As Mitsuki strolled through the village's path adorned with her ceremonial clothes, she couldn't help but notice the gloom in the atmosphere. If the previous day, the villagers were reluctant to entertain her, that day they were outright avoiding her.

"It can't be helped," thought Mitsuki. "The previous night was probably a stark reminder for them that people tend to take advantage of trust and faith…"

She knew all that, but still.. It made her sad. However, she knew that moping around waiting wouldn't get her closer to her goal as well. She need to find someone approachable, someone she could convince to confide in her.. Even if she, too, had to manipulate them for that.

"This is not just about me," thought Mitsuki as she summoned her conviction. She had promised herself before, that she would do anything needed whenever necessary. And now, it was exactly the time for that.

Itachi sent away one of his crow. Attached on the crow's feet was a new request for information. As for finding the hideout of the scammers, he would have to wait for the cover of the night. After all, it was not easy to roam undetected in a wide, open space, like the dessert. Honestly, Mitsuki's skill would come in handy, thought Itachi, remembering how she had managed to transport the sand and its inhabitant by manipulating the wind.

But she had things she needed to do, things he assigned her to do. Itachi understood why the girl was so eager to get things done this time, but because of that… he feared that her emotion will get the best of her, and that she would be put into danger because of it. Countless time he had seen the girl making small mistakes just because she was emotional, or distracted, and he didn't want to risk it. After all, this time, the enemy was likely connected to that Orochimaru. The sannin, the genius, the mad scientist.. the unhinged man of obsession.. Against that man, Mitsuki's guilt and desperation would be her doom. And.. if Orochimaru were to caught on to Mitsuki's unique existence, fate worse than death might be waiting for her. His action had already caused Sasuke to fall into Orochimaru's hand, and he wouldn't risk losing another to that person..

He needed to keep her away..

And thankfully, the girl had been obedient, to Itachi's relief. Honestly, even if he had to make use of her guilt to get her to obey, he wouldn't mind that, cruel as it was. He'd hurt her, but it would be better than the alternate outcome. Even so, picturing the pain that would be reflected in Mitsuki's eye if he were ever to guilt her into staying away from danger.. Somehow it made Itachi's heart uncomfortable. Nevertheless, he would need to deal with it when the time comes. And for now..

Itachi activated his sharingan, and blitzed away. Behind the red iris, the flame of determination burn bright.

"Stay safe, Sasuke.." Itachi muttered silently in his head, as he departed to find any possible clue, anything that would lead him to Orochimaru's whereabouts and the detail of his plan for his beloved little brother.

Kisame was already in the middle of his search. It started close by, inside a dark, tepid bar, located outside of the village, somewhere bordering the Land of Wind with another two territories, a perfect spot for those with no allegiance.

It was still day time, yet the underground bar was not lacking of customer. Among the shady sorts, information was being traded, along with poisons, substances, and rarities. Things both rare and illegal were never short in demand, especially in such a struggling border area. Among those, Kisame's identity were deemed both valuable, yet also protected. After all, everyone would be thirsting for the reward to turn him in, yet secrecy was also important in such place. With that in mind, Kisame approached the bar owner, whom he deemed to be the most trustworthy among the bunch. If there would be anyone who'd suffer most from losing credibility in the safe haven, it would be the bar owner himself. Not to mention, actually having connection to Akatsuki might prove to be profitable for such establishment. Hence, it would be a safe bet for him to start his enquiry.

"That robe.. you are from Akatsuki, aren't you?" the bar owner confirmed, as soon as Kisame took a seat nearby the bar's main counter. As if had been waiting for the chance, the bar owner offered with a smile. "How can I help you?"

Hearing the eagerness hidden behind the bar owner's greeting, Kisame grinned and started with his enquiry. "Hmmm, let's start with whatever you could get me about Orochimaru's involvement in Sunagakure.."

With Kisame already out of village undetected, and Itachi back in the shadow, destination unknown, Mitsuki was long done with her distraction task. Following that, Mitsuki was in hunt for any people in need, excluding those who need money, since as she was.. She was broke too..

So far, since his separation from the two, she had managed to.. help an elderly find her way back home, a cat out of a tree, and a kid who dropped his marbles find them back.. with little to no resulting "reward" or usable information in return.

Munching on a senbei she had received as thanks from the grandma, thinking of how she should report her progress later on that night make her writhe in shame. After all, what can she say? "Not her fault, everyone treats her like a scammer despite her sparkly appearance?" She could already imagine Kisame laughing at that excuse of hers.

"Wait.. are we even supposed to gather for dinner tonight?" she thought, only then noticing how she left in such a hurry she hadn't even confirmed with Itachi or Kisame about when they were supposed to update each other about their progress. Then again.. it made her remember..

She left in such a hurry, but she hadn't gathered anything of use yet so far.. and as it was, the sun was about to set..

Mitsuki felt like burying herself in a hole of shame.

"HOW IS IT THAT IT GETS EVEN HARDER IN MY DIVINE FORM!?"she yelled inside her mind as she clutched her head in frustration. At the current rate, Mitsuki felt like she would do better in her task dressing as a normal girl asking around than actually presenting herself as the holy maiden that she was. It was the opposite of how things were in her past. Back then, she could just walk elegantly and smiled, and everyone would treat her with respect and reverence. Now, only kids would actually pay attention to her.. while everyone else avoided her like a plague..

"Hrgh, I need to do something about this.. It couldn't be that there is not even a single person in need right? Amaterasu-samaaaa…."

"Pfft.."

Mitsuki's pitiful whine of frustration was heard. Not by the deity, but by a passing farmer who had the luck to witness Mitsuki's breakdown, to her shame.

"Girlie, if you want to help someone that badly, how about you help me push this cart?" offered the middle aged farmer. On his face was a sarcastic smirk, and laughter was clearly evident in his tone.

Mitsuki really felt like finding a hole for her to burrow in and hide… However, actually doing that would probably be even more embarrassing to do. So instead, with a complicated expression on her face, Mitsuki walked towards the cart, ready to give it a push like she was asked to. However, her action caught the farmer by surprise. Honestly, she didn't expect that the Miko would actually, really helped him out.

In a last minute attempt, the farmer remarked, just to be sure that they were on the same page about the "job" being thankless.

"Er, I have no money tho, girlie. Just to get it straight."

To his words, Mitsuki said nothing. Instead, still with a complicated expression on her face, Mitsuki signalled the farmer with her hand to go on and pull the cart as he did previously while she gave a push to the harvest filled cart from the back.

Itachi was undercover. Using Henge no Jutsu to slightly alter his appearance, he disguised himself as one of the travelling merchant he came across on his way. For that sake, he had stalked one of a visiting merchant that had similar build as him, and observed him for a good while before catching him off-guard on his break, trapping him within genjutsu. After taking his clothes, his cart, and memorizing the type of item he sold and the pricing, the swap was completed. Not forgetting about the merchant himself, Itachi went on and set up some simple camouflage around him, hiding the unconscious man from sight for the time being. Everything he did was thoroughly calculated. In order to conserve his energy and concentration needed to maintain the transformation, he had chosen the perfect target. Equipped with the "borrowed clothes" as well, he wouldn't need to recreate the looks based on his memory alone and maintain it. More than that, it also provided him with some kind of extra measure, since the clothes would also mask his actual scent.

Basing on how they interacted with "the merchant", Itachi carefully picked some of the customer to ask his question to. He had to be careful. After all, unlike Mitsuki, Itachi had never prided himself in conversation building or character mimicry. It would be far too risky to contact the people whom the merchant might actually know of. At the very least, with his observation skill, he was confident that he would be able to roughly gauge the level of coming customer's relationship with the merchant. And so, begin his hunt for information.

Kisame, on the other hand, had just finished his enquiry and information request through the establishment owner. By having the owner serving as a third party, Kisame had established a communication centre nearby with the owner serving as the informant's middleman. All for tiny price, so long as Kisame promised the owner that he would help relay some S-rank mission to the Akatsuki if there would ever be a need for their mercenary service. The underground, rogue shinobi world is riddled with a lot of dirty, dangerous work offers after all. That was why, comprised of the elites of elites, Akatsuki had surely gained a reputation for themselves as a group of mercenaries. Therefore, the ability to contact them would definitely come in handy for an establishment where such requests are being traded often. For that reason, Kisame was quite sure that the owner wouldn't turn against him and sell the information of his and his partner's where-about to the bounty hunter and such.

Leaving the establishment just before the sun started to set, grin decorated Kisame's face. Somehow, he felt like he had done a mighty good job on that day, even for his usual standard. Filled with pride, he couldn't wait to brag to his other teammates about it, and so, he started to hum lightly for a while as he journeyed back on his feet, before pausing and stopping for a while in confusion.

"Wait… Whose turn was today's dinner again?"

The farmer laughed as the Miko undignifiedly collapsed on his produce shop's front porch, exhausted.

"Well, thank you for your help, Missy. Honestly, I didn't expect that you'd actually went and help this old man," said the farmer. Even though he was quite apologetic about it, again, it was obvious that he was suppressing his laughter. Nevertheless, Mitsuki responded to the words of gratitude with a simple hand sign, saying that it was "no problem", even though she felt like her body was going to break from the exhaustion. Again, she was reminded that she definitely still needed to train her muscle endurance, as she had previously, begrudgingly, noticed. After all, during the transport, she had already tried her best to work smart, not work hard. Using combination of her skill and knowledge, she had tried to make the transport easier. Even so, she didn't expect that the path that they needed to take would be THAT hard to travel. She had really tried every trick in her book. Creating makeshift pulley using the bark of the trees around and the vines on her disposal, minor ground manipulation..

"Uncle..." called the girl suddenly, her voice still filled with exhaustion. "Do you really need to do this every day? How could you even…."

The farmer tried his best not to laugh as he heard the desperation and frustration within the Miko's question.

"Honestly no, today just happenned to be the day I had started on my harvest," he said, before adding ".. and so it will be for the next few days. It's winter soon after all."

Truthfully, he was actually toying with the girl a bit too, taking more break than he usually would, just to see if she would eventually get mad or give up on her "charity mission". However, there was no way he would tell her that honestly, wouldn't he? Especially, now that the girl had ended up sticking with him to the end. And so he just grinned at the girl who had now repositioned herself into a sitting position, as he started to feel bad about what he did.

"Sorry, Missy. I'm not sure how I can repay you somehow." After all, he was not lying when he said he didn't have any money. However, to his remark, Mitsuki shook her head.

"Nevermind, I told you I wasn't expecting payment after all. If anything, I could really do with some water about now."

Hearing the girl's answer, the farmer burst out laughing.

"SHUN!" The farmer called out loudly towards what seemed to be his house, surprising Mitsuki with the sheer loudness of his voice. "COME AND BRING ME TWO GLASS OF WATER"

Following his shout, a voice answered and two different set of footstep approached. One in a rush, one in steady slow pace..

"Daddy! You're back!"

The voice was of a 9 year old boy who then rushed unto the farmer's embrace. Honestly, Mitsuki was surprised. Judging from the farmer's look, she didn't expect the farmer to father such a young boy. He had to be 55 or older, at the very least..

"Welcome back, dear," greeted another voice, a lady about her 40s at the very least. Based on her footstep, Mitsuki recognised her to be the owner of the slow paced footsteps. While holding her knee, the lady then sat down on the porch carefully, as if her joint was hurting because of her movement. As Mitsuki's gaze met with her, the lady threw Mitsuki a questioning look.

"And.. this is?"

Hearing the confusion in the wife's voice, the farmer quickly explained.

"This Missy went and helped me with the harvest cart just now."

After her husband's brief explanation, the wife covered her mouth in worry that she had been rude for asking such things. Then, apologetically, she bowed towards Mitsuki and spoke.

"Thank you for helping my husband," she said in hurry as she tried to redeem the situation.

"It's fine, really," answered Mitsuki with a smile, her hand touched the wife's shoulder lightly and pushed it back up, as if telling her to lift her head. At the same time, the little boy turned his head to look at Mitsuki, and instantly recognised her.

"Ah! Lady Miko!"

Hearing the boy's call, Mitsuki took another look towards the little boy and searched her memory.

"Oh? You were in the park yesterday!" Mitsuki exclaimed in surprise, recognising the boy.

Then, another footstep approached and soon joined the party. This time, it was a young man, looking slightly past his teenage years, carrying two glasses of water.

"Is this the sister who was telling stories yesterday?" the wife asked the little boy in surprise, slight suspicion rose back in her eyes. Noticing the gaze, Mitsuki, who had just devoured the water passed to her in one go, tilted her head in confusion.

However, the farmer quickly tapped the wife's shoulder to catch her attention, and then shook his head with a smile.

"At the very least, she is not a bad person, I'm sure of that," said the farmer in an attempt to calm his wife down. The wife's expression was still doubtful, but seeing her husband's confidence, she decided to nod. Turning her head back towards the Miko, the wife then offered.

"It's late.. would you like to join us for dinner?" she offered, politely, thinking that it was the least she could do to express her gratitude. However, hearing the wife's statement, Mitsuki came to a realization and stood up.

"Ah! No! I should be leaving now, actually!" said the Miko while patting down her clothes to tidy it up slightly as soon as she was on her feet. After all, she should be getting back to the inn right about then. Nevertheless, she bowed her goodbye this time, making sure to show gratitude for the offer despite rejecting it.

"Thanks for the water and the offer anyway. I'll be off now!" she said hurriedly, before turning her head back one last time and asked.

"Are you transporting the harvest again about the same time tomorrow? Same route?"

Hearing the Miko's question, the farmer was surprised. Nevertheless, he felt like he had no reason to lie to her about it. After all, he had told her about the harvest season previously.

"Yep. Why?" said the farmer, enquiring. Hearing his response, Mitsuki smiled lightly and nodded.

"I'll help you again tomorrow. Hopefully I can figure out a better way!" said the Miko cheerfully, before bowing one last time and disappeared into the darkness.

Omake:

"Itachi-san, you're back already?"

The moment Kisame opened the door to his room, he was surprised to find that Itachi was already back and sitting on his own bed. In response to Kisame's remark, Itachi shifted his attention towards his partner and nodded lightly in response.

"Welcome back, Kisame," said Itachi, the words that he once evaded had already turned into a habit.

"Un, I'm back," said Kisame as he entered the room and closed the door behind him. Then, feeling that something was amiss, the two stared at each other, questioning.

"Wait.. Itachi-san? Today's not your turn to bring dinner?" Kisame asked in horror.

"No? Isn't it your turn?" Itachi remarked, slightly surprised that Kisame thought it was his turn. "Yesterday was Mitsuki's so..." said Itachi, even though actually it was him anyway, since Mitsuki hadn't recovered her funds yet.

"Darn it, I knew I forgot something!" said Kisame, his already pale face paled even more as he imagined the brat making fun of him for forgetting. Thankfully, the girl was nowhere to be seen, yet. If he rushed, he might still be able to make it, thought Kisame as he opened the room's door once more and dashed out through it.

Yet, not long after, Itachi heard Kisame's hurried footstep rushed back, followed by Kisame peeking back in towards the room, seemingly forgetting something.

"Itachi-san, I beg you please don't tell that kid that I've already went back. She'll never let me hear the end of it!"

Finished with his sentence, Kisame closed the door back and dashed away once more, leaving Itachi with a mix of confusion and hilarity.

Surprisingly, even by the time Kisame came back, the girl hadn't yet arrived. Still sweating from the rush he had been in, Kisame started to regret being in such a hurry.

Then, the door handle turned with a click, and the door swung open slowly, revealing Mitsuki's figure that was also in a mess.

"Sorry.. I'm late.." said the girl with frown of exhaustion embedded in her face.

"O..oh… welcome back.." Kisame responded awkwardly in a mix of relief and confusion. Meanwhile, Itachi observed quietly, sitting on the edge of his bed without a word. Following the greeting, Mitsuki took her seat on the room's chair and rested, all the while massaging her back with her own hand.

"Dinner?" Mitsuki enquired briefly, seemingly too exhausted to even talk, or brag. Trading glances with Itachi, Kisame then distributed the dinner that he had just procured not too long ago among themz. Without wasting any time, the three then started digging in silently as soon as the food was distributed. The dinner of that night was oddly quiet and awkward, until Mitsuki dared herself to talk and break the ice, despite her embarrassment.

"Before anyone ask, let me say. I haven't gotten anything useful today. I'm sorry."

Hearing Mitsuki's honest, frustrated confession, both Itachi and Kisame froze before trading glances once more.

"Ah, well…" Kisame responded, awkwardly, feeling slightly guilty for hiding his mistake, "It's ok, that happens.."

Kisame's respond was oddly serious and kinder than he usually would towards the girl. But even so, somehow Kisame could still feel Itachi staring at the back of his head. Even though Kisame knew that it was most likely for nothing, he couldn't help but feel judged for his own cover up attempt.

Nevertheless, there was no chance that he would admit his ruse here and there. Not until the hell freezes over.

Watching his two teammates from the edge of his bed, meal in his hand, a strained smiled flickered on Itachi's face, as he too recalled Mitsuki's ruse on the previous day. The event that he happened to witness that night too felt overtly familiar and he couldn't hold back his chuckle. After all, his two team mates had seemed to become more and more like siblings in some way, albeit ones in silly love hate relationship. Nevertheless, his chuckle didn't escape both Kisame's and Mitsuki's ear, confusing them. Noticing their eyes on him however, Itachi quickly rearranged his expression and faked ignorance as he continued to eat his meal, leaving the other two trading glances in confusion, both not daring to ask Itachi about the reason behind his chuckle in fear of getting ousted..

Author's note:

Happy CNY/Lunar New Year!

Shedding the bad energies and renewal, snake also associated with love in chinese folklore :3