Passionfruit

"Passive."
.

Colour drained out of his face, parallel to the red fading away under the orange mask he was quickly coming to detest. The Sharingan was gone, deactivated. Like this, he wouldn't be able to Kamui his body to the eye's other dimension. Tobi's Sharingan would have to work differently than Itachi's, so Deidara's eye wouldn't be able to detect any present genjutsu. Still, he had an inkling that he wasn't under any spell. If Deidara did it, if he implemented his C0, his partner would go out with him.

He looked the Uchiha up and down, assessing.

Tobi was mocking him. He was giving up, throwing away his life like it was meaningless. That wasn't how it worked. Art was an ending with purpose. Tobi dying like he didn't care if he did or not was insulting.

"Tch," Deidara swooped down low, watching in apathy as Tobi's head tilt, following his movements. After another gust of air from the flapping wings, Deidara finally said, "You're pathetic."

There was no reaction to his words.

"Do you think I won't do it? Is that it?"

This time, Tobi looked away, but he said nothing.

That was the wrong thing to do. Deidara hated being ignored. He pulled off his cloak and nearly ripped off his shirt, screaming, "Look at it! Look at me! Hm."

When Tobi did, Deidara continued, slamming his palm against the stitching on his chest, "I made this because I love reality, hm. I love the way of the world. Everything must come to an end. It's natures law. My final work is a symbol of truth, hm."

Deidara's eyes narrowed, "Tell me... Tell me why you're so determined to ruin yourself."

Maybe he could forgive him, if his drive stemmed from somewhere true.

Tobi stilled, and considering how motionless he'd been, it was a feat. Then the Uchiha finally spoke, "I will tell you—everything. But come down here. I need to see you. Please."

There was something odd about what he said, and it took him a long moment to figure out what it was.

Tobi had said please. Not the childish version of him, but the arrogant Uchiha that lay under the mask felt pressured to plead. That was a first. Deidara had to oblige, especially if it meant he'd get the answers he sought out for. A part of him wanted to be stubborn and not get closer, instead fly higher until he could blast himself into smithereens. Shit, he was so tempted to.

But when he stared down at Tobi's pitiful display, Deidara decided to land. He wanted to know what caused this, so maybe he could end it.

He kept his distance from his partner, stepping off the bird. He watched in confusion as Tobi suddenly sat down, right there in the dirt. A few heartbeats later and Deidara was copying his movements. They sat across from each other, cross-legged, hit by the force of their emotions.

No one moved for what felt like centuries, until Tobi was the first to break the silence, "There was a girl."

A muscle in Deidara's jaw twitched. Something foul had caught in his throat, the taste like acid. Bitter. A girl... Deidara clenched his fists. He'd never felt such jealousy, not since his first sight of the Sharingan.

He heard it in Tobi's voice.

"You love her," it wasn't a question.

"I did," Tobi then amended, "I do."

Whatever rage Deidara had felt earlier vanished with the wind. The fire he'd been trapped in dispersed, leaving ash and waste in its place. A horrible calm came over him.

It was unfamiliar; he preferred the hot anger. He didn't know what this was. It was cold. It was deep. It hurt.

"Her name was Rin," Tobi started again, and Deidara cursed him. He didn't want to know her name. He didn't want to know anything about her, "She was on my team, along with Kakashi – who you've met – and Minato Namikaze, Konoha's fourth Hokage. I've mentioned the failed mission, about what happened when I woke up. But there was more that I didn't want you to know about."

Then Tobi told him everything.

He started from when he was a young kid, a misunderstood orphan like Deidara. It seemed they both had old fools watching over them. Tobi with his grandmother and him with Ōnoki. Deidara listened carefully as the rest of Tobi – no, Obito's past unfolded. And when Madara Uchiha's name was whispered under the wind for the first time, an unpleasant chill crawled up his back. Madara, the – bastard – fed Obito until he cocooned himself, cracked, and crawled out with poisonous wings, as Tobi.

Deidara couldn't relate to the feeling of losing a loved one. He never loved another person enough to do so. But he could empathize. Deidara could imagine someone taking away his art, making him immortal and unchanging, unable to ever experience the thrill of an explosion ever again.

...Then, he thought of someone killing Tobi.

Really killing him. The thought of his heartbeat coming to a close, the last stutter before it gave in. He saw the Sharingan fading away, eye an endless stretch of midnight sky, dulling like a cooling coal. The thought of him being gone, forever, felt like a stab straight to the gut. He tried to breathe again, once, twice, before he could finally suck in air. Deidara scrambled to think of something else, unable to rest on that image. He'd never forgive whoever was at fault. He'd get revenge. It wouldn't be enough because Tobi would be gone, but someone would have to burn. Slowly.

Okay, maybe Deidara could understand what was driving Tobi, but he just couldn't understand. Even after the Kyuubi, and building the Akatsuki, aiding Itachi with the clan massacre – ha! He knew Itachi couldn't have done it all by himself – the finer details of the plan, and all of it, Deidara couldn't agree with the concept of a fake world.

"Time should have made the pain go away," Tobi inhaled deeply. Deidara could hear the breath from under his mask, "It doesn't. I think of other things as the years pass. But sometimes I go back. To those memories, good and bad, of her... them. And the pain returns. It's still raw, fresh."

Deidara didn't reply, thinking on his words. Good memories tend to hurt more than the bad ones, once you've left.

"I try to forget, but the Sharingan curses me. The night she was killed, my eye was active. I remember every last detail, every thought my young, naïve mind carried. All I see is her death happening again, and again, and again, exactly like the first time. It never ends."

Deidara stood to his feet.

He dropped the ring into his palm.

"This is my last night here."

He was tired. Of everything. He'd rest, and then that was the end of their budding friendship. People just got in the way, even dumb Uchiha's with too much time on their hands. If he could distance himself from this conniving imbecile, maybe he'd have a chance at crushing these feelings. Deidara's love for Tobi would become a work of art, once he's put an end to it. It was what they both needed and deserved: a beautiful end to the sickness that had made its nest in the innocent. Lies tainted truth. Deidara would destroy what they had when they were at their prime – each at the height of true emotions and both very real, in reality and not in some genjutsu – before it was too late. He didn't want to love Tobi with hate simmering on its edges.

Everything hurt. His heart ached, thickening and becoming to heavy for him to carry, but Deidara was ready to bring their story to a finish.

"I won't use C0 today, in exchange for your honesty, hm."

He wouldn't become a puppet. He'd blow up the fucking moon if he had to. He just... couldn't kill Tobi.

A part of him – a stupid part of him – held him back from that thought process. He didn't want to stop Tobi from completing his dreams. The man was passionate. Tobi was living because he cared, very much, about an eternal peace. That Uchiha would deny it, and he'd say he was nothing, worthless even, but he held a mind with a depth that ran deeper than any sea. Deidara admired his feelings. And he was in fucking love with that idiot.

He wanted Tobi to be happy.

Evidently, Tobi wasn't happy with him. Deidara wasn't good enough for this Uchiha. Fine. That was fine.

Deidara would kill himself before the moon stained red.

Tobi would wake up from his delusion eventually. Nothing was eternal.

He sounded desperate, "I can give you more missions, more opportunities for you to bl – "

"Shut up, Tobi, hm. I can't be bribed like some cheap whore. Not this time. I'm leaving for good, hm," Deidara thought back to the last time he slipped the ring off his finger. The ring was as light as a feather, but it carried a thousand times more its weight in responsibilities and memories. Removing the silver and teal felt liberating.

Tobi muttered, the sound hardly audible, "I know."

"Then stop trying, hm. I won't fall for the trap of another Sharingan's genjutsu. Never again, hm."

•

"I... I..." Why couldn't he say it? This was it, this was the moment to tell him.

But it wouldn't come out.

Perhaps because saying the words now would cheapen them, used like a playing card to get him to stay. He didn't want to taint it. He could just hope that Deidara would understand. Tobi retold his story, omitting nothing but the words 'I love you'. What was left of his heart was out in the open. But –

He knows he's lost Deidara.

The man didn't use his final technique, but with how ripped apart he felt, he surely must have.

He finally asked, mind numb, "Where will you go?"

Deidara gave him a blank stare that went right through him, before the man turned around to climb his bird. As if an afterthought, Deidara called out from up in the air, "You're welcome to find me when you've stopped acting like an idiot, hm. But knowing you, that's never going to happen."

The challenge that was usually in Deidara's voice was missing. All Tobi heard was disappointment and finality.

He looked at nothing as he pushed the last piece of meaning away from his life.

Remember last chapter when I said I'd update more frequently? And when I said I wouldn't start something new? Yeah, oops. Anyways, at least I'll be uploading a new one-shot in the near future, despite this being later and shorter than expected. Think of it as a Part II from the last chapter, if you will.