A/N: Double length chapter! Because I started writing it early, and I wanted to close out the day so next chapter can get to the Sunday action. Don't worry, advances are actually made in this one.
Enjoy!
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Konan
Konan was not like Yahiko and Hidan. She did not work best in the moment. In fact, she could not think of a single impulsive action she had ever taken that worked out well. Plus, she found planning soothing. So she spent the morning making plans.
She sat at the lobby desk with her notes from the brief discussion on how to approach the other group. It was a good outline of a plan. She attempted now to fill in the details. How would these plans account for Kisame? Where was the space in them that would be needed in order to flexibly account for unexpected factors? What if the rest of Shikaku's group was as incurious as he had been, and resisted learning? So many questions, so little time to worry. Konan sighed in relief as she contemplated how many questions there were.
What shall we do about Kisame? She could expect him to be there and to behave professionally as part of the mission. The bigger concern was everyone else's reactions to him. Would Hidan be too stressed to speak? Would they all be too distracted to stay on course? Would Shikaku's group pick up on the tension in the air and become defensive? All of these were risks.
"Hey, um, are you busy?"
Konan swiveled around in her chair to face Deidara. "What is it?"
Deidara stayed where he was. "Nothing important, yeah. I just wanted to talk. But not for like any reason."
Idle chatter? Like friends? "Of course," Konan answered. "What do you want to talk about?" For a while now, she had felt more and more excitement at the thought of having ordinary friendships. Witnessing idle chatter had awakened something in her. She knew now that she was starving for it.
Deidara came over and sat on the desk, carefully avoiding her notes. He groaned and put a hand to his head. "I did a deep dive yesterday into the language of a community I'm not part of and haven't interacted with before, yeah. It makes my head hurt. Why are there so many words? Why are they so specific? A lot of them go against what I thought about how the world works, hm."
Konan thought of what she would feel having to learn a whole persona for an undercover mission as someone else. I understand. The minutiae of other people, how extraordinarily detailed they can be, can be overwhelming. She thought of doing so in order to impersonate a specific person in front of their family and friends, which sounded more like what Deidara was learning. It would require ground-level changes to your self, not just surface-level pretending. For a person not used to being a chameleon, that would be very painful.
"What community was this?" she inquired.
Deidara hesitated. "Um… It's… You could say it's, sort of… A community of anyone whose gender and sexuality and stuff isn't typical. Anyone who's not straight or not a typical man or woman, yeah."
Konan frowned. "This community is defined by what it is not more than what it is?" That is not good. So-called communities formed under outside pressure tend not to last. There is not enough substance bonding the members to each other to keep them bonded. A group should have an identity of its own.
"Yeah," Deidara admitted.
"Why does it exist?"
"Because being straight and living as a man or woman is normal, and people who aren't like that have to fight for legal rights and things," Deidara said. "Gay people only got the right to marry someone who's the same gender as them a few years ago, and people who change from living as a man or woman to living as the opposite are still fighting for the right to use the bathrooms they want. Things like that."
How is this a problem? Who the hell would care about what bathroom a complete stranger uses? was Konan's first thought. But then she remembered something subtle that it had taken her years to notice, a lack rather than a presence. Nagato never used hot springs. He might once have, when they first settled under Jiraiya's care, but never since. It was because hot springs were separated by gender and he was too uncomfortable being around naked men. If hot springs had not been separated, he could have used them. I haven't thought about that in years. Hot springs are not very important; private showers exist. But bathrooms… If that same lack were made obvious every day, multiple times a day, then she would never be able to ignore it. Who the fuck cares about what bathroom a stranger uses? she thought again, much more angrily.
"What are you thinking about?" Deidara asked.
"I understand why that is something worth fighting for," she said. "It is common in my world to bathe in hot springs. It is a means of bonding, socializing, relaxing. Like going to the bar is in this world. Nagato was never able to do that because the baths are separated by gender and it made him too uncomfortable." If we had had a normal life, not one ripped apart by war, then even hot springs would have been important enough to fight for. Konan had never actually imagined what it must feel like to see a hot spring and turn away. The thought of her own brother being barred for having committed no crime made her chakra boil.
Deidara leaned away from the anger radiating off her. "You know more than I do about this community then," he said. "I don't know anyone well enough to get angry about that, yeah."
Konan repressed her anger. "I don't believe that. It is not secret that several members of this group are atypical."
Deidara lowered his head. "We don't talk about that though. I don't think of it."
"Why would not speaking of it be a problem?" she asked. "He and I never spoke of it either."
"Yeah, but you don't talk about a lot of things," Deidara told her. "It's different when it's the only thing you don't talk about."
"Hmm." Like Nagato said, about having a whole wing of his life closed to Yahiko. It is more painful when it's the only thing. "I see."
"Yeah, exactly like that, yeah," Deidara said. "Did you hear yourself just now? I have no idea what you were thinking, hm. You don't talk about so many things."
"I do not need to talk about everything that crosses my mind. True understanding is wordless."
"That only works when most of what you do is wordless," Deidara repeated. "When it's the only thing you don't use words for, it turns into a black hole that you forget exists and holy shit I just figured out why there are so many words." His jaw dropped, his eyes unfocused, and he started to speak in a whisper. "The words aren't there to make communities from. They're there to talk with, yeah, to hold whole conversations so that nobody forgets about these things. And all the flags, they lead to conversation too… Oh."
A candle flared to life in Konan's mind. "Ah," she said. "So this community you speak of is more of a secret society?"
Deidara nodded. "But nobody in it wants to be secret. They just ended up that way."
"How sad."
"Yeah." Deidara blinked. "I think you just totally helped me understand it, yeah. I'm gonna get back to reading." He left the room.
Without even intending to, I helped. Konan allowed herself a smile. She did not regret interrupting her plans in the slightest. She reread what she had last written on her paper. Risks associated with Kisame. Right. Of these, the most likely and the most dangerous is the last. I must think of a way to defuse the tension before it infects Shikaku's group. How does social tension get defused? She'd been in this world long enough to know that. The clones resolved nearly all social problems by talking about them openly in conversation, as Deidara had just stated. In a flash, Konan realized something important. I understand now. Talking and thinking are linked in this world. Refusing to speak about something is a strategy for forcing others to forget about it. But when it is impossible not to think of something, that strategy fails and it rebounds, making it impossible not to talk about it. If Deidara had still been in the room, she could have hugged him for enhancing her understanding of many things.
So we must have conversation about the tension. But how, and more importantly, when? Was she to hope that Kisame happened to show up five minutes before Shikaku did and that those five minutes were enough? No. That was ludicrous. Konan pulled out her phone and went to her contacts, where the numbers of every Akatsuki member had been loaded for her convenience. Konan studied Kisame's number several times before leaving her contacts and typing in the number herself. One of the things she knew about phones was that they could be called from any other phone as long as one knew the number. Therefore, she must memorize the number in case of needing to use a different phone. Konan assumed the contacts list was intended for young children and those with memory problems, who needed extra support.
In order to successfully interact with the other group tomorrow, there will be a conversation through the group chat, she messaged. No later than 10 am would be preferable.
She waited in case Kisame saw the message upon sending and was prompt about responding. He was. Fucking seriously?
The inevitable tension must be defused. Would you rather talk in person, face to face with Hidan? His powers do not work from long distances.
Tension? What tension? I'll be fine. I can be professional.
Konan blinked. Was it really possible that he didn't know? Kisame. You are relevant to others in this group. Sasori has not come out of his shed all morning. Kakuzu is being friendly and helpful. Nagato and Yahiko are scared. If you do not join a conversation, our chances of successfully establishing cordial relations will drop to a tenth of their normal level.
It took some time for Kisame to respond. Oh.
Be there. This is an order. Konan turned off her phone and put it away, hoping that her command would come across correctly in the absence of tone of voice and body language. It was awkward to use messaging sometimes.
She went back to her planning. Question number one: resolved. Now to question two. If an unexpected factor comes into play, which it almost certainly will, how will this plan account for it?
"Oh. Are you busy?"
Two is coincidence. Three is a pattern. Konan swiveled around in her chair to face Nagato. "What is it?"
"It's been a while since the three of us hung out," he said. "We thought…"
"Of course."
The notes went in a drawer. There was a brief debate over Nagato and Yahiko wearing their cloaks for solidarity. It was decided that no, they would not, because the last thing they needed was to be recognized by one of Shikaku's group and provoke a meeting before they were ready for it. Konan would be taking a risk, but that risk was considered unavoidable because the thought of going out in public in what she thought of as underclothes made her skin crawl.
They walked, following the road into town. "Has anything changed since we last spent time together?" she asked. Catching up is a normal thing to do, yes?
"Quitting my job is going better than I expected," Yahiko reported. "I'm still scheduled for the next week. I thought it would be hard, that everything would be awkward with my boss. But it's actually less awkward than before. I don't worry about what I say to her. I feel so free."
"What does quitting a job mean in this world?" Konan asked.
Nagato nodded to Yahiko, who smiled. "It, um, means something. I mean… It's important to have a job, it's considered important. So if you leave a job, it should be because you have something better lined up." He took a deep breath. "I quit my job because I finally decided that my own peace of mind was something better."
"You didn't have peace of mind working there?" Nagato asked. "I thought you liked working with clothing. Even though it's the women's section, you never seemed uncomfortable."
Yahiko turned red. "Yeah, um, uh, well… It's complicated."
"You prioritized your own well being over your responsibilities to others?" Konan asked.
"Yeah. I...I had to."
The idea both frightened and relieved her. "I'm glad."
Nagato smiled. "Good for you." He took Yahiko's hand. Yahiko giggled nervously. Nagato elbowed him. "No, seriously. If you thought it was the right thing to do, then I'm glad you went with it. Do what you think is right."
Yahiko couldn't stop grinning. "Thanks!"
"What will you do during the workweek now?" Konan asked.
"I don't know, and that's okay." Yahiko said that with the force of someone trying to convince himself. "I work better in the moment. I shouldn't plan too much."
"Are you quoting me?" Nagato asked.
"Yeah. I thought more planning always made everything better," Yahiko admitted. "It didn't occur to me that it could make anything worse until you told Hidan."
"You didn't know?" Nagato ducked his head. "I'm sorry. It's part of the way I've always thought about people, that there is no good or bad. There are just different styles. I didn't realize you saw differently."
"No good or bad?" Yahiko asked. "But that's how I see everything. Some things are good, and other things are bad. I always want to make everything better."
"Everything looks murky to me. It's hard to tell what I should be doing. Everything could be right, or it could be wrong. That's why I need you. You have such a good sense of direction."
"It doesn't work so well in reality."
"That's where other people come in. We can help you make it reality," Nagato said. He said that happily, as a good thing. Konan watched Yahiko. She sensed that he might not interpret it the same way. He would have before. He always has. Where is this new attitude coming from? Was he always capable of it? Is this...how he would have grown up, if he had ever had the chance to grow up?
"But…" Yahiko said. "I… I want to make it reality." It was hard to hear him, he was so quiet.
"You don't need to," whispered Nagato.
"But I want to. I want to do something myself." Yahiko was bright red again and could not look at anyone. "I want to be more than just a lamb."
Nagato stared at the ground, his face also red. That's right; the last time we walked like this was before they split. Konan fell back and drifted forward, in between them. She took their hands, linking the three of them together. "I'm sure the results of that will be marvelous. I can't wait to see it."
Yahiko squeezed her hand. So did Nagato. She returned them both. I'm beginning to understand. The role I played was so much more than that of the girl who they must fight to protect. They couldn't do just as well without me. It seemed impossible. How could they not do exactly as well if not better without her holding them back? But she could not avoid seeing it with her own eyes. Here was a world in which they did not have her. Result: they didn't do nearly as well. Her ninja training forced her to accept the evidence of her senses even when it clashed with what she believed. She must have some value, after all.
"Is it common for men to cook in this world?"
.
They went to the park. Yahiko talked excitedly about his adventures talking to plants, pointing to a specific bush he had made friends with. How did that work? Nagato suggested outlandish ideas, including soul to soul communication. Konan rejected that idea, because souls could not be made to move outside the body. Yahiko argued that that didn't mean they had no influence outside the body - didn't she project her emotions through her chakra? The argument ended in a draw and a tentative Maybe.
They found a space between bushes away from the path where it was unlikely that anyone would overhear, and started to talk about prophets. Konan learned a lot more about the mystical powers of prominent historical figures. She agreed that it was an amusing coincidence that the powers of godhood in this world were normal powers in her world. Did that make ninjas demigods?
At some point Yahiko jumped. "Oh, um, hi. How long have you been there?" Nobody could say. The young snake child had impressive powers of invisibility. Yahiko held the boy on his lap and continued the discussion. Konan restrained herself from thinking too much about how he would be an excellent mother. It was hard to do when the boy started sucking his thumb. Gods above. Men should be allowed to be mothers.
She did eventually raise the question, when enough time had passed and the topic had wandered onto Hidan, who made a plausible inspiration. Yahiko froze and had trouble breathing anyway. Nagato didn't notice. He expressed the opinion that motherhood and fatherhood should be considered job titles independent of gender, and backed it up with surprisingly solid reasons. Konan found an excuse to end the debate and move somewhere else before he noticed a thing. Yahiko released the boy and started to scratch his head.
"How much do you know?" he asked her in a whisper while Nagato looked at some wilting flowers.
"Much," she answered. "For example, I understand why you quit your job."
"I think I need to talk to you later."
"Of course."
They got ice cream. They went to the aquarium, which was open on weekends but stocked with friendly volunteers instead of socially awkward staff in preparation for bigger crowds. Nagato and Yahiko stared up at the shark tank in silence. Konan told them of her plans to have a group chat conversation. "You may not believe it, but he actually had not realized that he mattered to us before I told him."
"Aw," Yahiko said sadly. "But I was starting to talk with him like friends! How could he not…"
"It is hard to know how much you matter to someone else." Konan said that, and she meant one thing.
"Oh. Yeah, it is." Yahiko likely meant another.
"And sometimes it's wishful. You don't want to think you matter that much." Nagato had still a third interpretation.
They watched the sharks.
.
Konan sat down in the lobby chair and fished her notes out of the drawer. Nagato and Yahiko could be heard laughing as they made lunch. Hidan joined in, forcing Kakuzu out into the lobby. Konan looked at him. "What? I don't handle children well," he muttered before stomping off.
Konan looked at her second question. How will this plan be flexible enough to account for unexpected factors? Underneath it, she wrote Friendship and underlined twice. Friendly interactions can bend in a thousand ways and not break. Formal, distanced interactions cannot handle unpredictability. She wrote down ways they could attempt to form honest bonds with Shikaku's group, the same way as she and Hidan had formed honest bonds with Sakumo's group. In order to get anywhere with them, the Akatsuki would have to be more than mentors taking pity on the ignorant civilians. Hidan's ability to befriend everyone he meets could come in very handy.
Two down, one to go. Question three: what if Shikaku's associates are not curious and resist learning? This was a hard one. Konan knew there was nothing more impossible than teaching someone who did not want to be taught.
Itachi walked in the door, guitar case in hand. "Ah. Are you busy?"
It's a pattern. Konan raised an eyebrow. "What is it?"
"I have good news about our demonic neighbor." Itachi leaned his case against the wall. "I was just playing music for him. Allegedly for the residents of his hospital, but mainly for him. He enjoyed it very much. If he ever begins to cause trouble, I know what tunes he finds most entrancing. He will not be a problem for us."
"I was not aware demons had a taste for music."
"I am not so sure he's a proper demon," Itachi said slowly. "He looked small, like a young child in need of guidance. He's all alone. There are no other demons like him around. He is like a human child raised by wolves: not quite wolf, not quite human. If any other demons did appear, I suspect they would reject him for being too human."
"He wished for music because he is human?"
"Perhaps," Itachi murmured. "I wonder how long he has enjoyed such human things."
"Have you seen him listen to you before?"
Itachi shook his head. "That is not a meaningful measure. He would not say he wanted to listen to me play. Perhaps he has had an interest in music for a while, but refused until now."
Konan snorted. "The demon child lives a life of hedonism. He does not hold himself back."
"He has pride," Itachi argued. "That is why he didn't ask me to play for him directly. He's very prideful."
Really? Interesting. I never would have suspected it. "How do you know this? Does your Sharingan work on demons?"
Itachi smiled. "You ask the wrong question. I did not pursue him for knowledge. I sat and played, refusing to pursue him at all. That's how you handle children. They have to feel safe enough to come to you." He picked up his guitar case. "Also, I did not think to use the Sharingan. I will ask him if I may test it." He nodded to her and took his instrument to his room.
Konan stared down at her notes. That's eerily convenient. Itachi's advice for attracting reluctant people who were repressing their true interests could be applied to multiple situations. Konan wrote it down.
Then she stopped and took a good, hard think about her earliest experiences in this world. I thought it was unusually convenient that I should find such a well-appointed building. Honestly, it doesn't make sense. Others even commented on it - why do we have most amenities intact but no kitchen sink? I wondered if I was being steered. Now I have to wonder if I'm not the only one.
She took out her phone and sent Kisame one more message. I understand.
Yahiko
Laughing in the kitchen with Nagato and Hidan, it was impossible to think of anything else. No past, no future. No fear, no doubt. Just a warm vibration in the air that settled the nerves and soothed the senses and convinced everyone within that everything was utterly, supremely, right.
The conversation galloped across a beautiful countryside, past talking with plants, past the dignity of animals, past childhood playgrounds, past a variety of adventurous things. Nothing troublesome or painful was mentioned. Hidan did most of the talking about his childhood. And Yahiko did not have to think about himself at all, which was a great relief.
"Hey, wait a sec. I just remembered." Hidan turned to Nagato with a grin. "Wanna go run at birds? There have to be huge flocks somewhere by now."
Nagato's eyes lit up. "I would love that. The way they all hop into the air at once… It makes me so sad I wasn't around to see the passenger pigeons before they went extinct. They could blot out the sky, I've heard."
"I don't know. I like to see the huge flocks too, but I don't want to scare all those birds. They're just trying to eat in peace," Yahiko said. "I wouldn't like it if someone blasted an airhorn at me during dinner."
"True…" Nagato wavered.
"We could do it just once," Hidan suggested. "And FYI, they're not all that scared. A huge flock could totally knock me on my ass. But they don't. They're just moving because they know it's a good idea in general, not because they're terrified that I'll really start leaving bird corpses. Now if you set a cat loose, that might knock me back a bunch."
"Still don't want to disturb them too much," Nagato said. "Once is enough."
"Why did you say that like you're not a cat?" Yahiko asked.
Hidan scratched his head. "Because I'm kinda not one. I know, I purr and shit, I want a tail. But I'm not, like, a full cat. I'm just a lot like one. Fuck it's hard to explain."
"You're a catlike vampiric," Nagato said. "And your hunting instincts are your own, in this body, completely correct as they are. You don't need to be a full cat in order for it to make sense. Your current body is perfectly fine."
"Yeah! I want a tail, but I want it on this body." Hidan stroked the top blade of his scythe appreciatively. "Thanks, Moonlight."
"I still don't like disturbing them in the middle of dinner," Yahiko said. "But if you guys want to have fun, okay."
Hidan hugged them both. "You guys are the fucking best. My Sun and Moon. You…" His voice became too strangled to speak.
"You know," Nagato said, "you're not quite one of us the same way Konan is. There's a shared childhood background there that you don't have. But the three of us and you, we do belong together. You're one of us."
Hidan purred. "You guys are my family. This whole group. My family."
They hugged him tighter. "Kisame will come back," Yahiko said. "I'm sure he will."
Hidan nodded. "Everything'll be fine." He stepped back and took Nagato's hand. "C'mon, let's see if they blot out the sky."
Yahiko leaned back against the stove and sighed. He felt like he could explode from the pressure of all the love inside him. Thank goodness for chakra, and Hidan's ability. I would die if I couldn't express this! He remembered that he had wanted to talk to Konan and went off to see her.
Konan stood by the lobby desk checking over her plans, looking for anything that still needed revision. "Hey," Yahiko said. "If you're not too busy, can I give you a hug?"
Konan looked up at him. Her face got some kind of expression on it, he couldn't tell what, as she picked up his aura. She put her paper down and stepped within embracing range. He put his arms around her and squeezed her tightly. It's so weird that she's smaller than I am! But the size difference provoked a rush of affection. He smiled into her hair.
Her aura turned sharp. Ow. Pain? But I didn't mean to hurt her. He stepped back, confused.
Konan smoothed her hair into place. "It is alright."
"No, clearly, it's not. What's wrong?"
"Your original and I used to be lovers," she reminded him. "Painful memories."
"Oh."
Yahiko was very awkward all of a sudden. I don't feel that way toward her at all. Did I act like I did? Oh god. Fortunately, Konan recovered quickly. "Come." She led him back to her room and closed the door.
"I, um, don't think of you that way," he said.
"I know." Then she stood and waited, looking off at something above her bed, not directly at Yahiko but still making it clear that she was waiting for him.
Yahiko remembered what he had wanted to talk to her about. His cheeks reddened. She knows things about me. He started to fiddle with his hair nervously.
That was the cue she had been waiting for. "I am aware that you are an atypical man," she said gently. "Your way of acting has always been quite feminine. You are capable of filling a woman's role with ease."
Yahiko sat down on the bed. "Do you think I'm a girl?" he asked in a strangled squeak.
"No." Konan began to walk back and forth before him. "You are an atypical man, as I said. You are capable of being very manly. In the right situations, you will happily step up as a protector and leader. You will hold yourself as a man does then, and assume a man's role." Konan stopped walking and looked down at him. "You strike me as a natural chameleon. Without any training or effort, you can assume many different roles depending on what is needed."
"What if nothing's needed?"
Konan shook her head. "Something is always needed. Even alone, in the privacy of your own room, ideas of what you ought to be doing follow you."
Yahiko tried to understand. When I'm alone, I do what I can't do anywhere else. It is influenced by the rest of my life. Is that what she means? "So I'm...what? Some kind of nonbinary?"
Konan tilted her head. "What is nonbinary?"
"It's a word for people who aren't men or women. Or they're both, or…"
"Ah, it is one of the words belonging to the community that Deidara told me about." Konan sat on the bed beside him. "I understand better now. Talking about something causes it to become visible to the mind. Not talking casts it into a mental blind spot, causing you to be unable to see it. The great quantity of words created by and for this community is an attempt to remove their identities from this blind spot by encouraging conversation. So then, let's talk more about 'nonbinary.' What does it include?"
"Uhhh…" Yahiko's eyes darted around. "I don't know. It usually refers to people who aren't either, like, they go around looking androgynous and stuff. And I heard it mentioned somewhere that there are people with multiple gender identities at once? I don't know what that's called. It's confusing."
Konan tilted her head at him. "You do not know these words?"
"No?"
"Well, no wonder your own identity is unclear to you. Most of it falls within your mind's blind spot." She nodded decisively. "Learning these words will help you."
Yahiko had never heard such a clear and detailed plan for how he might resolve his identity crisis. "That's it? I just have to learn words?"
"No. You must use them to talk," Konan said. "It is conversation that brings things out of the blind spot. Deidara is learning these words too. You and he can discuss them together."
"Okay!" All I have to do is learn words and use them in conversation? That's so easy! Yahiko leaped up from the bed. "I'll go do that now! Thank you!" Konan smiled.
Yahiko crossed the hall and knocked on Deidara's door. "Dei?"
"Yeah?"
"Can I come in?"
"Sure, yeah."
Yahiko entered the room. Deidara was sitting on his bed looking at his phone. Yahiko sat down with him and pulled out his own phone. "Konan said I should learn words and talk about them. I thought it was a great idea!" He paused. He had Google open, but did not know what he wanted to search for. "So, is there anything you want to talk about?"
"You're gonna love this one, yeah," Deidara said. "Hidan doesn't know what word he should use, so I looked up what the difference is between bisexual and pansexual. The whole first page agrees that bisexual means attracted to multiple genders, and pansexual means attracted to all of them."
"...How many genders are there?"
"I don't know, and I don't understand why it matters," Deidara confessed. "If you like men, doesn't that include male nonbinary people and people who are partially men and people who are sometimes men by default? I mean, there's not any visible difference to look at, yeah! Attraction can't distinguish things that close together. If Hidan likes men and women, and he's cool with all kinds of personalities and interests, then really specific identities won't make a difference."
"Wait." Yahiko's brow wrinkled. "No, I think I can understand. If you want a man, you'd expect him to act manly, right? If he doesn't, it might be a turn off. I can see why people who like men wouldn't like nonbinary people who look like men."
"That's just personality differences, yeah. It doesn't have to do with gender. People don't have to act like stereotypical caricatures, yeah."
Yahiko's throat went dry. "I think it kind of does have to do with gender. Because…" He wanted to explain. He knew he had something to say. But what was it? How could he put it into words?
Deidara said nothing. He waited for Yahiko to find the words. He's waiting for me! Wow! Yahiko smiled. "Because, um… That's all inside. I mean, it comes from the inside. You can't do it if you don't feel it inside. Um… If you don't feel like a man, how can you hold yourself and talk and act those ways?"
"I don't get it, yeah. That's just learning. You can learn to act any way you want, yeah."
"No, it's… It's a role." Thank you Konan! "Acting and talking and standing that way, it's a certain role. Yeah, trained actors can put in effort and play a role that's different from how they really are. But if you're not a trained actor, how could you do it? If you don't feel like a man, how can you have the role of one? Like, if there was another man around to be the guy in charge, you might take a different role and act more like a woman instead. Someone who really was a man would act like it all the time, because it would be easy and wouldn't take any effort."
Deidara tossed his phone aside. "Everything you just said makes sense. But I was just reading that gender identity is different from gender roles! What the fuck?" He cradled his head in his hands.
"Well, people can do roles that are different from theirs," Yahiko mumbled. "It would just be work. But people can do work. So you can't know anyone's gender identity unless you psychically know what roles they would be taking if they didn't put in any effort."
Deidara raised his head from his hands. "Oh. That makes sense, yeah. So it meant that you can't tell what gender identity someone has just from what roles they're playing. It didn't mean there's no connection."
"I think so?" Yahiko opened up his phone. "I think I'd like to look at words before I try talking about things I don't understand."
"Try genderfluid," Deidara suggested. "For what you said about switching roles, yeah."
Yahiko looked. "What?! This doesn't make anything simpler!" He looked up at Deidara in wounded confusion. I thought learning words would make my life simpler! "It says that genderfluid refers to someone whose gender identity changes over time. But what is a gender identity?"
Deidara's eyes went wide. "Oh fuck."
"I talked with Itachi about identity once," Yahiko said. "He said there are at least two different ideas of what it is. Here, we think of it as something you just are that's inside you and can't be changed by anything outside. But in other parts of the world, your identity includes outside things. So if my role changes based on the situation, is that a change in my identity because my identity is inside me and not part of the outside world, or is it not a change because my identity includes the outside world and that includes all these different situations?"
Deidara looked like he was ready to start crying. "I don't fucking know, yeah!"
Yahiko felt like he was ready to start crying too. "Well… I guess either way, an identity includes something inside me. So I should feel a change." Do I feel a change? Not really. I'm still interested in makeup and stuff as a man. I just don't express that. "I don't think I'm genderfluid," he tentatively concluded.
"My brain is going to start melting again," Deidara said in a tortured voice.
Too late, Yahiko realized the true magnitude of the task Konan had given him. One gender down, who knows how many more to go.
.
He took a break half an hour later. He didn't want people to ask why he was sobbing his heart out. He rubbed away the few tears that had escaped so far and told Deidara, "I don't think I can do any more of this. Not tonight."
"Me either." Deidara's face was pale. "I'm gonna go find Sasori and hang out."
That's a great idea! "But I wanted to find Sasori and hang out with him."
"We can share him." Deidara shrugged and led the way.
"Hey, Sunshine!" Hidan saw them and ran up. "I can't believe you chose to miss out on that great big cloud of feathered ow what the fuck?"
Nagato came up behind him, still smiling from recent excitement. "Everything okay?"
"No, everything's way too complicated and I wanted to find Sasori."
"He went to his room to hang out with Kakuzu. Kakuzu had a notebook with him," Nagato recalled. "I wonder what they're talking about."
Yahiko took a deep breath. "So, what happened with the birds?"
Sasori
Kakuzu seemed tense as he did math in a little black notebook, using the price sheet to determine how much money needed to be spent. It was as if he expected Sasori to ask why he was keeping the group's money now. Sasori wondered why he would ever expect that. I'm not the type to pry. He only supplied information and looked at the book when Kakuzu was done. "I'll put in an order tomorrow. I've never done anything like this before, so I'll have to practice. It doesn't matter that I don't have the battery yet. Honestly, hooking up that thing will be a whole separate trial on its own. I just hope I can do it without destroying the battery and having to order a new one."
Kakuzu drummed his fingers. "Do you really think a single battery is going to be enough to operate this creation of yours?"
"No. But I did some more thinking about the jutsu, and I realized something. She told us Nagato's rods have been used to control dead bodies, right?" Sasori shook his head. "I can't believe I didn't realize it before. Dead bodies don't produce their own electricity. The jutsu must be producing all the electricity. That means I don't actually need a viable energy source. As long as it's hooked up to electrical pathways, the jutsu itself will provide everything I need. The battery can be useful backup in case I don't use the jutsu."
Kakuzu raised an eyebrow. Sasori elaborated, "In case I need to fake someone out by using my strings to make them think I needed to use strings. My strings can make things move on their own, but I don't think they could cause something as complicated as a motor to run just by pushing all the parts around. I think using strings would be more likely to turn the motors on, and that would require an actual energy source."
Kakuzu grinned. "In other words, if we met our originals. They're the only ones who would fall for such a trick."
"A man can dream," Sasori sighed.
Kakuzu looked at him closely. "Are you going to ask?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because you're going to tell me."
Kakuzu scowled. "Dammit, you're right. Fine. I...decided I didn't have enough reason to avoid it."
Sasori smiled. "Like how I realized I actually wanted to be here, and I wasn't just being obligated to?"
"The odds that I'll ever leave are getting smaller as we speak," Kakuzu admitted. "Especially now, when the most shocking news I've ever heard isn't enough to faze me. If I won't ever leave, why the hell shouldn't I hold onto money?"
Sasori's smile faded. "Do you think he'll come back?"
Kakuzu nodded. "I don't think it's limited to Hidan. Whatever divine balance we had before is out of order, like the succubus said. If the gods represent reality, that means reality is tilted. Things are biased to happen a certain way. After three weeks, I can safely say it: reality is biased in a way that brings us together. He won't be able to resist."
"If Jashin sama represents vitality through anything that gets the blood racing, including pain," Sasori thought aloud. "Then you're absolutely right. Being in this group is the most blood-racingly painful thing any of us have ever done. Kisame's trying to avoid being in pain and being too excited about things and being caught up in the moment. He's literally trying to run uphill, in a metaphorical way."
"I know when I'm beaten. The moment a god gets involved, that's it." Kakuzu crossed his arms. "I won't accept it happily, and that doesn't mean I won't resist. But I won't try to pretend, either."
"It's been most of a day. I'll try to talk to him." Sasori pulled out his phone and called Kisame. Thankfully, Kisame picked up. "Hey. I just wanted to find out if you're alright. You're on speaker; me and Kakuzu are the only ones in the room."
Kisame grunted. "I'm at the north campground playing with Same. He loves it here. We've made a new friend, talked a little, had snacks. It's been a super relaxed day."
"Same here," Sasori said. "I spent a lot of time in the shed and talking about my plans with Kakuzu. It's been nice."
"This is the sort of day I'd prefer to have," Kisame said. "Not days where I'm being chased by demons for no fucking reason. Hold on, Same. I'm having an important talk here."
"About that… You remember how she was angry at Hidan for imbalancing reality? And how Jashin sama is the god of heart racing, especially through pain? And how we tend to bring up each other's most painful conflicts, leading to a lot of activity and strong emotions?" Sasori paused to let those three facts sink in. "You are literally defying a god's will and going against the slant of reality right now. This isn't going to work."
"So what? Am I supposed to go with it?"
"I...don't want to be the bearer of bad news, but I think so."
Moments passed. Then, in a strangled mutter, Kisame admitted, "I can't."
Sasori closed his eyes. "I understand. You can't just let go of paranoia, either. We were all there for that talk. So how can you accept it without relaxing?"
"Acceptance implies a sort of relaxation. That's going to be tough," Kakuzu mused.
"How did you do it, Kakuzu?" Kisame asked. "You accept things without relaxing all the time. You grumble and pretend to be unhappy. How do you do that?"
Kakuzu thought. "Have you ever noticed that I don't grumble about substantial things? Only minor things, like the childishness of everyone around me. You could try redirecting your attention that way."
"You could try using humor, too." Sasori remembered the discussion about humor he had had with Sakumo and Ruta when they visited. "Humor makes everything feel lighter and more bearable, even things that aren't the focus of the joke. You could try keeping a healthy distance from Hidan and making sarcastic comments about how he's too charming and you're worried if you let him get too close, you'll find yourself enrolled in a Russian mafia blackmail operation by tomorrow. Things like that."
"You guys think I should get over the fact that I am fucking not in control of my own life by making jokes about being enrolled in movie plots?"
"Do you have any other plans for getting control of your life back?" Kakuzu asked.
"No, but -"
A tingle ran up Sasori's spine. "Kisame?"
"What?"
"I felt powerless too, when Konan stole my laptop. She stole from me, easily, with no consequences. It was like she had gone crazy. I didn't know what else would happen to me if I stayed anywhere near her."
"But you stayed." Kisame's anger seemed to have moved to the back burner, for now. "Why?"
"I stayed because I saw an opportunity to gain power," Sasori said. "I realized that if I left, it would be the result of her actions. She steals my stuff, I go. Everything was caused by her; it's in her hands. By staying, I broke that link. I gained the power to forgive or not, and I used it, and not because of her. Because of me."
Kakuzu looked at him with newfound respect. Kisame was silent for a while. "I have to think about that," he eventually said. "I'll see you guys in the big group chat conversation Konan's planning for tomorrow."
"Sure. See you then." Sasori ended the call. "What group chat conversation?"
There was a knock on the door. Kakuzu snapped at whoever it was to come in and get it over with. Konan opened the door and leaned in. "I am informing everyone that there is to be a conversation through the group chat in the early morning tomorrow. It will include Kisame, and its purpose is to defuse tension before our meeting with Shikaku's group."
"Preemptive party talk," Sasori said. "Got it."
Konan left. Kakuzu turned to him. "20 bucks says this talk will be a disaster."
"Fifteen says it won't," Sasori replied.
Kakuzu flipped his little notebook to a new page. The two of them got up and went around the whole base, finding everybody who had heard about the plan and recording bets on the expected outcome. Kakuzu's records were as follows:
Me: 20 on disaster.
Sasori: 15 on not-disaster.
Itachi: 15 on complete success.
Nagato: 10 on not-disaster.
Yahiko: 30 on complete success.
Deidara: 10 on complete sucess.
Hidan: 20 on success.
Konan: 10 on not-disaster.
"Excuse me," Itachi said. "Hidan must clarify his bet. Everyone else bet on complete success or mere non disaster. Which is it?"
"I think everything'll work out, but in a kinda unnerving way," Hidan said.
"I think everything will work out so that there'll be jokes, and friendship, and maybe a surprise breakthrough in understanding and sympathy," Yahiko said.
Kakuzu nodded. "Hidan's bet will be reclassified as not-disaster. So then. How will money be distributed?"
"Have you noticed that you're the only one betting on disaster?" Sasori asked. "That does not say good things about your odds."
Kakuzu's eyes widened with a new idea. He erased his entry. "How about I refrain from betting, and take a certain amount off the rewards pool regardless of who wins. The rewards pool is however much the other side bet; winning bets get their own money back. The rewards pool for not-disaster is 55 dollars, and for complete success, also 55. I'll take 5 from whichever pool wins, and the rest will be split evenly among all contributors."
"But some people contributed more than others," Itachi said.
"The rest will be awarded to the contributors collectively and my role is over. I got my money. What the hell do I care." Kakuzu marked the page and snapped his notebook shut. "Any questions?"
Konan raised a hand. "The small size of your take indicates that you expect to accumulate rewards through future bets."
"Yes, yes I do. Is there a problem with that?"
"No way," Nagato said. "I am entirely cool with this being a new thing we do." There were murmurs of agreement.
Konan shrugged. The consensus was overwhelmingly in Kakuzu's favor. "As long as it does not cause discord."
"All fucking right!" Hidan raised his hand for a high five. "Kakuzu, you're a grumpy genius!"
Kakuzu high fived him back. "Whatever. Let's see how tomorrow turns out."
.
A/N: I actually wrote the third scene (Sasori's) before I wrote the second scene (Yahiko's). It occurred to me that he had said he wanted to talk to Konan, and there was a time gap that needed to be filled. It turned into a whole thing.
I originally intended for Yahiko to just be a cisgender man who happened to have a really feminine personality, and there's nothing wrong with that. But when I explained this to one of my teachers in a little talk we had about different conceptions of gender, she said this talk had contributed much to her understanding of nonbinary people, even though I thought I had not been saying anything about nonbinary people. Ever since then, I've had much the same questions presented in this chapter. How much is personality? How much is identity? What the flip is the difference between the two? Is he some kind of nonbinary? I don't know!
We'll find out what he is about the same times as he does. It could be a while.
And literally ever since the beginning of this story, I have had thoughts about shocking things happening and the first response being an unusually coordinated round of betting. Kakuzu would have a table and notebook all ready in a storage scroll and everything. I thought I would have to give up on that. I'm so happy it's coming true!
Happy days everyone!