When Deidara returned to his room he no longer felt the want to continue what he had been doing. But then, if he didn't continue designing and creating his notorious bombs, he had nothing else to do except brood. And there were already enough brooding types in the Akatsuki— Hidan's behaviour was but the tip of the iceberg—and he didn't want to add onto the pile.

He collapsed onto his bed and achingly recalled his short visit to Hidan. The Jashinist had been bitter, but, if it was not just Deidara's imagination, it was a bitterness that was thoroughly forced.

"This is ridiculous," he muttered, pulling his Akatsuki coat off over his head. Lately, had hadn't been bothered to unbutton it: he figured that it was big enough to just pull on and off, and he didn't have to be bothered to undo the buttons in the first place. He threw the thick garment onto the floor and ran a hand through his hair, combing the long blonde hair out.

"Not you too,"

Deidara exhaled loudly and moved over on the bed to allow space for Itachi to sit down.

"Sorry," Deidara mumbled, scooping up the coat and folding it over in half. He placed it neatly next to him.

Itachi patted his shoulder awkwardly. "Hidan, right?"

Deidara glanced at Itachi's hand. "Yeah," he said after a while. "…I don't even know why I'm shaken up by it,"

"By him,"

"By him, whatever,"

"Perhaps… he's the only one who felt the loss,"

Deidara shrugged Itachi's hand off and stared at him. "Hidan, of all people, is mourning Sasori's death? Last I checked, Hidan was a—,"

"Stop, Deidara," Itachi gave the Iwa nin a half glare. "You can't try and understand it. If Hidan feels bad after Sasori's death, leave him alone,"

Deidara opened and closed his mouth, obviously wanting to say something in protest, but then thought better of it and looked away from Itachi angrily. He couldn't shake off the feeling that Hidan was like that specifically because of Sasori's death, which, of course played a role in his new behaviour, but—

"I'm going to go," Itachi's clothes rustled as he got up. "I just came by to see how you were,"
Deidara chuckled. There was a hint of bitterness in it, but overall, it sounded pretty warm.

"You have a real, live little brother, Itachi," Deidara said. "Why don't you try taking care of him instead, and check how he's doing?"

Itachi's eyes clouded over and he walked out of the room.

"Harsh, Deidara…," Deidara flopped backwards onto his bed and massaged the side of his neck. Why was he being such an asshole? Itachi was just being nice…well, probably not nice…maybe he was transferring all his big brother-ness to Deidara, simply because he was the youngest in the Akatsuki. Or…

It suddenly hit Deidara that he knew nothing about the Uchiha but the Uchiha knew everything about him. When Itachi had put his hand on Deidara's shoulder—it kind of woke him up. There was probably shitloads of things that Deidara had no idea about to do with Itachi, like if he was—

Itachi? Deidara thought, repositioning himself so that his head was actually on a pillow. No way. He's way too…

He didn't finish his own sentence. He didn't want to. He turned over on his side and forced himself to think about it no more.

***

Hidan was the last to sleep that night.

Out of all the people who actually slept that is: Kakuzu never did. Or if he did, it went for as long as your average power nap. Not to mention the guy was an extremely light sleeper. Hidan had no idea how Kakuzu could still function at optimum speed when he was constantly going without sleep.

Tonight, though, Kakuzu was asleep. Hidan had listened until he heard his partner get into bed. Then he had slipped out of the room, walked into the kitchen, pretended to get himself a drink, and then went to the long way to Sasori's room.

The place still looked like it normally did, except for the huge blackened section which had been Sasori's bed. Hidan tore his eyes away from it, trying not to remember the night he had been here, and went further into the room until he reached the pile of puppets which Sasori had previously discarded as "failures".

"Oi, Sasori," Hidan whispered. "I know you're in there. Now get out,"

One of the puppets began to shift. The corner of Hidan's mouth curled in a smirk.

Sorry to leave it on such a note…you're probably all confused at the moment…but it's all for a purpose…I remember when I was playing Pheonix Wright I was perpetually confused, so I can empathize. Anyway, I'm going to Sydney tomorrow (gotta get up at 4 am! TT__TT) so no updates for about a week after the next chapter I upload.