A slightly shorter chapter than I envisaged, but I really wanted to get a new chapter out promptly to all of you who had waited so patiently for my last one! Enjoy, and please review, it motivates me to keep writing! :)

THE PLAN

Udon felt that familiar thrill race down his spine as he saw the pink-haired kunoichi running towards his desk. It had been a long time since he had been on Team Ebisu with Konohamaru and Moegi, but he still remembered the first time he had seen Konohamaru's idol, Naruto, walking with his female teammate towards Ichiraku Ramen. It had been a cold, windy November day, and the leaves blew around them furiously. She had been bundled up in a jacket with a fluffy grey hood that fell around her shoulders, an emerald green scarf wrapped around her neck and puffy cream-coloured ear warmers which matched her gloves. Her porcelain skin had been flushed beautifully with the cold, and with the effort of her furious conversation with Naruto. Her hair had been tousled by the wind, and he was entranced by its unique colour, which complimented her other features so perfectly. Her jade eyes burned brightly, their colour made even more intense by the closeness of her scarf, and her rosette lips were mesmerising as she tore pieces off of Naruto for one reason or another. As they approached the ramen shop where he and his teammates were lunching, he shrunk lower into his seat and watched her surreptitiously, his ears catching snippets of their argument, which continued throughout their meal. Even her voice was beautiful. She argued with passion, but reason – and she certainly didn't shriek her point across like Moegi liked to do. And then, when they left the ramen stand (long before his trio – Naruto finished his and her meal in record time), she looked over at them and gave them a wink, before falling right back into her heated discussion and out the door towards the Hokage tower.

From that day on, Udon was hooked.

Taking this job at the Konoha library instead of continuing as a shinobi had been the best thing he had ever done. It suited his analytical mind to a tee. He had always loved mathematics and logic, and maintaining the ordered catalogue system gave him great pride in his work. And the old books and scrolls – he loved everything about them – from their beautiful bindings to the sometimes strange truths, messages or stories that they held within. He even loved the musty old smell. But the icing on the cake was his daily visit from Sakura Haruno.

And today she was literally running towards his desk with a smile as wide as the gates of Konoha beaming straight at him.

Udon swallowed thickly. Was this it? Was today the day that he had dreamed about so many times, when she would run up to him and tell him that she had finally realised after all these years that he was the only man who could make her happy? It was certainly possible. He didn't flatter himself that he was as handsome as say, Sasuke Uchiha or anything, gods no – but he thought he was at least attractive enough to be considered. He had grown tall and lean; he still kept up some level of training just in case he ever needed it one day, so he was fit enough. That, and the persistent snot-drip of his childhood was long gone.

As she reached his counter in the centre of the floor he donned his warmest smile – the one that he reserved only for her. "Hello Sakura. Where's the fire?"

"Huh? Oh. Nowhere, I just..." She was out of breath, and her smile turned embarrassed as she realised how eager she looked. She decided to start again. "Hi, Udon, how are you?"

"I'm fine, Sakura, just fine." He could see behind her eyes she was desperate to ask him something, so he left it at that.

"And your family, how are they? Oh – Is your grandmother out of hospital yet?"

The question was genuine, of course – Sakura cared deeply about people's health in general – but that desperation still simmered beneath the surface. He swallowed again. She looked nervous somehow, and it made him feel even more nervous in response. "Uh, yeah – Lady Hokage kept her in overnight, but it turned out it was just a kidney stone- Sakura?"

Her eyes snapped up at him, guilty. "Uh, yeah?"

"Did you want to ask me something?"

She looked embarrassed. Sakura Haruno was standing in front of him, wanting to ask him something, looking embarrassed. This was it.

"Well," She swallowed. He swallowed. "I was kind of hoping you could help me with something. A BIG favour. I know that Itachi Uchiha comes here every day, and I was kiiiind of hoping I could see what kind of books he takes out?" She finished with a sweet blush and chewed on her bottom lip.

Udon just stared. Itachi Uchiha. Of course.

She looked concerned when he didn't answer. "Udon?"

"You know I'm not supposed to give out that kind of personal information, Sakura."

"I know, I know. It's just, I thought, maybe you could do it just this once, for me? I promise not to do anything nefarious with the information, I swear. I just need to get an idea about what sort of things interest him." She blushed again, and then turned her most pleading puppy dog eyes on him. "Pleeeease? I would be eternally grateful."

Gods she was stunning. He sighed and turned to his computer, typed in I.T.A.C.H.I.U.C.H.I.H.A with the greatest menace that one could put into keyboard strokes, scrolled violently past the image of the prodigy's perfect face, and hit the PRINT HISTORY button at the bottom. This was it. This was a key moment in his dedication to the pink-haired kunoichi, but not the moment he had initially thought it was. This was the moment that he helped his crush to get closer to her own crush. He smiled weakly up at his inamorata, the expression not quite reaching his eyes.

"It won't be long," he mumbled out quietly, a lump in his throat like he had swallowed an onigiri whole.

"Oh...ok." She studied him carefully, quite concerned with his change in demeanor. She reached out, and put her hand on top of his. "Thank you so much, Udon. You're the best." She leaned over the counter and gave him a kiss on the cheek.

Despite the utter disappointment he still felt deep down inside, Udon couldn't help it as one side of his mouth pulled up in genuine happiness, and his cheek blushed hot where she had kissed him. "Oh, it's no problem Sakura, really." He handed her the still warm sheets which had finally popped out of the printer next to him. There were several pages. She grasped them as if she was holding the key to the universe in her hands, already absorbed by their contents. "Please feel free to come to me if I can help you with anything else. Anything at all." Pathetic. Gods he was pathetic.

She beamed up at him. "Thanks again, Udon. Have a great day!" And with that, she was gone.

Udon watched her leave, then turned back to his computer. Next to the Uchiha's last returned book, he typed out a note. Book returned damaged. Penalty: Membership revoked 30 days. Then he grabbed the book from amongst the pile next to him, waiting to be re-shelved. Looking around the library for any onlookers and finding none, he tore the bulk of the pages out from their bound covering, ripping the back cover in the process.

He quietly placed the tattered remains on top of the other books waiting to be repaired.

Usually, Udon loved books. But just this once, that had felt really good.

Tenten stood outside the Hokage tower not quite sure what to do with herself. She had only returned to the village from her mission a half hour ago, to be informed by the Hokage that her next mission was to actually seduce Itachi Uchiha. That was all well and good - well, actually it was pretty weird - although it sounded like a better mission than most. But how in the hell was she actually supposed to go about it? She wasn't fiercely beautiful, like Sakura, or sexy and bold like Ino, or even pretty and feminine like Hinata. She was a tomboy for the most part. Yeah, she thought the Uchiha was hot, and had fantasies about being with him, like every other girl – but in reality if she actually did manage to get his attention she would have absolutely no idea what to do with it.

"Tendn!"

Wait. Was that her name? It sounded suspiciously like it – albeit whispered hurriedly from shadows somewhere over behind that bench. She moved closer towards it, her hand reaching for a kunai just in case, and sure enough-

"Tenten! Psst. Over here."

A large green and shiny black shape came into focus. "Gai-sensei! What are you doing behind there?"

She squeaked as he reached out and pulled her into the bushes with him.

"I'm sorry for the covert nature of our conversation Tenten, but it is necessary to avoid suspicion."

"O-kayy?."

"I understand you have just been given the Uchiha assignment?"

Tenten looked relieved. "Yes! But, sensei, I have no idea what I'm supposed to do!"

"It's ok, Tenten. I'm here to help." He lowered his voice even further. "Now, as I have discovered, the Uchiha takes his weapons skill very seriously. And I believe that gives you an advantage over the other ladies."

Tenten was confused. "It does?"

Gai nodded solemnly. "It does. You must wow him with your incredible skills at every possibility. Those other ladies are trying to get to his heart with beauty, and brains. NONSENSE!" The birds flew from the tree above them in a flurry. "The way to the Uchiha's heart is with a kunai straight to the chest!"

"Uh, sensei, I'm not sure that's-"

"-And you are the only girl with the skills to actually pull it off!" The shouting bush was drawing stares now. "But you must train harder, my sweet blossom of youth! Come, we mustn't delay!"

He all but yanked her arm out of its socket as they took off down the street to the training grounds.

Asuma slowly massaged his temples and breathed deeply. Why, oh why had he agreed to this ridiculous bet again?

The immature redhead in front of him crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her boot. "But why?" She asked for the fifteenth time.

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because it's stupid, that's why."

Moegi growled with indignation. "I AM NOT STUPID!"

Asuma sighed and ground his teeth. "I didn't say you were stupid." He spoke with a barely restrained calm. "I said it was a stupid idea."

"I still think I should give it a go."

"Moegi. You can't just walk up to him and ask him out. That's not how this works. If he says no, you will have lost before you've even begun."

Moegi glared at him. "Why are you so sure he's going to say no?"

Asuma's head pounded harder. He could have sworn he'd already had this conversation. They were just going round and round in circles now. "Again, that's the whoooole big reason we are doing this." He spoke as if to a five year old now. "He says no to everybody."

Moegi stuck her chin out in indignation. "Hmph. I'm not just anybody you know."

Asuma took a large swig from his ice cool lemon tea, secretly wishing against all odds that it was sake instead. They were sat at a drinks vendor's portable stall, perched conveniently opposite and only a few feet away from his favourite drinking hole. He was sitting backwards on his stool, his elbows propped up on the counter behind him, his now empty mug in one hand and the last dregs of a cigarette in the other, watching the shinobi going in and out of the pub with a rarely felt envy. He didn't even try to hide the fact that he was openly mentoring his charge already, despite the threats that the Godaime had made – frankly, he couldn't give a rat's ass if he was caught. He didn't even want to be included in the stupid bet, but she had insisted (actually, she had completely ignored his protests), AND he didn't even get to mentor Ino. At least she would have been (slightly) more reasonable.

A glance at the sun told him it was nearing 4pm. 4pm on a Friday. If he could just hurry up and get whatever the hell he was trying to achieve here over and done with, ditch the girl, and he could be over the road and washing down the week's worries with his 'shinobros' in no time at all.

"You know what," he started, deciding on a strategy, "Fine. Do whatever you want. Maybe you're right. After all, you know what they say, 'honesty is the best policy'."

Her face lit up at him, the first positive reaction he had had from her in their short time together. "Really, sensei?"

Asuma felt his heart soften a little at her finally deferring to him with an honorific. She was a cute kid really, if a little naive. But hey, weren't they all, once? "Sure thing, kid. In fact-" He noticed then the familiar black ponytail and almost regal air of the shinobi just entering the bar, along with what looked like his cousin and a couple of others. "There he is now. Go ahead. Here's your big chance." Perhaps calling her bluff was the way to knock some caution into her.

He expected her to change her mind. He expected her to falter, or stall. He expected her to at least take a moment to think about it.

What he did not, under any circumstances expect was for her to go flying across the road at the speed of sound screaming "Itachi!"

Asuma turned white and bolted after her.

Shit.

Itachi revelled in the small bar's overwhelming cacophony of sensations as each one flooded his senses mercilessly. His quiet and reserved nature often had people assuming that he was a prude, or at the very least a discerning elitist. It couldn't be further from the truth. Itachi agreed wholeheartedly with whomever it was that said variety was the spice of life. He had one life to live and he wanted to sample as many sensations as he could in that time. His sharingan served him well in that purpose, at least as far as visual sensations went. But what many people didn't realise was that he had also spent years harnessing his other senses as well. He frequently went for long periods of time completely blind without anyone else being aware of it. It had started when he was a teenager – he was always pushing the boundaries of his abilities, testing and tweaking and manipulating his chakra, trying to discover entirely new techniques that had never been discovered before – when he had accidentally discovered how to short circuit the flow of chakra towards his optical nerves and instead direct them towards his other sensory organs. This resulted in a state of being completely blind, with incredibly enhanced alternative senses. Over time he had trained with this technique so often that it wasn't long before he had taught himself to use his other senses so well that he could actually follow other people's eyes with his own powerless pupils to the point where he looked completely natural. No one would ever suspect how often he had used this technique, not a single soul in the world knew that he was capable of it, not even his own father. But it had opened up a whole new world to him. He had become addicted to his other senses in a way; his ears wanted to hear every sound from the soft sighs of a summer zephyr, to the violent screams of a sand storm in Suna. His hands wanted to touch every texture, be it sharp or rough, velvet or slime. His nose wanted everything from the sweet soil smell of the earth after the rain, to the sharp metallic acridity of his own blood. He wanted to taste every delight that there was to be had. He had become greedy for sensations, and greed wasn't an attribute that sat easily with him. Greed was self-serving. His father and the rest of his misguided ancestors had drilled him with that adage enough times. Self indulgence was not becoming of an Uchiha.

Nonsense. As far as Itachi was concerned, that was his clan's whole problem. If they let go of their rigid traditions once in a while he believed that they could be a one of the great clans again. Until they did they were slowly suffocating, stifled by pomp and ceremony. In that respect he was actually secretly proud of Sasuke. While Itachi couldn't say he agreed with the –ahem- methods Sasuke was using, he was pleased to see that at least one Uchiha was rocking the boat.

But Itachi was also anything but disrespectful. He was still the heir to the clan, and with that came certain expectations about his decorum. So he kept his self-indulgence neatly tucked in, partaking of his cravings only deep down inside where no one else could see. On the outside he wore an impermeable mask of indifference. He donned it now, as he wandered slowly through the crowds of scruffy, unwashed shinobi, sampling them one by one. He didn't need anything but his eyes for the first – the back of his trousers were dusted with the unmistakable white powder of calcium carbonate from the limestone outcrop just outside of the village – his mission clearly hadn't taken him far. The next was awash with the subtle smell of streptomyces bacteria, most likely picked up from the soil in Amegakure. He tasted the salt that blew off of the next man as a breeze blew over him from the door - Land of Waves perhaps?

In with the breeze came another smell, sugar and lemon carefully combined with a subtle green tea – not insignificant enough to be from its source at the vendor across the street, but carried into the bar on one – no - make that, two person's breaths.

The first perpetrator drew closer, and as they did, Itachi became aware of other scents adhering to them that were thoroughly out of place in a bar such as this; a sickly vanilla perfume, strawberry-scented shampoo- and was that bubblegum?

A very feminine female then. Itachi had to admit, his curiosity was piqued, but he kept his perfectly schooled expression as Shisui began ordering their drinks from the barman, even though he had a terrible instinct creeping over him that this was somehow, someway, going to have something to do with him. It always seemed to.

Sure enough, not moments later the fruity-scent-drenched body stopped directly behind him, a female voice called out "Itachi!", and the sound was immediately swallowed up by the auditory cacophony created by the men around him, who were of course oblivious to the sounds of one female voice.

But not him. He heard it, and he did everything in his power to pretend he hadn't. Maybe it would go away.

Unfortunately for him, several variations on, "Itachi!", "Itachi, will-", "Itachi will you-" were all washed away to all but his ears, and even a gentle tug on his vest went ignored before:

"ITACHI WILL YOU GO OUT WITH ME!"

blared out across the entire bar.

Itachi clenched his teeth ever so slightly and turned around to face the propositioner as the entire bar full of shinobi burst out into raucous laughter.

The poor girl he found there was in the process of turning into a berry, and Itachi couldn't help but feel for her. She was only a child - she couldn't have been more than 15 or 16 – and part of him had to wonder what on earth she was thinking. He wondered how this situation had gone in her head before she acted upon it. However, he also found himself pretty impressed with her guts. She had clearly decided to do something and had actually done it, and even though close to fifty gnarled and weathered shinobi were all laughing at her she had yet to tuck tail and run, and still looked as though she was waiting for his response, while simultaneously hoping the floor would swallow her alive. Had it been anyone else, he would have brushed them off with a cool (but as always, somehow polite) 'no', before resuming his original activities, but somehow he couldn't quite bring himself to put this girl through any more embarrassment than she had already caused herself.

"Certainly."

The second he said it the entire bar went dead silent, and he was pretty sure that he actually heard Shisui's jaw drop. That in itself was worth it.

He began walking leisurely back towards the front door, before he stopped, turned his head to the side and called back to the stunned girl, "Are you coming?" She almost tripped over herself in her hurry to join him, and he made a show of holding his crooked elbow out for her to take. As they walked together the short distance to the door (past an almost catatonic Asuma), he hoped she was at least getting some pleasure out of this, as the poor girl currently looked like she was in some kind of drug-induced stupor.

The second they exited the building Itachi heard the noise within explode to three-fold its previous levels. He could just imagine what sort of gossip would be brewing. Not that it bothered him. Nobody would dare to even whisper a word about him in his presence. Let them say what they liked. Perhaps it would work in his favour and get the clan off of his case for a time.

He walked with her until they were just out of view of the bar windows, then he lowered her arm gently, and said, "There. You are out." He looked at her for a moment, wanting to give her some words of- encouragement, advice, he didn't know- but the right words just wouldn't come to him. "Well, have a good day."

He took off back towards town.

She would get over it.

Asuma couldn't help but feel quite impressed with the younger shinobi.

He had been certain when he couldn't stop her in time and she had blurted out her proposition in front of the whole bar that she was in for an even bigger embarrassment with the inevitable rejection by the Uchiha heir, but he had been surprised when the quiet shinobi had basically said 'yes' to her screeched request. Ok, surprised was putting it lightly. He was goddamned flabbergasted. His still burning cigarette butt had fallen out of his mouth and landed on top of his foot, and it wasn't until the pair had exited the building that he realised it was burning an angry red welt into his skin and he had to dance the bloody thing off. He quickly exited out the side door and straight into the trees to witness the final exchange between his charge and her objet du désir.

His respect for Itachi had jumped up a few notches today. Not only had he managed to not embarrass the girl further when she had already done such an excellent job of doing that to herself, he had also found a way for her to exit the bar with her dignity intact, and at the end of it all, he had managed to do so in a way that had seemed like a completely innocent misunderstanding on his end, allowing the girl to walk away from her interaction with him without any hard feelings.

Moegi had been left standing there still stunned of course, not quite sure what had just happened. Asuma took her around the shoulders. "Come on, let's go get an ice cream, Ok?"

After a few silent steps, she finally spoke up. "Asuma-sensei?"

"Hmm?"

"I think you were right."

Ahh. Music to his ears. Gods bless you, Itachi.