A/N: Like I said last chapter - if there is a tone shift coming, it's not happening yet. Not nearly yet.

Christmas is next week! Yes, I will be posting on Christmas. It's actually a relaxed day off for me.

Enjoy.

.

Nagato

After the meeting broke up, Nagato found Yahiko decompressing in his room. Yahiko lay flopped along the length of the bed, staring up at the ceiling and taking deep breaths. Nagato found some space on the bed next to him and sat there. "That was brave."

"Yeah. Even though I thought that was what would happen, it was still scary."

"Ideas are just ideas. It means a lot to have them confirmed."

"My vision was completely accurate." Yahiko moved the pillow out of the way so he could put his hands beneath his head and use them as a pillow. "I used the idea of going to a group meeting in that form as a way of measuring my comfort level. At first, I couldn't imagine anything beyond everyone turning to look at me. Like that was the end of the tape. Then I talked with Jiraiya. Right after our conversation, I tried again and found that I could finish the scenario. I imagined, after everyone looked at me, Sasori smiled and welcomed me in." Yahiko sat up and turned to Nagato. "That's always how it goes. I imagined that over and over to give myself courage, and it was always Sasori who smiled at me first. He always waved me in. Why him? I must be picking up on something, or, rather, my instincts are picking up on something. Because that's what actually happened. But why?"

He has a connection with Sasori? Nagato was a little hurt. The more he thought about it, the more the feeling of hurt deepened. He's right to. Sasori was the first one to reach out and make him comfortable. Why didn't I do that? "Have you had an interaction with him in the past where he did something like this?"

"No," Yahiko replied. "That time when he didn't react to my freaking out and it calmed me wasn't similar to this at all. And I can't think of any other important conversation we've had."

"Well -"

"Except for that one where he showed me how I was letting people walk all over me," Yahiko remembered. "I was feeling down and accepting all kinds of criticism about me. He showed me a scene from that episode where Aang started earthbending training. You remember that episode? He showed me some scenes where she was being mean to him, and all he did was go along with it and agree with her. I think he hugged me. That was an important conversation. But it wasn't like this, either."

"Maybe you knew he would reach out to you because he's a supportive friend."

"But why not you or Hidan?"

"Well, we would have accepted you. Hidan would have said he thought you were gorgeous, and I would have complimented you on your choice of outfit. But Sasori didn't just personally accept you. He pulled you in." Nagato's eyes widened. "Like what happened when Kakuzu got his cloak. Someone said, 'Come the fuck here and sit the fuck down.' It probably wasn't Sasori. Now that I say it, it sounds more like Kisame."

"You and Hidan reach out. They pull in." Yahiko looked down. "And I'm always worried about how I affect other people. I didn't want anyone going out of their way to come out and meet me where I am. I wanted to be pulled in."

Nagato smiled. "And you found that."

"Yeah." Yahiko smiled back. "I don't know how I lived before."

"Me neither."

"I like it here. I don't want to go back."

"Good news: you can't go back," Nagato told him. "Even if you ended up on your own again, we would still be with you in your head."

"'Once you know, you can never go back. I've got to take it on the other side,'" Yahiko whispered. "I'm pretty sure that song was about drugs. But that line works here, too. Meaning. Love. Family. Now that I know what it's like to have those things, I can't go back."

Nagato shrugged. "Drugs make people feel good. Maybe it's all the same. Once you know a good feeling, you can't go back to a life of misery."

"Are you saying drugs are functionally similar to meaningful relationships?" Yahiko said that jokingly, but then grew serious. "So the way to fix addiction is to replace the drug with meaningful relationships."

"Making you feel good isn't the only function of drugs," Nagato said. "They also change your body chemistry."

"Prescription medication."

Nagato laughed sadly. "Yahiko, are you suggesting that drug addicts should have friends and quality medical care? Don't you know they're bad people, and as such, should be denied all privileges? Because friends and quality medical care are privileges."

Yahiko fell back onto the bed. "You're making me sad!" He wiped away tears.

"Oh god, what kind of world do we live in," Nagato whispered.

Yahiko sniffled. "You mean what world is this one based off of. This little world that we live in doesn't work that way."

"Why can't the whole world function like this little one does?" Nagato asked. "I like it here. Everyone's friendly, there are no complicated politics, and it all makes sense. Why doesn't the wider world make sense?"

"Do you think most people live in a world that isn't theirs?"

Nagato looked down at Yahiko. Yahiko looked back. "I mean… What I mean is… The people that live in the wider world. Does it make sense to most of them, or do most of them really belong in a world that's more like this one? Does a world of cruelty and equivalent trade and everything having to be logical all the time really make sense to most people?"

"It can't," Nagato replied. "Humans have evolved tendencies to help others in ways and for reasons that aren't logical. The natural world isn't logical, and we evolved in the natural world, so we aren't either."

"But then why does it exist?"

"Human beings trying their hardest not to be human or beings."

"Why don't they want to be what they are?"

Nagato shrugged. "Beats me."

"You're right," Yahiko sighed. "It doesn't make any sense."

Konan

Konan woke up early the next morning. Dawn was just beginning. She put on her cloak and went out for a walk in the cool air. At this hour, the world is quiet. Peaceful. Restful. There is not yet any demand to go somewhere and do something. She watched the dew on the grass outside the front door. Several spiderwebs were visible. I can breathe out here.

She walked up the side of the building and surveyed the surrounding landscape from the roof. The sky was bright, but the sun did not yet touch any trees. The forest was well lit, but only indirectly. Konan sat in the crumbled corner to watch for the first touch of gold on the treetops.

She saw it. An especially tall tree some distance away grew fiery at its very tip. Konan stood up. Now that she had seen the first touch, she was done. She descended the back wall into the backyard.

A flash of white caught her eye. She went to the rock platform they used for fires and carefully removed a large stone that was on top of it. Beneath the stone was a scrap of paper. Konan took the paper inside, to her room, where she entered the phone number written on it into her phone. She then sent a text to that number. The text read, Friend or foe?

Friend. For now, was the reply.

Konan considered what more to say. She had suspicions about who she was messaging, but for some odd reason did not want to confirm them. After a bit of thought, she concluded that she did not want their identity to matter. They identified themselves as a friend. Couldn't that be enough?

In my world, it never could have been. Allegiances were important. Family ties. Villages. But in this world, it could be. Konan stared down at her phone, which had gone dark. I have grown fond of the ways of this world. It is like returning to my childhood. She decided that, for now, it could be.

She picked her phone back up and messaged, Welcome.

It took a while for the other person to respond. They were likely considering what to say, just as she had. Konan turned her notifications up and brushed her hair, applied the little makeup she wore, used the bathroom. Eventually, her phone pinged. To what?

Konan smiled. So much consideration for such a short reply. It must be Soye. She sat down and typed out an answer: To the alliance.

Are there others?

Yes. The Hatakes and their beast companions, the demon boy down the road, the demons in the bar in town, and a scattering of others. Anyone who calls themself a friend.

Alliance towards what?

Konan frowned. Mainly towards hypotheticals. In case a hostile person of great power attempts to seize control and create chaos. She hesitated before sending this. Such a vague answer screamed that they had no idea what they were doing or why. But that was the most concrete answer she could give, so she sent it.

Hypotheticals are small ground to build such a large alliance on.

Konan turned off her phone and put it down. She had a lot of thinking to do. Why were they allying themselves with every being they possibly could? It was one thing to make friends. It was quite another to make friends that were bound by promises and obligations to help you upon demand. What kind of help might be required? The new Akatsuki - they trained, they made alliances, they scouted the landscape and identified resources. Why?

We are ninja, she wrote back. Our original selves lived in a hostile world where there was always a potential for attack. We continue to follow our instincts and reflexes, though this world is not so hostile. Hypotheticals are only excuses, justifications for an urge that will be satisfied with or without any cause.

What will you do if no excuse presents itself?

Konan hissed under her breath. She didn't know.

Will you create one?

Such dangerous questions! They could not be left unanswered. Konan typed back, That would be difficult to do. Our preparations for the possibility of a hostile agent include creating a stable hierarchy under which every one of our friends feels safe and secure, so that there can be no weak point for such a person to take advantage of. In order to do what you suggest, we would first have to undo many of our preparations. This is not a natural direction for our instincts to lead us in.

Then what will you do?

Most likely, this situation will never arise. Unlike swords, which last for a long while once made, our preparations are only ideas. They degrade quickly. Friendship requires constant maintenance. Once the alliance reaches a certain size and complexity, simply maintaining it should take enough work to satisfy our instincts. Konan hit Send, and her shoulders relaxed. There. A strong answer, accurate, that implied competence. Just what the ninja doctor ordered.

What will you do if a reason arises?

Konan put more thought into this one. Realistically, what would they do? Go into battle? No; that was not the kind of fight they were preparing for. If they were not planning to kill the villain, then what? Legal justice? No; their preparations did not involve the law in any way. So what would they and all their allies actually do if attacked?

Excuse me. I must confer with others. Konan switched to the group chat and typed, What do you all believe we will do, in terms of concrete action, if the manipulator from my world or any other evil person attempts to move against us?

She checked at her window and saw that sunlight now reached the ground. The rest of the group should be awake. Sure enough, she got responses. Stop them from harming anyone and convert them to our side, Yahiko replied. Many others agreed. Most of the group had assumed the plan ended with the attacker becoming their friend.

Kakuzu had not. I thought we would repel the fucker and throw them into the shredder. By which I mean some kind of legal or quasi legal system of meting out justice.

Sasori also had not. A person like that wouldn't last long here. They'd be going against how the world works. All we have to do is resist and wait for them to disappear, like the succubus did.

A group discussion started. Nobody was in favor of Kakuzu's solution unless it just happened to coincidentally occur. Sasori's solution was argued against mainly on practical grounds. The succubus had given up her physical form, which she could do since she was a demon. An actual human being was unlikely to literally disappear. But, as Itachi pointed out, other forms of magic besides their own had been shown to exist. Some kind of disappearance could not be ruled out.

Konan switched back to her conversation with (most likely) Soye. The most likely possibility is that any hostile person would be converted to our side. The second most likely is that they will magically disappear. I do not mean that sarcastically; magic exists in this world. The remaining possibility is that the nonmagical aspects of this world - namely, the criminal and legal systems - would remove this person from our lives, as they have done once before. There is only a 50-50 chance that the eventual outcome would require deliberate action on our part. We plan to repel any attack and wait to see what happens.

How passive.

Passivity is an oddly productive strategy in this world.

Do you think so?

Konan stifled the urge to fire back a retort. As long as it is done deliberately, yes. Opportunities for progress tend to pop into existence and last for only a short time, as opposed to having always existed but requiring hard work to discover and attain. Perhaps I should have said opportunism instead of passivity. Working hard may leave you unable to take advantage.

There was a long pause. This alliance leaves much to be discovered. It was not acceptance, but not rejection either. Konan was quite satisfied.

She returned to the group chat. It was quiet. Of course it was; today was another workday. Konan was starting to get used to the peculiar structure of their time. She thought of workweeks as missions. During the workweek, roughly half the group was available for opportunistic pursuits while the rest were occupied in missions. Their missions were multifaceted and involved combinations of scouting, gathering information, forging alliances and performing field operations. The short periods of time at the beginning and end of each workday were when they sent field reports and received minor updates to their orders. And over the weekend, they returned from their missions to enjoy downtime, participate in group exercises, and decide the overall direction of their next extended mission. It wasn't a perfect analogy. Major decisions could be made midweek, they often began a workweek without any goals, and her field report analogy for the beginning and end of each workday was flimsy at best. It would be just as accurate to think of their workweek as the group temporarily splitting up and moving to base camps in various locations. All performing the same functions, just in different places. The base camp analogy also had several flaws, but different ones than the mission analogy, so between the two she had a nearly perfect understanding.

Konan made rounds to verify that they all had the same information. The wisdom of that remained unchanged regardless of the analogy. She found that they all considered the matter settled and were ready to think about other things. There was no remaining disagreement. Excellent. She posted in the group chat her reasons for having that discussion. Namely, that she was now in contact with someone who she was nearly sure was Soye.

Shouldn't you check before telling her our plans? Deidara asked.

Konan's throat closed at the sight of that message. Deidara was being reasonable. He was thinking like a ninja. It wasn't right. They weren't supposed to be ninja. She was the ninja. The rest of them were supposed to be like children. No. I'm overreacting. I've taught them some of my methods. That's all. They haven't become like I am. They haven't lost their innocence. They haven't fundamentally changed. They're just following my lead.

And yet…

Before she knew it, she was entirely within the clutches of grief. Her heart panged as if somebody had died. She couldn't stand to look at that message anymore. Konan retreated to her room and tried to get a grip on herself. But all that did was give her a safe place to curl up and be sad.

Hidan found her. "What's gone?" he asked.

"Childhood," she whispered back.

"Because of what Deidara said?"

She nodded.

"I'll get out of range and talk about it so you don't have to," he told her. Konan watched him go. A couple minutes later, her phone pinged. She did not yet feel strong enough, so she did not look at it. The messages would be there later.

I'm being ridiculous. I'm overreacting. Just because that was the first thing Deidara asked me over the chat doesn't mean that was his first thought. His first thought was probably of joy. Then he quickly remembered my lessons on caution and switched to a cautious approach. They're just quicker at remembering to not immediately follow their first instinct, which might lead them into danger.

How long will it be before they stop following that instinct at all?

She started to cry.

Her phone had made several more sounds, so the original message was probably buried by now. Konan wiped her eyes clear and took a look.

Hidan: No need to get all cautious. What happened to "Yay new friend!"?

Deidara: Shouldn't we know who a mysterious new contact is?

Hidan: Why? They said they're a friend. What happened to trusting people?

Deidara: I trust them. I just want to make sure, yeah.

Yahiko: Why not tell them about our plans? Our plans don't need to be kept secret from anyone. We could pull aside a random NPC and tell them about our plans.

Kisame: I want to know who the hell I'm talking to, though.

Hidan: I'm just asking because Dei's question made Konan sad. We're not becoming REAL ninjas, are we? The kind that are cold and distant and toollike?

He had yet to receive an answer.

Kisame

Hidan's question hit Kisame like a bag of rocks. He had to put his phone down before he dropped it. Samehada whined and made questioning sounds. Kisame was getting dressed, so all he had to do was take a few steps and sit on his bed. He took deep breaths.

"Same?" His throat had closed up, making it hard to speak. But Samehada had no idea what was going on and was very upset, so he had to speak now.

Samehada nuzzled his hand.

Kisame took another deep breath. "You know how I say I want you to stay happy? Never stop trusting people? Never get lost in worrying about the future, the way I do?" Samehada nodded. "I feel the same way about other people. About Yahiko, and Nagato, and anyone who's like you. I want you guys to stay there and wait for me." His voice cracked. "Wait for me to catch up. I want to be like you." He gasped and put a hand over his heart, which ached. "But the more time we spend together, the more my thinking infects you. Yahiko used to be the guy who ran right up to a demon to ask him how to kill demons. It never would have occurred to him that our neighbor wouldn't help us. Now he would stop and worry about if the demon kid would take offense, if he would get mad. The trust would take a while to come out from behind all that concern. If he keeps hanging around people like me, who point out all the bad possibilities, will it stop coming out at all? Then what the fuck will I do? I don't want people like you to ever agree with me. I want to be wrong. I want you to make me agree with you, because I can't find my way to that level of trust by myself."

Samehada made confused sounds. He didn't seem to understand. How could he not understand?

"The mind trap that Hidan mentioned traps you by convincing you that there is nothing else. That it's reality, and any other belief is just a dream." Kisame realized he had started gasping for air. "I want to get out of it, Same. I want trust, and kindness, and all that shit to be real. When other people start agreeing with me and becoming more cautious, the mind trap makes that seem like evidence that it is reality, after all. The more anyone agrees with me, even if they're only agreeing with me a reasonable amount, the more it feels like I'm falling back in."

Samehada exclaimed. He understood that! He lunged forward and bit down on the neckline of Kisame's shirt, growling. It got a little easier to breathe. Kisame hugged him back and held on for dear life.

Eventually, when he had recovered the ability to breathe normally, his eyes flew open. He released Samehada and flew across the room. He picked up his phone and typed furiously. You'd better fucking not be. I've spent so much goddamn energy on fighting the mind trap, on learning to trust, on learning to be like you. If you people fucking turn around and start being like me, I'm going to be so fucking betrayed. Way to throw it back in my face! If you people start being all cautious and paranoid, if you goddamn give up just when I was starting to believe you, I will hate you all forever. I mean that. You can't lead me out here and then strand me. Fuck anyone who was even thinking of doing that.

He went to the bathroom for a towel to wipe away the various substances on his face. His hands shook. First I was sad. Then I was angry. Now I'm afraid? What is this?

He went back to Samehada and stroked his shark's scales. Samehada chirred. "I don't want to go back," he told Samehada. "Before I joined this group, I was okay living like a hermit. I didn't feel how badly it was hurting me. Now that I've had a taste of what it's like to not live that way, I would feel it. All of it. And I don't think I could take it."

Samehada nuzzled his chest. Kisame held him close and whispered, "I can't go back, but I'm not strong enough to stay here by myself. Stay with me for just a little longer. Promise me you will."

His phone pinged. Kisame glanced at it and saw a notification from the group chat. It was brief. We're not leaving you, said Itachi.

.

.A/N: The song referenced is "Otherside," by Red Hot Chili Peppers.

To anyone who doesn't read next week's chapter when it is posted, which I think will be most people, Merry Christmas!