**********

Somewhere, sometime that night, a Cajun cursed the moon blue.

*********

Kakashi was in Washington before they worked out what the blue thing was. Naruto actually made him come into the Triesklon to hear about it.

Kakashi stared at the floor. Two years here in this weird world, and it was still hard to look at Naruto.

Naruto'd been here almost twelve years. He wasn't a boy anymore. He wasn't just a young man. He'd, grown up, somehow and while it wasn't quite the knife to the gut it had been that first, awful time?

Two years, and he still had to tell himself that it was Naruto he was looking at, not a damn ghost.

"Why was there an intersellar bit of space trash in Iran?" Kakashi asked, examining the wallpaper.

"Who cares?" Naruto shrugged. "But it was there, and if there's more of it? It's like a compass!"

It was easier to remember, keep the past right with the future, the more Naruto spoke. He was still a massive

fucking dork.

"For an interstellar space ship?"

"Yes! A good one!"

"And you couldn't tell me this in, say, an email because..."

"Because I want the other three pieces, but we think that they've already been acquired by your little Baghdad buddy."

"Iran."

"I know. Couldn't think of a cute nick name."

"And what would you DO with these four things, exactly?"

"Have fun finding out."

"I hate the fact that you outrank me," Kakashi said, after a moment.

"Should have killed me when we first met, then. I spent six years telling you i wanted to be the man in the big hat," Naruto said, pulling something out of his desk drawer and tossing it to Kakashi. "Here, picked you up a new volume."

Kakashi cursed all the way to the airport, in spite of the fresh porn.

**********

Remy Lebeau, also known as Gambit, the white devil, and for a brief while Death, was not having a great day.

That damn thing had been the last piece, too. And now Shield had it, according to a source who was as accurate as you could expect the cousin of a friend of the sister of the wife of the janitor who maybe overheard something possibly.

Seriously. What the fuck? And what had been UP with that white haired, light fingered bastard? Another super solider, some sort of hybrid mutant? It was almost tempting to track down Logan and try to convince him that Weapon X was involved but the only way that could end well was if... Well, there was no way it could end well. either he'd end up right, and that'd be all kinds of bad, or Logan'd realize he'd been lied too and the man took things so damn personal.

The object lay, glistening, on the cheap hotel sheets. Remy was splurging a little. If by splurge you meant breaking into a cheap hotel quietly via the window and setting a mental alarm clock for sunrise.

It was a Wednesday, he'd be fine.

Anyway, the object. It was, maybe the size of his outstretched hand. When it was completed, it'd be a slightly misshapen, probably sparky flattened disc. Ripply blue. Really if the thing'd stay one color it'd look like tacky jewelry. For a three year old. But even sitting on the sheet, it was quietly reddening in what Remy assumed was shame at it's failure. Possibly rage at the white haired bastard.

He gave it a prod. Stupid, stupid thing. The whole situation was shit, now. It'd been shit when he'd tracked that last piece down, it'd gotten shittier when he'd lost it, and now it was utter crap because there was a decent chance that he was back on some horrible little 'person of interest' list in some horrible little government building, and someone would at some point want to know what the hell he needed this piece of shit for.

That, he felt, was a private matter. So private he didn't actually KNOW, which honestly he didn't like all that much but hey, it was what he DID, right?

Prod, hate, prod, hate.

It wasn't a very complicated mental exercise.

Fine. He'd call the guy, then, and see about handing over what he HAD. Then see about getting that last piece back.

Maybe kicking that scrawny white haired bastard's ass in the process. Yeah. That'd be a nice bonus, blow the smart-ass up.

******

Sometimes, rarely, the universe looks down on you and smiles.

And other days it goes down on you, and smiles after with jizz on its chin.

Metaphorically.

Kakashi was having trouble believing his luck.

A month spent looking really damn hard for the guy, and the man just... Was THERE.

Kakashi wasn't even wearing an illusion. It was an airport. He put on a medical mask and a white plastic eye patch and waved his id's at the guards and meandered through at airports. It was a sheild perk, up there with never paying for parking tickets ever and making up things to put on his expense report to justify pay-per-veiw porn.

Not just a blow job. A good one. With humming and a finger or three and maybe an extra girl there for nipple duty.... Kakashi thought, staring at the back of Remy Lebeau's head. He recognized the head. And the shitty jacket.

It certainly wasn't as nice as Kakashi's jacket.

Kakashi stuck his hands in his pockets, fished out his porn and tucked his nose in. Sidled to the check in counter while the arrogant bastard slide past security. "Hi, miss?" he pulled out the right I.D. without looking. "I'd like to change my seats. Did you check that man in?"

"Yes sir," she started.

Kakashi grinned, eye a perfect crescent. "Excellent!"

****