Me: Hey guys! I guess that this isn't going to get up as soon as I want it to, but I'm going to start it.

Warnings: A little blood, not a lot and a bit of cussing (surprise).

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or the characters. I own the plot and the original characters.

'Lylas thoughts'

'My thoughts'

It was early morning and I found myself in the training room with Itachi. He had given me two days rest, before he finally dragged me out of bed to go train. Akira was awake and looking healthier. She hated being alone in her room, even though she shared the room with Konan, so I often found her climbing in with me at night. I didn't mind; Lylas and I always use to do that before she got married.

Konan seemed to warm up to me and she even invited me to watch a movie with her after my first day of training. She was surprisingly warm hearted and interesting. It made me happy that she was at least trying to make my stay a little more comfortable.

Sasori and Deidara were awesome. I guess it's because they feed me, but that wasn't the point. They fought constantly, but they held a brotherly affection toward each other. Of course I never told them that. I had a feeling that Sasori would deny it venomously.

I met the rest of the household face to face with the exception of Pein, who rather stay an unsocial able hermit. The first was Kisame, who apparently was Itachi's partner. He kind of reminded me of a shark. A tall shark. Kisame stood at 7 foot and 7 inches, with skin a pale blue. The dude even had gills! He had the body of a swimmer and dark blue spiky hair that matched his eyes. He was also surprisingly talkative and seemed to admire me in a secret, quiet kind of way.

The next one I met was definitely the freakiest guy I've ever met. His name was Zetsu and he resembled a carnivorous plant. His head was incased in a green plant claw. One side of his head was black and the other white and they fought each other! It was freaky! But he was also interesting in his own way. He knew everything about every battle fought and never hesitated to share with me on it.

The most indifferent to me was the eerie Kakuzu, who resembled a robot version of Kakashi. Big, tall and wore a mask. That's where the similarities ended though. He had bright green eyes with no pupils and instead of white around the eyes, it was scarlet. Every time I saw him, he just bowed his head politely before disappearing.

Hidan was surprisingly the most normal looking man out of all of them. He stood two inches taller than Deidara with a plain face and muscled body. His eyes were magenta and he was slightly aloof. However, he didn't mind talking to me as long as it was me that started the conversation.

The one that surprised me most was Tobi, who just seemed to damn cheery for a bloodthirsty killer. I mean, I guess they all seemed different from the stereotype killer, but that wasn't the point. Tobi was just the cheeriest. He was the same height as Hidan, but liked to hug people and make light of every situation. He made things almost bearable.

Itachi for the most part ignored me. At least until this morning.

At this moment he was just staring at me, like he could guess my skills by just looking at me. Hell, maybe he could. Eventually, I got bored and looked around. The training house was huge on the inside, with matted walls and floors, grate walks around the room and on the ceiling, and minimum weapons lying around. Those were in the weapons room, which was in the weapons house, which was separate from this building.

"Let's start with seeing how good you are at hand to hand combat." The deep voice of Itachi, took me out of my observations. Shrugging, I took a defensive stance. Itachi just stood there. "No." He said. "I want to see you're offensive first." Again I shrugged and relaxed my muscles. He was also relaxed, but he watched me intently. Taking a deep breath, I studied him.

He was unmoving and focused.

I rushed him; my left side tilted forward so I could knock him over and absorb the shock. Effortlessly, he moved to the side. No surprise. It was a weak attack. Swinging, I went for his head. Again he dodged, but I kept coming at him, making my steps predictable and my eyes locked onto his. Knowing he had the Sharingan, I wouldn't normally have done this, but this was purely hand to hand combat, so there was no chakra allowed.

Without warning, I dropped to a crouch and kicked out my leg toward his legs. His reaction was quick, but not quick enough to be saved from stumbling slightly. Taking advantage of that surprise, I wrapped an arm around his midsection and vaulted all my weight on him, before he could get both feet back under him. We hit the floor with a loud thump, but immediately, Itachi rolled and pinned me under him. His hands had bruising grip on my wrists, and straddled my thighs. Without hesitation, I moved my leg over to the outside of his, and forced my opposite arm straight across the floor above my head. This threw him off balance, and with a cry, I rolled us over and tried to force my body to stand. However, he still had a hold of one of my wrists and he yanked it to the opposite side of him, throwing me completely off balance and onto my back. I was still on top of him, but now my back was to his chest. Quickly, before I could struggle, he rolled, pressing me face down into the matted floor. His sudden weight on my back had me struggling for breath. He had my arms pulled back, and my forearms were almost parallel to my spine. His hands and chest kept them pinned there.

I struggled in vain for a moment, but he forced my arms a little further up, gaining a cry from me as my left shoulder popped out of place. I whipped my head back, and let out a satisfied smile as it connected hard with his face. It didn't surprise him enough to let go, but enough to get a growl out of him. My left arm was numb and as a medic Nin, I knew that wasn't really a good thing. I was struggling to breathe and I was pretty pissed when I noticed that the bastard above me wasn't even out of breath.

"Do you yield?" He asked. 'This bastard.' I thought. 'He's got me pinned! Why would he ask me if I fucking yield?' 'Who the hell are you talking about?' The answering voice in my head startled me and it made me jerk in surprise. Itachi took this as a negative and forced my other shoulder out of socket, but I was to distracted by the other thought to notice. The voice had sounded suspiciously like that of Lylas. So I hazard a thought back. 'Lylas?' There was no reply. For some reason that didn't surprise me. 'What the hell?'

"Do you yield?" Itachi asked again, oblivious to my confusion. His voice brought my mind back to the numbness in my arms and shoulders. "Well usually I wouldn't yield, but seeing as that you may very well tear my arms off if I don't, then I guess I do." I replied a bit brokenly due to loss of breath. His weight was suddenly gone and I gasped for breath. My arms fell limply to my sides, but before I could do anything, he was over me and popping my shoulders back into place. Grunting, I sat up and stretched, wincing slightly at the pain. I couldn't help but to feel satisfied when I saw a black eye beginning to form on his face.

"We'll have to start with getting you back into shape." He said standing and going over to a door on the far side of the room. I glared at his back, even though I knew he was right. I was out of shape. Not that I could have done much about that. It wasn't like I asked to be mal nourished for three weeks. Sighing, I stood and followed him into the room that was connected to the training house. It was just a plain office room, and Itachi was rooting threw the stacked paper on the desk, which was the only piece of furniture in the room.

"We'll start with running and core exercises." He said without even glancing up at me. "Every morning I'll set up a five mile course that I want you to run as a warm up. When you get back, we'll work on core and strength exercises that I have set up. We might do a bit of swimming as well. For now," He turned to me finally and handed me a paper, which was suppose to be a map. "There's your first run. Go." Mentally I raised an eyebrow at him and thought, 'Does he really think I'm going to use the map?'. The look he gave told me that, yes; he did expect me to use it.

Sighing, I made a venture to the house and knocked on Konan's door. She answered quickly, and smiled slightly at me. "Hey." I said. "Do you happen to own a pair of shorts that I could borrow?"

1212121212

Turns out that she did have a pair.

With the map stuck in the waistband of the shorts, I set off in a jog in the general direction it told me to go. Itachi, it seemed, was taking no chances with me, so there where protection wards keeping me in along the path that I was taking. Whether it was to simply keep me in, or to keep everyone else out, I wasn't so sure.

Surprisingly, the jog wasn't all that horrible. It was only noon, so the sun was still up and birds still sang. I'd say it was downright peaceful. Swinging my shoulders while running hurt like hell, though. All well, teaches me not to get distracted.

My peace ended when I returned to the house, and I saw Itachi standing in the deck with a clipboard in his hand.

He was a brutal trainer. He pushed me to my limits, and then beyond. He had me start out with core activities, like bicycles, mountain climbers and every other thing he could come up with. When that was done to his satisfaction, he had me do a whole bunch of arm strengthening activities, then to leg activities. It was dark when we were finally finished.

Exhausted and hungry, I made my way to the kitchen, where the smell of steaks lingered in the air. Deidara smiled at me, before placing the plate of glorious food in front of me. Everyone was there, with the exception of Itachi who came in later, freshly showered. Akira, who sat next to me, fidgeted, so I reached over and grabbed her hand under the table.

"Itachi." Kisame said sounding startled. "Where did you get the black eye?" The raven-haired man glared at me. Gleefully, I smiled back and saluted him with two fingers. The table fell silent. "You landed a hit on him?" The white side of Zetsu asked. "Well, obviously." The black side answered. Ok, that really weirded me out. It was so weird to see someone actually talk to himself or herself and get an answer.

"Well." I said before an argument broke out between Zetsu and…. Zetsu. Wow that was messed up. "He gets a couple pointers as well. The bastard pulled both my shoulder blades out of place." I accompanied this statement with a glare, which was ignored.

Akira squeezed my hand, and turned to talk to Konan, who was innocently eating her stake. Staring down into my plate, I relished toe feeling of being sweaty and tired. It was a feeling I missed since becoming the Mizukage. It had been a while since I had last been on a proper mission. When I looked up, I could have sworn that Kakuzu winked at me.

1212121212121

"That doesn't make sense." Lylas said, hitting her head repeatedly on the wall. "I know that's SaiKura's hair. I can feel her chakra lingering on it, but the calico cat means nothing to me." Kakashi placed a hand between her head and the wall, before addressing Gaara. "She hasn't contacted you has she?" The red head just shook his head.

Lylas sighed. "Have you talked to Shinomaru yet?" She asked. "No as a matter of fact no one has." A deep voice said. A six foot red headed man with green eyes, walked into the room. "Shinomaru!" Naruto exclaimed from his spot behind a stack of papers. The red head ignored him.

"What is this I hear of the Mizukage's hair?" He asked. Lylas sighed. That was Shinomaru all right, curt and straight to the point. "It was wrapped in the Akatsuki's cloak." She said. "But with it was a calico cat figurine." "Calico?" He asked, his eyebrows almost disappearing into his hairline. All of a sudden he looked stricken. "Could it be that they know?" He muttered.

Lylas was confused. What the hell was he talking about? She got so distracted, that when someone said, 'This bastard.' She snapped to attention. "Whose a bastard?" She asked. All the men stared at her like she was crazy. It wasn't until she heard, 'He's got me pinned! Why would he ask me if I fucking yield?' The voice was disfigured and unrecognizable, but Lylas replied, so that she could prove to herself that she wasn't crazy. 'Who the hell are you talking about?' There was no reply.

'Maybe I am crazy.' She thought. 'Damn.' "I need to talk to Akira's boss." She said suddenly. She didn't know why, but all she knew was that Akira's boss had answers. To what questions, she wasn't sure, and why this had to do with SaiKura, she wasn't sure about either.

When nobody in the room moved to do anything. She glared. "Now."

Sorry about the fight scene. I have no combat knowledge at all.