A/N: *purr* Celebrated Christmas yesterday... Got two new 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles... Gonna do the one of the pretty fishies... And I have the cutest homescreen for my phone ever. It is a picture of an in-game Warlic plushie from Dragonfable. To see it, google "Mr. Warlic plushie dragonfable." He's the cute little fellow casting spells to attack the player. A GOLEM plushie. I would do a lot of things for a Warlic plushie, golem or otherwise. *sniff*

Merry Christmas!

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Itachi

Yahiko and Hidan volunteered to take Itachi to the tailor's. "I can't believe it's almost over," said Hidan, sniffing. "When Kisame gets one, that'll be it. No more big moments."

"There will be plenty more," Itachi reassured him. "Not of the same kind, but certainly of the same magnitude."

"Now that I've gotten a handle on things, I like it here," Yahiko said. "I'm kind of fond of this crazy little world."

They set off towards town. Itachi thought of many things, but did not want to discuss them. The morning was too beautiful. He noticed the trees, lighting, lawns and houses, everything they passed. Gorgeous. They made it all the way to the tailor's before any of them felt the need to speak. "No matter what happens, we made an impact on at least one person," Yahiko said.

"Yeah," Hidan purred. They went in.

The tailor was working on something for another customer. This gave them a chance to look all around the little building that had changed their lives. "I gave him my whole wallet as payment for mine," Hidan remembered.

"Nagato and Konan and I went out for food," Yahiko remembered.

"You want to do something special, Itachi?"

"Why?" Itachi answered. "Anything that happened around this time would be retroactively deemed special regardless of what it was."

"Why wait?" Yahiko asked. "Let's do something that you can see as special now."

Hidan supported this plan. Itachi smiled and shook his head. "If you insist. Let me think…" They all thought as hard as they could of something special they could do to mark the occasion. It was very difficult. They hadn't thought of anything by the time the tailor came back.

The man immediately straightened. "A black cloak for this one?" he said, indicating Itachi. Itachi nodded. "I will just need your measurements," he said before going away to get measuring tools.

"Let's start with the basics," Hidan said. "Do we want to do something while waiting for him to finish, or after? 'Cause if we want to do anything while we wait, we'd better think fast."

"Or we could plan nothing and wait to find ourselves doing something special," Itachi said.

Yahiko looked unsure. "I'm starting to think Itachi's right."

The tailor came back and measured Itachi. Hidan and Yahiko waited by the door. Itachi left his phone number with the man and led the three of them outside. "Let's do something. I can't wait to find out what."

"Mm." Yahiko's voice was muffled. "I didn't eat anything before we left. Best mission prep ever."

Hidan touched his cheek and started chewing. Itachi did likewise. Hidan burst out into muffled giggling and led them somewhere they could sit down. Then he laughed openly. "We must look really weird, walking around chewing with no food in our hands!"

"If any NPC asked, we could just explain about the storage seals," Itachi said.

Yahiko laughed too. "That would look weird!"

Why are they laughing? Itachi did not join in. He looked at his two friends and wondered what they saw that he did not.

Hidan realized this first. "It's funny because there's a mismatch. They'd think we looked like total fucking weirdos, but it makes perfect sense on our end," he explained to Itachi.

"That sort of mismatch is funny to you? Not uncomfortable?" When Itachi thought about how they would look, he just got anxious that observers would have inaccurate information and there was no way for him to correct them.

"Why would it be uncomfortable?" Yahiko asked.

Itachi could have explained, but did not want to. He was hurt that they didn't already understand. He shook his head. "Let's find somewhere quiet to eat."

They went to the park. "Itachi, is everything okay?" Hidan asked.

"I am…surprised, though I do not think I should be, that once again my priorities are not the same as others'."

Yahiko put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. He circled around so he was facing Itachi. "Why would it be uncomfortable?" he asked again, but in a very different tone of voice. A tone like he really wanted to know.

"Inaccurate information is wrong. The sight or sound of it irritates me. In order to get rid of the irritation, I must correct the information. But in this scenario, I would not be able to do so."

"Do you mean that literally, or not?" Hidan said, sitting down on the nearest bench.

"Literally," Itachi replied. "My eyes, once they have detected something wrong, cannot stop looking at it. If I hear it, I can't stop replaying it in my head. No, this does not mean I can simply move away and avoid it. Once I have sensed it, the sensation lingers and itches for as long as I remember it."

"Is there any other way to soothe the itching?" Hidan asked.

Itachi sat next to him on the bench. "If I can't correct the information in actuality, I can imagine doing so."

"Or you could look for distractions," Yahiko added, joining them. "You said it only bothers you for as long as you remember. So make yourself forget. Like, Hidan and I don't feel uncomfortable about other people not knowing the truth. I wonder why that is."

He's right. Forgetting about it is another viable method. And he's given me the perfect distraction. Itachi smiled. "More than that. You laughed. Laughter, as far as I've read, is thought to serve a very specific function. It signals that something which may be dangerous is not in fact dangerous. I don't find your imagined scenario funny because for me, there is no relief. The possibility of looking unusual in the eyes of others seems unpleasant, and in fact thinking about it is unpleasant. There is no switch, so to speak."

"So we laughed because we didn't find it uncomfortable," Yahiko said. "But why didn't we find it uncomfortable?"

"Thinking too hard drains all the humor out of it," Hidan complained.

"Hidan! We're helping Itachi, remember?"

"Okay, okay. It wasn't uncomfortable because it's harmless. So fucking what if people get the wrong idea? It's a harmless idea, it won't lead them to treat us differently or anything, and actually I think they'd be amused to see a bunch of people walking around chewing for no reason. Why would I want to correct them? They're having fun thinking that."

Itachi shuddered. "I cannot believe that distorting the truth truly helps anyone."

"Sme truths are more important than others," Hidan told him. "You care about being accurate, and you like it when other people are happy and having fun. Which truth do you prioritize?"

"I acknowledge your viewpoint and agree," Itachi said. "But that doesn't make it less physically irritating to spot an inaccuracy. It's not just that my eyes keep getting drawn back. I have a minor stress response when I spot an inaccuracy, a response based solely on the fact that it is an inaccuracy and independent of any possible consequences the inaccuracy may have."

"Stress response? Like, your heart beats faster and you sweat and stuff?" Yahiko rubbed his chin. "It sounds like you're just built differently than us. There is no reason why we aren't uncomfortable. We just aren't."

Itachi closed his eyes. "That's what I've spent my whole life knowing."

"Have a brownie," Hidan told him. "Or whatever you last put in the seal. Being hungry doesn't help."

Hidan was right. Itachi was surprised at how much of his stress evaporated as soon as he had eaten something. Yet another reminder that I should take notice of my body's needs before assuming that I am reacting to something outside of myself. "I no longer feel uncomfortable," he told Hidan and Yahiko. "I was probably overreacting earlier just because I was hungry. My apologies."

"No apologies," Yahiko said. "This was nice. I never knew that about laughter before."

"We wanted to do something special," Hidan pointed out. "Itachi's the one who's always being asked to explain stuff. Now we explained something to him. That's special."

Yahiko put an arm around Itachi's shoulders. "Bonding experience!"

Itachi couldn't help but smile. His secret doubts vanished. I was not being hasty. I am truly ready to join this group.

Deidara

Deidara invited Konan to help him figure out what to do with his small army of spiders. This was an excuse to apologize for making her sad. "I'm sorry for what happened earlier," he said when they had walked in the forest for a while. "Making contact with the vampires is great, yeah! It's even better that she made the effort to come to you, hm."

Konan nodded. "It also helped me clarify to myself what we are doing and why."

"What are we doing and why?"

"We are acting as ninjas for no other reason than we have an irrepressible urge to. We don't need to form official alliances, or train, or scout out our surroundings. There is no external cause for our behavior. Whatever excuses we make up are just that: excuses."

"That's fine though. Right? It's fine to do things just because we want to."

"Of course. But it is good to know that that is what we are doing."

Deidara made one of his spiders climb a tree. He put his hands over his eyes and asked Konan to tell him when it was done. The spider successfully made it to the top of the tree without running into any branches. "I just wanted to confirm that they could do that, yeah," he told Konan. "Does that mean I could use them to send messages or something within the building? No - they could only go where I told them to, not to who. Or can they?" His eyes lit up. He put his hands over his eyes again and told Konan to go somewhere. He would send a spider to her, and she would tell him if it found her or not.

The spider did not find her. It circled the area, did not bump into her, and stopped. "Darn. There goes that idea."

"The largest one could be ridden on," Konan suggested.

Deidara did so. He had to carefully perch on it. "Maybe for kids."

"Entertaining children?"

"But I don't know any… Except I do. But wait, they're not really normal kids."

They both paused, expecting the demon boy to appear. They were surprised when neither he nor his snake friend did. "There must be a local school," Konan said. "Perhaps you could lend your services to them."

"What services?"

Konan shrugged. It was her only idea.

"I really have nothing to do with these guys," Deidara concluded. His spiders clustered around him. He looked down at them and wondered what responsibilities he had towards his creations. They were made of clay; they wouldn't mind having no purpose in life. Was it wrong to let them languish in an attic like old clothes?

"Where will you keep them?" Konan asked.

An answer appeared from nowhere. It is wrong. These are living creatures. They are mine. I can't abandon them. "My room," Deidara replied. "I'll find a purpose for them eventually, yeah."

"You are still comfortable with having them close to you and inside, then?"

"Yeah. No nightmares."

"Your nightmares have entirely ceased?"

Deidara adjusted his ponytail. "I wouldn't say that. They're degraded. Just, like, flashes, or impressions, that I don't remember after I wake up. But they're still real. Sometimes I wake up feeling totally powerless and like anything could happen. That must mean I still feel like that deep down."

Konan made gentle supportive noises, then led him on deeper into the forest. The walk was very pleasant. "What about you?" Deidara asked.

"No nightmares. As far as I know."

"Did you ever have nightmares?"

"I'm not sure if I did. I only remember the waking ones."

"You mean the flashbacks?"

Konan waved a hand dismissively.

"Have you had any of those recently?" Deidara asked.

"No."

"That's a good sign, right?"

Konan stopped. She looked around and found a fallen branch for them to sit on. She and Deidara sat on it, the spiders clustering nearby. There, she told him of a conversation she, Yahiko, and Kakuzu had had about the defining strengths of shinobi. "What he spoke of was not any particular ninja skill. He meant personal attributes. Endurance, creativity, charm, and the like." Konan paused and looked forward, staring at nothing in particular. "We concluded that my personal strength is self-sacrifice. I can accomplish great things because I am willing to give up so much more than any other person. I can disregard my safety, spend more than I can afford, and so on. I was always taught that this is a good thing. A shinobi should be able to sacrifice for their homeland. Here, you all tell me I should care for myself. I understand your point of view, and I acknowledge its merits. You are right. But if I give that up, what will I be? Will I have any strength aside from…brutality?"

"Are you sure that's your strength?" Deidara asked.

"What else would my strength be?"

"You're so organized. You do everything in such an orderly way, like it was easy. The only person as organized as you is Sasori. Your plans are solid, and we have needed resources, and everyone can count on you to figure out what a thing is and what we should do about it even when it seems like there's a crisis and we don't have time to think. I think your strength is your mind, yeah," Deidara gushed.

Konan looked at him like he was crazy. "You have forgotten some things."

"No I haven't," he insisted. "Even when you were going off the rails, I heard that you mostly held it together and sometimes found a plan you could focus on enough to get it done. You might have been in danger of hurting people and objects the whole time, but you got some stuff done. I might've looked up online other people's stories of what their episodes were like. Not remotely as productive, yeah. Their minds weren't strong enough to even try to contain that energy."

Konan stiffened. Slowly, Deidara saw understanding creep into her eyes. As if she was remembering something long forgotten. "My will," Konan said. "That inside me which says that a certain thing will be done. I thought…"

Deidara gave her a minute to think. "What?" he finally asked.

"I thought that it and that wild energy were the same."

"It can't be. You have a will even when you're not…" Deidara realized too late the implications of her words. "Wait. You mean you kind of feel like that now?"

"I have a sense of something lurking inside," Konan confirmed.

"That's a good thing! If you can sense it, you can tell when it's coming to the surface, yeah!"

"It's not that simple. When my own thinking begins to be affected, I lose the ability to sense it. Or rather… I probably still could, if only I remembered to."

"I'll remind you to check for it every morning," Deidara chirped. "And whenever else I think of it. Check for it now, yeah."

Konan closed her eyes. "Midlevel. For now."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that, with a great deal of struggle, I could tap into some of that energy. Barely any; enough for a temporary boost of strength while lifting something heavy, perhaps. Lower midlevel." She looked thoughtful. "In the upper midlevel, I could tap into it for a burst of emotional energy. Any higher, and I could tap into it for mental energy. That's where the problems start."

"Sounds like magma," Deidara said. "I used to love volcanoes. I would read about them like some kids read about dinosaurs. That's how magma moves, from one chamber to another all the way up to the top. People who monitor volcanoes use vibrations and such to tell when the magma's moving up, and that's how they predict an eruption, yeah."

"Lovely."

Deidara loved volcanoes so much it didn't occur to him that there was a possibility for sarcasm. "I know, right? It could explain a lot, yeah! Let's keep going! What kind of eruptions do you have? The kind where lava just streams out, or the kind where the whole body of the volcano explodes?"

Konan blinked. "Hm…"

"Based on what I've seen and heard of that one time, I'm guessing it's the first, yeah." I know I should stop talking and wait for her to think, but I love volcanoes so much! I can't stop! "Because there was no obstacle, yeah. In the accounts I've read, some people describe feeling like everything inside of them was going crazy but they couldn't let any of that craziness out. You can! You took all kinds of action. Not great actions, but you did stuff, yeah! It poured out no problem."

"Interesting perspective."

"Volcanoes that do that are the best kinds," Deidara gushed. "The kinds that people take pictures of. Because the lava flows down their sides and builds them up, layer by layer, making that classic cone shape. Mauna Loa is an example of a volcano like that, and it's famous and beloved. It's so majestic and scenic. That's a great kind of volcano for a person to be. A Krakatoa-like volcano would be… Um… Like someone who lives for years or decades with fits of depression, alcohol, a kinda respectable job that he's not satisfied with, and then one day he murders his wife and all their kids before hanging himself. That's a horrible kind of volcano for a person to be. It's an okay kind for a volcano to be. I hear there's a new Baby Krakatoa growing in the same place or right next to the remains of the old one, yeah. But really bad for a person to be."

"I assume Krakatoa is a volcano that entirely exploded."

"Yeah! Have you ever seen that painting The Scream?" Deidara pulled out his phone and frantically googled. "In it, the sky is this amazing golden red. I heard it was inspired by an actual moment the artist had, where he was looking at a sky just like that and he got overwhelmed. That moment was the year after Krakatoa exploded, after it poured all of its rock and dust and stuff into the atmosphere. It plunged the whole world into volcanic winter for a little while. Winter that year just lasted forever. And every sunset would have been like that." Deidara showed her the painting on his phone. "Cool, right?!"

"It is definitely better to be a person who exudes violent energy for a while than it is to be one who destroys the world," Konan agreed. "Next to this, I look downright harmless."

"I think it was called the hunger winter or something like that. I have no idea where I read this, and it was years ago. I could be way off."

"You said the lava creates their shape?"

"Yeah, it solidifies into new rock."

"Hmm." Konan drummed her fingers on the branch. "What have my past incidents solidified into?"

"Regret? Guilt? You're kind of a downer sometimes," Deidara admitted.

"That…sounds exactly right."

"Best conversation ever!" Deidara called his spiders over. "Thanks guys. You're doing me favors already, yeah!"

Konan snorted. "You may invite anyone you wish to talk to to help you find a purpose for your spiders."

"Exactly!" Deidara put the smallest one on his head. Its legs hung down to his ears. "I knew I couldn't abandon them. Even if I couldn't say what they were good for, I knew there was something and I'd find it eventually. Besides, they're mine. When I made them, that was me making a promise to them, and I'm gonna keep it."

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A/N: Krakatoa is the English name for the volcano. Its real name is Krakatau. I used the first because it's more common and that was the name used in whatever book I read all this trivia in.

Anyway, Merry Chistmas again, and joy to all.