nonperishable, light foods to carry with them back to Akatsuki and eat along the way.

The moment it was filled, the Hoshigaki and Hyuuga pair turned to leave, but just after they set foot out the door to the snowy world outside and dropped their henges, someone spoke.

"Hello, Akatsuki."

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Hiashi, who had been keeping up with the Akatsuki pair by using his Byakugan, cursed under his breath, then spoke louder to Shikamaru. "We're too late. He's dead; my daughter killed him," he spat.

The Nara looked vaguely surprised and almost slipped on the icy ground. "Hinata? She's the one that ended Takamoro-san's life?"

Hiashi nearly growled, letting out a puff of visible air vapor with his breath. "Yes. My supplier was killed by my own daughter!"

Shikamaru made a sound of acknowledgement. "I figured it would have been her partner," he said, then paused in his movements when he realized that Hiashi had stopped. "What's wrong? Tell me there aren't more Akatsuki on their way."

The Hyuuga clan leader frowned, worry lining his forehead. "No, there aren't more Akatsuki on their way. It's worse than that: Uchiha Sasuke."

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"Are you sure this is the place? It doesn't look like an Akatsuki hideout to me," Sasuke asked the summoned cat.

"Do you doubt me, boy? I'm positive that she and the fish-man are here. Their scents are too strong, and everywhere around here, they start to fade. The two of them are definitely in that building," the cat replied.

Sasuke nodded, thanking the cat respectfully before allowing it to happily return to its warm home.

Staying within the shadowy but leafless haven of the woods, Sasuke watched the back door, where his summoned animal had told him Hinata's scent was the strongest.

He glared so darkly at the door that he nearly thought it would burst into flames the moment something came into contact with it, but it swung neatly open several minutes later to reveal his most hated enemies.

"Hello, Akatsuki," he said, watching their expressions fall to complete blank masks, rather than lifting in surprise.

"Well, hello to you, too, Sasuke," Kisame said, able to make the sentence sound polite without sounding affable. "What do you want?"

"I'm going to ask your partner a few questions. If the two of you don't cooperate, I'm not afraid to start a fight that I know I'll win."

Kisame, leaning down to the small girl beside him and whispering something in her ear, then stood and said, "Depending on your questions, we'll either answer them or leave. Ask away," he ended flippantly.

Sasuke, stunned that his brother's ex-partner would even consider cooperating but not allowing the shock to show, took a moment to gather his thoughts and word his questions carefully. "Did you know Itachi?" He asked first, being sure to start simply and work up to the knowledge he demanded.

"We did," Kisame responded, clearly unwilling to give extra information, but also willing to answer the question.

So far, so good, Sasuke smirked. "Did you spend extensive amounts of time with him?"

Again, Kisame was the one that answered. While listening to the larger man's response, he took the time to study the smaller girl at his side.

Her eyes were downcast, and she was looking to the side. Her mouth was set in a tight line, and her eyes seemed to shine with a teary light, though he couldn't be sure.

"Itachi, Hinata, and I were very close."

"Which of you knew him better?" Sasuke asked, knowing that Kisame would answer that he knew him best because of all of their years as partners.

"Hinata."

Again surprised by the answer he had been given, Sasuke took a moment in asking his next question.

"Hyuuga, what was Itachi to you?"

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Kisame was worried. He didn't know how Hinata would react to being questioned about Itachi, but he knew that they would have to cooperate to get Hinata out alive.

It wasn't that he didn't trust in her abilities. No, far from that, he knew that she was just as capable of cold blooded murder as she was of killing in battle, but Sasuke was much too advanced for her to face.

Kisame could fight him, but he was scared that Sasuke would use his obvious preoccupation with the Hyuuga against him and take her hostage.

No, if we're going to get out of this, we'll have to answer his questions. Leaning down to the small Hyuuga girl, he whispered, "Don't worry. I'll do all the talking. You won't have to say a word about Itachi unless he specifically addresses you, okay?"

The Hyuuga gave a small nod, and he heard her sniffle softly. Turning his attention pointedly away from the fact that she was probably very close to tears, Kisame spoke louder, to Sasuke, "Depending on your questions, we'll either answer them or leave. Ask away," he ended flippantly.

And so the question and answer session began.

It was going well until Sasuke asked Hinata a direct question: "Hyuuga, what was Itachi to you?"

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She looked up from her shoes sharply. Speaking in a hesitant voice not unlike the one she once used to use all the time in Konoha, she said, "I'm honestly not sure," her voice wavered, cracking near the end.

"He was obviously important to you; the entire ninja world knows that you cared for him, at least. I think, though, that it was more than caring. You loved him," he accused scathingly.

A shudder ran through her body at being found out by her enemy. Weighing her words carefully, she looked up at Kisame, who was more than a foot taller than her, and moved closer to him as though for protection.

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The moment he felt Hinata pressing closer to him, he had to stifle the urge to look into her tear-filled eyes and wrap an arm around her shoulder. He knew she was searching for protection from Sasuke for her next words, words he knew to be an affirmation, so he had to stay fierce, not mushy.

He adjusted his stance threateningly, but allowed Hinata to stay very near him for protection.

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He watched as Hinata moved closer to Kisame, and the Hoshigaki altered his stance. When the blue-skinned man didn't move away, Sasuke could see that the younger girl was going to be fiercely protected.

He heard her take a deep, unnecessarily loud breath. He could almost see her gathering her courage. The Uchiha smirked haughtily. He'd hit the nail on the head. He gathered his chakra in preparation for an attack. The moment she gave the affirmative, he'd kill her.

"Yes, I did love your brother." She said, but continued on in the same breath, "but so did you."

The smirk melted off his face, "That was a long time ago, Hyuuga. Watch what you're saying very carefully," he ordered, tension flowing off of all the muscles in his body.

"He was more of a brother to me than anything. It took me a while to realize it, but I could never fall in love with a man who shows no emotions. I didn't love your brother in a romantic sense, but I did love him. It was almost like he was trying to make up for his past mistakes, mistakes he made with you, by taking care of me and helping me transition to the life of a missing ninja,"

The tension, the one that twisted and coiled through his whole body, abruptly left him as he realized that this woman knew the real Itachi. He opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted by a sharp gasp by Hinata.

"Kisame-san, we have to go." She reached out to grab his hand, pulling slightly to show her urgency.

"Scared of me, Hyuuga?" He smirked again.

"Kisame-san, we really need to leave," Hinata reiterated, glancing over her shoulder. Something seemed to occur to the much taller man, and he returned his attention to Sasuke.

"Sorry, Uchiha, but we're gonna have to cut this question and answer session a bit short," he said, glancing down at his Hyuuga partner again. "How far?"

"About two kilometers. I'm glad I checked when I did, or they'd have overtaken us." She frowned.

"I'm not done with you two!" Sasuke shouted coolly, hating being ignored like a minor threat.

Kisame opened his mouth to tell Sasuke exactly how much he cared, but a glare from Hinata stopped him. He shut his mouth and let her speak her mind, nearly making Sasuke chuckle. "If you want to know more, meet us at the old Akatsuki hideout a week from tomorrow. Right now, though, we must leave. I suggest you do the same," she said, deactivating her Byakugan and giving him a glimpse of what the Akatsuki had seen in her.

Narrowing his eyes at her demanding tone, he nevertheless complied. "I'll be there," he said, then leapt into the trees with a speed that made it seem as though he simply disappeared.

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Hinata turned back to Kisame. "It is okay that I told him to meet back up with us, right?" She hesitantly wondered.

"Yes, we'll just need to get permission from Leader-sama ahead of time. It shouldn't be too big of a deal," he reassured her. "But for now, let's get a move on and get away from the Konoha ninja on our tail. Hop on," he ordered.

(A/N: I really am sorry for the late update. I have been super busy lately, but I really don't have an excuse for making you wait almost two months for an update. I do hope you're satisfied with this chapter, as I feel that it moves the plot along much further than the previous two chapters did. I finally got something accomplished. Now, all you need to know is what happens with Sasuke in a week, how will Konoha deal with Takamoro's death, and what happens between Hinata and Deidara. (: And we'll be done. I make no promises about the length of this story, but I can't imagine it lasting TOO much longer. Well, leave a review, if you don't mind, and expect to hear from me again in about three weeks!)