Even though Kisame said nothing about the dinner, he sure yapped about Mitsuki scamming everyone with her appearance and acting, to Mitsuki's annoyance. Even going as far as pointing out her mannerism and choice of words, Kisame was surely, having a good laugh during that night's dinner.

"So much for borrowing money from Itachi-kun," thought Mitsuki to herself, considering if she should really just feed Kisame some berries next time.

Even so, Mitsuki was actually still feeling lost about her duty. After all, she hadn't yet figured what she could do for the civilians, even after the day's observation. She had done what she could to restore the natural balance in the area, but society's issue that needed solving usually goes way beyond that. Naturally, despite her appearance, the villagers were all wary of her, hence she couldn't ask them directly about their personal issues as they were not to keen on talking. On the other way, Mitsuki wondered if such attitude of mistrust was what helped them survive for so long in such a rough political and geographical terrain. Additionally, Mitsuki wondered if there was any specific reason for the common people to stay in the area, despite the hardship that they had faced there again and again through time. She really wanted to find out more, she had to find out more, for both her sake, the kamigami, and the humanity. After all, so many had changed since what she could remember last, and she felt desperate to catch up. If she were not able to keep up with time, how could she be doing her duty effectively?

That was when she heard noises coming from the outside of her inn's window. It was nothing loud or out of place in a village, however.. It was odd, especially since Mitsuki was pretty sure that it was around the middle of the night. Civilians rarely stayed up that late into the night, except for those who stayed in night entertainment focused area since it would be their best time to do business.

Curious, Mitsuki then sneaked out through her window, a habit she had picked up from the shinobis around her. Before long, after a short travel towards the direction of the town gate, Mitsuki arrived nearby the village's gate, where the villagers were gathering. With some of the village ladies lined up in front of the gate, all dressed in thin, white yukata, the villagers stood idly in front of the village gate, as if waiting for something. Mitsuki found it ridiculous. After all, nights at dessert were always so cold, in contrary to the desert's hellish hot daytime. No one in the right mind would wear such a thin clothing to sleep in such temperature, and indeed, the ladies were obviously shivering from the cold.

As she wondered what kind of torturous joke the ladies were enduring, Mitsuki saw line of torches approaching from afar, heading to the village's gate from the depth of the desert. Determined to observe first before joining in, Mitsuki stayed in silence, hiding herself from the villagers' view as she tucked her body behind the shadow of a nearby chimney.

Before long, the line of people holding the torches arrived at the village gate. Upon closer look, they were all dressed in unusual, colorful clothing. If Mitsuki didn't knew better, she would say that those were ritual clothing, yet some details were just not.. right… To her, it looked more like a cheap costume for a play than actual ritual clothes blessed by the Gods. In the first place, she couldn't sense any divine blessing coming from the "priests", despite him carrying what seemed to be a prayer bell.

The torches bearers stopped just right in front of the freezing ladies, and soon they spread out, opening up a path for someone with the grandest clothes of them all.

The villagers, including the ladies, bowed reluctantly as soon as the figure approached. And then in response, the man in the ritual clothes nodded his head, before proceeding to examine the white clad maidens by eye, his gaze scrutinizing them from their top, to bottom. Consecutively, he pointed at the three of the maidens in sequence, while signalling for the others behind him to tie the selected girls' hands up before dragging them to join their line. Following thus event, from among the crowd, a burst of emotion sparked in the villagers' soul.

"Anger, despair, sadness, grief, relief..?" thought Mitsuki, as she deciphered the colour of the sparks one by one. Still unsure of what was going on, Mitsuki held herself back from taking any action just yet.

"Good work, I'll do the ritual now," said the leader of the group, after his people took the ladies.

Raising his ritual bell to the sky, the priest declared. "May the blessing of the Rain God be with you all!"

And then, he slammed his ritual bell's rod to the ground, embedding it to the land before clasping his hands together, covered by his long sleeves.

And then, he began to dance, accompanied with a series of chant.

Mitsuki couldn't recognise what he was saying, or what he was dancing. Among the chant, she couldn't catch the name of the deity the priest was referring to. At least, none that she knew of..

Then, the priest lifted his hand towards the sky, and.. his chakra floated towards the sky.

Itachi sensed the shift in the air, and woke up. He could feel the chakra's disturbance, and without long, he activated his sharingan to check on what was going on. Likewise, Kisame had also woken up.

"Itachi-san? What's the matter?" asked Kisame warily, as he too felt the shift in the atmosphere.

"…"

Itachi kept his quiet. He too, didn't know what exactly was going on, so instead, he signalled towards Kisame to follow him out.

Outside of the inn, Itachi had managed to get a closer look on what was going on. Massive amount of chakra was shifting around, gathering, and headed up towards the sky. Shifting his attention to the sky, Itachi noticed that the previously clear sky was now covered in dark clouds, held together by chakra. The size of it was not massive, yet it had successfully covered the radius of the small border village. Observing further, Itachi looked around the village from his room's window, and saw how the villagers were awake and busy. Some of them had put out several clay pots, or any container they have outside their houses, others took in their hanged laundry and dried produce. It was as if they knew that rain was about to come down for sure, despite the darkness of the night sky.

All of which made some sense, if somehow the villagers had knowledge about what was going on. After all, the phenomenon that was brewing was clearly, artificial. But why pick this timing? Why at night? Itachi couldn't make sense of it yet nor was he sure that there were underlying meaning behind it. So instead, he jumped out and led his partner towards the village's gate, where he saw a lot of people had gathered.

As he approached the location of the crowd, traversing on top of the buildings discreetly, he then saw Mitsuki laying low on top of one of the building's roof, close to where the gathering were.

"What's going on?" Itachi asked in hushed whisper as soon as he and Kisame joined Mitsuki on her surveillance. Mitsuki was not surprised to see her team-mates arrival. After all, she had been in high alert ever since she saw the abnormal gathering, and kept her perception activated. With a hushed voice of her own, she answered Itachi's question briefly without removing her focus away from the odd gathering.

"I'm.. not sure yet.." she answered hesitantly, as it was yet a good time for her to share with Itachi and Kisame about what she had witnessed in detail.

Hearing Mitsuki's answer, Itachi crouched beside her and got into surveillance position, followed by Kisame who then opted to do the same.

"Itachi-san, what do you think is going on here? These amount of chakra.. It's out of ordinary.."

Itachi heard Kisame's question, but he had yet observed long enough to make a clear deduction. So, again, he just kept his quiet and shook his head lightly. Instead, he focused his chakra on his ear and sharpened his auditory senses to eavesdrop on the on-going conversation between the villagers. Seeing Itachi's non-existent reaction, Kisame shrugged and do just the same.

Some of the villagers among the crowd were crying. Some others were standing in silence, and some were complaining discreetly.

"We're sorry, Maki.."

"Why.. why does it have to be you?"

"Until when should we put up with this? I.."

"It can't be helped.. We have to depend on them afterall.."

Based on what he could hear from among the crowd, Itachi started to put his theory together. Likewise, Kisame seemed to have caught on to the gist of what happened. Unsure if Mitsuki could deduce the same, or even hear what was going on with her own senses, Itachi glanced at Mitsuki. Seeing the tense expression on her face, however, Itachi wondered about what she had witnessed, and if she had a rough idea on what was going on.

Shifting his attention back the crowd, Itachi planted his attention on the dancing man adorned with eye-catching robe. In a glance, he seemed to be dancing randomly, but.. With his Sharingan, Itachi could tell that behind the long sleeve, the man's hand were clasping together, weaving a complicated set of seal.

Then, as soon as the "dance" was over, the chakra which had been pooling on the air where sucked upwards, towards the coiling cloud. And then, as if triggered by the mass of chakra, rain started pouring down.

Upon seeing the sequence of event, Itachi frowned, and Kisame continued watching with a grin, seemingly amused by what he had witnessed. Even though, unlike Itachi, he couldn't see neither the chakra, nor the performed seal, being an expert shinobi as he was, there was no way that such massive gathering and movement of chakra would escape his senses. Upon the pouring of the rain, the man that was dancing lifted his hand up, while declaring.

"LOOK! THE GODS HAVE BESTOWED THEIR MIRACLE ONCE MORE! REJOICE!"

Even unable to see into souls like Mitsuki was, Itachi could still see anger flared up on Mitsuki's eye upon hearing the shameless declaration.

"That said, our work here is done. We will leave," the man continued with a sly smile, before turning his back against the villager and walked out of the gate, followed by the parading of his followers joined by the three previously selected girls.

The moment Mitsuki saw their movement, Mitsuki was ready to follow and prepped herself for a chase. Yet, Itachi caught her arm and stopped her movement.

"Where do you think you are going?" Itachi muttered with a whisper. His voice was soft, but his tone was clearly authoritative. In response of Itachi's interruption, Mitsuki frowned and quickly answered, her voice filled with urgency as the parade inched further and further from the village.

"Following them! I.."

Not letting Mitsuki finish her sentence, Itachi shot down her plan with its apparent flaws.

"Out there is wide, open dessert. How are you going to tail them without getting seen?"

Itachi's retort made sense, yet Mitsuki wasn't willing to let those people go, just yet. With a disapproving frown on her face, Mitsuki quickly coughed up a new plan.

"Then, let me at least put some seeds on them for trailing,"

Yet, it wasn't good enough for Itachi.

"In the dessert, a row of new vegetation would be too noticeable. You are not thinking clearly,"

Itachi's tone was stricter the second time, and it had successfully made Mitsuki pause, albeit unwittingly. Somehow, the whole turn of event reminded Itachi of what had transpired in the past, on the day when he and Kisame brought Mitsuki to meet Pain for the first time. Seeing how Mitsuki's face darkened as her body stopped resisting Itachi's pull, Itachi leaned closer towards Mitsuki as she pulled her body down into a crouch once more, and whispered.

"Calm down, we'll discuss later," said Itachi vaguely, knowing that Mitsuki was both worried and upset about the unprecedented situation.

Without a word, Mitsuki gave Itachi a nod without meeting his gaze. Her face was still riddled in frown.

"Well, that was.. something.." said Kisame with a grin, as the three gathered inside Itachi's and Kisame's room for discussion. Seemingly lost in his thought, Itachi sat quietly on the side of his bed, unmoving. Meanwhile, Mitsuki was pacing around the room, seemingly uneasy.

Kisame was right, thought Itachi. Throughout his study on shinobi's history, as well as various documentations of jutsus and kekkei genkai, the ability to control weather was a rare one.. That is also why their leader, Pain, was so respected, and even gained the alias of "God" due to him being able to put a stop to Amegakure's well known, ceaseless rain.

Seeing how no one was offering their ideas, Kisame offered his as he recalled something that he had previously heard on the past. "Do you think that guy might be part of that clan? The one that Orochimaru was researching on some time ago?"

The mention of Orochimaru's name immediately captured the attention of both Itachi and Mitsuki alike. As the two traded glance, Kisame who caught unto Itachi's and Mitsuki's subtle interaction blinked once in amusement.

Itachi had heard of it too. Around the time of his departure from Konoha, there was rumour that Orochimaru, who had been doing a lot of forbidden jutsu research, got his hand on the second Hokage's sealed jutsu, Edo Tensei, and used it to further his research of lost kekkei genkai even more. Based on his incomplete surveillance and information, around the same time, he had heard that there was a suspicion that a boy who could control the weather appeared in Konoha, and there was debate within the ANBU's rank about whether the boy was a spy from another village. However, that was as far as his knowledge goes. Despite Orochimaru still being a member of Akatsuki then, Young Itachi who had just joined Akatsuki couldn't gain much insight unto his research then. With Sasuke's fate now hanging on Orochimaru's hand, Itachi couldn't help but regret his lack of knowledge even more. Still, if the weather-controlling shinobi was related to Orochimaru somehow, there might be a way to redeem it just yet.

"Kisame," Itachi called out, suddenly. "You joined Akatsuki before I did. What did you know about Orochimaru and his experiment?"

Kisame almost couldn't believe what he just heard. After all, it was unusual for Itachi to be asking him question, instead of the other way round. However, honouring his partner's unusual curiosity, and remembering the recent news about Orochimaru and Itachi's brother as well as Mitsuki's reluctance to talk about it, Kisame gave a straight answer without further question.

"Hmm, only rumours and such. I've never been in a good term with him, after all. He always creeps me out, that snake.."

Not in a good term was an understatement. To be honest, Kisame had never liked Orochimaru. Hated him, even, about as much as he disliked the greedy zombie, Kakuzu. Even criminal as he was, he had always found Orochimaru's action and research to be.. unpalatable, unethical, and cruel, as hypocritical as it sounds coming from another notorious criminal.

"Heard that he was researching about immortality, as well as resurrecting the death. Something to do about Konoha's 2nd Hokage's jutsu or something. I've heard rumours of him collecting remains of famous, dead shinobi, including members of the Mist's Seven Swordsman.

Hearing Kisame's statement, Mitsuki's frown grew deeper in disbelieve.

"Resurrecting!? That's…!" she remarked, before stopping herself. She wanted to say how that would be unnatural and against the law of Gods, but.. Everything about shinobi had always been, unnatural to say the least.

"Also, I heard that among them corpses who were gathered was member of an old, weather-controlling clan that had been wiped out long ago.."

Itachi's eye lit up as he searched his own brain for information. Indeed, he felt like he had read about it somewhere.. Different from Pain's way of controlling the weather, mysterious as it was.. It was said that the now-extinct clan could manifest abnormal weather regardless of the locations and season. When he read about it, he was intrigued, but not enough to make him dig into it further. Along with the little amount of documentation that existed about their clan, Itachi's knowledge about them was close to none.

And, with the three party members lost in their own thought, the room had returned to silence once more.

Before long, Mitsuki broke the silence. She had bad feelings about what she witnessed, and she felt like she shouldn't ignore it. Not only that, she was sure that Itachi was interested in the matter as well, yet unable to convey it without being seemingly to curious, unlike her.

"I want to pursue this matter," said the girl with serious tone. "Something didn't feel right. Feels like I shouldn't let them be.."

Her expression was both solemn and spirited, showing her genuine interest and concern.

"This too, is part of your Miko duty?" replied Kisame teasingly. After all, the girl had always been such a busy body, yet it was rare for her to appear so serious.

Hearing Kisame's word, and reading between his lines, Mitsuki frowned slightly.

"Not exactly, but I guess, yea.. some of it is related.."

After all, that man seemed to be a fraud.. If he could be called that. After all, the weather change was real, but it had nothing to do with God's Miracle or whatever. If it was, she would be able to tell..

Hearing Mitsuki's inconclusive answer, Kisame got even more amused. After all, it would be his first time witnessing what they called by "Miko duties," vague as it was. Itachi, on the other hand, frowned slightly. He felt that somehow, Mitsuki's interest in the matter might have been exacerbated further by Itachi's situation and the case's connection to Orochimaru, which was threatening Sasuke his brother. Somehow, it made him worry. After all, the girl could prove to be emotional sometimes, and it would often make her careless.

But, despite all that, he too was interested. After all, by delving into the matter he might be able to uncover more about Orochimaru, and it would even prove to be vital for ensuring Sasuke's future safety. And so, decisively, he gave Mitsuki a silent nod of approval. Seeing how both of his teammates had agreed to proceed even without his input, Kisame snickered.

"Well, I don't really care about this but.. I guess we had nothing else to do anyway," he stated, jokingly, before adding his conclusion in. "Count me in, then," he said, grinning with his sharp teeth while shifting his glance between his partner and the troubled girl.

Hearing how even the usually unwilling Kisame agreed to get involved, Mitsuki could tell that part of his decision might be because of Kisame's hidden concern for Itachi, even if it was left unsaid. Somehow, it brought warmth and gratitude inside her heart. And she wanted to let Kisame know.

"Thank you, Kisame," said Mitsuki with a complicated mix of emotion on her face as she smiled, albeit accompanied with a light, hesitant frown. To Kisame, the attempt itself felt sincere, even more than she had ever shown to him before, and it honestly caught him off-guard. However, being how he was, Kisame was quick to recover unto his "mischievous" self.

With a grin, Kisame teased,

"Make it worth my time, kid," he said, with a meaningful grin, and mischievous chuckle.

Author's note:

Ehehe, I think this would be one of the more serious, canon related ark. This time, I had more freedom since it was connected to an unexplored filler~

Source:

Naruto Shippuden eps 313-315 filler

I crash coursed myself on the filler episode O_O