A/N: Chapter Eight! I'll try to make this chapter longer to make up for the last one. Oh, and for Unseen, just ignore it for now, cause I just wanted to get the prologue up. And thank you for the reviews and to Lucy Sumeragui for reading JSE. This'll be some Tobi bonding time at first, and then some Kisame fluff. I think. I also think that Kisame might blush when he realizes how protective he's being. Who knows what my muse has in store for poor Tsume-chan. And lastly, what should the mission be?! It's been driving me nuts trying to figure it out! What could be so important and difficult that it needs four Akastuki members to carry out?! Gaaaah! dies

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"Don't fall asleep, Tsume-chan!" Tobi said as he leaped through the trees and away from the battle, Tsume held in his arms. He'd scooped up Tsume's belongings during their escape, and Tsume had pressed one of her spare shirts against the wound to staunch the bleeding. For some reason, she was still carrying the kunai that had wounded her. Her eyes were squeezed shut and her teeth were clenched against the pain.

Angry tears burned in her eyes as Tobi leaped along. "I was useless! I'm always useless! It's not fair! All I want is to help Kisame-sama! He and Itachi-sama saved me! I have to repay them! I can't die . . ."

"Don't you die, Tsume-chan!" Tobi said firmly above Tsume, using a tone that she had never heard from him before. "You still have a lot of training to do!"

Tsume looked up at Tobi with a confused gaze. "What? He still . . . wants me around? Even after how useless I was? But I . . ." Tsume broke off at another surge of pain, and pressed her shirt closer to the wound.

"Tobi really likes Tsume-chan and Tobi will keep her alive because Tobi is a good boy!" Tobi said, still using the same, firm tone. "If Tsume-chan dies, then Kisame-senpai will be angry at Tobi!"

Tsume looked away, tears in her eyes. "No he won't," Tsume thought. "He doesn't care about me. How cold he? I mean, I'm just—"

"And Tsume-chan isn't useless!"

It was the last thing Tsume heard before the darkness finally claimed her. But it was not to be an unending darkness.

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Tsume's eyes snapped open, senses returning at full peak. She was acutely aware of all that was around her. The folded cloth under her head, the grassy ground beneath her body. She could smell the scent of her own blood, freshly turned earth, and some kind of crushed plant that she could not name. Tsume's breathing accelerated with her awakening, and she winced in pain, closing her eyes again. She was surprised; she'd expected a searing pain to engulf her. She was surprised that she was even alive. She heard someone kneeling beside her.

"Is Tsume-chan alright?" asked Tobi's voice.

Slowly, Tsume opened her eyes. Tobi was leaning over, tone worried and slightly fearful. "But . . . why would he be worried about me?" All the same, Tsume gave a small nod. She wasn't in perfect shape, but she was alive and, considering the circumstances, that counted as being alright.

Tobi sat back with a sigh of relief. "Good," he said. "Tobi was worried! You wouldn't wake up!"

Tsume wanted to ask how long she had been out, if Kisame and the others had returned, but a twinge of pain pushed the questions from her mind. Clenching her teeth against the pain, and waving off Tobi's protests, Tsume sat up slowly. The pain abated slightly. Tsume then looked down at herself. She'd been stripped of her shirt, and the wound in her stomach had been patched up. Pushing past the initial urge to blush, Tsume shifted her position again, this time looking at her surroundings. They were in a smaller clearing this time, only big for a few people to stand close together. Her backpack was sitting to her right, and Tobi sat cross-legged to her left. Tsume saw several bandages and rolls of gauze at Tobi sighed, and she realized that, obviously, Tobi was the one who had treated her wound.

Reaching out to her backpack, Tsume rummaged around for a moment before drawing out her notebook and pencil. Opening the now slightly ragged notebook. Tsume put the tip of the pencil to the page. "Thank you, Tobi-sama," she wrote. "I'm sorry I couldn't do anything after all that training. I feel awful for not being able to help. And then you had to go to the trouble of taking care of me." Tsume would have written more, but Tobi reached out and stilled her hand. Tsume looked up at him to find him shaking his head from side to side.

"I'm glad I could help Tsume-chan," he said, a smile in his voice. "I like Tsume-chan and think that she is a very nice person."

Tsume's sadness melted away at Tobi's kind words, and she beamed up at him. Only one person had ever said anything like that to her. But Tobi hardly even knew Tsume; how could he already care about her this much?

Tobi must have understood Tsume's questioning gaze. "Deidara-senpai likes you, and so does Kisame-senpai. Even Itachi-senpai is nice to you," Tobi explained. "Tsume-chan tries really hard and doesn't give up even when she's tired. And she also doesn't throw sandals at Tobi."

Tsume couldn't help but laugh silently at the last comment. Tobi seemed, no, was so childlike and innocent, he didn't seemed to fit with the group that she knew he was a part of. She was becoming quite sure that all the ninja were part of some kind of organization, and if Kisame was any standard to go by, all the members of the organization had to be extremely powerful and dangerous shinobi. At the last thought, a shiver of fear ran down Tsume's spine, and she bit her lip. Did she really want to keep traveling and learning with such dangerous people? Did she really want to live under the constant threat of attack?

Lifting her hands, Tsume placed them over her bandaged stomach, troubled gaze showing that she was deep in thought. Did she really want to stay with Kisame, Itachi, Deidara, and Tobi? Was it something that she really wanted? Then Tsume closed her eyes and shook her head. The answer was easy.

Yes.

"I do want to stay with Kisame-sama, Tobi-sama, Deidara-sama, and Itachi-sama," she thought. "I owe them a debt, and I can't leave until that debt had been repaid. I owe them my life. Kisame-sama especially.

Her smile returned, and Tsume turned to Tobi. Still smiling, Tsume leaned forward and hugged Tobi around the neck, hiding her suddenly tearful eyes in his chest. She felt so happy, so wonderfully happy. What Tobi said might have been strange, but it meant so much to Tsume. No one had been that kind to her in a long, long time, and she couldn't help it as tears rolled down her cheeks. She felt Tobi return the hug warmly, and Tsume felt that this might have been what hugging a kind older brother might have felt like. It was different from Kisame's embrace; it wad simply kind and warm and happy.

Tobi pulled back to ruffle Tsume's hair, just as Kisame had done. Tsume smiled at him, and mouthed, "thank you," as she continued smiling at him.

"Tsume-chan can call Tobi Nii-san if she wants," Tobi said.

Tsume blinked in slight surprise, but nodded. "Tobi-nii-san," she thought. It was a gesture that no one had ever extended to her before, and it filled her with a happy warmth that slowly dulled the pain in her stomach.

"Onna? Tobi?" Tsume recognized Kisame's voice in an instant, and she jerked her head around in the direction from which it had come. Relief flooded through Tsume at the sight of the shark-nin as he emerged from the trees, Itachi and Deidara behind him. Tsume saw that Kisame's sword had been bandaged again, was set diagonally across his back over his cloak by a wide leather belt. Setting eyes on Tsume, Kisame moved quickly over to her. Tobi got out of the way and Kisame took his place. Tsume blushed as she felt Kisame's eyes run over her, checking her for other wounds. When he saw none, he let out a sigh of relief that only Tsume could hear.

"Tobi did his job well, un," Deidara said, kneeling down next to Kisame and peering at the bandaged wound. "Always does, too, un."

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Tsume sat with her back against Kisame's chest and his arms wrapped loosely around her, watching as Tobi and Deidara argued heatedly several yards away. She smiled to herself as Deidara launched another sandal at the orange-masked shinobi, who dodged it quickly with a yell of protest. Tsume couldn't help but laugh to herself, the sound silent.

"Feeling better, onna?" Kisame asked. "That was a pretty bad wound. Though, I suppose, Tobi probably used a healing technique to close it up." Tsume turned her head to look quizzically up at Kisame. "Some ninja can use their chakra to heal as well as fight. Tobi's really good at it. Me, on the other hand," Kisame made a face, "I'm hopeless." Tsume smiled softly. "Hey, what're you laughing at?!" Kisame ruffled Tsume's hair playfully.

Tsume made a face of her own, and batted away Kisame's hand. But before she turned away, she saw an odd look in the shark-nin's eyes. Her brows furrowed, and she reached up to touch Kisame's cheek, silently asking, "what's wrong?"

To Tsume's great surprise, Kisame blushed. It was ever so slight, but Tsume's sharp eyes caught it. Avoiding Tsume's gaze, Kisame's cheeks were now tinged with a light purple, the color a result of his blue skin. But right then, it was the most adorable thing that Tsume had ever seen.

"I was . . . worried about you," Kisame said quietly, voice so soft that only Tsume could hear.

Now it was Tsume's turn to blush. Her cheeks darkened, and she turned away and lowered her head to hide the coloring of her face. Kisame had been worried about her. About her. Tsume couldn't help the smile that curved her lips. It had been so long since someone had cared about her; she'd almost forgotten what it felt like. But now that she remembered, it felt like the most wonderful thing in the world.

A/N: Chapter Eight and its eleven-forty. Blegh. I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows as of three this morning, and I've been weird ever since. Anyway, I wanted to finish this before I went to bed, so it might've ended up a big short. Thanks for reading and as always I love you!