Konan was having an extremely rough day, even for her. Attempts to locate Orochimaru were not going even half as well as she hoped, and her people were starting to doubt that he would ever be found. On top of that, they still hadn't been able to recruit any new troops to replace the ones killed by the toxic gas in the jungle. Morale was plummeting, and her leadership of VUM was being called into question (though only by a few particularly disgruntled Falks, and never to her face). Needless to say, she was not exactly in a charitable mood when Kisame burst into her tent begging to go up to the surface to Regi.

"Absolutely not!" she barked. "You would be murdered by an angry mob wizout a second guess!"

"You mean second thought, and I have to see Itachi!" Kisame argued. "Please, I promise I won't be obvious about it! I could wear a disguise, or be smuggled up in a suitcase-"

"No means no, Monsieur Fishy! And why am I just 'earing about Itachi now?! Kakuzu or Deidara should 'ave reported zis to me as soon as zey returned to base!"

"I don't know about Kakuzu, but Deidara and Sasori came straight to me."

"And where is Deidara now?!"

"Er, sulking, I believe. He said something…inappropriate, I overheard and told Sasori, and now Sasori's-"

"What did Deidara say," Konan growled out.

Kisame felt awful for ratting out his friend, but lying to Konan would only come back to bite both him and Sasori on the ass. At best, it might distract her long enough to give him an opening to sneak up to the surface. "He said that he loved Sasori."

Konan slammed her hands down on the desk and began to click and hiss so rapidly that even Kisame couldn't keep up with her, though he was pretty certain he heard the words "stupid child" and "murder with my own hands" before she calmed down.

The conversation was temporarily derailed by a dark-haired Falk bursting through the tent entrance, looking extremely upset. He began to click at her, but switched to English when he noticed Kisame's presence. "Commander, there's been a fight."

"Is it really necessary to bother me with some skirmish?" Konan growled, clearly not in the mood to discipline whatever grunts had gotten into a scuffle. These were what her underlings were for; to make sure that small disciplinary issues never made it to her desk.

"One of the humans was involved; the one with silver hair. Kakuzu's knocked out Erik, and he's in the infirmary now."

Konan swore and rose to her feet. "Monsieur Fishy, come wiz me; Monsieur Loudmouth needs to explain zis, and 'e better 'ave a damn good explanation for us."

"Damn it to hell, Hidan," Kisame snapped as he followed after Konan. So much for finding an opening to sneak out.

-n-

The Falk and human leaders hurriedly marched into the infirmary, looking for the source of the fight. There was an injured Falk lying on a nearby cot, with two other Falks standing close to him. Kakuzu was seated on a cot opposite his victim, holding a cloth to his right eye. Hidan was sitting beside him, though he immediately rose to his feet as soon as he caught sight of Kisame and Konan. "It wasn't his fault! I bumped into that jackass (here he pointed to the other Falk) and I kept apologizing, but he fucking shoved me, so Kakuzu decked him, and then his asshole friends showed up and-"

"Hidan, shut up," Kisame snapped, and for once his subordinate listened to him.

Konan, meanwhile, was talking in a hushed voice with the injured Falk, his friends interjecting every now and again. Kisame ignored their discussion for now, focusing on Hidan. "Hidan, I swear that if you're lying to me-"

"I'm not! And I don't know why Kakuzu protected me! I swear, I didn't ask the dumbass to do anything for me-"

"Monsieur Fishy." Kisame jerked his head towards Konan, who was frowning at him and motioning for him to come closer to her across the infirmary. Once they were safely out of earshot of everyone, Konan whispered to him, "Listen, Kakuzu and 'idan need to get out of 'ere immediately. Tell them to go to zeir tent and stay put for a while, at least ze rest of ze day. Kakuzu 'as just a few scrapes and Monsieur Loudmouth is uninjured, so zere is no reason to keep zem 'ere. Send zem out now."

Kisame nodded and walked back over to Hidan, giving him Konan's message. He escorted Kakuzu and Hidan out of the tent, glancing behind him to see Konan still talking with the Falks. Apparently her line of questioning wasn't quite done.

-two hours later-

Sasori was lucky enough to find Deidara hunkered down in their tent, looking less angry and more exhausted now than when they'd last been together. The redhead had had some time to think about his situation and had at last come up with an appropriate way to approach Deidara about the matter. Well, appropriate might be the wrong word, since it was really just an effective way to get a reaction out of Deidara. He slowly walked into the tent and sat down beside Deidara, hoping not to startle his friend or make him run away. "Hey Deidara."

"Danna."

"I'm sorry about-"

"Don't. I know you're just looking out for Kisame, un. But please, please don't go with him to Regi, un! I don't want you to get hurt." He bit his lip and clutched his hands in his lap. "I'm tired of seeing people die, un. It hurts even more when they're my friends."

Deidara looked so distraught that Sasori was half-tempted to promise the blond that he wouldn't put himself in danger. He stopped himself from giving this promise, however, and instead began to implement his plan. He gently reached up to Deidara and lightly stroked the side of his neck, making sure to locate the softer, darker skin when he did so. Deidara immediately started to fidget and look uncomfortable. "Sasori?"

"You look tense, Deidara. I thought you might enjoy a neck rub."

"Danna-"

"Humans do it all the time. Here, let me show you." Sasori lifted his other hand and began stroking the other side of Deidara's neck, watching the blond for any sort of reaction.

Deidara squirmed around for a bit, looking like he wanted to speak but never letting out a sound. Finally he smacked the hands away and scrambled to the other side of the cot. "You can't do that, un!"

"What's wrong, Deidara?"

"You just…that's not…"

"What, you can show me affection but I can't do the same to you?" Deidara froze, eyes widening at the words. "Kisame told me what you're doing, Deidara. Don't try to deny it."

Deidara at least had the decency to look ashamed, wrapping his arms around himself and looking away from the redhead. "I'm sorry, Sasori. I never wanted this to happen, un."

"Why did you hide this from me? Do you have any idea how messed up this is?! You can't just-"

"I know it's wrong, un!" Deidara shrieked, rising to his feet with fire in his eyes. "I know that I shouldn't feel this way about a human, I shouldn't act like this around you! But you don't understand how much this hurts, un!" Deidara began to make soft chirping noises, unlike anything Sasori had ever heard out of a Falk. "I know that you're mad, un. Of course you'd make fun of me for this."

"Deidara, that's not what I-"

"Not what, un?! Not what you want?! Not part of the agreement when you rescued me on that planet, un?! I don't want this either, Sasori! I hate this feeling, I hate myself for feeling like this, and I hate you most of all!"

"Deidara-"

"I wish my ship had crashed and I had died before I ever met you, un!" Before Sasori could say anything (or even think of something to say) Deidara ran past him and shot out of the tent. Sasori didn't try to follow him.

-meanwhile-

"Dear Jashin, I don't even want to think about what Kisame's going to do to me when Konan finishes chewing out his ass," Hidan grumbled as he stared at the ceiling of the tent. "Seriously, this is bad. I got in a fight back in basic and ended up knocking over a fucking port-o-potty while my CO was inside. This is gonna make that fiasco look like a Jashin-damned walk in the park." Hidan was drawn out of his lament by a soft hiss, so quiet that he almost thought he'd imagined it at first. He glanced over to Kakuzu, wondering if the Falk had heard it as well.

As it turned out, Kakuzu appeared to be the source of the noise. He was attempting to re-bandage his injured knuckles but was having difficulty manipulating the bandage with only one hand. His uncovered head allowed Hidan to see the frustration on his face, making a bit of guilt well up in Hidan's chest. The Falk had been injured trying to defend him, after all. "Hey, Kakuzu." The Falk immediately looked up, setting his hands in his lap and trying to act normal. "You need some help with that?"

Kakuzu attempted to give Hidan a confused look, acting as though he had no idea what the Jashinist was talking about. Hidan was not buying it, however. "Oh don't give me that shit, dumbass. I heard you hiss a second ago." Seeing that this line of arguing was getting him nowhere, Hidan decided to change tactics a little. "Look, you got hurt protecting me, right? So let me help you with the bandages so I don't feel so fucking guilty about this." Kakuzu finally relented at this line of reasoning and extended his injured hand and a clean bandage.

Hidan sat down on a crate in front of Kakuzu's cot and set to work bandaging the hand. His hands gently ghosted over the Falk's skin without much thought, admiring how similar the texture was to human flesh. It was a little tougher overall, almost calloused in texture, but that was it as far as differences went. The Jashinist suddenly realized that he'd become distracted and quickly returned to bandaging Kakuzu's knuckles, praying that the Falk hadn't noticed what he'd been doing.

The wrapping didn't take long, and once he was finished Hidan turned the hand over a few times before leaning back, satisfied with his work. "There. That should hold for a while." He looked at Kakuzu with a smile and asked, "What do you think, Kakuzu?"

Kakuzu clenched and unclenched his hand a few times before he nodded in agreement. At this point the pair of them fell silent, neither sure of what to do now. A few moments later Kakuzu motioned for Hidan to come closer, and the Jashinist obediently leaned in. Kakuzu took a few deep breaths and leaned closer to him, putting his lips almost right against Hidan's ear. "Thank…you…" he wheezed out softly, making Hidan's eyes go wide. For the first time, Kakuzu had spoken to him.